by Sue Duff
He straddled the beam. Jaered lined up the rifle’s scope on the wooden box at the opposite side of the warehouse and depressed the trigger with care. He would only get one chance at this. It had to count.
{58}
Ian stilled his aching heart and inhaled deep. The clattering of battered metal subsided.
Thunder bounced inside the warehouse, and a splintering crash from across the room startled him. Ian’s core ignited. He gasped at the instantaneous pyre. The earth’s energy flowed within his chest and churned like trapped gases. No time to question the gift or how it got there, he conjured the bindings away, then rolled off the gurney and headed for a padlock just itching to be touched.
A red blast struck the concrete at his feet. It left a scorch mark while heating the toes of his boots. He stopped in midstride.
Harcourt stood on the balcony with a raised hand. “Where do you think you’re going?”
The crazed look in the man’s eyes gave Ian pause. He backed up in the direction of the cage with slow, focused steps. “I need to stretch. I thought I’d take a walk.”
A ball of swirling energy formed in Harcourt’s upright palm. Ian stilled, transfixed at the power the man was able to summon at will. Harcourt flung it like a major-league pitcher. Ian dove out of the way, but it was faster than he had judged. He yelped in pain and rolled over, grabbing at his injured side. His core’s energy sputtered in his chest. Ian gasped. The blasts sucked core power.
“Ian!” Closest, Rayne reached through the bars.
“You can’t help him.” Mara grabbed her and pulled her away.
A blast struck inside the cage. It missed Tara by inches.
“You aren’t going anywhere,” Harcourt said. “We’re dead if I don’t hand you over.”
“We’re all dead if you do,” Ian shouted. “If Ning finds us both alive, he’ll know that my powers can’t be transferred. He’ll kill you and turn me over to Aeros.” Ian rose to his knees and winced. “If he finds me dead, well then—”
“I’m fucked no matter what,” Harcourt snapped. “Ning shut down the wireless system before my lab could download the bulk of the data.” He waved his tablet. “Even if I can escape, my life’s work goes up in flames.”
“The way I see it,” Ian stared up at Harcourt, “you have a choice to make.”
“No legacy is worth dying over,” Harcourt said.
Ian looked at Rayne. “Depends on the legacy.” She pressed her lips tight and blinked back tears.
“You don’t know who you’re up against. Ning is the scariest son of a bitch I’ve ever run across.”
“Then let’s work together and defeat him,” Ian said.
“This isn’t just about you. He’s commanding a hundred of Aeros’s most ruthless troops. They’ve spent the last couple of hours setting explosives across this campus and are lying in wait for the Syndrion traitor to deliver the entire council.”
“What are you talking about?” Ian got to his feet and pressed against the pain.
“Thanks to the traitor, the Syndrion and Pur troops are already en route. They’re about to storm the campus to rescue you and will be caught in the cross fire. Capturing you and destroying the Syndrion was Aeros’s plan. There won’t be anyone left who’s powerful enough to challenge him.”
A traitor … in the Syndrion. Ian locked eyes with Tara.
“Ahhh, scientist.” A man casually leaned against the wall while examining his fingernails on one hand. “What loose lips you have.”
Harcourt’s face turned ashen. “Ning, spare my daughter and lab technicians. They might still be of service to Aeros.”
Ning’s laugh resonated about the metal siding like a witch’s cackle. He pushed away from the door and headed for Ian. “You have nothing left of value. What makes you think they do?”
Warmth erupted in Ian’s core. He slammed a fist against his chest and staggered back toward the cage’s gate.
“No!” Ning stopped dead. His face contorted into a malevolent mask as he, too, backed away from Ian and sneered up at Harcourt with pointed teeth. “So much for your science!”
Ian gripped the padlock but couldn’t draw enough power to conjure it away. He grabbed one of the cage’s bars to stay on his feet.
Two crimson blasts rained down on Ning. He rolled away then retaliated with a fist-sized inferno of his own. It smashed into Harcourt’s next shot, both crimson fireballs colliding in midair before dispersing.
Another left Harcourt’s hand, but it barreled toward Ian. He dove. The blast struck the padlock and it exploded. Bits of shrapnel shot through the air.
“Go,” Harcourt shouted as a scarlet ball slammed into his upper chest. He staggered on his feet then collapsed onto the balcony.
Ian lunged at Ning. The Curse dropped both of them in writhing agony.
A figure ran past him and headed up the stairs.
“Rayne, no!” Ian moaned. Tara appeared at his side.
“She went after the book,” Mara shouted. She ran past Ning, pulled a fire extinguisher off the wall, and rushed toward him. She swung it, and the blow struck Ning in the jaw. He went limp. She crouched and patted around him. “Damn it. What Duach doesn’t carry a gun?”
“A confident one,” Ian croaked. They dragged him to his feet.
“Rayne, hurry,” Tara shouted.
“Go, I’ll be right behind you.” Rayne knelt down next to her father.
Ian gritted his teeth to stop from crying out as they made their way past Ning and out the door. The two guards that Drake had sent outside lay dead next to the warehouse. Ning had started to clean up.
Movement through the trees. Drake was headed for the warehouse with the three wolves at his heels.
Tara and Mara gripped Ian tighter around the waist and pulled him toward the tree line on the other side of the path, but not before Mara grabbed a gun from one of the dead guards.
Ian’s knees buckled when he tried to jerk away. “We’re not leaving her.”
“Ugh!” A bloody strip appeared along Mara’s upper arm as a shot rang out. They dove for the trees.
{59}
It had been so easy to hate him, yet Rayne found herself groping for words of comfort as he lay dying. She hung her head when nothing reached her lips.
“The daughter I could never hold.” Harcourt lifted the walkie-talkie to his draining face. “Turn on all the speakers. Widen the band frequency to the full spectrum. Barricade yourselves in.” The radio slipped from his scorched chest. “I’m sorry …” trailed off into breathy silence. A last exhale, and his eyes rolled back in his head.
She bit her lip, unable to shed a tear for the man.
“Where’s the doc?” Drake’s voice came from the direction of the door. “What happened to our men?”
Rayne hunched low and stole a peek over the edge of the balcony. Ning was on his knees cradling his jaw in his hand. “Fucking Channels. Where’s the Heir?”
“I shot a warning for them to stop, but they disappeared into the trees.” He gestured for the wolves to stay at the doorway. “Where’s the doc?” he insisted.
Ning didn’t answer. He rubbed his jaw and slowly got to his feet. “The Heir killed him and took off.”
Drake shook his head. “No.”
Ning turned on him and grabbed him by the throat. “Where were you? Why weren’t you here to protect him?”
The wolves advanced with a growl. Ning swung Drake toward them like a shield. “Call them off or they’ll be barbecued like their master.”
Drake waved and the wolves backed down. His eyes widened at spotting Rayne cowering on the balcony. He batted at Ning and pointed up at her.
Rayne ducked back and scampered into the office. She pushed a nearby file cabinet down in front of the door, but it tipped too easily and wouldn’t offer much weight. She slid the heavy metal desk up against it. The weathered book sat on top. She scooped it up in her arms and rushed across the office to the solitary window. A steep, lower roof trailed away a co
uple of yards below the sill. In the descending darkness, it was impossible to tell if it sloped low enough to jump the rest of the way to the ground. The window didn’t open. She grabbed a metal chair and flung it at the glass. Nothing happened. She picked it up and rammed it into the window with everything she had. On the third try, the glass cracked then shattered when she drove a chair leg at the center of the crackled spider web. She used the sleeve of the security jacket to cover her fist, and knocked out most of the remaining glass.
The file cabinet scraped as the door shoved inward a couple of inches. A hand grabbed the edge of the jamb and grunts accompanied another shove. An arm reached into the room, groping for a handhold.
Several shots rang out. A wolf’s howl.
“Get those beasts outside,” Ning shouted from the other side of the door.
“Someone’s shooting at them,” Drake said in the distance.
She crawled up and balanced on the sill then lowered herself onto the sloping roof, trying to avoid the worst of the glass shards. A thin layer of ice hugged the surface, and she slid downward in spite of her tennis shoes doing their best to grip along the way. She leaned back with one hand in an attempt to steer and held onto the book with the other.
A shout came from the open window but only the wind pushed against her back. She tried to control the drop-off from the roof, but she approached too fast and skidded off the edge. Rayne landed several feet below and rolled to a stop with a groan.
Shots struck near the warehouse door. Rayne didn’t turn around to see what was happening. It wasn’t until she limped into the trees without incident that she gave thanks to her father. His lab techs had followed his dying orders.
Ning was as powerless as Ian.
{60}
Jaered raced across the roof and peered over the edge in time to see her slip off the lower roof line. She dropped the rest of the way landing hard, picked up a book she’d dropped, and took off for the forest. He breathed a sigh of relief.
Bullets struck the building. One of the Channels had the beasts and men cornered inside the warehouse. The shots didn’t stop until after she slipped into the dark pitch between trees.
Ning ran out and yelled into the walkie-talkie. “Who changed the frequencies?” Static spit, but no one responded. “Do you read, over?” He turned on Drake. “Why aren’t they answering?”
“Maybe because you murdered their boss,” Drake said. “I’m not stupid. Harcourt was scared of you for a reason.”
“He was no longer useful.” Ning gestured toward the trees. “But you can be. I don’t care if those animals rip her to shreds. Bring me back that book. I’m going to connect with my men. We’ll rendezvous in Security.”
“I’m a dead man. What do I care about your book?”
Ning gripped Drake’s shirt and got in his face. “The Syndrion army is about to arrive. If I don’t hand over that book to the traitor, this battle may not go in our favor.”
“Sounds like your problem,” Drake said.
“Demonstrate the worth of those animals or be hunted down by the Pur guard.”
Drake hesitated a second longer. “Heel.” He took off with the animals by his side.
Jaered had to act fast. He stepped back to shyft. Miniscule energy sputtered in his chest. Nothing. He increased the pull. Still nothing. He stifled a scream. Dusk was fast approaching. By the time he’d get down there, she’d be lost on the hill.
The wolves wouldn’t have that problem.
{61}
Ian’s core no sooner had recovered from the Curse than it grew numb again. “Shit!” He pressed against his chest. “How can they turn me on and off like this?”
A wolf’s face appeared in the doorway. Mara depressed the trigger.
“Harcourt discovered that sound frequencies affect the core. They have speakers hidden all over the facility’s campus.” Tara tightened the tourniquet around Mara’s wound.
“They must have a control room somewhere,” Mara said.
“It’s got to be in his Acoustics building,” Ian said. A shout. Rayne dropped from an upstairs roof. He drew a breath in re-lief as she dashed into the trees with the book in her arms. He squeezed Mara’s shoulder. “Good job keeping them distracted. I’m going after her. Follow the perimeter fence behind the warehouse. There’s a sign near the path that directs you to the Acoustics building. Get inside and shut down whatever controls me. Once I get Rayne, we’ll meet you there and figure out a way to warn the Syndrion that they’re walking into a trap.”
“What about Patrick?” Tara said.
“If he followed directions, he’s rounded up most of the Pur scientists. Hopefully they’re prepared to defend themselves in the conference hall.”
Ian took off, staying low and sticking to the widening shadows of the vegetation, his dark clothing camouflaged by the bleeding colors of dusk. Voices outside the warehouse caused him to slow his pace then duck down.
The wolves headed upward through the brush.
Panic swept over Ian. Gusts blew through the trees, churning up the forest floor and wreaking havoc with their scent trail. Two of the wolves stopped and sneezed. They whined and grew restless.
“Stay focused!” Drake’s voice came from down the hill. The beasts separated and disappeared in the trees.
Ian picked up on Rayne’s heavy breathing and stifled grunts. He caught sight of her scaling a cluster of boulders several yards ahead. When she reached the top of the closest one, she paused long enough to look down the slope, then scrambled off the rock and kept moving upward. The hill grew steep and tree coverage scarce. Ian scaled the rocks like a bighorn sheep and closed the gap in minutes, then maneuvered ahead to intercept.
When she rounded another set of rocks directly in front of him, a white wolf blocked her path.
Ian leapt onto a nearby boulder as the animal crept toward her. “Rayne, stay very still. They can smell fear.”
“Then it’s getting a snout full.” Rayne clutched the book against her chest. She didn’t take her eyes off the animal.
The wolf pressed against her. It encircled her, rubbing itself around her legs. The gesture wasn’t aggressive, but something else. Ian scraped his boot across the boulder. The animal looked at him with sage-green eyes.
The girls’ channeling genes weren’t the only ones Orr used on the initial test group.
“Saxon?” Ian tried to connect with the animal that had been watching over him, but couldn’t.
Its ears stood at attention, and it lifted its nose in the air. Saxon turned away then looked back at Rayne from over its shoulder.
Footsteps. Drake was near. Ian’s pulse quickened when he couldn’t place the wolves. “Rayne, follow him.”
“Like hell.” She didn’t budge.
“You don’t know what’s coming after you.” Saxon turned to leave. “My powers are still shut down. This is Saxon. A friend.” She peeled her eyes from the animal and found Ian at the top of the rock. “I’m right behind you, I promise,” he said.
The wolf’s pace challenged her, but the threat of what followed kept them going. By the time they reached an outcropping higher up, she collapsed on the ground, panting. Ian bent down to help her, but stopped short. “We have to keep moving.”
Saxon nudged her with his snout and threw his weight against her.
“All right, I get it.” She rose to her feet. Saxon led them inside a narrow cave.
The numbing sensation lifted in Ian’s chest and his core warmth returned. Encouraged that Harcourt’s frequency didn’t extend into the cave, he grew bolder and quickened his step.
Two distinct growls. Snarls approached at a rapid pace. Ian strained to detect the third pursuing wolf while focused on maintaining distance with Rayne in the darkness.
“Ian, there’s a drop-off. We can’t go any farther. Saxon leapt over to the other side.”
“Press down against the wall and remain quiet.”
A shrill screech came from out of nowhere penetrating his skul
l like hammered spikes. Ian grabbed his head, unable to stop it. Glowing red eyes stared at him. He dropped to his knees at the debilitating sound. He had no idea where it came from.
The crimson eyes turned toward Rayne.
He struggled to his feet as a milky curtain covered his vision with a channeled image of a black wolf at its center. Sombra stood behind Ian on the other side of the narrow crevice.
Ian’s feet scraped across the cavern floor. An invisible force pushed him toward earth’s gaping mouth against his will. Dirt beneath his feet gave way. Small rocks and chunks of debris cascaded into the crevice.
The beasts had snared him in some kind of combined energy field. The pressure in his head grew unbearable, and he collapsed to his knees clawing at the ground to stop the skid. His legs fell in, and he grabbed the sharp tip of a rock and dangled from his waist.
Vicious snarls. Dirt kicked up from behind. The energy field weakened as Saxon took on Sombra. Ian pulled himself out of the crevice and broke off a fist-sized stone from the edge. He sent it jetting toward the other advancing wolves. A loud yelp. One set of glowing eyes extinguished.
The other wolf struck. Fangs ripped into Ian’s shoulder. Stunned, he lost his balance and they both went over the edge.
{62}
Patrick and Allison made it to the back door of the Acoustics lab and bent low with furtive glances over their shoulders. He handed her the universal pass card that Dr. Orr had confiscated from a QualSton security guard after subduing him with his homemade tear gas.
“I’m following your lead at this point,” he said.
She pocketed it. “What if the wolves go after Dr. Orr again?”
“There’s safety in numbers.” Patrick had insisted that Orr stay at the conference hall with the guard’s gun and some of the tear gas. The bag at Patrick’s knee was the rest of it.
He and Allison had avoided the main path to reach the Acoustics building, the only place they knew to begin their search for Ian and the girls. Everyone had adopted Ian’s theory that security was Duach. He and Allison had avoided dozens of security guards patrolling the campus. By the looks of it, the Duach had control of the entire area.
They’d made the trek in stunned silence. Allison stopped twice to purge reality along with her stomach contents. She’d had a hand in creating animals that not only had a shyfting power, but other dangerous skills as well.