In the Shadow of Dragons (Aftermagic Book 1) Read online

  Not for the first time, Noah started to reconsider what they were doing tomorrow.

  “Hey, Noah.” Diesel, who was seated facing the entrance, pointed. “Message.”

  He turned to find a green will-o’-wisp floating serenely toward him, stopping to hover in the air five or six feet away. The glowing ball pulsed like the beat of a heart. Single flashes. That meant it was straight from the top.

  “Took you long enough,” he muttered as he approached the ball. He’d sent the message out to the main camp immediately after the vision, hoping they’d be able to offer some kind of support. Extra bodies, supplies, weapons, anything. That the reply didn’t arrive until the day before the Eclipse meant they were probably being shafted. Again.

  Frowning, he held a hand out with his palm flat beneath the will-o’-wisp and tried to remember the latest ridiculous password. It was usually something awful to do with food. Chicken eggs Benedict? No, that was the previous one.

  Oh, right. He sighed, and said, “Banana mustard daiquiri.”

  The orb spun on his palm. He lowered his arm and stepped back, waiting for the message to load. The password system made sense, he supposed — there was pretty much zero chance someone would randomly decide to touch a will-o’-wisp and say ‘banana mustard daiquiri.’ He just wished they’d use passwords that didn’t sound so vomit-inducing.

  Hell, maybe goblins actually ate stuff like that.

  Finally, the bottom of the orb opened and light beams shot down, projecting a flickering holo. Jaeger Storm, the self-proclaimed Goblin King himself. Bent and green-skinned, a long and narrow face, pointed ears like ship sails rising above a thatch of white hair, dressed in a dirty fur-trimmed, patch-worn purple velvet cape.

  For a minute the image of Jaeger stood there, fidgeting with his robe, plucking out creases and brushing himself off. Finally, he cleared his throat and drew himself to his full height — which Noah happened to know was about five foot nothing, though the holo made him look bigger. “Mr. Delaney, we got your message,” the image said in a tinny voice. “Good for you, mounting such a brave attack on our enemy. We hope you don’t die.”

  “Great. Thanks,” Noah said, as if the recorded projection could hear him. “How about a little help, here?”

  The image of Jaeger held a hand up. “However, I’m declining your request. I mean, really. Do you think I have troops to spare during an Eclipse? Maybe you think I should send you my personal guards? No! My safety is crucial to our mission, and I can’t be bothered giving precious resources to every scrub who sends an orb, can I?”

  Noah’s jaw clenched. “A simple no would’ve sufficed,” he murmured.

  “Here’s what I think,” the holo went on. “I think you should stop begging me for help and do your job. How about that? Get out there and kill them, all of them. Death to the tyrants of BiCo!” He paused, looked around and scowled. “Why isn’t anyone blowing the damned trumpets? Do I have to do everything myself?”

  There was a horrible chorus of screeching, wailing, vaguely trumpet-like sounds.

  “All right. Message over.” The holo goblin turned away, and then looked over his shoulder. “By the way, the new message password is ‘sticky cabbage donuts.’ Let us know if you’re still alive tomorrow — and by us, I mean not me. Contact someone less important next time. Goodbye, Mr. Delaney.” With that, the image froze.

  “You scrawny little maniac,” Noah ground out. He gestured fiercely at the will-o’-wisp, and it unraveled into nothing. It wasn’t like they were just going on a HeMo raid this time. They were taking on Julian Bishop, in the flesh, on a chance that his vision would somehow pay off — and their so-called fearless leader couldn’t give them anything? Not even a motivational speech. ‘Good luck, hope you don’t die’ was the best he had. “How are we supposed to perform better if we can’t get—” He bit off the rest and faced the table again. “All right,” he said with a sigh. “It’s time to think about calling this off.”

  Darby bristled. “Hell, no. We’ve got a chance to bring him down for good. We have to take it.”

  “No, we don’t,” he said. “What we’ve got is a chance to find a way to bring him down. That was the vision. We confront Julian, he gives us the key to stopping him.” He closed his eyes briefly. “Thing is, I have no idea what the ‘key’ is going to be. Could be something big, like a weapon. Or something small … like a piece of information we can act on eventually, after months or years of groundwork. Point being, we’re not going to win tomorrow. So do we really want to die for a maybe?”

  “We won’t die.” Diesel looked hard at him. “I can handle Julian.”

  “Yeah, so you’ve said.” Noah took in a slow breath. He knew better than most how powerful Diesel was — the man packed more magic than anyone he’d seen or heard of since the dragons changed the world.

  With one notable exception: Julian Bishop. Who’d killed a dragon and a mage before the magic even started to spread.

  Finally, he looked at them. “All right. As long as everyone else agrees … we’ll do it.”

  “Sweet!” Darby pumped a fist in the air. “Anything I can do to prep? My babies are as ready as they’re gonna be.” She waved a hand at her gun collection.

  “Actually, yeah. You can get a message to Goddard in the city, tell him to push hard on finding recruits,” he said. “It won’t help for tomorrow, but we’ve got to have more people, fast. Preferably strong ones. We just can’t match their numbers, so we need more magic.”

  “Will do.”

  Noah clapped her shoulder. “Diesel, you and me are on route detail. I want to make sure we can get out of there if things go south.”

  Diesel nodded and stood. “I’ll get the maps.”

  “Thank you.” He kept his features schooled to neutral, knowing it wouldn’t help if they sensed how worried he really was.

  Maybe Jaeger was right to cut them off. Sending more resources out here was pointless — they were already rats on a sinking ship, and the nearest shore was hundreds of miles away. They’d never make it through this.

  Stopping BiCo, fixing the world, was impossible.

  And they’d all die trying.

  CHAPTER 4

  Yukon Street Clinic

  August 7, 6:04 p.m.

  Naomi locked the front door and headed for the reception desk, trying to stretch the kinks from her back. She’d finally convinced Aileen to go home and get some rest. It had been a long day, and tomorrow would be longer. Even with Bernadette Parish coming in. The retired nurse had been here on Eclipse Day the past three years, helping them give the extra HeMo boosters that everyone who wasn’t on daily pills was required to get prior to the Eclipse. It was supposed to protect them from the magic surges.

  She wasn’t convinced the extra dose did anything. But people panicked if they didn’t get their HeMo.

  At least they’d gotten little Robbie taken care of as best they could. His aunt came to pick him up about an hour after the patrols had taken Emily Harris away. Aunt Joan took the news of what happened to her sister in pale-faced silence, then offered mumbled thanks to them for watching Robbie and darted from the clinic with the boy like her ass was on fire. Naomi couldn’t blame her, after what she’d witnessed that morning.

  She’d wanted to ask about the necklace — if it really was a cantrip, if it actually worked. But Joan hadn’t seemed to be in an answering mood, or even a particularly coherent one.

  Naomi planned to take her own advice, to go home and rest, soon. She had a bit of business to tend to first. Namely, getting in touch with someone at BiCo who could do something about Greg Call-For-A-Good-Time Swain.

  She sat down at the desk, nudged the computer awake and went to the BiCo website. Calling the Eclipse Hotline was useless. There wouldn’t be anyone with authority working those lines, and even if there was, right now they’d be flooded with calls from scared people asking questions about tomorrow that probably couldn’t be answered.

  The list of numbers on the
directory page for the main BiCo facility was distressingly brief. Front office, service calls, public relations. Of course, she didn’t really expect to find a direct line to Julian Bishop listed on the website — but if it was, she’d have called him. And told him exactly what she thought of his ‘security.’

  She picked up the desk phone and dialed the number for public relations. There was a click, a few seconds of dead air, and then the line rang. After four rings, a deep male voice answered with, “BiCo public relations. If you’re public, we want relations with you.”

  She was too shocked to respond. The man sounded drunk, or at least halfway there. In the background she heard a giggle, and then a female voice half-whispered, “You’re not supposed to answer my phone!”

  The male shushed her. “Hello?” he said into the phone. “Anyone from the public there?”

  Naomi finally recovered enough to be angry. Slimy violent patrol officers, drunk phone operators — just what kind of company was Julian Bishop running?

  “Who is this?” she said coldly.

  There was a pause, more giggling. “Just your humble public servant,” the man said.

  “And this is how you answer the phone at a multi-billion dollar corporation.” She drummed her fingers on the desk. “I want to speak to your superior.”

  “Oh, you do?” The voice was suddenly, frigidly sober. “Well, let me just put you on hold. Your estimated wait time is forever, because my boss doesn’t do phones.”

  “Is that right. Who’s your boss?”

  “Julian Bishop.”

  “Hilarious,” she said in flat tones. “I want your name, and the name of your superior.”

  “Why?”

  “So I can report you.”

  The man laughed, a dark sound with no humor. “Sure. Report me,” he said. “My superior is Julian Bishop. And my name is Sawyer Volk. That’s S-a-w-y—”

  “Oh, come on,” Naomi interrupted. “Do you really expect me to believe that?”

  “Believe it, don’t believe it. I don’t care,” the man said. “It’s the only name I’ve got.”

  “You’re really Sawyer Volk.”

  “Yes. You might’ve heard of me,” he said. “Knight, movie star — I was just on the news this morning. Got that whole Eclipse thing coming up tomorrow?”

  She closed her eyes. “I know who you are, Mr. Volk.” Unbelievable. The Knights were even worse than the patrols.

  “Call me Sawyer.”

  She declined to comment on that. Though the last thing she wanted to do was keep talking to this drunken egomaniac, she might as well tell him about Swain. Wasn’t going to get any higher on the administrative chain than a Knight. “Look, Mr. Volk, I’m calling about one of your patrol officers—”

  “It’s Sawyer,” he said. “And you are?”

  For a moment she considered giving him a fake name, or just hanging up. But that would make her a hypocrite. “Naomi Talbot.”

  “Okay, Naomi. Why don’t you tell me about your problems in person?” There was a note in his voice she couldn’t identify, and didn’t like at all. “A bunch of us are heading to the Steel Drum around seven. Stop in, and I’ll buy you a drink. We can talk.”

  Once again, shock arrested her tongue. “Mr. Volk,” she finally managed. “Do you always offer to buy drinks for random callers?”

  “Only when they sound as pretty as you.”

  That was more than enough. “This conversation is being recorded, Mr. Volk,” she lied with barely a hitch in her voice. “And I will find a way to report you. Good night.”

  She hung up before he could respond and stared at the phone, trembling with rage. This was unacceptable, all of it. But she was beginning to think there was nothing she could do about it. If the callous, crude behavior at BiCo ran all the way to the Knights, then only Julian Bishop could do something about it. And since he hadn’t yet, it was very unlikely that he cared what they were doing.

  When the phone rang less than a minute later, she was sure Sawyer Volk had looked up the number and called back for more. Then she realized it was her cell. Aileen, then. Her assistant was pretty much the only one who called her personal number these days. At least now she could talk to someone sane and rational.

  She answered without looking at the incoming number. “Hello?”

  “Naomi. They’ve got it all wrong, and I can prove it.”

  The statement chilled her. Not Aileen, not Sawyer somehow getting his hands on her cell number. This voice was raspy, hollow, almost familiar — but the words made no sense. She glanced at the screen, didn’t recognize the number. “Who’s this?”

  A hitching breath. “It’s me, Omes.”

  “Oh, my God.” Only one person called her that. “Scott?”

  “Yes. But don’t say my name.”

  Dread curdled in the pit of her stomach. After the second unexpected Eclipse, the one that cemented the new reality and caused so much death and widespread panic, Dr. Scott Madden had dropped off the radar. He’d never gone back to work, stopped all communication with her and the few common friends they’d still talked to. By then she was caught up in the paranoia, trying to adjust to the infection of real magic and help wherever she could. She’d thought about him often but never really tried to get back in touch.

  Now here he was, out of the blue and talking like a crazy person.

  “Who’s got what wrong?” she finally said.

  “The Eclipse. It’s not doubling. It’s going to be longer than they say.” His tone was harsh and heavy, like he’d curled a hand around the phone to prevent someone from listening. “Time it. You’ll see.”

  “Sc—” She stopped herself with a shiver. Don’t say my name. “I’m not sure I can,” she said carefully. “Electronics don’t work, remember?”

  “Find a way. You have to see.”

  The tone was even lower now, his voice thrumming with fear. “What’s going on?” she said, dreading the answer.

  “I’m sorry, Omes. I have to go.”

  “Wait—”

  He was already gone.

  “Good lord,” she said aloud to the empty lobby. With shaking hands, she returned the phone to her lab coat pocket and took a moment to compose herself. Two unexpected, horrifying conversations in the space of ten minutes, the night before an Eclipse. This was not going to help her get through tomorrow.

  She decided to swear off phone calls for the rest of the night.

  CHAPTER 5

  BiCo Training Facility

  August 7, 10:49 p.m.

  Her phone was buzzing again. Teague ignored it and reloaded the crossbow, barely conscious of the sneer stamped on her face. He didn’t want her here tomorrow? Fine. She’d go wherever he told her — she always did. But she wasn’t going to listen to his list of bullshit reasons.

  She knew exactly why she was being sent to Casper. And yes, maybe there was a touch of jealousy on her part that she was being replaced by a twiggy little flake who wore ‘outfits’ instead of clothes, but that didn’t change the facts. This was a bad move, and Julian knew it.

  The quarter-mile indoor range wasn’t ideal, didn’t give her enough distance to hone her game as much as she wanted. But the lighting did mimic the dull red dark of the Eclipse. There were holo-targets roaming the lanes ahead of her, half-transformed beasts with snarling mouths and menacing stares.

  She tapped the panel on the side of the booth to activate the voice control. “Change target appearance. Custom program, Harlow two,” she said. “I want to shoot that son of a bitch some more.”

  The holos pulsed briefly and became a milling herd of Julian Bishops. All of them grinning, blond, six-foot-two icons of male perfection. She slugged the rifle stock against her shoulder and sent an arrow through the nearest smile.

  Julian’s head exploded in a satisfying spray of pixilated blood.

  “Taking our assignment a little personally, aren’t we?”

  The voice was behind her. She should’ve known he wouldn’t accept bei
ng ignored. Refusing to turn around, she sighted another holo and fired, this time nailing his heart. “Personally?” she said. “No. If this was personal, I’d aim a little lower and to the left.”

  “Ouch.” She sensed him approaching. “Didn’t I give you the night off?” he said. “You need to relax. The rest of them are down at the Steel Drum—”

  “I’m busy,” she bit off.

  “Come on, Tee. It’s not what you think.”

  Finally, she turned to face the real Julian and lowered the crossbow with reluctance. He was still in the tailored gray suit he’d been wearing in the conference room earlier, but he’d removed the tie and loosened the top buttons on the shirt. Like he expected her to melt at the sight of a little bare chest. “Isn’t it?” she said. “Tell me this has nothing to do with Carola. I dare you to.”

  Julian frowned. “This has nothing to do with Carola.”

  “Sure. And Sawyer’s not going to show up with a hangover tomorrow.”

  “It has nothing to do with Carola,” he repeated firmly, moving forward to take her free hand. She snatched it away, and he sighed. “Look, we’ve been over this,” he said. “She’s a good match for the media. I told you, I have to keep up my image—”

  “As what?” she snapped. “The CEO of Bishop Corporation, or king of the goddamned world?”

  The hurt look on his face almost made her regret the words. But only almost. “They have to trust me completely,” he said. “And my image is a huge part of that. We can’t risk a repeat of Year One. Teague, you know how important this is.” He offered a sad smile. “You more than anyone.”

  “Yeah, I do.” She wanted to slap the expression off his face. “So how does it make sense to send me out of Bishop, for the one day I need to be here?” Relenting slightly, she leaned the crossbow against the booth wall and stared at him. “Julian, I’ve been by your side for five years,” she said. “Then Carola Fierstein comes along, you’re with her for like three days—”