"Given that c.r.a.pload isn't an exact number, yeah."

"So why is the thing in the bas.e.m.e.nt sending the gardener to mess with us? He's in friggin' pieces."

"Well, it's obvious." Mason looked superior as attention turned to him. "He's a servant."

Tony shook his head. "Lucy Lewis is a servant."

"Yes, but she's all tied up."

"The guy she pushed down the stairs . . ."

"Maybe the pieces take less energy to control than the whole body," Amy suggested, her eyes gleaming in the lantern light. "If the thing in the bas.e.m.e.nt is feeding off the energy of the dead, it's going to want to give as little back as possible." "I was just about to say that." Mason's lip curled. He was still wearing Raymond Dark's teeth and Tony felt a rush of longing at the sight. If only Henry were here. Inside. Independence be d.a.m.ned, he'd give up control to Henry in a minute.

The heels of Mason's shoes thudded against the floor as he lifted his legs and let them drop. "Why am I tied up again?"

"You're not," Peter sighed. "You're taped."

"And I find I'm getting just a little annoyed about it." He sounded annoyed. He sounded, for the first time in a while, like Mason Reed.

Her hands shoved deep into the pockets of his tuxedo jacket, Ashley padded across the room and crouched beside him, peering into his face.

"Your father is going to hear about this," he muttered, struggling with the tape around his wrists.

Ashley's smile lit up the room. "He's back!"

"You're sure?"

"She knows," Brianna sighed before her sister could answer. "She's in love. Makes me want to . . ."

Probably puke, Tony thought as Charles started yelling at the top of the stairs. Hurl, upchuck, and ralph also contenders. He slid down the cupboards and sat cross-legged on the floor trying to work some feeling that wasn't pain into his left arm. He had to believe Lee wasn't in any immediate danger. He had to believe it because Amy was right-in a way. It wasn't that he couldn't use his arm; it was more that until it stopped hurting quite so d.a.m.ned much, he couldn't think of anything else. No way could he maintain enough concentration to pull Lee into his hand.

Inadvertent imagery very nearly made him forget the agony in his arm.

The lights dimmed and the present crowded back into the butler's pantry, just in time for him to see Mason get to his feet.

"There's tape debris on my cuff links."

"I'll help." Ashley began picking happily at one sleeve, Mason watching her with an it's the least I'm ent.i.tled to expression.

A little more disconcerting, considering, was seeing Mouse on his feet, staring through a . . .

"What the h.e.l.l is Mouse looking through?"

"It's the viewfinder off his camera," Amy told him dropping down on the floor beside him. "Zev detached it when we were upstairs taking Bri to the can. Isn't it brilliant?"

"Isn't what brilliant?"

"Zev's idea. You know how cameramen are always walking into war zones with this weird idea that nothing they see through the camera can hurt them?"

"Yeah, and then they get shot."

"Sometimes, but that's not the point. The point is, Mouse is a cameraman and now he has a camera to look through, he's completely stabilized."

"He has a viewfinder."

Amy shrugged. "Seems to be enough."

Since Mouse was coming his way, Tony sure as h.e.l.l hoped so. Large, bare, hairy knees poked out to either side of him as Mouse squatted.

"We have to talk."

"Now?"

"No. When we get out."

"About."

The big man chewed on a scarred lip. "Shadows," he said at last.

"Yeah. Sure." He watched Mouse rise and move away. And if I'm really lucky, I'll have to sacrifice myself to free everyone else.

"I'm not sure it's just the viewfinder," Amy murmured. "I think the thing in the bas.e.m.e.nt is pulling back, depossessing. I mean, Mouse seems fine and Mason's his usual arrogant nondancing self."

"What about Kate?"

Kate was still taped and gagged.

"Well, we tried releasing Kate, but since there seemed to be a good chance she'd try to kill someone, we gave it up as a bad idea."

"Funny that the thing in the bas.e.m.e.nt's still holding on to her."

"Yeah . . ." Amy picked at a bit of chipped nail polish. "I'm not so sure we can blame the thing. She's always been a bit . . . p.r.i.c.kly."

"p.r.i.c.kly is hardly homicidal."

"Yeah, true, but now she's motivated."

"Tony . . ."

He pushed himself up onto his feet as Peter approached. Had a feeling he needed to be standing.

". . . we talked it over while you were ghost walking and decided that if you want to go charging down to rescue Lee, we'll charge after you." Peter's gaze flickered over to Tony's arm and away. Okay. Hadn't expected that. Apparently, all he needed to have done to be taken seriously from the beginning was cripple himself. A near concussion and a couple of magical brands were apparently no more than par for the course.

"You look all sappy," Amy sn.i.g.g.e.red in his ear as Peter continued.

"Not all of us, of course. Tina will stay here to look after the girls . . ."

"And I'll be . . ." Mason trailed off, cleared his throat, and started again. Shoulders squared. Declarative. "I'll be helping her."

"With these girls, she'll need the help."

The almost grat.i.tude in Mason's eyes was almost enough to make up for the kick Brianna landed on his shins.

Almost.

"And if you phase off again . . ." Peter shrugged. "Well, we can still hear you, so just keep talking."

"I don't think that'll be a problem. The conservatory's up next and we have the gardener's head in a backpack. Part of the program's missing. It can't reboot."

"Computer metaphor?" Zev asked him, grinning.

Tony grinned back. "Best I could do on short notice." f.u.c.k, maybe it was all about Mason because with him up and about, the mood certainly had changed. They were all working together again. The "us" defined against Mason's "them".

If the bas.e.m.e.nt had taken Mason instead of Lee, they'd be out of here by now. He managed to move his lower arm about two inches from his upper. His fingernails still looked kind of opalescent, but he could feel his fingers. He kind of wished he couldn't, but the pain breaking up into specific areas was probably a good thing. "Okay, then. Let's . . ."

The door leading to the kitchen began to swing open.

Everyone crowded to the far end of the room. Behind Tony.

And given the size of the room and the numbers in the crowd, having everyone behind him pushed Tony to within about three feet of the door.

Sure. Now you're all fine with the wizard thing.

The lantern light extended just far enough to illuminate Lee's smiling face.

No one moved.

Tony's heart beat so hard the burn on his chest ached in time.

"Lee?"

Might have been Peter. Might have been Adam. Tony wasn't sure.

Green eyes gleamed. As Lee opened his mouth, Tony answered for him.

"No. That's not Lee."

His smile had too many angles. Tony knew Lee's smile and this wasn't it.

"The thing in the bas.e.m.e.nt," Lee said mockingly, "wants to talk to you."

No need to be more specific. They all knew who he was referring to.

"Why?" Tony demanded.

"I don't know."

"Give it up. For all intents and purposes, you are the thing in the bas.e.m.e.nt."

"Why, so I am." One long-fingered hand brushed back through the fall of dark hair. "But I don't want to talk to you in front of an audience-talk about a tough room. Unfortunately, you refused to be lured, so I had to go with the direct approach. Come downstairs and face me."

"And if I don't?"

Lee's hands started to tremble and the velvet voice roughened. "I think you know the answer to that."

"If you don't go with him, the thing in the bas.e.m.e.nt will hurt Lee!"

Tony sighed. "Yeah, Tina, I got it."

"Well, pardon me for wanting to be clear about things," the script supervisor muttered.

This time the smile was almost Lee's.

Tony looked past him, into the darkness of the kitchen, at the edge of the ceiling over the door, down toward the floor at his feet-anywhere but at the smile that almost wasn't Lee's. "Let me talk it over with the others."

"Why? You know you're going to come with me."

"Let's pretend I have a choice."

"All right." Dark amus.e.m.e.nt flashed in the depths of the green eyes. "Let's pretend. You talk. I'll wait."

Tony turned, stepped back toward the pack, and motioned for the others to huddle around him.

"If you go down there and the thing in the bas.e.m.e.nt destroys you, what the h.e.l.l are we supposed to do?" Amy demanded.

"Thanks for caring."

"You know what I mean!"

"If it destroys me, you stay in here and do anything you have to in order to survive until sunrise."

Adam shook his head. "How do you know it'll let us go at sunrise?"

"It's traditional."

"In order for a thing to become a tradition, it has to happen more than once," Zev pointed out, dragging Brianna back into the huddle and away from Lee.

"In every movie . . ."

"This isn't a movie!"

Tony closed his eyes and counted to three. "Look, you'll just have to trust me on the sunrise thing. Besides, I think I'll be okay. Brenda implied it didn't want me destroyed."

"Why not?"

"She didn't say." Technically, she'd only said that the thing in the bas.e.m.e.nt didn't want Lee to destroy him. It could still want to do the nasty itself. Since he was going into the bas.e.m.e.nt regardless, Tony didn't see a lot of point in mentioning that. "Does anyone have a mirror? I left Tina's in the ballroom."

"Honestly, Tony, you should be more careful when you borrow something!"