The Payment

by Michelle E Lowe

  “An eight,” announced the hustler. “Sorry, lads. Lost again.”

  The men groaned and threw their money down.

  “A swindler, eh, Thooranu?” Filip Faix tsked, stopping nearby. “That’s what you’ve been reduced to?”

  The demon tilted his chin up to him, and his expression turned deadly.

  “Swindler?” someone spoke up. “What does he mean by that, Faolan?”

  Thooranu stood up while keeping his eyes on the god. “Leave,” he ordered the men. “All of you—now!”

  “I wanna ken what he’s teuking about,” the same player demanded.

  “I said leave!” Thooranu exclaimed, pushing him with a single hand.

  The player’s feet left the ground as he flew back and hit the wall on the other side. The impact was so hard that he collapsed in a heap and was unable to move. The others, stunned, vacated without argument, and one of them helped the injured human on the way out.

  “Effective,” Filip Faix pointed out.

  “What are you doing here, Jack Pack?”

  “I go by Filip Faix these days,” he corrected the demon, holding himself straight with both hands clasped upon the head of his stylish cane.

  Although the cane looked fashionable, he really needed the support.

  “My, my. You have come a long way since I last saw you two hundred years ago,” Filip Faix mocked him. “Hustling the misfortunate filth of humanity for their small currency. Tsk.”

  He bent over to pick up a shilling and instantly regretted it. His face flushed hot and his body groaned like an ancient mortal. To keep from showing his vulnerability, Filip Faix hid his distress, took the coin from off the ground, and slowly rose to his full height.

  “I thought you hated money,” Filip Faix added, flicking the shilling up and catching it.

  “Coira forces me to do this,” Thooranu explained.

  “Is that the name of your current master? How long have you served her?”

  “Too long.”

  “Well, that’s the good thing about mortal humans. They have such short lifespans. You should thank the Fates for that.”

  Thooranu took a step toward him as if ready to attack when Filip Faix raised his finger. “Uh-uh. Did your master give you an order to harm me?”

  Thooranu stopped short and huffed.

  “Besides,” Filip Faix added, “I’m a god. I’ll destroy you in seconds, little boy demon.”

  While at full strength, the Trickster could, indeed, but the way things were at the moment, Thooranu had a better chance of destroying him, though he’d have to catch him first. Filip Faix knew how to hide, for he’d needed to plenty of times in the past. It was one of the reasons he frequently changed his name.

  “Anyway, I haven’t come to pick a fight, Thooranu. To answer your question, I came to see this master of yours.”

  Thooranu knitted his eyebrows together. “Why? Are you looking to take possession of me again?”

  Filip Faix snorted. “No. I have no more use for you—unless I can think of something else to trade a Cambion Demon for.” He took hold of Thooranu’s chin. “Although, I did have fun having my way with you while you were my prisoner. It was certainly more entertaining than when I pretended to be your friend.”

  The heartbreak in the demon’s eyes was priceless.

  Filip Faix regarded all demons as vile and disgusting. No better than trolls or brownies. He found them to be as stupid as they were clumsy. Even a Cambion Demon such as Thooranu, whose only good quality was being half human—and that said very little—was nothing shy of pathetic. Tricking the dumb thing into servitude only proved his point. Maybe for his next stunt, he’d try tricking a trickster. Now that would be a challenge.

  “Be a good slave and tell me where to find this master of yours.”

  Thooranu gave him a hateful glare as if he wasn’t going to answer. Then he sighed deeply, displaying his servitude.

  “She’s in the Vaults, past the brewery rooms.”

  Filip Faix tipped his leather top hat to him. “Ta.”

  He left down the alleyway and vanished before reaching the street.

  * * *

  Orenda sat on the rooftop of a hotel, ignoring the tiny, cold, and stinging raindrops. She didn’t expect the rain to fall any harder that day. She had been sitting on the rooftop for hours, working to weaken Freya’s protection before she went in for an attack. This was the closest she had been to the witch, and Orenda almost feared Freya would sense her before she could make her move. If Freya suspected she was close, it might prompt her to investigate, and if she discovered Orenda, then everything would tumble to ruin.

  It didn’t seem she or Élie were breaking much ground. Since abandoning Pierce, it felt as if they were only pecking a dent through Freya’s force field.

  The rain tapped against her face, feeling more like beads of ice. The wind blew through her damp hair, sending water droplets flying about. Her rear and legs had gone numb from the wet and cold. She was growing old. Time was slowly devouring her. It would have consumed her already, had she not used her hibernation trick to prolong her life and power. Her weakening state was the reason why she had given up being Mother of Craft so many centuries ago. She could only postpone the fading out for so long. Even so, Orenda was very happy to be alive. It occurred to her that after Pierce Landcross woke her with a kiss on her vessel’s hand like a charming fairytale prince, everything she had done was meant to be. She had helped young Joaquin Cruce de Tierras find a family, and in turn, she had become connected to his kin ever since.

  Orenda kept on with her task. So much depended on her at this critical juncture. If she couldn’t make headway soon, there would be no quarter given for their failure. Regardless, she would still have to face Freya, and so, she was preparing herself for the fight—and for her end.

  * * *

  The lock clicked and the cell door opened. Pierce raised his chin from his shackled wrists, which were folded over his bent knees.

  “Get up, Landcross,” Luke ordered, carrying the keys as he approached.

  Pierce got to his feet, and as he did, Luke whipped him fully around and pressed him up against the wall. He unlocked the padlock of the chain and let it drop to the floor, leaving the shackles clamped to Pierce’s arms.

  He snatched Pierce by the shoulder, yanked him back around, and shoved him forward. “Out, you.”

  Pierce kept his thoughts to himself as he exited the cell. Honestly, there was nothing he could say that would change what was about to happen to him. He was going to die, the payment met, and he could do nothing to stop it.

  In the hallway, Darius waited with over a dozen soldiers. He stood near the place where he decapitated Robin as if bragging about it.

  “I’ve heard there’s quite the turnout at the gallows,” Darius informed him in a weak tone of voice.

  Pierce figured he must have really put a hurting on his voice box. “Aye? Is that so? Wonder how many people will be with you when you die, eh?”

  Darius’s expression soured. “The only people I need with me on the day of my death are those who care for me. You shall have no loved ones there for you, Landcross.”

  The jab stung him more than he’d expected, mainly because it was the truth. Instead of friends and family, he’d have soldiers and spectators there to see him off.

  Pierce hid his despair from his lordship behind a forced smile. “Shall we, then?”

  They departed the underground cells and headed out through the prison.

  “I should have brought you to London when you showed up at my doorstep,” Darius grumbled as he walked abreast of the chained and condemned man. “The trouble that could have been avoided makes my head spin.”

  “You’re wrong about this,” Pierce stated earnestly.

  He turned to Darius, who glared at him. Pierce held his serious expression as if trying to project the truth through his eyes.

  “I hope that after I’m dead, you’ll find out the truth, and it’ll e
at you alive for the rest of your fuckin’ days, Darius.”

  “Shut your mouth,” his lordship seethed.

  It seemed he had gotten to him, after all. It was a minor victory. His last, no doubt.

  In the inner ward, the same prison wagon that had transported Pierce to court now waited to take him to the gallows. He shuddered at the steady sprinkle of rain coming down. Once they stepped outside, Darius stopped and allowed Pierce and the soldiers to go on ahead.

  “What is it?” Luke asked him.

  “I . . . I need to look into something,” Darius explained.

  Pierce’s ears perked up and he glanced over his shoulder as he approached the wagon.

  “What?” Luke asked. “Now?”

  Darius seemed unable to explain himself, so he simply asked, “Luke, will you take my stead? Make certain he gets to the gallows.”

  “Aye, but where are you going?”

  “To Newgate Prison.”

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  The Gathering

  Vela held tight to Kolt’s hand while his body disintegrated. His teeth had crumbled away, and just before he lost the ability to taste, the texture of chalk had danced over his tongue. He’d already gone white blind—so blind he could see only white—and after he no longer experienced the strange dissolution of his insides, his hearing had also stopped working. Now he was deaf, blind, and mute. Never in his life had he been so afraid. Despite all his studies and everything he had learned in life, nothing could prepare him for this. He thought he could withstand anything thrown at him. Conquer any quest without fail. In the end, it only took someone sneaking up on him to destroy his confidence.

  Although he’d had no inkling that he was the one the witch really wanted, Kolt should have been more aware of the trouble surrounding him. After the train and the brush with the soldiers while traveling to London with the nomads, the possibility that someone wanted to harm him, or use him to get to Landcross, was very much there.

  He had learned a lesson—but only too late. Landcross had even warned him about being too cocky.

  Landcross.

  Father.

  When Vela told him Landcross was his real father, he’d thought she was mad or a liar. But as he raced toward his fate, never had a lie felt so true. If only he could see Pierce one last time. If only he could tell his mother goodbye. And if only he could share his first kiss with Clover.

  If only.

  * * *

  The icy drizzle did nothing to keep Chief Sea Wind and his entire crew from Lincoln’s Inn Fields, where armed guards were searching people for weapons before allowing them to enter through the makeshift barrier they’d assembled around the hanging area.

  The Sea Warriors turned over their weapons freely. They weren’t there to try anything foolish, although the thought had crossed the chief’s minds many times over. He and his crew had come to be there for their friend who was about to pass through this life and travel into the next.

  They were there to say goodbye.

  Once they had surrendered their weapons, the chief and his crew headed for the gallows. Their steady approach startled many and caused them move aside without dispute.

  The Sea Warriors reached the scaffold. More armed guards, as well as photographers, some of whom were searching for the best spot to take their photographs, surrounded it. The gallows stood approximately thirty feet tall, and a long staircase stretched to the platform. The noose had yet to be strung up.

  Nico gasped at the eerie sight. “They’re really going to do this. They are actually going to kill him.”

  A man in a stovepipe top hat and a red tailcoat stood on the platform, telling jokes into a talky transmitter.

  His voice carried over the crowd through the flower-shaped amplifiers.

  “So, I hear Pierce Landcross has finally been sentenced to hang, but it turns out that it’s been suspended temporally.” The throng laughed or groaned. “Oh, now, only joking with you. They haven’t cut him loose!”

  Sees Beyond grabbed Nico by the hand and held it firmly. “We have to be strong,” she told him. “For Pierce.”

  “Knot your cup of tea?” the showman went on “Right, so a boy comes running into the kitchen and says, ‘Ma! Ma! Father hanged himself down in the cellar!’ His mother runs down into the cellar and sees no one there. Angrily, she says to her son, ‘You ever lie to me like that again and I’ll box your ears, do you understand?’ To this, the lad replied, ‘I’m sorry. I was only joking. He hanged himself in the barn.’”

  The crowd roared with laughter.

  * * *

  Robert Blackbird stood in the crowd, listening to the comedian performing his macabre act. He drank from his flask, which he had already refilled once already. The light, chilly rain had kept him sober, but the Scottish whiskey was finally starting to affect his head. Guilt had ballooned in his stomach. Robert’s wife told him he had done all that he could to save Pierce, and that he was very brave for risking his life and freedom by testifying in court when Penelope could have done so alone, but Robert didn’t feel like a brave or loyal friend. He felt he could have done so much more. He could have started by simply believing Pierce when he first claimed innocence in the train robbery.

  Everything around him seemed unreal and made-up. The crowd surrounding the scaffold was laughing for chrissakes! Photographers shot photographs. It was sick and twisted play and nothing more.

  Then the horses arrived—a pair of dark, shadowy mounts with tall, matching feathers sticking up from their heads. They traveled down the path created by short wooden dividers, pulling a black-painted wagon with an empty coffin in the bed of it. People by the dividers couldn’t help but stare at it in dread.

  Robert took another drink from his flask. He began feeling ill, especially when he saw the prison wagon coming. It, too, traveled down the path. Gone were the days when the doomed were led to their deaths by way of open carts. Nowadays, they were brought in by an enclosed wagon as if the prison was teasing the crowd.

  Robert clutched his stomach and drank. His whole body trembled, knowing his friend was inside and would soon fill that empty coffin.

  * * *

  From inside the wagon, Pierce heard someone announce, “Here he comes!”

  The chant was repeated throughout the crowd. Then a voice spoke incredibly loud over all of them.

  “Ladies and gents! Our condemned guest has arrived!”

  Pierce looked out through a narrow window behind him and saw a man in a red tailcoat speaking into a talky transmitter on the platform of the gallows.

  “Bloody hell,” he grumbled. “There’s a bleedin’ showman here? What else? Souvenirs?”

  The wagon came to a halt and Luke unlocked and opened the back door.

  “Let’s go, boy,” he ordered.

  Two guards who were riding in the wagon with Pierce grabbed him by the arms and practically carried him out. As he exited, people cheered and threw flowers. Some, however, cursed him to hell and threw rotten food. Clashes erupted in the crowd, forcing some of the guards to intervene. Pierce found the brawls amusing until his attention was drawn to something else: a coffin—his coffin—waiting inside the cart. He snarled at it.

  “Pierce!” the showman called from the platform, waving him on. “C’mon up, lad!”

  It was as if the man was calling him up to participate in some magic show. However, unlike a chosen audience member who could pass, Pierce had no choice. Again, the guards took hold of him.

  “Fuck off,” he snapped, shaking off their grip. “I can bloody well walk up the steps on my own.”

  He looked up at the stairs, breathed in a nervous breath, and went up with guards climbing behind him. When he reached the platform, he was amazed at the magnitude of the crowd.

  “It’s about time you got here,” the showman said irritably as if Pierce was keeping him from some engagement. “Get over here.”

  He snatched the chain of Pierce’s manacles and pulled him to the edge of the platform
. The chain across Pierce’s back pressed hard against him.

  The showman announced into the talky transmitter, “Ladies and gents! I’m pleased to present to you the enemy of the Crown, the thief of hearts . . . ” (Pierce rolled his eyes.) “Pierce . . . ” The twit shouted louder. “ . . . Laaaaandcrrrross!”

  The crowd both cheered and jeered.

  The showman turned to him and spoke into his talky transmitter, “Pierce Landcross. You’re about to be hanged. Your neck broken—if you’re lucky—how do you feel?”

  Pierce did not appreciate being treated like some side-show freak. A prop for the showman to toy with. To Pierce, the showman was nothing more than a hollow entertainer, getting his kicks out of what love the audience gave to him.

  Pierce decided to break his heart.

  “Piss off, tosser,” Pierce said, shoving him off the platform.

  The showman toppled over the ledge with his talky transmitter in hand and crashed down on top of a few guards below. A roar of laughter swept over the crowd. Pierce felt a tad proud of himself. He had just enough time to take a bow before Luke and another guard grabbed him and dragged him away. As he backpedaled, he spotted the still forms of the Sea Warriors through the highly animated crowd.

  “Chief,” Pierce whispered.

  It wasn’t until the floor beneath him bounced under his weight that he realized what he was standing on.

  The trapdoor.

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Slipknot

  The rain had stopped while Javan was riding steadfastly to Newgate Prison. When he arrived at the dreadful old building, his horse was frothing at the mouth. He spoke to Miles Garret, the warden who had taken the place of Joseph Waters during the prison’s reform process. He told Mr. Garret that he needed to question a couple of his prisoners and explained the dire circumstances behind it. He waited in the prison lounge where newly incarcerated prisoners were brought in to be shackled, and where the condemned were prepared for execution