by Unknown
Finally, her cloak. It had been created by the nightkeepers of the Ghosts, and it blended and merged with the shadows, rendering its wearer all but invisible. And as an added bonus, it shielded its wearer’s thoughts from mind-controlling sorcery.
Caina left the safehouse, stole a horse, and hastened through the capital’s dark alleys.
A short time later she arrived at the Street of Forges, where smiths labored endlessly to produce arms and armor for the Imperial Legions. Caina stopped before a large smithy, let the horse go, and climbed up the copper drainpipe. Within a window on the second floor she saw a man in his late forties and a woman in her early thirties eating dinner before a fireplace. The man had the look of a Legion veteran, with hard hands and hard gray eyes, and the thick arms and neck of a smith. His wife was pretty, despite the faint lines near her blue eyes.
Caina slipped open the window and dropped into the room.
The Legion veteran moved in an instant, a sword appearing in his hand, the tip resting at Caina’s throat. The woman was on her feet as well, a crossbow ready in her grasp.
Caina reached up, drew back her hood, and removed her mask.
“Countess,” said the Legion veteran, lowering his sword.
“Ark,” said Caina, nodding at the woman. “Tanya.”
“There’s trouble,” said Ark, “isn’t there?”
Caina nodded. “I need your help. Both of you.”
“You have it,” said Ark.
“Whatever you ask of us,” added Tanya, “it is yours.”
Caina nodded. Ark and Tanya were both Ghosts, and would do whatever she asked. And Caina had rescued Tanya from slave traders years ago. Both would follow her into hell if she asked it of them.
She hoped it wouldn’t come to that.
“An outlaw magus named Croanna returned to the capital,” said Caina. “She’s one of Morneus’s apprentices.”
Tanya’s eyes widened. “The necromancer your Lucan slew.”
Caina felt herself twitch, but nodded. “Lucan thought that Morneus killed his wife. Apparently, Croanna took her captive instead. She sent a note to Lucan, telling him to come or his wife would die. He went.”
“Oh,” said Tanya, “oh, Countess. I am sorry.”
“Get our gear,” said Ark, and Tanya nodded and went to a chest against the wall. “Do we have a plan?”
“Yes,” said Caina. “Red Trajus delivered the note to Lucan.”
Ark scowled. “The pet thug of the magi.”
Caina nodded. “I know where he’s staying. We’ll find him and make him tell us where Croanna is hiding.”
Ark grunted. “Red Trajus and his crew are nasty pieces of work. We may need help.”
“No time,” said Caina. “I don’t know what Croanna has in mind for Lucan, and I don’t want to find out.” Croanna might have killed him already. Caina refused to think about that. “And once Red Trajus tells us where Croanna is, we’ll kill her and rescue Lucan and Livia.”
“Livia?” said Tanya, pulling weapons and armor from the chest.
“Lucan’s wife,” said Caina.
Tanya handed a chain mail hauberk to Ark, and began to pull on a leather jerkin studded with steel discs.
“Croanna might have lied,” said Ark.
“Perhaps,” said Caina. “But if Livia is alive, then Lucan will go back to her.”
Ark tugged on the hauberk and strapped on a sword belt. “I’m surprised he hasn’t asked you to marry him yet.”
“He did,” said Caina, voice quiet. “So I went to Lord Corbould, his father. He declined.”
Ark nodded, lifting a massive Legion-issue shield, while Tanya tucked a pair of daggers and a quiver of crossbow bolts into her belt.
“Heartless old bastard,” muttered Tanya. “You should marry Lucan anyway, just to spite him.”
“No,” said Caina. “I am a Ghost, and I do what I must for the good of the Empire. Corbould Maraeus is one of the Emperor’s strongest allies. If I married Lucan without his permission, it would drive him away from the Emperor.” She hesitated. “Even if...I wish it might be otherwise.”
“I am sorry, Countess,” said Tanya.
“But there’s more going on here,” said Caina, hoping to change the topic, “than just Croanna’s vendetta against Lord Lucan.”
“What do you mean?” said Tanya.
“Red Trajus works for the Magisterium,” said Caina. “Not for outlaw magi. Which means that the high magi, maybe even the First Magus himself, ordered Red Trajus to help her.”
“So the magi are up to something,” said Tanya, shouldering her crossbow.
“And whatever it is,” said Caina, “we’re going to stop it. Let’s go.”
~o0o~
“Red Trajus owns an inn?” whispered Tanya.
They hid behind a stack of barrels in the mouth of an alley, the nearby docks reeking of salt and dead dish. A large inn of timber and stone stood across the street, and the sounds of carousing and off-key singing spilled into the street.
“He uses it as a base,” said Caina. “Billets his men here when he’s in the city. Stores captives in the cellar. And, of course, his men get free ale and whores when they’re here.”
Ark grunted. “There are at least sixty mercenaries in there.”
“Most of them drunk,” said Tanya.
“Aye,” said Ark. “But those guards…there, and there. They’re not drunk, and they look like they know their business.”
“Of course they do,” said Caina. “Trajus isn’t a fool. The Ghosts have been watching him for years.”
“Then how do we get him?” said Ark.
“Simple,” said Caina. “We set in the inn on fire.”
They stared at her.
“We…set the inn on fire?” said Tanya.
“Most of Trajus’s men are drunk,” said Caina. “We set the inn on fire, they’ll panic and run into the street. We snatch Trajus, run for it, and question him.”
“Why is it,” said Ark, “that your plans always seem to involve setting buildings on fire?”
“I haven’t burned down a building in years,” said Caina.
“After I joined the Ghosts and started working with you,” said Ark, “I set fire to more buildings than I did in twenty years with the Legion.”
“It always worked, didn’t it?” said Caina. “Wait here.”
She slipped out from behind the barrels and crept across the street, gliding from shadow to shadow. The guards at the door kept close watch over their surroundings, but Caina had years of experience moving unseen, and the shadow-woven cloak. In a short time she circled around to the inn’s back windows. It was child’s play to slip the latch and climb into the inn’s kitchen. Two stoves stood against the wall, pots of stew bubbling atop them.
Caina kicked both stoves over, found a jar of cooking oil, and flung it over the spilled coals.
The resultant flame was...rather more than she had hoped for.
“Fire!” she bellowed in the direction of the inn’s common room. “Fire! Fire!”
Then she raced out the back door, circled the block, and rejoined Ark and Tanya. Flames already billowed out the inn’s back door, and a stream of panicked, drunken mercenaries surged into the street.
“What did you do?” said Ark.
“Cooking oil,” said Caina.
A thunderous bellow cut over the roar of the flames. “Buckets! Damn your hides, you dogs, get buckets! A brigade from the docks! Move, damn you!” A tall man wearing a red chain mail shirt paced back and forth, his pale face marked with crimson tattoos around the mouth and eyes.
Red Trajus.
“Ark,” said Caina, scooping up some pebbles from the alley. “Tanya. Get ready.”
Ark nodded and pressed himself against the wall, while Tanya crouched in the shadows.
Caina tossed one of the pebbles, and it bounced off the back of Trajus’s head. He turned in irritation, scanning the alley, but saw nothing. Caina waited until he turned, then flick
ed another pebble. This one bounced off his earlobe. Again Trajus whirled in annoyance, and Caina’s third pebble caught him right between the eyes.
He stormed forward in a rush, and Caina stepped out from behind the barrels, letting him see her.
He hesitated, his eyes narrowing as he took in the shadow-woven cloak, and then he grinned and lifted his blade.
“So,” Trajus growled, “the Ghosts finally decided to burn down my inn?” Caina backed away, and Trajus followed, his sword point waving back and forth like an enraged serpent. “Well and good. The Magisterium offers a standing bounty of five hundred for the head of any Ghost...”
Ark surged out the darkness and seized Trajus’s arms. The mercenary opened his mouth to shout, and Tanya leapt upon him, a dripping rag in her hand. She slapped it over his face, the fluid filling his nostrils and mouth.
Trajus went rigid, and then slumped unconscious in Ark’s grip.
“Well done,” said Caina. “Tie him up, and we’ll take him someplace where we can have a private chat.”
~o0o~
Caina knew of an abandoned warehouse in the docks, and they took Red Trajus there. Ark bound him to a chair, taking his weapons and armor.
“Wake him,” said Caina.
Tanya pinched his nose closed and poured a vial of green fluid down his throat, and Red Trajus awoke, sputtering and cursing.
“Damn you all,” he muttered, “‘I’ll have your hides, I’ll...”
His bloodshot eyes darted back and forth, taking in Caina’s cloak and the masks hiding Ark and Tanya’s faces.
“Ah,” he said, spitting. “So, the Ghosts have finally decided to assassinate me, eh? Well, the Magisterium will be displeased, and you do not want to face an angry magus...”
“Spare me,” said Caina, speaking in the snarling rasp she used while disguised. “You’re the Magisterium’s rabid dog. Kill a dog, and a man simply finds another. But if we wanted to kill you, we’d have done so already.”
Trajus smirked. “So you want information.”
“Earlier today you delivered a note to a petty spy named Gnaeus,” said Caina. “Who gave you the note and why?”
Trajus grinned.
“You’re her, aren’t you?” he said. “The one they call the Ghost Countess.” He laughed. “She said you would get involved.”
“She,” said Caina. “You mean Croanna.”
“Aye,” said Trajus. “Tell me, is it true that every night you lure a different enemy of the Emperor to your bed, only to slit his throat while he lies exhausted in your embrace?”
Caina rolled her wrist, a throwing knife appearing in her hand. “We could skip to the end, if you like.”
“No need,” said Trajus, his eyes on the blade. “I’ll tell you everything you want to know.”
Caina frowned. He was far more cooperative than she had anticipated. She would have expected threats.
Not cooperation.
“Speak,” she said.
“You know the Magisterium pays me to do their dirty work,” said Trajus. “And one of the dirty jobs is killing outlaw magi...at least those that the high magi don’t find useful. One day Croanna turned up in the capital with a captive.”
Lucan’s wife, no doubt. Croanna had been telling the truth. Caina was grateful the mask hid the pain on her face.
“I would have killed her,” said Trajus, “but word came down from the First Magus himself. Said I was to assist her, quietly.”
“Did he say why?” said Caina.
“No,” said Trajus. “And I didn’t ask. I’m paid to kill people, not to think.”
“Then she’s up to something,” said Caina. “Something the First Magus thinks will be useful.”
Trajus shrugged. “Like I said, I don’t care. The crazy hag had only one job for me. Take a letter to a noble named Lucan Maraeus. The man plays the drunkard, but the high magi hate him, and he’s dangerous. So I hired that rat Gnaeus to deliver the letter, and hung back to watch. Maraeus took off the minute he got the letter. Croanna was waiting for him in a carriage, and he climbed in, and that was that.”
“Croanna,” said Caina. “What is she like?”
“Dangerous,” said Trajus. “All magi are, of course, but she’s...worse. Did you know she was old Morneus’s student? He was a necromancer, and she was his favorite apprentice. And she spent her exile in Catekharon. The sorcerers of Catekharon are the finest artificers of enspelled devices in the world. Croanna learned from them, as well. She can make...things, enspelled things, from the blood and flesh of her victims.”
And Lucan had been in this woman’s clutches for hours.
“Where is she?” said Caina.
Trajus answered without hesitation. “She’s hiding in the ruins of the Old Baths, where all those people died in the riots during the previous Emperor’s reign. She said it’s a place of power, that the energy of their deaths still lingers.”
“Why are you telling me this?” said Caina.
Trajus smirked. “Because Croanna ordered me to do so.”
“Did she,” said Caina.
“She knew you would come for her one way or another,” said Trajus.
“She should have hidden from me,” said Caina.
Trajus laughed. “She’s going to kill you. I’ve heard all about you, Countess. You’ve been giving the Magisterium fits for years. They’ve put a bounty of fifty thousand on your head, did you know that? No one’s been able to collect, and I wasn’t foolish enough to try.” He smiled. “But Croanna is more dangerous than the other magi. She uses her head, not just her spells. And she’s going to kill you, Countess.”
“She is welcome to try,” said Caina.
But the utter certainty in the mercenary’s eyes chilled her.
“Cut him loose,” said Caina. “Let him go.”
Trajus blinked in surprise.
“We should kill him,” said Ark.
“No point,” said Caina. “Croanna already knows that we’re coming.” She nodded to Tanya, who cut the ropes binding Trajus. “But if you interfere, you will regret it. Though only briefly.”
“Not to worry, Countess,” said Trajus. “Croanna can handle you by herself, and if I interject myself, you’ll probably kill me out of spite.”
“Probably,” said Caina. “You should stop working for the magi, while you still can.”
Trajus snorted. “You should worry more about what Croanna is going to do to you.”
He left without another word.
“I still think we should have killed him,” said Ark.
“He isn’t important,” said Caina. “We need to deal with Croanna.”
“How will we do that?” said Ark.
“We kill her, and quickly,” said Caina. “And we do it ourselves. If Croanna’s as powerful as Trajus claimed, and we bring a company of soldiers, we’ll only get them killed. If she gets a chance to use her spells against us, we’ll lose.”
“But how will we defeat her?” said Tanya.
“Simple,” said Caina. “We creep up and stab her in the back before she can cast any spells.”
“Straightforward,” said Ark.
“The best plans always are,” said Caina. “Let’s go.”
~o0o~
The ruined Old Baths jutted in the night like skeletal fingers. Years ago, during the final turbulent years of the previous Emperor’s reign, a riot had broken out. The Old Baths had caught fire, and hundreds of people had been killed when part of the structure collapsed. Ever since then, the site had been considered cursed, and no one had repaired the ruins for fear of drawing ill luck.
A perfect place, Caina supposed, for an outlaw magus to hide.
She sent Ark and Tanya to climb to the roof with their crossbows, and entered into the ruins herself, shadow-woven cloak flowing around her, boots making no sound against the tiled floor. Soot marred the elaborate reliefs upon the walls, and heaps of broken rubble covered the mosaics upon the floor. Statues of long-dead Emperors and lords stood at
crooked, drunken angles.
A glimmer of light came from the center of the Baths.
The main chamber of the Baths had once boasted a great dome. Now the dome had half-collapsed into piles of rubble, and algae choked the stagnant pools, weeds rising between the cracked tiles. A dozen wooden tables stood in the center of the chamber, laden with jars, vials, books, scrolls. Caina scrambled up one of the rubble piles for a better look.
She saw Lucan at once.
He lay upon one of the tables, still alive, and Caina let out a long breath of relief. Yet he stared at the ceiling, blinking every so often, and his eyes were empty and glassy.
What had Croanna done to him?
A dark shape moved near one of the tables, and Caina laid eyes upon Croanna.
She was tall and gaunt, with glittering black eyes and ragged gray hair. Jewels gleamed upon her fingers and ears, and she wore rings in her ears, her eyebrows, her nose, her lips. No doubt every last one of them had been imbued with sorcerous power.
Caina slipped a throwing knife into her hand and crept to the bottom of the rubble heap, looking closer.
And Croanna looked up, her eyes narrowed.
“Ah,” she said, her voice dusty. “That must be you, Countess. No need to hide further.” She lifted her left hand, and Caina saw that she wore a strange glove made of steel rings and delicate chains. “Do you like it? One of the little toys I learned to make in Catekharon. It lets me sense the presence of any steel within a certain distance.” She chuckled. “You are quite well armed, aren’t you?”
Caina straightened up, the knife still in her hand.
Croanna’s eyes fixed upon her. “You’ve come for Lucan, I suppose?”
“What have you done to him?” said Caina.
“Why, I’ve given him the chance to become famous,” said Croanna. “Tomorrow morning he is going to kill the Emperor.”
She smiled and gestured at Lucan, her sleeve falling away, and Caina saw a bronze spike driven through her left forearm, between the bones.
