Page 86 of Truthfinder’s Promise

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A black sedan idled outside the estate gates. Meredith brought the dirt bike to a stop and swung her leg over, Jensen a solid presence at her side, two-hundred pounds of claws and teeth and white fur.

Not that she should need him. She had precisely zero plans to step outside her wards, no matter how much the people waiting in the sedan were no doubt hoping she would. Julian had texted that Analisa was “sending someone” to pick up the necklace. He’d failed to specify who, but as soon as the car doors opened and its two occupants stepped out, she had a pretty good idea who—or what—they were.

Thralls.

A man and a woman in identical garb, loose black pants and black tunic-like shirts, walked toward her. At first glance, and if they weren’t moving, they might seem perfectly normal. But one look in their eyes and she knew something was off. Their eyes were dead, like there wasn’t a mind behind them. They turned to the gate and walked up to it in perfect unison, their movements at once both fluid and unnatural.

“You have something for me?” the woman asked. Something about the way she said it hit wrong. The voice matched the body, but the tone and cadence didn’t, as if someone else spoke through her mouth.

Meredith’s Aspect was an itch beneath her skin in the same way it had been when she’d first seen Jensen hiding behind his glamour. What stood before her wasn’t the truth. But it wasn’t exactly a lie, either.

An image of the circlet from the repository slipped into her mind, and she was struck with the certainty that if she had it, she could identify the thing that wasn’t quite right about the people. That whatever made them Analisa’s thralls would be revealed to her.

Jensen nudged her. She shook the image away, pulled the necklace from her pocket and tossed it through the gate. The man caught it and held it up for inspection before nodding. “I look forward to meeting you in person.”

Which would be a strange thing for someone she was literally standing in front of to say except that, like the other thrall, this one’s voice matched him, but the rhythms of his speech were the same as the woman’s had been. As if someone spoke through them like they were mere extensions of something else.

Meredith inclined her head. “I’m sure the pleasure will be all mine, Analisa.”

The man’s lips split in a wide grin. “Oh, indeed.” He turned, the female thrall moving in sync as they climbed into the car and drove away.

“Well, this is going to be creepier than I thought.”

Jensen yipped in agreement. Overhead a raven let out a sharp call before diving toward the house.

Hel was back.

They planned for hours, dissecting Hel’s information and going through every possible scenario. Sunset had come and gone, and Val was doing a final run-through.

“Meredith, we’ll be monitoring your phone’s GPS. Once we lose contact with it, we’ll know you’ve entered the bounds of the disorientation spell. From that point, you’ll have two hours to locate the Shifters before we arrive. Try not to move on it earlier than that unless you have to, otherwise we won’t be there to help you.

“We’ll begin moving into the zone at one-point-five hours after your entrance, estimating a half hour travel time for us to be in a usable position. We’ll have four teams moving in, starting from a different compass position at the perimeter, each team with a Shifter to guide us past the disorientation spell’s range of influence.”

Hel’s reconnaissance mission had proved the Shifters could pass through the disorientation spell in their animal forms without ill effect. She’d felt the brush of its magic, which had dissipated once the forest gave way to an interior clearing where a manor rested. It meant the spell was likely dome-shaped, allowing it to keep the entirety of the area hidden, but only had ground cover on the exterior, leaving the clearing free of its influence. Necessary, if Analisa intended to host Aspecters who would have clear enough minds to open their wallets at her auction.

“Each of the four teams is a beefed up standard, twenty total. Fourteen Battle Aspecters, four Elementals with combat training, and two specialty Aspecters varying by group. Once we hit the clearing, if we can take down the disorientation spell once we’re already in position, it could be a significant drain on the power Analisa’s using to fuel it, as well as misdirect her attention. We won’t know how feasible that is until we’re on the inside.”

Hel had counted twenty-six thralls on the grounds. The looks she’d managed through the manor’s windows had shown more inside, but trying to get an actual count would have made it all too obvious she wasn’t an ordinary bird. She’d also noted two outbuildings on the property, livestock-style windowless barns she’d described as “really big” and “super long.” What was inside them was anyone’s guess.

“Our priorities are getting the captive Shifters to safety and securing Analisa. The auction attendees will no doubt make a break for it at the first sign of trouble. We apprehend if possible but not at the expense of our first two priorities. Any final questions or concerns? Is everyone clear on their part?” Valkyrie waited, making eye contact with everyone around the table. “Good. Then get some sleep and wake up tomorrow with your heads on straight.”

Get some sleep. Sure, like that was going to be happening. The anxiety of tomorrow didn’t lend itself well to an insomniac finding sleep.

Meredith left Jensen talking to Hel and Rebekah and went up to her room. It seemed unfair that if she had to infiltrate a home and rescue people within it, she was not a Hollywood super spy. She didn’t have a skillset for every situation, she couldn’t beat the crap out of anyone, and she didn’t have a convenient blueprint of the home or an equally convenient person good at reading blueprints who could look at them and tell her the likeliest place to hold a bunch of strong Shifters.

She wasn’t the best person for this job. She was just the one that could get into the auction. That does make you the best person for the job, dumbass. You are good at handling people. No one else can play this part.

Didn’t mean she had to like that once she’d done the schmoozing and misdirection, it would all be on Jensen’s shoulders to handle the brute force part of their plan. If anything happened to him… She shook her head. She had her Aspect—it might not be very useful in a fight, but she knew how to be inventive.

Even so, she found herself wandering into one of her large walk-in closets, opening the bottom drawer of her jewelry box. A custom-made lock pick set waited, dripping with diamonds and orange sapphires. If she wore her hair up, the picks could be incorporated into the style, the pick ends hidden in her hair, the half showing looking like nothing more than an expensive hair pin.

She hadn’t worn them in over seven years. Not since she’d convinced her mother she was so ditzy there was no use in draining her Aspect dry and locking her away during important events. But as she picked the pins up, held them in her hands and felt the familiar weight and grip, they were a comfort. A reminder of her adaptability.

She placed them on top of the box and went to the side of her closet that held her evening gowns. Dress after dress slid through her fingers as she looked and discarded, hardly seeing them. The soft fabrics against her skin were another comfort. She might not have liked being her mother’s little dress-up doll, but she did like nice clothes.

Something about the weight of a quality dress, the way the right cut and design could speak louder than words, was its own kind of armor, but it no longer felt like enough.