Mathieu (White Flame Trilogy) - By Paula Flumerfelt Page 0,152

trick or two up my non-existent sleeves.” Most of them chuckled. He had regulated an outfit to be worn for his whole unit: a close cut, dark green tunic, dark brown pants that were practically painted on, soft leather boots, and fingerless gloves that came up to the elbows. He wasn’t going to have anyone die because they couldn’t move in their clothing. Mathieu pinned his hair back from his face, then took a deep breath and scooped up his sword. It was time.

~*~

Dawn is the most fickle time of day. Sometimes it bursts from nowhere, illuminating everything within its path until it vanquishes the darkness back to its void. Other times, like that morning, it slowly creeps across the landscape, taking languid strides over the land from the horizon. The light that morning was moving at its own, unhurried pace, dancing into the sky on its lonesome journey. It approached from behind Mathieu’s unit.

Mathieu was standing at the edge of the forest, still cloaked in the momentary darkness. The plan was simple. Once the false light that preceded the real tendrils of yellow illuminated the area around them, they were to make their move. A single sun provided a nice glare to hide their approach behind, should anyone be up. He really doubted it, however.

Solomon stood to his left, Erik on his right. Closing his eyes for the briefest of moments, Mathieu could see his mother and his best friend waiting for him. Failure was not an option.

“They’ve got guns, you know…” Kiev said from a few feet back.

Erik rolled his eyes, “Why do you think we put the people who can make force fields in the front? For fun?”

“Enough.” Mathieu said softly. The area around his feet was beginning to lighten. Taking a breath for courage, he started towards the city, keeping his head low and one hand on the pummel of his sword. The false light stayed even with him, as if doing what it could to help him with his endeavor. After a few moments, he could hear the soft crunching of grass under the feet of the others as they followed him to Zurn.

Vincent’s warmth brushed the side of his leg as they made it to the edge of the shanty houses. As he had predicted, the place was practically deserted. As quickly and quietly as they possibly could, they made their way up the rows of houses, using what little cover they could to stay out of the view of the homes’ front windows.

They were about a third of the way up the hill when suddenly a door on his left opened slowly. A young boy, maybe six or seven came into the fenced off front yard, carrying a bright red ball in his arms. A woman followed him, dark circles under her eyes. Her eyes widened as they flick from him to Solomon, who had pulled loose a throwing knife.

Mathieu hand caught his lover’s wrist before it could pull back and he shook his head quickly, turning his attention to the woman. He hoped against hope that she wouldn’t scream and alert others. Slowly, he brought a finger to his lips before nodding to the little boy and then back to the house.

“We should kill her. She could warn them that we’re coming.” Solomon hissed in his ear as the woman scooped up her child.

Mathieu shook his head, “I don’t kill innocents.” There was no room left for argument. To say that the group became tense after being spotted once would have been a gross understatement. They were wound as tight as tops by the time they reached the last row of houses, these being only a slight improvement over the houses they first passed. They slipped into an alley and hunched down, having a quiet exchange.

“Getting through that door won’t be hard, but we need a way to flush them into the courtyard.” Kiev said softly.

Mathieu marked out a quick sketch in the dirt. “This place is set in two levels, with alarms here, here, and here,” he marked them quickly, “so I’m thinking that if we can get someone up and over the roof, they can pull the alarm. That should funnel them into the courtyard, and then we can bust in both doors and take them. We’ll need to circle around, as well.” The others nodded at his plan, “this will be the break down. We send Kiev over the roof so that she’ll be on the second floor and