“Holy shit,” Evony whispered.
“Them or us,” Ethan said briefly. His expression was serene, unruffled…about the opposite of how I felt right about then. “Which way?”
She hesitated, then replied, “To the left, I guess.”
As we passed the prone bodies of the fallen guards, I couldn’t help glancing down. A tiny sigh of relief escaped my lips. I didn’t recognize either one of them. For a brief, awful second, I’d worried that Dan Lowery might be one of the men Ethan had shot, but obviously he hadn’t been working the night shift this evening. Or at all, I reflected. I still had no idea whether he’d escaped Margolis’ wrath after Jace and Evony and I had fled the cells under the Los Alamos justice center.
All the doors we tried were unlocked, opening into offices and meeting rooms and, here and there, what used to be small labs, with banks of tables and computers and oscilloscopes and other equipment I couldn’t even identify. Every one of those rooms was empty, and I forced myself not to let out a sigh of frustration.
We doubled back, passing the fallen guards. I hated to look at them, hated that we’d had to resort to violence to keep ourselves safe. All right, grabbing Miles Odekirk and hauling him out of here would be its own form of violence, but our intention wasn’t to hurt him, only to get him to help us. Maybe we could have subdued those guards without shooting them. Unfortunately, Ethan hadn’t really given us that option, and I didn’t have the time or the energy to upbraid him for his impulsive, deadly actions now.
At the far end of the hall was a set of double doors. There had been a similar set on the other side of the building, hiding one of the labs we’d discovered. It was probably too much to ask that Odekirk might be working in the room beyond those doors, but I found myself whispering a little prayer anyway.
Please let this be the one….
Ethan nodded at Evony, and she pushed the door open as he whipped around, gun out. Dani followed, then Jace, with me bringing up the rear.
As in the first lab we’d found, this one was crowded with equipment: multiple computers, their flat screens showing what looked like 3D modeling programs and scrolling banks of code. Oscilloscopes and tables filled with bits and pieces of what looked like junk, but which I guessed must be the components for more devices. Unlike that first lab, however, this one was occupied. Miles Odekirk stood next to one of the worktables, a half-assembled box in one hand. It fell from his fingers as he caught sight of us, hitting the tabletop with a thunk.
“Hello, Dr. Odekirk,” I said. “You’re coming with us.”
Chapter Seven
To his credit, he was only thrown off for a fraction of a second. Then he lunged for the walkie-talkie that had been lying on the worktable amongst the welter of parts and wires and pliers.
But Ethan was too fast for him. In that same instant, he charged forward and knocked the walkie-talkie to the linoleum floor with the hand that wasn’t holding the gun. Since the radio was one of those heavy-duty ones with a rubberized casing, it bounced instead of shattering. Still, Miles Odekirk wouldn’t be using it anytime soon.
“Hands up,” Ethan said, pistol trained on the scientist.
Odekirk seemed to realize there wasn’t much use in protesting, so he raised both his hands in the air. “I’m not sure what you think you’re going to accomplish with all this,” he said, gaze flicking to Jace and Dani, then to Evony and me. He frowned, although I wasn’t sure if the scowl resulted from surprise at seeing two djinn functioning more or less normally even in an area protected by the device, or because Evony’s and my presence there especially annoyed him for some reason.
In the end, it really didn’t matter. “We can discuss that later,” I said. “For now, we have to get going. Do you have a coat?”
Apparently surprised by the non sequitur, he blinked, then replied, “In the supply closet over there.”
“Get it.”
He sidled over to the closet in question and Ethan followed, his gun pointed dead in the center of the scientist’s back. It was fairly obvious that Ethan didn’t trust Miles Odekirk any farther than he could throw him. I didn’t trust him, either, but he didn’t seem to me like the type to keep a hold-out pistol anywhere around. No, he’d been relying on the two guards patrolling the building to protect him.
Guards who were now dead, thanks to us.
I swallowed uneasily, then watched as Miles pulled out a down coat out of the closet and began shrugging into it.
His tone almost conversational, he said, “Do you really think you’re going to get me away from here without being detected?”
Jace smiled grimly. “We got in, didn’t we?”
That reply was obviously not what Odekirk wanted to hear; his scowl deepened, but he finished zipping up his coat.
“Okay,” Evony said. “That thing you were working on? We want it, and any components you need to finish putting it together.”
“I don’t see — ”
“He’s just stalling in the hope that someone will come to rescue him,” Dani cut in. He stepped away from Jace and me, located a box, and began piling everything on the worktable into it.
“I had all that organized,” Miles protested.
“And you’ll organize it all over again once we get where we’re going,” Evony said. She went to the desk at the far end of the room, where a laptop sat open, then shut it and began gathering up its power cables.
Odekirk’s eyes took on a certain glint, as if he’d just deduced what we were up to. “If you think I’m going to provide you with any sort of assistance, you’re sadly mistaken.”
“We’ll see about that,” Jace said. His expression was so blank, it might have been carved from stone…that is, unless you happened to take a good look at his eyes. They were colder than a winter night, colder than the dark between the stars.
The scientist swallowed.
“I think we’ve got it all,” Evony announced, glancing over at Dani. He nodded, hefting the box of supplies he’d gathered. I wondered if the djinn would actually have the strength to carry it any distance, but decided I’d wait until he showed obvious signs of fatigue before offering to take it from him.
At that point, I did finally draw my own pistol and point it at Odekirk. “All right,” I told him. “Time to go.”
He didn’t offer any protest, but headed out the door meekly enough. I supposed he probably didn’t have much experience with having several guns pointed at him.
“The stairwell,” Jace said briefly.
We all headed in that direction, Ethan in the lead, scanning the whole time for signs of any more guards. No one stopped us from getting to the stairs, however, and we hurried down, this time not worrying about stealth. Right then, speed was our objective.
The Jeep still waited for us in the lee of the building, and we herded Odekirk that way. I could hear Dani’s labored breathing, so I said, “I can take that box from you.”
He shook his head. “No. We’re almost there.”
I supposed he had a point. It might have taken longer to stop and retrieve his burden from him than it did to stagger the last yard or two to our getaway vehicle. I clicked the remote to unlock it, and Ethan bundled Miles Odekirk into the back seat, with Evony squeezing in next to him. Dani went around to the back and set the box in the cargo area, then got in as well.
Despite everything, I couldn’t help but repress a smile at Miles Odekirk’s expression, revealed as it was in the moonlight. He didn’t look frightened, or even angry. No, he just appeared supremely annoyed, as if being wedged in the back seat of a Jeep Wrangler with a couple of armed human miscreants and a djinn was a huge inconvenience. Well, I supposed in a way it was.
Jace climbed into the passenger seat, and I got in behind the wheel. My foot hit the gas almost the same instant I turned the key in the ignition, and the Jeep leaped forward, tires squealing. Good thing there wasn’t any snow or ice in this particular section of the parking lot.
We racketed down the hill.
The whole time, I kept stealing glances in the rearview mirror, certain I would see an army of Margolis’ goons chasing down Pajarito Road after us, but the asphalt gleamed blank in the moonlight, unoccupied.
“So…what gives?” I asked over my shoulder. “Were those two guards really the only ones in the building? Didn’t you have any other kind of surveillance?”
Odekirk’s mouth tightened. “Two there, and four more covering the rest of the grounds. Just your good luck that the others were elsewhere. But, as you may have noticed, it is rather a large campus.”
His tone was cool, almost disinterested. For all I knew, he’d resigned himself to his fate, whatever that might turn out to be. Or maybe inwardly he hoped our luck was about to run out, and we’d come across those other guards at any moment.
I couldn’t help worrying about that, but at the same time, I kept my foot pressed firmly on the accelerator. The farther we got from the labs, the closer we drew to the rest of the group where they waited for us in that stand of juniper. The guards might have been tasked with keeping Miles Odekirk and the facility he now commanded safe, but I wondered if their loyalty to their commander was strong enough that it would lead them to venture beyond the bounds of the safe zone, especially if they were confronted by a group of angry djinn the second they passed over the border.
As soon as we were safely past the area the devices protected, I saw Jace straighten, and from the back seat, Dani let out a tight little sigh. Up ahead I saw the rest of our group, waiting in the cover of the trees. A quick scan of the scene told me they were more or less where we’d left them, although I noticed that some of the djinn had moved toward the road, as if to make sure they’d be the front line of defense in case anyone else came along.
I slowed, then came to a stop. As the waiting group began to move toward the Jeep, I rolled down the window. “I’ve got him,” I said briefly. “Everyone back to their vehicles. We need to get going.”
There were no cheers, nothing but a brief murmur among the djinn and their Chosen, and then everyone began to disperse toward the waiting vehicles. I’d handed off the keys of the pickup I’d driven here to Travis, and he and Azael hurried toward the truck, followed by the man whose Jeep I was driving and his djinn companion. In less than a minute, everyone was back inside their respective vehicles and falling in line behind us as we began moving south on Pajarito Road.
That went well, I told Jace.
Almost too well, he responded.
I’d been thinking about the same thing, but I didn’t want to admit it. Anyway, the time to be stopped by Margolis’ forces was some ways back up the road. My past experience with them had shown that they didn’t dare venture beyond the bubble of safety Miles Odekirk’s devices provided.
So what would they do when they discovered their resident wizard had been stolen from right under their noses? I honestly had no idea. There were plenty of people in Los Alamos who knew how to operate the little boxes, but that didn’t mean they could create any more of them, now that the scientist was gone. If one of the devices malfunctioned, they’d be in a world of hurt.
They’re short-staffed, and not all that well-trained, I told Jace after a pause. Probably they thought they had plenty of people guarding the facility. After all, no one who was a resident would ever think of going in there without an invitation, and no djinn would come anywhere close.
Except those of us who are mad enough to ignore what those devices do to us.
Not mad, I replied. Brave. The people in Los Alamos are not exactly of a mindset that would believe a djinn capable of personal bravery, or loyalty. So they would never imagine that any of you would willingly come here in order to do what you did.
What we all did. You and Evony and Dani.
And Ethan, I added. I didn’t really like his methods, but I couldn’t argue with the results.
And Ethan, Jace conceded. I hate to see death when it is not needed, but perhaps that was unavoidable. We will just have to do everything we can to make sure there are no more deaths that come about as a result of our actions.
I wasn’t sure that was exactly realistic, but I didn’t argue. Like Jace, I thought there had already been far too much death. We should be trying to avoid it. Every life was precious, even the lives of those in Los Alamos, the ones who believed all the djinn were pure evil.
Problem was, some of them actually were. I recalled Aidan’s story, how the djinn who’d destroyed his face had laughed and said, “Give my love to Lilias.” Surely those were the words and actions of a monster.
But we had no monsters in Taos, only djinn and the mortals they loved. And we had to do everything we could to make sure they could live real lives together, and not suffer endlessly just because some of the djinn had decided to go rogue.
The moon was higher in the sky now, almost directly overhead. It lit the landscape so brightly that we almost didn’t need our headlights, although I wasn’t foolish enough to try turning them off. This time I didn’t miss the turn-off onto Highway 4, and we all slipped onto it with nary a tire screech. From there, just that quick jog on 502, then on through Española, up 68, and back home.
Well, Taos, anyway. In my mind, Santa Fe was still home. And maybe, just maybe, the two of us could come up with a way to get back there. That was what I really wanted — a quiet corner of the world with Jace, a place to love each other and build and grow together.
But first things first.
“Everyone all right back there?” I asked as we passed the last casino in town and began heading out into open territory. That casino might have even been the place where Evony had been holed up with Natila for a while, but I didn’t dare ask. Evony’s was a wound which had barely begun to heal.
“Just fab,” she said in reply to my question. “Although this is probably a little cozier than I wanted to get with the legendary Miles Odekirk.”
Dani made a noise that sounded like a muffled laugh, but I could tell the scientist was far from amused.
“I assure you, the feeling is mutual,” he said icily.
That made me want to laugh as well. I decided that probably wasn’t a good idea, though. It was going to be a tough row to hoe, getting him to help us, and teasing him on top of kidnapping him in the middle of the night almost guaranteed his non-cooperation.
I glanced at the clock on the dashboard. Edging up to eleven. All right, so it wasn’t exactly the middle of the night, but late enough that I doubted he’d been expecting company. Did he actually go home, wherever that was, or did he sleep somewhere in the labs, so absorbed in his work that he couldn’t bear to be parted from it for even a few hours?
We’d find out soon enough, I supposed. He’d have to be set up in our basement lab, since the auto shop was too far away to be considered safe. Would he stay there, even if given a cozy hotel suite to sleep in?
Just as I was returning my gaze to the road, a wall of fire roared across the highway some fifty yards or so ahead. I let out a scream and hit the brakes, heart pounding, adrenaline bursting along every vein and artery like thousands of firecrackers going off. Behind me, I heard brakes squealing.
“It’s them!” Jace shouted, and before I could even blink, he’d undone his seatbelt and was hurrying outside. At the same time, Dani also clambered over a cursing Ethan so he could be out in the open as well.
Gale-force winds blew outward from Jace, causing the wall of flames to waver and dance. As soon as Dani was outside, those winds intensified, shrieking with the voices of a thousand enraged banshees. I wanted to put up my hands to cover my ears, but I wouldn’t allow myself to do anything so cowardly. Instead, I pulled out my pistol, thumb on the safety. Right then, I couldn’t see anyone except Jace and Dani, but I wasn’t foolish enough to think that wall of flames had just appeared out of nowhere.
More of our djinn emerged from their vehicles. Lightning crackled overhead, and the bright moonlight that had guided us along our way disappeared. I knew if I looked up, I’d see more of those same
roiling clouds that had accompanied the first attack by the rogue djinn on the people of Taos. But had they been created by the elementals who attacked us now, or our own djinn?
I didn’t know. All was chaos and sound and fury, the darkness penetrated by fire and lightning, the wind whipping up dust from all around us. We had twenty djinn — what should have been a formidable number, in most cases. The problem was, I didn’t know how many of the enemy confronted us now. They hid in the dark, an inimical presence, one that seemed to weigh on my heart and lungs, to suck all the air out of the surrounding spaces.
We’d brought mainly male djinn with us, but there were also several women. One of them approached Jace now, her pale hair fluttering wildly in the wind like a white banner of surrender. From the way she raised her arms, though, I got the feeling she wasn’t planning to capitulate anytime soon. Instead, water flowed out from her, as if she were some sort of latter-day Moses who could not only part the Red Sea, but call it to do her bidding.
The flames the other djinn had conjured flickered, weakened, but only for a moment. Then they surged back up again, brighter than ever. I could see Jace clearly right then, the firelight casting his features into strong relief, his black hair whipping around his head. He was beautiful, but frightening as well. I’d never seen him like this, using his full powers, the winds streaking out around him and beating down that unnatural fire, moving the female djinn’s waters forward in a surge as inexorable as a tidal wave.
For the first time, as the water seemed to swallow the fire for a brief second, I could also see one of our adversaries. He stood just beyond the dancing, angry flames. In the uncertain light, I couldn’t make out the color of the dark robes he wore, but I could still see his face, hair black as night, features proud and cruel. How could I have ever thought Zahrias’ face harsh or unkind? Stern, yes, but there was no evil in his features. Not like this man — this djinn — who stood there and smiled as the night tore itself apart around him.
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