slap, Fallon knocked her to the ground with a wave of power.
Alarms screamed. One of the men, his black uniform pristine against the flapping white lab coats, drew a sidearm. She melted it in his hand so he dropped to the floor.
The rest dropped to their knees, threw their hands in the air. She heard the rescue force battling, knew with all she was they wouldn’t fail.
“Carter,” she said, and read the fear in one pair of eyes.
As she stepped toward him, tears leaked from his eyes.
“Please. I was only following orders. President Commander Hargrove himself—”
“Torture, rape, mutilation, genocide. Experimentation on infants. These are your orders?”
“Please. I’m a scientist.”
“You’re a war criminal.” And because he deserved the insult—and so much more—she rammed her fist into his face.
Face coated with soot, eyes as fierce as they’d been at that break of dawn, Marichu pushed through. Those eyes and the arrow already nocked made her purpose clear.
Fallon simply shifted in front of Carter, said, “No.”
She turned to the holding cage, opened the locks, dropped the chains away. The boy staggered out.
“Give me a weapon. Let me kill them.”
“We don’t kill prisoners. We’re not like them.” She turned her gaze to Marichu. “We won’t be like them. Into the cage,” she told the rest, and gestured to Carter. “Drag him with you. Quickly, or I may change my mind and give this boy one of you after all.”
She turned to the boy. “Can you fight?”
“Yes.”
“Then fight.” She gave him her knife. “I’ll need that back. Let’s move.” She led him toward the sounds of combat, stopped short when she saw Arlys.
“You’re supposed to be—”
“Right here.” In flak jacket and helmet, Arlys recorded. “Right here. Finish this. For God’s sake, finish this and get these people out of here.”
“It’s done.” Duncan swung his sword left, right, and did what Arlys asked. He finished it.
“Secure the doors,” Fallon ordered. “You,” she snapped at Marichu, “help secure the doors, and don’t make me regret I gave you your wish.”
Cells, glass walled, ran at least fifty feet on either side of the space. People crowded into each section, some unconscious, some glassy eyed, others shouting for release. Children, separated from the adults, huddled together. In another, six infants squalled in clear containers with locked lids.
Like animals, Fallon thought. Even the babies caged like animals.
“We’re going to get you out. Those of you who can fight, move out and to the left when we get the doors opened. We’ll get the others to safety.”
She gripped Duncan’s hand. “Help me.”
They joined, power to power, purpose to purpose.
“Magickally sealed,” he murmured.
“Yes, I feel it. But we have more.”
At her call, Tonia, blood splattered on her thick jacket, joined hands with them.
The glass began to hum, to ripple, to vibrate.
“Open, not break. There the locks, here the key. Turn the key to set them free.”
The glass moved, a fraction, an inch, a foot, section by section, row by row.
People poured out, supporting, even carrying others. Some ran to the children, gathering them up, weeping. Over the clash of voices, languages, Fallon pitched her own.
“Stand together! We have to move quickly!” She noted more than a dozen walked to the left, prepared to fight. “Hold on to the children, the infants, the injured.”
“Where will we go?” someone cried out.
“Arlington. They’re waiting for you. Stay together, trust the light. Take them,” she said to Tonia. “With Greta and Mace, as planned.”
“We’ve got it.” With the two other witches, Tonia focused power. “We’ll be back,” she said, and flashed the rescues.
Fallon walked to her father, laid a hand on his arm to heal a wound. “Give them weapons. Lead them. Take this house.”
“Your standard’s going to fly over it tonight.”
“Secure the prisoners in the cells. We’ll be bringing another.” She looked at Duncan. “It’s time to cut off the head. Are you with me?”
“You know I am.”
She took his hand, spoke in his mind. His brows shot up.
“You know where he is?”
“Yes. They rehearsed only last week. The bunker’s magickally sealed, so—”
“Together.”
“Together.” She pulled the location into her mind, flowed it into his.
Light sparked from their joined hands as they stood, eyes locked, mating power with power. Her blood hummed with it, all but sang as the link flowed through her. She felt his heart beat inside her own. And so, that merged light peeled away the layers of the dark.
Then it burst.
While prisoners herded into the cells they’d used to cage others, while troops rushed out to fight, she flashed with Duncan.