Clara and Seb were setting up scrying, based off of a photo of Monica I found on the internet and printed off. It was painful to look at – it was a photo of how she had been before she got sick.

I got out of their way, curling in a corner and munching on one of the last slices of pizza. Again, I was hating having to let somebody else do it, but what could I do?

Beat them up when we found them. The mundane professionals would use guns, so I’d have to make sure I had mine. They wouldn’t know how to handle magic, though.

Unless they’d been briefed, but then they’d have to have been carefully chosen or, as usual, they would ignore it.

No. I decided to assume they had been briefed. I hoped they hadn’t for our sake; although I’d almost feel sorry for them.
Almost. They’d probably take money as readily to kill somebody as simply to snatch them, so they didn’t really deserve my pity or any thought that remotely resembled pity. But at the same time, this wasn’t their world.

I thought of the cultists, who had left me alone, and wondered which was truly their world. Most of them were essentially mundanes, after all.

But professionals, Mike had said. People who did this kind of thing for a living. I shuddered a little bit. Okay.

How did I deal with them? Not by killing them if I could avoid it, but I might have to. If they were trying to kill me, then I figured it was reasonably justified.

Did I try and talk to mafia types? No. The cops had people much better suited to that.

That was when I had an idea. A particularly evil idea and one that would have been well worthy of my father. In fact, it was pretty much exactly what Loki would do.

It didn’t preclude the need to find her, but if we did before the cops did? Oh, I would play a very nasty little game with them until I had all the information I needed.

Setting that to one side, I closed my eyes. If I got into a shootout, I could handle it. Kanesha wasn’t great with guns, though. Seb was better. Mike was good. Thruor hated guns…

But Thruor could also look after herself in pretty much any situation, so there was no sense either trying to leave her behind or trying to tell her what to do. Could I leave Kanesha behind?

It had to be up to her, I decided, but I had to make sure…

…duh. Mike could do it. “I need to call Mike,” I called to the others, then moved further away so I wouldn’t disturb them.

“Mike, I was wondering if you could get some equipment for if we go after the kidnappers?”

“What do you need?”

I told him.