Guy looked at the new arrival, now barely moving and holding his leg. Blood rushed from beneath it, and he stilled. Then Guy looked at the pile he'd made.
“Holy Davidon,” Guy muttered, his mouth suddenly quite dry. “What 'ave I done?”
“What I told you to!” the impersonator shouted. “Keep it up and you might just live to see the end of this.” There was only one of the thugs left facing the man in the black armor, and he was quivering, looking as though he had second, third, fourth, fifth thoughts. He stared at the impersonator, then at his own weapon, a short blade, back at the impersonator, then at the gap Guy had been defending.
He finally shook his head, turned on his heel, and sprinted off down the alley.
The impersonator bent over, wearing a grimace, and picked up the blade of one of the fallen thugs. It was a short thing, no more than a hand's length of a blade. The impersonator stared, lining up his throw at the back of the retreating thug.
“No way you make that,” Guy said. It just popped out.
“Watch me,” the Davidon impersonator said, and he threw—
Down the alley, the fleeing thug cried out.
The blade stuck, perfectly, between his shoulder blades. He dropped his own sword with a clang against the cobbles and hit his knees, reaching behind him, futilely, for the thing that ailed him. He did not succeed, and after a moment he fell over, motionless, knife still sticking from his back as he did so.
“Told you,” the impersonator said, dropping to a knee. He lifted a hand and it glowed red again. He seemed to take an easier breath after that, stretching, though he made no effort to stand again. He glanced back at Guy. “Finish that fellow at your feet, will you? Regardless of how cruel a foe is, I don't care to hear a man suffer and scream.”
Guy blinked at him, then stared down at the survivor left at his feet. He was, indeed, the man blinded and screaming. Guy stared at his blade, which was slick with crimson almost to the hilt.
“It's a mercy,” the impersonator said, cocking his head at Guy. “Would you want to lie in an alley screaming your last? Or would you want it over with?”
“I'd want to not die in the first place, I think,” Guy said, shuddering at the red tinge to his scavenged blade.
“Not an option,” the Davidon impersonator said. “If one of them lives, they can rat us out to the Machine, and I don't know about you, but I don't need any more trouble from them right now.” He straightened, then grimaced, apparently still in some pain. “Also, his screaming is going to draw people if you don't finish him quickly.”
Guy stared at his blade once more. It was steady in his hand, strangely enough.
“Do it.” The impersonator said it with a calm, a confidence that Guy couldn't quite fathom. “Base of the skull where it meets the spine would be kindest.”
Guy hesitated, but then he did it, plunging the blade exactly where he was told, meeting a little resistance somewhere in there. He pushed past it, and somehow, without giving it much in the way of thought, Guy murdered his...third? Fourth? Had he lost count? Whatever the number, his several-th human being of the day. He didn't wish to count them up.
Then, unexpectedly, as the wailing noise ceased, Guy got sick all over his own boots, as well as the pile of newly-minted corpses. He lost control of his legs, and when he finished, he found himself on all fours over a hell of a mess. Three corpses in a pile and his own sick. The smell of shit and piss was intense enough that he retched again, adding the nothing left in his stomach to an already prodigiously disgusting spectacle.
“You really weren't much of a killer, were you?” the Davidon impersonator asked once Guy had picked himself up. He wiped a sick-slicked hand on his own pants, suppressing the urge to throw up again. He turned away from the mess – Davidon, what an effing mess – and focused on the impersonator, trying to keep his eyes on the man's unamused expression.
“First time I've ever done that,” Guy said, trying not to think about the faces of the men he'd just slain.
“And second, third and fourth,” the impersonator said, still on one knee. “Not bad for your first time. I'd suggest being a bit more alacritous if you find yourself in this situation again, though. This lot was clearly about as poorly trained and ready for violence as yourself. Not a one of them had ever been in anything approaching a fair fight before.” He cast a wary eye over the fallen around him. “Stupidity kept them in the fight long past quitting time. Except that last fellow.”
Guy got sick again right there, though this time he kept his footing. It took a minute or two, him just retching and heaving all over the alley floor, emptying up a stomach that was already empty. Breathing was a bit difficult by the time he was done, and the muscles in his belly hurt from being turned inside-out a dozen times.
A sound overhead drew his attention, and Guy blinked, looking up.
An airship overflew the alley, the hull clearly a sleek Muratam design, so distinctive in their livery and style. Guy's eyes widened as it disappeared, heading toward the wall, toward the east, away from—
“No, no, no, no,” Guy said, shoving up to his feet again on legs that had lost their wobble, sense of nausea falling away, replaced by a different sort of sick feeling as he caught sight of the nameplate on the bow. “No, no – it can't be—”
“What?” the impersonator asked, still on one knee.
“That was my ship,” Guy said plaintively, staring up at the empty, grey sky above.
“So find another,” the impersonator said.
“I can't,” Guy said, almost whispering. “I paid in advance to have them hold my berth. They left early, the thieves.” He sagged. “That was every last copper I had left...”
The impersonator let out a low, long chortle.
“It's not bloody funny,” Guy said, flushing heat running to his cheeks. “What the hell am I supposed to do now?”
“I'd try not dying,” the impersonator said, attempting to get to his feet and barely making it. He seemed like he was about to pitch over, and Guy reached out, catching him with the same surprising instinct he'd shown as the thugs were pouring through that gap. No stabbing this time, though, just a quick shove that kept the impersonator from dropping to a knee.
“Thanks for the free advice,” Guy said, taking a step back from the big man. “It's worth exactly what I paid for it.”
The impersonator looked him up and down a little shrewdly. “You're quick, I'll give you that.”
“Not fast enough to outrun these fartwats, though, now, am I?” Guy gestured at the fallen around him with the bloody sword, still clutched in his hand. “Especially not in this city. Not now, anyway. They're going to bloodhound me, chase me right to any hole I run to, and then—” He drew the sword up and pretended to rake it across his own throat, though he kept it a foot away from his neck just to be safe. A little blood flecked off onto his hand and Guy stared at the spots of red, feeling a bit sick again—
When he made it back from his knees a minute later, stomach emptied definitely, for certain this time, nothing left to offer, no sir, he found the impersonator, unsteady on his feet, staring at Guy, assessing again. “What?” Guy asked, wiping his mouth, sticky bile on his lips transferred to the back of his hand.
“Come with me,” the impersonator said, still staring at him.
Guy squinted at him. “Are you bloody mad? How is that going to help me live?”
“How well are you going to do on your own?” the impersonator asked, then waved a hand at the carnage around them. “And how well do you think you could do with me?”
Guy thought about it a moment. “You're a bloody lightning rod for trouble, though, aren't you? They came for you, not me.”
“But they are looking for you,” the impersonator said. “You'll draw plenty of lightning all on your own, and I doubt you'll do nearly so well weathering the strikes without help.”
“You can barely stand,” Guy said.
“That's what you're for,” the impersonator said. “Yo
u're going to have to help me walk.” Guy let out an inadvertent laugh. “In exchange for your assistance, I have a place to hide where you'll be safe.”
Guy thought that over. The impersonator had almost killed the entire lot of them by himself, even whilst wounded. That was a fair sight better than Guy could have managed on his own.
Tossing a look back at the pile of corpses in the gap between bin and alley wall, Guy quickly turned back around. No, scratch that – without the impersonator, he wouldn't have managed any of this on his own. Not one bit. He'd have gone down in a circle of blades, skewered through like a pork sausage left in the communal ovens.
“Fine,” Guy said, coming to a reluctant conclusion. No airship, no money, nowhere else to hide. “I'll help you get where you're going. But if they come at you again? I'm running away and leaving you to it. Because this—” he waved his own hand to indicate the mess around them without daring to look at it. He was still almost sick again anyway. “—this was lucky. For you, for me. It won't turn out this well next time.”
“It'll be fine,” the impersonator said, and turned to walk out the alley mouth, staggering a step sideways as he did so.
Guy caught him before he pitched over, helping him right himself. “The hell it will,” he muttered, keeping the poor bastard upright like he was walking an elderly grandmother down the alley, his arm resting on the big man's armored biceps. “What's your name, anyway? Since I'm stuck wif' you.”
“Cyrus Davidon,” the impersonator said, favoring him with a look that suggested Guy must be an idiot.
“Fine,” Guy said as they reached the mouth of the alley. The street beyond was surprisingly quiet, as though no one had even taken notice of all the screaming within, covered as it was under the noise of the mill. “Keep your bloody name to yourself, then.” The impersonator struck off to the right, and Guy followed along beside him. “But don't expect me to call you – well, what it is you're calling yourself.” He shook his head, and they started limping their way along the avenue. “The last bloody thing I need is to get the actual Davidon hacked off at me for blaspheming.” That prompted the impersonator to roll his eyes, but Guy didn't find it all that funny.
Chapter 9
Alaric
The airship docks buzzed with activity. Ships arrived and departed around them as Alaric stood on the deck of the Yuutshee, waiting as a burly crewman held a hand thrust against his breastplate, blocking him from the gangplank. He said something quickly paced and serious, judging by his inexpressive mien.
“I'm sorry,” Alaric said. “I don't understand your language.”
“He says to wait for my permission to disembark,” Captain Mazirin said quietly, over the distant thrum of airship engines. The Yuutshee's own had quieted, given up their ceaseless, blurring spin. To Alaric's surprise, they were simple blades atop the mast, only a few of them, in fact, but turned at such speed that it seemed like there must be a dozen arrayed around the tip of each mast.
Alaric did not resist the man's hand, and soon enough he'd pulled it away and walked off, once Captain Mazirin had approached closely enough, hands behind her back, calmly surveying Alaric.
“Do you have some final instruction for me, perhaps?” Alaric asked, when Mazirin said nothing, did nothing but stand there for a moment or two.
Mazirin stirred. “I do. A customs official will board in a moment. You will need to have a story for them.”
“I know little of the world outside Arkaria,” Alaric said. “Might I add to my already considerable debt and prevail upon you for some advice in that regard?”
The captain studied him slowly. She always seemed to move slowly, and Alaric wondered if it was unique to her conversations with him, or if it was simply the way she was. Certainly something about her interaction with him felt odd, though he couldn't quite put a finger on how that might be so, given it was only his second time speaking with her. “Don't speak their language.”
Alaric raised an eyebrow. “Beg pardon?”
“Make yourself nonsensical,” Mazirin said. “I will speak for you.”
“Making yourself nonsensical should be easy enough,” Vaste said, appearing from behind him. “Why don't you speak in one of the Luukessian dialects of your youth? That'll probably be completely unrecognizable.”
Alaric looked sidelong at Vaste and said something.
“Sorry, didn't get that,” Vaste said.
“Perfect,” Mazirin said, moving over to the gangplank. “Here comes the customs inspector.”
“What the hell did you just say to me?” Vaste asked, brow puckered.
“He called you a great green buffoon,” Curatio said, joining them. “In the language of the ancients.” The healer paused, thinking. “No. Wait. That word was a bit more complex than just buffoon. It also meant—”
“Shhhh,” Alaric said, nodding at the customs official, who'd just finished climbing up the gangplank, and was wheezing before Captain Mazirin. It was a slightly plump, middle-aged woman with a tight bun on the back of her head. She looked surprisingly chipper, Alaric thought, especially given that every employee of Reikonos he'd met in the past seemed very bored by their jobs.
“Why are we shushing Vaste?” Vara whispered, pushing her way into their small, conversational circle. “Oh, who am I kidding? As though we need a reason.”
“None of us should be speaking this language,” Alaric muttered under his breath, hopefully low enough that the customs official wouldn't hear him.
“All right, then, dearie,” the customs inspector said, a little loudly, to Captain Mazirin. “What have you got for us today, luv?”
“No one should be shushing me, ever,” Vaste whispered. “Who knows what nuggets of genius you might stifle in the process? Lost forever in the recesses of my brilliant mind, a thousand perfect jests of elegant composition and absolute humor.”
“I can live with that loss,” Alaric muttered. “Now...shhhhhh.”
“A cargo of rice,” Captain Mazirin said. “And several passengers taken on in Binngart.”
“Ahhh,” the customs inspector said, eyes lighting up as she took in the group of them. Alaric turned to find Birissa and Hiressam had joined them. “What are you lot supposed to be?”
“I don't think they speak your language,” Mazirin said, stepping behind the customs inspector and nodding, once, at Alaric, but very subtly.
Alaric spoke, once more, in the language of the ancients. “The sun is rising high in the sky this day.”
“And my opinion is running low, very low, of your grasp of this language, my friend,” Curatio responded in kind.
“What are they saying?” Vaste asked, under his breath.
“Shhhh,” Vara whispered.
“I can't help if I'm curious,” Vaste said. “I think they're talking about me again.”
“They're just talking about the position of the sun and how bad Alaric is at speaking the language,” Birissa said under her breath as the customs inspector smiled politely at them as one might look at a child who'd just said something completely bizarre.
Alaric slowly turned round to look at Birissa. The troll favored him with a toothy smile – and with a troll, 'toothy' was quite a thing, given that their jutting canine teeth were half the size of his hand.
“Not a single speaker of the language, then?” the customs inspector asked. “How are they supposed to navigate the city? And what are they here for?”
“Actors,” Mazirin said smoothly. “Performing in some theater troupe, I believe. Really, it was their business. Bringing them here was mine.”
The customs inspector pursed her lips as she looked at them, then slowly meandered closer. “No, no. That won't do at all. Do they have someone meeting them here?”
“I don't know,” Mazirin said, her brow showing the first faint line.
“I'm afraid it wouldn't be right to just turn them loose, then,” the customs inspector said. “Foreigners who don't speak the language, abandoned here in our fair city? No, no.�
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“'Fair' might be pushing it,” Vaste muttered. “You can't even see the sky in this place, and everything is covered in black ash. I think 'dung heap' might be more accurate. Especially given the smell that hangs about.”
Alaric reached up and rested a hand on Vaste's shoulder, giving it a gentle squeeze, then a look. When the troll met his eyes, the Ghost tried to make his gaze a bit more daggered, to convey what he was thinking, which was: Shut. Up.
“Oh, fine, then,” Vaste said, under his breath.
“In order to allow you to dock, I'm going to need some further assurance from you,” the customs inspector said, looking at her little clipboard very seriously. “You will need to provide these people a guide in Reikonos, someone who speaks the language.”
“My crew is very busy—” Mazirin started.
“You can do this thing that I have asked and take responsibility for the well-being of your passengers,” the customs inspector said, lifting up the clipboard and what was, presumably, a customs form, “or you can put this ship back in the air and go elsewhere. They may just accept people to get lost in the bowels of Binngart or Emerald without a care for their welfare, but here in Reikonos we give a damn, you see. I won't have these poor souls turned loose in this place without so much as a guide to help them.”
“Sounds like she's admitting this place is a dangerous dung heap,” Vaste muttered. “Not sure I want to stay here now that I know that. Why, we might get assaulted in the streets. Or elsewhere, like the top of their majestic, penis-looking Citadel.”
Alaric just rolled his eyes.
Vara turned to look over her shoulder at the still-smoking Citadel. “You know, I never noticed before, but it actually was rather phallic with that bulb atop it where the meeting room and quarters are.”
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