Kirev's Door Read Online Free PDF Page A

minutes already and his absence might be missed by Dan, if not others. When the twin thoughts solidified, he barely hesitated, turning so that his back faced the muscular seer. He felt Wreg’s fingers at the base of his neck, nearly a caress before he lifted the collar, sliding the cold metal of the cutters into the ring.
    “You ready, little brother?”
    Kirev nodded, once.
    Wreg squeezed the cutters in his hand, slicing through the soft metal like flesh.
    Kirev let out an involuntary gasp as he felt the organism in the collar die. Within seconds, the strands that held onto the bones of his spine retracted. Something about killing the collar while he wore it like that always pained him, despite what it was.
    He stood there, fighting to recover, as Wreg did something to the two ends, likely to hold them together to make the collar seem whole.
    “More or less, yes,” Wreg grunted, even as he fit the ends together. “We also have a light field on this, to make it appear alive to the seers watching…”
    Kriev nodded, swallowing. He didn’t move while the larger seer worked.
    “You are all right?” Wreg said, as he stepped away from him.
    Kriev nodded, turning to face him. He had to fight not to touch the collar, or the place on his neck where it had entered his skin and flesh.
    “Yes,” he said only.
    “Good,” Wreg said again. He clapped a reassuring hand on his shoulder. “And yes, we’re doing this tonight, little brother. The labs, too. We will go there directly from here. But we don’t want them rebuilding when we’re done.”
    Kirev looked at him, confused. “But I thought the whole building––”
    “It will,” Wreg cut in. “But we’re not taking chances with the major players, and that includes all of the think tank assholes. The key is insurance. For your human, at least. And easier to smuggle inside than a gun.”
    Understanding reached Kirev, right before he nodded. “I see.”
    “Can you make sure it’s on him before he takes you upstairs?”
    Kirev motioned a decisive yes with one hand.
    Even so, he felt his jaw harden.
    Wreg must have felt it. He sharpened his gaze on Kirev’s face, even as he stuffed the ID Kirev had given him into an inside pocket of his jacket.
    “What?” he said. “What is it?”
    Kirev hesitated, then just said it.
    “There is a female here. One of our kind. I do not know if the human with her is on the list, but her situation is not good. I wondered if––”
    Wreg’s gaze abruptly cleared. “Do not worry about her, little brother.”
    Kirev frowned. “Meaning what?”
    “She is one of ours.”
    Kirev started. Then he found himself flushing, even as he fought discomfort. “Who is that she is with? Another who works in the labs?”
    “Do not worry about that, either, brother,” Wreg said, his voice slightly warning.
    Kirev frowned. He fought to control the reaction in his light, but could not.
    “What?” Wreg said again. “What is wrong? She will not be hurt…”
    But Kirev was already shaking his head.
    “I am not doing this again,” he said. Clicking under his breath, he gave the other a harder look. “…Playing the pet. Infiltrating the humans like this. I do not want to be groomed for this… specialization, brother. If that is what you or the Father have in mind for me, then this will be my last job. I will find some other way to fight for my race.”
    There was a silence.
    In it, both of them just looked at one another in the dark, their seer night vision penetrating the relative dimness with the help of the outside lights shining through the window from the Cliff House and that rising three-quarters moon. Even so, even without the collar, Kirev was blind with a seer as sight-trained as Wreg, at least in the ways that mattered.
    He knew he would be an open book to Wreg, however.
    Even as he thought it, Wreg smiled faintly, clapping him on the shoulder with a muscular hand. “We go where we’re needed most, little brother,” he said.