by James Hunter
Stupid bitch. Who did she think she was, telling me what to do?
I turned and stepped toward her—insolence could be tolerated to a degree, but better to teach her a hard lesson now. Make a brief, brutal example for her, then she’d know where she sat in the pecking order. Then she’d know not to interfere in the affairs of her betters. I wouldn’t kill her—she belonged to me, my prize, my concubine—but she’d learn her role.
She pulled the trigger. I conjured a shield of blue mist, which swallowed the fire, leaving nothing but a flash of steam that immediately froze and fell in a wave of snow. I called up a construct of force, a blast of energy that would lay her out for a good long while. The weaves coalesced in my hand, a rippling sphere of angry blue energy, ready to be unleashed.
Except I couldn’t do it. I mean I could do it, it’d be easy, and she couldn’t stop me. But I saw that VC kid in my head, my first kill—the boy who’d been in the wrong place at the wrong time. My finger had been on the trigger, I’d had a clear shot, and though I’d taken the shot, I hadn’t wanted to. I’d done what I’d had to do, but no more. I was a killer, couldn’t deny that, but I wasn’t a murderer, and I sure as shit wasn’t the kind of guy who turned on his friends.
The part of me that was still me cried out and snatched at the Vis flowing through my body, struggling weakly against the powerful, beastly thing inside of me. The fight seemed useless—I couldn’t beat the crook, not like this, and I sure as shit couldn’t beat Shelton without its aid. I had a backup plan, but holding the crook was the only way I could guarantee victory. But at what cost? Kill Shelton, but windup destroying Ferraro and myself in the process? No thanks.
With the last bit of will I could muster, I grappled with the force overriding my senses, desperate to regain control of myself even for a moment. The crook was a living force within me, a shadow beast roaming the hallways of my head, wrapping its dark, cold tendrils around my brain, my heart, pulling all the switches and making me dance like some goofy, poorly constructed puppet. My mind was still mine for the time being, but the crook’s sentience was too friggin’ powerful to drive out, not as long as I held the crook.
So there was only one possible option: I needed to get rid of the crook—needed to pitch it away, out of my reach, where its influence would be limited.
I summoned the little strength of will and determination left in me and focused inward, stripping away every distraction vying for my attention, every diversion screaming for me to take note. I needed total focus to win this battle, so I needed to push everything else away.
It was almost like shooting for qualification on the range back in my Marine Corps days. I went there: I imagined myself on the five hundred-yard firing line, the wind blowing gently across the range, my body pressed into the rough gravel and dirt as I lay in the prone. The "B" modified target was just a pinprick of dark color on the horizon, so if I wanted to put a round in the black I would need absolute concentration.
Sharp chunks of gravel and rock gouged into my knees and elbows—Shelton, Ferraro, the Guild—each demanding a share of my attention, but I pushed each of them from my mind in turn. The parade-sling, holding my rifle steady, dug into the meat of my arm, choking the blood flow; uncomfortable, but necessary. I put it out of mind and readjusted the rifle in my shoulder pocket, pushing my cheek against the buttstock, ignoring the sweat beading on my head. I slowed my breathing—in, out—the rifle barrel bobbing with each breath, rising minutely on the inhale and dropping level on the exhale.
I was one with the rifle, one with the target downrange, every thought, feeling, and worry cast into temporary exile. My finger curled around the trigger—slow and steady squeeze, until the rifle bucked. My thought exploded outward like a bullet zipping from the barrel—a single precise command, honed to a scalpel blade’s edge, and aimed at a very specific target.
I watched, a spectator in my own body, as my command hit black and my body responded in kind. My arm shot out and my hand flew open—the crook summersaulted through the air and clattered to the floor five or six feet away. The power and life drained out of me, the staff’s connection and hold on me vanishing in an instant, but taking its raw ass-kicking prowess with it. I tumbled to my knees, my body reverting—jaw shrinking, beard falling away, muscles resuming their normal size. Suddenly weak and empty, used up.
Ferraro pulled the shotgun trigger again, this time aiming over my head, right where Shelton had been.
THIRTY-FIVE:
Ace in the Hole
I swiveled my head, looking back just in time to see Shelton flick his wrist forward, streams of purple wind, swirling and tainted with fallout-green, swept forward. The construct stopped Ferraro’s shot dead while simultaneously scooping the crook from the floor and floating it into his outstretched hand.
A flash of green, as blinding as a solar flare, rolled through the room, a wave of force and light which drove me down to my back. When my vision finally cleared, Shelton hung suspended in the air, the crook held before him, a look of pure rapture painting his ugly mug.
“The power,” he muttered, more to himself than to us, “it’s so much more than we expected.”
I glanced right. Ferraro was down, though moving.
I pushed myself to my feet, pulling free my hand canon—too tired to do much else—and laid into the monster with everything I had. A wall of blue shimmered before him for a moment, like a sheet of frozen lake ice, then my bullets simply fell from the air, frozen chunks of lead that clattered uselessly on the busted linoleum. The Lich laughed then—and it was a real doozy, guy could’ve qualified for a feature piece in Evil Villain Cackle Quarterly. A swirl of blue wrapped around my hand, prying my fingers open—my gun jerked free and floated through the air and into Shelton’s free hand.
“This,” he said, eyeing the weapon, “is a crude and inelegant thing. The tool of a barbarian.” He smiled, a sharp grin, chock-full of wicked intent. “I’ll keep it as a souvenir.” Flows of air lifted me up off my feet and slammed me hard into the wall next to the stairwell opening—thick vines of black ice, spiked with thorns, sprouted from the wall and wrapped around my body, arms, and legs. This is exactly what I’d done to Old Man Winter on more than one occasion and let me tell you, being on the receiving end was about as much fun as a colonoscopy with a weed whacker.
The thorns themselves were as sharp as razors—my arms and torso were protected by the chainmail and my leather jacket, but the spikes slashed through my jeans into the skin of my thighs and calves. Every time I wiggled, the spikes burrowed deeper. To top it off, the little buggers were colder than a witch’s tit—cold enough that they should’ve numbed the wounds after a few minutes, but didn’t. Instead they seemed to burn with a cold heat that simply wouldn’t abate.
Though my wrists were secured to the wall good and tight, I could still access the Vis. I did have a backup plan, all I needed was a solid javelin of flame and I could probably, maybe, possibly right this capsizing ship. I summoned the weaves of fire necessary—it was damn tough going, didn’t seem like there was enough ambient heat to get the job done, and I felt like I’d just run a marathon—but at last a wispy ball of shifting orange coalesced into my palm.
It burned for a few seconds tops, then guttered and died. Great.
“Oh no,” the Lich murmured with a shake of his head. The ice-spikes dug deeper into the exposed flesh around my wrist, snaking up around my gloves and slicing into the backs of my hands and fingers. Blood trickled across my palms and dribbled to the floor. Shit-eating vines not only hurt, they sucked the Vis right out of my fire construct. Consuming the minute energy I had left.
Things are never easy. But I still had a backup, backup plan—one ace left in the hole: Ferraro, though she was currently lying on the floor. She was stirring, however, and she knew what needed to be done if Randy got a hold of the crook—that was a scenario we’d covered in detail. But she’d need a little time to get her head on right if she was gonna pull this thing out of the
bag. Time, I could buy her.
“Hey, Shelton,” I said, “I know you’re in there somewhere.”
Now normally, this is the part where I’d tried to appeal to Shelton’s humanity, convince him that he could still make the right choice. That underneath all the bad decisions, beneath the shit, and the heinous murders, he was still a good human being. Instead of doing that, I started insulting him.
“Yeah, I know you’re in there, taking orders like the little bitch you are. Maybe you’ve got your hands on some powerhouse item, but that doesn’t change the fact that underneath you’re still a shithead punk, who just couldn’t cut it. Spineless little limp-dick prick.”
What can I say? People are fickle sons of bitches. Sure, maybe an appeal to his humanity would pay dividends, but maybe not. Insults, however, almost always achieve the desired result. At least if the desired result is to royally piss someone off. My ploy certainly seemed to be working just fine—the green in his eyes faded, just a bit, then began to flicker between green and muddy brown.
“Yeah,” I continued, “just like I figured. Koschei won’t let you in the driver seat even for a second. Just a punk bitch, riding in the back seat while someone with a pair of balls takes care of business.”
“Shut up!” he yelled. “Take that back. We, we are …” Eye color now solidly brown, “I’m not a bitch. I can cut it—the Guild just couldn’t see it. Gatekeepers who think they have the right to pass judgment on me. No one could see it!” he shrieked, voice cracking.
“Couldn’t hack it,” I spat, ignoring him completely. “Reject. Washout. Pussy.”
“Shut up!” The spikes dug deeper into me, the pressure from the restraints themselves squeezing down like a boa constrictor, crushing the life from its prey. “I practiced for years. Worked harder than anyone. Anyone! It didn’t come easy for me, not like for you—naturally gifted. Pissing everything away. You’re the reject,” he said. “You’re the one who walked away because the pressure was too much.”
Even hanging against the wall, I managed to shrug my shoulder and feign a look of indifference. “Whatever you gotta tell yourself, kid. I walked away because I wanted to. You never even had a chance to walk away. You didn’t even make it that far.”
“Exactly! I worked and worked, but never even got a chance. Years of practice. Countless hours poring over arcane texts and undergoing grueling mental exercises. And for what?” Tears ran down his too-thin cheeks. “For what? So two men could spend a day assessing my future and dismiss me out of hand with a rubber rejection stamp? Fuck that. It’s not right. I earned my spot.” He practically growled that last part.
His eyes flickered again, muddy-brown back to green, green to muddy brown, and back once more before finally settling on a striking shade of Chernobyl. “That is quite enough, you are troubling us,” said a voice that was definitely less Randy and more Koschei.
“Wait,” I said. “That’s it? This whole friggin’ thing is really just about some kid not handling rejection well? Are you friggin’ kidding me? Bunch of petty bullshit.”
The creature, which had once been Randy, but which was now both more and less, chuckled. “Mortals are so easy to manipulate, fool. It’s just desire. Hope, love, pettiness, jealousy. It does not matter. Any desire—no matter how noble or vile—unfettered from conscience can lead here,” he laughed and shed a wicked grin, a grin that said, I win. “Now, we will dispose of you before you can trouble us further.” He held out the crook, a ball of light—steel-gray and writhing like a ball of snakes—formed in the crook’s circular opening.
Boom! The roar of Ferraro’s shotgun bit into the quiet, a great billow of fire ripped through the air as the Dragon breath shells released. The fire lapped over the surface of the crook, briefly flashing against Shelton’s hands and sleeves, before vanishing in the frosty air.
Thank God for evil baddies who just don’t know when to stick a sock in it.
The Lich turned his head, a petulant sneer pulling up one side of his mouth, showing chiseled teeth beneath.
“Idiot human,” he hissed. “You think a shotgun can undo us? We are Koschei the Deathless, eater of souls, Lord over death, wielder of the Crook of Winter. The mage couldn’t defeat us, and you think—”
Boom. Man, these idiot villains never learn. I get it, gloating is fun, we all like to rub our victory into the noses of our enemies—often against our better judgment—but damn, you’d think at some point they’d just finish things quick. The shotgun blast didn’t do much by way of damaging Shelton, the flame didn’t seem to bother him in the least. But it did hit the crook.
Shelton raised the ancient fae weapon, the glowing orb still hanging suspended between the crook’s curve and its handle.
Then something amazing happened: the glowing orb of life-ending doom flickered, faltered, and poofed out of existence with a little sputter and a gasp of air. The whimper of a small fart. Randy looked at the crook as he floated, his face scrunched up in an expression of absolute curiosity. What is this? that look seemed to ask. Then he plummeted to the ground, clutching his stomach as he shrieked and howled in agony, rolling first one way then the other. The crook lay off to the side, completely forgotten. I noticed that the crook left a dark smear on the floor where it’d fallen. Blood.
More precisely, my freshly thawed, diseased blood.
It was all over Randy’s bare hands.
Back at the Farm, I’d coated the crook in the contaminated blood I’d taken while in Wyoming—the stuff I’d been planning to make an antidote with—then flash froze it into place. The crook was naturally cold enough that I hadn’t been worried about the blood thawing from its surface, but the flame from Ferraro’s shotgun had warmed things up just enough to liquefy the toxin and, in turn, infect Shelton.
I’d known full well that the Lich wanted the crook and I’d also known that there was a better than even chance he’d take the damned thing from me no matter how prepared I was. So I figured delivering the poison through the crook seemed like the safest bet … I mean the Trojan horse has worked for sneaky underdogs since time immemorial.
I hadn’t been sure the ploy would pay out—I mean, what if there was an antidote and Randy was immune? What if he’d been wearing gloves? What if the blood had been rendered impotent by the flame? A thousand things could’ve gone wrong, but Lady Fate had told me that I was going to fight Shelton. And she’d also told me that the crook would be instrumental in winning, but only once it was in Shelton’s hands. The clues were about as clear as foggy glass on a dark night, but when you’re the little guy you grasp at whatever meager straws you’re offered.
Ferraro carefully circled toward me, sidestepping near the far edge of the wall, careful to keep the shottie pointed right at Shelton, just in case. Once she was in range, she pulled out her sleek expandable baton, flicked it open, and cracked the ice vines surrounding my wrists. The frozen vines seemed unthinking without the crook’s power and Randy’s direction to maintain them. They came away easily enough and once my hands were free, I had no trouble calling up enough flame to melt the rest of the ice holding me in place.
“What have you done to us?” Shelton shrieked, finally scrambling to his knees and making a dive at the crook. I took my time and strolled over—the crook wouldn’t do him a lick of good, not now. Not with that poison working in him, depriving him of the ability to touch the Vis.
“Turnabout’s fair play, jackass,” I said as I moved closer.
He held up the crook as though to ward me off, but I batted it away with the back of my gloved hand, then I conjured up a javelin of force, which plowed into his kisser like a grand slam delivered from a Louisville Slugger. The blow busted his lip and put him out cold. Without the Vis, the crook was no good for him, and even with the Lich in his head, without access to a power source he was about as useful as an encyclopedia set in the age of Google.
“Way to pull my ass out of the fire,” I said, glancing over my shoulder. “I knew you’d pull your weight.”
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Ferraro frowned. “You were worried about me pulling my weight?” She looked around the room, carefully taking in the general chaos and the bodies strewn across the floor. “Maybe my math is wrong, but it looks to me like I’ve done most of the work here. I subdued all those gnomes—”
“Scientist gnomes,” I muttered.
“—stopped the rampaging monster mage, you,” she said without pause, “and took down Shelton. I mean, you sucker-punched him in the nose after I’d beaten him, of course … If I remember correctly”—she pressed her lips together in mock thought—“you were frozen to a wall waiting to die.”
I frowned and squinted, trying to convey the vast levels of sheer annoyance I felt rolling around inside my belly.
“Stop pouting,” she said, and this time she did smile a little. Apparently Ferraro did have a sense of humor in there, though, apparently, it was buried somewhere deep, deep down—kept under lock and key and guarded by a shotgun-wielding Amazonian princess. “So what do we do now?” she asked. “We never really talked about the specifics if Shelton survived.”
“You know you can’t take him in, right?” I said, not sure at all that she knew any such thing.
But she nodded. “He’s a murderer. Responsible for the death of at least three people. He should be taken into custody and he should receive due process … that’s what should happen in a perfect world. But I’m smart enough to know that this situation isn’t going to turn out that way. Even if I took him in, I’d never be able to get the charges to stick. Not nearly enough evidence—at least not evidence that anyone will buy.” She was quiet for a moment, looking down at Shelton as though she didn’t really believe her words.
“The Guild will handle him,” I said softly, trying my best to sound reassuring. “I’ll take the crook and lock it up at the Farm. And I’ll turn the ring and this assbag,” I nodded at Randy, “over to James—if anyone can get the full story out of the little weasel, it’ll be James. And he’ll do it all discreetly.”
