I closed the Zippo and stared down at Jimmy like I’d stared down at Henry an hour ago. Important people in my life whom I’d never again get to talk to, sing with, or just hang around during after hours at the Horse. The silence of suffering closedme in, and it felt as if the pressure in my head might crack my skull. I snapped my hairbands really damn hard. Not much help.
“Henry’s dead, too. I just ID’d his body at the morgue.” I paused. “But at least his killer’s dead, as well.”
Neither revelation seemed like news to Lakshmi. “I am sorry about Mr. Wilkinson. He was a decent man.” She took a breath. “He died in a safe at the bottom of the Thames. Whoever put him there knew that, even if he returned from the Meadows, he’d immediately drown. And no matter how many times he drowned and came back, eventually . . . he wouldn’t. Because, eventually, he’d stop trying, or the winds would carry him to the fire.”
“Are you looking for whoever’s behind it all?”
“As time permits,” she said. “The raptorials have scarce resources to devote across all thanaturgic crime as it is, to say nothing of the dramatic increase in incidents these past few years.”
“What if I told you that I think I know who ordered the hit on me and Henry?”
“I’d ask if you have evidence.”
“A Shiguan recovery team may have just destroyed it.”
Lakshmi stood and put her phone away. “Regardless, whoever killed you and Mr. Wilkinson will never see to the dismissal of this wraith, even though its summoning is ultimately their fault.”
“Because it would out them as our killer, wouldn’t it?”
She nodded. “So, my time is best spent hunting this thing myself, since until it’s caught more innocents will die.”
“That’s fair.” I knelt there for another minute, trying, to no avail, to rub the pain from my temples. People were dead and gone because of me. I finally stood. “I’ll help you.”
“You understand that if you do, the same logic applies. The Convocation could view your effort to hunt down the wraith asan attempt to mop up after a crime.” Her eyes narrowed. “True or not, it won’t look good for you.”
I’d already crossed more thresholds than I could count. I damn sure wasn’t hesitating on this one. “I said I’ll help.”
Lakshmi almost smiled. “Couldn’t hurt.”
I looked down at Jimmy again. “Would the wraith that did this be considered mature?”
She eyed me. “Why do you ask?”
I shared what I knew about the Iron Horse ward and my hope to renew it.
“Putting aside the number of difficulties in dealing with a wraith,” she said, “it’s hard to tell how mature it is from a compromised ghost shadow. You might be able to see it with thanaturgic light, which I don’t wield, and you don’t yet possess.”
She meant light produced by burning ghost stone in a thanatist lantern, like Brach had shown me when we met. “But it’s possible?”
“Perhaps,” she said.
“Maybe we canusethis wraith then, to renew the ward.”
“Maybe.” She told me she’d send a team to take care of Jimmy’s body and would look in on me herself at the Iron Horse later. Then she left me in the silent company of my dead friend. The old anxiety and pain crept back in so hard my ears started to ring.
Jimmy’s guitar—his beautiful Martin—lay on the floor beyond him, next to my mini oven. I walked over to it, opened the case, and found Jimmy’s ax unbroken—same as mine. I took it out, shuffled back over to his side, brushed a D minor chord, and let it ring out.
Then, I tore into his third verse as clean as I could. The derby race. Somewhere I really hoped Jimmy could hear it.
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
The maturation of a wraith results from its consumption of other wraiths and semblances, usually to satisfy its one particularly maddening need.
—Anonymous Cython author,The Maturation of Wraiths
Cassiusand I steered wide of two Shiguan thanatists and a half dozen of their vestiges prowling the Iron Horse barrier, which we passed through just as we turned onto Manette Street. It had receded more than a hundred feet on this end since the night I was attacked. Time was running out fast.
At the Iron Horse door, I looked back at the Shiguan. “Hey, Cassius, would you mind standing guard here? Just in case.”
