by Martha Carr
Shyhand71: Sounds like fun. Hey, has anybody put together a magicals-only list of where people are? You know, like for networking or something?
The minute she posted it, she let out a grunt of disgust. I sound like such a noob.
The other users on the Borderlands forum were just as quick to jump to the same conclusion.
holdmyGrog911: @Shyhand71 You trying to get us all together in one spot so we can hold hands and make a big-ass target for the F-force? Looks like somebody’s trip Earthside fried all their brain cells.
2Magic2Quit: @Shyhand71 I call narc right here.
Fists4Daze: @Shyhand71 We went through the Reservations, dumbass. Why would we want more eyes on us when they already have us in the goddamn system? What the hell’s wrong with you?
CrownUndone21: Okay, everybody throwing their insecurities at a new commenter (and I’m pretty sure @Shyhand71’s new around here) needs to back the hell up and calm down. It was an innocent question. I’m pretty sure there are running lists somewhere. Maybe not by area where people live now, but I think I saw something maybe a year ago that had groups by trade, either back home or Earthside. Can’t remember. @Shyhand71, I’ll take a look around and hit you up here if I find anything.
CantCuffThis: I second everything @CrownUndone21 just said to all the haters. By the Crown, y’all hopped on this comment quickly. I thought we came Earthside to avoid the bloodshed, not to sit behind computer screens and try to draw more of it. @Shyhand71’s right to ask, especially if they’re new. Not everyone who made the crossing logs onto the fucking dark web to come watch you assholes make a circus of the Borderlands. Lay off.
Fists4Daze: @CrownUndone21 @CantCuffThis You trying to be peacekeepers now? I sure as shit could’ve used some backup two months ago when my shop got raided. Oh, yeah. That’s right. Everyone’s a damn hero when all they have to do is sit down at a keyboard and play around.
“Woah.” Cheyenne lifted her hands from her keyboard and watched the comments roll in one right after the other. “Hit a sore spot, huh?”
With a shrug, she leaned back over the keys and left one more comment. Otherwise, she really would look like just another troll trying to stir up shit where it wasn’t needed.
Shyhand71: @CrownUndone21 @CantCuffThis Thanks. I’ll keep looking. Feel free to DM me if you find something that might help. We can leave the peanut gallery out of it.
CantCuffThis: @Shyhand71 Yeah, just ignore those guys. They’re probably still shaking off the smell of whatever rez they just got themselves booted out of. You brought up a good point. It’s good to keep an eye open for ways we can help each other.
Nodding, Cheyenne clicked out of that particular topic thread, not wanting to waste her time reading through whatever other angry comments anyone else left her. She ran a search on the forum for anything about Jackson Ward, but before she could sort through the results, a private chat box popped up in the top corner of her monitor.
She’d expected something else from gu@rdi@n104, who she now knew was the Nightstalker Corian, mainly because the guy always seemed to be on the Borderlands forum when she was and generally hit her with a message. But this new chat box had come directly from the user handle CrownDown4What.
“Who the heck is that?” The halfling hadn’t seen the handle before on any of the open topics or in comment threads, though of course, she hadn’t been through all of them. The message, though, was even more confusing.
CrownDown4What: Just saw your comment about lists of people in certain areas. I might be able to help if you tell me why you’re looking.
“Huh.” Cheyenne cocked her head, frowned, then scooted a little closer to the desk and started typing again.
Shyhand71: Just thought it might be helpful. I’m sure other people would appreciate knowing what kind of neighborhood they’re stepping into. Where to find friends. Who to stay away from.
CrownDown4What: Well, you’re definitely not the first to come up with the idea. You stepping into a new neighborhood or something?
Shyhand71: Kind of. I just want to make sure I’m not about to put all my eggs in one basket before somebody steps on it.
CrownDown4What: I hear ya. What neighborhood?
Shyhand71: Jackson Ward. North side, mostly.
Her new friend took over a minute to reply. Cheyenne managed to sit patiently through the wait, hoping whoever it was had enough balls to tell her to scram if they didn’t want to dig any deeper into this with her. Then a new message popped up at the bottom of the chat.
CrownDown4What: Maybe this’ll help. It’s a section of a longer list I have access to, and that’s just one list of a lot more. If you have any other questions, I’m here.
Cheyenne rolled her eyes. Why can’t people just put it in the chat instead of making me do all the work?
She fired up the Bunker again because she had no idea who this CrownDown4What was and was too smart not to cover her bases. A link was a link, sure, but on the dark web, it could literally be anything else, too.
Once her custom program had fully opened, she clicked on the link and downloaded CrownDown4What’s little present through a bit torrent and right in. Five seconds later, the new file had been tested and scrubbed of nothing; it was as clean as the file gu@rdi@n104 had sent her on Durg, and it was just as small.
A list of names and races identified by “class” took up three-quarters of a page. Some of them had addresses, and several had professions listed after that. There were apparently only twenty or so other magicals listed in Jackson Ward altogether, not just the north side. She scanned the list again and clicked back into the chat.
Shyhand71: Definitely helpful. How long ago was this list updated?
CrownDown4What: About twenty seconds ago. My system’s pretty thorough.
Shyhand71: Nice. Any tips for how a noob can get access to a system like that?
CrownDown4What: You don’t have to pretend like you don’t know what you’re doing. The way you’ve been answering my questions proves enough. Wish I could help with more than sending over a list now and then. Built the system myself, though. Not looking to bring in partners.
“No kidding.” The halfling couldn’t help being a little impressed by that, if CrownDown4What was telling the truth. Looks like I’m not the only one who knows their way around serious coding.
Shyhand71: Makes sense. I appreciate the file anyway.
CrownDown4What: No worries. Let me know if you’re stepping into any other neighborhoods and want the same kind of info. You’ll eventually get the hang of working this stuff out on your own. When you’ve been Earthside as long as I have, you get real good at keeping a bird’s-eye view.
Shyhand71: Just for fun, how long have you been here?
CrownDown4What: Longer than the Accord. Not safe to say much more than that.
Shyhand71: Right. I’ll keep in touch.
CrownDown4What: Sounds good.
Cheyenne sat back in her office chair and read over their conversation one more time. Longer than the Accord, huh? So, before I was born, and before the FRoE started making their own lists. Who is this guy?
It made her curious, but it wasn’t the most important thing right now. She had the information she wanted about Durg’s neighborhood, and she had some time to kill, thanks to her new friend from the Borderlands forum. And no stupid scavenger hunts first. I like this guy.
It took her another fifteen minutes to cross-reference the addresses on that list with the area of Jackson Ward where Durg lived. There were other orcs living in the area, and all of them were at least four blocks away from her new target’s house. Those with listed jobs mostly worked on the other side of Richmond. If she wanted to make certain most of them were out of the way, she would wait until tomorrow, skip class, and go for the bastard in the middle of the day.
Cheyenne rubbed her forehead and glanced at her backpack on the floor by the kitchen counter’s half-wall. Can’t keep skipping. And most people are home on a Sunday night anyway.
Especially the orc she was bent on paying back for what he’d done to Ember.
Chapter Seven
No matter how badly she was itching to head to Durg’s place—which would have only taken her about twenty-five minutes to walk and maybe two minutes to run at full drow speed—Cheyenne did the smart thing and waited it out. She glanced at the clock on her computer—5:47 p.m. “Might as well warm up.”
She shut off the monitor and powered Glen down all the way before stepping into the tiny space between her desk and her kitchen. After a second’s thought, she let the heat of her drow magic flare at the base of her spine and wash over her. Then she conjured up the purple sparks shooting off the tips of her fingers and stared at them. How about something I haven’t mastered yet?
The sparks went out, and she closed her eyes to take herself back to her final “test” with Rhynehart the day before. Black fire on my skin. How the hell does that work?
The halfling tried to bring up the protective rage she’d felt fighting Rhynehart’s mountain of an ogre operative. Jamal’s face pulled up quickly in her memory—his sneer, the mottled gray flesh covering his lumpy head, the way he’d dropped to one knee in the middle of their fight and given up.
‘Cause it was a lie.
She clenched her fists and opened her eyes, hoping to see the black flames flickering across her black shirt and the purple-gray skin of her forearms showing beneath her three-quarter-length sleeves. Nothing.
One and done, then. What about the shield?
The chains on her wrists clinked when she shook out her hands, then she shot out her arm and threw her hand toward the window at the far end of her tiny living room. “Takes more than intention, huh?”
With a sigh, Cheyenne focused harder on what a shield was supposed to be—protection and a last-minute defense. She sucked in a breath and spun, raising both hands toward the closet just inside the front door. The doorknob might have rattled a little, but that was it.
Then a muted golden glow sputtered inside her backpack on the floor, and the halfling pointed at it. “Uh-uh. I’m not dealing with that tonight.”
There was a knock on her front door, and she started. The knock was repeated. “Yeah, I’m coming. Hold on.”
When she passed her backpack, she wanted to send a swift kick into the thing to get the copper puzzle box to quit flashing light. Nobody else needs to see that. But her laptop was in there too, so she just gave the thing a less-than-gentle nudge with the side of her foot and smirked when the golden light winked out.
Then she slipped out of her drow form and slowly opened the door. It didn’t surprise her all that much to find one of her troll neighbors on the other side of it.
“Cheyenne.” R’mahr grinned at her, his deep-scarlet eyes lighting up because she’d answered. “I hope this is a good time. Yadje’s almost finished with the cooking, and we would love to invite you into our home now to join us.”
“Right now?”
The troll cocked his head, his grin fading into a confused smile. “Yes. It’s Sunday. I mentioned this the other day. And you…well, I thought…”
I never said no.
Cheyenne nodded and shot him as much of a reassuring smile as she could manage. “Uh, yeah. Okay. You guys already started cooking and everything?”
R’mahr nodded vigorously. “As close to the food back home as we could get. I don’t know how Yadje does it with what little we can find at the bazaar, but she makes it work. You’ll be very happy with it.”
“Yeah, I bet.”
They stood there awkwardly on either side of her door, then R’mahr’s gaze drifted to her right toward the basket of all that brightly colored underwear they’d made her. “You still have our gift…”
“Yep.” Cheyenne followed his gaze and had to keep herself from laughing. “I can’t get rid of a present like that, can I?”
The troll’s grin returned with full force, and he let out a satisfied little chuckle. “Yadje will be so glad to hear you’ve found a use for them—”
“Okay, let’s head on over to your place, huh?” Not wanting to be rude, the halfling opened the door all the way before slipping into her black Vans that were tossed against the closet, then she hurried quickly out of her apartment and shut the door. “After you.”
“Yes. Well, it’s not very far.” The troll shot her an amused glance and chuckled again, shaking his head at the worn, stained carpet lining the hallway of the second floor. “I told Yadje you would be very pleased to walk inside and have this meal already prepared. She wasn’t convinced you were coming, you know.”
“Good thing I cleared my schedule, then.” Yadje had a better grip on how to make plans. Still plenty of time before dark.
The troll’s head bobbed up and down, his long scarlet hair bouncing against his back. They passed the two other apartments between them, and he stopped at his front door to shoot the drow halfling another wide grin full of clean but crooked teeth. “We’re honored to have you here with us.”
“No problem. I’m, uh, honored to be invited.” Can’t break the guy’s heart over this.
R’mahr sucked in a sharp breath, his eyes growing even wider as he whispered, “Thank you.”
Then he opened the door and gestured for her to step inside first.
A thick wave of pungent spices almost knocked her over when Cheyenne stepped into the troll family’s home. The air was filled with the sizzle of something frying on the stove beside a thick something else boiling in a huge pot.
R’mahr ushered her in even farther and closed the door. He clapped his hands and almost scampered toward the kitchen. “Our guest is here, Yadje. She’s here. How much longer for the meal?”
“You can’t hurry perfection,” Yadje snapped from the kitchen, completely hidden by the wall jutting out from the entryway. “I’ll finish it when I finish it, and you’ll just have to keep your greedy little hands out—” A sharp smack was followed by R’mahr’s exclamation of surprise and his wife laughing. Then Yadje poked her head around the corner and settled her scarlet gaze on the halfling standing just inside the door. “Make yourself at home, phér móre. We won’t be much longer.”
“Sure.” The halfling nodded, but the woman’s head had already disappeared back into the kitchen. Raising her eyebrows, Cheyenne took in the family’s living room, which looked more or less like it had the first time she’d stepped inside under much more urgent circumstances.
R’mahr and his family had made quick work of patching up the place. The planter hanging from the ceiling had been put back together with an insane amount of duct tape coating the bottom, the plant returned to its place after having been blasted by drow magic. The leaves drooped sadly over the mended plastic sides of the planter. More duct tape had been applied liberally to the broken leg of the armchair, as well as added for extra hold around two different pieces of thin plywood already nailed to the walls. Cheyenne still felt a little draft from the covered hole in the wall beside the door. If they’re happy with it, guess it works.
“Hi.”
The halfling glanced quickly across the room and found Bryl sitting on the floor in front of the sunken couch, an open book laid across her lap. “Hey. Your parents really went all out with the duct tape, huh?”
The young troll glanced around the room and sighed. “It’s one of their favorite new things on this side.”
“Yeah, well, it’s good for a lot of things. Glad they figured that out, at least.” Holding back a laugh, Cheyenne moved across the living room and stopped beside the girl, dipping her head to take a look at the book. “What’re you reading?”
Bryl shrugged. “Harry Potter.”
“Oh, yeah,” the halfling said as she wrinkled her nose and let out a little chuckle. “It’s a good story.”
“But they didn’t get any of the magic parts right.”
Cheyenne laughed and covered it with a hand, rubbing her mouth. “Well, it’s made up. Kinda fun to think about things in a different way.�
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“I guess…”
“Bryl, put that thing away and come help me set the table.” Yadje waved her daughter into the kitchen. With a small, knowing smile, the kid looked up at Cheyenne and tossed her book aside before going to help her parents.
Turning toward the kitchen, Cheyenne spread her arms and figured she might as well be a part of this while she was here. “I can help too.”
“Oh, no.” Yadje shook her head and pulled her daughter into the kitchen.
“Absolutely not.” R’mahr rounded the corner, waving his hands furiously like he was trying to flag somebody down on the highway. “No. The phér móre won’t lift a finger in our home.”
“You can just call me Cheyenne. Really.”
“The phér móre Cheyenne was not invited here to help. You’ve done that and more already.” R’mahr hurried toward her and settled his hands on her shoulders before steering her toward the wooden table with legs so thin, it didn’t look like it would be able to hold much of anything. He pulled out a chair and pointed. “You will sit right here.”
She didn’t try to fight him on that one and slowly lowered herself into the chair. It creaked and wobbled a little under her weight, and the halfling forced herself not to take up her usual position and lean all the way back with her feet stretched out in front of her under the table. I already broke too much of their stuff.
“We’ll take care of everything else.” R’mahr gave her a firm nod and hurried back into the kitchen.
A moment later, his wife stepped out into their makeshift dining room with a huge clay bowl piled high with something which looked like rice and noodles scrambled together, steam wafting off the top. She grinned and set the bowl in the center of the table, then disappeared again. Bryl brought out the next plate of what was maybe pita bread, only with purple streaks running down the sides of the still-warm pastry. The bowl R’mahr brought out next had vegetables Cheyenne recognized—bok choy and carrots and broccoli piled around something blue that couldn’t have possibly been grown in this world. The dishes seemed never-ending as the troll family brought out one after another. The halfling rubbed the side of her face and gave up on trying to give each of them a genuine smile when they came toward her from the kitchen.