by M. D. Massey
“You guys can do that?”
“We’ve had access to the NSA’s surveillance system for some time. Anyway, they got a hit at a store right there in Bastrop, not two miles from Carver’s place. He bought a burner phone a week ago, and called a number that was encoded in the job posting on that dark website Rocko gave you.”
“Shit, Bells, you’re killing me here. Skip the details and tell me what they dug up.”
“Long story short? It’s Gunnarson, Colin. Commander-fucking-Gunnarson is the one who ordered the hit on Elmo.”
Now I really was pissed. I gripped the phone tight enough to crack the screen, seething over the revelation. “That prick—I should’ve known it was him!”
Belladonna’s voice was steady on the other end of the line. “Now, Colin, settle down. We’re still not entirely sure it was him. All we really know was that the person Carver called was at headquarters and in the vicinity of Gunnarson’s ranch when they took the calls.”
“That’s pretty fucking suspicious, Bells. Who else could it have been?”
She hissed. “Shit, would you listen to me, before you go off half-cocked and start a war with the Circle? Gunnarson has dozens of people working for him—assistants, mage-hunter teams, research geeks, informants, you name it. It could have been anyone who had access to his place.”
“Well, there’s only one way to find out. Give me the address to his ranch. I’ll head out there and dig around, see if I can come up with anything concrete that we can use against him.”
Belladonna was silent for several seconds, then she sighed her reply. “Fine, but promise me you won’t confront him directly. He’s a lot tougher and more cunning that you might think. You don’t get on the waiting list for a high council seat in the Circle without being a badass.”
“I’ll take that under advisement,” I replied. “Text me the address and I’ll update you if I find anything.”
“If you do dig up any dirt on him, call me before you act on it. And just don’t get your cute ginger ass killed, alright?”
“I definitely promise not to get myself killed. As for anything I might run into, I make no promises.”
I hung up before Bells could respond, and I was already headed out of town on 290 West when she texted me his address. When I pulled it up on my maps app, it showed a large residence in the Hill Country, a posh area full of multi-million-dollar “ranch estates.” Several local celebrities lived out that way, along with a few captains of industry.
I guess being a commander in the Cold Iron Circle pays well, I thought. Or Gunnarson is on the take.
I’d certainly find out once I got to his place. The drive was only thirty minutes or so, and soon my phone told me to turn down a narrow asphalt two-lane that led to the address Bells had given me. At first, I passed a few upper-middle-class developments—the kind with “acreage homesites” and McMansions set far enough back from the road so the rabble didn’t bother the homeowners.
But the farther I drove, the fancier the homes got, until I was passing a custom stone and wrought iron entrance gate every quarter-mile or so. I finally neared the address indicated by the map, so I slowed down to check it out as I drove by. The gate was an enormous stone and iron affair, with a huge Texas star and “Bar G Ranch” in custom iron lettering and scrollwork above the automated gate. Beyond that, all I saw was a long, paved driveway that wound away into the distance.
“Damn, Gunnarson, either you won the lottery or you’re getting paid under the table,” I muttered as I drove past the gate. About a quarter-mile down the road I cut the lights, then I cruised to what I thought was the corner of the property. I parked alongside the road, well into the rocky shoulder to avoid getting Ed’s truck crunched by a passing car. I grabbed my stuff and locked it up, then crossed the road to get a closer look at Gunnarson’s fence.
The fence around the ranch was more like a stockade, of the type used on hunting ranches all over central and south Texas to keep game and livestock from wandering off. It was eight feet tall and sturdily built with welded iron pipes and thick wire mesh, painted flat black so as to blend into the natural scenery. I’d seen fences like this lining the roads near exotic game ranches in the Hill Country, and I couldn’t imagine what it had cost to build something like this around a multi-acre property like Gunnarson’s place.
And that was hardly where the perimeter security ended. In much the same way that I’d warded the fence at the junkyard, Gunnarson had spelled his fence to keep most supernatural creatures out of his property. When I looked at the barrier in the magical spectrum, Norse runes lit up in pale blue light up and down the length of the property. In addition, he had alarm spells set up to alert him of anything coming over the fence, and I suspected he might have cameras set up further inside the estate.
Well, if I can’t go over or around, then I’ll go under it. I began to walk the fence line, looking for the tiny natural drainage ditch I’d noticed when I’d first driven by. About fifty yards back, I located the small rocky channel—a trench no more than twelve inches deep or so. It’d be plenty to allow me to sneak past.
The ditch had been crisscrossed with wire mesh and baling wire where it dipped under the fence, but years of rainwater washing through had rusted the metal and weakened any connections to the spells that warded the fence itself. I severed the spells connected to the makeshift barrier where it was attached to the fence, then snipped the wires until I’d made a large enough opening to slip inside.
Once I was in, I waited for several minutes just to see if I might have triggered an alarm that I hadn’t spotted in my examination of the place’s security. When no sirens sounded and nothing came after me, I decided the coast was clear. I headed further into the property, crawling on my belly and following the small dry creek so I might remain hidden from prying eyes and unseen surveillance devices.
Here goes nothing.
It took me some time to travel the quarter-mile distance from the road to the estate proper. Belly crawling might seem like a fairly rapid method of locomotion over short distances, but it was hell doing it over a rocky, dry stream bed, in the dark, while trying to stay silent and unseen. Suddenly, I wished I could shift into some sort of animal form, like a Native American skinwalker. If I could turn into a coyote or a fox, there’d be no need for all that uncomfortable crawling.
But when I shifted, I became a cross between Quasimodo and Bane. So I’d have to make due with sneaking like a normal human for now. Maybe later in my druid training, Finnegas could teach me how to take on an animal form. That made me wonder, if I were a shaman, what would my spirit animal be? A wolverine? A honey badger? An eagle?
Of course, if I got caught sneaking around Gunnarson’s ranch, my spirit animal would be a turkey vulture. Those birds were like the rats of the sky in this part of Texas, and my corpse would end up in the bellies of a dozen of them if I bit the dust out here. Sure, Gunnarson would eventually get rid of my body, but I was pretty certain he’d leave me out to rot for a day or two, just on principle.
Finally, I crested a rise and Gunnarson’s home came into view.
If you’ve ever seen one of those HGTV dream homes they give away each year, just so the lucky recipient can sell it to avoid paying the ginormous property tax bill, that’s what Gunnarson’s house looked like. It was a massive, sprawling affair made up of huge floor to ceiling windows, natural limestone walls, and plenty of exposed cedar. A huge L-shaped swimming pool wrapped around two sides of the place, and it had a neatly manicured lawn bordered by a stone terrace, with a crushed granite walkway that led around to the back.
To be honest, I sat there for a moment taking it all in before I sized the place up for potential security measures.
So, this is how the other half lives, huh? It was more like the one percent in this case. Whatever Gunnarson was into had to be dirty, because there was no way the Circle was paying him enough to afford these digs. From what I could tell based on the little Belladonna shared, working for the
Circle was a lot like working for a government agency. You might make six-figures once you hit upper management, but no one was making CEO money.
As far as I could tell, there weren’t any glaring features that screamed security system, magical or otherwise. Without any schematics of the place or proper recon, I had to assume that most of the security measures had been added to the perimeter. I sincerely doubted that was the case, but until a fire-breathing dragon popped out of the ground, or I got chased by an army of animated topiary, I’d operate on the assumption that I was more or less safe.
Just for grins, I scanned the place in the magical spectrum. Nothing jumped out at me, so I kept creeping forward. I was about fifty feet from the main residence when I felt the hairs on my arms stand up.
“What the hell?” I muttered, just before the sky lit up and a lightning bolt flew from a weathervane that sat atop the house, straight at me where I lay in the creek bed. “Aw, fu—”
That was all I got out of my mouth before it hit me. I was fairly certain I blacked out for a few seconds, because the next thing I remembered was rolling around on the ground. Before I could recover, a team of six men and women wearing black fatigues and balaclavas came storming out from various hiding spots near the house. They were carrying funky-looking rifles, and the two people in the lead each shot me as they approached.
I looked down, and instead of bullet holes I had two tranquilizer darts sticking out of my chest. The effects of getting hit by that lightning bolt spell were wearing off, but I soon felt a distinct numbing sensation spread out from where the darts had hit, across my torso and out to my limbs. Within seconds, I was completely paralyzed.
Well shit, this is just great.
The guards had surrounded me, and they held position in a loose cordon around me, weapons at the ready. I soon heard someone crossing the lawn toward us, and a tall, lean man with a severe face and military crew cut came marching over to me.
Gunnarson barked commands at his security team in his Sam Elliott drawl. “Secure the prisoner, immediately! Do not fucking let him pull any of that druid bullshit on you. And keep him tranqed, or else that thing inside him will be crapping your bones out tonight. Shit barely worked on the ogre, so you can bet his other form is resistant. Am I understood?”
“Yes, sir!” the team replied in unison.
After they’d gagged me and locked my hands in some sort of medieval torture device that immobilized my fingers, Gunnarson tromped over and squatted down next to me.
“I knew it was only a matter of time before you came sniffing around. You’re stupid, McCool, but once you get your teeth in something you hang on like a tick on a dog. That stubbornness is the only thing I admire about you.”
Twenty
He gestured at the landscape and architecture around us. “You like it? Circle doesn’t pay much, but you get the right Council member on your side and the sky’s the limit.”
I glared at him, or at least I thought I was glaring. My face was pretty numb, so I wasn’t exactly sure whether I looked pissed or slack-jawed. Hell, I couldn’t even blink—whatever crap they’d drugged me with, it was some powerful stuff.
“It’s a selective paralytic,” Gunnarson said, anticipating my thoughts. “Something the lab geeks mixed up from manticore venom and a few modern pharmaceuticals. We keep it on hand, just in case a mage-in-training loses their shit. Didn’t work too well on the ogre, though—thing put up a hell of a fight.”
I managed to move my eyes enough to glance at the weathervane.
“You liked that, did you? That was my idea. We were just going to dose you with the tranqs when you showed up, but the trap Carver and his yahoos sprung on you worked so, well, I figured the hell with it—why not have a little fun?” He spat tobacco juice off to the side before leaning in eye to eye. “I gotta admit, seeing you do the funky chicken all over my lawn, well—that was a rare treat.”
He stood then, wiping his hands on his pants as he eyed me with a smug grin. “There’ll be plenty of time later to chat, McCool, don’t you worry. Right now, I’m going to have you locked up while I tie up a few loose ends. I think I’ll start with your girlfriend and those keyboard jockeys she has wrapped around her finger down in Research. Then, I’ll take care of that fat fuck you call your uncle. But not the old man—my benefactor on the Council will take care of him. As Reagan once said, ‘I may be dumb, but I’m not stupid.’”
Gunnarson turned his back to bark a few commands to his people. I might have been immobilized, but I could still see magic, so I took the opportunity to scan him for artifacts, charms, and spells while he wasn’t paying attention. He had some protection spells woven into an amulet around his neck, but most of his power was situated in the bracers around his wrists. Each of them practically pulsed with energy, and they gave off a low electric hum when I focused in on their magical signature.
Technomancy, I thought. I am definitely looking forward to killing this asshole.
Gunnarson signaled to the security team. “Lock him in the ’thrope pit.”
Two burly members of the team grabbed me and tossed me into back of a nearby utility task vehicle. I tried to shout at Gunnarson—curse him, whatever. Hell, I even tried to grunt at him, but I was unable to do anything but get thrown around like a rag doll.
Worst-case scenarios flew through my mind as they drove the UTV behind the house and down a narrow concrete path. Soon, the trail ended at a nondescript metal outbuilding, and the security team dismounted and dragged me inside. One of them pressed a button inside a hidden panel on the wall, and a section of the concrete floor slid away to reveal a pit below.
They took my Craneskin Bag and all my gear and weapons, then dragged me to the edge and tossed me in. Unable to do more than flounder helplessly, I landed hard on my left side and back. Something snapped when I landed, but I couldn’t be sure if it was a bone breaking or a rib popping out of place.
Before the lid closed on the pit, I looked around as best as I could, just in case they were going to leave me in the dark. The entire “room,” if you could call it that, was no more than twelve feet cubed. The walls were lined with steel plates, as was the floor and the sliding ceiling overhead. Other than a tiny toilet pit in the corner, some small vents near the ceiling, and one bare light bulb, it was devoid of any furnishings.
As the lid slid back over the holding cell, I heard the members of Gunnarson’s security team laughing and taking bets about who was going to kill Belladonna.
Fucking hell, but I needed to get out of there.
I knew it’d be hours before the drugs would completely wear off. Even then, with my hands bound and my mouth gagged, I was helpless as a baby and completely unable to do more than pace the room. And good luck getting any animal friends to free me inside a steel cube… not that they could chew through the metal devices around my hands.
My only hope of escaping in time to warn Bells and Ed was letting my Hyde-side free. I knew it was a gamble, because once I let him out I had no idea whether I could put him back in his cage. But in that form I could beat or melt my way out—with the Eye’s help, of course—and hopefully maintain enough of my faculties to get a message to my friends before it was too late.
I closed my eyes and slowed my breathing. Thankfully, paralyzation made it incredibly easy to enter the druid’s trance. I soon fell into that still and peaceful place inside that allowed me to commune with all natural life-forms nearby… and, more importantly, Balor’s Eye.
I focused on finding the Eye’s presence, to the exclusion of all else. Time lost all meaning and measure as my consciousness floated in that ethereal realm. Seconds, minutes, or hours later, my efforts were rewarded by a familiar voice speaking inside my head.
-Hello, Colin. It appears we are trapped.-
You mean I’m trapped, Eye. You can travel to another dimension. Me? I’m stuck here inside this metal cube, unless I find a way to get out of here.
-I would remind you that the vessel that I reside w
ithin is now bound to your physical form. Displaced though I am, I cannot move myself through space and time. I can only shift from one dimension to another while remaining in the same overlapping position as I travel from dimension to dimension.-
That’s fascinating, Eye, but what I really need is a way to get out of here. I’ve been bound, gagged, and drugged with a paralytic agent. And, Gunnarson’s sending a team to kill my uncle and Belladonna at this very second.
-You’re asking me to remove the block I placed inside your brain that’s preventing you from shifting into your Fomorian form.-
Exactly. Then we can burn our way out of here, and I can warn my friends.
-That is a dangerous proposition. Spending time in your Fomorian form is changing you, and that side of your personality is becoming more and more dominant each time you shift. If I allow you to change, the “you” that you are now might be completely replaced by that darker side of your person. And if that were to happen, you might never come back.-
I have to tell you, buddy, it’s a risk I’m willing to take. Besides, can’t you just zap me again if that happens? I shift, we melt our way out of here, and then you zap me. I wake up human again, and we’re good.
-Not so, Colin. If I give you another aneurism, you could easily die, or suffer permanent brain damage.-
You mean, in addition to the brain damage that’s keeping me from shifting?
-Yes.-
Right now, I don’t really have much choice. Also, consider that the men and women who are keeping me here are extremely powerful, and they have access to magical resources that could allow them to pluck you out of my head. If that were to happen, there’s no telling what evil purposes you might be put toward.
-True. But they also might use me to destroy the fae, which is my primary directive. I detect a 22.97% chance that the Cold Iron Circle would use me to obliterate the fae from the planet.-