The Fates of Yoran
The Chain Breaker Book 3
D.K. Holmberg
Copyright © 2020 by D.K. Holmberg
Cover by Damonza.com
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Contents
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Author’s Note
Series by D.K. Holmberg
Chapter One
The warehouse in the distance was better lit than Gavin preferred—more than what was necessary for a job like this. He pressed his back against the stone building nearest him. It was a tavern that would normally be boisterous, but it was quiet for probably the same reason Gavin and Gaspar were there.
“Are you going to stay there, boy, or are you going to get moving?” Gaspar asked.
Gaspar hadn’t given Gavin much insight about the job, only that it was something important to him. That alone was probably enough for Gavin to agree to take the job, but for whatever reason, Gaspar had preferred to keep it more secretive than Gavin thought necessary.
Gavin looked across the street to where Gaspar flattened himself against a different building. The only part of the old thief that stood out was his shock of silver hair and his flat gray eyes. Otherwise, his faded gray cloak helped him blend in. The building Gaspar concealed himself against was a general store that sold supplies, though it was one Gavin had never visited before.
“I don’t tell you what to do on my jobs.”
Gaspar grunted. “You tell me often enough. Like you know better than a man who’s worked on the streets for his entire career.”
“You worked on the streets as a constable,” Gavin said in a whisper. The enchantment that permitted them to speak to each other made the words carry easily, so he knew Gaspar wouldn’t struggle with hearing his taunt. “How long were you a thief?”
“Careful, boy.”
Gavin shook his head. Gaspar, despite his age, had good eyesight. Hopefully, he would see Gavin’s annoyance. He had to suppress it. None of his annoyance was really Gaspar’s fault. It was the situation. Staying in Yoran.
The choice had been his, but there were times when it felt otherwise.
“Will the two of you just get going?” Wrenlow’s voice broke in between the two of them.
“Stay out of it, kid,” Gaspar said.
“You don’t need to talk to him like that,” Gavin said.
“My job, my talk. Now we’re going to do this quietly.”
Gavin looked at the warehouse. It was a low stone building with a flat roof, and it occupied nearly the entire block. He stared at it, but they hadn’t seen any movement since their arrival. Gavin hadn’t expected to. Gaspar had scouted well enough, and as far as he knew, Imogen had taken care of anyone who might be watching.
“I don’t know why you really need me for this anyway,” Gavin said. “You already have your muscle.”
Gavin still didn’t know what Imogen was capable of doing. She was a skilled sword fighter—one of the most skilled he’d ever encountered—but he didn’t think she had magic. Maybe enchantments, but he hadn’t been able to determine whether she had any on her.
“I said quiet,” Gaspar growled.
He leaned forward, and then he scurried across the street, moving far more rapidly than Gavin would’ve given him credit for. Gaspar was older, though Gavin hadn’t learned how old. He had served as a constable for several decades, lost a wife, lost his job, and taken up thieving.
Gavin didn’t know much else about him. He called Gaspar old, but the man really wasn’t that much older than him. Gavin just looked young. He always had. Some days he felt older than he was, though that was mostly a weariness from everything he’d gone through. Since defeating the Mistress of Vines, he had more free time.
Gaspar reached the warehouse entrance, slipped out a lockpick set from his pocket, and made quick work of opening a side door. He disappeared inside.
“You’re in. Now what?” Gavin asked.
“Now you follow me, you damn fool. Did you forget the plan already?”
“I was just testing to make sure that you remembered it. You’re getting up in years, so how am I to know whether or not you’ll remember all of these things unless I question it?”
Gavin darted forward. As soon as he did, a flowing movement came from the side. He twisted, dropping low, and reached for his dagger. The dagger was El’aras made and filled with a strange sort of power. It glowed when magic was used around him.
Thankfully, it didn’t glow now.
Whoever approached was not using magic. Not an enchanter, though he still wouldn’t put it past one of them to attack. After what had happened with the Mistress of Vines, Gavin remained uncertain about the enchanters and what they might be willing to do.
“Where are you, boy?”
“Quiet,” Gavin hissed.
“Now you want me to be quiet?”
Something sped toward him, faster than Gavin could track, but he had trained for scenarios just like this. He rolled to the side and popped up, doing so in the fighting style of Kor. It was a loose sort of stance, but it lent itself well to this type of challenge. He reacted in exaggerated movements, which helped against a much quicker foe.
If he was right, then his opponent would be quite a bit faster than him.
He smiled tightly to himself, resisting the urge to reach for the enchantment stuffed in his pocket. It remained there, untouched, where it would stay.
Gavin had no interest in drawing upon the enchantment for speed and strength, though he could imagine Gaspar’s irritation in learning that he chose not to use something that would grant him a bit of an advantage.
Why use it when I need to keep myself sharp and spar?
It had been far too long since he’d had a worthy foe.
“What are you doing?”
“We have company,” Gavin said quickly.
He rolled sideways again as the blur of movement came toward him. He darted after it, swinging low and coming back up, then tumbling off to his side in the same exaggerated manner that was designed to catch somebody who was faster than him. There was always somebody faster and stronger and better, but knowing different styles allowed him to overcome any deficit he had.
According to his old mentor, Gavin had plenty of deficits, despite Tristan trying to beat them out of him.
The blurring movement came straight at him again, and he brought his fist around in a rapid shift of direction. The suddenness of it seemed to catch the person off guard. Gavin punched, and then the
person became visible.
He was young, probably no more than eighteen or nineteen, and skinny. Not the kind of person that Gavin would ever have expected to have trouble with normally.
Gavin slammed his open fist into the attacker’s throat, knocking the wind out of him. He quickly searched and found what he was looking for wrapped around the boy’s neck.
An enchantment.
He looked up quickly but didn’t see any sign of other attackers heading toward him.
“Are you coming?” Gaspar snapped at him.
“I told you to be patient,” Gavin said.
“You told me to be quiet.”
“And you’re not being either.”
He hurriedly finished checking the man and found no other enchantments on him. The one Gavin had retrieved seemed to be a reasonably powerful enchantment for speed, though perhaps not for strength. Not the way that Olivia had made Gavin’s enchantment. Too bad for this boy that he hadn’t added an element to help him recover.
Gavin dragged the young attacker off to the side of the road, propped him up against the wall in the alley, and then looked toward the warehouse. He could just make out Gaspar’s outline looking out through the cracked door, peering at him.
“You can get going,” Gavin said.
“Not without you.”
“You still haven’t explained why you needed me on this job.”
He looked over to the fallen boy, shaking his head. If it was only somebody like that, Imogen likely could’ve handled it—maybe not as neatly as Gavin and probably bloodier, though sometimes bloody was necessary. But Gaspar or Imogen could’ve done the job.
“I’m not a thief,” Gavin said.
“I don’t need a thief. Now get moving.”
Gavin inched along the wall, moving deliberately and watching. Now that he knew there was one enchanted attacker, he had to ensure that there wasn’t going to be another. He didn’t want to get caught up in whatever was taking place here.
“Keep your eyes open,” he said to Gaspar.
“My eyes are open.”
“What’s going on there?” Wrenlow asked.
“Maybe you should be out here,” Gavin said.
“I’d like to, but Gaspar didn’t want my help.” Wrenlow didn’t even bother to hide the note of disappointment in his voice.
“You’re better off inside,” Gaspar said. “Stay by the table. By the books.”
“He’s better doing what he’s good at,” Gavin said.
“Would you stop talking,” Gaspar muttered.
Gavin laughed softly. “You’re just mad that he’s sweet on Olivia.”
Gaspar grunted. “We are not talking about that.”
“Please,” Wrenlow said.
“Do I have something that the two of you agree on?” Gavin moved forward, glancing in either direction around him. No signs of another attacker, but there could still be somebody else here. A single person would not be enough to protect an entire warehouse of value, regardless of what lay inside. He didn’t know what Gaspar wanted his help for, but he could only imagine that it was worth something significant.
As Gavin started across the street, another flicker of movement came in either direction. Two attackers.
He stopped in the middle of the cobbled street, the stones more cracked than they were in other parts of Yoran, smiling. “I’m going to be another moment.”
“Gah,” Gaspar grunted, closing the door again.
Gavin didn’t have to wait long before the first of the attackers came. When they did, they lunged toward him, sweeping in a blur. Both were enhanced with speed enchantments. Gavin dropped down, punching with his fist toward the first one to arrive, and he nearly shattered the bones in the man’s forearm.
Not just enchanted with speed but with something else too.
He popped up, flipping in the air, and landed facing the attackers. The blur darted toward him, and Gavin swept his leg around, kicking outward. He braced himself for a more jarring connection.
His foot connected and crashed into the man, who went down. Gavin followed the movement, driving forward with his other foot. He stomped down on the man’s midsection, now visible and exposed, and knocked the wind out of him.
The other person came toward him. Gavin was ready. This was the one who had some enchantment that turned the man to stone, or something else that made him harder to strike. Gavin couldn’t do it openhanded. He’d have to use his shoulder. Or a knee.
Gavin braced himself and jumped, swinging both knees up right as the blurring movement streaked at him.
He connected with something. There was a soft, feminine yelp, and Gavin ignored it as he jumped again, swinging his leg around and driving it into the woman’s belly. Then she was down. If someone was going to fight him, he was going to defend himself, regardless of gender.
Another of Tristan’s lessons.
Gavin hurriedly searched both the woman and the fallen man. He found and stripped them of their enchantments, then dragged them off to the side of the street.
Fighting people with enchantments reminded him of breaking into the Captain’s home and what they dealt with when it came to the Mistress of Vines. Could he be responsible? Gavin hadn’t been paying that much attention when it came to the Captain, though perhaps he should have. He had allowed the Captain to remain in power, which may have been a mistake. Had he not, though, there would be a danger to the city—a power void that Gavin had been concerned about leaving too open. He suspected even the constables, and Davel Chan, approved.
Whatever this was, Gavin didn’t think this was the Captain. He had kept enough tabs that he would’ve known were he the one responsible.
“Now I’m coming,” he said. He pushed open the partially closed door, then stepped through the doorway. There was a faint light inside. “Is that your doing?” he asked Gaspar, nodding to the lantern glowing in the distance.
“I wouldn’t have lit that.”
“Then they know we’re coming.”
“Given the mess you made out there, I would say that’s a pretty good possibility.”
“I didn’t make a mess out there,” Gavin said, surveying the inside of the warehouse. It had as low of a ceiling on the inside as he’d expected from the outside. Lines of boxes were arranged throughout. A shelf ran along one wall. The lantern hung from a hook on the ceiling, but there was nothing else here.
He swept his gaze around, looking for any sign of an attacker, but he saw nothing.
They were safe… for now.
“Are you going to tell me what you wanted me for?” Gavin asked.
“Soon enough,” Gaspar whispered. He crept forward; his grizzled face wrinkled even more than usual as he stared at the lantern in the distance. He looked from side to side, moving silently.
Gavin followed, now filled more with curiosity than anything else. “You know, this will go a lot easier if you tell me what it is you’re up to.”
“This will go easier if you stop talking,” Gaspar said to him.
Gavin followed Gaspar forward. He really needed to be careful. This was Gaspar’s job, not his, and he knew better than to antagonize the old thief. Gaspar had helped him many times on different jobs that he’d taken, and Gavin knew he should really be more appreciative.
“Which one of these trunks are we taking?” he asked.
“None of them,” Gaspar said softly. He reached a short door at the back that barely went up to his shoulders, and he wasn’t that tall to begin with. He motioned for Gavin to get close.
There was nothing other than the size of the door that was remarkable about it. It was little more than three feet wide by maybe four feet tall. “Go ahead, pick it,” Gavin said.
“Do you see a damn lock to pick?” Gaspar asked.
Gavin smiled to himself. “Fine. There’s no lock. So what do you want inside of it?”
“Open it,” Gaspar said.
Understanding dawned on Gavin. “That’s why you asked me to come.”
“You’re damn right that’s why I asked you to come. I needed your special gifts.”
“Now they’re gifts?”
“I don’t know what else to call it. Now go ahead and be this so-called Chain Breaker that you like to keep going on and on about.”
The Chain Breaker. A name he had taken after he’d demonstrated his strange and unique ability when he was younger. A name that he should’ve known meant something more. A name that had told him that he was something more.
And yet, now that he operated out in the open, and now that others knew of it and of him, he wasn’t quite sure how to feel about it.
“Would you have asked for my help otherwise?” he asked.
“You do have your uses from time to time,” Gaspar said, turning his head and looking behind him.
Gavin glanced back too. Two figures came streaking toward them, and he shook his head. “You want to go ahead and get this, or do you need my help here too?”
“I could use a bit of an assist.”
“Just an assist, and that’s it?”
Gavin stepped forward. The first attacker came at him and moved with a blazing speed. Gavin stayed in place, prepared for the onslaught of the attack. When it struck, Gavin twisted, driving his elbow down and swinging his leg around.
He hit nothing.
This attacker was better. More controlled.
He should have known that there’d be a change in strategy—and a change in skill.
He couldn’t jump very high here. The ceiling was too low, only a few inches above his head. This and the rows of boxes limited his ability to fight effectively. It would limit the speed this person could come at him with too.
Gavin darted off to the side and watched as the blur came at him. He dropped, immediately flipping over and kicking up. He was greeted with a satisfying grunt. The kick sent the person slamming into the ceiling. When they connected, they went crashing down and landed on the ground. Gavin rolled and chopped the side of his hand at the person’s neck, knocking them out.
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