Night Season

CHAPTER FOUR

Cullen could walk without crutches now, if he had to. It had been nearly five weeks since a giant flying monster from hell had chowed down on his foot and related bits. He didn't heal as fast as some lupi—his talents lay in other directions—but he'd finished regrowing the lower leg and his ankle now ended in a foot bulb, a knobby projection with everything a foot might need. It was curled up in an unfootlike shape, but the parts were all there.

But it hurt like hell to walk on the blasted thing. Tarsal and metatarsal bones, itty-bitty phalanges, and all those tendons were curled around one another, the bones still soft, nothing finished, nothing in its proper position. So he swung along on crutches beside the Fed who'd been designated to bring him to some super secret location in the bowels of FBI Headquarters, aka the J. Edgar Hoover FBI Building, feeling foolish and annoyed.

Make that pissed. Lily gives him a call… and he'd answered his phone, hadn't he? Okay, maybe that was because he wanted to know how the shopping with Cynna had gone, whether the dippy woman had finally deigned to acknowledge reality. But he had answered.

And what does she do? Asks him to drop everything and come to this big, ugly block of a building named for the asshole who ran the FBI back when lupi were pretty much "shoot on sight" to the Feds. Wouldn't tell him why, either. She gave him this "can't tell you on an unsecured line" bullshit.

In spite of that, he'd agreed. Lily didn't make a habit of yanking him around, which meant something was up. He wanted to know what. But he'd been in the middle of an elaborate setup for a spell, an important one.

Cullen had the most impenetrable mental shields on the planet. They weren't some freakish natural ability, but something that had been given him—or done to him—while he was unconscious last September. It was driving him crazy. He possessed incredibly sophisticated spells, but passively. He didn't know the spells, couldn't cast them or learn from them. That was intolerable. He'd spent weeks creating a spell he hoped would read and copy the ones that had been used on him.

Of course, his shields were designed not to be tampered with, and reading them was akin to tampering. This would be his third attempt. He thought he had the parameters down, but only the casting would tell.

Lily knew all that. She knew how much this mattered. So when he'd told her he would come in tomorrow, he'd expected her to accept that.

Instead, she'd gotten Rule to order him to come here.

Oh, technically Rule hadn't ordered him. Technically, being heir to Nokolai clan didn't give him that authority. But if your Lu Nuncio tells you the clan needs you to do something, you're damned well going to do it, aren't you?

Especially if you've spent the better part of your life clanless. Outcast.

Cullen knew Rule wouldn't kick him out of Nokolai for failing to jump fast enough. He knew that. Yet here he was, and if a good half of his mad came from fears he had no intention of acknowledging, that didn't make him feel one whit more agreeable.

So maybe he was less than tactful when his escort turned him over to a pair of idiots in bad suits who were guarding a dull stretch of hallway holding three doors—one on the right, two on the left. The idiots wanted to search him.

He did keep his tone polite. "First you'd better search for some damned brains, I'll help. Bend over."

"Sorry, sir," said the first asshole, lying like a politician. "Orders. You're lupus. We have to search you before you can go any farther."

This was a perfect opportunity. All he had to do was exactly what he wanted—tell them to admit him immediately or else explain to their superiors why he'd left. They wouldn't back down. He could tell. They'd refuse to let him pass and he could leave.

Problem was, the bastards would think they'd won… and he'd told Rule he would do this. If he didn't follow through, he made himself a liar. Which he was, of course, when necessary. Lying was a fine and useful skill, one he'd honed well over the years. But he didn't lie to friends. He might occasionally omit to mention this or that, but he didn't lie to them.

So that was out.

Maybe he should just clobber these assholes and look for Lily on his own. An appealing notion… not smart, but definitely appealing. "First, I was asked to come here. Second, I've already been patted down, just before they issued me this nifty little badge that's supposed to admit me everywhere but the executive washroom."

"Yes, sir," said Asshole Number Two, who was enjoying himself. "But we have to conduct a more thorough search."

Cullen asked very sweetly, "Are you by any chance talking about a strip search?"

The first asshole wasn't as dumb as he looked. He took a quick, involuntary step back.

"Because if you are, you should know that I strip for a living. If you want me to take my clothes off, it will cost you."

"You can start with those crutches." Asshole Number Two smiled a tight, smug smile. "Hand them over."

Cullen's fingertips itched. It would be easy to singe that smirk right off the man's pudgy face. "I'm missing my foot, and you want to take away my crutches."

"They might be used as weapons."

Cullen nodded thoughtfully. He'd better do what the man said, hadn't he? One crutch would go to Asshole Number Two—a head shot, he thought. Clip him across the front of the skull, which shouldn't do any lasting damage as long as Cullen minded his strength. The other would go in the stomach of Asshole Number One, who wasn't quite as much of a prick.

One of the doors behind the assholes opened and a little over five feet of slender Asian woman emerged. "Chill, Cullen."

He spun to glare at her. "Did you tell this pair of shit-for-brains to strip-search me?"

Lily's eyebrows went up. She inspected the two guards, settling with admirable instinct on Asshole Number Two. "That your idea, ah…"

"Baxter," he said, still smirking. He really wasn't very smart. "And I'm following orders."

"Whose? No, never mind." She spoke over her shoulder to someone on the other side of the doorway. "Ruben, I'd like to bring Cullen in before he burns someone. Could you clear him?"

The whirr of a motorized wheelchair preceded the man she'd spoken to. Cullen's curiosity shot up, eclipsing his temper for the moment. He'd met the head of the secretive Unit 12 once, but he'd been blind at the time. He knew how Ruben Brooks smelled, the sound of his voice, but not what he looked like.

Gaunt, erect, and with a beak of a nose, it turned out. Brooks's navy suit was beautifully tailored; his tie, silk—and knotted with all the clumsy disinterest of a five-year-old. His shoes were polished; his socks, brown. Those details said "married" to Cullen, though he supposed it was possible the man's style-conscious partner belonged to his own sex.

A quick glance at Brook's left hand found a gold ring, giving weight to the married theory. Long fingers, Cullen noted, though the joints were swollen. Arthritis? The product of whatever condition kept him in that chair?

Behind the chair stood a skinny, red-headed gun freak. Brooks's bodyguard du jour. Steve Timms was human, intense, and barely back on duty after a month's medical leave. Cullen knew all this because he was the man's roommate at the moment.

Ah, Cullen thought, amused, when Timms failed to reveal by the flicker of a sandy eyelash that he knew Cullen, my little boy is growing up. Hope he doesn't shoot me.

The wheelchair required Brooks to tilt his head back to study the assholes. "The problem is, Agent Yu," he said mildly, "that I've already cleared Mr. Seabourne. So I'm confused, gentlemen. Whose orders were you following?"

Asshole Number One was puzzled. "It's standing orders, sir."

"And yet I didn't issue those orders, and you report to me. I remain mystified."

Asshole Number Two wasn't puzzled. He didn't like Brooks, thought he'd one-upped the man, and was stupid enough to let it show. "Orders issued by Acting Director Hayes last month, sir. All nonhumans are to be given a level one search before entering a level one secure area."

"Ah!" Brook's exclamation landed soft and cold in the hallway. "You are oddly ignorant. Those orders were rescinded two days after being issued. The President," he went on in that chill, quiet voice, "did not consider them helpful. Nor do I. You will call Mr. Croft now and inform him you are to be replaced here at once, as you are temporarily suspended from duty. Mr. Seabourne." He looked at Cullen. "I appreciate your promptness and apologize for the insult. Please come with me."

He reversed his chair. Lily followed him promptly. Cullen paused to give the two guards a cross-eyed grin.

Childish? Sure. But fun.

Behind the door on the right was another hallway, this one short and ending at yet another door.

"MCD idiots," Lily muttered as they headed for that door.

"You're MCD," he reminded her.

"They're regular MCD. Not Unit."

MCD stood for Magical Crimes Division, a section of the FBI that had a bad rep with the clans. MCD had been tasked with enforcing the registration laws before the Supreme Court decided that werewolves were citizens.

The Unit was different from the rest of MCD. Most of its personnel were Gifted, for one thing. On paper the Unit looked like part of MCD, but in practice it had always operated independently of the rest of the division—even, to some extent, of the entire FBI bureaucracy.

Then came the Turning. The number and severity of magical disturbances shot right off the scale. The Unit was the only law enforcement agency with trained, Gifted agents, but there weren't enough of them to deal with everything. So they'd recruited from the ranks of regular MCD agents for some positions… leading to the presence of cretins like the two Cullen had just encountered.

Brooks stopped his chair a few paces away from the door at the end of the hall and put it through a tidy maneuver that left him facing Cullen and Lily. "I'll ask Agent Yu to brief you in a moment, Mr. Seabourne. First, though, I have a question. In your opinion, did those two agents act in honest if regrettable ignorance? Or did their actions arise from prejudice?"

Cullen shrugged. "Asshole Number One is stupid—probably doesn't read much, so he never knew about the search orders being rescinded. He thought he was 'doing his dooty.' Asshole Number Two—"

"Sort that for me, please."

"Asshole Number One's the blond. Number Two is the African American, and if he didn't spend his formative years as an agent shooting lupi, he wanted to."

"Thank you. Mr. Timms? Your opinion, please."

His bodyguard was startled by the request, but answered promptly. "Baxter's an asshole, like Seabourne said. Likes to push around anyone who can be pushed. Carter's okay."

"Thank you. May I say, Mr. Seabourne, I'd like to meet you sometime when you're in possession of all of your parts. Is the regrowth painful?"

"You ever had a wound heal to the itching stage?"

"I have."

"It doesn't itch like that all the time. Just most of it. Inside, where I can't scratch."

"I see. That could be quite annoying." He nodded at Lily. "Please bring Mr. Seabourne up to date as briefly as possible."

"Yes, sir." She looked at Cullen. "We've got visitors. They say they came from another realm, and circumstances back that up. They arrived at the node at the Fashion Center Mall two hours ago. Just before their arrival Gan showed up, obviously aware they were on their way, though a little confused as to the timing. There are three of them—a gnome, a man who looks human but isn't, and the third… I don't know what to call the third one. The gnome won't give his name—we're to call him the Councilor. The one who looks human is Wen of Ekiba, and the other one is called Tash, no surname. They claim they're here for trade… and for me and Cynna. Gan says they want us to find something, but they're not talking. Or rather," she added, "the Councilor talks without saying much and they all talk among themselves, but not in English."

Cullen's eyebrows hitched up. "How did they communicate with you at all?"

"The gnome knows some English, but he won't discuss anything of substance without a shield. He's not talking about wards. Cynna asked about that. He claims he knows a shield spell, but can't use it. His magic isn't the right kind. That's why you're here."

Excitement rose and exploded in a dizzy froth. "Real shields," he repeated carefully. "This gnome is talking about a spell that erects a true shield over a space, not just a person?"

"One that blocks farseeing and farhearing, apparently, among other things. He was shocked to learn we didn't know how to make one."

Delight widened Cullen's grin. "How big a space?"

"Ask him."

Oh, he would. He'd ask the gnome from another realm—another realm!—a great many things. Cullen couldn't stop grinning. "I forgive you."

"I thought you would," she said dryly.

The door at the end of the short hall led to a small, dark, crowded room. Monitors lining the far wall held the rapt attention of three of the four men in the room. The fourth sat at a keyboard to one side, presumably doing tech things connected to the images on the screens. He wore headphones.

Three of the men were strangers. Cullen knew the fourth one, a beefy fellow with a fine frizz of white hair exploding around his face like an excited dandelion. Cullen rather liked Fagin. The man was a top-notch scholar specializing in pre-Purge history. He was also the head of the Presidential Task Force created at the onset of the Turning.

Not that any of them mattered. Not with what Cullen saw on those screens.

For some reason they had the sound turned off. There were five screens; two were dark. The large, central screen showed a room furnished with institutional lack of imagination: a beige sofa and a couple of chairs. The gnome Lily had mentioned sat in one of the chairs. His feet dangled well off the floor. He was talking to a small, bald, orange female who must be Gan; they were roughly the same size. Behind Gan and the gnome stood a gray-skinned… call her a warrior, he decided. Whatever else she was, she carried herself as a fighter.

The big blade sheathed on her back was a clue, too.

His gaze flicked to one of the other screens, which had a view of the room's other occupants. The bald fellow apparently lacked interest in clothing, though he wore a silver necklace with a small silver disk as pendant… inscribed?

Cullen squinted and frowned. The resolution wasn't good enough for him to be sure. The man was talking to the only other person in the room, a tallish woman with her back to the camera. His lips, tongue, and palate were dark gray like a chow's. The woman… hell!

Cullen spun to glare at Lily. "What the hell are you thinking? Get Cynna out of there!"

Brooks answered smoothly. "Agent Weaver is acting on my orders. We've been assured it would offer grave insult to leave our guests in a room without someone present to act as host. Apparently that's gnomish custom."

"Gnomish custom is to exchange hostages. That's her real function—hostage, not host."

"Is this your so-called expert, Ruben?" a slick-looking man in a pricey suit drawled. "Doesn't seem well-informed. Everyone knows gnomes are harmless."

"Everyone knows a lot of damned silly things," Cullen snapped. "Who the hell are you?"

"Adam McClosky. Assistant Undersecretary of Commerce."

"When we're ready to trade something, be sure to speak up. Till then shut your—"

"Cullen," Lily said.

He caught his breath and tried to catch hold of his temper.

"Mr. Seabourne is an expert practitioner," Brooks assured the smooth man. "He's consulted for us before. I have great confidence in his skills and knowledge."

Brooks had done a nice job of stepping around the word "sorcerer." Since sorcery remained illegal due to the impenetrable stupidity of most lawmakers, Cullen appreciated that. "And I'm ready to consult. Get me in there and get Cynna out."

"Soon. Rest assured that Agent Weaver is as safe as we can make her. The room has defenses that aren't obvious."

"The room can't defend her against a magical attack."

"No, she'll have to handle that herself, should the need arise."

Cullen took two quick steps, but the place was too damned crowded. He nearly bumped into another one of the strangers, who stepped aside, eying him warily.

Timms spoke without leaving Brooks's side. "It's her job, Cullen."

Cullen scowled. Lily put a hand on his arm. "I think she'll be okay. I've shaken hands with all of them."

The touch startled him enough to break through his urgency. Lily didn't touch often or easily. "And… ?"

"They're all of the Blood, but only the gnome is Gifted. It isn't a Gift I've encountered before, but his magic isn't…" She waved a hand. "I don't know how to describe it, but his magic felt like it's bound up in itself. Or in something. He doesn't have much juice for other things."

"Of the Blood" meant they were innately magical beings. This was true of most of the nonhuman races, from gnomes to lupi to any number of less common beings and creatures. What Lily meant was that those of the Blood were seldom able to work spells—their magic simply wasn't available that way.

Excepting the Fae, of course. And Cullen, who was both of the Blood and Gifted. As was this gnome, apparently. "Maybe he's using most of his magic for something else right now. I'd very much like to know what, wouldn't you? That doesn't make Cynna safe."

"She's doing her job. And she's pretty good with spell-work herself."

Okay. Okay, he knew that, but… Cullen ran a hand over his hair. "You'll know if something's been done to her. You'll check."

"Of course."

"What's the problem?" demanded the Deputy Under whatever.

Cullen decided it would be easier to keep a grip on his temper if he ignored the man, so he did.

Fagin blinked sleepily, looking like an aging refugee from the sixties. "Why, if those three come from a high-magic realm—and they do—we have no idea what they might be able to do, magically."

"Why do you believe they come from a high-magic realm?"

Stupidity was so hard to ignore. Cullen managed not to roll his eyes. "They got here, didn't they?"

On the screen, Cynna had moved closer to the gnome. Gan was saying something. Then the councilor spoke.

Damn, but he hated watching remotely this way. He couldn't smell them, couldn't see any of the energies involved. Bet he could hear them, though, if he moved closer to the tech guy with the headphones.

"Exactly." Fagin beamed at him. "Assuming their arrival was purposeful—"

One of the other men broke in. "What do you mean?"

"We've recently seen many examples of creatures crossing accidentally, haven't we? Fairies, brownies, gremlins, even banshees were blown in on the power winds during the Turning. But these visitors arrived without that impetus, and Gan was expecting them. This argues that they did come here intentionally, using a gate, as the councilor claims. This means we're dealing with a culture that's quite sophisticated magically."

"And has plenty of power available," Lily added. "Gates gobble power."

"Very true. There's also the shield spell itself, of course."

"Break that conclusion down for the rest of us, please," Brooks said.

Or just shut up. That would be better. Even with his hearing, Cullen was hard-pressed to listen in on the tech guy's headphones with all the chatter in the room. Couldn't any of them think for themselves long enough to see the obvious?

"Our knowledge of other realms is largely theoretical," Fagin began, "since inter-realm travel has been impossible since before the Purge—impossible for humans, that is. Some of the Fae have always been able to cross, though they chose not to. And imps or demons have crossed from time to time, although—"

Brooks spoke dryly. "Fagin, we aren't in class. I believe everyone here is aware of conditions prior to the Turning."

"Of course. The point I was wandering toward is that desert dwellers do not develop shipbuilding capabilities. Due to our relative dearth of magic, we've had no need for shields and haven't hung on to that knowledge. Their realm, apparently, does have a need."

"That makes sense," said one of the men Cullen didn't know. He looked at Cullen. "I understand you know something about gates, Mr. Seabourne."

Cullen twitched one shoulder in an impatient shrug. "Something. Theoretical knowledge, of course," he added in his first lie of the day. Three months ago he'd assisted in making a hellgate, but since that was even more illegal than being a sorcerer, he wasn't planning to add it to his resume.

"These, ah, people arrived at a node. Is that typical?"

"For a gate? It's necessary. Nodes are the points of greatest physical and temporal congruence. Also, you need the power. Like Lily said, gates gobble power."

"So you believe the councilor created a gate to come here."

"Ah… no. Is he claiming he did it alone? Gate building is a team effort. Even the dragons have to work together to do it."

"Dragons? Do you mean they… what are you doing?"

Cullen had yanked the headphones off the tech guy's head and was holding them close to his ear.

On one screen, the inky tracery on Cynna's face stood out in sharp relief against her sudden pallor. He saw her throat work as she swallowed. From the headphones came the thread of her voice saying, "No way."

The tech tried to grab his headphones back. Two of the men started toward Cullen. He looked at Lily. "That bastard just told Cynna he's got her father."