Cassie looked up at Alex, shook her head quickly. “I’m sorry.”
No, he realized, looking at Buck’s dead eyes, now glassing over. Not a traitor. I’m a murderer. He climbed to shaky feet, meeting the accusing, unbelieving eyes of the other soldiers. He nodded, accepting his fate. “Okay, I give up. Arrest me.”
Clara stepped forward, looking from Buck’s corpse to Alex, and finally around her at the other soldiers. “You can surrender to the colonel… once this shit is done.”
“But…”
Masters stood beside Clara. “We’re not leaving the colonel. We told him that. We told him.”
“You’re in charge now, Captain,” said Clara. “Until you’re not in charge. Just deal, all right?”
The rest of the task force, or what was left of it—Canadians and Americans—nodded, each looking Alex in the eye.
Then he understood: they had come all this way to bring back Colonel McKnight. And they were going to bring him back.
Chapter 50
Cassie couldn’t bring Buck back from the dead, but she could heal Elizabeth’s broken nose—well, mostly. Even after fusing the cartilage together again, Elizabeth’s former pert nose now had a pronounced bump, making her look like a boxer. Cassie had also somehow managed to heal Clyde. Buck’s attack had hurt the dog badly, fracturing his canine skull. But even after fusing the bones back together, the dog was still so badly hurt they had decided to sedate him, giving him an injection of painkillers as well as something that put him into a deep slumber. Alex had said it was similar to an induced coma. There had been no other choice: there were no vets here.
Cassie removed her palms from Elizabeth’s face. “I’m sorry. I can try again later. It’s been a hell of a night.”
Elizabeth tentatively reached up and ran her fingers over her nose. “No. It’s fine. Thank you.” She looked at Cassie’s face, at the sutures in her cheek. The gash still throbbed. “I’m sorry I can’t heal, or I’d do the same for you.”
“It’s okay,” said Cassie. “Dudes dig scars, right?”
Elizabeth’s smile was real, not forced. “Thank you for this, for helping Alex. Thank you.”
“Sh… sure.” Cassie’s voice cracked as her eyes darted to the poncho-wrapped corpse of Buck, not ten feet away, another life she couldn’t save.
Elizabeth surged forward and hugged Cassie, too tightly. It was a weird sensation, being hugged while wearing body armor and combat webbing, but Cassie returned the embrace just the same. “God’s will, Cassie, not yours. We’ll save the colonel—you’ll see.”
Elizabeth then sat back and handed Cassie her helmet. The jungle around them was still shrouded in shadows, but soon, the sun would be over the trees. Even now, birds and other wildlife were waking, greeting the alien dawn with song. Whatever Alex was planning, he needed to make his move soon. She glanced at where he knelt, apart from the others, scribbling away on a notepad, planning his attack. How can he concentrate after killing Buck? He must know he’s going to jail as soon as we get back.
If we get back. The basilisk was within that fort. And the dark-elf woman and her strange four-armed soldiers.
Alex leaned back. Then he asked Clara to gather the others, leaving only Toombs still watching the fort. They formed a circle around him, kneeling on the ground close enough so they could hear him. Alex motioned Cassie and Elizabeth over, and the soldiers cleared a space for them. He tore a page out of his notepad and placed it on the ground in front of them. Cassie saw that he had sketched the river, the bridge, and the hill fort. It was actually a pretty good drawing with rough distances drawn in.
He looked up, letting his gaze sweep their faces. “Okay, here’s the thing. We’ve lost the night, and we’re running out of time. We know of only two ways into that fort: the dragon-landing pad on the roof, and the entrance across the bridge.”
The soldiers jostled each other to see more clearly. Clara leaned in and gazed at the drawing then looked up at Alex. “We haven’t scouted out the rear. There may be another way in.”
“Maybe. But there’s no time to check,” Alex said. “This place is isolated, and I think they want it that way. There have to be other settlements—villages, towns—along the river, and this road must lead to the one we do know of. But I think for most of the locals, water is life, even on an alien world. The river is probably the main line of communication. I don’t think people hike through this jungle; it’s just too dangerous.”
“Other than us,” someone said. Quiet laughter spread through them, and even Alex smiled.
“Exactly right,” said Alex. “So they won’t be expecting us to come from the jungle. They haven’t even cleared the brush around their fort. These things—these elf creatures and their weird fish-faced, four-armed soldiers—they’re not expecting anyone to take them on. I think maybe they’re the big dogs around here. They’re secure in their fort, not worried about attack.”
“But they’re living in a stone fortress with only two entrances, one of which we can’t get to. The other one is guarded by a small army.”
“Not an army, just a section,” said Alex.
“Okay, a section, then. How do you expect to get past them? Fight your way in?”
“Maybe. But I don’t want to. There’s too much we don’t know about these things. The last thing I want is that elf woman throwing fireballs down at us as we bunch near the entrance taking on her soldiers. Besides, they might use that flying-dragon thing we saw earlier to move the colonel.”
“How do you know that?” Elizabeth asked.
“Because it’s what I’d do. Once you capture a significant prisoner, you move him somewhere safe for interrogation.”
“A stone fortress in the middle of a jungle isn’t safe?” Cassie asked.
Alex sounded tired as he met her eyes. “I don’t know, Cassie. We’ve barely even seen these creatures, these dark elves. We have no real intelligence on them—we don’t know how they’re organized, how they live. All we’ve seen is this jungle and the river. I can only guess based on what I would do if I were them.”
“So, what do you suggest?” Clara asked.
Alex paused. “We need to put someone inside before we hit them. We’ll plant C4 on the gate to make sure the entrance stays open. Once that’s done, that same team can move deeper within the fort and find and secure McKnight before they can move him or kill him.”
Clara leaned in. “You gonna just walk right past the guards?”
Alex stared into Cassie’s eyes. “Yes. That’s exactly what we’re going to do.”
Cassie sat back, realization gripping her. “You’ve got to be kidding me?”
Alex pointed through the trees, in the direction of the river. “Sun’s coming up, Cassie. Alien world or not, people have things they have to do. That dock is going to get active. So is the road. Those creatures will open that door. Once they do, we’ll slip inside, invisible.”
“You don’t know that,” she said. “What if it stays closed? What if I can’t do this? Hell, I almost certainly can’t do this. You have no idea how hard it is to channel that much mana for that long.”
“The elf woman did it for hours,” said Alex.
Elizabeth reached over and gripped Cassie’s hand. “You can do this, Cassie. You’re good at it.”
Cassie pulled back. “You’re better. You have the Brace.”
“I’m better at fighting, not at turning invisible. I can’t do that at all, or heal. It has to be you.”
“I don’t think I can. You don’t understand.” Her eyes darted about. She felt trapped by their gazes, by their expectations. They didn’t get it, didn’t understand what happened whenever she took chances. Once again, she saw the slurry of mud as it poured through the shattered rear window of her parents’ car, saving her but killing them. She had taken a chance, taken action—and killed her parents because of it. Then, at the hospital, it had been her channeling—her screwing around with forces she didn’t understand—that had attracted the
dark elf and her basilisk.
Her parents were dead because of her. Her sister was dead because of her. Whenever she took chances, people died.
“Cassie,” said Alex. “We have to try. You have to try.”
“You can do this,” said Elizabeth. “I know you can. We trust you.”
“You can do this, Cassie,” said Clara.
The others all murmured in agreement, nodding their heads.
She closed her eyes, heard her mother’s last words: we love you, baby. Her parents would have wanted her to try, to take a chance and commit to something… even if she failed.
She nodded.
Chapter 51
Cassie stood in place while Alex inspected her, making sure she was ready. Clara stood just to the side, also scrutinizing her—although they both called it “helping.” Cassie, under Clara’s supervision, had removed most of her kit and was now wearing only what she would need inside the fort: body armor, helmet with GPNVGs, small first-aid kit, and ballistic glasses with orange-tinted lenses. Clara had applied a fresh coat of camouflage paint to Cassie’s face, neck, and hands, covering every inch of exposed skin. She still had her pistol, but now she carried it openly in a shoulder holster that had belonged to Buck, which kind of felt ghoulish, but Alex had insisted.
“Jump,” Alex ordered.
“What?”
“Jump up and down. We need to make sure you don’t jingle.”
She gave him her best scornful gaze. “You think I’m stupid enough to come here with change in my pocket?”
I don’t have change in my pocket, do I?
“Just jump, Cassie,” Alex said, exasperation in his voice.
Frowning, she did as he asked, secretly grateful that she didn’t, in fact, jingle.
“Happy?”
He mumbled something incoherent, rubbing his chin.
“What now?”
“I’m wondering if we need the armor at all.”
Clara stepped forward, her lips a hard straight line. “Captain, she’s gonna need protection once the shooting starts. So will you.”
Alex bit his lower lip, a look of concentration on his face.
“There’s going to be violence,” Clara said.
Finally, Alex nodded. “Okay. Fine. We’ll go in heavy.”
Like Cassie, he had stripped away most of his nonessential gear, and was now only wearing what he’d need. Unlike her, though, he had kept all of his ammunition and weapons. He also carried the plastic explosives for the gate in a small backpack.
“Don’t I need some of those?” Cassie asked, pointing to one of the grenades stuffed into his load-bearing vest.
“Not a chance.”
“Well, why can’t I have a real gun, then?” She glanced at his M4.
He shook his head. “Carbine, and just concentrate on the magic.”
“You taught me to shoot for a reason, remember?”
He paused, his mouth partially open, then sighed. Like her, he wore orange-tinted ballistic glasses over skin covered with camouflage paint.
“We’ve spares now, Captain,” Clara said.
He mumbled something incoherent again.
“Someone’s gonna have to watch your back in there.” Clara said. “You kind of suck at that.”
He frowned at Clara then looked back at Cassie. “You put it on safety, and you leave your finger off the trigger unless you intend to kill someone, and then you don’t hesitate.”
Cassie nodded quickly, repeatedly. “No problem.”
He shook his head then faced Clara. “Do it fast. We’re moving in five.”
“On it, Boss.”
He walked away, leaving Cassie alone with Clara. “Not Buck’s,” he called over his shoulder. “Elizabeth threw it against a tree.”
“Marcus’s,” she said with a nod, darting away. Seconds later she returned with an M4 in one hand and two extra magazines in the other. Stuffing the magazines into a pocket on Cassie’s vest, she inspected the rifle, ejecting the magazine and holding it with one hand while she worked the action with the other. Finally, she reinserted the mag and handed the weapon to Cassie. “You’ve got twenty-nine rounds in the mag with one already in the chamber.” She met Cassie’s eyes, now looking very serious. “You understand what that means?”
Cassie exhaled, focused on remaining calm. “It means the weapon is ready for firing.”
“Once you take the safety off. Do you know how to do that?”
“I… yes, I remember.”
“Show me,” Clara said.
Cassie did, flicking the fire selector just above where her thumb would be when she held the pistol grip, moving it from safety to repetition.
“Good. Now put it back on safety, and try not to shoot the Captain in the back of the head, okay?”
“Got it.”
Alex came back. “We ready?”
Cassie nodded. “As ready as I’m going to be.”
“Sun’s up. Let’s do this.”
He led her and Clara back to the water’s edge, staying within the tree line. They went prone at the edge of the trees at a spot where they could watch the bridge, the dock, and the fort. In daylight, the river glowed green, just as it did at night with the GPNVGs. What had she been expecting? They remained like that for some minutes, waiting. They were banking a lot on Alex’s guess that the inhabitants weren’t nocturnal.
Sure enough, as the sun’s rays spread across the jungle, the fort came to life. Figures approached the dock, appearing as if from nowhere. They were small—much smaller than the four-armed guards—and slender, with sun-bronzed skin and bright-red hair. They moved about the dock with grace and skill, going about their day. Even from a distance, she could hear their voices, their laughter. Alex was right; there must be a village nearby. But these creatures looked nothing like the dark elf or her guards. They reminded her, she realized, of little people, dwarves or … gnomes. Yes, gnomes; they reminded her of garden gnomes. Although they didn’t have long white beards or pointed shoes.
“Where did they come from?” she whispered.
Alex shook his head.
She peered at the gnomes on the dock, who moved about the barges. They wore little clothing, mostly loincloths, reminding her of pygmies in the rain forests of South America she had read about in National Geographic. Pygmy-gnomes?
Then she heard the creaking of wagon wheels on the road. A wagon appeared, pulled by a six-legged lizard the size of a cow. Seated on the cart was another of the redheaded pygmy-gnomes.
“There is a settlement nearby,” said Alex. “That’s where the road must lead, to a village.”
The wagon crossed the wooden bridge, which creaked under its weight. On the other side of the bridge, two of the four-armed guards walked over to meet it. They spoke to the driver, and then one of them climbed onto the back of the wagon, looking through the wooden boxes and barrels stuffed on its bed.
“Come on,” whispered Alex, watching through his binoculars. “You know what I need you to do.”
The guard on the back of the wagon jumped down again, and the redheaded driver picked up his reins. The wagon began to move forward again toward the still-shut gate doors.
“Do it,” said Alex.
The other guards opened the doors wide, exposing a dark tunnel and a raised metal portcullis. The wagon drove through the gate, which remained open. Alex looked over at Cassie. “Ready?”
She didn’t feel ready, but if they were going to do this, it had to be now. Closing her eyes, she concentrated, drawing mana into her body and pooling it within her, twisting the energy about her and Alex. The last time she had channeled invisibility, the basilisk had been charging them. She had reacted out of pure instinct and had gotten lucky. This time, though, the casting was much easier than she had expected it to be. The flows of mana did exactly what she wanted, wrapping around her and Alex, forming a light-altering shield. Either she was getting far better at channeling mana and becoming a world-class mag-sens, or magic was just much easie
r on Rubicon. Maybe both. She suddenly had a new idea: what if I tie the spell off in place and just leave the energy wrapped around us, like a shield, so it moves with us? Somehow, that felt right. She gave it a shot, surprising herself when it worked. The invisibility shield held. This way, she realized, it would travel with them, requiring only a trickle of mana to stay in place. She beamed with pleasure, never having realized she even knew how to do this. That must have been what the dark-elf woman had done. Well, how about that?
Still smiling, she opened her eyes and flashed a smile at Alex. “Done.”
“Are we…?” He paused, staring down at himself. “But I can still see you.”
“There’s an invisibility weave… or shield if you prefer, tied around both of us. But we need to stay close, super intimate.” She winked. “Still, no one else outside the shield should be able to see us.”
Alex glanced at Clara, who stared at them open-mouthed.
“Cap, she’s right,” said Clara. “I can hear you but you’re just… gone.”
“Feel better?” Cassie asked Alex.
“I…” The uncertainty was still on his face as he stared at his hands, then Cassie, and then Clara. “This is so weird.”
“Tell me about it,” Cassie said as she climbed to her feet. “Keep close to me. The shield travels with me, not you. Don’t go darting off on your own.”
“Good luck, Cap,” Clara said.
Alex put his arm around Cassie’s shoulder, and they began to make their way down to the road and the bridge. None of the guards reacted. None of the gnomes reacted.
Cassie flashed Alex a smile then led him to the bridge. She knew her spell was still in place, but she still half expected the guards to start yelling and rush at them with their weapons. They did nothing.
“Son of a bitch,” whispered Alex. “I think this is working.”
“Shh,” whispered Cassie.
They crossed the bridge and walked past the dock, right by several of the redheaded gnomes. Their ears were pointy, their skin bronzed and freckled. They worked barefoot and bare chested, laughing and chattering amongst themselves as they jumped about the barges. She didn’t understand a word, but their language seemed to have a lyrical quality. If she hadn’t been so frightened, she’d have smiled. Instead, she turned her gaze to the approaching guards and the gate.
Starlight (The Dark Elf War Book 1) Page 40
