“I can physically prevent you from approaching Sturm’s fort,” he ground out.
“No, you can’t,” Catalina said quietly.
Rogan’s magic splayed out around him, a furious elemental thundercloud. The magic-sensitive people in the room sat up straighter, unconsciously trying to put some distance between themselves and the churning power. It shot out and met the cold wall that was my magic.
We stared at each other. The tension in the room was so thick, you could slice it with a knife and serve it with tea.
Leon whistled a melody from a gunfighter Western.
Rogan crossed his arms, regarding me. “Just out of curiosity, how are you planning on surviving long enough?”
“She’s going to let her grandma handle that,” Grandma Frida said.
“I would like to help,” Edward Sherwood said.
The room turned to him.
“You’re not a combat mage,” Rynda said softly. “And you’re still recovering.”
“But I am a Prime. My brother is at the root of all this mess.” Edward’s jaw was set.
“Thank you,” Rogan said. “We can use your help.”
I crouched in the field. Rogan waited like an impassive statue next to me. A few hundred yards away Sturm’s compound glowed, a bright electric jewel in the midnight fields. We’d doubled around the compound, across the pastures. The only road leading to the compound lay on our left, where it ran into the gate and the main guardhouse inside the electrified fence perimeter. Another, smaller guardhouse waited to the right, and two more were behind the ring of the inner wall, out of sight.
The place looked like a prison.
Around me Rogan’s people waited, quiet shadows in the dark night. I checked my watch. Fifteen minutes left on the deadline Adeyemi gave us. We had cut it too close. The wind was rising, the air thick as soup with violent magic.
Behind me, Cornelius stood with his head bowed. Behind him, Diana and Blake, Cornelius’ older brother, waited quietly, eight jaguars sitting at their feet, three black and five golden. The big cats watched the night with their bottomless eyes. Matilda sat with the cats, a human child somehow part of their pack. I couldn’t figure out why everyone insisted on bringing her with us despite the danger. When I asked Diana about it, she just smiled.
Edward Sherwood stood by himself on a level stretch of ground. He’d been sprinkling seeds out of a large packet around himself for the last five minutes.
Nothing left to do but wait.
“Are you sure you want to use that old tank?” Rogan asked me for the third time. “I can still get you a better one . . .”
“Hey!” Grandma Frida reached out and poked him with her finger. “You can get her a newer tank, but not better.”
Another minute dragged by.
“The badgers are through,” Cornelius said, and wiped the sweat off his forehead.
The jaguars dashed into the night. Above them two owls soared. Both Diana and Blake looked into small tablets, whispering into their communication sets.
Cornelius came to sit by me. He looked haggard.
“Will the cats go through the badger tunnel?” I asked.
“Not under ordinary circumstances,” he said. “But they will do whatever we ask of them.”
The cats reached the edge of the light and slunk forward, moving silently.
Another long moment.
“What if they are seen?”
“They won’t be,” Cornelius said. “The word yaguar means he who kills in one bite. They don’t suffocate their prey. They pierce its neck with one bite. Their jaws can crush a human skull. In terms of an ambush predator, they are perfect.”
Another minute.
Tension rode me. I had to squish the urge to run into that field of light screaming just to let it out.
Another minute . . .
“They are through,” Cornelius said.
Nothing changed. From all outward appearance, the base appeared untouched.
Talon landed on Cornelius’ arm. Cornelius looked at Edward, who nodded. The animal mage handed a small sack to Talon. The hawk clutched it in his claws and flew off.
Time to get in position. I got up and moved across our perimeter to take my place with the small team in tactical gear. Six people formed up around my sister. Rivera was in front, Melosa behind Catalina, and Leon on Catalina’s left. I took the spot on her right.
Catalina looked down at her ballistic vest. She looked twelve in that helmet, vulnerable and delicate. The worry in her eyes punched me.
“Are you sure?” I asked for the fiftieth time.
“Yes.”
I put my helmet on.
On the far right, Edward Sherwood straightened and held out his hands. White grass sprouted around him, its stalks forming a complex arcane circle. Wow.
Seconds dragged by.
“It’s done,” Diana said in my ear.
“Team Alpha, go,” Heart said.
We took off through the field, aiming for the nearest guardhouse and its gate. A few breaths and the sheltering darkness ended. Suddenly we were in the light, exposed like sitting ducks. My sister was right next to me in a stupid helmet, and if there was a sniper on the roof, they could shoot her right in the face.
Don’t think about it, don’t think about it, just do it.
I ran, trying to cover as much of Catalina with my body as I could.
Heartbeats echoed through my head, one, two, three . . .
We crouched by the gate. Rivera pulled out big wire cutters. Behind the fence, a guard slumped over the console inside the guardhouse. A wet red smudge marked the window.
The gate swung open. We dashed across to the wall and the door within it. One of the other ex-soldiers slapped a small charge on it. Rivera pushed us back, and we flattened ourselves against the wall.
The charge popped like a firecracker.
Rivera checked the door. Gunfire tore the silence. A siren screamed somewhere.
Rivera pointed to Leon and Melosa, and nodded to the door.
Leon lunged into the doorway, Melosa behind him, her magic screen flaring to shield them from the hail of bullets.
“Now!” Leon barked.
Four shots blended into one.
“Clear,” Leon called.
We filed into a narrow hallway, prone forms in the two guard cages on both sides of us.
A female ex-soldier slid a camera onto a flexible wire, checked the hallway, and drew back as bullets answered. “Long hallway. Rooms on both sides.”
The hallway probably ran the entire length of the wall.
“Marko, give me head count,” Rivera barked.
An older male soldier closed his eyes. “Three dozen in the room on the left, about five dozen on the right.”
They had pulled all of the personnel from the wall to box us in.
Catalina stood against the wall, her face bloodless.
A small metal object rolled into the hallway.
“Grenade!” Melosa lunged forward.
I threw myself over Catalina.
Magic flared in front of Melosa in a blue screen. An explosion shook the building. Melosa flew backward. Something burned my back. Debris pelted us.
Melosa rolled off the floor, snarling. “Fuckers.”
We were pinned down here. There were a hell of a lot more of them than of us. We couldn’t go forward. We couldn’t sit here, because they would come calling with superior firepower and flush us out. If we ran outside, they would shoot us.
“Now,” I told Catalina.
My sister pushed me aside and stepped forward. Her hands shook.
“You have to do it now. You can do it.”
She pushed from the wall. Magic coursed through her. I felt it. Like heat from a stove.
“Initiate deaf mode,” Rivera snapped.
I didn’t hear anything, but if everything went well, right now the helmets’ noise-canceling software was pumping sound into the soldiers’ ears.
Catalina turne
d to the hallway. Melosa followed Catalina, the blue screen shielding my sister. Magic coursed through her. The breath caught in my throat. So much power . . .
Bullets ripped into the barrier, sending waves through it. Catalina opened her mouth. Her skin glowed, as if a golden light warmed her from within. She raised her hands palms up in the mage pose. Her voice, impossibly beautiful, rolled through the building, an intimate whisper that somehow sounded as loud as a church bell, carrying a heart-stopping pulse of magic with it.
“Come to me.”
Too strong. She’d poured so much magic into it.
The gunfire died.
I moved next to her, blocking her from Rogan’s people.
A man walked into the hallway. He dropped his gun, pulled his helmet off, and knelt before my sister.
Rivera stared at me, trying to catch a glimpse of Catalina. I shook my head.
Men and women were coming through the hallway, dropping their weapons, and kneeling.
“Follow me to safety.”
“Face the wall!” I barked, and pointed at the wall. Rogan’s squad turned and put their faces into the wall.
I stepped aside. Catalina turned and walked past me outside.
People followed her, single file, moving past us smiling.
“Go!” I told Leon.
He pushed through the column of people outside, trailing Catalina, his gun up. If any of them tried to touch her, he would shoot them.
They came and came and came. I tapped my helmet’s comm link. “Rogan, she used so much magic. She will need immediate evac. Don’t let them kill my sister.”
“She’ll be safe,” his voice said, reassuring and calm. “I promise.”
Two of Rogan’s people followed the column. Marko and Melosa jumped on them.
The column marched through the fields. Above them the sky raged, shot through with lightning. Wind tore at their clothes. We had minutes until the storm hit.
The last person left the wall. They kept walking, oblivious to another shape speeding in the opposite direction on its tracks, the massive gun pointed straight at the wall, and Team Bravo, Rogan’s sappers, running next to it. Catalina had done her part. It was my turn.
I ran out of the building. Rivera’s team followed me.
Romeo tore through the chain-link fence. I ran up to it, climbed on top, and into the hatch. The inside of the tank was cramped and dark. I groped about for the weapon I told Grandma Frida to leave for me. My hand brushed the heavy cold metal. There.
Romeo lurched.
“Ready to do this?” Grandma Frida yelled.
“Ready.”
Romeo fired, shuddering. Another shot, another shudder.
“We have us a hole!” Grandma Frida laughed. The tank lurched forward. “Old tank, my foot. I’ll show him an old tank.”
I grabbed my firearm and popped out of the hatch. The bright electric light blinded me for a second. The wall was a dark barrier behind us. I blinked and saw the nearest construct, an enormous horselike beast, gleaming in the light of the floodlights. Its eyes flared with bright electric blue. It opened its jaws, testing scissorlike teeth as big as my forearm.
This was a bad idea. This was a horrible, ridiculous idea.
The XM25 in my hands weighed a ton. I leveled it at the construct, braced myself, and squeezed the trigger. The airburst grenade launcher spat a grenade. The recoil jerked me.
The grenade smashed against the horse’s chest and exploded, ripping a hole in its center and sending metal and plastic flying into the air. The construct faltered. Ha! They didn’t call it the Punisher for nothing.
Parts torn away by the blast streamed back to fill the hole. Crap.
“Go!” I yelled at Grandma. “Go!”
Romeo sped forward, circling the dome. The horse snarled, a harsh metal roar.
Holy crap.
It snapped its fangs and gave chase.
The little tank charged as fast as it could go, which wasn’t fast enough. The horse hurtled toward us.
I lobbed another grenade at it. It ripped through the bottom part of its stomach and blew apart its legs. The horse stumbled. Behind it, the massive tiger construct rounded the bend.
“Get down!” Grandma Frida screamed.
I whipped around just in time to see the massive rhino construct bearing down on us from the opposite direction.
I ducked inside. The construct smashed into the tank, sending me into the bulkhead. My helmet smacked into something hard, rattling my skull. Things went blurry.
Romeo shook. Grandma Frida fired another missile.
Steel teeth blocked out the light in the hatch above me. I saw metal guts glowing with magic. The horrible screech of metal ripping metal lanced my ears. The tiger was on top of us and trying to dig in.
Metal groaned. It was ripping our armor.
When I shot the horse, the explosion should’ve carried the particles out, but it didn’t. They shot out a few feet and fell back in. The magic contained the explosion.
I thrust the grenade launcher straight up, into the metal throat, fired, and dropped down. Metal teeth snapped, nearly scissoring my arm off.
The blast wave punched me, but not nearly as strong as it should’ve been. Suddenly light flooded through the hatch. I scrambled up. The tiger was rolling on the ground, a quickly reforming mess where its head used to be. The rhino had managed to come around and tore after us. The horse was only yards away.
I fired and kept firing, trying to buy us time. Massive gouges scored Romeo where the tiger had carved at it. We couldn’t take another attack. If we let the tiger get to us, the construct would open us like a tin can.
An explosion rolled through the air. We rounded the dome and I saw the wall collapsing in huge chunks.
We rocketed down the grass, the small tank and three giants following it: the horse, the tiger, and the rhino.
The horse leaped onto Romeo, looming over me. Enormous teeth ducked down.
I fired my last grenade into its gut and dropped into the tank, hearing it blossom into a beautiful explosion. That’s it. Out of ammo. I had three regular grenades left. I grabbed them and thrust into the open. The horse had faltered and the tiger took the lead.
I pulled the pin and tossed the grenade. The tiger dodged and leaped, metal tail snapping, claws spread for the kill.
That’s it. We’re done for.
A huge chunk of the wall rose and smashed into the tiger, knocking it aside in midair. The tiger crashed, the section of the wall on top of it, its tail flailing frantically, sticking out from under the wreckage. A second chunk landed on top of it.
Ahead, Rogan stood in the circle he drew on the paved driveway. He flexed, his hands clawing the air.
Another massive section of the wall rose in the air and flattened the horse. It didn’t rise, buried under the rubble.
Romeo rolled past Rogan.
Behind us, the rhino was coming up, unstoppable, massive, pounding the ground with its feet.
Rogan thrust his hands up.
A twenty-five-yard section of the wall shook. He was trying to break it free from the rest, but it held.
The tank stopped, turning.
“Jump!” Grandma Frida ordered.
“What?”
“Jump!” she snarled.
I pulled myself out of the hatch, jumped and rolled into the grass. Romeo sped toward the rhino.
Oh no. No . . .
The small tank rammed the construct. The rhino veered at the last moment, throwing all of its bulk against Romeo’s flank. The tank rolled on its side. The rhino tore at it with its feet, punching holes in the armor. Fear turned my insides liquid. I ran toward it, because that was all I could do.
A shadow fell on me. The section of the wall slid above me and swept the rhino aside, burying it.
The heap of rubble shook and exploded. The rhino sprang free, reforming.
The ground underneath it split. A forest of shoots sprang up, spiraling up to the sky, fed by magic,
straight through the rhino. The construct flailed, trying to break free, but the shoots caught the particles that made its substance and kept growing, thicker and thicker, becoming branches, their wood encasing the captured parts. Magic shook the lawn. The tree swept the rhino off the ground, trapping the stray pieces as they fell. An enormous tree spread its branches, a hundred and fifty feet tall, its trunk twenty-five feet wide. The colossal Montezuma cypress shook once and became still, towering over the lawn.
Wow.
Grandma Frida crawled out of Romeo, her face stained with blood. She ran for the remnants of the wall.
The sky tore. A funnel spun from the clouds, reaching toward us. We had run out of time.
“Nevada!” Rogan snarled.
I turned. He was running toward me. I sprinted to him. We collided. His arms closed around me.
The wind disappeared. It was suddenly calm and peaceful. I looked up. Rogan’s eyes had turned a glowing turquoise. He’d accessed his ultimate power. We stood in a circle of null space. Nothing would penetrate. This was how he broke entire cities, reducing them to rubble.
Around us the storm raged. An enormous tornado was forming just beyond the dome, as if someone had taken the storm clouds from the sky and spun them into a maelstrom.
The wall of air cut at us and stopped, severed by the perfect circle of the null space around Rogan. Beyond it another tornado touched down. Then another.
Dear God . . .
The circle containing us pulsed, the echo of it rattling my bones. The dome in front of us cracked.
Another pulse.
Pieces broke from the dome’s top, crashing down.
Rogan was looking into the distance. He began rising.
I clamped him to me. If I didn’t, he would keep going until he ran out of magic. Nothing would be left and our people wouldn’t be able to get away. They were too close.
He kept rising.
“Connor! Stay with me.”
His hands were still locked around me. My feet left the ground.
The third pulse. The dome cracked like a broken egg.
“I love you, Connor. Please come back to me. Come back.” I kissed him. “Come back.”
He turned his head slowly and looked at me, his eyes still distant, as if waking up from a deep sleep. Recognition flared within the magic-saturated turquoise.