A Flicker of Steel

by Steve McHugh

  Jared placed the book on the bed and almost ran to the bathroom.

  8

  Layla was fast asleep when the door to her bedroom was flung open and someone shouted for her to get up. She opened one eye, saw the time on the bedside clock, and was about to tell them where they could stick their 3:27 a.m. wake-up call when she saw that it was Sky standing in the doorway. It couldn’t be even slightly good. Layla sat up. “Why are you here?” she asked.

  “Because someone drew the short straw to get everyone in this place up, and that someone was me. You first, then I’ll wake everyone else.”

  “Why me first?”

  “You want to keep asking questions or would you rather come talk to my dad, Olivia, and the others to find out what’s going on?”

  “Others?” Layla still felt a little groggy. She had stayed up late with Jared, watching a movie, before he’d gone home, but now she wished she’d gone to sleep earlier.

  Sky crossed over to the bed and handed Layla a mug of coffee; the smell removed any remaining semblance of sleep almost immediately. “I’m up,” Layla said, putting the coffee on the table and getting out of bed.

  “Downstairs in five,” Sky said. “Wear something suitable for a mission. Weaponry will be given to you when you leave.”

  “Leave?”

  Sky crossed her arms.

  “I’m up,” Layla said, standing. “I’m up, and completely awake, Captain Sleepkill.”

  “That was awful.” Sky chuckled and left the room to go wake the others. Layla almost felt bad for her having to get Remy out of bed, but she looked at the clock again and any near-empathy vanished.

  Layla got dressed in a pair of jeans and some heavy black boots and pulled a black hoodie over a t-shirt. If she needed body armor she’d be given some, along with weapons, by the quartermaster of the main compound. She went out the front door to the sounds of Remy being woken, and she pictured his unhappy reaction. Chloe, Harry, and Kase were already outside when Layla arrived.

  “Any idea what’s going on?” Harry asked. “It’s too early to be this cold.”

  Chloe hopped from one booted foot to the other. “It’s never the time to be this cold.”

  “I’m okay,” Kase said with a smile. “Werewolves are hard to freeze, even in human form.”

  “Are all werewolves as smug as you?” Layla asked.

  “No. Just me,” Kase said, and started walking toward the village exit.

  “Doesn’t it strike you as odd that, apart from the guards on duty, no one else is awake?” Harry asked.

  “Cruel,” Chloe replied. “The word is cruel.”

  It didn’t take long for the four friends to reach the walkway, and as the travelator took them across the compound, Layla began to run through the possible reasons for their early wake-up call. Had someone been hurt on a mission? No, if that was the case, why wake up their whole household?

  “I don’t have any idea, either,” Chloe said to Layla. “I assume that’s what you’re thinking about.”

  Kase sighed. “I just don’t know what else could possibly go wrong at this point. We’re fugitives from Avalon and we live in a hollowed-out mountain in Greenland. Are they going to cut our Wi-Fi now? Did you download too much music and films, Harry?”

  Harry shrugged. “Define ‘too much’. We’re not under attack: they’d need more than us for that.”

  They reached the end of the walkway and were greeted by Tommy and Olivia. “I’m sorry for the early rise,” Tommy said.

  “Liar,” Kase replied. “You’re beaming inside.”

  “Unfortunately, not this time,” Tommy said with a solemn expression.

  “Dad, what’s going on?” Kase asked.

  “We’ll explain in a minute,” Olivia assured them as they ushered the group through the compound and into an elevator, which took them down to the third of over a dozen floors, where several large offices were located.

  The hallway was covered with the same gray brick as the rest of the compound, although here someone had at least tried to make it look slightly more inviting by painting the walls an eggshell-blue color. The floor was white, and it made Layla imagine she was walking on a cloud, which probably wasn’t what the designers were going for. Or maybe it was, after all; she wasn’t particularly up on her interior decorating dos and don’ts.

  They stopped outside the third door on the left and Olivia went in first, revealing the massive room. It was fifty feet long and twenty feet wide and contained nothing but chairs: forty of them, all pointing toward the far wall. The room was closer to a hall than an office.

  Most of the chairs were occupied by people Layla knew by name and by face, but they weren’t the folk she usually hung out with. The majority of them were professional soldiers: people who had worked for Hades or one of the other big names, representing all who had joined together to fight when shit had well and truly hit the fan. Jared sat at the far end of the hall and he waved in Layla’s direction. He had completed a lot of training in order to be invited onto one of the military teams and Layla was exceptionally proud of his progress. She waved back and watched as Jared’s hair was tussled by a large man sitting behind him. Laughter broke out on that side of the room as the people he worked with teased him.

  Other familiar faces were present. Nabu and Irkalla, once considered Mesopotamian deities, had worked with Nergal many centuries ago. Diana was already with them, talking to Irkalla. The pair were close friends, and Layla was surprised to see Irkalla wave her over to a chair beside them.

  Layla, Chloe, Harry, and Kase all sat in the row with Diana, Irkalla, Nabu, and several people who Layla didn’t know.

  “How are your umbra powers coming along?” Irkalla asked as Layla sat next to her. Irkalla was roughly Layla’s height and build, with dark brown skin and long, dark-purple hair that was currently in a bun. Her deep-brown eyes always held a sparkle of mischief, which was probably why she got on so well with Remy.

  “Good, thanks,” Layla said, not sure how to respond.

  She saw Zamek, the Norse dwarf—his battle-ax strapped across his back—enter the room and sit in the front row. He turned around to face Layla and the others. “Any idea what’s going on?” he asked.

  “None,” Irkalla told him. “Hades and Persephone told me to be here, so here I am. That’s all the information I was given.”

  “Do you sleep with that thing on?” Harry asked Zamek. “I don’t think I’ve ever seen you without it.”

  “I sleep with it, but I don’t wear it,” Zamek said with a wink. “I spent hundreds of years in a place where blood elves tried to eat my face at a moment’s notice. You met them, didn’t you, Layla?”

  Layla nodded. “They worked for Nergal. It wasn’t a fun time in their company.”

  The blood elves had once been called shadow elves, before a civil war between them and the sun elves had resulted in a loss for them. Their imprisonment in one of the Norse dwarf realms had caused them to become something feral, vicious, and evil. Layla had seen many of them over the years, and the experience never got any better.

  “Ladies and gentlemen, my thanks to you for coming,” Persephone said as she entered and moved toward the front of the room. “I know it’s short notice, and I know it’s blasted freezing outside, but this is important.”

  Despite the sleep-deprived state of pretty much everyone in the room, Persephone had their undivided attention.

  “About an hour ago, we managed to get intel from one Alfred Carter: Nergal is mobilizing a force to attack Thunder Bay.”

  There were murmurs throughout the room.

  “Yes, I know what you’re all thinking: we’ve been expecting this, but how can we believe the words of a lying piece of crap? Well, we have checked in with Copper Harbor and Sault Ste. Marie, and the latter has already fallen to Avalon forces. It’s being kept off the news and the fighting there was minimal as we pulled our people some time ago. We knew this was going to happen sooner or later. We’re going to war.” />
  There were more murmurs, this time tinged with regret, sadness, and more than a little anger. Everyone in the room knew what being held prisoner by Nergal meant. They’d all seen the results of his hospitality, and the aftermath of the brutal methods he used. If he took prisoners, they would not be treated well, non-combatant or otherwise.

  “What do you need us to do?” Zamek asked.

  “We’ll get to that,” Persephone said. “But first, Layla, I need you to go with Hades.” She pointed at the door. “I think you’re going to want answers I can’t provide.”

  Chloe took hold of Layla’s hand and squeezed it slightly as Layla got to her feet and walked over to the office door where both Sky and Hades stood.

  “You okay?” Sky asked.

  “I don’t know,” Layla told her honestly. “What’s the rest of the meeting about?”

  “We’ll explain, I promise,” Hades said softly. “But you’re going to have questions that no one else in this room needs to hear.”

  “This is to do with my dad, isn’t it?”

  Hades nodded.

  Layla knew it. Whenever something awful happened, she always wondered if her father was involved. He’d been in jail for years, but he still managed to cause her problems. Caleb Cassidy was the All-American Ripper, a title bestowed on him by the media after he had murdered people in almost every state. Over three hundred people died at his hands, and each of them had committed a crime and gotten away with it. On the outside, Caleb Cassidy had been an FBI agent with an exemplary record, while on the inside he’d used his position to murder those he deemed to have escaped justice.

  Her father was an umbra with the ability to track anyone down, anywhere. All he needed was something they’d used and he was able to see where they were: the longer the personal connection to the item, the more powerful the vision. Caleb used his power not only to locate his victims, but also watch them go about their lives, meeting loved ones, doing other mundane things. He could stalk people from any distance without them sensing him watching them. It was a power that both Nergal and Avalon wanted to use to track down their enemies. And something Tommy, Hades, and the others very much wanted to avoid.

  Layla walked with Sky and Hades back toward the elevator, which they then took up to the main floor of the compound. They entered a spacious room with windows that overlooked the mountain range. Sometimes Layla forgot how beautiful the place was.

  Tommy and Olivia were already seated on one side of the large table. Both got up to greet Layla, motioning for her to sit. Hades and Sky sat beside the young woman who now just wanted answers.

  “After the whole issue with Nergal and Elias,” Tommy began, reminding Layla of the man who had kidnapped her in the hope that she would put him in touch with her father. Nergal had then murdered her friends and been responsible for her finding a spirit scroll and becoming an umbra; then he’d tried to murder her and everyone she cared for. In short, they weren’t good memories. “Your father was moved. We couldn’t have anyone discovering where he was. We asked you if you wanted to know the location.”

  Layla remembered her reply. “I said no, and to bury him somewhere he’ll never be found.”

  “Well, only two people knew his new location,” Olivia said. “I was one.”

  “And I was the other,” Tommy replied. “We felt it was safer if it never went further. Your father was placed in a human prison that contained a wing covered in runes and used as a stop-gap for criminals with more-than-human characteristics. He was only meant to be there for a short time, but circumstances changed and the new political landscape made moving him a dangerous proposition.”

  “So you left him there?” Layla asked. It wasn’t a criticism; it was, quite frankly, what she would have done.

  Tommy nodded. “Safest place for him. He couldn’t hurt anyone, he couldn’t get out, and he certainly wasn’t about to draw attention to himself.”

  “Does Nergal know where he is?” Layla asked.

  “We don’t know,” Tommy admitted. “But the prison where your father is being housed is unfortunately close to Thunder Bay.”

  “We’re putting together two teams,” Olivia said. “One will go to the prison to retrieve your father, and the second is a strike force to provide support should the need arise.”

  “You want me to go in there,” Layla said. It wasn’t phrased as a question.

  “We need you to, yes,” Tommy said. “We have only one person he trusts at our disposal. And that’s you. We could only move him without you last time because we gave him something he wanted.”

  “What?”

  “His wedding ring,” Olivia said. “That was his one request.”

  “Why not just drug him?” Layla asked.

  “He’s an umbra with what appears to be a high level of power,” Hades said. “Unfortunately, we have no way of accurately gauging how powerful while he’s in the rune inscribed room. And we don’t want to take him out of it without some measure of assurance that he won’t do something stupid.”

  “Hence me,” Layla said.

  “If we knew he’d cooperate, or that we could drug him, we would have moved him here, but no one saw Arthur turning into a monster coming,” Hades said. “And by the time he had, we figured it’d be best not to draw attention to Caleb. That judgment has changed.”

  “Do you think that Nergal’s forces will be waiting for us?” Layla asked. It was something she’d always been concerned about. Nergal wanted her father and had kidnapped and tortured Layla to try to get her to cooperate with him, too. Two years ago, his people had murdered her friends and destroyed her life. So she’d become an umbra and agreed to help Tommy fight against Avalon’s enemies. And six months later, Avalon became the enemy. Arthur and his allies had seen to that. Layla wasn’t about to let what had happened to her be for nothing.

  “That’s why we’re sending you in with a team,” Tommy said. “Nergal wants Caleb, and he’s about to march on Thunder Bay. Once he takes the city, he’ll head toward Red Rock, where Nergal knows we have a realm gate. Alfred said as much. But Alfred also said that Nergal wasn’t going to war until the next batch of scrolls had been delivered, so apparently we’ve been moved up his schedule. It’s possible that Nergal’s forces will be there. We’re unsure if they know about Caleb’s location, or if you’ll just encounter them, but either way we can’t leave it to chance.”

  “I’ve known Nergal for many years,” Hades said. “Caleb is the prize he wants above all others: a way to find all those who oppose Arthur; a way to remove problems before they arise. It’s a nightmare scenario.”

  One thought occurred to Layla, and it wasn’t one she really wanted to consider. But it needed to be asked. “What are your strike teams’ orders if Nergal’s people get hold of my dad?”

  “If the members of the team can help him to escape, we go with that option,” Sky said.

  “And if we can’t?” Layla asked, knowing where it would lead, but wanting to hear them say it.

  “We kill him,” Hades said without pause. “He either comes with us, or he dies. There’s no third option.”

  Layla hated her father. He had ruined everything she’d ever loved as a child, forced her to undergo intensive training at a young age, and taught her to hurt people. Her father had done everything in his power to make her a weapon, although she still had no idea why, beyond his paranoid delusions about people coming to get them. It had taken Layla a long time to get over the crap that he’d stuck in her head, and even longer to talk about him with a detached coolness that only just betrayed the anger she felt at his continued existence. But despite the anger, and hatred, and resentment, she couldn’t kill him. And that was something she needed the others in the room to understand. “My father is a monster. But I don’t think I can kill him,” she said. “Who’s going to be in my team?”

  “Diana, Kase, Chloe, Remy, Irkalla, and Zamek,” Olivia said. “It’s a good mix of skills, and you’ve worked with all but Zamek and Irkalla bef
ore. Commander Fenix will lead the second group. I believe Jared is part of the strike team. We wanted people you knew and trusted to be with you. The strike team will accompany you to the cell area and wait for you to collect your father.”

  Each of them was a good person who Layla trusted. “So, who gets the job of killing my father?”

  “Irkalla will take his spirit,” Sky said. “That way, any information he has will be retained.”

  Layla sighed. She liked Irkalla a lot and knew she would kill Caleb without hesitation should the need arise. “I hope Irkalla knows what she’s got herself into.”

  “She is a last option,” Hades said. “She won’t do it unless it’s completely necessary. We’d rather we got your father back here so we can talk to him.”

  “You want him for the same reasons as Nergal,” Layla said. “Two sides of the same coin.”

  “We won’t use the information to slaughter innocent people,” Olivia said. “You know that, right?”

  Layla knew Olivia was telling the truth. But the idea of using her father for anything sat badly with her. She didn’t want her father to help either side; she didn’t want him to do anything but sit in a small room with a tiny window and watch the world pass him by. She wanted him to be punished and allowing him to use his power didn’t seem like a punishment, especially considering that Caleb wouldn’t just hand over that information for free. He would want something in return to play ball. “I’m finding it hard to comprehend that I’m discussing the murder of my father with Hades, his daughter, and my best friend’s parents. It’s . . . disturbing.”

  “I understand that,” Olivia said.

  “I don’t think you do,” Layla told her. “I’m not sure there’s anything else in the world that’s quite as strange as having this conversation.”

  “You’re right,” Tommy said. “This is weird and messed up, and an absolutely shitty thing to put on your shoulders. To bring you in here, ask you to retrieve your dad, and tell you that we’ll kill him if he falls into enemy hands, or refuses to leave . . . that’s shitty, and I wish that it didn’t have to be this way. I wish this could be resolved without death, and without your involvement. But you’re a smart woman and a massive asset to our organization. If we’d misled you, or secretly kept information from you, you’d have felt betrayed and hurt, and none of us here want that. We’ve told you the worst-case scenario because we feel that we owe you the truth. Part of the reason Avalon is now in the state it’s in is because of all the hidden deals and shady bullshit that happened over the centuries. When we defeat Arthur and his Avalon—and we will—we’ll need something better to replace it, and frankly, I don’t want to start whatever it will be by lying to our allies and friends.”