Truelove approaching at a crouch. Richards’s small army of animals slunk along behind them. Slit-Nose must have bugged out. Britton’s stomach went cold at the thought, but there was no time to worry about it.
Britton and Downer jogged to crouch behind an abandoned car that offered a better view of the circle. They were getting close, and Britton could hear snatches of conversation. He couldn’t count the number of people around the canvas domes, but there were far more than thirty, talking in low voices around a raging bonfire. Downer paused, beginning to stand until he yanked her down.
“What the hell is wrong with you?” he asked.
“Something’s…can you feel that?” she replied.
Britton paused, focusing. The cold air made his shirt stick to him beneath his armor, his ball cap itching on his brow. The magical currents on the Home Plane were so much fainter than the Source that he had scarcely noticed them despite so many Selfers in one place.
But once he focused, he picked up one current stronger than the rest. And close.
He moved to open a gate as his magic rolled back, and an elbow crashed into his ear, smashing the commlink and sending him sprawling. Four men emerged from the car they had chosen as their hiding place. Two wore jeans and T-shirts, pistols in their hands. The other two were stripped to the waist, their bodies painted entirely black. Their heads were enclosed in horned wooden masks, carved surfaces painted with leering, fanged smiles. The magical current, now Suppressing Britton’s own, came from one of them. The other reached out to Downer, Suppressing her as well. The Selfer Suppressing Britton reached down and unsnapped Britton’s holster, retrieving his pistol. The other Selfer advanced on Downer, who had begun to backpedal.
Downer raised a hand to her commlink. “One, one, this is Prometheus,” she said.
One of the other men raised his pistol to her face. “Don’t be stupid,” he said. His English was flat and slightly accented as Slit-Nose’s had been. “Give me your gun.”
He turned to the masked Apache Selfer Suppressing her. “She’s got a current?”
“They both do.” The Apache started forward, the mask leering. “How many more of you are there?”
Britton scrabbled in the dust, groaning. Even if Slit-Nose hadn’t sold them out, he should have known that they would have lookouts on the perimeter. Downer’s commlink buzzed in her ear, but she didn’t dare answer, staring at the muzzles of the guns, fingers tensed on the triggers. The Selfer Suppressing Britton kicked him again and again, then leaned over and punched him in the temple. Britton’s head rebounded off the packed earth, and he saw stars, as he fought to cling to consciousness.
“You got nothing to say, white eyes?” the masked Selfer before Downer asked her. “Maybe I’ll fuck it out of you. Maybe you’ll scream loud enough for your friends to come. Your boyfriend here”—he paused to add his own kick to Britton’s stomach—“can watch.”
One of the men pinned her elbows behind her back while the second covered Britton at a gesture from the masked Apache.
He nodded to the Selfer Suppressing Britton, who gave him a final kick, then turned his current to Suppress Downer while the other Selfer dropped his Suppression. “Watch and learn,” he said to Britton, easing his manhood out of his trousers.
“That’s too small to make me scream,” Downer snarled, struggling.
“Heh. White eyes bitch. I’ve got something for you,” the Selfer said from behind his mask, bursting into flame below the waist.
Britton’s stomach was a mottled pit of agony. His own magical tide drifted far from him, hidden in a haze of agony. But he saw the Apache Selfer step toward her, his manhood and pelvis engulfed in fire, reaching for Downer.
Oscar Britton dug deep. His stomach twisted, he head swam from the effort.
But a gate snapped open through the neck of the Selfer standing closest to him. Blood fountained skyward, and Downer squinted as she felt the Suppression drop.
“Oh, you’ve got something for me all right,” Downer said.
Two elementals sprang from the fire around the remaining Selfer’s crotch. The first leapt at the man covering Downer, who dropped his gun, screaming, as his skin began to bubble. The second darted between her legs. The man behind her released her arms, uttering curses that quickly became screams.
The masked Selfer held up a hand, flames rocketing toward Downer. She held up her own hand and five more burning human shapes surrounded her. Britton rose to his knees, still too weak to work any magic of his own.
The masked Selfer ran for the circle, calling for help in Apache. The circle erupted in response, and Britton could see the Apache running in the firelight and yelling. A few jumped into the air and others burst into flame or began to sparkle with gathered ice.
And something else. From within one of the wickiups came a high shriek, guttural and hissing at the same time, a horrid mockery of the Apache being spoken around it.
The night lit with muzzle flashes as the first bullets began to smack into the dirt around them. They took shelter behind the car just as Richards’s animal army broke over the circle.
Britton held a hand over his stomach, willing the nausea to pass. “Go! Go!” He waved at Downer. “It’s now or never! I’m behind you!”
Downer sprinted toward the circle, her elementals spreading out before her.
Britton came close behind. He put on speed as one Apache Selfer collapsed under the weight of a score of biting jackrabbits. A snarling coyote dragged another across the ground by his throat. Another coyote yanked at his arm.
Several coyotes and stray dogs yelped as rounds tore through them, and a few of the non-Latent Apache began to dance, stomping through a morass of spiders and snakes. One of the Apache Aeromancers blazed lightning through the animals, scorching them in droves. Britton felt Downer’s current reach out, and that same lightning became a small pack of electric elementals, man-shaped and diving for the canvas domes.
Fitzy gestured at the Aeromancer, and he fell from the sky, shrieking. He turned his head and sighted Britton. “Let’s get this over with,” he shouted. He pointed at one of the wickiups. “Secure the goddamn target, Keystone!”
The wickiup whipped into the air, support poles snapping, swept skyward by the casual sweep of a slender black arm. The Mountain God crouched, ten feet tall, its twisted man’s body so dark that it absorbed the firelight. Its horned head reared, the real horror making a mockery of the Selfer’s mask. Its dagger teeth glowed wetly.
Behind it, the air shimmered slightly, as if heat were reflecting off hot asphalt. Britton’s eyes widened. There was no speeding helicopter to obscure his vision this time. There could be no mistaking the rippling in the air. What the hell was that? Some strange magic? But there was no time to worry about it. Richards’s Whispered animals were recoiling from the thing, fleeing in a chorus of whines, barks, and squeaks. Richards frowned, focusing his ability with no result.
Fitzy knelt, drew his pistol, and fired three rounds into the gaping mouth; but the creature didn’t seem to notice. It lashed out, so fast that it blurred, and Fitzy was flying backward to skid in the dirt, the plates of his body armor shattering. He struggled to his feet, shaking his head.
“Damn it, Rictus! A little help here!” he shouted.
Truelove spread his arms and the ground all around them erupted.
The Apache turned their guns to their feet as gray corpses swarmed upward, snatching ankles and thighs and pulling them flat. Britton heard shrieks and snapping bones.
Downer gestured at the bonfire, which erupted into a fountain of elementals. At twenty, Britton lost count of the creatures leaping into the center of the camp to throw themselves at the Mountain God, which shrieked but did not burn. Its black skin seemed simply to absorb the energy of their attacks. It took another lurching blur-step toward Fitzy, gnashing its teeth.
Britton knelt and snapped open a gate in front of its face.
It shrieked again, throwing an arm across its face and turning away. Britton hauled the gate backward into its path, the edges slicing through its trailing heel and cutting it off. Tendrils of black mist escaped from the wound as the creature howled. It turned and fixed Britton with a hateful stare. Then its eyes flicked to the gate as Britton brought it around and slid it toward the creature.
In a moment, it was upon him. Britton threw himself sideways, parrying a raking sweep of the thing’s claws with his forearm. The collision made his shoulder shake, his teeth clicking together hard enough to make him grunt.
