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  Fallen Angels

  The year is 2063. Earth has been reborn. unleashing long-dormant magical forces across the globe. Megacorporations rule from on high. while organized crime syndicates rule the underworld. Sliding through the cracks are the shadowrunners—professionals who will do anything for a profit...and anything it takes to get the job done.

  Kellan Colt has come far in her magical training. But all her accomplishments haven't satisfied her desire to know the truth about her shadowrunner mother, and to learn the secrets of the amulet she found among her mother's possessions. Kellan is determined to find answers—and to earn the respect of her fellow runners in the process.

  Lately Kellan has been troubled by disturbing dreams. Something seems to be calling her, but before she can figure out who—or what—she joins a run into the paranoiac elven homeland of Tir Tairngire. Trapped deep inside foreign territory, she suddenly discovers the answers to her questions, but then she must unravel the most difficult riddle of all: Who can she really trust in the shadows?

  Double Cross

  Silk caught a gleam of something in one of the pockets on Aerwin’s close-fitting dark pants—a few links of a golden chain, hastily shoved into her pocket, had spilled loose in their struggle. Just as Aerwin followed his gaze, he stepped forward and crouched down, reaching to grab the trailing chain and pull it free.

  Her reaction was a fraction of a moment too late. Silk caught the chain and tugged, and it came out of her pocket. Along with it came a jade amulet in the shape of a dragon.

  "This is Marc’s," he accused, eyes coming up to fix hers with a cold glare. "This is why you fragged us?"

  "You have no idea how completely," Aerwin said softly, with a poisonous smile.

  Suddenly the night turned to day as a blazing light stabbed down from the sky. Though Silk’s optics compensated for the glare, he was momentarily dazzled, and reflexively sought the source of the light.

  Aerwin’s kick sent his pistol flying, but Silk held on to the amulet. He dove to the side as her weapon cleared its holster. There was no cover on the slope, nowhere to hide as the dark-clad woman leveled her gun directly at him, no way she could miss at this distance. Silk had seen her take down far harder targets.

  The shot that came, however, wasn’t from Aerwin’s gun but from farther up the slope, and it sent her staggering back. Silk followed the sound of the shot and saw Mustang standing less than fifteen meters away, fierce determination creasing her face as she scrambled down the slope toward them. He saw that the light was coming from a helicopter hovering overhead, its searchlight sweeping the side of the mountain.

  "Drop your weapons!" a voice boomed in English. "Drop your weapons and put your hands on your heads!"

  ROC

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  First published by Roc, an imprint of New American Library, a division of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.

  First Printing, March 2006

  10 987654321

  Copyright © WizKids, Inc., 2006 All rights reserved

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  Printed in the United States of America

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  FALLEN ANGELS

  A Shadowrun™ Novel

  Stephen Kenson

  To my friends; my parents, George and Lynn; and to Christopher, most of all.

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  When you write in the Sixth World of Shadowrun®, you stand on the shoulders of giants. My deepest thanks to Mike Mulvihill for his trust and guidance, to Sharon Turner Mulvihill for her input and expert editing, and to Bob Charrette, Tom Dowd, Paul Hume, and Jordan Weisman for starting it all, and each helping in his own way to bring the Sixth World to glorious and gritty life. Without them, this book wouldn’t exist, and I would have missed out on a whole lot of fun along the way.

  Contents

  Cover

  Copyright

  Title

  Dedication

  Acknowledgements

  Contents

  Prologue

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Epilogue

  Prologue

  Even the elves of Tir Tairngire feared the wilderness, and with good reason. They were haunted, those forests and mountains. They had been transformed—by the wild, untamed force of magic, the power unleashed in the Awakening in 2011—into places out of legend . . . places not at all friendly to visitors.

  The inhabitants of the Land of Promise knew better than most just how unpredictable, how capricious, magic could be. So they stayed clear of the deep forests and the smoking mountains. One such isolated area was an ideal place to perform the work going on that night, but the remoteness of the wilderness location only served to increase the nervousness of the woman called Mustang. She stood on the rocky slope of the mountainside—looking out over the dark forest that stretched in all directions, and the tattered clouds veiling the half-lit face of the waning moon—and tried not to worry about what was go
ing on in a nearby cave.

  The wind moaned, whipping loose strands of hair across her face, and she turned up the collar of her jacket, wishing for something warmer than synth-leather and ballistic armor lining. She zipped the jacket up as high as it would go, cradling a sleek automatic pistol in her right hand.

  A faint sound, a glimpse of movement out of the corner of her eye, and the gun swung up and around, laser sight showing as a faint red gleam in the darkness, painting a targeting dot on the shadowy figure approaching close at hand.

  "Easy!" came a low voice from the shadows. Mustang slowly lowered her weapon, but kept it ready in her hand.

  "You shouldn’t sneak up on me like that," she scolded, looking back out over the dark vista.

  "Sorry, force of habit." He moved closer, until he was standing just behind her shoulder. "When I can’t surprise someone, it’s time to get out of this business."

  Mustang snorted faintly. "I wonder if it isn’t that time already," she muttered. "I have a bad feeling about this, Silk."

  Her companion rested his hand gently on her shoulder.

  "It’ll be fine," he reassured her. "We’re almost finished. Once Marc has taken care of his business, we can get the frag out of this place. I know I won’t miss it."

  "I think I will, in a way." Mustang drew a deep breath and let it out in a slow sigh. "It’s not like most people believe, some faerie-tale kingdom, but it is . . . magical."

  "Sure, if you happen to have been born with pointed ears," Silk said derisively. "I didn’t see too much of the ‘magical land’ in the slums of Portland, did you?"

  She shook her head slowly. "No, but still . . . it’s like there’s something in the air here."

  "Well, I think you might have a somewhat biased view of elf culture," Silk replied, his voice gently mocking.

  Mustang just smiled. He was right about that. She would never look at Tir Tairngire, or elves, in quite the same way ever again. Her life would never be the same as it was before they came here—assuming they made it out alive.

  Silk gently squeezed her shoulder. "Don’t worry," he said, reading her look of concern. "He’s going to be fine. He knows what he’s doing."

  So he says, she thought, turning to face Silk. "It’s not him I’m worried about," she said, and Silk nodded grimly.

  "I know. But she wants out just as much as he does."

  "Does she? I still don’t know for sure."

  "We needed her help."

  "No. It was just easier with her help," Mustang countered.

  Silk shrugged. "So, it was easier. Since when have you had a problem with an opportunity to do things the easy way?"

  "Mostly when it involves people I can’t trust."

  "Hey, that’s life in the shadows," Silk said. "Can we really trust anybody?"

  Mustang stared over Silk’s shoulder at the cave entrance that was guarded by the dark crags of the mountains on either side. "One of us should be in there."

  Silk shook his head slowly. "I feel the same way, but Marc doesn’t need the extra distraction, and you don’t want to interrupt a wizard while he’s working."

  "It should have been me," Mustang insisted, "or you, not her."

  "I think he wants you out of danger," Silk replied, "and I think he trusts me least of all. I’m not an elf, and I’m not . . ." Mustang’s eyes narrowed, and Silk just shrugged and left the rest of the comment unspoken. "I think he’s a little jealous of me," he concluded instead. "He sees me as competition. I know, I know," he continued before Mustang could reply, "I’m not, but he doesn’t seem to know that. We work well together. It’s easy to mistake that for something else." She looked longingly at the cave entrance, her thoughts far away.

  "You really do love him, don’t you?"

  Mustang’s gaze jerked back to Silk. The bald statement shocked her like a wave of cold water.

  "Yeah, I really do." It was the first time she’d admitted it to anyone else and acknowledged that this was more than just another mission—that, after this, things wouldn’t be the same.

  She looked at the cave entrance again.

  "Silk," she said, and he turned to look. Red-gold light was pulsing from the entrance, growing brighter, like a miniature dawn coming up inside the dark mouth of the cavern. Light poured out and illuminated the ledge as the sound of chanting echoed down the mountain, the sound growing in intensity with the light.

  Mustang had taken three running steps before Silk managed to grab her arm. She angrily tried to jerk free.

  "We can’t interrupt!" Silk gritted out. "He said to stay here, no matter what happens!"

  She stopped struggling and stayed where she was. The chanting died away, but the light remained, glowing steadily, brightly.

  "What about that light? It’ll be visible for miles."

  "There’s nobody around for miles," Silk countered.

  "Patrols," she said stubbornly.

  "We’ll be done and gone long before a patrol could get here. Will you just take it easy?"

  Mustang sighed, her burst of energy leaking away. "You’re right. I just wish it was over."

  "What are you going to do when it is?"

  She shook her head slowly. "I don’t know. Depends on what the company does, I guess." Silk nodded in agreement. It always depended on what the company wanted.

  "Well, you know if I can help . . ." he began, but a flicker of movement in the cave caught their attention. A shadowy figure dashed from the entrance.

  "Aerwin!" Silk shouted, but the slim figure didn’t stop—didn’t even slow—as she flew toward the tree line.

  "Marc!" Mustang cried, and ran for the cave. Silk hesitated for a second, afraid of what Mustang would find, then took off after the woman who had rushed down the slope.

  Aerwin had a good lead on Silk, but the rocky slope of the mountain was treacherous, and even she couldn’t move too quickly. He thanked the implanted optics that magnified what little light came from the stars and veiled moon and allowed him to see as clearly as if it was daylight, avoiding obstacles and keeping track of the lithe figure in black moving in the shadows ahead.

  Silk put on a burst of speed and veered to the left, heading up a low ridge, then flinging himself off the edge. He tackled his quarry in midair, and they tumbled down the slope in a shower of loose stones.

  Aerwin scrambled to her feet. Silk took them out from under her with a sweep of his leg. She rolled to one side as he allowed his momentum to carry him in the opposite direction, and they both reached for their weapons. The optical signal processor at the base of his spine made Silk just a bit faster than his opponent. His weapon cleared the holster, the laser sight painting a vivid red dot on the pale face in front of him, the elf’s smooth skin gleaming almost like pearl in the moonlight.

  "Don’t," was all he said, and Aerwin slowly lifted her hand from her pistol. "Stay down," he told her, careful to keep the gun level as he pressed his other hand against the ground and slowly stood up. The woman’s dark eyes never left his, never flinched as the glare of the laser crossed them.

  "What the frag is going on?" Silk asked, afraid he already knew the answer. "You were playing us? This was just a setup? Why?"

  "We can make a deal . . she began, and Silk fought the urge to squeeze the trigger. Not until he found out what was going on.

  "Shut up," he said. "No deals. That was obviously a mistake the first time, and it’s not going to happen again. I’m going to ask one more time: why?"

  Aerwin remained still and silent, but Silk’s enhanced vision caught a gleam of something in one of the pockets on her close-fitting dark pants—a few links of a golden chain, hastily shoved into her pocket, had spilled loose in their struggle. Just as Aerwin followed his gaze, he stepped forward and crouched down, reaching to grab the trailing chain and pull it free.

  Her reaction was a fraction of a moment too late. Silk caught the chain and tugged, and it came out of her pocket. Along with it came a jade amulet in the shape of a dragon.

 
; "This is Marc’s," he accused, eyes coming up to fix hers with a cold glare. "This is why you fragged us?"

  "You have no idea how completely," Aerwin said softly, with a poisonous smile.

  Suddenly the night turned to day as a blazing light stabbed down from the sky. Though Silk’s optics compensated for the glare, he was momentarily dazzled, and reflexively sought the source of the light.

  Aerwin’s kick sent his pistol flying, but Silk held onto the amulet. He dove to the side as her weapon cleared its holster. There was no cover on the slope, nowhere to hide as the dark-clad woman leveled her gun directly at him, no way she could miss at this distance. Silk had seen her take down far harder targets.

  The shot that came, however, wasn’t from Aerwin’s gun but from farther up the slope, and it sent her staggering back. Silk followed the sound of the shot and saw Mustang standing less than fifteen meters away, fierce determination creasing her face as she scrambled down the slope toward them. He saw that the light was coming from a helicopter hovering overhead, its searchlight sweeping the side of the mountain.

  "Drop your weapons!" a voice boomed in English.

  "Drop your weapons and put your hands on your heads!"

  In one sweeping glance, Aerwin took in Silk lying on the ground, Mustang approaching, and the chopper as it banked around for another pass. She didn’t even hesitate before bolting again for the tree line. Silk could see that she was holding her left arm stiffly, but it barely slowed her movement.

  Mustang reached him just as he got to his feet. "Are you—?"

  "I’m fine," he said. "Let’s get out of here."

  "Are you crazy? We can still catch her!" She started after Aerwin, but again Silk grabbed her arm.

  "We can’t," he said. "It’s a setup. Any second now, this place is going to be swarming with Tir patrols! We have to get out of here!"

  "Silk, she—" Mustang’s voice broke.

  "I know!" he interrupted. "There’s nothing we can do, Stang! We’ve got to get out of here!"