Power (17 page)

The town car glowed as it hit, and the screen went white.

Chapter 28

North of Rome

280
A.D.

Marius could hear the legions in the distance. He stood upon the hill, Janus at his side with others, watching the coming of Proculus the Usurper’s army. They were so very, very many, and it made Marius wonder. The fires of war burned around them, thick and smoky. He could almost taste the meat he had become accustomed to in the last months, could nearly taste the flavor of roasted flesh on his tongue from the fires. It was an ill omen in these environs, he reckoned. Even in the summer heat, it sent a chill over his flesh.

“Be not afraid,” Janus said quietly from next to him.

“Do you see how many of them there are?” Marius whispered back. “I cannot even count them, they number so many.”

This was true. The legions of Proculus outnumbered the Roman ones by factors of ten. Though he had only recently learned about gods and powers, Marius had not been so impressed by the gods Diana and Janus had introduced him to that he could see this sight and remain unconcerned.

“Numbers are not everything,” Janus said calmly. “Not when gods are involved.” His face darkened. “Though this usurper should not have come anywhere this close to the center of the Empire. It is a dark day, one that shall not be spoken of save for in whispers henceforth.”

Marius shut his mouth, holding back his fear. His horse whickered softly beneath him, and Marius responded to it. He brushed a gloved hand against the ear of the creature, letting the dried cow hide that enveloped his fingers run down the back of the horse’s neck. He meant to reassure his animal, but he found a strange amount of solace in the gesture for himself. He glanced at Janus and wondered if the man was soothing his emotions. Janus turned to look at him and shook his head.

War horns blew in the distance, filling the valley below. They were outside Rome, Hadrian’s Tomb at their backs. An impressive structure, Marius thought, and all the better to try and defend the city from within, at least to his mind. But instead they were out here, in the wide-open spaces beyond the city wall, with a small legion in front of them and a greater legion aligned against them.

The smell of the horse overcame the smell of the fires as the wind shifted directions and came from the west. There were others with them on the hill. Marius knew Diana, of course, who was wearing a white cloak to keep the hot midday sun off her skin. He knew Venus on sight as well, her skin covered but her comely face somewhat visible over the lacy shawl that was pulled up to cover her mouth. He had seen her a few times, and on every one of them had trouble remembering his own name while fighting an impossible battle to keep his eyes off of her. This time seemed easier, though her attentions were on the battle, her eyes not roaming as they had been in every other instance he’d seen her.

He knew one of the others as well. Jupiter.

Colossally built, his broad chest partially exposed, Jupiter sat upon a warhorse that dwarfed Marius’s. His long hair was platinum, not white, and his beard matched. His bronzed skin was still youthful, and Marius felt a quiver of fear just being in his presence. Jupiter watched the movement of the armies impassively, but his dark eyes danced about the place that was soon to be a battlefield, and Marius thought they looked hungry for blood and spectacle and were irritable in their absence.

“You see what I see,” Janus said with quiet assurance as he looked over. Marius nodded. Jupiter’s cruelty was close to the surface, obvious even to his eyes.

Jupiter’s wife was at his side, her gaze cooler than her husband’s in the way that winter was cooler than summer. She caught Marius’s eyes and held them for a moment, watching him. She nodded once then turned away to speak to the man next to her, a physically imposing fellow whom Marius recognized as Neptune. He carried a long spear with three points, and Marius wondered if anyone who saw him riding the streets of Rome would recognize it as the trident.

“So it begins,” Janus murmured, and a low hum fell over the gods on the hilltop. Marius paused his examination of their numbers and looked out to the battlefield again. The battle had indeed begun, and he could see the front ranks of the legions engaged with each other, falling blades catching the light of the midday sun, glaring. The Roman Legion was outmatched—it was evident even to Marius’s untrained eye. The usurper’s forces were pouring into the middle of their lines like a wedge pushing itself into a stump before splitting it.

So it ends
, Marius thought, but he held his peace. He caught a glimmer of amusement from Janus and followed his mentor’s gaze just past him as a man on a horse clip-clopped up to come to a halt just beside him.

The man was large, like Jupiter. He had flaming red hair that flowed down his shoulders and a flat face with an unyielding nose that barely protruded from it. It looked as though it had been carved out of clay by a lazy sculptor who had cared little for giving the face depth. The eyes were shallow as well, and dark, and they rolled over Marius quickly and on to Janus.

“Janus,” the man said in acknowledgment.

“Ares,” Janus replied with a courteous nod.

The man called Ares sighed. “I do prefer that name, but all the same, perhaps it is best if you call me Mars now.”

Janus chuckled. “Have you met my ward? This is Marius. He is newly in my service.”

Mars with the flat face gave Marius another look. “He has little stomach for battle, Janus.”

Janus smiled. “Then he should be safe from any accidents should you find yourself slipping in your old age.”

Mars let a deep belly laugh out with such force it nearly made Marius jump. “I miss your company since you have become a hermit, Janus. We should sup again soon. It has been so long since the last time.”

“You are welcome in my home on any occasion,” Janus said solicitously.

“And you in mine,” Mars said with a nod of courtesy. He sighed. “I suppose I should get to work.”

“It would be greatly appreciated if you could spare Rome from the incompetence of her generals and the far-flung crusades of her emperor,” Janus said with a smile that Marius did not quite understand. He glanced back to the battle, which seemed to be going very poorly in his eyes. The usurper’s men were now through the Roman legion, had neatly divided it in half. They were swarming back and enveloping them with superior numbers. It was not what Marius thought a victory should look like.

Mars urged his horse forward a few paces with a nudge, putting himself in front of the line of gods atop the hill. Marius kept his eyes on the man—Mars, the God of War. He watched him, and Mars lifted his hands and sighed again, then pushed his hair back over his shoulders.

Mars lifted his hands in the air and held them aloft, eyes closed. He stood, still as a statue, facing the battle below. Marius heard faint whispering, like voices over the horizon, the maddening sounds of people just beyond his sight but not beyond his ears.

The wind swirled past him in hot tongues, the summer sun heating the air around him. Marius kept his eyes upon Mars, watching him hold there, the whispers raging around them. Marius’s eyes broke from the God of War and looked all around for the source of the whispers. The gods were all silent, gazes fixed on Mars, and the hillside around them was devoid of any spectators or speakers.

Marius turned his attention to Janus, ready to break the silence and ask the question, but Janus held a finger up to his lips to quell it before it was even asked. He then took it and pointed it to the battle, and Marius let his gaze fall back upon the site of the rout.

Where the usurper’s men were now losing.

It was not even a contest. He watched in the outlying spaces as the men of Proculus’s army fell upon their own spears by the dozens, by the hundreds. Even those not taking arms up against themselves were finding the Roman Legion surging through their number with increased ferocity. Marius squinted, his superior eyesight giving him a close view of the fight, as though it were happening right in front of him. The men of the Roman legion were moving with speed beyond that of normal humans, their blades moving up and down in fast, precise motions that sent the blood of their foes through the air in sprays and gushes.

Marius turned back to look at Mars, who was now lowering his hands. The battle was won, the enemy lines dissolved in a frenzy of suicide and panic. Mars let a long sigh of satisfaction and spoke. “Your servant yet lives, Janus. No accidents this time, you see.” He wheeled and smiled, his blunt, flat face suffused with a satisfaction that Marius had seen only a few times on the faces of people.

“Indeed, your skill is great, Ares,” Janus said with a nod. “I saw one of your children once attempt to influence a battle a tenth of this size.” He chortled. “They all killed themselves, to the last man.”

Mars’s face lost its look of amusement. “What can I say? Sometimes the apple is kicked far from the tree.”

“Indeed,” Janus said, and his eyes fell upon Marius, favoring him with a smile. “This is true.”

Marius turned his attention toward the battlefield below, a bloody mess of corpses and wounded, the screams echoing up to the hilltop. It was an utter display of cruel death, inconceivable defeat pulled from certain victory. Death grabbed whole from the jaws of life.

Marius realized after a moment that the sight of the battle’s more grisly elements—the blood, the screams—did not bother him at all. He looked back at Janus and saw the subtle nod. And he returned his mentor’s smile.

Chapter 29

Sienna

Now

Reed was already halfway out the door and I was right behind him when Harper yelled out, “Wait!” I glanced back and she tossed me something small, like the size of a shelled peanut. “Ear mic. I’ll be able to give you eyes in the sky.”

Reed hesitated and she tossed him one as well. He caught it and poked it into his ear, and I saw the look on his face. “We’re at least twenty minutes out, if we’re lucky. We’ll never make it in—”

I surged past him, pushing him out of the way as I headed out into the bullpen. “Maybe
you
won’t—”

I didn’t bother finishing my statement. I just took off in a flat charge toward the nearest window and called Wolfe to the front of my mind as I leapt through it. No surprise, it hurt a
lot
. Glass doesn’t shatter in full windows like it does in cars or in movies. That’s called safety glass and it turns into little pebbles that don’t tend to do much harm.

This glass shattered into razor sharp slivers, and I felt my clothes and skin suffer dozens of cuts of varying depths as I broke through.

I ignored every single one of them for about two seconds while I felt Wolfe go to work, then I pulled Gavrikov to front of my mind as well and switched off the Earth’s gravity.

I shot into the sky like I had a rocket motor latched to my feet, wind rushing into my face. I threw a hand forward like I was Superman … err … Superwoman? Whatever. I threw a hand forward as I flew and saw lines of blood running off my newly knitted flesh.

“What the f—” I heard Harper in my ear. “Did she just jump out the window?”

“She did,” I said, enjoying the feel of the wind in my face. I surged east, the sky above and the ground blurring past below. “I’m about two minutes out from the site.” I followed the freeway east and saw the white line of 494’s loop ahead just a few miles. I didn’t know exactly how fast I was going, but it had to be in the hundreds of miles per hour. The rush of the wind was probably not helping Harper hear me, I figured.

“Are you in a wind tunnel?” Harper’s voice came back. She sounded cautious. “There’s no way your ETA is two minutes.”

“Status report, MARS SIX,” I said.

That seemed to snap Harper out of her state of confusion. “Right,” she said with crisp professionalism. “The town car is burning, but we have three friendlies on the ground and moving. Tangos are engaging with them, I’m picking up a lot of heat discharge from one of them, like they have a flamethrower or something, I’ve never seen anything like it—”

“Understood,” I said.

“I am designating you MARS SIX-ACTUAL,” Harper said calmly. More calmly than I would have been if I’d been in her situation.

“Neat,” I said. “Consider me designated the Goddess of War.”

There was a moment’s pause, and I figured Harper’s brain was crunching away on the other end of the line, trying to come up with an explanation for everything she was experiencing right now. I knew she’d given up when I heard her reply. “Copy that, MARS SIX-ACTUAL.”

I streaked through the air, passing the interstate and coming down lower as I got closer to St. Louis Park. I tried to match my geography with the overhead imagery I’d seen from the drone and locked on to Minnesota Highway 7. I skirted toward it and slowed slightly, looking for the turn. My eyes found it a mile ahead and I traced it back to the grid-like latticework of roads. A lone warehouse stood with vacant lots for several blocks on one side, and I knew I’d found it. Even before I saw the flaming car just down the street.

“MARS SIX-ACTUAL …” Harper’s voice came into my earpiece. “Is that you flying …?”

“Like a bird, like a plane,” I said. “Janus, if you can hear me …” I paused. “Brace yourself.”

It was a total furball on the ground, someone scrambling around, someone else—one of my people, I assumed—firing a gun, and someone else throwing fireballs into the air like they were Aleksandr Gavrikov, Jr. Except this one was female. It very much looked like a battle, like a frigging war on a city street, completely with flames and black smoke churning skyward. I couldn’t pick out which of the people in front of me were enemies with full certainty, but I caught a glimpse of a guy hanging back from the others, closer to the warehouse than the fight, and I realized he was surveying the scene. And not one of mine.

“Incoming,” I muttered and arced sharply downward. I put my feet out and dropped, letting my speed carry me along with the power of gravity. The wind blurred my eyes, and I saw the ground rush up at me in a way that might have scared me yesterday.