go when they push forward.”
Rhys glanced over at Nyx. She sighed. “All right. Anything else you can get out of it?” she asked.
“Maybe,” Taite said. “Later, though. I have a limited window. They spray for foreign transmissions in that sector in half an hour. You’re still too close to the front.”
“Taite,” Nyx said.
“Yeah?”
“I want you to burn all those papers. I don’t want anybody using that against Nasheen. Have locusts eat whatever won’t burn.”
“And the transcriptions?”
“Nyx—” Rhys said. He had taken some of those papers with him for study. He hadn’t left them all with Taite, and he certainly wasn’t going to burn what he had bundled up and had Anneke smuggle in.
“See what you can do with them. If it’s just a record of failure, again, get rid of it. But if they found anything out, if she mentions any names—magicians, bel dames—you let me know before you toast it. I want to know if they actually accomplished anything over there.”
“All right,” Taite said.
“Let’s end this transmission,” Nyx said.
“Peace be to you, Taite,” Rhys said.
“And to you. I’ve been picking up a lot of other transmissions coming out of there. Be careful. God bless.”
Rhys released the bugs. “Your bel dames might have good reason to take Nikodem if she’s trying to pull information about the compounds,” he said.
“I’m leaning toward the idea that we’ll all be better off bringing back Nikodem dead,” Nyx said. “If they’re breeding magicians, we could bury your country in viral bugs in twenty years that’ll eat everything organic. Men, women, dogs, kids, shit, trees—the whole fucking deal. We could fuck up the world with shit like this. No wonder the bel dames are clawing at the queen for this tech. Whoever owns it owns the world.”
“I don’t like that idea.”
“It would end the war.”
“In your favor. And what then, when all your Nasheenian men come home to a blasted wasteland? I’m not convinced they’ll share power with you that easily,” Rhys said.
“You don’t have much faith in Nasheenian men,” she said. “Are you asking how long it’ll be until Nasheenian women all become slaves like the Ras Tiegan women and your Chenjan mothers?”
“It isn’t like that.” He hated it when she made her sweeping generalizations about foreign men. This, from a woman who had never known a father. That was the problem with Nasheenian women. They had all been raised without men.
“Why did you leave, again?” she said.
“That’s not fair.” And not, of course, true. If you wanted amnesty in Nasheen, you told them you were blacklisted for protecting a woman. You didn’t tell them the truth.
Anneke walked in from the hall. “Hungry?” she asked. “I got real tired of sitting around here watching Khos lick his ass all day.”
“Food sounds fine,” Nyx said. “The old man got anything?”
Rhys heard a low whine start up from outside, too high for the muezzin. He cocked his head. He knew the sound but couldn’t place it.
Anneke turned to look out the window, and Khos pushed himself away from the wall.
“Fucking incoming!” Nyx yelled, and before Rhys had time to realize what she was yelling about, he was on a pallet on the floor with Nyx on top of him.
A heavy thud and whump shook the whole house, and something rained against the unfiltered glass.
Anneke scrambled across the floor in front of him toward a gear bag stowed against the far wall. Nyx pulled herself off Rhys. His face was damp with her sweat. His whole body tingled. There was some bug in the air, something… He looked toward the window and saw centipedes crawling along the outside.
“Anneke!” Nyx said. She pulled off her burnous and grabbed adual-barreled acid rifle from one of the gear bags.
Anneke threw Rhys his pistols.
Rhys shook his head. “I don’t—”
“They’re coming over land!” Nyx said, her shoulder pressed against the gauzy window frame, one eye on the world outside.
“Overland?” Rhys said.
“Means Nasheenians are in the city,” Anneke said, scrambling past him, shotgun slung over her shoulder, sniper rifle in hand.
Khos said, “You see them?”
“I’ve got a scout in the alley,” Nyx said. “Cancel that. He’s waving his fucking squad through. Fuck.”
Khos pulled both pistols.
Rhys’s hands were shaking. He raised one arm, closed his eyes, and looked for a swarm. There were several, but his nerves made it hard to pinpoint them. Four wild, two locked and specialized. Whatever squad was coming down the alley, they had at least one magician with them carrying specialized swarms.
“Don’t fire unless I call it,” Nyx said.
“Boss?” Anneke said.
“They’re Nasheenians. Don’t fire without my call.”
“Nyx—” Khos said.
“Nyxnissa,” Rhys said, opening his eyes. He saw the sweat beading her forehead, her glistening bare arms. The gun was heavy, and as she stood against the window frame in her breast binding and knee-high trousers, baldric too tight, he saw the power in her arms, the muscle under her flesh. He had felt it when she pushed him to the floor, the weight of her.
She turned to them, outlined in the blue haze of the coming night, and in her face—the hard jaw and suddenly flat, fathomless eyes—he saw the woman who had burned at the front. He was breathless.
“I said you don’t fire without my call. Those are my boys,” Nyx said.
Anneke set up her sniper rifle at the window. She would have a clear view of the alley.
Rhys stayed on the floor. He could track the progress of the squad by the position of their wasp swarms. The swarms were sniffing out bursts and traps in the alley.
“Nyx?” Rhys said.
All her attention was at the window.
“Nyx?” he repeated.
He heard a banging on the door below them. Heard raised voices in the house.
Nyx turned to him. “I know,” she said.
The other magician had sniffed him out.
Another high whine sounded, close. “Down!” Nyx yelled, and pushed herself away from the window.
Khos dove flat next to Rhys. Rhys covered his head with his hands.
The world trembled; the windows shuddered, and cracks appeared. When Rhys raised his head, he saw that full night had spread over the city. The room was dark.
“Got another squad,” Anneke said.
“Khos, check the other window,” Nyx said.
Khos got up and went to the gauzy window, looked out. “There’s another patrol over here too,” he said.
The voices downstairs rose in pitch. Rhys heard the sound of a rifle shot. Screaming. A woman’s scream.
He tried to see Nyx, but in the darkness she was only a dim outline. Outside, he saw the pale green and red streamers of bursts trailing out over the city. God help me, he thought, and began to recite the ninety-nine names of God. He drew his pistols.
“Khos, check the stairs,” Nyx said.
Khos picked his way toward the door and opened it. He crept into the hall.
“They’re coming up,” Khos said.
