He set it aside. There were more complicated things in his life than Mephistopheles and he had learned to address them in order of arrival.
Thirty years since the Corps had crossed into the human world proper.
He had been counting. Not obsessively — it was simply a fact that sat in the background of the decision, the way the weight of a thing sat in the background of lifting it. Thirty years of the ceasefire framework holding. Thirty years of the Church acting as gatekeeper for supernatural access to human lands, the whole delicate architecture of mutual restraint balanced on the agreement that nobody would test its edges unless the provocation was severe enough to justify the cost.
He had crossed the edge. He had done it this morning, and he had done it without hesitation, which was not the same as without thought. He had thought. Extensively and carefully, every mile of the ride here, turning the political geometry from every angle he could find.
