Brighid's Flame

by Cate Morgan

  Nick didn’t disappoint. “Look, one of my guys brought someone to me. That someone put me in contact with another guy. The money was so good I had to see what it was about. They paid me half up front, the other half at completion.”

  “Poor Nick. You missed.”

  “No,” he said, an unfortunate Cheshire grin lighting his face. “I didn’t.”

  She handled it well. A pause to cover the sudden violent jump of her heart, and that was all. “Here’s what’s going to happen, Nick. You’re going to give me the location of your meeting, which is going to be verified.” She tapped her earpiece in a meaningful way.

  “Subway station. Times Square.” He sagged. “Forty-second and Broadway.”

  “Got that, Stephen?”

  “Yeah.” He didn’t sound pleased. In fact, he sounded decidedly not pleased. “Wait…here it is. We’ve got video confirmation. And a facial match.”

  “Nicely done, Nicky. We thank you for your cooperation.” She vacated her rickety seat. “We’re done here,” she told Vincent’s men.

  She made it all the way to the door, the guard opening it for her, before Nick’s betrayed howl filled the small stone building to the rafters. “I cooperated! You said I cooperated!”

  Tara turned. Nick had been lifted to his feet by two agents, was struggling manfully as a result. “And?”

  “Where are they taking me?” His grappling was almost laughable, his whining more appropriate to a five-year-old with a tummy hurt.

  “You exploited a desperate fourteen-year-old because you were too much of a coward to do your own dirty work. You nearly killed my Stephen. You nearly killed Julien, and quite possibly put Vincent Dante in danger in the process. These are the people I love most in the world, that I owe my very survival to.” She cocked an eyebrow. “I stopped wondering where you’re going thirty seconds after I discovered you were the gunman.”

  She left.

  “Tara, you can’t go to Times Square.” Stephen’s voice sank to a whispered growl she could barely make out. “Private security won’t even go there. There’s not enough hazard pay in the world.”

  She huffed—half with cold, half with impatience—as she opened the back hatch of one of the security vans. “Tell me something I don’t know.”

  “But you’re going anyway.”

  “We got through the war, hiking and hiding our way through half the city. Climbing over rubble. Sleeping in abandoned buildings. Going hungry and dodging more close calls than I care to remember. And then we lived in a shanty for three years.”

  He sighed. “We should have been done with all that.”

  “You are. I keep my promises.” She switched her headset off before he could try to talk her out of it.

  “Where to, ma’am?” the driver asked. “Back to the Tower?”

  Stephen had been mostly right when he’d said that not even private security would risk a foray into Times Square. Vincent’s security would, but only for Vincent or Gwen. Tara was years, perhaps decades, away from earning that kind of loyalty.

  She wouldn’t ask it of them.

  Tara reached in and grabbed a survival pack from the pile. “I could use a lift out of the gate.”

  The agent blinked at her with impossibly blue eyes. Then his straight, dark eyebrows rushed together in frown. “You’re not intending to continue on foot?”

  “As a matter of fact I am.” She smiled at the unmitigated horror scrawled across his face. She opened a case and chose a pair of military blades. “Don’t worry, I’m not asking you to come along.”

  “You misunderstand, ma’am. We can’t let you go in alone. It’s the Bloody Square!”

  She didn’t want to think about why it was called that. The first attacks had been there, and she’d been put in a home because of it. So many children, flooding an already overwrought system, so the paperwork never quite caught up. She’d been so full of rage for so many years. That day had been the first, and she’d been trapped in a cage of anger until Gwen found her.

  Stephen had been put in the same home, a grimy walkup in a questionable—well, more than questionable—Brooklyn neighborhood. Overcrowding and underfeeding had been the name of the game. That first day, an already undersized Stephen had been bullied for his meager portion of lunch. She was still surprised she hadn’t killed the trio of boys threatening him.

  “I know what it is, agent,” she said softly. She slammed the knives home into each boot. “It will be more dangerous if I stand out due to being surrounded by a small, private army. We’d be mobbed. As in pitchforks and flaming torches.” She hooked a gas mask to her belt. “Gwen trained me well, and Stephen will keep an eye on me. Besides, I’m not planning on actually going through Times Square.”

  “No, ma’am?”

  “No. I plan to go under it.”

  Tara landed hard enough to jolt the air from her lungs—she hadn’t expected quite so far a drop from the surface. The Columbus Circle metro entrance consisted of mostly rubble she’d had to climb through. The first few steps were largely intact, after which she’d had to jump for it. She felt naked without a stylish hat and bullwhip.

  She clicked on her ear piece. “Stephen?”

  “Agent Carson here, Miss Fitzpatrick.”

  She nearly fell over her own feet in the tepid dark. “Carson?” He’d been the agent who’d pulled her out of the way before Julien was shot. “Not that I’m not glad to hear from you, agent, but where’s Steph—Mr. Saint-John?”

  “I can handle anything Mr. Saint-John would handle for you, ma’am.”

  Frustration and worry combined in her gut to bubble uncomfortably. “What about Gwen?”

  “She’s otherwise occupied, ma’am.”

  Meaning Gwen was with Vincent. “It’s not like Mr. Saint-John to leave his post, agent.” If Carson didn’t cough up Stephen’s whereabouts in the next three seconds…

  Carson cleared his throat. “He hasn’t, exactly.”

  “Carson.”

  “He’s sort of…chasing it down, ma’am. If you catch my meaning.”

  Her response was an extremely foul expression, albeit strangled. “Listen to me very carefully. Stephen cannot, by any means, come to—here. I don’t care if it takes a dozen tactical squads. You find him, and you stop him.”

  “I’m sorry, ma’am. It’s too late.”

  “Then intercept him.” She clicked her headset off and gave the open hole above her a considering glare. She stuck two fingers in her mouth and elicited a bone-jarring whistle that echoed wetly across the cement walls of the station.

  A head popped into view before the reverberations died. “Ma’am?”

  She really wished they would stop calling her that. “Mr. Saint-John is on his way here. Under no account is he to follow me, understand? Consider it an order.”

  “Miss Fitzpatrick, we can’t actually stop—”

  “Then do everything you can to put him off. Have your superiors call Gwen or Mr. Dante directly if necessary. Hog-tie him and throw him in the back of the van. Whatever it takes.”

  “Yes, ma’am.” He saluted and disappeared.

  Tara sighed, hands on her hips, head bowed. Then she told herself to get a move on—she hadn’t much time.

  She fitted the gas mask over her head and adjusted the straps. She hated the things. They made her feel claustrophobic, but the alternative was so much worse. The idea of Stephen down here turned her stomach.

  She switched on her flashlight, the chill of the dense metal seeping through her gloves. She told herself to focus, and began her journey into the abyss.

  There was a vast difference between tunnels that radiated empty, aching loneliness and those on the perimeter of occupied territory. She’d honed that instinct the weeks she and Stephen had led thirty-six fellow students from their decaying, over-crowded school in Brooklyn down a war-tor
n Seventh Avenue to Central Park. There had been areas of violence, stretches of stunning, literal dead silence.

  Then there were those unmarked, yet clearly delineated pockets of disquiet. They vibrated with the feel of unseen, hungry eyes. The first time Tara’s group crossed such a boundary, they’d been ambushed for their supplies. Young adults, barely more than teenagers and wild with blind desperation, hunting children through the broken streets of New York. It had been absolutely the last shock Tara could take.

  They’d tried to take Stephen out first, to distract and panic the others. They hadn’t counted on the bigger kids running interference like pack of rabid linemen on Super Bowl Sunday. They hadn’t counted on Tara.

  She still carried the scars. But Stephen and the other children had been safe.

  It hadn’t been the last ambush, either—and not all of them had been by what she would term as human aggressors. By the second ambush, she could sense the preliminary tremor. By the third she knew what it meant.

  She sensed it now, felt it crawl over her skin in slow, heavy waves. Felt it reach out and brush against her. She slowed her progress until she stopped altogether, her back against the wall and eyes closed. She switched off her flashlight.

  She was still a good quarter mile away from her destination. This couldn’t be good.

  The dark quiet surrounded her, creeping in like a stalking cat until it caressed her. As Tara waited for her eyes to adjust, she concentrated on steadying her breathing, slowing her heart rate to that Zen-like state she had never quite fully mastered, despite Gwen’s excellent tutelage. The instinct of fight-or-flight was still too ingrained.

  The tiniest sound, a miniscule chink of a pebble losing purchase from its wall, made pond-ripple echoes in the dark. It was followed by a further, definite feeling of not there. Tara stepped carefully, boot heel rolling inch by inch up the sole until her toes pressed into the ground. Her other foot followed without so much a whisper of existence. She had the feeling whomever was in here with her was doing the same—a slow-motion game of chicken.

  Tara sensed the open space yawning around her now, felt the humid air cushion her. She cursed having neglected to switch on the heat signature setting in her mask the moment she sensed the other presence—instinct again. She paused to get her bearings, feet shoulder-width apart and centered. Waited, as the blood pounded and thrummed in her veins, her lungs filled with filtered, recycled air.

  She hated waiting.

  Instinct made her impatient, let fear and anger take her over in a rush.

  It also made her fast. Fast, and brutal.

  Her arm lashed out, switching on the flashlight to blind her unseen opponent. He gave a gurgle of a scream inside his own mask. She kicked him right in the business with her steel toes. He dropped like a brick from a ten-story building.

  Her relief was such she nearly failed to react to the other presence. She jabbed her elbow into a soft gut, spun away, and clocked her second assailant over the head with the flashlight in one smooth motion. For good measure, she whipped her arm in the other direction, upper-cutting the flashlight into his bent, groaning head. She hoped she broke a few teeth.

  She stepped away to a safe distance to await the next attack, breathing harsh with adrenaline. This is what she’d been trained for. It surprised her to discover how good she was at it in the field.

  A hand grabbed her arm hard from behind, tried to yank her close. The flare of light from her flashlight swung wildly as she turned into the yanker’s momentum. Her arm came up and around, taking her attacker’s grip with her. She forced him onto his toes until he teetered off balance, at which point Tara dropped to one knee.

  Her attacker struggled on his back. She gave his arm a vicious twist that flung him onto his stomach, crushed his face into the ground, and pressed her boot to the back of his neck. Then she stretched his arm back until she heard a telltale, satisfying crack and the resultant scream.

  It worried her she liked this part a little too much.

  “Everyone hold! Hold, I said!”

  That would be the leader. Tara switched her hands on her hostage’s arm so she could sweep the area with her flashlight.

  A lean, shadowed figure in a mask appeared, arm raised against her light. A strange sense of familiarity niggled at her.

  “Well,” he said, voice muffled by the mask. “It seems we are at an impasse.”

  Two other figures dragged a struggling Stephen between them. The fight left Tara in a sudden, heart-crushing flood. She released her hostage and stepped away.

  The leader nodded as though this was exactly what he’d expected and proceeded to ignore her as he checked on his people. There was nothing military about his bearing, but everything about him left her in no doubt of his status. She wondered if this was the elusive leader of the Underground. If so, she would need to be careful and compile as much information as possible before she and Stephen escaped.

  They would take her earpiece, but that was fine. Even off, it could be used to track her. God help the Underground and all its allies if Gwen found them before Tara could take Stephen and get out. It might even be worth it to stick around to watch.

  The leader knelt next to the prone, writhing figure she’d just lately held captive, apparently unconcerned about his close proximity to Tara despite her recent performance.

  Instead, he murmured something about a racked shoulder and let her second attacker hoist Dislocated to his feet, whereupon they limped off into the shadows. As the leader regarded her closely, a telling crunch followed by a strangled cry in the dark made the corner of Tara’s mouth twitch.

  “I don’t have to see your face to tell you’re amused,” the leader observed.

  “Well,” Tara returned in conversational tones, “if you had taught them proper ambush technique, they may not have provided such rich entertainment value instead.”

  “We did.” He sighed, disgusted with the lot of them. “The wisdom against attacking one at a time seems to have left them. I think a single opponent, apparently unarmed, made them overconfident.”

  “Work on that, will you?”

  “I suspect you’ve served a valuable object lesson, for which I am grateful. Of course, she said you would.” He motioned for Stephen to be brought over.

  The niggling in the back of her brain finally clicked into place. “It’s you, isn’t it? From the Park.” She didn’t protest when her hands were clasped behind her and firmly tied.

  The leader removed his gas mask with a grin and glasses askew. “Well done.”

  “Are you really a history teacher?” she asked, genuinely curious.

  “As a matter of fact, I am. And I really need help building a school—everything I told you was true.”

  Stephen was tied up next, unnecessarily. Tara could detect his horror at being caught behind his mask. “I’m sorry.”

  Tara’s mask was removed by one of the teacher’s men, roughly. As suspected, her ear piece was taken and handed over. “How should I address you? Granted, a few ideas come to mind…”

  He examined her earpiece closely, turning it over and over in his hands. “And we were being so civilized. Well, never mind.” He dropped the earpiece and crushed it underfoot.

  She nearly swore. Instead, she turned to Stephen, finally finding that Zen-like calm she’d been searching for. “Are you all right?”

  He nodded, interrupted mid-nod when his mask was removed as well.

  “Wait!” They all stopped and stared at her. “Give him back his mask—his lungs…he’ll get sick and there’s no need.” Tara had been given the same training as Vincent’s private security force, so she could withstand a certain amount of tainted air. Stephen was another matter entirely.

  The leader shook his head. “The air is clear down here. We’ve worked very hard to make it so. The masks merely serve the purpose of disguise when we don’t need
them in the usual way.”

  Her wrists strained against her bindings. “If you’re lying…”

  “I haven’t yet, believe it or not. You’ll simply have to take my word for it. I won’t bother to blindfold you—I know very well it won’t do any good. Come, Ms. Fitzpatrick. You’re in for a treat.”

  “Am I?”

  Another boyish grin. “Indeed. You’re about to find out who the Underground leader is.”

  “The agents were supposed to stop you at Columbus Circle,” Tara told Stephen as they walked along, trying not to sound accusatory.

  “I never reached it,” Stephen told her, voice soft.

  They left the main tunnels, turning into the maze of maintenance tunnels between routes. They saw one or two trains, stopped mid-route for evacuation during the war.

  Another of these trains, deep under the Square, turned out to be their destination. The Times Square station had been repurposed into a crowded, lively community. A newsstand without much going for it had been turned into a small library with basic sundries on offer. A disused, crumbling staircase provided a perch for an impromptu string quartet, their audience sitting cross-legged on the dusty ground. A former fast-food restaurant was now a cafeteria, deep recesses against the walls sleeping quarters.

  As they approached the train, two guards slid open one of the doors with a makeshift lever. Tara and Stephen were marched in, to the interest to everyone watching. Mass whispering bounced along the walls.

  “Is that her?” someone called out, right before the door slammed shut behind her.

  “What’s going on?” Tara asked. They were taken to the back car, trapped in the tunnel. Camp lights cast a sickly, yellow-green pall over everything. The cabin had been gutted to make way for a very basic living space. A row of benches had converted into a cot, a line of crates providing table space between benches on either side of the narrow tube. The plywood board laid across the crates was awash with books and papers.

  “It’s not for me to say.” The teacher motioned to his men, who unlashed Tara and retied her to the pole in the back of the car. Stephen was relegated to a bench, where his hands were tied to the rail.