Daybreak (38 page)
Everywhere, volleys of gunfire and even more detonations. Pen only saw them as shades, like the after-images of a dream. She was too focused on the churning evil battering at her head. Running again, she hugged the edges of the compound. Last thing she needed was a bullet to end her mission.
She wanted to go down fighting.
Tru had been near to tears, she thought.
He let me go.
He let me go.
As if he knew that she didn’t expect to live to see the morning.
Pen forced that heartache aside, focusing instead on the scarlet glow around a dilapidated woodshed. Such an innocuous little thing. The two-by-two-meter shed didn’t look big enough to house anything, let alone such a tremendous power source. She crept nearer, but the effort was like shoving magnets together the wrong way. The force didn’t want her any closer.
But Pen was determined. If this was where the battle ended for her, she would at least see her enemy.
Her short hair stood on end as she walked, forearm over her face as if guarding against a stiff wind. She blinked and coughed as the energy forced its way into her mouth, tasting of putrid meat. A roar of anguished frustration sounded like a train barreling full speed into her ears.
Hands shaking with the effort, she reached for the shed door. It was unlocked. The wood flung open as soon as she touched the handle.
A moment of odd calm swirled away the mayhem. She stood motionless, looking down at a shriveled, warped little creature. Perhaps an ordinary woman once, the thing now seemed like a troll out of a twisted fairy tale. Sparse gray hair grew all over her head and down over her face. Her spindly arms were spread wide, manacled to the shed’s walls. Her feet, too, were chained.
Warped and snarling, the thing smiled.
And attacked.
Pen flew back three meters and landed on her ass. She scampered off to the right of the shed, away from the physical dangers of the battle. From a tucked-in position behind a rusted wreck of a car, she huddled close to the metal and fired back at her opponent.
The dream space she entered was unlike any she’d ever experienced. Like walking through someone’s mind, only she didn’t know whether that mind belonged to her or to the creature. Maybe they created the battlefield together. Swirls of deep red and silvery white coalesced all around. No ground. No sky. Nothing but the feel of dripping, decaying thoughts seeping into hers. The gnarled woman’s cackle scratched like steel wool over Pen’s nerves. She took a deep breath to block out the ever-present stink, closed her senses to the sounds and the vile bitterness that burned acid-strong in her stomach.
Die!
The one word echoed so clearly that she thought it must have been screamed. But like the cackle, it was all in her mind, in that bizarre dream space.
Who are you?
Die!
Pen worked harder, digging past the spongy mass of the creature’s defenses. Images coalesced. A woman during the initial days of the Change, when it had first reached the east coast. Nearly two decades ago. Taken hostage by the man Pen knew to be O’Malley, only younger and stronger of body.
Torture. Such suffering as she’d never imagined. She watched as the woman was beaten and electrocuted, then left to heal on her own, alone, crying, until she begged for another beating just to be granted some semblance of human company.
Years.
Decades of abuse.
Pen threw up the meat she’d choked down, but the grisly images wouldn’t abate. Over and over, the woman had been stripped of her will. All that remained was this filthy, cowering beast of a human being.
Why didn’t you fight back? You had magic!
The devilish mind stuttered. Cried out. Pen saw nothing but fear—fear the thing had harbored of her abilities. Fear of all magic in the wake of the Change, even her own. Even when faced with an enemy that had stolen her freedom and erased her identity, she hadn’t fought back. By then it was too late. Torture erased the woman’s autonomy, her own desires replaced by nothing beyond pleasing O’Malley.
His misshapen pet.
Pleasing him meant providing cover. No wonder people had never known the fortress’s location, and why the shipments of slaves seemed to vanish into vapor. Complete magical camouflage.
Did you kill Reynard and Xialle?
Trespassers. Threat.
And Jack?
Ruse!
Pen had never been inside a mind so narrowly focused. Every higher thought had been dissolved across year after year of agony. Nothing remained but reflexes and gut instinct. How could a person empathize once divested of all trace of humanity?
Let me help.
But the woman screeched like a dying animal and flung another tidal wave of magic, burning Pen’s skin, flaying her defenses until she felt skeletal and exposed. Rather than fight that pain—it took too much energy—she let it sink into her marrow and ravage her muscles. No stopping it now. She would win this with her magic or she would die on the spot.
Although her confidence had increased to the point where she no longer needed it, she sank into her old ritual. She pressed her hands flat together, even while her palms seemed lined with razors. Turned her eyes to a sky she couldn’t see for the eddies of blood. Tucked her chin to her chest, when her ribs threatened to collapse under the battering weight of pure malice.
“Mama, I need you.”
She flung open her mind on a bellow of pain. The blood color sank into her eye sockets until she saw nothing else, just that nauseating haze. But the force of her blast carved out a tiny space of silvery light. Dizzy now, she kept pushing, pushing back.
The raging force of her potential, unleashed on a single creature.
The red faded by degrees to a sickening puce. Light and dark switched places, like the image of the sun that stays behind closed eyes. Shivering, crying, Pen reached down inside the woman’s consciousness and broke her in two.
The cackling wrath ceased as Pen hit the ground. She panted. Dirt clung to her sweat-soaked face and palms. The beat of her heart was unnatural—clipped and loping. Far too fast. She smacked parched lips. The ends of her toes and fingers were numb, as if all the blood in her body had been conserved in more vital places.
She blinked until the real world took the place of that viscous dream space. Around her, the battle still raged. Muscles quavered like a newborn foal’s as she pushed up from the dirt to a sitting position, huddled against that rusted-out car.
Arturi’s people still needed her. She should go. Get up. Help.
But Pen lowered her head and sobbed.
FORTY
The lion crept behind enemy lines. For this last mission, Tru had yielded control because he was distracted, worried about his wife. That lack of focus could lead to dangerous mistakes. Better to rely on the feline hunter and concentrate on success. The cat knew how to kill; he took great pleasure in it.
Of the skinwalkers who had begun the fight with him, only the marmot survived. Koss scampered ahead, scouting terrain. Sniffing, the big cat padded along while magic sparked in the air. His fur bristled as if touched by a static charge. Something big was happening, somewhere. Gunfire popped and men howled. But none of it was his business.
He was stalking bigger game.
He avoided the war machines, reeking of old pollution and grimy with years of accumulated dirt. The light would be gone soon, harder for the enemy to tell friend from foe. If O’Malley didn’t hate skinwalkers so much, he might have recruited more animals to fight, but his thugs remained confined to human skin. The lion shook his head with pity and disgust.
The main building rose before him. Old. Huge. Those small, wily females had said the largest force waited for the rebels in the courtyard, leaving the interior lightly defended. He circled, testing and trying to find the best way in. The old man would hide in there, bellowing orders to the people he expected to die on his behalf. Not how a proper male behaved. But all the power in the world couldn’t stand against simple resolve, and the lion had both determination and cunning.
He decided where to enter, through a fragile square window with no guards in sight. Launching through the glass, his fur protected him from the shards that sprayed everywhere. The assault wasn’t as quiet as he preferred, but this wasn’t his native hunting ground. The lion crouched in wait because guards would respond to the noise he’d made, unless they had all been sent outside. The old man would not be so foolish.
A door slammed open to reveal two men who stank of sweat and smoke. The lion took a great leap and knocked them down together. Their weapons clattered away. One of them pissed; that potent stench filled the air. That enraged the beast, so he the killed the urine-stained one first with a swift rake of his claws. He crushed the other in his jaws until the death rattle gurgled from his throat. The lion spat. Putrid-tasting flesh. Unworthy. He squatted over their useless guns and sauntered away, tail lashing with satisfaction.
The hallway stretched before him. He found no clues except the stink the guards had left. They might have been sent to check on the noise, which offered the best chance of finding their leader quickly and quietly. Afterward, he’d stand over the carcass and roar. The lion didn’t lose.
Koss scurried ahead, keeping out of sight. Though the lion lost track of his small partner, he was comforted to know that the marmot would warn him before any enemies approached. The smoky-sweat trail led deeper, through other rooms. His human self noted that this was a nice place, lots of salvaged luxury items from the pre-Change world. Fine paintings with gilt frames. Everything gleamed. But the animal wasn’t impressed. The floor was hard and slippery, no traction for his claws, and it stunk. People who lived there had stunk up the place with terror smells.
The muted noises of distant conflict made him prick up his sensitive ears. Then another closer sound registered. Human voices, not far. An argument? But he didn’t pay attention to the words. Just the anger in their tone. Hard to say how many, but that wouldn’t matter. He’d kill them all.
It might be helpful to stop and listen. We might learn where O’Malley is.
The lion obeyed his human half and waited as Koss scampered back with a chatter of warning.
“I’m telling you, this place is cursed,” said one guard. “We need to get the hell out.”
“The general will hunt us down like dogs if we do. If we die, it better be at the hands of the enemy.”
A new voice added, “You wouldn’t
believe
the shit I’ve seen today.”
believe
the shit I’ve seen today.”
“Just keep a sharp eye peeled. There’s no way these hedge witches and skinwalkers take us out. We’re the closest thing left to a fucking military outfit left in this godless hellhole.”
“Speak for yourself,” his cohort replied. “I’m going before it’s too late.”
A gunshot rang out. “Anybody else feel like deserting?”
The lion crept around the corner. Three guards stood over a body, stationed where the hall intersected with corridors leading off in several directions. Two of them wore shocked expressions, as if they couldn’t believe what the other had done. Their shock left the door wide open for a stealthy strike.
With a few slices of Tru’s paws, the surviving guards died. Blood smeared the tiles where their bodies fell. He leaped over their corpses, surging toward the final confrontation with the human responsible for enslaving so many innocent souls. Excitement pushed through his veins, spiking to new levels. The big cat savored his triumph even as he kept moving. His tail lashed like a victory pennant.
He let the marmot take the lead once more.
Scout on, little friend.
Scout on, little friend.
The scent trail grew stronger. More fear. More men. Up ahead, there would be greater resistance. He must be approaching the room where the old man lurked like a spider spinning his web. The coward was too weak to fight his own battles like a proper warrior, instead sending his thugs. But there was no escaping the lion.
With a tiny paw, Koss waved him on. Nothing scary here, it seemed. The lion passed into the next room, which was full of strange items, most of which he didn’t recognize. They smelled odd, but there was no prey to be found. He padded silently closer to O’Malley.
As he crossed the threshold, red light flared all around him. A carved head screamed. Both halves of him—human and feline—recoiled, dancing away from the sound. It was both awful and unnatural, as if someone’s voice had been bound into the statue itself, trapping it for all eternity, to serve as the old man’s alarm. The red light made it impossible for the lion to pass the barrier and rush farther into the house. This smelled dangerous.
Koss had been too small to activate the magical trap; he danced on his back legs—an apologetic stance. But that didn’t solve the problem. The lion stalked around as the shrieking continued. Three guards assembled on the other side of the red light, watching. Waiting. Aiming their rifles. Their bullets would tear him up.
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