by Eileen Wilks
He nodded. “I checked with Pete. Until further notice, I’m under your orders.”
“Good. That includes keeping Cullen out.” She started for the trail she’d come down a few minutes ago. “Cullen?”
“No one put me under your goddamn orders,” he grumbled, but he followed. He even brought the mage light with him.
It provided plenty of light, so she flicked her flashlight off and stuck it back in her purse. “So what’s the side effect that makes the prototype not ready for prime time?”
“It can create persistent, temporally displaced illusions in nulls.”
“Temporally displaced…unpack that for me.”
He shrugged. “Memories. Vivid, hallucinogenic memories of shit that never happened. Usually shit that couldn’t have happened, like flying rats in goggles and aviator jackets.”
“Flying rats.”
“With wings. Dressed up like World War I pilots.” He sighed. “That one came from the VP in charge of development. The really weird part was how little it bothered him. He clearly remembered seeing those rats flapping along beside the plane when he flew in that morning—he’d had a window seat—but the memory didn’t strike him as odd. After we talked things out, he agreed that there couldn’t really be any flying rats, so it had to be a hallucinatory memory, but he seemed to think I was making a lot of fuss about something pretty trivial. So did the other two.”
“The other two?”
“I did the demo for four execs from T-Corp. Three of them were nulls, not a whiff of magic to ’em. One was a practicing Wiccan—Air Gift, not strong, but well trained. The Gifted guy didn’t experience any hallucinogenic memories. The three nulls did. The fabricated memories all involved events that really occurred on that day between seven and four hours prior to the demo.”
“If they didn’t recognize the, uh, fabricated memories as bizarre, how did you find out about them? No, wait—I want to know that and a bunch of other things, like what the prototype looks like. But I need to call the CSI team first.” She reached for the phone in her jacket pocket. “Do you have a photo of it?’
“No photo.”
“What does it—”
“I’m afraid you can’t call CSI,” Rule said from the shadows partway up the slope.
She frowned at him. “Sure I can. If I don’t have any bars here I’ll head up the hill.”
“Isen forbids it. That means less to you than to the rest of us, but this isn’t a Unit matter. No magic was used in the crime.”
Her first reaction was to call it in anyway. Rule was wrong; MCD could only investigate felonies committed using magic, but she was Unit. She could investigate anything connected with magic, including the theft of a magical object. But if he wanted to, Isen could make investigation impossible. If their Rho told them to, every lupus at Clanhome would insist there had been no explosion, no intruder, and nothing was missing. Every damn one of them, including Cullen.
Including Rule.
“Cullen,” she said, her voice tight, “how about you go burn something while I chat with Rule?”
“Oh, stop and think, Lily,” Cullen said crossly as he brushed past her. “It’s obvious why Isen doesn’t want outsiders involved.”
Not to her, it wasn’t. “Well?” she said to Rule.
He sighed. “How did the thief know where to find the prototype?”
Ah, shit. Double shit. She should have thought of that.
There were other possibilities than the obvious. The thief might have conducted aerial surveillance. Photos that showed Cullen going to and from the workshop, for example, would locate it. But that was not the only way for him to find out. Not the easiest way, nor the most certain. Not the likeliest way. Her stomach hurt when she said it out loud. “Isen thinks there’s a traitor in the clan.”
“He believes it likely, yes. Or among our guests. Isen has called all three clans present at Clanhome to the meeting ground.”
Her eyes widened. “All of them? Will everyone fit?”
“Some of the tenders are excused to care for the children, as are those guards needed for patrol and those still fighting the fire on Big Sister—which was under control but not out, the last I heard. Otherwise, every adult must attend. He asked that I include my Leidolf guards. I agreed, with the stipulation that Leidolf be questioned first.”
Rule was Lu Nuncio to Nokolai—heir and enforcer, basically. Obedient to his Rho. He was, however, also a Rho in his own right. Rho to Leidolf, Nokolai’s longtime enemy. Two-mantled, some were calling him. Even at Nokolai Clanhome, Isen couldn’t command the Leidolf guards. He couldn’t order his son to bring them. He could only request. “Why first?”
“Most of those present will already be blaming my Leidolf guards. They must be shown quickly and publicly to be untainted. Lily, we need to go to the meeting field now.”
“In just a minute. First I need to—”
“This isn’t the time to argue. We have to go. My father is very angry.”
“He would be.”
“You don’t understand. You’ve never seen him deeply angry.”
No, she hadn’t. She’d seen Isen laughing, kind, ruthless, annoyed, tender, and ready to kill. But deeply angry…“How mad is he? Are you worried he’ll lose control?”
He hesitated. Only for a second, but that scared her as his words hadn’t. “No. Of course not.”
CULLEN accompanied them. The guards didn’t. They were among those excused, which reassured Lily somewhat. Isen might be throwing a Rho-sized hissy, but he hadn’t stopped thinking entirely. He’d left essential personnel on duty.
Some of them, anyway. The guards were guarding the scene, not investigating it. That’s what Lily should have been doing instead of tramping back down half a mountain. That and calling in the crime scene techs, dammit.
For several minutes none of them spoke. Lily was thinking hard and not liking the answers she turned up. She figured the others were in the same boat.
It was a brisk, clear night. The sky was heavy with stars the way you only see it this far from the city. The moon was a thin fingernail clipping lodged high overhead. That would have been plenty of light for the two men with her, but fortunately Cullen had remembered that it wasn’t enough for her. He’d held onto one of the mage lights and kept it bobbing a few paces ahead, giving her a good view of the ground and throwing weird shadows. The wind was soft, brushing at her hair and cheeks with airy caresses. It smelled of burning.
It would take them about twenty minutes to reach the meeting field, going at her slow, human pace. Might as well make use of that time. “Did you learn anything from the perp’s scent trail?” she asked Rule.
“Yes. José and his squad followed the strongest scent trail. Usually that means the most recent, but not this time. The thief had laid a false trail earlier by taking off his shoes and going back and forth barefooted along one stretch. Had José been less distracted by his own loss of smell, by the sudden blare of the klaxon, he’d have seen that the footprints changed from shod to bare.”
“Clever. He expected his pursuers to trust scent over sight. He knows something about lupi.”
He nodded grimly. “Too much.”
“There may be a traitor, but don’t lean on that idea too heavily. Yeah, the perp could have learned about lupi from a confederate here at Clanhome. Or he might know someone who knows a lot about lupi—an ospi friend or girlfriend or whatever—or maybe he hacked into the FBI database. There’s a lot about you there. Or he could just be damn good at research. He’s a planner. Cullen.”
He didn’t answer. She glanced back at him—he was trailing slightly behind her and Rule, frowning faintly as if he found the ground ahead of him perplexing. She suspected he didn’t even see it. “Cullen,” she repeated.
His frown tightened as he looked up. “What?”
“Who knows about the prototype?”
“That it exists? Four executives at T-Corp and whoever they told. Also most everyone here at Clanhome—mos
t all Nokolai, anyway. No one was supposed to speak of it outside the clan, so our guests aren’t supposed to know, but some of them probably do.”
“People will talk,” Lily agreed. “And kids repeat stuff they hear—especially if they think it’s a secret.”
“Which is why,” Rule said evenly, “silence was part of the agreement between Laban, Vochi, and Nokolai. They are bound not to reveal anything they learn while staying here, except to their Rhos, should they ask. Children can’t be bound by such an agreement, but the Laban and Vochi children have had no opportunity to speak with anyone outside Clanhome since they arrived.”
Laban and Vochi were subordinate clans, which was basically a feudal setup. Their Rhos were subject to Isen the way a minor lord used to be to an earl or a count or whatever back when titles were more than an attraction for the paparazzi. Back when titles were connected to real duties and responsibilities…duties that flowed both ways. “Vochi’s supposed to be good with money,” she said after a moment.
“Abe trained me.”
“Abe’s the Vochi Rho.”
“Yes.” Rule’s voice was tight. “I have a degree, but that only gave me the blocks to build with. Abe taught me how to build, what to watch for, how much fluidity to retain under various conditions, how to…he taught me so much. I can’t believe—” He cut himself off abruptly.
That his teacher had betrayed Nokolai. That’s what Rule meant. That’s why Isen was so furious. The Vochi Rho could have learned all about the prototype from his people living here. He could have learned everything the thief had needed to know.
Lupi didn’t have the same priorities as humans. To them, the possibility that a subordinate Rho had betrayed that relationship was a much bigger deal than the loss of a device that was potentially worth millions, maybe hundreds of millions. Or would be if it worked. Did the thief know it didn’t work right? Lily tabled that question for now. It was vital, but not as urgent at the moment. Lupi took a really hard line on betrayal. No shades of gray. If a member of Nokolai betrayed the clan, that was treason. If a subordinate Rho violated his agreement with Nokolai’s Rho, that was treason. In their world, treason had only one possible punishment.
If she wasn’t really smart—and probably lucky, too—someone was going to die. Maybe tonight. “Laban would be in the same position as Vochi to learn stuff,” she said carefully. “And they’re a lot more competitive than Vochi.”
Cullen snorted. “I doubt Leo knows how to balance his checkbook, much less how to sell the prototype. Rich in fighters, Laban. Poor in everything else.”
That’s what she’d been told. Nokolai’s two North American subordinate clans were opposites. Laban was small, contentious, and bred good fighters. Vochi was small, wealthy, and bred too many submissives. “Vochi like money games. They’re good at them.”
Rule bit off a one-word reply. “Yes.”
“The thief stole the prototype of a device that doesn’t work.”
“That…doesn’t sound like Abe.” Rule’s voice loosened slightly. “Treachery doesn’t sound like him, either, but to steal something that doesn’t work—to betray everything for an object without value—Isen needs to hear this.” He started to move ahead. Stopped.
“Go,” Lily told him. “Cullen can walk me down. If we run into trouble, he’ll burn it. It’ll do him good. Go.”
He hesitated a moment longer, then nodded and took off.
Lily and her fire-happy escort moved on in silence at the best pace her human feet could keep on the rough slope. It was maybe five minutes before Cullen spoke. “The prototype does work.”
She sighed. “Yeah. I know.” It was possible the thief knew about the side effects, too. And wanted them. She didn’t know why, but maybe that’s what had kept that abstracted look on Cullen’s face. Maybe he’d been trying to figure that out.
After a pause Lily added obliquely, “Abe matters to him.”
Cullen sighed back at her. “Yeah. He does.”
Lupi were very black and white about treason. Traditionally, it had only one punishment: death. And traditionally, it was the Lu Nuncio who carried out that sentence.
NINE
RULE stood at the center of the meeting field on his Rho’s right hand beneath glowing mage lights that blotted out the brilliance of the stars overhead. His heart beat slowly because he willed it so…but it was hard.
His Rho was angry. The stink of that anger rolled through him. He felt it in the very pulse of the mantle—a hard pulse, steady but a shade too fast. Out of sync with his own. This was something a Rho could do, use the mantle to pull any of his clan into an intimate rhythm. Rhos did it most often to steady a clan member whose control was slipping. Rule had done that himself. You didn’t have to pull on the mantle very hard, not one-on-one. Control your own heart rate, allow the mantle to flow out, and the heart rate of the other fell in with yours. Fast, if you wanted to move them into action. Slow, if you wanted to calm them. Rule had never tried to spread his control over so many at once, but Isen had, many times. Rule had experienced it from the other side.
He should be experiencing it now. Standing so close to his father, his Rho, while Isen pulled firmly on the mantle, no amount of training was enough for him to separate his pulse from that demanding beat. But he carried a mantle, too. And Leidolf did not beat at Nokolai’s command.
He felt dizzy. Disoriented. He was Nokolai.
And he was Leidolf.
He’d known that since the Leidolf mantle was forced upon him. Known with his head, at least, that the trace of Leidolf blood he’d inherited from a great-grandmother had made it possible for Victor to force the mantle on him. Victor had meant to destroy him with it. He’d failed.
Now he stood beside his Rho, surrounded by clan—by Nokolai—and his heart didn’t beat with Nokolai. It beat for Leidolf. He held it to a slow, steady rhythm, and that was hard, but not as hard as it should have been.
He was Leidolf. He knew that in his heart now. Literally. He was Leidolf, and Nokolai did not command him unless he allowed it.
Isen was playing a dangerous game tonight.
“Bill Peterson,” a voice called from the left.
“On duty,” Pete said firmly. “Excused.”
Rule’s nostrils were flared, open to the night. The air was soft and cool and thick with scent—dust and skin, sage and grass, fear and anger, a whiff of menstrual blood from a young woman nearby. Most of all, it was heavy with the massed scent of lupi.
Nokolai. That was the strongest smell, the scent of clan reassuring even now. But Leidolf as well, a scent carrying so many of the same notes, yet arranged to a different tune. That smell, too, contented him, where it used to wake his nape to bristles. Also Laban. A musky lot, Laban. And Vochi. Quiet, unthreatening Vochi. Leidolf, Laban, Vochi…each was clumped up together not far from the center of the field.
Nokolai Clanhome was crowded these days.
“Josh Krugman,” another voice called. “And Celia Thompson.”
“On duty,” Pete replied loudly, his voice crossing the response from the woman standing near Cullen saying the same thing. “Excused,” they both said, one right after the other.
In normal times, most lupi did not live at their clanhomes. Nearby, yes, if they could, but lupi had to earn a living just as humans did, which for most of them meant living elsewhere. Some worked at Clanhome, either as guards or for the nursery or at the clan’s construction firm. Others owned their own small businesses elsewhere or worked for human employers or companies. But a large number worked at companies owned by the clan in the three coastal states that comprised Nokolai’s territory.
This was unusual. Until the Supreme Court stopped the government from administering the drug gado to any lupi it caught, Rule’s people hadn’t dared live together in large numbers. Most clanhomes couldn’t house even half their clan’s members, and clans hadn’t considered it safe to have too many of their members working at the same place.
Nokolai was different b
ecause of Isen…and Vochi.
Isen had known for a long time that lupi couldn’t continue to live secretly. The world had changed too much. He’d planned for the day they came out into the open; he’d worked with Wythe clan to make that happen, using the country’s legal system. Even before that, though, he’d been preparing. First he’d created a pretext for gathering forty or fifty clan to him—the fiction that Clanhome housed a religious cult. In addition to the homes here, he’d built dormitory-type housing for “visiting brethren.” After Nokolai went public, he’d added a second dormitory and additional houses.
Nokolai could, at need and with some crowding, house their entire clan.
Even so, and even now, not all Nokolai lived here. Many remained scattered in California, Oregon, and Washington, keeping their ears perked and their eyes open. That was both strategy and necessity. War was expensive. Nokolai was a wealthy clan, but even it couldn’t afford to fully support all of its members for a long stretch. Not when a large chunk of that wealth came from the businesses it owned, where its people worked.
The decision to operate businesses that employed clan had been Isen’s. But he couldn’t have implemented it without Vochi’s help.
Vochi had always been a small clan, suffering even more than most from the limited fertility common to those of the Blood. It had always thrown too many submissives, too few fighters. Add to that a peculiar interest in accumulating wealth, and Vochi could have been the skinny kid in glasses getting picked on by the jocks…or, during times of clan strife, the skinny white guy who got caught on the wrong turf when the Crips and the Bloods were slugging it out.
Vochi knew this. They’d first submitted to Nokolai sixteen hundred years ago. Nokolai had defended Vochi ever since, and Vochi had done much in return for Nokolai. They were the reason Nokolai was the wealthiest clan—their acumen and, more recently, Isen’s understanding that money meant power in the human world. And for better or worse, that was the world lupi lived in.
