Face Of The Void (Desa Kincaid Book 3)

by R S Penney

  Phillips drew himself up, puffing out his chest. “And quite proudly, sir,” he declared. “If you think I’m going to cower before rabble like you.”

  Tommy was about to reply, but the sound of wood scraping on tile made him turn around. One of the younger guests – a heavyset man with broad shoulders – got out of his chair, slipped through the space between two tables and charged onto the dance floor.

  Stretching his hand out, Tommy released a wave of kinetic energy from his ring. The young fool was thrown backward, hurled across the room as if by a powerful wind. He slammed into the wall.

  Some of the tables had been displaced as well, their occupants tossed out of their chairs. One woman was down on her belly while her husband knelt at her side, muttering something that Tommy couldn’t hear.

  He caught the flicker of motion a second too late.

  A young man in the corner got up and drew his revolver. He cocked the hammer, pointing the weapon at Tommy.

  Before he could fire, a knife sank into his shoulder, causing him to yelp and drop the gun. He stumbled backward, clutching the wound and hissing air through his teeth. Some of the others started shrieking.

  Kalia fired several shots through the skylight. The thunder of gunfire drowned out everything else, and when it faded, Delarac’s guests were silent. “That’s better,” she said.

  “Let me be perfectly clear!” Tommy boomed. “No one is getting out of this room unless I let them go. So, I suggest you all sit down and enjoy the show. Because, tonight, court is in session.”

  He rounded on Anthony Phillips, prompting the other man to step back. “You!” he growled, pointing an accusing finger. “You stand accused of carrying out a war of aggression against your neighbours. You have already admitted your guilt.”

  “I am guilty of nothing!” Phillips spat. “The Empire conquers by divine right. We need not justify ourselves to-”

  Tommy’s hand was a blur as he pulled an arrow from his quiver. He nocked it, drew back the bowstring and loosed.

  The shaft punched right through Anthony Phillips’s forehead, protruding from the back of his skull. The old man twitched a few times before keeling over on his side.

  Some of the others were weeping.

  Why was Delarac silent? The things Desa had said about him indicated a pompous man who did not take kindly to being challenged. Surely, he would have something to say about all this! But no. He just stood there, watching.

  “Now,” Tommy said. “Where is Adam Miller?”

  The instant he finished speaking, a spindly man with flecks of gray in his brown hair got out of his seat and ran. Not for the door. For the window at the back of the room.

  Tommy’s first instinct was to use a Gravity-Source, but that would be dangerous. Even with directional modifiers, it would pull more than just Miller to him. He wouldn’t look very intimidating dodging plates and knives. He was about to reach for an arrow, but he needn’t have bothered.

  One of Miri’s throwing knives landed in the back of Miller’s thigh, forcing the man down onto his knees. Tommy could hear him sobbing. Some of the other guests shied away from him, eager to avoid whatever punishment Miller would receive. Wasn’t that just way with aristocrats? Rats fleeing a sinking ship, every last one of them.

  Grinding his teeth, Tommy felt a wave of heat in his face. He narrowed his eyes as he approached the condemned man. “Mr. Miller,” he said. “Last year, a bill came before parliament to formally abolish slavery throughout the empire.”

  Miller didn’t answer.

  “You organized a resistance to that bill,” Tommy went on. “Convinced several MPs to change their votes from yea to nay. And as a result, slavery is still in practice on the southern coast.”

  Miller had his back turned, but Tommy could see that he was trembling, weeping bitter tears. “Please,” he begged. “Don’t.”

  Tommy stopped dead, unable to believe his ears. Was this fool really pleading for his life? Did he think that he could escape the consequences of his actions. The answer was obvious: of course, he did. Wealthy people always thought they were untouchable. “Why not?” Tommy replied. “You were willing to condemn thousands of innocent people to brutal conditions? Why should we spare you?”

  “Please!”

  Tommy seized another arrow, nocking it and drawing back the string. He took aim and let loose before the man could say another word. Miller stiffened when the shaft went through his skull.

  Tommy ran his gaze over the crowd, his eyes hard and merciless. “There is nowhere you can hide from us!” he shouted. “Nowhere you can run! Your mansions aren’t safe. Your country estates aren’t safe.

  “War, slavery, the flagrant abuse of the poor for your own profit: do these things, and we will hunt you down like dogs. And just when you think you’ve escaped us, when you’ve fled to the one place we can’t find, that is when we will come. And the very last thing you will ever see…will be us.” Some of the guests started murmuring. Good. He had gotten his point across. “Now, run and tell everyone what you have witnessed here tonight.”

  Just as they began to rise, the sound of clapping echoed through the ballroom. He looked up to find a black-clad Adele hovering above the dance floor, smiling viciously down at her uncle’s horrified guests. “Glorious!” she said. “I was going to kill every last one of these pigs. But this was so much better! What a delightful surprise! I didn’t think you had it in you, Thomas!”

  Moving by instinct, he fired an arrow up at her, an arrow that streaked toward the ceiling. Adele vanished at the last second, and his shot went through the shattered skylight.

  “Now, now,” she said, shouldering her way between two men and stepping onto the dance floor. “Is that any way to take a compliment?”

  The instant he sensed an opportunity, Arnold Taylor got out of his chair and ran. Not for the door. Old Bill Hendricks was still frozen at the entrance to the ballroom. No, Arnold ran in the opposite direction.

  A large window with muntin segmenting the glass into individual panes the size of his palm looked out on the backyard. Safety beckoned. All he had to do was reach it.

  Heedless of any danger, Arnold leaped and crashed through the glass, leaving a large hole in the window. Shards cut him. He felt blood trickling down his leg. But that didn’t matter. He kept running.

  The wall at the edge of the property.

  He would scale it, and-

  An old man in livery stepped in front of him, blocking his path. One of Delarac’s servants. The man was a fossil: skinny and short with deep creases in his leathery face. “My humblest apologies, Mr. Taylor,” he said. “But I’m afraid you can’t leave yet.”

  Skidding to a stop, Arnold placed a hand over his heart and gasped for breath. He wasn’t used to such exertion. “Get out of my way.”

  “I’m afraid not.”

  Only then did Arnold notice the other servants stepping out from behind bushes, emerging from behind trees, closing in on him from all sides. Every single one of them carried a gun.

  “No one will be leaving,” the old man said. “Not until the party is over.”

  Adele giggled as she watched the young man charging through the back window. Something about her laughter sent chills down Tommy’s spine. There was more going on here than realized. “Now,” she said, flicking her coarse, black hair with a scaly hand. “Where were we?”

  Kalia raised her pistol, but Adele disappeared again. The sheriff spun around, searching the room for a target and finding nothing. “We need to get out of here,” she said. “This wasn’t part of-.”

  A chair went hurtling toward her.

  Lightning quick, Kalia raised her left hand and used her bracelet to drain its kinetic energy, leaving the thing to hover about two feet in front of her. Tommy was about to help, but something else caught his eye.

  A woman in red came striding onto the dance floor, carrying a nasty-looking dagger. She was tall and lean, but that was all Tommy could say about her. Every inch of he
r was swathed in red fabric, including her face, which she hid under a hood. He had no idea who she was, but that didn’t matter.

  She was working for Adele.

  Backing up, Tommy pulled a Heat-Sink arrow from his quiver. With swift, mechanical precision, he fired a shot that would pierce her heart.

  She already had her hand thrust out toward him, fingers splayed. The arrow was flung backward. It landed at Tommy’s feet half a second before a wave of kinetic energy slammed into him. He stumbled, trying to regain his balance.

  Using his momentum, Tommy pulsed his Gravity-Sink and jumped. He back-flipped over a table, landing on the other side.

  Clever.

  The Woman in Red was a Field Binder and a particularly talented one at that. The most common response to an arrow was to use a Force-Sink, but this lady had anticipated Tommy’s next move. She knew that he would trigger the Heat-Sink while the arrow hung in front of her; so, she didn’t let it get anywhere near her.

  He noticed Adele floating under the skylight, raining streaks of fire down on Miri and Kalia, who leaped out of the way.

  The Woman in Red kicked the chair that Kalia had left in the middle of the dance floor, and with a wave of her hand, she sent it flying toward Tommy. He had only half a second to duck before the damn thing went over his head.

  And then he heard footsteps.

  He looked up to find the hooded woman leaping onto his table, the wicked blade of her knife catching the lamplight. She jumped and kicked him in the face, His vision went dark, dizziness creeping in as he fell to the floor.

  He heard a soft squeak when his adversary hopped off the table. In a second, she would be on top of him.

  His hand flew up, unleashing a torrent of kinetic energy from his ring, energy that hurled the strange woman up to the ceiling. She cackled, grabbing the frame of the skylight to steady herself.

  A Gravity-Sink in her belt buckle kept her aloft. Tommy felt it draining energy into the Ether. “Not bad, boy,” she mocked. “Better than I would have expected.”

  Slipping one hand into her pocket, she pulled out a fistful of something that he couldn’t see. Infusions, no doubt. Who in blazes was this woman? He would rather be fighting Adele.

  Coins rained down on him.

  Triggering his Gravity-Sink, Tommy pressed his hands to the floor and pushed off. Freed from the Earth’s tether, he soared upward and flipped upright so that he could see what his enemy had done.

  Frost spread across the tiles in a wave, crystalizing with a sharp, crackling sound, snuffing out the fires Adele had started. He could feel the sudden drop in temperature. His breath misted. The frigid air seared his lungs. Those aristocrats who had failed to escape were frozen solid in seconds.

  Miri.

  He scanned the room for his love and found her taking cover in Kalia’s arms. The Sheriff had used a Heat-Source to hold back the cold, creating a small island of safety. Safety that wouldn’t last. Adele swooped low with a triumphant grin, moving in for the kill.

  Tommy hovered under the ceiling. In the blink of an eye, he had an arrow nocked and the bowstring drawn.

  He loosed.

  The bolt went straight for Adele, a perfect shot that would pierce her ribcage if it landed. But he didn’t let it strike her. Instead, he detonated the Force-Source within the arrowhead just before it punctured her skin.

  The blast had Adele careening toward the back wall, tumbling through the air like a log rolling down a hill. What remained of the window shattered as she crashed through it with a blood-curdling scream.

  Kalia’s Heat-Source died out.

  It wasn’t strong enough to contend with all those Sinks.

  He took two arrows from his quiver and threw them down without even bothering to use the bow. Once they hit the floor, he triggered the Heat-Sources that he had Infused into them

  It was a beautiful thing to witness. Energy flowed out of the Ether only to be drawn right back into it. Divine symmetry. A perfect circle that only a Field Binder could appreciate. In the end, the room was just cool. Not cold.

  A feral hiss caught his attention.

  He twisted around to find the Woman in Red flying at him with her arms outstretched. She grabbed him by the shoulders, shoving him backward.

  Tommy went flailing toward the wall. He planted one foot against the plaster, then pushed off and launched himself across the room. His opponent was waiting above the dance floor, giggling with mad glee.

  She offered a high punch.

  Ducking his head, Tommy barely evaded the hit. He drove his fist into her belly, then popped up to back-hand her cheek with. The woman’s head wrenched around, blood flying from her mouth.

  Tommy brought his knee up into her abdomen, and then, when she was winded, he yanked down the hood. What he saw froze his blood.

  Exploiting his moment of hesitation, the woman flipped over backward and kicked his chin with the toe of a soft, red boot. He was so dazed that he barely even noticed her reorienting herself.

  Nor did he sense the surge of kinetic energy that slammed him into the wall with enough force to leave cracks in it. His body ached; his head felt like it was stuffed with cotton. But for all that, he was distinctly aware of a crisp, clear voice ringing throughout the room.

  “That,” Adele said as she glided through the shattered window. “Was not nice.”

  15

  Lying in bed with her hands folded over her stomach, Desa stared up at the stone roof. A long day with much to think about. She still hadn’t sorted out how she felt about everything she had seen. Sebastian. Somehow, knowing that he might have become a good man made her happy even as it stoked her guilt.

  She wasn’t sure, but she suspected that Mercy’s visions had changed her outlook on a great many things. Perhaps the world was not full of greedy, selfish people looking for any excuse to betray you. Perhaps…Perhaps humanity had the potential to be something magnificent. If they had the right support.

  The door flew open, Light-Source disks beginning to glow, illuminating a small bedroom with a wooden table and a vase of flowers. “Forgive my intrusion,” Mercy said. “But your friends are in trouble.”

  The goddess wore white, a simple dress with sheer sleeves and frills along the hem. Strings of delicate pearls were threaded through her hair. She looked as though she were on her way to a fancy dinner at a wealthy tycoon’s house.

  Desa sat up, her mouth stretching open in a yawn. She clamped a hand over it instinctively. “What do you mean?” she mumbled. “How could you know that my friends are in trouble?”

  “I’ve kept an eye on them for you.”

  Swinging her legs over the side of the bed, Desa stood. She shook her head to clear away the fog of fatigue. “Well, thank you,” she grunted. “What’s wrong?”

  “They’ve encountered Adele.”

  “What?”

  “She’s in New Beloran.”

  Sliding her pistol into its belt holster, Desa searched the room for her knife. Ah! There! On the table! She could be there in…Well, that presented a problem didn’t it? Why would Mercy tell her about this when there was nothing she could do? “New Beloran is almost five hundred miles from here,” she said. “I don’t see how we can help.”

  Mercy stepped into the room, appearing far more calm than Desa would have expected given the situation. “Now that you have restored my power,” she began. “I can have you there in a few seconds.”

  Pausing in the act of lacing her boot, Desa shot a glance over her shoulder. “A few seconds,” she muttered. “Can you come with me?”

  “I can.”

  “Then let’s go.”

  The goddess forestalled her with a raised hand. Of course. She should have realized it wouldn’t be so easy. “I do not know how strong Adele has become,” Mercy explained. “If I confront her in a city of thousands, innocent people may be hurt.”

  Desa thought about it for a moment, then nodded her agreement. “Good point,” she said. “We’ll lure her out of t
he city. To the grasslands near the Vinrella. You and I will face her together.”

  It took all of two minutes for Desa to get ready, and then they proceeded down the stairs to the front door. She found Midnight waiting in the street; the stallion had been saddled and bridled. Something in the way he looked at her made Desa feel like he was scolding her for taking too long.

  Mercy stood by the door with her hands folded over her stomach, smiling as if she could sense the horse’s thoughts. “I hope you don’t mind,” she said. “But given the urgency, I took the liberty…”

  Slipping her boot into the stirrup, Desa climbed into the saddle. “Not at all,” she said, taking the reins in hand. “We’ll herd Adele toward the river. Assuming, of course, that she doesn’t just disappear on us.”

  “I sincerely hope that she does,” Mercy replied. “Chances are, she will flee to some remote hideaway. I can track her if she tries to run.”

  “Wonderful! Then all you have to do is come get me, and-”

  Scowling, Mercy shook her head. “No,” she said. “Desa, when I brought you here, I was under the impression that I would have to work by proxy. I never dreamed that my power would be restored to me. So, I taught you what you needed to know to defeat Hanak Tuvar.

  “But the situation has changed. Adele is no match for me now. She can hide from me, but she cannot defeat me. If I attack her, she will put up a fight, but in the end, she will lose. All I need you to do is lure her out of the city so that no one gets hurt. Beyond that, there is no reason to put your life at risk.”

  Gliding forward with such impeccable grace, Mercy rested a hand on Desa’s thigh. She stared up at Desa, and her smile lit up the night. “Besides,” she went on. “I shall need someone to teach Field Binding when I reopen the school. I was hoping that you might take the job.”

  “I accept,” Desa said. “Now, if you don’t mind-”

  “Of course.”