Marauder Read Free

then flinging its fingers open. An Avilon Security ID materialized in the air, before fading after a few moments.
‘Otherwise I’ll have to knock you out for the rest of the journey.’
    ‘You’re . . . ?’
    ‘The police,’ said the Freeholder. ‘Welcome to Avilon. Now shut the hell up.’
    He closed the door hard, and she heard him climb back up into the truck’s cabin. They were soon under way once more.
    Well, that’s that, then.
She’d clearly walked into a trap, and a carefully prepared one at that.
    She let her head fall forward on to her knees, giving herself up to hopeless exhaustion. As a result, she barely noticed when the truck finally came to a halt, a few hours later.
    She squinted painfully as the compartment door opened again, letting daylight flood back in. The Freeholder reached in and grabbed the collar of her jacket, dragging her out
and depositing her in a heap on the yellow soil.
    She looked around, seeing they had come to a halt in front of a vast sprawling building that looked as if it had been modelled on a fairytale castle. It sat at the centre of a few dozen acres of
carefully tended lawns and coppiced trees. It was, even by the excessive standards of Avilon’s population of the ultra-wealthy, stunningly tasteless.
    ‘Get up,’ said the Freeholder, as the two bead-zombies came over to stand behind him.
    ‘How long have you been working for Sifra?’ she asked as calmly as she could, staring up at him. She was damned if she was going to let him see how frightened she really was.
    ‘He told me to bring you here,’ the Freeholder grunted. ‘He didn’t say whether you had to still be in one piece.’ He gestured towards a nearby gate. ‘So how
about you shut the fuck up, and start—’
    She jumped up and ran. One thing she knew about bead-zombies was that they weren’t very good at moving fast.
    For the first few moments, she thought her legs might actually give way beneath her. She was still afflicted by numerous aches and cramps, and one ankle felt strangely numb. But she ignored all
that, letting her frank terror of ever again setting eyes on Anil Sifra empower her muscles to carry her away as far and fast as humanly possible.
    She sped back along the same narrow road on which the spider-truck crouched. Just a few kilometres away she could see the glistening towers of Cockaigne – Avilon’s primary settlement
– rising up to pierce through the containment field more than a kilometre overhead.
    The aching in her legs grew, her lungs burning in her chest like twin embers. She listened for the steady thump-thump of the spider-truck pursuing her, but heard nothing yet. Just when she began
to think she might actually make it to freedom, she heard a yipping sound from somewhere to her right, and the noise of something running up behind her.
    She risked a quick glance over her shoulder, and nearly stumbled in fright. Two mogs were closing in on her from either side: half-human, half-canine hybrids, bipedal like a human being but
dumb, vicious and short-lived.
    Not to mention wildly, incredibly illegal. Megan had once seen a mog rip a man’s throat out within seconds.
    They were closing in on her fast, and she knew she could never outrun them. But the thought of those long snouts equipped with their rows of gleaming teeth spurred her to even greater
effort.
    Damn Sifra. Damn him to hell. And damn Bash for losing his mind.
    She suddenly stumbled, falling to the ground with a yell, and stuck out both her arms in a desperate bid to protect herself. The sleek grey bodies of her pursuers darted all around her, jaws
snapping at the bare flesh of her throat but never quite coming close enough. She saw, at close quarters, humanoid hands tapering into long, black claws. She screamed in panic again, convinced she
was about to die in a particularly horrible and unpleasant fashion.
    Just then, a sharp, high-pitched sound cut through the air. Suddenly, the creatures pulled away,