So Artemis kicked, punched, and gouged. He buried his knee in Kronski’s ample stomach and blinded him with his fists.
All very superficial blows that had little lasting effect—except one. Artemis’s right heel brushed against Kronski’s chest. Kronski didn’t even feel it. But the heel connected briefly with the oversize button on the remote control in the doctor’s pocket, releasing the dock trapdoor.
The second his brain registered the loss of back support, Artemis knew what had happened.
I am dead, he realized. Sorry, Mother.
Artemis fell bodily into the pit, breaking the laser beam with his elbow. There was a beep, and half a second later the pit was filled with blue-white flame, which blasted black scorch marks in the walls.
Nothing could have survived.
Kronski braced himself against the dock rails, perspiration dripping from the tip of his nose into the pit, evaporating on the way down.
Do I feel bad about what just happened? he asked himself, aware that psychologists recommended facing trauma head-on in order to avoid stress later in life.
No, he found. I don’t. In fact, I feel as though a weight has been lifted from my shoulders.
Kronski raised himself up with a great creaking and cracking of knees.
Now, where’s the other one? he wondered. I still have some weight to lose.
Artemis saw the flames blossom around him. He saw his skin glow blue with their light and heard their raw roar, then he was through, unscathed.
Impossible.
Obviously not. Obviously these flames had more bark about them than bite.
Holograms?
The pit floor yielded beneath his weight with a hiss of pneumatics, and Artemis found himself in a sub-chamber, looking up at heavy steel doors swinging closed above him.
The view from inside a swing-top bin.
A very high-tech swing-top bin, with expanding gel hinges. Fairy design, without a doubt.
Artemis remembered something Kronski had said earlier.
This is not how she said it would go. . . .
She ... She ...
Fairy design. Endangered species. What fairy had been harvesting lemur brain fluid even before the Spelltropy epidemic?
Artemis paled. Not her. Please, not her.
What do I have to do? he thought. How many times must I save the world from this lunatic?
He scrambled to his knees and saw he had been funneled onto a padded pallet. Before he could roll off, octobonds sprang from recessed apertures along the pallet’s steel rim, trussing him tighter than a tumbled rodeo cow. Purple gas hissed from a dozen overhead nozzles, shrouding the pallet.
Hold your breath, Artemis told himself. Animals don’t know to hold their breath.
He held on until it felt as though his sternum would split, and then just as he was about to exhale and suck in a huge breath, a second gas was pumped into the chamber, crystallizing the first. It fell onto Artemis’s face like purple snowflakes.
You are asleep now. Play possum.
A small door sank smoothly into the floor, with a sound like air being blown through a straw.
Artemis peeked through one half-closed eye.
Magnetic field, he thought dully, a band of steel creasing his forehead.
I know what I will see, but I have no wish to see it.
A pixie stood framed by the doorway, her tiny, beautiful features twisted with their customary pouting cruelty.
“This,” squealed Opal Koboi, pointing a vibrating finger, “is not a lemur.”
CHAPTER 13
THE HAIRY ONE IS DEAD
The Leather Souk
Butler jogged from the Extinctionists’ compound to the leather souk. Artemis was waiting in the building where they had planned the previous day’s exchange. Police presence in Fez amounted to no more than a couple of two-man patrols, and so it was easy for someone of Butler’s experience to sneak around without being detected. Though it was hardly illegal to visit a medina, it was certainly frowned on to stroll around a tourist area with a large rifle strapped to one’s back.
Butler ducked into a dark corner and quickly broke down his dart rifle into almost a dozen parts, slotting them into various garbage bins. It was possible that he could slip the Fez Saïss Airport customs men some baksheesh and simply stow the weapon under his seat, but these days it was better to be safe than sorry.
Ten-year-old Artemis was sitting at a prearranged spot in one of the sniper windows, picking nonexistent lint from his jacket sleeve, which was his version of nervous pacing.
“Well?” he asked, steeling himself for the answer.
“The female got out,” said Butler. He thought it better not to mention that the long-haired male had everything under control until Artemis’s video arrived.
Artemis caught the implication.“The female? The other one was there too?”
Butler nodded. “The hairy one is dead. He attempted a rescue, and it didn’t work out.”
Artemis gasped.
“Dead?” he said. “Dead?”
“Repeating the word won’t change its meaning,” said Butler sharply. “He tried to rescue his friend, and Kronski killed him for it. But what’s done is done, eh? And at least we have our diamonds.”
Butler checked his temper. “We should move out for the airport. I need to run the preflight checks.”
Artemis was left stunned and silent, unable to take his eyes from the bag of diamonds, which winked accusingly from their slouched perch on his lap.
Holly was not having any luck. Her shield was so weak that she switched it off to save her last spark for a small healing if it was needed; and no sooner had her image solidified than one of Kronski’s goons spotted her and walkie-talkied his entire squad. Now she was running for her life through the medina, praying that Artemis was at the meeting point and that he had thought to bring the scooter.
No one was taking potshots at her, which was encouraging, unless Kronski wanted to do the potshotting himself.
No time to think about that now. Survival was the priority.
The medina was quiet this late in the evening, with only a few straggling tourists and die-hard merchants still walking the streets. Holly dodged between them, pulling down whatever she could reach to get in the way of the stampede of security men behind her. She tugged over towers of baskets, upended a kebab stand, and shouldered a table of spices, dashing a white wall with multicolored arcs.
The thunder of footsteps behind her did not recede in the least. Her tactics were not working. The security guards were simply too large and were bustling past the obstacles.
Dodge and weave, then. Lose them in the alleyways.
This tactic was no more succesful than the last. Her pursuers were familiar with the medina’s layout and coordinated their pursuit on handheld radios, herding Holly toward the leather souk.
Where I’ll be in the open. An easy target.
Holly raced on, Artemis’s loafers cutting into her heels. A series of cries and curses arose behind her as she barged without apology through bands of tourists and shoulder-slammed tea boys, sending trays flying.
I am corralled, she thought desperately. You’d better be waiting, Artemis.
It occurred to Holly that she was leading the posse directly to Artemis, but there was no other option. If he was waiting, then he could help; if not, she was on her own anyway.
She jinked left, but four huffing guards blocked the alleyway, all hefting vicious long-bladed knives.
The other way, I think.
Right, then. Holly skidded into the leather souk, heels throwing up dust fans.
Where are you, Artemis?
She cast her gaze upward toward their observation point, but there was nothing there. Not even the telltale shimmer of a hide.
He’s not here.
She felt panic scratch at her heart. Holly Short was an excellent field officer, but she was way out of her jurisdiction, her league, and her time.
The leather
souk was quiet now, with only a few workers scraping skins on the surrounding rooftops. Lanterns crackled below the roofline, and the giant urns lurked like alien pods. The smell was just as bad as it had been the previous day, possibly worse, as the vats had had longer to cook. The stench of droppings hit Holly like a soft, feverish glove, further addling her mind.
Keep running. Find a nook.
Holly spent half a moment considering which body part she would trade for a weapon, then sprinted for a doorway in the adjacent wall.
A guard appeared, dragging his knife from its sheath. The blade was red. Maybe blood, maybe rust. Holly switched direction, losing a shoe in the turn. There was a window one floor up, but the wall was cracked: she could make the climb.
Two more guards. Grinning. One held a net, like a gladiator.
Holly skidded to a halt.
We’re in the desert! Why does he have a fishing net?
She tried again. An alleyway barely broad enough for an adult human. She was almost there when a fat guard with a ponytail to his waist and a mouthful of yellowed teeth wedged himself into the avenue, blocking it.
Trapped. Trapped. No escape and not enough magic to shield. Not even enough to mesmerize.
It was difficult to stay calm, in spite of all her training and experience. Holly could feel her animal instincts bubbling in the pit of her stomach.