Scott headed out for his appointment with Tía Ramirez.
    "Hello," he greeted the woman waiting for him. Incense hung heavy in the air—not that he could smell it, but its haze was visible.
    "If it will make you comfortable, sit," she invited. He did so. "I see that you are in great danger."
    "Listening to the news, have you?"
    "Yes, actually." She smiled slightly. "Please. I charge for the real readings, not the 'you are interested in a woman, yes?' which you can get anywhere. What is it you need to know? Phrase your questions carefully," she added quietly.
    He spent a moment figuring out what to ask. "So far we've had two art experts dead, their eyes turned solid black, crow feathers found at the last one."
    "Do you wish to know who? Why? How?"
    "Yes." He wondered how he should note this on the monthly expense report.
    Tía Ramirez gathered up a handful of human finger bones and cast them on the table, studied them closely. Her eyes widened sharply.
    "Things are worse than you think. The storm crow is here; the war is coming," she whispered. "The crows are gathering here. It may think that it is here of its own free will, but it has been summoned. The war happens here."
    "Which war?"
    A long silence. "The war when wolf and winter battle for the sunrise. It's coming. It's nearly here. This was not why I wanted to see you," she added, shooting him a venomous look.
    "Why did you want to see me?"
    "You were supposed to ask simple questions, about understandable and explicable things," she told him in something of a growl. "You're a detective, this I understood. Am I wrong?"
    "No, you're not. But I do have an entire other level of question," he added. "So do you have a phone number on Yen Chu-Hsia?"
    "Those I can answer!" she shouted. "I did not need to know this!" A moment in which she calmed herself. "I did not need to know this," she repeated in a whisper, looking down at the bones, then up at him. "Pack your things, leave the city—it will be faster."
    "I don't think I can do that, but thank you for the warning," he replied politely.
    She stood up and began throwing things into a bag as he watched. Apparently she hadn't been kidding. "What were your other questions, quickly?"
    "Yen Chu-Hsia and the people he broke out of jail, where can we find them?"
    "They're a distraction now, ignore them." She paused to glare at him. "Don't you understand, it won't matter. The war is coming. Find the storm crow. The victim and the killer are the same."
    "Okay...."
    "Leave your credit card number with the woman out front. Oh," she added. "And I was hoping you could—given the circumstances, it's irrelevant," she decided.
    "As long as I'm here, what?"
    "My nephew. He's an idiot."
    "At the moment he's an idiot who's in jail rather far away from here," Scott noted.
    "I'm aware of that fact. If you could do me a favor, I'll waive the fee."
    "Which is?
    "Speak a word with his parole officer. Don't let him out."
    "I'll see what we can do." He'd been expecting a slightly different request on Tybalt's behalf. "I'm not sure he was in any real danger of that, soon...." Given the body count after their little rampage, it was going to be a while.
    "He needs to learn wisdom and restraint. Incarceration will help him," she explained. "He will think that he needs to escape, and he will attempt it in...." She paused, her gaze unfocusing for a moment. "Twenty four days, nine hours, seven minutes. Keep him from doing so, and I will be grateful."
    "Assuming I'm still functioning then, yes. Thank you." He took his leave to return to the cave.
    
    * * *
    
    K. Robeson Enterprises.
    The door frosted over, crystallized, and shattered. Liang Hsiang stepped inside and glanced around, held her hands out at her sides. Fog began billowing out from beneath them as the temperature dropped rapidly. The pipes froze, shattered. Computers sparked and died. A thick layer of frost and ice grew over all of it.
    She turned and left, looking somewhat put out about the fact that no one had been there.
    
    Don Vincent Guiliani's mansion.
    "Should we tell him?"
    "I don't know, I'm fairly certain he knows what going on here."
    "We're getting reports in from everywhere," the first man noted.
    The second made a helpless gesture. "He said we should just lie low, and this is gonna blow over. He has no doubts that the Revolution is going to be able to handle this."
    "Y'know, I don't think I understand this, letting the superheroes fight the gang war for us!" The first guard was losing his patience.
    "That's why he's in charge and you're not."
    "He's a cripple lying in a bed!"
    "I wouldn't yell that too loud if I were you. Besides, look at how protected we are. What are they gonna be able to do here?"
    A minibus flew over the compound wall. A moment later the gunfire started. The don's guards held firm for a few moments, but Yeh Cha shrugged off the bullets, and if they struck Liang Hsiang they simply fell to the ground.
    The biggest of the Wuxia reached out and grabbed a man. "Where's the old man, and you live?"
    "He's—he's down in the basement!"
    "Thank you." He tossed the man over the wall behind him. "You'll walk again." He headed down; poison gas flooded the halls, and he and his slender partner backed up quickly. "Liang, forget this. We've scattered them. The old man is on life support. Drain the building, it'll kill him."
    "Right." She held up a hand. Lights began to flicker.
    Inside, a group of men stood clustered around the don's hospital bed as the electricity went in and out around them.
    "We've gotta try and keep him stable!"
    "Stable is not going to do it!" another barked. "We don't have any other option here! Flick the switch!"
    The other man swallowed hard, and did so. The emergency generator came online. Power surged wildly and died just as quickly under Liang's assault.
    "Sir? Sir?!"
    The heart monitor showed a single flat line.
    "Did it work?" the second man asked in a hushed voice.
    "I don't know." The first hesitated, stepped toward a door, and opened it.

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