In person, it was easy to confirm Miika’s suspicions. The Attorney General was not operating under his own free will. A dozen people attended the meeting, half wearing military uniforms. Perhaps a stronger mage could have compelled them all, but Bronski didn’t even try. He really didn’t have to, since his puppet the Attorney General played his role perfectly.
A document explaining the crisis was handed out to each participant. Explaining that and answering questions took an hour. To say it was complete bullshit would be an understatement. Bronski blamed me for the spell that destroyed the park, and listening to him, I was almost ready to declare myself a menace to all life on Earth. Isabella was right. I should have killed him when I had the chance.
The second document was the plan for arresting all non-Humans and putting them in some sort of camps out in the wilderness all over the country. It didn’t sound possible to me, but Bronski assured everyone that with the help of loyal Human mages and the support of the ICAA, he could control all the terrible monsters and send them back where they came from. He never directly came out and said he planned to exterminate us, but I could tell that several people in the room took that for granted.
The security plan for the President’s Congressional speech was included with the document. There were twelve people in the room, but Bronski had brought fifteen copies, so I just had to make it out with one.
Although invisible due to my glamour, I stood well out of the way, in a fold of a curtain where I could see everyone in the room. Only a few of the men there—they were all men—seemed at all skeptical, and only two of those were in the military. Several openly displayed anger at the charges in the background document, and the smell of fear in the room was almost overwhelming.
People who were afraid were easy to manipulate, and while Bronski might have lacked in magical power, he displayed a keen ability to persuade. Of course, not being constrained by facts certainly helped. He told more lies in two hours than I could have possibly imagined. What little trust I had in Humans almost totally evaporated.
When the meeting was over, everyone left except the President and one other man. The President wrung his hands and moaned about the terrible situation. The other man didn’t look convinced. Finally, the other man left. The President waited a couple of minutes, then followed him. I leaped onto his desk, grabbed a copy of each of the documents, and slipped out the door beside him.
We walked around a couple of corners with his escort following behind us. It made me sort of nervous, thinking that surely someone would detect me, but no one did. Humans hadn’t yet overcome their distrust of mages enough to use them as guardians or to set wards. The weird thing was that Bronski had sold them on that exact thing. The mages—Human mages—will protect you from the non-Human monsters.
I realized the President was going to wherever he lived. The schedule I memorized showed a break for lunch after the meeting. I needed to find a way out. I was afraid that if I stopped to get my bearings, someone might step on me. We passed an open door with a sign saying “Press Briefing Room”, and I ducked inside. The room was empty and memory told me the door at the other end of the room led to another room with an outside door.
To my consternation, the next room had a lot of small cubicles with small offices along the walls. And people. Lots of people. Working on laptops, talking into phones, rushing back and forth.
Sticking close to the wall, I worked my way around the room until I got to the door. That’s when I ran into a minor problem. Being twelve inches tall had its drawbacks. I wasn’t tall enough to reach the latch, and even if it was unlocked, I wasn’t sure I was strong enough to open it. Growing back to full size would increase my chances of getting caught. I knew everyone there was engrossed in their own business, but someone would notice a person appearing from thin air.
I waited for half an hour before someone opened the door, and I slid out before the door closed. There were more people outside—a lot more people—many with cameras and microphones, plus security guards and men in suits with pistols under their jackets. It took me an hour to work my way out of the mob and across the lawn.
Beyond the White House grounds, there were even more people—people with microphones and cameras, more men in suits with pistols, and DC cops instead of security guards. Then there were the tourists and their children. I viewed the wall of people with dismay. The chances of getting stepped on escalated, and children were the worst when I was small. I never knew what they were going to do or what direction they might decide to move. I cringed as one child cried and stamped his feet while his mother ignored him.
I found myself wishing that I looked like Wen-li. She might be able to grow to her normal size in the middle of a crowd without attracting much notice, but a six-foot-six woman with green hair suddenly appearing in the middle of a crowd was bound to draw people’s attention.
It took me another forty minutes to work my way along the base of the fence until I cleared the crowd. I needed to find someplace to change my size. Although my clothing and bag shrunk with me, all of my stuff in the pocket dimension inside the bag didn’t. Even if I managed to pull my phone out, it would be almost as large as I was.
A flower bed partially hidden by a tree on the side of the Treasury building gave me enough cover to change my size. I pulled out my phone and called Torbert. We met up and caught a bus.
Torbert and Wen-li pored over the documents, dissecting and analyzing them. Isabella read through them. I was concerned only with the part having to do with me and my property.
I texted my employees, telling them that I was shutting down the business until further notice. The financial hit would be severe, as early summer was my busiest time of the year. I had six crews working, new clients coming on board.
“We have to find another place to stay,” I told Miika. “Even with you reinforcing my wards, we can’t withstand a concerted attack.”
He nodded, knowing I was correct.
During our trip to Pennsylvania, Miika and I talked about our lives back at home. His father was a realm walker who had fallen for a mage on Earth and taken her with him back to Midgard. It happened. While many halflings were the result of mere dalliances, true affection was possible between races. Miika was older than I was, and had traveled more extensively, but he’d spent his early years in Midgard. We had seen mage wars, there and in other realms.
“We can move to my place in Chevy Chase,” he said. “If we could get there without detection, it will work, but it can’t be fortified even as much as this place.”
And there lay the problem. How to get relocated with all the watchers. Since the President declared the emergency, a small force of soldiers had taken up posts across the street from my gates. The Fairies reported there were more soldiers in the areas surrounding the park.
I had a small fleet of vehicles, but we knew we would be followed if we drove out of the compound, if not arrested. The final declaration of martial law and the order to arrest all illegal aliens had not happened yet, but that was the purpose of the upcoming meeting between the President and Congress.
“I’m betting that Bronski and Nieminen will wait until Congress affirms the President’s declaration of martial law, then pull the trigger on that spell,” Torbert said. “Any time a full gathering of Congress and the President’s Cabinet is called, one Cabinet officer is kept away in case of a disaster.” He held up one of the pages from the document. “Bronski and Attorney General Adair will be at Camp David, so Adair will end up as President.”
“And Bronski controls Adair,” I said.
“We have to find Nieminen,” Isabella said.
“That would save a lot of lives,” I said, “but it wouldn’t change the current situation. We need to kill Bronski and save Adair. We need to prevent the President’s speech.”
“I’m afraid even that won’t change things enough,” Torbert said. “That meeting set powerful forces in motion. If everyone in that meeting was convinced to follow Bronski’s
plan, then they wanted to be convinced. Changing their minds won’t be easy.”
“There was a man there,” I said, “tall with a bit of a stoop as though his back hurt, with gray hair, going bald, and bright blue eyes. Who is that?”
“William Harvey, the President’s Chief of Staff. Why?”
“He wasn’t convinced. He argued with the President after everyone else left. He said the plan was reckless and poorly conceived. There were two men in military uniforms who didn’t act as though they liked the plan, either.”
“You don’t know their names?”
“No one introduced anyone. They all knew each other.”
Wen-li tapped on the keys of Isabella’s laptop, then turned the screen toward me. “Any of these men?”
The pictures showed five of the soldiers who had been at the meeting. “They were all there.” I pointed at one of the pictures. “That one was very skeptical. One of the men in a business suit said that trying to control non-Humans in the United States was silly because we would just go across the border into Canada or Mexico. But the other soldier who agreed with him isn’t in this picture.”
Torbert took the laptop and pulled up another picture. “How about him?”
“That’s the one.”
“General Driscoll, the Marine Corps leader of the Paranormal Strike Force.”
“So, what does all that mean?” I asked.
“That there are enough powerful men who might listen if we can free Adair from whatever spell he’s under.”
Chapter 24
As soon as it got dark, we went over the fence and walked to a restaurant. Miika and I left the others there and ran to his place where we got a car.
“You really like fancy cars,” I said as we entered the garage.
He laughed. “The BMW we left at the nursery is mine. All of these belong to the house’s owner.”
“Oh. I thought it was your house.”
“It belongs to a friend. She’s in another realm right now.”
We took a large black Lexus and drove back to the restaurant where we picked up Isabella and the PCU agents. Miika gave each of us a bedroom and, more importantly, from my perspective, a bathroom. It was difficult enough sharing my three-room cottage with four other people, but the small bathroom was totally inadequate for all of us.
“Are you sure the owner won’t mind?” I asked. The mansion was huge, the furnishings and decorations obviously expensive. The kitchen alone was larger than my cottage.
“Absolutely,” he said. “The owner is a Nephilim, and if she were here, she’d be working with us.”
Torbert had selectively contacted colleagues at PCU and other agencies. He arranged a meeting at a restaurant in Silver Spring owned by a friend of his who was a witch. Immediately after arriving at Miika’s place, we took two cars and headed out again.
Thankfully, Torbert wasn’t any more trusting than I was. He told us frankly that he couldn’t be sure everyone he contacted would believe him and take our side. While he and Karen went inside, Miika donned a glamour and took up a post across the street. Isabella leaped on top of the building in her jaguar form and watched from there.
I sort of roamed around, checking side streets, parked cars, and anyplace that looked like a good observation point with a view of the restaurant.
All of the agents Torbert invited showed up. None of them had been told the others would be there. Half an hour after the last invitee entered the restaurant, caravans of cars converged on the place from both directions.
I called Torbert when I saw the first cars coming.
“You’ve been betrayed,” I said when he answered. “Go out the back. Don’t let anyone use their phones.”
My next call was to Miika. I started to call Isabella, then realized that from her perch she could see the cars coming better than I could.
The first two cars pulled into the parking lot, right by the front door. I walked up to the men getting out of their cars and peppered them with sleepy gas.
As I was turning away, I heard a horrendous crash, followed by two more. An SUV filled with men sat in the middle of the street, looking as though it had run into a wall, but there was nothing there. Two more vehicles had plowed into the first one, creating a terrible mess.
Another car came down the street and slammed on its brakes. Tires squealing, the driver tried to avoid the wreck in front of him and jerked the steering wheel to the right. The rear end of his car clipped the last car in the pileup even as his front wheels hit the curb and flew a few feet into the air. He lost control, and the car skidded into a couple of parked cars.
Miika ran up to me, and we rushed around the side of the building only to find cars entering the parking lot from the side entrance.
He pushed me in the back. “Go! Run! I’ll hold them off.”
I looked over my shoulder, and saw flame kindle in his hand. The lead car screeched to a stop, and men jumped out of it. Miika hurled a fireball at the car, and it burst into flames. The men dove to the ground. I saw the one closest to me raise a pistol, pointing at Miika.
The noise of the pistol firing coincided with me firing a paintball in the man’s direction. Probably none of the Humans saw Miika lean slightly to one side, his movement so slight but so fast. The bullet hit the building behind him. I decided that if he could dodge bullets, I would take his advice. I ran.
Behind me, I heard the swoosh of another fireball, and then another, along with the sound of gunfire. Around the back of the restaurant, I found a man lying face down with a pistol by his hand. His back looked like hamburger. I didn’t slow down, hurdling the wall in front of me into someone’s backyard. The dog looked startled, but I was over the next wall before it could bark. Two more backyards, then I stopped in the shadow of a large elm tree on the next street.
My phone buzzed and I answered, “Hi, Karen. Where are you?”
She asked, “Are you okay?”
“I’m fine. Where are you?”
“Hiding in a backyard a couple of houses away from the restaurant. It sounds like a war over there.”
“Where’s Torbert?” I asked.
“He’s with me, and so is another PCU agent. Everyone scattered.”
“Did everyone get away?”
“I think so. Thanks to Isabella.”
“Well, just keep your head down. I’ll come for you.”
I circled around and came at the restaurant from the same direction some of the cars had come. It wasn’t difficult to find my destination. The glow of flames could be seen above the rooflines of the houses between me and the restaurant. I didn’t hear anymore gunshots, so I tried Miika’s cellphone. No answer, but we all had our phones on buzz.
When I got within sight of the restaurant, I shrank and donned a glamour. Several vehicles were on fire. Men walked around, some hurried from one place to another. A few bodies lay on the ground. In addition to the wreck on the street and burning vehicles in the parking lot, I passed another SUV that looked like it had blown up. I didn’t know what kind of spell did that, but it was far beyond my ability.
I didn’t care what kind of bullshit Miika tried to feed me about his training. I had seen Elven battle mages in Midgard. Halfling or not, I doubted there were many warriors in Earth’s realm who could match him. He had been absolutely calm while facing probably a hundred armed enemies.
Working my way past the battlefield, I checked out backyards until I felt Karen’s magic. I snuck up to the gate and grew back to my normal size, then vaulted over the gate. Karen and the others were behind a shed in the far corner of the yard.
I knew the agents were armed, so I let myself glow a little so they could see me. Putting my finger to my lips, I urged them to silence and let the glow fade. Motioning them to follow me, I scrambled over the wall into the yard behind. One of the men boosted Karen up, and over and I caught her. The two men followed.
We passed through the gate and out to the street, heading away from the scene. The sound of sirens in
the distance grew louder as they drew closer. I checked and saw that I had missed one call from Miika, but he had left a message, “I’m back at the car.”
“Miika is at the Lexus,” I told them as we walked down the street. “It’s down this way another block. Do you know where Isabella went?”
“After she took down Kilpatrick,” Torbert said, “she jumped back on top of the roof.”
That meant she was up there when Miika engaged with the government men.
“We need to hurry,” Torbert said, pointing up. A helicopter with a searchlight was heading toward us, probably about a mile away.
Down the street, the black Lexus began rolling toward us with its lights off, and I knew Miika had seen us. He stopped when he reached us, and I pushed Torbert toward the front door, then opened the back. A jaguar lay across the back seat, cleaning her paws, and she gave me a languid yawn.
“Move over,” I said, pushing at her. She shifted and scooted to the far side of the car. Karen and the other man jumped in after me. Miika drove off, only turning on the headlights two blocks later.
“What about the car we had to leave at the restaurant?” Torbert asked.
“You weren’t the only patrons, were you?” Miika asked in return.
“No, we weren’t.”
“Don’t worry about it. Whoever was after you is going to have a difficult time sorting out the chaos. We’ll figure out how to retrieve the car later.”
“What happened after we bugged out?” Torbert asked. He turned in his seat to look at Isabella. “Thanks for taking out Kilpatrick.”
“Oh, was that the man with the gun?” She gave him a small, lopsided grin. “You’re welcome.”
“Let’s figure out where we’re going and what we’re doing,” I said. “We can talk about the rest later.” Considering how fixated Torbert was on following the law, I didn’t think that was a good time to tell him Isabella and Miika had slaughtered at least a dozen government agents. That didn’t even take into account any injuries or deaths of the men riding in the cars that wrecked or were incinerated.
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