Midnight Blue-Light Special
Page 41
“It doesn’t work like that for humans, Ryan,” I said, and chucked another throwing knife at the nearest dart board. It embedded itself deep into the cork. “We keep track of our relatives more so we’ll know where to send Christmas cards and who to hate than because we’re planning to help each other out.”
“Hey, now.” Uncle Mike stopped cutting the lasagna long enough to shake his spatula at me. It was store-bought—the lasagna, not the spatula, although the spatula probably came from a store somewhere—and the smell rising off the baked meat-and-cheese concoction was heavenly. “Family is a good thing, too. Don’t you forget about that just because you’re busy being freaked out over some cousin you didn’t even know existed before yesterday.”
“Even knowing that the Covenant probably sent her because she’s family? Nobody sniffs out a Healy like a Healy, and we’ve only been Prices for two generations.” If I was going by Grandma Alice and the pictures I’d seen of Great-Grandma Fran, I could call myself a Price as much as I wanted; I was still going to be an obvious Healy girl to anyone with eyes.
“Even knowing that she’s here because she’s family. Being a Healy doesn’t give you magic powers or anything. Maybe makes you a little stubborn. The stubborn has to be genetic. And then there’s the luck thing. But none of that guarantees that she’s going to trip over your hiding place, and you’ve got a lot more allies in this town than she does.” Uncle Mike dished a healthy serving of lasagna onto a paper plate. “Now eat. You’re too thin, and you’re going to worry yourself into getting even thinner.”
“I’m a professional ballroom dancer,” I said. “Thinner is a good thing.” I still took the lasagna, moving to sit down at the nearby table. The dragons had been living in this Nest for long enough to have paid—probably grudgingly—for converting the employee break room into a serviceable kitchen. Between the stove, the fridge, and the microwave Ryan and Istas had brought with them, we had sufficient facilities to keep us all fed for the duration of the siege.
“Not when you have to wrestle a lindworm out of its hole, it isn’t. Eat.” Uncle Mike turned and pressed another plate into Ryan’s hands. “You, too. Is that girlfriend of yours going to want some when she finishes partying with the mice?”
“Probably,” said Ryan. “Istas is a black hole in a lacy pinafore.”
“And other phrases that have never before been uttered.” I stabbed my lasagna with my fork. It wasn’t as satisfying as certain other kinds of stabbing would have been, but it was what I had available at the moment. “We need a plan.”
“Don’t die,” suggested Ryan.
“We need a better plan.”
“Don’t get seriously injured,” said Uncle Mike.
I eyed him. “Are you going to take this seriously? This is serious. This is a serious situation.” I paused, scowling. “Only now I’ve said ‘serious’ so many times that it’s starting to sound funny to me. Dammit. We need a plan.”
“The Covenant doesn’t know where this place is, so that’s a start,” said Mike.
“Dominic has never been here, and he doesn’t like free running, so he’s unlikely to have ever followed me,” I agreed. “The others don’t know yet that I’m someone they should be following, so that buys us a little time. We’ll need to be careful coming and going, but we were already planning on that. And the mice make remarkably good spies. If anyone comes sniffing around here, we’ll know.”
For the first time, Ryan looked faintly uncomfortable. “They’re not going to be, you know, announcing themselves to people on the sidewalk or anything, are they? Because talking mice will convince the Covenant that there’s something up with this place pretty darn quick.”
“They’re actually better at being subtle than anyone gives them credit for,” I assured him. “When you see them around me, they’re in a safe place. They know they can be themselves here. Out in the world, they practice stealth and actual cunning. If they didn’t, we would have long since run out of Aeslin mice.”
“That’s a relief,” said Ryan.
I paused. “Actually . . . there’s something to be said for using Aeslin mice as spies. We’ve done it before, when we felt that we really had to. The mice are happy to have something they can do to help the gods.” And some of them inevitably wouldn’t make it back from their “holy mission,” because they were mice, and what I was contemplating involved sending them out into a world where practically everything was bigger than they were.
It was still one of the best ideas I’d had so far, and from the thoughtful look on Uncle Mike’s face, he thought so, too. He brought his plate and sat down next to me. “It would be a good way to find out what the Covenant was up to, if we could find a way to sneak some mice into their headquarters,” he said. “Didn’t the mice come before your family left the Covenant, though?”
“Yeah, but they came with my great-great-grandmother, Enid, when she married into the Healys,” I said. “Margaret might not know about the mice.”
“There’s an awful lot of wiggle room in ‘might.’”
I didn’t have an answer for that. I was saved from needing one when Istas appeared in the kitchen doorway. “I smell lasagna,” she announced. “You will share.”
“Hi, sweetie.” Ryan waved his fork in her direction. “Food’s on the stove. Did you have a good time with the mice?”
“Yes.” Istas started toward the lasagna, detouring only long enough to kiss Ryan on the cheek. “They are very pleasant company.”
“You have rat breath,” said Ryan, wrinkling his nose.
Istas looked pleased. “Yes,” she said. “I know.” She dished half the remaining lasagna onto a plate, bringing it with her as she moved to sit down next to Ryan. “Have we determined the best method for driving the Covenant from our territory yet? Will carnage be involved?”
“We’re still working on that,” I said. “We have numbers . . . now. But if this whole team disappears without a trace, the odds are good that the Covenant will send more people to find out what happened to them. Maybe we can disappear a second team, but can we manage a third? Or a fourth? Eventually, we’re going to wind up being the ones who don’t have the numbers in our favor.” And then the purge of New York would be able to begin in earnest.
“Hey, now.” Uncle Mike stopped cutting the lasagna long enough to shake his spatula at me. It was store-bought—the lasagna, not the spatula, although the spatula probably came from a store somewhere—and the smell rising off the baked meat-and-cheese concoction was heavenly. “Family is a good thing, too. Don’t you forget about that just because you’re busy being freaked out over some cousin you didn’t even know existed before yesterday.”
“Even knowing that the Covenant probably sent her because she’s family? Nobody sniffs out a Healy like a Healy, and we’ve only been Prices for two generations.” If I was going by Grandma Alice and the pictures I’d seen of Great-Grandma Fran, I could call myself a Price as much as I wanted; I was still going to be an obvious Healy girl to anyone with eyes.
“Even knowing that she’s here because she’s family. Being a Healy doesn’t give you magic powers or anything. Maybe makes you a little stubborn. The stubborn has to be genetic. And then there’s the luck thing. But none of that guarantees that she’s going to trip over your hiding place, and you’ve got a lot more allies in this town than she does.” Uncle Mike dished a healthy serving of lasagna onto a paper plate. “Now eat. You’re too thin, and you’re going to worry yourself into getting even thinner.”
“I’m a professional ballroom dancer,” I said. “Thinner is a good thing.” I still took the lasagna, moving to sit down at the nearby table. The dragons had been living in this Nest for long enough to have paid—probably grudgingly—for converting the employee break room into a serviceable kitchen. Between the stove, the fridge, and the microwave Ryan and Istas had brought with them, we had sufficient facilities to keep us all fed for the duration of the siege.
“Not when you have to wrestle a lindworm out of its hole, it isn’t. Eat.” Uncle Mike turned and pressed another plate into Ryan’s hands. “You, too. Is that girlfriend of yours going to want some when she finishes partying with the mice?”
“Probably,” said Ryan. “Istas is a black hole in a lacy pinafore.”
“And other phrases that have never before been uttered.” I stabbed my lasagna with my fork. It wasn’t as satisfying as certain other kinds of stabbing would have been, but it was what I had available at the moment. “We need a plan.”
“Don’t die,” suggested Ryan.
“We need a better plan.”
“Don’t get seriously injured,” said Uncle Mike.
I eyed him. “Are you going to take this seriously? This is serious. This is a serious situation.” I paused, scowling. “Only now I’ve said ‘serious’ so many times that it’s starting to sound funny to me. Dammit. We need a plan.”
“The Covenant doesn’t know where this place is, so that’s a start,” said Mike.
“Dominic has never been here, and he doesn’t like free running, so he’s unlikely to have ever followed me,” I agreed. “The others don’t know yet that I’m someone they should be following, so that buys us a little time. We’ll need to be careful coming and going, but we were already planning on that. And the mice make remarkably good spies. If anyone comes sniffing around here, we’ll know.”
For the first time, Ryan looked faintly uncomfortable. “They’re not going to be, you know, announcing themselves to people on the sidewalk or anything, are they? Because talking mice will convince the Covenant that there’s something up with this place pretty darn quick.”
“They’re actually better at being subtle than anyone gives them credit for,” I assured him. “When you see them around me, they’re in a safe place. They know they can be themselves here. Out in the world, they practice stealth and actual cunning. If they didn’t, we would have long since run out of Aeslin mice.”
“That’s a relief,” said Ryan.
I paused. “Actually . . . there’s something to be said for using Aeslin mice as spies. We’ve done it before, when we felt that we really had to. The mice are happy to have something they can do to help the gods.” And some of them inevitably wouldn’t make it back from their “holy mission,” because they were mice, and what I was contemplating involved sending them out into a world where practically everything was bigger than they were.
It was still one of the best ideas I’d had so far, and from the thoughtful look on Uncle Mike’s face, he thought so, too. He brought his plate and sat down next to me. “It would be a good way to find out what the Covenant was up to, if we could find a way to sneak some mice into their headquarters,” he said. “Didn’t the mice come before your family left the Covenant, though?”
“Yeah, but they came with my great-great-grandmother, Enid, when she married into the Healys,” I said. “Margaret might not know about the mice.”
“There’s an awful lot of wiggle room in ‘might.’”
I didn’t have an answer for that. I was saved from needing one when Istas appeared in the kitchen doorway. “I smell lasagna,” she announced. “You will share.”
“Hi, sweetie.” Ryan waved his fork in her direction. “Food’s on the stove. Did you have a good time with the mice?”
“Yes.” Istas started toward the lasagna, detouring only long enough to kiss Ryan on the cheek. “They are very pleasant company.”
“You have rat breath,” said Ryan, wrinkling his nose.
Istas looked pleased. “Yes,” she said. “I know.” She dished half the remaining lasagna onto a plate, bringing it with her as she moved to sit down next to Ryan. “Have we determined the best method for driving the Covenant from our territory yet? Will carnage be involved?”
“We’re still working on that,” I said. “We have numbers . . . now. But if this whole team disappears without a trace, the odds are good that the Covenant will send more people to find out what happened to them. Maybe we can disappear a second team, but can we manage a third? Or a fourth? Eventually, we’re going to wind up being the ones who don’t have the numbers in our favor.” And then the purge of New York would be able to begin in earnest.
