A tiny hand slid into mine, and I jerked at the contact. “Oh. Hey.”
Lira, the child I met on my visit to the enclave, stood beside me in a frilly dress she’d paired with kid-sized combat boots.
“I’ll protect him.” She reached out and patted his cheek. “Sometimes, when no one is looking, he turns into a cat.” Glee sparked in her eyes. “Daddy said not to touch his wings, but Thom lets me scratch his ears.”
Confirmation Thom had been shifting, even in semi-private, eased a weight on my chest I hadn’t noticed bogging me down since I first set eyes on my friend again.
“Do you think, when I get to go back home, that he could live with me for always?” She stared up at me, eyes hopeful. “He’s a good kitty, and I would take very good care of him.”
A snort escaped me before I could stop from hurting her feelings, and her face crumpled.
“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to laugh.” I gave her sticky fingers an apologetic squeeze. “Thom isn’t a real kitty. He’s a man who can turn into one. You can keep a kitty for a pet, but you can’t keep a man as a pet.”
After careful consideration, she decided. “Dad wouldn’t like that.”
“Between you and me … ” I leaned down to whisper in her ear. “Kitties are much better than men. I’ll see if I can talk your parents into getting you a real cat when this is over. How about that?”
“Really?” She jumped up and clamped onto me at hip level. “You mean it?”
“Really.” I laughed, easing her down. “I mean it.”
No guarantees, but it couldn’t hurt to ask, right?
With Lira on Thom guard duty, I went in search of Cole. “Any sign of Wu yet?”
“No.” He glanced up from his phone. “He ought to be here within the next ten minutes.”
“You texting Death?” I jabbed him in the ribs with my elbow then rubbed the tender spot. I had fallen on concrete softer than him. “Should I be jealous?”
“Janardan,” he corrected me. “Even if I didn’t have a mate I loved, I would never steal one from a friend.”
Surreal to think he had struck up a friendship with one of his brothers-in-law. After dealing with War, and her homicidal counterpart — Thanases — I wasn’t sure what I had expected from Death. The title alone was foreboding, but the female herself was subdued, and totally in love with her mate.
Out of all my siblings, I was glad she was the last one standing. Even I had to admit, “They are disgustingly cute for a corpse and his animator.”
And what else could they be? Just like Conquest, Death had a type. But whereas my alter ego preferred a good purr in a man, Death appeared to find a pulse optional.
“Janardan lived a single lifetime, but it wasn’t enough.” Cole pocketed his phone, giving me his full attention. “Death couldn’t bear to be parted from him, so she got his permission to reanimate him after his natural death.”
And since he was her mate, a conduit of her power, he could stand separation from her for long periods of time whereas the rest of her coterie would drop like marionettes with their strings cut if they got out of range. That’s why Janardan had been forced to brave this terrene to negotiate a truce with us alone. No one else would have survived the transition without Death to anchor them.
Worry my own coterie was just as susceptible without me around squeezed my heart in an iron fist. But, I reminded myself for the hundredth time, other coteries had survived the cadre. Otherwise, there would be no charun from the lower terrenes on this one.
A commotion at the house drew our attention, and adrenaline spiked, but the happy faces surrounding me made it clear Wu had arrived with the last of the enclave in tow. Families rushed down the lane to embrace one another, and Wu shook hands and accepted pats on the back like he had carried each of them individually to safety.
Once he escaped his adoring fans, he strolled right up to me. “We have a problem.”
“Many of them, in fact.” I took his proclamation in stride. “To which are you referring?”
“The Malakhim have captured Knox.”
I cursed under my breath. “Kimora?”
“A sentry crossed our path, and a cry went up before we could silence him. Knox sacrificed himself to save us from detection.”
A selfish act or a selfless one?
After capturing Knox, they would escort him straight to his daughter, right where he wanted to go.
Wu, despite his best intentions, might not have done the enclave any favors by hiding and protecting them all this time. The enclave, Knox included, viewed him as their own sort of avenging angel. But he answered prayers with about as much dependability as any divine being. The sooner they realized that, the sooner they would start looking to each other for salvation.
“They don’t need two guides to show them the way into the enclave.” Cole exhaled. “Knox is the more valuable prisoner. He’ll know where the other outposts are and how to access them. He’ll also know where the enclave would have gone after it’s discovered they’ve escaped.”
“True.” I hated admitting he had a point. “But you have to keep in mind that Knox is also seasoned, and a leader. They’ll know he won’t give up his people for nothing. They’ll need leverage to get him to cooperate. That’s Kimora. They’ll keep her alive until they don’t need him any longer.”
“And then they’ll kill them both,” Wu finished, eyes sparking gold.
“Mateo has agreed to watch over the farmhouse. The enclave — ” and Thom “ — will be safe here while we figure out how to extract Knox and Kimora.”
Singling out Santiago, the one guaranteed to know, I asked, “Where are Portia and Miller?”
“Purchasing supplies for your guests now that they have backup on site.” He glanced up from his phone. “Do you want them to report back here, or do you want them to meet us at Lake Bevin?”
“Tell them to meet us there.” We would need all the extra hands we had available to pull this off. “We ought to arrive about the same time.”
Without the enclave in tow, we could cover more ground faster.
Creases gathered across his forehead, worry for Portia he would die before acknowledging. “All right.”
Strolling up to Wu, I crossed my arms over my chest. “Feel like giving me a lift?”
Cole tensed behind me, but he didn’t interfere, and I could have knocked Wu over with a feather.
“Yes?” He made it sound like a question. “If you like.”
“I like.” That was the easy part. Convincing Cole … that might not go as smoothly. Playing dirty, I sauntered up to him, planted my palms on his chest, then claimed his lips until mine tingled. “I want to talk to Wu alone.” Best to give it to him straight. “He’s like a peacock with his tailfeathers fanned when he’s around you. I need him to open up without all the posturing.”
“I don’t trust his intentions.” Cole searched my face. “The enclave matters to him. He’s made that clear. They’re innocents, so I have no problem using our resources to defend them in exchange for them sheltering Thom.”
Sensing he had more to say, I prompted him. “Okay.”
“Wu is risking his life, and the lives of those he loves, to rise against his father. We need to understand what his vision of the world after is, and if there’s a place for us in it. The Malakhim won’t retreat unless we defeat their leader. Maybe not even then. The upper terrenes may let this play out, let us weaken ourselves against their earthbound forces, and then attack when we’re at our lowest.”
The subtle hint gave me chills. “Unless someone of equal strength steps in to fill the void.”
“This might be a power bid for Wu. You might be a means of overthrowing his father and claiming his position as a leader for his people. I’m not saying Wu isn’t the better option, but I am saying we need to determine his goals and motivations before we align more closely with him.”
“I agree.” After all, his father had been a better option to someone once upon a time too,
and we saw how that had panned out. “Also? I really, really don’t want to fly.”
Never in a million years would I admit that Wu’s flights were smoother than Cole’s as a dragon, but even with Wu I was left with jelly legs and quivering thighs from holding on for dear life.
I was the only winged member of my coterie terrified of flying. Good grief. How could I complete my transformation into a badass dragoness if I couldn’t control my own gag reflex?
Cole tipped my head back with a finger placed beneath my chin. “You’ll get used to it.”
“That’s not as comforting as you must think it is.” I sighed. “How can I learn to fly if being flown makes me airsick?”
“It’s different when you have control.” Mischief sparkled in his eyes. “I’ll show you one day. Soon.”
“Soon,” I squeaked. “I mean, yeah. I can’t wait.”
“Here.” He reached in a pocket. “Take these.” He tossed me a tube of chewable Dramamine, and my heart fluttered. “That ought to help with the worst of it.”
“You’re an angel.” I blew him a kiss and returned to Wu, resigned to facing the awkwardness of clinging to him for the next few hours. At least this time he was wearing a shirt. “Ready?”
Wu frowned after Cole. “He’s no angel.”
“Neither are you.”
“Hmm.”
“Don’t get your feathers in a twist. It’s just a thing people say. I hate to tell you this, but dragons beat angels any day. They’re cooler by a factor of ten.”
“They’re giant lizards with wings.”
“They’re as close to a living dinosaur as I’m ever going to get.” Rixton had that part right. “How is that not awesome to you? Do you know how many documentaries I’ve watched on them? At least a thousand. Cole is a living fossil record.”
“I’m a living symbol of Christian faith.”
“A few months ago, I would have awarded points for that.” Sorrow ebbed through me. “Faith isn’t as easy when you’ve lost so much family in such a short time.” Aunt Nancy. Uncle Harold. Even though Rixton, Nettie, and Sherry were alive, our friendship had been a casualty of this war that might or might not survive. “Plus, you kind of debunked God as I know him when you admitted your dad basically seeded rumors of his own almightiness.”
“I didn’t say your god doesn’t exist. Just that he isn’t a being I have encountered.”
“Mmm-hmm.” I looked him up and down, already plotting the best handholds. “Give it up, Wu. You lost fair and square. Dragons rule and angels drool.”
Laughing softly, he opened his arms to me and bent his knees. I wrapped my arms around his neck and latched my ankles at his spine. As it turns out, he was right about this being the safest way to travel with him. Even if it was the most awkward.
With a wave to the coterie, I held on tight as Wu launched us skyward.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
Wu broke the silence after we pulled ahead of the others, a curious glint in his eyes that made me wary. “I assume there’s a reason why you chose to travel with me and not your mate.”
My mate.
Cole was my mate.
The title hummed through my bones, just like Wu had promised me it would with the right person.
Shaking off the warm fuzzies before they turned infectious, I pressed, “Any luck finding Ezra?”
“Arranging a meeting between the two of you is proving more difficult than originally anticipated.”
“I’m confused.” Vague answers had that effect on me. “Is that a yes or a no?”
“I will update you when a time and date are set.”
Emotions churned my gut when I envisioned meeting the male who had made all those calls on my birthdays. He had held me together with his presence over the line whenever my body burned, itching to release what prowled beneath my skin.
How had he remained as much of a mystery as what he was doing to me all this time? Had he provoked those crippling episodes? Prevented them? I wasn’t sure, and that made him dangerous. As much as I hoped he could help us, that he would help us, I had as much reason to suspect he would do the opposite. Anyone with altruistic motives would have revealed themselves to me after I rejoined the coterie and learned of my birthright, but he hadn’t. That didn’t award him any points in his favor.
Writing that topic off as a temporary loss, I plowed ahead. “How about Deland Bruster?”
“He heard rumors you’re recruiting, and he’s gone underground.”
Bruster had the uncanny ability to look into a person’s soul, and he was the only charun on Earth who could peer that deep. He would prove invaluable in interrogating Ezra and learning what he stood to gain from all this. But it cost. Not money, but secrets, and only the ones held tightest to your chest.
Running low on those, I had no doubt he would dream up something else he wanted in trade.
“We need him. Both of them.”
Wu didn’t have anything to add, so I settled in for the flight, expecting him to go quiet on me.
“You’ve done something no other cadre member has ever done in the history of ascensions.” He studied me. “You’ve united unaligned clans against my father. You’ve won them to your cause. Do you understand how remarkable that makes you? That they would risk themselves, their families, their secrecy, to stand beside you to end this when they’ve only ever cowered in shadows until now?”
“Don’t give me too much credit. I thought I was winning over Conquest loyalists. I didn’t realize there was more to it until Mateo showed up at the farmhouse.”
“Santiago was right to keep the truth from you.”
Irked at how often I was kept in the dark, at how often I preferred it, I growled, “Santiago is an ass.”
“He cares about you. They all do. I envy that.”
“Why?” It was my turn to study him. “You have the enclave.”
“Knox is the closest relationship I’ve dared with them in generations. I risk exposing them each time I visit. My friendship endangers their lives.”
“I hear you.” The wind whisked the sigh off my lips. “It’s the same for me, with Rixton and Sherry.”
Fear that knowledge wasn’t enough, that he would want to help, made me grateful Wu was supporting me, otherwise I might have wobbled on my legs imaging Rixton squaring off against charun like War and Famine. He would do it too, for the same reasons as me.
His family. His friends. His home.
Funny how many of those things used to overlap for us.
“How do you want to play this?” I pushed out those fears to clear my head. “You know the parties involved better than the rest of us. You can anticipate their strategies.”
“They will use Kimora as leverage to force Knox to reveal the location of the enclave,” he confirmed, “but how long that lasts is anyone’s guess. Knox is aware we’ve evacuated his people. All he’s surrendering is an empty building. Once the Malakhim learn we’ve thwarted them, they will retaliate. They’ll kill Kimora unless Knox reveals the enclave’s present location. Father won’t stop with rousting them. He doesn’t do things by half. He moved against them, and that means he wants them dead.”
Basically, he was reinforcing my supposition. Except his speculation was backed by experience with this breed and familial knowledge. “Do you think Knox has given up the bunker yet?”
“He’ll draw it out as long as he can,” Wu said darkly, “but he can only last so long before he breaks.”
“Then we cross our fingers and hope for the best.”
Because that’s ever helped in the history of ever.
“If more than the one sentry observed our group, we’ll be too late. They’ll dismiss the bunker and press for the enclave’s location.” His gaze went distant. “Once they put hands on Kimora, Knox will cave. She’s his only child, and her mother was his mate. He won’t lose her. He would die to protect her.”
Thinking back to the decimation of The Hole, I wondered, “Are there any fail-safes in th
e bunker?”
“Yes.” Wu zeroed back in on me. “Why?”
“The enclave can never use that location again,” I said, thinking it through. “They’ll have to cut their losses and hole up in another one of their homes after this blows over.” This meaning the war, and possibly our lives. “There’s no way to get back in to collect keepsakes or material belongings — ”
“Those are tucked away elsewhere. Only necessities are allowed in the bunker.”
“Even better.” I settled in for the ride. “In that case, I have an idea.”
We touched down in a different area than before, just to muddy our scent trails. That’s one thing you don’t have to consider when you’re on the street. Lifelong criminals develop a sixth sense where cops are concerned, but they couldn’t literally sniff us out. No matter how many times they called us pigs, we didn’t smell like bacon.
Cole and Santiago joined us just as I got my land legs back, but I was happy to fake a case of the wobbles if it gave me an excuse to lean against Cole for support.
Santiago, not fooled for a minute, rolled his eyes. “What’s the plan?”
Wu deferred to me — big surprise — and I got ready to sound crazy.
“We’re going to give the Malakhim what they want.” And make them regret it. “We’re going to lead them straight to the bunker, and we’re going to let them in.”
Santiago arched his brows. “And?”
“Wu is going to trigger its doomsday protocol and blow them all sky high.” I smiled in response to his spreading grin. “You down with that?”
Rubbing his hands together, he bounced on the balls of his feet. “Boom, baby.”
“Cole?” I glanced over my shoulder. “What do you think?”
“It won’t stop the Malakhim from coming for the enclave, but it will announce loud and clear that they’re under our protection. It might make the Malakhim think twice before attacking again.”
“Or it might light a fire under them.” I sighed. “Whatever we do, we’re going to take a loss. Hopefully, just property-wise. At least this way, we take some of them out too.”
Rise Against: A Foundling novel (The Foundling Series) Page 10
