“Not anymore he can’t.” I gave Aisling a brief explanation of the bête noire. “Now he’s stuck in the world with the rest of us.”

“Hmm.” Aisling gave me an unreadable look. “I don’t think I’ve ever tried to break a bête noire. I could try, but it could be that Constantine is happier the way things are. He was always running out of energy at the most inopportune moments…”

“I don’t know what he wants.” For a moment or two, I was beset with an odd emotion: part frustration, part protectiveness. I knew exactly what Aisling had been subtly hinting, and while the idea of Constantine in a permanently corporeal form was pleasant, less so was the idea that he might use that fact to engage in sexual acts with other women.

Dammit, I did not want to get involved with him. Not romantically. I wanted a nice, normal man, one who wasn’t complicated, and who wouldn’t drive me crazy.

“Perhaps we could ask him to find Bael anyway,” Aisling said, following her own train of thought. “He’s still a ghost even if he’s in physical form, so he can’t be killed if he is caught again. And if we locate Bael, he could steal the talisman you need.”

I laughed a short, harsh, and very bitter laugh. “Oh, that’s been tried, and failed pretty spectacularly, let me tell you. When I asked Constantine about getting Bael’s talisman, he just turned into a block of ice and then stomped out.”

“A block of ice? Constantine?” Aisling shook her head. “I don’t know him very well, but I find that unlikely.”

“Regardless, it’s true. I don’t mean to rush you, but can we get to the demon summoning? I’d like to get this over before the night is gone.”

Aisling thought for a moment, then stood up. “We don’t have to summon a demon. I’ll have Jim do the job. It’s much safer than any other demon I could summon.”

“Jim is a demon?” I watched him a bit warily.

“Fifth class,” Jim said with pride.

“Yes, it is. It belongs to me, so there won’t be any risk of a demon two-timing you, although I’m not sure one could if I summoned it for the express purpose of following your commands.”

I was reminded that most people referred to demons by gender-neutral terms, but I couldn’t bring myself to do that. I patted the dog on his head while he gave me a once-over: both visually, and with his nose. “Cool,” he said after a few seconds’ silence. “I can try, although I’m going to need food to do any sort of tracking. Lots and lots of food.”

“You’ve had lunch, and we won’t have dinner for another few hours,” Aisling said. “Effrijim, I command thee to aid and assist Bee Dakar by any means necessary. There, that ought to do it. May I offer you a beverage, Bee? Some tea? Coffee? Dragon’s blood?”

I stared at her in horror for a few seconds before I remembered the dark red, heavily spiced wine that no one but dragons drank, commonly referred to as dragon’s blood. I stood up and slung my bag across my chest. “No, thank you. I’d like to get started, since I hope to find Bael by morning. I’ll bring Jim back to you as soon as I can.”

“Oh, it won’t be going with you,” Aisling said, smiling benignly. Before I could ask what she meant, she muttered a few words, her hands dancing in the air as she drew two wards, after which Jim disappeared in a puff of oily black smoke that lingered in the air before slowly falling to the floor. “Jim’ll check around Abaddon to see what it can find out there about Bael.”

“But… but I thought…”

“Trust me, I know demon lords, and if anyone knows Bael’s location, it’s the princes of hell. Jim’ll just do a little covert sniffing around, as it were, and pick up the gossip on what Bael’s up to.”

“If it’s that easy,” I couldn’t help but ask, wondering just what sort of people these dragons were, “then why didn’t you locate him before now?”

Aisling made a face. “I told Drake that we’d find Bael when we needed him. He was all, ‘let the dragons handle this, and stay out of Abaddon—we don’t need anything to do with them since they are warring with us,’ and so on.” She gave a little roll of her eyes and laughed. “You coming to me is the perfect excuse to show him that we don’t necessarily have to do everything the hard way. Luckily, he’s in the country checking on our kids, so I have tonight to help you before he comes home and finds out we fixed things without dragony intervention.”

I smiled, not convinced, but grateful for any help I could get. “How long do you think we’ll need to wait?”

“Hours.” She glanced at a clock. “You’re welcome to stay, but if you have other things to do, I’d suggest coming back around midnight. That will give Jim a good six hours of poking around Abaddon, and by then he ought to have an idea of whether the demons and demon lords know where Bael is, and how willing they are to talk.”

I left agreeing to return at midnight, and slowly made my way to the arrondissement containing the hotel I stay at when I’m in Paris. The Hôtel de la Femme Sans Tête is known more for its budget nature rather than fabulous accommodations, but it was my Parisian home away from home.

At the reception desk was a familiar face.

“Bonjour, Luc,” I greeted the man behind the latest copy of Charlie Hebdo. He was round like an egg, with pomaded black hair, a nose ring, and alchemical symbols tattooed on each of his fingers.

“Eh? Oh, it is you,” he grunted at me, setting down his magazine only when I asked if there were any messages for me.

“Tch,” he said, sucking his teeth as he heaved himself out of the chair and padding over to where an old-fashioned pigeonhole arrangement housed room keys, mail, and phone messages. “There are three.”

I waited a minute. It was a game that Luc and I played, although I had a sneaky suspicion that the game aspect was solely on my side. “Might I have them?”

He tched again, but deigned to pluck the three sheets of pale canary paper from the pigeonhole, and slide them across the desk before resuming his seat and magazine with the air of one who has been well martyred.

The first message was from the coordinator of the local Charmer’s chapter, reminding me of the annual conference coming up in three weeks. The second was dated two days ago, and was from Kostya informing me that a dragon had been sent to fetch the talisman.