We fought and we won, but everyone was hurt and tired. We’d paid a toll. We would likely pay another before this was over.
“It’s you and me,” I said. “It will have to be enough.”
“It always has,” he agreed.
Chapter 13
“Walther Q5 Match SF.” I lifted the gun from its spot and showed it to Alessandro seated across from me on the bench. “Blue trigger. 9 mm. 17 rounds.”
“Walther Q5, blue trigger, 17 rounds,” Alessandro repeated.
The cabin trembled as our vehicle rolled over some pothole in the road. Scarab 17, one of the latest in Grandma Frida’s line of armored personnel carriers, didn’t provide the smoothest ride but it would roll over a mine like it was nothing. The inside of it resembled the Bus: two long benches attached to the walls with a weapon console between them, which I was currently mining.
I slid the Walther back into its spot and picked up the next gun. “Duncan Arms Little Brother, red trigger, 9 mm, 17 rounds.”
“DA Little Brother, red trigger, 9 mm, 17 rounds.”
“Maximum Defense PDX.” I lifted the light machine gun out. “Tan finish, 7.62x39 mm, 21 rounds.”
“Excuse me,” Julian said from his spot to the left of me. “Why are you doing this?”
“It shaves off time from the manifestation,” I told him. “It will help him summon weapons faster.”
It also helped when the specs of the firearm were said out loud. For some reason, Alessandro retained it better, and by now we had gotten the system down to an art.
Bladed weapons didn’t require a review. They were simpler. When Alessandro needed a blade, he called up something narrow and fast or something heavy and wide and the exact length or weight of the blade didn’t really matter. But the firearms were more complicated, so we assessed them to make sure he could replicate them fast. Once Alessandro summoned something, he couldn’t summon it again for at least twenty-four hours, so selecting the right guns required a balance between too many options and not enough versatility.
“Got it,” Alessandro said. “Next.”
“Mossberg JM 940, 12 GA, 10 rounds.”
Technically it was 9 rounds but when Alessandro summoned guns, they popped into his hands with a round in the chamber already. The beautiful thing about this shotgun was its speed. In the right hands, it fired almost as fast as a semiautomatic rifle.
“Winchester 1895.” I didn’t need to go through the specs. He knew the rifle.
Julian blinked. “It’s an antique.”
“Newer isn’t always better,” Alessandro said.
“What does it even fire?”
“.30–40 Krag,” I told him. “Next, Duncan Arms, Big Brother.”
I tapped the section of the console and it slid straight up, displaying the machine gun. It weighed eighteen pounds and I didn’t feel like taking it out.
“338 Norma Magnum, maximum range 2,300 meters, 700 rounds per minute.”
Arabella had christened it the Six Thousand Dollar Gun. Linus gave it to us for free, but the ammunition it ate cost $8.50 per round. It cost us about six grand to fire it for a full minute.
Julian stared at the machine gun as if it were a striking cobra. “Is this necessary?”
“We won’t know until we get there,” Alessandro said.
“This is my family.” Julian clenched his fists.
And this was exactly why I never took clients with us. Unfortunately, Julian had insisted. If we didn’t take him with us, he would follow us in his car. I could compel him to stay if I disclosed that I was the Acting Warden, but I didn’t trust him enough. Right now, we were just FBI consultants riding to the rescue.
“ETA five minutes,” Brittney called out from the front passenger seat.
Brittney was one of our private guards and the only aegis we managed to get on our payroll. The aegis mages were hideously expensive and very selective about who they worked with. Brittney was a Notable, meaning the magic shield she projected would stop an average handgun and absorb quite a bit of rifle fire, but a sniper bullet would go straight through it.
I glanced at the screen embedded in the hull above Alessandro’s head. It showed the feed from external cameras. We were driving through an estate neighborhood, a weird hybrid of rural living and suburbia. Huge houses sprawled on two- to three-acre lots, set way back from the road and protected by walls and gates. An affluent neighborhood. Their biggest battles were likely with their HOA and herds of marauding deer.
“This has to be a big misunderstanding,” Julian said, and I couldn’t tell if he was trying to convince us or himself. “I can’t imagine Kaylee would hurt her grandparents. It’s just not in that child’s nature.”
Human nature was a tricky thing. Five years ago, all I’d wanted to do was to scurry unnoticed through life, never causing conflicts, never getting into fights. Never drawing attention to myself. Yet here we were.
I had to make sure I didn’t screech.
Alessandro was watching me.
“She has a big heart,” Julian continued. “She was always a good girl. She wouldn’t do something like this.”
I didn’t ask him what “something like this” meant to him. He was too scared to go there. But I did need to redirect him, or he would become a distraction.
“Mr. Cabera, have you checked on your other family members?”
He gave me a startled look.
“You have a large family. We know where your parents are, and we think we know where your brother and your niece are. What about the rest of your relatives? Somebody just targeted the Head of your House.”
The Scarab turned. We were almost there.
“I don’t . . . I don’t know.” Julian’s eyes went wide.
“Please make some calls,” Alessandro said. “You can do this from the safety of our vehicle.”
“But don’t you need me?”
Normally I would have jumped at a chance to use an upper-range halcyon in a fight. But Julian’s hands kept shaking. Right now, he needed his own halcyon just to slow his breathing.
“We can fight,” Alessandro said, his voice firm and sincere. “But we can’t track down your family. You know them best. It would help us tremendously.”
“If you’re sure . . .” The relief in Julian’s eyes was painfully obvious.
“Absolutely,” I told him.
He took a deep breath. “Okay.”
The Scarab stopped.
I opened a small box attached to the wall of the cabin, took out two pieces of chalk, and stuck them in my pocket. I doubted they would give me an opportunity to draw an arcane circle, but it was always better to have the chalk than to not.
The view on the screen showed a paver driveway. Kaylee wouldn’t let us get through the doors of the house. She’d want a spectacle in front of an audience and whoever was with her likely preferred to target us in the open. The pavers of the driveway lay close together but not close enough for an arcane circle. The line would be broken. I’d need the screen.
Alessandro unlocked the rear door. Heavy metal clanged and the ramp slid to the ground. Brittney came from the front, dressed in full tactical gear complete with a helmet and bulletproof vest.
“Stay with Mr. Cabera,” I told her.
“Yes, ma’am.”
I undid the Velcro straps securing the roll of the screen to the hull and slid the cloth handles onto my shoulder. Made of dark plastic with several layers, the screen resembled a giant yoga mat, six by six when laid flat. It took the chalk like a dream. Circle mats like this one had existed forever, but common wisdom said that only circles drawn directly on unmoving surfaces, solid ground, the concrete roof of a building, and so on, were actually useful. Drawing a circle on a mat broke the magic continuity and failed to anchor it to the ground. Without that anchor, the circles were just chalk drawings. I had tested it myself, and the drop in power with an unanchored circle was dramatic.