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He grinned at Tonia, laid his arm over hers. “Plural.”
The vocalists shouted out: “Thank God I’m a Country Boy.” Eddie added a “Yee-haw.”
And Garrett, a shifter once nearly hanged by the PWs, came on the run.
Shifted from cougar to teen. “Trouble’s coming. I found Will.” His breath came fast as all three surged to their feet. “He’s mobilizing. He said Eddie was here, and I should—”
“What’s the trouble?” Duncan interrupted.
“PWs, Raiders, and DUs with them. Maybe thirty miles beyond the checkpoint, moving this way.”
“I’ll get Jonah, Rachel, Mom.” Hannah ran from the gardens.
“How many?” Duncan demanded.
“It looked like hundreds. We were just out for a run. We went past the checkpoint. I know that’s against the rules, but—”
“We’ll worry about that later. Thirty miles?” Tonia pressed.
“About. They’re not moving fast, and we did once we spotted them. I told the others to peel off, alert the outlying farms. But the thing is, I think White’s with them. I saw him once when they had me. I think I saw him with them.”
As his blood heated—he’d wanted to take on White all of his life—Duncan shot a look at Tonia. Understanding, she gave him a nod.
“Tell Eddie, Garrett. He’ll get things started on this end of town. We need to scout past the other checkpoints, see if they’re coming in from other directions.”
“I’ll alert the barracks, and pull in who we need on the way.” Duncan swung onto his bike, something else that came out in spring. “Get the Swifts, let Fred know.” He revved the engine. “You take Flynn. I’ll take Mallick in Arlington.”
“Fast,” Tonia said. “Even if they’re moving slow, we don’t have much time.”
She flashed as Duncan roared away.
They’d trained for this, he thought as he all but flew out of New Hope. Every man, woman, and child had their emergency posts and duties. He alerted them along the way, eating up what he knew would be precious time skidding to a halt to call out the alert to the man tossing a ball to his dog, to the old woman rocking on her porch.
He caught some luck at the barracks when he saw Colin and Travis entertaining themselves by putting some troops through night maneuvers.
“Enemy forces spotted heading in from the south—less than thirty miles beyond the checkpoint. Indeterminate numbers, possibly hundreds. White may be with them.”
“Well, hot damn.” Colin managed to bring his two hands together in a clap. “All right, boys and girls, suit the fuck up.”
“We’ve got this,” Travis said. “Get Dad.”
“Next stop.”
He spun the bike in a circle, streaked toward the Swift house. Leaping off, he didn’t bother to knock, but shoved open the door.
Simon and Lana broke off what looked like a pretty serious kiss.
“Sorry. Enemy forces moving in from the south.” Even as he continued with the details he had, Simon rushed to the pantry, came out with a rifle, ammo. Lana darted into the mudroom for jackets.
“Ethan’s with the horses. Simon will need one, so he’ll tell him.” Lana shoved her arms through the sleeves of her jacket, voice steady, eyes showing not a hint of the fear. “Ethan can alert Fred and the kids, I’ll get Mallick. Duncan, you get Poe. Simon.”
She gripped his hand, then let it go and flashed.
Simon clipped a holster onto his belt, met Duncan’s eyes. “Go.”
__________
Ten miles beyond the checkpoint, the enemy halted. Silver hair streaming, eyes ablaze with fervor, Jeremiah White climbed onto the roof of a truck. As planned, one of the DUs at his side illuminated him so all could see. His voice carried, full-throated, through the soft spring night.
“Fellow warriors, friends, patriots, tonight, at long last, we will eradicate the sanctuary of the demons that defile our world. Tonight, at long last, our blessed crusade to purify the land, the seas, the very air we breathe ends. We mark this night as God’s wrath, delivered through his true children. We will strike them down, rip out this beating heart of their evil. Tonight, in our righteous fury, we avenge our fallen brothers. Arlington. Washington. New York. Philadelphia.”
Others in the crowd shouted out names of other battles, other places as White spread his arms, lifted his face to the starstruck heavens.
“And our brothers will cry out from their graves, will rip the air with their gratitude as we wipe these demons and all who truck with them from the face of this earth.”
“Burn the witches!”
As that cry rang out, over and over, the Dark Uncanny who stood with them remained stone-faced. No sense of irony leaked through.
“Burn the witches,” White echoed. “Hang the demons. Strike them down as they flee. Root out the false prophet they worship as The One, for she will face our judgment. And with her death, as promised, as decreed, by her own fiery sword, we take back the world, we ride the glory.
“Tonight, New Hope burns!”
He drew his own sword, lifted it high, then sliced it down to point toward the glimmer of lights in the distance.
They spread out, squads to attack outlying farms, homes, families, others to circle or flash to the west and east to strike from those directions. Another handful to surge to the checkpoint, take down security as the main forces followed.
Still agile and fit, White boosted down from the roof of the truck, nodded to the pair of burly DUs who served as his personal guard.
“Let them burn, let them bleed, let them litter the ground of this cursed place with bodies. Through the flames and the blood we’ll take her at last. When I strike the bitch down, we’ll have all.”
Troops swept by in a flood, eager for that blood. Others, according to plan, pushed in from the north, with advance teams striking at the checkpoints.
Seasoned, experienced warriors, White thought, some of whom had been with him since the earliest days. Raiders who killed and maimed for the thrill of it. Dark Uncannys who sought the end of Fallon Swift as much as the most fanatical Purity Warrior.
And all under his command.
He waited, his own eagerness growing, the thirst for vengeance searing his throat.
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
White heard the first snaps of gunfire, watched the first spear of lightning rip across the dark. The crows swarmed in.
Like music, he thought. Like triumph.
Like power.
Finally, what had risen from the dark would know all he was.
“Now. To the heart, straight to the heart to tear it out.”
But rather than the gardens, as planned, the protective shield held. When power struck power at the checkpoint, the light spread. In the pale green the faeries brought, the troops, the people of New Hope, magickals, NMs, farmers, teachers, soldiers, weavers, potters engaged the enemy.
On the road to town, in the woods, over fields, on outlying farms, they struck back.
Colin and his recruits met the enemy rushing from the south. Flynn sprinted with troops from The Beach through the woods, turning the ambush back on the attackers. At the farm, Travis fought with Eddie while Fred turned the torches an
d flaming arrows meant to burn down her home to flowers. To the east, Will fought with his son, with Poe and his.
At the checkpoint, Simon fired from his sniper’s nest, blocked out worry for Lana. She’d refused to join the second line of defense, and whipped her power against the dark on the front line.
White had haunted her and hunted her, he understood. And Mallick was with her. He had to trust.
Duncan wove his bike through the oncoming forces, sword slashing in one hand, power in the other. He swung back, the bike another weapon as Tonia loosed arrows from her own sniper’s nest.
A pair of Raiders—and he could admire the chopper under them—barreled toward him. The one riding tandem heaved an axe. Veering to avoid the crash, Duncan flipped power, sent the axe flying back and into the skull of the lead rider. The speed, the sudden loss of control sent the chopper careening off the road, into the tree where Tonia had her nest.
“Watch it!” she snapped out.
“Sorry.”
He spun around, saw a couple more Raiders, some PWs on foot, a couple on horseback pull back to retreat.
“No, not today.”
He started to pursue, then saw White.
“Son of a bitch. Assholes in retreat!” he called out, satisfied when riders on horseback set off after them. He spun around again to confront White.
He looked dazed, Duncan realized. Likely from the crash into the shield. But the two DU’s flanking him didn’t have the same issues.
He threw up a block, and still the force of the power strike spun at him nearly unseated him. He gunned his engine, started to blast out his own.
Fallon dived out of the sky, Laoch’s wings arrowed up. Both the wolf and the owl leaped off to join the battle. And she, as Duncan fought to keep the flood of emotions inside him dammed, dropped the left guard with one strike of her sword, took down the one on the right with a bolt of light.
A swipe of her hand through the air blew White to the ground. “Sleep.” With him sprawled, she wheeled Laoch around, looked at Duncan. “I’m back,” she said, and charged into the enemy who remained.
