The City of Monsters

by Matthew McCollum

  Kelly forced herself to avert my eyes. “Wouldn't happen. The fey don't plan.”

  “Hm,” Alex muttered. “I'm sure they don't. Kat's intercepted communication is clearly just an anomaly. The fey couldn't, for example, be in league with the Composer.”

  Chapter 50: SEDUCERE

  LING

  Ling closed her phone with a click. Her class was over, Akane was still at the hospital with Adam and the retinue after a gargant hunt, and Laura was shopping with Lizzy again.

  Perfect.

  This time, she wasn't taking any chances. It was about four, and she had just finished soccer, so she made sure to take a shower first. Then she called around, making sure everyone was where they were supposed to be—that was, far away from Derek. She finished it off by calling Derek himself, and acting surprised that he was in his room. He invited her over immediately.

  Perfect.

  She didn't lock the door behind her. She didn't have anywhere to put her keys, so she didn't really have a choice. Across the hall, Derek's door was closed, but almost certainly unlocked. She just took a deep breath—remembering the similarities to last time—and knocked.

  “It's open!” he called out. Ling nodded to herself, opened the door, and quickly closed it behind her.

  Derek looked up and smiled. “Good, you're here. Do you have clothes on under that?”

  The way he said it threw her off-balance. “Uh... no? Just some underwear...”

  “Perfect,” he said. “He'll be here in a couple minutes. You can try it on then.”

  “I...” Ling was at a loss. What the hell was going on? If someone else was coming, this obviously wouldn't be a good time to go through with her plan. She made sure to tighten the bathrobe—didn't want it to fall off at the wrong moment.

  She pretty much just stood there for about ten minutes, while Derek tapped away at his laptop, oblivious to her discomfort. He seemed to be reading something about gargants, if the pictures were anything to go by, but she couldn't quite bring herself to lean in closer to get a better look.

  Thankfully, there was a knock on the door before things got too unbearable. Ling jumped forward and opened it. The man standing there, a large cardboard box in his arms, was an orc.

  Orcs were a bit complicated. Technically, they were a subculture of demons, but there was so much variety among them it was hard to identify them. Unlike most of the other Houses, orcs were pretty much only connected ideologically. Their buffs and cosmos had little to do with their beliefs.

  That being said, there were a few things they were known for. Orcs were the death-wranglers, the ones who had forced the vampires to work together long enough to stand a chance against the angels. Therefore, they shared a lot of buffs with the vampire bloodlines. The orc at the door may as well have walked out of the Codex. He was, without a doubt, the stereotypical disciple of Orcus.

  He had black horns, longer than normal, curling out from under his hair, and nighteyes hidden by daygoggles. He had large, sharp claws, as well as big tusks jutting out from his lower lips. He had a long mane of dark hair, clean but poorly brushed. He didn't have a beard, but he did have the stubble of a couple days without shaving.

  He pushed past Ling quickly, muttering a hurried apology, and set the box down on Derek's bed. Then he turned to her and held out his hand to shake. “Are you Ling?”

  She recovered and took his hand. His grip was loose, probably to keep her from getting cut by his claws. She had grown up with demons, and even been one for a time, so she was accustomed to it. “Yes, I am. And you are?”

  “Obould. I'm here to see how your armor looks.” He started unpacking the box.

  Ling blinked. She had heard of Obould, of course, but she had never met him or even seen him. He was the one who had taken over the culture after Orcus died. At least that explained his appearance. He wasn't pandering to the stereotype, he was the stereotype.

  “I asked Ob to get some armor for you and Akane,” Derek said, turning away from his laptop. “That's why she asked you for your measurements.”

  Ah, right, now she remembered. She had assumed that was in preparation for her birthday.

  The orc looked around. “Speaking of which, where is your Akane? Bathroom?”

  “No, at the hospital. Some of our friends got injured taking down that gargant.”

  Obould clicked his tongue, his tail twitching. Ling hadn't noticed that before. “I hope they're all right.”

  Derek nodded. “They should be. Oh! That reminds me.” He gestured to his computer, still displaying the same page as before. “I read your article. Seems interesting.”

  Obould grinned, his tusks widening his smile even more. “Yes, it was a new type. Steel-plated gargant, we're calling it. I haven't even begun dissecting it, so the current article is just a preliminary report.”

  “It's good,” Derek said. “Very in-depth and detailed.”

  Obould chuckled. “You flatter me, Huntsman. But ah, now I'm reminded as well. I transferred the money into your accounts. We agreed on twenty thousand for the corpse, correct?”

  Ling choked. Twenty thousand? She knew monster slaying could pay well, but that was just...

  “Yes, that's right,” Derek said. “And we got thirty thousand for killing it in the first place.”

  Ling coughed, trying to get her breath back. What?

  Obould at least seemed a little surprised. “That seems a bit much.”

  Derek shrugged. “The park committee freaked out a little and overestimated the bounty. But you can understand where they're coming from, with that bus it chomped down on. Also, Akane said it was completely steel plated?”

  Obould scratched his hairy chin. “Yes, it's completely bulletproof. Even the killing blow had to go through the eye. Though if Akane's report is accurate, the open mouth would have been a better target. Regardless, all payments have been made. And you—” He turned to Ling. “You need to try on this armor.”

  He held up what looked like a black wetsuit, covered with small pebbles. Each tiny stone had a hole drilled in the middle, and was carefully sewn to the fabric. She touched it gingerly.

  “When did you make this?” she asked. There were hundreds, maybe thousands of pebbles. He would have had to do it all by hand.

  He shrugged. “My kids did it. Kept them quiet for a few hours. This is just the prototype, of course. We're hoping it can be a sort of powered armor.”

  She frowned. “Wait, what?”

  “Obould knows about out powers,” Derek said. “He wouldn't have been able to make decent armor if he didn't.”

  That seemed... unnecessarily risky. Ling might not be the tactician of the group, but even she knew you didn't spread around that kind of secret. Okay, yes, they had told Flynn...

  “Relax,” Derek said with a chuckle. “I've known Ob for years. He's more than trustworthy. Just put the suit on, see how it feels.”

  “Ah... all right.” She took the armor, such as it was, from Obould. Both men got up and stepped into the hall while she changed.

  Once they were gone, she sighed and dropped her bathrobe, revealing the almost completely see-through lingerie beneath. Such a waste.

  The armor was a simple two-piece suit. It reminded her of a wetsuit, and it might have actually been made from one. She slid it on carefully, wary of the rocks, which clicked against each other every time she moved. The bottom was fine, but the top was a little bit tight. She realized she had forgotten to tell Akane she had gained a bit of weight in the chest area recently—she had just rattled off her sizes from memory. Oh well.

  She felt silly covered in those pebbles. Still, she took a few cautious steps around the room. Nothing fell off, and the suit felt very snug, but it didn't look like it would actually be effective as any type of armor. Of course, anything is better than nothing, so it was worth a shot.

  “Okay, come back!” she called. They came in, then nodded approvingly when they saw her. “I'm ready to try it.”

  This was the real
payoff. The actual armor quality wasn't important, it was seeing if she could use it to enhance her strength. And if some of Laura's theories about their powers improving were right, that would in turn help strengthen Ling's ability.

  “Let's start slow,” Obould said. “Try using your power to move your left arm.”

  She nodded and closed her eyes. She took a deep breath, concentrating her awareness on her left arm. She could feel the stone woven into the fabric. She reached out and pulled it very, very gently.

  Her arm moved. An inch. Probably less, actually.

  “Okay, good,” Obould said. “Now move it side to side a few times.”

  She did, moving it a little father than before. The pebbles didn't seem to be in danger of ripping off. Whatever the suit itself was made out of was stronger than she thought.

  “Good, you're doing great,” he said. Ling heard him move around, but her eyes were still closed. “Now, I want you to hold the suit steady while you fall backwards.”

  “I... what?”

  “Try and fall backwards, but use the suit to hold yourself upright. It's either this or throw you off a building.”

  “Okay,” Ling said quickly, before that idea had too much time to take root in his head. “I'm doing it.” She concentrated on her entire body, grabbing the pebbles of the suit as best she could. Then she fell backwards.

  Or rather, she tried. She could feel the pressure on the suit, both against her skin and in her mind, as her power fought against gravity and her muscles. Her reservoir was draining relatively fast. She could only keep this up for maybe a minute.

  But it was working.

  She grinned, keeping her eyes closed. “I'm doing it. It's working.”

  “Good,” Obould said cheerfully. “Let's try something a little more difficult.” He pushed her on the chest, hard, upsetting her balance. She tried desperately to regain control.

  The suit exploded.

  She landed hard on her ass and swore, opening her eyes just in time to see Derek's shield snap out of existence—he had protected himself instinctively. A thin film of rock dust was in the air, and Obould was coughing. She could hear the soft click of the last few pebbles rolling around the room.

  Derek glanced at her, decided she was unhurt, and turned to Obould. “You all right?”

  “Yeah,” he said as graciously as possible, sputtering a little to get the dust out of his throat. “Lucky I was wearing the goggles.” He frowned, and pulled something out of his mouth.

  It was one of the pebbles, ripped in half. Not shattered, ripped. Ling inspected her suit. The threads that were supposed to tie the rocks to it were mostly intact. It was the stone that had failed.

  “Huh,” Obould said, tossing the pebble away. “Interesting. Well, at least she has the power for it.”

  Ling managed to get to her feet. “The power for what, exactly?”

  He grinned. “Flight! I think if we cover you in stone, you can fly!”

  She just stared at him.

  Derek didn't seem at all troubled by her destruction of the suit. He touched one of the arms, and she could tell her was noticing the same things she had. “Maybe you can get thin pieces of granite or something,” he suggested. “Sew them into a pocket. Think plate mail rather than chain mail.”

  Obould frowned. “Well, maybe. Stone doesn't always shape the way you want, though.”

  Ling looked up. “I could help with that,” she said, feeling useful again. “I can—”

  “Affect the viscosity of stone. I know.” Obould nodded, and she didn't mention she wasn't sure what viscosity was. “That might work.” He grabbed the box off the bed and upended it, both to remove the pebbles at the bottom and the second set of armor. It also looked a bit like a wetsuit, but without anything sewn to it.

  Derek glanced at it. “That Akane's?”

  The old man nodded. “Yeah. It should fit perfectly, but have her send me an e-mail later.” He turned to Ling. “Give me back yours, and I'll let you know when I need your help shaping the stone.”

  She shrugged. She wasn't particularly worried about her armor situation, but if Derek thought it was a good idea, she wasn't going to say anything. “Sure, let me just give you my e-mail.” She glanced around the room, looking for a pen, but stopped when she remembered something else. “But first, leave so I can get changed.”

  Chapter 51: ERUDITIO

  LAURA

  Laura looked down at the corpse with a frown. It was so burned it was barely recognizable as human. It was lying on an operating table, its limbs twisted and cracked from the heat, its skin nothing but a black sheet of charcoal, flakes of it already coming off. She saw something that had once been the skull; it looked like it had exploded, perhaps as the brain inside boiled.

  “Clarke, what is this?”

  The old doctor shook his head. He wore a white lab coat, large coke-bottle glasses that didn't actually do anything, and a stethoscope. He had a wild shock of pure white hair springing out of his head, only barely combed backwards, as if blown in a stiff wind. His skin was pale and wrinkled like old leather, and he walked with a limp.

  All in all, he looked exactly like what you would expect the inventor of the toy maker to look like—which was the point. He wasn't really that old; he was fifty, and very fit for his age, but he altered himself to look older, mostly because he thought it was more “sciency.” His words.

  “That,” he said with far too much drama, “is all that is left of Loga'ha'shanar of the Sky-Borne Lords. He was assassinated this morning, during the screamer attack.”

  Laura took a deep breath, touching her necklace. No crying. No emotions. She felt her nose begin to run, the first sign of tears.

  No. She sniffed. No crying, no emotions. Think through it logically.

  “Wha—” She paused, nearly choking. “What do you mean, assassinated?”

  “Someone forgot to lock up one of the burners properly,” he said. “And it got out.” He shook his head again. That distinctive voice of his, like everything was the most interesting thing the world, was beginning to grate on her nerves. “But the thing is, it didn't act like a screamer. It walked out of the cage, closed the door behind it, then found the poor changeling and ashed him.”

  Laura cursed. “The Composer can control screamers directly.”

  “That's what I assumed. Hopefully he can only do one or two at a time, though. Otherwise we're in big trouble.”

  “Did you examine the screamer?”

  “Yes, and nothing seemed out of the ordinary. It's in solitary confinement for the moment. But that's not the biggest problem right now.”

  Laura blinked, then nodded in understanding. “The Sky-Borne Lords.”

  The changelings were a close-knit group, and very insular. As escaped slaves and experiments of the fey, they knew they needed to look out for each other, or no one would. They couldn't go back to their families; they were all mind-wiped when they were first captured, and the fey's illegal genetic modification made it impossible to even figure out for certain what they originally looked like.

  “They want to take the fight to him,” she said. This was the reason the changelings survived after they escaped. They only had one rule when dealing with outsiders: Screw with one of us, you screw with all of us. And they didn't play fair.

  “Yes, unfortunately,” Clarke said. “Of course, that's not a bad idea, but they're not going to do this the smart way. They'll run in, guns blazing, and kill anything that moves.”

  Laura frowned, realizing the implications of that last statement. “Wait, they have a location?”

  Clarke shrugged. “They have something. Apparently there's a hole in the culture territories, where no one has any men. They want to look into it.”

  She bit her lip. “That seems too obvious. What did the Big Boss say?”

  “The same.”

  She brushed her hair back. Some of the changelings were with Necessarius, but most weren't. If they insisted on trying to avenge Loga, they'd
start another war. They had done that more than once before, but starting one with the 'sarians was something different altogether. “If they go through with that...”

  Clarke made a tutting noise. “Artemis is talking them down right now. Everything will be fine. Let's get back to the topic at hand.”

  Laura sighed. He was always like this. He changed topics more than a schizophrenic. “What is the topic at hand?”

  “The screamers,” he said. “The attack on Loga'ha'shanar proves that there are things we don't understand about them. They infect people and have powers, but what else?” He clicked his tongue. “Perhaps the Composer isn't a single person, but a mind that travels from one host to the next.”

  Hm. That had some merit. “And the screamers are the potential hosts?”

  He bobbed his head happily, cheered that she was keeping up. “Exactly, exactly.”

  “And the singers are some sort of... radio tower. They spread his wavelength around more efficiently than the other types of infection.”

  “Right, that's obvious.”

  She scratched her head, frowning. “Well, the only confusing part is why a former screamer would retain powers, and be able to hear them.”

  “Well, if the link is severed quickly enough, it isn't permanent,” Clarke said. That was their working theory on why Loga had been cured. “But the subject retains enough of a connection to keep the powers and can still 'hear' the hive mind, to a point.”

  “At least now we have proof that former screamers can't be reinfected,” Laura said. “If they could, the Composer would have done that to Loga, rather than killing him.”

  “Yes, unless he wants us to think that. After all, it would be disastrous if the Paladins were to be reinfected.”

  It hadn't taken them long to realize that the only logical explanation for their powers was that the Paladins, like Loga, had once been screamers. His powers and sixth sense were exactly the same as theirs, so it was the only thing that made sense.

  But who had cured them? It couldn't have been random luck. If they all had the same power, then perhaps. It would be somewhat believable that the singer who turned them accidentally walked off a ledge or something and died within minutes of them getting infected. But as far as they knew, each singer only gave one power. It would be ridiculously improbable for five singers to just randomly die after empowering them. That meant someone had done this to them intentionally.