“We scented her.” Thom wore his heart on his sleeve. “She’s gone now, but she was there.”
“The bangles are failing,” I confirmed. “I’m not sure how much longer I have before Conquest punches through the barriers separating us.” Given how easily she had manipulated me moments earlier, I had to admit, “Whatever Ezra did to me shifted the balance. She’s stronger now than she’s ever been, closer to the surface.” I toyed with the cool metal on my wrists. “I’m not sure there will be anything left of me once she succeeds.”
Silence choked the room. Even Phoebe had gone silent as faint tremors shivered through her delicate wings. If I didn’t know better, I would think she was afraid. Of what happened to me or of the whiff she caught of Conquest, I wasn’t sure, and it’s not like she could tell me if I asked.
“We’ll find a way,” Cole promised me then shared a long look with Wu, who nodded he would help.
The promise meant nothing to me. Wu was a con artist. He would say what Cole wanted to hear, a thing Cole himself never did, in order to keep his head on his shoulders. But if Cole took comfort from the lie, or thought I did, I wouldn’t disabuse him of the notion.
“You can fight this.” Maggie clutched her hands in her lap, her fingers cramped and bloodless. “You’ve got this, Luce.”
“I want you to knock me out if it looks like she’s surfacing,” I told Thom, hating to burden him with the task. “It’s the only chance you’ll get to contain me before there are any casualties.”
“And then what?” Santiago challenged. “Are you going to sleep through the siege on Hart Island?”
“I don’t know what else I can do.” I made fists at my sides, my knuckles itching to crash into his clenched jaw. We couldn’t count on Conquest to fight on our side, and he knew that. She was as likely to smite the coterie in a fit of pique over them allowing me to keep her bottled as she was to pitch in. “I’m doing the best I can.”
“Then your best sucks.” He sneered at me then shoved out of the room. Slamming the door behind him, he yelled through the wood, “And cutting out our allies is stupid.”
“I don’t care if hate is how he shows his love,” I snarled, “if he doesn’t pull his head out of his ass soon, I’m going to lace his brownies with Ex-Lax. Then he’ll be a bone fide shithead.”
Portia, who had claimed Maggie and was halfway to rising, no doubt planning to hunt down Santiago, snorted a laugh that rippled through the others in the room. Just like that, the worst of the tension evaporated, and we all took a collective breath.
“Where do you think you’re going?” I cocked a hip and planted a fist there. In all the commotion, Phoebe had slipped away from Thom and made her move. “Get your scaly … buns … over here.”
I wasn’t going to curse at a child, even if I had let my potty mouth get away from me seconds earlier. All I could do was be thankful Dad wasn’t here. He would have shoved a bar of soap in my mouth so far bubbles shot out of my toes.
Ducking her head, Phoebe made halting steps over to me, and a horrible realization seized me.
“You’re afraid.” I staggered back, tripping over a foot-stool. “Of me.”
“You’re projecting.” Maggie had worked with kids for years, so I trusted her judgement in matters three feet and under. “She’s slinking in because she was about to do something bad and got caught. It’s worse because she admires you and doesn’t want to let you down. She doesn’t want to get punished either.”
But Phoebe had smelled Conquest on me for the first time. That was enough to spook any kid.
“Thom, can you take her back to Cole’s room?” I strode to the window, ignoring my troubled reflection. “Mags, you and Rixton can take one of the White Horse credit cards to go stock up on supplies. We’re going to need it all. Tents, blankets, food, water. There’s nothing on Hart Island, and we don’t have time to circle back to Canton.”
A nudge at my calf prompted me to glance down where Phoebe was busy curling her tail around the same ankle her father preferred, her shorter length only making the full loop once.
“You should go with Thom.” I bent down to rub her silky mane. “He’ll take good care of you.”
Once my hand got within grabbing distance, that’s what she did. She hooked her tiny kitten claws into the long sleeve of my shirt and hauled herself up my arm and over my shoulder until she could wind her tail around her preferred anchor — my throat. Using that hold to stand on my chest an inch from my nose, she stroked my cheeks, claws sheathed, with her small paws and butted her head against me while purring her tiny purr.
I cradled her in my hands, holding her lightly so I didn’t hurt her, and gave her what passed for a hug when your kid was a squirmy dragon with better things to do.
Without a backward glance, she sped across my torso, down my legs, and leapt onto the carpet. She trotted after Thom, swishing her rump, clearly pleased with herself even though I wasn’t sure what she had accomplished aside from convincing me she loved me, warts and all.
“Cole?” I didn’t seek him out, afraid of what I might find in his expression. “Care to do some light recon with me?”
He came up behind me, set his hands on my shoulders. “Do you have to ask?”
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
Hart Island was as desolate as a quick internet search promised. The entire island was a mile long and maybe a third that wide. I expected it to be barren, and it was in its way, but there were several ruins and wooded areas as well. Those would provide an ideal place to set up camp away from prying eyes.
Once I had looked my fill and checked with Cole that we had all the intel we required to make our next move, I pointed him toward the hotel. As much as anyone can point a dragon anywhere. And that is why it shouldn’t have surprised me to find he didn’t go where I expected him to but where he wanted.
He landed on the muddy edge of an unfamiliar riverbank and shed his dragon skin almost quicker than I could dismount.
“I give up.” From this vantage, I couldn’t tell this city from any other. There were no postcard-worthy feats of architecture in sight. “Where are we?”
“The where doesn’t matter.” He walked to the edge and peered into the murky water. “This is the closest point of contact for the Diorte.”
Thanks to the influx of new allies, I had to think back to identify the species in question.
Joining him, I studied the rippling surface below us. “Was this meeting your idea or Santiago’s?”
They had discovered Jean Ashford, one of the humans Janardan had infected when he was trying to make first contact with me. The only other thing I could recall was their size meant they had to cull their own in order to survive undetected in the rivers and lakes where they lived.
Reproduction was illegal, according to the NSB, but Wu let some species willing to police their numbers off the hook. Yet another reason getting a bead on him was difficult. For as many of his bad attributes I could name, I could list two or more acts of kindness he had shown species his father would have wiped off the face of the earth without losing sleep.
Really, when I framed it that way, it cast Wu in the light of savior and me in the role of sacrificial lamb. Everyone not chosen for team death-by-pointy-object loved the guy, and I’ll be honest, it pissed me off they didn’t see the conflicting sides of him I did.
No one was wholly good or wholly evil. I wasn’t arguing that point. He was a mostly good guy. There. I admitted it.
What burned my biscuits about Wu was how quick he was to make life or death decisions for the rest of us when half the time we would have volunteered to follow his cockamamie schemes for the greater good, but we never got the chance to choose. He was too busy railroading us at every opportunity to ensure his grand vision for the end unfurled as planned and on schedule.
That was what tempted me to ask Thom to knock Wu out so I could pluck him like a chicken while he was unconscious.
Cole’s lips pulled to one side. “What do you think?”
“Ugh.” I leaned my shoulder against his. “He’s adjusting his recruitment strategy.”
We had named Hart Island ground zero, and now he was refining our options to suit the conditions.
Santiago might be an ass, but he was smart, and I was glad to have him on my team.
Except when forced to interact with him. I was definitely gladder to have him on my team when he wasn’t also in the same room as me.
“Here they come.” Cole squared his shoulders, and I took the hint to do the same. “Their leader is Castro.”
Charun come in every size, shape, and color imaginable, so I didn’t waste energy attempting to picture them. It was easier all around to wait and let them reveal themselves to me. Good thing I had adopted that mentality. What parted the waters was nothing I would have imagined on my own. I wasn’t that creative.
The closest match to a known, if extinct, animal my brain supplied was a plesiosaur. Its conical head, however, was bloated in comparison, far too large for its slender neck. Its sleek hide was black except for its face, and red and white flesh streaked its cheeks, shifting to darker colors as I watched, telling me they could shove their heads out of the water to breathe and scout, and as long as no one got too close or paid too much attention, they could pass for buoys.
Really, really terrifying buoys. The bone structure in their jaws that allowed for sinuous muscle to rope over their broad foreheads mystified me. The Discovery Channel had definitely not prepared me for this. I bet every paleontologist in the world would give their eye teeth for a look at her, let alone an opportunity to observe her in the wild.
“Child of man,” a gentle whisper glided over the water. “Well met.”
Child of man. That was a new one. I liked it better than other names I had been called: scourge, plague on humanity, etc.
“Well met.” I knelt at the soft edge to put our heads at a similar level, given the steep embankment. “I hope you and your kin are well.”
A pleased trill rippled through the water, proof she approved of my good manners. “We are, and for that we give thanks to the Mother of the Deep.”
Cole stepped in to save me before things got awkward, what with me having no clue what we were doing here aside from likely recruiting a new clan. For that I was grateful. I routinely made an ass out of myself by heading into these things without any talking points. Probably because I avoided recruitment missions like the plague.
“Your elders contacted our coterie.” Cole joined me on his knees, a little behind and to the side of me. “The message indicated you wish to cooperate with us.”
“It is the time of the culling,” she murmured. “Our numbers have blossomed, and our young have outstripped the resources we have available. For the good of the pod, we must abide with tradition.” The colors fluctuated along her nasal passages. “However, we wish to prolong our deaths if our lives might yet be paid in service to you.”
A knot formed in my throat as I recalled what precious little else I knew about their kind. They thinned their population in accordance with the number of children they birthed, the adults willing to sacrifice their lives in order to welcome new ones into this world.
“I would be honored,” I said, and I meant it. “It is my greatest wish to preserve this world for all our children.”
The curve of Cole’s lips told me he hadn’t missed the slip. The circumstances of Phoebe’s conception and birth might exist beyond me, but I loved the kid. I was one hundred percent my father’s daughter in that regard. All it took was looking at that adorable face, and I was lost. She was my daughter as much as she was Cole’s because I already loved her with a depth I hadn’t known I was capable of, let alone in so short a time. But Dad told me once he knew from the moment he saw me that I was his. It must run in the family.
“We too wish for this world to survive.” Her head tilted, and only then did I notice the black bead of her nearest eye as she took a gander at me. “It will take a few days for us to reach the Sound.”
“You prefer lakes and rivers. Can you survive in saltwater?”
“Long Island Sound is a caldron swirling with freshwater from tributaries and saltwater from the ocean. It is enough for us to acclimate and survive for a short period of time. Long term exposure to saltwater will kill us.” Amusement shone in the one eye I could see. “But we are already dead.”
I bit my lip to keep from saying what I might regret later. I had the wrong perspective to question their commitment. I should be grateful, not sad. I should applaud them, not mourn them. They were making this choice. For that alone, I ought to be glad. No one had forced them to this point. They had reached it on their own.
“We heard you were different.” A slender filament extended from the tip of her nose to caress my cheek, capturing a tear I hadn’t noticed falling. “We are pleased to see the rumors, for once, were true.”
“I’m not sure different is better,” I admitted. “Different has cost a lot of good people their lives.”
The alternative, allowing Conquest to rise uninhibited, would have cost more. I tried remembering that, but it was hard when the reason grief clouded my judgement was because I was different, because I was Luce, I had been the catalyst for more death and destruction than I could sometimes bear.
“Change requires sacrifice, child.” A warm glow emitted from the filament. “We are pleased to offer what we can to help you further your goals, as they are ours as well. You are unique, and that which is unique must be sheltered and allowed to thrive for the good of all.”
“I didn’t mean to lessen your offer by questioning it.” I kept my joints locked in a stiff pose, uncertain what protocol demanded when a charun caressed you with its shiny nose hair tentacle. “I respect your decision and appreciate your help.”
“The longer charun live, the less empathy we possess. It is a kind of mercy for our kind that we choose to shorten our existence in order to preserve that brightness of spirit. The future belongs to the young.” Her touch retreated. “Despite the weight of your soul, you are young. Your future … is what you make it.”
A fraction of the weight pressing on my chest lifted as her meaning sank in. Without knowing the entirety of my circumstances, she had given me a way of spinning what Wu had done to me. He might have orchestrated this, but he couldn’t carry it out on his own. He required my help. I had to be willing to take my own life in exchange for saving everyone else’s. In that sense, it was my choice. I wasn’t helpless. I could decide to spend what time I had left with my family and tell the rest of the world screw you. It was a small consolation, but it gave me some of my own back, and I needed all the spunk I could muster to get through the next few days.
“We should return to the others,” Cole said, perhaps sensing my distraction. “They’ll be expecting us.”
“Go on.” Castro patted my cheek and then withdrew. “We will meet again soon enough.”
I rose, Cole standing in tandem with me, and we backed away as she glided deeper into the water.
After he embraced his dragon, I climbed onto his back and, thinking of Castro’s choice, buried my face in his mane.
*
Santiago waited on us in the hall below the roof access door at the hotel, tablet in hand. I was starting to wonder why he didn’t just amputate one and fuse the device to his wrist. He didn’t acknowledge us at first, which wasn’t unusual for him, but he didn’t let us pass either.
Emotionally drained after the meeting with Castro, I sighed. “I’m guessing you’ve got something on your mind.”
“You need to lock the kid down before we leave.” He glanced up, shot Cole a pointed glance, then settled his ire, as usual, on me. “She’s got a fighting spirit, but what you propose to do on that island … It’s no place for a kid. She’s small, fast, and she’s got invisibility on her side, but the Malakhim aren’t going to leave any survivors. No matter how cute they are.”
I hated to agree with him, but he might as well have been plucking my thoughts s
traight out of my head. “Are you that certain we’ll lose?”
“I’m that certain we’ll win, at great cost.” His focus slid past us, down the hall. “You don’t want her death on your conscience. She’s a good kid, and she’s been through enough. You’re going to have to figure out a way to keep her butt at Haven or something. I don’t know.”
Short of supergluing her paws to the floor, I didn’t see that happening. She was too crafty.
“She’ll only come after us.” Cole softened his voice the way he did when explaining the facts of charun life to me. “She’s a predator, and her bond to us is ironclad. Convallarian young are rare and treasured. It’s part of their genetic memory to stay close to their parents to better their chances of survival.”
“I figured you’d say that.”
Santiago resumed his typing. “I had to try.”
“I didn’t know you cared,” I joked, mostly.
“Portia is torn up about it.” He kept busy, tapping and reading.
“I promised I would mention it. She didn’t want to come off as questioning your parenting skills.”
The hit landed, right on target, and I debated kicking him in the junk to make myself feel better.
Portia’s father had sold her into marriage. Her husband beat her, shared her with his men, and generally made her life a living hell. Those things, she gritted her teeth and endured. But when he crushed her eggs as she laid them, because he couldn’t be certain who fathered her offspring, that’s when she snapped. She struck her bargain with Conquest, they killed him and all his men, and Portia joined the coterie.
Kicking up an eyebrow at him, I kept my tone even. “Clearly you don’t have that problem.”
“Nope.”
“I wanted her to stay with Dad, at Haven, where they would both be safe.” I sought out Cole’s hand, classic united front body language. “It’s not like we’re thrilled about the prospect of her joining in, but we can’t stop her. She’s too clever and too capable. At least if we allow her to participate, we get to set the ground rules instead of her sneaking off to do what she wants how she wants behind our backs.”
End Game (The Foundling Series) Page 15
