She continued eating for a half minute or so, then found another smile.

“It was too appropriate an opportunity to pass up,” she told me then, “when you broke up with Julia and she grew interested in the occult. I saw that I would have to get her together with Victor, to have him train her, to teach her a few simple effects, to capitalize on her unhappiness at your parting, to turn it into a full-blown hatred so intense that she would be willing to cut your throat when the time came for the sacrifice.”

I choked on something which otherwise tasted wonderful.

A frosty crystal goblet of water appeared beside my right hand. I raised it and washed everything down. I took another sip.

“Ah, that reaction is worth something, anyhow,” Jasra remarked. “You must admit that having someone you once loved as executioner adds spice to vengeance.”

Out of the corner of my eye I saw that Mandor was nodding. And I, also, had to agree that she was right.

“I must acknowledge it as a well-conceived bit of revenge,” I said. “Was Rinaldo in on this part?”

“No, you two had grown too chummy by then. I was afraid he’d warn you.”

I thought about it for another minute or so, then, “What went wrong?” I asked.

“The one thing I’d never have guessed,” she said. “Julia really had talent. A few lessons from Victor, and she was better than he was at anything he could do — except painting. Hell! Maybe she paints, too. I don’t know. I’d dealt myself a wild card, and it played itself.”

I shuddered. I thought of my conversation with the ty’iga at Arbor Horse, back when it was possessing Vinta Bayle. “Did Julia develop the abilities she sought?” it had asked me. I’d told it that I didn’t know. I’d said that she’d never shown any signs… And shortly thereafter I’d remembered our meeting in the supermarket parking lot and the dog she told to sit that may never have moved again… I’d recalled this, but —