Deliverance (28 page)

It’s part of the game to her.

She looked around to see if anyone had observed her peculiar action of suddenly kicking her leg into the air. A girl about nine years old, bored with the speeches, was staring at her and tugging on her mother’s shirt to get her to look at Maliha. Maliha pointed at her, then at herself and smiled a wide grin. Then she did a handstand and walked a few steps on her hands. The girl was giggling. Maliha drifted away, leaving the girl trying to do a handstand against her mother’s back. By the time Maliha tried to detect the black smear of the moving Ageless aura again, she couldn’t find it.

Her earpiece came alive with Mickey’s voice. “Target sighted.”

“Where?”

“Can you see the metal fern ball from where you are?”

There was a sculpture of silver fern leaves suspended in the square, over forty feet up in the air.

“Yes.”

“Move toward it.”

“Moving. Where are you?”

“Second floor of the City Gallery,” Mickey said. “Very nice in here.”

“What am I looking for?”

“The Town Hall building. Tan and brown with columns built into the front. Third floor, last window on the left as you face the building.”

“Got it.” There was a shadow visible in the window.

Maliha slung her gear bag over her shoulder and raced toward the building. She found a side entrance out of view of the crowd, but guarded by two Wellington constables. She walked up to them and asked to check that the door was locked. When they turned their backs on her, she kicked one of them into the side of the building, dropping him unconscious. The other spun around to confront her. She punched him in the stomach, and when he bent over, she kicked his chin, sending him back against the building. He hit his head and slumped down the wall, leaving a blood stripe on the surface. She checked his pulse. He was alive. The scalp wound was superficial. She opened the door and dragged both of them inside. There was a utility room nearby so she stored the bodies out of sight. She didn’t want to take the chance of leaving someone behind who could report her activities, so she shot both of the officers with her tranquilizer gun.

Maliha took the stairs on the south end of the building. The first office facing the square was locked, and that’s where she expected to find her target. Slipping a small mirror on a rod under the door, she twisted the rod and the mirror responded by moving from horizontal to vertical, allowing her a view around the room.

There!

She spotted him at the window, seated in a chair. His rifle was already set up but he was relaxing, smoking a cigarette. He knew there was some time to wait. Maliha gently withdrew the mirror. She had no qualms about doing away with a sniper working for Elizabeth and decided on a blitz attack.

She knocked the door down with a powerful kick. The sniper just had time to bolt up from a sitting position before two throwing stars struck him in the throat. Clutching his throat, he fell backward over the chair. Blood poured from his neck, soaking into the carpet. Maliha continued the momentum of breaking down the door and ran into the room to check her kill.

That’s when she spotted the other man, sitting on a wooden chair in the corner of the room. He was either the sniper’s spotter or bodyguard. The mirror hadn’t revealed him. He’d been smoking, too, but had tossed the cigarette aside. Their eyes met and he fired his Israeli Tavor assault rifle at her. Maliha kept moving, diving at the floor and rolling behind a desk. Bullets tracked her across the room and smacked into the wooden desk, which for the moment protected her. The wood splintered as he fired again. Maliha reached up and grabbed a paperweight from the desk. Looking underneath, she could see the man’s feet to locate him. Swinging her arm up, she threw the paperweight hard in his direction. She heard a thud when it hit and an exclamation of surprise and pain from him. That’s all the incentive she needed.

Sliding out from the desk, staying low to the floor, she saw the man clutching at his chest. She’d struck him over his heart with the heavy brass paperweight, breaking ribs and delivering a stunning blow to the heart muscle. Maliha threw a knife and skewered his heart. He collapsed to the floor.

She walked over and picked up his Tavor, then unclipped several spare magazines from his belt. She snubbed out both cigarettes that were smoldering on the carpeted floor, leaving ugly black marks.

“You should have obeyed the ban on smoking,” she admonished the bloody corpses. “Just look at the mess on this carpet.”

Chapter Thirty-Nine

M
aliha moved rapidly out of the building, because the sound of gunshots, even muffled by the suppressor on the Tavor, should draw a bevy of security forces. She was outside on Wakefield Street, doing her best to look like a patrolling officer in spite of the assault rifle.

Will they let Millhouse go on speaking after finding this room? I wouldn’t.

“Threat eliminated,” Maliha said into her communicator. “Did you hear anything over there?”

She didn’t feel it necessary to explain to Mickey that there had been two men in the room. If he’d taken out one of them with a bullet and assumed the job was done, the spotter might have been able to squeeze off a shot at Millhouse. Both members of the sniper team could handle the rifle.

“No. The crowd’s really wound up. Millhouse will speak in a couple of minutes and I found another sniper.”

Maliha was alarmed. “Where the hell is he?”

“He is a she. She’s in the Central Library—tan, fluted columns, second story, center.”

She. Could be Elizabeth.

“There’s not much time,” Mickey said. “Want me to handle this one?”

“What?” Maliha said.

“You didn’t think I left that beautiful rifle on the plane, did you? I went back for it.”

Shit. Whose side is he on?

“Uh, no. If it’s Elizabeth in the library, a bullet will just make her mad. I’ll go check it out.”

And to do that, I’ll be in Mickey’s gun sight. I don’t even know he’s really where he says he is.

“Okay. Be careful.”

Maliha decided that her safest route would be to stay out of the interior of Civic Square and walk on the boundary streets. Time was pressing, so she found a spot out of sight of most and started running at Ageless speed. She hated vanishing in front of observers’ eyes, especially observers packing cameras.

Maliha ran up Wakefield Street until it joined Victoria, and kept going until she reached the Central Library, which was closed for the day. It wasn’t hard to find a side entrance, but there was an alarm system. As soon as she opened the door, there would be an audible alarm plus an alert at a police station. She checked some windows but it was likely the alarm system would detect the sound of breaking glass. That was the preferred method now, instead of having silver wires around the perimeter of each window.

Is this a wild goose chase to keep me away from Millhouse while Mickey finishes him off? No time to think . . .

She made her decision. Opening the gear bag, she picked out a piece of equipment she’d thought she probably wouldn’t need, but had tossed it in anyway. It was a retractable grappling hook fired from a compressed air gun.

On the roof I’ll be visible to the helicopters and they won’t hesitate to fire. I’d better be moving fast up there.

Maliha shot the grappling hook onto the roof and tested to make sure the rope would hold her weight. She shinnied up the rope and reached to pull up onto the roof of the building.

Elizabeth peered down at her. She didn’t say anything, just slashed both of Maliha’s forearms with a knife.

Expecting her rope to be cut any second, Maliha ignored the pain and levered herself up onto the roof. Elizabeth was gone. There were no helicopters in her immediate vicinity, but she knew she had only seconds to get out of sight. With blood running down her arms, she gathered the rope and grappling hook and ran to the cover of a ventilation shaft. Lifting the heavy cover, she noticed that her arms had been weakened. She got inside the shaft, let the cover drop over her, and hung for a moment on an interior handle on the cover.

Then she let go.

Falling down the shaft, Maliha saw a side opening coming up. Her timing had to be perfect. As she fell past it, she thrust the grappling hook into the metal lining of the opening and felt the prongs bite. Grabbing the rope, she came to an abrupt stop in her fall and instead swung sideways against the metal of the main shaft.

Ow.

She climbed up the side of the shaft, using her feet and the rope. She reached the side opening where she’d snagged the grappling hook and crawled into it.

Once out of danger, the full impact of her wounds struck her. One of the cuts was nearly down to the bone. If Elizabeth had meant to handicap her, she’d done a good job. Maliha tore off the sleeves of her blouse, wrapped the cloth tightly around her wounds, and convinced herself that she felt better. She had to get moving.

She made her way through the ventilation shaft until she found a grill that allowed her entry into a room. After checking that no one was in the room, she kicked the grill with both feet and went through the open rectangle.

It took her a moment to get her bearings. She was on the first floor. She took the stairs, hoping she wouldn’t run into any patrolling guards and for once, her luck held. The sniper was in a room that stored archived media. Maliha quietly picked the lock and planned her next moves. She had to assume there were two people in the room. Turning the doorknob, she eased into the room enough to see the situation.

There were two people near the window. One, a woman, was fingering the trigger of a rifle. The other, a man, crouched next to her with a laptop. He’d cut a small hole in the window and inserted a probe to take readings of outdoor conditions. They both had their backs to her and were intent on what they were doing. Millhouse must be on the stage.

Maliha considered the tranquilizer gun, but its results might not be instantaneous and could cause muscle spasms. The woman’s finger was closing on the trigger. Maliha reached into a vest pocket, took out two throwing stars and sent them whirling through the air at an angle toward the man and woman with a twist of her wrist. The stars separated in midair and hit their targets: the backs of two skulls. Maliha burst into the room, reaching the duo in just a few steps. Taking the woman first, Maliha snapped her neck, then turned her attention to the man. He was on the floor and still alive.

“Don’t . . . don’t . . .” he said.

She saw that the throwing star was not deeply embedded. He might have a chance of survival. Something in her rebelled against killing a man pleading for his life, even if he did work for Elizabeth. He might have been coerced. She shot him with a tranquilizer dart.

He’ll either make it until he’s discovered here or die under sedation. Best I can do right now, since I’m not going to call for an ambulance. Elizabeth’s out there. She’s here to make sure I do the job, and since I’ve made it clear I’m not going to, she’ll have to kill the president and find some way to blame it on me.

Outside, Maliha retrieved her gear bag. There was no pretense now. She discarded her duty belt and vest and strapped her sword on her back. Two gleaming sai were tucked in her remaining belt, the one that served as a sheath for the whip sword. The assault rifle was reluctantly left behind—too much opportunity for collateral damage where so many people were gathered. In the square, she felt vulnerable with Mickey able to spot her. She switched to Ageless speed to conceal her formidable-looking presence from security and from Mickey, in case he wasn’t trustworthy. Dodging through the crowds, she scanned with her aura vision, looking for signs of Elizabeth.

There she is!

Elizabeth was in the clear space between the president and the barriers holding people back from getting too close. Maliha headed for her without daring to think about it. She already knew that her likelihood of stopping Elizabeth was small, especially given her weakened arms. And Maliha knew her chance of surviving a full-on confrontation with Ageless, cruel Elizabeth was even smaller. But if Maliha stopped to think about all those things, she wouldn’t take action.

She leaped the barrier and joined Elizabeth in the open space. An invisible battle began at Ageless speed. Maliha, already weakened from the deep knife gashes, struggled to keep up, but Elizabeth wouldn’t let her rest. Elizabeth fought two handed, a sword in one hand and a knife in the other, meaning that Maliha’s defense had to be perfectly timed with her sword and a sai, or one of Elizabeth’s two blades would break through it.

While their bodies were invisible to the crowd as long as they kept up Ageless speed, the clanging of their swords was audible. Maliha knew people would be running away in panic from the unexplained sounds of swordplay, and the president would be surrounded and taken away by the Secret Service. Elizabeth was so involved with Maliha in her face that the president was safe—at least for now.

Running out of time and life, Maliha remembered what Master Liu had told her. She began to taunt Elizabeth about her appearance. Bathing in the blood of young girls hadn’t really kept her young and beautiful. It never did work, but Elizabeth’s demon fostered that lie and kept her looking young.

Pulling back, trying to get a little relief from the hammering blows, Maliha said, “You know Tirid will punish you when you fail this assignment. You’ll look like an old hag.”

“I won’t fail. When I’m finished with you, you’ll look like puzzle pieces.”

In spite of her words, Elizabeth faltered just a little at the thought of her demon’s punishment. Maliha reached across her own body with her sword and sliced Elizabeth’s face from her earlobe to her jaw.

“Oh!” Elizabeth said. It was a serious wound, an open flap of flesh baring the bones of her jaw on the left side. Elizabeth desperately wanted to hold it back in place so that it would heal quickly and return her to her beautiful state. To do so, she could fight with only one hand. In her rage and frustration, Elizabeth threw herself at Maliha with all the force an Ageless could muster, and pinned her to the ground. People still nearby were horrified at the sight of the two women suddenly visible in their midst, bleeding and slashing at each other.

This time it was Maliha who was desperate. Master Liu had told her not to let Elizabeth get her on the ground for infighting—that Maliha wouldn’t survive it. Maliha felt the hot penetration of a knife in her side and her whole right side lit up with pain. Her right arm—her sword arm—and leg collapsed briefly, leaving Elizabeth with a solid opening for a fatal blow. Maliha did the only thing she could do. She dropped the sai she held in her left hand, grabbed the flap of skin from Elizabeth’s face, and pulled as hard as she could.

Elizabeth screamed in pain and rolled off Maliha, leaving Maliha clutching a hunk of bloody flesh. Maliha rose to her knees, getting as much use from her numb right leg as she could. Clasping her belly in sudden agony, Maliha felt the acid trails of small footprints moving across her skin. She was being rewarded by Anu for taking out the snipers and saving the lives of their future victims.

Shit, not now!

Elizabeth, far quicker to recover, was on her feet and heading toward Maliha fast, with her sword ready. Suddenly Elizabeth was jolted forward once, and then again.

Shot from the back. Mickey!

Maliha struggled to her feet, pain screaming from her midsection as the pans of the scale began to shift and seek a new balance. She swung her sword one handed as Elizabeth fell toward her. Elizabeth’s head and body crashed separately to the tiles of the square. Her eyes wide open in surprise, Elizabeth’s head had a few moments to absorb what had happened to her before her brain shut down.

By that time, Maliha was gone, using the last of her energy and her greatest tolerance of pain for an invisible sprint from Civic Square.