Ritual Magic

death wounds if possible, but they, too, might have to kill.
    And all of that assumed that the cheap acrylic caps they wore worked as they were supposed to. So far they had. If that changed, they would all die tonight.
    Not yet,
he begged the Lady, for whatever luck her grace might bring.
Don’t let me die yet.
If he could live long enough to give Lily and Cullen a chance . . . and with them, his son, his father, his clan. And everyone and everything else.
    There was only one way to reach the node behind Isen’s house . . . from the outside. But there was another way, of course. Through the house. Which could be reached through the tunnel that opened up in Isen’s study.
    * * *
    L ILY sat on the cool dirt floor of the tunnel and checked her watch. Seven more minutes. She swallowed and told her heartbeat to settle down. It didn’t listen.
    It was dim here, but not dark. A mage light bobbed up near the low ceiling. Cullen’s doing. He was pacing, moving cat-quiet but too restless to stop.
    Cullen had many talents. Waiting wasn’t one of them. Lily, on the other hand, was normally pretty good at it. Cops got plenty of practice in the fine art of waiting.
    Nothing was normal tonight.
You’ve done this sort of thing before,
she told her jittery heartbeat and checked her watch again. Her hand shook, a fine tremor that seemed to begin in her belly. Dammit, dammit, dammit . . . She’d gone into bad situations before, yeah. High-stakes situations, when she had no idea if her plan had any chance of working But she’d never imagined going into a fight not knowing if her plans were even
hers
. If her thoughts were her own.
    She was immune to compulsion, but like Friar kept pointing out—damn him—not to persuasion or corruption. How could she trust the decisions she made tonight?
    Lily sucked in a shaky breath and rubbed the
toltoi
with her thumb. Was it warmer than usual? She wanted that to be true, wanted to think it was protecting her. She wished like hell Drummond would show up and tell her if someone or something was influencing her. She thought his name as hard as she could.
    Nothing.
    Getting here had been simple enough. Nerve-wracking, but simple. This tunnel was larger and more elaborate than the one they were putting in at their place. It had three arms leading to three access points: one at a stand of trees only thirty yards from Isen’s house; one under the water tower; and one at the general store.
    Lily and Cullen had driven up to the general store and walked in. Simple.
    They hadn’t used the Mercedes. The clan kept an old truck near the gate. Supposedly it was there for the guards, but people borrowed it all the time. The old truck was such a familiar sight that Rule thought no one would pay any attention to it, but if someone had—if they’d been stopped—Lily would have pretended to be Cullen’s prisoner. Cullen would have pretended to be among the compelled, delivering Lily to Miriam.
    It was Rule who’d seen that the problem with trying to figure out who was under compulsion went both ways. No doubt Miriam knew who she controlled, but those she’d compelled into obedience couldn’t know who was like them or what she’d told others. At worst, Cullen figured they’d confuse anyone who tried to detain them long enough for him to use a sleep charm.
    As it turned out, they hadn’t needed to do anything but drive up and go inside. No one stopped them; as far as they could tell, no one saw them. The store was closed at this hour, but it was never locked. People went there after hours all the time and left a note about what they’d bought along with cash or an IOU. The entrance to the tunnel was in the floor of the storeroom in back. The storeroom was locked, but locks didn’t slow Cullen down. The trapdoor there was warded, but Cullen had created the ward, so he could take it down pretty quickly. That was one reason he was with her.
    The other reason, of course, was his shields. The shields he’d mysteriously acquired almost two years ago had withstood the illusions of an immortal Chimea and the power of another ancient artifact, one created by the Great Bitch herself. They’d probably hold against anything the knife could do, as long as he didn’t actually touch it.
    Rule’s approach was much harder, coming at the house from over the ridge. She and Cullen couldn’t know exactly when he’d be in place, but they’d set a time for when he should be ready. They’d have to