Shattered Skies in My Eyes: The Fifth Chronicle of the Wolf Pack

By Thomas Tipton

After their defeat during the siege of Falcons Crest, Falcon and the Wolf Pack, backed by the armies of the North, are ready to push south and avenge their fallen. With the forces of the Forsaken and the Darklords in disarray, the Wolf Pack is ready to seize the opportunity to finally force their enemies from the shores of Mekedah.

Will the Wolf Pack finally achieve the victory they have sought for so long? It will if its battle hardened soldiers have any say in the matter.

• Language: English
• Publisher: AuthorHouse
• Release date: Apr 17, 2015
• ISBN: 9781504906180

Thomas Tipton

Tip was born in 1975 and lives in Texas with his incredible children. He teaches high school art, watches too much kung fu, and dreams in infrared. He is the notorious author of Into the Breach Once More, To Catch a Tiger by the Tail, Archangel, Shadows Wait to Play, Wolves' Blood Rising, Ashes in the Fall, and Shattered Skies in my Eyes.

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© 2015 THOMAS TIPTON. All rights reserved.

No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted by any means without the written permission of the author.

Published by AuthorHouse 04/16/2015

ISBN: 978-1-5049-0616-6 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-5049-0618-0 (e)

Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Thinkstock are models,

and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.

Certain stock imagery © Thinkstock.

Because of the dynamic nature of the Internet, any web addresses or links contained in this book may have changed since publication and may no longer be valid. The views expressed in this work are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the publisher, and the publisher hereby disclaims any responsibility for them.

CONTENTS

Acknowledgments

Author’s Notes

Prologue

The Book of Strobe

The Book of Bulldog

The Book of Strobe

The Book of Bulldog

The Book of Strobe

The Book of Bulldog

The Book of Strobe

The Book of Bulldog

The Book of Strobe

The Book of Lonely

The Book of Bulldog

The Book of Lonely

The Book of Bulldog

The Book of Lonely

The Book of Strobe

The Book of Bulldog

The Book of Lonely

The Book of Strobe

The Book of Bulldog

The Book of Strobe

The Book of Lonely

The Book of Lonely

The Book of Strobe

The Book of Bulldog

DEDICATION

For Cook and Gemmell, who continue to inspire me.

For my students, who I seek to inspire.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

Special thanks to God the Creator and Jesus, my savior. To Pops, my father and hero. To my brother, Tim, who always has my back. To my children, thank you for all the life lessons and for all the laughs.

AUTHOR’S NOTES

This story was taken from the eyewitness account of a warrior known only as Bulldog, and he, like most artists, has taken some creative license with the spelling of certain names. I have left them as I found them in his annals. Let it be known, as well, that several of the races that appear within this text, including the Corilium, Khorinin, and Kintara are spelled the same for both the plural and singular.

PROLOGUE

Blood and sweat poured into his eye. He could not see clearly, but he stumbled on, thrashing through the thick underbrush. Thorny bushes grabbed at the ruin of his face, tearing through the hideous wounds around his ocular cavity and along his jaw line.

He fell and found his legs would no longer respond to his mental commands. He was spent and bleeding profusely. Unable to stand, no longer able to run, he lay still.

Voices drifted to him as he lay panting for breath. He remained motionless even as a dozen armed warriors rushed by on horseback mere feet from his position. There were others trailing the warriors on foot. If he were particularly unlucky, they would trip over him.

He formed a small spell of concealment. It was all he could manage at the moment. One of the horses slowed and stamped its hooves nearby nearly crushing his hand. The animal sensed him despite his spell. Rhaige did not withdraw his hand, though to leave it went against every instinct he possessed.

The riders were Khorinin and they were hunting him. Any movement would have negated his spell, and he could not afford another skirmish. The Darklord simply did not have the strength for another battle.

He and Haight had been holding the Khorinin city called Eagles’ Heights when High King Falcon and his people had descended upon their armies like avenging gods. Rhaige had fought on long after Darklord Haight’s forces had buckled. He had not seen what had become of his fellow Darklord, but he was not concerned. He did not care whether the man had lived or died. For Rhaige it had always been survival of the fittest. If Haight had fallen prey to King Falcon, so be it.

The horsemen spent a few moments searching the tangled undergrowth for signs, and then thundered off in pursuit of the remainder of his soldiers who had also been retreating from the Khorinin. They had been his soldiers, but he felt no loyalty to them. Rhaige would not risk himself to save them.

The Darklord waited for a while. When he could no longer hear voices in the jungle around him, he began untangling himself from the thorny vines. He lacked subtlety in all aspects of his life. It was one of his many flaws. The characteristic carried over into his removal of the thorns. Instead of picking them loose carefully, Rhaige ripped them free, tearing his skin.

Removing one of his gauntlets, he used his hand to wipe the blood from his eye. Then he started walking, limping through the jungle far to the south of Eagles’ Heights. He walked for hours, coming across time and again the corpses of his soldiers. His army was destroyed, broken by the Khorinin.

Absently, he thought of marching north, of taking the fight straight to King Falcon, to face what he believed would be the battle of the age. Every age had one battle that defined it, one battle that fueled legends and inspired saga poets for generations.

Unlike the other Darklords or the Forsaken who thought Falcon nothing more than an upstart whose luck had held, Rhaige knew he was one of the premier powers on Mekedah. He also knew that even if he reached the Khorinin, he doubted he would be in any shape to confront him. Falcon inspired rabid devotion from his followers. Rhaige knew he would have to single-handedly destroy the Wolf Pack before he ever had a chance to call the man out.

Instead, he kept moving south, using earth magic to knit his broken bones and heal the damage to his flesh. By the time he had come to a large pool on the sixth day after his defeat, he was no longer limping. The savage wounds on his face had healed, though he would carry their gruesome scars for the rest of his life. He was not a vain man, though. His looks did not matter to him. Only battle mattered. Only the struggle to dominate concerned the Darklord.

Rhaige knelt by the water’s edge and filled his canteen with cool water fed by a small waterfall some distance away. Careful not to drink too much, the Darklord had to force himself not to chug the liquid. It had been two days since his canteen had run dry. It had been three since he had eaten.

As he sat by the edge of the pond he became acutely aware of someone watching him. He did not see anyone, but he felt their eyes. His senses had been trained by many hard years in a danger filled life.

Come out, he commanded. Show yourselves.

Rhaige watched as a dozen or more heavily muscled men, their bodies painted in greens and browns emerged from the trees. They carried wicked, primitive blades. A smile drew up the corners of Rhaige’s mouth.

You take our water, but offer nothing in exchange, one of the large males said.

Rhaige said nothing of the idiocy of such a statement. Silently, he was glad for the unprovoked violence. His dreams were twisted, his ideas corroded. It was survival of the fittest. For Rhaige it had always been so.

Survival of the fittest, he whispered.

The male heard him and nodded. He had green eyes and a small scar across the bridge of his nose. He was not yet out of his teens.

It is as you say, old man, the male said moving forward with his large blade poised to strike.

Rhaige drew a knife, the only weapon he had kept in his flight from Eagles’ Heights. The Darklord smiled as he moved in to meet the younger man’s charge. Slipping under the swinging blade, Rhaige lunged up, driving his knife into the man’s armpit, puncturing a lung and a major artery. Two more of the men stormed in. They died as easily as the first. The rest of the warriors knelt in submission when Rhaige turned his baleful eyes on them.

Rhaige smiled. He pointed his bloodied knife at the survivors as if telling them they belonged to him now. As one they nodded. He smiled again, and felt like he had come home.

The Blind Elf walked slowly across the small clearing, strolling in between the great stone columns and cross stones that had been used to create Stonehenge. Though old to her own people and ancient to most of the other races on Kronnus, she moved with the grace of a girl in her teens. The smooth staff carved from a sliver of one of the great redwoods that she carried was merely a tool to help keep her from walking into a stream rather than a crutch to help support her.

Her slow walk slowed even further as she listened to the wind and the rustle of leaves. Plunging her staff into the soft earth at her feet, she listened to the soil and heartbeat of the world. She heard what she had already suspected.

It was time to go.

The Blind Elf made her way much more swiftly to encampment at the center of the woods. Five hundred Elves of Light had been stationed here centuries ago to guard Stonehenge. A few of those of the original guard still lived here. Most of the others had rotated back to the Sacred City, the home of the Elves of Light, deep in the heart of the Forest of Screaming Trees.

Those who served in this far outpost were honored among the warriors of the Elves, who wanted little, if anything to do with the outside world. Here, the outpost was surrounded by the outside world, and those stationed here were almost constantly skirmishing with Corilium who wanted to harvest the lumber of the woods.

She approached a group of warriors seated around the dying embers of one of the campfires. Unlike many of the races she had spent time with over the course of her long life, there was not much laughter among the Elves of Light. No bawdy tales were traded. No single warrior was attacked with playful banter. She found them taciturn and without the light that the name of their race would suggest. To be honest, she thought them boring.

All of the warriors rose smoothly as she approached. They bowed as one. Identically clad, and as usual bearing no hint of emotion of any kind, there was nothing to discern one from another. There was no evidence of any sort of personality. She dearly missed personality.

Good morning to you, Lady, Lexi said. He was the captain of the outpost and member of the royal family. Like most nobles, in her experience, he was arrogant. Lexi seemed aware of her feelings toward arrogance and tempered his in her presence. That did not endear the warrior to her, though. She could see his deepest feelings, touch his deepest thoughts. Despite all appearances, Lexi had a deep-seeded hatred for all races he thought inferior to his own. On some level, he even considered the Blind Elf inferior because she was not of his race.

It is time for me to leave this wood, Captain, she said.

Lexi nodded and then bent to set his bowl on the log upon which he had been seated. The other warriors cast one another glances. She had been in the woods, dwelling in the mystic Stonehenge longer than some of them had been alive. For a race as long lived as the Elves of Light, that was indeed quite some time. Her declaration signaled a departure from their endless routine.

I will gather an escort, Milady. We will be with you presently, Lexi said.

No, Captain, she said. I ask only one warrior to accompany me.

You dishonor me, Lady, Lexi said.

I mean no disrespect, Captain, she replied evenly. But given the preconceived ideas you and most of your warriors carry regarding Corilium, I fear where I intend to go might prove more than your honor and pride can bear. No, I would have Vitras accompany me.

But he is the youngest of us all, Lexi replied. Surely you’ll need someone more world wary to lead you.

Isolated as we are here, I doubt any of these are prepared for the world beyond these trees, she said. Vitras is young, but he has a natural sense of wonder that will serve him well for the time he will be among the short-lived Corilium and Khorinin.

Lexi was silent a moment. His eyes had grown hard, but she could feel he had resigned himself to follow her instructions. He stiffened, drawing himself up to his full six and a half feet. He did not even try to deny her words. The Elves of Light had learned long ago of the Blind Elf’s abilities to see to the deepest part of them.

It will be as you say, Lady.

An hour later Vitras had gathered all of the provisions needed for the journey and stood before Lexi and the Blind Elf. He was much taller than she, but shorter than the captain by more than a few inches. His long, lustrous blond hair was held back by a simple skullcap made of soft leather. His eyes were green and the Blind Elf had always imagined there was a measure of mirth in them.

His spirit sang, and the Blind Elf, attuned to such things, felt an abiding humor within the young Elf. It was a trait the warrior had worked hard to hide from his brothers in arms. It was a source of frustration and the Blind Elf sensed his restlessness of spirit. That had been the reason she had chosen Vitras to accompany her.

Have you everything you need, Vitras? Lexi asked.

There was the slightest hint of bitterness in the captain’s voice. The Blind Elf knew that Lexi considered the choice of Vitras over him and a contingent of his best warriors a slap in the face. In time, she thought, he will forgive and forget. By then, the world would have either been saved or destroyed.

The Blind Elf felt a slow melancholy slide over her as she thought of the possibility of the latter. She had seen so many worlds end in her long life. How many, she wondered. She could not remember them all.

She drew herself out of the melancholy. There was no time for it. Vitras would need her every bit as much as she needed him outside of this magical wood. She reached for and touched Vitras on the shoulder. With a nod, Vitras stepped away while the Blind Elf moved forward, and, rising to her tip toes, softly kissed Lexi on his smooth cheek. Then she turned and moved toward Vitras, her staff touching the uneven ground before her.

She and the much taller Elven warrior left the camp and then moved through the woodlands in silence. The woods were not large, but it still took them several hours to navigate to the ancient trees that marked the outer boundaries. It had been years, nearly a decade in fact, since she had crossed the magical threshold of the forest. As she and Vitras did so a feeling both familiar and infinitely more disturbing washed over her.

What was that? Vitras asked.

You felt it? the Blind Elf replied, astonished. She had not realized Vitras had the sense.

Aye, Lady, he replied. Just then, as we exited the trees, something foul, a spirit perhaps, moved through me.

It was not a spirit, Vitras, she said. What you felt is the essence of the land.

It stinks of corruption, Vitras said.

Of course it does, she said. The land is dying.

The trip did not take long. Those she sought were operating nearby. Vitras was a pleasant traveling companion. He was curious and asked questions often. He was also sensitive to the fact that the Blind Elf needed comfortable silence from time to time and would remain quiet despite his curiosity.

The only trouble that the two Elves found was a trio of small bearded men who acted as if they meant to rob them. Their ambush was poorly planned and even more poorly timed. Attacking from tall bushes along the trail, with no more than a long knife between them, they were simply no match for Vitras, an elite fighter by any standards.

The Blind Elf simply listened as the younger Elf thrashed the three men with the butt of his spear. She smiled at his bewildered amusement with the three would-be highway robbers. She could feel the briefest of smiles flicker across his face as the whipped bandits beat a hasty retreat and the two Elves continued on their way. Later she would ask him what he had been thinking, why he had not killed the bandits. His answer was gratifying.

They were simply hungry, he had said. Besides, they were not committed to doing us any harm.

Later still, the travelers would be forced to skirt a thinning point the Corilium were calling a shallow. She knew the shallows to be places where the fabric that separated realities was being eaten away by the violence and unrestrained use of magic throughout the land. Yet that was only part of the problem. The real culprit behind the breakdown of the multiple realities’ boundaries was too awful to ponder and too familiar to forget.

Vitras started moving with care at some point, and the questions about the many races of Mekedah ceased. The Blind Elf sensed his sudden unease and let her keen senses take in her surroundings. It was some time before she felt the subtle differences in the energy around her. She wondered how Vitras had sensed it before she had.

We are being watched, Vitras said.

Steady on, the Blind Elf replied. These are the ones we are seeking.

How do we approach them? They do not show themselves. Instead, they skulk among the shadows like vermin, Vitras said.

They will approach us when they are of a mind to, she replied with a small grin. And I would advise you to keep comments like that to yourself when we are among them.

A half hour later the two came upon two figures seated by a stream. There was a small campfire and the aroma of what the Corilium knew as java and what the Elves called kaf drifted to them. The Blind Elf approached the two men slowly, noting the camps proximity to a grove of trees from which a sniper with a bow could ambush any would-be aggressors.

Vitras must have taken note of it as well. He moved smoothly, putting his body between hers and the two sitting by the fire and the trees. The Blind Elf caught a glimpse of the warrior’s thoughts. She was amused by the ideas flickering across his mindscape. He was not worried about the possibility of those two strangers being hostile, but rather, whether or not the Blind Elf had noted his subtle shift into a protective position, and if so, he wondered if she had been offended by his presumption that she needed protecting.

One of the men was watching them approach. The other seemed to pay them no attention at all. Instead, he concentrated on flipping strips of bacon frying in a pan from one side to the other over the fire.

The face of the one who was watching broke into a grin as he stood. He was short and heavily built with thick arms and legs. His eyes were dark, and the humor that caused him to smile did not touch them.

Come on and have a seat, he said. The Kintara said you’d be here today.

Several hours later, a small group of people filed out of the trees. They were unarmed and flanked by two men who were. They were directed to the campfire and told to sit down. The Blind Elf felt tension and fear radiating from eight of the nine unarmed people. The other vibrated with a sort of giddy anticipation.

The two armed men who had accompanied them spent a few moments speaking quietly with the one who had greeted her and Vitras, and then their host returned to the campfire. He had introduced himself as Thresher at some point. His companion, the quiet one, was called Buzzkill. The two newcomers looked at the pair of Elves and nodded as a way of greeting.

They do not seem all that surprised to see us, Vitras said in his native tongue. The Blind Elf smiled.

Most Corilium were, at the very least, surprised to see Elves. These men showed none of the usual awe and wonder. Vitras seemed hurt by their lack of interest. She grinned again. There was a touch of arrogance in the young Elf, after all.

Perhaps they are used to such as us, the Blind Elf replied.

Hours passed. As twilight darkened the world, the two Elves were offered a fine meal prepared by Buzzkill, but no conversation. The Blind Elf could sense in Vitras a strong desire to ask questions, but he held his tongue.

Around sunset, their patience was rewarded. The Blind Elf rose as another line of Corilium entered the small clearing flanked by a Blue Elf, two Red Elves, and a female Shadow Elf who stood as tall as Vitras. Her eyes were cruel as she took them in.

I believe you were correct when you assumed they were used to seeing such as us, Vitras whispered in his own tongue.

The Blue Elf directed the line of unarmed Corilium to sit with those who had come into the camp earlier. They did so, acting nothing like the prisoners the Blind Elf had first assumed they were. The two Red Elves approached the fire and each ate a ladle full of the stew Buzzkill had created. They acknowledged Vitras with a nod, who had stuck out his hand. Their yellow eyes narrowed as if they suspected some sort of treachery. Vitras withdrew his hand.

Greetings, cousin, the tall elf said. The Blue Elf looked at him a moment longer, then strode past him and into the woods.

The Shadow Elf stepped around the two fair haired Elves, looking Vitras over appraisingly. She ran one long finger along the ridges of one of his shoulder plates. The Blind Elf sensed her emotions warring inside her. She moved gracefully, her long lean body rippling with smooth muscle. Standing before Vitras, she was only a couple of inches shorter than he. The two Elves spent a few moments staring into one another’s eyes, stark opposites of one another. The Shadow Elf had short black hair that contrasted sharply with the long golden locks of Vitras. The Blind Elf saw through her mind that she wore a malevolent grin while Vitras’s face remained a stoic mask. The sky blue of his eyes did nothing to quench the fire in the cinnamon of hers.

The things I could do to you, she said in a voice that was somewhere between lustful and sensual.

Vitras’s stoic mask fell away then. His eyes widened in shock. The Blind Elf had to stifle the grin threatening to betray her.

She could feel that Vitras did not fear the Shadow Elf, though he should have. Instead, he was stunned by her forwardness. The young warrior had never heard a female speak in such a way.

Of course, Vitras also assumed she was speaking of sex. The Blind Elf knew better. There was murder on the Shadow Elf’s mind.

A harsh, guttural bark sounded from the darkness and the predatory look in the Shadow Elf’s eyes was replaced by a slightly fearful glance toward the trees. She quickly took a step away from the pair of fair haired Elves. To hide her moment of fear, the Shadow Elf moved to the stewpot and poured a ladle full into a tin cup. As she sat down, Vitras and the Blind Elf turned toward the voice who had cowed her.

The Blind Elf felt rather than saw him. Power and animal intensity poured from him in palpable waves. She felt her heartbeat quicken and wondered at it. Most of her life had been spent among the most powerful beings in the galaxies. His was not brute power that affected her so. It was something more primitive and raw in him that quickened her heart.

Most of the beings she had known were at least predictable no matter how powerful. This one was not. This one was Kintara and his heart beat furious and beautiful.

And what she felt was fear. It was fear produced by natural magic he probably was not even aware he conjured. And yet, the knowledge of his magic did nothing to assuage its effects. Every animal recognized a predator, and this Kintara was very much a predator.

I dreamed of you, Elf, the Kintara said. He was flanked by another of his kind. There was mirth in the mind of this one.

I have been looking for you, Kintara, the Blind Elf replied.

The two Kintara approached the two Elves. The shorter, bulkier of the two stood before the Blind Elf, looking into her eyes. The thought that she was short for an Elf flickered across his mind and was then gone, replaced by other, darker things. She stifled the grin she felt despite her fear.

What do you want? he growled.

I come bearing the gift of seven, she replied.

Seven to save our world, he said. Seven to save them all.

This time it was her turn to be shocked. There was more to ThunderRage the StormDancer than she had originally thought. Much more, indeed.

THE BOOK OF STROBE

Are you flipping kidding me? I whispered.

Staking out one of the many courtyards dressed in putrid rags disguised as a beggar was not my idea of a good time. On a good day I could let my mind wander while I watched people come and go on business only they knew. On those days I could go to what passed for home lately feeling okay about our plight and my place in it. On days like this, I usually returned home feeling like unleashing Hell’s fury on someone.

I stuck around another half-hour making sure my departure would be noticed by neither the Headhunters policing the city or the ShadowMaster assassin who had been charged with finding and disposing of us. Speaking of Hell’s fury, I would have loved to open up and let flow every bit of power I could muster on this particular ShadowMaster. His name was Prowl. He had betrayed and killed his oldest friend. He had killed the love of my life.

I can admit that now. I had loved Raven. I loved him still. My heart breaks to know he is gone.

I didn’t unleash on Prowl. As much as I wanted to, it would have only ended with me in shackles or worse, and that would put a lot more of my people in harm’s way. I knew too much to allow myself to be captured.

Besides, at the moment I was much more disturbed by the idiocy that was ruining what could have been a perfectly uneventful day. The more I thought about it, the angrier I became. I made my way across the city of Defiance, the city we lost to the Harbinger and the Shadow Elves over a year ago, and worked my way down below the metal grating Darklord White had order constructed over the parts of the city that had collapsed when the goblins undercut the bedrock and caused a tenth of the territory within the walls to tumble into the subterranean mazes.

I guess White thought he could control the part of the city populace that would live in the dark places. The grating helped him keep track of who was coming and going from what was being called Low Town these days. It also gave those of us who were of a mind to, the perfect place from which to plan our guerilla strikes and then retreat to hide from the city’s policing unit.

The policing unit was called the Headhunters. A mercenary unit now, the Headhunters had once been on some sort of holy mission for their master, Rival, who for some reason wanted Falcon dead. Back then they had been led by a man named Rama the Archer. He, at least, had had a strong sense of honor. He was dead, though. Now they were led by a piece of filth called Tirade. He had once infiltrated the Wolf Pack and killed a couple of our brothers. He had continued to make our lives hell and we wanted him dead. But not before some of our more wicked minded boys could go to work on him.

Tirade had established the checkpoints at the entrances to the metal grates. His soldiers were constantly harassing tenants of Low Town. Unprovoked beatings were not uncommon. Troublemakers simply disappeared. The Headhunters’ tactics were brutal and kept the population in fear.

We didn’t sweat the checkpoints too much. Most of the time we disguised ourselves and that was usually good enough to get us past without any trouble. There were only a handful of Headhunters who had any idea what any of us looked like anyway. Except for maybe five or six who had survived and a quartet of them who had defected to our side, the majority of their force was new recruits and a hodgepodge melding of survivors of other units.

Yeah, the Darklords and Forsaken had taken the city, but we made them work for it.

On occasion, one of our less than self-disciplined brethren would do something foolish and bring heat down on us. As an example, I offer you the time Groundzero decided he had the perfect opportunity to get some heavy payback on Tirade. Despite orders to do no such thing, Groundzero did his level best to blow Tirade up. What Groundzero did not take into account had been that Tirade was in the company of not one, but three Darklords and that one of them, Tryst, was actually fond enough of Tirade to save his worthless life. All Groundzero managed was a city block worth of property damage and to draw attention to the fact that Defiance might just have a pest problem running its dark corners after all.

The Headhunters were sent in droves. They patrolled, harassed, and made us keep our heads down, living underground for months on end. When we finally dared creep out of our holes, we had to start all over.

Militia was angry enough that she had punched Groundzero full on in the face. I have absolutely no doubt that if he had showed anything short of complete contrition she would have killed him then and there. Groundzero had not shown his usual temper, though. He ate the punch and accepted it as part of his punishment. Militia was not done with him. Not by a longshot. Groundzero got every shit detail we could think of for a long time after that.

The episode did show us the need to make alternate arrangements should similar circumstances arise. With Groundzero, we were sure they would. And we had been right.

As alternatives to going through the regular checkpoints when the Headhunters were putting the screws to not just us, but all of the denizens of Defiance, we had Stone the Albinine create mazes and tunnels underground, branching off of what the Goblins had done. Well, I guess I should specify. He worked for us when he wasn’t busy losing his mind. He had lost his arm at the shoulder in the fall of Defiance. We had treated and nursed him the best we could, but none of us trapped here were surgeons. He suffered three weeks of delirium and misery and then simply disappeared into the maze. I thought he was dead. He reappeared a few weeks later, though. The scar on his right shoulder was smooth and healed completely.

Stone was not the same, though. Every so often he would have an episode. He became manically depressed and would spend weeks on end alone in the darkness crying or raving as the moods took him. He wouldn’t eat or speak to anyone. Then, he would come out of it and go back to work in the tunnels.

The tunnels allowed us to move around without drawing attention. The tunnels led to lots of different places in the city. There were shanties built atop some of the entries and some of our guys passing as homeless folks living and sleeping atop others. Others opened into remote warehouses. Still others ended in basements of housing units we had taken over. Each and every one of the openings and tunnels were rigged so anyone not carrying one of the little buttons Capricious had designed would set off a number of Groundzero and Shrapnel’s unpleasantries.

I saw a few of our people going about various activities as I made my way down into the tunnels we had claimed as our own. Here there were none of the miscreants and homeless people that marked the other areas of Low Town. Here, only surviving members of the Wolf Pack were allowed. Capricious had been layering the area with thousands of spells of misdirection. It was a lot like what she had done in Juma a couple of years back. Anyone not wearing a button would lose focus and forget why they were trying to walk through this particular neighborhood anyway.

The spells were subtle as not to attract the attention of any of the five Darklords calling Defiance home. For those who proved too strong-willed for the subtlety of the misdirection, Capri had set up triggers for other spells that would have a swarm of insects or a host of rats climbing all over an intruder in a heartbeat.

I no longer considered these things when I returned from an outing, especially not on a day like this. I had built up a nice big mad on and I was looking for just the right person to tear a new poop chute. Walking back into the Warren, I saw my victim immediately.

He saw me and made a feeble attempt to go elsewhere. That spoke of a guilty conscience to me. Why else would he run away?

Poppy, I bellowed. Are you a damned moron? You’re selling lotus to the guy looking to pinch us.

I had seen him laughing it up with Prowl as the ShadowMaster purchased the narcotic. I used to be what you might call carefree. Since the fall of Defiance, I had been thrust into a leadership position by sheer necessity. Though those Wolf Pack soldiers trapped numbered nearly a hundred, none of this cast of characters were what Bulldog would have called officer material.

Apple held the highest rank, but her command before the fall had been as a quartermaster. She had little experience in either combat or troop management. Militia held the next highest rank. In fact, she held the only other rank. She needed help, though, and had enlisted Ember and I to assist her with troop deployment and strategy. Apple was more than capable when it came to securing provisions and supplies, so she focused on keeping us fed and supplied, and we kept the machine, however undermanned and rusty it might be, working as smoothly as possible.

Did you ever consider the possibility that the reason Prowl hasn’t turned us over to Tirade is because we sell him the best lotus he’s ever experienced? Poppy said. No offense to our girl, but Whiskers isn’t exactly in the same league with a bloody ShadowMaster assassin.

Your argument is as flawed as your decision to sell your narcotics to him. Whiskers has nothing at all to do with keeping him off of us, I said. That’s all Capricious.

Chill out, Strobe, Groundzero said. It’s not like he just did this because it seemed like a good idea. Apple approved it.

Apple approved the sale of narcotics to the Kintara that is trying to catch us? I asked.

Yep.

There was a moment of silence. I was very much aware of all the eyes of the soldiers in the room on me. I was wrong. There was absolutely no point in trying to deny it.

Then I apologize, Poppy, I said.

Think nothing of it, Strobe, he said as he left the room with a big pie eating grin on his face.

You’ve got to relax, Strobe, Groundzero said. You’re too tense these days. Keep it up and you’ll drive yourself to an early grave.

It’s guys like you and Poppy playing the part of chauffeur, Zero, I replied. You’re teaching that boy all of your bad habits.

It’s not me, Groundzero replied. I’ve tried to teach him everything I know. He’s too hardheaded. He won’t listen.

That was the pot calling the kettle black.

I left the lounge, as we called it, and moved to my personal quarters. I say personal quarters, but it was basically an antechamber off the main tunnel that I shared with Ember and Capricious. A soldier named Tramp would occasionally spend the night with me, but not too often. Tramp had seduced Ember long ago when she was with Groundzero. After the act of betrayal, Tramp had gone on about his merry way. He left their broken relationship in his wake and made an unpredictable enemy out of Groundzero. The fact that he was with me now probably didn’t sit well with Ember either despite what she told me when I asked her how she felt about it.

As for me, I didn’t love Tramp. He had a good sense of humor, and he was good company, but I did not let him in. I guess if I’m truthful here, I was using him. He helped me take my mind off things for a while.

Speaking of the devil, Tramp was napping in my bedroll when I arrived. Capricious was snoring in her own bunk. Ember was not there. I stripped the beggar’s rags I had been wearing and washed my face, dipping my hands into a porcelain bowl we had set up on a small stand.

Tramp woke up and handed me a towel. He