by P. T. Hylton
Zane had noticed, but he wasn’t about to admit it.
“That’s why you’re here, isn’t it?” Farns asked. “Someone doesn’t want my tangles to hit the market.”
“Can you blame them?” Zane asked. The words felt strange in his mouth. He was pretty sure his sense of taste was gone now. “No one should have these weapons. And certainly not the nobles who can afford them.”
“Does it matter? It’s not like the poor have a chance against the nobles as it is. My tangles are powerful, yes, but they’ll just end up as decorations on a shelf. That’s why I quit in the first place. It wasn’t the duels, although that was plenty annoying. It wasn’t my wife’s death, although that certainly changed the way I looked at the world. I just couldn’t stand seeing my creations gathering dust on the mantlepieces of the rich.”
“You think that’s all that happens? You underestimate the sadism of some of your clients.”
Farns sighed. “This is it, assassin. Make a decision before I turn on this last tangle. As long as you mean me no harm, it won’t affect you. But if you still intend to kill me, it will take your hearing. And then I will kill you. Ready?”
Zane made no reply.
Suddenly the world was silent. He thought he’d experienced silence before, but this was something else, a whole different level of quiet. All the little sounds he hadn’t even noticed were gone in an instant.
Darkness and silence enveloped him.
He concentrated on his breathing. And on the one sense he had left.
He felt the weight of the sword in his hand and the pressure of the medallion on his chest.
The medallion. It wouldn’t work unless Farns actually tried to hurt him. Which meant Farns would have to remove it before he attacked.
Zane kept perfectly still and waited. It might have been only minutes, but it felt like hours. He put all his energy into his remaining sense, struggling to keep his alertness on the razor’s edge while he waited for oh so long.
Then, he felt it. The medallion sliding down his chest. The cord holding it had been cut. Zane spun. He let the sword fall to the ground and snaked his now empty hand out in a desperate grab. For a terrible moment, there was nothing. Then, he felt cloth against his knuckles. Farns was a bit farther away than he’d anticipated, but he was there.
Zane brought up his other hand, the one with the thorn in it, and activated the weapon.
The light and the sound both hit him at once. The harsh glow of a lamp and the piercing scream of the old man. It was like a blow to the head. Zane gritted his teeth and shook it off, scooping the sword off the floor.
Irving Farns lay on the ground, clutching his chest. His short white hair stood in disheveled spikes on his head. Blood seeped between his fingers.
“I always liked that one,” Farns said. His voice had a calm but distant quality. One Zane had seen in many dying men. “The Nettle. Vander should have used it in that silly duel. I didn’t have a way to stop it.” He glanced down at the wound on his chest. “Guess I still don’t. Nasty bit of work. It materializes tiny bits of iron under your opponent’s skin and then pulls them out.” Farns coughed weakly. “You must have gotten it from Vander’s workshop. There were two versions, the de-powered dueling version and this one. How’d you know which one to grab?”
“I know a little about thorns,” Zane said. “Enough to identify a de-powered thorn, anyway.”
Farns stared at the thorn for a long moment. “I’m glad it never went up for sale.”
Zane crouched down next to him. “Then why’d you create it?”
Farns looked up and gave him a weak smile. “Figured it out, did you?”
Zane shrugged. “Vander never said he invented them. He talked around the issue. Couple that with what his apprentice said and the fact that you apprenticed under a man who made both tangles and thorns…”
Farns said, “I saw what making both did to my mentor. He was never taken seriously. The Society demands specialization. And Vander knew he wasn’t smart enough to make a name for himself based on his own work. So we came to an arrangement.”
“Good deal for him. You did the work and he became the world’s most respected thornsman.”
Farns gave a weak shrug. “For a time. But he’s lived in fear of his secret coming out ever since.” He looked at Zane, and the assassin saw there were tears standing in the old man’s eyes. “Will you tell my daughter I love her? That I’m proud of her?”
“No,” Zane said. “I’m not a messenger. But you don’t need to fear for her safety. I won’t go after her.” He thought for a moment, then said, “I’m sure she already knows you love her.”
“Yes,” the old abditus said. “That’s the one thing I’m sure of.”
Before the man could speak again, Zane flicked his wrist and sent the tip of his sword through the man’s throat. In a moment, it was over.
The job was done.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
Lily looked at the man in the chair. “I’ll ask again. Are you sure you don’t want to come back tomorrow?”
The man gave his head a brisk shake.
Lily sighed. She’d tried everything. She’d told the man she had no idea when Zane would be returning, which was true. She’d offered to personally come to his house to let him know when Zane arrived, which she was happy to do. But the man was stubborn. He hadn’t even given his name.
All he’d said was, “I’m here to discuss life and death. I don’t mind waiting.”
He’d been waiting seven hours. No telling how much longer it would be before Zane returned.
The door burst open and Zane marched into the room, his shirt speckled with blood and his eyes cold. He looked tired.
“Lily!” he said. “It’s done.”
Lily cleared her throat and nodded toward the man in the chair. “I’m glad to hear that. We have a client.”
“What?” Zane looked at the visitor with a combination of surprise and disgust.
The man rose and held out his hand to Zane. “Mr. Halloway. I’m honored. I would like to acquire your services. It involves a matter of the utmost—”
“No,” Zane said.
The man tilted his head, surprised at the interruption. “I’m sorry?”
Zane leaned in close to the man and spoke very deliberately. “The answer is no.”
“But, Mr. Halloway, you don’t understand. This matter is not only important to the crown—”
“It’s really very simple, sir. You can leave now or you can pay me twenty-five thrones for the privilege of explaining your offer for thirty seconds before I dismiss it again. I’m very tired. Please leave.”
The man stared at Zane for a long moment. He gave a curt nod, turned, and walked out. Lily followed him and tried to smooth things over.
When she returned, she found Zane sitting in the chair the man had occupied for the last seven hours. His head was resting in his hands.
“He wasn’t pleased,” she said. “Best case scenario, I imagine he’ll be contacting the Ferox Society.”
Zane said nothing. He looked distant. He was always melancholy after a job, but this seemed different somehow.
Lily sank into the chair across from him. “You want to talk about it?”
“I really don’t.”
She considered leaving, giving him his privacy. Then he surprised her and spoke again.
“He was just an old man living in this sad little cottage. He wanted to give his daughter a nice life.”
Lily thought for a moment before answering. “Intentions don’t matter, though. He created instruments of death. Who knows what else he might have created if he’d lived longer?”
“Instruments of death?” Zane chuckled. “The other way to look at it is he created instruments of life. Things to protect the innocent.”
Lily knew she wouldn’t win any argument about the morality of their dark profession. Whichever position she took, he would take the opposite. He just liked to argue.
“We didn�
��t choose this life,” Zane said. “Neither of us. We just scored a certain way on a certain test and now we have to do these terrible things. Make these terrible choices.”
“Even you?” Lily asked in a gentle voice. “You started down the abditus path. Seems like you had a choice.”
“We all have a choice. It’s just a question of how much we’re willing to pay for each option.”
“You’ll tell me that story someday.” It wasn’t a question.
“Perhaps.” Zane reached into his pocket and pulled out a small round object. “I destroyed the tangles and thorns in Farns’s cottage. I expect his daughter still has some socked away. Nothing we can do about her selling those. Others will study them and eventually duplicate them. But I did what I could. Here.” He tossed the round object to Lily.
She snatched it out of the air and examined it.
“Careful,” Zane said. “It’s a thorn. It makes shards of iron appear inside your enemy’s body and then rips them out. Or some such nonsense. I used it to kill Farns.”
She looked it over closely. “Why didn’t you destroy it?”
“I wanted to give it to you.”
She paused. “Why?”
Zane leaned forward and looked her in the eye. “Outside the Oasis, I think I might have implied I don’t trust you.”
“You did more than imply it.”
Zane nodded. “That was wrong of me. And untrue. I trust you, and I’m giving you the most deadly thorn I’ve ever seen to prove it.”
“Huh,” she said. The object seemed heavier in her hand all of the sudden. “Aren’t you afraid I’ll use it on you? That I’ll try to kill you at some point?”
“Maybe everything doesn’t have to end in death,” he said.
Lily couldn’t help but smile. “Not even you can stop that. Everything always ends in death. That’s life.”
“Perhaps. But maybe someday we’ll be fighting against death instead of bringing it.”
“That…that would be nice.”
“Indeed.” He got to his feet. “I’ve just finished defeating the greatest abditus of our time, and I’m tired. I’m going to bed.”
“Good night, Zane.”
“Good night, Lily.” He started toward the door. “One more thing. No more jobs for a couple weeks. I need a break.”
“Of course,” she said, even though she knew better.
The next morning a woman came asking for an audience with the great ferox Zane Halloway. He took her money and heard her case. After she was gone, Lily asked if he was going to take the job.
“I haven’t decided yet,” he said. “But let’s investigate, just in case.”
BOOK TWO: SWORDS AND SHADOWS
CHAPTER ONE
Zane Halloway tipped back his mug and drained it. He rarely drank alcohol, especially outside his own home, but this was a special occasion.
This was the anniversary of the day he’d ended his abditus apprenticeship and started down the road toward becoming a ferox.
He was careful, though. Patterns could be used against him. And he couldn’t afford to give his many enemies even the slightest edge.
Yes, he went out for a drink on this day every year. And, yes, he always raised a toast to the embers burning in the hearth before draining his mug in a single long pull.
But it was only ever one mug. And it was always in a different tavern.
He was as careful as could be, but tonight it was not enough.
Tonight, his enemies had found him.
He set down the mug and felt himself tense even before he knew why. There was something in the air. A smell he knew all too well. The tang of salty sea mixed with a hint of lavender.
He turned slowly and saw her standing there, her rapier raised, a casual smile on her face.
“Hello, Zane.”
“Hello, Amber.”
Amber Longstrain looked every bit the pirate. She wore drab layers of clothing tied at strategic locations to keep them from falling off. Though she was currently one of the most successful pirates working the Gamlond Sea, Zane knew Amber had grown up alone and destitute, orphaned by the very sea she now called home. She’d learned the valuable lessons of frugality early and well, and she wasn’t one to let a single scrap of cloth go to waste.
She wore a long knife in her belt. Her ears sparkled with a dozen studs. A sly grin curved across her face and there was a gleam in her eye that spoke of violence. Yes, she was a pirate through and through.
And if there was anything Zane knew about pirates, it was that they didn’t travel without their crews.
He let his eyes move over the other patrons in the tavern. There were eleven customers besides Amber and himself. Maybe two of them were civilians. Maybe. The rest had a hard look to them. They wrapped their paws around their mugs and held them close to their bodies as if someone might try to snatch them away at any moment. Or as if they didn’t want them spilled by the lurching of the sea.
Pirates all. Their captain wanted Zane dead, so they were obliged to help make it happen.
He’d been careless. Now that he saw them, he couldn’t understand how he’d missed the salty funk in the air. He’d been too preoccupied when he entered. And now he was going to pay the price.
Zane eyed the tip of the rapier six inches from his face. He knew from painful experience Amber was quick, and deadly accurate, with the weapon.
“Mind if I ask how you found me?” he asked.
Amber grinned. “I didn’t. Not exactly. You found us.”
It took Zane a moment before he got it. There were only fifteen taverns in this part of Barnes. How many wives had Henry Longstrain had? At least that many. And he’d gifted each of them a ship and a crew. The Longstrain widows were the terror of the Gamlond Sea. They all wanted Zane dead for what he’d done to their husband ten years earlier.
Zane would bet one of the pirate crews was waiting in each tavern.
“I didn’t know you lot worked together,” Zane said. “I thought it was every woman for herself.”
Amber let out a hearty, full-bodied laugh. “We’ve known for a while that you go out on this night every year, but we’ve never been able to catch you. I personally watched your house last year, but somehow you slipped past me. So we decided on a new approach.”
Zane’s mind was racing, tallying odds and the distances between him and the three exits. But he didn’t see a way out of this without getting at least a bit bloodied.
“I thought this was some sort of contest for you,” Zane said. “Like whoever killed me would prove they loved Henry the most.”
Amber’s grin widened. “And Lord Luck’s given me my shot. So I guess he’s made his thoughts on that matter clear, savvy?”
Zane eased his hand toward his belt where he kept one of his throwing daggers.
Without unlocking her gaze from his, Amber answered his movement with her rapier. He felt it sting his wrist like a wasp. He looked down at the wound. It wasn’t deep. She was trying to warn him, not injure him. But the blood was already running down his hand. He’d need every advantage he could get in this fight. A slick hand wouldn’t help.
“We were all wondering about the significance of this day,” Amber said. “Some of the others thought it was your birthday. But you’re not the type who’d get melancholy about growing older. You seem too somber for that. So I’m thinking it is something else. The death of someone close, perhaps?”
Zane made no reaction. He was supremely skilled at not revealing his emotions. But no response was response enough for Amber.
“Ah,” she said. “So then you know a little of the pain we feel. You understand. If you could hurt the one who’d taken away the person you love, you’d do it. Don’t say that you wouldn’t.”
In truth, Zane did still intend to get his revenge on that front. Eventually. But he wasn’t like the Longstrains. He played an even longer game. He was patient.
There was a time for patience and a time for action. This, Zane knew, was his
time for action.
Amber was watching for him to either attack or go for a weapon. He did neither. Instead, he took his beer mug and shoved it forward, capturing the tip of her rapier inside the mug. He kept pushing, driving with his legs and moving forward. She staggered backwards, all her effort on keeping her feet. Most people would have fallen on their asses, but Amber Longstrain’s superior sea legs kept her upright.
He pushed harder and moved faster, not giving her a moment to regain her balance. She stopped with an oof as her back hit the wall behind her, but still Zane pushed with the mug. The blade made a terrible grinding sound against the inside of the pewter mug, but it also began to bend.
Zane had to act fast. Amber wasn’t falling backwards now. She would quickly regain her head.
Zane kicked, driving his foot into the blade at just the right angle. He heard a satisfying snap and the top half of the blade hit the floor with a surprisingly soft ting.
Amber was already in motion, thrusting at him with her newly shortened blade. But Zane was in motion, too. He spun forward and caught her blade arm with his free hand. He twisted it violently, ignoring the crack of the bone and continuing to twist until she dropped the sword. He brought the beer mug down hard on her head, and the pirate crumpled to the floor.
Zane allowed himself a deep breath as he turned.
Amber’s nine crew members stood in a semi-circle around him. The rest of the patrons—and the barkeep—had already made for the exits.
Every one of the nine crew members was armed, and they all looked like they had ample experience using their weapons. None of them seemed too pleased to see their captain unconscious on the ground.
