She watched the packing for a long time, something that grew more difficult as dusk fell and stole the remaining light. But by the end of her surveillance, she felt confident in her assessment of the situation. The two guards from her last visit were there, occasionally appearing outside for some task, though they weren’t responsible for the bulk of the packing. That fell on two other men who seemed to be hired laborers. A fifth, older man paced the property and barked orders to everyone. Someone referred to him as Pittsfield, the same name Carl’s sons had given to this salon’s owner. Mae instantly despised him. Aside from these men, the only other person Mae saw was the marked woman from the kitchen whom must indeed be a servant working for the salon, judging from the way she scurried about her tasks. None of the young girls, the actual merchandise, were visible.
Probably locked away in their rooms, Mae thought. Pittsfield and his cronies wouldn’t have them on display with workers around, though something told Mae the girls probably never got outside, even without visitors. They were probably kept concealed at all times, with no sunlight or play, forced to listen to that horrendous religious rhetoric about how they were lesser beings only put on this earth to serve men.
Anger began to kindle in Mae, and she forced it down. She needed a cool, collected head to pull this off.
An hour later, the packers finished, and the moving truck left. Pittsfield and one of the guards went inside while the other remained on the porch. It was almost completely dark now, and Mae was able to move about the perimeter more freely. She wondered what the delay was until the marked girl brought the outside guard a plate. Dinnertime. It made sense, feeding the girls before a trip, and Mae realized it was something she too now wished she had done for herself. No matter. Praetorians might love their meals, but they were trained to go without and withstand harsh conditions.
This was her last opportunity to plan. There was another car on the property, so most likely only some of the men would be accompanying the girls in the van. That didn’t mean all three might not see them off, and Mae needed to start evening her odds. Creeping into a dark thatch of woods near the property’s edge, she grabbed a large limb and struck it against a tree as hard as she could. The guard, illuminated on the porch, immediately set his plate down and aimed his gun in Mae’s direction. He took a few steps forward and peered around, but the darkness was against him. She could guess his thoughts. The noise had definitely been made by something living . . . but was it human or animal? The guard cast a hesitant glance back and then, to Mae’s relief, strode forward without seeking backup. He moved toward Mae’s hiding spot, and even when he took out a flashlight, the advantage was still hers. She waited until he’d almost walked past her and then sprang on him from behind, clamping a hand on his mouth to muffle his cries as she wrestled him to the ground and choked off his air. When he was still, she eased up and shone his flashlight on him, revealing him to be the same guard she’d struck the other night. Bad luck for him. Ripping off a piece of his shirt, she made a makeshift gag for him and then tied his hands up with his belt. In the event he came to before she was gone, that would slow him down.
You could always kill him. The voice in her head was her own, not the goddess’s, and Mae hesitated. It was true that killing the man would be the ultimate act of incapacitating him. There was no telling what atrocities he’d committed and would continue to do. Shooting him would make too much noise and give her away. Slitting his throat with the knife was an option, but she’d already used it once to kill, and Mae didn’t want to link the blade to death again if she didn’t have to. The Morrigan had been all about death. If Mae was getting involved with another goddess, she wanted this relationship to be as much about life as possible. For now, he would live.
She took his gun, his lighter, his coat, and the real treasure: a set of keys, which she was pleased to learn unlocked the van. A quick check of it showed no extra supplies, save a few jugs of water that suggested they were going farther than just down the street, though perhaps not across the country. A folded up map provided no clues to Pittsfield’s destination, though it did give her a much-needed sense of the roads in the areas. No one had noticed the guard’s absence yet, and she used the time to study their best escape route. Due west would lead her to the RUNA’s border in less than a day and was by far the fastest. That particular border was a river crossing. In fact, the Mississippi River made up a huge portion of the Gemman-Arcadian border. It was nearly impossible to avoid. The river became bigger the farther south it went, and Mae had no idea how she’d get a group of young girls over it. If she went northwest, she might have an easier time crossing where the river narrowed, but her best chance would be going straight north, to a point where the border turned east and was strictly on land. Those points had the greatest clusters of soldiers, on both sides, and meant a longer trip, but if she could get close enough to the Gemman border, their technology would pick up her chip and at least get her countrymen’s attention, if not their aid.
It was the best shot she had at a plan. The rest would have to be faith.
She stuffed the map in her coat pocket and then took the coat from the unconscious man over to the smaller parked car. Mae wasn’t overly familiar with the mechanics of gas-powered cars, but she understood the basic principles and figured out the rest by doing a quick survey of the vehicle. No one else had come to check on the missing guard, and she used her opportunity to twist and tear the stolen coat into a makeshift fuse leading into the gas tank. Satisfied with her work, Mae used the lighter to ignite the end of the cloth, and then she ran as fast as she could to the far side of the house’s property. She’d just ducked for cover when the car exploded spectacularly.
It took a few moments, but the response she’d hoped for came. Pittsfield and the other guard came tearing out, both armed. They ran the opposite direction from Mae, staring openmouthed at the fiery wreckage. With their backs to her, Mae was able to run right past them into the house, slipping in without them noticing. The entryway was empty, but the marked girl hovered in the doorway to the kitchen, cringing when she saw Mae.
“I’m not going to hurt you,” Mae said, realizing that probably didn’t seem convincing with her two guns. “Where’s the emergency exit?”
Hannah had explained to her that many Arcadian homes, especially salons, had secret ways in and out similar to the tunnel Mae had used at Carl’s. Arcadian men were covetous of their women and wanted them secured, but they still needed fire exits and other emergency paths out.
Mae’s hope was that a household servant like this girl would know where the house’s hidden exit was, and then Mae could smuggle the upstairs girls out while the men were distracted by the fire. It became immediately obvious that the girl wasn’t going to help, however, when she began screaming.
“Shut up!” hissed Mae. The girl kept screaming, dashing any tentative attempt at secrecy. Desperate to regain some semblance of control, Mae leapt out at the girl and dealt her a blow to the head that rendered her unconscious. That brought a merciful return to silence, but Mae didn’t know if it was a little too late. That, and it had also silenced a potential source of information unless one of the girls knew about the house’s secret escape.
As it turned out, danger came not from outside, but within. Mae had barely turned toward the stairs leading up when two unknown men came barreling down. Her implant, already on alert, surged to action, flooding her with adrenaline that made her act quickly and instinctively. She lashed out as the first assailant came at her, blocking his attack and flipping him over so that he landed hard on his back. At the same instant, she saw his partner draw a gun on her, and with no other means to dodge or attack the man directly, Mae deferred to her faster reflexes and shot him before he could shoot her. The man she’d knocked to the ground began to scramble toward her, and she shot him too.