by Jamie Davis
“Thank you for your insightful analysis, my dear,” Kane sneered. If he didn’t need Jane and her department’s research into magical fields and storage, he’d have kicked her to the curb a long time ago.
The door at the far end of his office opened and his new assistant entered.
The new secretary’s arrival reminded him of Maria’s betrayal and stoked the fires inside him. The new assistant was wearing the uniform of a Red Leg clerk. She’d been a mailroom orderly a few days before.
“Director Kane,” she said, bowing as she approached his desk. “I have received another call from the Assembly president. He’d like you to return his call immediately. He wants to know what to do.”
“Bah,” Kane waved a careless hand. “Put him through.”
“Be careful what you say, Nils,” Jane cautioned. “The president will be under tremendous pressure from his constituents and the rest of the senators.”
“I don’t care, Jane. He wanted his job and my support when he ran for the position. Now it’s time to pay up. He can stand by me or I’ll have his head. I know where the bodies are buried around here, and exactly what’s in everyone’s closet. The president is no exception.”
The secretary left to re-route the call. A moment later, the phone rang on his desk.
“Hello, Mr. President,” Kane answered. “How may I help you?”
“Have you been watching the news? Have you seen what they’re saying?”
“Of course,” Kane replied. “I assure you, it’s all manufactured. I am starting an investigation into chanter sympathizers within the networks. There is no other explanation for the irresponsible nature of the videos.”
Kane’s key Red Legs were responding to the demonstrations with local police, and most weren’t returning his calls. That could be because they were busy heading off riots, or because they believed the video and were disassociating themselves. Right now Nils had no way to know which it was.
“Director, I have no choice. I must order the Assembly to return from their recess for a special hearing. People are clamoring for answers, and the senators want them, too. They want to know what you’ve been up to.”
“Don’t give me that bullshit, Mr. President. You have a choice. Control your people. Make them step up and do the right thing. This is a ploy to get you all to turn against me.”
“Nils, you know how this works. People are up in arms. If we don’t respond, we’re out of office.”
“You forget who put you in that office to begin with, Daniel.” Nils was tired of playing games. “I got you into your first senatorial position because you knew how to listen and follow instructions. If you can no longer do that, I’ll have to put my backing behind someone else. Perhaps a no-confidence vote might be due.”
“Threaten all you want, Nils. It doesn’t change the facts. People want an explanation. I want an explanation. You can’t explain all of what I saw in that video away with some sort of special-effects story line. You’ve been hiding your true nature from me and the voters.” The President’s voice bordered a low grows. “It’s time we had a full accounting.”
Nils hung up without an answer, then threw the phone across the room.
He wished he was face-to-face with the man.
He’d show the president what an accounting could look like.
Jane cleared her throat, reminding Nils that he wasn’t alone.
He turned his glare on her and she flinched.
Good. She should be afraid.
They all should be.
He’d been holding back, playing by the rules for the most part.
Not anymore.
It was time to move things along.
“Give me your phone,” Nils ordered.
Jane fished inside her purse and pulled out her smartphone. “Who are you calling? Maybe you should wait until you’re … ”
“I’m what?” Nils snapped. “Under control? Not on the verge of losing my temper? It’s too late for that. If they want to turn on me as soon as things get a difficult, so be it. I don’t need them. Give me your phone.”
Kane held out his hand, waiting.
Jane unlocked the screen and handed it over.
Nils dialed a number he’d committed to memory a long time ago, then waited while the phone rang several times. He was about to hang up when someone finally answered.
“Hello,” said a man’s voice from the other side of the line. “Who is this?”
“General Couch,” Nils said. “It’s Director Kane.”
“I wondered if I would be hearing from you tonight, or if you’d wait and call me in the morning.”
General Philip Couch was a smart man with an intuitive grasp of power struggles and politics. Nils had met him when the young captain commanded Nils’s European expedition to retrieve the stone throne sculpture along with a few other important artifacts and records from his family’s secret archive in England.
Couch had shown remarkable bravery and leadership, as well as a loyalty and discretion during that foray into the wilds that used to be Europe. Since then, Kane had fostered the captain’s career. Now he headed the small standing army that stayed in place despite budget cuts over the years. He and Couch had a plan in place for a time like this.
It was time to put that plan into motion.
“General, you recognize the situation for the crisis it is, yes?”
“I see that this is a pivotal moment for you, Director,” the General replied. “You are in a position where you have some hard choices to make. I assume, since you contacted me, you have decided on your next course of action?”
“I have. It is time. Start activating your loyalists and prepare for my signal. It should come in the next few days. I just spoke with the president and he’s no longer the loyal follower I believed him to be.”
“I feel obligated to inform you, Director, that once you start me down this road, there’s no going back. We must proceed to the end, no matter what happens.”
“Don’t lecture me on the necessities of the plan, General. I know all too well what implementing this means going forward. You may commence with Operation Clean Sweep. Let me know when you have all your forces in position. I have a few things to get in place on my end. I’ll give the final command then.”
“Very well, Director Kane. I will place the necessary calls.”
“How long will it take you to get your forces in place?” Kane asked.
“Things have changed a bit since we first discussed this option. The military is a shadow of its former self. As the only world power with an organized government, our leaders decided we no longer had to protect from threats from outside our borders. The current army is mostly a national militia. Still, I have retained my most loyal followers and the forces they control on active duty. It will be enough to do the job, but I’ll need a few days to put everything in place.”
“Very well, General. I’ll expect you to be ready in seventy-two hours. Expect my call any time after that. Understood?”
“I understand, Director. Good luck, sir. We’ll be ready.”
Kane disconnected the call and handed the phone to Jane.
He looked at her, wondering if she was as loyal as he thought.
No time to play it safe. He drew in a surge of magic and, before Jane could react or so much as utter a word, he grabbed her head in both his hands and sent his flows into her mind.
She opened her mouth to scream but Nils gained control before she could.
He knew she’d be of little use to him after such a brute force attack on her psyche but Kane didn’t care. He needed to vent his frustration on something and she was the victim of being in the wrong place at the wrong time.
Jane gurgled a few nonsense syllables as he tore into her mind with abandon, finding her deepest secrets and fears, forcing her to see them coming in a vivid virtual reality of his design.
Kane had wanted to bed her after dinner, but this option offered him much more fun. And she’d still be a rece
ptive plaything if he still had the energy or desire for sex once he was finished forcing himself onto her mind.
For the time being, Kane forgot about his own fears and insecurities. He enjoyed his new toy.
There would be ample time for other concerns in the morning.
CHAPTER 7
Winnie got out of the car and looked around the deserted street in the center of Baltimore’s Enclave—her first time back since the chanters were all shipped off to the camps over a month before.
It was eerie to stand there in a place that should be bustling with life. The silence unsettled her. Everything had been left as it was when people were snatched from their daily routines to be carried off by the invading Red Legs.
Cars sat with open doors beside baby strollers lying on their sides in the street. The world had been paralyzed.
Elaine got out of the car behind Winnie, followed by Danny and Garraldi. The four of them had made the trip to retrieve more of Elaine’s medicine. They had also returned to Baltimore to appear on a newscast condemning Director Kane’s hypocrisy, but that would come later in the day. For now they were here to see what was left of their former lives.
“At least no one looted the homes in this part of the neighborhood,” Elaine said, looking around at the deserted buildings on either side.
“Not so far as we can tell, Mom,” Winnie said. “But there was widespread looting in the section of the Enclave closer to the commercial district. And we know the police and Red Legs did little to stop the looting. I’m sure some of the middling looters ventured this far into the Enclave at some point.”
“Which one is your building, Elaine?” Garraldi asked. “We should finish our business instead of standing out here in the street. I don’t care if the chanter ban has been temporarily lifted, I don’t trust the more zealous Red Legs.”
“We’ve been granted safe passage by the Mayor of Baltimore and the Chief of Police, Garraldi. It’ll be fine,” Danny assured him.
“So you say. But you’re not the one being hunted for what you can do.”
“No, I’m being hunted because of what I decided to do,” Danny replied.
“That’s enough,” Winnie said. “I know we’re all uneasy about this trip and the assurances we’ve received from the authorities. But I think we need to trust them right now. It’s been days since the release of our evidence against Kane. There have been public hearings in the Assembly and it looks like a full repeal of the chanter ban is coming. Public opinion is in our favor.”
Garraldi snorted a laugh. “It doesn’t bother you that we’ve seen no response from Kane? He refused a summons to appear before the oversight committee, and there are reports that he hasn’t left his office since we exposed him. I don’t know about you, but I was never one to think Kane would roll over like this.”
“He’s defeated,” Danny said. “And he knows it. If he’s accepted it, why can’t you?”
“Because,” Garraldi said, “I don’t believe that he’s given up and neither should any of you.”
“Right now, none of that matters,” Winnie said. “Mom’s building is right over there. Let’s go upstairs and get her meds, then we’ll head to the station for our interview. Everything else can come after that.”
They entered Elaine’s apartment building and rode the elevator upstairs. As they stood in the box, Winnie watched her mother, who looked better than she had in years. Winnie wasn’t sure she even needed her meds, now. Her magic work with the twins was certainly having a positive effect.
She had to make time to investigate what they were doing once they returned to the Pike. It was hard to schedule anything right now. There were so many changes happening that she was hard pressed to break away from the incoming reports.
The elevator stopped and the doors yawned open.
Winnie led the others down the hallway, fishing for her keys as they walked.
She stopped several feet shy of her old apartment door.
Like many others along the hallway, it was ajar, as it had been left over a month before.
She slowly approached, then started to enter, but Garraldi pushed her to one side and went in before her, taking his appointed position as head of her personal security detail seriously.
He waved Winnie in and she stepped through the door.
She looked around. There were signs of a brief struggle from when her mother had been taken. But it didn’t look like the apartment had been ransacked by looters afterward.
“Mom, are your meds stored in the same place,” Winnie called over her shoulder, walking down the hallway towards the bathroom.
“Yes, they’re in the medicine cabinet in the bathroom,” Elaine answered. “There should be a ninety-tablet box from the last time I filled the prescription.”
Winnie paused in the bathroom threshold when she heard a noise from farther down the hallway, coming from one of the bedrooms.
It sounded like something fell over. She considered telling Garraldi but decided she could investigate it on her own.
He’d already checked the apartment, after all.
Winnie turned from the bathroom then continued down the hallway toward her mother’s room. She looked inside.
There was a lamp next to the bed lying on its side on the nightstand, still wobbling from where it had fallen.
Strange.
Winnie crossed to the nightstand and picked up the lamp to stand it back up.
A blade pressed into her flesh.
A drop of blood dripped down her neck.
A strong arm encircled her shoulders, pulling her backward.
“Don’t make a sound, middling scum,” a man’s voice hissed in her ear. “I’m tired of you looters coming down here like it’s some sort of sight-seeing tour. These used to be our homes.”
Winnie froze and fought her urge to cry out.
Clearly this man was a chanter.
Winnie raised her hands to show that she wasn’t resisting and, channeling a small bit of magic, she caused a light to appear above her extended palms.
She changed the color of the small globe from white to a spinning spectrum of every color of the rainbow, all of them blinding.
“How did you …?” The man relaxed his grip. The knife fell from her throat. “You’re a chanter like me.”
Winnie stepped away then turned to face him.
But he wasn’t a man at all. Her would-be captor was a boy of fourteen or fifteen.
Garraldi slowly crept up behind the boy, his hands outstretched, prepared to launch himself at her attacker.
Winnie shook her head to her security chief. He stopped but didn’t relax.
“I’m a chanter like you,” Winnie said. “And this is my apartment. What are you doing here?”
The boy’s shoulder’s sagged. “I’m sorry. I was looking for food when I heard you come in the door. I couldn’t get out past you so I grabbed a kitchen knife and ran back here.”
Winnie smiled. “My name is Winnie, what’s yours?”
“I’m Kripke.” He stopped and looked at her in alarm before slapping his hand to his head. “Oh my God. You’re her, Winnie Durham! You’re the one who exposed Kane. I didn’t know this was your apartment; I’m sorry. I’ve been watching the news feeds from wherever I can see them. You’re awesome.”
“Hello, Kripke. It’s a pleasure to meet you,” Winnie said. “Do me a favor. You’re still holding that knife. Why don’t you turn around and hand it to my friend so he can finally relax.”
Kripke turned and saw Garraldi’s hulking form standing behind him. Color drained from his face and he shifted his grip on the knife to a forefinger and thumb pinch, offering the knife, handle first.
Garraldi gave the boy a toothy grin and took the knife from Kripke.
“I’m really sorry, Ms. Durham,” Kripke said, turning back to face her. “I didn’t know this place was yours. I never would’ve come in here if I’d known.”
“That’s fine, and please—call me Winnie. Ms. Durham
is my mother.” She punctuated the last with another smile. The boy grinned.
Danny and Elaine were peeking down the hallway past Garraldi, trying to see what was happening. She’d succeeded in disarming the boy. Now it was time to find out what he was doing here, and how he’d escaped the sweeps.
“Kripke, why don’t you come out into the living room. We can talk some more out there, and I’ll introduce you to the rest of my friends.”
The boy nodded and turned to follow Garraldi to the living room.
Once they were all seated on the sofa and chairs around the coffee table, Winnie asked Kripke how he’d escaped getting rounded up by the Red Legs.
“I saw the soldiers coming down the street first,” he said. “Then I watched them start herding people on the sidewalks into groups and pulling them from their cars. I knew they’d catch us all, so I ducked into an alley when the group of soldiers passed, then used a trick I’d learned to make them not see me.”
“What do you mean?” Winnie asked. “How did you do that?”
“It’s something I learned when I was younger. It helped when my dad came home drunk, angry, and looking for someone to hit. I was tired of being his punching bag so I learned how to sort of disappear.”
“Disappear, as in becoming invisible?” Garraldi asked.
“I don’t know. I can still see me,” Kripke said. “I sort of thought about making it so he couldn’t see my while I called on the magic to help me out. It just worked. I never figured out how.”
“Can you show me how you do it, Kripke, right now?” Winnie shifted her vision into the magical spectrum and prepared to watch him.
“Sure, I guess,” he said.
His brow furrowed, then he blurred and became sort of transparent.
A variation of what Winnie had done to hide the vans on their run to the chanter camp. It bent the light around the surface of whatever it was cast on and hid the object, or in this case, the person from view.
Kripke wasn’t invisible. She could still see the child’s outline if she looked close and focused, but it was close.