Kiss of Snow

HAWKE saw several of his people fall, knew they’d been hit with a psychic blast. Racing out to the one closest, he pulled the male back out of range with a grip on his bulletproof vest, then went back to retrieve another, a woman. Around him, more SnowDancer soldiers were doing the same, as others fought off the Pure Psy operatives targeting those trying to assist the injured.

There was no doubt that Scott had a massive advantage with his telepaths and telekinetics, but from the looks of things, the Tk unit was beginning to tire from the troop movements—which meant SnowDancer didn’t have to worry about missiles being lobbed at them without warning, though the techs had prepared for that eventuality by placing a number of interception units along the defensive line.

The changelings had also evened out the field with preparation, the choice of when to fight, and the knowledge of home ground. Enemy soldiers who tried to teleport in behind SnowDancer’s defensive line found themselves caught between layers of wolves arranged up and down the mountain.

Not all of those wolves were changeling.

Good, Hawke howled to the feral wolves that treated him as alpha. Watch. Hold.

The wolves howled in unison in response, and Hawke saw the enemy freeze for a fraction of an instant. Then the crashing noise and blood-soaked scent of battle started again. Contrary to Hawke’s expectations, Henry Scott remained on the field. The Councilor stood in the center of that tight guard, his eyes closed—Hawke realized the man was using his considerable psychic abilities against the changelings at the same time that he saw a shot coming straight at a soldier.

“Drew, duck!”

Drew slammed flat. His gaze was annoyed when he raised his head. “I swear to God, if I get shot again, Indigo will strangle me.” Obviously irritated by that, he turned around and took out the man who’d come after him just as SnowDancer’s aerial defenses ignited an incoming vessel, causing everyone to run for cover from the falling debris.

Scrabbling up beside Hawke, Drew put his back to a tree. “That should remind them to keep the hell out of our skies,” he muttered, then pressed his finger to an ear. “I’ve got info coming in from the Rats—Henry’s operatives are landing all over the place in San Francisco.”





TEIJAN and his people were used to being forgotten, being shoved aside. They were Rats, accustomed to living Below, where the world couldn’t hurt them. But the DarkRiver cats had seen them, had treated them as sentient beings capable of giving something back. As for the wolves—well, the Rats remained leery of them, but there was no arguing that SnowDancer had always held up its end of the bargain. More than one Rat had been pulled out of trouble or given protection by a wolf who was otherwise a stranger.

“It’s home,” Zane had said when Teijan had told his people what might be coming and offered them the option of leaving. “We stay and we fight.”

Now, they did just that.

Having worked with DarkRiver over the past couple of months to connect with the cats’ network of human and non-predatory changeling shopkeepers in Chinatown, that connection spreading out through family and business contacts like an ever-growing tree, the Rats had a flow of information coming in not even the PsyNet could beat.

They knew where Henry Scott’s people were landing, their numbers, the approximate type and number of their weapons within seconds of each landing. All that data was routed at once to the DarkRiver teams in charge of holding the city as SnowDancer held the mountains.

The tactical split showed a massive amount of trust from both packs—because some of that mountain land was DarkRiver territory, and if San Francisco fell, then Henry Scott’s army would have the perfect location in which to dig in and throw assault after assault at the wolves. Both parts of the defense had to hold if they were to win this battle.

“A new team’s rappelling down near Russian Hill,” Teijan reported to Clay, “and a bigger one has surrounded Nikita’s building.”

Clay’s voice came through peppered with the sounds of gunfire. “She said she didn’t need backup, but—”

“Wait.” Teijan swore low and hard. “Nikita doesn’t like people poaching on her territory. Fifteen attackers just went down with exploding brain syndrome.” There was no other way to put it—on the video feed coming through a street camera, Scott’s people fell where they stood, their brains leaking out their ears.

The survivors wisely decided to get the hell out of Nikita’s zone.