The Awakened World Boxed Set

by William Stacey

  "Don't know," Rowan answered. "I'm scanning IR but not seeing anything."

  Angie leaned between Casey and Rowan, reaching for the small IR monitor in front of Rowan. "Let me," she said as she pushed Rowan's hands from the dials.

  "Excuse you," Rowan muttered as he leaned out of the way.

  As the Intel officer and life-sense expert, she was familiar with the infrared scanner and had used it on many operations. Under her control, the IR camera affixed to the nose of the helicopter panned over the terrain surrounding the fissure, displaying the landscape in shades of cold blue with scores of bright dots of orange and red signifying life, but she couldn't tell if they were human or animal.

  "Circle the fissure," she said, now in her element. "But keep us within two hundred meters so I can use my life-sense magic."

  Casey adjusted the throttle, carefully easing the stealth helicopter in a slow clockwise circle around the ravine. At this altitude, with strong crosswinds, and if he kept the aircraft's speed down, it was unlikely sentries would hear the stealth turbine—probably.

  Angie closed her eyes and cast out her life-sense magic, collecting and discarding animal life-forms as she divined them. The insects, birds, and reptiles she could ignore as background noise, focusing instead on the larger animals, those that pulsed with life. There were badgers and gophers, a trio of deer that distracted her for a few moments, and even a single mountain lion, but nothing that could be a person. Then, just before Casey completed his loop, she found what she had been looking for—two humans, men, she thought, but they could have been large women.

  "Got them," she said, her eyes flashing open. She leaned past Rowan to focus the dials on the IR camera, zooming in on the sentries, now showing as bright-orange flares amid the cool blue of the trees. Zoomed in like that, they were clearly people, both sitting together under a tree on an outcropping that overlooked the fissure, the perfect location for a sentry post. They even held what had to be rifles, cold blue against the orange glare of their heat signatures.

  Casey whistled in appreciation as he brought the Shrike to a hover a couple hundred meters from the sentries. "Always a joy to watch you do your thing, Angie-baby."

  "Erin." Rowan glanced at his sister. "Can you?"

  "Just hold us steady," she said before darting back into the cramped cargo cabin filled with twenty elven warriors all sitting facing one another in the cargo seats, their helmets removed and their faces covered in camouflage paint. They still wore their armor, though, and carried short bows and longswords. Only elves could somehow be both practical and traditional, but she had no doubt each was a deadly fighter.

  Angie followed Erin, slipping past Morgan in her bulky elven cuirass. Erin took up her silenced rifle and pulled the cargo bay door open a half foot, through which the wind howled. The elven warriors gave her room to take up a firing stance before the opening, and Erin knelt against the fuselage and sighted down the scope, her chest rising and falling, her left forearm wrapped through the rifle's sling to hold it tight against her shoulder.

  "She can't possibly hit them from an aircraft at night," Morgan whispered.

  "Shh," Angie answered. She closed her eyes and focused on the lifeforms of the two sentries. "Call it," she said to Erin.

  "The far left first."

  "Got it." Angie's attention focused on the life-form Erin aimed at.

  A moment later, Erin fired. Even suppressed, the shot cracked loudly. Without waiting to see if she had hit or not, Erin lowered the rifle and worked the bolt, chambering another round.

  "Tango down," Angie said, his life-form blinking out. "The other's moving."

  Erin didn't answer, merely aimed down the scope. The rifle fired once more, and Erin lowered it again, chambering another round without pause.

  The second life-form was on the ground but crawling, still shining with life force. "Tango still in play," Angie warned.

  "Oh, no you don't," Erin whispered. Then she fired a third time.

  The man's life force vanished. Erin had killed them both. Angie opened her eyes. "You got them." She turned her head and raised her voice so Rowan and Casey could hear. "Both Tangos down."

  Rowan rose from his seat and slipped back to join Angie and the others. He glanced at Morgan. "Can your people rappel?"

  "As well as you, I'd imagine. Maybe better. How do you want to do this?"

  Erin and Jay opened both side cargo doors on the aircraft and attached rappel lines to the mechanical winches, throwing them over the side so they dangled below.

  "Casey and Jay are staying with the aircraft to find some place to put her down while the rest of us rappel into the cave opening," Rowan said. "I have no idea if we have enough rope or not, but we're about to find out." He grabbed Angie's shoulder and pulled her in close before speaking into her ear, just loud enough for her to hear over the wind. "Can you do this?"

  Nathan had insisted all his mages train with heliborne insertions, and she had taken part in a two-week training course, using the ropes to rappel twice but always in perfect conditions, never at night in windswept mountains and certainly not into a giant crack in the earth that led to a cave system. She was so frightened she thought she might faint, but she nodded, forcing a smile to her lips. "I got this."

  "Tell me what to do," Tavi said, now standing beside her and Rowan.

  He shook his head. "You’re staying in the bird. You can help Jay and Casey."

  "I’m coming."

  "No, you’re not." He towered over Tavi, his face like granite. "You’re not an elf, and you’ve never rappelled from an aircraft."

  Tavi turned to glare at Morgan. "She’s not an elf."

  "Might as well be."

  "But—"

  Rowan shook his head empathically. "I’m not going to watch you slide off the end of the rope in the dark and fall to your death. Ain’t happening."

  Tavi looked as though she was going to argue further, but Jay slid up to her, smiled, and touched her forearm. "He’s right, Tavi. And I’ll need your help with the lines and the winches. Please."

  Tavi’s eyes darted about, her face distraught, but she sighed and nodded.

  Angie gave her a smile, wondering if she would be better off staying in the helicopter as well. Rowan wasn’t wrong about the threat of sliding right off the end of the rope. Even with the night-vision gear, they’d be dropping near blind.

  "Please, God," she whispered to herself. "Don't let me screw this up."

  This might be the dumbest thing I've ever done, Angie thought as she leaned backward out the open cabin door, holding one end of the rappelling line in her gloved right hand, her left hand pulling the other end tight across her hip.

  Erin, standing before her in the cabin doorway, met Angie's eyes and then slapped her palm against Angie's helmet.

  With a single heartrending push of her legs, Angie dropped away from the helicopter, using her right hand to slow her descent on the rappel line. She wore her NVGs, so she saw the world in shades of green, but it was still terrifying to fall like this, and her heart lurched into her throat as the walls of the chasm, a cave system in the base of the ravine, seemed to rise up around her as she dropped.

  Then she saw the green glow stick below her—the marker!

  She pulled hard with her right hand, wrenching the rope against her hip to stop her drop. The nylon rope stretched tight, but she skidded to a lurching halt, spinning in the air. Then hands gripped her, catching her around the waist and pulling her in toward them.

  Rowan—it was Rowan, his face covered by his own NVGs. On his back, he wore a small tactical pack just as Angie did. Hers contained Tec's water bottles, but she imagined Rowan's probably held more ammunition. He was always muttering about never having enough. The others stood nearby with their weapons held at the ready as they scanned their surroundings. Angie had been one of the last to come. Her boots scraped the rock, and then she was standing on firm ground, her heart hammering wildly. I made it!

  Rowan pulled her out
of the way and unclipped her harness. Then he whispered into his radio, and Angie heard the hiss of someone else descending—Erin. She hit the ground in moments, not needing Rowan's help, her scoped rifle slung over her back, a sub-gun in her free hand. She handled the descent so well that she might just have been dismounting from a horse.

  Seconds later, the rope withdrew, drawn back into the aircraft by the winch. As Angie got her bearings and made sure her weapons were still in place—Nightfall on her hip, a suppressed sub-gun dangling from a tactical sling—she heard the soft beat of the Shrike's rotors drift away, leaving them in complete silence. Casey, Jay, and Tavi were no longer a part of this escapade. Casey would find a place to set the aircraft down and wait to retrieve them.

  If they found Tec and Wyn Renna.

  The party stood cramped together on the base of a wide ledge cut into the chasm's wall. A narrow path cut into the wall led down. The chasm seemed bottomless from where she stood.

  Without waiting a moment more than it took for Erin to sort herself out, Rowan led the others down the path cut into the cliff face and into the underground cave system. Angie took a deep breath, raised her sub-gun to her shoulder, and followed. One of the elves came last, watching their rear.

  The path twisted back and forth on its way under the mountains. Soon, she couldn’t even see the stars above, and she realized they were underground. The path led to stone steps carved into the rock, the rough stone wall on one side, a precipitous drop into darkness on the other. Angie heard rushing water, a stream or underground river, and even the air tasted wet. The stairs, hundreds of them, led into a massive natural tunnel system. Rowan turned and looked at Angie, his face unrecognizable with the camouflage paint and NVGs, but she knew what he wanted. She closed her eyes and cast out her life-sense magic, detecting nothing more than rodents, bats, and insects. She opened her eyes and shook her head. Rowan nodded and moved on, leading the group into the huge tunnel system.

  Now even the rock walls dripped with condensation. After about ten minutes, Rowan halted them again. From where she crouched, she could just make out a pair of massive stone columns ahead, like giant posts carved out of the rock on either side of an arched entrance large enough to drive a bus through. There must be another cavern on the other side of the archway, she realized, which meant they must be near the Olmtec temple of Zolin. Erin slipped back to Angie, motioning for her to follow.

  Angie dropped to a crouch beside Rowan and Morgan. Rowan pointed forward, and she followed his gaze to the armed sentries standing near one of the columns not thirty meters away. She had almost missed them. Both were men, and both wore jungle fatigues with floppy hats. They carried assault rifles, Kalashnikovs with their distinctive banana-shaped magazines. There was light beyond the sentries, a glow in the distance, but she couldn't see anything else. Rowan held up two fingers and then waited, still watching her. She understood. He wanted her to confirm there were only the two sentries. She closed her eyes and cast out her life-sense magic, seeing both men flare into existence—as well as the additional pair just beyond the first two. Opening her eyes, she shook her head, taking Rowan's hand and opening two more fingers.

  Rowan nodded then showed Morgan and Erin all four fingers. Morgan pointed to herself and one of her elves and then at the two closest sentries. Rowan and Erin nodded, letting their sub-guns dangle by the tactical slings and drawing long fighting knives. Morgan and the elf drew long, wickedly curved elven knives the length of Angie's forearm.

  Without a moment's hesitation, all four rose and moved at once, taking Angie by surprise. She was an expert fencer but had never taken easily to killing. She closed her eyes once more, watching the violence through her magic. The two closest sentries died within a moment of one another, their life forces winking out of existence. The other two, twenty meters farther away, died when Rowan and Erin reached them only seconds later. The superhuman speed and stealth the werewolf family was capable of always stunned Angie. Faster than she would have believed possible, four men were dead.

  And they wouldn't be the last this night.

  Rowan and Erin rejoined Angie at the columns while Morgan and her elf watched their front. Rowan knelt, removed his small pack, and opened it, rooting about inside. Moments later, he pulled out a thick bundle of cloth and set it on the ground before him. Erin knelt next to her brother, watching him as he began to unwrap the bundle. Angie's eyes narrowed but then grew wide with fear when she saw the four slabs of CL-20 hexa-nitro.

  Oh my god, she thought, all night long—during a bumpy truck ride and turbulent flight—he’s been carrying enough high explosives to atomize us. Didn't he say this stuff was sensitive to impact?

  Rowan gave two of the slabs to Erin, who scuttled over to the far column, setting them in place. Rowan did the same to the other column and then affixed what had to be a remote detonator to the explosive charge. He glanced at Angie and then grinned as he pointed up to the cave structure looming over the columns. Angie understood. It scared the living shit out of her, but she understood. If they succeeded in rescuing Tec and Wyn Renna, all they'd need to do would be to get past the cavern entrance at a safe distance and set off the charges. No one would be able to pursue them. If they didn't bring the entire mountain down on top of their heads.

  They all moved forward once more, slipping past the dead sentries. The moment she saw what was on the other side of the columns, Angie froze in stunned disbelief. An enormous cavern opened below her, at the far end of which flowed an underground river, its waters sparkling in her NVGs. And in the center of the cavern sat a vast stone structure lit with torches. The structure was hundreds of feet long and shaped like a hexagon with pyramid towers twenty feet high standing at each of its six sides. Figures moved about atop the structure, but from this distance, she could only make out shadows in the torchlight. She cast out her life-sense magic, detecting dozens of people. Other stone buildings, an entire town’s worth, were scattered around the towered hexagon. So, this is Zolin. If the world hadn't been shattered by the Awakening, this cavern would be the archaeological find of the century.

  Erin removed the shemagh she had stuffed into her pocket earlier and sniffed it. Realization coursed through Angie. She's going to track Tec by smell. Angie stared in wonder, having had no idea she could do that. What else don't I know about them?

  Erin pointed down the stairs before them to a series of stone buildings built around the base of the temple, an underground village. Rowan nodded and then pointed to Angie and Erin, the message clear: follow Erin. She nodded, but her nerves were electrified.

  Everyone had their own mission. Angie and Erin would save Tec. Rowan, Morgan, and the elves would save Wyn Renna. Erin led her down the stairs as Rowan and the others prepared to assault the pyramid. It wasn't much of a strike force, but it was all they had.

  All too soon, Erin and Angie were at the bottom of the stairs, slipping among the ruins. Erin led her unerringly through the old buildings, many of which were in remarkably good condition, maybe preserved by being underground. The closer they came to the hexagonal temple, the more Angie heard voices raised in chanting, the sound making her skin crawl.

  Angie paused often to cast out her life-sense magic. Most of the Tzitzime were congregated atop the hexagon temple, but a few sentries patrolled the ruins, usually in pairs. With Angie’s help, Erin easily led them past the guards. In the darkness, the two women were like ghosts.

  Then Erin stopped, her posture erect, and drew her fighting knife again. Just ahead was a large stone building held together with ancient blocks of wood and rope. The light of a lantern flared within the building, the glow seeping out of the narrow window slats. Angie cast out her magic, sensing three life-forms. Angie raised three fingers, and Erin, clutching her knife tightly, nodded in understanding.

  Erin moved first, bolting through the open doorway with Angie rushing in behind her. The large chamber held a table around which sat a pair of men in jungle fatigues. A man, naked and covered in blo
od, was chained to the far wall, his head hanging down and his long black hair covering his face, but Angie knew it was Tec in an instant.

  We’ve found him!

  Erin rushed the two guards. Their eyes wide in panic, they grasped for their assault rifles sitting atop the table, but Erin was much faster and was on them in a moment. She lashed out with her fighting knife, severing the jugular and spinal cord of a guard with a savage cut. Blood sprayed as the second man jumped to his feet, but Erin slammed into him, sending him flying back to strike the wall and rebound forward onto the stone floor, dazed. Before he could rise, Erin was on him with the knife. It was over in moments.

  Angie ran to Tec, her fingers lifting his head as she examined him. His eyes were burned out. His body was shattered—burned, cut, broken, even flayed in places. They must have been torturing him for days now to force him to change to his were-jaguar form. Monsters!

  It was a wonder he was still alive.

  "Find the keys to the manacles," she whispered to Erin.

  "Here," she said, thrusting the key ring at her.

  Angie undid the chains, and Tec fell forward into her arms. She almost dropped him, but Erin helped her, and together, they laid him out on the stones. Angie removed her pack and pulled out three of the water bottles. "Please work," she whispered as she opened one and began to pour it over his face.

  The moment the water touched him, it washed away injuries, leaving nothing but untouched flesh, even restoring his eyes—like the dragon magic it was. She emptied the entire bottle and then another, pouring them over his body. She had just opened the third bottle when his hand gripped her wrist, stopping her. His eyes, whole and the most stunning emerald green, stared at her in gratitude. "Don’t waste it," he said through cracked lips.

  "Drink," she said, pushing the bottle into his lips.

  He did, swallowing large mouthfuls, his color coming back into his face. Angie took the water bottle, still three-quarters full, and stuffed it beneath her tactical vest in one of the inner pockets. "How do you feel?"