The Light mages were hesitating. They obviously all knew who Richard was. Jarnaff recovered first. “Bullshit.”
“No,” the air mage said. “Jarnaff, it’s him.”
“Shut up,” Jarnaff said under his breath, then addressed Richard. “All right, fine. You’re Drakh. That supposed to impress us?”
“That is entirely up to you,” Richard said. “However, Verus and Miss Walker are, for the moment at least, under my protection. I must ask that you not take any hostile action against them.”
“Yeah, you’re not really in a position to be asking anything,” Jarnaff said. The Light mage seemed to be regaining his confidence. “You were with the raiders. That means you’re in violation of the Concord.”
“Really?” Richard said. “So you’d be happy with this whole incident being reported in full to the Council?” Richard shook his head. “I really don’t see any need for them to be informed of every trivial detail. Nor is it your business to clear up every straggler. You swept the facility, fought your way through to this room, and secured it. I imagine Sal Sarque will be quite pleased.”
“Know what’d make him a lot more pleased?” Jarnaff said. “If I bring in the ringleader.”
I felt the mood in the room shift. All of the guns were pointed at Richard now, though I couldn’t help but notice that not all of the Crusaders looked happy about it. Lightbringer’s face was set, but the air mage behind him looked nervous and Zilean had edged away. All of a sudden I had the feeling that if it weren’t for Jarnaff, the Crusaders would be backing down.
Even better, from my point of view, was that Anne and I seemed to have been forgotten. One of the gunmen had closed to within ten feet of me before Richard had made his appearance, and now he was caught between us, trying to watch us both at the same time. I measured distances, calculating how long it would take him to bring that gun up.
Richard faced the Light mages, his stance relaxed. If the number of men facing him bothered him, he didn’t show it. “I would advise against it.”
“Unless you’ve got a whole lot more Dark mages up your sleeve, I don’t really see what you’re going to do.”
“Councilman Jarnaff,” Richard said. “Let me make myself quite clear. I will be departing this facility with Mage Verus and Miss Walker. Your choice is whether you will be alive or dead at the time.”
“Really,” Jarnaff said with a sneer. “You’re going to single-handedly kill every one of us.”
“Not all of you,” Richard said calmly. “Somewhere between seven and ten of you. I expect Verus will account for the remainder.”
Several of the Crusaders turned to look at me and I inwardly cursed. They weren’t going to forget about me now.
Jarnaff hesitated. Just for a second, I saw the futures shift and I knew that Jarnaff wasn’t as confident as he was trying to sound. He was genuinely considering backing off on this one. But then he glanced very quickly behind him to the other mages and the other paths winked out. “Lightbringer, Maraxus,” he said. “Arrest him.”
Richard spoke again, this time addressing the two mages behind Jarnaff. “Last chance.”
The fire mage—Maraxus—hesitated, but Lightbringer didn’t. He started walking forward, his dark face level and set, hammer in one hand, shield in the other. A barrier of solid force shimmered around him, and Maraxus fell in slightly behind him, watching Richard carefully.
Everything started happening very fast.
Richard shifted slightly, and Maraxus shouted out, “Hands!” and then Richard was throwing something at Lightbringer. It impacted on the centre of Lightbringer’s shield and with a sputter of sparks both Lightbringer’s shield and force barrier vanished. Lightbringer’s hand flicked up and he made a gesture; nothing happened, and I had just time to see surprise on Lightbringer’s face before Richard shot him through the head.
The room erupted in shouts and gunfire. I was already moving, closing the distance to the nearest gunman. I caught the rifle by the barrel as he tried to bring it to bear, hit him in the face, then landed a kick which put him on the floor. Another of the gunmen saw me and turned. I sprinted for cover, bullets chipping fragments of stone from my heels, the trail of gunfire catching up with me just an instant before I dived behind the partition.
Richard was fighting on the other side of the room and I could sense battle-magic flying back and forth, but I didn’t have time to see who was winning. The man I’d knocked down was struggling to his feet and two more gunmen were moving in. I tried to snap off a shot and a volley of fire made me jerk back into cover. I glanced to the right; Anne was still lying there, unconscious. Can’t let them get too close. One was circling, trying to get a bead. A future flashed up where I could get an uninterrupted shot, and I tensed, ready. Fire magic flashed; there was a scream and I leant out, sighting. The gun was an unfamiliar one, some type of assault rifle, but I knew how to make it work and that was all that mattered. The flanking man was still looking in the direction of the scream when my burst took him through the neck.
Blades of air lashed my position, invisible and razor-sharp, curving around the pillar to strike. I jerked aside from one which would have blinded me, feeling it score a line across my cheek, then fumbled out the gold discs of one of my force walls and threw. They clattered to the floor and I called out the command word just before another cloud of razor darts came curving in, slamming into the force barrier and bouncing off. It wouldn’t stop them but it would slow them down.
Behind. I whirled to see Zilean backing away from the other side of the partition, lightning crackling around his hands. He was maybe twenty feet away from Anne, and as I watched he turned, seeing both of us.
I already had the assault rifle levelled. I fired, aiming for his chest.
A translucent shield of silver-grey formed at Zilean’s fingertips. My burst slammed into it, ricocheted. “Not this time, Verus!” Zilean shouted. There was a wild look in his eyes, but he held the shield flat towards me with one hand, electricity crackling at the other.
I’d already scanned the futures in which I fired again. I started walking towards him, keeping the gun trained.
Zilean flexed his fingers, electricity jumping in blue-white sparks. “Any closer and you die.”
I didn’t stop. “From what?” I said calmly. “If you could blast me through that shield, you’d have done it already. That’s the trouble with lightning magic. Great for hurting people, but it’s not so good on defence, is it?”
Zilean hesitated, and I knew my guess had been right. That shield he was holding was from a focus, and it wouldn’t be easy for him to hold it up while also attacking. And as long as I held the gun trained on him, he wouldn’t dare take his attention off me to blast Anne.
But then Zilean’s eyes flicked over my shoulder and without turning I knew I was surrounded. The two gunmen were working their way around the forcewall. I hadn’t been able to get it all the way across the room, and in only a few seconds they’d reach the edge.
“You know, you hurt me that last time,” Zilean said. He sounded more confident now, and I knew he was trying to keep me talking. “Took them a long time to fix me up.”
“Sounds like your life mages are a lot worse than Anne.”
Behind me, the gunmen cleared the wall. I shifted, placing myself between them and Zilean so that if they fired, they’d risk hitting each other. “Who?” Zilean said. “Oh. Was that her name?”
A bolt of fury spiked through me and my finger trembled as I fought the urge to shoot. Have to think. On the other side of the partition the battle was still raging, but I knew I wouldn’t be getting any help. I looked at the shield with my magesight, recognising the pattern. It was a basic kinetic barrier. But it’s not anchored, is it? Not to anything except his hand . . .