I noticed a small red light flashing on Circe’s laptop. “What’s that?” I asked.
“The Goddess!” she said, toggling over to a Twitter screen. “I have it programmed to signal me if there’s a new Goddess post and—oh my God!”
“What?” demanded Church.
“The Goddess … she posted something … .”
Circe hit a button to send the message to the main screen. We sat there, shocked to silence. The message read:
The Ten Plagues have been visited on the wicked.
Witness the fall of the House of Bones.
And then the kicker.
It is complete.
“Dios mio,” whispered Rudy.
“Yeah. The Seven Kings beat us,” I said. “We lost.”
Part Five
Grief’s Best Music
The miserable have no other medicine
But only hope.
—WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE, MEASURE FOR MEASURE
Chapter Sixty-six
The Hangar
Floyd Bennett Field, Brooklyn
December 19, 11:59 P.M. EST
We wrestled and wrangled it and talked it to death, but nothing we said could change the fact that the Seven Kings had set out to murder the firstborn of the Inner Circle and they had accomplished exactly that.
They’d won. Was it a battle? Or had we just lost the war?
We were all so tired, so heartsick and angry, that we were losing perspective. And the great shadowy mass that was the Seven Kings was still moving through our lives. I looked into my own heart and wondered for the hundredth time if this was what I was and who I was: a foot soldier in a war without beginning or end.
Our meeting broke up and we shambled out. Burning with impotent anger, defeated, unable to look at one another.
Circe helped Rudy into the wheelchair and this time he didn’t complain. He looked small and used up, and as he sat there he hung his head. Pain had aged him and the loss of so many innocent lives seemed to have sapped away his life force. I walked with him and Circe out into the hall.
“I … can’t believe it,” Circe said in a voice that sounded more like that of a scared little girl than that of a doctor and an expert in global terrorism.
Rudy said nothing. He simply shook his head and refused to look up.
“This isn’t over,” I said. “We still have some puzzle pieces that don’t fit.”
She gave a single harsh laugh. “What’s the point?”
“Look, Doc, we were starting to make headway when this thing blind-sided us. Let’s all get some sleep,” I suggested. “Maybe in the morning we can make some kind of plan.”
“A plan to do what?” demanded Circe. “We’ve already lost.”
I gave her a hard look. “No, we damn well haven’t. The Kings are still out there. Just because they won tonight doesn’t mean that they’ll go away. We need to keep at this. We need to find a way to hit them back.”
She stared at me for a moment, then nodded. “If we go after them,” she said slowly, “if we can hurt them, then—”
“Maybe we can stop them from winning the next war.”
Rudy just turned his head away and said nothing. Circe sighed and pushed his wheelchair down the hall. I stood and watched them go.
“Captain?”
I turned to see Church standing a yard away. I hadn’t heard him approach.
“Tell me, Captain, do you think that this is what Toys meant when he said that we had to stop Gault?”
“No.”
“Nor do I.”
“I suppose nothing is what it seems with the Seven Kings. Get some sleep.” And as if to echo my own thoughts, he added: “The war isn’t over.”
With that he walked away.
Chapter Sixty-seven
The Hangar
Floyd Bennett Field, Brooklyn
December 20, 1:06 A.M. EST
Ghost was lying amid a heap of gnawed bones, too stuffed to wag. I stepped over him and threw myself onto my bed with every intention of sleeping until sometime in midsummer.
I didn’t get a minute of sleep. Not a second.
I lay there for hours. I could feel each minute; I could hear each dry second crack off and fall away.
As soon as I closed my eyes I could hear Toys’ voice speaking to me.
You can’t trust anyone. Or anything. Nothing is what it seems. It never is with the Kings.
When I’d asked about Santoro, Toys had said, That psycho prick will be in the thick of it. He wouldn’t miss an opportunity to see that much pain.
And then it hit me.
Nothing is what it seems. It never is with the Kings.
My eyes popped open.
“Holy shit!” I said. I think I yelled it. Ghost woke up and barked in alarm.
Two minutes later I was banging on Church’s door.
He opened the door almost at once. He did not look one bit surprised that I was there.
“I was wondering how long it would take you to figure it out,” he said.
Chapter Sixty-eight
The Hangar
Floyd Bennett Field, Brooklyn
December 20, 1:19 A.M. EST
This time the meeting was held in Church’s office. Rudy, Circe, Aunt Sallie, and me.
Church sat behind his desk in a crisp white shirt with the sleeves rolled up, his tie loosened at the throat. I think this was maybe the second time I’d ever seen him without a suit coat. It did absolutely nothing to make him look less official and imposing.
“Why are we still flogging this thing?” growled Rudy. He looked terrible. His hair was uncombed and he wore pajamas that were too big for him. Circe, in sweats, was only marginally more composed.
“It’s the coercion thing,” I said. “That’s been the problem all along. If the firstborn thing hadn’t happened, we might have gotten to it during the meeting. The clue to this thing is there.”
“I sure as hell don’t see it,” Aunt Sallie said irritably. She wore a bathrobe that had little ducks on it. I knew it was more than my life was worth to comment on it.
“Wait,” Rudy said slowly. “Maybe I do.” He rubbed his eyes and accepted a cup of coffee from Church. “There are only a few psychological subgroups that are acutely susceptible to suggestion. And an even smaller sub-subgroup who are otherwise healthy and functional. Call it one or two per fifty thousand.”
Circe was catching on fast. “No … . To do the kind of thing we’ve seen, it’s even more rare. I’d say it’s one in two or three hundred thousand.”
“Fair enough,” Rudy said. “So, measure that against the number of people in the professions that relate to these circumstances. Law enforcement, security, viral research. A few others we haven’t identified. That number becomes impossible.”
“Right,” I said. “It’s only possible if we go on the premise that this is not random chance.”
“Hold on, dammit,” growled Aunt Sallie. “Do you mean that they were deliberately sought or deliberately placed?”
“Either,” Rudy said. “Both.”