Song (The Manhunters Book 1)

by Jesse Teller

  “Tama is gone, Artiss. Ripped from the world with a stab of Smear’s blade,” Konnon said. “Did you know I found a beggar on the street the other day wearing Treavor’s shirt? The one he never went without. The sleeves, the daggers, all of it. This street trash wore it proudly. I asked him where he got it and he said he found it on a body with one stab wound in it. He took it off the corpse and wore it.”

  “So, Treavor was a bastard. Found a bastard’s death.”

  “He found Smear is what he found. The shirt hole was the size of Smear’s fist dagger.”

  “A lot of people fight with daggers, Konnon,” Artiss said.

  Konnon stood and walked to the window again. He stared at the crate and he growled. He remembered the look on the bum’s face when he spoke of the shirt, and the horrid wounds on the man’s hands and arms. He had cut himself taking the shirt, and the poison of the blades was working on him. Konnon had cleaned the wounds and told the man to go to a healer. He hated to do it, but he had given the man a few copper coins to tithe with.

  Konnon’s blood went cold as he looked at the figure walking down the street in the direction of the wagon. He could not breathe as he watched, and then he saw it. The easy stride of Rayph Ivoryfist. The trap was set to spring.

  When Rayph walked past the crate, it exploded and Barrigan erupted from the shards. He slammed his shoulder into Rayph’s middle and brayed. Rayph slammed into the wall of the building and sagged. He fought to open his mouth and Barrigan backhanded him. Rayph reeled and Barrigan wrapped an arm around Ivoryfist and hefted him on his shoulders. He gripped the building and leapt.

  Konnon stepped back and Artiss pulled a cord. He wrapped it around his hands twice, his face breaking out in sweat. Artiss looked scared. Konnon could hardly breathe as the gorilla raksa climbed. When he burst through the window, Artiss boomed out a cry and rushed forward.

  Rayph was dropped to the ground, the wind knocked out of him and gasping for air. He could not speak, and Konnon stared dumbfounded as Artiss grabbed up Rayph and ran the cord across his sword master’s mouth. The corners of his mouth were pulled painfully tight as the cord wrapped his head, gagging him. Barrigan stomped on Rayph’s wrist, as he fought to get free, and Artiss grabbed it. He kicked Rayph over on his chest and grabbed both wrists. He tied them behind Rayph’s back, and set on binding the feet.

  Within a few brief moments, Rayph Ivoryfist was tied in a neat package.

  The last remaining Bloodhounds stepped back, and Konnon stepped into the breech.

  “Rayph Ivoryfist,” Konnon said. “Wanted man.” Konnon pulled both swords and drove them into the floor on either side of Rayph’s head. “When I heard you were a wanted man, I had to come see for myself. When I found out the Bloodhounds were in town searching for you, I knew you were as good as caught. This crew never misses.”

  Artiss howled in glee and excitement. He punched Barrigan in the chest, and they both roared in victory.

  “This crew never misses,” Konnon said. “So I came to help you out.”

  Artiss stepped forward and looked down at Rayph, then up at Konnon.

  “You came for what?” Artiss said.

  The window to the alleyway shattered as Glyss rolled into the room and popped to his feet. Konnon smiled at Rayph and winked. “Wish me luck. This is the tricky part.”

  He spun and put his back to Glyss. “I get the monkey,” Konnon said.

  “Deal,” Glyss said. Glyss stomped his foot twice and Konnon knew what that meant. When Artiss charged and Barrigan swung, they both rolled at the same time. Konnon went east.

  Glyss rolled across the room and threw two daggers. That was all Konnon could see. He prayed Glyss was fast enough. He sidestepped and ducked every wild swing Barrigan threw. The monster knew only strength and speed, and every wicked swing could have been the one to end Konnon, but Barrigan had never been taught how to set a snare. He had not been taught, by whoever trained him, how to walk an opponent into a trap.

  But Rayph Ivoryfist had trained Konnon.

  When Konnon backed up to the wall, Barrigan thought he had him hemmed in. He swung and Konnon ducked. The blade cleaved into the wall and embedded itself in the wood. Konnon stepped behind Barrigan and severed both his hamstrings.

  Barrigan dropped, howling, and Konnon stepped back. The gorilla on his knees was still deadly as a viper, and he swung his blades wildly around his body and over his head.

  Konnon waited and swung hard. Barrigan’s hand flew off, and he screamed. He dropped his sword and grabbed his nub, squeezing to try to stop the blood. Konnon sheathed one sword and gripped the other with two hands. He needed every ounce of strength at his command to sever the thick neck with a perfectly placed chop.

  It took two.

  Konnon stepped back and dropped to his knee. Glyss clapped a hand on his back and laughed.

  “We got him,” Glyss said.

  “Cut him loose,” Konnon said. “We need to get moving as soon as possible. I have a lead on a job out west.”

  Glyss cut Rayph free and Konnon turned to hug his old swordmaster, his ally and dear friend.

  Old Friends

  Glyss stood when she got to the table, and wrapped his cousin in a tight embrace. Trysliana laughed, and he picked her up to spin her around.

  Smear looked uncomfortable, and Konnon looked up at Trysliana. “This is him, isn’t it?” he said, pointing at Smear.

  Smear looked at Trysliana and back at Konnon. “What? Am I who?”

  Trysliana dropped into Smear’s lap and wrapped her arms around him. Konnon had never seen her so happy. He thought of Tiera, and his heart broke into smaller pieces.

  “I agree with you. He is terrible,” Konnon said. “Has to go, just has to go now.”

  Smear looked at him with shock and back up at Trysliana. “What does he mean?”

  “Means he’s an ass is what he means,” Rayph said. “Konnon, how is Bree?”

  All the happiness drained out of the room. Konnon shook his head and looked at his mug. It was a rare ale from a small brewery outside of Mystal. Konnon had only had it once in his life. He drank it now and could almost see the face of his wife again.

  “We found this ale when we had just married,” Konnon said. “Her favorite, said she wanted to bathe in it.”

  “We all miss her, Konnon,” Glyss said. “We all loved her.”

  “Saddest day of my life was the day we saw her off,” Rayph said. “You loved her well.”

  “Bree is dying. I struggle to earn the money to hold back the disease, but Glyss just came from there, and he said the medicine has quit working. The disease has progressed from the middle of her thighs to her waist. She can’t regulate her waste anymore. She has started messing all over herself.” Konnon wept and Rayph reached across the table to take his hand. “I don’t know how to tell her she is going to die.”

  “She doesn’t have to,” Rayph said. “I have been working on it. Been to see a lot of people, and read countless books on Bree’s condition, and I have a radical idea that you might hate. But it will save her life.”

  Konnon hated the sheer hope that bloomed in his chest. He realized he had never really considered his daughter surviving. He had never felt hope of any kind since Tiera had died.

  “I have talked to Dova,” Rayph said.

  “The ethereal?” Glyss asked.

  “Yes. We worked on a few options, did a lot of tests, and we might be able to save her if we cut the disease off at the waist.”

  “You want to cut her legs off?” Konnon said. He felt hollow, the hope that had just lit him up now shadowed by a cloud of despair.

  “I do, and I will tell you why. Dova can give her a transplant,” Rayph said.

  “What are you talking about?” Glyss said.

  “She will never live a normal life, but she can walk again on ethereal legs, and the disease will be stopped instantly,” Rayph shook his head. “It breaks my heart to—”

  Konnon stood and shoved the table away
with the slap of his hand. He rushed Rayph, snatched him up in a hug that might break the man’s back, and wept.

  Wrath of the Demoness

  “If you want in, you’re in,” Rayph said. He looked at his friends, Konnon and Glyss, and he smiled. “We are hunting down every villain who escaped Mending Keep. We cannot stop until they are all dead or imprisoned. We need every man or woman I can count on, and that list starts at this table.”

  Glyss turned to Konnon and lifted an eyebrow. Glyss was always for the road. The man had built a reputation, and he was willing to do anything to keep it. Glyss would have signed on to rove the nation, hunting the worst that had ever graced it, but Konnon looked at Rayph, and Rayph could see it deep in the eyes of his good friend.

  “I can’t,” Konnon said. “It’s not that I don’t see the value in what you are doing. And if you tell me you need me, I will fight for you, but—”

  “But you have Bree,” Rayph said.

  “I do. I have my daughter to think about. And it is not only a money thing. There are people I could leave her with who would care for her well, give her a vast education and train her in any way I saw fit. But that is not their job. She talks to me every now and then, when I have time to go see her. She tells me of a dream she keeps having. A dream of a red-headed girl.” Konnon looked frightened in a way only a parent could.

  “A red-headed girl?” Glyss said. He obviously had not heard this story, which alarmed Rayph. Never had two men existed who were closer than Konnon and Glyss. The idea of Glyss not knowing of this tale made Rayph not want to hear it at all.

  “She says she dreams of a red-headed girl who will one day call on her,” Konnon said.

  “Call on her for what?” Smear asked.

  “She cannot be sure. This girl, whoever she is, will set out a beacon and draw people to her, and Bree says she must answer when she does.” Konnon looked at Glyss, who looked worried and a little mad. “She said to me many times that the dream made no sense because in the dream she—” Konnon closed his eyes and drew in a deep breath to hold back the tears. “She told me she had no legs but could walk, and she possessed a great and terrible power that only this red-headed girl could pull out of her.”

  “Do we know anyone with a red-haired daughter?” Smear asked. He looked behind him, seeking and finding Trysliana. Then he turned back around, as if seeing her alone was enough to satisfy him.

  “Caleb has Distalis, but she is not a girl. That girl became a woman a long time ago,” Glyss said. “And what a woman she became. But no, other than that, the only red heads I know are boys.”

  “She is adamant about this and won’t hear it is a dream. She has stopped talking about it. A while ago she lost hope of ever being powerful, and she stopped talking about the hidden power some mythical girl would pull out of her. But I never forgot,” Konnon said. “I must admit I did not believe it was any more than fancy until you spoke of Dova. The prospect of her walking with no legs makes sense in a way I cannot deny.

  “In the end, if she is seeing herself being led by a girl, then we have to prepare her for that,” Konnon said.

  Glyss looked at him and nodded.

  “We can’t help you in even this noble of a war. She has to come first,” Glyss said.

  “What will you do?” Rayph said. “Where will you go?”

  “Dragonsbane,” Glyss said.

  “No,” Konnon said. “Anywhere but there.”

  “You are going home,” Glyss said. “You need to be in that city. You need to face it once and for all and find your place in it. We were both meant for that city. It is beautiful and powerful and flawed in a way Bree needs to understand.”

  “Brole lives there,” Konnon said with a growl, and Rayph could hear the utter contempt Konnon had for his one-time father, and Rayph’s long-time friend.

  “Father is but a tiny piece of that town. We have many other reasons to be there, and if this plan of Rayph’s is going to work, then we have a chance at a life,” Glyss said. “We can concentrate on raising her and preparing her for whatever this beacon is. Konnon, I have thought about it a long time. I tried to figure what we would do when we got clear of this disease, and this is what I want.”

  “We can talk about this later,” Konnon said.

  The topic was instantly dropped. But Rayph knew his dear friend, and he knew that, through his protests, Konnon felt a lightening of heart when he was told they were going back to Dragonsbane. No man ever belonged in a city more than Konnon belonged in Dragonsbane. When this was all over and Bree was saved, Konnon would go home.

  “So let’s talk about this plan of yours,” Konnon said, turning to Rayph.

  “Let’s talk him out of this plan of his,” Smear said. “It is lunacy and I want nothing to do with it.”

  “Lunacy is a strong word. I prefer doomed,” Glyss said.

  Everyone laughed but Smear. “You come up with these things and I wonder if you ever speak them out loud and just say to yourself, ‘By the gods, I have lost my mind.’”

  “There is no other way,” Rayph said.

  “That is crap. There are plenty of other things we could do to draw him out,” Smear said.

  “And if we fail, he disappears into the ether, maybe goes back to his hole, and we never see him again until his blade is in our back,” Rayph said. “If we lose him now, we lose him forever. We have him here. In this city. He had one purpose for being here, now he has two. He will not leave if I dangle this before him. He is too much of a sadist to walk away.”

  “You’re too much of a masochist to let him go,” Smear said.

  “That is not fair!” Rayph said.

  “What are you two old hens clucking about?” Trysliana asked as she walked up to the table with refills on all their mugs.

  Smear pulled her into his lap and she giggled.

  “Rayph has a terrible plan that will get him killed,” Smear said. “He needs to be told this is insane.” Smear shook his head. “Can you even imagine the position you are putting Dreark in?”

  “Dreark will do his part,” Rayph said. “And if it gets out of hand...”

  “What?” Glyss said. “What is the end of that sentence?” He took his drink and put it to his mouth before setting it down. Glyss could never drink when he was upset.

  “If things get out of hand, we change tactics,” Rayph said.

  “Impossible,” Smear snapped. “If things go as planned, we are right at the point of no return. There is no walking away from this. No going back. If this works, things will already be out of control!”

  “What is so bad about this plan?” Trysliana asked.

  “It is dangerous,” Smear said.

  “Everything you have done in this city in the last month has been dangerous. You two live in danger all of the time,” she said. “So this is dangerous, too. How is that different?”

  “Thank you,” Rayph said.

  “It is going to get him killed,” Smear said.

  “Maybe, and maybe this roof will cave in and kill us all,” Trysliana said.

  “There is a difference between faulty craftsmanship and throwing yourself into the lion’s jaws.”

  “Can you do this chore any other way?” she asked. She flipped a stray lock of hair over her forehead and Rayph realized how much he missed his wife.

  “There has to be a better way,” Glyss said.

  Konnon looked at Rayph and nodded. “Do it,” he said. “Do it just as you planned it. It has a simple elegance to it.”

  Rayph nodded and grinned.

  “You’re going to take his advice?” Smear said. The table burst into laughter, and Konnon leaned back and grinned. “You’re going to take sanity advice from the man who once rushed into a burning tower to rescue a keg of ale?”

  Trysliana gasped. “Konnon, what were you thinking?”

  “Oh yes, Rowdy, that’s what they call you,” Smear said. “I met you today, but that doesn’t mean I haven’t heard your legends.”

  Konn
on laughed. “I feel like this is not the time to talk about my choices. This is Rayph’s choice. This is his bad plan. We should keep our focus on him.”

  They all laughed but Trysliana. She looked out the window to the street beyond and her jaw dropped open.

  “Gentlemen,” she said.

  “Let’s just lop his head off now and step away from all the ceremony,” Glyss said.

  The men laughed again.

  Trysliana stood and grabbed Smear by the sides of the head and pointed his face at the window.

  “Gentlemen, we are in trouble,” she said.

  Rayph looked out the window and stood, throwing his chair to clatter against the wall behind him. Outside the bar, the streets were packed with people holding various tools and torches. All held vacant expressions and each had their eyes closed.

  “That is not good, Rayph,” Smear said. He stood and turned to Trysliana. “Run!” he shouted. He pulled his fist daggers and curled his fingers around them.

  “What is happening here?” Konnon said. He pulled his swords and kicked the table over on its edge.

  “Slinter is a possessing demon. These people—” Rayph began, but a shattered window stopped him. The torch thrown into the room sputtered on the floor and customers stood. They closed their eyes and turned as one to the table Rayph and his friends stood around.

  Rayph could hear torches dropping to the roof above. The citizens outside were attempting to burn them out.

  Rayph cursed and closed his eyes. He summoned up the surrounding magic and his aura swelled. But this was not the sane, normal energy of Song. This was something maniacal, demon magic summoned up by Slinter to break the crowd to her will. The dark magic rushed to Rayph’s body and he felt himself tear. Rayph bled and screamed. He groaned and swung the power out wide, through the building and up into the sky. He could not maintain this for long.

  He cried out his words of power. The sky split above them and rain dropped in a harsh curtain. A torrential rain poured, like water from a bucket, onto the bar and the streets beyond. The torches on the roof sputtered out. The torches on the street blotted out, and from within, Rayph could only see vague gray shapes ambling toward the bar.