BEFORE THE SHIFT, THE HARTSFIELD-JACKSON AIRPORT had served as the primary hub for all flights to the Southern United States. Almost three miles wide and flanked by highways on all sides, the airport ate a huge chunk of the city’s Southside. The damn place was so big, there was a train going through it.
If you died in the South, you had to stop in Atlanta for a layover before getting to the other side. The Shift fixed that right up. The commercial aviation industry took a century to grow and only five minutes to die, as the first magic wave dropped five thousand planes out of the sky. Overnight, the airport was dead.
The structure didn’t sit abandoned for too long. When the MSDU officially came into being, christened in the blood of the Three-Month Riots, the local Unit took over the airport, turning it into a fortified base and the HQ of military operations for the Southeast. Over the decades that followed, the MSDU’s forces had continued steadily increasing the airport’s defenses, turning it into a full-fledged fortress.
As I drove along a narrow access road, I could see the edge of the runways, the concourse, and beyond them the white and sea-foam spire of the control tower. The place looked impenetrable. The long gray building of the terminal bristled with siege engines and machine guns, aided by square boxes of concrete bunkers. A hundred yards out, the second row of bunkers guarded the concourse. Between the bunkers and us lay half a mile of clear ground. Nothing but the old pavement of the runways and brownish grass, mowed down to mere fuzz. No cover, no safe approach, nothing.
Three wards shimmered in the air. The first sheathed the tower in a bluish translucent cocoon. The second rose just past the bunkers. Glowing threads of pale magic wound through it, swirling like colors on a soap bubble. The third and final ward, a translucent wall tinted with red, extended the length of the field.
Why were all three wards up? MSDU usually didn’t bother with activating the defensive spells unless they had to contain something nasty, and even then, only the perimeter and the killing field ward went active. I could see the killing field to the left—no ward shielded it. What the hell was going on?
“Could the Keepers have taken the MSDU?” I murmured.
Curran stirred in the passenger seat. “If they have, the device is in the tower.”
I’d stick the device in some sort of storage room in some forgotten concourse, but if the Keepers somehow claimed the base, they would choose the tower. They knew we were coming. The tower was an excellent place for their last stand. Stick enough sharpshooters with crossbows at the top and we’d all look like hedgehogs by the time we got to it. Assuming we’d manage to breach all the other defenses first.
“The red ward is a bouncer,” I said. “It’s not too hard to break. With all of our magic juice, we can breach it in fifteen, twenty minutes. We go through it, and it will bounce shut right back behind us. We’ll be pinned between that ward and whatever is in those front bunkers.”
“How can you tell?”
“The red is more opaque near the ground, which means magic is concentrated there. That’s usually a mark of a bouncer. Regular wards have uniform thickness, like the ones I used to have on my apartment.
They can be opened or closed, but once they break, they take several magic waves to regenerate. This one will surge right back up.”
“Your wards are transparent, too,” Curran said.
“I could make them in color. Transparent wards take more effort. In this case they are warding an area about three miles in diameter. They went for the most bang for their buck—the strongest ward with the least effort. And to people who don’t know about wards, giant red domes look impressive.”
The access road spat us out into the field. It was half full—search parties trickled in via the other two roads. A vampire completely covered in purple sunblock rose at our approach and waved his claws.
I parked. The moment I stepped outside, Andrea was there. “The Keepers took over the MSDU.”
“How?”
“Remember that buddy of mine I called to check out de Harven?” Andrea said. “He has three kids. All of them chock full of magic. So I called him.” She held up her hands. “I know, I know. I wasn’t going to say anything. I just wanted to suggest to him that he take his family on a trip to the coast or something.
He wasn’t at his number. So I called the reception in his building. Some guy I never spoke to answered and said that my friend was on bereavement leave. I was right there, so I dropped by his house. His wife says he didn’t come home last night. She called the base, and MSDU told her they were holding him overnight due to an emergency. She didn’t think anything of it. So I came by here. Look!” She thrust a pair of binoculars at me. “Third bunker from the left.”
I looked through the binoculars. First, second, third . . . A leg in urban fatigues and an Army-issue steel-toed boot stuck out from behind the bunker. I waited a couple of seconds. It didn’t move. Either he was suffering from a sudden bout of severe narcolepsy or we had a dead soldier. A body like that wouldn’t be left lying about if the base were still under military control. The Keepers must’ve ta ken the base.
I passed the binoculars to Curran. He looked through them.
Jim came striding up, his cloak flaring behind him. “The gate’s shut down. The ward’s blocking the approach.”
“Did you try the emergency channel?” Curran asked.
“Twice. No response. The People tried it on their end as well, and nothing. The base is shut down.
Phones are working, but they aren’t taking any phone calls.”
“All right,” Curran said. “Send up the flares. Get everyone here.”
Jim turned and raised his hand. A young shapeshifter ran from group to group. At the far end of the field, mages raised their staves. Magic popped, like a large firecracker, and seven green bursts exploded in the sky.
THE SHAPESHIFTERS LINED UP ALONG THE WARD’S perimeter. Some I knew, some I didn’t. I sat on top of the Jeep. I’d need the energy for the fight.
Next to me Ghastek stood, leaning on the Jeep’s hood, looking slightly absurd in a formal black suit and a gun-gray shirt. Two vampires sat at his feet like bald, mutated cats, both coated in bright lime-green sunblock. Ghastek had enough range to navigate vampires from the other end of the city.
Unlike us, he didn’t have to be here in person.
“Why are you here? Shouldn’t you be off hiding in some armored bus miles away?”
Ghastek glanced at me. “Derision, Kate? How unlike you. I’m here because when this unfortunate affair is over, people will remember who was here and who wasn’t.”
“I take it Mulradin chose to evacuate.”
Ghastek bent his lips a little. It was almost a smile. “It’s an unfortunate fact of life that some people value discretion above valor. As the saying goes, fortune favors the brave.”
Or the foolish. “And of course, the fact that if we survive this, you’ll come out looking like a hero has nothing to do with your decision.”
He widened his eyes. “Why, Kate, you might be right. If only I had thought of that.”
Maybe one of the Keepers would shoot him.
Below us Kamen stared at the ward. Two younger volhvs watched him. He said that about twenty minutes before the activation, the device would send out a “plume” of magic. Whatever the hell that meant. When the shit was about to hit the fan, we’d get a short warning.
Kamen also said that raising the device off the ground extended its range by about a mile. We thought the Keepers were aiming for the city center. We were wrong. They were aiming for the densely populated neighborhoods just outside. The MSDU provided protection in case of emergency. Real estate next to the Unit was highly priced, and the Pack owned a quarter of it. That was where the shapeshifters who worked in the city built their homes.
All the Keeper claims of “we regret casualties” had been complete bullshit. They aimed for casualties.
Wiping out these neighborhoods would snap the backbone of the city. Atlanta’s citizens would panic and flee, and the Keepers could purge the entire city at their leisure.
A long forlorn cry rolled through the sky. I raised my hand to my eyes, shielding them from the sunlight. A huge dark bird circled the dome once, enormous wings stretched wide, and landed in the far field. A man slid off its back and jogged over. Amadahy, one of the Cherokee shamans.
Amadahy came to a stop near Curran. His voice carried to us. “The bunkers have no roof. There is a catapult in each one and a small cheiroballista. There are guns, too.”
“Are there people in the bunkers?” Curran asked.
Amadahy nodded. “They were priming the catapults as I flew over.”
The catapult would lob something nasty our way, and the cheiroballista would shoot us with bolts while we ran around trying to avoid it. Great.
Thomas and Robert Lonesco came along the line of the shapeshifters. Thomas was tall, well over six feet. Robert, his spouse, leaned toward dark and delicate, with large brown eyes and a narrow face.
They spoke to Curran.
“Just out of curiosity, does your paramour have an actual plan to breach this ward, or is he just making it up as he goes along?”
“Ghastek, do you want to lead this attack alone?”
“No thanks. I’m after the benefits, not the responsibility.”
“Then shut up.”
Robert Lonesco stepped forward to the ward and raised his hand. Behind him members of Clan Rat formed into five columns, four people wide, three people deep. Robert closed his hand into a fist. The columns split into an upside-down V formation, with Robert at the head of the center V.
Robert stripped off his sweats. For a second he stood nude, and then his skin burst. Muscle whipped and stretched like elastic cords, and a wererat crouched in his place, one enormous clawed paw leaning on the ground. A green glow washed over Robert’s eyes. Behind him the rats shed their humanity.
Robert raised his muzzle to the sky. A deep ragged voice broke free of his mouth.
“Foooooorrrrrrwaaaard.”
The rats crouched down as one and dug into the ground. Dirt flew.
“Interesting tactic,” Ghastek murmured.
We wouldn’t need to break the ward. We would simply tunnel under it. Nice.
Andrea ran up to the Jeep and climbed up next to me. “Hey.”
“Hey.”
Teams of four shapeshifters began dragging wooden beams and laying them down behind the rats to reinforce the tunnel.
I glanced at Ghastek. “Aren’t you going to help them dig?”
Ghastek shrugged. “A vampire is a precision instrument, not a bulldozer.”
The front lines of the rats had vanished into the ground. They only had to go about fifty feet or so.
The ward itself was narrow, but to get under it would take some effort.
Twenty minutes later the ground on the other side of the ward shifted. The first of the wererats emerged from the dirt.
Something sparked with orange in the slit of the bunker’s narrow window. Probably the catapult inside. Sound rolled, and a bright orange ball shot from the roofless bunker. It whistled through the air and crashed right at the middle column, exploding into orange liquid. The liquid splattered in a wide arc.
Two other bunkers followed suit, adding more orange goo to the mess. Yellow lightning danced on its surface. The fluid caught fire.