Gathering Storm (9 page)

Glen could see that it was
taking every bit of self-discipline and training they had undergone
to keep from groaning out a protest. He pulled up his calendar and
identified the date when they would regain the normal life of a
Black Swan trainee, which was anything but normal by most
standards. He pointed to a calendar date.

“This is when you will
have completed your obligation to me. Dismissed.”

“Yes sir,” they both
mumbled.

“Whatever. Out.”

As they closed the door
behind them, Glen was thinking that he was going to have a story to
tell at dinner that night at the vineyard. He had dinner with Storm
and Litha every Thursday night. She either picked him up right at
nine or sent Deliverance. It made an early dinner for them on
Pacific time, but it seemed to work.

There was a soft knock on his door. “Come
in.”

Barrock stuck his head in.
“Good one, si… Glen.”

Glen cocked his head. “You
heard that?” Barrock nodded. “I guess I didn’t think anything about
your reporting of those other incidents. How are you managing to
know everything that goes on in here?”

“I put my ear against the
door, si… Glen.” Sol’s gofer didn’t hesitate to answer or bother
with trying to look sheepish. As far as he was concerned, knowing
what was doing was one of the perks of the job.

“Oh. Okay. Thanks. And
either call me sir or call me Glen. Sir Glen sounds
stupid.”

“Yes, si…” He closed the door.

Almost immediately there was another
knock.

“What is it now,
Barrock?”

Elora opened the door and stuck her head in.
“Name’s Laiken, Rookie.”

Glen’s face lit up in a
way that left no mistake he was glad to see her. He jumped up and
came around the desk. “Sorry. I just had to lower the boom on two
trainees who are two years younger than I am. Everything about it
was…”

“Weird.”

He nodded. “To say the least.”

“You’re doing great, kiddo. It takes some
enormous… um, confidence to sit in the chair.”

He grinned. “Some enormous
confidence?”

“Um-hmm. So there’s a reason why I’m
honoring you with a visit.”

“Hey. That was my line. You stole my
line.”

“Okay. I take it
back.”

“To what do I owe the honor of your
visit?”

“You remember that thing you were doing for
me. What I asked before we left Ireland?”

“You thought I forgot.”

“Well…”

“Of course you would think
that. I should have let you know I’m on it. It’s a worthy mystery,
tough enough to be fun, cool enough to be interesting. I was at the
latest in a series of dead ends, but I’ve got a new lead. So the
trail is heating up again. As soon as Sol gets back I’ll request
some time off and a pass ride.”

“Good news.”

“I don’t know yet.”

“Well, I’m hoping. I wish
I could tell you why I need the intel so badly, but just to
reiterate, it’s important to some people I know. Really, really,
really important.”

Glen cocked his head. “Abandon-my-post
important? Or work-on-it-when-I-can important?”

“Scale of one to ten. One means if we never
find out it’s no big deal. Ten is the end of days. I’m putting this
between seven and eight.”

“Okay. You know I don’t have any free time
while Sol’s gone and not much when he’s here. And the lead I need
to follow requires travel with flex time and a long leash.”

“When Sol gets back, let me know what you
need and I’ll make it happen.”

“Done, my Lady.” He gave
her a little chivalrous bow.

“You know I never thought
I’d live to see the acting Jefferson Unit Sovereign bow to me – and
in his own office at that. Sol would have a coronary. Got to
go.”

“Where you off to?”

“Trainee Mid,
hand-to-hand.” She specified “Mid” because the twenty four trainees
were divided into two classes of twelve each. The younger boys were
beginning. The older boys were midlevel. The active duty knights
were advanced.

Glen looked at his watch absently. “Would
you drop this in Monq’s box on your way by?” He handed her a
file.

“Sure. Later.”

Elora exited Elevator 3 a
couple of steps behind Kristoph Falcon and Rolfe Wakenmann, who had
been on Elevator 2. Some of the boys were gathered in the hall
outside the sparring room. When Kris and Wakey walked up, one of
the loiterers said, “Yo, Wakey. Let me see your eyes.” Wakey gave
him a funny look. “Yep. Bottomless pools, clear and deep as a
cloudless night.”

Amid a round of youthful
laughter, Wakey responded with, “Fuck you!” Then he noticed that
everyone stood straight as all eyes shifted to something behind
him. He turned to come face to face with his instructor, the famous
and formidable Lady Laiken. Taking a step back, he dropped his
eyes.

She looked over the group.
“Go on in and warm up. I want a private word with Mr. Wakenmann.”
Once the boys had filed inside and closed the door, leaving the two
of them alone in the hallway, she turned to Wakey. “You know,
Sovereign Nemamiah has strong feelings about minors – that would be
you, and expletives – that would be the last two words that came
out of your mouth.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“Personally, I wouldn’t
care. My husband is quite partial to colorful language and I’ve
grown used to it. But as long as you and I are on these premises,
working with this organization, we’re going to respect the
Sovereign’s wishes on the matter. Not because it’s the rules, but
because he’s earned the right to set the rules. If I’ve learned
anything since being here, it’s that he always has good reasons for
what he does.

“Was that clear, Mr.
Wakenmann?”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“Then get to the friggin’
mats now.”

He grinned. “Yes, ma’am.”

“Oh, and Wakey?”

“Yes, ma’am?”

“You do have eyes as clear as a cloudless
night.”

He spit out a laugh and
jogged toward the door to the sparring room.

CHAPTER 7

Halcyon Dimension, Present Day.

Angel was done for the
night. When it first opened, Divas Dive had shown some promise as a
club. It was a little different in look and atmosphere and often
drew yupsters who wanted to check out clubbing in his tawdry neck
of the borough. It had even been named in the hopes of drawing
uptown curiosity seekers.
Come walk on the
wild side.
He sneered at that. Like a
couple of hours of pounding bass and undulating bodies could make
you worldly.

It’s not so easy.
Real
corruption takes
practice. For some it even takes dedication.

The ladies had been given
a chance to interest him. He’d held court at the bar for an hour
while a parade of cartoon tits and well-used tail came and went.
They offered the usual, immediate availability and tipsy gushing
about his beautiful eyes and broad shoulders. He was almost as
tired of that old song as he was of being groped without his
permission. Almost.

It was a waste of time,
like standing in front of the butcher’s premium case, staring at
the strips and filets, when you’re in the mood for fish and not
meat.

He decided to hit the
men’s room before he left. As he came back out into the dim hallway
a girl stepped in front of him. She pressed the front of her body
up against him and purred his name. Between the pale blond hair and
the white dress, she was glowing like radiation in the semi-black
lighting. He’d been with her last week, in a stall on the other
side of the men’s room door. Maybe she’d given her name and maybe
she hadn’t. It was irrelevant because he couldn’t remember either
way.

“Okay look, doll, it’s not
happening, right?”

He tried to ease her away, but she pressed
closer, thinking she was being seductive.

“What’s the hurry? Stick
around. See what I’ve got for you.”

He grabbed her biceps, his
big hands completely circling her arms, and swung her around so
that her back was against the wall. When he shoved three fingers
inside her, none too gently, she went bug-eyed and gasped. The
skirt was so short and the thong so tiny that he didn’t even have
to work for it.

“Oh, yeah, been there.”
The words were vicious, but his actions were even more brutal. He
wiggled his fingers around while her mouth hung wide open in shock.
“And once was enough. See ya.”

When he withdrew his fingers, she gasped all
over again, maybe even louder. “You dick!”

He laughed right in her face. She jerked and
squeezed her eyes shut when she felt spittle.

“That’s right, no name.
You loiter outside the men’s room and make your twat that
accessible, somebody’s gonna take advantage.”

He wiped his hand on the
leg of his jeans and walked off thinking that he’d done the piece a
service. He hadn't left anything open for misunderstanding. Even
though he didn’t remember the details of that particular encounter,
he was confident that he’d been honest about his part of the
bargain. He never led women on. Never said, “Sure. I’ll call,” or
any such shit. It was what you might call a policy of
his.

Actually, thinking more
about it, he realized he’d just schooled her up on one of the
downsides to indiscriminate fucking. Yeah. He chuckled to himself.
He should actually be recognized for philanthropy in the area of
saving women from guys like him. Like the song says, sometimes you
have to be cruel to be kind.

Angel had never had to
work for pussy. Even when his features were completely at rest, his
natural intensity mimicked the look of sexually fueled passion. The
promise of something forbidden radiating from those black eyes drew
women like a Nordstrom going-out-of-business sale. Of course his
perfectly proportioned anatomy didn't hurt either.

When he landed himself on
the streets as a young teen, he’d survived at first by stealing. It
didn’t take long before other kids on the street gravitated to him.
They seemed to congregate around him and then stand nearby looking
at him like he was supposed to know what to do next. So he put them
to work stealing for him. He liked to think of himself as a
community organizer. Angel loved tongue-in-cheek.

It wasn’t a bad gig. He
found places where they could be safe to crash, some even had
working plumbing. He spent enough of the proceeds on clothes and
grooming so that none of the kids would ever be taken for homeless.
He taught them how to look and act like suburban kids in the city
for a shopping trip, thereby appearing completely non-threatening
so that no mark would ever be on their guard.

The big moneymaker was
lunchtime in the shopping districts. Nicer restaurants. Women hung
their purses off the backs of chairs and then got busy talking to
their friends. Lots of people coming and going past tables. If
somebody walked by, smoothly eased a bag off a chair back, and kept
walking, no one would be the wiser until it was time to pay the
check. Then the budding criminal would meet friends around the
corner and pass out the plastic. By the time the credit card
companies were involved, the nice-looking kids with the fresh faces
and conservative clothes could have run up thousands in purchases.
The cards, along with the bag and the rest of its contents - except
cash – would be in a dumpster within a couple of hours.

He ran the Fagin racket for
two or three years before learning - almost by accident - that he
had skills to make
real
money.

One of the other boys had
pocketed a deck of playing cards on the way out of a convenience
store, even though that kind of minimum return risk was strictly
against Angel’s rules. The other kid taught him the rules of
poker.

There was no way to judge
how good he was, playing other street kids. He could beat them, all
of them, without trying, but that didn’t tell him what he needed to
know. So he asked around about low stakes street games. Nothing
fancy. Something affordable with a cap on bets. He took the gang’s
take for the week, which was a big gamble in itself, and tripled
the money. Since the other kids had provided the funding – even
though they hadn’t known about the plan, he divided the total take
in half, kept half for himself and split the other half equally
among the others, which meant they profited as well.

Within six months he had
enough money to play with big boys. Maybe not the biggest boys, but
hefty nonetheless.

When it came to poker,
Angel was special. Even more so than he ever could have imagined
because that talent was the result of demon blood that enhanced his
intuitive ability.

If he’d been satisfied
with playing poker, he could have led a cushy, carefree life and
had anything he wanted with minimal effort. He’d already made more
money than his parents would earn in their lifetime.

There was just one little
problem. Angel liked betting on the horses. He liked it even more
than playing poker but unlike poker, he didn’t always win. After a
while he fell into a cycle of addiction. The only reason he played
poker was to get money to bet on horses, which he was sure to
lose.

While he could always pull
a win with poker, because the energy of cards is static, the energy
of living things - like horses - was unstable. Horses have
fluctuations in their biological and psychic patterns and they come
with personality factors just like all mammals. Some days they feel
like running. Some days they don't. Some days they
have
to win. Some days
they don't mind being second. Then there are the unforeseeable
factors like accidents that complicate things even more.