Page 36 of On A Rift’s Edge (Riftworld #2)

L yall was in no mood to talk with Teo. Beating him to within an inch of his life, on the other hand, had a certain amount of appeal.

“If you don’t want your ass handed to you, I suggest you turn around and go away.

” Lyall didn’t bother to look up from his work.

The desk in front of him was covered in paper—maps of the surrounding area, blueprints of the empty commercial building they were in, and even city records of underground structures like sewage pipes.

The material had been printed from satellite images and other, older sources.

Lyall could use computers, of course. He just didn’t like the fucking things.

“Another parlay?” Teo sounded hopeful. “An informal one. I have a gift.”

Lyall gave up and raised his head.

The hopper held a large bottle of scotch in one hand. “I threatened to break Fable’s arm if he didn’t tell me what you would consider a proper offering.”

Well, he could use a drink and more importantly learn why the hopper wanted to risk bothering him again.

“Five minutes.” Lyall held his hand out, and Teo cautiously came forward to hand him the bottle.

“What are you doing?” Teo examined Lyall’s work surface with interest. The hopper continued to improve his Earth alterform, although he had odd quirks that would raise the suspicions of anyone paying attention. It would be good enough to fool most humans, though.

“My fucking job,” Lyall answered as he opened the scotch. It was a decent brand. Fable had no interest in alcohol, but he was quite good at stealing stuff that was worth a lot at resale. Lyall didn’t have a glass handy, so he took a gulp from the bottle.

Teo showed no sign of comprehension. In addition to Lyall’s personal dislike of the hopper, Teo provided an added layer of complication to his plan.

Lyall hated wild cards like that. Unlike Mabel and Fable, the hopper was dangerously naive about human society.

He was an excellent fighter, better even than Zale, but lacked a sense of self-preservation, as evidenced by the fact that he was here.

Lyall didn’t need the currently fucked-up situation to get any worse. Kat was safely out of Arimanius’s grasp, and as much as it hurt to lose him, Lyall had always known that even the Matchmaker couldn’t create a world where the two of them could be together.

As for his friends, Remi had enough sense to tell Kaveh not to confront Arimanius while Lyall was once again the mafia boss’s indentured servant.

The boss would love a fight between Lyall and the drakone who taken both the control object and his half-human son.

That battle would leave either him or the Azdaha dead, and Lyall’s money would be on Kaveh.

Then there was the control object. Since Arimanius had Zale as his only asset in the monstertown, there was a good chance the don would cut his losses and take Lyall and his new froggy recruit back to Boston.

Arimanius knew Lyall would be the best person to train the hopper, partially because Lyall wouldn’t be able to handle Teo’s current level of cluelessness and the contract regretfully stopped him from killing the hopper.

Maybe it was best to start with the basics.

“We’re here.” Lyall showed Teo several different views of their current location, a penthouse at the top of an abandoned downtown office building in Tucson.

The building was empty of anyone but Arimanius and his Colony enforcers.

“I’m going over possible escape routes in case of attack by either riftpeople or humans, as well as assessing any weak points in the defense of our current position.

There are wards preventing portal entry to this space, but direct assault remains an option.

Mabel and Fable are far better at grand larceny than holding off a fighting force, and Zale is away failing miserably as a spy.

That leaves the two of us unless the boss gets involved, and we’ll never hear the end of it if that happens. ”

“There are human technologies that can help with this type of risk assessment.” Teo held out his wrist, which was encircled with one of the human e-watches that could be used to interface with a cyberbug.

A pair of inquisitive antennae popped up, and then a cyberbug with red wings speckled with black dots rose out the phone.

Arimanius had let Teo borrow Evangeline. Giana was going to be furious.

Teo made a decent attempt to talk to the cyberbug with a series of trills and chirps, but she ignored him and flew over to rest on Lyall’s hand.

“Hello, Evangeline.” Lyall lifted up his hand and smiled at the cyberbug, dropping his mental shields to allow for better communication.

Given that she spent most of her time with Giana, Evangeline was better at using voice mimicry to set up cons than planning for a fight, but she could get the job done.

“Teo’s a little slow on the uptake. Show him a 3-D version of the data on this table and add in any online human data sources, please. ”

Evangeline gave a delighted trill and buzzed over the papers before zooming back into Teo’s watch.

A few moments later a hologram began to form on the desk, creating the building and the surrounding neighborhood in miniature form.

Potential security vulnerabilities and escape routes were highlighted in glowing colors, as were load-bearing supports inside the walls of the high-rise.

Evangeline kindly added in a timer to count down the minutes of Lyall’s painful conversation with the hopper.

Teo furrowed his brow. “I didn’t think the ratkind planned out war strategies like this. They’re a group of thieves, not soldiers. Also, how did you get the cyberbug to obey you? It won’t listen to me at all.”

“You’re not a soldier anymore. You’re hired security for a group of ratkind thieves.

” Lyall watched the timer tick down, wishing he had given the hopper less time.

“As for Evangeline, she likes me. By the way, she also belongs to Giana Gatti, and the don’s wife won’t be happy he took her.

I’d stay out of that domestic dispute if I were you. ”

Teo frowned but nodded. “This is valuable information. What do you want to know from me in exchange?”

“How did Arimanius know that Kat had been selected by the Matchmaker for me?” Lyall asked.

Teo opened his mouth, then did something with his tongue. “I can’t say the name in this form. The little scuttling creatures that unlocked the stasis chamber, that’s how he knew.”

“The trash scorpions told him?” Lyall hadn’t expected that. Damn crabs.

“Not told him, no.” Teo shrugged. “The species is known for the ability to identify the Matchmaker’s choice.

They are protected and given gifts for this ability by my clan and others.

The capitán knew of your gatito and wanted to find out why you had taken such an interest in a human.

He told me you don’t care for them much. ”

Lyall grunted. “True enough. So, Arimanius stole a trash scorpion and put him in that art exhibit, then conned Kat’s sisters into bringing their brother there.”

Teo nodded. “But he didn’t expect Kat to make friends with the head of the trash scorpion clan and convince them to let me out of the stasis chamber. Your pet human is quite charming.”

“He’s not a pet and get his name out of your filthy mouth.” Lyall snarled the warning even as he turned the new information over in his mind. “You don’t think Arimanius planned to take you out of stasis that soon.”

“If at all.” Teo sighed. “I didn’t lie to you before about wanting you to go away and be happy with your pretty human.

I’d like to be free myself, but I signed a contract with a new capitán because if my people find me they will kill me on sight.

If I have to be a servant, I’d like to be the top dog, at least.”

Teo broke into laughter at his own joke.

“This has been a blast, but your time is up.” Lyall pointed to the floating timer Evangeline had set up.

“One more thing.” Teo leaned over and held out his hand for the bottle.

Was scotch dangerous for hoppers? Well, it was poisonous to humans and they drank it. He took another chug of the amber liquid to show him what to do and gave him the bottle.

“Zale sent a message to the capitán, but I made sure to intercept it.” Teo eyed the scotch with a mix of trepidation and curiosity. “He’s made a deal with someone on the inside to grab the control object and bring it here.”

“A deal with Remi?” Lyall was puzzled. His friend was great at cons, but he knew his father better than anyone. Attempting to beat Arimanius at his own game was too big a risk, no matter how much Remi might want to help Lyall out.

Teo gripped the bottle’s neck, preparing to imitate Lyall’s maneuver. “He made the deal with Kat. Your little gatito is headed here to try and save you.”

Lyall shot to his feet, alarm racing through him, as Teo tilted the bottle up and took a large gulp.

The hopper bent over, coughing and grabbing at his throat. He spat the liquid onto the floor.

Lyall gave him a whack between his shoulder blades and dragged him upright. “No, I’m not fucking going to let him do this, and you’re going to help me.”

It took Lyall a solid twenty minutes to get Teo in good enough shape to stand and talk with any degree of coherence.

What a fucking lightweight.

The full story from the hopper wasn’t much help. Kat had sent the text to Arimanius’s phone, which Teo had been able to intercept because he had been told to work on transferring Evangeline from one e-watch to another.

Evangeline was more helpful. In return for an update on Bug—cyberbugs reproduced asexually, but the two had always been sweet on each other—she provided additional details. Kat had messaged the mafia boss yesterday afternoon from a strip-mall restaurant not far from his parents’ home.