Staying Dead

by Laura Anne Gilman

  “What, no granting of wishes? No handing out of gratitude?” Sergei had meant for his comment to be for Wren’s ears only, but the fatae lifted its head and stared at him with outraged dignity.

  “I am a Leshiy, not some Disneyfied djinni. I do not spend my life adhering to human-dreamed rules of how magic works.”

  “Actually, they’re more suggestions than rules,” Wren said, stepping forward to help the fatae dust itself off. “And we prefer that you call it ‘Talent,’ not magic.”

  The fatae turned its heavy, antlered head toward her. “That is bullshit. You have Talent. The thing you have a talent for is magic.”

  “Oh, great, magical semantics in the middle of a crime scene. If you’re going to split word-hairs with me—” and she poked it in the middle of its pelt-covered chest “—I have a skill for Retrieval which is part of how my Talent manifests.”

  Sergei snorted. “Magic. And they’re all faeries.”

  “Thank you,” the fatae started to say. And then “Hey!”

  Wren rolled her eyes. Men. Antlered or otherwise.

  Back out on the street, Wren turned to say something pointed to her partner about dragging a poor defenseless lonejack out into the middle of chaos and then never actually talking about what he wanted to say, but the moment she opened her mouth her body betrayed her with a huge, jaw-cracking yawn. Great. Of all the times for her rush rush panic crash lifestyle to catch up with her.

  “Go to bed, Wren.” Sergei didn’t look much better than she felt. His face was always lean, but now it looked drawn, and his skin tone had an ashy tint to it, even discounting the street-lamp lighting.

  “You okay?”

  “I’ll be fine. I just need a full night’s sleep and a few sales to keep the artists from whining at me.”

  She laughed, as she was supposed to. “There’s still this conversation we were supposed to have—”

  “Later.” He was too determined not to talk about it, after dragging her out to talk about it in the first place. The fight had put walls up between them, somehow, and she didn’t know how to pull them down, or even if she should, right now.

  “Sergei…” Something told her that this was important, maybe even more important than the job, but he moved his hand so that his thumb covered her mouth, gently silencing her.

  “You need sleep. Focus on the job.” He hesitated, then reached out and tucked a strand of hair behind her ear, his hand resting on the side of her face. “Everything can wait until that’s done.”

  He refused to talk about it any further, seeing her onto the subway heading downtown, standing on the platform watching as the train pulled away.

  She trusted him. What other choice did she have?

  eleven

  Wren could feel the tingle run along her arms and down her spine. Nothing physical—this was a pure mental kick. Anticipation jiving with readiness. Matthew Prevost wouldn’t know what had hit him.

  It had been late afternoon when she finally drove up to the site, and dusk had moved in while she got into position. She was dressed for work in a clouded gray bodysuit; camouflage for the shadows. When she worked in urban areas, she wore a more conservative gray or black fleece jogging suit, to better blend in, but there was no reason she could invent that would cover being caught out here in the boonies, in a building that was never open to the public. Sergei kept promising one of those chemically-triggered chameleon suits, but so far it hadn’t turned up under the Christmas tree. Just as well, probably. Whatever favors he’d have to call in or promise to get his hands on it wouldn’t be worth it. Nothing ever was.

  She sat in the vee of a decent-sized tree, hidden behind a fall of small, spear-shaped leaves that shifted and turned in the occasional breeze. The target’s home looked quaint from the exterior; a pretty little white two-story building in the middle of seven acres of rolling lawn. There was the main farmhouse-style building, circa 1950, plus two wings added on by the current owner in a similar enough style to look natural. The entire property was framed on three sides by a man-height stone wall with sharp-cut metal shards set into the top, and backed on the other by a wooded patch that led into another private enclave that was patrolled on a regular basis by armed guards. Nasty neighbors, Sergei had reported: not the kind to invite over for a picnic. But the target wasn’t much for socializing. Parties were occasionally held, written invite only, black tie not optional. Money, money, and more money. It was enough to make a girl salivate.

  There were two ways in and out; through the huge iron gates at the end of the long, winding driveway, or through the equally impressive iron door that was the only break in the wall. The door was locked by remote control, with a mechanism that looked very pretty, and very unfamiliar, and nobody went through the gates without a digital pass that was scanned five feet in front of the gate, under the watchful eye of screened-in surveillance cameras.

  So Wren wasn’t going in through either entrance.

  The mark was smart enough to keep his landscaping trimmed—no convenient tree limb close enough to the wall to swing over on. “Why is nothing ever easy?” Dropping gently out of the tree, she landed on her heels and palms. Keeping to the low brush that did grow there, she edged closer and stopped about ten feet from the wall.

  What the hell…?

  She had already noted the stirrings underground, where the electric cables were run into the house. He probably got premium cable, too. But the ground muffled the current, making it a background sensation, like the crickets and the peeper frogs. She could probably pull power from it, if pushed, but it would be more effort than it was worth, even in an emergency.

  No, this was different. This current was live, and practically twitching with energy. It was like waving a candy bar under a chocoholic’s nose. But where was it coming from? Could a mage have left a storage cell somewhere on the grounds? But why here, with a mark that hired out all his work? It didn’t make sense. No, this had to be a natural source, somehow. Maybe a lodestone, or—

  Or the goddamn stone wall was hiding a nasty electrical alarm system. And she bet those metal shards carried a charge, too. Tricky, tricky. Very nice. Bastard.

  “Thank you sir, may I have another?”

  She had two choices. She could try to use magic to untangle all the strands, figure out how the alarm worked, and try to shut it down. Thereby likely alerting whoever was manning the system that there was a problem, and taking up lots of valuable time off her schedule, even assuming she could figure it out. Or, she could stick to her original plan, to vault the fence, and pray that she didn’t set off any charge that floated above the wall as well. He had hired a mage to steal the client’s possession, why not use one to protect his home as well? It was unlikely—people who know that mages can be hired tend to shy away from magical defenses; what can be bought can be sold—but still a concern. Or—

  “Monty, I’ll take what’s behind Door Number Three.”

  Moving backward on her hands and knees, Wren retreated almost to the road she had come in on. A pastoral country road, with large trees lining its winding length, it looked like something out of a Jane Austen novel. At any minute now, a horse and buggy could come clomping around the corner.

  “Or a cop car, making his patrols. Get a move on, idiot!”

  Her own car, boosted from a used car lot that night, was down the road several miles, tucked into the scrub on the shoulder. She had lugged her equipment from there, hiding it until now. A web-and-cloth utility belt, strapped down like a gunslinger’s holster, carried her tools. A slimline headset fit over her left ear, the antenna almost hidden in her hair. It was set to open receive, with a very limited field, meaning that she should be able to pick up anything transmitted within the house—like an alarm, or a phone call.

  A quick check on the ties of her shoes, the Velcro closures of her suit hood fastened, and she was ready to go.

  Hiking down the road, she had seen several deer flitting through the trees, foraging in the dusk light. And the
memory of that sight had given her an idea for assault option number 3.

  The push was the first skill she had manifested, back as a preteen. It had grown so gradually, so naturally, that she had been a full year into her training before she realized it was magic at all. Neezer had called it empathic coercion. Once she knew what she was doing, it felt uncomfortably like rape.

  But with animals, she justified to herself, it was no worse than any other means of control.

  Power was easy enough to draw down, once you knew what you were looking for. After that, it was all a question of focus. Wren sat cross-legged on the ground, her palms flat in the dirt, and concentrated.

  “Ground, child. If you’re not grounded, it will snap you into cinders like some dumb bug.”

  John Ebenezer’s voice in her head. The first lesson. The most important lesson. You couldn’t rush it. A deep breath in, then an exhalation, then in again, and she could reach inside and touch the core of energy stored within her, feeling the pulse of magic respond to her call. Visualizing it as a cleanly-rolled ball of glowing cord, she pulled gently at one strand, unrolling just enough to suit her need. The tip split off into a baker’s dozen individual threads, each one reaching out into the forest in front of her, searching for something of the right mass.

  Like a fishing pole, one thread jerked, then began reeling itself in, enticing the creature at the other end to follow it.

  Grass. Fresh grass. Sweet grass.

  It came in closer, passing within a handbreadth of Wren as though it could neither see nor smell the human. A deer, full in the chest and shoulder, looking like a bow hunter’s wet dream. Okay, maybe a little more mass than she needed. She turned to watch it, keeping her hands firmly in touch with the grainy, reassuring solidity of the earth. Wait…wait…

  When the deer had almost reached the stone wall, Wren closed her eyes, and flicked the end of the strand on the deer’s hindquarters.

  Flee!

  The deer, panicked, shied and ran away from the feel of the lash, side-slamming the wall with one powerful shoulder and falling away slightly stunned. It reeled for a moment, then bounded away, taking clear, powerful jumps that—at any other time—Wren would have been tempted to admire. But she was already moving, taking advantage of the momentary distraction to scramble up the wall, find tiny finger holds in the mortared niches, and vault herself over the dangerous top to land with a sold thud in the grass on the other side, falling flat on her face and praying that her suit would protect her from any visual scan of the area.

  Any security system in this kind of setting, she reasoned, had to make allowances for wildlife. She hoped.

  A moment passed, then five, each counted off in her head like a metronome counting out piano practices. Then another five. Almost off-schedule…time to risk it.

  She raised her head, scanning the area. Nothing moved. Nothing sparked, or otherwise indicated watchers.

  “Oh, screw this,” she said in disgust, hauling herself up and sitting back on her haunches. Either she’d get shot, or she wouldn’t.

  She didn’t.

  The first barrier passed without confrontation, Wren settled comfortably on the grass. Her weight was balanced evenly, her spine relaxed and flexible, like a gymnast ready for the next set of tumbles. You can’t rush things, not if you want it to work. Don’t force the moment, let it flow…

  Without warning, she felt a presence behind her, then another in front of her. Low to the ground, not towering man-height. Two more came in from the sides, with a fifth waiting just off to the right and forward, almost out of range. By the prickling of her thumbs—not to mention the distinct aroma of wet fur—she knew what they were. No real surprise on that. She just hadn’t expected so many.

  Five hellhounds, she thought in disgust. This guy just has way too damn much money.

  Quarter-breed hellhounds, actually, about half their grandsire’s estimated size. Nobody she knew of had ever seen a purebred hellhound. Or if they had, they hadn’t been in any condition to talk about it afterward. But their offspring showed up often enough to prove that they existed. Those pups usually came to a quick, bad end. If their own dams didn’t smother them, disgusted owners or annoyed ASPCA workers did it.

  Hellhound crosses were mean.

  But enough breeders had seen the potential, crossing those pups with a calmer breed—Saint Bernards were popular—and selling them to very selective owners as the ultimate in guard dog. Quarter-hounds were smart, aggressive, and trainable. Barely. They were also strong enough to take down a person, one-on-one. And she had to deal with five.

  And they were starting to get restless.

  “Sergei, I’m blaming this on you,” she said in a calm, even voice. “And if I get torn to bits, I swear every single bit is going to come back and haunt you.”

  One hound snarled at the sound of her voice, and the others shifted, but they didn’t attack. Yet.

  The thread of energy she had used to call the deer to her was still loose. She picked it up, mentally, and extended it toward the closest-in hound, on the odds that this was the alpha. Canids were pack animals. One brain, many bodies. Please God let that hold true.

  Nothreat. Noalarm. Nodanger. Noprey. It was more wordlike than what she had used with the deer, playing on the animal’s reasoning and training to direct it where she wanted its brain to go. All concern, all wise-ass comments faded into the back of her brain. Dropping focus meant losing control of the current, and losing control meant ending up like Neezer. Or, in this case, torn to shreds physically before her mind shattered. I’m no threat to you, no danger…no reason to be here, no reason to stay…

  There was a heavy wuffling sound way too damn close by, the wet smack of jaws snapped together, but she didn’t let it distract her. Nothreat. Noalarm. Nodanger. Noprey.

  A whine, then the furthest-away hounds backed off a step, then another. And the alpha let them do it. Another step back, out of immediate lunging range, and all five were gone into the shadows, dismissing her as insignificant.

  Okay, thank you, God. I do truly appreciate it, and know that you’re telling me to get my ass in gear, which I will do just as soon as my heart gets itself down out of my throat, and my stomach picks itself up from my knees.

  According to the information she had been able to sneak out of the local police department mainframe, the digital gate and dogs were the only protections the mark had outside the house. But the legal stuff was usually only the surface. He was a collector. Think like he thinks. How would he safeguard his pretties, so that no one could take them away from him? Think like the nice crazy person, Wren. Get into his head and make yourself at home.

  Wren got to her feet and started moving toward the house, keeping alert for any noise or sound out of the ordinary. Security lights every twenty yards, easy enough to skirt around. Low to the ground, look like one of the dogs. Any camera will only pick up a shadow, any heat sensors could mistake her outline for one of the equally-sized dogs. If he had anything that picked up pulse rates, she was cooked. Don’t think about it.

  The information Sergei had pulled together said that the mark had some kind of alarm system set up in the house proper, but no human guards. Made sense—if you have something to hide, why invite strangers in? Likewise, the mark wasn’t hooked up to the local police department’s monitoring system. If you don’t want strangers, you doubly don’t want strangers with badges, and FBI-supplied downloads of stolen art.

  She was close enough now to see that the white clapboard had been painted recently, likewise the deep blue shutters. A low hedge of holly bush ran along the foundation, preventing any would-be burglar from getting too close. She removed a slender plastic tube from her belt and extended it to its full twelve-inch length. The lens at the end adjusted for the darkness, and she was able to focus in on the nearest window. There were plain white curtains hanging from either side, and the suggestion of white furniture. Recalling the blueprints spread out on the kitchen counter, Wren decided that this m
ust be the sitting room off the kitchen. Which meant that she was on the wrong side of the house.

  “Damn.”

  Changing the magnification on the spyglass, she inspected the window itself. Faint lines ran through the glass in a meshlike pattern. That ruled out a first-floor entry, but she hadn’t been planning on one, anyway. “Not a duckling, but a swan,” she said, raising the spyglass up further, passing the second floor and continuing on up to the roof. And what she saw there made her smile.

  The sleeves of her bodysuit were flexible, like the rest of the material, until it came to her wrists. The cuffs around each hand hid several layers which extended to cover her palm and hooked into the microfiber of her gloves. The palm of each hand was now covered with five powerful-looking claws—sharp enough to find purchase in anything short of concrete. Also sharp enough to tear her suit, which is why she hated using them. But so equipped, the wood shingles of this house would be easier to access than climbing the tree, earlier. In fact, it took her five minutes, only because she was muffling her motions, keeping her weight spread like a spider’s—not the ideal conditions for a human to climb under. But five minutes later, she was at the nearest second-floor window.

  The mesh was absent from this pane. The lock was electromagnetic, probably wired throughout the house and tied into the master control box. The only way to unlock the window would be to enter the key code into that box, and Wren would be willing to bet her paycheck that the mark was the only one who had the key.

  Whoever had sold him the system had given him a pretty good household system, especially when tied into the first-floor precautions, and the external defenses. But they hadn’t accounted for someone like Wren. She moved further on up, onto the roof, and lay down to regain her breath, and still the shaking in her arms. Once her body was sufficiently under control again, she swung herself over the roof, head first, until she had eye contact with the locking device. Once the image of it was secure in her mind, she closed her eyes and reached for the tiny twelve-volt hum that was coming from it. It was like some kind of surreal virtual reality race, chasing one spark of power through the thousands of relays that made up the house. She ignored the feel of blood rushing to her brain from her physical position, and the distractions of a more powerful hum of electricity from the generator hidden somewhere under the first floor, falling into a warm campfire glow of the dedicated security system. She could feel a backup generator there as well, but no other power source. Just as well—this way she didn’t have to be delicate, for fear of triggering a blackout throughout the neighborhood. Those tended to be messy and attention-catching.