Carrie Vaughn: Kitty in the Underworld

I said, “Maybe now’s exactly the time to show him how much we have. Keep him nervous.”

Neither one of them tried to argue against it. So we made a plan.

I TALKED to the webmaster at KNOB about what we needed, and she referred me to a friend of hers who knew more about the security aspects involved in the project. Anonymous servers, untraceable IP addresses, jargon that I sort of knew about in the abstract, but not really. We needed a level of protection between us and the big wide world of the Internet, so that it looked like the book of shadows just appeared online and couldn’t be immediately traced back to me. Not foolproof, but it was something. For a while now, I’d been trying to get the word out about Roman. Telling people what I knew about him, not just so he couldn’t work anonymously anymore, but also so I wouldn’t feel alone. Could be, the book of shadows would languish online, one of those weird backwater websites that haven’t been updated in a decade and no one ever visits except to admire the wackiness. Could be, the thing would do exactly what we wanted, and attract the attention of people who could help. Not just warn the world that Roman was out there, but raise an army to stand against him.

We edited, leaving out most of Amy’s personal diary. I’d only met her at the very end of her road, when she’d been overwhelmed by her quest, a crusader with one central purpose. I hadn’t met the real Amy, I decided, and reading her diary made me wish I had. She’d been a true explorer, fascinated by every culture and locale she encountered. She’d loved learning, but she’d also been searching for meaning. For a purpose for everything she was learning. Kumarbis had provided something, and she’d embraced his quest. That part of her journey didn’t need to go on the website.

But her raw knowledge and the extensive, encrypted notes she’d made, we uploaded directly. It took a few weeks to prepare it all, but at last, the website went live.

Then we waited.

Kitty Goes to War

Kitty’s Big Trouble

Kitty’s Greatest Hits

Kitty Steals the Show

Kitty Rocks the House

Discord’s Apple

After the Golden Age

Dreams of the Golden Age (forthcoming)

CARRIE VAUGHN had the nomadic childhood of the typical U.S. Air Force brat, with stops across the country from California to Florida. She is the New York Times bestselling author of the Kitty Norville books, and she lives in Boulder, Colorado. Her website is at www.carrievaughn.com.