by Chloe Neill
* * *
• • •
We opened the store and kept ourselves busy, offered bottled water to the few Paras and Containment agents who came in, sat down at the community table, and talked through what had happened. We’d left a pile of scavenged fans on the counter—card-stock ads attached to pieces of wood shaped like Popsicle sticks. They fanned themselves as they talked, wiped cold bottled water—kept in an old-fashioned metal cooler with a literal block of ice—across their brows.
It seemed friendly, communal. But there was something beneath it. A tension that hadn’t been there at Tadji’s birthday party or my practice with the Sensitives. A new kind of fear. A new kind of waiting.
The anticipation of terrible things to come.
Burke had been called into the Cabildo, interrupting his and Tadji’s reunion, so she came to the store for the update. Tadji was normally stoic, but even she looked frazzled today.
“There’s something in the air,” Tadji said as we stood together behind the counter. A united front against . . . something.
“I know,” I said. “I feel it, too.”
“What do you think they’re going to do?” she asked, wiping away water that had settled on the counter.
“I don’t know. But I don’t think ‘judgment’ means anything good.”
“Yeah,” she said, and tucked a curl behind her ear. “That’s what I was afraid of.”
An agent in fatigues came in, but from the strong stride it was obvious he wasn’t there for refreshments or conversation. Tadji, Liam, and I watched him move toward us with a summons from the Commandant, delivered via a pretty card with gilded edges, a gold wax seal, and a flourished “G.”
“He always had a thing for good paper,” Tadji said, smiling at the card. “At least some things never change.”
“At least,” I said, and prepared for the beckoning.
* * *
• • •
The Cabildo had been the seat of New Orleans’s government, the seat of the Louisiana Supreme Court, a museum. Now it was Containment’s New Orleans headquarters. The interior was old—hardwood and columns and glass and chandeliers. There’d once been weddings in this space, brides and grooms making promises about love and lifetimes.
War had broken so many of the promises we’d made to one another.
I’d been to the Cabildo before Belle Chasse, had found Gunnar among the dozens of soldiers, analysts, assistants, and clerks who worked to keep Devil’s Isle running and secure. The mood had been subdued and bureaucratic, and I’d been nervous about the visit, because magic had still been banned, which made my existence illegal. But I wasn’t the enemy anymore, and there was a different energy in the building now, a focus that hadn’t been here before. The difference between soldiers in peace and soldiers in wartime.
The windows were open to let in the minimal cross breeze, with people fanning themselves as they worked.
Gunnar came striding toward us, offered bottles of water beading with condensation. Gavin walked behind him, his own bottle nearly half-empty.
“Sorry for the note,” Gunnar said. “I couldn’t get away.” He scooped a hand through his hair. He’d probably done that so many times today I was half-surprised he hadn’t tunneled grooves through it.
“No problem,” I said.
“You need food?” Liam asked. “We’ve got red beans and rice at the store.”
“I’m all right. Mariah brought by some tamales.”
“My Mariah?” I asked, glad he’d gotten food and jealous I hadn’t been the recipient. Mariah was a hell of a cook when she could get the ingredients.
“Your Mariah. Pork, masa, spices. Exquisite.”
“Jealous,” I admitted. “Although it’s gonna be hard for you to go back to MREs after that.” Week-old red beans and rice were less of a stretch, unless Gavin flattened and fried them into the cakes he took on scouting trips. Nutritious, but mouth-puckeringly dry.
Liam looked at his brother. “How’d you end up here?”
“I was in Algiers,” he said. “Enjoying a fine beverage at a little club I know.”
“There’s a club in Algiers?” Gunnar asked, brow lifted.
“It’s the bed of an abandoned pickup truck and a fifth of Wild Turkey,” Gavin said with a grin. “But it does the job. Couple of agents took a break from patrol. And drank only water,” he added primly, glancing at Gunnar. “Found out from them, so I came down here.”
We were all quiet for a moment.
“Did you bring the Wild Turkey?” Liam asked. War had done a number on even New Orleans’s supply of booze.
“Wasn’t mine to bring,” Gavin said, lifting a shoulder. “But it went down smooth.”
“Lest we should be late because we’re talking about booze,” Gunnar said, “let’s go to the Commandant’s office.”
We followed him down the sunny corridor and through a door at the end. It was quieter here, with a few well-worn rugs muffling the sounds of footsteps on hardwood. Only a single desk in this room, where a tall and slender woman, cheeks flushed in the heat and hair pulled into a bun, clacked fingertips against the keys of an old typewriter.
“He’s ready,” she said, without looking up, and Gunnar walked to the door, knocked.
“In.” The Commandant’s bass voice boomed through the door.
We walked inside, found an office that wouldn’t have been out of place in a prewar law firm. There were two chairs in front of the desk, and two more in a corner seating area. The desk’s wooden surface gleamed; it was a lovely antique. The art was good quality and gilt framed. A long table sat on the far side with a mix of chairs around it.
The Commandant smiled, came around his desk. He was a tall man with dark skin, shorn gray hair, and the build of a soldier. Still muscled beneath his fatigues, even though he’d been behind the desk for several years.
“I can see the appraisal in your eyes, Ms. Connolly. Antiques are one of your specialties, are they not?”
“It’s genetic,” I said.
“Everything in the building was salvaged or saved,” the Commandant explained as I moved toward the desk. “Materiel wanted to fill the building with furniture from outside the Zone, have it all shipped in. Inefficient, to my mind, and it ignores the opportunity we have.”
“Opportunity?” Liam asked.
“This is one of the most secure buildings in the city. I thought we should take advantage, bring in and save what we could.” He gestured to the ceiling. “Two rooms upstairs are filled with tables, sideboards, silver sets, Baccarat.”
I may have squeaked.
“Perhaps, if we make it through this particular fight, I’ll be able to give you a tour.”
“That would be fantastic.”
Gunnar cleared his throat. “Very interesting girlfriend you have there, Liam.”
“She’s a unique treasure,” Liam said.
“Not unlike the desk,” I said with a smile.
Malachi walked in, looking generally uncomfortable. I bet he’d been in the Cabildo before, but he certainly didn’t look eager to repeat the experience now.
“Malachi,” the Commandant said, and they shook. “Now that we’re nearly all here, let’s move down to the briefing room.”
“Nearly all?” I asked quietly, as we followed the Commandant into the hallway. “Who else are we waiting for?”
“No idea,” Liam said, squeezing my hand. “Political leaders? Paranormal debutantes? Vampire butlers?”
I glanced at him. “Right off the top of your head?”
“I’m a clever man, Claire.”
I couldn’t argue with that.
* * *
• • •
It was my first time in an official briefing, and I wasn’t disappointed to find the briefing room looked a lot like those I’d seen in cop shows growing up. Lines of ta
bles in a rectangular room with a podium at the front. Except the tables and chairs were a mix of cheap office plastic and scavenged Empire-style antiques.
Liam must have seen the desire in my eyes. “Keep a handle on it. You can antique the roadshow later.”
“Quit talking dirty to me in public,” I said, and at Gunnar’s nod, we took empty seats in the first row, acknowledging the other agents who sat around us.
A woman walked to the door, looked inside. Rachel Lewis, Containment’s operations director. She was a gorgeous woman, with pale skin, blue-green eyes, and a generous mouth. She also wore fatigues, her long, dark hair pulled into an immaculate bun at the back of her neck—not a single hair out of place.
“You’ll remember Captain Lewis,” the Commandant said, gesturing to the woman. “She’s been coordinating the search for the Seelies.”
Rachel nodded efficiently. “My apologies for the delay, Commandant. We’ve just returned to the Quarter.”
“Understood, Agent. Take a seat.”
She walked toward the tables, her gaze slipping from person to person, and all but jolting to a halt when she saw Malachi.
There was history between them, something that had happened during the first war, probably while they’d worked together to close the Veil. Something I didn’t know nearly enough about.
She took a seat at the table across the aisle, gave her attention to the Commandant, who stepped to the podium, rested his joined hands atop it.
“We’re here to discuss the Seelies, their likely targets, and the manner in which we will bring them all to Devil’s Isle. Because we will bring them all to Devil’s Isle.”
There was no doubt in his tone, just absolute confidence in his people. No wonder Gunnar was so loyal.
“Gunnar,” he said, gesturing. “If you’d start us off.”
“Sir,” Gunnar said. He’d stood a few feet from the podium, replaced the Commandant there when he moved.
“We’re in the early stages of the investigation of the breach this morning,” Gunnar said, and gave a brief summary of the escape and the attack, an update on the injuries and fatalities.
“We’ve searched Aeryth’s quarters, found nothing. There was no destruction, no personal effects left behind. There are no other Seelies in Devil’s Isle, and if she had Paranormal allies, we haven’t found them. She seems to have been generally loathed.”
An agent in the back of the room raised a hand—a petite woman with tan skin and straight dark hair pulled into a tight bun.
“Jefferson,” Gunnar said, pointing at her.
“Were there Seelies in Devil’s Isle previously?” Jefferson asked.
“Only two,” Gunnar said. “Both were captured just after the war began, but they didn’t last long in Devil’s Isle. Ritual suicides,” he added grimly.
“Seelies are proud, arrogant,” Malachi offered from his position near the door. “They wouldn’t be interested in being prisoners of war.”
“And yet Aeryth didn’t go that route,” Jefferson said.
“And now appears to be interested in passing judgment,” the Commandant said, without moving back to the podium. He looked at Rachel. “Captain. The status of your search to date?”
Rachel rose, hands behind her, shoulders back. “Sir. Based on the information provided by the Quinns, we searched the camp on the north side of the lake.” She shifted her gaze to Liam. “They were gone by the time we arrived, no sign of the camp.”
“They weren’t all at Devil’s Isle today,” Liam said. “The camp was bigger.”
Rachel nodded. “If the remainder has established a new camp, we haven’t yet located it.” She looked back at the Commandant, promise in her eyes. “But we will. Sir, we need more volunteers.”
“We’ll get to that,” the Commandant said. “Before we discuss next steps and assignments, it’s crucial that we understand who and what we’re dealing with. Know thine enemy,” he said, and shifted his gaze to Malachi. “And, fortunately, we have an expert in the house. Commander, if you could provide some background for the benefit of those who aren’t familiar with this particular Para?”
Malachi looked around the room. His expression was unreadable, and I wondered if he was relieved to see a dedicated team of human allies, or if he’d have preferred a team of Paras like him, who could face the Seelies with magic.
Either way, there was no denying he looked perfectly comfortable preparing to brief a bunch of humans. He was a commander of soldiers, whatever their biology.
“There was war, once,” he began. “Separate societies of beings who fought, killed, pillaged. The angels, the Seelies, the Valkyries, among many others. After much death and destruction, the Consularis—those who supported the creation of a unified council to rule our world—came to power. The world became more peaceful. Cleaner. Safer. Healthier. But . . . the same.”
“In what respect?” a second agent asked, an older man with pale skin, a bulky build, and the closely cropped hair and short mustache that male cops and soldiers seemed to prefer.
“This is Agent Baumeister,” Gunnar said to Malachi, who nodded.
“The Consularis believed the things that separated us should be minimized. That we would be unified only if we gave up our differences and found solidarity. Similarity, at least within the tiers of Consularis society.”
“You mean the other cultures were wiped out,” Baumeister said, his voice matter-of-fact.
“Not the beings, but the customs, yes. The language, the song, the dress, the mythology. All were exchanged for a new, unified tradition. A regimented tradition.”
Malachi kept his feelings closely guarded, and rarely allowed emotion to peek through. Maybe that was the cost of having lived in rebellion. I watched him now, trying to figure out how he really felt about the conflict, the Consularis. But he didn’t show it.
“There had always been those who did not support unification, the Consularis, the notion of the council. But they had also seen war and death, so they learned to live with their concerns. But as generations passed, and memories of the chaos faded, more and more decided they wanted something different.”
“And so the Court of Dawn was born,” Gunnar said.
“Yes,” Malachi said. “Seelies abhorred unification, at least with outsiders. Internally, they are tight-knit. They held to their customs, their belief in their inherent superiority, even as the world around them rejected that idea. Joining the rebellion came naturally.”
“And how did Aeryth end up in Devil’s Isle?” Jefferson asked.
Gunnar looked at Liam, and concern narrowed his eyes.
My heart thudded in response as I realized what he was going to say.
“Gavin and I brought her in,” Liam said. There was no fear in his voice, which made me feel a little better. He was smart enough to know whether he ought to be worried.
“We were on Grand Isle,” Liam said, glancing at Gavin. “It was about two years after the war. We hadn’t been looking for her particularly. We’d been in Breaux Bridge, had heard rumors about a band of Paras who were stealing supplies, food near the coast.”
“It wasn’t an unusual rumor,” Gavin said. “Humans did plenty of stealing after the war. Some for need, some for profit. But we decided to check it out.”
Liam picked up the story. “We made our way down to Grand Isle and heard the same rumors, including talk about a flying ghost who didn’t have wings.”
“A Seelie,” Gunnar said, and he nodded.
“We found her by accident. Decided to stop for the night in an abandoned fishing camp—a small house on stilts,” Gavin explained, “and we found her inside. She’d been dead asleep, was shocked to see us.”
“Surprise was probably the only reason we were able to bring her in peacefully,” Liam said.
“And our impressive physical prowess,” Gavin put in, and the
agents chuckled.
“I’m certain that was the case,” the Commandant said with a mild smile. “Continue.”
“She’s thin,” Liam said, “and she was even thinner then. Withered away, maybe because she hadn’t been eating enough, because she was in hiding, because she didn’t have access to the Beyond’s magic.” He looked at Malachi for confirmation.
“Likely a combination of all three,” Malachi said.
Liam nodded. “We used cold iron cuffs, borrowed a jeep for the drive back to the city, had to camp out overnight when the power failed. We didn’t trust her, and trusted her less on foot than in the vehicle. Eventually we made it back here, turned her over to Containment.”
“I doubt she even remembers us,” Gavin said, meeting my gaze. “As you’ve seen, she’s not generally impressed with humans.”
I nodded, grateful that he was trying to offer comfort, to relieve the concern that was probably obvious on my face.
Judgment, she’d said. But against who?
“Why was she so far south?” Rachel asked.
“We didn’t get much out of her. She said she was looking for her sister, but we didn’t have any intel about family relationships, so we weren’t sure if that was true or not.” He looked at Gunnar. “Did she ever discuss that inside? Her family?”
“Not that I’m aware of,” Gunnar said, and glanced around the room, settled his gaze on someone in the back. “Flores is the supervisor for our problem children like Aeryth. Miguel?”
“Nothing,” said the man behind us. “She rarely talked. And if she did, she asked questions.”
“About what?” Malachi asked.
“Humans. New Orleans. The government. She liked information, and we’d bargain for it sometimes. Nothing confidential or classified, of course. Textbook stuff. Basics. She was smart, curious. I had the sense that knowing information made her feel, I suppose, a little more in control of her circumstances.”
Malachi nodded, seemed impressed by the analysis.
“If Aeryth’s been here for years,” Rachel said, “why didn’t they try to break her out before?”
