Mind Magic (47 page)

All around him, brownies burst into angry cries—“They lied!” “They’re lying about her!” “Why do they lie?”

“Quiet,” Rule said sharply. “Quiet. I need to hear.”

This being an all-news channel, they repeated everything they’d just said, using different words and adding a lot of speculation and a few more details. The first fire had occurred in the early morning at a small manufacturing plant in eastern Virginia; a security guard had been the only person on the site of the blaze, and he’d been killed. Casualties at the last two fires were still unknown.

Rule listened a little longer before sitting up. He met Lily’s eyes.

“One of the Gifted kids Danny told me about has a Fire Gift,” she said. “A strong one. They’re doing it to Mika now. What they did to you to, Ruben, to Danny. They’re framing Mika.”

“Yes. You were right.” Rule’s voice sounded hollow in his own ears. He understood now why Sam had said what he had about Lily and the Unit. “Smith intends to break the Dragon Accords.”

THIRTY-NINE

DEMI
didn’t hear the whole newscast, having arrived a little behind Rule and Lily, but she heard enough to be shocked. At first no one would answer her questions, but after a bit of confusion Rule got the brownies and everyone else to adjourn to the middle of the green, where they could talk. Just as they settled there, Bert arrived, carrying several paper bags. Demi smelled hot dogs.

That distracted her. Hot dogs were one of the few meat products she missed sometimes, maybe because they didn’t seem like they’d ever been part of an animal. Lily—she’d told Demi to call her that—hadn’t had any breakfast, so she took a couple of hot dogs. The lupi wanted some, too. Lupi always seemed to be ready to eat.

Fortunately Demi wasn’t all that hungry, having had some trail mix when she woke up, so she could ignore the way the hot dogs smelled. Mostly. Then Bert passed around Cokes. She took one of them, and it tasted great. She didn’t usually have Coke in the morning, but that rule wasn’t as important as the “no meat” rule, and she didn’t want to wear out her prefrontal cortex. She needed it working right now. The sugar in the Coke would help with that. Then one of the brownies—his call-name was Mallum, he said, which meant “young oak”—gave her an apple. That helped, too. It was a good apple.

While Lily Yu ate, Rule Turner explained what was wrong. Demi tried to listen, but most of it she already knew. She kept thinking about Saul. She didn’t know why she’d run off when she heard he was dead. How did that help? It was a strange reaction, but she felt strange. Like someone had hit her in the stomach and she couldn’t get her breath, only of course she was breathing just fine, but she didn’t want Saul to be dead. She’d only talked to him twice. She didn’t know why it hurt so much.

Mr. Hawkins was dead, too. He wouldn’t go to the Tip-Top ever again so he could eat and be with people without talking much. So were two people from Whistle she didn’t know, or at least she hadn’t recognized their names. The article she’d found last night that gave the names of the victims of the “large predator” hadn’t had photos, just names. She’d been so relieved that Jamie’s name wasn’t on that list, but she knew Mr. Hawkins. He wasn’t exactly a friend, but she knew him.

No, she
had
known him. He was dead now. Demi had understood how real death was ever since her mother died. She hadn’t understood how often it happened. Oh, in her head she’d known. She’s seen statistics. Now her whole body knew.

Was it Nicky who’d killed them? Had her friend cut up Mr. Hawkins with his Gift until he died?

Bert’s exclamation got her attention. “He’s trying to frame a dragon? How can he think he can get away with that?”

“Because he keeps getting away with it,” Demi said. She hadn’t seen the dragon last night—which she deeply regretted—but she’d heard her. “He’s good at it. He can plant pretty much anything in a system that relies on electronic data. That’s how he was able to create those radar bogeys. His weakness is that he thinks that’s what it takes to win—that if the data is on his side, the people involved don’t much matter.” She stopped, frowning. “Why are all of you staring at me?”

“I guess we were surprised,” Lily said. “You’re a computer geek yourself, and geeks often think the data is the important part.”

“It is important,” Demi agreed. “But the difference between him and me is that he thinks he’s good at people. I know I’m not. I get people wrong all the time, so I know from experience that getting the data right isn’t enough.”

“True,” Rule said, “but for the moment he’s ahead on the people front, too. He’s using the media to get his message of fear out.”

She frowned at him. “Even I know you can get people to do bad things if you can scare them enough. That’s easy. It doesn’t make Mr. Smith good at people. He thinks he is because his Gift has always helped him get what he wants. But his Gift won’t work on millions of people watching the news the way it does on whoever is right there with him. You’re the one who knows how to do that. You’re good with people one-on-one or in bunches or over the television. I bet that’s why he wanted you out of the way—so you couldn’t go on television and calm everyone down when he wanted them to be scared.”

Rule had a funny look on his face. He glanced at Lily, who raised her eyebrows at him. “You may be right,” he said. Demi wasn’t sure if he meant her or Lily. “But if so, he got what he wanted. I can’t go on TV and calm people down right now.”

She thought that over. While she was thinking, the others were talking and talking. At one point they got loud as if they were arguing, but she didn’t let that distract her. She had an idea. She thought about it for quite a while before she got it lined up right, then she spoke. Loudly, because someone else was talking and this was important. “You don’t need TV.”

Everyone stared at her again. “What?” Rule said.

“The brownie webcam gets millions of hits a day. The brownies should bring it to this part of the reservation, where police can’t come and arrest you again. Then you go on the webcam and explain to people what’s really going on and why they don’t need to be afraid of lupi. You should have brownies with you, and they should talk, too. Everyone loves brownies. People will trust them.”

“That . . .” Rule did the look-at-Lily thing again. “That’s a very good idea. It would give away my location and probably Danny’s, too, but the potential gain is substantial.”

“What about me?” Lily said. “I can’t exactly arrest Smith over the Internet, but if I—”

“The only reason you’re still on active duty is that you’re missing in action. We need to keep it that way.”

Even Demi could see that Lily didn’t like that, but after a moment she nodded. Then she looked at Demi. “I suspect you didn’t hear what we were discussing just now.”

“No, I was thinking.”

“What you suggest is important and might help. But our first priority has to be stopping Smith. I, ah—I recently learned that the president had the Pentagon work up contingency plans in case there was ever a need to take out one of the dragons. Those plans call for using the military. I don’t know what the other dragons would do if that happened, but it would be bad. Dragons aren’t just big, smart animals who dislike visitors and soak up magic. They’re powerful. More powerful than I think most people realize, including Smith. Do you know where they lived before they returned to Earth?”

“Sure. In hell.”

“Yes, otherwise known as Dis, the demon realm. When the dragons first arrived in Dis, they killed a demon lord and took over his territory. You wouldn’t know how powerful a demon lord is when he’s on his territory, but I don’t think any of our tech could accomplish that. I think that if we dropped an atomic bomb on a demon lord when he was in his own territory, he’d laugh and eat the fallout.”

That made Demi feel cold. Shivery cold. “A fission bomb or hydrogen? Because a fission bomb delivers the equivalent of twenty thousand tons of TNT, while a modern thermonuclear weapon, which is often called a hydrogen bomb, releases a blast equal to one-point-two tons of—”

“Let’s just leave it that demon lords are incredibly hard to kill on their territory, and incredibly bad things would happen if our government violated the Dragon Accords.”

Demi nodded, still feeling cold. “Dragmageddon.”

“Uh—what?”

“Dragon plus Armageddon. Dragmageddon.”

“That’s pretty much right.”

Rule said, “We know who is behind this. Edward Smith. Others are part of it, but if we stop Smith, we throw his people into chaos. A man as bent on control as Smith is would have total control of his organization; without him, the rest will flounder. I see only three ways to stop him: we kill him, we kidnap him, or we arrest him. Setting personal preferences aside, killing him would have severe consequences for my people because it plays into the narrative he’s established. Smith’s people wouldn’t need to know who killed him to blame it on lupi. Kidnapping him carries the same risk. Arresting him is the only thing that might work. That’s what we were discussing.”

“You mean Lily?” Demi asked. “She could arrest him?”

“Maybe,” Lily said. “It’s complicated. The Fourth Amendment means that I almost always need a warrant to make an arrest, but getting one is likely to tip off Smith—if I even could, based on hard evidence. That’s pretty skimpy at the moment. Felony arrests without a warrant are permissible in a public place based on probable cause, or if the law officer is in hot pursuit, or if there are “exigent circumstances”—which usually means an immediate emergency, like shots being fired. This is certainly an emergency, so a case could be made that it’s a lawful arrest, especially given the gravity of the charges. But—”

Rule broke in. “It is, as Lily said, complicated. It’s also moot, because Lily says she can’t leave the reservation.”

“Mika needs me here,” Lily said. “I promised I’d stay.”

“Why does she need you here?”

For some reason that startled Lily. “She?”

“Mika,” Demi said impatiently.

“Ah . . . I can’t go into that. It’s part of my promise. But among the powers granted the Unit by Congress is one most people aren’t aware of. I can temporarily skip the paperwork and bring someone into the Unit immediately on my own authority. They’d have to be approved later, but until they were recalled for that procedure, they could act with full authority.”

“Lily wants to induct me,” Rule said. “I think that’s a bad idea.”

Demi nodded. “You’d just get arrested yourself, wouldn’t you? Probably before you ever got to Mr. Smith. Your face is pretty well-known.”

“No, he wouldn’t,” piped up Dirty Harry. “That’s where we can help. We can spread dul-dul around a little bit. Not for very long, but if he can do most of the sneaking himself, a couple of us could go along and hide him when he needed hiding.”

Rule shook his head. “As I was about to say when Danny told us about her idea, arresting Smith isn’t enough. He has to stay arrested. No law enforcement officer or agency in D.C. is going to believe me when I claim to be a Unit agent—particularly,” he said with a quick glance at Lily, “since I won’t have a warrant. They’ll let him go and keep me.”

“Who, then?” Lily demanded hotly. “Who could I tap? The same problem arises no matter who it is. If I inducted Jason into the Unit, they’d probably arrest him for impersonating a Unit agent. They’d have to drop the charges later, but they’d take Smith’s word over his. Smith would still go free.”

Everyone was very quiet for a moment. Lily spoke first. “We’ll just have to get in touch with another Unit agent.”

“Who?” Rule asked. “Abel and Martin are among the ones who’ve been relieved of duty pending the results of the investigation. Doesn’t that mean they currently lack the authority to make an arrest?”

“I didn’t know that.” Lily sounded discouraged or mad or something. She was frowning, but frowns didn’t always mean anger. “Did you tell me they’d been relieved of duty? I don’t remember it.”

Rule ran a hand through his hair. “Perhaps I forgot. I can’t think of anyone else who’d listen to us.”

Lily shook her head and didn’t say anything.

Demi did. “Mr. Brooks would, I bet. Has he been relieved of duty, too? Or put under arrest? Or was he just removed as head of the Unit?”

“I don’t know,” Rule said slowly. “The press didn’t use that term—‘relieved of duty.’ Officially he’s still under investigation, but he hasn’t been arrested. Being lupus isn’t technically a violation of the law. Some of the television pundits claim that he can’t be employed by the FBI at all due to his status as a lupus, but that would have to be litigated. Lily?”

She was still frowning. “There are procedures that have to be followed. It’s possible that Ruben was removed as head of the Unit without actually being relieved of duty. It depends on . . .” Her voice drifted off. “Ida! Did Ida stay on as secretary to the head of Unit Twelve?”

“I have no idea,” Rule said. “How would that help? Are you thinking of making her a Unit agent?”

“No, I’d have to go there to do that—can’t do it over the phone. I’ll bet she’s still the top guy’s secretary. Smith wouldn’t think she was a threat. People don’t think of secretaries as having power, but even this idiot they brought in to run the Unit must know he has to keep the monster fed. The bureaucracy, I mean. Bureaucracies can’t function without paperwork, which means secretaries and clerks who know how to feed the monster the proper forms.” She grinned. “Or not. If anyone knows how to delay or bollix up the paperwork, it’s Ida.”