Wildwood Imperium (Wildwood Chronicles 3)

The two girls laughed, and Rachel pushed her shoulder into Elsie’s. As they were sharing this rare moment of levity, Michael approached them.

“Hey, you two,” he said. “You guys should come over here. We need to learn these vent plans.”

“Right,” said Rachel. “C’mon, Els.”

“What about him?” asked Elsie, nodding toward the singing Unthank.

Michael frowned. “He’ll get it together,” he said. “He has to.” As if punctuating what Michael had said, Unthank let out a loud, harried yelp and then began reciting what sounded like the technical manual to some obscure apparatus. “Come on,” said Michael, and the three of them made their way to the table in the center of the room.

Nico was briefing the children on the ductwork of Titan Tower, carefully drawing in a navigable route in red ink on the plans. It was complex: a snaking line that moved in and out of the little corridors on the blueprints at fixed points. The route had to be amended several times, apparently, as there were dead ends that had been scratched out and new routes appended like a particularly challenging maze in an activity book. He’d finally arrived at a usable path, but it was going to require the children to become fluent in the ductwork’s crazy patterns and movements.

“Okay,” said Nico, breathing deeply. “You’ll enter here, through the subterranean ducts. There’s a security gate in the ventilation here. Should be disabled when you get to it. Crossing through that, you’ll be in the system.”

“Who’s disabling the security gate?” asked Michael.

Nico made eye contact with Michael, as if to say, You know who. He looked over at the crowd of Chapeaux Noirs swarming Joffrey Unthank. “After he’s disabled the tower’s security system.”

Joffrey was now loudly quoting warranty information over the hum of his barber’s clippers. “FAILURE to HEED the INSTRUCTIONS will result in VOID of WARRANTY. Tra la! Tra la! USE ONLY as DIRECTED!”

“After he’s disabled the security system,” repeated Michael. “And how’s he going to do that?”

“By going inside the front gates, just like he’s always done.”

“DO not UNDER any CIRCUMSTANCES use THIS PRODUCT as a HEAT SOURCE! Tra la!” came the shouting voice. The black-bereted men around him swore as they tried to keep their subject in his seat.

“He’s one of their fellow Titans,” said Nico, swallowing hard. “Now, once you’ve—”

Michael interrupted him. “Wait, wait, wait. He was one of their fellow Titans. He’s been kicked out, hasn’t he?”

“Our sources suggest he’s just been suspended,” answered Nico. “They’ve absorbed his Division into Shipping. So it shouldn’t be that big of a hurdle. He shows up, tells them he’s ready to come back into the fold. They let him in.”

“Excuse me, gentlesmen,” sang Unthank in a faux-Slavic accent on the other side of the room. “We must get back on the chicken!” He then began laughing uproariously. “Tra la! Tra la!”

Michael stared at Nico.

Nico looked back down at the plans.

“You were saying?” prompted Elsie.

“Right,” said Nico. “You’ll need to pick a team—the smallest of the kids. Judging from the plans, they’ll all need to be about your height, Elsie. The shafts get fairly narrow at points.”

“Wait a second,” said Rachel. “Elsie’s not going. Not without me.”

“You wouldn’t fit,” said Nico. “And Elsie’s here. We’ll still need a few more of your kids. She can get them up to speed.”

Rachel looked down at her sister, wide-eyed. “I can do it, Rach,” said Elsie. “I can fit.”

“I want to be there,” said Rachel. “I want to be close.”

“We’ll get you close,” said Nico. “You can be on the demolitions team, if you’d like.”

“I would like.”

“A teenager?” asked a voice from behind them. It was Jacques, who’d just left the circle around Joffrey. He frowned at Rachel, studying her, before saying, “You know, your typical Chapeau trains for months before his first deployment.”

“Come on, Jacques,” replied Nico. “Trust me. She’s a natural-born saboteur. She’s got the guts for it.”

“What about him?” asked Michael, still staring at Unthank. “I don’t understand how he’s going to pull off his part of the plan.”