The Book of War, page 22
The two guards looked at each other, then at me again. Finally, the Warden in black said, “No one’s been inside since the bone magi brought Lucia here, Ms. Campbell.”
I let out a relieved breath. “See? That wasn’t so hard. Thank you.”
“Who poisoned her?” the Warden in white said.
“I…I’m not allowed to say until the person is taken into custody,” I improvised. I felt instinctively that I shouldn’t spread the information around in case Nyla got wind of it and escaped. True, these men weren’t likely to be in a position to reveal it, being stuck on guard duty, but I knew what Lucia would say if she found out I’d given it away. I hoped she would eventually be in a condition to yell at me again.
“We won’t let anyone pass,” the Warden in white said.
Movement at his hip caught my eye. Without anyone touching it, the steel knife slipped from its sheath and flashed upward. I stared at it, dumbfounded, as it flipped end over end and pressed against the Warden’s neck. The man barely had time to let out a choked cry of astonishment before it slit his throat, sending a spray of arterial blood pulsing into the air.
I threw myself out of the way and landed heavily on my hip. The Warden sagged and collapsed, letting his gun fall from lifeless hands. The Warden in black brought his handgun up, then hesitated as if he realized how crazy it was that he was pointing his gun at a free-floating knife.
“Watch out!” I shrieked, pointing at the Warden’s own knife, which had come halfway free of its sheath. The Warden clapped his free hand over it, shoving it back down, and the flying knife took advantage of his distraction to dart inside his guard and ram itself halfway to the hilt in his left eye. I screamed again and scrambled backward on hands and feet. “Jun! Run!”
“She’s not running,” a familiar voice said.
I scrabbled around to face the way I’d come and saw Nyla standing there, her hands on her hips and a satisfied smile on her lips. Jun, standing just behind her, was expressionless. I stared at Jun, willing her to grab Nyla, to do something to stop her. She didn’t move. “Jun,” I said, then couldn’t think of anything else to say.
Nyla walked slowly toward me. “What an interesting complication you make,” she said.
20
“I ought to kill you, too,” Nyla said. “But I have a hard time killing people I know.”
I ignored her. “How much of that story was true?” I asked Jun. “You met an intelligent invader, but you took its offer?”
“I told you it made a convincing argument,” Jun said as Nyla half-turned to look at her. “Taking its deal made sense. But I’m not going to explain myself to you. I don’t owe you anything.”
“That’s not entirely true,” Nyla said. “We owe her for introducing us to this world. And putting us in a position where we can gain everything we ever wanted.”
My chest felt tight with fear. “Nyla, what could you possibly want that only one of those treacherous, lying monsters could give you? Or claim to give you, since they have no reason to keep their word to humans. They only see us as walking repositories of magic, did you know that?”
Nyla turned back to me and took a few steps in my direction. “I know all about it,” she said. “Know more than you, clearly. They only want a few humans, now and then, criminals and losers, people who won’t be missed.”
“They told me that too, but they lie. Why would they stop with just a few when there are so many of them starving for our magic?” I shook my hair out of my eyes where it had come loose from my ponytail. “They’ll never stop until they’ve drained our world, and then they’ll move on to the next one.”
Nyla’s smile was pitying. “You can’t see the truth. It doesn’t matter. They’re winning, and anything you do to try to stop them is pointless. Jun and I accepted it—it’s too bad you can’t. Wouldn’t you love to keep your husband safe? Keep all the Wardens safe? All you have to do is join us, and when the war is over, no more fighting, no more hunting. It’s your heart’s dream, isn’t it?”
I shook my head. “Nyla, it’s a trap, all of it. What did they promise you to get you to go along? Wealth?”
Nyla smiled more broadly. “They promised to take care of Mom.”
“But I could do that!” I exclaimed. “Nyla, you don’t have to bargain with them. If that’s what you want, I can afford to get her the best care, or have a bone magus maybe even heal her—”
Nyla was shaking her head. “Not that kind of care,” she said. “Do you have any idea what it’s like to care for an invalid, day after night after day, never being able to do so much as get a damn haircut without making a production out of finding someone else to take over while you’re gone? I’m tired, Helena, tired of living like a slave, and my new friends have promised to end that for me. Permanently. Just as soon as I wrap up this last little detail.”
I got to my feet. “You’ll have to get through me.”
Nyla shrugged. “If that’s what it takes.”
An unseen force swept me off my feet and hurled me into the wall, knocking the wind out of me. I gasped, bending over, desperate for air, but the same force pressed me back, pushing me against the wall until I was spread-eagled and helpless. My head twisted painfully to one side, pressing one cheek against the wall that smelled of cold concrete.
Nyla walked up to me and patted my other cheek. “You stay there like a good girl, and we’ll talk more when I’m done,” she said.
I tried to speak, but my jaw was as immobile as the rest of me. This was so far beyond what I’d thought Nyla’s talent was. She’d gotten more from the invaders than a promise that they’d kill her mother.
Nyla made her way around the fallen Wardens and the pools of blood to the door. She put her hand on the knob and cocked her head as if listening to distant music. “Complicated,” she said, “but not beyond me.” She rested her forehead against the wood and closed her eyes.
Jun passed in front of me. I glared at her, keeping my despair and embarrassment at having been fooled by her well hidden. I’d thought I was being so noble, and all I’d been was an idiot.
Jun stopped where I could see her, behind Nyla. She turned her head to face me.
And she winked.
I gaped at her, uncomprehending. Jun took a couple of casual steps away from Nyla and pulled a familiar white baton from beneath her cardigan. I hadn’t realized she still had it. She twisted it, making it telescope out to a three-foot length, and said, “Nyla, what’s that?”
“What?” Nyla said, turning.
Jun lunged and caught Nyla square at the base of her throat, right where the cardigan fell open. Nyla’s whole body jerked as if she’d been electrocuted. She landed in an awkward tangle of limbs in front of the door. The grip on my body disappeared, and I sagged and caught myself before I could join her.
Jun switched the baton to her left hand and offered me her right. “Sorry about that,” she said. “She caught me by surprise, and I had to pretend I was her ally so she wouldn’t kill me like she did those two.”
“You were convincing.” I rubbed my neck. “Is she dead?”
“I don’t think so. It wasn’t a head shot, at least not exactly.” Jun knelt beside Nyla and felt for a pulse. “She’s alive. I don’t know if that’s good or bad.”
“The problem is, she’s going to wake up eventually, and how are we supposed to keep a telekinetic captive? Especially one who’s had her talent goosed to eleven by the invaders?”
We stared at each other. “We can’t even lock ourselves in Lucia’s room and wait for help,” Jun said.
“And even if we had some way to tie her up, she’d just fling knives at us. Or figure out how to shoot a gun with her mind.” I gathered up the Wardens’ weapons and carried them far down the corridor, hoping out of sight would be out of the range of Nyla’s talent.
When I returned, Jun held something small and crystalline in her fingers. “I wonder if this will still work?”
I took it. It was a glass earbud. “Is this Nyla’s?”
“Yes, and I’m trying to overcome my revulsion at the idea of putting it in my ear after it’s been in hers.”
I grimaced. “I’ll do it.”
I wedged the thing into my ear and was relieved to feel the brief swelling sensation that said it was fitting itself to me. When I was sure it was secure, I pressed my finger against it and said, “Malcolm?”
Nothing happened. I was about to repeat his name when a voice in my ear said, “Helena?”
“Oh, I’m so glad,” I said. “Listen, Malcolm—”
“Are you all right?”
“Yes, but—”
“I can’t talk now. We were hit while I was taking the sports to a secure location. Nyla and Victor are both down, and Mike is badly wounded. We’re trying to reach the infirmary—”
“Malcolm, listen to me. Nyla is the traitor. She must have pretended to fall to get away from you. Jun and I caught her at Lucia’s room, trying to finish what she started. I need someone to take Nyla into custody—she’s powerful, Malcolm, the invaders altered her to be as strong a telekinetic as a stone magus.”
Silence again. “Malcolm?”
“Helena,” Malcolm said. His voice was clear enough that I could tell he was suppressing a dozen exclamations. “Helena, how did you stop her?”
“I didn’t. Jun did. I’m going to give Dave so much crap for not having her searched before taking her into custody. Look, we don’t know how long Nyla will be unconscious, but we need help.”
“It kills me to admit I am in no position to join you. Contact Henry immediately. He’ll know who to send.”
“Be safe. I love you.”
“This will all be over soon. The Wardens are winning. I love you.”
I shifted my hand and spoke again, before my aching heart could override me. “Dave? Dave Henry?”
Instantly the reply came, “Who is this?”
“It’s Helena Campbell. Nyla Priest is the traitor who tried to kill Lucia. Jun Li and I have her unconscious outside Lucia’s hospital room and we need someone to take her into custody.”
This time, the silence lasted so long I was afraid the communicator had broken. “Dave?”
“Helena, what in the hell is going on?”
“I just told you. I think I was very concise. Could you save your incredulity for later? We don’t know when Nyla will wake up, and I don’t know if it’s good for her to be zapped repeatedly.”
“I don’t understand half of that, but—Helena, stay put, and I’ll send someone.”
“And tell them not to arrest Jun. She’s not a traitor.”
“I wish I had time to ask you how you managed to escape custody,” Dave said. I removed my hand from the communicator without replying.
Jun stood over Nyla, her baton at the ready. “You said she was as strong as a…what kind of magus?”
“A stone magus. They’re all powerful telekinetics. I saw one stop a speeding truck once. Well, it wasn’t actually speeding, but it was a massive truck.”
“So they’ll have a way to contain her.”
That hadn’t occurred to me. “True. That’s a relief. Although…” I looked down at the unconscious Nyla. “They’ll try her for attempted murder, and their punishments aren’t lenient. That makes me uncomfortable.”
Jun didn’t change her position at all. “I know. But it’s not as if it’s safe to let her roam free. Maybe she has trouble killing people she knows, but that might not last. Not to mention that there are billions of people she doesn’t know and might not have any problem killing.”
I heard footsteps, and the purr of a motorized cart, and turned to see a handful of people rushing down the hall toward us, followed by not one, but two of those carts, both traveling more sedately than the one that had brought us to the infirmary. “Be careful,” I said when the people were within speaking distance. “She’s a powerful telekinetic, and—”
“How powerful?” said a woman in teal scrubs who knelt beside Nyla, forcing Jun to take a step back.
“She killed those Wardens with their own knives. She’s like a stone magus. And she’s the one who poisoned Lucia.”
The woman’s face went grim. “Might be better if she never woke up. Better for her, at any rate.”
“She has to face justice,” I said, feeling cold at the realization that I’d just delivered Nyla into the hands of magi capable of killing with a touch. Blood clot to the brain, heart attack, disrupting the nervous system—and it would all look like a natural death. “Promise me she will.”
The woman looked at me, and her expression softened. “Friend of yours?”
“I thought she was. I guess I was wrong.”
“I promise no one will enact vigilante justice on her,” the woman said. She stood and gestured to her companions, who lifted Nyla and deposited her, not very gently, into the back of the first cart. I thought about yelling at them, but realized I wouldn’t have been very gentle myself and let it go.
The magi were gentler with the bodies of the fallen Wardens, putting them into the second cart. I ran back down the hall to retrieve their weapons and laid them atop their bodies. It felt like preparing someone for Viking funeral rites.
One of the Wardens, dressed in the black jumpsuit of a Gunther Node tech, unlocked Lucia’s door and held it open for scrubs-suited magi to enter. I made as if to follow them, and the woman in teal scrubs who had climbed into the cart next to Nyla said, “You’re not allowed in there.”
Her peremptory tone irritated me. “Why not? We saved her life.”
“Because you’re not bone magi and will just get in the way of the healing.”
“They’re going to restore Lucia?”
The woman took Nyla’s wrist as if checking for a pulse. “The fight’s not going well. We need her in charge. And those bone magi are doing this instead of saving Warden lives. So stay out of the way.”
I couldn’t argue with that. “We’ll wait out here.”
“You should come back to the infirmary with us. There’s nothing you can do here.”
I wasn’t about to tell her that the sight of Lucia’s mottled, unconscious face had rattled me, nor that I superstitiously feared that some of these magi were corrupted by the invaders. It was irrational, but after the day I’d had—hell, it wasn’t even a full day yet!—I felt inclined to give in to paranoia. “She’ll need to know the truth about who poisoned her,” I said.
The woman shrugged. “Fine. You’re braver than me. She’s going to be pissed off royally when she finds out what’s been going on. You want to be the target of her fury, go ahead.” She signaled the driver, who wheeled the cart around and drove back the way he’d come, followed by the other cart. The remaining Wardens grouped up on both sides of the door, like they thought numbers could make up for their fallen comrades.
I stood in the doorway and peered inside, ignoring the glares of the guards. There were enough bone magi in the room that all I could see of Lucia was the foot of her bed. Jun had retreated to the wall opposite the door. I joined her. “Malcolm said the Wardens were winning,” I said.
“Maybe that was true where he was,” Jun said. “This is a big place. The Wardens might not be able to hold all of it.”
I nodded. I didn’t like what the woman had said, about the bone magi being pulled off duty to take care of Lucia. I wasn’t going to say Lucia’s life was more valuable, fundamentally, than the nameless Wardens who might die because these magi weren’t in the infirmary to save them, but there were things only Lucia could do that might save so many more lives. So didn’t that make her more valuable in the long run?
The hall was perfectly silent, quiet enough that I could hear my pulse beating. The guards eyed us as if they weren’t convinced we weren’t a threat. I glared at them, but it didn’t intimidate them. That was for the best. Lucia didn’t need guards who could be overawed by anything.
Then I heard a voice croak, “Davies? Get in here!”
My heart beat faster. I rushed across the hall and into the room. It was crowded with six bone magi, the bed, and me, but I only cared that Lucia was sitting propped up against the elevated head of the bed. She looked way too pale, and her eyes were deep holes in her face, ringed with darkness, but they were alert and intelligent. “Lucia,” I gasped.
“Save the exclamations and tell me what happened. I was poisoned?” Her voice sounded as raw as if she’d been screaming.
“By Nyla Priest. Only we thought it was Jun at first. Nyla made a bargain with the invaders—”
“All right, that’s enough.” Lucia sat up and winced, putting a hand to her abdomen.
“You should take it easy,” one of the magi warned.
Lucia shot him a sardonic look, and the man subsided, looking like he’d just realized what a stupid thing he’d said.
“I feel like I vomited up my intestines,” she said. “Let’s walk, and you can tell me the rest.”
“Walk?” another of the magi said.
Lucia glared at him. “You want to carry me, Reintgen?”
Reintgen swallowed. “I’ll call a cart.”
Lucia put her hand to her ear and swore. “Who removed my communicator?”
Nobody looked willing to admit to having done it, or maybe none of them knew. Lucia snorted and swung her legs over the side of the bed. “Never mind. Davies, let’s go.”
Outside the room, Lucia eyed Jun skeptically. “You’re sure it wasn’t her?” she asked me.
“I’m sure. She zapped Nyla unconscious and saved your life.”
“Which is exactly what I’d do if I were a Mercy operative who wanted access to the heart of the Gunther Node.” Lucia smiled. It wasn’t a pleasant expression. “But at some point paranoia has to give way to faith. Don’t think I’m not watching you, Ms. Li.”
“That’s fair,” Jun said, stepping up next to me. “I’d be suspicious of me, too.”
