A Flight of Ravens by John Conroe (thriller books to read TXT) 📗

another rough map, with details of the northwest section.  My team all leaned in and offered landmarks and corrections.  After a minute, I tuned most of them out and listened to my sniper’s comments.  Soshi’s eye for range and direction is excellent, as you would expect.  My drawing skills are so-so.  I stopped when the map felt complete enough.  This time, the swinging tie pulled immediately to a blank spot on my map between a pub that Trell knew well and a seafood seller that Drew recommended.

“What’s in between?” I asked.

Both of them paused, Trell closing his eyes in some kind of visualization thing and Drew tapping his chin as he thought about it.

“Just doors, I think.” Drew answered first.  “Apartments, I would guess.”

Trell’s eyes popped open when Drew said apartments and he suddenly tensed up.  “Yeah, that sounds right,” the tall bard said, his eyes locked onto me.  Like afraid-to-look-anywhere-else locked on to me.

“Have either of you been in them?” I asked.  “Information about the layout would be vital.”  I watched Trell, as I knew Drew would have spoken up.

“Um, it’s possible, like a long time ago,” Trell admitted.  “I was likely pretty drunk, so I don’t really remember too much.”

Kassa frowned and looked at him closely.

“You sure about that?  Drunk even the next morning, stud?” Soshi asked with smirk.

“Well, now that you mention it, I have a vague memory of walking downstairs and then a long hall before leaving out a front door,” Trell said, shifting his feet and rubbing the side of his head.  “Maybe one or two buildings down from the pub.”

“How many doors in that hallway?” Jella asked.

“Not super clear on that.  Maybe two on each side. Possibly three?”

“I can’t tell exactly where he is in this space, so we’re gonna have to do it the hard way,” I said.

Chapter 27

It turned out to be easier than we anticipated, by virtue of the fact that Andru was coming out the front door of the middle building as we approached.  Unfortunately, he saw us just as we saw him.

There were three buildings jammed together between the fish shop and the bar, with no spaces or alleys to run into.  He took his only option, which was to run back into the building and slam the door.

Jella and I were right behind him, blasting the door open in time to spot him at the far end of a dark hallway.  Two people were lying or sitting on the floor, either passed out, dead, or stoned into a coma.  They were both on Jella’s side, but she easily hurdled each of them as we raced after the stubby bastard. He was shockingly fast for such a short man, yet not fast enough, as we were gaining on him.  He ran right through the grease-paper window at the far end, tearing the paper and smashing the rickety wooden frame right out of the wall.  Two seconds later, we arrived at the newly formed opening just in time to see Andru run right into a wooden beam that Cort swung into his face.

The sound was like a door slamming and the short bundle of muscle was laid out flat—for a second.  Then he sat up, shaking his shaggy head just as Drew stepped up and hit him from behind with a weighted cudgel.  He still didn’t drop, instead starting to growl like a wounded animal.

That’s when a pair of bolter darts appeared in his back and neck, one right after the other.  Coated with enough of our special knockout agent to stun a woldling, it had an immediate effect.  Andru stiffened up and fell back, his body locking up tight.

I looked around and spotted Soshi up on the roof of the seafood place, a barely visible trail of gas rising from the long-barreled bolter she was already reloading.

The back door of the pub opened and a seedy-looking man with a mop and bucket started to come out, only to see us and change his mind.  Quick as a wink, he was back inside, the door almost slamming, the thunk of a wooden beam sounding as he no doubt barred it.

“Damn, it was like I hit a rock,” Drew said, shaking out his arm.

“No shit, this guy is tough!” Cort said.  “I think he was starting to get mad.”

“You should thank your leader’s foresight in having Soshi on overwatch,” Jella said.  “When a Nuk goes into a battle rage, you pretty much have to take out his or her brain or spine to stop them.  Even a heart shot will leave them as much as ten seconds to wreak unbelievable damage.  Foresters tend to just put an arrow in their eye socket.”

“Tricky shot,” Soshi noted as she climbed nimbly down from her perch.

“Eye socket, nose, or open mouth are all good, as is a center neck shot,” Jella instructed, using a long hunting knife to point at each anatomical target as she said it.  “Their skulls are so thick that only bodkin points are assured of getting through all that bone.”

“Let’s get him bound and out of here,” I said, looking around.

“Use the steel manacles I told you to bring,” Jella said.

Cort pulled a set of super expensive chains and cuffs from a pack.  “I thought you were crazy when you told us he would just break most rope but now…”

“Yeah, I don’t want to try wrestling this squatty dude,” Drew agreed.

“He would literally pull your arms from your sockets,” Jella said.  “Hand-to-hand, you either choke them immediately or bleed them out with multiple artery cuts.”

“What if you don’t have a blade?” Soshi asked.

“Run,” Jella said without a hint of a smile.  “They are surprisingly quick, but only for short bursts.  All that mass takes too much oxygen to keep it moving.”

“Shit, he weighs as much as Cort and me together,” Drew said as they rolled our captive over to remove the darts and bind his arms.

He was a block of muscle and bone, his hands and feet huge