Jeffrey drew a sharp breath. “It’s back. His aura’s back,” he whispered.
“What color?” Grant said.
“Dark. Muddy.”
“Ronald Valenti,” Grant hissed at the body. “Who else is working with you? Where are they? What is your plan? Show me in the mirror.” The magician looked at the fogged mirror. I couldn’t tell what he saw in it, if anything.
The body blinked but otherwise didn’t move at all. If it had started speaking, I probably would have run. Grant must have seen something, because he studied the mirror, jaw set.
Then his gaze shifted back to the body. “Just one more thing. Why? Why do this?”
Again, I couldn’t see what the mirror showed, but Grant seemed to be fascinated by what he saw in it.
Grant didn’t ask anything else. When he was satisfied, he put his hand over the corpse’s face, closing the eyes. “Ronald Valenti, I’m finished with you. Rest now. Depart this place. Finish your journey onward. And may you rot in a fitting hell.”
A breath sighed through the room, as if a window had blown open, and the candle went out, all on its own. Tina gasped—she and Jeffrey were holding each other tightly now.
“It’s gone now,” Jeffrey said. “He’s dark again.”
Grant pulled a white handkerchief from his pocket, wiped away the symbols he’d drawn, and scrubbed the chalk circle until it was a blurred, formless mess. The mirror was bright and clear.
“I’m done with it,” he said, nodding at the body. “We should put it with the others.”
Or drop it in the lake. But that would feel like poisoning the lake.
“I think I need to take a shower,” Tina said.
Nobody moved except Grant, who was packing items back in his case. The magician finishing his work. And I didn’t know why anything Grant did surprised me anymore.
“That was sick,” Lee said, harsh, frowning.
Grant stood, glared. “What that man did to Ariel, Jerome, Dorian, and the production assistants was sick. He and the others did what they did for sport. I do it out of necessity. And I don’t do it lightly.”
Cormac would have understood. Cormac would have approved, so I couldn’t argue.
Grant paused in front of me. I’d been staring at the body, and I turned to him reluctantly. “You look like you want to say something.”
I shook my head. “I don’t have anything to say.”
His expression didn’t change. It hardly ever did. But he put his hand on my shoulder, a brief touch, a faint comfort.
Anastasia was the one to finally ask, “What did you learn?”
“They’re still filming us,” he said. “They’re planning on selling the footage as proof that monsters can be killed. That they ought to be killed.”
“A snuff film?” I said, astounded.
Grant nodded. “Provost and Cabe are his partners. They’re out there now. I saw two bases of operation, one near the lodge and one near the outgoing trail. They attacked Jerome and Kitty from that one. They have us trapped, and they have all the time in the world.”
“Then we go after them,” Lee said. “We know where they are now, we go get them, then get the hell out of here.”
“They have weapons,” Anastasia said. “They’re entrenched. We’re too vulnerable. That’s exactly how they planned it.”
“So we flush them out,” I said, because that was what Cormac would say and how he’d have handled this. He sure as hell wouldn’t sit here waiting for the bad guys to come to us. Get the upper hand. Startle them.
“How do we do that?” Lee said, anxious, frustrated. Sweat shone on his brow, and the ocean smell of him was stronger.
I picked up the walkie-talkie from the pile of Valenti’s leavings, switched it on, and pressed talk. Everyone in the room cringed or lurched, making various noises of protest—what the hell was I doing?