A shadow crossed his perfect face. “I’m a warrior. I lead my battalions, and the fight is not yet done. I did not choose to be here, but the fight has moved into this land.”
“Meaning the fight is now against Containment?” Liam asked.
“In a manner of speaking,” Malachi said. “It would, perhaps, be better to say that the fight is against ignorance.”
“And what’s the current agenda?” Liam asked.
“Tracking down the rest of the Sensitives who worked with Containment, even incidentally,” Burke said. “But it’s a slow process, and we haven’t been able to keep up. We’re still losing Sensitives.”
“We’ve got a friend in Devil’s Isle who has comp skills,” Liam said. “If you’re good with it, we can talk to him, have him search the network. Maybe he can find something about who might be targeted next.”
Burke glanced at Malachi and Darby, who nodded. “Good idea,” he said.
“So, how do we communicate?” I asked. “Or know when to meet?”
Malachi whistled. At his command, a milky-white pigeon flew down from the rafters, landed on his outstretched arm. There was a small leather band around one scaly leg. “Carrier pigeon,” he said, then gestured to the leather band. “A small message can be placed here.”
“I thought carrier pigeons were extinct.”
“You’re thinking of passenger pigeons,” Darby said. “They are extinct. Carrier pigeons are actually a type of homing pigeon, which is not.”
I looked at the bird, which turned its head in jerky, robotic movements. War hadn’t done much to lower the pigeon count in New Orleans, and since telephones were gone, it was a pretty ingenious solution. Humans had come a long way . . . and sometimes circled right back again.
Malachi nodded. “There’s a spot at your store where a bird could land? Where you could receive a message?”
I thought for a moment. “The courtyard windows. They’re away from the street, and the other buildings that face the courtyard aren’t occupied. There’s a flagpole outside the third-floor window. If you can get them to land there, that could work.”
He nodded. “When you take the message, you can insert another. The bird will fly back here, where we’ll retrieve it.”
“What if we need to get in touch with you before that?” I asked.
“Signal us,” Malachi said. “You’ve got a postwar flag?”
That was the flag with gold fleurs-de-lis. “Sure.”
He nodded. “If you need to meet with us, hang it on your third-floor balcony. Someone will see it, send a note. And if we need to meet, we meet here.”
I nodded. “Easy enough.”
“In that case,” Darby said with a smile that looked pretty relieved, “welcome to the team.”
? ? ?
A warm breeze was blowing outside as we walked across scratching gravel to the truck.
“So, I guess we’ve joined a treasonous secret alliance.”
“That’s what it looks like,” Liam said as we climbed into the truck. He stuck the key in the ignition, pumped the gas until the truck roared to life.
He glanced at me. “I can’t say I’m thrilled about the possibility the Veil will open again—or that we’re the only thing standing between war and peace.”
“We have to start somewhere,” I said.
He looked at me, smiled. “That’s one of those things people say that doesn’t really mean anything. They just say it to make you feel better.”
“Yeah, they do,” I said. “And don’t you feel better?”
He grunted.
“What are you going to have Moses look for?”
Liam frowned. “I’m not sure yet. It’s not like he can search every instance of ‘Sensitives’ in Containment-Net. That’s probably thousands of documents.”
I smiled at him. “No. But he could search for ‘Marla Salas.’”
He opened his mouth, closed it again. “Damn, Connolly. That’s not bad.”
“It’s pretty damn brilliant, actually.”
Liam snorted, swerved the truck around an enormous pothole. “Don’t get a big head. I’ll talk to him tomorrow.”
“If we keep the Veil closed and save the world, do you think there’s any chance Containment will rethink its position on Paras?”
“Not immediately. They’re too invested in the narrative at this point.”
That sounded like something Tadji would say. “Right. Containment lies.”
“Put that on a damn T-shirt,” he muttered. “But in the long term? Yeah. Public opinion will eventually sway. It always does. And it sounds like we’re going to help it along. We just have to keep you safe in the interim. I mean, except for the treason.”
“Eh,” I said, waving it off. “Compared to saving the world, what’s a little treason between friends?”
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
I found out the next morning, when they blew in like a hurricane—eight men and women in dark gray fatigues with helmets and very large guns, led by Jack Broussard.
He wore a dark gray suit with a pale blue tie, his wavy hair gelled back above his forehead. His badge was on a chain around his neck, and there was a folded piece of ivory paper in his hand.