The Rogue Retrieval

by Dan Koboldt

  “What about you? Where are you from?” Quinn asked.

  “I was born in Farbor, in the Pirean tip. My parents worked the nets, like everyone else there.” He held up his hands; the palms were laced with old scars.

  Pirea. Northeastern part of the continent, sparsely populated. Very little arable land, but the cold, deep coastal waters held some of the best fisheries in the world. The information just popped into Quinn’s head out of nowhere. “Son of a bitch,” he said. They’d had these headphones in his room, back at the island facility. He’d had to put them on at night. Kiara called it a memory consolidation program, but it was clearly more than that. What the hell else had they stuck in his head?

  Moric was frowning at him. “I’m sorry?”

  “Nothing. Sorry,” Quinn said. “So, how did you end up here?”

  “I was twelve, working the boats with my family. A storm caught us too far from the harbor. I knew about my abilities by then, but I’d kept them hidden. Didn’t practice. I couldn’t save anyone else.”

  “I’m sorry,” Quinn said. He was surprised at how much he’d meant it. He knew what it was like to lose both parents at once. He knew the darkness it brought.

  “It was a long time ago,” Moric said.

  A chime sounded then, almost like a doorbell, though Quinn couldn’t pinpoint the source. The sound seemed to be coming from everywhere at once.

  “What was that?” Quinn asked.

  “A summons,” Moric said. He stood. “The council meets today. No doubt they want a report on you.”

  “Do you know what you’re going to tell them?”

  “I haven’t decided yet.”

  “I’d like to speak on my own behalf,” Quinn said.

  “The council is closed to outsiders, I’m afraid.”

  “You’re not going to make me sit here all day, are you?” Quinn asked.

  “I expect you to make your way back to your room. Can I trust you in that?”

  “Fine,” Quinn said.

  “I’ll find you when the meeting ends,” Moric said. He strode out from the copse of trees. Once clear, he jumped and glided down the slope of the vale like a snowboarder. He didn’t even bother with a stone this time. Robes flying, shaven head glinting in the sun. He was an odd bird for certain.

  Quinn had said he’d go to his room.

  I just didn’t say I’d go there right away.

  He really wanted to go to the docks for a closer look at that sailing ship, but that might look like he was trying to get off the island. So instead he found his way back to the stone-­lined path that led around the vale. The climate was absolutely perfect. About seventy degrees, slight breeze, sunny. It was like southern California.

  No wonder the magicians like to keep this island private.

  He climbed to the highest point of the slope he was on to get a better vantage point and try to see the full island. A jumble of rocks and boulders littered the high point of the land, so he started free climbing them. Not being careless, but glad to have the chance to do something on his own. He gained the top of the pile, exhilarated . . .

  Only to find that the highest rock was already occupied.

  A fair-­haired girl sat there, with her back to the vale, looking out across the water.

  “Oh. Hello,” Quinn said. He looked past her for a moment and fought a wave of vertigo. Beyond the boulder’s edge was empty space; the ground dropped away a few hundred feet to where waves crashed on rocks below.

  She turned slowly as if coming out of a trance. Not startled at all, which said she’d heard him climbing. Not a girl, either, but a young woman. Probably not as old as him, but it was harder to tell with Alissians. She had a freckled, youthful look and she was, hands down, the prettiest Alissian he’d seen so far. “Who are you?” she asked.

  “My name’s Quinn,” he said. “I’m new here.”

  She went back to looking out over the water. He waited a minute. “And you are . . .”

  “Jillaine.” She brushed a strand of golden hair from her face. Her eyes were violet; Quinn had never seen anything like them.

  “Are you a magician?” Quinn asked.

  “I’m a chandler.”

  A candle-­maker. Often kept bees as well. He hated that he knew that. “So, you make candles?”

  “And soap, among other things,” she said.

  Quinn locked eyes with her and smiled. “You never answered my question.”

  She ignored him and looked back over the water. Her fingers fluttered slightly; Quinn saw the movement and waited. A light, floral aroma wafted to him on the breeze; it smelled faintly of roses. It grew powerful, nearly enough to make him dizzy, then it changed to the smell of warm bread. More scents assaulted his nose: cinnamon, lavender, hemp, vanilla. There was something he could only describe as new rain on stone. Then a strong scent of pollen. It caught him off guard, and he sneezed.

  She smiled faintly, but never so much as looked at him. Apparently “Bless you” wasn’t a custom here.

  “That was incredible,” Quinn said, and he meant it. Not just because she was pretty.

  “I find it useful sometimes.” She turned back to him. “What can you do?” she asked.

  “Nothing so grand as that, I’m afraid,” Quinn said. He gestured to the stone beside her, and raised his eyebrows in question.

  She nodded; he sat down. Not too close, but not far away, either. He produced his deck of cards and began shuffling one-­handed. She watched the cards move as well as any mark back in Vegas.

  He held the deck out to her. “Pick a card, any card.”

  She touched a card in the middle, thought better of it, and took one from the very edge. A choice that hinted at suspicion, though her face was hard to read.

  “Memorize it, and then put it back in my hand,” Quinn said. He held out the fan of cards toward her, and looked the other way. He felt her slide the card back in. Right away he began shuffling, with both hands this time, riffling and churning the cards for show. Dealers in Vegas learned this on their first day; shuffling cards the way most ­people did it would have them worn out in half an hour in a real casino.

  The wind picked up suddenly and nearly blew them out of his hands. Jillaine had her little smile again, and he couldn’t help but think she might have had something to do with it. He spread the cards in a line on the stone between them, just enough that the symbols showed.

  “Do you see your card?” he asked.

  She scanned the deck carefully, giving away nothing. She looked back at him before answering. Smart. “Yes.”

  “Good.” He swept up the cards again, shuffling efficiently this time. Riffle, cut, riffle. Then he made another spread. “How about now?”

  She looked again. It took longer this time, because her card wasn’t there. “No. It’s gone,” she said.

  “Are you sure?”

  Her mouth opened a little. She was surprised he’d questioned her. “I’m sure.”

  “Maybe the wind took it,” Quinn said. He began searching the area where they were sitting. Jillaine hadn’t moved; she was watching him.

  He came up empty, of course. “What about under your boot?” he asked.

  Her boots were ankle-­high, cut in some kind of soft leather. Maybe suede. She lifted the one closest to him, and there it was. A single red-­backed card, facedown on the ground beneath her. She gasped in a soft, girlie way. Adorable. She snatched it up.

  “Is that your card?” Quinn asked. It would be, of course. She’d picked the queen of hearts.

  “No,” she said.

  “It’s not?”

  She handed it over. It was a queen, all right, but green instead of red, and the hearts had been changed to something else. It took him a second to recognize them. Candles. Oh, she thought she was so clever. But it wasn’t the first time a mark had tried
switching a card on him. He had another queen of hearts at the ready. He made the switch and held it up for her to see.

  “I think this is your card,” he said.

  She smiled and rolled her eyes. “Still wrong.”

  He flipped it over; now this card had candles on it. “Hey!”

  She laughed then, a soft and delicate laugh. He laughed, too.

  “How long have you been on the island?” he asked.

  She groaned. “Too long. My father rarely lets me leave.”

  Ah, yes, a father. She’d have one around, and he’d probably keep a tight watch on her. “He’s a magician, too, I take it,” Quinn said.

  “Of the most boring kind. He’s been here, like, forever.”

  “What does he do?”

  She shrugged and looked back out across the water. “Something or other for the council.”

  Oh, no. Please, no. “What’s his name?” Quinn asked. Hoping desperately he didn’t already know the answer.

  “Moric.”

  Of course it was.

  “Alissians might not recognize a thoroughbred, but they know a good horse when they see one.”

  —­R. HOLT, “OVERVIEW OF ALISSIAN HUSBANDRY”

  CHAPTER 14

  PESTS

  Logan made the rendezvous just in time. Kiara and Chaudri had arrived earlier and erased all signs of their presence from the abandoned farmstead. They’d bought about a week’s worth of provisions, mostly in the form of local nuts, figs, and cured meat.

  “We had to wait in line to get it, no matter the price,” Kiara said.

  “Too many ­people, not enough food,” Chaudri said. “Even with Dr. Holt’s intervention, things will be difficult here for some time.”

  “That reminds me,” Logan said. “Briannah said someone tried to steal the horses.”

  “Did they get anything?”

  “Don’t think so. Lem and the boys were all over them.”

  “When this is over, we should have another look at the security at Briannah’s inn.”

  “It’s not as bad as it sounds. And we can trust them.”

  “I suppose the food is decent,” Kiara said.

  “Decent?”

  Chaudri leaned over. “You smell just like her kitchen. She was cooking, wasn’t she?”

  Logan shrugged. “I have great timing.”

  “Did you bring me some?”

  “Ooh, sorry,” Logan said. “Not like I had any Tupperware.” Yet another item on the company’s doesn’t-­go-­through list.

  Chaudri’s face fell.

  Logan handed her a bundle wrapped in wax paper. “Brought you some of her honey rolls, though.”

  “Oh, Logan! You’re a knight of honor,” Chaudri said. She was all grins, which was fitting. Briannah’s baking was the only thing equal to her cooking.

  Kiara and Logan wandered over to where the horses were hobbled. “I assume that’s to keep her busy while we drug the animals?” she asked quietly.

  “Not sure she’d be thrilled about it. You know how she is with the horses.”

  Logan dug into his saddlebags and came up with a sealed leather pouch. The tech team had crafted it to look like the kit of an Alissian surgeon. The vials inside held a proprietary solution derived from South American tree frogs. The natural substance was called dermorphin, and often used to dope racehorses. The company’s synthetic isoform was more potent, though, and longer-­lasting. They’d even gone so far as to match doses to each animal based on gender, weight, and genetics.

  Logan read the reminder label inside the kit. “ ‘Emergency Use Only.’ ”

  “This qualifies,” Kiara said.

  The horses didn’t protest the needle prick like Logan feared. He supposed that as company investments, they saw regular blood draws, antibiotics, and supplements to keep them in pristine health. And they came from good stock, too, which couldn’t hurt.

  They mounted. Chaudri took the reins of the packhorse, and Logan handled Bradley’s mare. He gave the isotope scanner a quick glance. Nothing was on the scope but the three of them. Holt had defeated the system somehow—­Logan forgot to ask him about that—­and Bradley was still MIA.

  Great: all this tech, and it’s useless when we need it.

  It’s one of the reasons they’d brought Bradley in the first place, and now he was lost. Logan had left instructions with Briannah in case the magician wandered back that way. He hoped to hell that he would.

  But he wasn’t holding his breath.

  Drugged-­up horses made incredible time.

  A week of hard riding put them in north Valteron, approaching the border. Kiara set an aggressive pace; they stopped only to feed and water their mounts. The animals didn’t seem to tire, thanks to the frog juice, but they still had to refuel. Logan, as the heaviest member of the party by half, had alternated riding his own mount and Bradley’s mare to spare the animals.

  The fact was, though, that the ride was harder on Logan, Kiara, and Chaudri than it was on the horses. Too bad CASE Global didn’t have a serum for its soldiers as well. The company had one in the works, of course, but it wasn’t yet ready for prime time. Which was a shame, because they could have used it. He was exhausted, and even the lieutenant looked a little worn.

  Not that she’d ever admit it.

  What surprised him was that even though Chaudri was dragging, she voiced no complaint, either. She’d been uncharacteristically quiet since encountering her former mentor. She’d been more awed than indignant during their encounter, which was intriguing. Logan would have thought she’d be the angriest of all of them.

  Word of Holt’s ascendancy must have spread quickly, because most of the ­people on the road were heading south. The majority of them were walking and not riding, though they passed the rare wooden cart with two wheels and a mule.

  Hard to tell what nationality they were, but they were refugees for certain. It showed in the possessions strapped on their backs, the dirt and road grime that coated all of them. A lot of groups of women and children. Must have left their men behind, when the fighting started. Now they were headed back to reunite. Or to bury them.

  They came to a shallow creek that crossed the road, and stopped to water the horses.

  “What’s the status of Bravo Team?” Logan asked. It was easier to talk when they weren’t riding; the timbered north of Valteron often had them riding single file. He knew she’d been in touch with Command, but nothing had merited an update so far.

  “They’re making slow progress. Felara just had a snowstorm, one of the worst we’ve ever seen. The snowdrifts are chest-­deep in some places.”

  Logan had out his lightweight parchmap of Alissia. A hell of a lot of work had gone into these. There was no satellite coverage here, no long-­range aircraft. Once upon a time, charting the main Alissian continent ranked among the most dangerous jobs in Project Gateway. He didn’t miss it. Sudden winter storms in the north, when the temperature dropped forty degrees and the sky dropped four feet of snow. Caralissian sinkholes. Packs of wild dogs that would kill your horse right under you.

  Bravo Team had played a part in that. Logan had trained every single one of them. They were solid guys. Tough. Whether or not the company had decided to send another Vegas magician to accompany them wasn’t clear, but he doubted it. A hostile party slipping through the gate merited only one kind of response.

  “Any word on the infiltrators? Who they are, what they’re doing?” Logan asked.

  “Two to seven individuals, based on the tracks. As for who they are, I have my suspicions.”

  Logan chewed his lip. A few organizations had the resources to raid the island compound and breach the security protocols CASE Global had in place. Most were governments, and that made them more likely to try a soft approach first. Legal actions, casual blockades, inquiries from state departme
nts. A raid was far more direct, but riskier, too. It had to be someone with a lot to gain from CASE Global, and that meant only one thing.

  “Raptor Tech,” Logan said.

  Sabotage, espionage, stock manipulation . . . nothing was out of bounds for them. If anything, he wished CASE Global would hit back harder sometimes.

  “I had the same thought,” Kiara said.

  “Did they do a head count at the company?”

  “Right away,” Kiara said. “Everyone’s accounted for, except for a janitor with limited access.”

  “I don’t think a janitor managed to evade Bravo Team for this long,” Logan said.

  “He might have been taken, or bought off,” Kiara said.

  Logan guessed they’d find him stuffed in a closet. Or several closets.

  “I’ll keep an eye out for anyone in blue coveralls,” Chaudri offered.

  Over the next week, they continued to push the horses hard. They crossed into the city-­state of Tion, a marshy and sparsely populated kingdom between Valteron and New Kestani. They’d avoided this trek by catching a ship from Bayport while heading south, and with good reason. In every bit of Tion that he’d scouted, the ground was a constant form of muck and the air smelled like stagnant water. You wouldn’t want to mention that to the Tioni, though. They didn’t seem to notice the smell, and took offense if an outsider brought it up. Bugs were bad here, too; biting flies of the dime-­sized variety swarmed their horses whenever they slowed.

  Kiara’s communicator-­bracelet made a coughing noise. Urgent message. She looked at it, and her brow furrowed. “Video coming in from Command,” she said.

  Logan fell back beside her. The video was footage from external security cameras at the island facility. A shadow swept across the frame. Airborne, triangular, and moving incredibly fast. Then it stopped in midair and just hovered there.

  “It’s jamming the island radar systems,” Kiara said. “Broadcasting a high-­band signal at the facility, too.”

  “You were right about Raptor Tech,” Logan said. “But that’s a bird I’ve never seen before.” Not a surveillance-­only model, either. It had the bulky shape of a weaponized aircraft. Just looking at it had him reaching for his holster.