But such a practice had given us the idea to check how the pipes weaved into their military’s barracks. Their network had turned out to be separate from the rest of the city, so all we would have to do was pass a few vials of highly concentrated substance to our contacts working in Ilasall’s water plant.
Kali’s fascination with the yellow oleander had proved to be useful. With the citizens contained behind the city’s wall, Ilasall did not pay attention to developing an antidote for the poisonous flower.
Tomorrow night, together with a fourth of our forces, Eli and Eislyn were going to sneak through the catacombs and deliver the special package to our friends pretending to be complacent citizens of Ilasall.
There was not a chance Eli would have stayed home and allowed Eislyn to trudge alone. And I had no wish to have himbreathing down my neck if I assigned him a different type of duty. Or any, to be precise.
“Oh, hi there,” Eislyn greeted Ryder and Sadira, squeezing past her in the doorway.
Before the door could shut behind Eislyn’s back, Ryder was already across the room, collapsing in an empty chair, the wood creaking from his weight. Based on the film of sweat on his and Sadira’s faces, they had sprinted here from their workshop.
I quirked an eyebrow. These two avoided leaving their nest of tech unless the situation was dire, like that one time when Ryder had set their kettle on fire—by accident, according to him—or because of a major breakthrough.
Somehow, I doubted they would have rushed over to my study due to tea problems.
“We”—Ryder tousled his tight, caramel curls—“figured”—he panted—“it”—he swallowed, and finished—“out.”
Sadira patted the shoulder of her tech team’s second-in-command. “We gained access to Ilasall’s security system,” she announced, collected and cool.
Pushing off the wall, Kali splayed her hands on my desk, the rolled-up sleeves of her fitted cotton shirt displaying my tattoo twining around her forearm. “You can open the city gates?”
“Yeah.” Ryder pulled at the collar of his hoodie, the back undoubtedly soaked through. “Shit, I shouldn’t have eaten that sandwich just before running here. I can feel it climbing back up.”
“Told you.” Sadira clutched his chair’s backrest. “He’s right about us having access to the gates, but there is one problem.”
Of course there was. Nothing ever came easy.
It was also the truth Zion was currentlyexperiencing. Playing with him before this meeting had been fun, but watching him try not to squirm and pretend all was well while he lounged on the floor was particularly satisfying.
Especially when he would adjust his position, taking a pause in whetting his knife and gritting his teeth.
KnowingIwas the cause of his torture—with the help of a special toy I had stuffed inside him—caused a rush of power to flush me.
“Let me guess, you need someone on the inside to open them.” Eli rested an ankle on his knee. Although most would describe him as a mellow man, he could snap your spinal cord before you so much as muttered his name. A trained hunter always remained on edge.
Ripping off his hoodie, Ryder grumbled at the fabric tangling around his head. “No-Not,” he sputtered as he battled his clothing, “Any-Anymore.” Successful, he tugged the hem of his navy t-shirt to cover his toned stomach. “We can do it remotely.”
Dropping the kitchen knife onto the cushion covering his groin, Zion studied the purlicue of his left hand. “So our microchips are useless then.”
“Yes and no.” Sadira freed one of her thin ebony braids from the strap of her dark teal overalls. “They’re still functioning, but if Ilasall locks the gates down, then they won’t help us.”
While Kali flipped through the yellowed pages of the disintegrating book beside me, I found her thigh andyanked. She stumbled, crashing into my side, and the intensity of her scowl matched Sadira’s eye roll.
Ihadto do something. Not touching Kali or Zion hindered my neurons from firing properly. All I could think about was them and not the issue at hand.
Dragging her down onto my lap despite her protest, I splayed my hands on her belly. “If we can open the gates remotely, then what’s the problem?”
Sadira grew as taut as a rod, the way she often did when the news was far from pleasant. “We won’t be able to hold the gatesopen for long. Their security system is tight, and we don’t have the resources to fight back when they discover our meddling.”
Ryder rubbed his forehead, as if it could erase the emerging freckles. “We predict you will have anywhere between five to ten minutes.”
“And once the gates close, they won’t open again,” Kali finished for them. Drumming her fingers on my shoulder, she tapped out a melody of five, from her pinky to her thumb. “How many people can we move inside in this little time?”
Honing his knife in even, mesmerizing moves, Zion muttered, “Not enough.”
Far from that. It would take at minimum a couple of minutes to run through the open field surrounding Ilasall to reach the gates, which significantly lowered the number of people we could squeeze through.
The solution, however improbable, was to overtake as many entrance and exit points as possible at once and keep them open by sheer force.
