They fell in line behind the rest of the compound residents and waited. When Cassie finally made it to the people serving the food, the woman with the bacon slices gave her a skeptical look but shoveled three slices onto her plate anyway. Three slices of bacon! Score.
Cassie and her group took their food to an empty picnic table and sat down to eat. As soon as Cassie took her first bite of savory bacon, the gothic witch sat down beside her, slamming her plate down on the table.
Cassie raised her eyebrows at the girl and took another bite of bacon. “Hi,” she said in a halfhearted attempt to be polite.
“So, you are the one, aren’t you?”
“Uh. I guess. That depends on what you are talking about.”
“Thanks to you, Emilia has lost her workshop.”
“Nobody made you send that transmission,” said Clark.
Brigid shot him a devil’s glare. “Yes, they did. I heard it in my mind very clearly. It was a personal request. Are you saying you didn’t send it?”
“Sister. Cassandra did not send you any messages. She has been far too busy perfecting her skills with our coven. Why aren’t you with a coven?” asked Circe.
Brigid turned her dirty look on Circe, who didn’t react to the girl’s evil stare. Circe gazed back at her, impassive, like a stone statue. Finally, Brigid sighed.
“I’ve been with Emilia since the first radiation blasts. We mutated together, but differently. We’ve been asked to leave each other so many times I can’t even remember. But we don’t leave each other. Not for anything. So don’t get any ideas about breaking us up, because I’ll die first.”
“It was a simple question,” said Circe. “You must gain control of your emotions if you wish to develop your power.”
“I do just fine. I don’t need any help from anyone.”
“Emilia is a wolf, isn’t she?” asked Rafe.
“Yeah. What’s it to you?”
“Wolves tend to be good with computers and technology, engineering stuff. Plus I could smell it.”
“Well. Thanks to you people, she lost her workshop, and she’s bawling her eyes out right now. God damn it. I hate it when she cries like that.”
“Won’t your alpha let her have it back eventually?” asked Selina, who had been stuffing her face until then.
“I don’t have an alpha. And I doubt it. Xavier can be a real dick, sometimes.”
Selina laughed explosively. “I can’t believe you talk about him like that.”
“Whatever. I have to go check on Emilia.”
Brigid stormed off, and Cassie and Selina burst into laughter as soon as she was out of earshot.
“She loves the wolf a great deal,” Circe said in a dead-serious tone that made Cassie and Selina only laugh harder.
“We should find out who sent her that message, because it did intercept us,” said Rafe.
“It was probably the Council of the Seventh House,” Circe said with even greater seriousness.
“Who are they, anyway?” asked Clark.
“They are the galactic guardians who protect the integrity of life on the planet.”
“They aren’t doing such a great job then, are they?” said Clark.
Selina and Cassie, who had gotten their laughter under control, burst out laughing again as soon as they looked at each other.
“From what I understand, they cannot intervene directly. But they have given Cassandra special abilities, and I suspect they have done the same with others,” Circe said.
“I wish they would just tell me what to do.”
Xavier approached their table, his blue eyes shining like the midday sky. He scanned their faces, his gaze falling briefly on Circe, who drew a deep breath.
Cassie could tell they were checking each other out. Xavier’s presence had killed her laughter and buried it in her throat. She gulped. This guy is a piece of work.
“I want to speak with you all, now, in my house.”
Cassie’s group followed Xavier and his guards to the farmhouse. The guards held military-grade rifles, making Cassie feel nervous because none of her friends were armed. They had their natural abilities, but she knew that nothing worked better than a couple of handguns or a sword in a pinch.
They walked up the stairs and into the living room of Xavier’s place. It looked as though the only one living in the whole place was Xavier. A servant girl brought him a cup of coffee, and Xavier settled into an armchair after everyone else had sat down.
“Coffee?” he asked them.
“You have coffee?” Rafe asked.
“We have a stockpile of coffee for special occasions. Get them each a cup,” he said to the girl. She scurried off into the kitchen and brought back a tray for Cassie and her friends. The girl handed Cassie coffee in a delicate porcelain cup, cream and sugar already stirred in. She took a sip. Heaven.
“Wow. What a treat,” said Cassie.
“This is quite the setup you have here, Xavier,” said Rafe. “I’ve been in contact with other wolf packs and a few witches on a makeshift Internet for years. Why haven’t I ever heard of your group?”
“We try to lie low.”
“Why have you called us here? We have an important mission, and we’d like to be on our way,” Rafe replied.
“Right. Liberating a dome.” Xavier set his cup on the saucer and chuckled. The sound sent shivers down Cassie’s spine, reminding her of the last dragon she’d seen—the one who had set fire to a car and murdered her friends for no reason.
“We have information that will make that possible, yes. We are still fighting the Anu. Aren’t you?” asked Rafe.
“Fighting the Anu?” Xavier lifted his eyebrow. “The Anu do not bother us here. If you were to ‘liberate’ a dome, as you put it, you would bring their wrath down on our heads. Why would I do that? Why would I allow you to do it?”
“Because it’s the right thing to do,” Cassie barked.
Cassie could feel rage boiling up from deep within. The cups and saucers on the coffee table began to shake as energy built in her belly. Xavier glanced at the shaking dishes and then at Cassie with a questioning look in his face.
“And who is to say what the ‘right’ thing to do is? If we free the children inside the dome and the Anu then murder all the people here, was it really the ‘right’ thing in the end? As far as I know, those children are not suffering.”
“Not suffering!” Cassie screamed, jumping to her feet. “Do you have any idea what they are doing to the girls in there? God knows what they are doing to the boys. They are raping and impregnating young women, every day, with hybrid Anu fetuses.” She could feel the bile rise in her gut and sat back down, clutching her stomach and covering her mouth.
“I see. I can understand your anger, young woman. I really can, seeing that you came from one of these domes. But I cannot allow you to jeopardize everything I’ve built here. So you see, we have a bit of a problem. We live just over a hundred miles from L.A. The Anu know our settlement is here and have left us in peace. But I doubt they will be so kind if you interfere. Thus, I cannot allow you to leave.”
Cassie shot to her feet, energy pouring out of her and shattering the antique porcelain cups on the table. Coffee splashed in the air and splattered on Xavier’s face.
“Cassie, no,” Rafe ordered. His tone of voice brought her out of her rage, and she looked at him questioningly.
“Take them to the brig, and take special precautions with that one”—Xavier said, indicating Cassie—“and the witch. I know what witches can do.”
Circe stared at Xavier, her dark eyes penetrating his. He turned away, blood rising to his face. Cassie stared at Rafe as the guards tied her and Circe’s hands.
Once they were out of the farmhouse and walking across the yard toward a barn, Cassie asked him, “What was that about? Why didn’t you let me take care of him?”
“This isn’t the time,” he muttered.
A light rain began to fall from the gray sky, but by the time they w
ere in the barn, it was falling hard in a cacophony of pounding notes on the tin roof.
They were led into a room with a series of wire dog cages tall enough to fit a man, and locked inside. Cassie had been put in a cage by herself, as had Circe. The rest were caged together. Cassie sat on the folding chair in her cell and frowned.
“Didn’t see this coming, did you, Cassandra?” sneered Clark.
“Shut up, Clark,” Cassie and Selina said at the same time.
Circe burst out of her bonds easily using her magic. The same hand that had picked Cassie up and thrown her during the gauntlet gently picked at the ropes on her hands. Soon she too was free.
Cassie shot up to look at the lock on her cage, seeing it had some kind of electronic combination code, before a guard entered the room with Xavier. Rain dripped down Xavier’s broad chest and his eyes gleamed.
“I see the two of you have already freed yourselves from the restraints. Let me be clear: I have nothing against any of you personally. I’m sure you are fine people. But I cannot let you leave here until I’m sure you will not interfere with the dome. My guard has been told to shoot to kill if you try to escape.”
He glanced at Circe before disappearing from the barn. The guard hefted his rifle and took a seat opposite the cages, staring at them as if they were cable TV.
“Great. Just great,” Clark moaned. “Hey, you. I never thought liberating the dome was a good idea to begin with. You can let me out now.”
The guard just chuckled.
“I always knew you were a traitor, Clark,” said Selina.
“Everyone just calm down and shut up,” Rafe ordered. “Xavier has a point, and I respect his reasoning. I might do the same thing in his shoes. Let’s just wait this out.”
For the next several hours, they paced their cages. Cassie alternated between walking and sitting. She sat on the chair, on the floor, and at one point, she lay down, humming to herself. Selina and Clark kept snapping at each other. Clark insulted Selina’s intelligence, and Selina called Clark a “traitorous pussy” more than once.
Circe kept quiet most of the time. Cassie assumed she was in communication with Hecate and Vesta back in Arizona—little good it would do them now. Rafe passed the time by going through his martial arts forms in the small space available.
It made Cassie feel lazy—she was just sitting around, but she didn’t have the motivation to meditate or practice her moves. She wanted to free them all but wasn’t sure she could control her powers well enough to not kill everyone in the room at the same time.
They were brought lunch a few hours later. It was slipped through a tiny hole in the cage, only big enough for a food bowl to pass through. They were given smoked meat with wheat berries and greens.
They ate in silence. Selina and Clark even stopped fighting for a few minutes. When Cassie was done, she set her plate next to the opening and glanced up at the guard, just as his rifle crashed to the floor.
His eyes bugged out and his hands groped at his neck. The man tried to stand, but his feet slipped from under him, and he crashed back down on the seat. Gurgling sounds escaped his lips as his eyes slowly closed, and he fell to the floor.
A moment later, Brigid and Emilia emerged from the hayloft above the cages. Emilia held some kind of tablet device with a cable attached to it. She went to Circe’s cage and stuck the cable into the lock.
“What are you doing?” asked Rafe. “Is he dead?”
“No,” said Emilia, “We’re getting you out of here. This is a program I developed that runs through random numbers until it finds the combination to these locks,” Emilia said. The lock on Circe’s cage clicked open. Brigid flung open the door, but Circe remained statue still, her eyes closed tight.
“What’s wrong with her?”
“She’s in meditation. Unlock me next,” said Cassie. Emilia came to her cage and ran through the same process. The lock opened. They moved to the cage with Rafe, Selina, and Clark, opening it a few moments later. Everyone but Circe burst out into freedom, their eyes darting around the room for an escape route.
“Why did you free us?” asked Rafe.
“I heard you wanted to free those kids in the dome,” Brigid said. “I don’t want to sit here like a lame ass waiting for those alien bastards to attack. Plus jackass Xavier locked up Emilia’s workshop and won’t let her inside. She’s a mess without her work. So we might as well leave.”
Emilia looked at them with red-rimmed eyes behind her thick glasses. It was hard to believe she was a wolf, but considering that Clark was also a wolf, it wasn’t that surprising.
“What about Clark?” Selina asked. “I say we leave him here.”
“I was just kidding,” said Clark.
“There isn’t time for this. We need to get out of here. Brigid, what is the best way out?” Rafe demanded.
“What about Circe? She won’t wake up,” asked Cassie, shaking her friend and mentor, panic rising more each passing second.
“Can we carry her out?” Rafe asked Brigid.
“I doubt it.”
“We’ll have to leave her, Cassandra. We’ll come back for her later.”
“Follow me,” Brigid said.
Chapter 61
They climbed the ladder into the loft and then scurried, hunched over, through the hay bales. At the far end of the loft, an opening led out onto the roof. Rain pelted the roof and washed down in a torrent to the ground twenty feet below.
Cassie didn’t see a way out, but Brigid ducked through the window and descended a ladder partially hidden behind a mass of vegetation that had grown over the barn wall.
The group followed her one by one. Brigid ran across the barnyard and through a fence and ducked into the thin underbrush beyond. Cassie’s hair and clothing were soaked through, but the dark sky and thick sheets of rain had obscured them from anyone who might have been looking at the back of the barn.
They crawled through the bushes until they came to the forest, where they ran under a large cypress tree that partially protected them from the rain.
“What now?” Rafe asked through the pounding of the downpour.
“What do you mean? Don’t you have a plan?” Brigid shouted back.
Cassie was shivering from the cool water soaking her skin. “We need a terminal. I saw one in your workshop.”
“Terminal? Wait, when were you in my workshop?” Emilia asked.
“I spirit-walked there. Ask Brigid. She saw me.”
“I did.”
“A terminal from the dome. I don’t know how you got it, but you had one. It’s like a cylindrical computer attached to a virtual-reality helmet.”
“Oh. Yes. I have that. I found it in one of the Pyramid Corp. vans we blew up.”
“You ‘blew up’?”
“It’s a long story,” said Brigid. “We haven’t always lived in this settlement.”
“It’s back in my workshop, but I’ve been locked out.”
“Then we’ll have to just break back in,” said Rafe.
Brigid led them through the forest to a trailer that smelled of mold and moss and got them all inside. The rain pelted down outside, and Cassie was grateful to be out of the weather. She couldn’t help feeling terrible for leaving Circe. There was no telling what Xavier would do to her once he found her alone there.
They tried to dry out their clothes as well as they could in the damp little trailer. When the rain finally let up, it was already late evening, and the moon rose in the clearing sky.
They set out through the woods, back to the compound, where they would break into Emilia’s workshop, take the terminal, steal a car, and escape. Maybe Cassie would find her weapons while they were at it. It wasn’t as though their plan wasn’t impossible enough already.
As they drew near the compound, she could see the people gathering under a large tent for their evening meal. The smell of food made her stomach rumble. What I wouldn’t give for another piece of bread. She added that to her to-do list. Might as well.
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“This way.” Brigid motioned for them to follow her, and they walked under the cover of bushes, hunched low to the ground. They circled around the side of the compound, where a series of small buildings hugged the perimeter.
Brigid scurried from the bushes to the rear of the building. Cassie watched her wrap a rock in cloth from her damp sweatshirt and smash it into a window. The sound of breaking glass was muffled enough at this distance that Cassie hoped no one else would hear.
Brigid pulled herself through the window and disappeared inside. A moment later, she emerged with the terminal in her hands. Rafe ran to the window and helped her lower it to the ground. Just then, a light flicked on inside the room, and Cassie could see several large guards grab the small witch.
Rafe made a run for it with the terminal, but a voice broke through the air behind him. “We have you surrounded. All of you. Come out now.”
Cassie raised her hands and walked out of the forest with Selina, Clark, and Emilia.
“What have you done with Xavier?” one of the guards asked angrily.
“We haven’t seen him since he locked us in the barn,” Rafe said, turning to face the man who’d spoken.
“He disappeared with that witch woman hours ago. Something happened to him. And to her. Then they just disappeared.”
“Literally disappeared, or he flew away?”
“We don’t know. He took her into the house and never came back out. Everyone was inside during the monsoon. We searched the entire place. He’s gone. Where has the woman taken him?”
“We don’t know anything about that,” Rafe said.
“’What has he done with Circe?’ is the better question,” Cassie yelled.
“All of you, come with us.”
The guards marched them back to the barns with the dog cages and pushed them inside. They outfitted Brigid with fortified steel handcuffs and left a guard to watch them all night.
“This is just great,” Clark whined.
Cassie sat down on the cot that had been added to her cage. “You could have just left us when we got out last time, Clark,” Cassie said, staring at the wall. Her clothes were still soaking wet, so she stripped down to her underwear, hung them on the wire walls, and slipped under the blanket.