Chapter 90 Two Days
The new location was a warehouse complex five hours east of the old camp, a cluster of industrial buildings that had been disused long enough to have lost any official interest but not long enough to have deteriorated past usefulness. The rogue king's people had used it as a secondary base twice before and it had served well both times. It wasn't comfortable and it wasn't intended to be.
The council room was the largest interior space in the main building, with a wide concrete floor and a long table. Eight chairs on each side and one at the head. The overhead lights worked on two of the four fixtures, casting the table in adequate light and leaving the edges of the room in relative shadow.
The rogue king sat at the head.
Khan sat at the far end of the right side, which was not the position he would have chosen. When he had moved toward a more central seat upon arrival, the quality of the looks he received had communicated clearly enough. He had taken the indicated chair without comment.
Eleven people at the table. Seven of Elijah's senior commanders, two operational leads, Khan, and the rogue king himself. The commanders had called for the meeting. Elijah had agreed to it, which told Khan something about the pressure currently being applied from that side of the table.
Three days had passed since Maddox had disappeared from the old camp. Khan still hadn’t known where Maddox was because Silena not the others hadn’t sent word back through the agreed channel.
One of Elijah’s men was talking. He had been talking for a while.
"Three days with no contact and no explanation," the man said, addressing the table and Elijah specifically. "That is not a man who got separated in the chaos of the raid. That is a man who made a choice. The choice was to take a witch who helped the police find us and run rather than face what that meant."
Khan looked up. "We do not know this."
Several heads turned toward him. Ferris, sitting directly across, looked at him with the expression of a man who had not invited the contribution.
"Nobody asked you," Ferris said.
Khan kept his eyes level. "Our Raja," he said carefully, forming the English with deliberate weight, "is not man who run. Three day is not long time. Raid was chaos. Maybe he is pursued. Maybe he could not contact without exposing where he is." He paused. "These are reasons. Good reasons."
"Those are also the excuses a traitor hopes his lackeys are making on his behalf," Ferris said.
Khan glared at him and said nothing.
"The fact remains," the man speaking earlier said, redirecting to Elijah, "that three days ago we were raided. We lost our base. We lost men. And the person most closely connected to the witch who helped the police find us is now absent and uncontactable." He spread his hands. "From the outside, this looks a specific way. We can choose not to see it that way but the men in this camp are seeing it that way regardless of what we decide in this room."
Elijah had not spoken. He sat at the head of the table with his hands folded on the surface and his eyes moving between the people speaking.
The oldest commander at the table, cleared his throat. "There is also the question of the pack," he said. "Cesare's people have been moving. Our people in the field have tracked increased activity along the eastern corridors this past week. Whether that is connected to what happened at the old camp or not, the direction of it suggests they are not being passive."
"They are coming," Ferris said.
"We don't know that," the commander said.
"They have been wanting a reason for months. We have given them several." Ferris looked at Elijah directly. "We have the numbers now. More than we have ever had. If we wait for them to come to us we lose the only advantage we have, which is timing. We should go to them first."
The room absorbed that.
Khan looked at the table and kept his face composed.
The Islanders had come for their island. That was the purpose. Every day spent fighting someone else's territorial war was a day not spent on the thing they had actually come for. He had understood when he pledged to Maddox that the rogue king's conflict was part of the context, but the context was not supposed to become the purpose.
"Our people," Khan said slowly, "do not fight other men's wars."
Ferris looked at him.
"Islander come to take back our home," Khan continued. "We say we stand with this group as ally. We do not say we fight Cesare pack because someone here think timing is good."
"That is interesting," Ferris said, leaning back. "Because what I am looking at is a group of outsiders that show up before we were raided, who follow a man who has since vanished with the witch responsible, and who are now telling us they will not fight." He paused. "That also looks a specific way."
The room went quiet.
Khan understood the move. He had seen it before. Place a person between two bad options and frame both as evidence of the same bad thing. Fight and you are being used. Don't fight and you are a traitor by association.
"You are saying my people had hand in raid," Khan frowned.
"I am observing a pattern," Ferris said.
"Pattern is wrong." Khan's voice was flat and careful. "My people in that prison. We were freed from it. We have no reason bring human police to place where we can just find shelter and food."
"Maddox does," someone said. "And your people follow Maddox."
"Raja free us," Khan said. "He did not betray."
"Then where is he?" Another asked.
Khan had no answer he could give. Everyone at the table saw him not giving it and the silence became its own kind of answer.
The oldest commander spoke into the quiet. "The concern at this table is not personal to you or your people, Khan. The concern is that we cannot look weak to the men in this camp. If it becomes understood that someone connected to our operation helped the police find us and faced no consequence, the structure of this organisation becomes questionable." He looked at Elijah. "The commanders are recommending that Maddox be officially branded a traitor. It sends a message. Accountability is consistent regardless of the relationship."
Khan looked at Elijah.
The rogue king had still not spoken.
"If Raja is branded traitor," Khan said, directing it only to the man at the head of the table, "my people not fight for group. Is not threat. Is truth about who we are." He placed one large hand flat on the table. "Raja free us. If group brand him and put bounty on him, you ask us to stand with people who hunt the man who free us." He shook his head once. "We not do this."
"Then you are choosing him over the king," Ferris said.
"I being honest," Khan said simply.
"If your people will not fight with us," the previous guy said, leaning forward, "then Maddox's treason becomes worse. Because it means he did not just run. He fractured the alliance. A bounty would be the appropriate response."
Khan sat very still. He looked at him and then at Ferris and then at the others who had been watching with the attentiveness of people tracking a negotiation they had a stake in. He understood what had been done. The backing had been so gradual it had felt like a conversation until it was complete.
He looked at Elijah.
"I ask," Khan said, and the words came out slowly, "for time. More days. Raja will return or send word, he will explain. He is not traitor. His eyes not traitor eyes." He held Elijah's eyes. "Give him more days before you make decision that cannot be unmade."
The room was quiet.
Elijah looked at Khan. Then at the table. Then at his commanders, and the assembled weight of three days of frustration and the genuine operational problem of leading an organisation whose structure had been shaken.
He unfolded his hands.
He placed them flat on the table and pushed himself to standing, and the room's attention shifted to him.
He looked at no one in particular.
"Two more days," he said. Final. Already decided before it was spoken. "Maddox has two days to make contact or account for himself. After that this council reconvenes and whatever decision is made will be made." He looked once at Khan, briefly, with an expression that gave nothing away. "Two days."
He pushed back from the table.
"No one follows me," he said, and walked to the door and through it.
The room did not follow him.