by Travis Bughi
She was straddling Adelpha, legs on either side of her, and had a knife pressed tightly to her older sister’s neck. Although Adelpha was still tied up, she’d flailed her body about like a club, and the evidence of that was apparent. Heliena’s face was red, her nose was bleeding, and her legs and arms looked bruised while Adelpha had dark marks on her own legs where she’d swung them with little regard for her own health.
Though the fight was over, Heliena screamed against the urge to push the knife down further.
“I said stop!” Drowin commanded again.
“Dear, please,” the well-dressed man said, neither begging nor ordering.
“WHY?” Heliena seethed, ignoring the man who’d called her ‘dear’ and looking at Drowin.
“Because this situation has become too difficult to act brashly anymore,” Count Drowin said.
His attitude was at odds with his blood-covered hands. Carefully, he reached a dainty hand into his coat pocket to pluck out a handkerchief. He wiped his chin with it first, cleaning away Harvok’s blood before it could dry, and then quietly turned to cleaning off his hands.
“Minotaur blood,” he spoke to himself. “Horrible tasting stuff.”
Heliena seemed to be immune to his calming influence. She and Adelpha’s eyes bore into each other. Heliena’s teeth were clenched, and Adelpha’s jaw was set. As Heliena held the knife to her sister’s throat, Adelpha leaned up into it.
“Do it,” she taunted.
“Don’t!” Drowin yelled over Heliena’s screams. “Control your wife, Ichiro, and do it quickly, please. You and what’s left of your men will need to leave here as soon as possible.”
“Heliena Katsu,” the well-dressed man said now, finally speaking with authority. “Control yourself at once.”
Heliena at first appeared to ignore the order. She leaned down, breathing heavily—the tip of the knife hovering over her sister’s throat. A drop of blood fell from her nose and splashed on Adelpha’s cheek. Neither of them moved.
After a moment, Heliena expelled her outrage with one last scream of frustration. Only then did she lift herself off of Adelpha and stand over her. They stared into each other’s eyes, even as Heliena, her lips white and strained, took two steps back and sheathed her knife. Adelpha wisely refrained from making any sudden movements or remarks.
“Your samurai did well, at least,” Drowin commented to Ichiro. “Did you order him to let her live?”
“No,” Ichiro replied, sounding irritated, “I did not.”
Ichiro was looking at Takeo with contempt. Takeo was watching Emily, but when he heard the tone of Ichiro’s voice, his eyes were shadowed by a hint of apprehension.
“Hm,” the Count replied, shrugging it off. “No matter. Seems he did it well enough on his own. Now, O’Conner, have some ogres disarm those knights and move them off to the side. Remove their helmets as well. The rest can start removing these bodies from my sight. Toss them off to the side for now.”
“Yes, my lord,” Mark said, bowing as he did so.
“As for you, Mr. Borgan,” Drowin continued, “you can come out of hiding now.”
Just as Drowin finished wiping the last bit of blood from his nails, Borgan poked his head out from behind one of the angels’ thrones. He appeared frightened, but after scanning the entire room thoroughly, he seemed to regain his aura of self-worth. He stepped out and straightened his coat jacket as if he’d never been bothered in the first place.
“I’ll say,” he grumbled, wiping dust that had brushed off on his jacket when he’d clung to the back of the throne. “That was most unpleasant. Barbaric to the core, if I don’t say so myself. Absolutely absurd!”
He shook himself as if the entire experience was draped over him like a cold chill, though the only cold Emily felt was the one unleashed by Drowin’s presence.
“What shall I do with her, my lord?” Takeo called out, voice sounding almost apologetic.
“Bring her over here,” Ichiro commanded. “Set her next to the other one.”
Takeo and Emily exchanged glances. At first Emily thought he was going to drag her, but instead he just lifted his sword off her neck and stood back. Emily swallowed and held her tongue, still in disbelief that she was alive. Her eyes drifted to her bow near the entrance to the room, but it was surrounded by twenty ogres, so she only heaved a sigh before walking over to where Adelpha was still prone. When she reached Adelpha and turned to face Drowin, a sharp kick to the inside of her leg dropped her down.
“On your knees, gremlin!” Heliena said.
“Please keep her quiet,” Count Drowin groaned at Ichiro.
While Emily was being shoved to the floor, Mark was busy lifting the helmets off the remaining knights. When he pulled off Gavin’s, Mark shook his head, and he appeared both unsurprised and disapproving as he continued to lift the helmets off the others, one by one until he lifted the last and gasped at the sight of the abashed face it revealed.
“Macalister?”
Duncan said nothing, his head bowed, refusing to look up.
“How are you involved in this? Wait, was it you? You did this, didn’t you?” Mark accused, his voice sharp. “Why? After all I’ve done for you?”
“I’m sorry, sir,” Duncan replied, face averted.
“But why?” Mark shook his head, still unable to comprehend how he could have been betrayed by the ever-dutiful Duncan. Emily looked upon Mark’s shocked face and saw another wave of comprehension wash over him. She realized that the old knight must have just figured out that Duncan had assisted Gavin in robbing the bank.
“It doesn’t matter why!” Borgan cut in. “The only thing I want to know is how in the world these criminals are alive! They should be slaughtered like the rest! Kill them!”
The leprechaun’s words were directed at the ogres, and all twenty-five of them raised their weapons with eager grins. Aghast, Mark stared at Duncan in helpless shock. The ogres stopped at once, though, when Drowin held up a single hand.
“Stop,” he said. “There will be no more bloodshed today. The bodies we have to dispose of are too many already. Maybe with a bit of mercy, we can still come clean of this mess. We’ll need to be as diplomatic about it as possible.”
“Come clean? Diplomatic?” Borgan stuttered. “What nonsense are you speaking?”
“And also,” Ichiro cut in, “what did you mean I will need to leave soon?”
Looking down at the blood-soaked handkerchief still in his hands, Count Drowin let loose a heavy sigh, one normally reserved for parents with mischievous children, and then threw the handkerchief to the ground rather than place it back in his coat pocket. When he looked up, he gazed at Emily, and her throat dried up.
“I suppose I have you to thank for all of this?” he said. “This was supposed to be a quiet event. You come forward with the money you took, I take your life in exchange, and we all walk away for the better. But you, I should have known that somewhere, somehow, you’d find a way to keep on living. You’re terrible at dying, do you know that, Emily? I know thunderbirds more prone to injury than you.”
Emily just stared back in confusion. The vampire was accusing her of being overly clever, and here she thought she had simply been overly confident. The evidence of that was piled on the floor: two dead minotaurs and four dead knights. Although she knew that death was inevitable, it never made it any easier to look upon those who’d paid the ultimate price, especially knowing that her own bill had been paid by another.
What was worse was that the sacrifice had been for naught. Their one and only chance of getting to the basilisk poison hadn’t even come close to succeeding. In Emily’s eyes, she was nothing but a failure, and yet Drowin seemed to think otherwise.
“Get on with it, Drowin,” Borgan demanded. “I haven’t got all day.”
“Watch that tone of yours, leprechaun,” the Count replied. “You’re part of the reason for this mess as well.”
“The only mess I see is that these criminals are still aliv
e!” Borgan shouted. “Let’s kill them and be done with it! Cut off their heads, put them on pikes, and hang them from the tower! The entire city must have seen these fools enter, and I want them all to know that only death awaits those who attempt this sort of foolishness!”
“And that, right there, is the problem,” Drowin said, his normally calm voice taking on a hint of impatience. “You’re so eager to crush those beneath you that you forget why you’re on top in the first place. That’s the entire reason we have this problem now. You couldn’t swallow your arrogant pride and greed long enough to look at the big picture. You rallied your greedy leprechauns and took control of this city before it was ready. Then I had to step in and save you!”
“Save me?” Borgan scoffed before raising his voice. “Save me from what? Peasants? I don’t need saving from these scum! I control the money; I control the power! Those bottom-feeding carcasses need me and have been sucking me dry for far too long. The damned angels made me donate half my savings, HALF I say, to charities. Then after they’re gone, I come in and try to help them, put some real standards of business to work, and what are the thanks I get? I get robbed! Robbed, I say! My money! MINE! Stolen by a knight with a thieving past and a prancing little farmer girl whose family couldn’t even afford to rent a minotaur unless they got lucky! I’ll be damned if I have to help useless folks like that again! Damned, I say! I want them to know who’s in charge now. You’re damned right I want to crush them, and I’m not afraid to do it, not like you! Coward!”
Count Drowin flew across the room with inhuman speed, closing the distance to Borgan before he could even finish gasping. With one pale hand, Drowin struck and sent him crashing to the ground. The leprechaun’s head bounced off the stone floor so hard that Emily thought Drowin had killed him. Startled, she gasped. Her eyes were glued to Borgan until he released a painful moan.
“Silence, you arrogant fool!” Drowin yelled. “By all the power in this world, if I had known you were this ignorant from the start, I would have strung you up by your own hamstrings. You think you have power over the people because you have money? Because you’re at the top of Lucifan’s economic scale? Do you honestly think, even for one second, that your way of life could exist without a plethora of individuals below you? Without a bottom, there is no top, Mr. Borgan! Without peasants, there are no privileged. Without citizens, there is no ruler. Without poor, there would be no rich! You would kill the very thing that makes you possible! Those people out there that you’d so willingly abandon on the back of a kraken, they don’t need you. You need them! You! They need to be content, hopeful, or otherwise ignorant of how much you take advantage of them. Do you realize what they will see here? They will see knights, a young girl, and two minotaurs uniting to fight against the greedy and the corrupt. They will see martyrs, do you understand? Not criminals, Mr. Borgan, but martyrs! If I killed them now, it would only solidify their sacrifice and encourage others to follow in their footsteps.
“I didn’t get here by being stupid, Mr. Borgan. I suggest you take notes. You can count numbers all day, but I know the heart of the living soul. Money is merely a tool. You cannot create an empire of money any more than you could an empire of hammers. In the end, it’s just a pile of wasted potential. No, Mr. Borgan. To be a ruler, one needs people. You need a society working under your rule, one perfectly content to do so. I do not expect you to understand immediately, but I’ll never again have you question my commands if we are to remain business partners. And, if you wish to stay alive, I suggest you never insult me again either. Am I understood?”
Borgan, still lying on the floor, had lifted his head up halfway through Drowin’s speech to spit blood out of his mouth. He seemed angry, shocked, but racked with far too much pain to do anything about it. With heavy movements, he closed his eyes and nodded at the Count’s last words. Then he reached a hand up toward one of the ogres who was gracious enough to grab the tiny creature by the back of his coat and lift him to his feet.
“Which brings me to your question,” Drowin said to Katsu. “I’m sorry to keep you waiting, but yes, you must leave immediately. The sooner, the better. I’ll send ten of these ogres with you. If you leave now, you’ll be able to sail before the sun sets.”
“You’re worried about the people?” Ichiro asked. “Afraid they might revolt?”
“It’s a possibility,” Drowin said. “I can handle that if it happens, but it’s probably best if you set sail immediately.”
“I understand,” Katsu replied. “I’m no stranger to death by commoners; we have our ninjas. Now that this business is finally settled, I can return home knowing our deal is intact. I only wish I’d been able to leave sooner.”
“What about them?” Heliena asked, pointing to Adelpha and Emily.
“You’ll have to leave them here.” Drowin sighed. “If you leave this place with prisoners while the crowds are still flocking outside, well, I’d rather not take that chance. Rest assured, though, that neither of them will leave this tower alive.”
Heliena glared at the vampire, trying to discern if he would carry out the deed. Ichiro Katsu reached out and pressed a hand to the small of her back. She didn’t seem to notice.
“Fine,” she muttered, “if I must, but promise that you’ll use basilisk poison on them. It’s a very painful way to go. Isn’t that right, Emily?”
Emily didn’t respond. She was looking past Drowin to where the basilisk cage was leaning up against Ephron’s old throne. There lay the key to slaying the vampire, but she knew there was no chance to reach it. Neither her hands nor her legs were bound, but charging toward it would be hopeless. The room was filled with ogres, right behind her was Heliena, in the way stood Drowin, and to her side was Takeo.
She took the briefest of moments to contemplate Takeo. How in world was she still alive? Surely he’d heard her apology, and she was truly sorry for the pain he was feeling at the loss of his brother, but that alone should not have stopped him. If Heliena apologized to her, even wholeheartedly, Emily did not think that would stay her hand. Yet here she was, alive at Takeo’s mercy, with no explanation for it. If she acted again, though, would he spare her life once more?
That was a risk she would have to take. Something had to be done. She was close, so very close, to eliminating the tyrannical head of Lucifan’s new masters; she couldn’t give up now. She refused to accept defeat just yet. There had to be another way!
Emily looked down to Adelpha, who was tied up and lying on the ground. As always, Adelpha would help in any way she could, but in her current state, that help would not be enough. Emily looked out towards the knights, but they were all kneeling down, surrounded by ogres. Unarmed and without a minotaur ally, they wouldn’t be able to do much against such superior numbers and strength.
The situation appeared hopeless, yet still Emily would not give up. There had to be way. There just had to be!
“They’ll die by basilisk poison,” Drowin said. “Now leave, quickly. The ogres will escort you.”
Think, Emily, think.
If she could just kill Drowin, then this whole thing would fall apart. She likely wouldn’t survive, not with this many ogres in the room, but at least her death would count for something. There was no way the leprechauns could keep Lucifan in their grasp without an immortal at their head. There just had to be a way to end this.
“Very well,” Katsu said. “I trust nothing has changed in our trade agreement?”
What could she do? Emily considered the basilisk filled bow once more and then clenched her teeth. That was not an option; she knew that. There had to be another way.
What else hurts vampires?
“None whatsoever,” Drowin said.
I wish Quartus were here.
“That is good to hear,” Katsu replied, then looked to Takeo. “Let us depart.”
Emily thought back to the last time she’d seen Quartus in person. She and the amazons had just raided Okamoto Karaoshi’s ship, and the group was burying their
dead. Emily had thought Belen was the traitor, and so had drawn Adelpha away from the others to warn her in secret. Drowin had attacked, she had called for Quartus, and a moment later he had appeared, shining brightly and sending Drowin running. If only Quartus were here now, shining down. . .
Then it hit her: light!
“You there, ogres,” Takeo said, “lead the way.”
Light!
Light could kill Drowin! All she needed was sunlight! But how? There was light outside. The sun couldn’t have set yet, and it was a clear day. All around her there were blackened, full-length windows, but just outside lay the key to Drowin’s demise. All she had to do was break a window.
The ogres were filing out now, and Emily looked around frantically. She wouldn’t be able to make it to a window, but if she could just throw something, anything, heavy enough, then this could end here and now. She had no knife, her shoes were leather, and her bow was gone. What was left? Something metal would work best, like a sword or a—
Her thoughts came to a screeching halt as she looked behind her. There, just within arm’s reach, was the servant holding Abe’s precious gunslinger guns. In that leather bag were two heavy, metal, dense, palm-sized six-shooters that were perfectly sized and correctly packaged for throwing.
It was almost too good to be true.
Of the twenty-five ogres in the room, ten of them were leaving with Katsu. The purple brutes were marching out first, and behind them, Ichiro and Heliena were next. Heliena gave the two amazons one last sneer before turning away. Takeo, however, avoided Emily’s eyes, and instead just turned to leave as well. The servants were next, and just as the rest veered toward the door, Emily made her move.
She spun and ripped the leather bag out of the servant’s hands. His grip had been loose, and he could only gasp in shock. Emily caught a glimpse of Drowin, who raised an eyebrow in surprised confusion, before hurling it with all her strength in his direction. Takeo and Heliena both whirled to watch the pistols go sailing through the air. As they flew by, Drowin turned to watch them with curiosity, as if Emily’s target had been him and her aim had been horrid. However, as he did, his eyes widened in terror. Then the satchel struck the glass, and the blackened window broke where the pistols hit it, smashing out a hole barely larger than a human head. The six-shooters were lost to the open air and plunged out of sight forever, and through the hole they’d made came a wondrous thing: sunlight.
