by TR Cameron
The mansion that served as the home base of the Zatora syndicate was uncomfortably bright, exactly as it had been during their involuntary reconnaissance a few nights before. The portal had deposited them about a hundred and fifty yards away from the front door, which was on a diagonal from their position. She manipulated the surrounding air to muffle their sounds and cast a veil in a small semicircle to keep them unseen.
A movement from below revealed that Fyre wore the body of a rottweiler. “Will you vanish or something?”
He offered her a doggy smile. “I’m letting you two see my disguise. No one else can. It’s only in case there are problems with the veil.”
She nodded and looked at Tanyith. “So, last chance to take Barton’s offer and choose the safety of a jail cell.”
He shook his head, and his game face gave her no indication whether he’d appreciated the joke. “Been there, done that. It’s completely overrated. Let’s mess up some gangsters instead.”
“Okay. Your lead.” It hadn’t taken long to determine that he had skills and knowledge about breaking and entering she lacked.
“When I set up the portal earlier, I managed to look all the way around the house. There’s a back door we can use.” He walked in that direction and crouched behind cover where it was present despite the illusion masking them from sight. “Always over-prepare,” he’d said during the planning sessions, and Zeb had agreed heartily.
“So, did you get a better sense of where the pistols are?”
His response sounded annoyed. “No, I didn’t. There were no windows into the basement and too much traffic upstairs to see anything. But my guess is that he’d want them close, so we’ll start with the office and maybe his bedroom.”
“Okay. I don’t suppose you have skills in mind reading or mind control or mind manipulation or something useful?”
He released a short laugh. It, too, sounded annoyed. “No. Is it possible for you to be quiet? We’re on enemy territory here.”
Fyre replied, “Not that I’ve seen. The greater the danger, the more words she has.”
Cali growled a protest. “Shut it, both of you. There’s a guard ahead.”
In fact, there were two, roving outdoor patrols that had briefly come together mid-circuit from opposite directions. Tanyith said, “They’ll do the same in the front. There are four guards. We’ll have to sneak in quickly enough that they don’t walk into us.”
She closed her eyes for an instant and pulled the sight and sound shields in tighter. They needed to get in unseen. At the right moment, they darted ahead, and she watched over Tanyith’s shoulder as he stuck some kind of device into the lock. The Draksa pressed against her leg. A couple of seconds later, it clicked and he repeated the process with the deadbolt before they stepped hastily inside. He closed the door quietly behind them with no time to spare.
They’d anticipated seeing the same or fewer people milling about and so far, their luck was holding. Sounds of a billiards game came from the front, reduced mainly to impressions by the size of the home. Tanyith pointed to the left, and they advanced through a storage area before arriving at the junction with the hallway they’d traveled previously. He peeked around the corner and waved them forward, and they made it to the basement without incident.
He checked his blades again. “It’s time.”
She nodded and let the veil fall so their disguises would show. If the plan worked, they’d be seen on security cameras and the blame would fall on the other gang. At all costs, they had to have deniability, and maintaining the cover was her primary responsibility. As soon as someone saw them, the time for stealth would be over, so they had to move fast. Tanyith led the way to the office door at a run, pushed it open, and thrust into the room.
Rion Grisham was in there, again working at the couch. Two guards leaned against the walls and launched immediately in motion at the intrusion. She yelled, “Left,” and headed to the one closest to the entry wall. Tanyith turned toward the one on the right, raised his hands, and discharged a shimmering blast of power that lifted the guard and thumped him into the wall. Her own target clawed for the pistol under his armpit when she punched the air and her force fist connected with his solar plexus. He dropped to a knee but maintained enough composure to get the gun out. She kicked it from his hand and put him in a chokehold that stole the rest of his breath. When she released him, he slumped to the ground unconscious.
Gunfire rang out as Grisham reacted slower than the others, but it was quickly silenced when the giant dog pounced on him. He cried out in fear, unable to see what was attacking him, which unexpectedly made her laugh. A burst of frost breath sealed the Zatora boss in a shimmering case of ice. She patted Fyre on the back. “Who’s a good dog? You are, that’s who.”
He snorted with amusement, and she turned to help Tanyith search. Her partner ransacked the furniture in the room and opened every drawer and door. Locked ones received a blast of force magic that reduced them to splinters. She yanked paintings off the walls and moved the area rug that was under a table on the far side. Her partner emerged from the en suite bathroom shaking his head. “They aren’t here.”
She sighed. “So, we have to go upstairs.”
“Yeah.”
“And there are probably many more of them between here and there, by now.”
“Also yeah.”
Cali was struck by a sudden thought. “Hey, Fyre, you haven’t mentioned being able to portal. I bet you can, though, right?”
“Of course.”
“Okay. I have a plan. Tanyith, help me barricade the door.”
They emerged from the rift in the same location where they’d arrived before. The house was awash in spotlights, but there was also clearly activity through the windows. The Draksa had been tasked with keeping up the appearance that they were trapped inside the office, and Cali had little doubt he would do an excellent job of it.
They ran under cover of a veil again, headed toward the side of the mansion, and stopped before the pool of light that covered the last dozen yards. Several upstairs windows were illuminated from within, but there was no visible activity in them. Getting to the house was the easy part, though. When they arrived, it was time for the hard part. She turned to Tanyith. “How good are you with force magic?”
“Extremely.”
Damn. Why does he have to be so confident about it? “Then you’ll have to do the throwing unless you can jump that high.”
He stared at it. “No, I can’t make that. Half that, tops.”
“I couldn’t even get that far. And I’d probably throw you into a wall.”
“Okay, I see your point. How will you pull me up after you?”
She shrugged. “Maybe I’ll find an escape rope or something. Otherwise, wait here and be prepared to save me if things go wrong. If you’re in danger, bail and I can portal away. If I’m not out in ten minutes, same deal, and I’ll meet you at the Tavern.”
“Zeb won’t let me leave the place alive if you get hurt. So don’t. Are you ready?”
“Yeah.” She took a deep breath. “As ready as I’m gonna be. Do it.”
It was as if a giant hand took hold of her and hurled her upward. She was already casting as it started and summoned small shields of force on each palm which she held in front of her face and curled body as she impacted with the window. Glass shattered and the wooden braces splintered as she careened through. She bounded briefly on a bed but rolled off, landed on her side, and slid to a stop with a hard thump when she collided with the wall.
Her body wanted to pause and recover, but Cali forced herself into motion. She was in a feminine bedroom and discarded it as the likeliest hiding place. A door led to a hallway with several other doors in it. She whispered a plea to fate as she yanked the next one open, only to discover it was a knitting room of some kind with an actual spinning wheel in the corner. The third door was a dressing chamber, and she cursed the gendered arrangement of the upstairs as she bolted across the landing toward the
far side of the house. As she flashed past the stairs, there was a shout from below and she growled angrily and ran faster.
She battered the door ahead with a force bolt and it catapulted into the area beyond. It was another bedroom, twice the size of the last, and painted in shades of dark-blue and brown with an enormous bed in the center. An open door on the left caught her eye, and she passed through it to discover a trophy room celebrating illegal activities. Glass cases with newspapers, books, clothes on mannequins, and old-time collector items of all kinds were on display, with small plaques explaining each. Her jaw dropped at the sight, so completely unlike anything she’d ever seen or imagined, before she shook her head with a jolt. Get moving, Caliste.
The rear wall held a giant gun safe, taller than she was and heavy enough that she assumed they’d had to bring it in with a crane and rebuild the wall after. I certainly can’t unlock it. The large combination wheel had a hundred tiny numbers on it. Damn it. Think. Frustrated and very conscious that time was of the essence, she tapped on her sticks as she looked around for a solution. A flash of insight rocketed through her brain. She drew the weapons and told them to turn into bracelets. When they assumed liquid form to flow over her hands, she willed them to stop.
With her fingers pressed along the tiny crack between the safe door and the frame, she marshaled her intent and sent it to the magical weapon, which pushed into the gap and expanded at her urging. She poured more power into it and backed away slowly until finally, the metal creaked and deformed under the strength of the magic. Holy hell, it worked. It had bent enough in the right place to give her access, and she silently thanked whatever fool had selected one with a single bar lock rather than the three a safe this size would normally have.
She yanked the warped door open and reclaimed her sticks. There, in the middle of the safe, was the object of her search. She lifted the lid to ensure the pistols were in there and turned toward the doorway she’d entered through as two of the suited gangsters stuck their guns through it.
Her instinctive scream caused one to flinch and miss. The other fired and the bullet burned its way into her flesh and embedded itself in her shoulder. She’d experienced pain before, but this was nastier than anything she could remember. The shock made her stumble as she bolted for the room’s other door, blasted it off its hinges, and leapt over the banister that separated the second floor from the first.
Cali focused hard on maintaining her illusion and to lock that intent into a corner of her mind to avoid giving their game away. She used a force burst from her good hand to guide her path and landed awkwardly to trip when she reached the stairs. Her newly injured arm thankfully managed to hold onto the railing.
At the bottom, two guards were as surprised to see her as she was to see them. She hurled them aside with another force blast but felt distinctly woozy from the pain—and, she realized, the loss of the blood that poured down her arm. One more full-strength force attack shredded the building’s front doors, and she sprinted to where she’d last seen Tanyith. Magic streaked past her toward her pursuers. As soon as she was out of the light, a portal appeared before her with the tavern basement on the other side. She leapt through and her partner followed a moment later and closed it behind them.
Fyre sat primly on a crate. She smiled to see he was safe and heard him say, “It took you long enough,” before her knees gave out and her eyes rolled back in her head.
Chapter Thirty-Two
“Easy now, there you go.” Cali heard Zeb’s words and felt the trickle of liquid between her lips. It was wonderfully delicious and she drank greedily as he poured the healing potion into her. It raced through her body and collected in her shoulder to cause new pain and draw a moan as it pushed the bullet out and healed the flesh behind it. When it was over, she was whole. Panting, bloody, and exhausted, but whole.
The first potion had tasted of honey and cinnamon. The next one he put to her lips was ferocious mint, and with it came a blast of magical energy that had her up on her feet in an instant. He stopped her after a few sips with a shake of his head. “If you take too much, you’ll crash sooner. This counteracts the drain on your systems from the healing but eventually, that bill will come due, knocking you out whether you like it or not.” He gestured toward the untouched potions in her belt. “Use them with caution if you plan to be functional tomorrow.”
She pointed at the Draksa. “You still suck. But thanks for keeping them busy.”
He lowered his snout in acknowledgment and his scales glistened as his tail swiped from left to right. Tanyith said, “So, no emergency rope, huh?”
Cali thought about lying but decided there was no point. “I kind of forgot and was…uh, swept up in the moment.”
“Let’s stick together on the next one, shall we?”
“Yeah.” She nodded. “I need you to step in front of those bullets for me. That bloody hurt.”
“The important part is that you succeeded, and you made it back safely,” Zeb interjected. Now, leave the case here and get the second half done. I’ll keep it safe, don’t you worry.”
“Okay. Let’s switch up our looks, shall we?” She concentrated again on the other two pictures Barton had shared. Her magic slid over Tanyith and he grew paler, his hair lightened to a beach blonde, and his beard vanished. His clothes became an ill-fitting suit. She transformed herself into another man in a bad suit who was shorter than her partner, with a buzz cut and a pale scar on his cheek. Zeb and Tanyith both nodded in approval.
Fyre barked and drew attention to the fact that he was now some kind of labrador. She grinned and said, “You know, I’ve always wanted a cat.”
“No.” His opinion on that idea was clear in the frosty growl.
“River otter?” He raised his chin and ignored her and she laughed. “Okay, then. Let’s hit it, Tanyith.”
He retrieved a bag next to him on a crate she hadn’t noticed before and opened the portal, and they stepped through together.
Unlike the mansion, The Shark Nightclub was dark except for a light over the front door. They crept down carefully from a rooftop across the street. As she was about to dash toward the building, Tanyith grabbed her arm. “Let’s try something first.” He took them a half-block away, where a large garage door and a smaller person-door nestled side by side. He used the lock tool again, and they entered without seeing any obvious indication that they’d been detected.
The interior was empty, save for a dark luxury sedan. She watched her partner, who frowned as he prowled the space. He muttered, “Okay, they could have portaled from here, but if you’re going to portal anyway, why so close? It doesn’t make sense.” Finally, he seemed to notice something and pushed against one of the concrete blocks in the wall closest to the club. He scrambled aside as the floor beneath him—which had previously looked seamless—revealed a rectangle that descended and transformed into stairs.
He grinned. “Now we’re talking. I knew it had to be there.” He scrabbled in the bag, withdrew two pistols, and handed one to her. She tilted her head in a question. “They’ll expect members of the Zatora gang to have guns. So, we fire them dry, manage not to hit anything, and drop them. Zeb added some magic to avoid fingerprints.”
She nodded. “You had me worried there for a second.”
“Remember, I was in the decent version of the group. Like, Robin Hood and the Merry Atlanteans.”
Cali laughed. “Awesome. Now I picture you in tights. It’s not a good look, by the way.” Fyre snorted in agreement and banged against her legs. “I think someone wants to get moving.”
“Yeah, me too. Sooner begun, sooner finished.”
“And sooner to sleep." The effects of the energy potion were wearing off but given Zeb’s warning, she wasn’t ready to take more.
He led them along the passage under the street. The magicals in New Orleans should get together and open a construction business. They’d make millions creating and maintaining basements. It ended in a heavy steel door with no handle
and a security camera. He waved into the lens, then shot it with the pistol. “Stand back.” He threw a fireball and a force sphere one after the other at the door jamb and the barrier separated from it. “It looks more like an explosive device that way.” He answered the question before she asked it.
They pulled the door wide and stepped inside. Tanyith destroyed another security camera, and they heard footsteps coming from the side of the room, where a staircase led upward. She positioned herself where they could see her in response to Fyre’s move to stand next to the stairs. The Draksa flicked his tail out and swiped the legs out from under the first men to descend.
She fired wildly at the ones who remained upright, and when the gun clicked empty, threw it at the Atlanteans. There were five in total, two of them already on the ground. She yanked her sticks from their sheaths and willed them to be normal brown wood as she attacked the one closest. Her partner disabled the one on his side with a strike from the hilt of his sai, and Fyre tumbled the fallen thugs again as they tried to rise. The final enemy still on his feet dispatched a blast of ice at her, and she ducked and rolled away from it. I have to remember not to use magic where they can see it.
Her partner made short work of the scumbag who’d attacked her and together, they finished the two remaining on the floor. She yanked their belts from their trousers and used them to bind their hands and feet. “Okay, so that’s the security squad. Do you think there will be more?”
Tanyith nodded. “They wouldn’t want to spread the alarm if they thought they could handle it to avoid losing face in front of the others. We should still have the element of surprise. Let’s get upstairs.” The Draksa snaked up ahead of them, leading the way. They followed with more speed than caution. She recognized the end of the hallway they’d been down before and found the door. The man kicked it in without preamble and they discovered three people waiting inside. Usha the enemy leader looked casual in jeans and a pretty blouse with her red braids piled on her head. Her female subordinate Danna Cudon seemed as perfect as ever in her suit with a dark shirt and tie. A hulking bald man in gang street clothes had already blurred into motion.
