Brigid, jammed up beside him hip and thigh, gingerly touched the contusion discoloring the right side of his head. The brine made it feel raw and sticky. "You sure you're okay?" she asked lowly.

  "Just the prerequisite post-ambush concussion," he answered with a wry smile. "Really, I'm fine."

  She returned the smile with a weary one of her own and glanced away. Kane guessed she recalled the serious head injury she had suffered less than a year before. The only visible sign of the wound that had laid her scalp open to the bone and put her in a coma for several days was a faintly red, horizontal line on her right temple that disappeared into the roots of her hair. Her recovery time had been little short of uncanny. Kane was always impressed by the woman's steel-spring resiliency.

  The pilot restarted the engine with a yank of the cord and turned the boat back toward the marina. He gunned the engine, the dinghy bouncing roughly on the chop, until Breeze ordered him to ease off on the rpm.

  Instead of tying up at the pier or within one of the boathouses, the dinghy rounded the berths and navigated among the derelicts. Many of the old craft were little more than algae- and barnacle-encrusted hulks. The masts of sailboats rose from the sea like a forest of defoliated trees. Other vessels appeared relatively intact and some of the larger wrecks were pressed closely together. Gangplanks made of lashed timbers joined them to one another.

  The dinghy chugged under the bow of a half- sunken, rust-pimpled old steamer and pulled alongside an ancient barge. It was secured to another barge by a bridge made of welded lengths of anchor chain. The broad deck of the barge was piled high with all manner of flotsam and jetsam—sticks, seaweed, logs, old fuel barrels and just about every conceivable kind of trash.

  Kane gazed speculatively at the collection of debris and his pointman's sense, his sixth sense, rang an alarm. The skin between his shoulder blades seemed to tighten, and the short hairs at the back of his neck tingled. What he called his pointman's sense was really a combined manifestation of the five he had, trained to the epitome of keenness. The pattern of garbage seemed a bit too mannered, not as haphazard as on the first, casual glance.

  Looking up into the azure sky, he imagined what the graveyard of ships and the barge might look like to the pilot of a Deathbird. He decided it would look pretty much the same from the air as it did from the boat— uninhabited and uninhabitable.

  The hull of the dinghy bumped against the side of the barge. Moving swiftly, without having to be ordered, Belevedere tied the boat to a stanchion and the pilot cut the engine. Breeze Castigleone gestured expansively to the barge. "Mi casa es su casa."

  Kane didn't ask him what he meant by the cryptic comment, but Brigid inquired skeptically, "You expect us to believe you live here?"

  Castigleone shrugged. "It's my ocean-side resort, you might say."

  Brigid, Grant and Kane clambered aboard the barge. They made no move to help Castigleone or his crew disembark, but they didn't ask for a hand up, either.

  Grant surveyed the detritus on the barge's deck with his eyebrows drawn together at the bridge of his nose. He inquired, "The merchandise?"

  Castigleone marched across the deck toward an upended oil drum and a tall framework of rusty angle iron. He barked, "Belevedere! Come here, boy!"

  Belevedere hustled swiftly forward, falling into step behind the mustached man Tashlyn and the dinghy's pilot lingered near the three outlanders, but Kane figured their proximity didn't derive from enjoyment of their company.

  Belevedere heaved away the fuel barrel, revealing a drum-and-winch assembly bolted to the deck. A heavy hemp hawser was wound around the drum. At the same time, Castigleone kicked aside a scattering of rotted canvas and lifted a long but slim I-beam from the deck. He fitted it in the framework as a crossbar. A block and tackle dangled from its center.

  Brigid, Grant and Kane watched with keen interest as Castigleone took the end of the rope, which was tipped by a metal hook, and pulled out a dozen or so feet of slack. He threaded it through the pulley system and kneeled over a staple-shaped handle protruding from the deck.

  Belevedere picked up a cold-rolled iron crank handle and inserted the flanged end into the notches at the side of a drum. At a nod from Castigleone, he began to vigorously turn it. The rope went taut and the crossbar sagged, creaking a little under a great weight.

  Mystified, Grant murmured, "What the hell is this now?"

  A circular steel enclosure slowly rose from below the barge deck. As Belevedere hoisted it out foot by foot, they saw that it resembled a steel cylinder about seven feet long and four feet in diameter.

  Castigleone gestured, waving them over. As the three outlanders joined him, Breeze said jauntily, "You'll be among the very few who ever actually peeked into my vault of wonder."

  "'Vault of wonder'?" repeated Grant caustically. "What's so wonderful about blasters and grens?"

  Castigleone smiled thinly. "I suppose that depends on your definition of magic."

  As the tube slowly cleared the metal collared opening in the deck, Brigid eyed it closely, noting an almost invisible seam running from top to bottom and a series of tiny hinges. She also saw that its surface was not damp or streaked with rust, so the vault's hiding place, although below the waterline, was not actually in the water.

  Sweat poured down Belevedere's face as he labored, cutting runnels through the dried blood on his chin. Kane's pointman's sense refused to relax. He cast a casual over-the-shoulder glance toward Tashlyn Her body language, her posture, telegraphed tension. She absently tapped the truncheon against the side of her leg.

  It occurred to him that he hadn't tested the action of his Sin Eater's power holster since Tashlyn had returned it to him She could have disabled the actuator mechanism while he'd lain unconscious.

  He cut his eyes over to Grant. His Sin Eater was strapped securely to his right forearm, but he held the Barrett inside its zipped-up case angled over his shoulder. If circumstances changed quickly, as they often did in the Outlands, then Grant would expend precious seconds freeing up his gun hand.

  The best bet if matters took an ugly turn would be Brigid Baptiste's Copperhead. Less than two feet long, with a 700-round-per-minute rate of fire, the magazine held fifteen 4.85 mm steel jacketed rounds. The grip and trigger unit were placed in front of the breech in the "bull-pup" design, allowing for one-handed use. An optical image intensifier scope and laser auto-targeter was fitted on the top of the frame. Its low recoil allowed the Copperhead to be fired in a long, devastating, full-auto burst. All of the Cerberus exiles were required to become reasonably proficient with firearms, and the lightweight "point and shoot" sub- guns were the easiest for the firearm-challenged to handle.

  With a grunt of exertion, Belevedere hoisted the steel cylinder a foot or so clear of the deck's surface and held it in position, his biceps bulging as if they might burst. The boatman came forward and wrestled the enclosure away from the opening, and Belevedere gave the crank a half-reverse turn, bringing it to rest gently on its flat bottom.

  Breeze Castigleone ran his hands over the surface. "Be prepared to have your minds staggered and your eyes dazzled."

  "We better have something after all the trouble we went to," Grant growled.

  Castigleone threw him a fleeting smile as he touched the cylinder. The curved side facing them swung outward on its hinges. Breeze stepped back, pulling it with him. "Abracadabra—"

  Two Magistrates in full body armor stepped out of the cylinder, bores of their Sin Eaters trained directly on Brigid, Grant and Kane.

  "Hey, presto," Castigleone murmured.

  Chapter 3

  Everybody looked at each other as if in a tableau. Kane and Grant were intimately familiar with the Magistrate polycarbonate body armor, since they had worn the molded suits themselves for many years.

  Jet-black, only the small disk-shaped badge of office attached to the rounded left pectoral showed any color. The emblem, depicting a stylized crimson, balanced scale of justice superimposed over a nine-spoked wheel, symbolized the Magistrate oath to keep the wheels of justice turning in the nine baronies.

  The helmet was also of molded black polycarbonate that conformed to the shape of a man's head and exposed only a portion of mouth and chin. The red- tinted visor was slightly concave. The Magistrate armor had been designed for more than strictly functional, practical reasons. The two helmeted men were symbols of awe, of fear. They looked strong, fierce, implacable and not altogether human.

  Kane and Grant weren't intimidated since they had manipulated the psychology of anonymity many times in their years as hard-contact Magistrates. However, facing the hollow bores of two Sin Eaters, they respected how swiftly the weapons could spit a torrent of 9 mm hollowpoints.

  As surreptitiously as he could manage, Kane flexed the tendons of his right wrist. The big-bored automatic handblaster had no trigger guards or safety, and the pistol fired immediately upon the touch of his crooked index finger. The sensitive actuator ignored all movements except the one that indicated the weapon should be drawn.

  Nothing happened, as Kane had halfway expected. Either the tiny electric motor or the actuator had been disabled.

  "Nobody move," announced the Magistrate on their right. His voice held no emotion, sounding like the hollow echo of distant kettle drum. "Don't even breathe deep. That includes you and your crew, Castigleone."

  Kane, Brigid and Grant obeyed the order, all of them knowing that even if they squeezed off the first shots, the body armor would protect the Magistrates from serious injury.

  "Back up," the Mag said, gesturing with his Sin Eater. "Keep backing up until I tell you to stop."

  The three did as they were told, and the Magistrates stepped out of the enclosure. The armored man who gave the orders exuded an air of detached professionalism, not resorting to bombastic threats or gloating speeches. He was a little over medium size with the thick, square body of a man who intimately knew the ways of close and bloody combat.

  Kane and Grant guessed he was probably a veteran officer of some authority. As a general rule, only inexperienced rank-and-file Mags acted like sadistic thugs, little better than the "sec man" pejorative applied to them

  "Stop now," the Magistrate said. "Castigleone, take Grant's rifle and Baptiste's Copperhead."

  Kane experienced a brief surge of surprise, but he realized in retrospect it would have been more surprising if the man hadn't recognized them. He and his two friends had topped the baronies' Most Wanted lists for some time now, particularly after the assassination of Baron Ragnar nearly two years before. Tales of the renegades' exploits circulated through the Outlands, giving rise not only to rebellious thoughts but also to outright acts of resistance. To kill a baron was tantamount to killing a god and if a god could be assassinated by mortal hands, then the tyranny of the nine barons could no longer be maintained.

  Breeze Castigleone opened his mouth as if to object to the Mag's order, but turned to Tashlyn. "Tasha, get their weapons and—"

  "No," snapped the Magistrate, his voice rising a trifle. "I told you to do it, Pit boss."

  Castigleone swallowed hard, his face paling by several shades under the tan. Reluctantly he stepped forward and took hold of the leather-encased Barrett leaning against Grant's right shoulder. Studiously avoiding eye contact. Breeze took the weapon, then moved over to Brigid. She relinquished her subgun without a murmur of protest or the flicker of an eyelash.

  Castigleone slid away, gusting out a sigh of relief that his trim body was no longer in front of two Sin Eaters. He handed the rifle to Tashlyn but kept the Copperhead.

  "Grant, Kane," the Magistrate continued, "I want you to remove your side arms. Just drop them."

  Kane and Grant hesitated and the bore of the Mag's pistol shifted to Brigid. "Must I make an example of her?" His tone held an undercurrent of cold conviction. Both men instantly realized he wasn't running a bluff.

  Doing as they were told, they unbuckled the straps and fastened the Velcro tabs on the power holsters. They let them thump to the deck at their feet.

  "Very good, gentlemen," the Magistrate said. Perspiration trickled down his cheeks from beneath his visor. Both Grant and Kane knew from uncomfortable experience how hot the armor and its Kevlar under- sheathing could become in high temperatures.

  "You have the advantage of us," Kane commented mildly.

  The man's mouth quirked in a half smile. "Which is quite the feat, from what I hear. My name is Hauk. This is Loxley." With one hand, the Mag undid the under jaw locking guards of his helmet and tugged it off his head. Loxley kept his on, as if he didn't want to show his face regardless of how much he sweated.

  Hauk's face was that of a man in the prime of his life—a hard life. His features were regular and unexceptional. If not for the deep cicatrix scar creasing his left cheek from the corner of his gray eye to his chin, he wouldn't have drawn any attention in a crowded room. His blond hair was pulled back and knotted at the nape of his neck.

  "Does my name mean anything to you?" he asked, his eyes darting from Grant's face to Kane.

  Brigid answered the question, after swiftly reviewing her mental index file, recalling all the data she had studied about the nine baronies. As a former archivist in the Cobaltville Historical Division, Brigid's knowledge on a wide variety of subjects was profound, due in the main to her greatest asset—an eidetic, or "photographic," memory. She could instantly and totally recall in detail everything she had read, seen or experienced, which was both a blessing and a curse.

  "You're the Snakefish Magistrate Division administrator," she intoned. "Or you used to be."

  Hauk nodded in acknowledgment. "Very good."

  Absently, Kane noted that Hauk's hair wasn't quite regulation length. But he also knew that ville division administrators were allowed a certain leeway with the rules as long as they performed their jobs to the baron's satisfaction. Hauk also looked a shade too young to be a division administrator, no more than thirty-five or forty, but then Kane had never gained a truly clear understanding of the criteria by which such transfers were granted.

  Although Magistrates were legally allowed to marry and to produce legitimate offspring only when they held an administrative post, being appointed as an administrator in any of the ville divisions wasn't exactly a promotion, nor was the transfer completely based on age. The quality of service was the most important consideration. Kane could only assume that Hauk had personally involved himself in their apprehension because Baron Snakefish might have been disappointed in the quality of his service as of late.

  Recalling the sinking of the baron's beloved and virtually irreplaceable CG-47 cruiser in the bay of New Edo, as well as the loss of its entire crew of Mags, Kane wasn't surprised by Hack's presence. Although Baron Snakefish had ordered the attack on New Edo, he certainly held the Magistrate Division commander responsible for its success or failure.

  Hauk continued, "You're probably wondering why a Mag Division administrator is out here, participating in the apprehension of three renegades."

  "Actually," replied Grant with a remarkable mildness of tone, "I'm pretty sure we can guess:'

  Hauk arched a challenging eyebrow. "Do tell."

  "Back during the Imperator War, we three caused you and your baron a big loss in men and ordnance. I imagine your ville's armory was pretty well cleaned out after the battle of Area 51 and the siege of Cobaltville."

  Hauk's expression hardened. "The same could be said for a couple of other baronies, too."

  Grant nodded in agreement. "Yeah, but I doubt any other barony suffered the loss of a predark battle cruiser with all hands. After that disaster you were either disciplined by Baron Snakefish or removed from your position. Either way, you need to get back into his good graces and there's no better way than to bring in the three of us in shackles."

  Hauk spoke quietly, biting out every word as if he resented each syllable that left his lips. "You're pretty damn close. You're off a bit on a couple of points, but they're minor. Overall, you've pegged the situation correctly. I almost forgot you and Kane used to be Mags yourselves."

  "We haven't," commented Kane grimly.

  Since both men had spent most of their lives as Mags, forgetting wasn't likely to happen, despite how fervently they sometimes wished they could. At the onset of the Program of Unification nearly a century before, the Magistrate Divisions had been formed as a complex police machine. Kane and Grant had served as cogs in the merciless machine. They had been through the dehumanizing cruelty of Magistrate training, yet the two men had somehow, almost miraculously, managed to retain their humanity.

  For the past two years, they had exercised their humanity by doing their very best to not just dismantle the machine, but to utterly destroy it and scatter the pieces to the four corners of the world.

  Hauk didn't respond to Kane's remark. "I gave the specific order to have you three hunted down. That's the important thing."

  "The old 'if you want something done right' thing?" Grant inquired.

 

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27