by R. L. King
Trin had just about decided that the hippie chicks had been stoned and invented their whole delusional story when she spotted the glow.
For the last half an hour she’d been cruising around on an old bicycle in the area Aisha had indicated, pausing occasionally to shift to magical sight. Frustrated at finding nothing, she contemplated tracking down the two would-be dancers and showing them exactly what happened to anybody who sent her off on a wild-goose chase, but those thoughts vanished as her latest scan revealed the bright forms of powerful wards surrounding a pair of tents just ahead. She paused, turning slowly around to look at the whole area, but saw nothing else even remotely interesting, magically speaking.
This had to be the place the women were talking about.
She pedaled slowly past, directing her gaze back and forth as if she were a wide-eyed tourist taking in the sights, but most of her attention was on the camp.
It consisted of two large tents, an ancient wooden horse trailer, and the dark bulk of an SUV, all arranged in a rough circle around a firepit and some lounge chairs and lit by a series of flickering tiki torches stuck into the ground around the perimeter. Someone sat in one of the chairs. Trin swung off her bike, squatted down next to it as if fiddling in her bag, and studied the person. It was a woman: tall, blonde, and athletic looking. She leaned back in one of the lounge chairs, reading a magazine by the light of a battery-powered lantern. Trin didn’t recognize her, but she too had the telltale glow of magic around her. Shifting back to magical sight again, she examined the woman in more detail.
The illusion, which had never been designed to stand up to full magical scrutiny, faded away to reveal that the woman was actually red-haired, tan, and less stacked than she appeared to normal vision. Trin still didn’t recognize her, but this was interesting.
She wondered if the man was there as well, maybe inside one of the tents. She doubted it: the lights were off, so unless he was asleep, he was probably out on the playa somewhere. She got back up and wheeled her bike to a more concealed location, careful not to make any moves that might attract the attention of the woman reading the magazine. She needn’t have worried: a constant flow of people moved past them at different speeds, and she blended in with them well.
She decided she could afford to wait a while and see if the man returned. The wards made sneaking into the tent under an invisibility spell impossible: she had no idea what they were tuned to do: at best they would alert the camp’s occupants to her presence, while at worst they could give her a nasty zap. She doubted the designers would build them to kill—not in a place like this, with so many people who might blunder accidentally into the wrong tent while drunk or high—but even so, getting knocked unconscious even for a short while this close to showtime would be a bad idea.
Instead, she glanced around until she spotted a couple of dusty wooden benches that some considerate souls had set out as a place for tired wanderers to sit. One of them was occupied by a pair of older men deep in conversation, but the other was empty. She sat down, pulled a bottle of water out of her bag, and did her best to look like she was too tired to move for a while.
After half an hour, her impatience grew. Trin was not by nature a patient person—she was all about instant gratification, and didn’t like waiting very long for anything. For all she knew, the guy could be out screwing some chick in her tent and wouldn’t be back until the morning. Trin couldn’t blame him for that: she wished she had time to find some guy and fuck his brains out while simultaneously draining a healthy measure of power from him (sex was the best for that: the guy never questioned why he felt exhausted afterward, attributing it to Trin’s mind-blowing skills in the sack). She was about to give up and head back to her own tent when the Other inside her urged her to wait a while longer.
She had never completely gotten used to the way the Other interacted with her, though by now she merely accepted it as a part of life. From what she understood from talking to some of the other leaders among them, the merge could work differently if the Other in question was of a higher power level and the host was particularly willing to permit it. In those cases, the host retained a larger measure of her own volition and could, with sufficient mental effort, assert more of her will in matters where she felt particularly strongly. This was especially true when the host was a mage. It was much more of a symbiotic relationship than the typical soldier-host one, where the soldier was in full control and made use of the host’s mind, memories, and abilities without any input from them. In the rare cases where the soldier was ousted from the host’s body without killing it (only possible, as far as Trin knew, when that infernal apprentice of Stone’s exercised her inconvenient power), the host remembered everything he had done while under the influence of the Other soldier. Trin had heard of more than one case where the host had committed suicide afterward, unable to handle the things he’d done.
The Others didn’t communicate in words, per se. As Trin sat there sipping at her water bottle and snatching glances over at the woman in the lounge chair, she wasn’t having an internal conversation with the Other inside her, like, “Yeah, fuck this waiting shit, I’m leaving,” and “No, hang on, let’s just sit tight and see what happens for a little while longer.” It was more like an impression, hard to differentiate from her own thoughts, that gently compelled her to remain. She’d learned to listen to those compulsions most of the time—life was always easier when she and her Other were in agreement.
So she continued to wait. Another twenty minutes passed. The two older men had long ago gotten up and moved on, and now the second bench was occupied by a chubby woman in a loose flowered dress and her two chattering small children. The woman with the magazine got up and went inside the tent for a couple of minutes, then came back out with a book and a tall glass of something and settled back down to read.
Trin’s attention had started to wander when, from the corner of her eye, she spotted the woman sit up straighter in her chair. This time she didn’t get up, though: she was waving greeting to someone. Trin forced herself to remain calm and look uninterested as she realized it was the blond man.
He approached her chair and leaned down a bit for a conversation with the woman; of course Trin couldn’t hear what they were saying, but from their body language it seemed like he was simply checking in at the base camp before moving on again. She got no feeling of romantic interest between the two of them—that was something she was a master at picking up.
“Let’s see what you really look like,” she murmured, switching to magical sight.
Holy fuck.
She started visibly, drawing the attention of the chubby woman’s two children, who glanced at her with bright-eyed interest. She didn’t even notice. She stared hard at what had been the blond man.
It was Stone.
She took a long deep breath, forcing herself to look carefully—wishful thinking could be a powerful force when you were trying so hard to find someone. But no, despite the completely incongruous outfit he wore, the man in the cargo shorts and the steampunk hat was none other than Alastair fucking Stone.
Quickly she looked away, as if afraid that her focus on Stone would catch his attention. She dug in her bag again while keeping a covert eye on the two of them. Her mind moved fast: she’d found him now, and found his camp. That meant she could find him again if she needed to—but time was running out. Whatever she did, if she was going to do anything at all, would have to be soon.
Inside her, the Other twinged. She recognized that twinge: it was the ‘we agreed we weren’t going to do anything to him until after the plan was complete’ reminder. But, she pointed out, she’d also promised them that if she could do it safely and discreetly, she didn’t plan to pass up the chance.
And here he was, right in front of her, with no idea that she was even here, let alone that she’d penetrated his ridiculous disguise. This was entirely too good to pass up. And if she could get him out of the picture, then nobody would stand between them and succe
ss. As she’d pointed out before, even the apprentice was just a teenager—she had a dangerous power, but it was unpredictable, and she didn’t have anywhere near the experience Stone did. Without him to direct her, the worst she could do was inconvenience them by taking out a few of their soldiers.
Stone rose up to his full height again, nodded to the woman, then ducked inside one of the tents and came out pulling a long-sleeved T-shirt over his head. Then he moved off away from the tent, continuing in the direction he’d been heading when he stopped there. Trin watched him go, marking the direction in which he seemed to be heading, then rose and picked up her bike. She would just have to follow him until he got far enough away, and then—
But wait…
A slow and nasty grin spread across her face as an idea flashed to mind. It would involve a risk—she’d have to let him out of her sight for several minutes—but the idea, sudden and unbidden, had a poetic beauty she simply could not ignore. She’d have to take the chance that she wouldn’t be able to find Stone again, but she didn’t think she had much to worry about.
After all, she knew where he lived now.
CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE
Friday
So far, Verity’s luck finding anything useful had been lousy.
She’d had no trouble getting back to the tent, digging out the big map of the playa, and scribbling down a smaller version of her own with the general locations of the magical glows she’d found marked in red pencil. She’d consulted with Sharra, who’d been hanging out at the camp, and they decided the best place for her to start was at the two magical areas she’d found close together. The reasoning for this was that if the Evil had mages, they might want to keep them together so they could consult, especially if they didn’t know anyone was on to them.
It had been a great idea, but so far it hadn’t panned out. The first place she found proved to be a neighboring pair of camps occupied by a collection of young party-hearty types who seemed to be using Burning Man as an excuse to smoke as much weed as possible, slather each other up with body paint, and spend the week in the pursuit of fun and hookups. As Verity cruised by on her bike, some of them beckoned her to join the party; she declined, but while she chatted with the inviters she noticed a couple of the others sprawled by the fire entertaining the group with what looked like multicolored sparklers—except that they weren’t holding any sparklers. Verity supposed it was possible the magically talented subset of this group could be affiliated with the Evil, but she wouldn’t bet her next paycheck on it. The magic she’d spotted while on her levitation jaunt didn’t even come from wards; it was simply the residue of a whole lot of low-powered spellcasting over an extended period.
She consulted her map and set off for the next location, wondering if Stone was having any better luck.
Sam looked up as Trin appeared in the tent doorway. “You’re back early,” he said. He no longer sat at the table; now he lay back on his cot reading a book. He looked like a preteen camper waiting for the rest of his bunkmates to return from the mess hall. The bag containing the vials was nowhere to be seen. “Is anything wrong?”
She shook her head. “Nope. Things are going right for a change, actually.” She glanced around. “Where’s that stuff you were messing around with before?”
“What stuff?” His eyes narrowed; he sat up and put the book down.
“The drugs.” She looked around as if expecting to spot them, and impatience crept into her voice.
“Why?”
She rolled her eyes. “Because I want some,” she said. “I saw how many of those vials you had—I just need one.”
“What are you going to do with it?” he asked. “You know we can’t draw attention to ourselves now. If you kill someone—”
Trin didn’t answer. She’d spotted the bag, sticking partway out from beneath Sam’s cot. She took a step toward it.
Sam stood, putting himself between her and the bag. “Trin, don’t.”
“And how exactly are you gonna stop me, kid?” she asked, making a show of looking down at him.
“What do you even want with it?” he asked, obviously trying to sound reasonable. “I thought we both agreed that you could scare people well enough without any artificial help.”
Damn, the kid was tiresome. She wished she could just kill him, reduce the annoying little pipsqueak to ash and be done with it, but all that would do was eject his Other. Since the powerful Others could survive for far longer without a host than the soldiers could, it would give him time to flit around the playa and locate a host that might even have a chance at giving her real trouble. At the very least, it could rat her out to the others in their group. Better to keep him trapped in this small, ineffectual form if it came to that.
“I found Stone,” she said. “He’s using an illusionary disguise. And he doesn’t have a fucking clue that I’ve seen through it. So I’m gonna finish him off once and for all.”
He glared at her. “No. You’re not. We already discussed this, Trin. We’ve only got one more day. If you endanger the plan—”
“I’m not going to endanger the plan,” she said. “I’m going to make it so we don’t have to worry about endangering the plan. If Stone’s out of the picture, his little crew of idiots won’t be able to find their asses with both hands. By the time they realize he’s not here anymore, we’ll be done and it’ll be too late. It won’t matter.”
Sam sighed. “He doesn’t know we’re here. Nothing any of the others have said indicates that he or his people have found us. All we have to do is keep doing what we’re doing, keep Dr. Brandt out of sight, and hold it together for less than one more day. You’ve waited this long—you can wait one day longer. And you’re going to have to.”
“Sam, Sam,” Trin said, in a deceptively kind voice, shaking her head. “You don’t get it, do you? I’m not telling you this because I’m giving you a chance to talk me out of it. Without me, your precious little plan won’t even work. You need me. That means I hold the cards, not you. Not any of you. If I left now, even with Dr. Brandt you wouldn’t be able to do jack shit, because only I know how to run my half of the ritual. So be a good little boy and hand over the stuff so I don’t have to take it from you. Because you won’t like that at all.”
Sam’s expression took on a very adult anger. “Trin. Stop it now. You know what will happen if you do this. Even if you succeed, the others will kill you once the ritual is over. Just give it up now and wait until tomorrow, and I won’t tell anyone about this lapse.”
Trin realized that even if Sam did an about-face and handed over the drugs, she still couldn’t just thank him and walk away. As soon as she was gone, the little twerp would hare off to the others scattered around the playa and tell them about her transgression. Even if she managed to deal with Stone, Sam was right: they would punish her for breaking ranks. She could probably handle most of them—all of them, in fact—but it would make things inconvenient, and it would mean that if she were forced to kill them, their Others would end up in new bodies: bodies she didn’t know about. Possibly even other mages.
She made a fast decision, one that didn’t give Sam a chance to react. “Okay, fine,” she said, infusing her voice with reluctant capitulation. She raised her hand in a conciliatory gesture. “I’ll wait. But you’d fucking well better help me kill Stone after the ritual’s over.”
“I told you I would,” he said, though he still looked suspicious. He might look like a ten-year-old boy, but he still had the mind of an ancient being. “We will—”
She hit him between the eyes with a focused concussion beam that flung him backward into the soft wall of the tent. He didn’t even have time to cry out before he was unconscious.
She hurried over and checked him to make sure he was still alive. He was—his chest still rose and fell with his breathing. She shook him, then pinched him hard to make sure he wasn’t faking it (it felt good to do that: she’d wanted to for quite some time now). When she was sure he was out, she found some r
ope and tied him up, gagged him, then wrapped him in a ground cloth and carried him outside, using a disregarding spell to make sure nobody noticed.
She opened one of the large cargo bays along the outside of their RV and slipped him into it, arranging the cloth to make sure he could breathe, and then closed and locked it. He might still die—it would get pretty hot in there once the sun came up, even with the ventilation grate—but he wouldn’t do it until she’d finished what she wanted to do with Stone. At that point, she didn’t give a damn what happened to him. The Others couldn’t do anything about it. Not if they wanted their ritual to work.
Inside her, the Other twinged again. It didn’t approve of what she was doing, not completely. It pointed out that the group would kill her when they found out, and it rather liked being inside someone with her abilities and power level. It didn’t relish the idea of being kicked out of her body when she died and having to find another, especially since possessing those with magical power required either permission or a whole lot of subterfuge, and those types were rare enough as it was.
Trin went back inside the tent, crouched down next to Sam’s cot, and opened the bag. She grabbed two of the vials (just in case something went wrong with the first one) and two covered hypodermic syringes, and sat down at the camp table to fill them. As she worked, she smiled.
Another idea had just come to her, and this one was almost better than the one she’d had about Stone. She nearly wriggled with pleasure as the implications of it sunk in.
It would solve everything.
She wouldn’t need to worry about the others killing her when they found out what she’d done.
They wouldn’t be able to kill her if they were all dead first.