Looks like this is going to crack 80,000 words.
Speaking of the needle: I unwrapped it, and showed it to her. I was hoping for a hiss, or possibly a mad scramble for holy water. Instead she just held it for a second or two before dropping it back down on the rag I had wrapped it in. “Well, it was evil.”
“Was?”
“Feels like it got thoroughly cleaned.” Mira gave me the Look New Californians give when they want you to know they’re talking about magic. “The kind of cleaning that wipes away distinguishing marks.”
“Well, I was in a hurry, and it was still wriggling,” I replied. “In my foot.”
“What? Sit.”
“It’s fine.”
“Sit.”
When a cleaning lady tells you to sit and uses the tone Mira did, you sit. While she started fussing with me, I asked her, “Hey, did you know a Joey the Pug?”
“Not enough to feel too bad if he’s dead.” She looked up. “He dead?”
“Afraid so. I take it he didn’t have many fans?”
“You could say that, Shamus. Joey was a little too sketchy for the Syndicate. Not respectable,” said the illegal mage, “and he was tied up with some bad people. I’m not gonna lie, he was going to end up with a shiv in his gut. There. Now your foot is cleaned, and ready to heal.”