Adrenaline faded, leaving nothing but shivering. His fingers played over the grip of the weapon, as though uncertain whether to let go.
Seconds crawled by. His eyes crept up to the room, and the god-like perspective of the windows. The height was familiar. The view too. His father had to be close. Maybe only a couple floors away, if not closer still.
And Ashe would be coming.
He headed for the stairs.
*****
The door slammed closed on Brogan and Cole, and it was all Harris could do not to swear.
Whatever semblance of a plan anybody’d had in all this was disintegrating faster than a sandcastle in a hurricane.
Resisting the urge to punch something, he took to the stairs again. The boy would be fine. Trapped with the giant and his father, but fine.
It was the girl blowing up the building to rescue her sister who was in real trouble now.
Another explosion shook a lower level as he rounded the landing. Screams rose with the smoke this time, cutting off with a sickening sharpness that could only mean the wizard hadn’t been able to fly. Gripping the banister, he ran faster and didn’t look back.
It wasn’t like there’d be any point.
The fifteenth floor came into view, the number painted large on the concrete wall by the door’s side, and he skidded to a halt, trying to regroup. Barreling in wouldn’t do any good. Whether or not the wizards saw him as a threat, startling them would probably still get him killed.
He drew a breath, running a hand over his hair and then straightening his sports coat. Habit drove him to check his gun in its holster and pure survival made him step to one side before punching his access code into the keypad. No magic flew out as he tugged the door open, and he couldn’t hear any shouting coming from the corridor beyond.
Cautiously, he leaned around the doorframe.
Security cameras were locked on him up and down the hall.
Rapidly, he schooled his face into as purposeful an expression as he could manage, and then stepped through the doorway. A hall stretched in either direction from him, looping the circumference of the building with staid offices that barely interrupted the colorless walls. Another corridor ran directly ahead, peppered with more cameras and ending in a metal door, and only the hiss of the ventilation system broke the eerie quiet as the stairwell exit closed behind him.
A wizard leaned her head out of an office, and he barely stopped himself from grabbing his gun. Her cold expression became disgusted, and then she disappeared back inside.
Forcing himself to breathe and hiding an annoyed expression of his own, he started toward the metal door. Guards in the offices. Of course. The narrow hallway he was currently walking along would bottleneck any assault and the guards could cut off retreat, turning this little corridor into an instant killing ground.
It was a decent strategy, all things considered.
He wondered what other security measures they had up here that he couldn’t see.
Drawing another breath, he kept going, trying to ignore the soft whir of the cameras as they turned to follow him. That magic was a part of the defense was obvious; a moment’s thought on the subject made his eyes want to slide from every surface he could see. And the security codes for the doors would potentially slow someone down, though probably only someone like him. As it stood, he’d only made it this far because Brogan had long since given orders that, second only to the protection of Jamison himself, the last fallback for the building’s defense was the outer hallway of this floor.
But that meant nothing for the protections they’d have in the office at the end of the hall.
He had no idea how he was going to get those shields down.
Another breath struggled into his lungs. The barriers were linked throughout the building by magic and computers combined and, barring the chance they’d just installed a big red button on the thing, both would present a problem. He couldn’t do anything about the one, and had never exactly been a master of the other, and as nice as it would be to just pull out his gun and shoot something, he doubted that would actually accomplish anything.
His mouth tightened. It didn’t matter. He’d just have to figure something out.
The security office door had obviously been purchased with the goal of withstanding a battering ram in mind. His knuckles hit the metal with a dull thud, and silence answered, unchanging as the seconds stretched and the cameras stared like gun sights at his back.
Trying not to grimace, he lifted a hand to knock again and then hesitated. Brogan was occupied with fighting the Merlin or protecting Jamison. The odds of anyone being able to confirm anything with him quickly were minute at best.
Hopefully, anyway.
He pounded on the door. “Open up! I have orders from Brogan!”
Nothing happened.
He hit the metal surface again. “I said I–”
The door swung back. His heart plummeted like a rock, hitting his stomach hard.
“What do you want?” Simeon snapped.
“I have–”
“We heard you. What?”
“I–” he started, and then faltered as his eyes went beyond the man. The gray office sprawled across the width of the fifteenth floor, excluding the space left for the outer halls, and little else filled the room. Guards stood around an area enclosed in green glass and shimmering magic at the center of the room, within which sat other wizards watching computer screens. More monitors lined the office walls, each of them scrolling images of every floor.
He fought the urge to curse. Of course they could see the halls. What’d he think they had cameras for? Which meant they would’ve seen Brogan take Cole and–
“Spit it out,” Simeon ordered.
Hell with it.
“Brogan’s got Cole,” he said. “Found him downstairs. We need to get the boy to a secure location, and Brogan sent me to check if everything was clear to bring him here.”
Simeon regarded him flatly. “Brogan sent you?”
Harris feigned an apologetic shrug. “He needed the wizards to hold off the Merlin. And he’s protecting Cole.”
Irritation and disgust flickered across Simeon’s face in equal measure as he ran his gaze over Harris again. “Tell Brogan this location is just–”
Klaxons blared overhead.
“What the hell?” Simeon barked, looking beyond Harris to the hall and then turning to the office. “Where’s the breach?”
“Northwest stairs, sir!” a woman shouted, her hand to an earpiece as she relayed the information. “Keller’s on his way and the guards have them contained–”
The door on the far side of the room exploded.
Harris darted around the swiftly closing door as Simeon took off across the office, the wizards around the glass cube a step ahead of him. An onslaught of magic lashed out at them, cutting down four of the guards instantly and making Simeon falter, his defenses shuddering. Fire roared in the hallway and smoke billowed through the door, turning the Merlin into lethal ghosts in the shadows. Lightning raked the room and then struck the cube, setting the iridescent barrier alight. Blue-green electricity snarled as it spread like a web over the surface, engulfing each side and growing brighter by the second.
Till the glass shattered.
Harris hit the deck as shards exploded across the office to smash into the walls. Covering his head with his arms, he cringed at the sound of screaming and the sting of glass raining down.
Simeon gave an inarticulate snarl. Lifting his head from the protection of his arms, Harris only had time to see the defenses around Simeon go opaque, and then the wizard’s magic rushed outward with a roar. Tiles stripped from the ceiling and floor as the magic passed, as did the glass and debris, and all of it lunged straight for the Merlin. Amid the lightning and smoke, defenses glinted like crystal balls, but as the Blood’s assault continued, some of them flickered and failed.
Shoving up from the ground, Harris bolted for the remnants of the cube. Glass crack
led beneath his feet as he ran, the broken chunks skittering and slipping alarmingly, and an errant blast of lightning sliced the air above his ducked head. He could hear shouts coming from the Merlin, the words indistinguishable past the howling magic racing at them all, and behind the Blood wizard, the Taliesin paced like wolves, waiting to strike anyone who made it past Simeon’s attack.
He reached the shattered glass door and his steps suddenly faltered, the memory of the guard caught in the barrier downstairs flashing through his mind. There wasn’t any evidence the defenses on the room still stood; if anything, the destruction was a strong indication they were gone. But he wasn’t a wizard. He couldn’t be sure.
And to burn like that… like Malden had…
A cry rang out. It sounded like it came from a girl. Across the room, the Merlin were falling back, and he couldn’t tell how many were still alive.
He lunged past the door.
The hairs on his arms rose, tingling as though electrified, and then he was through. Racing toward the desk, he leapt a fallen body and then slid to a halt before the bank of monitors. Only a handful still clung to their metal braces, while the rest lay shattered on the floor.
But the wizards hadn’t had time to log out. They hadn’t had time for anything.
And they’d been working on getting the lower floor barriers back online.
He bit back a laugh, the sound edging closer to hysterical than could ever be safe, and then he rushed for a chair. A grimace twisted his face as he pushed the glass-peppered body of a dead wizard aside, letting it tumble to the floor. Splatters of blood covered the mouse and keyboard, with more splashed across the screens nearby, and he swallowed hard, trying to focus on which of the meters on the monitor directly before him was connected to the barrier outside.
On the right side of the screen, he spotted it. In a gradient of green, the meter pulsed near the maximum of its gauge, although he had no idea whether that meant it was fully defended or under attack. Behind him, he could hear the fight fading, and he kept from looking back as he grabbed the sticky mouse and navigated to the bar.
A click brought up the controls, from startup to shutdown and everything in between.
He swallowed hard, feeling the laugh rise up again.
“What the hell are you doing?”
Simeon’s voice sent his heart clawing for an exit from his chest. His gaze snapped to the other side of the room, and the Blood wizard standing there. The Merlin were gone and bodies lay by the door, though he didn’t recognize any of them. The Taliesin were running for the hall while explosions echoed from deeper in the building, testimony that the surviving Merlin were still fighting for their lives.
“I asked you a question, human,” Simeon demanded, striding toward him.
Harris struggled to breathe, his thoughts racing. No blur of magic surrounded the wizard, and no hint of defense either, because the danger had moved on and only the human remained.
And he wasn’t a threat. He never had been.
A boathouse flashed through his mind, bringing with it the sight of a teenage girl falling bloodied to the ground.
Never, except to those he shouldn’t ever have tried to harm.
He turned back to the desk, his eyes rising to the monitors overhead and the reflections caught in the gloss of their broken screens. Gently, his hand slid beneath his jacket as the wizard rounded the remnants of the shattered glass door.
“I’m making it right,” Harris answered.
The weapon left its holster as the chair spun, and the rapid gunshots echoed in the empty room before Simeon’s eyes went wide. The bullets ripped through the man’s chest, driving him back into the wall, and glass crunched and broke and dripped red behind him as the wizard slid slowly to the ground.
Harris exhaled, briefly eyeing the fallen wizard, and then his gaze went to the hallway door. None of the Taliesin reappeared; amid the explosions, no one had heard the gun.
A smile lifted the corner of his mouth.
He turned to the controls and hit shutdown.
Chapter Twenty-Six
With a gasp, Ashe ripped the magic from another faceless wizard and hurled it into the endless horde. Howling, the man stumbled away, colliding with two others and then crashing to the tile.
She didn’t stop. Three more wizards followed him screaming to the ground.
They’d made it fifteen floors, though it felt like more. With every inch of concrete and tile coming at a cost, the Merlin had carved a path all the way to the security office, only to find a Blood wizard inside. The fight had been manageable, and the barrier controls had been in sight, but when another Blood showed up behind them, the narrow hallway suddenly made every previous floor look like paradise.
And too many of their people had fallen before the Blood behind them died. Too many by far.
Swiftly, she drew in a blast of magic rushing for Nathaniel and flung it back. The large wizard didn’t react as the Taliesin fell. He was used to it by now.
She swallowed down a breath and kept going. The surge of magic gave her strength and, though her muscles and bones still ached, she could see the difference the borrowed power was making for her in the exhaustion on the others’ faces.
These were the strongest wizards Merlin had.
And without help, they wouldn’t last much longer.
She bit back a curse as more Taliesin rounded the corner, reinforcements for wizards the Merlin had long since cut down, and a few steps ahead, Nathaniel snarled as another group at the opposite end of the corridor did the same.
“Get her out of here!” Elias shouted to Nathaniel.
“No!” she snapped back.
A blast of magic tried to race past her and, without looking from Elias, she stripped it from the air and threw it at the Taliesin. Lightning from Cornelius joined the attack, knocking the wizards into those following them.
Elias ignored her. “That’s an order, Nathaniel!”
A pair of Taliesin rushed by their fallen counterparts, heading for Cornelius, and swiftly, she set them both on fire.
“We just need to get inside the–” she started.
Every surface seemed to shiver. In a heartbeat, all the barriers on the building fell.
“Signal the damn reinforcements!” Cornelius yelled.
Elias grabbed his phone, hit speed dial and then sent a burst of magic through the device so strong that the plastic melted as he flung it to the ground.
Portals opened. Taliesin flooded the hall.
“Son of a–” Elias swore desperately.
Magic slammed them from all sides. She stumbled, catching one blast of electricity as she dodged another flying past her head, and for a moment, she couldn’t see the others to know if any of them were still alive.
More portals opened at the end of the hall. The Merlin guard rushed through. Screams and explosions surrounded her as the Taliesin surged forward, crushing against her as they fled the Merlin charging them from behind. She sent her magic rushing outward, shoving the Taliesin back and giving herself a fragile moment of space. Caught in the chaos, she could see Nathaniel struggling to reach her while Cornelius yelled for him to get her away.
Electricity snarled over her defenses and she turned, hissing with pain. At her back, the Taliesin were regrouping against the Merlin mowing them down.
And by her side stood an empty office door.
She gasped, glancing back to see Nathaniel fling a man bodily through the air, though two more just took the fallen wizard’s place. Beyond him, Cornelius and Elias were surrounded by Taliesin, while the Merlin guard pressed in from either side.
They’d make her leave.
They were too tired to stand a chance.
And they were all running out of time.
Her hand landed on the doorframe. A portal swirled to life.
“Your majesty!” Nathaniel shouted.
She cast him an apologetic look, and then raced into the darkness.
*****
&nbs
p; At the end of the stairs, Cole paced. Cold metal waited in front of him and beyond the banister, the stairwell stretched down into an infinity of dizzying shadows before ever reaching the ground.
He barely noticed.
“Dad?” he yelled.
There weren’t any cameras. Nothing adorned the wall but the windowless gray door. He couldn’t guarantee that anyone could hear him, but he didn’t have another option. Even putting a finger on the metal had been excruciating.
A click sounded in the silence. The door swung open.
Hesitating before the doorframe, he eased a hand through, and then took off when he encountered nothing but air. Moving fast, he strode down the black-marbled corridor and barely paused as he rounded the lobby doors. Glass chimes clinked at his presence while reflected light from the panes danced across the white sofa to the delight of the tiny, blonde girl seated upon it, though her mother didn’t seem to notice. As he came in, Tanya looked over, the repressed fury on her face almost as easy to read as the fear, while standing behind her, Isabella regarded him with all the warmth of marble.
He eyed the Blood wizard briefly, and then his gaze flicked up to the sunlit gallery and the closed double doors. No sound could be heard from the office, meaning nothing and worrying him all the same, and with a last glance for the ice queen, he headed for the doors atop the wide staircase.
Her gaze seemed to follow him all the way.
Pausing on the landing, he reached for the door handle cautiously, waiting for the bite of magic, but nothing came. Drawing a steadying breath, he pushed the door open and walked into the room.
“Cole,” his father said, rising from behind the desk with a smile as the door swung shut again.
Seated before the massive desk, Lily turned, her eyes widening. Swiftly, she shoved out of the chair and raced across the office, throwing her arms around him as she reached his side.
His arms wrapped around her instinctively, his gaze dropping to search every inch of her that he could see. She wasn’t hurt. He’d been right. But no hint of a glow surrounded her at all.
Merlin's Children (The Children and the Blood) Page 35
