Black Guild

by J. P. Ashman

  Terrina’s painful smile fell away, but for a moment. ‘You’ll not sour my mood now, you shit!’ She laughed and rushed to gather her things, pains forgotten, just about. For today she would see her resurrected brother and all was well with the world; she caught sight of herself in the mirror as she flashed a glance around the room to ensure she’d not forgotten anything. Well, almost all.

  Mere moments later, Terrina gasped at the horror before her.

  Pangan winced and looked away. ‘I’ll leave you two to it.’ Without looking back, he left the small room.

  ‘Oh no you don’t, Pangan…’ Terrina’s loud words stopped the man, ‘…not until I get answers.’ Her eyes locked on the empty pits where her brother’s grey orbs had once been; red and raw, wrinkled, puckered and… Bile reached the back of her throat, burning, making her gag. The sounds and smells hit her from when Longoss took his revenge on her brother, and on her. The sounds and the smells and the sights and the pains. She shuddered. She ground teeth and sneered as Pangan turned and re-entered the room.

  ‘Very well.’ Pangan closed the door and stood with his back to it, studying his fingernails.

  ‘Look!’

  Pangan looked up from the picking of said nails, looked up to a face contorted with anger. No, not anger… Terrina’s face was twisted, scars pulling, others creasing, in rage. Pure, red-faced rage. Spittle flecked her bottom lip, which trembled along with the rest of her. Pangan took a deep breath and released it as a sigh.

  ‘Look—’ Terrina started.

  ‘I am bloody looking, lass. Aren’t I, eh? Aren’t I?’ He stared at Blanck, the ghost of a man he once knew, curled up on the bunk, back against daubed walls of filthy cream, a million miles from the rooms Terrina had inhabited since her and her brother’s run in with their last mark, with Longoss.

  Terrina sneered once more and looked back to her brother, who said nothing. ‘Blanck? Brother?’ Nothing but the slightest movement of his head. He rocked back and forward, arms wrapped around useless legs. ‘It’s me, Terrina.’

  ‘I know.’ Blanck’s voice was hoarse, worse than Terrina’s had been even at the height of her recent illness.

  Terrina cursed long and hard, in her head. She cursed Longoss, she cursed Poi Son, but most of all she cursed herself for cursing again and again, throughout her recovery; her internment. Oh, how she’d wailed and railed and pissed and moaned about her wounds and ruined face, and all the while here was Blanck, her brother, living in a hovel with his eyes – and worse – removed.

  She spun on Pangan. ‘Why’s he in this roach infested shit of a dive, Pangan, you prick? Why?’

  Pangan’s eyes narrowed. A rare sight to behold, and a damned scary one. ‘Careful, lass.’

  Terrina bit her lip rather than release the retort that attempted to enter the world through her wrecked lips. The pain was worth it; worth her life. Pangan was nice, as assassins went, and that made him one of the most dangerous, that she knew. And she knew a lot… or had, before Longoss turned on them.

  There was an awkward pause as the two assassins watched one another. Blanck shifted, shuddered out a breath and lay flat, rolling away from his sister to face the mouldy wall.

  ‘He can’t see finery, so why surround him with it?’ Pangan threw out his hands, palms forward. ‘Poi Son’s words, repeated by me is all,’ he said.

  Terrina knew Pangan wasn’t scared of her, but she also knew he was no fool and wouldn’t risk a fight if unnecessary: “The meanest bastard of a knight can get stuck play-fighting with horse and long-stick, his opponent on the other side of a fence. And if that can happen, the toughest assassin in Brisance can get stuck in a spur-of-the-moment tavern brawl. A fight is only worth it if there’s no other way, lass. That’s why I chose to be an assassin, so the other fucker doesn’t have a chance to fight back and stick me through skill or by my own slip up. I’ve usually stuck them, you see, before they know it’s coming. No pomp and ceremony. No posturing and chest puffing. A length of iron in their back or a good edge across their throat, from behind. Suits me fine.” Pangan told her that years ago, and it’d stuck. She’d never followed it, wasn’t her way, or Blanck’s… perhaps it should have been. Pangan was nearing four decades, at least, and had not a scar to show for his years butchering folk for the guild.

  And us…? she thought, turning back to her brother and stroking his back. Well… we postured and strutted and put ourselves about like The bastard Three. ‘And look where that got us, eh Blanck?’ Her voice was but a whisper, but her brother heard it, she knew.

  Blanck said nothing and Terrina silently railed at the world.

  Chapter 33 - Cruel to be kind

  Terrina tipped the sloshing chamber pot out of the bright window, as she had been doing for the past few days and, like those other times, cared little whether there were folk below.

  Someone yelled in outrage. Terrina ignored them and closed the window with a slam. The filthy glass rattled in the frame before she let go of it, crossing the room thereafter to place the pot back under her brother’s bed.

  ‘Who was that?’ Blanck’s voice was weak. He’d said little to her since her arrival, despite her attempts at conversation. Most of what he’d said had been questions, questions about immediate things like sounds outside and in.

  ‘You pissed on someone, from a pot.’ Terrina’s attempted smile fell away when Blanck said nothing. She watched him rock some more, his back to her. His back had been to her the whole time, apart from when she helped him piss through the small pipe the cutters had inserted into… well, it didn’t bear thinking about. Terrina gritted her teeth again. She’d been doing that a lot. She fantasised about sawing Longoss’ cock off with a dull blade. She knew it wasn’t terribly inventive, but didn’t care.

  ‘I won’t kill him, you know?’

  Nothing.

  ‘Blanck, my love?’

  A groan was all Blanck gave in return. Terrina watched him wrap his arms around himself all the more, rock all the more, too.

  ‘I’ll do what he did to you and more when I find him, but I won’t let the stinking bastard die. No. That’d be too—’

  A thud against the wall, from the adjoining room, drew her attention. Terrina frowned. ‘I didn’t think there was anyone else here except your watchers?’

  Blanck groaned some more, whimpered, cried, shoulders bobbing. Terrina rubbed his back, her red eyes stinging as more salty tears appeared.

  Another thud, followed by a third.

  ‘Shut it, ye shit!’ Terrina surged to her feet and made for the door, her hand trailing behind her after leaving Blanck’s back. The door opened as her hand brushed the handle.

  The rasping, dry breath that filled the following silence unnerved Terrina and she didn’t like it. She’d been unnerved more of late than she had her whole life. But if she thought the breathing was bad, it wasn’t until she took in the rest of the man, face and all, that she took a step back into the room, mouth as dry as the ragged breaths being forced through the desiccated nose and lip-less mouth she stared at.

  Terrina sucked in a breath of her own as recognition struck her, somehow. ‘It can’t be?’ she breathed, shaking her head. ‘I thought you were dead?’

  The man’s voice was no more pleasant than his breathing. His red head tilted sideways to hear her, his ear-less, hairless head ironic considering the man he’d been sent to kill when this horror befell him. ‘Believe… me… Terrina lass…’ the former street-assassin said, the words scratching at his scar-knotted throat, ‘there’s many a time… I think I am dead. Then I move… and the pain reminds… me otherwise.’ Each breath was a forced and conscious decision, that much was clear. It stopped his unfamiliar voice from forming words, causing him to speak slowly, carefully; painfully.

  Terrina held out an arm and invited the man into Blanck’s room. ‘Did you know my brother was in here?’ The man shook his head and shuffled past, his red stained white linens looking more like a mottled dress than a man’s clothing. ‘
I don’t think he knew you were next door, either. Did you Blanck?’

  Nothing.

  The burnt red blur of a man sat on the bunk next to Blanck. He raised a hand, the fingers fused, and patted Blanck’s back before lifting puffy eyes Terrina’s way. ‘It’s good… to see you, lass.’

  Nodding, Terrina closed the door behind her and moved round to take in the two former killers on the bunk. ‘Despite all this,’ she said, finding a little strength in herself in comparison to her audience, ‘it’s good to see you too, Rapeel.’

  ‘Well?’ Poi Son was drawing a black bow across the strings of his favourite fiddle. The whine irked Pangan, his right eye twitching as Poi Son repeated the note once more.

  ‘Well, they’re together again.’ Pangan looked about the room. It was larger than those Poi Son usually resided in, which surprised Pangan. He hadn’t been to this one either, which surprised him all the more. Is the situation that bad? Makes sense that it is, I suppose. He filled his cheeks and released the breath he’d held. No answer came from Poi Son, so he looked away from the hooded tapestry on the wall, the only bastard thing he recognised since Poi Son had it transported with him to each building he stopped at. He met his master’s eyes. ‘All this time,’ Pangan said, ignoring the fact that Poi Son wanted him to elaborate, ‘and I never knew you had a pad above Blanck and Rapeel. I can’t say I’d thought about what was up here at all really. Just another separated ‘wing’ of the Black Guild estate.’

  Poi Son forced the bow across at an angle and Pangan grimaced, bringing hands to ears. ‘Point taken,’ Pangan said through gritted teeth.

  Poi Son stopped, placed the bow on the desk before him – there was always a desk before him – and sat back in his high-backed chair.

  ‘Terrina’s pissed… er… I mean annoyed, at Longoss, naturally.’ Pangan lowered one hand, but rubbed at his left ear with the other. The memory of the awful, instrumental sound was hard to shake. ‘Well, she was annoyed at him before, but more so now.’

  ‘And what did Terrina think of Rapeel?’

  Pangan snorted. ‘Disgust most likely. Sympathy too. Strange seeing the latter in her eyes, but it was there, I could see it through the spy hole.’ Pangan grinned. It was brief. He sighed and continued. ‘I think they’ll work together, if that’s what you want to hear, but it’ll take them a good while to be fit for it. Flay me, Master Son,’ Pangan flung his hands up and let them slap back down against his sides, ‘Terrina and Blanck struggled enough against Longoss when they were at their peak, let alone a beaten Terrina with a scorched street-assassin in tow.’

  Poi Son seemed to relax a little more. ‘I have, items, which will ensure they are fit enough, strong and fast enough. It’s their want… their need to do it, that I can’t force. Well, not with alchemy, anyway.’

  Pangan nodded. ‘You give them the means, Master Son, and they’ll deliver the enthusiasm, I guarantee you that. Especially when Blanck dies.’

  ‘Is that set?’ Poi Son leaned forward, hands clasped on his desk in anticipation.

  Pangan winced and nodded. ‘I can’t say I like this, but aye, it’s in motion as we speak.’ He looked to the floorboards beneath him and sighed once more. Poor lass, he thought, guilt threatening his resolve. Poor Blanck! That lad’s been through enough. Mind you, it’ll be an end to his suffering, that’s for sure. He looked back to Poi Son, who had the bow back in one hand and was reaching for the fiddle with the other. ‘We shouldn’t rush any of this, despite the problems we face on the streets.’

  ‘It’s not because of that, that I make haste,’ Poi Son said, eyes on strings. ‘It’s the other obvious thing, Pangan.’

  ‘Mistress Bronwen’s visit?’

  Poi Son nodded and plucked a string repeatedly, the resulting sound twanging through Pangan’s head.

  ‘I thought you didn’t want to know the silent outcome of that meeting?’

  ‘I’m not saying I do, Master Son. I wanted to know why you’ve sped things up is all.’

  Their eyes met and Pangan’s stomach lurched. Poi Son looked back to his strings.

  ‘She didn’t, did she?’

  Poi Son nodded.

  Pangan swore under his breath. ‘Full on guild war, Master Son?’

  ‘War, Pangan. With everything for the taking. I’m surprised she’s yet to make a move.’

  Pangan linked his hands behind his head. Makes things more complicated than normal for me though, you twat. ‘Well I hope this damned and bloody contract is worth it, whenever it’s carried out.’

  ‘It will be.’ Twang! ‘It will be. Despite that red-haired oaf of a guardsman escaping Dockside and running to the Duke of Yewdale with a warning. Despite that, I have—

  ‘Did you have him arrested, Pangan?’ Poi Son asked, forgetting his plucking and looking up to his right-hand man.

  Pangan grinned. ‘Weeks ago, Master Son. Should have been to court by now and be swinging lifeless in Execution Square. I threatened the magistrates, ye see. Although it didn’t take much when I said he were a fire breathing demon.’

  Poi Son’s eyes widened. ‘Well, well, Pangan. Well, well. It’s all happening now, isn’t it?’

  ‘It is, aye.’ Although I’m a boat-load less enthusiastic about it all than you are. ’Morl’s arse, but this is all going to end badly. After all, the Black Guild’s at war… with itself! And all because this prick wanted to teach Longoss a lesson. With a heavy sigh and nothing more, Pangan turned and left the room, hurriedly, since his head ached, no thanks to the twanging plucker he left behind.

  Terrina started as Rapeel knelt down beside her, breath scraping through his throat. ‘He suffers… every moment… of every day, Terrina.’

  She said nothing. Her right hand pulled at her golden locks, her eyes searching her brother’s eye-less face for some hint of his former self. He’d said little. He didn’t respond to her words, bar winces, grimaces and heavy sighs. He rocked ceaselessly. ‘Where’s Pangan?’ she said, voice low. She feared it may break as she watched her brother. It didn’t seem like Blanck, apart from his features, and even they…

  ‘Busy.’ Rapeel shifted and Terrina looked sidelong at him. Bile threatened to rise yet again as she studied his twisted, red skin. All creases and sores. ‘I’m no looker… Terrina,’ he breathed, glancing back, eyes as bloodshot red as the surrounding skin. ‘But a rage burns in me that’ll make up for anything I’ve lost, if you’ll excuse the analogy.’

  Terrina frowned. ‘Your voice?’

  Rapeel bared more of his teeth than his poor attempts at lips already showed. ‘You noticed.’ He looked back to Blanck, who was turning his head left and right like a bird locked in a small cage for far too long. ‘It heals quickly now. Feels… better. Not how it should be, lass, but better. My skin eases, my strength returns.’ He looked back at her, eyes boring into hers. ‘You can have the same. You can heal quicker. You can gain the strength you need to pay that pissing bastard back. And we can do it together. For him.’ A crisped clump of fused fingers shook as they pointed to Blanck. As Terrina watched the grotesque fingers, she gasped; she saw a lightness return to the skin, a hue more akin to normality. She witnessed them separating, right there before her eyes. The shaking stopped. She looked back to Rapeel’s face. It remained scarred, terribly so, but the scars weren’t half as bad as they’d been a moment ago.

  Terrina scrambled back across the floor, ignoring the pain, a sneer pulling at her mouth, at her scars. ‘What trickery is this, Rapeel? What game do you play?’

  Rapeel sighed, with relief, with pleasure. He flexed his fingers in front of his face, a face positively beaming as he rose effortlessly to his feet. ‘Oh Terrina,’ he said, turning to her, unnerving grin ever present. His lips were better than they had been, but they failed to hide his teeth completely. She’d seen opened faces in combat that scared her less when they came back to her in the quiet of the night. ‘Pangan did this for me, or rather Poi Son did through Pangan.’ He dropped to a squat and sprang up again, twisted left
and right at his waist, arms out wide. ‘I feel… ready.’

  ‘For what?’ she said to the ear-less man.

  ‘Revenge, lass. Revenge!’ He grinned all the more, then faltered as he looked back to Blanck’s prone form. Blanck had shifted onto his back, oblivious of Rapeel’s transformation as he covered his groin with his hands, as he was wont to do of late.

  Terrina hadn’t missed the movement. It had been in her periphery, whilst staring dumbfounded at Rapeel, but she’d seen him physically move his useless legs into position before doing so. She’d noticed the winces and silent curses his lips worked at whilst doing so. So simple a movement and it pained him so much.

  Rapeel crouched down again, looking from Blanck to Terrina. She kept her eyes on her brother, or what was left of him.

  ‘You see it don’t you, Terrina? You know it!’

  ‘What?’ she whispered. She did know.

  ‘That this is the end for Blanck.’

  She sucked in a breath. She watched her brother, who must have heard the words. Nothing. Not a movement nor murmur. He lay there, empty sockets facing a ceiling he couldn’t see.

  ‘It’s what he wants—’

  ‘Shut up!’

  ‘He won’t say it, but nor does he deny it, lass.’ Rapeel produced a blade.

  The shine from the window seemed like the brightest thing Terrina had ever seen. She cringed and pulled back, tight into the corner of the room as Rapeel moved in closer, hilt held out, offering her the weapon. ‘Take it,’ he hissed. His voice was much improved, but it rasped past gristle-come-lips nonetheless. ‘Take it and end his misery. Take it… and break Longoss’ vow!’

  Terrina took her eyes from the blade and found Rapeel’s. As she did, she noticed his other hand behind his back. Before she could ask what he held, he brought forth Blanck’s soiled mask. Her brother’s blood-tears stained the white beneath the holes where his grey eyes used to look through. Other speckles of dried blood decorated the previously immaculate mask that she knew so well. The elongated beak-like point came towards her, jerked as Rapeel offered it to her.