Head Down

by Jan Stryvant

  "Well yeah, she's a cheetah, she sort of defines fast," Daelyn grumbled.

  Roxy raced towards the guardhouse wall, spinning around just before she hit it, and slamming into it back first. It hurt like hell, she'd probably been doing close to forty when she hit it. But she'd heal.

  She just hoped that all of the noise outside covered for the sound of her body hitting the concrete. Pulling out one of the wands that her Sean had given her, she inched her way towards the corner, keeping flat against the wall. Once she acted she'd have to be quick, but then again, she was quick.

  Spinning around the corner, she took ten steps away from the guardhouse, and then turning around she charged the door as hard as she could, and dropping a shoulder she slammed into the door with her body. She may not weigh more than a hundred and forty in her hybrid form, but a hundred and forty pounds at fifty miles an hour was a force that no simple metal door was ever going to stand up to!

  Swearing loudly in pain as she crashed through the door, as she felt the bones in her left shoulder all breaking along with the door, she pointed the wand at one of the men inside and triggered it. Letting go of the wand, she spun around then and backhanded the other guard in the face with enough force to knock him off of his feet and into the wall, which he slid down, rather nicely, leaving a little bit of a blood trail as he did.

  "Get your asses in here!" Roxy yelled and staggering over to a chair, she collapsed into it as she held her very broken left arm still with her right one. The grating of the bones was particularly nasty.

  "Are you done showing off?" Daelyn said, grinning as she came into the guardhouse with her uncle right behind her.

  "You may be stronger, Dae, but I'm faster!" Roxy said with a grin.

  "How long until you can move again?"

  "I can move now, it's just not going to be any fun for another couple of minutes. I think I pulverized all the bones in my shoulder."

  Daelyn shuddered, "Rox, you definitely won this round." Turning to her uncle Samis who was examining the control board she asked him, "Do you think you can raise those riot gates from here?"

  Samis shook his head, "There's an interlock and I'm afraid to mess with it. We know there's traps inside and I don't want to risk triggering them. Let me get Horis and Garth to check the gates and see if they're trapped as well."

  Roxy watched as Samis ran out of the open door. She could see the dwarves had taken up defensive positions around the entryway to the building.

  "Who the hell names their kid 'Horis?'" she asked Daelyn.

  Daelyn snickered, "We used to call him 'Horse Face' in school."

  "What, is he ugly?"

  Daelyn laughed and shook her head, "No, he's probably one of the most good looking men in the hill. It drove his mom crazy! Oh how she hated all of his friends."

  "Your people are weird, you know that, right Dae?"

  "Stubborn as hell too. Horis could have changed his name when he became a man, as his coming of age ceremony. Instead he showed up wearing a horse head hat." Daelyn shook her head and snickered, "I think his mother had a heart attack."

  Samis came back in, "The riot gates are booby trapped alright.

  "Can they disarm them?" Daelyn asked.

  Samis nodded, "Already working on it. But you better call Chad and let him know. It's gonna be at least five minutes. It's tricky stuff and some of it's magical."

  Roxy grunted and got to her feet, "I'll go help with the defenses, Dae. You can call it in and keep an eye on things."

  Daelyn nodded as both Samis and Roxy left the guardhouse and started to check what was going on outside. A few of the defenders had noticed what was going on, but thankfully none of them were attacking, yet.

  "Delta one, Kennel calling."

  "What's going on, Kennel?" Daelyn heard Chad's voice ask.

  "The doors are trapped, we're working it, but it's going to take a while."

  "Understood, I'll keep the heat off. Delta one clear."

  "So now what," Max asked Chad. He'd been right, they'd only gotten three in their next attack.

  "We divide into two groups, and take the heat off the primary force, so they can get in here and bulwark our numbers. Until we get that kennel situation cleared, it's going to be a simple war of attrition."

  Max swore, "Well, I hope your friend Sean can stop them from pressing the button in there."

  "You and me both, Hon." Chad sighed.

  Max blinked, "Did you just call me 'Hon?'" she asked with a grin.

  "Umm," Chad could feel the fur on his face bushing out in embarrassment. His first werewolf blush.

  "Ha! Got ya!" Max laughed.

  "Shush, quit distracting me, we got a fight to win," Chad sighed shaking his head.

  Sean staggered out of the main building. He'd used up a fair deal of his own magic, and all of the wands he had brought were spent. Same for most of the ones the other wolves had brought as well.

  The fighting in the main building had been rather tough, they'd lost another team member to a rather nasty spell, but they'd gotten their hands on the last of the kill switches. However, the defenders outside didn't know that, they still believed that they were in danger of dying, horribly, any minute.

  Sean looked around; there were dead and dying everywhere. The attackers were trying as hard as they could to not use lethal force, and the defenders were using it and damn near nothing else. Sean was hearing reports over the radio now, about a quarter of the defenders had been taken down and purged of silver, but they'd still had to be immobilized, because they were fearing for their loved ones, who were being held in the bunker that Daelyn was still in the process of breaking into, with the rest of the dwarves.

  "Shit," Sean swore and calling up his offense framework, he shot out a dozen paralyzation spells, but there were still dozens more, and now he was starting to draw fire!

  'You know, I could really use some of that mystical shit right now!'

  'Yeah, no shit,' his lion sighed. 'I got this, shift...'

  Sean hadn't even waited, the moment he heard his lion agree, he'd shifted.

  Sean roared, loudly. So loudly that every pair of eyes in the compound glanced his way, and every defender with a gun turned to aim at the rather large lion that was suddenly standing out in the open.

  "My children!" Sean's lion yelled in a voice that carried far beyond anything natural. "Stop fighting! NOW!" and he roared again.

  Sean blinked as he found himself in control again. He was panting, hard, and surprisingly everyone had set down their weapons.

  Everyone.

  "The traps have been disabled!" Sean called out. "Now, let my people remove the silver from your bodies! Make sure we get everyone! Then we must leave!

  "Now do as I say!" Sean roared and then plopped down on his ass to sit there and catch his breath.

  'Damn, that was impressive!'

  Sean got the distinct impression that his lion was either asleep, or just too spent to talk. Whatever, he'd sort it out later. Right now, he needed to go check on everyone, and see to it that people were following his orders.

  Sean tried to get up on all fours and found that he was barely able to continue sitting upright without falling over.

  "On second thought, I think I'll just sit here and supervise," he sighed.

  With the fighting stopped, it took Chad and the other leaders only five minutes to get all of the defenders purged of their silver. It took another five to break open the bunker and get those inside out, as the helicopters came in to haul away Claudia's team.

  As soon as Sean was able to shift, he grabbed one of the van's along with Roxy, Daelyn and Hunter's team and took off for the address that Harkins lived at.

  "Where are we going in such a rush?" Roxy asked.

  "Harkins' house."

  "He doesn't live at the compound?" she said, surprised.

  "Apparently his wife didn't like it there."

  "What's the rush?" Daelyn asked, "We got everybody."

  "Harkins is
the one who paid to have my father killed, and is the one that started all of this."

  "So?"

  "So I'm going to kill him," Sean growled.

  "Hon," Roxy said, "right now I don't think you could kill a fly, you're completely wore out."

  "I have to get to him before that hyena does."

  "What?"

  "Woiseman, the hitman. The guy who killed my father. I cornered him and we had a little talk. He had an agreement with my father. My dad knew his days were numbered, no matter what he did. So he got Woiseman to promise not to let them kill me or mom, and in return he gave Woiseman his prototype silver protection device.

  "Harkins was one of the people who swore the oath. So now Woiseman is going to kill him for breaking his word, as he'd promised my father."

  "Is that why you didn't kill him?" Daelyn asked.

  Sean growled, "Yes. He had a deal with my dad, and he lived up to it, and he wasn't done with it."

  "So why not let him kill Harkins?"

  "Because I want to be sure he's dead," Sean grumbled.

  Pulling up in front of the house, Sean got out of the van and headed for the front door. Surprisingly, when he got there, it was unlocked.

  Stepping inside, he could smell it: blood. Following the scent he stepped into the office. Lying on the floor was Harkins, quite dead. Pinned to the wall, and panting heavily, was Woiseman.

  "Care to help a guy down?" Sal grunted.

  "Damn, that looks painful," Roxy said.

  "You got that right, it is."

  "Why haven't you pulled yourself off?"

  "Rough night," Sal grumbled, and then looked at Sean. "So, Kid, either kill me or help me. But don't just stand there. Sooner or later the family is gonna wake up."

  Sean growled and raised a hand to kill the man who had killed his father.

  "Sean," Roxy said, taking his arm and pushing it back down, "no."

  "Why not?" Sean said turning to look at her, the pain and hurt visible in his eyes. "He murdered my father! He took my dad away from me!"

  Sean sniffed and felt the tears start to run down his face. "This is the man who hurt me! Hurt my mom! Took away my family! He ruined my life!"

  "Sean, the man who did that is dead on the floor. You said it yourself; your father knew his days were numbered. He made the best deal he could for you, he died on his own terms. Yeah, that hyena may be a murderous piece of shit," Roxy growled and shot Woiseman a look, "but you're not."

  Sean lowered his head slowly and gave Roxy a hug, trying not to sob as she lead him out of the room.

  "Cut him down, Dae. And try not to get any blood on you," Roxy said as she left with Sean.

  Daelyn looked at him and growled, "Sean's dad was a friend of the family. After I get you down off of there, I'll give you a twenty-minute head start. After that, every dwarf in Reno is going to be on your ass."

  Sal sighed, "I get it, truly, I do. I'm a bad man and I'm not welcome anymore. Now, can you get this thing out of me?"

  "Of course," Daelyn smiled and grabbing his coat she pulled him off the spike with a hard yank, causing Sal to almost scream in pain as he slid off it.

  "Gee, thanks," he growled.

  "Think nothing of it!" Daelyn laughed, and then headed out the door to catch up with the others, as Hunter and his group freed the lycan servants in the house.

  "I think maybe I should just go to Florida and stay there," Sal grumbled and limped off after them. At least his car wasn't all that far away.

  Arthur watched as the last of the vehicles left, taking all of the attackers, the freed lycans, their wounded, and their dead, with them.

  "How many died?" Arthur asked Bill, who was talking on a radio to someone in the attacking force.

  "Eight of our people, and over a dozen of the defending lycans," Bill sighed.

  "And the Ascendants living there?"

  Bill shrugged, "As far as I can tell, none of them. There were a couple who got hurt bad and are going to need medical assistance, but the dwarves have made it clear and Sean agreed, that if we started killing people, we'd be no better than them."

  "Plus it would enrage the other councils?" Arthur suggested.

  Bill nodded. "If they see it as just losing their slaves, maybe they won't fight as hard. It's not like their lives are on the line."

  "Well, let's give it a few minutes to settle down, then I'll drop the spell and break the circle," Arthur told him. He and the four other senior mages he'd brought with him had cast a circle of silence around the entire estate, so that nothing that happened inside could be heard outside. It was a spell that most houses knew, but one which Sapientia specialized in. The purpose of it was simple: when a house raided another house, the mundanes had to be kept unawares of the battle going on. If it had been daytime, Arthur could have even added an illusion to the spell, to keep unwanted eyes out.

  "Are those your people coming back?" Arthur asked as five large vans pulled into the compound and people piled out, armed with what looked like rifles from here.

  Bill shook his head, "No, I have no idea who those people are."

  As they watched, the new arrivals all ran into the buildings and as Arthur and Bill were on the inside of the sound shield, they could hear the muted sounds of gunshots from inside the buildings.

  "They're killing everyone," Arthur said surprised.

  "Can you do anything?" Bill asked.

  "If I do anything, it'll drop the circle, and as I said before, I can not get involved."

  "But this isn't our fight!" Bill protested.

  "I don't know that," Arthur sighed.

  Looking down at the center of the compound, Bill saw one man directing things. Grabbing his binoculars, he looked down to get a better look at the man.

  "Shit," Bill swore and handed his binoculars to Arthur, who looked as well.

  "Morgan," Arthur sighed, "I should have known."

  "Known what?" Bill asked.

  "Morgan hates the Ascendants with an almost religious fervor. With their defenses gone, I'm not surprised he moved in to finish them off. He's probably been waiting for Sean to attack for weeks now."

  "And this way he can claim we did it!" Bill growled.

  "I can't drop the circle, until they're done," Arthur sighed, shaking his head. "None of us can risk the exposure."

  "But you will tell people what you saw?"

  Arthur nodded, "When the time is right, or when you ask. They didn't request us after all, so they have no right to expect my silence."

  Fellowship Meeting, Friday

  "So," Sean said looking around the room at all of the faces, "the Vesti's came in and wiped out everyone we'd gone to all of that trouble to leave alive. Further, they went to the houses of all of the senior council members and killed everyone there, man, woman, child, lycans, everyone, and then just took the lycan bodies away to make it look like they'd been freed.

  "In fact, the only places where they weren't able to kill the council members were when our people got there first, and were able to run them off."

  Sean was seated at the foot of the table, he'd made it clear to Bill, his father-in-law, that he didn't want to run the meetings or be in charge of the Fellowship. However he'd made it equally clear that when push came to shove, he expected to get his way.

  Yeah, he was being a bitch about it, but right now, he didn't care. Maybe it was his lion starting to rub off on him? Sean didn't know. It could just as easily be that right now he was just really tired of all this shit. If he hadn't promised the dwarves not to start a war, he'd be leading everyone on an immediate attack to do just that to the Vestibulum after the crap they just pulled.

  "Does this mean we're at war with the Vestibulum then?" Jeffery, the head of the bear clan asked.

  Sean sighed and nodded, "Yup. They just committed mass murder and are trying to hang the crime on us. Thankfully we have witnesses to prove otherwise, but we haven't brought them forward just yet."

  "Is that wise?" Jeffery asked.


  Sean grinned at him, "It's the course we're pursuing at this time. If you wish to suggest something different, please write it up and submit it to me after the meeting."

  Jeffery grumbled and pulling out a piece of paper he actually started writing on it. Of all the people there, Jeffery actually worked for the state government and had a love of forms and paperwork that Sean just couldn't understand.

  "What about the dark elves?" Boris asked.

  "What of them?"

  "What were they doing there?"

  "Best I can figure out is that the nice folks over at the Ascendants missed their lycan sex toys and servants so much that they decided to pursue other options. The girls have told us that they were sold off as slaves after their family lost in some sort of power struggle in the sidhe, or wherever the hell it is that they come from."

  "What are you going to do? Send them back?"

  Sean shook his head, "They can't go back. They're effectively exiled right now. That may change someday, but for now, they're stuck here." Sean held up a hand, "Just to be clear, I have no idea what we're going to do with them, I've left it up to them to decide."

  Ted laughed, "They could make a mint as a lounge act in Vegas. I've heard their voices. If they want to, send them to me and I'll get them set up right."

  "I'll be sure to mention that to them," Sean said with a nod.

  "What about our dead," Jorge, the representative of the Nevada boar clans asked.

  Sean sighed heavily. "There really isn't anything I can do for their families beyond thanking them and giving them a bunch of extra tags and collars to sell or give away as they wish. I've thanked them all, personally," Sean remembered doing that this morning before the meeting. That had sucked beyond anything he'd ever had to deal with before, "and I've let them know that if they ever need help, to ask me.

  "I've especially thanked Claudia," Sean motioned to her and she nodded back, "for the use of her strike team. Chad is also setting up a couple of strike teams," Sean nodded to Chad, who nodded in return.

  "I think the time has come for all of you to start considering such measures. I'm starting to think that the Vesti's are going to be by far our most dangerous and nasty opponents."