SANDMAN SLIM

I don't understand anything, either. My brain is bouncing back and forth between asking why Mason wants to open up Hell and wondering if that's what's really going on at all. It seems like opening Hell, or pretending to open it, might be a nice distraction. While everyone's looking one way, he does a slip and slide around back and pulls something else. But what?

Mostly, I'm trying not to think at all. I'm never going to get inside Mason's head. I might have been born a better magician, but he's always been smarter. That's why he's going to end up running the carnival and I'm going to end up biting the heads off chickens. But that's thinking, too. I want silence. Big, blank, Zen silence. I need to get back to that calm quiet moment I'd have before I went into the arena. No thought. No action. Thought and action as one. I control my breathing and focus on the road ahead. I can feel the calm coming on.

That's when the siren starts and the light bar pops behind me. Colored lights reflect off the rearview mirror and right into my eyes. A cop's garbled, amplified voice echoes off the glass buildings. I can't understand a word, but I know how to translate this cop haiku: You're driving around in the same stolen Jag you should have ditched an hour ago. It's not like there aren't other cars in L.A. to steal. But you started thinking and you got distracted and now look what's happened.

This is really the last thing I need right now. I wonder if they'll let me off with a warning if I tell them I'm going to be trying to save the world later tonight?

The cop voice booms again. They hit me from behind with their searchlight. About a billion candlepower. I stop the car and put it in park.

Thanks for the shadow, Dick Tracy. It's a tight fit, but I can just slip through. I drag the body armor in behind me. I hope that one of the cops sneaks up on the driver's side window in time to see my feet disappear into the dashboard.

I step out into the lobby of the Bradbury Building. The place is dark. Shut down tight. I get into the elevator hoping they haven't cut the power over the holiday. I hit the button. The car shivers and rises, and I can breathe again.

It goes up a floor and stops. I press the one and three buttons at the same time and the car starts moving. I get out when it stops, not sure I did it right. Then the Fury in Muninn's window lunges at me from inside its glass cage. I blow her a kiss, go inside, bump my way through the clutter, and head straight down the stairs in back.

Muninn is waiting for me at the bottom.

"My boy! I heard the bell and wondered who'd be coming here tonight. This is usually a quiet evening for me."

"Sorry if I'm keeping you from a party or something."

Muninn laughs.

"My boy, when you've seen as many new years as I have, the last thing you want to do is throw a party for the damned thing."

He takes me by the arm and leads me to a table covered with neatly laid out groups of bones. Fingers. Toes. A whole hand or foot.

"Relics," he says. "Each bone and appendage belonged to one saint or another. I have a client who wants to build a summer home in the form of a sort of ossuary. But only with the bones of saints. No commoners allowed. As you might imagine, that takes quite a lot of bones. I'm just cataloging this batch tonight."

He goes to a shelf and takes down the same dusty bottle we drank from after Vidocq and I got back from Avila. He gets two small glasses and pours us each a drink.

"Thanks," I say, and shotgun it. "I'm in kind of a rush tonight."

"Of course. Sorry," he says. "Just because I ignore the new year doesn't mean you do. My apologies."

"No problem." I clear my throat. "Mr. Muninn. I want to make a deal with you. A big one."

"I'm always open to a good trade. What would you like?"

"It's not what I want. It's what you want. You're going to want this." I reach under my shirt and take off the coin. I set it on the table and push it toward him. Muninn looks at it without touching it.

"Is that a Veritas?"

"Straight from a Hellion general's pocket."

"You've had it all this time?"

"I brought it back with me."

"My boy, I could have made you a very rich man by now, if I'd known that. Does it work?"

"Like a charm. Take it for a test drive."

"You're the experienced one. What's the proper way?"

"There's no trick to it. Just hold it and ask your question. Say it in your head, not out loud. Saying it out loud won't ruin the magic. Just makes you sound like a mental patient."

Muninn picks up the Veritas slowly, like it might shock him. He makes a fist and closes his eyes. A moment later, he opens his hand and laughs at what he sees.

"Well?"