by Will Wight
“Go home and rest,” Ayana murmured. “We will contact you when your workshop is cleared. Rest assured: your problem is already solved.”
Fletcher looked askance at Ayana, obviously disturbed by her hoarse whisper. But he didn’t say anything about it, merely offering another word of thanks and departing to the ring of a bell.
As soon as he was out of sight, Shera hopped up and pulled her shears—a pair of bronze blades, still sheathed—out from under the desk. She would need to get her blacks from the back room, and she’d have to consult the file to see if she needed any climbing gear.
Ayana stopped her with a bladed hand on her arm. “We have four Shepherds on standby, and two Masons associated with this gang. I’ll assemble a team.”
Shera waved her off, walking toward the back room and calling out, “No need. Order a cleanup team for the workshop.”
Iron fingernails drummed against the desk again, and Shera could hear it from the next room. “This won’t impress Yala,” Ayana said. “I think this is exactly what she wanted to avoid.”
“Then she should give me more time off,” Shera responded. “Or a more interesting job.”
~~~
The alchemical workshop on Regent Way was unexpectedly boring. Shera had seen alchemist’s lairs disguised as castles, made entirely of invested glass, and filling pyramids half-buried in the earth. This one was just…a warehouse. One identical building nestled among its brothers.
She’d climbed up on the roof of a neighboring building and slept until dark, which already made the mission worth her time. She would have taken the assignment for no more reward than these hours of sleep.
At the sound of a shout far below, she instantly woke and rolled onto her belly. Down by the workshop entrance, two men were pushing a third down onto the street.
She pulled a collapsible telescope out of her pouch for a closer look. The men certainly looked like they had dressed to intimidate rather than to impress: they wore rumpled suits with buttons undone, jackets that looked as though they’d been intentionally frayed, and far more jewelry than the situation deserved.
On closer inspection, one of the men had strangely colored eyes. She stared through the telescope until she’d confirmed her suspicion—the veins in the sclera of his eye had turned solid blue. A long-time Anthem user, then, and he wouldn’t have long to live at this rate.
His partner scratched surreptitiously at the skin on his arm, and it looked like the skin rippled out of the way, as though trying to avoid his fingernails. Either he was an Imperial Guard who was kicked out for failing a graft, or else he’d taken one too many potions. His limbs twitched and jerked, and he rolled his shoulder as though the joint pained him.
Anthem user, potion abuser, she noted. Must be the right place.
The man on the ground tried to scramble away on his hands and knees, but Anthem User grabbed his heel and pulled him back. Potion Abuser walked up to the side, kicking him in the ribs.
Holding up an arm as though to ward off his attackers, the man on the ground said something in a pleading tone. Begging for his life, no doubt. There was a certain memorable cadence to people who were begging for mercy in times of certain death.
Potion Abuser hauled the victim to his feet as Anthem User pulled out a pair of knives. He tossed one to their prey, keeping one in his hand.
Victim missed the knife, which clattered to his feet, earning him a punch in the kidney from Potion Abuser. Thus encouraged, Victim bent over and scooped the knife up, holding it awkwardly in his right hand.
Anthem User tossed his own blade from hand to hand, spinning it around his wrist and walking it across the back of his fingers. Showing off, no doubt, but it made Shera roll her eyes. He had earned death for that display alone.
Anthem User stepped in closer, slashing Victim across the upper arm. Victim staggered and tried to retaliate, but he dropped his knife again. Potion Abuser took the opportunity to kick him in the forehead as he tried to recover it.
Growing bored, Shera considered her options. While they were playing around outside, they had left the workshop door open. She had planned to move from roof to roof and then lower herself down through one of the high windows, but if she tried that now, those three outside would likely get away. There was the possibility, in that case, that they would return to trouble her client after she’d left.
The client is Emperor.
She wouldn’t allow that to happen. So she either had to wait until they returned to the workshop, or take care of them now.
Victim was bleeding from half a dozen cuts, and Anthem User was laughing hard enough that Shera heard him clearly. He had taken Victim’s knife back, and was waving a blade in each hand, weaving a complex pattern of steel in the air before him.
That settled it. She couldn’t risk the chance that Anthem User would escape, spreading his defective knife-fighting technique to an unsuspecting world.
Her rope waited for her, lying camouflaged against the wall, and she slid down to the street without a sound.
~~~
Tombstone had chosen his own name when he was fifteen, because he’d thought a tough denizen of the streets should have a name to match. Now, as he knelt in front of Wellin and bled from a dozen wounds, he wondered if he’d chosen his name too well.
Wellin widened his blue-stained eyes and grinned, flashing his knives so quick that they blurred into a mesh of steel. That was a technique of a master knife-fighter, Tombstone was sure. He could never hope to match that skill.
“What now, Tombstone? Hm? Never let go of your weapon, I told you that. I told you.”
Behind Tombstone, Fisher laughed. “Hey! Hey. Where do you put a tombstone, huh? In a graveyard!”
Wellin flicked his eyes up to Fisher and back down, as though he didn’t get it.
A few seconds ago, Tombstone had been filled with such terror that he thought the fear alone would stop his heart. He’d wet himself, for which the other two men had mocked him mercilessly, and he’d emptied his stomach onto the stones.
Now, he felt…hollow. Maybe it was the blood loss, he didn’t know. But instead of being terrified, he simply wished they would stop toying with him and get on with it.
Wellin kept hurling insults about his lack of respect, his betrayal, but that didn’t make much sense. Tombstone had simply sold a couple of the potions on the side. Where was the harm in that? Wellin and Fisher were using up the stock themselves, and nobody cared. But Tombstone decides to make a silvermark or two by moving the stock on the street, and suddenly it’s a death sentence.
He steeled himself, trying to look death in the eye, as his father taught him. So he was looking straight at Wellin as the man’s face tightened in confusion.
“Hey, what happened to…” Wellin trailed off, then threw his head back. “Fisher! Get back here you, you…Elder-spawned…trash. Thing.” Wellin’s insults trailed off into rambles.
Tombstone tried to turn and look behind him without taking his eyes off Wellin’s knives. It was true: the presence at his back known as Fisher was gone. Probably off to water some alley somewhere.
A spark lit inside his heart. This could be his chance for escape.
He started scrambling away, pushing against the road with his feet, pulling himself along with the tips of his fingers. Wellin laughed.
Tombstone looked back in time to see the man throw a knife at his back. It struck him square between the shoulder blades with enough force to send him sprawling on the street.
The knife clattered down to land in front of Tombstone. That’s good news, he thought dimly; it meant the blade hadn’t pierced his flesh. It must have hit him hilt-first.
Unfortunately, Wellin had already caught up and retrieved his weapon.
His boots, scuffed and black, moved up into Tombstone’s vision.
“Can’t go anywhere my knives can’t reach you, Tombstone,” Wellin said from above.
It seemed that was true.
Then the boots turned away
, in the opposite direction of the warehouse. “Private business, get gone.” Confusion entered Wellin’s voice. “Hey, what’re you wearing? You…you’re not Blackwatch, are you?”
Tombstone propped his head up with his chin against the cobblestones. There was someone in the shadows.
After a moment, the outline resolved itself into a slender figure, crouching in the darkness. Could be a woman, though Tombstone couldn’t see enough detail to be sure. Black hair fell down around her face, and a black cloth covered her mouth. The rest of her body was sheathed in solid black, though irregular spots on her silhouette showed places where she’d strapped on weapons or equipment.
She said nothing, but she stepped forward into the dim starlight. With one hand, she reached behind her back, grasping a hilt.
Slowly, she withdrew a bronze knife.
The spark of hope in Tombstone’s heart flared back to life. Rescue! Someone had come to rescue him!
He couldn’t think who would have bothered to come save him, especially since he didn’t know he was in trouble until a few minutes ago, but he wasn’t picky. He scooted out of the way so he wouldn’t get caught up in the fight.
And so he might be able to escape once the battle began.
Wellin grinned as soon as he saw the woman’s knife, brandishing his own blades and waving them in a shining web. “Oooohhhh? You want a knife lesson, do you? Well, step up, I’m game.”
Tombstone noticed a detail he hadn’t considered before: there was a second sheath on her back, with a hilt sticking out from her left side. She had a second blade. Why not draw it?
She stepped forward, and Wellin advanced, and then something happened. Tombstone couldn’t say what.
Wellin’s knife flew out of his hand, ringing like a bell against the cobblestones. He didn’t look like he had any better idea what had happened than Tombstone did.
The woman waited, still calm and half-bent, as though she meant to rush forward at any second. Her knife remained absolutely still.
Widening his blue-stained eyes, Wellin took a half-step back. “What…what did you…”
The woman in black straightened, walking casually closer to Wellin. He slashed desperately with his one remaining blade, trying to ward her off.
The second knife clattered against the street, coming to rest next to the first. Tombstone still couldn’t tell how it had gotten there.
When the woman reached Wellin, she lifted her foot and stomped Wellin’s knee in. From the side. Didn’t look like she put any special force in it, or that she was in a particular hurry, but the joint sounded like crunching bone as it crumbled.
Wellin opened his mouth for a scream, but she jabbed him in the side of the neck with something in her hand. A syringe? A needle? He couldn’t see. Was this an alchemist who had come to get revenge for the workshop?
Tombstone’s spark of hope flickered, and he began to push himself farther away, closer to the shadows underneath the nearest building. His only chance was to stay out of sight.
The woman pushed Wellin roughly to the cobblestones as he choked and coughed, trying to get out a scream.
She leaned down beside him, whispering in his ear. Tombstone was close enough that he could hear each word clearly.
“This is my workshop. If I ever catch you within a city block, I will enter your home through the window. You know, the one that creaks? The one with a crack in the corner? That window. I’ll slip in, and no one will hear me. While you sleep, I’ll put a knife between your ribs. You’ll never make a sound. No one will wake. They will find your body the next morning, soaked in your own blood.”
Wellin whimpered, and Tombstone understood the impulse. He pressed himself against the far wall, his terror having returned in full force.
She walked over, picked up Wellin’s knives, and then returned to crouching in front of him. She held the blades so he could see them.
“Also, if I ever see you pick these up again, I’ll make you eat them.”
She drove one of the knives down at the ground, and for a second Tombstone thought she had buried it to the hilt in Wellin’s throat. But the man was still breathing, still staring wide-eyed at nothing, still struggling to scream.
The woman had wedged the knife in between two cobblestones, where the edge would be pressed against Wellin’s neck.
She shoved the other knife down on the other side, pinning Wellin’s throat between two blades. Then she stood up and walked away, closer to the workshop.
Tombstone couldn’t believe his luck. His wounds burned as though his entire body had been dipped in fire, and his blood was leaking out more every second, but the woman had completely overlooked him. He was free!
Without turning around, she threw a hand back at him, and something stung him in the shoulder. Perhaps a wasp.
He moved his hand up to find the tip of a needle buried in his flesh, the outer edge sheathed in a small wooden handle. Rather than a needle, it might have been better to call it an oversized pin.
Tombstone pulled it out and let it fall to the ground. All things considered, it wasn’t too bad. Didn’t hurt much worse than a pinprick, and she was still leaving him alone.
He noticed the poison only seconds later, when he realized he couldn’t move his arm.
It spread like ice through his veins, locking up all his muscles. He lay on the stones seconds later, rigid as a board, forced to watch the woman in black walk up to the glowing rectangle of the workshop entrance.
He didn’t know who she was. He didn’t know what she wanted. But in his heart, he fervently swore to the Unknown God of the Luminian Order: If I live through tonight, I’m never coming back here again.
Someone called out from the inside of the workshop. “Hey, Fisher! Why is it so quiet?”
The woman walked through the workshop’s open door. There were a few shouts.
A second later, the lights went out.
Even through his paralysis, Tombstone shuddered.
CHAPTER THREE
Fifteen years ago
GLADSTONE KIDNAPPER FOUND DEAD
During the early hours of yesterday morning, Rudeus Maxwell (previously known in this publication as the Gladstone Kidnapper) was found dead in his home, not two miles from the very same Gladstone Park in which he committed his fiendish crimes. Members of the public are no doubt fully acquainted with the infamous Kidnapper, who abducted some five dozen children from Gladstone Park and the surrounding areas over the course of his six-year career.
Professional investigators, Imperial troops, and the best Readers in the Empire failed to uncover any trace of the Kidnapper prior to yesterday’s events, previously leading some to speculate that the “Gladstone Kidnapper” may have never existed at all. This theory has now been proven decidedly false, as Maxwell’s corpse was discovered in the same house as many of the missing children.
The public should note that it was not an officer of the peace who discovered Maxwell’s crimes, nor a judge who executed him. At an hour before dawn, members of the Consultant’s Guild arrived at 75 Hanberry Street to investigate the suspicion of their clients. When they arrived on the premises, they found Maxwell’s body still warm. It is presumed by Imperial investigators that the Kidnapper was dispatched by one of his own victims.
All the evidence needed to posthumously convict Rudeus Maxwell was found in his home, including the surviving handful of kidnapped children.
Forty-eight boys and girls were rescued by Capital police, and are currently residing in the local chapter house of the Consultant’s Guild. If you believe your child may have been taken by the Kidnapper, please proceed to that location with all haste.
The name of the child who turned on his captor still has not been released.
Tapping her pen, Kerian regarded the child across the desk. The girl’s feet didn’t quite reach the floor.
“How old are you?” Kerian asked.
The girl leaned forward, eyeing the plate on Kerian’s desk. Remnants of dinner still rested t
here—a half-eaten pork sandwich and a handful of fried almonds, bought from a street vendor. Kerian had the meal brought to her while she worked, but she’d been too busy to finish.
Kerian handed over the food, and the girl snatched it away, sinking her teeth into the sandwich before she’d settled the plate on her lap. She closed her eyes, savoring the flavor.
“Mmmm. This is real pork. I can tell.”
“How long has it been since you’ve eaten?” Kerian asked. She wouldn’t put it past the Gladstone Kidnapper to have starved his victims.
Still chewing, the girl twisted her face in thought. “Lunch? No, wait; I stole some dates from the cart outside. About two hours ago.”
“Oh.”
The girl tore into the sandwich like a ravenous wolf, and Kerian elected to stick with her professional questions. “How old are you?”
The girl shrugged. “Not ten yet, I don’t think. The ten-year-olds got special treatment.”
Kerian put a question mark in her ledger next to ‘Age.’
“How long have you been with Mr. Maxwell?”
The pork sandwich had vanished, so the girl held up a single salted almond to the light, examining it with one eye shut like a jeweler holding a diamond. “A long time,” she said.
Kerian wrote another question mark next to ‘Length of Confinement.’
“Now, what’s your name?”
The girl popped another almond into her mouth. “Maxwell called me Shera.”
Kerian froze with her pen a half-inch from the ledger. That sounded suspiciously like an Am’haranai name.
Based on what the Shepherds observed and the Miners dug up, Rudeus Maxwell was a nobody. A malcontent who aspired to rebellion. He’d served in the Imperial army for almost ten years, but retired before the South Sea Revolution to inherit his family’s remaining fortune.
Judging from a handful of Maxwell’s letters the Consultants intercepted, some drunken talk with a Mason in a nearby bar, and the testimony of Maxwell’s former squad members, it was good that he’d left the service when he had. He would have been more likely to join the Revolution than stay with the army.
