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by Autumn Birt

  Friends of my Enemy:

  Stories from the War

  by Autumn M. Birt

  Copyright 2015 Autumn M. Birt

  Cover art by Autumn M. Birt © 2015

  Kindle Edition

  Discover other titles by Autumn M. Birt on Amazon

  Including the epic fantasy trilogy the Rise of the Fifth Order

  Born of Water Novel Companion

  Born of Water

  Rule of Fire

  Spirit of Life

  Kindle Edition, License Notes

  This eBook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This eBook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to Amazon and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

  Novels in the Friends of my Enemy series:

  Book 1: Stories from the War

  Book 2: After the War

  Book 3: Battle for Europe

  Book 4: The Fight for Peace

  Learn more about the series Friends of my Enemy here, including background information and release dates.

  Dedication

  To Kym S. for the many hours of help, beta reading, and of course years of friendship!

  And to Michael C. and Scott K. with thanks for the helpful suggestions and encouragement.

  Lastly to my Raven for the many evenings of late, and sometimes burnt, dinners as well as always being willing to come up with a name on the drop of a hat or discuss the intricacies of electrical generated shields.

  Table of Contents

  Part 1: First Meeting

  Part 2: Orders

  Part 3: Stirrings

  Part 4: Beginning of the Guard

  Part 5: War in the Streets

  Part 6: New Heir

  Part 7: Loss

  Part 8: First Foray

  Part 9: Changing Tide

  Part 10: No Quarter

  Part 11: Last Battle

  Excerpt from Friends of my Enemy: After the War

  About the Author

  First Meeting

  January 2055

  Dammit, he wouldn’t do this. Not to her.

  “Would it make a difference if I told you I was a Barón?”

  “Perhaps,” Arinna snapped, “if this were a Jane Austin novel.”

  “Arinna, it is just a lunch date!”

  “I heard the stories. It is never just lunch with you, Byran. Excuse me - Baron Vasquez, I am married. Happily, actually.”

  Byran sat back in the café chair, crossing his arms while giving her that trouble-making smile that Arinna wouldn’t admit jumped her pulse. His black hair and dusky skin contrasted with a white shirt that cost more than she made in a month. Everything about him exuded his heritage and confidence.

  “Then why are you here talking to me?” he asked. Two weeks and she already hated him.

  “The only reason Michael hasn’t gone to the ambassador,” she said, “is because I assured him I could make you back off. That is why I’m here. You’ve been ... impossible since the holiday ball. Why do they even hold such things anymore?”

  “You should learn to appreciate a good party. They are a way to forget how crazy the world is getting.” Byran leaned back enough to sweep her with his eyes and gave her a wicked smile. “And happy 2055, by the way. Since you haven’t let me say it in person before now.”

  “Let you say? You can’t track me down in the embassy whenever you like or call and say it is for an important meeting. Do you want to lose your job? Or make me lose mine?”

  He sulked. “Allow you to be sent back to that agujero de mierda of a country? No. I’d rather you stay here.” Byran held up a hand as she prepared to berate him. “But you are wrong. I’m not trying to interfere. I am trying to help.”

  “How is stalking me a help?” Arinna hissed, keeping her voice low. The customers seated at nearby tables glanced toward their animated discussion. Arinna sat back, her hands shaking too much to reach for her teacup.

  She wasn’t certain what to do. If she were home, she would demand Byran’s arrest. But here, in the EU, the rules she knew didn’t apply. And if she caused too much of a fuss, she’d be replaced and sent home. She had to handle this for herself and for Michael. Arinna squeezed the bridge of her nose, strategizing how to deal with Byran.

  He was watching her without the amusement that had lit his eyes at the ball as well as the beginning of this hastily arranged meeting. Michael had agreed to its necessity, but not liked the idea. Arinna expected to see him through the front windows, watching them from across the street.

  “I forget how different it must be for you,” he said, refocusing her scattered attention. “You are unmoored here, aren’t you? No military law to organize everything you can and cannot do.”

  Arinna swallowed hard, refusing to admit how right he was. “What of it?”

  “Don’t you wonder why all the previous occupants of your post failed?”

  “Terissa’s term was over and she was rotated out. I was rotated in. She didn’t fail.”

  “After six months? Please, no embassy has that short of a staff rotation. She wasn’t effective. They sent you, hoping you will be more so. Just like her previous counterpart and the one before that.”

  Arinna’s mouth was dry. She reached for her tea, savoring the warmth of the cup in her hands as she took a sip. The day was cool for Madrid, so everyone said. It was cool compared to home. Two weeks had not been adequate to acclimatize. Across the café table, Byran watched her with the same observant look. Doubt grew in her like a strangling vine.

  “So you are trying to say you haven’t been stalking me since the ball, but that this is your way of offering to help me succeed? Why?” The last came out forcefully, fueled by exasperation.

  “What can I say? You seem different from your fellow countrymen. I thought you might even have been enjoying yourself.”

  “Hardly. Fun is against the law in the USA.”

  Byran shot her an amused glance over his coffee cup, one that warmed his eyes. Arinna was dry-mouthed again.

  “See? I’ve not met anyone else from the New States who’d dare make that joke. I like you. Are you happy? I admit it - you are beautiful, and you are unfortunately married,” he added hurriedly as she opened her mouth. “As well as possessing a smart sense of humor. What is wrong with liking you? You are too good for that country you call home. I cannot believe a delicate redhead with such blue, blue eyes can be from such a cesspool. You should stay here in Spain. I can help you.”

  “I can imagine what you want to help me with.”

  “I might surprise you,” he said with a grin, something wicked and a little wild in his looks. It didn’t add to her confidence that he wasn’t going to cause more trouble.

  Arinna shifted in her chair. “I doubt it, considering what I’ve heard about you,” she shot back.

  “You’ve been interested enough to research me. Bueno! I will behave, as you say,” he added. “If you will at least treat me as a friend.”

  “I didn’t think you knew any women with whom you were just friends,” Arinna said, sitting back in her chair, and trying to measure his sincerity. It was hopeless. She hadn’t known Byran long enough to be able to read him. Not to mention that he refused to conform to any standard she tried to place him in. Arinna had never expected the EU to feel so alien.

  “Ah see, you will be good for me,” he said, leaning forward to squeeze her hand and immediately letting go when he saw the spark in her eye telling him he’d not merely crossed a boundary
, but had leapt over it doing the salsa. He leaned back, grinning again.

  She wanted to hit him. Instead, she laughed. Damn her if she couldn’t tell him to leave her alone and make it stick. Two weeks she’d been telling him or avoiding him, and it led up to this. “I’m not going to lunch with you. Or dinner, so don’t ask. And don’t call my embassy every day. We danced at the ball. That is it. Everyone thinks we’re having an affair!”

  “Well you certainly weren’t with your husband that night.”

  The comment and look in his eyes scalded her cheeks. “He was there meeting other staff and our NATO officers, networking.”

  “If you were my wife, I wouldn’t leave you unattended,” Byran said low enough she leaned forward to hear. “You need connections to succeed. Correct?”

  Arinna nodded, too flustered to trust her voice or words.

  “I will introduce you. Your counterparts do it wrong. They barge in like your military government and demand quick answers. That isn’t how it is done here. I’ll show you.”

  She’d wondered if Byran understood the risk he put her in. What did a handsome Spanish baron know of famine and riots? Back home, if a state wasn’t being shredded by the weather, it was being torn apart by its populace. The militarized government kept tight control, at least of the things it could. The EU was strained, drought and unrest more common than in decades past. But Europe rose above the darkness spreading through the rest of the world. It had food, industry, and stability. Byran had a sport’s car for goodness sakes.

  But now she wondered what she understood of Europe. Its people hadn’t grown up with gunfights over food or with martial law locking down riots while the military organized relief after the most recent storm.

  Thoughts like that made his company dangerous, Arinna thought, rubbing her forehead. But he might be right. He might give her an edge others before her hadn’t had. Others who had failed and been sent home with no promotion to help in a turbulent world and a deeply troubled country.

  “Okay,” she said in answer, pulse picking up a step. “But only work related! Nothing else, understand?”

  “Yes. We are to be work friends,” Byran said, purring the final word.

  Arinna meant to say, “As long as you respect my boundaries.” Instead, she shook her head at the glint in his eye and how he unrolled a smile, fighting one of her own.

  “Yes, work friends,” she choked out, attempting to be serious. Which was not going to be easy with him. “We’ll only see each other in our official duties.”

  “Good! What are you doing tomorrow?”

  —

  “You had tea with Count le Marc and his heir ... what is his name?”

  “Jacque,” Arinna answered, pulling off her boots. She eyed the worn scuffs on the toes. Polished silver and fine porcelain cups sprang to mind. “Damn him,” she swore under her breath. To Michael, she added, “He is an actual baron. The family is political. He grew up with most of the elite sons and daughters of Europe.”

  “Yes, I know,” Michael said, bending to kiss her forehead.

  “You researched him,” Arinna replied with a laugh.

  “You are not the only tactician in the family,” he teased.

  “So you see how useful he can be? One day, and I’m on first names with the best political dynasty of France!”

  “Yes, well, I think he was trying to impress you.”

  Arinna waved her hand. “So what? I can use Byran. If he wants to introduce me to everyone of importance in Europe, why not let him?”

  “Are you certain you’re fine with this? With spending time with him? You seemed ... unnerved last week,” Michael asked, his light hazel eyes concerned.

  “I misread him. I thought,” Arinna shook her head, dismissing old ideas. “Well, I still don’t entirely trust him. But if our assignment is to build connections, then he can be useful.”

  “Useful, yes. But that doesn’t mean he is worth the risk. I heard the rumors,” Michael said.

  “He tries to tumble every woman on staff at every embassy in town. Do you really think he’d interest me?” Arinna asked, snorting at the idea. Michael chuckled as well, sliding his arms against her waist when she turned to check the contents of the fridge. The dinner choices overwhelmed her nightly. Most of the produce they had here was beyond their budget in the States.

  “I think if he touched you, you’d most likely drop him to his knees before he blinked,” Michael said, voice husky as he whispered into her ear.

  “Oh, like our first meeting?” Arinna said, leaning back to swipe his lips with a kiss.

  Michael’s smile brightened the grey flecks in his eyes. “What is it?” Michael said, as Arinna’s gaze remained on him.

  “Old memories,” Arinna said, shaking her head before pulling out a packet of cheese. “Remember when we used to camp in the Outlands and explored those empty towns back before I finished college?”

  “Of course. It is where I spent my time when not flying. Other girls I dated wanted to go to nice restaurants. You wanted to explore places emptied of people by disease and tempests, tempting fate to see ruins. Not that I ever minded spending a weekend in a tent with you.”

  “Hah. We were both immune to HALO, why would I worry about old contagions? I barely remember when the world was so full, before the diseases.”

  Michael looked over at her as he put a pot on the stove. “It’s not like you to think about the past,” he said. “Are you sure you are alright here? It was a difficult choice to come to the EU.”

  “Really, I’m fine. It is an adjustment. I’d barely been off the east coast, but for our little explorations inland. Maybe I’m a little homesick, but it hasn’t been a month yet. I’ll adjust.”

  Thankfully Michael let it go, turning on the stove instead of replying. To herself, Arinna admitted how much easier the States had been despite the problems of the last decade with its devastating storms, droughts, and fires. The only thing she hated about the new military government had been when they’d locked down the Outlands. She’d loved those wild and empty places, witnessing a world unlike any before with a world population not seen since the 1970’s.

  She’d enlisted, just like Michael, because of the riots that erupted after hurricane Lempert drowned Florida when she was fifteen. Because if she didn’t fight the chaos, she would become part of it. The riots after hurricane Dexter devastated New York in 2048 proved she’d made the right choice. They’d needed the military and its martial law to control the fighting and organize relief aid. That was also the year she met Michael. It had been her first as a student in West Point and his first as a new officer in the Air Force, fresh from his two years of training.

  She’d never dreamed of going so far from home. Here in Spain, they were with a handful of embassy staff, most pseudo-military rather than having actually served in the forces. The military government was only three years old and still adapting to be more than a defensive force. She and Michael had left their country and traditional military careers behind for this assignment. Their altered government needed allies, food, and new industry to rebuild from the chaos of the decade before. Her country had changed, but it was growing strong again. She wanted to help.

  That was why they were here. Why she had to adapt to Europe and its ambiguous rules of conduct of who was entitled to what rank and privilege. It made no sense. Byran was the first person who had bothered to explain any of it to her. She never would have imagined she’d be grateful to him.

  “What about you? How are you doing? You gave up flying for this assignment. We could be here at least a year, assuming we are moderately successful,” she asked her husband, realizing that she at least had Byran showing her around.

  “I miss flying, of course. But it’s hard to start a family if my feet are never on the ground. Besides,” he added, more serious, “I’m DSS and dealing with the intelligence and orders coming through. Most of my day isn’t much different from home. I just don’t get into a plane right now. It’ll b
e worth it when we go back. My rank will be high enough that I can train or command and still come home to you.”

  “That would be nice,” Arinna replied, imaging a life returned to normal after this ordeal was over. For that possible life, she could struggle through her time in Europe. “Byran already has another visit set up for the day after tomorrow, but he won’t tell me where.”

  “You really are going to spend time with Byran and let him take you around?” Michael asked after a pause. His tone and sudden stillness made Arinna glance up from the tomato she was slicing.

  “I ... yes. For now at least. He really has been useful despite having to fight him off and remind him constantly that I’m happily married.”

  Michael snorted, crossing his arms as he leaned against the kitchen counter. He didn’t laugh.

  “If you don’t mind? I think he can give us an advantage. All the previous incumbents of this post didn’t last six months. I checked into it.”

  Michael frowned. “He might be useful. Just, Arinna, be careful around him.”

  “You really don’t like him, do you?” Arinna asked, walking over to slip her arms under Michael’s. The tension left Michael’s frame as he pulled her against his chest.

  “No. I don’t like the interest he has in my wife.”

  —

  “You look quite beautiful today,” Byran said, glancing over at her.

  Arinna waited for the inappropriate remark to follow. When Byran said nothing else, she glanced at him. He was focused on the road ahead. Which was good. They were cruising at nearly a hundred.

  Beyond Byran lay rolling hills flashing by at a pace that should have felt far too quick. It definitely shouldn’t make her grin. Sunlight warmed her face, falling through the open top of Byran’s convertible. The world raced by, wind streaming around the car. But she and Byran were insulated from it, bathing in sunlight and music. It was so easy to forget herself.