At that instant, Ian’s hand came around from behind his back, and a round and dark object came flying directly at my face. What the hell?! Instinctively I winced and closed my eyes. A second later, I heard and felt a wet splat followed by an enraged scream from my doppelganger.
Black spots bloomed on the edge of my vision, and I suddenly pitched forward as the collar snapped off and into my hands. I felt myself falling, the thought only half registering through my air-starved brain; so fortunately I was only half-conscious when my face hit the floor and broke my fall.
I groaned and rolled to see the doppelganger’s face and head splattered with what I could only call chicken-shit green. I knew then what Ian had gotten out of his desk drawer.
Paint grenades.
As Ian opened fire on the doppelganger with bullets instead of paint, something slammed into the catwalk, and suddenly I was rolling and sliding. I didn’t know which way was up, down, or sideways. But when I no longer felt the cold metal of the catwalk, I knew I was going down. Way down. Falling through three stories of empty space toward a pack of hungry baby grendels. By the time my survival instinct kicked in, I was screaming and it was two inches too late to grab the edge of the pitching catwalk.
My scream was cut short when a massive clawed hand snatched me out of the air.
Vivienne Sagadraco.
I instinctively grabbed one of the boss’s scaled fingers that was the size of my arm, and held on, prayed, screamed, and fought the urge to be sick, all at the same time. The boss spun to intercept a grendel attack from behind, swinging me around to give me a quick and blurry tour of the entire bull pen like I was on the Scrambler from Hell.
I was beyond nauseous with all the dropping, swooping, and flying; but I’d rather be sick than eaten by the grendel spawn that were leaping up to grab my legs whenever I came within reach. All the monster scenery flew back and forth before my eyes as nauseating streams of color.
Ian was shouting at me from somewhere above, but I couldn’t hear a word he was yelling while being whipped around. I groaned, dropped my head to the boss’s scaled finger, and tried to hold on to her finger and my barbeque dinner as tightly as I could.
The sudden stench like rotten fish made me look up to see where I was.
The male grendel’s bloody face was inches from mine.
I drew breath to scream and the boss yanked me away just as the grendel’s steak knives raked through the air where I’d just been.
Vivienne Sagadraco flung her right arm out full length and dropped me on another section of catwalk. This one wasn’t moving or even tilting.
Oh God, I loved this catwalk. Rather than kiss it, I just tried real hard not to throw up on it.
The weight of someone running toward me pounded and vibrated the catwalk against my aching head. The pounding stopped and strong hands pulled me up.
I forced my eyes open. Ian’s face came into focus, then out again.
“Stop moving,” I said blearily.
“I’m not moving.”
I clutched at his arms. “Then stop me from moving.”
“I’ve got you; you’re not going anywhere.”
Too bad nobody told the catwalk.
The only warning we got was groaning metal and the popping of support cables as the rest of the catwalk went down, and us with it.
Something hard and cold whapped me in the head and everything went mercifully black.
19
I think it was the quiet that woke me up—and the dark that freaked me out.
Dark could mean any number of things, and in my mind right now, all of them were bad. That is, until I felt the pillows under my head and a blanket snuggled around me. I couldn’t imagine Papa Grendel tucking me in, unless it was to roll me up in the world’s biggest piece of bacon.
There was a click and a small light came on. A bedside lamp. I blinked my eyes into focus and saw Ian sitting on a cot next to the narrow bed I was on. He appeared to be in one piece. Tired, scruffy, with a mild case of bed head, but in one piece.
I lifted my blanket and looked down at the rest of me. I was wearing what looked like scrubs. “My third outfit today. Do I have you to thank for another wardrobe change?”
One side of his mouth curved up. “The company doc and her medic took care of it this time. She stitched up your leg and the cut on your head while you were out.”
I touched the fresh bandage on my head and winced. I felt like death warmed over and served up. “I can tell.”
“The painkillers must be wearing off. Do you need more?”
I held up a hand. “I’m good. I think I’d better go with lucid over loopy.” I pulled myself up against the pillows. “We fell off the third floor. How are we even—”
“Alive?” Ian gave me a little crooked grin. “The boss managed to catch you and me. Said she wished her employees would stop falling off of things at inconvenient times.” The grin vanished. “Unfortunately she couldn’t catch you before you grazed your head on a steel cable.”
I got out one chuckle before I had to grab at my head to make the pounding stop. “How is she?” I whispered against the throbbing.
“Dragons heal quickly. And after you marked the grendel for everyone, the boss could see him just fine.”
“I do seem to recall a triumphant-sounding roar.”
“You made the boss very happy.”
“She got him?”
Ian shook his head. “Got away. Moved so fast no one could get enough bullets in him to bring him down.”
“Damn.”
“Yeah, but we’re tracking him.”
“The spawn?”
Ian hesitated a beat. “Disposed of.”
“By Roy and Sandra?”
“The boss took care of it.”
My brow creased as I tried to figure out what he meant.
“Turning dragon and exerting herself as she did, she needed to . . . replenish her strength.”
My lip curled. “Replenish as in she ate them?”
“She did leave the two from the HVAC room intact for Lars Anderssen to see. Right now, she’s . . .”
“Digesting?”
“And sleeping it off.”
“What about my doppelganger?”
“No longer a problem for anyone,” Ian assured me.
“Nice move with the paint grenade.” I paused. I wasn’t sure how I felt about my partner being able to open fire on something that looked exactly like me. “Uh . . . after I pulled the device off, you could see her—looking just like me—and you didn’t hesitate to fill her full of lead.”
“Silver,” he corrected me.
“Whatever. You didn’t feel . . . odd . . . about doing that?”
“Mac, I knew she wasn’t you. I know what a doppelganger looks like—”
“An amorphous blob.”
“An amorphous blob that brought that monster into our house, was going to put a bullet through the boss’s head, and snap my partner’s neck.” His voice was tight with unused rage. “I could’ve put every round I had into that thing and still slept like a baby afterward.”
“Um . . . thank you?”
A little of the tension went out of his shoulders. “Sorry.”
“No, no. It’s okay. I mean, who wouldn’t want their partner to kill their murderous amorphous blob twin for them?” There was a second or two of awkward silence. “Where’s the cloaking device I tore off the doppelganger?”
“Kenji found it. The fall broke it, but he thinks they can repair it. He and a team of engineers are working on it now.”
There was a little digital clock on the bedside table. It was 3:54. In the ever-lovin’ morning.
New Year’s Eve morning. Holy crap.
“How long was I out?” I asked.
“Out for only thirty minutes. Asleep for
the next four hours.”
“Why didn’t you—”
“You needed the sleep.” He patted the cot he was sitting on. “I caught a few winks myself once Calvin came in to relieve me.”
“Relieve?”
“From watching over you.”
“You watched me sleep?” Usually I’d think a man watching me sleep was creepy. With my normally stoic partner doing the watching, it was kinda sweet. “Isn’t watching me sleep on the excitement meter somewhere above watching paint dry and below golf?”
“I’m learning that when I take my eyes off you, all hell’s liable to break loose, so watching you is safer for everyone.”
I had no idea how to respond to that, so I simply changed the subject. I glanced around. The room we were in looked like a college dorm. “Where is this?”
“Sandra’s quarters. She and Roy each keep a room here for multiple shifts or emergencies.”
I didn’t have to ask which one this was. “She doesn’t need it?”
“Sandy’s a busy lady right now; she’s overseeing the cleanup.”
“The bull pen looked like a war zone.”
Ian shook his head. “Cleanup as in making sure there aren’t any more eggs. She hasn’t found any. Two of our werewolves got the scent from one of the dead spawn and have searched every place an egg could be hidden.”
“Where’s Yasha? Is he—”
“Out with the rest of our werewolves tracking that grendel. Yasha was at the north tunnel entrance when the big male tore through there. He tried to stop him, but all he ended up with was a mouthful of grendel scales.”
I made a face.
“Which gave him the grendel’s taste and scent. The wounds the thing got in the bull pen sent him running back to wherever home is.”
“The nest.”
“That’s what we’re hoping. Find out where they are, gear up, and go end this. The boss has notified Lars Anderssen about the eggs and spawn. He’ll tell us all we never wanted to know about grendel spawn.” Ian stood. “In the meantime, if you’re up to it, Sandra found you a fourth outfit for today.” He smiled. “With accessories—body armor.”
20
EARLIER it’d been a swarm of spawn. Now, we’d been invaded by a horde of Vikings. This horde had arrived in a big private jet from Oslo; but other than that, they sure looked like Vikings to me, at least via my experience watching the History Channel.
Judging from the equipment and gear they had with them, I could see why the team from SPI Scandinavia hadn’t wanted to get into the country via JFK or LaGuardia—or go anywhere near an airport security, customs, or TSA checkpoint. Their jet had landed at a private airstrip in Westchester County. Considering their cargo, they’d had to.
Every last one of them was tall, blond, and buff. Way buff. But instead of leather and chain mail, they wore black fatigues and had unloaded cases of matte black body armor. Instead of swords and axes, they had . . . well, swords and axes. Add to that a war’s worth of automatic weapons, flamethrowers, and what looked like Godzilla-sized barbed spears, and Director Lars Anderssen and his team looked ready enough to take on the newest residents of New York’s sewers.
I was in the subterranean parking area just outside the SPI complex, along with my official bodyguard, Ian, and Yasha, my unofficial guard werewolf. Yasha and the other two werewolf agents had gotten back from their tracking mission only about half an hour ago. After getting a taste of a grendel, and the primal excitement of trying to track it to its lair, the big Russian’s eyes had gone gold and stayed that way. He also looked a little hairier, though maybe that was due to a lack of shaving rather than an abundance of wolf.
The Vikings weren’t the only ones decked out like cover models from Soldier of Fortune.
My eyes involuntarily flicked to the midsection of Ian’s black Under Armour T-shirt that was tight enough to outline every can in his six-pack.
“Why bring so much?” Yasha asked. “We have guns.”
“A man likes to have his own,” Ian replied.
“It would’ve been nice if they could’ve been here earlier,” I muttered. The Scandinavians had landed a little after nine o’clock as scheduled, but icy road conditions had made getting into Manhattan from Westchester County a challenge, even with the snow chain–equipped SUVs the boss had sent to pick them up.
“For this kind of party,” Ian said, “better late than never. The real fun hasn’t even started yet.”
Vivienne Sagadraco’s petite human form suddenly appeared behind Ian, regarding me with expressionless eyes. The only sign that the last few hours had been anything except business as usual was the boss leaning on an elegant cane, its grip a silver dragon’s head.
“Exemplary work, Agent Fraser.”
“Thank you, ma’am,” I managed to say. I gestured vaguely in the direction of wherever she’d been injured. “How are you?”
“Passably well. Well enough to do whatever is needed. And yourself?”
“Uh, good. I’m good.”
She seemed to expect more.
“And I’m ready to get this done,” I added with enthusiasm. Jeez, I sounded like such a dork.
She gave me a sharp nod. “Commendable. Agents Byrne and Kazakov, you also have my thanks. The actions of the three of you this evening exemplify the sterling qualities that all our agents should aspire to.”
Both men gave a bow of their heads. “Thank you, ma’am.” I quickly followed suit.
Vivienne Sagadraco crossed the parking area to speak with the SPI Scandinavia director.
Ian lowered his voice. “I’m ready to get this done?”
I cringed. “I know. You’ve got one more job as my partner.”
“What’s that?”
“Save me from myself.”
“Spawn and doppelgangers I can do, but saving you from yourself is too tall an order for any man.”
There were nine Scandinavians—and half of the men looked like they’d walked out of a Viking romance novel cover shoot. The team included two women—one with a long braid and the other who actually made a military cut look good. Both of them had that whole Valkyrie/Norse goddess thing going. And the one with the short hair had an aura showing me that the Norwegians also had a werewolf on their team.
A garage-door-sized section of the wall rolled up. Beyond was the combat teams’ briefing and staging area. SPI commanders Roy Benoit and Sandra Niles came out into the parking area along with their teams. They’d already fought round one of the battle. Two hadn’t survived, and others had been injured, but they were all here. The New Yorkers and Vikings stepped up to greet each other—but mainly to size up the competition.
“I love the smell of animosity in the morning,” Ian murmured.
One of the Scandinavians, who was slightly older than the others, crossed the parking area floor to meet Vivienne Sagadraco. They exchanged handshakes and did that double-cheek-kissing thing then spoke in low tones. Judging from the Scandinavian director’s serious scowling, he was getting the expanded version of our rapidly growing problem. At one point, the man turned his head and looked directly at me, and his eyes narrowed appraisingly. Seems I’d just been introduced as the agency seer and self-appointed painter of monsters. Without further expression, his attention went back to the boss, leaving me with no idea if he approved of what he’d seen, though I suspect he was less than impressed. I had that effect on people. His blond hair wasn’t long, but it wasn’t buzz-cut short, either. His beard was neatly trimmed. He looked fit, but not in a brawny way. He was the shortest among the Scandinavians, but he towered over Vivienne Sagadraco. Though mere hours ago, she would’ve towered over every last one of them combined.
“Director Lars Anderssen, I presume?”
“In the flesh,” Ian confirmed. “Good man. Knows his business. I’m going to assume that he wouldn’t have brought those men
and women with him unless they knew the same. Considering our situation, I’m going to be very disappointed if any of them prove me wrong.”
The boss lady and Anderssen handled the team leader introductions, and our people helped the visiting team get their gear inside. The briefing room had chairs lined up in rows with a table, screen, and whiteboard at the front of the room. Everyone quickly found a seat.
“Based on the data from the DNA samples we were able to provide from the claw and lock of hair,” Vivienne Sagadraco told us, “Director Anderssen’s science team in Oslo has narrowed the age of our two grendels to less than a hundred years old, which confirms that they are of prime mating age, and were probably selected by our adversary because they are a breeding pair.”
I wondered if she had told Lars Anderssen who the adversary was. Regardless, she still wasn’t sharing that information with anyone else.
Anderssen stepped forward. “The way in which the first victim, the goblin Kanil Ghevari, was killed and the relative absence of blood found at the scene, suggests that the attack was by the female. Female grendels must consume blood for weeks after spawning to replenish their strength; and as they are large creatures—larger than the males—they require an equally great quantity.”
Holy crap. I turned to Ian. “Larger?” I mouthed.
Then with dawning horror, I recalled the photos in the folder from Kanil Ghevari’s autopsy. There’d been teeth marks around the stub of the goblin’s remaining arm. The female grendel must have used it like a straw and drained him like a freaking juice box.
Sandra half raised her hand. “Director Anderssen, how many eggs are we talking about?”
“Anywhere from twenty to thirty eggs—in each clutch.”
Silence.
Roy Benoit swore. “There’s more than one clutch?”
“Grendels lay three clutches of eggs over the course of three days, with one clutch expelled every twenty-four hours. The incubation period is approximately forty days.”
The Grendel Affair: A SPI Files Novel Page 21