Fields of Blood (The DeathSpeaker Codex Book 2) (21 page)

I heard her sharp intake of breath just before we made it far enough to see the small army of Milus Dei soldiers waiting for us, with a collection of ATVs and Jeeps parked half-hidden from the road.

And Reese was leading them.

There were at least thirty. All armed, dressed in body armor, and standing at attention behind Reese with weapons drawn. In addition to handguns, most of them had handcuffs, Tasers, and nightsticks on their belts. A few carried cattle prods.

I really didn’t feel much better knowing they didn’t plan to kill us.

Elara stood frozen in place just a few steps past the entrance to the camper. But Marlon was still moving—straight toward the soldiers.

When he stopped, Reese grinned at him. “Well done, Marlon,” he said. “You gave us plenty of time to get here. I have to say, shooting yourself was a nice touch. Wish I’d thought of that myself.”

“You son of a bitch,” I spat. “You’re working for them?” Now I knew why he’d stopped trying to redirect us to the bunker—he’d already told Reese where we were headed. It explained a few things back at the compound, too. Why he’d insisted on using ‘his’ way out, and fired on the first of the soldiers. He’d
wanted
to draw their attention.

And this was how Reese knew we were Fae, and came to the sheriff’s station prepared. Marlon must’ve told him after the attack at the path.

But we still had half a chance. They were only in front of us. If we pulled back now, ran for the mountain, maybe we could lose them. At least Taeral and Chester might make it with me.

Before I could try anything, I heard movement behind me and glanced back to see another two dozen or so armed men forming ranks. Cutting off a retreat.

Then four of them broke loose and immediately seized Chester.

“All of you drop your guns,” Reese said as the soldiers started frisking him, removing weapon after weapon. “Unless, of course, you don’t mind if we kill Mr. Rigby. Maybe you don’t. He is only human, after all.” The grin widened. “You have five seconds to decide whether he lives or dies.”

Taeral snarled an oath and dropped the shotgun he still carried on the ground. I glared at Reese as I produced the dagger and tossed it. “That’s all I got,” I said. “Gave my gun to your boy, here.”

“We’ll see about that.” Reese nodded, and more soldiers split off to search Taeral and me.

“Marlon?” Elara said haltingly. “I don’t understand.”

Marlon ignored her. “She’s not part of the deal, got it?” he said to Reese. “None of the younger ones are. They shouldn’t have even been up there, but these Fae bastards dragged them in.”

“What deal?” Elara’s voice rose as she took a step toward her brother. “Marlon,
what deal
?”

“Stay back, Elara.” Marlon spoke in flat, deadly tones, then turned back to Reese. “I brought Sadie to you,” he said. “That was supposed to be it. But you took the elders, too.”

Reese shrugged. “Plans changed. We had to neutralize them. They could have killed the Fae…and we have use for them alive.”

“Well, now you have them. So let my pack go.”

This time Reese laughed outright. “You’re not exactly the brains of the family, are you?” he said. “I knew there was a good reason to use you.” He made a sharp gesture, and a column of soldiers behind him marched toward Elara.

“You son of a bitch,” Marlon growled. “If you touch her, I’ll—”

“Oh, for God’s sake. Someone shoot him.”

Several rounds of gunfire erupted from the ranks. Elara screamed and sank to her knees as Marlon went down, riddled with bullets. She didn’t even try to resist the soldiers when they cuffed her and dragged her toward the tangle of vehicles.

“Get him loaded up.” Reese stepped casually over Marlon’s still form and walked toward us.

I glanced aside and saw they’d already cuffed Chester. Two of them held his arms, and another two kept their weapons trained on the back of his head. He looked just as furious as I felt. There wasn’t a damned thing we could do to stop any of this.

Reese was a hell of a lot smarter than Foley had been.

He stopped in front of me, produced a pair of shackles and handed them off to one of the soldiers guarding Taeral. I assumed they were cold iron. “Put these on tall, dark and angry,” he said. “If he resists, dose him with mandrake. And try not to damage the hardware. I’ll want a look at that arm later.”

My jaw clenched hard. “You know, I’ve been trying to better myself lately and not kill so many assholes,” I said. “But for you, I’m going to make an exception.”

Reese smiled. “Is this the part where I tremble in fear of your awesome power, or should I just skip directly to pissing myself?”

Okay. I really hated this guy.

“Nothing to say?” Reese shook his head. “I suspected the Quaestio branch had you pegged wrong. Now I know they did. You can’t be the DeathSpeaker—you’re far too weak. But I suppose I should thank you for getting rid of Foley,” he said. “The man was insane. We never should have allowed him to run the research branch. He was a hot-headed hunter with delusions of grandeur, and he exposed an operation that went unnoticed for years. Nearly toppled the entire organization.”

I bit back a sharp retort. Focusing on long-term plans was almost impossible when everything in me wanted to tear this smug bastard to shreds, right now—but if they really thought I wasn’t the DeathSpeaker, it could be an advantage. “My pleasure,” I finally said. “Got any other crazy bastards you want me to kill? Maybe you could volunteer yourself, since you’re nuttier than a goddamned fruitcake.”

The smile remained in place. “Oh, I’m going to have a wonderful time with you. I already owe you for getting me shot,” he said, holding up a bandaged right hand. “You might have escaped the first time, but no one gets away from me twice.” He stepped back and looked beyond me. “I want this one unconscious for the trip. Hit him with the maximum setting.”

Before I could think
oh good, a cattle prod
, something hard rammed my spine, and incredible buzzing pain filled the whole world. Then everything was gone.

C
HAPTER 31

T
his was the second time in as many days that I’d woken up in a cage. I didn’t like it any better than the first time.

Coming around to consciousness hurt like hell. For a minute or two, all I noticed besides the pain was a cold floor that felt like ice beneath me, and wire mesh walls with bars outside them around me. My head took its time clearing. I heard sounds, low mutters and echoing footsteps. A pair of black-clad legs walked past the front of the cage.

I finally realized the floor was so cold because I was wearing pants, and nothing else. No shirt, no shoes…no pendant.

That got me moving. I pushed up to my knees, wincing, and succeeded only in making myself too dizzy to see anything. As I hung my head and waited for the whirling sensation to pass, a voice spoke from somewhere to the left.

“Don’t touch the walls.”

The voice seemed vaguely familiar. When I figured I could move without puking, I lifted my head carefully and looked. A flash of red hair in a separate cage next to me identified the speaker—Tate.

At least he was still alive.

I took my time arranging myself in a seated position, and then said thickly, “I can probably guess, but why shouldn’t I touch the walls?”

“They’re electrified,” Tate said.

“I was right. I could’ve guessed.” I sighed and scrubbed a hand down my face. Beyond Tate, there were more free-standing cages that looked occupied, but I didn’t see much movement. The cages lined one side of a long, narrow room. And there were large screens mounted on the opposite wall, powered down at the moment. I didn’t know what they were for, but the sight of them failed to lift my spirits.

I had to assume they weren’t for showing in-captivity movies.

Reluctantly, I looked to the right. Taeral was in the next cage over—awake and sitting, but not moving. They’d stripped him down to pants, too, and taken his metal arm. There were no more cages past his. Only a gap of about ten feet, and at the end, a windowless, industrial double door with two soldiers stationed in front of it.

I could still hear the footsteps of the soldier who’d passed my cage, moving further down the room.

“If you move around too much, they’ll shoot you with a dart,” Tate said hoarsely. “We get wolfsbane. I don’t know what they shot your friend with.”

My gut twisted. I could guess that one, too.

“You’ve been out for hours.” Taeral spoke with care, and I knew for sure they’d hit him with mandrake again. “It’s nearly moonrise.”

“Great,” I said. “Does anyone know what they’re planning to do with us?”

“Run tests. They haven’t got the formula right yet…that woman last night went nuts.” Tate nodded grimly at the screens across from the cages. “And they’re going to make us watch.”

“Jesus Christ. Are they—”

“Be quiet,” he hissed suddenly.

I decided to listen to him. A moment later, the soldier who’d been walking the hall came into view. He stopped in front of my cage and stared at me for a minute. Then he pulled a walkie from his belt, held a button and spoke into it. “He’s awake.”

The unit crackled, and a voice that sounded like Reese said, “Good. I’ll be down soon.”

I didn’t like the sound of that.

The soldier glanced at Taeral, and then turned to walk the other way, past the rest of the cages. I waited a minute or so and said, “Time for plan B. Anybody have one yet?”

Tate swiveled his head to stare at me. “I didn’t know there was a plan A.”

“Yeah. It was ‘don’t get caught,’ so that’s shot,” I said. “We need to do something else.”

“There is no way out.” Taeral stared straight down, his hair hanging in his face. “We’ve no advantage now, and there are too many of them.”

I frowned. “There has to be something. Is everyone down here, wherever this is?” I said. “Where’s Sadie?”

“No one’s seen her,” Tate said. “The elders aren’t here, either. Or the humans. It’s just us five, and you guys.”

“Five?”

“They brought Marlon in with you.” His voice caught on the name. “He looked dead.”

I decided now wasn’t the time to mention that Marlon was working with the bad guys. Or had been, anyway. It sounded like he didn’t mean for this to happen. Not that it excused him from doing it in the first place, or completely screwing Sadie over…twice now, apparently.

For whatever reason, he’d believed their lies. And now they had a weapon that could make them unstoppable—and a whole werewolf pack to experiment on with it.

“What if we use magic?” I said. “I mean, it should still work. I can unlock this. Even if the shutdown thing doesn’t take, I’d only get shocked once pushing the door open.”

“And then what?” Taeral said dryly. “There are at least six guards in this corridor, watching constantly. Even if you had a weapon, you’d not be able to kill them all.”

I tried to think. “That thing you did to me, when you threw me down the well. I could use that.”

“The sleep spell?”

“Yeah, that. If I knock them all out, take their guns and get everybody out of these things…” I trailed off as the rest of the scenario played out in my head. A handful of gun-toting, half-drugged werewolves, and Taeral and I both missing something important, storming straight into a hundred fully alert, armed soldiers.

Probably not a great plan.

Before I could think of anything else that wouldn’t work, the double doors at the end of the room opened and Reese strolled through. I caught a glimpse of a walkway lined with wrought-iron gates on the other side of the doors just before they closed. At least I knew where we were now—the research building, with convenient and heavily guarded access to the stadium. Terrific.

Reese stopped at my cage, once again grinning broadly. “I hope you’re enjoying the accommodations, Mr. Black,” he said. “Are you rested? Comfortable?”

“Where’s Sadie, you piece of shit?”

“Really. I thought you’d know better than to ask questions I’m not going to answer.” He stepped closer, almost daring me to lunge for him. When I didn’t, he shrugged. “I can make the cage smaller, you know,” he said. “So small that if you move even an inch, you get zapped. But I won’t for now, because I have other plans for you.”