Quest SMASH

by Joseph Lallo

  “You’re not going to emulate Sicarius, are you?”

  “Assassinate her?” Amaranthe shuddered. “No.”

  From the walkway, she squinted up at Mitsy’s office. Darkness behind the window obscured all interior details. She could not tell if anyone had observed the escape.

  “You don’t need to come with me,” she said.

  “Someone has to trail after you and pull you up to safety when needed.”

  Amaranthe gave him a bemused smile. “Thank you.”

  The door behind the bettors’ cage was not locked. Amaranthe paused with her hand on the knob. The last time she entered, Ragos had let her through. She had only known him for a few minutes, but he had seemed a decent fellow. Nice smile. Had the beast killed him or had it been Hollowcrest’s medical zealots from the dungeon? And why did Mitsy think they came from the same source? Amaranthe felt certain Hollowcrest was a traditionalist, not someone who would flirt with the unnatural, and Akstyr believed that creature of magical origins. She shook her head. Only one person could answer her questions.

  She pushed the door open. Empty stairs rose to the catwalk. Amaranthe and Books climbed them and crossed to Mitsy’s office. Books leaned heavily on the railing, limping now that his blood had cooled. The rumbling of machinery thrummed through the empty building. Below, pieces of the maze glided about the corridors, making and breaking routes.

  At the office door, Amaranthe pressed her ear to the cold metal. Though she heard nothing, her nose caught an earthy scent like decomposing leaves.

  Books crinkled his nose. “What is it?”

  “Caymay,” she said.

  “Which is?”

  Mildly surprised he had not explored the city’s drug offerings during his months of depression, she said, “A mood-altering mixture concocted by one of Stumps’s turn-of-the-century gangs. Taken orally, the substance is deadly, but you can burn it to inhale the fumes. It dulls pain, but it tends to leave one volatile.”

  “As opposed to the paragon of serenity she was before?”

  Again, the door was not locked. Amaranthe opened it slowly. No lamps burned in the office, and only ambient light from below filtered through the window. A haze blurred the air, and the earthy smell intensified.

  Amaranthe lifted a hand to stay Books. “Stand watch in case any of the bouncers are still around.” She stepped inside and walked around a couple boxes but did not see anyone. “Mitsy?”

  The clutter in the room had not changed, though two open bottles of wine on the desk had been added, both liberally sampled. In a bronze bowl, a stick of compressed caymay burned like incense.

  “I’m not working for Hollowcrest,” Amaranthe said. “Yes, I lied to you last time, and I’m sorry. I didn’t think I could trust you. But we have a common enemy. We could work together to end the threat to your gang. Mitsy, are you in here?”

  A rustle came from beneath the desk. Amaranthe tensed. Mitsy’s head rose over the edge, hair disheveled, eyes swollen.

  “You killed him.” Mitsy hiccupped. “You.”

  “No.” Amaranthe spread her arms to show she had no weapon. “Let’s talk. I’m not armed.”

  “I am.”

  Mitsy lifted a loaded pistol clear of the desk and leveled the weapon at Amaranthe. Mitsy’s finger flexed on the trigger.

  Amaranthe dropped in anticipation. The pistol fired. The ball zipped over her head and pierced the window with a loud crack, leaving a web of splintered glass. The pungent scent of black powder smoke mixed with the caymay.

  With a knife in hand, Mitsy clambered over the desk and launched herself. Amaranthe slid to the side. More agile than expected, Mitsy threw out an arm and hooked Amaranthe around the neck. They went down in a tangle.

  Amaranthe slammed an elbow into Mitsy’s ribs and scrambled to her feet first. Once up, she hesitated. She didn’t want to kill Mitsy, just subdue and question her. But how could one reason with a drugged-up crime boss?

  Her hesitation gave Mitsy time to find her feet. She crouched and charged, knife leading. Amaranthe should have evaded the attack easily, but her heel caught on something. She landed on her back on a pile of folders and papers. Stacks of boxes loomed, blocking escape routes. The knife flashed.

  “Look out!” Books yelled.

  Mitsy raised her arm over her head. Amaranthe kicked her in the stomach. At the same time, Books rammed into Mitsy’s back. His weight sent her tumbling over Amaranthe’s head. Folders rained down from the pile.

  Amaranthe rolled to her feet and turned, fists up in anticipation of another attack.

  Mitsy did not rise. Face down on the heap of clutter, she did not move at all. Blood pooled beneath her, soaking scattered papers.

  “Mitsy?” Amaranthe asked, a sick feeling creeping into her belly.

  She edged forward and turned Mitsy over. The knife protruded from her chest, and she was not breathing.

  Books hissed. “I didn’t mean to...”

  Amaranthe kneeled back, shaking her head slowly. “Not again,” she whispered.

  First the enforcers, now a woman she had gone to school with. How many people were going to die on her quest to help the emperor? Maybe she was the wrong person for this mission. She rubbed her face and sighed. Though she had chosen the task for herself, she could not bring herself to walk away from it. It was her only chance for...

  What, Amaranthe? What do you hope to gain from this? A pardon? A reward? Recognition? She stood up without answering her mind’s nagging questions. If her motivations were that selfish, she did not want to admit it, even to herself.

  She stared at the body. I’m sorry, Mitsy. We were never friends, but I didn’t want this.

  Amaranthe set her jaw. She still owed Mitsy a favor.

  I’ll find the creature that killed Ragos, and I’ll get rid of it. I swear it.

  Chapter 15

  Before dawn, on the icy dock outside of the cannery, Amaranthe tightened her boot laces. Despite chilled fingers, she took the time to ensure each loop was the same size and tails of identical length hung free from each knot. She wished Hollowcrest’s minions hadn’t taken her spiked leather training shoes—and everything else she owned.

  She grabbed her mittens, stood, and jumped in surprise when Sicarius coalesced out of the darkness. No hint of pink brightened the sky over the distant mountains, so she could not see his face, but then it rarely expressed much anyway.

  “Where are you going?” he asked.

  Was his voice less cool than it had been the day before? She wished she had offered that apology, but bringing it up now would feel awkward.

  “To run the lake trail,” Amaranthe said.

  “It’s too early. The creature could still be hunting.”

  Which was the point. She needed a good look so she could describe this deadly mystery beast to Akstyr. If he could identify it, maybe he could also suggest how to kill it. She planned to run along the waterfront and out toward Fort Urgot, where copious mature trees lined the trail. If it did show up, she hoped to have time to climb out of reach.

  All she said to Sicarius was, “You’re out here training every morning before dawn.”

  “Very well. Let’s go.”

  She blinked. Was that an invitation to join him?

  Before she could ask for clarification, he trotted up the dock toward the street. A backward glance suggested he meant for her to follow.

  She subdued a grimace and jogged after him, snow and ice crunching beneath her boots. A witness for her first day back, wouldn’t that be lovely?

  They turned onto the street and headed for the trail.

  “I’m usually a decent runner, but I’m sure I won’t be able to keep up with you today.” Amaranthe hated the idea of wheezing at a mediocre pace in front of him. “Not after being sick and missing so many days of exercise.”

  When he did not respond, she forced herself not to utter more preemptive excuses. Why did it matter what he thought anyw
ay?

  They passed the first mile in silence, and the docks and warehouses of the waterfront dropped behind. Bare-limbed trees, evergreen shrubbery, and snowy hills marched past. No doubt Sicarius’s gaze absorbed it all. Amaranthe tended to use her running time for inward thoughts, but this morning her eyes probed the shadowy terrain as well.

  “May I ask a question?” she asked when minutes drifted past with nothing jumping out at them. Since he was letting her set the pace, her words came out conversationally rather than in spurts and puffs.

  A glance her direction was his only response. Not exactly a yes but close enough.

  “What’s a Hunter?” She had not forgotten Akstyr’s question from that first morning at the ice house.

  “Do you refer to the Nurian word, istapa?” Sicarius asked. “Wizard Hunter?”

  “Uh, maybe.”

  “How much do you know about Nuria’s history?” he asked.

  “About what your average former-business-student-turned-enforcer knows.”

  “Little, then.”

  “Exactly.” Amaranthe jogged around a large broken branch stretched across the trail.

  Sicarius glided over it without breaking stride. “Where we have a warrior caste, Nuria is ruled by a wizard caste. Those who cannot access the mental sciences—the majority of the population—are laborers and slaves. As with our system, there is friction between those with power and those without. Hundreds of years ago, an anti-wizard organization developed with the intention of usurping the government. They believed people could develop an immunity to the mental sciences, especially invasive telepathy, by conditioning the mind.” He spoke as easily as if he were sitting at a table rather than running, but then this pace could hardly challenge him.

  “Is that possible?” Sweat dampened Amaranthe’s shirt and stung her eyes. She removed her mittens.

  “To some degree. With decades of mental training, you can learn to defend against mind-control techniques. It does no good against indirect attacks, however. A wizard could still levitate a rock and hurl it at you. Nonetheless, the idea of creating a man who could resist mental torture and whose thoughts could not be read by telepaths appealed to many. The cerebral training was combined with combat training, and the organization called their warriors Wizard Hunters, which is often shortened to Hunters.”

  “I assume they didn’t succeed in overthrowing the government.”

  “No, the time and dedication needed to complete the training meant few finished it. Though Hunters have become legendary in Nuria—and feared by wizards—the organization never developed enough clout to threaten the status quo.”

  Time to ask what she was really wondering: “Are you one of these Hunters?”

  “No.”

  “Akstyr heard it somewhere.”

  “There are many rumors about me.”

  “No kidding.” Amaranthe wasn’t yet panting, but carrying on a conversation was growing more challenging. Another mile and she would turn back. “One does wonder where Akstyr would have gotten that idea.”

  He did not respond. Only the scrape of her boots on the sanded trail broke the silence. As usual, Sicarius whispered soundlessly over the earth, like a spirit. She couldn’t even hear him breathing, and only small puffs of fog appeared in the air before his face.

  “Did you have any training for it?” Amaranthe asked. “I apologize for prying...but I’m curious because...if you have any special skills...that would help fight this creature...it’d be good to know.”

  “I do not,” Sicarius said. “If that creature is some wizard’s spawn, it would be made from the mental sciences—probably crafted to be impervious to weapons—but it could not access them itself. A full Hunter may be able to harm the maker, but would be ineffective against the beast.”

  Full Hunter? Did that imply he was a partial one? Maybe he had had some training—the same way he had had cartography training—but not as much as one needed to qualify for the title. Or maybe she was imagining hints that weren’t there. Still, he did seem to have a better idea what the creature was than he was admitting.

  “Regardless, there are no Hunters in Stumps,” Sicarius said.

  “Too bad.”

  Before she could pepper him with further questions, a pair of soldiers clomped into sight on the trail ahead. With their black fatigues and training rucksacks, their occupation was unmistakable even in the dark.

  Amaranthe’s breath caught. Wholt’s death reared in her mind again. Sicarius wouldn’t attack them, would he? Surely, he didn’t kill every enforcer or soldier he passed. Maybe he would veer into the trees to avoid them.

  Sicarius’s gait didn’t falter, nor did he leave the trail, though he did speed up and move in front of Amaranthe. The soldiers passed on the left without a word, and she blew out a relieved breath. Several times, she glanced back, but in the darkness, they appeared not to have recognized either of them. The men soon disappeared around a curve in the lake.

  Lights appeared on a distant hilltop, outlining the walls of the fort.

  “This is far enough for me for the first day.” Amaranthe slowed and then stopped to grab a handful of snow. “We haven’t seen any sign of the creature, so there’s no reason for you to run back with me. I’m sure you’ll want to do some real training.” She chomped on the snow, rolling it around in her mouth to melt it. The water sent a chill down her gullet, but it felt good.

  Sicarius looked farther down the trail. He probably ran twice as fast and four times as far on his own.

  “Very well,” he said.

  “Before you go, uhm. About the other night.” Amaranthe thumbed the clump of snow, sending powder to the ground. Why was it so hard to apologize for this? Because she wasn’t really sorry? Because Wholt had been her partner? “When I yelled at you, I didn’t mean... I mean, I did sort of, but you thought you were helping. You were helping, and—” Just spit it out, girl. “—I’m sorry.” There.

  He said nothing.

  She sighed, not really expecting anything else. Still, she had said it. Maybe it would matter to him in some small way.

  Amaranthe turned back toward the city. Time to get moving again.

  “Lokdon,” Sicarius said.

  She looked over her shoulder, hoping for...she wasn’t sure exactly. “Yes?”

  “Stay alert.”

  Her lip twitched up and she gave him a soldier’s salute. It was a start.

  She headed back.

  In his absence, the predawn darkness felt lonely and oppressive. Few sounds disturbed the lakeside. No animals skittered across the trail; no birds chirped from the trees. A breeze stirred the bare branches, rattling them like bones. She regretted urging Sicarius to leave.

  A scream sounded beyond a bend in the trail. She skidded to a stop, then darted for the closest tree before her mind caught up with her reflexes. That had been a human scream, not the unearthly screech of the creature. Still, humans rarely screamed on dark trails for good reasons, and a moment passed before she coerced her legs into moving forward again.

  Hand on her knife, ears cocked, she eased around the bend. Beneath the waning starlight, two bodies sprawled on the trail, limbs twisted at unnatural angles. Rucksacks, black fatigues... The soldiers. Neither figure moved.

  Her foot bumped something on the edge of the trail. It rolled away from her. The object lacked the heft of a rock, but in the weak light, she could not make out details. Amaranthe reached down to investigate, and her fingers brushed against human hair.

  She jerked her arm back, and her heart leapt into double time. She took a steadying breath, forcing reason into her mind. However distressing, a severed head was not a mystifying find next to a couple of bodies.

  She examined it more closely. The head had been torn off.

  The creature.

  Light blue had crept into the eastern sky, but trees and bushes created shadows and offered dozens of hiding spots on either side of the trail. Ears straining
, she listened for footfalls or breathing. This had just happened, so the creature could not have gone far.

  Amaranthe skirted the head and approached the bodies. The gouges tearing flesh and bone apart appeared the same as those she had seen on the dead man outside the icehouse.

  A familiar screech tore through the foothills. Even though she expected it, Amaranthe flinched.

  At least the creature was not right on the trail beside her. It had headed inland.

  Several moments of squinting into the gloom let her find tracks trampling the snow beside the trail. She knelt and probed the cold craters. The size of the prints dwarfed her hand, but it was the shape that drew her interest. They were asymmetrical, even lopsided, with five clawed digits on one paw and four on the other, none of them balanced. She had long suspected the creature was nothing natural, but a thrum of excitement went through her. Perhaps she finally had some proof. No one could look at the prints and think bear or panther. Amaranthe glanced at the sky, noting the lack of clouds. With no snow heading in, the tracks would remain for searchers to discover.

  “Once the soldiers see this, they’ll know there’s magic about,” she muttered.

  “Perhaps.”

  Maybe she was growing accustomed to Sicarius’s stealthy approaches, because she did not jump this time. She could have hugged him though. Being out here alone was about as appealing as roaming an old battlefield during a full Spirit Moon.

  “I doubt their upbringing will allow them to see the truth,” Sicarius said.

  “Some of the soldiers who have been stationed on the borders must know these mental sciences exist.”

  “Some.” As he spoke, Sicarius circled the area, head up, eyes scanning. “It’s been almost twenty years since the last war with Nuria though. Of late, the empire has used more subtle tactics to keep neighboring nations off-balance.”

  More subtle, huh? Like sending in assassins? She recalled he spoke at least one foreign language, enough to chat with the shaman who healed her anyway.