I killed the connection and sat there, silently seething, my mind flashing through a hundred equally futile plans to do something—anything—to help those people.
I wanted to hate Glenbark—wanted to be furious with Johnny—but I couldn’t. It wasn’t their fault. It was the raknoth. It was my failure to stop them before it had come to this. I needed something to sink my rage into. Preferably something with red eyes and a thick hide.
Elise was holding me, gently stroking me. I realized I was trembling.
“Hey.” She tugged on my jawline until I finally met her eyes. “This war belongs to Enochia. Not to Haldin Raish. You know that, right?”
“I know,” I said, my voice as mechanical as my movements as I kissed her palm, pulled on my undershorts, and climbed out of bed.
“Where are you going?”
I paused in the doorway. “To do the one useful thing I can right now.”
14
Meetings
There was no getting around it: it was a long night. My eyes hung half-lidded, full of a dull burning, and my brain had long since been fried, turned to sludge, and fried again. But I kept working. If “working” was what it could be called. In truth, I mostly alternated between trying to hone my mental island technique, staring forlornly at the runes of my own cloaking pendant, begging them to cough up their secrets, and agonizing over the news of the day’s attacks.
Abductees. That’s what the reels had been calling the several hundred civilians already confirmed missing following the attacks. There were dozens of eyewitness reports floating around—frantic civilians recounting the horror of watching their loved ones dragged off by beasts with pale red eyes, loaded onto transports and carried off to Alpha knew where.
But whether Alpha knew or not, I was pretty sure I did.
Hundreds of civilians, taken by the raknoth? The WAN reels might be hesitant to make the leap, but I couldn’t imagine those people were headed anywhere but straight to Alton Parker’s facilities to be assimilated into his grotesque war machine—either as new hybrids or as the blood rack victims who’d be feeding them.
The thought had not been helping my sleep-starved brain focus on the problem at hand.
Elise and Johnny had fallen asleep on the couch behind me—Johnny softly snoring, Elise curled up in a surprisingly compact ball, her head resting on Johnny’s thigh. I’d woken about an hour ago to find them like that, apparently after having drifted off for nearly an hour myself, despite everything. Some corner of my mind insisted that that should irritate me—both my own drifting off and Elise’s head in Johnny’s lap—but I was too tired to give either thought much credence.
The way I felt, I would’ve gladly slept on Johnny’s thigh.
But I couldn’t. Not while I knew those abductees were out there, suffering the worst kind of fate because I’d failed to stop the raknoth before this whole situation had exploded. Now more than ever, we needed a way to move on Oasis and disrupt the raknoth forces. Which meant I needed to recreate Carlisle’s and Cassius’ damn little pendant, sitting there so benignly in my palm—existing, and refusing to tell me how.
We’d copied its runes onto a few dummy models in painstaking detail, despite the fact that the markings were still complete gibberish to us. Hitting them with a fancy piece of Shaping and getting it to stick—that was the hard part. The impossible part.
Maybe it’d make more sense to start simple—trying to imbue a single rune to, say, absorb heat from the air. Something I could do without effort even on the worst of days. That made way more sense… which was exactly why we’d thought of it a couple hours ago, I remembered, shaking my head. Before I’d fallen asleep. Sweet Alpha. But then… There’d been something else. Some reason why I hadn’t already tried our brilliant new plan of simplifying the problem…
Because I hadn’t been sure if a different application would require a different rune or not. That was why. We’d had an hour-long debate about exactly that, which was right about when Johnny and Elise had drifted off.
And now here I was, thinking in damn circles. Wonderful.
But Past Hal and Present Hal both raised a fair point. The runes on Elise’s and Johnny’s pendants were quite similar to those on mine—albeit simplified on Johnny’s, which lacked the adjustable range of mine and Elise’s pendants. But did that mean the runes were some kind of universal, set characters in a language I didn’t yet know? Or had Carlisle simply made them up and decided to keep things simple and copy them over and over?
Was it even worth asking these questions when I had no damn way of answering them?
I buried my face in my hands and let out a low groan. Then I made the mistake of reminding myself that untold thousands—and maybe millions—of lives might well depend on my figuring this out. I was on my feet before I knew it, pacing back and forth in a vain attempt to drain the flash flood of panic ripping through me.
I was just a kid. Just a gropping kid, and—
On the couch, Johnny gave a sharp snort, smacked his lips a few times, and resumed his vigilant slumber.
I sighed and reached out with my senses. Carefully, my thoughts all of pillows and clouds, I telekinetically lifted Elise from the couch and slowly, slowly floated her into the bedroom, onto the bed. There, she stirred slightly, her mind brushing against mine in what felt like the equivalent of a sleep murmur. Then she was out again, peaceful as ever.
I longed to go nestle up beside her and sleep for days.
Instead, I telekinetically laid Johnny down to take advantage of the full couch, then I settled cross-legged back to the floor and picked up the light etcher and one of the blank pendants Johnny had brought.
It was time to do some experimenting.
Something—a sound—jolted me awake. Reflexively, my hand flew for the daggers on the bedside table. I missed the table and hit the carpeted floor with a soft thunk.
“Hal?” came Elise’s groggy voice from… not next to me.
I looked up from the floor with a groan and realized I’d missed the bedside table because it wasn’t there at all. I was in the living room, where I’d apparently fallen asleep sitting up again. Right in the center of a heaping pile of failure and worthless pendants.
The sound repeated. A knock at the door.
“Wuzzit—Huh?”
I turned to see a bleary-eyed Johnny stirring on the couch.
“Damn delinquents,” he muttered, wiping at the dried drool stain at the corner of his lips.
“I swear to Alpha, you’re becoming an old man right before my eyes.” I pushed myself to all fours and stopped there, allowing my back’s indignant cries to subside.
Johnny huffed a victorious laugh. “Who’s the old man now, ya wimperwhipper?”
“Probably the guy using the word wimperwhipper.”
Another knock.
Elise appeared in the bedroom doorway. “Were you boys planning on answering that?”
“Does my answer to that question in any way affect my eligibility for a nice steaming cup of caffa?” Johnny asked.
Elise rolled her eyes and vaulted the divider to the entryway. I pulled myself to my feet to follow by the less acrobatic route.
“Yeah, you guys…” Johnny yawned. “… right behind you.”
Elise pulled the door open, and I barely had time to see our visitors before Elise surged forward to wrap her dad in a hug.
Franco Fields was a man whose every inch always seemed to exude sophistication. He had the same raven-dark hair as Elise, but his skin was darker, as were his eyes, deep forest green. Even with several days’ worth of unshaven stubble underlying his usual dark, slender mustache, he simply looked roguish instead of unkempt.
Behind him, his two companions, James Bell and Phineas Hammer, were polar opposites of one another—James small and twitchy with light blond hair, and Phineas a stoic mountain with a bald crown at the peak of his dark hair. When Elise finally released Franco from her warm embrace to move on to greeting James and Phineas, Franco st
rode into the room to clap me on the shoulders.
“I heard about what happened at Vantage.” His eyes traced the bandaged side of my head in what was quickly becoming a familiar double-take. I expected him to say something about how I should be more careful, but he didn’t.
James shimmied in and pulled me into a jittery embrace, complete with a hefty pat on the back. In the doorway, Phineas didn’t so much hug Elise as stand there somberly and allow her to wrap her arms around him—a right I imagined was exclusive to Elise and few others. After a second, he even reached up and patted her back.
It had been less than a cycle since we’d all last seen each other, but we were still close enough to our recent ordeals—most notably, the Legion blasting into Franco’s home and driving us apart—that it was hard not to appreciate the times we had together as if they might be our last.
By way of greeting to me, Phineas eyed my bandages then gave a nod and a grunt. There may have even been the hint of a friendly smile buried under that thick beard. I swear, he seemed to like me just a little bit more every time I got my ass kicked and lived to tell about it. Sadistic, maybe, but I chose to take it as a sign of respect from a fellow warrior—Phineas being the only non-Shaper man I’d known to punch a raknoth in the face and live to tell about it. Of course, the fact that that fist was a solid, cutting-edge prosthetic probably hadn’t hurt either.
“Ah,” Franco said, sliding around the divider and taking in Johnny and the untidy aftermath of our—or my, at least—late night work session. “Charming.”
“I might resent that,” Johnny groaned, sitting up on the couch and rubbing at his eyes. “Just give me a minute to think about it. Preferably with a nice cup of—Agh!”
He recoiled and awkwardly caught the sack of caffa beans that came sailing through the air and struck his chest. I traced the trajectory to the basic kitchen unit, thinking for a second that Elise had eked out some stronger-than-normal telekinesis from the doorway, but it turned out she’d just moved into attack position quietly.
“Right,” Johnny said, standing with his sack of beans. “Cups all around, then?”
James went to help Johnny in the corner kitchen unit while the rest of us pulled the couple extra chairs across from the couch and settled down around the caffa table.
“So no luck on the last lead?” I asked.
Franco shook his head. “Not really. This one might have actually seen something, but if we chart it with the other two probable sightings so far, all we really get is that our red-eyed friends covered a large sweep of Enochia before settling down.” Slightly louder, he turned and added, “Any updates on having a look at those records, Johnny?”
“As I told Lise,” Johnny said. “I’ll get right on that. I’m sure Glenbark would be thrilled to let more civies into the top secret club. Especially ones who think we’re too stupid to notice an alien ship sitting around in our records.”
“That would be wonderful, Johnny,” Franco said, turning back to us. “Thank you.”
Johnny narrowed his eyes at the back of Franco’s head, then he sobered. “How are things looking out there after yesterday?”
Franco’s expression turned grim. “The people are scared,” he said finally. “More and more are beginning to wake up to what’s happening—hard not to when the stories just keep spreading faster and faster. Red eyes. Humanoid monsters.” His eyes flicked to me. “Talk of demons walking the streets. And after yesterday…”
A heavy silence settled over the room.
“What’s the count at?” I forced myself to ask.
“Over six hundred,” Franco said, his gaze fixed on an uninteresting patch of the dull blue carpet.
Six hundred. Something twisted inside me, kicking in revulsion at the thought of the missing civilians who’d plagued my nightmares, probably already well on their way to becoming helpless blood bags or feral hybrids as we—
“Stop it,” Elise sent, taking my hand in hers. “This isn’t your fault.”
I took a careful breath, trying to let it pass.
“In other news, Barbara’s still set on nailing down that exclusive with you,” Franco said, almost apologetically trying to change the topic. “Could be helpful. For you and for Enochia.”
“Hmm,” I said, barely even considering. “You can tell her I’ll try soon, I guess.” It was the same answer I’d been giving for two cycles now, ever since our darling WAN reporter, Barbara Sanders, had saved my life at the gallows and I’d offered to thank her with the true story.
“You know,” I added, waving at the room, “after all this is…”
“Yes,” Franco said, his eyes flicking surreptitiously to Elise. “Yes, of course. I’ll tell her.”
“What about the other thing?” Elise asked. “That lead you didn’t wanna talk about over the lights?”
Franco’s brow furrowed. “Yes. That.” He looked around the room. “Not entirely sure these quarters are any safer than speaking over the lights”—he looked at his palmlight, swiped a few commands, and seemed to decide we were safe enough—“but we do need to talk about it.”
I waited for him to elaborate, but he seemed to be unsure exactly where to begin.
“How much do you know about the Emmútari?” he finally asked.
That made me sit a little straighter.
“Only what Carlisle told me. Ancient order of Shapers, hunted to extinction by—”
I paused as James came to deposit a tray of five steaming cups in front of us, Johnny trailing him, sipping contentedly at his own caffa. I hadn’t told Johnny about the Emmútari—in part because it hadn’t precisely come up by itself, but also in part because I wasn’t sure he’d appreciate a story that cast the prophet Sarentus and the rise of his Sanctum on a foundation of intolerant slaughter rather than one of peace and unity. He knew that the Sanctum hunted my kind, and for now, that was probably enough. On top of that, I wasn’t sure what James or Phineas might know, or if someone really might be spying on us in these quarters.
“Why do you ask?” I said. “You’re not saying this lead…?”
“I am,” Franco said, also shooting a furtive glance at Johnny, as if debating how much to say. “I was discreetly contacted by a man claiming to have answers to our questions. Both of our questions,” he added, pointing back and forth between himself and me.
“Sounds super legitimate,” Johnny said, squeezing onto the couch beside Elise.
“I don’t suppose this mystery man happened to specify what those questions might be?” Elise added.
Franco looked troubled. “He did, in fact. He knew I’d been… Well, here.” He drew something—a piece of paper, I realized—from a pocket and handed it to me. “Read it for yourself. He left this in a deposit lockup for us.”
I looked dumbly down at the note.
It felt foreign in my fingers. Too light. Too old, I decided, looking closer. Not the off-white of the pages in the few books I’d ever held, but flimsier, stained yellow with age.
“This guy’s slinging paper notes?” Johnny asked. “He’s definitely a murderer.”
No one said a thing.
Carefully, I unfolded the paper, taking in the spindly, hand-written script.
Broker,
Your wayward ship. The Prospect’s shroud. The answers to your questions lie in records long sealed—lost to history, but not lost.
If you should wish to find them, bring the Prospect to Humility on third Alphasday, the eleventh of Forge. Go to the Penitent Path. There, you will find further instructions.
Do not bring others.
That was it.
No details. No signature. Just simple instructions for me and Franco to walk straight onto this guy’s smashball court three days from now without the faintest clue of what might be waiting.
“Bit of a riddler, isn’t he?” Johnny said, leaning in to read with me and Elise. “Records long sealed and all that.”
“This doesn’t say anything about the… the order,” I said.
Johnny was looking around at us like he’d missed something. “What’s the deal with this—what was it? Em-yoo-tary?”
He hadn’t missed it, then.
“It’s a long story,” I said, “from a time before the Sanctum. Old Shapers. Lost secrets. All that.”
“Right,” Johnny said. “Of course. Classic, really.”
I looked back at the note, then to Franco. “And you’re assuming I’m this…”
“Prospect,” Elise said, wrinkling her nose. “Prospect for what, exactly?”
“I’m more concerned about the next word,” I said, handing the paper back to Franco. “How in demon’s depths would he know about Mission Mindsafe? The cloaks, I mean,” I added at Franco’s confused look. “I’m assuming that’s what he means by the shroud, right?”
“I believe so, based on our brief communication.” Franco stashed the note in his pocket. “As for the how of the matter, I’m afraid I can’t say. That he knew I was investigating the trail of the raknoth ship isn’t so inexplicable, considering I’ve had my feelers out, and my anonymity isn’t what it once was. But the cloaks, your Project Mindsafe…”
“Mission Mindsafe,” Johnny corrected. Elise shot him a look, and he shrugged. “Fine. Not important.”
“Yes, well,” Franco said, “point being, either this man has powerful colleagues and ears in tight places, or—”
“Or he understands enough about Shaping to put two and two together,” Elise said. “It’s no secret Hal’s here in Haven. We’ve all seen the headlines. If someone out there understands cloaks and telepathy enough to reason out what the raknoth did to the legionnaires at Oasis, it’s probably not a huge stretch for them to figure out at least part of what Hal’s doing here.”
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