“Alright then, go ahead.”
Scythe told his friends, “Okay, we can clear these out,” twisting the tiny camera until it snapped. The Blades quickly scoured the room and then the rest of the house, disabling every monitoring device.
“Did we get them all?” Smoke asked when everyone had reconvened in the living room. At their nods, he asked, “What about distance monitoring?”
“Let’s take it in the nursery, there’s no window there; I’ll get the audio.” Scythe stepped up to the environmental control panel and turned on music in every room surrounding the nursery, adjusting the volume until he was satisfied that they would not be heard. He went into the small room adjacent to his friends’ bedroom. It was a tight fit with himself, four well built Blades and Grant.
Grant started speaking immediately, “The last I heard from Ian, he was despondent, thinking that they were just about out of leads. That was six days ago, two days before you spoke with him.”
“Grant, I hope you don’t take offense, but, we want to be sure of you. Do you mind if we ask you a few questions?”
He widened his eyes, startled. “I...uh...I guess not. What do you want to...”
Scythe interrupted, “Do you know what may have happened to them?”
He answered easily, “I think they might have been kidnapped, maybe killed.” Truth.
“Do you know who may have done it?”
“I do not have any idea, though I think it may be the people we have been searching for.” Truth.
“Where are they?”
“I don’t know.” Truth.
“Grant, there is one more thing I want to try, before I trust you with anything else, but, it may be uncomfortable for you. Can you handle that?”
“What is it?” he asked, his attention on Leandra, who had taken a position at his side, her face a blank mask. She laid her hand on his shoulder to steady him. His heart raced and his eyes darted nervously to Scythe.
“This.” Scythe, wrapped himself in a calm, cool aura. He held Grant’s gaze, easily peeling away the barrier that was wrapped around his mind. He and Smoke had decided on this plan, despite its many risks, for verifying Grant’s reliability. Scythe had been honing his focus with Smoke and Rend as his targets over the last few days and were hopeful that it was a technique they could use effectively to get the information they would need.
Grant froze in place. His head jerked minutely, but he couldn’t break the connection between them.
Scythe dove into his mind, zipping past the spheres that didn’t interest him: his family, long days at work, old memories of his childhood. He found, as he did with Smoke, that there was so much to see that he couldn’t find what he was looking for.
“Think about Lena,” he prompted. “I want to see her.”
“I...feel...sick,” Grant whispered.
“Lena, Grant...Lena and Ian: focus on them.” Several spheres pushed their way through the myriad of memories. Scythe brushed them, dismissing the old memories and finally finding the ones he wanted. He saw and heard Ian checking in through the video terminal just a few rooms away from them. He felt Grant’s disappointment at the apparent end to their fruitless search. Then, another, more recent memory of an aide, Jules, reporting to him about Lena’s request for resources to locate a certain border officer. He approved it, making a note of it in his research portfolio, before moving on to more pressing matters in his office.
“That’s right, I did approve that, just a few nights ago...” he muttered, gathering his wits when Scythe released him. “Han something...the one that shot you, I think.”
Scythe nodded, “We were hoping he might be a lead.”
“What was that?” Grant demanded. He was more than a little upset and then defensive when he couldn’t back up because Leandra still blocked his movement. “There is nothing about you having a gift of power in your records.”
“No, and I like it that way. I don’t want any more Humans experimenting on me, okay, Grant?” Scythe leaned back against the wall, gripping his head with one hand and squeezing his eyes shut. He still couldn’t do it without getting dizzy afterwards. If he did it too much, he’d get a headache, too, and start to get nauseous. Once a day was what they had agreed would be the most he could do safely; any more than that and he tended to pass out.
That took some of the wind out of the man's sails. “I see.” Grant shook his head to dispel the disorientation that he also felt. “Well, that’s about as amazing a gift as I have ever seen. I’d keep it a secret, too, without a doubt.”
Scythe nodded again, turning to the Blades, “He doesn’t know anything. Okay, do we have the scents of everyone?” When they affirmed that they had, he turned back to Grant. “We’ve got everything we need here, so let’s head out to Lena’s place.”
“Wait, can you share with me the information you have, first?”
“The only thing we have to share is that bit about Han the shooter, and you already know that.”
Grant frowned, “That’s it? I got the feeling that…” He leaned forward intently when he picked up on something in Scythe’s expression. He pressed, “So there is more, but...”
“It’s not for you, and if it were, you’d probably end up missing, too.”
“Scythe, my job is gathering information; I can’t do it right with only half of the information.”
Scythe sighed. Normally, there were others who were older and more experienced that took charge of dealing with people, but Scythe was the only one who spoke Human, so he did his best to explain. “And you can’t do it at all if you are dead. Look, Grant, Lena gave me the information you are asking for and the next day she, Ian and all of Ian’s family disappeared. They didn’t just kill your agents, they took them, and their family, too. Why would they take the kids, Grant?” Scythe felt the anger that had been simmering for days start to heat up. He clamped down on it with a few deep breaths.
Grant sighed, “It could be a message to the rest of us, a threat.”
“Fine, but why not just kill them all and leave a big, bloody threat?”
“I don’t know...”
“Me, either. This way, we have to keep looking, right?”
“Yes, definitely. If there was a ransom request, some kind of demands, then I would understand. This serves to both warn us off and goad us on...”
Scythe tried to reason it out from the Kin perspective, but shook his head when he couldn’t find a solution. Turning to the Blades, he asked in Kin, “Why would they kidnap instead of kill them?”
“Who knows what Humans are thinking. They are inherently cruel,” Leandra shrugged.
Scythe looked at Smoke, who was the only other one who was looking at the case from the perspective that the Kin were involved somehow. In a moment, the Blade shook his head as well, unable to reason why any Kin perpetrators would have taken them.
“For now, can you get on Han, assuming he can even be found after all of this?” Scythe asked Grant.
“I’ll check to see what progress has been made on that assignment.” He paused, before saying, “There’s nothing you can give me, then?”
“Do you have a family, Grant?”
“Yes,” he answered nervously. “I could have them sent...”
“Where? Where would they be safe?”
“Another city...”
Scythe put his hand on Grant’s shoulder, leaning forward a little, “If it’s who we think it is, there is nowhere you could possibly hide them.”
“We know they are high up...”
Scythe shrugged, seeing Grant’s determination, “It’s your choice, Grant, but you need to be ready for the consequences. To you, your family, anyone you inform, and their families.” He looked around the nursery, laying his hand on the crib and gripping it. “I’m wishing Lena hadn’t come up with the idea in the first place. If she’s alive, I’m betting she wishes the same thing, too.”
“Okay,” Grant said, finally convinced and a little shaky. “How can I help you,
then?”
“We need to contact the Kin liaison at the embassy here, and we’ll need some escorts that you trust to take us around the city.”
“That is no problem. I’ll take care of that right away.”
“Don’t forget the maps,” Smoke said to Scythe, “and all possible exit routes from the city.”
“Grant, we may be able to tell by the scent of a place if any of the Young family have been there within the last week. We’re gonna try to check out as many likely spots as we can; if you get any ideas, let us know. We need maps of the city and the location of every possible exit from the city. Can you check out anyone who has left the city in the last few days?”
“You think they might have been taken out of the city?”
“We think there is a good chance of it, and an even better chance once we start snooping around.”
“Okay, we’ll review the documentation and I’ll get a team to the gates immediately.” He was thoughtful for a minute, “You think they may have been taken to a border installation, or another city?”
Scythe did not respond.
“Right, got it, better not to know. Well, it would have to be one of those anyway, wouldn’t it? I mean, the only other place...” His eyebrows shot up, his heart started beating faster and his face paled. He looked at each of the Blades, his mouth open as he rifled through the possibilities in his mind. He seemed to be unconscious of the low cursing that was escaping his lips. Finally, he clamped his mouth shut, saying with a look of nervous determination, “Nowhere to hide is right. I’ll get you what you have asked for. Let’s get started.”
The Kin followed him out of the nursery, heading for the living room.
Turning off the music, Scythe added, “We might disappear for a while, too, if we need to.”
“That might be a problem. You don’t have authorization to travel unescorted.”
“Then give us someone you trust and we’ll drag them along, but we’ll need to clear them ourselves, as well.”
“All right, but I would only use the...known methods for interrogation...unless it is absolutely necessary. The fewer who know about your more innovative measures, the better.”
Scythe agreed with him. “Why don’t we head out to Lena’s and meet up with you later at the embassy?”
“I’ll have everything for you then,” he affirmed and opened the door for them.
Forty-five minutes later, Scythe waited at the door to Lena’s apartment while Smoke took one more look around. The rest of the Blades waited silently in the hall with their escort: two border guards and a field agent named Henry.
Smoke held in his hand a small yellow silk scarf and a picture that he had slipped from one of her antique frames. “There is nothing here to help us,” he whispered with the same frustration that Scythe felt.
The apartment was very small, with just one living space and a tiny bathroom. Sunlight shone through thin, sheer curtains into an unkempt room. Numerous plates and cups were piled up on the counter in the area that served as a makeshift kitchen, with a small refrigerator, a food preparer and a cabinet filled with a variety of convenience food. A pile of papers and folders were held down by a fast food box on the desk directly across from a sink overflowing with dishes. On the other side of a computer terminal, a second pile of pages was buried under clothes that were folded halfheartedly, when at all. The couch that also served as a bed looked like it had just been used, with the fluffy blankets and pillows thrown everywhere.
“No,” Scythe said, remembering the first time he had visited her apartment, just after he joined her and Ian’s team.
“It’s just a place to crash,” Lena had explained, “not a home. If I want to go home, I go to Ian’s.”
He had accepted it easily, as he had everything else about her at the time. Now, though, it looked different to him. The mess which his earlier self had gloried in after the sterility of his life at his apartment seemed to him now to be filled with a sad kind of hopelessness, something he never thought of when he was around Lena. The silence bugged him even more, though. The quiet was like a living thing that had snuck in and was hanging about the place, an obscene visitor in the home of someone like Lena.
“Let’s go,” Scythe said impatiently. “I want to check out something before we go to the embassy.”
When Smoke turned on his heel and joined Scythe, he wore his usual unconcerned look. Tucking the smooth fabric and the photo into a fold in his tunic, he asked, “Yeah? What?”
“My mother’s grave,” he answered solemnly.
“Do we have time for that?” Smoke asked, confused by the change in plans.
“We’re making time,” Scythe said, locking the door behind them. Turning to the Humans, he said, “We need to swing by this place next.” He handed Henry a piece of paper. “It won’t take long,” he added when the middle aged man hesitated.
Looking over the address, he said, “Sure, no problem. This cemetery is very close to here. We can be there in ten minutes.”
Scythe laid his hand on the man’s arm when he started to speak into his phone. “Didn’t Grant leave orders that you were not to communicate our movements?”
“Um...no,” he lied.
“Well,” Scythe said pointedly, “we’d rather you didn’t announce where we are. Five people are already missing, after all.”
“Sure, no problem,” the man said, pocketing his device. “Let’s head on out.” He turned and walked toward the stairs.
Scythe and the Blades strode down the hall after him. Pride whispered for their ears only, “Why do I want him on a plate?”
“Because your instincts are good,” Scythe replied, grinning.
Leandra smiled mischievously. She spoke conversationally in Kin, “Gentlemen, I’m having a hard time deciding which of these Humans we should kill first.”
They all grinned when Henry stumbled nearly imperceptibly. Scythe had already begun to wonder if he had some fluency in Kin, as some border patrol officers did. He would have figured out the truth eventually, but Leandra's method was more fun.
“Now Leandra, don’t be so hasty,” soothed Smoke, his face a cool mask. “You always want to get to the killing. You need to learn to savor the kill. There’s the fear, first...”
“And then the torture...” added Ungol with a grin.
“Naturally, the torture is the best part, but it just isn’t the same without the slow buildup of terror. There are so many ways to be creative, to really express yourself.”
“Always with you it’s fear and torture. No wonder it takes you ingrates so long to finish assignments. A ten minute job and three hours later you’re still at it. That’s why you’re stuck where you are at the bottom of the barrel. Now here’s how you do it: find ‘em, bind ‘em, cut ‘em, done,” she gestured sharply for each stage. “If you’re in a hurry, well, then it’s just find ‘em, cut 'em, done.”
“No finesse,” complained Pride.
“No imagination,” Smoke rolled his eyes.
“And no fixin’s for the barbecue,” whined Ungol, playing it up. They all shared a laugh at the reference to the ridiculous old superstition from the bordertowns that the Kin used to eat Humans.
“Henry,” Scythe asked as they passed through the door at the bottom of the stairs that led across the parking area to their van, “does anyone on your team speak Kin?”
“Huh?” He replied, his heart beating.
“Do any of you know Kin?”
“Not many people do, it’s so tricky to pronounce and I’m told the rules are impossible to keep straight. For every rule, there are forty exceptions, or something like that.”
“Yeah, but sometimes you have to speak to the Kin on the border, right? So, someone must know it...”
“There are some translators in the border patrol, sure.”
“Are there any here?”
“In the city?”
“No,” Scythe said, making an effort to seem like he was missing the fact that the man was dod
ging the question, “here, right now, on your team.”
“I can’t disclose that,” he grudgingly admitted.
Scythe tilted his head curiously, “Why?”
“Because you are Kin,” he held up his hand to stop Scythe’s retort. “Even though we are working together right now, you are still officially potential enemies and that information is classified.”
“Oh, okay. I don’t want to get you in any trouble.” He said in Kin to the Blades, “I guess we should be careful with our jokes. Someone is likely to take us seriously.”
“That’s good advice, Sleepyhead, I’ll keep it in mind.” Leandra grinned at the chuckle she got from the rest of the Blades and the narrow look from Scythe.
Scythe decided to probe further, addressing Henry again once they were all in the van and moving toward the outskirts of the city, “We don’t really eat Humans.”
Henry tried to look shocked at the revelation, “Who said you did?”
Scythe continued, “It’s just that, I told my brothers that I read in an old book that the Humans used to think that the Kin ate them, and they got such a kick out of it that it’s a running joke now. Seriously, we don’t eat Humans.”
“I never thought about it, to be honest,” Henry said, turning to look out of the window.
“I just didn’t want you to get the wrong idea from what we were talking about.” Scythe watched him, noting the smell of sweat coming off him and the other Humans.
“When? Just now?” When Scythe nodded, he lied, giving Scythe a blank look, “I don’t understand Kin.”
“Oh, okay, then that must have seemed weird to you.”
Halfblood Heritage Page 28