“You sure about that?” Cyrus asked for the third time.

  “Positive,” Pat Bateman said, putting the socket wrench down. “I've got it from here. Go rest, save your energy for the others.” The older man sounded a little irritated.

  Truth be told, Cyrus couldn't blame him. The little ultralight aircraft was one of the first of its kind, a V-shaped cloth wing with a spindly wheeled motorized cart and seat underneath, just big enough for a pilot. It was fascinating, and yeah, Cyrus had perhaps been spending more time examining the parts than putting it together, so Bateman's ire was understandable.

  “It's a pity they don't have a pontoon version of that,” Cyrus said, as he stood and took one last look at the wheels. “I got a feeling flat ground's rarer than water 'round here.”

  “Oh, pontoons have their downsides, believe you me,” Bateman said. “With an engine this small it wouldn't work so hot. Couldn't take off properly.”

  Cyrus nodded, took one more look at the little contraption, and headed up the gallery a ways to a small stone ramp that twisted and turned like a set of very shallow stairs. About three turns later it opened up into a gazebo-like stone cupola, with cracked walls permitting some slight visibility out into the swamp. Cyrus had found this space the last time he'd gone walking. It offered shelter from the sun, and a pretty decent place to brood.

  But, as Henri Guiscare shifted from his seat on the round lip of stone that circled the cupola, Cyrus realized that brooding was off the menu. Henri had that look about him: the look of an expert who'd just made a discovery, and had just found an audience to brag to.

  Cyrus tried to keep despair off his face, and prepared to smile and nod along to a whole lot of incomprehensible medical jargon.

  Much to his surprise, that wasn't what he got.

  “We're poison!” Guiscare declared, grinning widely.

  “Uh, what?”

  “Oh, not us specifically, but I've tested three different kinds of meat, and all the bugs that have dared to take nibbles are deader than Marie Laveau.” Guiscare waved a hand at a few small, black-speckled piles across the room.

  Cyrus crouched down and squinted, and sure enough Guiscare had dumped out a few tins of meat, and the local insects had dared to take a nibble. He counted three or four different types of insects on the meat, most lying still and curled up, a few still moving, slowly.

  “This is good for us, right?” Cyrus straightened up and sat on the doctor's left side, where there was a good view through one of the larger cracks in the stone walls.

  “Good and bad,” Guiscare said. “Only took a couple of minutes for the bugs to start showin' up, so I reckon we smell pretty tasty. And it takes a few minutes of chewin' once they settle in 'fore they die, so I 'spect that taste is to their likin'. But it does look like young Miss Carmina's got the right of it; we are from two different worlds, and we ain't built to digest each other.”

  “Ain't stopping those bugs from trying,” Cyrus said.

  “No, and that's the bad of it,” Henri sighed. “We're made out of stuff that SMELLS tasty. So the local predators? They still likely to try their luck with us. And worse, if we run into one with poison, it could go bad. Real bad.”

  Cyrus sucked his teeth, let his mind wander as he stared at the meat piles. “You sure it's the meat?” he asked, turning the notion over in his mind. “Could be the preservatives, or something else in there.”

  “No, I ain't completely sure,” Guiscare said, sounding unperturbed by the notion. “That's why I took samples of the meat and the dead bugs. Jarred 'em and passed 'em through the portal the last time Miss Carmina opened it to check in. So wiser heads than mine are gonna test those samples, and I'll let proper scientists worry 'bout my little theory.”

  Cyrus blinked his eye. It was refreshing to spend time with someone secure enough about themselves that they could admit they could be wrong about things. Those kinds of folks were a little too rare in Texas, sometimes.

  “So what's the good news?” Cyrus asked.

  Guiscare pursed his lips. “Goin' by how long it took the bugs to die, I'd say the toxicity is pretty mild if you go by body weight. Accidentally swallowing a bug or something like that might make us sick, but it likely won't kill us, at least not right away. Might be survivable. Or getting a little water up your nose, that shouldn't be too much of a big deal.”

  “Okay,” Cyrus nodded. “What about diseases?”

  “That's the other good news.” Guiscare smiled wider. “With this much toxicity between us, we ain't likely to be compatible for the local germs. Can't guarantee it, mind you.”

  “Maybe keep quiet about that part,” Cyrus said. “Last time I checked HQ the privates on guard duty were speculating about trying out the local satyr and turtle-woman pussy. Don't want to encourage them none.”

  Guiscare laughed. “Boys 'gone be boys, and PFCs never change. They talk big, sure, but don't you worry none. If any of them seem serious 'bout that I'll keep pointing out that doing stuff along those lines is just gonna add more quarantine time for the team.”

  “Hold on,” Cyrus squinted at him. “Quarantine time? Didn't you just say disease won't be a problem?”

  “No, I said disease SHOULDN'T be a problem. But I ain't certain, and the folks at home ain't gonna take chances. Come on now, I thought you were a fan of all those alien books? You mean to tell me you ain't never read or heard the War of the Worlds?” Guiscare spread his hands out, weighing the air. “Why you think we got such a small team? If it turns out there's a lethal virus or something, it's easier to cover up a dozen deaths from a team of deniable assets. And easier to contain and watch us for a month or two, to make sure it ain't just slow acting.”

  “Well, shit,” Cyrus said, settling back against the stone. “We're less of a strike force, and more like canaries in a coal mine.”

  “Ain't the first time Uncle Sam's done a thing like this,” Guiscare shrugged. “Upside is they ain't stinting on the supplies. So we're not just laboratory rats or guinea pigs. Lab rodents generally don't get all the bullets they can carry.”

  “Yeah,” Cyrus said, standing up as he caught a glimpse of motion through the crack. “And judging by the way Mossjaeger's hauling ass, we might need some of those bullets real soon. Come on Henri, shit's happening.

  *****

  Barty Mossjaeger's grin was just as disturbing as Cyrus remembered. But what he was saying was more disturbing. “Yep, I'm sure, sir. At least forty of 'em, you betcha. They're moving quick in and formation, coming on fast.”

  “Fast and in a group? Like birds on the ground?” Carmina asked.

  Major Phillips shot the girl a glare for interrupting, but Mossjaeger squatted down on his haunches and looked her in the eye. “Almost exactly like a big old flock of birds, all flowin' around obstacles without breaking formation. Do you know something about that?”

  If you spot this narrative on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.

  Carmina nodded. “Did you see a woman in red robes? That's Jadar. One of her runes is 'migration.' She's one of the reasons the war isn't going great.”

  “I did see a flash of red,” Mossjaeger nodded. “But I couldn't get much of an angle to see who they were, then. All right.”

  “You're certain they're coming this way?” Phillips asked, for the second time.

  Mossjaeger's grin didn't waver. “Them and about three of those green guys, sir.”

  “Elves?” Carmina's eyes went wide. “You saw ELVES? Without them seeing YOU?”

  Barty shrugged. “Eh, they're decent but not great. They don't look up often enough.”

  Cyrus looked over to the treeline. The lowest branch he could see was at least thirty feet up. He looked back at Mossjaeger, and suppressed the urge to shudder. Rangers were insane.

  “How long until they get here?” Phillips asked.

  “Don't rightly know, sir. They stopped when they got within sight of this place. That was about twenty minutes ago. Oh, don't you worry none, they're on the opposite side from where I ran in. That's the only reason I broke cover.”

  “It's the spell!” Carmina put her hands to her face. “Oh no, Jadar saw it! She's the master of assensing in the tower. I should drop the spell—”

  “Wait.” Cyrus put a hand on her shoulder. “Let's think about this. They were coming this direction anyway, but stopped. Maybe they weren't expecting to find a spell on this place. And if it suddenly goes away...” he shifted his eye to Phillips.

  The officer nodded. “They'll now we know they're out there. No dropping your witchcraft until we're ready to draw them in. Colfax, get in the HQ. Take your sister with you. If we can't hold, re-open the portal and report in person.”

  “Wait,” Cyrus said, mind working. “We need to get Bateman in the skies. It might draw a few of them off, and it'll put him and the plane out of harm's way.”

  “Maybe,” Phillips frowned. “Carmina. This Jadar, she got any long-range hoodoo? Any stealthy shenanigans like yours?”

  “No— no,” Carmina shook her head, bangs wobbling. “She can make people explode, but she has to be close to do it. And I don't think she can do it a lot. It's probably expensive to cast.”

  Phillips nodded, his eyes flickering as he did a cold calculation. “Understood. We'll kick things off by dropping the spell and sending the plane up at the same time. Colfax, Carmina, and Guiscare, get below. We'll handle the next part and signal when we're ready.”

  “But... but... there's at least forty of them! And elves!” Carmina burst out. “And only seven of you fighting?”

  Phillips nodded. “I know. Bad odds. I almost feel sorry for the poor, primitive bastards.”

  *****

  Jadar stared into the depths of the mirror. “How long must I wait?” she snarled.

  The mirror flickered, and Terathon's bearded visage replaced her own reflection. His calm sneer made Jadar clench her teeth in fury. His voice made them grind even more.

  “As I told you before, Zarkimorr is journeying to his post, for his part of the plan. As you should be.”

  “And as I told YOU before, I cannot! Either the Lion has garrisoned the Tegs Ahz gate, or someone plans treachery against me!”

  “It is possible it is merely a lingering enchantment. Your fear could be misplaced.”

  “No, it is not,” she snapped. “I am the master of assensing, you unbound dog. And the enchantment has something to do with the mind. Why put something like that there without something more lethal beneath it? It is either a trap or an ambush or both. I cannot march past it and leave it at my back.”

  “Then send in your weakest helots to spring the trap and watch what happens,” Terathon shrugged.

  “Fool! I have none to spare! The ruse in the West didn't hold the Lion long enough. I am securing that flank... YOUR flank against the Lion Cub, should he come back east. It is in your interests to aid me.” Jadar snarled the last few words.

  That seemed to get through Terathon's smugness, at least momentarily. “How?” he snapped back. “Zarkimorr cannot respond to the mirrors! He is off-world right now! Once he is in the proper place and ready eh will reach out, but I expect that shall be hours at least.”

  “There is another way,” Jadar said, trying to put honey in her voice. Not too much, but enough, just enough that a frustrated mage might take the bait.

  “If there is another way, tell me,” Terathon rubbed his cheeks, ratlike, pulling the flesh on his face and smoothing his wrinkles a bit.

  Jadar kept her words smooth, as well. “Terathon's library is unguarded right now. The pages of the Prophecy that are there could have something to tell me what I am walking into. You could—”

  “No.”

  Jadar drew a deep breath and counted to three. “He would never know.”

  “The Unicorn would.”

  “The Unicorn does not—” Jadar bit her words off. Telling another wizard, ESPECIALLY an unbound, that the Unicorn didn't care would have been heresy.

  Worse, it would have been a show of stupidity. Everyone who wasn't a fool knew the Unicorn only cared about himself.

  “Jadar,” Terathon said, somberly. “I respect you. I hold nothing but respect for the House of the Manticore. Your helots are high quality, and Safinx's coin was well spent to purchase them.”

  “Not nearly enough coin,” Jadar grumbled. “We should have thousands, not hundreds for this job.”

  Terathon ignored her words and pressed on. “I respect you. And so I will forget what you asked of me today. You must do what you think is best. Farewell.”

  His face faded from the mirror. Jadar resisted the urge to dash it against the nearest tree. Barely.

  She swept open the flaps of the tent, and scowled at her guards. They looked down, meekly. Beyond them, the fifty-two other helots sat on roots around the soggy clearing, with a few just visible within the underbrush nearest the ruins, lying down and watching through the sliver of a gap in the trees.

  A full thirty minutes they had been watching, and waiting for the elven rangers to return to the ruins, while Jadar had wasted her time trying to rouse her so-called colleagues with the mirrors.

  But after speaking with Balangor and Terathon, she was beginning to think that treachery was off the table.

  It still felt like a trap, but... perhaps not one meant for her? Jadar took stock of her assets.

  Jadar had been through two campaigns of conquest for House Manticore. She bore three runes, and had been permitted by the will of her house to keep thirteen harvested chakra to add to her initial twenty-five. But half of that had been expended on this trip to use her 'migration' rune to speed her helots on their way.

  Her remaining runes, 'Full,' and 'Outside,' would be of little use in disarming whatever trap lay ahead. Not at this distance, with her chakra half depleted.

  She had a full panoply of defensive charms, and a few offensive ones, but only one that might preserve her mind. If that trap was mental, as its aura suggested, the 'ideology' charm set to defend her beliefs might or might not help.

  Perhaps... perhaps she should ignore the doctrine that had been drilled into her at a young age? Perhaps she should just march on past?

  Almost to the second the thought crossed her mind, a strange, distant droning filled the air. Jadar immediately put her back to the nearest tree, as the helots throughout the clearing did the same.

  After a tense moment, one of the helots assigned to watch the ruins crawled out of the bush and ran to her. “Master! A skelran rises from the ruins!”

  A skelran? Balangor's toy? Was this treachery after all? Jadar hurried to the clearing's edge, and summoned all her skill.

  There was something in the sky, turning unnaturally. It was circling and rising, but it wasn't anything like Balangor's skelran, or any she had seen before. And it was as noisy as a growcust in a grain field.

  And it was absolutely, undeniably non-magical to her senses.

  For a moment she wondered, how?

  Then she dropped her gaze to the ruin.

  The spell on the ruins was gone!

  What kind of trap was this?

  Jadar's mind raced, searching for answers.

  And came up with an absolutely incorrect realization.

  “Illusion,” she declared with a snort. Yes, she saw it now. The spell had been set to make an illusion. Likely one of the elves had gotten close enough to trigger it. “Ignore the skelran. It's a distraction. First!”

  The helot commander jogged over to attend her. “Master?”

  “Take twenty and go see what the Lion is trying to hide in there. If anyone is still in there, take them alive if possible. Go!”

  While the First gathered his squads, Jadar pulled her sleeve back and examined the bracelet of leaves and vines that was the Elven equivalent of a mirror.

  The helots would go in obviously. The elves would strike unseen. And anyone they found would die.