Zhukov's Dogs Page 7

  “Thank God you’re back. They’ve been driving me crazy,” came a voice from another room.

  A lean girl with dark skin stepped through a doorframe up the hall. Her hair was tied into a thick braid and hung down to the middle of her back like a great stinger. The sharpness of her face and golden eyes led me to believe she might be capable of stinging someone, too. She wore a set of khaki cargos which hung low on her narrow hips and looked like they might have belonged to a boy. The sleeves of her dark green turtleneck were pushed up above her elbows, and she dried her hands with a discolored washrag similar to the ones the rowdy children wore around their necks.

  “Fritzi, come meet our guest,” Tibbs called as he turned the children in a circle to face me.

  Fritzi seemed every bit as apprehensive of me as Val had been. Golden eyes narrowed into cat-like slits as she looked me up and down. “Great. Another mouth to feed. I thought we were done bringing in strays.”

  Tibbs jumped to my defense. “Be nice, Fritz. Nik here helped us out of a couple tight spots, and Val invited him back.”

  “Oh, well that makes everything totally fine.”

  Tibbs rolled his eyes at her and set the children down. He patted each one on the head, giving the one with the colander a hard thunk before sending them on their way. I watched the tiny herd scurry into a room off the entry hall and heard a crash as one of them fell into something.

  Fritzi mumbled something in German under her breath. With little ears nearby, I knew better than to repeat the translation aloud. She strode past us toward the room the children had disappeared into, shoving the dishrag into Tibbs hands.

  Tibbs removed his hat and scratched the top of his head, like he was embarrassed we’d somehow gone from robbing the governor’s suits to babysitting. “Sorry about that. I promise we’re not a daycare.”

  “Is it just you guys?” I asked.

  “Nah, there should be a few more around here somewhere, and we got a few topside on a mission right now. We’re just one branch, though.”

  The words came like an unexpected smack to the face. I kept my voice steady, and shock hidden, as I asked, “What do you mean? Branch? There are more of you?”

  “Oh yeah, loads,” Tibbs laughed as he shrugged out of his coat. “What sort ‘o threat would just a handful of kids be? We’re all spread out down here.”

  My head swirled. The file Aiden handed me barely had a dozen names in it. Tibbs made it sound like they had a small army to be reckoned with. I needed to know more; that would be the next step of my mission. The endless questions I wanted to ask caught in my throat when Fritzi shouted from the living room.

  “Tibbs! Get in here and help me! Joey’s head is stuck under the couch again!”

  Tibbs grimaced and patted me on the back soundly. “Val should be upstairs. He’s the guy to ask if you want the gritty details,” he said before rushing off to answer Fritzi’s call, leaving me alone in the hall.

  My mind ran wild with theories. I imagined one-hundred grubby revolutionaries swarming the streets. How greatly outnumbered was I? Sweeping my tongue over the roof of my mouth to quell the dryness taking over, I told myself not to panic.

  I was alone in the hall and realized this was my chance to get a quick message out to Aiden. I pulled my phone out of my back pocket and composed a text.

  Made it to Seattle. With the family now. Love, Nik

  I wasn’t with my family, and I certainly didn’t love Aiden. At the risk of having my phone taken and the messages checked, though, we’d agreed on a strict code. He was even listed under the name “Ginger” in my contacts.

  With the message sent, I leaned against a long table shoved against the wall covered in winter clothes, including snow boots and thick goggles. As I looked over it all, asking myself if they ventured above ground frequently, I got the feeling I was being watched. I assumed it was Val. He was probably hoping to catch me doing something suspicious so he could barrage me with questions again.

  When I looked up the hall, though, I saw it was a little girl. She was one of the children who’d rushed at Tibbs when we first came in, her foam sword still in hand. I didn’t know what to do with a child. My only experience with children was in a mentorship role, and not in the sort of position where I taught them how to make macaroni art or finger paint.

  I forced a smile. The girl didn’t smile back; she didn’t even budge from her seat on the stairs. She just stared at me with her big, gray eyes behind her long, blonde curls.

  “Zoe?” Anya called from upstairs. She appeared on the landing a moment later, wearing an oversized cable-knit sweater instead of her jacket. She smiled as she came downstairs and picked Zoe up in her arms. “This is Nik,” she said, bouncing the little girl on her hip. “He saved us today.”

  Zoe kept staring at me.

  “I don’t think she likes me,” I said.

  “Don’t feel bad. She’s just shy and doesn’t talk much,” Anya assured me. She kissed the top of Zoe’s head, and untied the washrag around her neck. I took the rag from her and tossed it onto the table with the winter clothes.

  “Thank you,” she said. “I’m going to put her down for a nap, okay? Val wanted you to meet him in the war room upstairs. Oh, don’t look at me like that. It’s not an actual war room; it’s just fun to say. Come on.”

  I followed her upstairs, all the while under the constant watch of gray-eyed Zoe. Anya left me on the second floor with simple instructions, “Go up one more floor and down the hall. It’s the last door on your right. The purple one.”

  On the third floor, my pocket buzzed, and I pulled my phone out to read the message—a reply from Aiden.

  So glad to hear you made it to Seattle safely. Things are dull here. Your cat ate another one of my socks, and your mother won’t stop calling. Hurry home. <3

  There was no code, only the bored ravings of my best friend who was likely slacking off at his desk. I pocketed my phone as I reached the purple door standing open at the end of the hall. Inside, half empty bookshelves lined the walls, while ancient looking maps of the world and solar system hung in dusty frames. The entire room reeked of an old woman’s bedroom, a combination of mothballs and death, and I doubted any of the windows had been opened in months.

  A tall girl in baggy, mismatched clothing stood at the table in the center next to Val. She had dark hair, crudely woven into long dreadlocks and pulled back into a birds nest knot on the back of her head. As I stepped into the war room, the girl’s hand whipped out from where it had been tucked inside her jacket. Impulse seized me, my mind forcing my body into action. My hand shot back into my bag and closed around my gun. I brought it in front as the girl turned her body and pointed the pistol straight at me.

  The draw ended as quickly as it started. Val lunged, grabbing the girl’s wrist, and forcing her aim toward the ground. Judging from the way his other hand white-knuckled the edge of the table, Val was just as alarmed by the sudden turn of events as I was.

  “Put it away,” he barked. “Both of you.”

  Slowly, I lowered my gun. There was no way I was going to put it away before the girl who drew first, though.

  Val sighed and shook his head at the girl. “Christ, Lee, this is the guy I told you about, Cook’s friend.”

  “Oh,” she said, her eyes softening and cheeks flushing.

  “Sorry about that, Nik,” Val said as he released the girl’s wrist and introduced us. “This is Lee. She’s kind of trigger-happy.”

  “Couldn’t tell,” I grumbled. Lee set her gun on the table and took half a step back from it. A peaceful gesture. I stepped up along the table, blind to its contents until the moment I set my gun on the surface. What I saw confirmed my worst suspicions.

  The revolutionaries were organized.

  A massive map of the underground was laid out, every street and shop labeled. Large, red x’s were spread out all over the map; numbers and dates I didn’t understand jotted along their edges. Four overturned shot glasses were placed arou
nd the map with a different letter written on the bottom of each. It wasn’t the most extensive war board I’d ever seen, but it was definitely more than what I’d expected.

  “Impressive,” I said with a whistle. I tried to decipher and memorize as much of it as I could. Streets already looked familiar. I saw the train station, the canal, and the monorail marked on the map, and I followed Second Avenue all the way to where a shot glass was placed over the base we were in.

  “These are different bases?” I asked, tapping the bottom of the shot glass closest to me.

  Val nodded, and Lee pointed to the one I’d tapped. “That’s the one I’m running,” she said as she bounced on the balls of her feet, the long necklaces she wore jingling together loudly.

  “Only until Jayne gets back,” Val corrected. Judging from the curtness in his tone, Val didn’t enjoy the company of the substitute.

  “He up topside on that mission?” I asked. Val and Lee both jerked their heads up to look at me suspiciously until I told them, “Tibbs mentioned it.”

  “Yeah, he’s up there,” Lee said with a sidelong glance at Val. I could see her biting the inside of her cheek and wondered what she was resisting the urge to say.

  Before she could bring it up, Val reached under the table and pulled out the small brown box they’d taken during the heist at the bridge. The string was cut and the top open, a glint of blue and gold peeking out between the wrapping papers inside.

  “So, what is it?” I asked, leaning over the table to get a better look.

  “This is a Fabergé egg, one of the last remaining originals crafted by the House of Fabergé in 1887,” Val said. He didn’t need to explain them—there was one sitting above the fireplace in my father’s study—but I listened anyway. The egg was a beautiful sapphire blue with a golden crown accent and silver laurels. A band of Roman numerals wrapped around the center, and it looked like they might have once moved to indicate the time.

  “It’s called Blue Serpent Clock. It was retrieved from a palace in Monaco earlier this year and auctioned off. Governor Granne spent a small fortune in taxpayer dollars on this thing. We intercepted the ambassador delivering it on the bridge earlier today.”

  “Planning to hold it as ransom?” I assumed.

  “No. We’re going to give it to him, just in the million or so pieces he spent on it,” Val said. He shut the lid on the box and stood up. Holding the box in one hand, Val turned and lobbed it right into the wall. Everything inside my body pulled taught with utter mortification. A piece of history, almost two-hundred years old, had just been thrown across the room like a baseball. My father would have skinned Val alive had he been in the room.

  Val walked over to pick it back up, the subtle sound of shattered glass clinking inside the box making him smile. He returned to the table and set the box down between us as he said, “I want you to take this to the governor’s mansion. I want you to break into his study and leave it on the desk right next to his morning paper. Let’s call it your initiation test, Nik.”

  The governor was the one who wanted me to come to Seattle in the first place. He wouldn’t be happy to know what happened to his expensive Fabergé egg, but at least I could assure him I was on the right track. Maybe I’d even be able to enjoy a hot shower or a nice meal before returning to the revolutionaries.

  “Consider it done,” I said.

  “And I’ll be coming with you,” Val added as soon as I agreed. It looked like I wouldn’t get that shower after all.

  Governor Granne’s Estate—Seattle, WA

  Wednesday, November 11th, 2076—12:09 a.m.

  overnor Granne’s home was back across the bridge and a way north of the station. It was straight across the water from the hydroelectric power plant Tibbs had mentioned, situated low on the bank and noisily drawing from the canal. The three-story mansion was much easier on the eyes than the power plant. The light from the factories across the water lit the lawn up in a putrid gold which made the entire plot of land look contaminated.

  With two suits standing guard at the front gate, Val and I made our way along the bank of the canal until we were behind the house. I was surprised when Val scaled the tall, black fence every bit as easily as I did. The bullet graze from earlier didn’t seem to be bothering him at all. We landed on the other side of the fence and hurried for cover behind a tool shed.

  “What are you waiting for?” Val asked as I peered around the corner of the shed.

  “Looking for suits. It’s called being careful,” I said. Val huffed and tapped his fingers against the shed with blatant impatience. I ignored his wordless complaints and instead focused on scanning the area. There was a winding, stone walkway leading from the garden to the back porch. A screen door, the door behind it wide open, provided a clear view into the kitchen. With no suits in sight, it looked like this mission would be simple.

  “That’s how we’ll get in,” I told Val with a nod toward the door.

  “After you, then.”

  Keeping our heads down, we hurried across the lawn and onto the porch. Through the screen door, I heard a woman humming somewhere inside the kitchen. We pressed our backs against the side of the house to avoid being seen. I stole a quick look through the screen. No sign of the woman, but there was an open door which looked like it led to a pantry.

  The floor plans of the Granne mansion we’d studied in the war room indicated the study was on the second floor in the east wing. The stairs were located in the parlor, through the kitchen, the dining room, and then to the left.

  Our first step was to locate and sneak past the woman in the kitchen. I reached up and turned the latch, opening the door just slightly and gesturing for Val to go through first. I shut it silently behind us, and we crept into the kitchen.

  The humming grew louder the closer we got to the pantry door. I looked at the windows across from us, their reflection showing a heavyset woman on her knees as she sorted through the shelves. With her back toward us, it wouldn’t be difficult to get by her. Val and I had just made it past the open door when we heard the sound of bare feet clopping through the dining room. Someone was coming.

  My body went rigid, one hand shooting out to keep Val from going any further. He muttered under his breath all the curses running through my mind. We needed to hide. Fast.

  I looked over my shoulder at the screen door, too far away to make a quick escape. Then I spotted the cupboards beneath the counters along the wall behind us. I seized Val’s arm with one hand and opened the cupboard door behind us with the other. He resisted as I ducked inside and tried yanking him in after me.

  “What are you—?”

  I didn’t get the rest out because, all at once, Val’s resistance faded. He fell into the cupboard after me, landing heavy between my legs with a knee knocking square into the worst place possible. I slammed my head against the wall behind me as the shock ripped through my entire body. The nauseating pain in my stomach was hard to ignore. My ears rang, and I barely managed to stifle the roar tearing up my throat into a low rumble.

  “Sorry,” Val whispered as he hastily scooted off. Our hiding spot was so small, though; every movement bumped the cupboard door open. Despite the cracks of light and danger of getting caught, Val tried to find a position in which he wasn’t half on top of me.

  My patience was too thin, and my balls too sore, to put up with Val’s shifting. I threw my arms around his shoulders and hauled him into my lap. With his back firm against my chest, his body tensed to struggle. I tightened my grip even more and growled near his ear, “Hold still.”

  Val went still as a statue—a statue whose bony ass was digging into my thigh. He mumbled an apology under his breath, like it would somehow make me less angry than I already was. He hung his head forward while I leaned mine against the cupboard wall and listened to the footsteps coming closer. They stopped in front of the pantry doorway next to us.

  “My sweet woman, what are you doing on your knees?” came a jovial male voice. From his voice alone
, I could tell the man was in the latter half of middle age. It carried a hint of authority, too. The governor?

  Val looked over his shoulder at me. He seemed to read the question crossing my mind because he nodded to confirm it. His heart rate escalated, resonating against my chest harder and faster every second. Apparently, the haughty leader of the revolutionaries was feeling the pressure.

  “The wretched kitchen staff is still on strike,” the woman replied. “Nobody has sorted out what’s expired this month, and our poor boy ate stale cereal this morning. I swear, have you ever seen so much mold in your life?”

  “Leave it alone, dear. I’ll find someone to take care of this mess tomorrow. I will not have my wife on her knees like a servant.”

  “Oh, love,” she giggled, “You’re so kind.”

  “Come, let’s retire.”

  Two sets of feet scuffled past us as the governor and his wife left the kitchen. When the sound of their footsteps faded into the distance, I let out a relieved sigh. “I guess kitchen staff isn’t going to be a problem after all. Should be easy to get upstairs from here.”

  I hadn’t known him for long, but I expected some kind of patronizing response from Val. He remained perfectly silent, though, head hung and heart flying. “Claustrophobic?” I asked.

  “I’m fine,” he snapped back at me. He scooted off my lap, out of the cupboard, and to his feet. I followed, mindful of the discomfort still stabbing at my stomach. Val looked at me with a frown. I waved off his apology before he could offer it.

  “I’m fine,” I said, mimicking his tone as I adjusted myself. Val shot me an annoyed look but said nothing. There was definitely something off about him.

  We made our way through the dining room into the parlor without any sign of suits or servants. Halfway up the stairs to the first landing, I heard a door open. Immediately, Val and I dropped to our knees. The governess laughed wildly as she and the governor scampered across the hall. Another door opened and shut just as quickly, the laughter shut out with it.