Eye of the Equifade

by J A Stone

  British gave her the kill on Thaddeus, almost died on that mission. Things had changed for Jaime, the Assassin known as Soulless. In years past, her one focal point was always staying next to Shadoweye no matter what. Now her loyalties were to British Fey, and she had just failed her horribly.

  Her last memory was of the beast wrapping its legs around her waist and squeezing like a vise, arms tightening on her chest, gripping harder with each breath expelled until she could no longer bring in air. Sixty seconds of intense, violent struggle against the creature wrapped around her and Jaime Weathers relaxed, filling her mind with images of her family, the Dead, Shadoweye, Warfell and beautiful British Fey…

  Robert John Stone was growing impatient. The desk attendant was being very helpful, but it was taking too long to unlock each door and look inside. Most of the rooms were occupied with startled guests. Bigfoot thought carefully for a second.

  “Do you have a list of the empty rooms? I think a bad guy would want to keep things low,” he asked the clerk.

  “Debbi,” she said with a smile, “and yes!”

  “Take me to those doors first please—you are being very nice Debbi.”

  She blushed, she blushed! Bigfoot’s heart leaped in his chest.

  “Most of the tenth floor is empty, let’s try there first,” she leaned her head sideways to Rob, silently asking.

  “Oh! Um Robert, Robert John Stone, but my friends call me Bigfoot Bob,” he smiled like a dumbass and they hurried to the stairwell together.

  “What are Warfell and Fey doing right now?” Alorica wondered aloud as she neared the eastside of town, clip clopping the Black Racer at an easy walk. She no sooner spoke, when the blond-haired beauty heard hooves pounding the street behind her. She rotated in the saddle and raised her eyebrows high to the sight of Danica and British thundering in on the Appaloosa and the Snowhorse. “I guess they’d be doing that!” she answered herself, jabbing heels to ribs, vaulting herself forward to match gaits.

  “It’s the grey-haired bitch!” Warfell exclaimed as they rode. It made sense—Alorica connected the points quickly and then grew angry with herself.

  “I should’ve seen that boss, I am really sorry,” she rode with her head down in shame. A half block ahead, they saw Danton and Tom Snow at full gallop. Warfell whistled and the boys shot back serious looks.

  “The House Maid!” Snowman shouted and British smiled—good boys. Where were Jaime and Rob?

  “Leave now Missus Debbi, run and don’t look back,” Bigfoot cautiously pushed the door open the rest of the way and panned his eyes to each corner of the room.

  He approached the bed and saw the tattoos on the shrunken, wrinkled face, it was Jaime all right, she had become like a little Sister to Robert, she was family.

  “Oh honey, not you, please not you,” Bigfoot fell to his knees and clenched the soft sheets with his thick, scarred fingers, setting his face to the mattress and screaming, howling with all of his might. “NO! NO! NOOOOO!”

  He raised his head high and wailed like tempest thunder into the room.

  A curtain moved and Rob jerked his head towards the closed window. He saw the dark shape hiding behind the drapes and rose to a stand, pointing with a shaking finger.

  “YOU! I’m going to RIP YOUR HEAD OFF!”

  She lunged for the door and Bigfoot blocked the way. She held a palm up and spoke in the strange dialect.

  “They took meh home, killed meh young.”

  “She was just a kid,” he looked to the bed and the Arenth bolted right past him. “Dammit!” Rob picked a large dresser up and threw the furniture at the woman, barely missing her, crashing into and through the wall. She ran for her life as Rob thrust the debris aside and gave chase, an unrelenting behemoth of rage and muscle, bashing his fists to the walls and screaming bloody murder.

  Below in the lobby, Warfell, Fey, Danton, Alorica and Tom heard the crashes and the howling bass pipes of their giant friend ten flights above.

  “Found Bigfoot boss,” Warfell studied the rafters as dust cascaded down

  “He figured it out before we did,” British added, “c’mon!” They ran for the stairs.

  The Vanguard had four stairwells on each corner of the tall rectangular tower, with a central spiral in the middle. The team split up, Warfell, Alorica, Tom, and Danton on each corner, with British threading the needle.

  Snowman and Danton held riot shotguns with extended clips and perforated barrel-shells for quick cool down after rapid firings. Warfell held the Chesterborne repeater in one hand and a dagger in the other. Alorica held a long barreled pistol in each hand. British had the Coralo Machete and Westbury Scimitar in the open air as she ascended the steps two and three at a time. Everyone knew how fast the woman was, no one was taking chances.

  They moved upwards towards the roars and crashes of Bigfoot Bob ripping his path after the target—destroying the tenth floor.

  And on that tenth floor, Robert was ten paces behind the half-naked raven haired woman. She was fast but she was also scared to death. It’s the sheer fright that often gets little critters in the wild when they run from the wolf and hesitate for brief seconds, unable to think, petrified with fear.

  “BE STILL!” he lunged and she cut to the right like a rabbit. Bigfoot struck the wall with his arms to change his momentum towards her, pounding his legs like a bull.

  Few people understand how huge lumbering weight lifters can jump so high. A dead-lift athlete can bound upwards his own height—truth. This is what Bigfoot did as he came within five paces of the black rabbit, pumping the floor and catapulting himself the distance, clipping an arm and losing his grip, then slinging that arm to the side as a last ditch, the skin! It was dry but smooth—slick!

  It worked, though Rob struck the floor hard. Smacking her arm spun the woman out of control, flinging her into the wall.

  Both leaped to a stand, Giant and Arenth two paces apart, eyes calculating one another’s stances, watching each other’s hands—waiting for the first one to flinch.

  Bigfoot made another critical decision, to release the beast inside of him. This was not a human being before him, it was a creature who just killed Soulless. He allowed the anger to swell in his eyes until they were bulging with raw fury, he took his breaths slow and deep, drawing the rage from deep within.

  Then he saw it, the change in her dark red irises and there it was, fear in its purest state. She buckled and cowered like a beaten puppy. He had her—just needed to get his meat hooks on that slippery neck…

  “Bobby!” Tom shouted from behind and somehow, the rabbit found her wit, bolting like lightning through Robert’s grip, down the hall, straight for the Snowman.

  He fired the shotgun, damn the odds! She jerked—he missed as she leaped for the wall, striking it with a bare foot, sending her airborne over Tom’s Shoulder with two fast jabs to his solar plexus, thrusting him to the floor in shock.

  No hesitation, Bigfoot charged after her, tagging Snowman’s extended hand as he flew by. Tom stared to the ceiling, gasping for air, pointing to the target with a feeble finger.

  Not far away, Danica Warfell entered the room and saw what was left of Soulless, the impetuous kid.

  “Quell the fire in your heart and rest,” Danica flushed with anger, no time for tears. She took a deep breath, backed out and ran down the hall, following the damage on the walls, a clear path of mayhem straight for the target.

  “BIGFOOT STOP!” British held a palm up and the Giant slid to a halt. The Arenthian was between the two—ten paces on either side with nowhere to run. The Daughter of Caelum Fey sheathed her weapons and spoke calmly.

  “Do you know who I am?”

  “Nope, but you know meh?”

  “Yes I do, Arenthian.”

  “Then ya know meh Mum’s gonna find ya.”

  British did not know about a Mother—never occurred to her there could be more of them or that a hibernating creature would have no idea who the Aequitas Caelum was, Damn! She was being s
loppy on this case.

  “She will die if she leaves the city and enters our lands,” Fey was winging it, remembering the text referring to the Sunken City of Arenthia, lost somewhere in the western desertlands.

  The night crawler laughed, relaxing, calculating. She looked back and forth from pixie to giant, deciding which would be easier. Her choice was British, when she saw Warfell and Tom Snow creeping in twenty paces behind the big man.

  The Renth took off, dodging left, right, back-left with a spin—she vaulted past British, the tip of the Scimitar slicing a sizeable lock of the black hair free, the flared tip of the Blunderbuss flaming and striking the wall.

  “She’s slick boss!” Bigfoot said as he and the tiny woman ran side by side, just behind the target who found the right doors and leaped through to the stairwell.

  They hit the stairs and looked over the rail to see the black-haired creature plummeting down the center, landing on deck and running away.

  “No Ma’am, not today. Boss, forgive me please, but…” Bigfoot scooped British up with one massive arm and a squeak from Fey. He ran back to the hall, passing Warfell and Tom, now sprinting with everything he had for the window at the end of the corridor, striking the floor like an insane, half-ton mountain goat.

  “Bigfoot? Uh, sweetie?” British asked, ten paces away.

  “I love you boss,” Robert replied, three paces. He leaped, spinning mid-air, thrusting his massive back through the glass, clutching British like a baby against his wide chest in the freefall…ten flights, nearly two hundred feet, a mere three seconds.

  Bigfoot saw the target below and threw his child-size boss like a sack of flour, straight for the creature’s shoulders.

  “UGGHHH!” she landed hard, driving the Westbury in all the way to the hilt, releasing the pommel, rolling away, leaving the cruel blade impaled through the ribs of an astonished adversary.

  British leaped to her feet like a cat and closed the distance on the downed target, shoving the Blunderbuss under the neck firm and bringing her face to the beast’s.

  Nearby, Rob rose to a raw adrenaline stand, clutching a broken arm close to his side, dragging a fractured leg the width of a white oak. He hobbled close and growled at the woman with black hair and eyes, clenching his one good fist until the knuckles were white.

  British Fey spoke to her captive with a cold voice of utter disgust, her fingers firmly wrapping around the pommel of the Scimitar.

  “By the authority of the Governor of Moor and the Justice from Heaven, the Aequitas Caelum, you are under arrest. Get the fuck up—you’re coming with us.”

  “Say what?” Bigfoot whispered.

  *

  The Girl who Loved Horses

  I LOVE HORSES—no, stop it—listen to me—I really love horses. They speak to me, not with words, they tell me how they feel, and they listen to me when I need them most.

  Horses are living Angels—Souls climbing a ladder of ascension. They are one-step away from human, one breath away from losing that wonderful innocence forever.

  They are creatures of love who possess great power within, amazing minds, they view our world with an awareness and clarity we cannot comprehend—they see right through our words to our true emotions, and yet they are so loyal to us, drawn to us because our Spirits are so much alike.

  So what do we do to these fantastic creatures? We strap a fifty-pound saddle cinched tight about the waist, plop a two-hundred pound warrior with another fifty pounds of armor and forty pounds of weaponry on top, jab metal spikes in the ribs, yank a rope around the teeth and ride them, sometimes until they die. Stop it, stop it—listen to me.

  I’ll slit your goddamn throat if you even think that’s funny—you need to check yourself bitch.

  Back up, Stop it, listen to me, a few things first.

  I can always be found at the stables, it’s my life and I’ve worked dozens of them from Oceanport to Moor to Whitefalls, to this remote desert outpost. Good thing about stables is nobody cares who shovels the shit. It boggles my mind that they never thought to look for me there, or here for that matter, but then, I don’t think anyone is really looking for me. Nobody cares about orphans—nobody. Even the people who run orphanages do it for the money, or because they feel they have to, STOP IT! Listen to me.

  I am only seventeen, but I’ve lived a hundred or so lifetimes now. I brag, it’s actually twenty-two, maybe three, (I have no idea if the fat man in Tibor Proper made it or not, I had to scoot quick).

  I’m just gonna say it up front, when people mistreat horses, I mistreat them. I live their lifetime for them, they don’t need it anymore when I’m done. Stop it—listen to me.

  I drift, work hard, and connect to horses all over the Moon. I have no money, never needed it. Food usually comes with the job and I always sleep in the straw—would not have it any other way.

  I rarely ride but when I do, I have been told I have a magic with them. I can calm the most savage warhorses, slip effortlessly on to the backs of emotionally enraged Broncos and canter them like show horses. When trail bosses and owners start asking me to train racers, break wild ponies or other things like that, I leave, usually that night. I’ll walk among my friends and see which one wants to carry me far away and we find another town, another village, another city.

  I’m out here because of the Sand Pony who brought me here, it’s where he wanted to go, so here we are. His first human named him Dare, which he definitely likes so we kept it. Dare trampled his Master in his sleep. Seems his name was the only thing Dare liked about that asshole.

  I may have suggested that I was afraid of the man—that he was gonna hurt me if he wasn’t stopped somehow. My friends always look out for me.

  Stop it—listen to me, your eyes are crashing my peace. I’m only telling you this because of who you are. I know how many ponies and horses you’ve taken to their deaths—numbering them like it’s funny, who does that? I had your food poisoned less than sixty seconds after recognizing you in the galley, you understand, stop it.

  You know what you have done—you know you got it coming.

  Hey, sorry, two of your friends are here. They’re out back right now drinking, resting up for the trek on the sands. They are not going the find Arenthia this way, or you for that matter, as I said, no one cares who shovels the shit around here, welcome to my world. Stop it—listen to me.

  I like the Appaloosa and his white haired rider, those two are bonded, they share the love. The Black Racer was just purchased—she does not know his rider at all—spooked by all of the face tattoos. That’s my way in.

  They have a Snowhorse in tow, yours? What number is he? You are one sick little bitch.

  All three of those beautiful creatures will die on the dunes if they don’t get a smarter human and better gear. I can’t let that happen, so you sit tight and think about what you’ve done little missy. Dare and I will be back in a couple of days.

  Aren’t you worth more than a search party of just two? Stop it—listen to me.

  The Snowhorse has already alerted to your scent several times, so I have your feet soaking in a eucalyptus-menthol gel with pine camphor; that’s the strange taste in your mouth—it soaks through the skin and makes you sweat menthol.

  Your stable harness is used by cattlemen to make veal from calves. The steel is adjustable, and completely encases the beast so it cannot move a single muscle for months, makes the meat very tender. They had one out back, so I put it to good use, you understand.

  You cannot talk because of the needle in the back of your neck that inhibits the vocal chords completely. It’s used for branding—we’ll get to that fun when I return.

  This is important, stop it—listen to me, when horses get really sick, sometimes their throats swell so bad they cannot eat or drink, we insert the rubber tubes deep in the rectum to keep the poor things hydrated and allow for absorption of critical nutrients, so that’s what you’re feeling down there. This bag hanging here is feeding you. This bag is your saline for hyd
ration, and this one is a mild tranquilizer drip, you are welcome.

  All right, enjoy the cocktail in your tail, couple of days—ta ta horse killer.

  I am known across Aleutha as Shadoweye, but my real name, Tawnee, is used exclusively by the Dead, the only real family I have ever had.

  Three days northwest out of Moor, we found this casebook, all of British’s weapons and Snowflake. Danica is with me—she said to write everything down as we go, so.

  A quick note to my boss: British, I do not blame you or Danica for Soulless. She was a big girl—too young to be chasing demons like that, but none of us could have stopped her anyway.

  We put the Renth on ice deep below the Platinum Palace like you said.

  Bigfoot is recuperating, Warfell had to beg him to stay behind and heal. I still cannot believe he survived the fall, that big fellow will follow you to the Seven Hells and tear them apart if you but ask him to!

  Day one: Troth Ranch

  Fey was last seen at this desert outpost called Troth Ranch—a small trading town, several farms, if you can call them that. We are four-hundred miles north of Moor, Halfway to Tibor, then due west, one-hundred and fifty miles. The grasslands have turned to scrub for the last twenty miles—before us lay rolling dunes as far as the eye can see. Out here, the sands are measured in nautical leagues, which oddly makes sense given they resemble an ocean with fifty foot swells, frozen in place.

  Witnesses say British ate and took on supplies, striking out alone with the evening equi-fade. She never returned, that was five days past.

  We bought the stables and ranch, paid well for it sending everyone away after some intense questioning. Danica is ready to kill someone—insane with worry.