The three men, three women and I gathered around Talus and Shelly at the table. I could see that the papers were, in fact, blueprints of the hotel. Two floors and a basement: it wasn’t much of a building.
“This is our target,” Talus told us, gesturing at the plans. “There are a limited number of exits and entrances, and it appears that the vampires are using the front door, here.” He pointed at the lobby of the hotel. “There are secondary exits that they can likely use here, here and here.” He indicated each one in turn.
“My biggest worry at this point is keeping the feeders bottled up,” he explained. “I see that we can position snipers opposite this door and this door”—he pointed at the two in question—“and cover all the exits. O’Malley and MacDougall, that’s your role in this mess,” he told the two gentry. Both of them had already acquired large, ugly-looking rifles from the cabinets around them.
“The rest of us go in through the front entrance—we sweep the building, post a guard—probably you, Tamara—at the stairs here, where you can cover both sets on this side of the building.” He pointed to a spot at the end of the lobby.
“There is an access on the second floor,” I noted, touching the spot on the map. “I used it to sneak in,” I explained.
Talus nodded. “That’s a good point, and useful.” He considered the map for a moment. “Okay, Tamara, you, Frankie, Celine and Kyle will go in the front door and sweep the building, still leaving you as a guard in the lobby. Jason and I will go in through the second-floor window and sweep the top floor. We meet here”—he stabbed at the old bar at the opposite end of the hotel—“and then head downstairs. Most likely, the basement is where we will meet the heaviest resistance, so we’ll want to concentrate there.
“Any questions?”
29
WE ALL LOADED our weapons and gear into a van, more to conceal the fact that we were all wearing bulky body armor than any issue with walking the dozen or so blocks to the hotel. Shelly kissed Talus goodbye and wished us all luck before returning to the armory slash safehouse to secure it against accidental intrusion.
After the few minutes it took us to get there, Talus maneuvered the van into the parking area of the construction lot across the street from the hotel and parked. He took a moment to look back at all of us.
“Remember, there may be more prisoners in the building,” he told us, “so watch for them, and try to rescue them. But remember—I don’t want any vampires escaping alive. Kill every last one of them.”
The sound that echoed in the van was too...animal to call anything but a snarl. Talus’s comment was definitely one we could all agree with.
“O’Malley, MacDougall.” The noble gestured to the two men who’d slung heavy sniper rifles. “Think you can get up on those roofs?” He pointed through the window. Both men nodded instantly. “We’ll give you five minutes to get in position,” Talus told them, “then we’ll start moving in. Radio if there’s a problem.”
The two gentry didn’t even respond before slipping out the back of the van. I watched them for a moment, somehow weaving their way through the sparse crowds while concealing the long weapons they held under their coats.
Talus looked over at me, his expression concerned.
“Jason, you can still back out if you want,” he told me. “You’re the only one here who isn’t a greater or noble fae; you’re not really in the weight class for this fight,” he reminded me quietly. “You did more than enough by showing us where to strike.”
I needed to be along as the Queen’s eyes and ears on the ground, to see and remember the proof for Her as much as for myself. Talus knew I was a Vassal after our accidental mind-sharing, but his men didn’t—and weren’t supposed to know, either. I took a moment to think of how to explain to him, without saying the part we both knew.
“After what I saw last night,” I said even more slowly than my usual drawl. “That poor girl. I want to help—I want to kill these bastards with my own hands.”
“Fair enough,” Talus grunted. “I won’t mind the second gun hand and set of eyes upstairs.” He checked the watch. “Let’s move.”
Tamara led the way out of the van, the flicker of flame on her skin concealed by a silk scarf wrapped around her face. The rest of us followed, keeping our weapons concealed. I know I walked with my hand on the grip of the Micro Uzi under my coat, and I doubted the others were any less paranoid.
Talus led us toward the hotel, stopping by the scaffolding to look around at the group of fae.
“Jason and I will go up here,” he said simply. “Give us a minute, and then go through the front. We’ll see you in a few minutes.”
The fae noble was up the ladder so fast, I barely saw him move. I followed him up at a more sedate pace, joining him on the scaffolding as he opened the window I’d permanently unlocked the previous night. He held back, drawing his own machine pistol and waving me forward.
Taking the invitation, I drew the Micro Uzi and stepped through into the empty room. Nothing had changed from the last time I’d been in there, though weak sunlight still leaked in today, illuminating the dust and the scuffed-up track from my and Jill’s escape last night.
“Clear,” I whispered, knowing that Talus would hear me. One advantage to sneaking around when you knew your companions had superhuman hearing.
Talus ducked in, and we paused to attach the suppressors to our Uzis now that concealment was less of a factor than noise and light. The fae noble drew an ancient-looking short sword, its blade covered in black oil of some kind, and held it in his left hand.
“You have a knife?” he asked quietly. “Better than shooting them if they’re still sleeping from the sun.”
When I shook my head, he tucked the short sword into the same hand as his Uzi for a moment and produced a US Marine Corps combat knife from the small of his back, the blade pitch black.
“Nothing special about it; it’s just black to conceal it,” he whispered. “Sever the spinal cord, they’ll survive anything else.”
I nodded jerkily as I took the knife in my free hand. For all my anger at the vampires last night, the thought of knifing them in their sleep made me acutely uncomfortable. Given that the feeders were just as fast and strong as me, and some of them had blood magic as well, it made sense. I just didn’t like it.
“You go left,” the noble instructed, pointing as he stepped to the right. “Come if you hear me shoot.”
With a swift exchange of nods, I headed left. More of the doors were shut tonight than last night, presumably closed on occupants asleep against the sun. The first one was locked, but we really didn’t need to worry about people coming through after us and seeing evidence, so I burnt the deadbolt out with a quick slash of flame and stepped inside.
Two people were asleep on the bed, and I hesitated as I stepped inside. It was hard to consider killing someone in their sleep. Then I got closer and saw the state of the bed. It was half-covered in blood, as were the two vampires. The blood came from a man who looked to have been in his mid-thirties but aged another twenty years by drugs and alcohol. For all that, he hadn’t deserved to be dragged up there and have his throat torn out to feed their thirst.
The male—I refused to think of the vampire as a man—was the first and, in some ways, the hardest. I very carefully positioned the very sharp knife at the base of his neck, then, with a deep breath, stabbed home.
A human might have failed to cleanly sever the spinal cord, but a changeling like me stood at the peak of human abilities. The knife slipped between the vertebrae perfectly, with a sickening popping feel, and the vampire just...stopped.
He wasn’t really breathing and didn’t have much of a heartbeat before, so it was hard to say exactly how I knew he was dead. But I did. Quickly, realizing I was probably moving much slower than Talus was expecting, I took a deep breath and repeated the exercise with the second vampire.