“You look stupid,” Jack told him.
“Exactly,” George agreed. “The object has to be something inconspicuous. And usually the object will be inert until the user focuses their magic into it.”
“So wait,” Gaston said. “It won’t work for just anyone?”
“No,” George said. “You have to have some magic talent in emotional manipulation already. These devices just make that kind of magic stronger. Since Yonker manipulates a crowd, you’re looking for something with range, so the magic goes out at a wide angle. Like a crown or some sort of device he holds between himself and them.”
“He wouldn’t wear a crown,” Audrey said. “This is an American congregation we’re talking about. They wouldn’t stand for that.
“So first we have to find out what the device looks like,” Kaldar said. “Then we make a copy.”
“Out of what?” Audrey stared at him.
“Memory plaster,” Kaldar said. “The Mirror gave me a tub of it. If you expose it to the right magic, it will mimic glass, metal, or wood. Gaston is very good with it.”
Audrey frowned. “And again, to get that close to Yonker very fast, we’ll need money. Lots and lots of money.”
“I am confused,” Jack said.
“So am I,” George said.
“Yeah, can we be in on the plan?” Gaston asked.
“Let me explain,” Kaldar said. “Yonker has a magic gadget that manipulates people’s emotions. He is probably keeping it in the camp in the woods. We need to steal that gadget.”
“I got that part,” Jack said. “But how do we steal it?”
“There are two ways,” Kaldar continued. “First, we must find out where and how the gadget is guarded. To find that out, we’ll need to infiltrate Yonker’s camp, which is why we’re going with this plan.”
“You’re getting them more confused,” Audrey said. “Can I step in here for a second?”
“Sure.” Kaldar invited her with a sweep of his hand.
“This heist is called Night and Day,” Audrey said. “There are two teams: Day team and Night team. The two teams pretend not to know each other. Jack and George will be the Night team.
Jack exhaled. Finally. Something to do besides sitting on the wyvern. Yes!
Audrey continued. “Yonker’s church takes in runaway children. You boys will pretend to be runaways, get Yonker church people to let you work for the church, and try to get into the camp. Once in the camp, George, you can use your necromancy to find the gadget and figure out how heavily it’s protected. You have to be sneaky and avoid attracting attention.”
“Meanwhile,” Kaldar added, “Audrey and I will be the Day team. We will approach Yonker out in the open and draw a lot of attention to ourselves. Yonker will concentrate on us.”
“Here comes the fun part.” Audrey smiled. “If the gadget isn’t well protected, then the Night team will either steal it or tell us, and we’ll sneak in and steal it together.”
Kaldar nodded. “If the gadget is too well protected, then the Day team will swap the real gadget for the fake one in broad daylight, pocket the real item, and walk right out of there.”
Gaston raised his hand. “Question: what happens when Yonker figures out that the gadget is a fake?”
“All hell will break loose,” Kaldar said. “But the gadget switch should buy us enough time to get out.”
“And if it doesn’t?” Gaston asked.
“Then we go to Plan C and cut our way out,” Kaldar said.
“I like that plan,” Gaston said.
“Let’s hope it won’t come to that.” Audrey looked at George, then at Jack. “This heist usually takes a lot of time. We don’t have time because that blond bitch is on our trail. We’ll be very rushed. There can be no mistakes, guys. No room for error. Do you understand?”
Jack nodded. No mistakes, got it.
“And if we tell you to get out, you run,” Audrey said. “You run, and you don’t look back.”
“Listen to her,” Kaldar said. “If we pull the plug in the middle of the heist, you two walk away. Clear?”
Jack nodded again.
“Can the two of you handle pretending to be runaways for a couple of days?” Kaldar asked.
George nodded. “We can do it.”
“You don’t have to if you don’t want to,” Audrey said. “These are unscrupulous people. We don’t know what they will do, but we may not be there to help you. It’s real, and it’s dangerous.”
And they were not babies. “We’ll be fine,” Jack said. “I’ll take care of George.”
“I’m not worried about George.” Kaldar stared at him. It was a dominant, hard stare. Jack felt invisible hackles rise on his back. To the right, Gaston rose, his jaw set, and moved to stand by Kaldar’s side. Gaston’s silvery eyes glared at Jack. Ready to fight.
“Why would you worry about me?”
“You’re a whiny baby,” Gaston said.
What?
“You like to feel sorry for yourself, Jack,” Kaldar said. “It’s all about Jack, all the time.”
Inside him, the Wild gathered itself into a tight ball, all fur and teeth.
“Poor, poor Jack,” Audrey said. Her voice was sweet, but her eyes mocked him. “Everyone’s mean to you. What will you do? There is no room to run away to this time, and Rose won’t help you.”
How does she know about my sister?
The Wild snarled. They had all ganged up on him. Jack’s heart hammered in his chest. His claws prickled the inside of his hands. He glanced at George. His brother stood there, his face calm, like he was a complete stranger.
“Selfish and stupid,” Kaldar said. “That’s you.”
“Good for nothing,” Gaston added.
The Wild screamed and scratched inside Jack, straining to break free. He wanted to grow teeth and claws and dash into the forest. No, he had to stand his ground. Changing in the Edge wasn’t like changing in the Weird. It hurt, and it lasted half a minute. They would kill him before he was done.
The world distilled itself to painful clarity. He had to defend himself. He couldn’t let them take him.
Why? They were friends—why would they do this? Why didn’t George do anything?
“You’re on your own,” George said. “Don’t ask me for help, crybaby.”
Traitor. Jack looked into his brother’s eyes. They were blue and calm, almost peaceful. George always helped him. Always. Even when everyone else turned away.
This was wrong. George would never turn on him.
It’s a test, he suddenly realized. They were testing him to see if he would snap and give himself away. They were watching him carefully, trying to gauge what he would do.
Jack’s instincts told him to bite back as hard as he could. But that was what they expected of him, then he’d be stuck in that clearing by himself, while George went out to spy and probably fight. George was good with his rapier but not that good.
Jack pushed the Wild back into its hole. It clawed him, refusing to go, and he had to force it, step by step. It hurt. His mouth tasted bitter. Finally, he shoved it deep inside, into its usual place. It must’ve taken only a couple of moments, but to him it felt like forever.
The colors lost some of their sharpness, the scents faded just a fraction. He stepped away from the edge of the cliff.
Jack took a deep breath and forced himself to smile. “That’s okay. If I get in trouble, I’ll just mop up my tears with George’s hair.”
It was a lame joke, but that was all he could manage.
Audrey was looking at him, and her eyes were kind again.
“Good man,” Kaldar said. “There is hope for you yet.”
Gaston walked over and punched his shoulder.
Jack breathed. He was terribly tired all of a sudden.
“Okay, now we’ll need money,” Audrey said. “And a lot of it. Preferably owned by some ass, so I won’t feel bad stealing from him. Gaston, any candidates?”
Gaston raised his blac
k eyebrows. “How do you feel about a slaver? Rumor says he doesn’t believe in banks. He keeps all his money in his mansion in the Edge.”
Kaldar raised his hand. “Sold!”
“Oh, really?” Audrey crossed her arms. “So I guess you’ll be breaking into this mansion all on your own without my help.”
“I could,” Kaldar said. “But I would get caught.”
“In that case, how about I decide if we’re sold or not?”
Gaston waved his notebook. “Maybe the two of you should let me tell you about the guy first.”
Jack heard them bicker, but the words barely sank in. His legs grew weak, as if all his muscles had turned to mush. He took a couple of steps back and half sat, half fell, on the grass. Exhaustion claimed him. He took rapid, shallow breaths.
George came over and sat next to him. “The Wild?”
Jack nodded. He had beat it back that time. But it was so hard, much harder than it had been before in the parking lot. He had won this time. There would be a next time, and he wasn’t sure who would win then.
TEN
KALDAR lay on a low ridge, wearing one of the Mirror’s night suits. The fabric, painted with swirls in a dozen shades of gray, hugged his body, formfitting but too elastic to hinder his movements. With the hood hiding his hair and his face painted gray and black, he supposed he resembled a ninja.
It was good that nobody could see him because he looked completely ridiculous.
Although, come to think of it, the suits did have their advantages. For example, if one had decent night vision, he could admire the way the stretchy fabric clung to Audrey’s incredibly shapely ass . . .
“Kaldar,” Audrey hissed. “Stop looking at my butt.”
Behind them, Gaston made some choked-up noises that might have been coughing but really resembled chortling.
She had a sixth sense. That had to be it. He would never again take woman’s intuition lightly.
She leaned closer, her whisper so quiet he had to strain to hear it. “Do you ever take anything seriously?”
“No.”
Audrey shook her head and raised her binoculars to her eyes, looking down on the house three miles below. Kaldar picked up his binoculars and looked, too. The full moon ducked in and out of torn clouds, dappling the building with patches of silvery light and deep shadow. The house sat in the middle of the shallow valley, surrounded by palms and greenery. The building rose two stories high, with white arches sheltering a long front porch under a bright orange roof. Five thousand square feet, at least. A tennis court stretched in front of the house. To the left, a fenced-in field contained a horse course with white gates. Farther back, a barn loomed, and next to it a caretaker’s house. To the right, a picturesque pool gleamed in the weak moonlight. Except for a gun tower behind the house and the ring of metal spikes circling the house, which served as anchors for the defensive spells, the place looked like a tropical resort built by a Spanish family with unlimited funds.
The humble abode of Arturo Pena. Kaldar gritted his teeth. If houses could tell stories, this one would bleed.
According to Gaston, Arturo Pena prayed on coyotes, the human traffickers who ferried illegals from Mexico into the embrace of the State of California. Arturo and his band of hired lowlifes ambushed the coyote vehicles, extracted the cargo, and sold the people in the Democracy of California’s slave markets. Half of the people died making the crossing into the Weird. The other half followed shortly thereafter. There was a reason why the robber barons always needed fresh bodies to till the fields, build their castles, and fight in their armies.
Nobody ever missed Pena’s victims. The Broken’s California didn’t know they existed; the Broken’s Mexico lost jurisdiction once they left its borders, and the victims themselves had no idea where they were taken. Those who ran away never found their way back across the boundary.
Pena was a sonovabitch of the first order. His name was spoken in whispers. The local Edgers feared him, but for the most part, he left them alone, and they did the same—which said something considering that Arturo Pena didn’t believe in banks and was rumored to keep large sums of cash in his house. It made sense, Kaldar decided. Putting money in the bank resulted in questions. Money earned interest, which was reported. Arturo Pena avoided all that transparency by hiding all of his blood money in his house, in a supposedly unbreakable safe. A tempting ripe plum for any Edger.
Kaldar focused the binoculars at the circle of iron spikes. The ward extended in a rough oval shape around the house, not including the barn or the caretaker’s dwelling. The ward couldn’t be very old—the house looked too new. Still, the defensive spell presented a problem. It kept out anything magical, including people with magic and sometimes even those without. Screwing with it would be like ringing a warning bell because anyone with any magic sensitivity would come running.
This was impossible. They should’ve gone with his plan: stroll up to the front door and con their way in. He had tried suggesting that, but both Audrey and Gaston refused. It seemed that Arturo Pena had a habit of shooting visitors in the face first and checking identification second.
Next to Audrey, Ling crouched on the slope.
Kaldar leaned to Audrey, and whispered, “I still don’t understand why we had to bring that creature.”
“Because she helps,” Audrey told him “You really should use her given name. You might hurt her feelings.”
And she nagged him about not taking things seriously. “How exactly is she going to help?”
Audrey nodded at Ling. “See how she’s quiet? This means Pena has no dogs. Don’t move. I’ll be back in a minute.”
She slithered backward and, bending low, ran to the right along the ridge. Ling followed her. He watched them go, then Gaston landed in her place, his dark hair obscuring his field of vision.
“If you keep taking her side instead of mine, I’ll have to disown you,” Kaldar murmured.
“I’m crushed.” Gaston pantomimed being struck in the heart.
“That’s right. Don’t forget whose rolpies are pulling your boat.” Walking up to the front door was still a better way to go. Getting through the wards without noise would be impossible. Suppose something went wrong with Audrey’s brilliant plan. How many guards would they have to deal with?
“Uncle?”
“Mmm?”
“Arturo Pena. He’s a slaver. A scumbag.”
“Yes?”
“Why don’t we just kill him?”
Kaldar paused.
Gaston shrugged. “With the equipment we have, we could slice through that ward. Walk in, kill him, and once his guys realized that their paycheck was dead, they would scatter.”
“You’ve spent too much time with the wolf,” Kaldar said.
“William is efficient.”
“He is that.” This would have to be said just right. “What’s the difference between you and me and a murderer?”
“A murderer kills out of passion or for money. We kill for our country.”
Kaldar shook his head. “We kill to keep our people safe. ‘Country’ has a nice ring to it, but it doesn’t really get to the heart of the matter. Families, Gaston. Our family. Your brothers, your cousins, uncles, aunts, grandmother. We do this so they can sleep in their beds at night, worry about their daily problems, and have delicious berry wine on their porch while their kids play in the grass.”
Gaston smirked. “I never knew you were all about noble purpose and grandeur.”
“I’m not. Tell me, what do you want out of this life?”
“Vengeance for our family.”
“And then?”
The boy shrugged again. “I don’t know.”
“You think, eventually you might want to be like those people we’re protecting and start a family?”
“Sure.”
“You might find some funny girl to be your wife, have some kids, someone to come home to?”
“Yeah, I guess it would be nice.”
“
This job, if you let it, will burn every shred of humanity out of your soul. It will chew you up and spit out an empty husk. If you don’t take care, you’ll be hollow like an empty casket. No pretty, funny girl for your wife, no home, no love, no laughter, nothing.” Kaldar paused to make sure it sank in. “You’ve seen the old Mirror agents. They walk jingling enough medals on their chests to be their own marching bands, but their eyes are dead. That isn’t what you want.”
“At the end of the day, they know they’ve done their job.”
“That satisfaction doesn’t keep them warm at night. It’s no substitute for a life or a clear conscience.” Kaldar pointed at the house. “Every time you get into a situation like this, I want you to think of our family. If one of us asks you why you killed or maimed or tortured, you need to be able with a clear conscience to say, ‘There was no other way.’”
“William . . .”
“William has Cerise,” Kaldar said. “And she has a temper, and she kills, but she is also kind and compassionate. Cerise seeks balance in all things. William listens to her because he knows she has something he lacks. It’s not his fault; the Adrianglians did their best to murder any humanity he had in him when he was a child. And even he has some lines he won’t cross. I once saw him run into an open field, in plain view of the enemy’s guns and bows, to save Lark, with no regard for his own life.”
“That was different! Lark is a kid.”
“Can you tell me for sure that there are no children in that house? Can you tell me that one won’t run out and be caught in the cross fire? Are you prepared to murder Pena while his family watches?”
Gaston opened his mouth and closed it.
“You must hold on to your humanity, nephew, so when it’s time to return to your house for a family dinner, you can do so as a happy man. At some point, you will have a son or a daughter. When you come home, you need to be able to look your wife and children in the eye.”
Gaston looked at the house.
“We kill only when we have no other choice. Is Pena a scumbag? Sure he is. But he’s outside of the scope of our job. We are not judges. Remember, we do only what is necessary. We need his money, and we’ll take it—because it’s dirty and we can. But until he levels a gun on another human being, we will not take his life. Am I clear?”
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