Eve of Destruction

by C. E. Stalbaum

  “Soroshi, apparently.”

  “Yeah, but he works for someone. Must be important for twenty thousand.”

  Agren shrugged. “Whatever. Let’s just get this over with. We don’t want them saving the bottle for later.”

  “What else have they got to do in here? I wouldn’t worry about it.”

  “You always say that.”

  “Yeah, and I’m always right.”

  Agren grunted and rang the cabin bell. He snatched the bottle from his partner and flopped his change purse on the table between them. A few moments later an accented female voice spoke up outside the curtain.

  “Is there something you need, sirs?”

  Agren grabbed the drawstring and pulled. The attendant was unusually tall, probably 185 centimeters, and slender almost to the point of being gaunt. Her looks weren’t bad, though, especially for someone who was probably in her forties. Her hair was still a striking auburn aside from a single lock of white dangling on her forehead, and her green eyes were almost uncomfortably intense.

  “I have a gift for cabin six,” Agren told her. “Polerian brandy. I’d like you to deliver it to them, if you would.”

  She raised an eyebrow. “I’d be happy to do so, sir, but you are free to walk over there yourself, if you didn’t know.”

  He smiled. “I think I’d rather have you do it.” He pulled out a few coins from the pouch and placed them on the table in front of her. “We heard the ruckus up there earlier and just wanted to offer our support. We want it anonymous.”

  “Very well, thank you, sir,” she said, deftly taking the bottle and sliding the change into her own pouch. She started to walk away but then stopped and turned back. “Might I recommend a glass of Zefron Deu to you gentlemen? It’s a fine vintage straight from Sunoa.”

  “I bet that costs a dainty drake,” Hanos commented.

  She smiled and twirled their coins between her fingers. “I’m sure I can find you two glasses on the house.”

  “Sure, why not?” Agren said. She disappeared for a minute, and he chuckled at his partner. “Good help.”

  “Looks like she hasn’t eaten in weeks,” Hanos replied. “They probably don’t pay the foreign help dirt.”

  Agren shrugged. His stomach was always in knots before a mission, but now it was finally starting to settle. Soon they would be in Olastown with some real money and he could get away from this drek for a while…maybe for good. It was far too stressful, and he really did hate trains.

  The attendant came back with two glasses of purple liquid and a warm smile. “They were appreciative of the gift—I think they want to give you something back.”

  “You didn’t tell them it was from us, did you?” he asked, eyes narrowing. They couldn’t afford to have this traced…

  “No, but they were quite curious. Do you want me to tell them?”

  “No, you did fine,” Hanos said dismissively, taking a long sip. “You know, I don’t get why you Esharians turn your noses up at good old Arkadian wine. Ours is just as good as this.”

  The attendant turned towards him. “Well, that isn’t wine—at least, not anymore. It’s Polerian brandy with coloring in it.”

  Hanos froze. The woman took a step forward and flicked the curtain back across behind her.

  “You—” Argen started to talk, but his voice died as a hand clamped across his throat. He struggled, but her bony fingers were impossibly strong. Hanos tried to move, but her other hand chopped viciously into his throat. He staggered back into his chair, clutching wildly for breath. The poison he just drank would probably kill him before he even managed to sit up again.

  “I need to know exactly who hired you,” she whispered coldly. “If I’m satisfied with your answer, I won’t even make you drink this.”

  Her grip relaxed just slightly and Agren struggled to breathe. He thought to cry out, but with the strength of her grip she could snap his neck with little more than a flick of her wrist. His next instinct was to reach for his knife or gun, but there was no way he could manage it in time. He had no idea who this woman was or how she knew what they’d been up to, but his only option was to go along with whatever she wanted. A warm wetness spread between his legs as he tried to speak.

  “I don’t…really know him. He said his name was…Soroshi,” he managed. “He told us exactly what to do and where to find them.”

  “Have you worked with him before?”

  He shook his head desperately. “N…no. But I’ve heard others have. He’s been a big player for the past few months.”

  The woman nodded and tilted her head to Hanos. The man was already dead, his now purple lips frozen open in permanent display of horror. She glanced down to Agren’s full glass and swept it up with her free hand.

  “Coward,” she muttered, and downed the poisoned liquid in a single gulp.

  Agren’s mouth fell open. Was she completely insane? Who in the void was she?

  She swiveled back to him. “You answered my question, so you don’t have to drink it. I keep my word.”

  “Wha…what are you?”

  She smiled. “Hungry.”

  Her grip tightened, and Agren tried in vain to scream. But she didn’t crush his throat—she just held him there firmly, and a bitter chill crept its way up his entire body. Finally a jagged, wrenching pain stabbed into his chest and a soundless shriek died on his lips. All the while the woman stood there in silence, her green eyes glossing over into a pure white haze as she drank his life away.

  Chapter Four

  Even in the final throes of autumn, the nighttime air in Vaschberg still managed to be damp and sticky, and somehow the stench grew more pungent with each passing month. Twenty years ago when Gregori Danev had first set foot in this city, the battered cobblestone walks had reeked of horse dung and human garbage. Now those stimulating aromas had been replaced by the acrid odor of sulfur and industrial discharge. On most mornings, the dense smoke packed in tightly with the fog and smeared across the sky in a greasy haze. Winter would help some, but not much, and Danev whispered a silent thanks to the Goddess that the sun had already fallen for the day. Given his foul mood, he really didn’t need to be reminded of the withering state of the city he called home.

  “Expecting a slow night?”

  Danev’s first reaction was to spin wildly with his cane and pop free the knife concealed at its tip, but he managed to maintain his dignity and instead settle for a startled hop.

  “It’s the middle of the week, so probably,” he said.

  Aram Kolasi didn’t reply. If he hadn’t spoken in the first place, Danev wouldn’t have even known he was there—perhaps he had been for some time. Long shadows swallowed the rooftop of the Pampered Goddess at this hour, and his bodyguard was intimate with each and every one.

  “I’m guessing you didn’t stop by to share in the view,” Danev commented, if only to break the silence. He pulled his half-finished cigar up to his lips and let the taste calm his nerves.

  “We received a wire from Morsh,” Aram reported, leaning out from the darkness with a piece of paper in his hand. “You might want to finish smoking first.”

  Danev grunted as he reached out and grabbed the transcript. “That pleasant, eh?”

  “The latest polls from the southeast show Chaval with a commanding lead. At this point the election is his to lose.”

  Danev sighed and glanced down to the street some thirty meters below. Bulletins and pamphlets completely saturated the city, and nearly all were painted cover to cover with support proclamations for the Industrialists. Simon Chaval had Vaschberg firmly under his thumb. The local papers hadn’t run a single disparaging article about him in weeks. They were little more than thinly veiled campaign flyers, and sales were better than ever.

  “If you’re that worried about being shut down, you could move,” Aram suggested. “This property’s worth a small fortune.”

  “I’m not going anywhere,” Danev said a bit too loudly, then bit his lip and turned. “Not yet, an
yway.”

  Aram slid out of the darkness. He wore his usual black pants and long-sleeved, collared shirt despite the lingering mugginess. His dark brown hair was cut military short, and his gray eyes were both hollow and pale. If not for the fact smiles rarely brightened his face, his tall, muscular frame would have made for an excellent doorman for the Pampered Goddess’s female clientele. Instead Danev typically kept him out of sight, which is what the man preferred anyway.

  “So what are you going to do?” Aram asked. “I know you don’t want to support Janel, either.”

  No, he most certainly did not. It was an impossible situation, really. In his six-year term, President Janel had done nothing to stem the growing and vicious anti-magi sentiment festering all across the country, especially here out west. He had, in fact, managed to do almost the exact opposite. His campaign of “moderation and discipline” had resulted in a term of stagnation and outright inaction. As the first torbo president in Arkadian history, Janel was a historical figure from the moment he had taken office, but his weak coalition government hadn’t managed to please anyone in the long term. Arkadia was the closest it had ever been to civil war.

  “Janel is moderate and passive, and right now people want an active extremist,” Danev muttered eventually. “I doubt his party will keep a quarter of their seats in Parliament.”

  “You don’t really think Marose has a chance?”

  He snorted. “She’ll be lucky to get ten seats. The Enclave will support her, but I have the feeling a lot of magi won’t even turn out to vote this time.”

  Aram raised an eyebrow. “Including you?”

  “She’ll get my vote. I did graduate with her, you know.” Danev raised an eyebrow at the other man. “Why the sudden interest, anyway?”

  “I needed to know if you were planning to pack up so I could talk you out of it,” Aram said. “Business is still good, after all.”

  “And you don’t like to run.”

  The bodyguard’s face might have twitched slightly, but it was hard to tell in the dim light. “No.”

  Danev smiled. Either way, Aram was probably right. Regardless of how bad Vaschberg had gotten, the Pampered Goddess continued to do well. It had been a fixture in this town for almost twenty years now, and the services he provided were still unique.

  He was an illusionist, a mage specialized in distorting the perceptions of others. In the case of his business, it took the form of bringing erotic fantasies to life. Back in his university days at Valmeri, illusion had been a heavily disparaged discipline—and it still was in most academic circles—but unlike most of his peers he had taken his weaving talents beyond the church or university and moved into the private sector.

  His critics liked to label the Pampered Goddess as a brothel, but it was far more than a seedy bordello. It catered to upper class, independent wealthy women rather than the boorish masses of inebriated young men or even the hobbyist older male crowd. It was also, he liked to remind puritans, not technically a brothel. The women who came in were treated to his best romantic illusions, but in the end it was all just a fantasy. Without the risk of disease, pregnancy, or even peer judgment, the Goddess had become legendary only months after it opened.

  It had made him a wealthy man, even if business had been slowly decreasing over the past few years. He could easily move anywhere in the world and not look back, and in truth the Goddess was only one of his many business ventures these days. He liked to stay informed on politics and the economy, and his own private network of contacts had brought in more drakes than “legitimate” business for some time. He could move and keep all of that intact, but that wasn’t his style. He liked to be in the game, as the saying went, and Vaschberg was close to the center of the board.

  And the truth was that he didn’t like to run, either.

  “I probably shouldn’t complain so much,” Danev commented after another long drag from his cigar. “I doubt there’s another mage in the country who has gained as much from the Dusties as I have.”

  “Because you aren’t scared of trains?”

  He chuckled. “Because I understand how they’ve changed the world. Can you imagine trying to keep in contact with our people without the telegraph?”

  Aram shrugged. “Sending stones work just as well. Better, for the most part.”

  “They also cost a fortune. Have you seen the price of varium crystals recently?”

  “So instead we pillage the Fane right along with Chaval.”

  “That’s hardly what I meant.”

  “Maybe not,” Aram said softly, “but it’s the price and you know it.”

  Danev pursed his lips. He didn’t consider himself much of a holy man, especially for a mage, but he understood the danger that Chaval and Steamworks represented as well as anyone. The Fane was suffering, and it went beyond the morning smog and perpetual ash on the breeze. The damage was subtle, but he could feel it every time he wove a spell. It was getting harder and harder to draw enough power to maintain his illusions, almost as if the Fane was trying to starve him out. His magi employees that did most of the work these days were starting to complain about it, and as a rule their skills and senses were considerably less attuned than his. As factories supplanted living things, bit by bit it felt like the Fane was starting to recede. Eventually, maybe in his lifetime, it would be gone, and he didn’t want to know what would happen then.

  “We’re staying, one way or another,” he murmured after a few moments. “All is not lost. Not yet.”

  Aram followed his gaze to the streets below. “It’s only a matter of time before the Dusties turn on you.”

  “Well, that’s why I have you here.”

  “I’m serious.”

  “So was I,” Danev said flatly, then sighed. “I need to go over some client lists before it gets too late. Come on.”

  He popped his white hat back on and headed downstairs, Aram silently in tow. Before they reached his office, one of his attendants nervously flagged him down.

  “Mr. Danev, sir, there’s a woman here who wants to speak with you.”

  “Client?”

  “No, sir. She’s never been here before, and she has a man with her.”

  “Perhaps he didn’t read the sign,” Aram grunted.

  “She claims you knew her mother, Tara DeShane,” the attendant said.

  Danev froze. “Tara…”

  Aram cocked an eyebrow. “Is that who I think it is?”

  “Send her in, Emily,” Danev instructed.

  The woman nodded and quickly left. Aram maintained his expectant stare.

  “Ghost from the past?” the bodyguard pressed.

  “You could say that,” Danev murmured as the memories slowly trudged to the surface. “Goddess, I haven’t seen Tara since…well, since long before I opened this place.”

  “Curious,” Aram replied neutrally. “I’ll stay close just in case.”

  A second later he vanished, but Danev wasn’t really paying attention. Tara DeShane…his thoughts flickered back to Valmeri, to a time in his life when everything had seemed so perfect and simple. Then it had all shattered around them, and he had spent every day since trying to tiptoe around the pieces.

  A minute later a young woman walked in, followed by a rugged-looking man the same age. Even if Danev hadn’t been told she was Tara’s daughter, he would have instantly known. Her brown hair, amber eyes, and pale skin made his memories all the more vivid.

  “You must be Evelyn,” he greeted, quickly composing himself and taking a half bow before her. “It’s a pleasure to finally meet you.”

  “Thank you for seeing me, Mr. Danev,” she said politely. “This is my friend, Zach. I generally go by Eve.”

  “A pleasure to meet both of you. Can I get you anything?”

  “Nothing for me, thank you again.”

  The young man was still gaping at the tapestries along the wall. “Are these Rethulo?”

  Danev blinked. While he liked to do his best to make even the mundan
e decorations in here cater to a certain upscale clientele, he doubted more than a small handful could actually identify such an obscure artist. “Yes, actually.”

  The young man nodded. “I was stationed in Sandratha for three months. There was actually a museum only a few kilometers from the base, and they liked to show off his work. These are much earlier pieces, though, and I think they’re better.”

  “A fine eye,” Danev said, and meant it. He sat down and gestured for them to join him. “So I have to say, I’m a bit puzzled why you might be here, my dear. Were you on a romantic getaway and recalled your mother dropping my name?”

  Her smile vanished, and Danev wondered if he might have embarrassed her. But as her eyes lowered and her hands clutched together, he understood it was worse. Much worse.

  “She’s dead, Mr. Danev.”

  Zach turned from the paintings. “She was murdered.”

  “Murdered?” Danev stammered. A lump formed in his throat, and his stomach suddenly twisted into knots. “When was this?”

  “Just over a week ago,” she told him softly. “A group of Dusties broke into the house and shot her. That’s what it looked like, anyway.”

  “Goddess be merciful,” he breathed. “I am so very sorry, my dear.”

  Danev was a glib man when he needed to be, but he’d long ago learned that sometimes the best thing to say was nothing. Words wouldn’t bring her consolation, so he let the silence linger for a minute while he leaned back in his chair and tried to work through it for himself.

  “I never met your father, but your mother was a good friend.,” he said wistfully. “I’ve always regretted losing touch with her. You’re a spitting image of her back in the day.”

  Eve nodded solemnly. He could tell she was doing her best to steel herself, and she was doing a commendable job for someone so young and obviously inexperienced at dealing with loss. But Danev was neither, and to him the tension in her face, hands, and even voice was obvious. She was barely keeping it together.

  Zach placed a comforting hand on her shoulder then looked up to Danev. “The killers stole one of her books from the house, but they didn’t touch anything else. We were hoping you might know why.”