Secret Treaties

by Jan Stryvant

  Ten minutes later Vincent got off the phone and smiled at them. "Frank Gerold, their leader, agreed to it. They don't have a very large council here; it's less than a hundred people, really. He told me he'll free all their lycans immediately, and the sooner we can get there, the happier he'll be."

  "And you're sure it's not a trap?" Sean asked.

  "Fairly certain, Frank's always been a fairly straightforward man."

  "I'll send Ruthelma," Maitland said. "If there's one thing we faerie are good at, it's knowing when we're about to be betrayed."

  "Okay, that sounds good. I think we can leave Guillermo in charge here," Sean said, nodding to the werewolf who was in charge of Sapientia's security. "I'll set up with you and the reaction force over here." Sean pointed to the spot on the map they'd agreed on.

  "Sean," Maitland said, lowering his voice, "I really think it would be better if you stayed here."

  "Why's that?"

  "Because you're one of the strongest magic users we've got, and honestly, this is a key position that needs to be defended."

  "You just don't want me second-guessing you in the field," Sean said with a smile to take any possible sting out of his words.

  Maitland smiled back. "That too."

  Sean sighed and smiled. "Well, I gave you the job, so I have to listen to your advice. Fine, I'll stay here. Now, if only we knew how many people they're going to be attacking us with."

  "The Vestibulum have about a hundred and fifty lycans," Guillermo said. "According to my counterpart in Fresno, they think they'll be adding another forty or so."

  "Two hundred lycans, plus I wonder how many magic users?" Maitland said.

  "Well, if they hit the Ascendants first, probably only a handful," Sean mused. "But if they come here first? I'd expect a lot more."

  "Assuming they want to risk their own skins," Maitland pointed out.

  Sean shrugged. "If they weren't, I don't think they'd be attacking at all."

  "Well, let me gather my group up and get going. The sooner we're out of sight, the better."

  Sean nodded. "I'll work on the defenses here with Guillermo and Vincent. Are you sure Ruth will be okay?"

  "She's actually fairly experienced at defensive stands, this won't be her first. As long as you tell the others to listen to her, she'll be okay."

  Sean nodded. "Well, you know her better than I do, so if you say so, I'm good. I'll go make sure everyone knows she's the one in charge."

  #

  Chad stood back as Burke argued with the leader of the Ascendance at the front gate of their compound. They'd shown him the video, they'd told him about their overwhelming numbers, yet this asshole was still arguing with Burke.

  "Alright, it's been twenty minutes! Times up!" Chad said with a growl, and pressing the transmit button on his radio, he continued. "Okay, Charlie. It's no good. Put plan 'A' to work."

  "It's about time," someone replied on the radio as a half dozen explosions went off, destroying most of the wall that surrounded the Ascendant's compound. Chad had taken the time to have his small squad of 'sappers' place mines against the walls using John's two quad-copters. After what he'd seen last night, John had been all too willing to help.

  "Now," Chad raised his voice, "are you going to comply? Or am I going to have to use plan 'B'?"

  "What's plan 'B'?" Burke said, looking rather worried as the Vestibulum's leader's face suddenly went pale.

  "We do to them what they did to the Vestis last night," Chad growled. "Only we're going to use a lot more high explosives."

  "Okay! Okay!" the Vestibulum's leader said, waving his hands. "No need to get hasty!" He turned back to the people behind him in the compound, several of whom had dropped to the ground when the explosions had gone off.

  "Get all of our lycans! Send them out here!"

  Chad smiled at Burke. "And to think I doubted you when you told me the people here would be reasonable."

  Burke sighed and shook his head but didn't say anything as they both stood there and waited for the lycans to come out.

  When they finally did, the team Chad had brought with him to the gate immediately set about collaring and tagging each of the werewolves as they came out to remove their silver tags.

  "Great!" Chad said when they were all done. "Now, which of you was in charge in there?" he asked the assembled wolves.

  One of them raised his hand.

  "Wonderful! You're going to lead a bunch of my people through a search of the compound inside to make sure we didn't miss anybody."

  "What!" the man at the gate exclaimed hotly. "You can't do that!"

  Chad smiled at the man. "I can do whatever the hell I want, including leveling this entire compound with artillery without ever having to set a foot inside. Plan 'B' is still very much an option." Chad turned to the other wolf. "You are?"

  "Silverback, and there's about a dozen females still inside."

  "Ah." Chad turned back Burke. "Would you accompany Silverback and my men to make sure that nothing untoward happens? I would hate for any of my people to get out of hand."

  "Now see here!" the Ascendance's leader said.

  Chad clicked his radio again. "Targeting!"

  Suddenly there were eight red dots on the man's shirt, and looking down, he gasped.

  "Ah! I see you are familiar with laser sights!" Chad smiled. "So you're going to be a good boy and stand right there, and if any of these missing fems turn up dead...well, let's just say you're not going to be around to worry about the consequences. Understand?"

  "Burke! How, how could you let this happen?" the man sputtered.

  "Kurt, so far I haven't let anything happen. Now if you stop cooperating, or if any of those poor women you're still holding should suddenly die, well then I guess I'll be guilty of letting all sorts of bad things happen.

  "I mean really, after what you guys did last night, you're hardly in a position to plead for any kind of mercy or have any guise of innocence! Even the Vestibulum didn't go after the children, Kurt! Honestly! You're still coming out ahead in the game. Just shut up and cooperate, and you'll be fine."

  "Alright already!" Kurt grumbled. "Ian! Robert! Escort Burke here and whatever wolves he brings with him and make sure everyone understands they're not to kill anyone or anything! Got that?"

  "Yes, Kurt!" they both said and nodded.

  "Jonas," Chad said looking over at him, "take your team and Silverback there and accompany Burke."

  "You got it," Jonas said with a nod.

  "What are you going to do?" Burke asked.

  "Why, I'm going to stay here with my new special friend and have a lovely chat," Chad said with a toothy grin; he really did love his werewolf form.

  For the next forty-five minutes, Chad got to watch Kurt sweat. Chad could listen to the running commentary from Jonas as they searched the buildings. They found the missing women immediately, but Jonas wanted to search every last inch, even though Silverback was pretty sure there wasn't anyone else.

  Chad suspected Jonas didn't think there was anyone else, either. He was just being rude and obnoxious, and Chad was more than willing to allow it.

  When they finally did come out, they all headed over to their cars and vans and left for Sapientia, while Chad gave the order to withdraw.

  "Feel better?" Chad whispered to Jonas as they headed back.

  "What do you mean?" Jonas whispered back, looking at him.

  "You were an Ascendance wolf, weren't you?"

  "Was it that obvious?"

  "You wanted to know if anyone recognized you, didn't you?"

  Jonas sighed. "I don't know if I should feel insulted or relieved that absolutely no one there remembered me. Even if it was over twenty years ago."

  "Do you remember them?"

  Jonas nodded. "I remember the people, the older ones that is. The younger ones? They weren't here back then. There is one thing that makes me sad, however."

  "And that is?"

  "None of the wolves I knew back then ar
e here with us now."

  Chad nodded. "Now that truly is sad."

  #

  Virgil Gerhard looked at the gathered forces out in front of their local council building. He had sixty mages, ten of whom were experienced in combat, four of whom were his lycan handlers. With the addition of the Fresno lycans, he had a total of two hundred and twenty-nine lycans, and that was all their lycans. He'd taken the maids, the butlers, even the bedroom toys, put them all in uniform, and handed them a weapon.

  As Todd had said, it was 'use them or lose them', and there was no point in leaving any of them behind. It wasn't like it really mattered if they lived or died, just as long as they helped in the upcoming fight. He now had four times the number of lycans Sapientia was expected to have on defense.

  "What about the Ascendance?" Bill Jeffries, his lead lycan handler, asked him.

  "What about them?"

  "Are we going after them first, or last?"

  Virgil shook his head. "We're not. I don't want to push my luck or split my forces. We'll hit Sapientia tonight. Once that's done and we've beaten them, we'll ship all our lycans off to Phoenix. When that lion gets here, we let him deal with the Ascendance, and after that, we can clean up whatever's left, if the folks back in Boston decide it's necessary."

  Bill nodded. "Sounds good to me. I got Tim setting up some rentals on some trucks so we can haul them all out of here come the morning."

  Virgil nodded and signaled everyone to get into their vehicles. Then he got into the command van at the back of the line and waved Bill to lead them out. This whole month had been just crazy. First the rumors about a lycan revolt, then the destruction of the Gradatim headquarters, and now this. He'd spent the day getting his family packed, sent them north on a vacation on the coast, and told everyone else to do the same. He wasn't stupid; there was a war on, like it or not, and if you didn't take care of your family, they might not be there when you got back.

  As for what they were about to do, well, he was no stranger to conflict. They'd had several battles with the Gradatim over the years. While none of them had been to the same level as this one, any one of them could have turned into something nasty. There had never been any love lost between the Gradatim and the Vestibulum, and it had taken decades for things to settle down into the uneasy peace that had existed in Los Angeles for the last several decades.

  And now it was about to all blow up again. But, like that old movie said, you needed these little wars every now and again, to clean out the bad blood and get rid of the dead wood.

  It was late, and the ride to the Sapientia compound didn't take all that long. For all that it was late on a Saturday night, traffic was light. Virgil had waited until after two AM, mainly because after what had happened with the Gradatim, a lot of eyes were on the Los Angeles area, and the last thing he wanted to do was to have this show up on anybody's radar.

  They stopped by a park about a quarter mile from their destination, did a quick check, dumped half of their wolves to run ahead to their positions, and sent the mages who would be holding the silence off to set up.

  Then they drove off to the compound, each of them going to their assigned positions and deploying. Virgil gave the signal from the van he was running everything from, and they all attacked.

  The first line of werewolves charged the wall, jumped up to the top, and pulled themselves over it. No alarms were raised, which made Virgil wonder if the Sapientia had anybody on watch. He'd expected there to be some sort of alarm raised, or at least some sort of noise. He was just about to call for an all-out attack when two of the first team over the wall stood up at the top and waved for the next group to join them, then ducked down out of sight.

  "What's going on over there, Bill?" Virgil asked on his radio.

  "The two guards on duty were distracted by a bitch in heat." Bill snickered. "I told them they could keep the bitch, as long as they got to the gates without raising an alarm."

  "What?" Virgil said in surprise. "Don't they keep their females on birth control?"

  "Apparently not anymore. They're 'free', don't you know!"

  Virgil sighed. "And that's why we don't free animals."

  "No kidding! They're about to open the gates. Let's see how many we can get inside before the balloon goes up!"

  "Okay," Virgil replied and then gave the orders for the first six squads, backed up by his combat experienced mages, to move in as soon as the gates were opened.

  Opening the door on the side of the van, Virgil watched as the gates opened and sixty werewolves ran inside, followed a moment later by the ten mages.

  Suddenly there was a very bright flash, and he felt the ground tremble under his feet, but oddly enough there was no noise, and the last four mages just disappeared as the ground beneath their feet exploded.

  "It's a trap!" someone screamed over the radio, and then with a sudden gurgling noise the voice cut off.

  "Everyone, attack!" Virgil called over the radio, and dropping to the ground, he cast his own personal shields. Then pulling out one of his wands, he looked around for targets of opportunity as the sound of gunfire and explosions filled the air.

  Sean watched as the five surviving mages who had come in through the gates were quickly subdued. Guillermo had laid a number of metal mesh mats on the ground near the gates, then simply electrified them with high voltage A/C current when the time was right. The effect on the magic users who had made it past the claymores was quite educational.

  The wolves who had run in had either been slept or were staring in wonder at their brothers, who were quickly moving among them and removing their silver. It hadn't been hard for Sean to overwhelm the first group over the wall, and once they'd gotten over the shock of it, he'd dealt with their silver pellets and let them call the next group, who'd suddenly found themselves in a very strange situation. Not that they'd put up any sort of a fight when their friends and alphas had told them what was going on, as they'd stared at the lion who had told them all to 'sit'.

  "So, how many did we get?" Sean asked Guillermo.

  "About half, according to the senior alpha. They've also got about another fifty mages outside our walls."

  "So not counting the ones we just grabbed, we've got about the same number of lycans and twice the magic users. Think they'll run?"

  Guillermo shrugged. "They don't know you're here. They may just figure we got lucky."

  Sean nodded. "Well, if they don't leave in the next five minutes, they're never going to."

  "They're gathering their people for another attempt to storm the gates," one of Guillermo's people said over the radio.

  Shaking his head, Sean started to prepare another mass sleep spell. The last one had eaten up half his mana pool; this one would definitely take him out of the fight.

  "Peg, could you throw some new illusions over those mesh mats?" Sean asked as he got ready.

  "Everyone else, get your guns ready!" Guillermo called. "And make sure you're not using any silver! These are our brothers! They will be with us soon enough!"

  Virgil ordered the next group into the gap, only this time he had his magic users mixed in with the lycans, who had orders to put their bodies between any guns and their mages. Virgil hoped that whatever the trap was, it hadn't been reset yet, but if nothing else, charging through the front gates would focus the Sapientia forces there, while the rest of his group attacked the south wall.

  It may not be the best diversion, but it was the only one he was going to get.

  "Everybody ready?" he called over the radio.

  "Ready on the south wall!"

  "Ready by the gates!"

  "Charge!" Virgil said.

  The sound of the fighting got even louder then, as a group of fifty charged the gates with six mages mixed in with them. Virgil left his command post and jogged over to where the second group was preparing to launch their attack. One more wouldn't hurt, and it might make the difference, he figured.

  They started to assault the wall just as he got t
here, the first group going up and over without any trouble, but just as the second group started to go over the wall, a line of machine guns opened up from the tree line, taking everyone out at the knees!

  Virgil screamed as he got shot in both legs, then collapsed to the ground. As he tried to crawl forward towards the others, he saw a large group of werewolves, definitely a lot more than what he'd brought today, come streaming out of the woods. All were armed, and none of them seemed to be shy about putting another shot into anyone who didn't stop moving.

  "Mages keep your mouths shut and your hands up, and we'll heal you and send you home!" someone was yelling.

  "Lycans do the same, and we'll pull your pellets! Medics! Look for the magic users! They're the ones who'll still be bleeding!"

  Virgil saw the speaker then, a tall handsome man, who was wearing some sort of armor that appeared to have ghostlike flames dancing over it.

  Virgil figured he could probably get a spell off, maybe even kill or seriously hurt the man in the armor before they killed him.

  He also figured he'd much rather see his kids grow up.

  #

  "Okay everyone, listen up!" Ruthelma said. "I just got word they hit the Sapientia first, and my father has them wrapped up. So get your gear, and let's get out of here."

  "That's it?" Frank Gerold asked.

  Ruthelma nodded. "They're not coming here. Honestly, I think you got lucky; this place is a lot smaller, I would have thought they'd come here first. It sounds like they really had quite the group."

  "So you're just going to leave? Go back to Sapientia?"

  Ruthelma grinned at him evilly. "Leave? Yes. Go back to Sapientia..." she hesitated and then winked at him, "I thought perhaps we might swing by the Vestibulum and take a little look at who and what they left behind. Care to join us?"

  Frank's face split in a big grin. "Has anyone told you that you look lovely when plotting mayhem?"

  "Does this mean you're coming?"

  "Stacy! Get your men sorted and into their cars! We're following Ruth here over to the Vestibulum!"