He looked over his shoulder at someone else in the trailer, then said, “Uh, excuse me for a minute, ma’am,” and shut the door. I waited patiently, putting my glove back on and crossing my arms. The day was nice in New Jersey, though humid. Sheep ambled the hills, having forgotten the scare of my passage. I wondered if the cows I’d set free on the road from their slaughterhouse trip had ever found freedom—sweet grass and long life. Probably not. Life was rarely so simple, even for cows.
After a lengthy, but restful, few minutes, the door opened again, and Earl leaned out. “Ma’am? Please step inside.” He said it politely enough, but it wasn’t exactly a request, either. His tone implied the please was really just a formality.
Since it had been my choice, I allowed him his little illusion of power and obliged.
Inside I found no fewer than four agents, all dressed in gray jumpsuits with creatively rustic names embroidered on the front, under a corporate logo so vague as to have been entirely mysterious. Three of them had weapons in their hands—FBI-issued handguns, extremely effective at such close range, should I allow them the luxury of firing.
“Please sit down,” Earl said, and indicated an office chair that, from the warmth of the cushions, had been recently vacated by someone’s rear. The FBI van was stripped to the essentials, but at least the chairs were reasonably comfortable, and there was coffee brewing in the corner. “Special Agent in Charge Rostow is on the way to talk to you. Until he gets here, please sit quietly.”
I didn’t know Special Agent Rostow, but I had no doubt that he would be just as effective and efficient as all of the other FBI representatives I had met. I had no real desire to chat, and instead I studied the van workers each in turn. I found nothing especially interesting, but one of them, a woman, found my regard uncomfortable and finally snapped, “What?”
“She’s not doing anything, Andy,” said the man sitting beside her. They both had banks of monitors to watch, and he’d never taken his eyes off of his responsibility. “Stay focused. She’s not our problem.”
I wondered what their problem was, and so I focused on the monitors as well. It was the compound, of course, shown from a painstakingly thorough set of angles, and both distant and close views. Beyond the gates, people moved with every evidence of calm purpose. Some of them were tilling a field, by hand, with hoes. A group of women in pastel clothing was hanging up laundry on a line strung between two trees, while another group had taken on the task of scrubbing and wringing out clothes in a series of large tubs. Still another group was preparing for a meal, and I watched them as they casually chatted and chopped vegetables for a pot.
Men, women, and, yes, children. All seemed totally at ease within their little world.
I envied them that, a little.
A few moments later, the door of the van opened without any knocking preliminaries, and three more men crowded in. The one in front was shorter than most federal agents, and wider; he was definitely a senior man, probably close to fifty, and although he looked soft, I was certain he was not. The benign smile and low hum of contentment emanating from him were treacherous; he seemed to have a touch of Earth power about him—something like what Janice Worthing radiated, but of course at a much lower level. It must have served him well in gaining trust and eliciting confessions.
“You must be Special Agent Rostow,” I said. I dismissed the other two with him, and he didn’t bother to introduce them, either. “I’m Cassiel.”
He smiled reassuringly and gestured for a chair. One of the individuals watching the monitors got up and rolled his over; you had to be quick to catch the expression of annoyance that came across his face before the smile of compliance. Rostow seemed to just expect obedience, and get it. That said a great deal about his style of leadership, I thought.
He settled himself in the rolling chair and moved it to sit across from me, elbows resting comfortably on his thighs, hands dangling. Casual and relaxed. “Cassiel,” he repeated. “I’m pleased to meet you. There are lots of stories going around about you. Is any of it true?”
“All of it,” I said. “Especially the parts that say I’m dangerous.”
“I think I’ll take my chances,” he said. His smile invited me to share the naughty conspiracy, but I didn’t smile back. “So. Half the agency is turning over rocks looking for you, and you just show up here. To what do we owe this honor?”
“Necessity,” I said. “I need to get inside the compound.”
“Inside,” he repeated, and leaned back in the chair. The back gave a small squeak of protest. “For what purpose?”
“If you’re thinking you can keep me here and talking until you get a response from your superiors, I can tell you what it will be—detain me and send me on to Quantico,” I said. “You don’t want to know my purpose, because you won’t care; in any case, you’re not inclined to trust me at all, and you’d never help me get inside. Correct?”
He blinked a little, and some of the benign trust-me aura faded. I liked him better this way: suspicious. “I suppose so,” he said. “I have no reason to help you, and plenty of reasons to do what my bosses tell me. For one thing, I’d like to retire in a few years on my hard-earned pension. So tell me what I ought to be doing for you and why. Make it convincing.”
We were drawing glances from the monitor techs, and Rostow must have noticed; without moving his gaze away from me, he snapped his fingers rapidly and pointed to the monitors. “Eyes forward, people. Always forward.”
There was a murmur of assent. He cocked an eyebrow at me, waiting.
“You’re aware that the Church of the New World is involved in child abductions,” I said. “And murder.”
“Some of them,” he said. “But it’s a subgroup. Most of their activities are perfectly legal, which is why we’re observing, not taking action. No evidence that this compound is anything but a bunch of people getting together to reject modern life. I’m not going Waco on a bunch of would-be Amish. Not unless I see evidence that something is really going on inside that needs stopping.”
“There’s something evil here,” I said. “Or was, until recently. I need inside to find out what they’re planning, because I assure you, they are planning something. Pearl wouldn’t have been here if they weren’t.”
“Pearl,” he repeated. “Who the hell is Pearl?”
“No one you can find in your monitors,” I said. “You may think of her as—a spiritual leader. She influences others, the way Earth Wardens can; she found a ready audience in the Church of the New World, who already distrusted the modern world, and the Wardens, once they learned of their existence. Pearl has used her influence to make them increasingly afraid of you, and us, making them withdraw even more radically.”
He didn’t indicate whether he agreed with me. “And the children?”
“They believe they’re saving them,” I said. “Rehabilitating them. They think the Wardens will maim or kill them. Make no mistake, Pearl’s followers believe they are saving the world, not bent on destroying it. That’s the danger of fanatics. They’re blind to everything but their own preconceptions.”
“You’re not telling me much I didn’t find out from interviews with detainees,” he said. “And?”
“And if Pearl was inside the compound—and I assure you that she was, recently—she may be back, especially if she has unfinished business there. It’s our best chance to get to her, if we work together.”
His gaze didn’t waver. “Miss, we’re the FBI. We don’t cooperate with civilians in investigations, unless we’re the ones doing the investigation and they’re the ones doing the cooperating.”
“I know.” I smiled, with bared teeth. “But I believe that you might make an exception for me.”
“Or I might slap some cuffs on you and hand you over to Quantico, just like they’re going to ask me to do.”
“Not if you want to live,” I said softly. I saw the agents around me stiffen, and a few reached quite calmly for weapons. Rostow didn’t bother. �
��Please understand, threats are not my preferred method, but I can’t lose this chance; she was here, and I believe she will return.”
“I’d advise you not to make empty threats, ma’am.”
“I can kill every one of you in this room by stopping your hearts, and there is nothing any of you can do about it. That is far from an empty threat. Do you understand?”
“Sure,” Rostow said. He moved quickly, standing in one fluid motion, drawing his handgun at the same time, flicking the safety off, and firing three times in rapid succession.
Straight at my head.
Chapter 9
CLICK, CLICK, CLICK.
I was no Fire Warden, but I didn’t need to be one to disrupt the bullets in his gun; in the past few moments, I’d chemically changed the powder in all of their bullets into a similar but inert compound that wouldn’t fire, no matter how many times he pulled the trigger.
Rostow’s eyes widened, but he took the shock in stride, and his people were well trained. It was close quarters, and they swarmed me ... or tried to. But it was a metal van, and I was an Earth Warden. Metal flowed up over their feet, trapping them in place, tripping them up and binding them to the floor of the van wherever they hit.
I didn’t kill anyone.
I didn’t have to.
I’d left Rostow unbound, to make the point. His chair rolled a few inches, and stopped as it bumped into the leg of one of his two assistants, who was pinned to the wall of the van with a thick band of metal.
“I didn’t have to be so nice,” I said. “Do we have an understanding now about why you don’t want to make me angry?”
He was beaten, and he knew it. Rostow looked down at the gun in his hand, flicked the safety back on, and holstered it with a quick, fluid motion. “What do you want?” His voice was clipped and businesslike now. He was done trying to persuade or reassure me. “If you’ve hurt any of them ...”
“Bruises,” I said. “And you tried to put three bullets through my skull, Agent Rostow, so I would suggest you have no grounds to expect too much in the way of restraint from me. What I want is for you to tell me how the people in that compound come and go.”
“They don’t,” he snapped.
“They must. They can’t be totally self-sufficient. Not yet.”
He hesitated, then said, “They bring in supplies and new recruits once a month. One of them leaves to pick up the supplies and recruits in a minivan.”
“Where do the recruits come from?”
“The Church has people out there proselytizing. We catch them sometimes, but not often. They’ve formed a kind of underground railroad that ferries converts from one place to another. The rally points change every time; we don’t know where the next one will be.”
“But you do know where they go for supplies?”
“They vary that, too. We haven’t figured out how they place the order; probably through someone on the outside, because we’re monitoring phones, cell frequencies, Internet, et cetera. We follow them when they leave, but we can’t get ahead of them. What bugs we’ve managed to slip in have been intercepted and destroyed before they get inside.”
That was not as much information as I’d hoped, but what had I expected—that Pearl would leave this facility as sloppily run as the one in California? No, she learned from mistakes, most definitely.
“Have you managed to get anyone inside the compound undercover?” I asked.
Without a flicker, he said, “Not yet.” I couldn’t tell whether he was lying; it was entirely possible he meant what he’d said. Still. it never hurts to cultivate a reputation for supernatural keenness, and so I gave him a slow, wicked smile, and said, “Liar. You do have someone inside. Who?”
He frowned, just a slight groove between his eyebrows. “Where are you getting that? I just told you we don’t.”
“I’m an Earth Warden. We know a lie when we hear one. Please, don’t insult me by continuing to bluff.”
For a long moment, I thought that my bluff had been called, but then he shook his head and said, “We did, until two days ago.”
“What happened two days ago?”
“Our agent walked out of the gates, came to find me, and told me that she’d seen the error of her ways and she was quitting the bureau. Then she turned and walked back inside.” He turned to the monitors, looking at each in turn, and then pointed at one of them—the field, and the people out in the sun using the hoes. “There. That’s her.”
“You’re sure she wasn’t just trying to get in deeper with them, or preserve her cover?”
Rostow’s mouth set in a flat, grim line. “I know Stephanie,” he said. “Known her a long time. I can tell you that wasn’t an act, and it damn sure wasn’t Stephanie. What went into that compound was a great agent; what came out to quit was a true believer. She got turned. I know it in here.” He tapped his gut with one hand. I believed him. There was no reason for him to lie about it, and there was real pain in his expression. “I hate losing people, but I’d rather lose them honestly than have them brainwashed into a cult.”
“You realize that she will have already told them everything she could about you, your operation here, and anything else that could be helpful to them.”
His eyes turned blank and hard. “No shit. Surprisingly enough, I did think of it. So what other stunning revelations do you have to share with me, Warden?”
“If you help me get inside, I can get information back to you freely.”
That made him frown. “Freely. As in, anytime you want.”
“Exactly.”
“How?”
I smiled, just a little, and fluttered his eardrum in a whisper. I just can, I said, and he jerked in surprise and clapped a hand over his left ear. “What the hell?”
“Warden abilities,” I said. “You won’t be able to communicate back to me, but I can talk to you across a considerable distance, as long as I can find you on the aetheric.”
“I’m going to pretend that last part made sense,” he said, “because I like the first part a lot. Trouble is, you’re just a tad recognizable—maybe not as a Djinn, but you sure don’t look like a likely recruit, either.”
“I can manage.”
“Do you have any idea of your own arrogance, lady?”
“Yes,” I said. “Do you have any idea of yours?” One of the FBI agents pinned to the van let out a choked sound that was almost a laugh. I didn’t blink. “I will let your people go if you promise good behavior. If not, you may wish to invest in some kind of welding equipment.”
Rostow considered all that, and it was obvious that he really, really wanted to tell me to go to hell, but he finally nodded reluctantly. “All right,” he said. “Last thing I want to do is piss off the Wardens right now. Let them go. I promise we’ll play nice.”
That did not seem to me to be an exact enough definition of cooperation—not for a Djinn—but he seemed sincere enough. I extended my hand, and after a hesitation he accepted the gesture and shook firmly.
As he did so, I released his people from their bonds. Some, overbalanced, sprawled on the van floor; others grabbed for their weapons. “Enough of that!” Rostow snapped, still shaking my hand. “Stand down. Not sure your guns will fire any better than mine, and we don’t need more excitement in close quarters right now.”
The agents quieted down, positioning themselves carefully. I noticed they did so with an eye to firing cleanly at me, should that be necessary. I didn’t mind. I would restore their ability to fire their weapons, but not until I left the van.
“Now,” I said, looking Rostow in the eye, “tell me how you plan to get me into the compound.”
“I can’t.”
“You can. You’ve already selected another agent, and you’re planning to infiltrate within the next few days.”
I had to give him credit—he really didn’t allow me to shock him this time. “I don’t know where you’re getting this stuff, but it isn’t—”
“It must be,” I said, “bec
ause otherwise your superiors would be demanding action of some kind, and it’s been quiet and tranquil here in what I can only think is your command center. No demanding phone calls. No tension. So you have a plan, which you are in the process of executing.”
A couple of agents murmured in the background, while Rostow stared bleakly at me without speaking. I waited, then said, “All I ask for is a chance. Put me in the same way you’re introducing your own agent. I can serve as backup, which could be the difference between success and failure, or life and death. I’m offering you help. Take it.”
“Like I said”—he shrugged—“you’re don’t exactly blend in.”
I closed my eyes and concentrated on my physical body. It took a great deal of power—more than I could easily spare—but I slowly, carefully altered the black of my hair to a short, mousy brown, and my skin to something unremarkable for the area. My face I shifted to one I’d glimpsed in Albuquerque months ago—not pretty, not ugly, not memorable at all, except that I’d noted it for future reference. I shortened my stature and shifted the inert textures of my clothes to something bland, blocky, nothing of any identifiable style at all. After a moment’s thought, I roughened the condition, added dirt and spots of grime, and the smells of old food, smoke, and unwashed sweat.
I looked like any of the thousands of struggling, subsistence-level poor to be found in any city.
I opened my eyes, looked directly at Rostow, and said, “Do I blend in now?”
I sensed it wasn’t often that a man like him experienced amazement, but that was as close as he came—widened eyes, slightly open mouth that quickly snapped shut as he realized others were looking on. He needn’t have worried, though. His people all looked far more thoroughly impressed, and unnerved.
“I guess that’d do,” he said. “Can you—ah, do that whenever you want?”
I smiled faintly. He had no real idea of what it had just cost me. I had drained myself dangerously low, but the important thing had been to make a definitive impression. I felt the cost was justified. “No,” I said, and didn’t elaborate. “Will you trust me?”
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