I waited an hour but Dragon dude and no-name didn't show so I went out to the street after dressing in my local, non-sexy, shapeless duds. I could go back to the temple, I suppose, but they'd be on their guard now and I didn't know anyone that I might trust to yank a bullet out of my body if I were shot. I roamed the streets instead. I heard whispers of where retaliations might take place. The consensus seemed to be the poor side of town, wherever that might be.

"Where is that, what you're talking about?" I asked one man, who didn't seem to worry whether he was overheard or not.

"The pity streets?"

"Yeah." I guess I gave him the Refizani equivalent of an Earth "yeah."

"If you go to the southeastern edge of the city, you'll find them," he replied. "Are you a journalist?"

"Yeah. That's exactly what I am," I lied. I went to find a deserted alley. That super dude had his phone booths; I had alleys. Not a bit of glamour in my less than super-hero changing place. I went to mist and flew over rooftops, going right through tall buildings instead of leaping them if they were in my way. I found the pity streets. Strange lingo these Refizani had. Very strange.

Normally, I think children might have been playing in those narrow, brick-lined streets. This was a very old portion of the city, with crumbling facades lining the uneven walks out front. I smelled fear throughout the place. Misting overhead, I passed over buildings that had scraps of laundry drying on lines hanging across rooftops. Somewhere, perhaps a mile away, bells rang out to mark the hours. Refizani days were divided into twenty-eight hours. Around second bell, I heard the noise; a car was coming down one of the narrow lanes. So far, I hadn't seen one of the solar powered cars anywhere in these neighborhoods. I misted toward the sound, eventually flying over the thing. It looked like a van of some sort.

It pulled up outside a house and three men, dressed in the red uniforms of Solar Red guards and armed with rifles stepped out silently. They didn't smell pure to me and were certainly up to no good. "Grab them," one whispered to the others. "If the man fights, kill him. We'll dump the body elsewhere." I didn't like where this was going one bit. Those f**kers didn't get a chance to knock on the apartment door; I knew by scent that a man, a woman and five children slept inside. No way was I going to take chances with babies' lives. Or their parents, for that matter.

Hauling three frightened, gun-toting men across town was no picnic let me tell you, and the farther I hauled them the more frightened they became. What I did learn, though, was that they couldn't fly. I dropped them from about a hundred feet up, right over the street that ran in front of the temple. Then I went back for their van.

* * *

"You mean she figured everything out this quickly?" Kiarra stared at Pheligar of the Larentii as he reported the latest events on Refizan.

"The first night, after reading the newspapers Dragon left on her bed," Pheligar replied. He seldom smiled, but a corner of his mouth quirked slightly, surprising Kiarra. "We took a chance, hoping she would take the initiative without our interference," he added.

"Dragon and Karzac are there for our enemy. They can't go against Solar Red without violating the rules," Kiarra nodded. "Remind me to thank Merrill and find an appropriate gift for allowing this," she added.

"I fail to understand how the Reth Alliance allows Solar Red to remain in operation," Pheligar offered a rare opinion. Larentii seldom expressed their judgment or condemnation on anything.

"I agree—somebody should get rid of them. Some days I hate that no interference rule," Kiarra grumbled, patting Pheligar's back absently. He blinked at the unexpected contact before his slight smile widened.

* * *

"The van appears to have been dropped from a great height, although that in itself is impossible," the journalist declared. I was watching the news again while I had my usual for dinner. Footage was shown of the van in question; it was crumpled up in the same street where I'd dropped three armed men. There wasn't any word on those guys, though. Maybe the temple didn't report it when their hit men came up missing. I went to shower and dress.

* * *

"May I buy you a drink?" The man seemed nice enough and didn't smell evil, but I wasn't interested in a date and nobody had bothered to give me any money so I could reciprocate. Hell, I didn't even know where in the universe I was, for Pete's sake. If nobody came to retrieve me eventually, I could be stuck here forever. I'd just have to hope that didn't happen. I'd been hanging out near the bar, expecting to get a little more information, but these Refizani were tight-lipped tonight.

"No, but thank you for the offer," I was as polite as I could be before moving down the street. The street reminded me of one I'd seen in Paris in what might have been a lifetime ago. Merrill, Franklin, Greg and I had gone there to find a dress for me to wear to the annual vampire meeting. Cafés and restaurants lined both sides of the street and plenty of people were wandering toward a nearby wharf; we weren't far from a particularly scenic loop in the river.

"I heard they were bringing them downriver," someone said quietly. My ears immediately perked up.

"If you can't find locals to sacrifice, you pull some in from elsewhere," his companion observed. "An entire family disappeared last night. The local authorities claim they're searching for them." The man snorted as if that was the last thing he might believe. The two men were sitting at a tiny table outside a café, drinking something that smelled like tea, only a kind I'd never scented before. I trotted away as quickly as I could.

Where do you go if there are people coming down the river to be sacrificed? There weren't any flashing neon signs anywhere, proclaiming where that spot might be. Surely, there were landings somewhere. I'd seen ships and boats on the first night but they'd been far away when I'd dumped my dead priests into the water. I misted toward the river.

There was a huge landing area about three miles past the spot where I'd dumped my priests and about a half-mile from the temple, thanks to a bend in the river itself. There were priests and more gun-toters waiting in a van at one of the slips. Another good-sized ship was tied to a dock nearby and sailors were unloading crates and glaring at the priests while they did it. I had an idea. I'd already carried one van as mist. Why not one loaded down with priests and thugs? I heard the sailors calling out and shouting as the van simply disappeared before their eyes. These Solar Red guys got a trip to the ocean that night; I dropped the van from high enough that I had time to mist inside the van, kill all six inside it and then mist out again before it ever hit the water.




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