Susan Krinard - Shadowmaster

“That there are ways of getting out in this part of the city? Why do you think such exits exist?”

“You are kidding, right?”

“I’m deadly serious.”

“Everyone remotely connected to the government knows that such passages exist. Most of them have been shut down by the Enforcers, but someone always manages to find another one. It’s common knowledge that convicts can be smuggled out of the city for the right price.”

“The price.” Drakon straightened and circled the room, his heart beating fast. “Why do you believe we have use for information on the foibles of a government official?”

“That’s not all I have,” she said. “Some of it might be very useful to your...operations.”

He came to a stop before her. “If you have something valuable to us, why do you believe you can withhold anything we choose to take from you?”

“You mean by torturing me? Or do whatever you thought this Preacher guy would do?” She shook her head. “That would be a mistake. You see, even the lowest-level govrats—to use your Fringe lingo—are given anti-torture conditioning. It’s not much, but usually it works by triggering a fatal chemical reaction in our bodies after a significant amount of pain is applied.”

“This is the first time I’ve heard of such conditioning,” Drakon said.

“It’s new. They want to keep it secret, of course. But I’m telling you now because I have nothing to lose, and you’d be better off taking what I’m willing to give you instead of losing all of it. I promise you that what you’ll get from me will be worth what I’m asking.”

Drakon took the chair again.

“Assuming you have such information,” he asked, “how are we to substantiate it without risk to ourselves?”

“I never said it was without risk,” she said, “just as I knew it could be a fatal risk coming out here.”

Perhaps even worse than merely fatal, if he acted as loyalty dictated. He had no reason to trust her. If he found a chance to pass her on to Erebusian agents who could get her to the Citadel, she could be extremely valuable as a source of intelligence.

But he couldn’t envision taking such a drastic step, and he certainly wouldn’t return her to her Enclave hunters. His mission had been clearly defined, and once completed would have virtually the same effect as if he were to tear the government down with his own two hands.

One highly popular mayor, in the midst of a highly contentious election, dead. The mayor who claimed to want to end the deportation of criminals to Erebus, cut off the tribute of blood serfs who were so essential to maintaining Opiri society in the Citadel of Night. Essential to maintaining the Armistice and preventing another devastating war.

Aaron Shepherd. One of the two men in all the world Drakon wanted dead more than he wanted to live.

* * *

Phoenix couldn’t see the man’s face, but she didn’t have to. She’d memorized it the first time she’d glimpsed him, when he’d snatched her away from the leering henchman of The Preacher, the Boss she’d been sent to find.

Either someone at Aegis had given her very bad information, as this man had told her, or her instincts had been dangerously off. But she didn’t think hearing a man offer to buy her for “five hundred A-dollars” would inspire much confidence in even the most desperate fugitive.

She could honestly say she’d been incredibly lucky. This Boss’s treatment of her had been no worse than she might have expected from any one of his kind, likely better than most. He was handsome, most definitely, with his defined features, gray eyes and auburn hair. Strong and fast, his movements swift and graceful. He had struck her right away as being someone extraordinary.

Even so, she hadn’t been sure until she’d seen the faint red reflection behind his otherwise very normal-looking eyes. His incisors were covered in some way she couldn’t quite define. She’d been luckier—or unluckier—than she or Aegis could possibly have imagined.

The man who had “saved” her from The Preacher wasn’t human. After the first shock had passed, Phoenix had quickly realized that neither his fellow Boss nor either of their crews knew what he was. His coloring told her he must be a Daysider—one of those very human-looking “mutant” Opiri who could walk in daylight without suffering fatal burns—and Daysiders looked very human to most non-Opiri. The headlamp he wore wasn’t just protective camouflage, since his breed couldn’t see nearly as well in the dark as dhampires or other Nightsiders. But he seemed to have forgotten that no ordinary man or woman could keep up with him, and that he was supposedly leading a human female to safety.

What he believed to be a human female.

He didn’t seem even remotely concerned about what he might have revealed, but if he believed her story, he wouldn’t expect a govrat to be looking for Opiri in the city.

And this Opir had done very well for himself by becoming a turf Boss. He couldn’t be the assassin Drakon, since no one less than a Freeblood—the lowest rank among full-blooded Opiri—could be trusted with such a task, and only a true Nightsider could operate in the dark with complete freedom.

But any Opir in the Enclave had to know who and where the assassin was hiding. This was too big an operation for one agent to handle alone. Others would be helping him make preparations. All resources would be thrown behind the killer, regardless of the danger to the other spies in San Francisco.

“I knew it could be a fatal risk coming out here,” she’d told him. She had been warned that the Fringe could be dangerous, but now that she’d seen it—seen how people were forced to live, families scraping by on whatever discarded material they could find, raiding garbage bins in the Mids, forced into theft and worse by the very need to survive and protect those under their care—she understood why the Fringers might attack an outsider.

It had made her feel sick, this suffering...a feeling she’d had to force aside as a distraction she couldn’t afford. And any trouble from the people here was by far outweighed by the incredibly delicate and deadly task of prying information out of her “captor” without getting herself summarily killed or, almost as likely, smuggled out of the city and shipped right off to Erebus for interrogation.

Phoenix wondered if he’d accepted her implausible story about the new anti-torture conditioning. What she did have was an implant in one of her molars, the old reliable standby of covert agents since well before the War.

But she wasn’t nearly ready to die. She’d completed Phase One of the operation: making a connection with someone influential in the Fringe, one who could help her locate an Opir operative. The Preacher, or another like him, was to have provided the necessary access, but she’d bypassed that step entirely. Phase Two, finding an Opir spy, was also complete.

That was all she was supposed to do. Phase Three, pinning down the location of the assassin Drakon’s hiding place, was to be the work of a more experienced agent. She should have been making plans to escape and return to Aegis.

But not yet. Not quite yet. She was in too good a position to give it up now. Even though Aegis wouldn’t know how far she’d already come, they’d follow through with their part of the plan by continuing the search for the “fugitive.” And when she finally did return, she’d have plenty to give them.

Now the Daysider’s silence was heavy, as if his mind was focused on weighty matters...as well it should be. But she knew he was thinking of other, more personal subjects, as well, not the least of which was her body.

She’d been well aware of his arousal; it had been impossible not to be, given the impressive size of his package. She could still smell his desire for her like a heady perfume, even though she could no longer see the way his pale gray eyes followed every slight move of her body.