Damian's Oracle (14 page)

Claire.
Darian was silent, his voice
almost too hushed to make out.

Damian dropped an envelope on the table in
front of her.

“There are traitors on the council,” Damian
started. “Our European front has been growing progressively weaker
the past hundred years. They know what they shouldn’t about our
capabilities and our weaknesses. Jule’s going crazy trying to keep
up.”

He pulled photos from the envelope as he
spoke. Dustin began sorting through them. She didn’t want to look,
sensing she’d met a source of their issues already.

“Sofia, Han tells me you’ve gotten quite good
at reading people.”

She said nothing.

“The quarterly council meeting is tonight.
You’ll get to meet all my council members.”

Dread trickled through her.

“You can tell me who the traitors are.”

“Is this what oracles do?” she forced herself
to ask.

“Oracles do many things, but this is one of
them,” Dustin responded. “It’s unfortunate you don’t have a mentor
to show you more about your talents. The ability for you to
determine a traitor from a loyalist is one of your most valuable
talents. It’s also what makes people hate oracles.”

“People hate oracles?” she repeated,
distraught.

“Let me rephrase - people
fear
oracles. It’s a good thing. The more people fear you, the less
they’ll fuck with you.”

She rested her chin on her knees, gazing at
Damian.

“You’ll identify the traitors,” Damian
continued.

“Then we take them out back and - “ Dustin
ran his finger across his throat.

Sofia gripped her throat with one hand.

“You kill them?” she whispered,
horrified.

“Bad people,” Damian said. “People who would
kill you. People like Czerno. Dusty takes care of these kinds of
people.”

“Yep,” Dusty agreed.

She shuddered as the distant sensation of
burning returned. If any man deserved death, it was Czerno. But
did
any man deserve death? And if she told Damian who to
kill, did that make her
worse
than them? Her eyes slid to
Dustin as she tried to reconcile the executioner with the man who
liked presents. She met Damian’s gaze.

“Ours is not a pretty world, kiri,” he said
firmly. “This is what you are.”

It wasn’t the reassurance she hoped for.

Stop Claire,
Darian all but
demanded.

Their plan made sense, as ugly as it was. Who
better to weed out traitors than the one who could see them for
what they were?

“I wanted to see if you’re to the point where
you don’t need human touch,” he said, gesturing to the
pictures.

She shook her head. She leapt up and closed
the door behind her, turmoil in her breast. She didn’t belong in
the human world anymore, and yet, she couldn’t just dump it. Her
thoughts darkened and returned to Toby and Jake.

No, she could never become as cold and
accepting of death as the men around her, even if they were at war
with a monster like Czerno.

But it’s my fate.

Damian’s gaze lingered on the door after the
oracle fled. Something more than Dusty killing bad guys was
upsetting her.

“Wanna visit the sector?” he asked, turning
his attention to Dusty. “I’ll show you what Rainy’s guys
found.”

“Yeah.”

He held out his hand, and Dusty clasped his
wrist, allowing him to transport them both to Tucson Sector HQ.
They appeared in the quiet living room, turning at the startled
gasp.

Rainy’s Natural, a beautiful woman with mocha
skin and blue eyes, leapt up from her seat.

“No worries, Traci,” Damian said, seeing her
panicked look. She’d been there for about two months, not yet
enough time to acclimate to the Guardians.

“Rainy around?” Dusty asked.

Traci’s eyes were on Damian. A human’s
reaction to him never ceased to intrigue him. It was irritating,
most of the time, like now when he wanted to get a quick response
out of one.

“Traci,” Dusty said more sharply.

She looked to him and blinked.

“He’s sleeping,” she said at last.

“You wanna wake him up or you want us to?”
Damian asked in amusement.

She hesitated only a moment longer before
bolting and disappearing up a set of stairs.

“Can’t take you anywhere, D,” Dusty
complained.

“Like you’re normal,” he replied.

“Who decorated this place?” the groused,
taking in the lopsided posters of cars and beer bottle décor.

“You’re such a woman, Dusty,” Damian said
with a chuckle.

“Speaking of women … “ his BFF said, pinning
him with a look. “What’s up with your oracle? She didn’t seem happy
today.”

“Damned if I know. She walked in on me and
Claire last night.”

“I bet that went well.”

“Nothing, and they’re both pissed at me. You
didn’t tell me Claire was coming this way, bro..”

“Bro, I didn’t know. You can blame Jule for
that one. Is Sofia doing any oracling yet?”

“She’s learning. Han says she’s progressing
pretty quickly, though since none of us know how to train her, it’s
hard to tell. She’s trying,” he said. “We’ll find out what she can
do when our guests arrive.”

“Ikir, boss,” Rainy greeted them as he
trotted down the stairs, dressed in jeans and nothing else. “You
scared the shit outta Traci.”

Damian caught his eye and looked pointedly at
Dusty. Rainy smiled faintly with a nod.

“What’d you find?” Dusty asked, oblivious to
the exchange.

“Traci found several of the vamps’ stash
houses here in Tucson,” Rainy said, motioning them to follow him
into a small, dark study humming with electronics.

He sat down in front of a computer and pulled
up a satellite image with the stash houses marked.

“This is what’s interesting,” he said,
pointing to a trail leading from a stash house on the northeastern
side of the city and dead ending in the desert. “She can’t pick up
anything past this point.”

He drew a box around a large area.

“Only you and Czerno can put up one of those
types of shields,” Dusty muttered.

“And it’s not mine,” Damian responded. “Any
intercepts on why he’s in town?”

“The local intel team is having a problem
tracking his vamps. We think they’re using disposable cells. As
soon as we get a number, it goes inop.”

“But we know he’s here,” Dusty said.

“Yeah, pretty sure. This square is ten square
miles, though. Unless we know where to look, we won’t find where
his base is.”

“It can’t be a coincidence he’s here, a few
miles from
you
,” Dusty said, turning to him.

Damian nodded. He suspected Czerno’s Watcher
allies tipped him off.

“The vamps we’ve captured for interrogation
have a new technique. They’ve been killing themselves with cyanide
pills,” Rainy added.

“What happened in Europe is happening here,”
Damian said, meeting Dusty’s gaze. “Antoine probably wasn’t the
main threat in Europe.”

Dusty studied him, an odd look crossing his
face. Damian waited expectantly, but he shook his head.

“It’s probably nothing,” Dusty said. “I’ll
check the records to see which Guardians

rotated here from Europe from the past
year.”

“After the Quarterly, we’ll pack up and clean
up,” Damian said. “Hopefully, Sofi can tell us who’s on Czerno’s
payroll.”

“I hope so,” Dusty replied. “Rainy, can your
Natural trace anything at all within the square?”

“Nope, though I’ve only let her past the
barrier once. Not sure what traps Czerno might have set.”

Dusty gave Damian a cool look, and he heard
the unspoken warning about women being the downfall of mankind. He
smiled.

“Send the UAV’s over the area,” Dusty said.
“We’ll see what we can see.”

“Got it,” Rainy said, turning to face them.
“I need more people, boss, or a transporter at least.”

“I’ve got several incoming,” Dusty replied.
“Damian, transporters?”

“None have survived recruitment,” he said
grimly. “We had three in the last class, more than we’ve seen in a
few hundred years. All three were gunned down. Jule’s short, too.
We can pull in a Natural from Latin America. He’s the closest.”

“Hector?”

“Yeah.”

“I’ll contact his station chief,” Dusty said,
pulling out his phone. “Whoever is taking out the recruits knows
who to hit first.”

“They do indeed,” he agreed.

“Call me if you need a transporter in the
meantime,” Dusty directed. “I’ll make myself available.”

“Thanks, boss,” Rainy said. “You have a new
Natural, ikir?”

“I do.”

“If she’s flipping out, you can call Lon’s
wife. Traci hasn’t adjusted yet, and Linda’s been a big help.”

“Linda’s the talker, right?” Dusty asked,
glancing up from his phone.

“Yeah. Good girl.”

He’d been considering how to help Sofia
adjust. She seemed a solitary person, but he wondered if she’d
benefit from meeting the Natural women in the organization. She’d
been stuck in the mansion since he’d found her, mainly because he
wasn’t about to let a fucking
oracle
– the first in a few
hundred thousand years! – out of the safest place he could put her.
His gaze returned to the screen as he deliberated over how close
Czerno was and shelved the thought of letting her out of his
sight.

“I’ll keep it in mind,” he said.

“Jasmine’s pissed, but Hector will be in this
weekend,” Dusty said.

“Awesome, boss.”

“Dust-man, we’ve got a Quarterly to prep
for,” Damian said.

“Let’s go,” Dusty agreed. “Rainy, thanks.
I’ll be back tomorrow.”

“Roger, boss.”

Damian’s attention lingered on the image on
Rainy’s screen. He couldn’t help the sense of unease sliding
through him. He didn’t like the new level Czerno was taking their
battle to. The playing field was as uneven as the Watcher had
warned, and it appeared as though Czerno’s Watchers weren’t as
dedicated to non-interference as
his
Watcher was.

At least he’d know who the traitors were by
the end of the night.

Sonoran desert, Arizona

The Black God’s southwest base camp

“What the fuck are you doing here?”

Two dropped his arms to his side.

“Water,” he said.

“Slaves don’t drink the master’s water.”

He felt the stinging blow at the back of his
head and wobbled, dropping to his knees. One of his master’s men -
the ones with the red eyes - shoved him away and took his canteen,
dumping its contents.

“Get the fuck outta here!”

He threw the canteen, and it hit Two’s cheek.
Two took his canteen and rose. He moved mechanically out of the
kitchen a few hundred feet below ground. He went back to his small
room and sat on the bed staring at the white wall in front of
him.

“Two, what’re you doing?”

He didn’t remember when this man had arrived
or why he was supposed to remember him. But he knew he must
remember him as he did his master. He concluded he was his master’s
friend, or he wouldn’t be here. His master’s friend, the man with
eyes as green as the moss in the corner of Two’s room, stood in his
doorway.

“I’m thinking, master.”

“Thinking?”

His master’s friend was powerful. Two sensed
it and cringed as he entered the room. His master’s friend had
never hit him, but he scared Two.

“Slaves don’t think, Two,” his master’s
friend said. “What are you thinking?”

“I see a woman in my head,” Two said.

“A woman? What woman?”

“I don’t know her.”

“What does she look like?”

Kiri.
He didn’t know where the word
came from or what it meant. It sounded pretty, like the poof the
desert dust made when the first drops of rain fell. The last time
he went to the surface, it had rained huge raindrops. Then a
rainbow had come out, and he’d stared at it until his master beat
him.

“Slave, what does she look like?”

There was an impatient note in his master’s
friend’s voice that scared him.

“Who, master?” he asked.

“The woman.”

“What woman?”

“The woman in your head.”

Kiri.

A strange voice spoke the word again, and he
saw the woman with blue and silver eyes. She was crying, because
his master was going to hurt her.

Don’t cry, kiri,
he thought.

“Did you remember to do as I told you? Did
you stop drinking the juice your master gave you?”

He looked up, surprised to see his master’s
friend in his doorway, the man with eyes the color of the moss in
the corner of his room. He rose in respect.

“Yes, master.”

“Good boy. You must do as I tell you,” his
master’s friend said. “It’s very important you don’t drink that
juice ever again. Don’t forget.”

“Yes, master.”

“Come. Your master calls for you.”

Two obeyed. He followed the man with eyes as
green as the moss in the corner of his room down the busy hallways,
unaffected by the men who spit on him or shoved him as he went.
Slaves were treated this way.

He’d had a dream last night, something he
never remembered in the morning, except for this time. He thought
hard. There were many people in his dream, and he thought he should
remember them. He heard the strange voice again.

Kiri.

The woman came from his dream! She was
talking to him. He didn’t know what she said, but she was holding
out a hand to him, crying. Uneasiness swept over him.

He didn’t want her to cry.

Don’t cry, kiri.

But she kept crying.

“Two, coffee,” his master said.

Two obeyed and left the room filled with
lights and computers. The man with green eyes was waiting for him
in the hall and touched his arm. Two cringed away. When he let him
go, he saw the woman more clearly.