“I have to step out for a minute,” she told Cecile. “You’re in charge. You and . . . who’s the closest to a leader this group has?”
Cecile nodded toward one of the older girls in the back, who looked a bit startled at the attention. She’d regarded Mae warily back at the house, but Mae had long since discovered the pressure of responsibility could end up swaying someone to your side.
“You’re in charge too,” Mae told her. “Both of you need to keep everyone calm until I get back. Do not leave the van. There are dangerous things out there, and I won’t be around to protect you.”
It was a bit of an exaggeration, but Mae couldn’t risk her prizes escaping or being detected. And if the Grand Disciple had lackeys in the area, it might not be an exaggeration after all. The girls looked properly cowed and had probably never been left on their own before. If the goddess did intend for Mae to accomplish something here at the lake, then hopefully that goddess would keep the girls together until said task was done.
Mae traded coats with one of the girls, wanting something more her size that would allow better movement than the bulky men’s coat she’d worn earlier. Rather than wear the equally cumbersome hat, Mae also accepted a couple of collected scarves that she managed to wrap around her face and head. She wasn’t sure what kind of surveillance equipment she’d run into and didn’t want to risk any chance of her features being recorded. A glance at her reflection in one of the van’s mirrors showed she’d ended up looking like some ancient bank robber, but at least she didn’t look like herself.
A mile down the road soon brought her to what seemed like a pretty good possibility for the Grand Disciple’s residence. The lodge was built into the side of a hill that afforded what was probably a stunning view of the lake. A fence enclosed a wide perimeter of gardens and ornamental trees around the house, and Mae could vaguely make out control panels that indicated the fence was probably another electrified one. Lights shone strategically on the grounds and in the house, but they were faint and seemed to be the type that were regularly left on when a house was vacant. She saw no signs of any other occupation, which made sense if the Grand Disciple was busy entertaining Justin.
Feeling confident, Mae scouted out a tree that would allow her to jump the fence, just as she’d done at Carl’s. But once she was actually up in the tree, a look down showed her that there might be more danger than just the fence itself. Tiny, nearly obscured pinpricks of light on the fence’s interior side indicated some secondary defense system. Mae jumped back down and approached one of the control panels on a fence post. Its display showed readings for more than just electric current in the fence: there was also a motion sensing field being projected from the fence onto the grounds. If she jumped over, she’d promptly set off that alarm and give herself away.
The panel’s display had a keypad ready to accept a security code, but Mae couldn’t make any attempt at guessing that. She needed a more primitive solution. After a few moments of studying the wires and cords coming out of the control panel, she did a quick walk around the property and soon had a sense for how the fence’s power was generated. It fed out of a large cord, which wound up a power pole into a control box, which was then connected to more wires feeding out to large power lines running along the road.
Exposed power lines were rare but not unheard of in the RUNA, especially in more rural areas. Mae had seen a few in the outskirts of the Nordic land grant—and had also seen how susceptible they were to storms. Operating on the idea that Arcadian technology was faultier than her homeland’s, she scoured the wooded area around the fence until she found the biggest fallen limb that she could reasonably carry up the pole with her. It made for a cumbersome journey, but the pole was designed for worker access and had hand and footholds that made the task much easier than climbing the tree earlier. Wrapping her legs around the top of the pole, Mae swung the limb down on the wire leading to the fence—only to have the wire stay firmly connected.
So much for faulty Arcadian technology. Mae had seen power lines at home brought down by smaller limbs and had assumed this would be simple. She supposed anyone building and powering a residence out in the woods wouldn’t have done so without reinforcing their power lines. Sizing up another swing, Mae struck the power line again and managed to put more of her weight into it. Doing so cost her her balance and secure hold on the pole’s top, however. She managed to scramble at the last moment and save herself from plummeting to the ground, but her strike with the limb turned out more unwieldy than she’d intended. She not only hit the line running to the fence but also the one feeding into the house. Both fell, swinging down in a shower of sparks.
Mae clung to the pole and held her breath. Two things were very likely to happen. One was that a power outage would trigger some kind of backup alarm system, sending security forces out this way. She’d have no way of knowing that until they actually showed, however. The other possibility was that losing main power would trigger a backup generator, meaning her acrobatics had been for nothing. But as the lights in the house and on the grounds went out and continued to stay that way, Mae realized she might have gotten lucky on that, at least. In fact, as she climbed down, she wondered if she’d gotten lucky inadvertently knocking out the house’s main power by accident. After all, the house probably had a security system she would have had to deal with as well. Now there were no obstacles preventing her from going inside, so long as she could beat any backup coming.
Wasting no time, she ran up to the house’s main door. A manual lock kept it closed, power or no power, but no active security system meant she could freely break a nearby window without consequences. There’d be tangible signs of a break-in, yes, but so long as she was gone in a timely manner, it wouldn’t be connected to her—or hopefully the person who’d raided the salon. An ornamental garden urn proved a useful tool for smashing a large enough opening in the window, but once she was inside the house, Mae discovered her luck might be out.
“What was that?” she barely heard a voice say. It was followed by the sound of running feet.
So. Apparently the house was occupied after all, not by its main resident, but by security guards skulking in the dark. She’d seen no obvious movement in her initial observations and had been foolish to assume the Grand Disciple wouldn’t leave a manual security system in place. Mae dove behind a large couch, using the shadows and darkness to her advantage as three men with flashlights came barreling into the room. They immediately ran toward the broken window, studying it with their backs to her. One of them tucked his flashlight under his arm and used his free hand to retrieve an old-fashioned radio communication device. Mae didn’t know if he had on-site or off-site backup in mind, but she couldn’t risk either. She sprang out from the couch, again using her gun as a blunt weapon, just as she had at the salon. Shooting would’ve been more efficient, but she didn’t want to risk Arcadian forensics tracking the gun back to the salon. Tonight’s altercations needed to seem unrelated.
She effectively took out the guy with the radio in one blow, aided by the element of surprise. His comrades took a little more finessing, but they too were caught unprepared and limited with hands full of guns and flashlights. Their eyes weren’t attuned to the darkness like Mae’s were, and she was too fast for them to initially get a good a fix on, though one managed a few futile shots. Within a minute, she had both of them knocked unconscious on the ground.