by Mark Henwick
“Amber, Jari, are you both completely clear on this?”
My life, and the life of everyone I declared to be in my House, would depend on the colonel’s loyalty. If he were kin, the binding would ensure this. If we agreed he wasn’t going to be kin, I was dependent on his word. I might have to kill him. Skylur might have the whole House killed.
We needed the colonel. Not just me and Altau, the whole of Panethus needed the colonel. Which meant I needed to take this risk.
“I understand,” I said, sounding half strangled. The colonel just nodded. He’d gone as pale as I felt.
“Take it as read that the ordinary package will exceed what could be expected in an equivalent role for the army. You would be seconded from House Farrell to live and work here. Your ability to come and go would be the responsibility of your House under the obligations I’ve explained. At your choice, you could enjoy kin benefits from Altau without further commitment.”
Naryn’s brow furrowed.
Skylur ignored him, his eyes fixed on the colonel and me. “Given that, are you willing to commit to us?”
The colonel and Vera looked at me. I read the apprehension in his eyes about the effect of his decision on me and my House. But did I trust the colonel? Of course. Sweat chilling my brow, I nodded.
He and Vera looked silently at each other, before he turned to Skylur. “I am,” he said.
At that moment, my cell beeped an incoming message—V team – Target acquired.
Verano’s team. The bounty hunters had found something already. There was no way I was going to let this descend into a scrabble.
Skylur waved me out.
Chapter 39
The TacNet headset whispered with messages as I flicked through onto the command channel, heading into the city.
“V1, this is Charlie,” I said. “Update.”
“Charlie, this is V2. V1 en route. We are at Zuni 3. We have positive sign. Mixed multiple. We have a perimeter this side of the river with two teams and a reserve. We are undetected, but unable to contain should they move. Request instructions.”
Zuni 3 was the grid reading. It was a small industrial area between the interstate and the river. It was much closer in to the city than I had hoped for. Not a pedestrian shopping area, but enough offices and factories around that there would be witnesses and bystanders.
Mixed multiple just meant there were more than one marque detectable. Not even Were noses could count the number of people in a building.
“V2, fall back as far as you can without breaking surveillance. Do not engage. Await reinforcement and further instructions. Charlie out.”
I keyed in the Denver pack frequency.
“Sierra or Uniform, this is Charlie,” I said. Silas or Ursula.
“Ursula,” she said. “Drop the military bullshit.”
I huffed. Amateur hour.
“Okay Ursula, I need everyone available at Zuni and 13th. Verano teams have got mixed multiple.”
I checked the map as I spoke.
“Mixed?” she said.
“Yeah. I think the Matlal Were might just be hosting some Confederation guests. That gives us a tactical problem. We can’t afford to give the Confederation an excuse—”
“I’m not stupid.”
“Good. Then you’ll get forty people, split into four teams on the east side of the river. You’ll put another team on the west side, just across the rail bridge. You’ll do it within fifteen minutes. And you’ll wait for my instructions. Out.”
It wasn’t a minor point I’d been trying to make. Any deaths on the Matlal Were side could be justified. They were trespassing, and their purpose was clear.
But Confederation Were casualties, even though they didn’t have permission to be in Denver, was a problem for pack—the Confederation could use it as an excuse to push into Denver.
And casualties on our side would be another problem.
Bian came through on the control channel. She’d stayed behind at the meeting with the colonel, but it sounded as if that’d ended.
“Not forgetting to invite me, are you?” she said sweetly.
“You have the information, Pussycat. See you there.”
The Matlal Were hadn’t picked this place as carefully as the Oaxaca diner up in Swansea. Sure, there were the same sort of escape routes—a railway, running trails along the Platte, a freeway not far, but there were too many people around. They must’ve wanted to impress the Confederation with how deep into Denver they could operate. Mistake for them; we’d caught them. Headache for me; with people around, it was going to be near impossible to contain this.
And I had volunteered for this? Had I learned nothing in the army?
Fifteen minutes later and the headache hadn’t magically gone away. I had a solution and no one was going to like. Hell, I didn’t like it.
The Denver pack was in place. I was in a Verano SUV, peering down to where an orphaned spur of 13th Street stuttered out to nothing just before the Platte river. Cinderblock buildings and lockups leaned against each other like they were tired. Tattered square pane windows looked down onto the street or were blank-eyed where they’d been boarded up. Faded graffiti struggled with cheap whitewash that scabbed the walls. A solitary air conditioning unit hung half way off a wall where a truck had sideswiped it. Wires swung overhead and trailed down across the fronts of buildings. The smell of a small brewery behind me stole across the road.
I wished for just two squads of Ops 4-10. One would be through the roof and the other through the door, noisily or silently, but expertly. It would be over in two minutes.
Instead, I had enthusiastic but untrained Denver werewolves and a bunch of professional bounty hunters of unknown capabilities.
But sitting there wishing wasn’t going to change that.
“Verano teams,” I said into the TacNet system, “maintain position . Engagement rules are now red three. Confirm.”
The two patrols and one reserve team dutifully read back the statuses. They were now authorized to use their silenced weapons on anyone escaping. They were the safety net.
I got out of the Verano SUV.
“Denver teams one, two and three. Commence infiltration at rear on my mark. Silently. Confirm wearing markers.”
The team leaders answered, excitement building in their voices. They were wearing luminous road-workers’ safety vests. They hid the Kevlar vests beneath and stopped them being accidentally shot by Verano. I hoped.
Bian hadn’t got here yet, but I couldn’t wait.
“Denver four, you drive your van down the road right behind me.”
I started walking and I could hear the sound of their tires creeping on the road.
“If they attack me, Denver four, your job is to alert the other teams and bottle them in the building. And make sure that van is blocking the view.”
I was more nervous than I should be, repeating instructions I’d already gone through with them. Back in Ops 4-10 days, my teams hit hard, left the scene and didn’t come back. I couldn’t do that with the pack in my home town. And I couldn’t alert the police or let bystanders get too curious about what was going on.
All of which meant it came down to me.
“Denver one, two, three—go, go, go.” Three teams began working on boarded over windows at the back and I hammered on the door, hidden from the rest of the street by the van behind me.
One possible reaction was a gutful of shotgun pellets through the door, but I didn’t want to dwell on that. No time now anyway.
The door opened a crack and slammed shut again.
Message delivered.
I got out of the way, but no blast came through.
There were noises inside, a shimmer of the Call from the Denver pack, then the TacNet hissed. “It’s Ursula,” she said. “They tried the back. Three of them down.”
“Hold position.”
I took another deep breath, stood in front of the door and knocked again. The scent of Matlal and other Were mingled wi
th the acrid smells from gunfire and fear slipping out of the house.
The door opened a fraction.
The same sort of messages that reached my nose would be reaching whoever was behind the door. Denver pack and Athanate. They’d be thinking they were trapped in a building and not only surrounded by Were, but Athanate as well.
The weak point of my plan was that was a very different message for the two different groups inside. The Matlal Were would probably think they had nothing to lose. Shooting me would be a good first step. The Confederation, however, might see a way out with talking.
More noise inside—a struggle and shouting. The two groups had seen they’d got a conflict of interest.
It took every ounce of control not to haul the HK out and lead a charge. They’d be distracted. It was the ideal time for an assault, but that wasn’t my plan.
Top is behind my shoulder, standing at parade rest. Tall as a tower, dark face unreadable.
“You going in, soldier?”
“No, Top.”
“Why not?”
“No idea of building layout or enemy numbers. No idea how good my team is. Absolute requirement to keep it covert.”
“Good answer, soldier. Good answer.”
I smiled sadly.
The door opened enough for me to see a face. Beneath it, a barrel pointed at me. I sniffed and slowly folded my arms. It’d slow me down if things went south, but I’d be dead anyway, and until I was dead I was going to keep sending messages. I sniffed again. Despite the gun pointed at me, this was the person I wanted to see.
“Well, well, the Confederation sneaks back in again,” I said. It was a guess, but a safe one.
“Who the hell are you?”
He’d be sensing the Athanate marque and the Denver Were marque from the team behind me. A confusing smell, but I was hoping he would concentrate on the main point. It wasn’t just Were here.
“House Farrell, affiliate of Altau and tasked with cleaning the area of undesirables…and the uninvited.”
“Since when do Altau get involved in Were politics?” he snarled.
“Since it’s in our back yard. And that’s a big back yard now. Have you any idea the shit you’re in? No, stupid question, of course you don’t.”
His face remained carefully blank, but the pause told me I’d rattled him.
“Now, we’ve already told you, politely, that we don’t support you moving in on Denver.” Well, I hoped Skylur had been polite. “And still you come back.”
“It’s Were business.”
“It’s not when you’re dealing with slaves from an Athanate House that not even Basilikos recognize any more.”
“They aren’t tied to Matlal anymore.”
“You know that because they told you?” I laughed. “But you better hope that’s true, because by that slender thread hangs your whole federation.”
He blinked. His eyes slid past me to the van behind. The panel was open just enough for him to see and sense the waiting Were. The Call was muted, like a distant trumpet, but if I could feel it, so could he. The Confederation had to have achieved a lot of what it had by negotiation, not aggression. They’d have people who thought on their feet, and they’d have sent someone like that down here to assess.
He still hesitated, so I pushed again.
“That’s right, Mr. Confederation. Athanate and Were working together. Just think of that, all the way up your little Rocky Mountain federation. Altau has claimed all of North America. Any Houses not willing to swear allegiance are leaving. As far as you’re concerned, from now on, Athanate means Altau, and Altau will work with local packs. Whether they work with the Confederation depends on exactly how much you can credibly deny supporting our enemies.”
No, Skylur hadn’t just died and assigned me control over Altau diplomatic strategy, but I’d carefully not committed Altau to anything. The threat was all there by implication.
His ongoing silence and jittery eyes confirmed he understood the problem. The worst outcome, if he believed my threat, was that the Confederation could suffer attacks from neighboring packs supported by Altau. Or even attacks from Altau Houses in their own established territories. The best outcome was their expansion had just come to a crashing halt—and history was littered with the corpses of empires that had stopped expanding and succumbed to internal problems.
He licked his lips. “You’re not Altau. You’re bluffing.”
He wasn’t sure, but he’d go along with whatever I said. The alternative was the deaths of every Confederation Were in the building. He was a realist; he’d already written off the Matlal Were. All he was trying to do now was gauge from my responses exactly how much of a problem the Confederation was in.
For me, my marque senses told me that had just become academic. My stomach tensed as I counted the approaching footsteps.
“Is she, Iversen?” Bian said from behind me. “What are you going to bet on that? The whole Confederation? I thought we’d made our position clear when you came calling?”
“Diakon,” he said quietly, and I could see the scenarios re-running through his head.
“You were just leaving?” Bian said.
“Maybe I should stay while the rest of them go,” he replied. “The situation seems to have changed. It’s probably a good idea for me to talk to you again. To ensure understanding.”
No lack of balls then. As if balls made a difference. Fragile, sensitive things in my experience.
“All of you?” Bian said.
His eyes flicked to me and the van behind me, returned to Bian.
I guessed he still had a problem. Maybe the team he’d brought down from the Confederation was outnumbered by the Matlal Were in the building. I’d heard the struggle inside between Confederation and Matlal. Since he was still alive, most likely it had ended in a standoff. He was now wondering whether the offer still stood for him and his team to get out if we then had to go get the Matlal Were.
“All of them,” I said quickly, before my better judgment could back out of it.
He jerked back to face me.
“You’ll take the Matlal Were out of Denver and return with them to Confederation territory.” I could feel the Denver pack stir all around me, the unhappy, growling variant of the Call. From Bian, silence. “How you deal with them, and any impact it has on any Athanate, or any pack outside of your territory, will affect how Altau deal with you in future.”
The TacNet was still on. I heard Ursula’s indrawn breath. Her reaction was key. She was Larimer’s lieutenant here, not me.
“Ursula?” I said into the mike.
Seconds ticked by. Despite the cold air, sweat gleamed on Iversen’s brow. His gun hadn’t moved an inch. I wondered morbidly just how much damage I could survive as an Athanate.
Then Ursula came back. “Yes,” she said. Tense, not quite a snarl.
Iversen looked back to Bian.
She shrugged. “What she says.”
∞ ∞ ∞ ∞ ∞
The Confederation had come down in a little eighteen-seat coach with ‘Happy Mountain Tours’ written down the side alongside grinning wolf cub emblem. Cute.
The Matlal Were had drug gang SUVs.
We arranged for their vehicles to be brought around and watched them load up, mixing the two groups between the four vehicles.
One of the Verano team had a camera, and every face that came out the building got captured. The Confederation looked confident and alert—too much for my liking. The Matlal looked like they were in the last chance saloon. Maybe they were.
I stopped a Matlal Were. “Where are the rest of them?”
His head was already down and he didn’t want to look at me.
“They’re going wild. They went off. We don’t know where.”
I grabbed his jaw and lifted his face. His eyes slid from side to side and sweat beaded on his skin.
“Look at me.”
He managed to look at my chin.
“How many?”
“
Six,” he said hoarsely.
“And you claim you don’t know where. How were you going to square that with the Confederation? Claim to be a pack in residence leaving rogues to run free?”
He jerked his head side to side.
“Where?”
“Trailer park, top end of Commerce, near the aggregate depot.”
I squeezed harder. “And the Athanate?”
“Don’t know. Straight up.” He was shaking. His hands came up, but he didn’t dare touch me. “No lies. They don’t mix, man.”
I let him go and wiped my hand on my jeans.
Once they’d loaded, we let them drive off in convoy, with a couple of Denver pack SUVs following to make sure no one got lost.
I had the Verano team leader call in the cleanup crew. There were four bodies to dispose of—three killed by Ursula’s teams at the back and one from the struggle between Confederation and Matlal inside the building.
I wondered what the Confederation would do with them now. They’d been considering doing a deal with them as a rival Denver pack, so they had to believe they hadn’t been driven crazy by Matlal. Would they give them a territory inside their own? Seed them out to existing packs? Kill them?
Not my immediate concern.
“Denver one and two,” I spoke into the TacNet mike. “Check the building’s clear of anything else and then return to previous assignments. Verano patrol, continue searching your patch and well done on calling this one. Denver three and Verano reserve, go check the trailer park in Commerce City. Open mike when you get there. Break. Ricky, you on?”
“Got that,” Ricky replied quickly. “I’m in Arvada. On my way to rendezvous with team three and Verano reserve in Commerce.”
Team three went at a flat run, picking up the Verano guys without complaint.
Worked in the army, worked here.
No matter how much they distrusted each other, even a little action together fixed things. I wondered if Verano would be upset about it. I had the feeling he wanted his pack to keep aloof.
The other teams didn’t like their orders. They wanted to go kick Matlal ass or go party, not return to patrol. Tough. We had a whole city to search and there was no guarantee our information was any good. They trailed out once they finished checking, their equipment hidden in gym bags. Grumpy, but not overtly hostile to me. I’d take that.
