“Portal!” The cry tore through the room just as the wind intensity jumped from that of a summer storm to a hurricane.
Someone screamed, a lot of other someones went running for the exits, and a giant black maw clawed open the air, ripping a hole through reality right in the middle of the room.
It sent a lot of people sliding across the floor or stumbling against the walls—
Including ours, when a man in a business suit skidded helplessly over the slick stone floor and into a ward that someone had erected in front of our conference room. I hadn’t seen who did it, but it held, leaving him stuck there like a bug on a fly strip. He flailed around, trying to find purchase, but the ward wouldn’t let him in and the wind wouldn’t let him move away.
And he wasn’t the only one in trouble.
One of the servants had a tray of drinks thrown back in his face. Another went staggering into the clump of weres, causing two more to spontaneously change and one of those to go for his throat, only to be pulled back at the last second by the dark-haired man. I saw the woman with all the feathers resemble a bird for more than one reason when she literally went flying, being picked up off her feet and slammed into a column. Where she stayed, splayed flat, until she managed to roll off into the relative safety of a conference room.
But most of the others weren’t trying for temporary safety.
Most of the others were trying to get out.
“Nobody leaves!” the consul snapped at Marlowe. “Seal it off!”
He looked at her wildly for a second, but did as he was told. Everywhere, the senate’s guards started pushing people back, which was easier than you might expect, because the winds weren’t acting normal. They were coming out of the portal in mad gusts, but in all different directions. And then hitting the walls and circling back around from still more.
The result was people being propelled toward the doorways one minute and shoved away from them the next. Or ending up caught in the middle, like one of the servants, who had abandoned his post in an attempt to flee, only to find himself running in place when two strong gusts hit him from opposite directions. And to be flipped on his face when one cut out sooner than the other.
And then the pressure abruptly got worse.
I made a sound of pain, because it felt like someone was stabbing a knife into my eardrums, or like I was on a plane that had decided to head for the stratosphere with no warning. Mircea pulled me against him, while Marlowe started screaming instructions to his men, who had arrived in force to help with the doors, where fights had broken out between those trying to get out and those attempting to keep them in. And I still didn’t know why.
“We’re in this together,” the consul told me viciously, I guess reading the confusion on my face. “If one of us goes, so do the rest. Best they understand that now.”
“You think someone in here is to blame?” I asked.
“We’re not on a ley line!” Marlowe yelled, as if in answer, although I doubted he’d heard. He was too busy listening to his men. “And we half buried this place in anti-portal charms! How are they doing this?”
“Someone is acting as a locus,” the consul snarled. Her tone said that it was the last thing they’d ever do.
“A what?” I asked, yelling now, too, because the wind was insane.
“A spell designed to override the charms,” Mircea explained. “It is possible to extend a portal’s gate, elongating it to reach from a ley line into an area where you wish it to manifest, if that location is relatively nearby. However, charms can be set up to deny that and reflect it back again. After the last attack, we put a large number of them in place—”
“But a locus could override them if powerful enough,” Marlowe shouted. “And if performed by someone inside the charmed space—”
“In other words, we’ve been betrayed,” the consul spat.
But Marlowe wasn’t having it. “We’ve received no warning from the Circle!” he yelled, one hand to his ear, trying to block out the noise so he could hear the voices in his head. “They monitor the portal system. A spike this big should have set off every alarm they had. There’s no way in this world to hide that much power!”
In this world? I thought, a weird feeling coming over me.
Oh, shit.
“What is it?” Mircea asked, but I didn’t get a chance to answer.
Because the people who were close enough had started diving into the conference rooms for protection, and that included Parendra. Who threw the splayed-limbed guy off the front of ours, sending him tumbling into the wind, and somehow pushed inside. The ward crackled and spit around him, but it parted, and a second later he had Mircea by the collar. And was immediately knocked back into Marlowe, who had the presence of mind to hold on to him—also for about a second.
Parendra broke away with a savage gesture and rounded on the consul. Only to get caught again from behind, and Marlowe wasn’t playing this time. His face was vicious and his fangs were out and completely extended. In that moment, he looked like a killer.
I stared at him.
I didn’t think I’d ever be able to see the laughing charmer again.
But he somehow held on, even as Parendra struggled. I assumed that wouldn’t last for long; a consul could destroy Marlowe, but he wasn’t giving it his all. He was too busy staring down Marlowe’s master, who was regarding him with a sneer on her lovely features.