The Dragon Conspiracy (11 page)

“What level gem mage is he?” Rake looked at each of us in turn. “Oh, come now, the boy didn’t even have to touch those diamonds last night. He grabbed the harpy that held them and the stones lit like tiny suns.”

“Our assessment team has evaluated him as a level ten,” Moreau said.

“Merci, Monsieur. Direct talk will serve you well over the coming hours. You may not have time for much else.”

“Then, like yourself, I will be very direct,” Moreau continued. “We have information on the Queen of Dreams, but anything else you can tell us concerning what it’s capable of would be greatly appreciated. It is documented that it was stolen from your people. We will do everything within our power to see it returned to you.”

Rake Danescu’s expression went from surprise, to suspicion, to cautious acceptance, finally settling on reserved gratitude. “If you accomplish this, you will have my thanks as well as the gratitude of His Majesty, King Chigaru Mal’Salin. Aside from being part of the goblin crown jewels, the Queen of Dreams cures disorders of the mind and diseases of the body, an ironic ability I’ve always thought considering its color.”

I was confused. “But isn’t the Queen of Dreams the pink diamond?”

“It is.”

“But pink’s a nice color.”

“Not for goblins. Pink is the color of pure evil.”

I had a flashback to shopping for one of my nieces in the all-pink Barbie aisle at Toys “R” Us. I had to admit, it had creeped me out. I nodded. “I can see that.”

“If you’re familiar with our royal family,” Rake continued, “you know that insanity is a problem every few generations. We’ve been fortunate for at least half of this generation, but fate is one lady I do not wish to tempt.”

“A diamond that heals,” Ian noted. “That’s certainly motive enough for a theft. Perhaps our thief needs someone’s disease cured—or needs healing themselves. Does it only work with goblins?”

“It has been found to work on any supernatural, from any dimension.”

“Making it even more valuable,” I said.

“Indeed.”

“As to why the thief took all of the diamonds, maybe they didn’t want to risk Viktor Kain splitting up the Dragon Eggs and auctioning them off separately.”

“What about the elf diamond?” Ian asked Rake.

“The Eye of Destiny is said to enable the seeing of the truth in all things and expose that which is hidden.”

Oh, wonderful. A rock that did my job. I was glad the boss had already assured me that she wasn’t interested in owning any of the Dragon Eggs. “How does it do that?”

“By negating magic,” Rake said.

Those three words hit our collective pause button.

Depending on who was throwing the magic around, and what kind they were tossing, that could be a very good—or an exceptionally bad—thing.

“How wide of an area would be affected and for how long?” Moreau asked.

Rake shrugged. “That would depend entirely on the strength and control of the gem mage using it.”

And the thief had just kidnapped a level ten—a level ten with no control whatsoever. I wondered if the thief would let Ben Sadler go once he found out he’d snatched himself a loose cannon. As soon as I thought the question, I knew the answer. They may have gone to a lot of trouble to kidnap Ben, but getting rid of him would be easy. There were endless ways to kill someone.

“The other five diamonds came from this world,” Rake was saying. “Any gem that appears to possess any kind of supernatural power, humans usually refer to it as cursed. Stones typically don’t bring bad luck by themselves. That’s simply what happens when a stone’s power is activated, but not controlled.”

“Like a car that gets put in gear on a hill and turned loose,” I said.

“A more accurate analogy would be the parts to a particularly large bomb,” Moreau said. “Each isn’t necessarily dangerous by itself, but once combined and activated . . .”

“When would it be set to go off?” Ian asked.

“The veils between the dimensions are at their thinnest twice a year,” Rake said. “The summer solstice and what mortals call All Hallows’ Eve. The goblin and elven diamonds will be at their strongest, equal in strength to the others. At any other time of the year, the Queen of Dreams and Eye of Destiny would be weaker than the diamonds from this dimension. But tonight at midnight, the power of all will be able to unite equally as one.”

“But to do what?” I asked.

“Unknown, my dear Makenna. But regardless of the seemingly benign capabilities of the elf and goblin stone, no one steals, murders, and kidnaps, then turns around and begins bestowing gifts.”

“The first time all seven diamonds were together was when they were owned by Nicholas and Alexandra of Russia,” Moreau said. “The stones were split up again and lost during the Russian Revolution until Viktor Kain found them and brought them together again.”

We all pondered that for a moment.

“To release those harpies from stasis required proximity,” Moreau continued. “Other than Agent Fraser and Ben Sadler, you were closest to that statue when the spell holding them immobile was dropped.”

A faint shadow of a smile creased Rake’s lips. “You of all people know what I’m capable of, Alain. Have you ever seen me petrify a living creature, much less keep them in stasis for how long?”

“Six days,” Ian said. “That’s the length of time the ‘statue’ was in the Sackler Wing before last night.”

“Six days. Not an inconsequential length of time, and then release them, immediately bringing them back to full awareness, so they can carry out my evil and brazen master plan?”

“I am not accusing you personally, Rake,” Moreau said.

“But you believe I am involved in some way.”

“I believe you know more than you are telling us.”

The goblin smiled. “Always,
mon ami
. But were I to attempt such a feat of criminal daring, I would be much more circumspect. Less truly is more. The successful theft of what are at this time the seven most famous diamonds in the world would be enough of a coup even for the most inflated of egos. It would be wise to carry out the theft when there are the fewest people around. The more people, the more unknown elements. Even though he—or she—was successful, they should consider themselves the luckiest person in this world, or any other, because they now not only possess the diamonds, but a master gem mage to wield them. The persistence in the abduction of Mr. Sadler tells me that the thief knows what the Dragon Eggs are capable of,” Rake was saying, “but didn’t have a gem mage, or not one who would be willing to risk his life activating those diamonds. You must admit that Mr. Sadler gave a dazzling audition. He activated the stones without even directly touching them, and if that harpy hadn’t hit him, he would have been none the worse for wear for the experience. In less than twelve hours, not only was this individual successful in acquiring the Dragon Eggs, but their persistence with their harpies paid off handsomely with the capture of quite possibly the most powerful human gem mage in this world. Since five of the diamonds are of this world, the thief would need a human to do the heavy lifting, so to speak.”

“Which brings up the question of why Sebastian du Beckett wanted Ben in the first place,” I said. “He’s a junior-level diamond appraiser, and Ms. Sagadraco said that du Beckett had a good eye for magical talent. He had to have known what Ben could do. Heck, he even had a gem of power in his office. Ben used it on one of the harpies.”

Moreau sighed in frustration. “Unfortunately, Monsieur du Beckett is in no condition to answer that or any other question we have.”

“I can’t imagine you not knowing who your competition was in Kain’s auction,” Ian said to Rake. “Especially the powerful ones who preferred to fly under the radar.”

“They, or their representatives, were all in attendance at last night’s rudely interrupted gathering. These individuals are like myself in that they value their privacy. They form an intricate network, a web, if you will. The slightest touch at any point sends a tremor down every strand. Were I to give you names, Bastian’s fate could very well be mine.”

“Afraid of a little gravel in your hair?”

“Merely the annoyance of having to add another individual to the list of those already queuing up to kill me. Eventually someone’s luck will triumph over my skill. Though being immortalized in stone does have its appeal.” He eyed me. “Unless a clumsy harpy obliterates the masterpiece. I do not wish to be reduced to dust.”

The corner of my left eyelid began to twitch.

“Would you like to avail yourself of my shower, dearest Makenna? I’m certain these two gentlemen could think of more rudely invasive questions. I can assure you my bath has everything you could possibly desire in your hour of need.”

The slightest emphasis he put on “desire” and “need” elevated the twitch to a spasm. I had to put my finger on my eyelid to make it stop.

Everyone noticed.

Rake smiled.

I resisted the urge to flip Rake the bird.

“Thank you,” I told him. “I’ll be fine.”

Alain Moreau stood. “And we need to be going. I have asked the questions that needed to be asked.”

“I trust my answers were to your satisfaction?”

“They were what I expected.”

“I’m always glad to be what SPI expects.” The charming banter vanished along with Rake Danescu’s smile. “Though if you want to get all the answers, you’ll need to ask the one creature who has them. Viktor Kain.”

11

IT
was noon on Halloween. Twelve hours until midnight on Halloween, and we were no closer to finding where the harpies had taken Ben and the diamonds.

Until last night, Ben Sadler had been blissfully ignorant that the three largest populations in New York weren’t humans, pigeons, and rats. Within a few hours of finding out that monsters were real, he’d been kidnapped by three of them.

Last night was supposed to have been fun for him. Get dressed up, go to a museum gala, size up some diamonds for a client, have a few drinks, maybe meet a nice girl—a normal, human one, like a lawyer, stockbroker, actress, advertising exec—anything but three reanimated harpies.

Why the hell couldn’t he have run away like every other human in the room with a lick of good sense?

I hadn’t run, but crap like that was my job, as was protecting people like him who should’ve escaped outside, jumped in a cab with the cute lawyer he’d just met, hit the nearest bar, and tried to convince each other that their eyes and the lighting had been playing tricks on them, or the museum sure did pull out all the stops with the special effects. Then maybe end up back at her place—not unconscious in the back of a Suburban with a werewolf outside kicking a harpy’s ass who ten seconds before was trying to drag you out a back window she’d bashed in with one punch.

Ben had wanted to hear for himself what Sebastian du Beckett knew about him. He’d insisted on going with us. We were armed, we had backup, and it still hadn’t been enough.

I ran what had happened over and over in my head, searching for a missed opportunity, or an action I could have done better to change the outcome.

Nada.

I was still relatively new and untrained. I had an excuse, even if I didn’t want to take it.

Ian and Alain Moreau were seasoned veterans of monster combat, and this morning, a man under their protection had been taken. Pissed didn’t even begin to describe what I’d seen burning in their eyes. They wanted a rematch, they were going to have one, and the outcome would be different.

Ian’s desk was next to mine in the bull pen. He’d been on the phone since we’d gotten back. One of his calls sounded like he’d finally gotten in touch with his black market art guy.

Moreau had gone to check on progress with Sebastian du Beckett’s remains in the lab, and then it was to the boss’s office to tell her about Ben and fill her in on our visit with Rake Danescu.

“They will not hurt him.” Yasha put his big hand on my shoulder. It was warm and reassuring. “They need him.”

The Russian was six five in his bare feet, and well over seven feet tall in his bare paw pads, but that didn’t keep him from moving like ninja.

“Thank you, Yasha.”

He was right. The thief or thieves wouldn’t hurt Ben as long as he was useful to them. Whatever the Dragon Eggs were capable of, they needed Ben to wake them up and put them to work. But it didn’t mean they’d say “please” while asking him to do whatever it was they needed him to do.

That’s why they’re called bad guys, Mac. They’re not nice.

With Ben’s left arm being broken, half of their job would be done for them. I’d had a broken arm before, and until it’d been set, I’d scream if the wind blew the wrong way. “Hurt like hell” didn’t even
begin
to describe how it’d felt when those broken bits of bone had shifted.

Ben was new to his gift. What if he couldn’t do what the thieves wanted?

Then they wouldn’t need him.

Ian got off the phone and rolled his chair over to us.

“So where do harpies roost?” I asked them. “Obviously they don’t have a problem with sunlight. Do they leave a trail a werewolf can follow? What do they eat? Are pigeon brains a delicacy? Maybe Midtown’s having a rash of mangled pigeon corpses with the heads bitten off—I don’t know. There’s got to be
something
we can do.”

“We’ve put out an APB.”

I damned near jumped out of my skin. Again.

Alain Moreau. Right behind me. At least Yasha had the consideration to displace air when he moved.

“Sir, don’t take this the wrong way,” I said, “but could you walk louder? At least when you’re coming up behind me?”

My vampire manager almost smiled. “I will make every effort, Agent Fraser. The APB is for Monsieur Sadler, the harpies, and any trace of gorgon activity. Normally we would not want to frighten the city’s supernatural population unnecessarily, but Madame Sagadraco has just learned that the disturbance that was felt by the supernaturals in the museum when Monsieur Sadler made contact with the harpy and the Dragon Eggs was felt by every supernatural and magic sensitive on the island of Manhattan and two of the other boroughs.”

Holy crap.

Ian and Yasha’s stunned expressions told me they were thinking pretty much the same thing.

“Madame agrees with Rake Danescu’s theory that the thief is on a schedule,” Moreau continued. “Whatever the Dragon Eggs are capable of doing, the best time to use them will be midnight tonight. That leaves us only twelve hours to find the diamonds and Monsieur Sandler.” He paused. “He will be unharmed until at least after midnight—and perhaps longer, depending on what use the thief has for the diamonds. A gem mage of his ability is rare, and the thief went to a great deal of trouble to abduct him.”

“How far can harpies fly?” I asked him.

One corner of his lips quirked in amusement. “And how am I supposed to know that, Agent Fraser?”

“You’re . . . you know . . .”

His pale blue eyes glittered. “Old?”

“I wouldn’t have used that word. I was going to go with ‘experienced’.”

“Of course,” he said smoothly. “I do not know what a comfortable flight distance for a harpy would be. But if I had to make a guess based on their performance in Monsieur du Beckett’s office, I would say that a harpy, even with an injured wing or laden with the weight of a human, could fly as far as she needed to go. I would guess their destination would be within the five boroughs, which leaves us with entirely too many possibilities. Madame Sagadraco is having Agent Hayashi and his team monitor both human and supernatural news sources for reports of any winged creatures. Perhaps one good thing that came from the harpies appearing before the human public is that the people of this city are now alert to the unusual.”

“And who is searching?” I asked.

“Every agent we can spare.”

Ian leaned back in his chair. “Viktor Kain wouldn’t have brought the Dragon Eggs to Ms. Sagadraco’s doorstep unless he intended to not only use them against her, but against the city as well. He has to know how protective she is of this place. If he wanted to hurt her, hurt her city.”

Moreau nodded. “She is aware of this. Until we know the threat, we do not know what precautions to take.”

“If we knew what the diamonds could do,” I said, “and what the thief plans to do with them, we could at least narrow down possible hideouts, lair—”

“Nests,” Moreau said. “Harpies have nests. But your other word choices would be the correct ones for their master. Harpies do not act of their own initiative. They are but tools for whoever is behind this.”

Ian scowled. “For someone who threw a public tantrum, Viktor Kain must be a happy man right now. Still think his hands are clean?”

Moreau gave a haughty sniff of derision. “They never have been. I do not think that has now changed. However, Madame believes that he is not directly responsible; indirect involvement is another thing altogether.”

“Ms. Sagadraco said that Viktor Kain’s real motive for coming to New York wasn’t to sell those diamonds,” I said. “That he could have done that a lot easier from home. Does this mean that whatever Kain planned to do with the diamonds is what the thief will try to do, now that they have Ben? I don’t know how this kind of thing works. Can two gem mages do something completely different with the same set of stones? Or is it dependent on the stones what kind of magic is worked, and the mage is just the switch to get them started?”

“The latter, Agent Fraser,” Moreau replied.

“If Kain hasn’t left town yet, then whatever the thief plans to have Ben do with those diamonds must not be too bad.” I stopped. “Kain hasn’t left town, has he?”

“No,” Moreau replied. “He hasn’t. He and his entourage are staying on the top two floors of the Mandarin Oriental. Kain himself is in the Presidential Suite.”

“Central Park,” Ian noted. “High enough so he can survey Vivienne Sagadraco’s domain, and only a diamond’s throw from her penthouse—and Rake Danescu’s.”

“Do we have anybody other than Ms. Sagadraco who could stand a chance of getting Kain to talk?” I asked.

“No.” Moreau’s response was blunt and not what I wanted to hear, and from the tightness of his voice, it wasn’t the response he wanted to give. “If he came here with lethal intent, nothing will get it out of him, unless he’s certain that she or we won’t be able to stop him. Then he’d probably be only too happy to tell us everything.”

“Whatever it is the Dragon Eggs can do, it must be something that Kain wanted done in or to New York,” I said. “Hopefully the thief isn’t planning the same thing, but I’m not gonna hold my breath. Kain’s pissed at the boss; that’s his motive. Revenge. What are the chances the thief wants the same thing? Or same thing but with a different motive?”

“When you have lived for as long as Madame Sagadraco, you accumulate enemies along with those years. Powerful enemies. That is the first possibility Madame considered. She’s cross-referencing them with any known association with harpies.”

I couldn’t imagine living so long as to have accumulated enough enemies to cross-reference. Made me glad I was human.

As the head of an international crime cartel, Viktor Kain and his organization thrived on chaos and fear. Through SPI, Vivienne Sagadraco had given those in the supernatural world a place to turn to for help against supernatural criminals. It wasn’t like they could go to the human authorities. If humans ever got confirmation that supernaturals lived among them, there would be monster hunters and vigilantes everywhere. Supernaturals would either be constantly on the run, or decide to stand and fight. Many of the vampire covens and more than a few of the goblins and elves were fed up with hiding, and thought it was high time they made themselves known to humans, whom the vamps considered food, and the goblins and elves thought were beneath them.

Vivienne Sagadraco didn’t think that way. Compared to her, humans had the life expectancy of fruit flies. That she didn’t think of earth as a giant petri dish said a lot about her, all of it good.

“I know people in Russia,” Yasha said. “Well, people part of time, werewolves rest of time. One of them is a friend. Mercenary, but with honor. Will only work for those who also have honor.”

“I take it this means he has not worked for Viktor Kain,” Moreau said.

“No, he has not. He has worked for men who were destroyed by Kain.”

“Sounds like a survivor,” Ian noted.

Yasha gave us a sad smile. “Werewolves are good survivors. Men pay my friend for work, not to die. Russians are practical people.” He looked at Moreau. “When you learned that Viktor Kain would be coming here and bringing the Dragon Eggs with him, I called my friend in St. Petersburg for information. He calls friends he trusts—friends inside Kain’s organization. Not high in organization; he only accepts werewolves as outer circle guards.” Yasha grinned. “But we have big ears, very good for hearing. Some consider guards like furniture. They are there, but not there. Last year, Viktor Kain tries to buy red diamond from businessman in Berlin. Price is too low, businessman did not want to sell. Viktor makes another offer. Not much higher than first. Man still refuses. Kain orders man’s family taken. Ransom is red diamond plus ten million dollars for refusing to sell when first asked. Businessman is to deliver it himself. He brings diamond and money, and Kain has the man’s family shot through their heads one by one. Then after this poor man sees his wife and children murdered, Viktor Kain burns him to a crisp. When he locates the owner of the black diamond and makes offer, owner takes first offer made.” Yasha paused, and I could hear the clock ticking on the wall. “Word gets around.”

“So it would seem,” Moreau said quietly.

“Sir, would be a great favor to entire world if Viktor Kain could be . . . what is fitting word . . . exterminated.”

“That is the perfect word, Agent Kazakov. Attempts have been made and those attempts have failed. There are many beings who agree with you, myself and Madame included, and those efforts will not cease until there is success.”

“So within a month of getting his hands on all seven diamonds,” Ian said, “the first thing he does is bring them here, in Ms. Sagadraco’s territory, for show-and-tell and sets loose a rumor about an inter-dimensional auction to sell the lot.”

“It seems odd to say it,” I began, “but those harpies busting out those museum windows and taking those diamonds with them is sounding more and more like a good thing. I mean, what are the odds that someone worse than Viktor Kain is in town?”

As soon as I said it, I realized I really should’ve kept my mouth shut.