Gameboard of the Gods (Age of X 1)

“Sure,” said the woman. She held out her hand without hesitation. “Valeria Jardin. My friends call me Val, and you can definitely be one of my friends.” Justin often likened Mae to a lioness when she was ready to fight. There was something feline about Val too, but of an entirely different nature. She was sleek and sensuous—but most certainly had claws of her own.

“Back off,” the man warned Val. “You heard what she said.”

“Mae?” asked Justin. “What did she say?”

“She said you were cute,” said Val.

The prætorian man rolled his eyes. “She did not. She just told you to stay away.”

“That’s practically an admission of lust from her.”

“It is not. She just doesn’t want you complicating things, Val.”

Val looked up at Justin through long lashes, a demure look in her dark eyes. “I never complicate anything,” she purred. “Not too much, at least.”

“I need that drink,” the guy prætorian said, stepping around her. “Hope you’re well stocked.”

“Extremely,” said Justin. He was still a little mystified. “I didn’t catch your name…?”

“Dag,” called the man, not elaborating on whether that was his first or last name. He was already striding toward the kitchen, with the self-assurance of one who knew he could go anywhere.

Justin showed them the liquor cabinet, which met with their approval. They grabbed two bottles each and looked at him expectantly. “Out to the patio,” he said. He took a bottle of bourbon for himself and three glasses, not that the prætorians seemed to need any vessels. “Everyone else is asleep.”

The expansive backyard patio was far away from the bedrooms, which were clustered together. Like everything else around here, it was opulent and lovely. It had a slate floor set with patina-covered furniture and a trellised cover wrapped with vines that offered protection on hot days. A fire pit sat off to the side, ready with warmth on cooler days. The whole area was ripe and ready for entertaining, but backyard parties hadn’t exactly been on Justin’s agenda recently. He never would have guessed he’d be breaking it in with two prætorians.

Both of Dag’s bottles were whiskey. He set one on the table and then immediately began drinking the other, no glass required.

“Isn’t that”—Justin groped for the right words—“kind of a waste? With the implant and everything?”

“He’s slamming the implant,” explained Val. She opened a bottle of tequila. “If he can down that bottle in a couple minutes, he’ll get a buzz. A short one, but hey, you take what you can get.” From the way she then dove into her own bottle, she was apparently “slamming” her implant as well.

This was news to Justin. “Seems like you’d mostly get alcohol poisoning.”

“Nah.” Dag paused in his drinking. He was about halfway through the bottle. “The implant will catch up. I’m just getting a head start.”

“I see.” Justin watched them continue their binge drinking and felt a little lame for sipping his own drink. He had no delusions about trying to keep up, though. He’d probably have been dead already.

They both finished and looked supremely pleased with themselves. Dag gave Val a high five. “There it is.”

She sighed happily and settled back into her chair. “Fun end to a fun night.”

“What happened tonight?” Justin asked. “Why is Tessa a terrorist?”

That brought the grins back. “She scaled the wall into the National Gardens,” said Dag. “Happens every once in a while. I mean, there’s so much surveillance there that they’re always spotted before they even get to the wall, but they should really cut that fucking tree down.”

Justin didn’t even hear the part about the tree. “Tessa broke into the gardens? Why would she do that?”

“Because kids do that with other kids,” said Val. “And she was drunk.”

Justin nearly dropped his glass. “No. Not her. No way.”

Dag actually looked sympathetic. “I know it’s hard to accept, but no matter how innocent you think they are, teenage girls are always going to do things you don’t want to believe.”

“Oh, I have no delusions about teen girls, believe me. But not her. If you knew her, you’d understand. Hell, she put on her first pair of jeans two weeks ago and still gets freaked out about how cars have no drivers.”

Val laughed. “Well, she was lucky this time, so keep her out of trouble. Next time federal security drags her in, she may not have two gallant heroes to rescue her.”

“Something tells me there won’t be a repeat.” Justin toyed with his glass and used the opportunity to mull over their story. “How’d you know who she was?”

“Finn—er, Mae—told us everything, and there aren’t that many Panamanian girls wandering Vancouver.” Dag was already eyeing the second bottle. “Then we just tracked you down.”

Justin thought back on recent events. “Mae did too good a job at teaching her to climb trees.”

That made Dag laugh. “She’s good at everything. You should see her in combat.”

Val nodded along with Dag’s words. “I mean, we’re all good, but she’s really good. Even before she had the implant, she was kicking ass. She got a lot of crap for being castal when she joined the guard. I think she beat up three people that first day, and no one ever messed with her again. Well, not in our cohort, of course.”

Justin knew enough about prætorians to understand the color-coded system. Their pip color was visible in the dim light. “Red cohort?”

“Scarlet,” they said in unison.

“Why do you call her Finn? She already fits into your monosyllabic club.”

They found that hilarious. “Dag couldn’t remember her name back then,” said Val. “But we could all remember she was Nordic. Hard not to. And ‘Finn’ is a cuter nickname than ‘Swede.’”

Silence fell as the prætorians cracked into their second bottles. Justin still couldn’t get over the weirdness of this situation. Before that miscreant-camp nonsense, even he’d been taken aback when they’d shown up at his door. The faces…the posture…those uniforms. His own heart had nearly stopped. He’d also seen Mae in action enough to appreciate just how lethal prætorians could be.

Which made it completely ludicrous that he now had two of them before him, trying desperately to get drunk as they made wisecracks and congratulated themselves over a prank played on a teenage girl. The government took nearly 40 percent of his paycheck, and he felt kind of affronted that this was what his taxes paid for.

“And so you guys are guarding the gardens?”

Dag nodded. “Yup. Pretty sweet deal. Easy work and lots of time off.”

“I’m free tomorrow night,” said Val meaningfully.

“I kind of miss the field.” Dag stared wistfully at his bottle. “I’m ready for action.”

Val touched his arm. “Soon enough. Maybe we’ll go together. Maybe Finn too. They can’t stick her with this job forever.” She glanced up at Justin. “No offense.”

That instinct rose up in Justin, the one that said something was about to happen. “Why would I be offended?” He examined her words. “And what do you mean she’s stuck?”

“You don’t know?” Val looked legitimately puzzled. “You’re punishment.”

“That’s harsh. I mean, someone had to be with him, right? It’s not like they just designed this job to teach her a lesson.” Dag turned thoughtful. “But I don’t think she would’ve gotten it if she hadn’t done what she did. She’d be with us in the gardens.”

The big man sounded sad, but there was almost an accusatory note in his voice. Justin didn’t know if it was directed toward him, Mae, or some other mysterious factor. All he knew was that he was being left behind in this conversation, and he needed to catch up. The idea of his being someone’s punishment didn’t make any sense.

Horatio laughed, inasmuch as a raven could. Right. Because how could your company be anything but a delight?

“What did she do? Why is she being taught a lesson?”

Val and Dag exchanged looks. Their happy-go-lucky natures had vanished. “I don’t know if we should tell,” said Dag slowly. “I mean, if she hasn’t told him, maybe she doesn’t want him to know.”

“Well, it’s not exactly a big secret,” Val pointed out, a bit of her swagger returning. “Hell, practically every prætorian knows the Ballad of Mae and Porfirio.” She laughed at her own word choice, and Dag soon joined in.

But Justin wasn’t amused. He was too caught up in the glimmer of insight he was starting to feel. “Porfirio…that’s him, isn’t it? The beach guy.”

Val turned from Dag. “She did tell you.”

“No…not exactly.” How could he explain all the telltale signs he’d gathered? The way she wouldn’t meet his eyes when any whisper of this came up, the way her whole body went still. “I just kind of guessed something was going on.”

“Oh, believe me, I don’t think you could guess all of this. It’s one of those stranger-than-fiction things.” She looked back at Dag. “Do you want to tell it?”

“You start,” he said. “I’ll correct you when you’re wrong.”

She elbowed him with a force that would’ve knocked an ordinary person out of his chair. “I know the story. I was there when it happened.”

“So stop wasting time, and tell it,” Dag ordered.

“Fine, fine.” Val took a deep breath. “So, about two years ago, we were at this party. Since it was an election year, they had a bunch of us in town—it’ll happen later this year too. Too many important people around who need protection. Guarding politicians is a lot like guarding the gardens. Lots of ceremony, lots of time off—and lots of ree parties. One night, this guy—Maize, I think—rented out a whole hall. I swear, half the guard was there.”