by Jamel Cato
“Am I not worthy of the truth?”
“You are worthy of kingdoms on this world and the next.”
“Did you feel this way when you sent me to mate with another?”
“I,” he said, “have always felt this way.”
She thought about that. “I release you from your oath not to look upon me with desire.”
He placed a hand on the curve of her hip.
She removed it and gently placed it back on his chair. “Our other oaths must remain in place.”
* * *
Early the next morning, as the rest of the village slept, Enieda was on her way to the river to wash Elpidio’s lab coat when she came upon Yefet, who was leaving Soul Bringer’s hut in the human shape that was like a magnet for her master’s eyes.
They shared a brief look before carrying their secrets off in opposite directions.
CHAPTER SIXTY-ONE
Arlington, Virginia
Four hours after leaving the DSO Tactical Operations Center, the Assistant Deputy Minister of the Canadian Supernatural Service climbed into the back of a luxurious stretch SUV that was parked in an underground lot near Reagan International.
Two strikingly attractive women awaited him inside.
“Pascal,” one of them said.
“Isabella. It is always a pleasure.”
“You never arrive on schedule.”
“But I am always worth the wait,” the handsome incubus said, reclining in his seat.
“Today is not a day for overtures,” Isabella said.
Pascal glanced nervously at the other woman. “Yes, I agree. Forgive me. Old habits and such.”
“The item you want is between page six and seven in the Essence Magazine at the back of the rack in the bookstore next to Terminal C,” Isabella said. “I suggest you go directly there from here.”
“You left the item unguarded?”
“I assure you it will be there when you arrive.”
“I heard about the nastiness that happened at your school and your house. If you need a place to stay temporarily, I—”
“Pascal,” Isabella said.
“Right. No overtures.”
The demon casually pulled his left eyeball from its socket and placed it into a cup in the armrest.
“Everything I saw is in there,” he said as he replaced the empty socket with another eye he had pulled from an antiseptic pouch. “I was careful to scan everything at least twice.”
“Must I ask to whom that eye belonged before you acquired it?”
“Someone who could bypass all of your government’s biometric defenses but is not immune to any of the vision spells you might cast upon it.”
“Excellent. Take the elevator behind us to level B2. There is a driver there who will deliver you to a waypoint that emerges in the restroom of the Admiral’s Club of Terminal F. Remember to set your watch back ten minutes.”
When their guest didn’t immediately depart, Isabella asked, “Is there something else?”
Pascal looked at the other woman. “You are even more lovely than the stories claim. That bust does you poor justice.”
Isabella’s driver pulled the door open. “I’ll escort you to the elevator, Sir.”
When Pascal had gone, Isabella said, “That is the first time in six hundred years I have heard him speak the full truth.”
“The woman in Maryland who is missing an eye would disagree with you,” Nefertiti said.
Isabella held up the cup containing the disembodied eye. “I have no doubt you are correct.”
“The next time you speak with Nehi, I would like you to tell him that the best way to protect those you care about is to see that they are strong enough to protect themselves.”
Nehi was a shortened form of Xavier’s birth name.
“Of course, Queen Mother.”
A beat passed.
“You do not feel this is wise.”
“One such as I cannot countenance the wisdom of one such as you.”
“Speak freely.”
“I think giving him that message will make it clear you were present whenever he asked the question that necessitated such an answer. And that will cause him to ask why you were not always present, which is a question that gets harder to answer the more it is asked.”
The goddess considered this. “If I possess wisdom, I best displayed it when I chose you to serve me. Now let us see what secrets this eye holds before it begins to degrade.”
Isabella began to cast the spell.
CHAPTER SIXTY-TWO
The Amazon Rainforest
Zina had barely left Xavier’s side since he had returned to the village. The two of them were in Yefet’s trailer listening to stories about Xavier’s early childhood when Baynin entered with a grim expression.
Yefet stood.
* * *
Yefet burst from the waypoint in the Pine Barrens running at full speed. She crossed the forested terrain at close to thirty miles per hour, only slowing to retrieve the weapons she had hidden in trees and ditches outside her tribe’s village.
She found the first body within three minutes. It was Simrayia, a female who gave crossbow lessons to the cubs and always enjoyed hearing of Yefet’s adventures in the Big City. The back of her torso and legs were riddled with bullet wounds from high caliber rounds.
Then she found the bodies of Zin’Boa and Pimyet and Q’Jobou, all felled in the same manner.
She had stopped running by the time she passed the pair of oak trees that projected a three-dimensional hologram they had once believed protected their home from direct observation.
Tu’Lok was sitting on the ground next to Om’Risi’s corpse, which, unlike most of the others, had been shot in the front.
“I’ve already searched the whole area twice,” he said, staring away from her. “We’re all that’s left.”
“The cubs?”
They had constructed a steel bunker beneath a nearby gorge that had enough space and supplies to support all the cubs for weeks in an emergency.
“They’re piled up in the bunker. There’s residue from diamond drills that came up through the floor. They were shot and burned. All the females have blade punctures in their ovaries.”
Yefet fell to her knees, wretching.
Tu’Lok walked over and embraced her. “I keep telling myself I could have done something if I hadn’t spent so much time on that damn mountain.” Om’Risi had been convinced that the Garden of Eden was the one place that Baynin could not pursue them. He had sent Tu’Lok on a pilgrimage to find the way there. “But the truth is, I’m not sure I could have done anything but die.”
“I will make them regret this,” Yefet said.
“Both of the hellfire cannons were smashed to pieces right in their turrets. Smashed, like Yahwey’s foot stomped on them. What harm could you bring to something capable of that?”
She removed his arm from her shoulder. “We shall see.”
“Om’Risi would have told us that it would be wiser to relocate and rebuild. Perhaps one of the tribes in Canada will take us in.”
“Relocate? I saw the tread marks on my way here, on all three paths. They’ve obviously found a way to penetrate our hologram and track us from above. All we would do is lead them to a new target.”
In his heart, Tu’Lok did not want to join a new tribe. “If we use the Delaware waypoint, we could make it to DC before dark. There are still a few weapons left in the armory by the cedar grove.”
Yefet stepped closer to her mate and spoke in a softer tone. “Today we will give our people proper burials. Tomorrow we will honor Om’Risi’s spirit by coming up with an intelligent plan.”
Xavier and six chupacabra warriors, all breathing hard, caused the hologram to ripple when they crossed the threshold of the village.
Tu’Lok eyed them for a few seconds, then went over to a clearing and started digging a grave.
They all followed suit.
CHAPTER SIXTY-THREE
Arlington, Virginia
Isabella sat back in her seat. They had just seen what Pascal’s eye had to show them.
“I must get a copy of this to the Science Council,” she said.
“So they can be as frightened as you are now?” Nefertiti asked.
“They can locate us anywhere in the world,” Isabella protested. “I have to let the others know.”
“I can feel their movements. I assure you they have figured this out on their own.”
Three Humvees and an armored personnel carrier filled with DSO assault troops pulled into the garage. One of the Humvees, as expected, was carrying the spectrographic marker of something that had been in recent contact with the object they had traded Pascal in exchange for the eye.
“You would have me do nothing?” Isabella asked.
The Humvees encircled the SUV. Troops began pouring from the APC.
“Do not be such a fatalist,” Nefertiti said. “There are many pages left in your story. Proceed with your parlay. I will see to the satellites and reunite with you in Mesopotamia at the place where Baynin decides to pursue his folly.”
Their driver retrieved an automatic weapon from beneath his seat.
“That will not be necessary,” Nefertiti said to him as she opened the door and stepped out of the vehicle.
The parking lot fell silent as she walked away from the SUV, her hands clasped casually behind her back.
She raised an eyebrow when no bullets or orders were hurled in her direction. Then she smiled and turned her palms face up. All four of the ACUs that were tunneling up beneath the garage shot upward through gaps that had irised open in the asphalt. The machines crashed into the cement ceiling at five times the speed of sound, bursting into pieces that sent shrapnel flying.
Isabella cast a plasma shield spell around the SUV that deflected the debris.
“Fire!”
Hundreds of rounds streaked toward the goddess. Bullets that reached her body or clothing transformed into white flower petals at the point of impact.
She plucked one of the petals from her shoulder and gently blew on it. A wall composed of earth, water and fire exploded outward from her body in all directions like a nuclear shockwave. Her attackers were flattened, burned and drowned in the space of a few seconds.
She strolled through the resulting steam and wreckage toward a DSO video camera that had remarkably sustained no damage.
CHAPTER SIXTY-FOUR
Coral Gate, Florida
“We can smell you, Darling, so come on out,” Zildan yelled into the darkness. “And do it slowly with your hands where we can see ‘em.”
Zildan, Michelle, Nick Patreaus and two armed chupacabra warriors were standing in front of a dilapidated mobile home in an empty lot with overgrown grass up to their knees.
Amy Gargac, a slightly overweight brunette in her mid-forties, timidly stepped out and waved her flashlight over the group. The light same to stop on Zildan’s ears. “No Elf species has an enhanced sense of smell.”
Zildan yanked a thumb at the pair of chupacabras. “Not me, them.”
Amy pointed her light in that direction, causing one of the chupacabras to shield its eyes with its paw.
“Mujer loca!” it snapped.
Amy stumbled backward. “South American Chupacabra. Why is it standing upright? And talking?”
Zildan quickly moved forward and snatched the flashlight out of Amy’s hand. “For the same reasons you are. Nick, would you mind?”
Nick flicked on an LED lantern that lit the whole area. “Hello, Dr. Gargac.”
“Mr. Patreaus,” she said with relief.
“I prefer fellow treasonous conspirators call me Nick.”
Amy frowned.
“Bad joke,” Nick said.
“Bad delivery,” Amy said, smiling. “And you’re shorter than you make yourself look in your Tinder profile pics.”
“Tinder?” Michelle asked with a raised eyebrow.
“It’s not what you think,” Nick said. “It’s how we’ve been communicating outside official channels.”
“Is that secure?”
“Technically it’s not,” Amy said. “But there’s an unspoken rule in the intelligence community to overlook profiles with the E-O-S-H tag.”
“Is that like a Fifty Shades of Grey code?” Zildan asked.
“Not quite. It stands for Eye of Sauron Here, which is how lonely NSA geeks refer to themselves on dating sites. It’s supposed to be outrageously witty, like how supers give themselves human handles when they play Norm City.”
“This is all fascinating,” Michelle said. “But can we head out to the facility now? The mosquitos are eating me alive.”
Amy eyed Michelle closely.
“What?” Michelle asked.
“You’re the green dot from DSO HQ,” Nick said. “You’re famous in certain circles.”
“That’s not it,” Amy said, breaking eye contact but saying no more.
* * *
Amy was leading the group through a maintenance corridor in the DSO Facility where she worked. They came upon a metal door with three sets of scanners on either side of its frame.
“Do you remember the sequence?” she asked Nick.
“Hand, eye, code,” he said.
“This won’t trigger an access alert?” Michelle asked.
“I disabled access logging this morning,” Amy said. “And the cameras are on a loop. We don’t have wards because of the wide variety of species we keep here.”
Nick and Amy positioned themselves in front of the scanners, which required simultaneous biometrics and credentials from two active DSO employees.
They passed the fingerprint and retina scans easily, but the system refused to recognize Nick’s voice authentication.
After the fourth failed attempt, Zildan became uneasy. He clicked his rifle to full auto and gave the chupacabras the predetermined hand signal to spread out.
In frustration, Amy stepped over to Nick’s scanner. “Let me try.”
That was the signal.
One of the chupacabras began loudly barking a second before three DSO security officers burst from a supply closet firing their weapons.
Zildan grabbed Michelle and rolled back down the maintenance corridor.
The chupacabra who had issued the warning bark was cut down in a hail of bullets.
His companion had moved far enough away to get off a shot that struck one of the DSO officers in the shoulder before it too was pummeled by the return volley.
This exchange had given Amy the extra split second she had needed to press a button on a bulky contraption protruding from her belt. A purple-colored bubble of light very similar to the one Isabella had deployed in the parking garage quickly formed around her and Nick, deflecting the dozens of bullets the remaining two DSO officers were sending their way.
Then Michelle screamed out a powerful note.
The thunderous noise of weapons fire abruptly ceased as the two officers and Nick fell to their knees clutching at their ears.
Zildan, who seemed to be unaffected, steadied himself on one knee and fired three rounds, striking each DSO officer. They wobbled for a few seconds before falling to the ground.
Amy clicked off the plasma shield. “You killed them?”
Zildan glared at her as he marched over and kicked the weapons away from the bodies. “Rhino tranquilizers. They’ll be out until tomorrow.”
Amy collapsed back onto the wall and fanned herself. “Oh my god. Oh my god.”
“Pull it together,” Zildan said. “How big is the security detail here?”
“Ten during the day, four at night.”
“Is the last one on the other side of that door?”
“If she’s following protocol, she’ll be in the security center calling for backup.”
“How long will that take?”
“Twenty-three minutes. There’s a Black Hawk at McDill Air Force Base always on standby.”
Zildan checked his watch. “It’ll take us four minu
tes to get back to the Rover. That leaves us about fifteen minutes to do what we need to do here, assuming the Black Hawk was not airborne five minutes ago.”
“It’s wasn’t.”
“How do you know?”
“The C.O. at McDill gave us strict orders not to call them again unless shots are fired or Godzilla eats Miami. We have a lot of false alarms due to escape attempts.”
“Swell,” Zildan grunted as he pulled one of the chupacabra corpses out of camera view. “Nick, help me with the other body.”
Nick continued cradling himself on the floor.
“He can’t hear you,” Michelle said. “It’ll be at least an hour before he’s any use again. I’ll do it.”
The canine was heavier than it looked and she struggled to move it before Amy came over and grabbed its other leg.
“What kind of Siren note was that? I’ve never seen a single note have such a potent impact on males.”
“I’ll tell you after you tell me about that thing on your belt.”
“This? Oh, it’s an experimental device that generates a localized plasma shield.”
“Just like an Isiteric Gypsy can generate with a shield spell?”
“Basically.”
“What’s inside?”
Amy hesitated.
“I’m a trained analyst,” Michelle said. I can put two and two together about what you do here. The only thing I’m wondering is if you just have a finger or someone’s whole hand inside that case.”
“There’s Gypsy biological material inside the generator,” Amy admitted.
“And I’m guessing there’s Mami Wati biological material somewhere on the other side of that door. That’s why you were staring at me so hard back at the trailer.”
Zildan walked up and took the Chupacabra paw from Michelle’s hand before Amy could respond. “I need you two to stay back here and cover your eyes and ears. I’m going to blow the door with C4. No point being subtle now.”
It took almost five minutes to reach and then breach the long-term storage vault. Once inside, Michelle removed a shoebox-sized black box and two rectangular objects from a shelf.
