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Chapter 13
King Of Lions
Today was the day that Doctor Nudd would die.
Liliana had a lot to do.
She had determined that, while her own presence would not save Doctor Nudd, the highest probability of his survival involved her being physically present to aid him at the crucial moment.
Her main problem was that Doctor Nudd’s death would occur on base at Fort Liberty. For a person who didn’t officially exist, and wanted to keep it that way, walking onto an Army base was not a simple thing.
There was an added complication. She had already foreseen that Alexander Bennet would be in considerable danger today. While he had been unwilling to trade access to the base for her help, she felt she had to help anyway.
Ignoring visions that insisted the Sidhe prince who protected Pete and whose lips sent thrills from her fingers all the way to her toes would be badly injured or possibly killed when she could prevent it—that was not something Liliana could do.
She tried looking ahead in the day to see if there was a time when any one of the other people who would be involved in Doctor Nudd’s death went off base. Pete would be off base for a time, but he would arrive too late to save Doctor Nudd. Perhaps she could find someone else who could get her on base sooner, while still allowing her time to help Alexander Bennet.
She was in luck.
Doctor Periclum would travel to a nice restaurant in downtown Fayetteville for dinner. A violent spring storm had moved in. As it was pouring rain with a possibility of hail predicted, he would opt to park his large, sleek car in a parking garage.
She could speak to Andrew Periclum when he finished his dinner meeting. A pride member had arranged the meeting to provide the king of lions with a large amount of transferable pay cards. Liliana did not know why the jackal-kin did that, but pride business was not her concern. She hoped to convince the king of lions to smuggle her onto the base.
Liliana found a comfortable out-of-the-way spot in the concrete roof structure of the parking garage near where the lion-kin’s car was charging and waited. She had seen that Andrew Periclum would come out of the restaurant and return directly to base.
As a lion-kin’s daughter, she was technically a pride child, even though she was not a lion, jackal, or hyena herself. A good pride-king would nonetheless give her aid in return for the loyalty she had pledged to him.
She wasn’t sure if the lion-kin cyberneticist who built Siobhan’s eye and arm even remembered that Liliana was a pride-child, but she could remind him. If he did her this favor, it would obligate her to give the pride aid in some way at a later date, much like an exchange of favors among the Fae. She would accept that obligation if it helped her to save her favorite goblin and her favorite sprite.
If the king of lions was not willing to smuggle her onto the base, then she considered possibly hiding in his trunk. The large black vehicle was equipped with modern magnetic shielding designed to protect from many projectile and energy weapons. It would also keep the base’s entrance scanner from detecting her as long as it was on, and unlike most base visitors, Andrew Periclum routinely left his on.
The puzzle was, how could she either convince the king of lions to help her or get into his trunk without his knowing. If the first tactic failed, she would probably lose any possibility of trying the second tactic.
When she looked more closely at the car, she saw something unexpected. The car was occupied. Apparently, someone was waiting to drive Doctor Periclum back to the base: a muscular lion-kin with three slash scars on his face that looked like claw marks. She remembered him as the man who had been Andrew Periclum’s second during the pride succession challenge. He had filled out with even more muscle over the years, and the scars pulled his lip in a way that gave him a permanent sneer. It made him look very fierce.
Well, then. The trunk was not an option. She would have to convince the doctor to let her ride with him and his driver. She looked ahead in time, with the idea of asking for that favor firmly in mind. If she did not see a likelihood of success, then she would have to abandon her plan and find another way.
The spider-kin watched as Colonel Alexander Bennet’s urban camouflage-painted car with big, knobby, all-terrain tires parked directly under her perch in the roof structure. She had seen that this was the location of his danger and hoped to have time to save him, then ask the pride-king for a favor.
She looked forward in time to see why the prince had come.
Oh. Hmm.
Liliana sighed. She would have to change her plan. The king of lions would not be granting her any favors. The Colonel’s plans completely negated hers.
She should simply leave while there was time and find another way onto the base, but that would leave Alexander Bennet to an unpleasant fate. The probability of his death was low, but the probability of serious injury was high.
She sighed and shimmied down her safety line onto the broad flat hood of Colonel Bennet’s car. She had left a few lines dangling from convenient alcoves in the concrete ceiling structure here and there.
The prince had been getting out of his car when she dropped onto it.
He dropped his hand to his sidearm, unsnapped it, drew it, and pointed it at her, nearly as fast as an old west gunfighter. It was drawn and pointed before his face showed recognition. “Liliana!”
She nodded to him and sat cross-legged on the hood of his huge car with the big tires, putting herself close to eye level with him.
“Why are you here?” the prince asked, lowering his gun to his side.
“I also came to speak to Andrew Periclum. I was going to ask the same favor of him that I already asked of you, but because of what you will do, I will not get the chance.”
