Wings of Fire Ch. 19 - Teaser (Patreon)

‘I thought my glory days were behind me,’ Maribel chuckled.

“They usually are until some Nazi bastard gets sentimental.” Michelle smiled despite everything. A rough laugh cracked through the radio, which didn’t exactly sound like joy, but close enough to frighten anyone who knew what it meant.

‘God help me,’ Maribel laughed, ‘I missed having a righteous reason.’

“You have one.”

‘Oh, I hear that.’

“Can you help?”

‘Oh, I can do more than help,’ Maribel stated without hesitation. There was a shift on the other end of the line, the scrape of a chair, and the hard clack of a receiver being set down but not disconnected. Michelle heard Maribel turn from the radio and shout into the room beyond.

‘Rafa! Bells! Wake every house! Copper Lantern priority!’

Someone answered in the background, sounding startled but cheery, as though he’d never hear those words again, but was happy to hear them. Maribel’s voice rose, filling with the old authority of a woman who had once made occupation forces bleed without ever letting them see her face.

‘Tell the Brass Saint, the Low Door, the Red Violin, all of them. The fight is on at the Chicago flight docks. Chimera is here.’

There was a pause, then her voice came out louder.

‘Yes, I said Chimera! Get the rifles.’

“Maribel,” Michelle breathed, gripping the transmitter tighter.

Maribel came back onto the line. ‘Still there, Artemis?’

“For now.”

‘Then stay that way. We’ll be along soon.’

“We’ll hold as long as we can.”

‘You had better. I am too old to rescue corpses and too angry to be polite about it,’ Maribel groused, and despite herself, Michelle laughed. It hurt, but it helped, and Maribel’s voice softened for a second.

‘Your people?’

“Bleeding, but holding, bless them.”

‘Li-Fan?’ Maribel asked and Michelle looked toward the door as another burst of gunfire echoed above.

“Holding with the rest of them, and likely giving the bastards hell,” Michelle stated proudly.

‘Good woman,’ Maribel stated.

“The best,” Michelle agreed.

‘Then don’t waste what she’s buying you.’

“I don’t intend to,” Michelle swallowed. Then the old warmth vanished from Maribel’s voice, replaced by command.

‘Listen carefully. Keep them in choke points. Do not let the mob spread across the open deck. If they have police at the entrances, that means they are trying to isolate the berth. I’ll send runners through the old service routes and hit the blocked access points from behind.’

Michelle’s eyes narrowed with grim appreciation. “You still know the dock tunnels?”

‘Darling, I know places under this city where rats go to confess.’

“Of course you do.”

‘The Council will be warned and we’ll call every veteran still alive, along with anyone sober enough to aim. Anyone too drunk to aim can carry ammunition.’

“Maribel.”

‘Yes?’

“If you come, come hard,” Michelle told her and the laugh that came through the radio this time was all teeth.

‘Artemis,’ La Madrina said, ‘I only know one way.’