by Anna Windsor
Andy sat, apparently speechless, as her fighting group dispersed without making eye contact with her. Dio jogged up the stairs without so much as a sideways glance, and Bela and Camille scuttled off through the kitchen, heading for the downstairs chamber that housed the lab.
Before the swinging door between the living room and the kitchen even stopped swinging, Andy got to her feet and glared down at Jack. “Did all of you work this out ahead of time? I’m not some rookie who needs coddling and protecting—I have special skills, and these Coven assholes seem to want me, personal-like. It’s crazy not to use that to our advantage.”
Crazy. The word echoed through Jack’s mind as he held up both hands, palms out, hoping he looked clean and innocent and completely nonconspiratorial. He stood. Slowly. No point in riling Andy into a mini tidal wave that might smash the brownstone’s front window.
“You’re probably right,” he said.
“Damn straight I’m right.” She jabbed a finger against his chest even though he still had his hands raised in a peace gesture and he’d just agreed with her. “And don’t forget, you asked me back here because I’m a strategist, and a damned good one—so why do you keep arguing with what I propose?”
“Give them a little more time to find an alternative to hanging you out in the wind. Please? At least something to better our odds?”
Andy kept glaring, but at least she stopped poking him. Her palm flattened against his shirt, and he wondered if she was about to push him through the living room wall. She hissed out a breath through her teeth, and her red cheeks faded to a slightly less hectic shade of furious.
“It’s hard to argue with you when you’re not being an asshole.”
“Thanks,” Jack said. “I think.” With all the bad news about more gang shootings, he knew he should be all business, but she had her hands on him, and Andy’s touch short-circuited his better sense.
“I still think I’m right,” she muttered.
“Noted.”
“I still think we’re going to have to do this my way. Soon. A few days. A week tops. We can’t keep slow-footing because you’re all scared I might get a hangnail.”
Jack tried to keep any hint of frustration out of his voice. “You took a bunch of bullets in the last attack. A lot more than a hangnail.”
“They didn’t even leave marks.” She moved her hand across his ribs to his shoulder, right above one of his new scars. A funny look crossed her face, like maybe, just maybe, she might have realized that putting herself in danger could have consequences for other people in the world, too. The fight seemed to drain out of her then, and she just stood there with her hand pressed tight and warm against him.
“So, earlier we were talking about babies.” Jack risked putting his hands on her shoulders. “Since you can read my feelings so clearly and you know exactly how much I like that idea, what do you think about having my children?”
Andy’s mouth came open. “I—” She blinked at him. “I—you. Now you are being an asshole.”
He put his arms around her. Pulled her to him and lowered his face toward hers. “I think we’d make gorgeous babies, if they come out looking anything like you.”
She kissed him, then whispered, “Asshole,” one more time for good measure.
Jack didn’t care. For the moment, his world had up and turned perfect while he wasn’t paying attention, and that was just fine by him.
Sunlight streamed onto the beach as Andy walked with Elana, barely enjoying the waves and definitely not enjoying the heat. “Jack’s not listening. I’ve spent almost a week trying to convince him to let me try one of my plans. He’s dead set on going after one of Seneca’s heirs instead.”
“Jack’s stubborn.” Elana navigated the rocky terrain like she had every step memorized. “And he’s concerned for you. I imagine by now he’s desperate to make some progress—any progress—before more killings touch off riots and gang wars.”
Andy didn’t want to acknowledge how right Elana was, so she kicked a little sand and some stones instead.
“As for you,” Elana continued, “you’re not confident enough in your own instincts, and you aren’t giving the truth enough value.”
Andy bit back a bunch of smart remarks, but in the end, she couldn’t completely control her own mouth. “I’m confident. It’s just that nobody else is—and what the hell do you mean about truth? I tell the truth.”
“Some of it.” Elana shrugged. “What you let yourself know and accept. The rest you look away from because you fear it.”
“Okay, old woman. Knock it off.” Andy kicked a few more rocks. “I don’t fear anything.”
Elana stopped walking and turned her scarred face to the sea. “Why do you think you can heal Jack Blackmore? Why is it, do you suppose, that your talents work on him when they would have little or no effect on another human with no elemental abilities?”
Uh-oh. Andy looked at the water, too, but she didn’t find it relaxing at all. “I—I haven’t given that much thought.”
“Come now. Is that the truth?”
“Go to hell, Elana.”
The old woman laughed at her. “Your own feelings for him make a connection between the two of you. A true connection, soul to soul. If you can let yourself evade one obvious truth, why not others?”
Andy found herself too choked up to say anything, so she didn’t bother trying. She focused on easing a few of the bigger waves she’d accidentally summoned, helping them crest early, then watching as the foamy water swirled around her bare feet.
“It’s been too long since we occupied our rightful place in fighting groups.” Elana sounded sad—and a little anxious. “They’ll learn, Andy. And, I’m sad to say, so will you. To disregard a water Sibyl’s intuition is to court disaster.”
Images of Bela’s smile, Camille’s grin, and Dio’s bright, stormy eyes flashed through Andy’s mind. “I don’t want any disasters. God, that’s the last thing we need.”
“Then you must listen to yourself, and you must make others listen. It’s not always possible to accept truths in your own good time, or to allow others that luxury. Truth—and destiny—have their own timetables.”
Andy heard the words, and she heard truth, both what Elana said and what Elana meant, but how was she supposed to figure all that out and make everybody do what she sensed was best? She stared out at the sea, feeling its peace, its power, its immense relentlessness. The sea never had to convince anybody of anything. It just flowed where it wanted, how it wanted, and washed over anything that stood in its way.
For all my bluster, I’m more like a windswept puddle than this ocean. Andy bit at her bottom lip. I’ve got to find my own inner force. Aloud, she said, “Jack’s plan isn’t all bad. He’s got some good points about going after the visible remnants of the Seneca empire. How can I argue with that?”
“It may not be that your plan is superior to his, or his to yours.” Elana still seemed patient, but she was clearly worried, and the light off the blue water made her hair twice as silvery. “You may simply be sensing that you and your group should not take the direction he’s encouraging.”
“But why? What reason can I give?”
“We don’t always know the reason. We just feel it here.” Elana placed her hand over her heart, then let it drift down to her belly. “Have you had more dreams?”
“Just one, about a quiet place in the ocean and floating on waves so warm I never want to leave. It was peaceful, not some portent of doom.”
“But the rest of your dreams, and your air Sibyl Dio’s nightmares—do you still see monsters from your past, rising to kill you all?”
“Yes.” And Neala. Andy didn’t say that aloud because she didn’t want to make it any more real.
“How does your group feel about the dreams?”
Andy started into descriptions about Bela’s beliefs, Camille’s theories, and Dio’s ideas, but Elana stopped her. “I didn’t ask you what they thought. I asked you how they felt.”
<
br /> “I—nervous, I guess.” Andy tried not to look at Elana, but she couldn’t help it. “Don’t give me that shame-on-you expression. My group doesn’t want me poking around their emotions. They tell me almost every day.”
“Do it anyway. Force the issue. Force all the issues just as your fire Sibyl forces issues of communication and your earth Sibyl makes decisions about directions the group will take. Force it like your air Sibyl forces protection in emergency situations and never fails to record the necessary details. This is your duty, Andy, and it matters.”
Andy watched the waves wash into the tidal pools, then watched the water eddy off down dozens of grooves in the rocks and sand. “Everything connects. Everything returns to the same source.” Elana planted her foot across one eddy as if she could see it in great detail. Trapped water washed against her foot, then pooled, backing up the outflow for that tiny branch of the system. “Not much water retained. Not much effect on the source—though in truth, we never know that. It could be a tipping point for temperature or salinity or nutrients needed by a weak species that feeds a stronger species. Chain reactions could begin. The effect on the whole might be tremendous.”
“Or it might be nothing.”
“Yes. But no matter what, the effect on the water in this pool”—Elana pointed to the moisture beside her foot—“is intense. Possibly permanent. This water may never rejoin the source, at least not in its current form.”
“I get it, I get it.” Andy wanted to sigh, but she managed not to do it. “My quad is like the tiny branch you dammed up with your foot. If I don’t take care of what I’m supposed to take care of, bad things could happen.”
“To them. You. Maybe everyone.”
“No pressure.” Andy hugged herself and started walking away, wishing she hadn’t come here this morning at all.
“Plenty of pressure,” Elana called from behind her. “All the pressure in the world.”
Less than eight hours later, Andy decided Elana was unrealistic, cracked, or just plain crazy.
There was no reasoning with Jack about him being wrong and her being right. The man was too damned stubborn for words. She really didn’t think this raid was a good idea, but Jack wanted it, and Bela, along with most of the OCU and the Sibyls in the city, thought hitting one of the few remaining Seneca family strongholds might gain them some valuable information. God only knew Andy wanted movement on this case, but everybody might be getting a little too desperate for progress. Sometimes yanking the tiger’s tail wasn’t the best strategy—literally or figuratively.
Not that anyone’s listening to me.
Elana would tell her to make them listen—but how?
And what would happen if she couldn’t?
The warm night air seemed to stick to Andy’s skin as she followed Bela and Camille into the basement of the big office building. Her sensitive Sibyl vision made the night bright, but the darkness still seemed too close. The taste of stagnant water in her mouth reminded her every few seconds that this course of action felt strange. Not really wrong, just—off. Like it shouldn’t be. She gripped the crescent moon pendant around her neck and thought about Elana disrupting the flow of water on the beach in Kérkira.
Where would this lead?
Don’t be stupid. You can’t always have your way, and disaster won’t always follow if you compromise.
Anyway, they had new advantages. Camille had remade their charms with new elemental properties. Now the jewelry was supposed to give them some basic protections from projective energy traps and make it harder for anybody to track their specific energy signatures. Good idea if it worked, but they hadn’t had time to test them, and to Andy, her charm still looked and felt the same.
Dio slipped into the basement behind Andy and closed the door. Before she slid into the shadows to watch their backs from a distance, she muttered, “I don’t like the look on your face, Andy.”
Andy didn’t answer, but Bela must have heard Dio because she stopped, turned, and said, “Talk to me.”
Andy faced Bela and Camille and whispered, “Won’t do any good.”
“Andy.” Bela sounded wounded, and Andy felt like a bitch.
So much for managing her group’s emotional flow. Andy sucked in a deep breath of the stale air in the quiet basement. Some sort of telemarketing firm used it in the daytime, and her sensitive vision picked out rows and rows of desks, chairs, and phones. The remnant emotional energy in the place felt frenetic and a little desperate. “Sorry, Bela. I didn’t mean that you wouldn’t listen or care. I meant we’re committed to this course of action, and I had a chance to voice my objections earlier. I got overruled.”
“Okay, but that’s your my-instincts-are-bothering-me look.” Bela studied her with dark, worried eyes. “Do you sense something wrong in the building?”
“No, not really.” Andy rubbed her leather-clad arms with her palms to fight the chill from the old, rattling air conditioner servicing the building. “I just feel like we’re off course here. Right ocean, wrong current.”
“And?” Camille glanced around the basement, then back at Andy. “We have three minutes. Say the rest of what’s on your mind.”
Andy frowned. “I think Jack’s doubting that Tarek’s alive, and I don’t doubt it.”
“I don’t, either,” Camille said.
“I think he’s got plenty of tricks up his furry demon sleeve.” Andy let her concerns out in a rush, feeling stronger and more settled with each word. “I think we might be about to get our asses kicked—or do something that leads to that outcome down the road.”
“We’ve got five OCU SWAT units and four Sibyl patrols converging.” Bela looked at the ceiling over their head. “We’ve already arrested the lookouts—three humans, headed to the precinct for questioning. All we’re going to do is bust a crooked stock trading operation Seneca’s son is still managing off the third floor of this building and question the guy if we can. I don’t think there’ll be any ass kicking tonight. Not our asses, anyway.”
Andy fidgeted with her own elbows. “Maybe not. If it’s that simple. If everything works like we think it will.”
“We’ve got good surveillance,” Camille said. “It’s fifteen guys, all human, and Ari Junior. No demons. No projective traps.”
“That we know of,” Bela allowed. “But we won’t need projective energy for this raid. Even if we did, I think Camille’s new protections would give us time to react if we encountered any unusual elemental protections or energy snares.”
“I know, I know.” Andy let her arms fall loose and tried to shake out her tension. The emotions bouncing out of her group ranged from irritation to impatience to worry, and she didn’t know how to get a better read, a deeper read, much less redirect the energy or even put it to good use. She didn’t even want to bring up sensing feelings since it made the people closest to her so uncomfortable. “Honestly, maybe I’m just ticked because everybody went with Jack’s plan instead of mine.”
Bela’s angst shifted to something like sympathy. “Yeah, well, I can understand that. Before he showed up and took over, this would have been your call.”
“It wouldn’t have been my anything.” Sadness trickled through Andy, top to bottom. “When I started really accepting all of this and becoming a Sibyl, I would have had to give up my station and status with the OCU and the NYPD. That’s not Jack’s fault.”
“I don’t think he’s being overprotective, just so you know.” The sympathy stayed on Bela’s face. “Just … reasonably protective.”
She didn’t address Andy’s sadness and confusion about the loss of the life she had known, but Andy didn’t fault her for that. That topic was too broad and huge to address in a handful of seconds in some strange basement when they were supposed to be on a raid. And she had no business letting all that emotion distract her, either.
Time to pack it all away. Time to go to work.
Camille slid her hand to the hilt of her scimitar. “We have to move.”
A
ndy reacted immediately, falling into the raid time schedule. She walked with Bela and Camille to the stairwell they had located on structural maps provided by the OCU researchers. No structural alarms had been detected, and Andy didn’t sense any elemental alerts, either. Bela gave an all-clear signal, followed by Camille. One at a time, earth first, fire second, then water, they slipped into the stairwell and climbed toward the third floor. Behind them in the basement they had just vacated, Andy heard the rustle of OCU officers moving in to take their initial positions.
Andy sensed other Sibyls nearby and on the move. Her pulse picked up and her breathing got faster. Her muscles felt loose and ready, and her hand dropped to the hilt of her dart pistol. They reached the third-floor stairwell door. Bela pushed it open. Waited. Waited a little longer.
Another Sibyl group was arriving from the western corner of the floor, having come up a separate staircase. Two more groups were on their way down from the roof, covering the north and south doors. OCU squads waited for the all-clear on each staircase, and one squad had the elevator covered.
When the Sibyls got into position, Bela quietly opened the door to lead Andy and Camille into the hallway. Andy tapped twice on the metal railing before she left the stairwell, getting their OCU SWAT team in motion.
Once she got into the hall, Andy detected no stray elemental energy on the third floor. All the other Sibyls seemed to reach the same conclusion, and Maggie Cregan, who was closest to the elevator, pushed the call button to bring up the main OCU raid team. When she turned to rejoin her fighting group, she gave Andy and her group a startled look. Her gaze moved over them like she was searching for something, but whatever it was she didn’t find it.
Andy didn’t have time to figure out what was bothering Maggie. If it was serious, she’d let them know later. For the moment, Andy was just glad they hadn’t run into any unexpected disasters.
In the center of the main hall, the wooden doors to Seneca Trading were closed, but light spilled under them, illuminating the old tile of the building’s hallway. All the hall fixtures had been switched off, likely by a computer program at the close of business hours, and the other offices on the floor weren’t occupied at this time of night. Even though the American markets were closed, Seneca’s group used this time to contact and pressure clients, work world markets, and deploy illegal programs designed to influence trading activity and swing activity in their favor. The SEC and other monitoring agencies had gotten wise, but the FBI’s organized crime division had argued for the takedown and gotten the go-ahead from different agency coordinators. Then, thanks to Jack, the assignment had fallen to the OCU. Whichever suspects they didn’t keep, they’d hand over to the various regulators who wanted them.
