War Song (The Rift Chronicles Book 2)

by BR Kingsolver

  On the way out to Domingo, I explained what I proposed to do. He didn’t tell me I was crazy, or even act particularly surprised.

  When I finished, he said, “You know that after university, I spent four years as a guardian. Did I ever tell you that?” He grinned. “Do I get to decide what flavor of nookie?”

  “I’m yours.”

  His grin widened.

  Carmelita and her grandfather met us when we arrived at Domingo and took us around to their garages. Aleks and Jorge knew each other, so introductions didn’t take any time. One of their mechanics awaited us.

  “What exactly do you want to do to the car?” the mechanic asked.

  “I’m going to turn it into a flying machine,” I said, indicating the boxes Aleks and I brought from my car. “I need to install a magitek converter, baffles and directional controls, along with a gyroscopic stabilizing system. I’ll also install an enhancer connected to the engine that will extend its time between charges almost indefinitely. If we’re going to use it for a getaway car, we don’t want to have to stop at a charging station.”

  To say he looked skeptical would be an understatement, but he put the huge limo up on a lift so I could access the undercarriage. I had prepared the devices ahead of time and built them much larger and more powerful than what I had installed on my cop car. The limo weighed about fifteen thousand pounds, and I figured it would be a bitch to steer once I got it into the air. I planned on adding the same package to the limo we were borrowing from Novak, although only one of them would fly during the operation.

  It took me about two hours to install everything and test it, then I drove it outside and took it up in the air. I discovered I was right about the steering, and I was glad I’d thought of installing the stabilizers. I hadn’t done that on my Toyota, but it was a sleek pursuit vehicle, and I wanted nimble control. The limo just needed to go fast in a straight line. If anyone chased it in a jet or a helicopter, I’d take it back to the ground.

  “How much for this kind of modification?” Jorge asked.

  “Assuming that I get it back to you in one piece, we’ll consider it payment for the rent on the vehicle.”

  “And to do other cars?”

  I named a figure. He didn’t show any surprise.

  “That’s with a family discount,” I said. “Cost of equipment and labor plus twenty percent. Double that commercially. About two-thirds of the limo price for a smaller vehicle like mine.”

  I handed him one of Mary Sue’s cards. “Right now, we’re producing weaponized drones for Commissioner Whittaker and Osiris, but she’ll schedule you in. There is one catch. You need to be a magitek to drive it.”

  He nodded, a slight smile on his face. “I’m acquainted with Ms. Dressler. You said ‘we’?”

  “We’re partners. I’m the lead designer.”

  When we finished, I washed up and took Aleks out to dinner, then we went back to his place, and I let him have his way with me. A truly enjoyable evening, and since I didn’t know if we would survive the next few days, I thought I deserved it.

  I drove out to Novak the following day. Mychal was mostly recovered from his injuries. He fed me lunch on the terrace off his suite. It was a bright sunny day but very cold. The mage shield covering the terrace made it quite pleasant, though.

  His rooms were more expansive and fancier than what my grandmother provided for me at Findlay House, but he was the son of Frank Novak, the Family head.

  “Has Kirsten been out here?” I asked.

  He shook his head. “I don’t want her to get the wrong idea. I prefer she just sees me as Mychal, a cop, not a part of the richest Family on the planet.”

  I chuckled. “She knows who you are. Now, if you’re saying you can’t marry her, that she’s always going to be a mistress, then you’d better start lavishing gifts. She likes you a lot, but she won’t stick around without some commitment from you.”

  He looked away, staring off at the immaculately cultured garden. I studied him.

  “Or are you afraid she’s only after your money?”

  Turning back to me, he said, “I’m a nerd, socially awkward, and not that much to look at. Why else would the most beautiful, intelligent woman I ever met be interested in me? I can’t figure it out.”

  I grinned at him. “Because you’re a nerd, socially awkward, very intelligent, and actually damned good-looking. The walls in our house aren’t that well insulated, so I might also postulate that you’re extraordinarily good in bed.” I waited a minute for him to process that. “I’ve known Kirsten almost twenty years, and the past few months is the only time I’ve ever known her to be monogamous. She almost never invites men to stay at our place. I think she’s got it bad.”

  His expression was stunned.

  “But just in case you aren’t serious,” I continued, “you should know that every person that’s ever hurt her, in any way whatsoever, I’ve hurt worse.” I smiled and batted my eyes at him. His stunned expression turned to one of shock.

  “Anyway, let’s talk business. I assume you’re aware of the offensive Akiyama and its allies plan. I need you to help me spring Karolyn Moncrieff and capture or kill Akiyama Hiroku.”

  Mychal requisitioned one of Novak’s limousines, and I installed the equipment I had brought with me. We took the car up and flew around the area to test it, then landed.

  “Dani,” he said as I got in my car to go back to town, “I really do love her. I want to spend my life with her.”

  “Then tell her before someone else makes her an offer. She’s always wanted to be a fairy-tale princess. She’ll say yes.”

  Chapter 43

  The Akiyama offensive was set to launch at midnight. But the demons didn’t get the memo, or maybe they couldn’t read human. Half of the demons assigned to assault the airport began their attack at eight o’clock in the evening. Two of the five groups of demons assigned to the attack on the port facilities also launched early, but not in concert with each other.

  An Akiyama convoy left Wilmington at three o’clock and met up with Moncrieff fighters at Elk Neck. The combined force moved south starting at sundown, almost clogging the freeway. Troop ships from Wilmington sailed around the Delmarva Peninsula and back up the Chesapeake, landing at the Gunpowder River estuary.

  By nine o’clock, the convoy had passed the restaurant where my team waited in a suburb imaginatively named North East. I gave the signal, and two hundred of Whittaker’s elite troops set out for Elk Neck via boats from the opposite shore. Another two hundred flew in on helicopters, and a hundred more followed my group in from the north.

  I drove the lead car with Aleks, Carmelita, and two elves, while Mychal drove the other car with Kirsten and the other elves. We had used illusions to disguise the limos, and the plan was to make them invisible when we reached the gates of the Moncrieff estate.

  As we travelled, I received information through my implant concerning what was happening elsewhere. I already knew the demons were attacking in certain areas, and that our allies were taking advantage of the disjointed assault to flank some of the enemy forces.

  Likewise, when the Moncrieff troops and Courtney’s Findlay guardians set out from the Findlay estate to attack Novak, our allied forces swept down from the northwest, and using passcodes and routes I supplied, breached the defenses at Findlay House. Courtney wasn’t a detail-oriented person, preferring to give orders and delegate. So, no one had changed my accesses, either to the physical properties or the computer systems. In fact, the overall system was still being administered by the mysterious Dexter.

  On our journey down the road into the Elk Neck Peninsula, we didn’t encounter a single vehicle traveling either way. It was sort of eerie.

  I pulled to a stop at the last bend in the road before we came to the Moncrieff estate, and killed the headlights. We all got out and went over the plan again, then the elves cast their spells and rendered the cars invisible. I got back into the limo and drove it to a point less than fifty feet fro
m the gates, praying the whole time that Mychal didn’t rear-end us.

  At that point, I slithered out of the car, carrying a magikally enhanced laser rifle. Leaning against the car I could no longer see, I set the rifle to full power and aimed it at the gatehouse. When I pulled the trigger, the gatehouse disappeared. Swiftly shifting my aim, I took out the brick post on the other side. What was left of the wrought-iron gate crashed to the ground.

  I slipped back in the car, and we proceeded into the estate. It was quiet, and I didn’t see anyone about. We knew there were troops there, but hoped most of them were guarding the perimeter walls and the great house itself.

  We managed to reach the house without being detected and parked the limos at each end of the open traffic circle in front of the house.

  As my group left the vehicle, I pushed a stake with a blue plastic pyramid on top in the ground in front of the car. I doubted anyone would notice it, or be concerned about it if they did. It looked like a child’s block—which it was. A red cube would mark the location of the other car.

  I was the only one on the whole team who could cast neither a shield nor a glamour. Siarin took my hand and cast a glamour on me, transforming me into a man in the uniform of a Moncrieff guardian. She would have to stay close to me, though, to maintain it.

  We walked around the house, trying to stay in the shadows in spite of the bright floodlights. My group planned to enter the house through the kitchen entrance, while Mychal’s group waited outside to cover our exit.

  The two elves Joren had inserted knew we were coming. Their job was to ensure they had Karolyn ready to go, and to cover us as we took her out. Mychal’s group would take her and leave the estate. If things went well, and we weren’t discovered, I might also go looking for Hiroku.

  Updates were coming through my implant. The demons who were supposed to flank Whittaker’s troops between Annapolis and Baltimore had jumped the gun and attacked early. What they found was an ambush, including two hundred of Mary Sue’s drones. By the time the rest of the demons on that front started to move, the slaughter was over, and our forces had pivoted back to meet them.

  We were still two hours away from when the coordinated attack was scheduled to begin—two hours away from the transports coming into the airport.

  I disabled the lock on the kitchen door, and Gildor slipped through. Siarin and I followed him, with Aleks and Carmelita behind us. I had armed each of the humans with a laser rifle like mine and convinced the elves to exchange their sidearms for fifty-caliber Raiders firing explosive incendiary rounds. I really didn’t give a damn if we lit the place on fire, or who we killed, with the exception of three beings in the house. I figured the elves could take care of themselves, so that left only Karolyn for me to worry about.

  The computer system had supplied me with the house’s layout. We passed by the kitchen, where servants were baking for the next morning, and took the servants’ stairs up to the third floor. We made it up there without encountering anyone.

  “Here’s where it gets dicey,” I whispered. “We know there are guards on this floor, and we might encounter some of the family, also.”

  I pushed open the door and found a guardian standing in front of me, a puzzled look on his face. I didn’t wait for him to understand that someone invisible had opened the door. The laser on one-quarter setting burned a hole through his chest, and he dropped to the floor.

  Several doors down the hall, two more guardians stood, flanking a doorway. I shot them both and trotted toward them.

  Gildor arrived before I did and tapped on the door. It was opened almost immediately by a human woman dressed in Moncrieff livery. Without even a blink of surprise, she reached down, grabbed one of the dead guards, and dragged him into the room. Gildor hauled the other guard inside, and we all filed into the room.

  The servant morphed into the form of a female elf.

  “She’s in there,” she said in elvish, pointing deeper into the suite of rooms.

  “Let me go,” I said to Siarin, and was suddenly able to see my own hand. I strode through the suite until I reached the main sitting room. Karolyn stood at the windows on the other side. I could see lightning and flashes of light in the distance.

  “We’ve come to take you out of here,” I said.

  Karolyn whirled around and stared at me. “Dani?”

  I walked to the window and looked over her shoulder. “I think that’s our landing party, taking over the Moncrieff airport,” I said. “There should be more troops coming from the north in a few minutes.”

  “Beatrice?”

  “She’s safe in Ireland.”

  “Thank God.”

  “We’re going to take you downstairs, and turn you over to some more of my people. “

  “Dani, there’s a huge attack planned for tonight. The Metroplex airport, the Baltimore seaport, as well as attacks on Novak and Domingo.”

  I smiled. “We know. Come on, let’s get you out of here. Then I need to find Hiroku. You wouldn’t happen to know where he is, do you?”

  “Probably the basement. That’s where all the computer and telecom stuff is located.”

  “Easiest and most discreet way of getting there?”

  She shook her head. “I’d have to show you. You know how much of a maze these houses are.”

  I looked at the long dress she was wearing. “Change. Quickly.”

  Karolyn had never struck me as stupid, and she didn’t disappoint me. Without a word or any hesitation, she hurried to her bedroom and started pulling clothes out of a bureau.

  “Can you unzip me?” she asked.

  I moved her hair aside, found the zipper, and pulled it down. Shrugging out of the dress, she let it pool around her feet and stepped away from it. She pulled on tights, jeans, a turtleneck shirt, and a heavy sweater, then retrieved a pair of boots from her closet.

  “Ready. Did you come up the kitchen stairs?” she asked. I nodded. “We need to go back down that way to the second floor,” she continued.

  The elf who had been her companion led the way, and we quickly started back down the stairs. One floor down, the elf donned her servant’s glamour again and opened the door from the landing to the hallway. After a brief look around, she waved us forward.

  Instead of going the long way down the hall, we turned left toward a door at the end only a few feet away from us.

  “It’s locked,” the elf said.

  I cast a spell and the lock clicked. She tried it again, it opened, and she smiled.

  Down two more flights of stairs to the bottom. Another locked door that I opened. Down a hallway, around a corner to the left to the end and another locked door. Through that one was another stairway down. The hallway at the bottom was larger and round, more a tunnel than a hallway. Lights in the ceiling every twenty feet provided the only illumination.

  “We’re not under the house anymore, are we?” I asked Karolyn.

  “No, we’re actually under the east lawn. You know that ugly fountain with all the cherubs? The computer system rooms are under it.”

  “This isn’t the way most people get there, is it?”

  She shook her head. “Mother would never abide all those lower-class people traipsing through her house. They take stairs down from a building next to the garages.” She waved her hand in the air. “This is a maintenance tunnel. The electrical, water, and all that stuff for the house run through here. We’ll take a branch off it to the computer center.”

  “Really? All the electrical?”

  “Yeah. It runs under the garages, and the main power plant is in back of the garages.”

  I hung back and pulled Aleks close to me. “Do you have any magik that could break those large water pipes?”

  He studied the overhead pipes. “Yes, if you don’t mind drowning.”

  “But you could disrupt them once we’re above ground?”

  “Yes, I suppose.”

  I turned to Gildor and gave him a handful of magitek enhancers. “Could you pl
ease stick one of these on that large pipe every time there’s a junction?”

  He shrugged, reached up, and attached one to the overhead pipe. Nine feet off the floor, and he didn’t even have to jump.

  “Like that?”

  “Exactly like that.”

  Aleks grinned. “I know how to trigger a magitek device, but how will I find them?”

  “Through me. Don’t worry, I can feel them from a several hundred feet away.”

  We followed Karolyn until she made a left turn down a smaller side tunnel. Fifty feet ahead was a bulkhead door.

  “That is a back entrance to the computer and communication complex. You go through that door, and you’re in a room with the power converters and a backup generator. You’ll love it, lots of magitek. There’s a door from there into a room where all the wiring runs, then another door to where people work. Somewhere in there is where Hiroku and Karl hold all their meetings virtually with Benjiro and other people from all over the world.”

  “How many people are in there?”

  “Tonight? At least a couple of hundred. People have been coming in from China and Japan the past two weeks.”

  “Where’s the closest way out of here for us?” I asked.

  “Go straight the way we’ve been going. Another hundred feet, there’s a stairway on the right that leads up to the garages.”

  Chapter 44

  My original plan was to try and kidnap Hiroku, but I wasn’t sure the team I had with me could take on two hundred people—most, if not all of them, mages—and make it out safely. But I also hadn’t counted on being handed the keys to destroy their entire command center.

  I called everyone together.

  “I can disrupt all their electronics,” I said. “Once we do that, Aleks can burst all those large water pipes and flood everything down here. We’ll need to get up those stairs over there and be prepared for resistance when we come up into the garage.”

  Everyone nodded except Karolyn. “You know that both Hiroku and Karl are hydromancers, don’t you?” she asked.