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“I’ll tell you later.”

She tries the office’s back door.

“It’s locked,” she says.

“Let me see.”

I stand in front of it so she can’t see me and whisper some Hellion hoodoo. There’s no explosion, but the doorknob and its internal mechanism fly apart in my hand.

“How did you do that?”

“Magic.”

“Fuck you.”

Daja takes a knife off one of the dead guards, so now she has one in each hand. I leave the na’at as a sword for the moment.

There are more explosions out front. More gunfire. A horrendous crash of metal on metal. I gently push the door open and we go inside.

There’s no one in the back office. We creep up the hall, checking each of the side rooms. Those are empty, too. Up front by the check-in desk, four Legionnaires are hunkered down. The Magistrate lies on a fake leather sofa. He’s gagged and his arms are tied behind his back. The front of the office is peppered with bullet holes. The Legionnaires are all chattering to each other in nervous, guttural Hellion. I don’t know if Daja can understand it, but I can and it makes me smile.

The deserters are working out how best to desert the other deserters. Through the window, I see that one of the AAVs is on fire. They jump at each successive explosion from the havoc’s cars. These aren’t officers. They’re all outside in the fight. These are the ones too stupid or useless to do anything but babysit an unarmed man. Only one of them has the brains to actually hold her rifle. The other three have left theirs on the floor. From the way things look, I don’t think any of them has ever been in a firefight before.

I tap Daja on the shoulder and point to the Hellion holding the rifle. She’s closest to the Magistrate, so I know Daja will go all out for him. Two of the others are on their knees planning their getaway. The fourth one is also by the Magistrate, but couldn’t care less about him. He’s on the lookout for officers who might blow their escape plans. I point to myself and the two talkers. She points to the lookout. I point to both of us and shrug. Basically, whoever gets there first. She nods.

With her fingers, she counts down: three, two, one—

She springs at the soldier near the Magistrate, getting her in the ribs with both knives. The two talkers turn at the sound and scramble for their rifles. I slice the arm off the one who almost reaches his. Swing the blade around and take off his buddy’s head.

There’s a shot and all of a sudden my right side is on fire. My leg goes numb and collapses. Not for long, but long enough for the lookout, whose gun jammed, to clear it. However, before he can turn me inside out, the Magistrate kicks out, driving the shooter’s head into the wall. His rifle goes off, but the shots are wild and I can roll out of the way. By the time I have the na’at up, Daja is on the guy with her knives buried in his heart.

I limp over to the Magistrate and use Doris’s butcher knife to cut his hands free. Daja takes off his gag.

“Thank you both,” he says. He puts his hands on Daja’s bloody cheeks and she hugs him.

I can feel blood running down my side, but I’m not about to look at the wound. My leg gets funny again, but I make it to the window before it goes. I kneel down and look outside.

There are a lot of bloody patches on the ground where dead Hellions and souls blipped out to Tartarus. The gunfire from the roof and out front is more sporadic. A second AAV is on fire. There’s a whole wall of exploded havoc vehicles burning out front. Smoke slowly drifts down from the ceiling.

“I believe the building is on fire,” says the Magistrate. “Perhaps we should go out the back.”

I look down the hall.

“Good news. That’s the part that’s on fire.”

Daja looks out the front window. The wall of flame is higher than ever. She turns to me.

“I knew I shouldn’t trust you. Big talker. Man with the plan. What’s the plan now?”

I look at the Magistrate.

“You’re the smart one. What do you say?”

“I am sorry,” he says sleepily. “This one hit my head with his rifle. It’s hard to think . . .”

The smoke is getting thicker, drifting down with a red rain of ashes.

I hate lying. No, actually I love lying. I just like it to be a good one and this might be the lamest lie I’ve ever come up with.