The five of us were all that stood between Miroc and utter destruction. And what was more—
“Things may be worse than we thought,” Iris said once everyone had settled.
“How is that even possible?” I asked. I shouldn’t have asked. I didn’t truly want to know.
Iris had returned to a more natural color, but her appearance was still terribly subdued. Her hair was short and lay flat against her head; the clothing she’d created was a single shade of navy and neither it nor her soft ebony skin held any ornament. “We know now that his people,” she flicked her fingers at Syed, “have been in Miroc for a while. That until Spark messed everything up, their plans were to basically keep the city pointed in the direction it wanted to go. A passive approach, rather than an active one.”
I nodded. Not that the shadow’s actions had been anything I’d describe as passive.
“Well now we’ve fucked that up for them. They’re on the attack and they’ve got Amelia.” Iris waited, staring at me.
“I still don’t get it.”
Her skin flushed a frustrated red. “The riots, remember? The protests? The bombs? Amelia’s been in charge of security around the reservoir. With the reservoir intact, Miroc still had months, maybe, if nothing else drastic changed. Without it…”
This time I was able to finish her thought. “The end. Just like that. No more water. No more city.”
Vogg swore under his breath.
Spark was still calm. “If we can bring the rain, it won’t matter.”
“And how are we supposed to do that?” Iris snapped.
“Iris—” I began.
She kept talking over me. “I’m serious. How? Should we invade the Crescent? That plan was suicidal back when we thought they were on our side.”
“My sister’s plans—”
I cut Spark off. “Were never going to work. I’m sorry, but I saw what Copper meant to do. She never understood how the Jansynians work, and that’s not even taking into account the added difficulty the shadows present.”
Vogg’s ears flapped open and closed, a sure sign of agitation. “To even have a chance of getting into the Crescent, we would need time to organize and to gather more resources. We won’t have that if the reservoir is destroyed.”
“Can we protect it?” Spark directed her question at Vogg.
Vogg’s answer was honest. “There are five of us. Between Director Seana and Ms. Price, they control most of the power in this city.”
“They couldn’t have chosen better targets.” I heard the bitterness in my voice. One of those targets, at least, we’d handed them. I was the one who suggested Amelia and Seana work together. Oh, and I couldn’t forget the fact Seana had been taken by a shadow only because I’d done the magic to drive it out of Eddis. If only I’d known—
Spark reached over to rest her tiny hand on my knee. “It isn’t your fault.”
“It’s their fault,” Vogg said. “Everything that has happened is their fault.”
I shook my head. “Not just their fault. The shadows are taking advantage, but they didn’t create this situation. They didn’t abandon the world they created and leave their children scrabbling in the sand.”
“This is what we have,” Spark said softly. “We can’t make it any better by wishing or arguing.”
“We won’t make it better by dying, either,” Iris pointed out. “We keep rushing unprepared and uninformed and look where that’s gotten us.”
Not that there was any forward left to rush to. As Vogg had pointed out, there were five of us against the only organized powers left in Miroc. Amelia and Seana knew what we could do, and they had the resources to see us coming. And as if that weren’t enough, there was still one more shadow out there who, since I’d lost track of it in the tube station, could be anyone.
I had to be honest. “I don’t know what to do from here. I don’t know if there’s anything we can do. There may not be anything we can do. From here, our only two choices may be dying quickly or dying slowly. Except for you.” I directed that last line at Iris. “Of all of us, you’re the only one who can actually get out of the city any time you want. If you left now, I can’t imagine any of us would hold it against you.”
For once, Iris’s response was no more dramatic than a simple shake of her head. “I stayed in this dying city for her. I won’t leave while one of those creatures still wears her face.”
I couldn’t deny how glad it made me to hear that. “Spark, Vogg, if you stay here in the church, you’d be safe from the shadows, and possibly even from any riots—”
“No,” Spark said. “Whatever happens, we’ll help. I’m tired of hiding while my friends and my family die around me.”
I looked at Vogg. His job, even before it was mine, was to keep her safe. He smiled, an unnerving, sharp-toothed smile. “If we are to die either way, better to die taking action.”
The situation was just as impossible as it had been five minutes ago, but I felt better all the same. Vogg was right. We were dead either way. We might as well die trying. This was the truth I’d known after the Abandon, the truth that had driven me out into the riots, the truth that had gotten me nearly killed once already. I’d been hiding from it ever since.
This was better. I was still afraid—I wasn’t sure I’d ever not be afraid from now until my inevitable death—but this was a fear I could face. To do anything less would be to let down my friends. To let down myself.
“So we have two impossible tasks before us. We have to figure out how the five of us can a) keep the reservoir from being sabotaged by the security team protecting it and b) break into the Crescent’s impenetrable security to reach the lab that hopefully will have the tools Spark needs to fix the satellite.”
“No,” Syed said. He’d been quiet all this time. I’d almost forgotten he was there.
“Excuse me?” Iris asked, annoyed again.
“Now you’ve wasted this time talking yourselves into taking the actions you knew you had to take from the start, I will not suggest we not waste anything further. The reservoir is a distraction. The satellite is a distraction. If we do not, first and foremost, find and kill the children of my father, none of the rest will matter.”
Iris opened her mouth to argue, but I spoke faster. “First of all, you’re not in charge here, so don’t think you get to decide anything for the rest of us. Second of all, you’re going to have to accept that our goal is Miroc. If the city goes up in flames, I don’t give a shit what happens to you and the rest of your kind.”
“Why are you even here?” Iris demanded. “Why should we trust you?”
I was beginning to understand. At least I thought. “You’re just as locked into your path as they are. You can’t let them live because they’ve become something they shouldn’t be. The only problem is, there are three of them and only one of you.”
He glared at me and I met his eyes, unblinking. “You need us. The fact you’re still sitting here proves that’s true. And don’t get me wrong, we probably need you too. But that doesn’t mean you get to call the shots.”
“So I am to follow your lead?” He barked a laugh. “Your plans have gone so well thus far.”
“And yours have gone so much better,” I snapped back. “You know, if you’d just come to us at the start, while the shadow was still in Eddis, we could have stopped all of this—”
“Ash.” Spark’s soft voice cut me off. I’d been yelling.
And it wasn’t even true. I knew that. If Syed had tried to talk to me before I’d done the magic that had driven the shadow from Eddis into Seana, I would have been useless to him. I probably wouldn’t even have believed him.
It felt like forever ago, the time before I’d known about the shadows.
Vogg’s voice broke the silence that had descended. “What was wrong with Copper’s plan?”
The change of subject threw me. “What?”
“You said it wouldn’t work. What were the failure points? What was she doing wrong
?”
I pushed a hand back through my hair, trying to organize my exhausted mind. “Jansynian security doesn’t exist at a single point. Copper had found what she thought was a weak point where she could sneak in, and that’s fine, but the problem is, once you’re in, there’s more.”
“What sort of more?” Vogg pressed.
I peeled my security tab off my collarbone. Not like it was of any use now. “This, for one. Even after they let me into Desavris, I was given very specific instructions about the areas I could and couldn’t go into. They track where people are and what clearance they have.”
Spark held out her hand. “May I see that?”
I passed it to her. From a pocket in her tunic, she pulled out what resembled a jeweler’s loupe, except with blinking lights and a lens that turned on its own. She squinted through the device at the tab. “Hmmm.”
I left her to that and turned back to Vogg. “Plus there’s simple visual confirmation. Only Jansynians in the Crescent. There’s no way to hide the fact we don’t belong.”
“Maybe not for you,” Iris said.
“I can hack this,” Spark said, looking up. “I can make it tell security we’re allowed…well, wherever we want to be allowed. Does that change things?”
“Are you sure?” It sounded too good to be true and we’d have no margin for error.
Spark grinned, like my question was silly. “Of course. There’s nothing in this circuitry I haven’t seen.” Her smile grew. “There’s nothing here my people didn’t discover first.”
Iris laughed. “It’s no wonder they don’t like you much. Do you Fyeans make a habit of breaking into Jansynian security?”
“Why would we? It’s not like they’re ever doing anything interesting.” Serious again, Spark looked back at me. “Does this help?”
I thought of Seana’s office, all the screens on the wall. “We’d still have cameras to deal with—”
“Cameras are not a problem,” Syed said with finality.
“And the fact no one who sees us is going to believe we belong there.”
“I can look like I belong there,” Iris pointed out. “If I take point, I can try to steer us around witnesses.”
“And if we cannot evade them, we can surprise them,” Vogg said, laying a hand meaningfully on the hilt of his sword.
Call me crazy, but this was starting to sound possible. “Spark, how long will it take you to hack the security disc?”
“Hard to say.” Her attention was back on the tiny badge, focused through her eyepiece. “Vogg, could you get my bag? I need my NetPad and my tools.”
Iris stood. “While she’s working on that, Ash, you and I need to deal with the reservoir.”
“How are we going to do that?”
Her color was back to normal, and she flashed a sharp, dangerous smile. “We’re going to do the last thing they’d think of. We’re going to tell the truth.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
The Right Trigger at the Right Time
The one advantage we had was the shadows’ need for secrecy. They had Amelia, but she couldn’t revoke Iris’s and my security access without raising questions. When Spark asked if they might accuse us of being the ones possessed, Syed was confident with his no. “No one knows about us, and even as insane as those three have become, they will not break that most fundamental secret. They aren’t capable of it.”
I had to hope he was right. Our plan hinged on it.
Miroc sloped up on this side of the city as it reached out into the dry foothills that formed the bottom tips of a mountain range that spread halfway up the world. It meant the towering wall of the reservoir dam stood almost as high as the Crescent itself. All the lights were on, a blazing cloud of white that washed out the sky and made the arching metal roof seem to glow.
A restless crowd filled the streets and parking lots outside the two-story security fence that surrounded the reservoir. I’d never been here in person. Even when rain was a regular thing, the main water supply for our city in the desert was kept under heavy guard. No one was allowed in unless they had business.
Even so, I’d seen pictures, videos, news stories. What I’d never seen before were armed men standing atop the wall, weapons in hand. None of them were pointed at the crowd—not yet—but the situation was not stable.
Iris and I had been forced to walk here. The tubes were still shut down from the…disruption earlier. I’d left my Jansynian bike back at the safehouse, and it was too easy to imagine any number of terrible outcomes were we to go back and get it. Besides, I’d left my security disc with Spark, so the bike probably wouldn’t work.
Approaching on foot meant Iris and I got to experience the sheer scope of the restless sea of people. Mostly human, which was to be expected, but I saw an alarming number of giants—tall enough to reach up and grab the security people on the walls—and even a few lizards. If nothing else convinced me how dire the city’s situation had become, it was lizards on the side of rebellion.
Even in these early morning hours, no one was asleep. Everyone was yelling. Demanding help. Demanding water. Demanding a salvation that was in no one’s power to grant. The guards on the wall looked grim. Armed or not, there weren’t enough of them to keep back this crowd if things turned ugly.
Iris and I pushed through, earning hostile looks and the occasional rough shove. I apologized where I could, but I kept moving.
A barrier had been set up in front of the gate that led into the reservoir. A team of five men, rifles in hand, stood guard around it, keeping the crowd back. All five looked as edgy and restless as the people they guarded against. None of this was good.
As we reached the front of the crowd, Iris’s face smoothed and shifted to one I’d seen her wear a few times around the office—any repeats with Iris were notable.
And not just to me. “Iris,” one of the guards said, relief obvious in his voice. “Thank the gods. We’ve been calling for hours for Ms. Price to send more support.”
Iris twitched her head at the people spread out behind us. “What’s the situation?”
“They’re restless. They’ve been restless. They want the government to release more water. We haven’t gotten any more threats from the terrorists, but if there’s an attack, these people are going to be stuck in the middle of it. A bomb like the one they set off at the university—they wouldn’t even have to get it into the reservoir proper. Just set it off in the middle of this crowd…”
He didn’t need to finish his sentence. “Molly Chambers still on duty?” Iris asked. “I need to talk to her.”
The guard nodded. “She’s in the security office inside.” He waved his hand around three times in the air, and the gate behind him opened. “Go on through.”
While Iris talked, I had watched the guards carefully for any sign of possession. Assuming the shadows in Seana and Amelia would stay put, we still had one shadow unaccounted for. But if it had infiltrated one of these guards, it was well hidden. “How well do you know Molly?” I asked Iris softly as we passed through the gate.
“Well enough to trust her to be smart and sensible. As long as she hasn’t been—as long as one of them hasn’t taken her.”
“She’s the logical target if they want things here to fall apart.”
We’d discussed possible attack routes on the way over. Rational ideas like poison in the water or blowing up the dam. Crazier ideas like underground drilling to drain the reservoir or a full Jansynian military strike. The conclusion we’d reached was that unless Molly herself was compromised, we could hold things stable for the time we needed to break into the Crescent. If the security team was on the lookout for a lone saboteur, our one missing shadow would have a hard time getting around it. Molly and the rest of Amelia’s people were too smart for Amelia to be able to give them new instructions that would leave a gaping hole in the security. And even Seana didn’t have the sole authority to direct a full-scale military attack on the city’s water supply.
I hoped.
The one person we needed, though, was Molly. If the missing shadow had her already, we were in trouble. “Has anyone from the city asked to see Ms. Chambers since yesterday?” I asked our escort.
“Nah, we’ve been locked down pretty tight.”
“Have there been any deaths?” Iris asked. Probably a better question.
If the guard thought our questions odd, he didn’t show it. “Nope. Other than the crowd outside, it’s been quiet.”
The riot waiting to happen. “How long have they been there?”
“Been growing for days. There’ve been some scuffles, and I expect we’ll see more. I saw the threats the city council got. Molly showed ’em around. We’re buttoned up pretty tight. I don’t think the terrorists can get through us, but they can sure cause a panic and if that happens, lots of people are going to die.”
The main security office was at the base of the dam, a solid-looking concrete square with bars over the windows and a reinforced metal door. Our escort stopped at the door and looked up, into the small camera that pointed down at us. A moment later, the door clicked and swung open.
We walked into a dustier version of Seana’s office up in the Crescent. The city had put a lot of money into this place. A wall of screens showed every imaginable location, from the front gate to the maintenance hallways to the walkway at the top of the dam. At the desk, a woman I’d seen in passing back when I’d been moving through P&B in a daze, but had never stopped to talk to.
“Molly,” Iris said.
Molly nodded back. “About time. I know it’s the middle of the night and all, but Amelia stuck us here and it would be nice if she’d take our calls. I need more men. We’ve got the front gate protected well enough, but if this crowd takes it in their head to circle around into the hills, I’m not equipped to fight a war on two fronts.”
“I’m afraid it gets more complicated.” Iris grabbed for herself the only other chair in the room. “Ash and I need to talk to you alone.”
City of Burning Shadows (Apocrypha: The Dying World) Page 23