“A bit?”

“—a bit difficult to tell.” I undid his belt, then his slacks, and slid my hand inside. “Umm, let’s see. Yes, I’d say that’s interested enough.”

I lowered myself to my knees and set about distracting him.

Afterward, we talked quietly, delaying our exit from the room. At 7:45, I pulled away.

“Fifteen minutes,” I said. “We should get inside.”

“In a moment.” He kissed me. “I love you.”

“Of course you do. You have to. It’s the law.”

A smile. “Law?”

“Any girl who gives a guy a blow job in a broom closet is entitled to at least one ‘I love you.’ Whether you mean it or not, you’re morally and legally obligated to say it.”

He laughed, then kissed the top of my head. “Well, I do mean it. You know that.”

“I do. And I also know that if we don’t get into that courtroom before the session starts, they’ll have an excuse to not let us in at all.”

Signed, Sealed, Delivered

AS LUCAS PUSHED OPEN THE DOOR INTO THE WAITING area, a wave of appropriately somber conversation rolled out. Then it stopped and every head turned to watch us enter. There were at least a dozen men, ranging in age from mid-teens to postretirement, all in suits that would have paid our rent for three months, and all of them sorcerers. It reminded me of the day I’d joined the previously all-male computer club in high school. One step through that door and the icy stares nearly froze me in my tracks.

Lucas, now feeling more himself, simply gazed about the room, nodded once or twice, then put his hand against the small of my back and propelled me through the crowd.

A straight-backed, silver-haired man in his seventies stepped into our path. My gaze snagged on the black band around his suit jacket arm.

“What do you think you’re doing?” he hissed. “How dare you bring her here?”

“Paige, this is Thomas Nast, CEO of the Nast Cabal. Thomas, this is Paige Winterbourne.”

Thomas Nast. My eyes returned to the black band on his arm. For his son, Kristof. This was Savannah’s grandfather.

“I know perfectly well who she is, you—” He bit the word off with an audible click of his teeth. “This is a slap in the face to my family and I won’t stand for it.”

Lucas met the old man’s glare with a level gaze. “If you are referring to the events leading to your son’s demise, may I point out that your family was the instigator in the matter. By pursuing custody in such an unconventional manner, Kristof contravened intra-Cabal policy.”

“My son is dead. Don’t you dare imply—”

“I’m not implying anything. I’m stating fact. The escalation of events leading to Kristof’s death was entirely of his own devising. As for his death itself, Paige played no role in it. If there had been any evidence to the contrary, you would have brought it forward at the inquiry this summer. Now, if you’ll excuse us…”

“She is not going to sit in our courtroom—”

“If it weren’t for her, none of us would be sitting in that courtroom. Good day,sir.”

Lucas led me around Nast and through the next set of doors.

The courtroom seated maybe fifty people, tops, and was half-full when we entered. As Lucas looked around for good seats, a door at the front of the room opened and Benicio walked through. His timing was too perfect to be coincidental. He’d been waiting for us. Why, then, wouldn’t he meet us in the other room and escort us past the Cabal gauntlet? Because he knew better. Lucas would not have appreciated his father protecting him from Thomas Nast and the others, for the same reason that Lucas refused to slip in the back door. Luca his path, quite literally, and accepted the consequences of it.

Benicio caught Lucas’s eye and waved him to an empty row right behind the prosecution bench. When Lucas nodded, a glimmer of surprise crossed Benicio’s face. He hovered at the end of the aisle, as if not quite sure Lucas really intended to join him. We walked to the front and I slid in first, letting Lucas follow so he could sit beside his father.

“Good to see you, Paige,” Benicio said, leaning over Lucas as we sat. “I’m glad you could join us. You seem to be making a speedy recovery.”

“Not as speedy as she’d like,” Lucas said. “But she’s doing well.”

“It may be a long day,” Benicio said, and I steeled myself for a considerate “suggestion” that I forgo the trial. “If you need anything—a cushion, a cold drink—just let me know.”

As I nodded my thanks, the front doors opened again and Griffin walked in, accompanied by Troy and a man I didn’t recognize but could guess, by his size, was a fellow guard. Troy led Griffin to our row, where Benicio stood and ushered him in to sit with us. Troy and the other guard took seats on opposite ends of our row.

While Lucas and I talked to Griffin, both front doors opened almost simultaneously. Through one, Weber stumbled in, blinking at the sight of the crowded courtroom. He was dressed in a regular shirt and trousers. Although he wasn’t handcuffed or chained, there was a gag across his mouth. That might seem cruel, but a druid’s power is the ability to call upon his deities, so the gag was an understandable precaution.

As the guards led Weber to his seat, three sixtyish men walked through the other front door. The judges. Last night Lucas had explained the basics of the Cabal justice system. Cases are presented not to a single judge or a jury, but to a panel of three judges, and the majority vote carries. The judges work a five-year term and the same three are used by all four Cabals, in a circuit-court arrangement. The men—always sorcerers, therefore always male—are selected by an intra-Cabal committee. They are lawyers nearing the end of their careers, and are paid very handsomely for their term, meaning they can retire at the end of it, so they are not beholden to the Cabals for later employment. Fifty percent of their payment is withheld until after the term is completed, and any judge found guilty of accepting bribes or otherwise compromising his position forfeits that portion. All this is intended to make the judges as impartial as possible. Is it perfect? Of course not. But to give the Cabals their due, they’d taken reasonable steps to ensure a fair justice system.