“I do not yet know,” he admitted. “But I intend to remedy that deficiency soon.” He rose, putting down the unsipped teacup on a side table. “Until next time, Scholar.”

  “I need more books,” she said. “And those star charts and oceanographic surveys I told you about. And where are those photographic plates of the sky, taken from the coordinates I supplied?”

  She was terribly demanding, for a prisoner. “I have agents en route to the godforsaken islands you indicated, Scholar, but it will take some time for them to arrive. It’s not as if their destinations are located on regular trade routes. I wish you’d tell me why you want all this information.”

  “There are indications of movements in the sea, and I wish to see if they are mirrored in the sky,” she said, rather cryptically, Sanford thought. “The stars are not yet right, but I feel there is a… culmination, growing nearer. When you bring me more information, I might be able to provide more coherent answers.”

  “This has been a pleasure, as always,” Sanford said. “Come, Altman. We have work to do.” He left the room, followed by his bodyguard, and the door’s many locks, seen and unseen, engaged themselves.

  A maker of relics! Could this Tillinghast be more formidable than Sanford had supposed? He needed to get in touch with Ruby and find out what, if anything, she’d discovered about the man’s business in Arkham. Perhaps he should reach out to that Dyer woman, too, and light a fire under her about arranging that appointment.

  When they returned to his study, Sanford stopped dead, staring. There was a damp box in the center of his desk, wrapped in waterlogged paper and bedraggled ribbon, standing in a puddle that smelled strongly of the river. “Altman. Is that the gift from Tillinghast I told you to dispose of?”

  “I tossed it into the river myself!” Altman said. “In a sack with rocks, like you said. How the devil did it get back here?”

  “It seems we have a serpent in our garden,” Sanford murmured. He’d once believed his Silver Twilight Lodge to be unassailable, home only to those who gave him their unwavering loyalty… or at least loyalty to his ability to help them achieve their petty dreams of power and success. In order to reach anything beyond the rank of Initiate, there were certain tests of devotion, after all. But a member named Diana Stanley, who’d attained the rank of Seeker, had disabused him of such rosy notions last year, when she turned against the Order and began working against his ends from within. Since discovering her treachery, he’d become vigilant toward signs of rot and ruin at home, but apparently not vigilant enough.

  Someone with access to the Lodge, and his office, was in league with Randall Tillinghast.

  “Take this box down to the basements,” Sanford said. “There’s an empty workroom just beyond the Threshold of Light, on the left.” Until last week, one of Sanford’s pet archaeologists had been teasing apart a mummy there, supposedly the remains of a high priest of the notorious pharaoh Nephren-Ka, in search of genuine magical tokens secreted in the wrappings, but he’d found only the usual gimcrackery: mundane amulets carved in the shape of scarabs and scepters and beetles and the like. But there were still magical protections active in that laboratory, and Sanford could use them. “I’ll be down shortly.”

  “Where are you going in the meantime?” Altman asked.

  A hot, short spurt of fury ripped through Sanford, but he didn’t allow it to show. Now, moments after discovering someone in the Lodge was working against him, Altman chose to ask questions? When immediate obedience was clearly the better choice? That was the problem with having close lieutenants; they began to think of themselves as more, even when Sanford didn’t want them to. “I will begin investigating this breach in security.”

  Altman nodded, thoughtful, and picked up the soggy box without apparent fear. Well, why not? Tillinghast had proven that he could attune his gifts to their recipients, enthralling the minds of only those he chose, not anyone who looked upon the things. Sanford had seen an enchanted snow globe and pulp magazine, and neither had ensnared his mind, but whatever was in that box… it well might. Altman was almost certainly safe from it, though, and he departed for the basements with the poisoned gift in hand while Sanford went storming through the Lodge.

  Initiates scattered at the very sight of him, finding other things to occupy themselves and other places to be occupied in. Sanford was not what anyone would call convivial with his underlings, maintaining an air of aloof gentility so they would never doubt that he was the master, but he seldom displayed anger. The rare occasions when he did let his temper slip had become the stuff of legends, and no one wished to be nearby should his fury make itself known. The fact that he stared balefully at everyone he saw, wondering Was it you? didn’t help to calm the nerves of his fearful adherents.

  Sanford found his target outside, on the grounds, beneath a twisted old hawthorn tree with burn marks on its trunk. The grounds of the Lodge were deliberately left untended to cultivate an air of neglect, in order to deceive onlookers about the power of those who dwelled within, and to discourage unwanted visitors.

  The day was drawing down to dusk, but the shadows were always thick, back here among the trees. Though the rear wall of the Lodge building was only a few score yards behind him, this part of the grounds felt like the forest primeval, a suitable habitat for wolves and bears and witches’ sabbats. Sanford wondered sometimes if there were fragments of wild magic back here, left over from long ago, connecting this forest to darker places, but he’d never had time to undertake the proper experiments.

  Sarah Van Shaw knelt in the leaf litter, seemingly unconcerned at soiling her long blue dress. She gazed into a hole at the base of the tree, her head cocked to one side, and hummed quietly to herself. There was no sign of the variable number of immense, slavering black mastiffs that usually accompanied her, but Sanford had no doubt they were nearby. No matter. The dogs couldn’t hurt him, because Van Shaw couldn’t hurt him, and the hounds were extensions of her will.

  “Warden,” he barked. “We need to talk.”

  “Just a moment, please, master.” She opened a dirt-colored sack beside her and began rummaging around inside.

  More impertinence! What was wrong with everyone today? Had he let standards slip so far? “You do not bid me to wait, warden. You serve me, do you not?”

  “I am the servant of the Silver Twilight Lodge, and you are its master, and so also mine.” She kept rummaging.

  Sanford found her reply pointlessly circuitous when a simple “Yes, master” would have done. “Then stand and face me!”

  She put down the bag and rose, standing before him with her hands crossed primly at her waist. Somehow her dress was unmarred by the damp soil. Van Shaw was a striking woman, tall and strong-featured, somewhere between not-quite-young and middle-aged, with long red hair she wore loose most of the time. Her current expression was a sort of ferocious blank, but that was usual for her. “How may I help you, master?”

  “As warden, it is your duty to prevent unauthorized entry to the Lodge, is it not?” Before she could answer, he went on, “Someone brought a package into the Lodge today, a package sent to me by an enemy, and placed it on the desk in my office.”

  Van Shaw nodded. “I see. You wish to know who brought this package in. I will investigate, but if the perpetrators wish to hide their involvement, it may be difficult to track them down. This has been a busy day at the Lodge, with preparations for the annual orphans and widows charity rummage sale underway – we’ve had twenty-two Initiates enter the gates today, plus six Seekers, a Brother of the Dark, two Knights of the Stars, and even the current Keeper of the Red Stone, back from Morocco for the day. We can question them all–”

  “And so we shall, but I want to know how someone brought a dangerous artifact into the Lodge at all without you knowing!” Sanford let himself shout. It felt good. Being in control was important, of course, but a show of pique might motivate her. A distant keening sound reached Sanford’s ears, and annoyed him, like the buzz of a fly, or the whine of a lumber saw.

  Van Shaw shook her head. The dark trees loomed around her, and she seemed perfectly at ease in this pocket wilderness. His shouting made no more impression on her than a raindrop upon a rock. “No one brought anything dangerous into the Lodge, master. Nothing occult, anyway. Such a breach is simply not possible. After the unpleasantness last year, with the Cult of Asterias, I made alterations to my security methods. My hounds have been granted certain… improvements. They now sniff everyone that passes through our gates, indeed, anything that draws near our gates, and if they detect any whiff of the arcane, they bar the affected individual from entering, and summon me. In turn, I would summon you. No one has brought anything but mundane objects through those gates today.”

  “We are dealing with a very powerful adversary, warden.” Sanford paced back and forth in front of her, kicking the moldering leaves aside with each step. That buzzing had gotten louder and had been joined by a chittering counterpoint. Why did the world conspire to vex him? “A man named Randall Tillinghast, new to town, and possessed of numerous relics of power. He has used his baubles to ensnare the minds of some of my allies and may very well be capable of shielding his poisonous gifts from your perception.”

  The warden frowned, which wasn’t much of a change from her default expression. “I see. I did not realize we had a new and active foe.” Her voice held not even a whisper of reproach, which made the implied criticism sting Sanford even more. He should have told his warden that he was tangling with Tillinghast; he’d just been so damned busy lately, chasing ghosts. “I can institute more thorough security checks of incoming members–”

  “Shutting the barn door after the horse has already fled!” Sanford said. “Or more like locking up the chicken coop after the fox has already eaten his fill.”

  “I only await your instructions, master. Bid me to serve, and I shall obey.” She’d gone completely stony and blank, so much so that her previous expressions seemed animated in comparison.

  He took a deep breath. Antagonizing Van Shaw was pointless. And the fault was, he had to admit, not entirely hers. “Warden, I apologize for speaking intemperately. I know we share a desire to protect the Lodge from – blast it, what is that noise?”

  “The things in the tunnels beneath the hill have discovered the bait I set below the tree.” Van Shaw gestured at the twisted trunk behind her. “We’ve had a few incursions of late, and I finally traced them to this place – an old animal den beneath the tree collapsed into the tunnels below, allowing the dwellers in the hill entry to the upper world. I thought it best to kill the beasts before I sealed up the opening, lest they seek another avenue and return. They will likely emerge from the ground in search of more meat shortly. They become frenzied when they feed.” She glanced over her shoulder. “I was just about to pour the poison into the breach when you arrived and commanded my attention.” Still not even a whiff of reproach in her voice.

  Sanford winced. “Go ahead, woman, get about your business!”

  She shook her head. “I fear it’s too late for the poison, master, but my dogs will deal with whatever emerges. A messier outcome, to be sure, but no less definitive.” Half a dozen huge black dogs – or things that looked like dogs – came out of the trees, slinking low to the ground, their hackles raised. They arrayed themselves around the warden, three on each side, and stared at Sanford with their red-rimmed eyes.

  Sanford didn’t let his instinct to take a step back spur him to action. He couldn’t control the dogs directly, but he could control the warden, and that was enough. She was an arcane thing in her own right, with a deep connection to the Lodge that brought along with it certain powers… and certain restrictions. The most potent of those was her inability to leave the grounds of the Lodge house for more than a few hours at a time without growing sick; too long away, and she would die. Van Shaw almost never left the grounds at all, unless he called upon her to do so, and if her leash chafed at her, she never let it show. As long as Sanford was the head of the Lodge, the warden’s loyalty to him was absolute. As a result, he did call on her to assist him off the grounds, sometimes, for short periods. It was so rare to find someone you could completely trust, after all.

  Sanford nodded and attempted a conciliatory tone. “I killed some of the dwellers under the hill last year and have no desire to splash their ichor on my clothes this evening. I’ll leave you to your work. Do let me know when you find out who brought that package into the Lodge. I’ll want to question them.” He turned away, though a deep, atavistic part of him protested mightily at presenting his back to the predators arrayed behind him. Sanford was the master of himself as well as the Lodge, however, and he departed with a straight back and a steady tread.

  The chittering and keening got louder, and ferocious growls and snapping sounds and squeals erupted behind him, but Sanford did not look back to see the carnage. Such petty problems are beneath my station, he thought. Others could deal with the rot beneath this house, the pests beneath this earth. His real problem, Sanford increasingly believed, was Randall Tillinghast.

  It was time to see what kind of gift the stranger had sent him.

  Chapter Eight

  The Honest Thief

  “The problem with betraying your employer is, once word gets around, it’s hard to find future employment.” Ruby abandoned her stool and leaned against a sturdy table of heavy dark wood, the legs carved with things that looked like gryphons, but with the heads of snakes instead of eagles. She wanted a little more distance from the shopkeeper.

  Tillinghast nodded, green eyes twinkling. “And so we arrive at the paradox of the honest thief, yes? The criminal with a code? You will do whatever you promise to do, so long as you’re paid appropriately?”

  Ruby shrugged. She picked up a dark purple crystal from the array on the table and pretended to look at it. Tillinghast’s gaze was even more disconcerting than she remembered – his gaze said he knew something about you that even you didn’t, and that whatever it was profoundly amused him. “Playing fair with the people who pay me leads to a less paranoid existence. Someone lured me to Arkham under false pretenses last year, and I was lucky to survive the whole business. Deception is exhausting, so I prefer to be honest in my dealings, insofar as honesty is possible in this business.”

  “Most commendable!” Tillinghast said. “I would certainly prefer that you never betrayed me, after all.” Tillinghast moved the stool she’d departed a little closer to her and sat down. He was still a few feet away, but the proximity was entirely too intimate for her taste. “But imagine, Ruby, being so rich that you didn’t ever have to work for anyone else again. Wouldn’t that be worth a little bit of treachery? It would also solve the whole ‘future employment’ problem.”

  Were Tillinghast’s pockets that deep? She supposed they might be. “I would entertain that sort of offer.” Sanford had asked her to work for Tillinghast again, in order to get information, after all. In this case, contemplating betrayal was no betrayal at all. She just had to keep her loyalties straight in her head. Not that she was loyal to Sanford, exactly, but he was the one paying her first, which bought him some kind of consideration, didn’t it?

  “I am likely to need your services in several capacities, in the months to come.” Tillinghast twisted a ring on his finger, idly, the great green stone winking. “I am working toward certain long-term goals, and someone with your knowledge, skill, and experience could be invaluable to me. I wish, therefore, to put you on retainer, as it were. If I call upon you for a service, you will fulfill that service immediately, placing my needs before all other considerations. In exchange, you will be compensated handsomely.”

  “What kind of services?” Ruby said. “I like to know what I’m getting into, and there are some jobs I just won’t do.”

  Tillinghast waved a hand airily. “Oh, fear not, I will only call upon you for purposes of acquisition – that is, to acquire certain items for me, or else to acquire useful information.”

  “So, thieving and spying.” She sighed. “Those are both things I have been known to do for money.”

  “And you do them so well. Money, I have in abundance.” He rose from the stool and came a step closer toward her. “For you, money means freedom, doesn’t it? To be your own woman? To pursue your own interests? With a proper foundation of funds, you could stop working for other people, and work only for yourself, isn’t that right?”

  “That’s the dream.” Ruby had spent too much of her career stealing things for other people, working as a mercenary of the illicit, and even when she’d researched and organized her own scores, there’d always been some local crime lord who needed tribute, or some specialist who’d taken an outsized cut because Ruby needed their assistance with an element of her plan. If she had enough money, she could hire her own specialists instead of cutting people in on the profits, and maybe even get people paying tribute to her eventually. She was still pretty young. She had a plan, and she was making progress. But a nice fat payoff from Tillinghast could accelerate her timeline significantly. Especially if she could wrangle a bonus from Sanford at the same time…

  “Would the promise of such a sum serve to overcome your hesitations?” Tillinghast said. “Or are you loyal to Carl Sanford for more than merely philosophical reasons? A personal relationship is always more durable than a professional one, I know.”

  Ruby snorted. “Sanford tried to have me kidnapped last year. I ripped him off a while back, and he held that against me. Before he could lock me up and torture me, we ended up on the same side of some unrelated trouble, and joined forces against a common enemy. I kept him from dying, and Sanford agreed to wipe the slate clean afterward, as payment for services rendered. We’ve done some business together since then, but I’m not loyal to him. I don’t even like him.” All that was true. Whenever possible, Ruby tried to tell the truth; that way, you didn’t risk any little tells, the kind of tics and gestures and fleeting expressions a shark like Tillinghast might look for. She just omitted certain things, selectively, to convey the impression she wished to create.