Wine of the Gods 05: Spy Wars (33 page)

1365
Summer

Fascia
, Auralian Empire

The female servants in the Amma's Palace wore uniforms that apparently rendered them invisible, gave them entry everywhere, and made them easy pickings for the guards. So, while their illusions gained them entry nearly everywhere, Oscar had to send at least one guard a day off with a fantasy tryst stuck in his brain. It was unfortunately obvious that a lot of the Oner's decisions were coming out of the Amma's harem, so it was time to assault the last bastion of privacy in the building. A basket of wines from the Amma's cellar was the first legitimate opportunity.

As he approached the door, the enormous guards knocked on the door behind them, and a brown haired women looked out, and nodded. "Finally. The Princess asked for more wine yesterday. Don't dawdle, girl."

Oscar was really glad he hadn't just shown up and tried to bluff his way in. He followed the woman up a flight of stairs to an airy chamber with the windows open on a view across the grounds. A breeze swept in and up spiral stairs to an open hatch. No doubt a roof top patio for the Princess. The Princess turned away from the window and he gawped. Blonde hair so pale it was nearly white, crystalline blue eyes, striking in a deep tanned face of exquisite beauty. Glow. Old Gods! What a glow! He got his mouth closed and followed the brown haired woman to the wine rack. He placed the bottles carefully, reds, roses and whites.

"Well, finally a servant who knows how to handle wine. Open a bottle of the Chardonnay."

Oscar pulled the cork as a bell tinkled. The brown haired woman frowned, but was sent off by the Princess. Old Gods! An opportunity like this didn't come along every day. While the Princess made a deal out of examining the cork, Oscar slipped a jot of wine from his flask into a glass and poured a bit of Chardonnay into it.

The Princess sipped. "Lovely!" Oscar poured more and then set the bottle on the table. Old gods, she had a glow like no one he'd ever seen . . . no. She glowed like the Goddess of Fertility in her maiden aspect. And she saw Oscar's interest.

"You're no woman. What are you doing here?" Her eyes narrowed as she put the glass down and stalked him. He backed away until he came into contact with an overstuffed sofa. "Actually, you are just what I need, right now." She shoved him down on the sofa and straddled him. Oscar heard a heavy masculine tread outside the door and saw the perfect opportunity to unsettle an alliance. He threw an illusion over himself. Instead of a blonde fellow in a rucked up maid's dress, the Oner commander of the troops . . . his pants down.

The Princess jerked back in shock.

The Amma walked through the doorway.

Oscar tossed the Princess into the Amma's arms, then threw about five spells of misdirection, fog, disorientation, trip and slow as he dashed for the door and threw a light warp around himself. Screams, angry yelling and a slap rose behind him, then the alarm was up, eunuchs with swords were running everywhere, and he wound up sitting on top of a book shelf for three hours before the opportunity to get out the doors came around.

He sought privacy, and let the light warp go, and spent the rest of the afternoon nursing his aching head in an underutilized dining room.

Bran finally found him. "What on the World happened? The Amma has thrown the Oner Ambassador in the dungeon and executed the troop commander. Everyone's running around in a complete tizzy."

Oscar snickered. "I saw an opportunity and grabbed it. I only wish I could pretend it was a deeply laid plan instead of a half panicked flash of inspiration." He grinned and told the tale.

"
That was epic. Even for you." Bran wasn't even trying to not grin.

"From what you say
, we're done here. It's time to go home." Oscar pried himself off the floor.

"Correct. Now get up and let's get started." Bran hauled him up and led the way.

15 Qadah 1367
/ late Summer 1365

Karista, Kingdom of the West, Target World Forty-two

Ajha was walking up the street toward the warehouse when he heard his name called.
Egto thumped his weary horse, then gave up and slid off. Idre was behind him and half fell off as his horse staggered to a halt. Ajha's stomach dropped. They were alone.

"Egto? Idre? What happened? Where are . . . "

Egto grabbed his arm for support. "They're dead, all of them."

Idre nodded. "The dragons ate them."

Ajha dragged them inside.

"Usse, trouble!"

Egto and Idre made a beeline for the downstairs water tap.

Then they sat down and tried to give a coherent tale. They didn't succeed.

Usse was having trouble maintaining his calm. Ajha gave up trying. Idre and Egto had ridden their horses into the ground, getting away from Ash. The rest of the Oners weren't going to come back. An entire expanded Action Team, eighteen men highly trained in fighting both magically and physically. And Idre and Egto were both babbling on about teenage girls who turned into dragons, and how they'd had to flee into the thickest forest to escape them.

Ajha
had a sinking feeling that perhaps the local magic wasn't as strictly physical as they had supposed. Illusions, and hallucinations of this strength took immense power.
They must have been able to group and gang up on the team, or rather, the individual members. Surely, if the team had been able to form compasses, or even circuits, they couldn't have been so easily overwhelmed.

Usse stared at Egto. "You say there were t
hirty-six of them? And the team was defeated in minutes? There were twenty of you."

"Those kids all knew how to fight, they had training, including bare handed against knives. And magic. One of them raised a magical suppression spell, and even Edmo couldn't bre
ak it. It even fogged the team bond a bit; we couldn't join forces. If we could have touched . . . But I still saw and felt what happened to them. It was the ones that turned into dragons that were the real danger." Egto's eyes were wide with remembered terror. "We were set to guard the road, keep them from escaping!" A hysterical cackle burst out of him, turned into a sob. "We faded back and observed. No one saw the weapons go, but I, someone, started seeing empty holsters, and I, someone, tried to warn Edmo, but it was too late, all the guns were gone. Then this girl appeared out of nowhere, and told one of the hostages to release the dragons."

Idre hugged himself as if he were cold. "About half of the girls turned into dragons. They raped the team, then killed them and ate them. That's when we ran for it.
When everyone was dead. I saw some dragons flying, and ducked into the thickest forest I could find."

Usse bit his knuckles in frustration. "Could you see anything from there?"

"Yes, people from the village were arriving, armed to the teeth. That man we traced, in armor, on the biggest horse I've ever seen. Popped out of nowhere. The rest of them came running over the hill, but there wasn't anything left for them to do. I waited until everyone had gone, then we got back here as fast as possible." Idre was alternating between flushed and pale, sweating in fear. "We took the two fastest horses and left the rest, so maybe they'd think no one escaped."

Usse stood up, paced around in a little circle, and sat back down.

"Quite apart from the obvious hallucinatory overlay, which the experts will no doubt have fun analyzing, all we know is that Ash is an enclave of magic users. Discol's previous report spoke of a 'witches school' and a 'wizard's tower'. Heretical ceremonies at the tops of volcanoes and sexual licentiousness."

Ajha shifted uncertainly. "There's a perfectly ordinary school in town, and the horse farm to the south has a sort of stumpy fat tower. But it's right on the road to the nearest town."
One Damn it, it didn't need to come to this. Damn Usse for that spell . . . I've been sleep walking for three weeks . . . One damn it all, they could have been allies, friends.
He leaned his head back and stared at the overhead.
I am of the One. I am the eyes and ears of the One. But by the same logic, my brains are also at the service of the One. So I had better go home and report my
thoughts
to the One, and argue my position. Otherwise I have failed to serve the One to the best of my abilities.

Usse snorted. "Discol had few morals, the witches probably led him around by his male parts
. Obviously they were expecting some sort of attack. The Action Team—the natives found their weakest point. They were all apparently distracted by bunch of young women, open to a hallucinatory spell." His glare fell on Ajha this time. "And we obviously underestimated the strength of the local magic. Again."

And I'm starting now.
Ajha crossed his arms and glared back. "I've been arguing about them being similar to the One for
years
. Would you send twenty men to slaughter a Oner Enclave of several hundred people, some quite old and experienced?"

Usse's eyes narrowed.

"Will you radio in a report?" Idre shivered.

"No. I don't dare break radio silence, especially to announce that we're completely unprotected. You three will go to Fascia with a report, and if those idiots left in Fascia can manage a gate location signal, they may send you to HQ for in-depth questioning.
They have a crisis of their own, down there. Ajha, in view of the obviously compromised condition of the rest of your team, you are in command until relieved by a superior."

"Yes, sir."
And so we'll see really soon whether anyone will actually listen to me.

"
The end of this world is getting close." Egto looked hopeful. "Maybe we don't need to do anything, and maybe it would be wise to leave early. Maybe they'll all die."

Usse snorted. "If the first comet hits, those magicians will be frantic to get off this World. The Earth will not be allowed to recruit these dangerous magicians. If I have to risk dying with them when the comet hits, I will die knowing I have served the One."

Ajha bowed his head, hearing the iron determination in the old man's voice.
Why do I keep trying? Because I'm right, that's why. Silence is the wrong way to serve the One.

Idre nodded jerkily. "Yes, the risk is necessary. This magic is too dangerous to be allowed to survive."

              Ajha huffed out a breath. "I'll walk down to the sea docks and look for ships departing for Panama. Soon."

1 September 3483 / L
ate Summer 1366 Local

Karista, Kingdom of the West, Comet Fall

"Psst! Code! You guys wanna buy some horses, cheap?"

Damien looked over at the kid who was hiding halfway behind Code. Scrawny twelve year old, ragged clothing.

"Where'd you get horses, Eddy? How many, and who from?" Code turned to face the younger kid. Probably reminded him of himself.

"Two, these guys with weird names, Egg Toast and Idiot or something, rode them half to death, so I figured they didn't deserve to keep them. And one of them's a pinto, so I figured you guys . . . " The boy was pulling Code out the door as he talked.

Damien frowned. Egg toast? Egto was one of the Oner names they'd caught in radio intercepts, and Idre another.

"Solstice!" Code sounded shocked, and Damien was halfway out the door before he realized he was moving.

The big bay and white pinto was salt crusted with days of sweat, flanks tucked up, dull eyed. He was standing with his weight off one foreleg. He blew wearily and laid his head on Code's shoulder.
The second horse was glassy eyed, in pain. Leaning backwards as if trying to take weight off his front feet.
Foundering. I'm surprised the kid could get them three blocks.

Damien glanced back at Barto, who was crowding out to see what was going on. "So, what's that Temple Water do for done-in, lamed horses?"

Barto snickered. "Five royals and a new bottle of wine, and I'll show you."

"In a bucket of warm water." Damien passed over the money, and walked over to the boy. "So, where'd this Egg Toast live, anyway?"

The boy eyed the pouch he was still holding. "They all went inside that old green warehouse on Rock Fish. It's right across the alley from your place." He looked a bit dismayed suddenly, as it occurred to him that they might not want to be driving in and out with the neighbor's horses.

Right across the alley. Good. Grief.
Proximity would explain how they'd been able to get so many RF intercepts.

"Bunch of them, were there? I'm surprised you could cut two horses out."

"Nah, there were only two of them. They said dragons ate everyone else."

Damien hauled him inside and bought him lunch. While Code and Barto ministered to the horses, Damien got the brief exchange the boy had heard
, pretty much verbatim. Then he paid him a ridiculous sum for returning Solstice, and suggested that if he kept the other horse he could hire out to run small packages all over town. "Any horse that could keep up with Solstice is damn good. If he recovers from what they've done to him." He braced himself. "I've got some space in the new barn, you could keep him there."

The wary child finished every crumb and said he'd think about it.

Then Code walked Solstice carefully home while Damien drove. Time to write a report while it was still fresh in his mind. And talk to Andrai and Max about how to get an optic cable under the alley with a passive pickup on the other end.

It was an all night job, but they got a cable through the hole they drilled. It stopped just at the floor level,
in a crack between boards, about the middle of the back wall. It had a panoramic view, with good line of sight to the front of the warehouse, and a row of rooms upstairs across half the front. They couldn't see the other half of the upstairs, because of the angle, but they had a clear view of the high glass windows. With a bit of fine tuning, the vibrations of the glass were reconstituted back into the sounds that had caused the vibrations.

"I swear by the One, Ajha, it was not an illusion. They turned into dragons. One minute they were a bunch of obnoxious teenage girls, then suddenly they were crawling all over the
team. They choked them into, look you're pretty young you wouldn't understand what suffocation does to the . . . Oh One. I can't sleep. I just see it over and over."

Damien nodded thoughtfully.
So that is what the purple bunny girl does to attackers. Well, maybe her older friends, she's a bit young to be raping men. We need to somehow get a line on that village. Do business with them regularly, become part of their background. Somehow
.