seen what I can do,” I said. “What the Makers have promised me will boost whatever power I have by a significant factor. I’m not saying that to scare you, though it should—it scares the bejesus out of me. I’m telling you so that you’ll understand how much power they have, and that it would not be a good idea to interrupt or otherwise interfere with my communication with them. Are we clear?”
Senator Knight stood there, trying not to show how shocked he’d been by the morning’s events. While there was an audience, he’d held it together. Now . . . he was feeling the impact of all the ramifications of what he’d seen. “Crystal clear.”
“I’m going to need some things.”
“We can get you whatever you need.” Suddenly that list of radical solutions I discussed with Claudia after the incident with the oracles didn’t seem so radical.
“First off, I’m going to need an island. I have a short list of those that will serve.” It was a dangerously short list. Every one of the entries had the things I needed, and each was state or federal property. No messing with private landowners for me; we had to move fast. There was a tiny bit of me that enjoyed watching Knight’s eyebrows go up. I let myself enjoy the satisfaction for as long as his eyes weren’t on me. It was almost as good as a bubble bath for my spirits.
“Very well, I’ll see what I can do.”
“There’s more.”
I handed him another list, one he’d find more familiar, I thought. It was the supplies for a moderately well-appointed Fangborn stronghold. My Family had gotten very good at creating hidey-holes that were well supplied over the years, and I was going to need some of that know-how and efficiency right away.
It had struck me that in all the fairy tales that might have revealed something of the Fangborn presence through history, in so many of the myths, the legends, there was always a stronghold. Dracula’s castle loomed large in my mind as an example, or the dragon’s lair, or a deep, dark dungeon. Who knew? Maybe even the troll who lived under the bridge and menaced the Billy Goats Gruff was Fangborn, colored with menace to protect him from the Normals and distract from his real purpose.
Recalling the setup that Okamura-san and Ken-san had in Kanazawa, and what Gerry had told me about the major Family strongholds around New England, I put that knowledge to work for me.
“How soon?” Knight’s patience was wearing thin.
“Immediately. As soon as inhumanly possible.”
Representative Nichols gave me a stern look. “You don’t want much, do you?”
“Just enough. It all has to be done as secretly as possible,” I said. “Also, we’re going to need sovereign status. I don’t care how you do it. Make it a reservation; create an embassy. Something. But my team—me, the dragons, and anyone I say—has to be inviolate. If the Makers want to come here, this is where they’ll come. If I have to act on behalf of us—Fangborn, Normals, everyone on this plane of existence—I need to be subject to nothing but my own law. It’s not like you can make me president, or king, or whatever. But you might be able to make me an ambassador.”
“Sovereign status?”
“Or diplomatic status. I’m not sure exactly what it is, but make it so I have authority without breaking too many rules. Make something up.” “And you’ll want some kind of distance from me,” I almost said, but didn’t want to give him any ideas about what could happen if I failed in whatever happened with the Makers next. “There’s got to be some fancy word for what that is.”
“Without breaking rules,” Knight said, “I believe your fancy word may look like ‘treason,’ or ‘secession,’ or ‘act of war.’ What you’re proposing violates many, many federal laws and more than a few international treaties. The president, NATO, the EU, the United Nations . . . all will be very interested.”
I wanted to say, “Since when do you care about the UN, Senator Knight?” as he pretty much played out his games with very little thought for the rights of other nations. But I thought that would be childish and I wasn’t here for my own vengeance. I felt that much of the ill use I’d had at the hands of the senator would be easily repaid now. But I took a deep breath and settled for signifying, implication, and passive aggression instead. “I have