by Kyle Prue
The Marksman extended his hand and the noble hesitantly reached out for it. The second the Marksman entered the handshake, he removed his pistol from his coat, placed it under the noble’s chin and fired a shot straight through his head. The corpse dropped to the marble so hard that the Marksman estimated such a fall might have killed him, if he weren’t already dead. The girl began screaming as she stared down at the spots of red on her white dress. The other nobles stared in horror and few cried. The music stopped. “Be at peace,” the Marksman said to the girl in white. “You’d thank me if you knew the extent of his plans for the evening.”
He pocketed his pistol and turned to the room of nobles. “Don’t pretend you care,” he said to the partygoers. “He’s no better than any of the citizens dying in your slums. He’s just dressed better.” He patted his hands on his coat and went through the back door of the party and into the streets. He ducked into an alley, leaving the young girl to weep over the body of her would-be assailant.
Chapter Six
THE GOLDEN MUG
NEIL VAPROS
Josephine put down her scissors and smiled. “What do you think?” she asked, leaning against the counter. “Worthy of family standards?”
Rhys pushed his hand through his newly cut hair. “I’m satisfied with mine,” he announced. His hair had remained long on top, but the sides had been cut short. Neil and Lilly mumbled their agreement. Only Darius remained silent. He was pouting in the corner, staring mournfully at the long locks of blonde hair on the floor. His new haircut consisted of short spiky strands; Josephine had wanted to dye it brown, but Darius had leaped from the chair and run away when she suggested it.
“Good to hear,” Josephine said, closing her eyes. “I’m beat. Can I count on you to clean up around here?”
Neil suppressed a groan. Rhys nudged him. “Of course,” Neil said, and Josephine smiled gratefully and wandered off to bed.
Once she was out of earshot, Darius got to his feet and gently touched the top of his head. “I hate it,” he moaned.
Lilly rolled her eyes. “You look fine.”
“You’re one to talk,” Darius pouted. “Celerius hair grows back in a flash.”
He was right. Lilly was a Celerius and because of her regenerative qualities, her hair grew alarmingly fast. It would be back to its old length in no time. For some reason, she still fought Josephine every time she produced her shears. The honorable Celerius men back in Altryon had always kept close-cropped hair. Neil wondered if they had weekly, or even daily, haircuts.
“You really look fine,” Neil said. Darius didn’t seem convinced.
“I think it’s an improvement, actually,” Rhys offered.
Darius looked down at him. “No, it’s not.”
Rhys persisted. “Longer hair is impractical. Keeping it short like that is a good idea. Your flowing golden locks aren’t exactly inconspicuous.” Darius said nothing, but looked slightly less murderous after that.
“Okay,” Rebecca said, examining the mess in the room. “Rhys, I want you to straighten all the tables and chairs. Lilly, why don’t you clean the floors and tabletops? Darius can fetch some water, and Neil, you can finish up the dishes with me.”
Darius started for the door. “Of course Neil gets the soft job,” he muttered.
Rebecca heard him. “You’re stronger than Neil,” she insisted. “You can handle harder jobs. Neil is delicate.”
“Delicate,” Darius repeated with a grin.
“Delicate?” Neil looked at her incredulously. He was definitely bigger than Rhys and Lilly. “I’m a trained warrior, Becca!”
Lilly snorted. Rebecca smiled. “Forgive me,” she said with a mocking bow. “Would you like to go fetch the water, then?”
Neil sighed. “Did I mention . . . I’m a very delicate trained warrior?”
Rebecca laughed. “That’s what I thought.” She walked back to the kitchen. Neil followed at her heels and began to scrub at a plate with a rag. Rebecca was humming one of Darius’s Taurlum drinking songs under her breath. She and Josephine both liked to sing while they worked. While Neil normally didn’t mind listening, this song drove him crazy.
“A lot of business tonight, huh?” he said, hoping to spark a conversation and end the humming.
Rebecca submerged a mug. “People really like Rhys’s beer. They can’t get enough of it.”
“Yeah, back home the Vapros are in charge of alcohol. We owned all the bars and made all the drinks. It was a good business strategy.” He picked up a new dish. “Because people always want beer, you know? In good times, they celebrate with it. In bad times, they use it to forget their troubles. We were more successful than any of the Taurlum market stands.”
“Isn’t it funny,” Rebecca said, “that you all used to be so competitive?”
“‘Funny isn’t the word I’d use,” Neil said.
Rebecca laughed. “But look at you now! You’re all cleaning Josephine’s restaurant and singing each other’s songs.”
“You are singing his songs,” he corrected. “I have never sung about the ‘Mighty, mighty Taurlum and their mighty, mighty might.’ Most idiotic lyrics of all time.”
“I like them. They’re catchy.”
“So is smallpox,” he grunted and began to scrub as hard as he could against a tough stain. It didn’t budge. He quickly let a small flame leap from his hand and burned it away. Rebecca yelped, and Neil quickly doused the plate in water. “Sorry about that,” he said, examining the plate. He’d left a few scorch marks, but the stain was gone. “I forgot you aren’t used to that.”
“It’s okay,” she said, still stunned. “You ruined the plate, though.”
“Yeah,” he said tossing it into the sink. “Sorry.”
“It’s fine.” She wouldn’t meet his eye. “I’ve ruined plenty of plates before. No big deal.”
“I keep forgetting you aren’t used to people like me.”
“What, men?” Rebecca laughed shakily and threw herself back into dishwashing. “I’ve known plenty of men, I can assure you.”
“I meant people with abilities like mine,” Neil said.
“Oh!” Rebecca’s face flushed. “Right. I mean . . . I’ve heard things about people like you. But I’ve never met any Lightborns before your gang arrived. I don’t know if I’ve met anyone from the Industrial City before now.”
It took Neil a moment to remember that the Industrial City was the name those outside the wall had given the walled city where he had grown up. Those within the walls just called it Altryon. He’d once thought that Altryon was the word for the entire realm, but once again he and the people had been misled. The people had dubbed the greater landmass Volteria, even though the Empire insisted on leaving the outer reaches nameless. Rebecca had taught him many new terms in his weeks outside the walls. People out here were dubbed “Outsiders” by the Empire. They also commonly used the slang term for family members, Lightborns. Neil had heard that word inside the walls but far less frequently than they used it out here. “Well, here we are.” He quickly burned away another stain while her back was turned. This time he was careful not to damage the plate itself. “Most of what you’ve heard is probably just rumors, though. There are a lot of myths that aren’t true. We Vapros don’t eat children, for instance.”
She laughed. “Does anyone actually believe that?”
“You’d be surprised.” He smiled fondly at a memory. “What kinds of things do they say about us out here?”
She thoughtfully dried her hands on a cloth. Her half of the sink was empty; she’d finished before him again. “The Celerius can catch arrows,” she said finally. “Is that true?”
“Probably.”
“The Taurlum are huge drinkers?”
“Very true. Darius used to be an insufferable drunk, before he decided to join us.”
She pushed him aside and started to finish his half of the dishes. “The Celerius are afraid of heights?”
“I’m not sure about that one,”
he said after a moment. “You’ll have to ask Lilly. You don’t have to finish these,” he added, taking a mug out of her hand. “I can do my part.”
She backed off. “How about . . . the Taurlum can’t read?”
Neil let out a laugh. “Darius can read!” he insisted. “At least . . . I think he can.” He paused. “Well now that you mention it, I’ve never actually seen him read anything. Might be worth investigating.” He dunked another mug in the sudsy water and began to scrub at its sticky handle. “We’ve heard a lot of rumors about you people, too.”
“Outsiders?” Rebecca asked.
Neil dried the mug and set it aside. “And the outside world in general. It’s different than we were told.”
“How so?”
“We were told that it was a wasteland out here, but it’s not. It’s beautiful, and it’s peaceful. We were also told that the people out here were savages.”
She frowned and he remembered that these people didn’t like that word. The Imperial Army used it too often to belittle and degrade the people of Volteria. They were tired of hearing it. “But if anything, the people out here are kinder than inside the walls. They’re less polite, but definitely kinder.”
“I’m sorry that we’re so rude to you,” she teased. “Would you like me to curtsey every time you enter a room?”
“Now that you mention it, that would certainly make me feel more at home.”
She slugged him in the arm playfully and doused it with soap and water. He thought about using a flame to dry it, but thought better of it. He was using his powers too frequently. It was a thing to be hidden.
“Well if you ask me,” she said playfulness fading, “the Imperial meatheads are the real savages. People outside the walls respect each other. It’s only when those soldiers come around that things get messy.”
She was absolutely right. Volteria had its bad eggs, but not nearly as many as he’d encountered in Altryon. Maybe it had something to do with packing people together in an enclosed space. People in Altryon were practically tripping over each other while citizens of Volteria were given ample room to keep their own space. If Neil wanted to, he could run off into the wilderness and not see another human for weeks. It really hadn’t taken him long to understand the need for revolution outside the walls. The Empire imposed exorbitant taxes and their soldiers never missed a chance to demonstrate excessive force. No one had ever shared with Neil what started the current rebellion. According to Rebecca, they’d been revolting since the walls had been built to keep them out of Altryon.
“What about the Vapros?” Neil pressed. “What do you hear about my family?”
She smiled. “The Vapros are liars?” she tried. She was trying to look nonchalant, but he could tell she was afraid to hear the answer.
“Sometimes,” he admitted quietly. “When we need to be.”
“The Vapros are ruthless womanizers.”
He stopped washing. “You know that’s not true,” he said lightly. “Look at Rhys. Rhys could never be a womanizer. He’s too shy.”
“What about you?” she asked.
“I wouldn’t say I’m ruthless,” he said carefully. “There’s been a fair share of girls, but only one that’s mattered.”
There was one dish left in the sink. They both reached for it, but she got there first. “Was it the girl who left the city with you?” Rebecca asked when the dish was clean. “Your girlfriend? Where’d she end up?”
“She’s not my girlfriend,” Neil said automatically. Then he glared at Rebecca. “Did you do that on purpose? Did you plan that last question?”
She didn’t meet his eye as she dried the dish and put it away. “What do you mean?”
“That last question. Was that something you asked so you could get me to talk about Bianca? Because I’ve refused to talk about her before, and I’m not about to start now.”
She met his eyes. “Never mind, then,” she said quickly. “Forget it.”
He leaned back against one of the counters and stared at the floor. “I don’t know where she is,” he said finally. “But I can only assume that she’s cutting through a soldier or burning something down.”
Chapter Seven
LT BLACKMORE’S CABIN
BIANCA BLACKMORE
Bianca knew exactly what was waiting for her in the deteriorating cabin. Word travelled surprisingly fast through Volteria and Bianca was famous for being able to track people down. She patted her torso to make sure her throwing knives were within reach and her leather breastplate was securely fastened. It was a useless precaution. What did she have to fear from a corpse? She entered the cabin without making a sound. Even the rustiest of hinges went silent at Bianca’s expert touch.
“Hel---” Bianca had a knife at the ready before the middle-aged man was even finished with his greeting. He raised an eyebrow at her. “You’re the one breaking and entering, Bianca.”
Bianca’s heart raced. The scene inside the cabin was a lot to take in. In the center was a table. Seated at that table were the middle-aged man and the body of a man with ivory colored hair. The living man was examining her politely, but he had his hand on the hilt of a rapier. The dead man was all too familiar. His eyes were closed, but his skin gave him away: it was grey and lacked the hue shared by living things. “Why are you here?” she asked.
“To pay respects to one of my oldest friends.” His voice had a deep richness. It was the voice of a much younger man.
Bianca stared. He wore a long dirty coat over thin leather armor and he had wavy auburn hair. Despite the fact that his head was without a single gray hair, his face was covered in a thin layer of grey stubble. Some of his features looked oddly familiar, and Bianca could feel old memories resurface. Who did he look like?
“How do you know my name?” she asked cautiously nearing the table. He looked trustworthy, but Bianca knew never to judge based on appearance.
“Well, when I found out my old friend Paul Blackmore had finally passed, I knew I had to come visit to say goodbye one last time. Funny thing is, I’ve been looking for you for weeks. So I didn’t see any harm in waiting a while with him to see if his daughter would show.” The man spoke carefully. “They call me The Wolf.”
Bianca’s jaw fell. The leader of the revolution? Bianca knew that if she tried to talk she would end up stuttering, so she opted for stunned silence instead. He grinned at her knowingly. His eyes shifted to her father’s body and his smile vanished. “Do you know how he went?”
“I could wager a guess,” she said cynically. The smell of alcohol was palpable in the must of the cabin. “He wasn’t a good father. And it’s been years. I just thought I might as well come see him one last time.”
The Wolf patted the dead man. “He and I have been on opposite sides of this thing for a while now.” Bianca realized he was referring to the war for Volteria’s independence. “I thought this would be a good last meeting for the two of us. Friends again. Sharing a drink.”
“He had a few too many before you got here, it seems.”
The Wolf chuckled. “Paul was always a few drinks ahead of everyone.”
The name sounded foreign to Bianca. She’d never heard anyone call her father by his first name. It was always Lieutenant Blackmore. She sheathed her throwing knife and sat at the table. He didn’t seem surprised. “How did you know him?”
The Wolf delicately turned the body’s head to show the tattoo on the back of his neck. IHS. “Your father and I were part of a very special club.”
“He’s had that since before I was born,” she said.
The Wolf unbuttoned the shirt underneath his leather breastplate and exposed an identical tattoo just below his collarbone. “I’ve had it since before you were born too. General Carlin’s got one too, on his forearm. It’s short for Imperial Hunting Squadron.”
They sat in silence. She couldn’t help but wonder if it was in remembrance of her father or if he simply couldn’t find the right words to say. She didn’t really want him to say
anything. She didn’t need to be comforted, she didn’t need words of wisdom, and she didn’t need a friend. She’d come to see the body. That was all. As always, Paul Blackmore wore his Imperial lieutenant badge and cape, but it was fastened over beige pajamas. Bianca stared at the badge for a moment before pulling it from his corpse. She unclipped it from the crimson cape and draped the cape over her father’s body. She pocketed the badge. The Wolf acknowledged this action with a nod of his head. “Why have you been looking for me?” she asked.
“Well, it started when I heard that you were looking for me.”
“I am. To join the revolution.”
“Then I heard whose daughter you were and your story, so I made it a point to meet you.”
“My story?” Bianca asked.
“You were with the Lightborns who escaped the city and made it through the wall, correct?”
“Without me, they wouldn’t have made it.” Bianca had told Neil when she learned of the secret back gate through which they had all escaped.
He leaned toward her urgently. “Did Lilly Celerius make it out?” he asked. “I know Jonathan died. I need to know. Is Lilly alive?”
Bianca didn’t flinch. “Are you an enemy of hers?” she asked fiercely.
He shook his head and rubbed his forehead, closing his eyes. “Hardly.” He wiped a smudge of dirt from his faded blue coat. Something about that coat stirred Bianca’s memory. “I’ve been trying to find her for months,” the Wolf said. He picked up his glass and drained it with three gulps. He met Bianca’s eyes, and for the first time she saw pain in his piercing stare. “I’m her uncle.”
Chapter Eight
HOME OF SEAN BEATON
THE PACK
The Marksman admired his rifle for a moment and then checked to make sure that all of his pistols were in working order. He set his sights on the village a few miles below the mountain on which he stood. He glared down at the entrance to his target’s home with his incredible sight and patiently waited. Sean Beaton was his target. And Sean Beaton was a former friend, a friend with a daily schedule. This made him an easy target, despite his extensive security detail.