“Before he was Ruined,” Angkor said, reluctantly. “His true name. Anyway. I figured you’d bargained with Elijah and the Deacon to get away from the Vigiles.”
So much for not being angry. “You really think I’d deal with that child-murdering, child-fucking-?”
“I think you’re a criminal,” he said sharply. “From an organized crime family, who was being pressured to help a lawful evil organization he hates. Given the choice between two evils, I figured you’d do what it took to survive. It was a hypothesis.”
“I stuck my neck out for you.” Fury curled my tongue and made my hands ball up. As I took a step forward, Angkor bobbed up smoothly to his feet. “I fucking risked my pride, my self-respect, my reputation to try to get close to you. You saw me being raked over the coals by the Deutsche Orden, and you did nothing except make up bullshit about me in your head?”
“Alexi-”
“Do you want to know what the Deacon offered me to kill you?” I snapped my jaws together on the last word, advancing on him. “He offered me a trip back in time to save my sworn brother. Sergei’s turned him into a fucking monster, and I could kill you and undo what was done to him, Angkor. If I said ‘yes’.”
“You couldn’t.” His face had drained of all expression.
“I won’t,” I said. “Because I don’t work for men like the Deacon, or Joshua Keen. I’m sick of men like them, and I’m sick of cowards and liars like you.”
“Don’t speak to me like that.” Angkor’s voice was cold now. “You don’t know the first damn thing about me.”
“You’re right. Because you hid it all.” I squared up my shoulders, fighting the urge to close in and deck him. “The Templars got Lee and Kristen. They got Ayashe, and they’ve probably got Jenner, Talya, and the rest. So you can stay here and live with your fucking hypotheticals, while I go help them.”
“Your crusade can wait twenty minutes,” Angkor said. His voice was cool now, like polished metal. “Norgay wants to speak with you.”
“I’m going whether you and your boy scout troop do or not. And I’m taking Zarya with me.”
"That's Zarya's decision to make," he said, voice dark with warning.
“She’ll choose me,” I stopped, but didn’t turn. “Because she doesn’t lie. She cares about me, and I gave everything—EVERYTHING—that I gave a shit about to save her.”
“If you waited just a few damn minutes-”
“You thought I was going to turn on my people. You’re right, Angkor, I am from a fucking crime family. And you know what the fastest way to piss off a brat’ye is? Tell him he’s a suka who rats out and betrays his friends.” I did turn on him then, pointing. “You keep your mercenary, manwhore ass out of her bed and out of her life, and you stay the fuck out of mine. I’ll do whatever work we have to do, and then that’s it. You can go back to space camp and keep pretending like you’re a real fucking person.”
“There’s bigger things happening than your journey of self-discovery right now, okay?” Angkor’s face was as sharp as a knife’s edge now, eyes blazing and furious. “The MahTree, the harbingers... If we can’t work together, then you can leave. I don’t need your approval to be Zarya’s Hound, or to try and save your world before it rots.”
‘Zarya’s Hound?’ I was Zarya’s Hound. I wasn’t sure what was worse: that he’d gotten to know her when I’d never had that chance, or that I’d been rejected by him for a woman.
My face heated. “This is my fucking world, not yours, and I know what's coming for it. And no, I’m not telling you. I’ll tell Norgay directly before I leave.”
“Suit yourself,” Angkor said. His features had tightened to arrogant aloofness. “I’m sorry. I thought you cared more about us than your pride.”
“I spent twenty-nine years having the worst assumed of me. I’ll fight for the people who don’t.” I hawked and spat, and with that, marched off back for the sanitarium.
Chapter 40
We found Doug loafing around t inside the main camp area. He was standing near his station to stretch his back, soda in hand, and casually glanced over as we approached. He looked a lot fitter than he had when he was sitting down. “Hey, Angkor! Norgay called about briefing. He wants Zarya to be there.”
“She’s busy,” Angkor said crisply. I let him move in front of me, trying not to glare at him as he put his back to me. “Tell him she’ll-”
“No can do, Sir.” If Doug noticed anything was wrong, he didn’t show it. “He’s not on the line yet. Said to call when everyone you want to dial in is available.”
“That will be me and Zarya,” Angkor said. His tone was decidedly frosty.
“No,” I said. “I need to speak to Norgay.”
Both Angkor and Doug turned, staring at me like I had two heads.
“I have a report from Kristen Cross to deliver, and information from Lee Harrison,” I said. “Norgay’s ears only.”
“Wait.” Angkor held up his hands. “You can’t have Kristen’s report. Not unless she didn’t code it properly.”
“You mean the flower seeds?” I said.
Angkor frowned. “Those seeds were specially designed to pass a message on to only one specific person—my commanding officer. Kristen was given blank seeds and an enchantment to be able to send a message to him.”
Then you didn’t even get that right. “Well, they didn’t work properly. I planted them and saw the message.”
“That isn’t good. Section Six better up their game,” Doug drawled.
Angkor rubbed his face. “Shibal no ma. Fine. Whatever. Just don’t embarrass yourself in front of my commanding officer.”
“And if you want to tell him he’s an asshole about something, you have to preface it like: ‘with all due respect, Sir’,” Doug added. “That’s an actual rule.”
“Don’t encourage him,” Angkor snapped.
“Well, with all due respect, Sir...”
“I swear to GOD, Doug, I’ll never buy you crystal soda ever again.”
Across the sanitarium chamber, I spotted a flicker of white: Zarya, mounting the steps as she strode toward us. I grunted. “She’s here.”
Angkor brightened and straightened, and I felt a powerful wave of jealousy as she saw us—saw Angkor—and smiled. “Okay, let’s go get this over with.”
It felt strange to be doing something as banal as arranging a meeting where Zarya was involved. She was so unearthly that I found myself feeling dissociated as the four of us gathered at Doug’s workstation. Guards were posted at the main door to the sanitarium—something of a formality, given that the building’s walls were full of holes and half the ceiling was missing. I watched on dubiously as Doug’s fingers flew over the keyless keyboard, and he brought up a window on screen. It was very like what Talya had done on her computer, but... I had no concept of what I was seeing, really.
“So, who was snitching to you in the Tigers?” I asked them all, arms crossed.
“Talya,” Angkor replied, not looking at me. “We were able to get in touch with her on Usenet.”
“And believe me, that was a trip,” Doug said. “Last time I used a phone to dial into a modem was... jeez, I don’t even remember. It was like trying to use the Batmobile to talk to a dinosaur.”
I sighed, exasperated. “GODdammit, Talya.”
“She gave me her dial-in,” Angkor said. “Ages ago. I got in contact with her and explained what was going on. She’s a Weeder... she understands the gravity of what’s happening.”
“She’s just lost her gang for doing this,” I said. “No matter how well intentioned. She’s a snitch.”
“She’s a first-generation incarnate super-predator, and she knows the stakes,” Angkor replied curtly. “The appearance of super-predators on a world like this one is a really bad sign. Her ‘gang’ won’t hurt over what they don’t know.”
“Assuming she’s not already been rendered down into her component Phi by the Vigiles.” I didn’t want to look at him, even though it was tempting to stare at t
he way the suit hugged his figure from behind. The Yen was still goading me, forcing my attraction to him.
Zarya drew up beside us, her smile fading as she looked between me and Angkor. I was slightly mollified when she came to me first, leaning in against me and bumping at my jaw with her mouth before turning to Angkor. She slid her hands over his shoulders, and turned her face to nuzzle at the side of his head, and the fractional improvement in my mood was dramatically and thoroughly crushed.
“Okay, fix your makeup, ladies.” Doug had another program up now. “We’re encrypted, online and live in three, two, one. Good morning, Sir. Can you see us?”
“I can. Thank you, Officer.” A deep, oddly familiar baritone spoke over the line. The screen was now black with a logo showing: a white circle outlined in green with an eight-pointed star in the center. “I understand we’ve escalated to Crimson status?”
Angkor bowed from the waist, hands in tight fistsby his sides. “Yes, Sir. I’m sorry, I-”
“Scouts don’t apologize, Zealot.” Norgay cut him off quietly and firmly. “They report, evaluate, revise, and proceed. As it stands, you overcame amnesia via torture, the removal of your CTRL Device, and attempted to salvage the operation to the best of your ability. How long have you been doing this job?”
“Seventy years, Sir.” He muttered.
Seventy? I gawked at Angkor in shock. Given his magic specialty, I’d been willing to believe he was fifty, but… well. I guess he’d lied about that, too.
“Your case file has sixty-five years of successful operations up until this point,” Norgay said. “We will review the collapse of the mission with that track record in mind.”
Angkor had shut down into military mode, still and self-contained. He kept his eyes down, and for a moment, I almost felt sorry for him. “Thank you, Sir. We will do our best for the rest of the time we’re here.”
“I do not doubt you.” Norgay was all parts dry, crisp, and articulate. “We have escalated to an emergency scenario, but that does not mean this Cell is lost—yet. With a Mare onsite, not to mention the man standing to your left, there’s still a good chance we can salvage the situation on a larger scale. Speaking of that, are you well, Zarya?”
I stiffened in place. Even without an image, I had the strangest, dizzying sense of someone looking out from that mostly-blank screen.
“I am.” Zarya’s tone was formal, but she was smiling and relaxed.
“Your uncle was displeased to learn you are associating with miscreants like Zealot and Digger,” Norgay remarked.
Doug laughed. “Mischief managed, Sir.”
Zarya flushed—her cheeks and throat turned a silvery metallic blue. “I-”
“-Didn’t intentionally go there to wallow in Digger’s kiddy pool, we know.” The unseen man’s voice warmed with a touch of wry humor. “So. Zealot, give me your briefing. Then I will pass on our latest.”
“With Alexi present, Sir?”
“I have on good authority that men in his line of work are known for their discretion,” Norgay said, amused.
I blinked, and considered Zarya for a moment. She was standing at ease, hands behind her back, like she’d done it all her life. Maybe she’d told him about me.
Angkor sighed heavily. “Agent Cross is dead. Alexi has reported that the second Keeper is dead. Our last Keeper is still MIA, and his radio is unresponsive. We don’t know if he or Lee divulged the location of the Shard. I’m concerned that they extracted the information from Lee and then had her disposed of.”
“No.” I shook my head. “It was an accident. She caught a round when we were escaping the Vigiles holding facility together. They were torturing her, and she broke out and rescued me. We made our way outside into Fresh Kills landfill, and she was shot just inside the perimeter fence.”
“Oh, yeah.” Angkor grimaced. “You were there, weren’t you?”
“If they were interrogating her, I doubt they managed to get her to talk about her discovery. She had a ferocious will,” Norgay said. “Did you overhear anything of the sort, Alexi?”
“No,” I said. “They were in the middle of torturing her. From start to finish, all I heard were screams. She broke out of the torture room.”
“If they were trying to get her to bend with pain, I guarantee she held her silence. Which means that two of the three have managed to keep their secret, and only one remains.”
“Who else died over this?” I asked.
Angkor pressed his lips together in a thin line.
“You have permission to answer his question, Zealot,” Norgay said, after a couple of tense seconds.
“It was Michael.” Angkor nodded stiffly. “The leader of the Pathfinders. You remember him?”
I did. Michael had been the Elder of New York before Jenner. We’d discovered him half-transformed and eviscerated in Lily and Dru’s forest bunker. I’d only met him twice: an ebony-skinned, bald, austere man with kind eyes and a formal, controlled air. “Yes.”
“He was the hereditary Grovekeeper of this Cell,” Angkor said. “And the true Elder of the state. I figured out that the Templum Voctus Sol were the ones who helped John Spotted-Elk into his position, probably to put him in a position to learn where to find the Garden. He didn’t. Michael took his secret to the grave.”
I rubbed the inside of my arm thoughtfully as I listened. Petty as it was, I didn’t want to tell Angkor the coordinates Lee had given me. She’d trusted him, but she trusted Norgay more. And so did I. “I see. And there’s a third?”
“Yes,” Norgay replied. “Continue.”
“There was a second Harbinger event which allowed us to find the location of the Spur fragment.”
“Where?”
“Wall Street,” Angkor admitted. “The Vigiles are making use of a building there, and we’ve got people watching it already. Besides that, we found Kristen Cross’s final report on the involvement of the Deutsche Orden with the Vigiles. Or, more accurately, Alexi found it... and he decrypted the message. Which is why he is here.”
“You might want to let the eggheads in Section Six know,” Doug says. “Tell ‘em their magic beans didn’t work properly.”
“I’ll be sure to do that.” Norgay sounded distinctly wry now. “Alexi, has Angkor briefed you on our essential mission here?”
“No,” I said. “I’ve been neck-deep in conflict with the TVS since August and the Vigiles since earlier this month, but Angkor hasn’t told me a damn thing.”
“That is precisely what he was supposed to do,” Norgay said. “But I will give you the essence of it. The MahTree who you were being held captive with is a refugee. Zealot risked his life and soul to go into a warzone and save her and several other trapped Trees a number of years ago, patiently regrowing them from nothing but roots and Rhizomes prior to finding shelter for them.”
I glanced at Angkor’s profile. He was stony-faced, eyes forward on the screen.
“Rehabilitation was mostly complete when Zealot’s location was compromised by a paramilitary cult affiliated with the TVS,” Norgay continued. “Odaeyang. They took the Tree and brought her here.”
I nodded. “To America, or to this ‘Cell’?”
“To this Cell. The local chapter of this cult was wiped out during an international conflict with the Crusaders. Both organizations are interstitial, having a presence on multiple worlds. The Deutsche Orden’s East Asian chapter assembled a multinational strike force to intercept the Tree and brought her to the U.S., where they have the best facilities for Phitometry.”
“They tortured her.” Zarya finally spoke, low and furious. I looked over at her. Her hands were fisted by her thighs. “Her final cry was… it was…”
“I have no doubt she was terribly abused,” Norgay said. “But to continue. The Templum Voctus Sol briefly had possession of the Tree, and she was recently reclaimed during a raid on the Church of the Voice here, where they are based. Zealot has been pursuing this Tree since she was kidnapped.”
“I think I
know who’s behind the Deutsche Orden and the Deacon’s cult,” I said. Whoever this Norgay was, I was pretty sure he needed to know what Celso and Lee had told me. “Lee told me that she was handed into the Deutsche Orden by her father, who was himself a Crusader agent. She told me that he was being led by some kind of supernatural being called ‘Munificence’. I convinced another man to talk, too: the son of a Mafia Don who’s been working in opposition to the Deacon. He said that the Deacon answers to an ‘angel’, whose name is Providence.”
At mention of Munificence’s name, Angkor’s head turned like an owl’s, skin paling. Zarya made a stifled noise in her throat. Norgay said nothing at all.
“I, uh... I feel like I’m missing something here.” Doug scratched his jaw, turning back to look at me.
Me too. I nodded.
“Did either of them describe Munificence or Providence?” Norgay’s tone had hardened now. Seriousness, not anger.
“No description of Munificence, other than that she’s apparently blind and there was some confusion as to her gender. Celso said Providence was an angel. Tall, long white hair, blazing blue eyes. I thought she sounded like a-”
“Gift Horse,” Zarya finished. “Yes. She’s a Ruined Mare.”
“You say ‘Ruined’ like a title,” I said.
“It is, sort of.” Zarya was clearly troubled. “We are fruit, bat’ko. What happens to fruit when it is not eaten?”
“It goes bad.”
“Ruinicornu are bad fruit,” she said. “Most are like Glory: Gift Horses who have been forced into a corrupt state. Providence and Munificence are... they were born that way. Morphorde-born. They are... “
“The seed-daughters of one of the Morphorde’s Generals,” Norgay said grimly. “Celebrity terrorists, you might say. They must be softening up the Cell prior to an invasion. That’s the only reason Ruinicornu of their station would be here.”
I swallowed. How much should I tell them? The glyphs on the inside of my arms itched. “I, incidentally, had a meeting with the Deacon. The short version of how is that he wanted to parley, and he asked me to kill Angkor and Charles Bishop, the head of the CIA Paranormal Special Activities Division.”
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