“Before we proceed further, Kit, shall we discuss your abilities?” he asked with a sharp edge—one that warned me it was my turn to be forthcoming. “I’m afraid I can’t broker a deal until I know.”

So as to ensure I wasn’t psychically gifted at deception—which I was, though not in the way he was worried about.

“My abilities,” I hedged, delaying for every possible second as my gaze darted to the kitchen door.

Faustus waited several patient moments, his tolerance fading along with his pleasant expression.

I lifted my mug to my mouth and pretended to take a long sip. “They don’t have a name.”

And that’s all it took to revive The Smile. “Fascinating! If you are the first in a new order, why, that would be an exciting discovery.”

“Yeah.” I could feel my grasp on the invisi-bomb slipping as worry dug its persistent tendrils in my thoughts. “Exciting.”

“So? Describe your powers, Kit. I’m something of an expert in classifications.”

Across the dining room, the kitchen door swung open. The orangutan lumbered out—and Vera slipped through on his heels, her backpack bulging with items she hadn’t carried in with her.

Yes! Now all we had to do was make our escape.

I snapped my attention back to Faustus. “It’s difficult to describe.”

Vera wound between tables, her movement slow and cautious. She couldn’t see herself, making navigation difficult. I knew she couldn’t go any faster, but I needed her to hurry. My brain was getting foggy, like I’d just woken up from a deep sleep—a warning sign that I was maxing out my mental stamina.

“I could demonstrate,” I drawled slowly, suppressing a flinch when Vera’s backpack grazed a chair, “but that tends to freak people out.”

Faustus was nearly drooling on the tabletop. Geez. This was inching into verbal foreplay, and I wanted to hang up the figurative phone.

“You can go ahead and demonstrate,” he breathed. “I assure you my nerves are more than sufficient for any display of power.”

“Yours might be, but what about your collector’s editions over there?”

As Faustus glanced at the manly posse in the corner, Vera passed by, waving at me as she headed for the door. She couldn’t open it on her own. I needed to end my conversation with Faustus ASAP.

Before my foggy mind could come up with a conversation ender, he turned back to face me. A sharp-edged frown had replaced his smile, and his hand drifted to his chest. He pressed his palm against his sweater—where his mythic-detecting compass was hidden.

Oh. Oh shit.

Faustus’s birdlike eyes darted around the room, moving back and forth across Vera. She’d frozen a dozen paces from the door, and her expression blanked as a vision of the future hit her.

“How odd,” Faustus murmured, tugging on the chain around his neck. The diamond-encrusted artifact appeared from beneath his shirt. He studied it, probably wondering why he could detect a new presence. Maybe he was realizing that the reason he’d sensed my arrival so strongly wasn’t because I was a super-mythic, but because I hadn’t entered alone.

Vera’s eyelids fluttered and emotion returned to her face—a mouth-popping expression of horror. And I knew the future was about to get ugly.

Which gave me about two minutes to change it.

“A mythic presence,” Faustus mused. “Extremely close, but I don’t see another mythic.” His stare fixed on me. “I do not suppose you have any idea as to why that would be, do you, Kit?”

“No idea at all.”

Vera stared at me, half a dozen tables between us. Her face was ashen and I knew what she was about to do. After all, it’s what I’d do in her shoes.

She bolted for the door.

I gathered my fraying concentration, preparing to disguise the opening of the door—not because I wanted to save her while she ditched me, but because her being out of the way would increase my chances of escaping alive.

But when I tried to add a new projection on top of the invisibility halluci-bomb, my exhausted brain and waning power imploded inside my skull.

I sagged into my chair, the room spinning and the floor rocking like I was back on Vera’s boat.

The table jerked as Faustus shot to his feet. A shout rang out, followed by a raucous clatter of chairs and stomping feet, then a crash.

My vision steadied as Vera tripped over a chair that had flown into her path. As she hit the floor, she slid backward on her stomach, dragged by an invisible force.

The goon squad was on their feet, and a six-and-a-half-foot beast the approximate weight of a buffalo was making a Darth Vader claw as he telekinetically dragged Vera away from the door. Blythe was the scariest telekinetic I’d ever met, but at three times her mass, this guy could give her a run for her money.

A face appeared in my vision. Faustus leaned over me, his triangular smile back—but completely different from before. Menace oozed from his every geometrical line.

“Interesting, Kit. I see you brought a friend.” His gaze turned to Vera. “I’ll deal with her before we return to our discussion of your most fascinating powers.”

Chapter Nineteen

“Vera, darling,” Faustus crooned. “I should have expected you. Although maybe it is you who should have expected me.”

A little seer humor. Cute.

Vera stood as the goon gang circled her. I, unfortunately, wouldn’t be standing to join them. The room was spinning slowly, and it took effort to keep my eyes from rolling back in my head.

I might have pushed my abilities too far.

Faustus, realizing I wasn’t a threat right now, kept half an eye on my limply sprawled self as he regarded Vera and her full backpack. “Is it safe to assume you have stolen from me?”

“This shit’s mine,” she snapped.

“I am afraid we disagree on that.”

“You can’t be pissed that I took back what’s mine.”

His smile sharpened. “I can be, I am, and I’m sure you are aware of what happens to those unfortunate enough to land on my ugly side.”

From where I sat, every side was an ugly side with this dude.

“Chucky,” he said to the orangutan-like cook, “would you like to do the honors?”

The man stepped forward, looked her up and down, then gave his boss an inquisitive look. “Right now?”

“Afraid, Chucky? She’s just a seer. While it is a useful ability, she has no real power.”

At this particular moment, neither did I. I’d used up my psychic juice and I needed a couple minutes to recover enough to save my ass, especially if I had to target this entire collective of slime-ball mythics.

The orangutan turned his palms upward and fire ignited over his hands. Did Faustus have his enemies burned alive like Salem witches?

Vera’s eyes widened, her darting gaze searching for an escape—but there was none. The pyromage raised his arms, flames streaking toward the ceiling. Furnace-like heat washed over me even from my table in the corner.

I shoved upright in my seat. “What about a trade, Faustus? My information is worth more than our lives—and Vera’s goodies.”

Faustus gestured at Chucky to wait, then rotated to face me. “I rather doubt that.”