Wine of the Gods 05: Spy Wars

by Pam Uphoff

  :: We need to track them, get to them when they're isolated. :: Edmo with echo, again.

  Ajha hiked until he was well past the Market, then cut north two streets. He glanced east and spotted the miss-matched team of horses cresting the hill. Traffic was heavy enough to slow them. He turned and strode away. Checking behind periodically.

  It vanished in between glances, unless that was it, disappearing down a road to the south.

  He turned south. Listened, mentally, but couldn't hear . . . no, he could feel a group excitement, hunting, closing in. He shivered, closed his shields most of the way and hurried south. Felt a sharp leap in the excitement and turned back east. Ajha rounded the corner in time to see the wagon turning, backing into a carriageway. Nice neighborhood . . . it clicked suddenly. They were delivering something to the other Earthers, the Native Affairs people. Figures closed in from all directions. More than eight. He spotted Idre and Egto hanging back, Wink slid up to look in closer.

  :: Let them unload. We can attack while they have their hands on the cargo. ::

  :: No. Continue to follow them. We want their base of operations. :: Usse's mental voice was deep and powerful.

  The sense of hunger disappeared, abruptly.

  :: Don't shut me out, and don't let the native see your lasers. One damn you, Edmo. Listen to me. ::

  Ajha winced at the mental shout. They are frustrated by their losses to Pax. They just want to kill something. He shivered, and wondered how the One had come to this.

  Except . . . a few of us have always been like this, I just didn't let myself see it.

  The walls of the close built houses contained and magnified the first shots. Why weren't they using laser guns? Or were they, and the Earthers' were armed?

  Wink threw himself back as the horses exploded out of the driveway, panicked by the noise. The driver was rolling from his seat into the back, and came up, pistol in hand, aimed back at the Oners. The Action Team threw themselves to the side, firing recklessly. However flimsy the wagon, the wood was thick enough to protect the driver as he fired back at the Oners. His gun snapped.

  Ajha flinched as a spike of pain rammed through his head. His stomach. No, Wink's stomach, and through the team link, Ajha's head. He reeled down the street as the wagon tore out of sight. The others pursued, but Wink was rolling on the ground, gasping. Ajha could hear whistles, the City police would be coming.

  "Wink, we need to get out of here. Where . . .crap." There was blood all over his side. Ajha hoisted him to his feet and half carried him down the street, into an alley. He propped him up against a wall, and stripped off his own shirt. Rolled it up and tied it around Wink's abdomen, hoping pressure would slow the bleeding.

  He stepped out to the next street. A small cart with a single horse pulling it. Perfect. He reached out with his mind, and felt the driver. A young man, on his way home. Ajha's mind filled with pictures of his wife, probably cooking dinner, but he turned down the alley. And he was so tired. Tired, very tired, he'd just stop here and sleep a bit . . . Ajha rolled Wink into the boot of the cart, hoisted himself up beside the driver and took the reins. The horse moved out, trotted, snorting and alarmed, probably by the scent of blood. Ajha let him go as fast as the traffic would allow, without calling too much attention to them, holding a spell around himself, a spell of normalcy. The driver flopped as the cart bounced over a pothole and leaned on Ajha. Snoring with his head on Ajha's shoulder. Ajha resisted the temptation to dump him. Don't leave a trail. No matter what.

  He hauled the horse up to make the turn onto Rock Fish, and pulled up in front of the warehouse. He put the reins in the driver's hands, and jumped down. Threw open the warehouse door. He grabbed Wick under the arms and dragged him out of the boot, through the door. The skittish horse moved off, and Ajha mentally poked the man to wake him. And thought hard at him :: I must have fallen asleep. Where am I? Oh, the docks. ::

  Wink's boots bumped over the threshold, and he whimpered as Ajha backed up and dragged him under the stairs. The dockbox was in a small room. Not concealed, but not obvious. Ajha hit the startup sequence, and while it was warming up, started stripping Wink. Broke off to tap the emergency, trauma, and abdominal buttons. The lid popped open and Ajha summoned the strength for one last heave and managed to get Wink over the lip and into place.

  He sank down and watched the blinking lights, red and yellow, mostly, until he heard the other door slam.

  ". . . left him!" Idre was following Usse, no, being dragged in by Usse. The Action Team was propping up two of their own. One was Edmo. The other was cussing under his breath and Idre raised his voice. "We could have at least . . . "

  Egto trailed in last, pale and distressed. He closed the door, and scowled at Ajha. "And where the hell were you?"

  "Hauling Wink home and getting him into the dockbox."

  Instant silence.

  Usse stalked over to the little room, Idre and Egto right behind. He scanned the readouts and whistled. "That going to be hours, just stabilizing him." The old man looked back at Edmo. "You and Ohge will have to wait. Enjoy the pain. You deserve it."

  Ajha nervously started picking up all the bloody clothing.

  "Now, youngster, how did you get him back here." Usse backed Ajha up against the wall.

  Ajha could feel his mind synchronizing, and relaxed. Remembered mentally kidnapping the driver, and how he'd sent the man off, confused, lost, and completely unaware.

  Usse snapped the link. "You're not too bad for a Clostuone."

  Outside the room, Edmo growled something under his breath.

  Usse snorted. "You aren't going anywhere for days. Your Team can scout around town a bit. Perhaps they can spot one of the Earthers. And this time. Follow. Him. Home."

  Edmo grunted in pain.

  His second glared at the old man. "We're going to kill them. Those are our orders from both the Priest and the Princess."

  Usse scowled. "I'd forgotten how single minded Action Teams could be. It's as if your joined minds cancel each other out, leaving only stubbornness and blood lust. Necessary at times, but you have to control the gestalt, let a little intelligence leak through. You've been singly unimpressive, to date."

  Ajha slid away to the laundry, unfortunately one of the native variety. He scrubbed, boiled and bleached clothing, then hung it in the alley. The yard across the alley was busy, two horses being backed up to a wagon. One was a bright black and white pinto, the other bay and white. Maybe he should talk to them, they might know of a hauler with a white and dark grey team.

  He shrugged and went back inside. No rush to ask questions, might as well wait until both Action and Info teams were at full strength. If. It was going to be a long night. There had been an awful lot of red lights on the doc . . .

  Chapter Thirty-nine

  1 March 3480 / Late Winter 1363

  Karista, Kingdom of the West, Comet Fall

  "Man, that hurt."

  Damien shot a look at Vani. She looked upset, but so far hadn't questioned that Max had just hit his head when the horses bolted. The autodoc had taken care of Max's laser burns, and Damien had emerged nearly unscathed. With no dead bodies around, the City Guards had apparently written off the attack as loud noises that had spooked someone's horses . . . alarmed the neighbors . . .

  Far be it for me to correct that idea. Or give them cause to look for that drover with the spooked horses—and a good thing I knew a regular customer who had left a nice empty house for me to lead the Oners to.

  Max was stretched out on the couch. The autodoc could only do so much, the body still had to finish healing itself.

  Damien looked at the people who depended on him, as he depended on them. My family, my hostages to fate. And not just his team mates. Code had practically adopted them two years ago, and Vani had been so much help all winter, with Code out at the farm, it was hard to remember she'd only been here for three months.

  And I think I need to get rid of two horses. It might be a coincidence that they s
potted us nearly the first time I drove the same pair that they'd seen before. But not something to bet on.

  I ought to have sold them. Except, during the summer I'm swapping teams in the afternoon and working until late at night. I could use four teams, if I had them.

  I could buy a white horse to pair with Sombrero, and a dark one to pair with Blue . . .

  ***

  Ajha hefted the foot end of the stretcher. Idre and Egto maneuvered the heavy end across the gap between fishing boat and dock, then Ajha stepped across. Almost home. The trip to Fascia had been harrowing. But necessary. Dockboxes could only do so much, and Wink needed more, and then he'd need recuperation, physical therapy.

  My manhandling him may have saved his life . . . I didn't realize he had spinal injuries . . . couldn't have done anything else, really, but I should have been gentler.

  A taxi with actual leaf springs answered their hail, and took them to the Embassy compound. The main building was still under construction, but it was a relief to reach a safe haven.

  As an anti-grav platform was slipped under him, Wink's death grip on the stretcher poles relaxed. "One! I will be so glad when this trip is over. No offense, guys but . . . "

  "Yeah, yeah. Snub us, just because you want a surgeon and pretty nurses fluttering around."

  "Especially the nurses." Wink clutched again as the platform moved. "I deserve some TLC, and what do I get? Your ugly faces."

  The medgician snorted. "Don't hold your breath. Pretty and young are not job requirements. Now, you say you have some feeling down the right leg?"

  Wink sounded hopeful. "The dockbox said it was just pressure on the nerves."

  Ajha sighed in relief as the medical staff took over.

  One of the embassy staff slipped around the medical personnel. "We've got rooms for you three. Wnco is scheduled for the next gate—tomorrow morning, very early. Perhaps you can go as well, and report to the Directorate." His nose wrinkled a bit. "Fortunately they installed all the plumbing last week. The laundries and baths are in working order. The Ambassador wishes to see you. I suggest you clean up first."

  Ajha gave him a jaundiced look. City boy. Well, the fishing boat had been a bit aromatic. And going home, relaxing, and getting centered, sounded really good. But he was willing to bet the Ambassador had other plans for them.

  Indeed. A scouting trip to Verona, to check the disposition of their military, take a look at their government and get a general impression of their society. They left an hour after seeing Wink off through the gate.

  Chapter Forty

  30 May 3480 /Spring 1363

  Cadent, Verona, Comet Fall

  "My head hurts."

  No one seemed to care, and lifting his head carefully, Ajha surveyed the state of the Info Team. Two limp bodies. He was pretty sure they were both breathing. He fumbled a simple pain reducing spell, tried again. Better. The water pitcher was empty. One damn it. He staggered out of their tiny hotel room, and down the stairs. There was a faucet in the Inn's kitchen. Cadent, the capital of the Empire of Verona was a small step ahead of Fascia, in public works, but with the city wide insanity of last night, no one was fetching or carrying for the guests.

  Ajha drank deeply, filled the pitcher and labored up three flights of stairs to the tiny room. They'd been in Verona for almost a month, quietly noting military placement and collecting gene samples, when this extraordinary celebration sprang up. They'd all drunk the wine that was circulating before they realized the mind boggling complexity of the spells layered into what amounted to a potion to cure anything and everything and get you laid, too. They'd all drunk too much, fucked too much, been swamped by the thoughts of a whole city drunk and amorous, and tried too hard to shield those thoughts. He felt drained. Ought to be drinking electrolytes, not water.

  He frowned over at the genetic analyzer. According to it, the Veronians averaged around three insertions, roughly a quarter of the genes of the prophets, local version. Before the insanity hit, they'd collected a couple of hundred samples. Two of them, a couple of children in the "Temple of Love" who were supposed to be the children of the god, had all of them. Not complete, though. Like the boy in Karista, they had dropped genes on . . . he looked up the boy's results. How interesting. They were all three missing a lot of the same genes. He pulled up Pax's results. Again. None of them had any copies, at all, of three specific genes, and digging deeper he found those missing in every sample. Individuals lacked other genes, but which ones varied from person to person.

  Only those three seemed to be completely missing from this world.

  "Good. We can always tell these natives from the One, even with ordinary analyzers."

  A muffled moan answered his speech. Idre opened a bleary eye. "As soon as we recover, we are getting out of this scary damned city."

  Ajha opened his mouth to agree, then shut it and poured the man a glass of water.

  They'd taken a circuitous route and made note of Verona's state of military readiness—high. And their army's location—west, against the border with the Kingdom of the West—or in the northeast against the border of Scoone. And the level of its weaponry—typical medieval.

  The government? It ran around a dried up little mummy of an Emperor, with a boy prince to wave to the populous and a grown princess and her husband doing the day-to-day business of running the bureaucracy.

  And they had these incredible parties, once a year.

  The God of Love apparently showed up once or twice a decade. If he didn't show, the "Virgins of Love" chose a stand in.

  Idre had had a very busy night.

  Not much else to study, here.

  Unfortunately they were ordered to stay out of Scoone. Apparently the Scooners were in the habit of burning witches and wizards at the stake, and the Commander had decided, from the long history of violence across their mutual border, that Scoone was unlikely to interfere with an Auralian attack on Verona.

  So, they'd just move up to the border and get a rough idea of the number of troops on each side kept on the border. Then they'd head south, and report to all appropriate parties.

  After they—well, technically, Auralia—had conquered Verona, perhaps they'd be allowed to infiltrate Scoone.

  Ajha looked out the tiny window at a few kids laughing and running down the street. He winced at the thought of a war fought through these streets, and what would happen to the kids.

  Then he told himself the pain was just the hangover. I'm a Oner. The natives are nothing.

  Chapter Forty-one

  Summer 1363

  Ash, Kingdom of the West

  "Here it is!" Rustle called out, and pushed the rest of the way through the brush. They'd been able to smell the sulfur from downwind, but finding the fumarole had taken a bit of work. There was a small hot pond, up against a cliff, hidden by brush and a couple of big trees. She stuck a finger in cautiously, and decided it was about right.

  "Yippee!" Primo kicked his boots off and stuck his feet in. "Our very own hot spring."

  The rest of the dragons had sort of wound up hanging out with Tromp's group, or at least around the fringes.

  But Primo was just a natural fit with the Goat Boys.

  Havi rode up on Blackberry, Cor behind him. Kett and Amo were riding Inky and Joffe and Zip were on the old Dun who was following the other two horses and had no tack on what-so-ever. Havi dismounted and tied two of the three horses up. They'd spent so much time trading around riding the horses that they probably could have gotten almost anywhere faster with no horses at all.

  "We could clear this out, just a bit, so we have more room. Just leave enough that no one will ever find it." Ech pulled out a knife and attacked a bush that filled up too much of the edge of the pond.

  They all set to, destruction coming naturally to them, and soon there was room for all fourteen of them under the remaining foliage.

  "That man is back." Ask said. "The trader that watches us."

  "He talked to me," Rustle said. "He wa
nted to know where the witches got the diamonds."

  "What did you tell him?" Ask looked at her, wide eyed.

  "I told him about the jeweler in Wallenton where Dad bought Mom that ring." She grinned. "He was all irritated and told me to not tell my Mom I'd talked to him. I figured Dad would just be steamed if I told him, so I didn't."

  Havi snickered. "I'll bet the Goat would have gotten him."

  "That's what I figured, and there's a bunch of other people here too, so it might have been awkward."

  Havi sighed. "You're ten, you don't have to be so, so . . . "

  "Grown up." Kett pulled her feet out of the hot water. "Pruney. So, what's more fun, sword fighting or magic?"

  "Sword fighting." Rustle wrinkled her nose. "The Sisters won't let me do any of the really fun stuff yet. You guys are doing really good sword fighting, though. The Auld Wulf is impressed."

  The Goats looked at each other. "Maaaah! She's acting like a grownup. Baaaaad!" Their group cry.

  She stuck her tongue out at them. "Ha! Just you wait. I'll bet I can figure out Dad's goat spell, then you'll be sorry."

  "No we won't. Then we can be real Goat Boys." Cor said.

  "You should figure out my dragon spell." Primo looked hopeful.

  "I think you're a dragon with a human spell." Rustle said. "Turning it off ought to be fairly easy. But Nil wouldn't like that. And Mayor Accure."

  Primo deflated. "Rats. I need to fly away before the girls grow up."

  "Do girl dragons really eat boy dragons when they mate?" Zip looked nervous. "I heard they practice on people."

  "Mother says that a male dragon needs to be about three times the size of the female to be certain of surviving mating." Primo said. "So, I figure I need to go far away, and never, ever mate."

  Nods all around at the obvious common sense.

  "That sounds like the best idea." Rustle said. "Sec and Trip are pretty big, and they act silly an awful lot."

  "And they are bad fencers." Ask looked smug. After almost two years, her sword work was good and getting better.