The Dragon Conspiracy

by Lisa Shearin

  “Yes.”

  “Those possessing earth magic can tap a microscopic amount of power from ley lines, but they are unable to use the lines to magnify and spread their magic.” He paused. “Diamonds, like ley lines, are of and from the earth. Those rare diamonds that are imbued with power can tap directly into ley lines to carry and spread the power they contain like an underground river.”

  Rob touched the tablet again and a red dot appeared at a point along the north/south ley line. An instant later, it completely overspread the blue ley lines with pulsing red.

  “Two locations—North Brother Island and the Red Hook Warehouse—have not one, but two ley lines: a major artery and a smaller capillary. The larger and more powerful runs north to south; the weaker one, though still of significant power, runs east to west. They intersect near these two locations. We believe that one of these is where the Dragon Eggs will be activated.”

  “We can’t narrow it further?” the boss asked.

  “Not with the information we have, ma’am.”

  “Then we’ll cover both. How far will the effects travel once the ley lines pick up the diamonds’ magic, channel, and carry it?”

  “We conservatively estimate that the power of the combined diamonds, plus the strength of the ley lines, will extend the fallout, if you will, to roughly the entire tristate area, and perhaps a bit beyond.”

  Holy mother of God.

  Tens of thousands of supernaturals.

  “We will dispatch teams to both locations,” Vivienne Sagadraco said. “Again, prevent this event by any means necessary.” She turned to Alain Moreau. “We need to evacuate every supernatural in the city and beyond.”

  Ian leaned over to me. “Those things aren’t diamonds; they’re time bombs.”

  20

  SPI HQ was now running RTC.

  Round the clock.

  Problem was the clock wasn’t going to make it around before what was going to happen happened. Not shit-hits-the-fan big. This was cataclysmic.

  In less than three hours, the Dragon Eggs would cure the undead of New York right out of existence, and strip the secret identities off of every supernatural being to leave them as naked and vulnerable as the day they were born.

  Supernaturals in New York, New Jersey, and Connecticut were being told to leave. Now.

  Vivienne Sagadraco called a fast all-hands briefing.

  Every agent, researcher, and lab tech was gathered in the bull pen, looking up at the second-story catwalk. I was on the edge of the bull pen, toward the front, Ian and Yasha on either side. Kenji was close along with the Dorgan twins. For once they weren’t being creepy, and they weren’t standing next to each other as they nearly always did. They were standing on either side of the elf tech, their faces set in grim determination.

  The boss was there, Alain Moreau by her side.

  We knew what was coming—the evacuation order, not only for every supernatural in the area, but for supernatural SPI agents as well.

  Yasha had informed us that he wasn’t going anywhere.

  The silence had been absolute as Vivienne Sagadraco had told them what we faced.

  “The alert has gone out on all communication channels in the supernatural community to leave the city if they can, and if they can’t, to make themselves and their families secure where they are. Remaining in a secure place applies only to those who are using glamours to protect their identities. Those immortals who were turned from a human are being ordered to leave immediately. If the Dragon Eggs are not found before midnight, every vampire or were within the area of influence will become mortal again. If you were twenty years old when you were turned a century ago, at midnight you will be a one-hundred-and-twenty-year-old human. You will die and be reduced to bone within seconds. Those older will be reduced to dust.”

  Vivienne Sagadraco paused to let her words sink in.

  “I founded SPI with the mission of protecting supernaturals. That mission has never been more in force than right now. This mission is even closer to my heart when it comes to you—each and every one of you. You have stood ready to put your lives on the line every day. I will not see you remain here and forfeit your lives should we fail in the task set before us tonight. I want every agent in this room who was once mortal to leave the city. Now. I am determined not to fail, and will do everything in my power to prevent this. But should the worst come to pass, I will know that you are safe. As you have never disobeyed me before, do not disobey me now. Leave the city. I do not know when—or if—it will be safe to return. Regardless, we will regroup, and we will continue in our mission until those who brought this night upon us are brought to justice.”

  Naturally, she wouldn’t say one word to indicate that she was in worse danger than almost any of them.

  “Are there any questions?”

  Vivienne Sagadraco carefully surveyed her people, ostensibly looking for raised hands. I knew different. She had either handpicked or approved each and every one of them before they were hired, and was now memorizing their faces as if it were the last time she would ever see them, either because they would be dead, or she would be forced to flee or be hunted down.

  We were her family.

  Family wasn’t only people you shared DNA with. You couldn’t pick those; and God knows sometimes you wanted to unpick rotten fruit from your family tree. Vivienne Sagadraco knew about that, too. She’d shared a nest with Tiamat.

  Family was who you shared a mission and a goal with; who you shared life and faced death with. For many of the men and women gathered here, SPI was the only family they had who knew what their job truly was, a job they could never reveal to others.

  SPI was created to protect and to serve, and at no time in its history would that be more true than during the next three hours.

  The two commando teams, made up of a dozen men and women, a mix of human, supernatural, and immortal, were lined along the back walls, closest to the stairs that would take them down to their transport.

  Since some of their numbers were immortals, Roy and Sandra had recruited extra agents to take their places if the Dragon Eggs were activated. The mission wouldn’t end after that happened. The ultimate goal would not change—get those diamonds.

  Or kill Ben Sadler.

  Ian had put us within quick access to an exit. The instant the last word passed the boss’s lips, he opened the door and pulled me through, Yasha on our heels.

  The fastest way for the teams to get to the Red Hook Warehouse or North Brother Island would be to fly over and rappel out. But since 9/11, heavily armed men and women rappelling out of helicopters, or zipping around the city’s waterways in high-speed boats, would get the same chilly reception—everything the NYPD and Coast Guard could throw at them, soon followed by federal reinforcements.

  They had to get in and they couldn’t be seen. Speed was critical, but so was stealth.

  Roy Benoit’s team would be going out from the South Street Seaport area. Party boats were always going out from there. Tonight was Halloween; they’d be just another two-boats-load of partiers going out for a midnight cruise.

  The boss had arranged for Sandra Niles and her team to have a private charter from a marina on the Upper East Side.

  Since masks tended to raise suspicion, even on Halloween, our teams were going with a couples cruise theme. The team members would pair off in any configuration they saw fit to complete a disguise. They couldn’t travel as fast as they wanted to; zipping up or across the East River at the speed they needed to go would just get them pulled over. When you were carrying body armor and enough munitions to start and finish your own war, you tended not to get off with a slap on the wrist.

  Once, I’d been allowed to go on a mission with the monster hunter teams. They’d taken me with them into the city’s sewer and abandoned subway tunnels because as a seer I could tell ghoul from human and see grendels
rendered invisible by an amulet that had been created with some science, but mostly magic. They’d needed me, so I had gone with them. Ian had been there, too—as the new seer’s bodyguard.

  They didn’t need a seer this time, so Ian and I had been shut out, but hopefully we were about to get an assignment that’d be more productive than watching the clock.

  Alain Moreau wanted to see us.

  He’d asked us to meet him in the small conference room on the second floor.

  Ian and I came up the stairs and stopped. There were two people having what wasn’t exactly a fight, more like a polite disagreement.

  Alain Moreau and Vivienne Sagadraco.

  Moreau was only partially visible, standing in the hallway with his back half toward us. The boss must have been in the conference room.

  “. . . feared what I said would cause other agents of my age and condition to feel pressured to remain. Mine is a personal decision.”

  “You’re staying.” Ms. Sagadraco didn’t ask it as a question.

  “I am.”

  “And if I order you to leave?”

  “Then I will disobey your order.”

  “What if I ask you as a friend?”

  “As a friend, I would refuse you.”

  “You’ve never disobeyed me before.”

  “There is a first time for everything, Madame.” I could hear the smile in his voice. “I can better serve you, SPI, and the community we protect from here—and here I will remain, by your side, where I belong.”

  “Regardless of the consequences?”

  “I’m counting on you—and our people—being as good as I know you are.”

  We then witnessed an act we’d never seen before and were unlikely to witness again.

  Vivienne Sagadraco stepped forward into the hallway, wrapped her arms around Alain Moreau, enfolding him in a hug. She then pulled back and kissed the French vampire on both cheeks.

  “My dear and faithful friend,” she whispered.

  “Always at your service, Madame,” Moreau replied quietly.

  Vivienne Sagadraco smiled in a baring of teeth. “Let’s get to work.”

  They had to have known we were just around the corner, but they didn’t acknowledge us, so we did the same, preserving our plausible deniability of seeing my manager and boss show emotion.

  Vivienne Sagadraco took the stairs at the other end of the hall.

  “Be careful this evening, Agent Fraser,” came the soft echo of her voice in my head. “Tell Agent Byrne the same.”

  So much for deniability. “I will, ma’am. Please take care of yourself.” It was good that I wasn’t talking out loud; I didn’t think I could have gotten the words past the lump in my throat.

  “Agents Byrne and Fraser,” Moreau said without turning.

  Busted again.

  We showed ourselves in. Ian didn’t acknowledge to Alain Moreau that we’d overheard anything, so I wisely followed the lead of my senior agent.

  “I’ve received a call from the agents watching Viktor Kain,” Moreau said. “His assistant has notified the hotel management that they will be checking out within the hour. He could be going to the airport.”

  “Not without his diamonds, he won’t,” Ian said.

  One corner of Moreau’s mouth quirked upward. “That is what we’re counting on. I want you and Agents Fraser and Kazakov to follow him. Viktor Kain has had his people out looking for the Dragon Eggs, and one of them may have discovered their location. If he has made arrangements to travel to North Brother Island or to the Red Hook Warehouse, that would allow us to reroute one of our teams to reinforce the other. They will need it, because that will likely indicate that Viktor Kain means to fight to be the one to activate the Dragon Eggs.”

  I spoke up. “Sir, if he stays here, won’t Viktor Kain get his magic and glamour zapped at midnight, too?”

  “Unfortunately not. Kain’s a multi-millennia-old gem mage. If he’s the one to activate the diamonds, his proximity to them will actually act in his favor.”

  “The rocks won’t bite the hand that unleashes them.”

  “Essentially.” Moreau smiled, and his eyes glittered. “Though if Kain can’t get to the diamonds, he’d better turn dragon and fly as far out over the Atlantic as he can.” The vampire chuckled darkly. “In fact, if he values his life, he should keep going.”

  “Why’s that?”

  “If they haven’t yet left the city, the sorcerers Kain lured here with the chance of buying the Dragon Eggs will have all of their considerable powers negated at midnight.”

  Ian whistled. I winced.

  “Madame Sagadraco believes that was the true reason Viktor Kain said he would be selling the diamonds, to lure some of the most powerful sorcerers in this dimension and beyond out into the open.”

  “Kain is after more than revenge against Ms. Sagadraco,” I said.

  Moreau gave a single nod. “If we succeed this evening, our next order of business is to discover what Viktor Kain truly wants.”

  Ian grinned evilly. “If we succeed this evening, and the sorcerers on our most-wanted list catch up with him, Viktor Kain won’t be a problem for anyone ever again.”

  21

  IAN and I were in the backseat of one of New York’s sixty gazillion yellow cabs.

  Except this one was clean, with the latest communications equipment, some serious horses under the hood, and was being driven by an increasingly hairy Russian.

  SPI had cabs. Who knew?

  I’d learned something new tonight, though it made perfect sense. What better way to follow someone around the city than in a yellow cab.

  Viktor Kain’s dark sedan had left the Mandarin Oriental and we’d flowed into traffic soon after. When his driver turned left on Lexington Avenue, we were five car lengths away from doing the same.

  “Time to change it up,” Ian told Yasha.

  The Russian pushed a button on the steering wheel.

  Nothing happened—at least nothing that I could see.

  “What was that?” I asked.

  “It changes the roof lights. Kain or his driver will be checking for tails. We can’t have them make us.”

  Yasha was doing his best impersonation of a New York cabdriver, meaning he was making an effort to dial back his aggression. For death-defying maneuvers, New York cabbies had nothing on the werewolf, whom SPI’s other drivers called Kamakazi Kazakov.

  I always carried chewable, orange-flavored Dramamine in my purse. I probably should eat one right now. If Kain’s driver thought he was being followed and started doing vehicular acrobatics, I’d be wishing I had because there was no way in heaven, hell, or Hoboken that Yasha—or me or Ian—was going to let Viktor Kain get away.

  “He has to know our people will follow him,” I said to Ian.

  “He does. We haven’t been spotted, but he’ll still take precautions. He’s due for a car change anytime now.”

  I sat up straighter. “Then how are we going to stay with him?”

  Yasha rolled down his window. “Big dragons stink. I can smell them a mile away.”

  Huh?

  I’d been close enough to the boss on numerous occasions to get a good whiff. I thought she smelled nice, but maybe werewolves thought—

  “He means male dragons,” Ian clarified, at my apparently obvious confusion. “If Kain’s going to the airport, he won’t change cars or give a damn that he’s being followed.” My partner’s smile was a flash of white in the dark backseat. “If he changes cars, the bastard is up to something and we’re going to find out what and where it is.”

  Viktor Kain’s driver pulled the sedan into a parking garage off East Twenty-third Street.

  “Change number one, coming up. Looks like our boy’s not leaving town.”

  Yasha calmly pulled over half a block from the entran
ce.

  I started to get nervous. “Is there another exit?”

  “Not for this garage,” Yasha said. “We wait. He will come out. When he does, I will smell him.”

  The Russian werewolf’s eyes were glittering gold in the rearview mirror. Tomorrow night was the full moon. Yasha wasn’t old for a werewolf, but he was old enough to be able to control himself.

  Mostly.

  He and the other werewolves who worked for SPI usually made themselves scarce twenty-four hours before the full moon—which was right now. Normally, Yasha still being on duty would bother me, or at least be a concern. Tonight there was no one else, aside from Ian, who I wanted by my side.

  Minutes passed. A blue sedan came out; no sniffs from the front seat. Then a white SUV emerged. No reaction. Next came a tiny Smart car. Yasha chuckled. When a dark green Land Rover came out, Yasha inhaled and nearly gagged.

  “We have a winner,” Ian announced. He put his hand on Yasha’s shoulder. “Give him space, buddy. You won’t lose him.”

  Yasha gave the Land Rover and its thankfully-smelly-to-werewolves passenger a few extra seconds and then pulled into traffic and followed him.

  “We’ve got plenty of yellow camouflage now,” I said, “but what about when he gets close to the docks?”

  “Won’t matter,” Ian said. “Once he’s in a boat and on the water, we’ve got other contacts waiting to track him from there, if necessary.”

  “What do you mean, if necessary?”

  Ian almost smiled. “All we need to know is whether he’s going north to North Brother, or south to Red Hook. Then we can have Kenji send Sandy to back up Roy, or vice versa.”

  Then there’d be two expert snipers available to kill Ben Sadler.

  “The more backup they have and the quicker they get it,” Ian said, “the better the chances of ending this thing without any of our people getting killed.”

  Ian was including Ben as one of ours.

  I smiled. “I don’t know why I bother to talk at all; you always know what I’m thinking.”