by Joseph Lallo
“The first decent image I’ve seen applied to the front page of this otherwise detestable rag since they worked out how to print photographs. Evidence, of course, that if you want something done properly, you must do it yourself. Teaching Mr. Q to use a camera was a bit like training a dog to ice a cake, but the result is at least an image worthy of recording my exploits.”
“I might have expended my energies in pursuit of less frivolous details, but to each his own. Every eye that turns in your direction is one too busy to look for activities of mine, which are better left unseen. Your dramatic flair has pushed the story of the museum storehouse robbery to the second page. You have succeeded brilliantly in your misdirection.”
“As if there was any doubt I would do so. In all my exploits I have been bested only once, and it was by the Wind Breaker crew, figures as monstrous in the minds of the populace as to be titans shaking the very mountains with their steps. Any lesser foe is comparatively nothing to my towering intellect. Insects to be brushed aside like so much—”
Tusk raised his voice to interrupt. “Much as I enjoy your poetic assertions of your own greatness, we haven’t got the time to see them through to their end. I have some pressing engagements to see to. Your visibility in this caper was only one of the two requirements I had of you. Is it fair to assume you wouldn’t be here if you’d not had similar success in the second task?”
Alabaster, allowing himself a brief venomous glare at having his self-aggrandizing proclamation cut short, plucked a small folio from the ground beside his chair and presented it.
“Every image of any reasonable level of detail depicting the aforementioned Wind Breaker and its crew,” Alabaster said. “Why you would seek to accumulate such things is quite beyond me.”
“Yes, Alabaster, it is quite beyond you, which is why you are not privy to my motivation.” Tusk glanced at the satchel beside Alabaster’s chair. “As I recall, at the time of our last meeting you were awaiting a response from some of your operatives with regard to your prior mission.”
“Ah, yes. In this case I must report something less than total success. It is, of course, no fault of mine. Instead the blame lies upon the spy. I must assume his failure to arrive at the appointed time is indication that he has been captured or killed. For his sake I hope he has, because the Well Diggers would no doubt have delivered him to a swifter and kinder end than I will if he shows his face having failed me. There, of course, remains the outside chance that he shall arrive. A single meeting time remains for him to deliver his goods.”
“Am I to understand that your satchel is empty?”
“It is not! Because, in my brilliance and foresight, I saw fit to put not one but three operatives into play. Two of them infiltrated the Well Digger’s facility. Only one returned, of course. At your behest he was detained after dropping his purloined materials at the predetermined cache and sent back within The Thicket to meet his demise at the claws of the local fauna. And thus, your desired secrecy of The Thicket is maintained and I present you with this. Everything he was able to find relating in any way to the Wind Breaker and its crew.”
Alabaster presented the bag to Tusk. The simply dressed man accepted it and flipped through the contents. It was an odd assortment of materials. A small pile of poorly developed photographs seemed to be the centerpiece. There were swatches of cloth cut from the envelope of the Wind Breaker during repairs, as well as a small mound of bits of the ship’s hardware that had been thrown into the waste pile. Some of the items were connected only in the most tangential way to the ship. There were three bundles of letters that, based upon the addresses on the unopened envelopes, were merely slated to be delivered by the Wind Breaker crew.
Despite the evident lack of strategic or monetary value, Tusk worked his way through the items as though sifting for gold. He gave each new piece great care and consideration, leaving Alabaster to sit in increasingly agitated silence. Eventually the more flamboyantly appointed occupant of the room could hold his tongue no longer.
“As filled as I am with genuine gratitude at the opportunity to serve as the most valued general in this shadowy army you have no doubt assembled, and as much as I share a burning hatred for the Wind Breaker crew, I cannot conceive that you would expend my considerable talents for little more reward than an assortment of Wind Breaker ephemera. I understand the value of knowing one’s enemy, obviously, but a bag of scraps and scribbles is effectively useless. I must assume you have a deeper plan for these items, and I would be remiss if I did not request greater insight into that plan, such that I might more ably advise and administer it.”
Tusk glanced at him. “No.”
Alabaster’s flimsy mask of tolerance wavered. “No? That is all you have to say?”
“Yes.”
“May I at least know to what your unexplained refusal replies?”
“A great many things. No, you may not have insight into my plan. No, I do not require or desire your aid or input in its execution. No, these are not simply ephemera, nor are they effectively useless. No, you do not understand the value of knowing one’s enemy. No, I do not have a shadowy army. No, you are not my most valued general. And no, I do not believe your gratitude is genuine. I do, however, believe you when you say you cannot conceive that I would behave as I have.”
Among Tusk’s many supposed achievements over his life, perhaps the most impressive was this one. He had rendered Lucius P. Alabaster speechless. In the absence of a reply, Tusk continued.
“Utilizing you is a considerable risk, Alabaster. One that at the moment is barely exceeded by the potential reward of your services. I’ve gotten this far by knowing when to act, when not to act, and knowing precisely the tasks that a given operative can handle. I have more jobs for you, naturally. I intend to keep you busy. But if you believe that at any point prior to its completion I shall give you an indication of anything more than the general shape of my plan, you are illustrating the selfsame lack of judgment that precludes your access to said information.”
He carefully placed all the things Alabaster had secured inside the bag and set them beside his chair, then reached into a pocket in his vest to retrieve a slip of paper.
“Your next assignment,” Tusk said.
Alabaster took the paper, practically trembling with suppressed rage, and looked it over.
“Two… thousand pounds of Calderan sea salt?” he said. “I, Lucius P. Alabaster, mastermind of a scheme of potentially global infamy, am to fetch a ludicrous quantity of exotic seasoning?” He ended with his teeth clenched tightly enough they threatened to fracture.
“Yes,” Tusk said.
Alabaster’s knuckles cracked as he tightened his fist around the slip.
“… Of course, Tusk. Might I suggest, following the forgone conclusion of the successful completion of this absurd task, that we devote some level of planning and resources to securing the ichor well rather than simply infiltrating it for trophies?”
“No,” Tusk said.
Alabaster shook. “May I ask why you do not wish to control something that would grant you almost limitless wealth and power?”
“I already have quite enough wealth and power, Alabaster. Only failure can come from overreaching one’s requirements. And the schemes I have in place require that Ichor Well continues to operate. Its fall is inevitable. It can wait. And you certainly will not be a part of any future attacks upon the facility. Your attempts to end the world by utilizing the place were ill-advised enough to forbid you further access.”
“Forbid me further…” Alabaster blurted, but he paused long enough to wrestle his voice back down below a raving shout. “You… shall… have… your… salt…”
He paced to the back door, the one that would spare him both the publicity and humiliation of walking through the main floor of his former club. Before he could turn the knob, the door opened and a familiar, neatly dressed fellow entered with a tray of tea.
“Mallow?” Alabas
ter said, taken aback.
“Ah, hello, sir,” Mallow said, his weakly masked expression of unpleasant surprise making Alabaster’s acting ability seem world class.
“Where have you been? In your absence I have been forced to employ two thickheaded grunts, who while serving ably as the blunt instruments sometimes necessary to acquire the cooperation of those unaware of the threat innate to my own presence, are sorely lacking as personal valets.”
“I have been working for Mr. Tusk, sir,” Mallow said, setting down the tea.
“For Tusk? When precisely did I provide permission for you to leave my own employ?”
Tusk provided the answer. “When you were locked away and I sought him out personally. Time is a factor, Mr. Alabaster.” He sipped the tea. “On your way.”
“… Yes… Of course… You shall have your salt, no doubt a crucial element in an elaborate scheme and in no way a waste of my boundless intellect. Until our next meeting, Tusk.”
“Until then. And do yourself a favor, Alabaster. Right about now, unless I’ve misjudged you, that furtive mind of yours is endeavoring to plant the seeds of my own overthrow. If you wish to have anything resembling a long career, I would entreat you to set that plan aside. I have built a fair bit of my plan for the immediate future around your involvement. It would be terribly inconvenient to have to replace you at this stage, but contingencies are in place should I need to. Anyone can be replaced.”
“Yes, Tusk,” Alabaster said darkly. “Anyone can be replaced…”
Chapter 3
Elsewhere, Lucius P. Alabaster stumbled out of his personal airship as it tugged roughly at a dropped anchor. Unlike his prior ships, this one lacked the self-indulgent panache he typically preferred. Gone was the piercingly white ship with his name emblazoned on the side. Instead he traveled in a similarly sized vehicle painted dark violet. It blended into the dim mist of the fug brilliantly, such that when he traveled by night—effectively the only way he ever traveled since his escape from prison—it was nearly invisible. The one compromise to his design sensibility was the stitching of his name on the side of the envelope in a fabric of the same color but a different texture. It was nearly impossible to see, but it satisfied his urge to advertise his greatness.
“Mr. P,” he barked, straightening his outfit and tucking a newspaper under one arm. “Mr. Mallow, my valet prior to his loathsome abandonment of my service for the sake of our now mutual employer, was at best a mediocre pilot. He would be pleased to discover that, by comparison to you, he has risen in my assessment to nothing short of flawless. Next time you come in for a landing, you might find it a refreshing change of pace to slow the ship before dropping its anchor.”
He took a breath, then glanced at where the anchor had landed. “And why in the fug’s name did you approach an estate surrounded on all sides by acres of barren ground and choose to drop anchor on the cobblestone courtyard?” Alabaster raved, eyeing the damage done to the paving stones. “Until this moment I thought the fools among us resided in squalor because they were not intelligent enough to amass the wealth to escape it. Now I realize that idiots actually create squalor!”
He threw his hands up. “How am I expected to succeed when there does not seem to exist a worthwhile employee anywhere in our mist-shrouded society?”
Mr. P and Mr. Q, paying about as much mind to the constant verbal abuse as a cow pays to the flies buzzing at its ears, simply climbed from the ship.
“No, no. You great idiots. I have plotting to do, and the enormity of your idiocy is such that I can feel you clouding my own brilliant thoughts by your mere proximity. Go, you troglodytic ignrorami! Find yourselves some watering hole to soak your pea brains in spirits and don’t return until the morning! Perhaps while you are rendering yourselves besotted I can have a moment’s peace to think.”
The pair turned and boarded again. Alabaster watched them embark, wincing angrily as their departure dragged a long furrow along the courtyard before the anchor finally pulled free.
“It is a wonder they have the wisdom between the two of them to remember to exhale,” he muttered.
He paced up the walk of a mildly decrepit manor. At one time, prior to the calamity, it must have been a sight to behold. Two stories tall, surrounded by gardens, wrapped with a stone wall, and large enough to rival the city hall in Fugtown. It was no doubt the home to a wealthy landowner, but that had been long ago. Now it was just another of the countless abandoned, decaying buildings that dotted the landscape outside the handful of established cities and towns within the fug. This one had held up better than most, but some degradation was unavoidable. What plants had not been reduced to dry husks had been twisted by the fug into jagged purple shadows of their former selves. The roof of the west wing of the house had slumped in on itself, and there was not a single intact glass window. A glimpse of this place now was enough to conjure ghost stories to mind.
Alabaster yanked the door open and stalked inside. To his credit, or more likely to the credit of Misters P and Q under his direction, the interior was much tidier and more livable. He hung his cape on a rack by the door, set his cane in an umbrella stand, and stalked angrily through the entry hall toward the den.
“Tusk… Mallow… Ebonwhite… the Wind Breaker. Why must great men always be confounded and besieged on all sides by fiends and betrayers?”
He entered the den, a musty room with tall ceilings and a few shelves of moldering books. There he lit an oil lamp and flopped into a high-backed chair, sending a cloud of dust into the air. He waved it off with the newspaper, then set it down and pulled the stopper from a bottle of brandy on the side table.
“More agonizing than their unified effort to drag me down is the detestable truth that, for now, I am beholden to that relic of a bygone era. Until I am able to get my feet more firmly beneath me, there is nothing to be done but obey his misguided whims.” He swirled the brandy and took a sip. “Two thousand pounds of salt. It smacks of busy work, of something to keep me out of his hair, to hold back my ambition. The most obvious means to acquire so vast a quantity of that pointless yet valuable substance would be a months- or weeks-long campaign of thefts from wealthy boutiques and storehouses all throughout the fug. I could spend the better part of a year finding shipments of it, planning heists, et cetera… Yes… He wants me to either fail or tie myself up with such things.”
He took another sip and allowed the facts to stew.
“It is a complex matter. It is a tremendous waste of my intellect to solve this riddle of a caper, but at the same time a lesser intellect could not solve it at all. And it affords me a plausible reason to go virtually anywhere without raising the suspicion of Tusk.” He set down his glass and drummed his fingers together. “And who, of course, is the source of all the Calderan salt that has been delivered in recent memory? The Wind Breaker… Yes… Yes the pieces are coming together. In his hubris, Tusk has given me the means to set in motion a scheme that could just ensnare my two greatest adversaries.”
Alabaster stood and snatched his brandy, pacing in slow circles as he continued to think aloud.
“Under the guise of reconnaissance on this ridiculous errand I shall gather information about whatever scheme Tusk believes he can keep secret from me. This, for instance.” He jabbed a finger at the page. “He knew my exploits would supplant this story. Though he plainly has no issue wasting my valuable time and effort, I doubt he would waste his own. … Something stolen from the antiquities collection in a museum to the south. No doubt another caper by another lackey of his… but why… I shall need to investigate. And I shall furthermore need to gather information about the comings and goings of the Wind Breaker. They are profligate traders. Where they have been, they shall return, and always with more wares with which to part the locals from their hard-earned coins. A trap can be set…”
He turned. “But a trap for Tusk? No, that simply won’t do. Tusk has had success in the past, never against one as intelligent and inspi
red as I, or as dastardly and ingenious as the Wind Breaker crew, but certainly victories against the equivalents of his era. If I set about this and my schemes do not bear fruit for a time, he will grow suspicious no matter how carefully I work. The schedule will be crucial. Regular deliveries of his precious salt. So I shall require a sizable quantity of it to be meted out over time to allay suspicion.
“Tusk strikes me as the sort willing to stretch his schemes out across months, years, even decades before seeing them come to fruition. But we must plan for the potentiality that the timetable for this particular scheme is shorter. Speed is thus of the essence… And speed is best attained through parallel tasks.”
He drained his glass and set it down. “So the question is, what single target can earn me a quantity of Calderan salt, information about the Wind Breaker, and potential insight into Tusk’s plans? I could attempt to rob Tusk himself, right under his nose… No, at this stage I do not have the proper resources. Where then…”
Alabaster fetched his cane from the entry hall and paced into a disused, dust-caked room. He jabbed the tip of the cane into the dust and traced out a C on the ground.
“Caldera. Source of the salt. I cannot go there without fear of being blasted from the sky by their defenses. However…” He traced a W a few inches away. “The Wind Breaker, through their own nefarious means, makes trips there and back with impunity. If the rumors are to be believed, for some months now their ship’s visits have been sanctioned by those frivolous artists. They deliver it to Westrim, for the most part. And I must deliver it to Tusk. In the fug.”
He drew a T, then slashed a line separating them to represent the fug.
“Salt still finds its way into the fug, despite the fact that the Wind Breaker has not had cause to do business directly with the fug folk since the Calderan joined the crew. Most of the salt passes through Fugtown, under the control of Ebonwhite…”