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“I will, but one last thing. What’s a Sub Rosa?”

“A guardian angel,” I say.

“Guardian asshole,” she mumbles, and opens the doors.

After getting my second set of stitches, Aqua Regia, and more laudanum, I sleep hard.

In fact, the whole dog pack sleeps late. I only wake up when someone drops a shot-up transmission as they’re raising it out of a truck and it shears off the side of the engine housing. Apparently there was a memorial service for everyone who died in the firefight. I don’t like preachers and a few of the dead didn’t deserve it, so I’m glad I missed it.

An hour later, I’m sitting on my bike staring at Daja and the wreck of the camp behind her.

It’s going to be a few days’ work to get the havoc on its feet and moving again. The mechanics strip every part from every dead vehicle. Then they start on the Hellion AAVs. One of them is still running, but there’s a few inches of Hellion blood inside that need to be swabbed out. It’s times like this that I’m glad I’m in the pack. I don’t know how to fix car engines. I don’t want to haul supplies in and out of trucks like the conscripts. And I sure don’t want to be on blood cleanup duty.

When the whole pack was in the motor home last night, the Magistrate laid out our post-getting-royally-fucked orders. One, do a recon run up the road and scout for other towns and potential ambush points. And two, look for a landmark the dear departed Empress told the Magistrate about. An obelisk with instructions to whatever magic beans it is we’re looking for. Fortunately, they’re both in the same direction, so yay for small favors.

Billy is still laid up with his belly wound, but at least he’s not dead. Lerajie, Babetta, and the old toothless guy are dead (I never could remember his name, but with the white power tats on his knuckles I didn’t try very hard). The rest of us are bandaged and stitched together, but basically functional.

“We’re short on people, so this is going to get complicated,” Daja says. “We need people on the run, but we need to leave enough behind to protect the Magistrate.”

“Why not just do four and four?” says Wanuri.

“I thought of that, but with shit the way it is, I’d like one more to stay here as guard.”

“That leaves three of us for the run. We can make do with that,” Johnny says to the group.

Daja shakes her head.

“That’s thin if anything goes wrong out there. Even if it’s just a breakdown when you’re far out. Two on one bike might not have the fuel to make it back.”

&nbs

p; I raise my hand.

Daja gives me a look.

“This isn’t kindergarten. Say what you have to say.”

“Get Traven to help stand guard. That will give us four for the road.”

The pack laughs quietly.

“No offense, dear, but he looks like he’s afraid of moths,” says Doris.

“I used to work with him back home. He put the fear of God in a lot of bad people. And I watched him kill an Inquisitor with his bare hands.”

Medea Bava was the grand high executioner for the Sub Rosa in L.A., and she had a real thing for me. She might have taken me down, too, if it wasn’t for Traven.

“An Inquisitor? How old are you?” says Barbora.

“Not that kind of Inquisitor. More like an enforcer for a group of underground power brokers.”

“Father Traven?” says Daja. “Mr. Bookworm Librarian? You saw him kill someone.”

“With his bare hands. And he’s damned more souls than Hooters. He could do a trick called the Via Dolorosa. Whenever he wanted, he could fill a soul full of so much sin it was a one-way ticket to Pandemonium.”

The pack isn’t impressed. Lots of shaking heads and nos.

“Look, mate, I respect loyalty to a friend, but you’ve got to be fucking joking,” says Johnny.