by Alex Steele
Honorless
Chaos Mages Book 4
Alex Steele
Steel Fox Media LLC
Contents
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
Chapter 36
Chapter 37
Chapter 38
Chapter 39
Chapter 40
Chapter 41
Chapter 42
Chapter 43
Chapter 44
Chapter 45
Chapter 46
Acknowledgments
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One
“Five minutes. No exceptions and no delays,” the magister said, showing no emotion whatsoever.
I nodded and held out my hands for the magic dampening cuffs. No one was allowed to see prisoners with free use of their magic. It made sense, but it still rankled. A slithering thought in the back of my mind said that the cuffs couldn’t hold me.
My mayhem magic could burn them off and tear this building to the ground. The only problem was, after that, I’d be a fugitive, and so would Bradley, my former chief at the IMIB. He had to be cleared of charges. There was still a chance, however slim, and we had to fight for it.
The magister shifted slightly to his right and waved his hand over the lock. A red glow started in the deeply recessed lines of the runes carved into the stone of the doorway. This place was old. Dug out of stone a millennia ago and reformed over the years as its purpose and ownership changed. People jokingly referred to it as the new Tower of London because its prisoners rarely went free.
A thick, metal door swung inward. I stepped into the narrow hall, noting the chill in the air. It was damp down here, and cold. The air stale. The metal of the cuffs took on that chill as I walked, making them impossible to ignore. I curled my hands into fists to hold back the impulse to pry them off.
The cell doors were solid. Runes reinforced the doors themselves and the stone around them. The farther I walked, the more oppressive it all became. This was where political prisoners were held pending their trials. Guilty until proven innocent seemed to be the motto of the Mage’s Guild.
I paused in front of cell 4824 and pressed the square block I’d been given to the door. The rune activated and the top half of the door seemingly disappeared. It was still there, however, now simply transparent.
“Chief, can you hear me?” I asked quietly. The cell was pitch black except for a slash of light from the door.
“What the hell are you doing here, Blackwell?” Bradley demanded.
It warmed me to hear the fire in his voice wasn’t completely lost yet. “Just visiting an old friend before his trial.”
There was a rustling and Bradley scoffed at me. “You have more important things to be doing. I heard there was an attack on Moira.”
“There was,” I admitted.
“How many dead?”
“They don’t know yet.” The estimates grew every day. Every time I looked at them, it made me sick to my stomach. These gods, whoever they were, had stomped all over us without care. The deaths in Moira were collateral damage. They hadn’t even been the point.
I shook my head, trying to force my thoughts back to the present. “What can we do to help prepare for your trial? Swift wanted-”
“Nothing. You and Swift will not get involved.”
I glared into the darkness. “Why the hell not?”
“A trial won’t go in my favor, Blackwell. They have too much evidence, and it doesn’t matter if it is fabricated.” Bradley leaned out of the shadow. His face was drawn, eyes tired. He looked every bit of his three hundred years right now. “I did what I could. It’s your turn now. Forget about me.”
“I can’t do that-”
“Yes, you can. That’s an order. My final one.” Bradley stood finally, walking up to the door. He leaned close, his dark eyes still hard with determination despite the tone of his words. “Take care of my family. There are other people that can help you. Find them.”
“You sound like a man headed to an execution. There’s still hope-”
“No. Not for me, and don’t you try to infect me with it. I can accept my fate, but I cannot stand hope right now. I may be an old man, but I still have a lot to lose. A good life I can’t go back to. I have to let it go.” He took a step back and the shadows hung around his shoulders like a shroud. “Don’t come back here again.”
I bit back my retort. I wanted to argue, demand he keep the very hope that would torment him if he was sent to Purgatory after all. But it was a selfish desire. The odds were stacked against us.
“Alright. I won’t come back, and I’ll see to your family if you can’t.”
Bradley nodded once. I held his gaze for a moment, refusing to think of this as a farewell, then pulled the runeblock away from the door. The solid wood of the door blocked him from sight once again.
I walked back to the entrance without pausing, barely seeing what was right in front of me. The door opened, the magister removed the cuffs, and they ushered me back into the light.
Old, fluorescent bulbs that not even prosaics used anymore lit the hallway. Their flickering hum made my eyes ache. Soft footsteps echoed mine. I paid them no attention until I rounded a corner and they followed.
I slowed to a stop and turned back cautiously. A man stood a few paces back. His black robes almost faded into the shadows. The light directly above him was out but I still recognized him.
He stepped into the light, but the shadows didn’t quite leave Atticus’s face. Or his eyes. I hadn’t noticed the weight of his magic the first time we met, or during the battle in Moira. The presence of Fear had overwhelmed my senses. Now, though, the darkness within him was all too apparent.
A smile spread across his face, lighting up his eyes with sadistic glee. “Such a hard farewell for you, isn’t it?”
He still had the same thin mustache, a slight limp, and beady eyes that gave the impression of a simpering idiot. All of that was a mask for something much worse — and more dangerous.
“What do you want, Atticus?”
“I only wanted to assure you that your friend will be taken care of in Purgatory. I’ll see to it personally.” He took another step toward me. Predatory. Deliberate. He wanted to startle me. “You see, I am the warden of that prison.”
His threat was unmistakable. Horror curled in my chest, crawling up my throat with pinpricks of panic. I ground my teeth together but nothing could keep my face clear of anger. He’d gotten to me and he knew it.
“He hasn’t been sentenced there yet.”
Atticus’s smile grew. “Not yet.”
“I will hold you personally responsible for his safety if he is then.”
Atticus laughed. The sound grated on my ears. “Of course, as you should.” He nodded his head once. “Until next time, Blackwell.”
As he wa
lked away, the panic eased. He’d been influencing my emotions. Drawing out my fear and anger.
That son of a bitch was enjoying this. Like it was a game and not someone’s life on the line. That made him dangerous too. He’d be watching me. Waiting for me to join him in his sadistic game. I turned and kept walking, anger building in my chest like a storm.
Two
I slammed open the door to the training room in the manor and strode in. The last time I’d been down here was when Swift needed a chance to work off some anger. Today, it was my turn.
Attacks. Conspiracies. Gods. It all had me at a loss. Normally I’d be able to throw myself into work, but even that felt empty now. I wasn’t one to sit around and whine. If I couldn’t do anything else, I could figure out what the damn voice in my head that I’d been randomly hearing since the attack on Moira was.
I cracked my knuckles and took a deep breath. This would be just like any other training session with Sakura. Only the goal was to get the voice in my head to chat. Right. Totally the same.
Slowly, I pulled the magic that pounded in my chest throughout my body. It grew with each inhale until it reached my hands. Trusting my instincts, I drew it out. It didn’t matter if I lost control down here. The room was made for it. The magic didn’t feel out of control though. Eager, perhaps, but not crazed.
My hands itched for a katana. When I’d fought Fear, I’d made one. Somehow. If I did it once, I could do it again.
Longing for your crutch? How quaint.
My head snapped up. I hadn’t expected to hear the voice again so soon. “What the hell are you?”
There was no answer.
I ground my teeth together and shut my eyes. Screw the voice. Maybe I was just a little senile in my old age.
I turned my attention inward, to the magic that pumped through me like the blood in my veins. With an inhale, I pooled it in my palms, then pushed it outward on an exhale. A deep ache spread up my arm and through my chest. Shaping the magic with my will, I focused on exactly how the new katana had felt in my hand. The roughness of the handle. The power.
The moment it formed was less dramatic this time. No wind, no magic wrapping around me. I felt the same exhilaration though. It was like taking a hit of electricity. Exhaustion fled from my limbs and I became hyper-aware of the destructive power I held in my hand.
I gripped the newly formed katana tightly in one hand, letting the strange blade rest in the other, and opened my eyes. It wasn’t anything like my former katana. It was twice as long and at least a hand’s breadth wide the whole way down with a blunt tip.
The surface of the blade shifted continuously as if it were folding in on itself. The edge was sharp — as I found out when I nicked my thumb on it. It was the energy vibrating from the weapon that was truly different though. Impatience thrummed through the entire thing. It was eager to move, fight, and cut.
I adjusted my grip and settled into the starting stance for the first form I’d ever learned. It was simple, but as I had grown more familiar with it, I had pushed myself to perform each move exactly right. Going back to the basics would give me a chance to get to know this new blade.
The first thing I noticed was that while it was physically lighter, moving it required more mental effort. I had to maintain the shape of the weapon the entire time I held it. Perhaps in time it would become second-nature to do so. Until then, it would be taxing. Even distracting.
Maybe the voice was right and it was still a crutch.
I’m always right.
I froze mid-swing. That time the voice had almost seemed to come from outside of me.
“Are you going to just keep making snide comments, or do you ever plan on revealing yourself?”
Something moved inside the blade of the katana. An eye blinked at me. I took a quick step back as though I could run from it.
I see how it is. Acquiesce to your request and you recoil at the very sight of me.
“How are you in there?”
The eye rolled in irritation. So demanding.
I scowled at the thing. “You’re being irritating on purpose.”
It laughed. Just having a little fun. It’s rather boring in your head, you know.
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
I’m like a genie in a bottle. Trapped for eternity.
“Am I supposed to be the bottle in this analogy?”
The eye moved out of sight and a feral grin full of sharp teeth appeared on the flat of the blade instead. It didn’t seem quite human. Absolutely. You’re catching on finally.
“What are you?”
The sword wobbled as the thing sighed. I really can’t stress enough how demanding you are.
“I can’t stress enough how much I don’t care. What are you and why are you here?”
What I am is none of your business. Why I’m here is a very long story. But I’ll answer what you aren’t asking: where I am. I am within your magic. Part of it, in a manner of speaking.
I curled my hand into a fist, trying to suppress my irritation. Dealing with this thing was worse than trying to have a conversation with Yui. “Have you always been in my magic? Or did you infect me somehow?”
Always. Since the day of your birth.
“So you’re the reason it’s always been so chaotic?”
The feral smiled widened. Oh yes, I can certainly take credit for that.
“Any chance I can get you to leave?”
The eye appeared again, gazing at me curiously. No chance at all.
Great. Haunted by my own magic, just what I needed. Despite the frustration, it did feel good to be holding a katana again. I didn’t want it to be a crutch or a liability though.
If I was going to use this weapon, I needed to know my limits, and I needed practice. My training with Master Hiko had taught me that lesson the hard way. You had to find your limits, then learn to surpass them.
I tightened my grip on the katana and slid my foot back, preparing to practice the form again. Sleep was for the weak. Tonight, I would train until I couldn’t anymore.
Three
An artificial sunrise cast a red glare over Moira. The scale of the destruction wasn’t evident at first. It’s hard to see how much has been lost when you are focused on pulling bodies and survivors from underneath the rubble. The human mind has difficulty processing that kind of thing. It shies away from the pain to protect itself from the scale of the loss.
I’d wanted to avoid thinking about what happened, but it had all been playing on repeat in my brain. The fight. The deaths. The voice in my mind that I knew, against all reason, was the mayhem magic.
With a grunt, I hoisted myself up onto the last bit of wall still standing from what used to be the IMIB offices. The upper levels were completely decimated, leaving a broken shell in a mountain of debris. This was one of the hardest hit areas.
From my perch, I could finally see everything. Twisted metal jutted up from the broken skeletons of office buildings. One demolished, while the next was virtually unscathed, as if a tornado had skipped through the city. The tallest buildings had been damaged the most, clearing the view all the way to the Edge. It made Moira feel strangely empty.
Construction crews were already rebuilding in some areas. I knew people would have to move on, but it felt like they were trying to erase what happened. It was too soon for everything to go back to normal.
A flash of movement caught my eye. Swift was climbing up toward me, a red spot in a sea of gray. I gave her a wave and hopped off the wall.
She stopped a few feet away, looking out at the destruction silently. “It looks like a war zone.”
“I suppose it is one.”
She shook her head slowly as she stared into the distance. “They won’t keep the city evacuated. Everything that’s undamaged will reopen tomorrow and the Rune Rail will resume for all major cities.”
I wasn’t surprised. The Mage’s Guild was moving fast to try to restore everyone’s confidence in Moira. There were a f
ew groups speaking out against them, but no one was listening. Not enough people, at least.
“How was he?”
The bitter tone of the conversation with Bradley rose up in the back of my throat like bile. “He’s...given up. Told us — ordered to be precise — to stay out of it. He doesn’t think there’s any hope left for him.”
“That bad?”
I nodded once in confirmation. “He wants us to look after his family.”
She turned away, hands clasped tightly together behind her. “We’ll do that, but I can’t let him rot in there, no matter what he wants.”
“He said something else too, something that’s been bothering me since. He told me there were other people that could help us and told me to find them.”
She looked back at me with her brows pinched together. “Any idea who he was talking about?”
“No. We were likely being listened to, so he couldn’t speak freely. He didn’t say anything else.”
“We’ll find them, and find a way to help Bradley.” Her hands tightened until her knuckles turned white.
“Any news on Bradley’s trial?” I asked, without expecting a good answer.
“Not yet.”
With the IMIB in chaos after the death of Director Harland, information was even harder to come by than usual. No one seemed to know what the status of the charges against Bradley were, only that the Mage’s Guild hadn’t seen fit to release him on bail. Harland had been protecting him. With her gone...well, it didn’t look good.
