by JM Guillen
The light went out.
And yet, we could still see. A wicked, brilliantly blue light shone from the room beyond the door. From where I lay, I could see that every surface of the room was wreathed in delicate, sharp, tendrils of frost.
They were moving.
The glowing tendrils of frost were meandering across the floor and walls of Ely’s storefront. I could see that the floor was mostly covered with it, and it was clawing its way up the wall, as if hungrily searching out every surface. It moved like it had a will, like a hunting predator.
It was creeping through the door.
I heard Ely’s gasp of horror. For a moment she was babbling, almost inarticulate.
“Thom!” I could hear the fear strangling her voice. “Ferric Rime! You need to—”
I didn’t know what Ferric Rime was, but Ely’s reaction chilled me more than the odd coldness seeping from the room. I would need about ten more hands to count the things that Ely knew that I did not, and this certainly seemed to fall under that jurisdiction.
Her fear spoke more than words ever could.
“Yes. All right.” I was mesmerized by how quickly the frost was spreading into the room. I scuttled backward, even as it crept into the room. Behind me, I heard Ely moving back up the ladder.
“Thom!” Her tone was like the tale of a whip. “Quit caper-fooling!” She was almost to the top of the ladder. “Get up here!”
The frost was spreading over every surface it touched, and that haunting crackling echoed in the darkened room. A wave of bluish light passed through it as it crawled, and I could see my breath.
I did not wait.
I was on the ladder in a nonce but apparently not fast enough for Ely. Her eyes were wide, and she extended me an arm.
Once I was in her bedroom, she pulled the ladder up after us.
“Ferric Rime is alchemical. It’s used in stalwarting iron after it’s been tempered.” I noticed her breath also came in puffs of frost. “For wintersteel. Handling it is incredibly dangerous.”
“Does recommended use include throwing it through windows?” I gave her a sideward look.
“The Rime is naturally frigid, scores of points below freezing.” Her voice was distant, as if reciting. “It’s a hungry element and seeks out oxygen. When you opened the door, you fed it.”
I cursed beneath my breath. “Can it climb up here?”
She shrugged. “If there’s enough of it.” She glanced at me. “It will burn where it touches you—it’s that cold. Your skin will turn black and slough off.”
“Lost gods.” I sighed. “It’s just as I always thought.”
She canted her head. “What?”
I looked straight at her. “Your bedroom is the most frigid place in Teredon.”
I actually thought she might throw me down.
Teasing aside, I could actually feel the temperature dropping. Holding on to the edge of the floor, I craned my head into the hole and looked at the room I had been sleeping in. Once I saw what was happening, I swore to myself.
“It’s creeping up the walls.” I turned to her. “Is this place up to fire standards?”
She gave me a patronizing glance. “You can’t possibly imagine that my father would ever have anything not be up to spec, can you? The man was meticulous.”
“That’s what I wanted to hear. Where is your fire ladder?”
Ely was already on the move. She picked her way through the darkness of her room and came to the window by her bed. “I keep it here. Standard, really.” She reached down and opened the window.
For just a moment, I thought it was going to stick.
It didn’t however. She flicked a small latch, opened the window, and unrolled the ladder outside.
“This sets down into the street.” Her voice was still distant, oddly distracted. She attached the ladder firmly at the base of her cell and then pushed the window open wider.
“Careful now. You’re not thinking clearly.” I stepped over to the window and peered into the street. Then, I straightened, and met Ely’s green eyes. “We don’t know who threw the Ferric Rime into your shop.”
She looked at me for just a moment, not quite comprehending. I watched as understanding dawned on her face.
“You—you think someone is still outside?”
“I think it’s quite likely.” I glanced out the window again. “I don’t think someone thought they would kill us with the Rime. I think someone wanted to force us to come outside.”
“Who would do that?” Her eyes searched my face. “Thom?”
Even as I looked outside, I realized that it must be true. I couldn’t see anyone hiding in the streets, or huddling in one of the alleyways, but it only made sense that someone would be there.
Someone was waiting for us to stumble out the doors.
“I’ll step down first.” I winked at her. “I know, I know. Ladies and heirs precedent, I get it. However, in this case, I think that someone with a weapon should step first.”
Ely wasn’t really with me. I knew it was shock, knew that the combination of being awakened in the middle of the night and having her father’s shop attacked was simply too unbelievable at first to actually grasp. Therefore, I put my hand on her shoulder and made certain that her eyes met mine.
“Ely? Are you with me? I need to know that you understand.”
“I understand.” She took a deep breath and then nodded at me. “I understand very well. I agree.”
I gave her one final nod, and made my way into the street.
2
Of course, the men had seen the moment that Ely had thrown the ladder out the window. They had been waiting, watching. They weren’t stupid, whoever they were. I had my suspicions about that of course; I had been attacked in my own home just the night before, and by my tally, neither of those men were in custody.
I assume they had left and gotten friends. The question was…
How did they know where I was?
The ruffians in question had an understanding of how to set up an ambush. Apparently, one of them had access to a brassbow.
As soon as I heard the telltale click of the hammer falling back, I let go of the ladder. I dropped about four armspans to the ground, doing my best to land with a lot of bend in my knees.
The bolt struck the side of Ely’s shop.
I turned, stepping sideways before anyone had time to crank the brassbow again. “You will desist and submit!” I practically roared the words, screaming into the shadowy darkness of the street. “I have already sent my bird—”
“You have not.” The voice was smug, certain. “You sent that little bint away hours ago. It’s just you, Judicar.” I could hear footsteps in the darkness as the man walked closer. His voice was familiar. “I think that tonight we’ll finish the business we were about last night.”
Then I saw the slender man, the same man who had been in my flat, in the mouth of an alleyway.
“I thought that your business last night centered around telling some soft belly he needed to mind his betters. I think that that message has been delivered.”
“Apparently it hasn’t. Just because the pork belly ended up being a Judicar doesn’t mean the job was done.” He glanced meaningfully to his left, toward an alleyway that twisted off toward Jahaan’s Street. I followed his glance, and saw man in the shadows there.
“What, there are four of you? Maybe five?” I scoffed. “I still give you the opportunity to desist. Or, on the other hand, perhaps you can go and roundup some friends.”
“We understand quite well the value of friends.” The man who had been in my apartment the night before took a few steps forward, out of his alleyway. He held the brassbow, and he was cranking again as he walked. “Unfortunately, it seems as if you do not. Last night, the only person to stand by your side was a woman drunk from a revel. Tonight, you stand alone.”
That was when the metal spike exploded into his leg.
I know now what it was. Ely had an old cliffcast
er, a device designed to fire a spike into stone for surveying, and rock climbing. Powered by small compression cartrodges, it fired equally as hard as the brassbow, only its spiked projectile wasn’t a quarrel.
It was a barbed climbing pin, a climbing pin with about forty strides worth of cordage attached.
“Fecking damn!” The man screamed, one hand going to his leg. The strike had been brutal. It was just below the knee, but the climbing pin had torn out the other side.
While the man screamed, Ely let the machine begin cranking in the climbing pin, drawing the screaming man toward her building.
Toward me.
I took a few steps forward, my stave in hand. My stride was confident, my eyes flat. “I believe I offered you the opportunity to desist.” I gave the man a grim smile, and then peered at the shadows in the alleyway. “Is your friend from last night with you?” I strained, trying to see. “We had an appointment this morning, which I’m afraid he failed to attend.”
“You fecking dare to speak of him?” The man was absolutely livid, torn between pain and fury. “If you knew what you were playing at, Judicar, you would not be so glad. You would know respect is due.”
“That’s probably not true.” I took another step forward. “I am not known for being a smart man. And you aren’t the first person to tell me that I’m too glib for my own good.”
“Unfortunately for you, I am fairly certain that I will be the last.” Through his anger and pain, the slender man seemed to remember the brassbow in his hand. He reached up and finished cranking it and then leveled it at my chest.
I stepped forward and swung my stave. It flashed in a downward arc, but landed nowhere near the man—we were still a good five strides apart after all. There was no way I could hit him.
The cranking mechanism on the cliffcaster was intended to haul or support the weight of a man. Therefore, no matter how quickly the slender man stepped forward, the device kept a steady pressure on the pin embedded his leg. Even through the pain, he had drawn a bead on me, knowing that he was well outside my reach.
The cord was not.
I swung downward, catching the cord and tearing it loose from the man’s leg. He screamed again, sinking down on one knee and completely losing his gait. Quickly, I took a few steps forward and swung my stave at the side of his face.
There was a sickening, wet crack.
The men waiting in the alleyway had apparently been doing just that; waiting. There must’ve been awaiting some cue from the slender man before they gave up their shadows. Now, seeing that things had gone desperately awry, they rushed out. They were large, brutish men. From the scars on their faces and knuckles, they were men who knew well their business.
They were also Twilight Blades.
I realized it as I heard the cord snap its way back into Ely’s device. The man screaming on the ground held part of my attention, but the rest of it was tracking the faces of the men from the alleyway. I only knew one of them, but I knew him well. His name was Brendan Drôs, and he was a well-known knuckle duster. I’d seen his work before, but I’d just never been able to appreciate it from this perspective.
“Morning, gentles.” I aimed a boot squarely at my slender friend’s leg, and he screamed again before I casually bent and picked up his brassbow. I wound with one hand. “I suppose you’re here so that I might requisition you to assist with an undesirable?”
Brendan had an ugly grin. “Afraid not, blackbird. We have some business to discuss, see? We do have us a little understanding.”
“I, too, have an understanding.” I cocked the brassbow into place with a click. “I understand that this gentleman awoke me from a fairly sound sleep. He did so by attacking my friend’s home.” I gave the downed man another kick, more to make certain he stayed down that anything else. “I also understand that it might be difficult for me to dance with you four fine gentlemen.” I smiled. “Therefore I would like to levy my guarantus that whichever of you gentlemen wishes to step forward first will have an iron cast bolt in his eye.”
Brendan nodded at the other men. One of them muttered something beneath his breath, but the others were quiet. They began to fan around me.
Brendan cleared his throat. “You got one shot, Judicar.” His smile was gone. “The moment you take it, the rest of us will be on you.”
“Two shots!” Ely’s voice was wild, but she had the pin back in her cliffcaster. “I think I can aim better the second time. I have the hang of it now.” I could hear the almost mad grin in her voice.
I looked back to Brendan. My eyes were stern. “Even without my good right hand I’ll take my odds against two of you.” I looked to the ground and spat. “Lost gods, even two of you and a wounded third.” I hefted my stave in my left hand, while holding the brassbow with my right. “It may be that you can take me here, Mister Drôs. It is also a good likelihood that two of you will die trying. Is your business worth that?”
Drôs chuckled darkly to himself. “Our business is every bit worth that.” From within his sleeve, a small knife made a sudden appearance in his hand. “Unless, of course, you’re willing to cry off? You’re poking into things that don’t need poked into.”
There was nothing to say to that. Of course I couldn’t cry off. I took two steps back toward Ely’s shop, holding my eyes on Drôs, and shaking my head.
“Kill him!” As I had backed away from him, apparently the slender man had found his voice. “It’s not a choice anymore. He’ll remember me, and apparently he knows you, Brendan.”
I cocked my head at the men. “I do know Brendan. I know Brendan is a guildman with the Twilight Blades. My assumption, therefore, has to be that you gentles are Twilight Blades as well.” I cleared my throat and took another step back. “I obviously know far too much to live.”
At that moment, the fight seemed to explode around me.
I don’t know what their prearranged signal was, but they apparently had one. Without giving any true indication as to their intentions, the men on my far right, the opposite arc of Brendan Drôs, burst forward, both of them simultaneously. I whirled, and the moment I did, Brendan himself leapt at me, knife in hand.
Overhead, I heard Ely’s device sing again, and one of the men screamed. I did not have time to look however, as I was trying to draw the brassbow back down on Brendan. He was rushing me, every bit the enraged bull. My shot entirely missed his center, but tore through the muscle at his shoulder, burying the quarrel deeply. Brendan cried out and was thrown back, but I had no time to pay him much heed. Two other men were enclosing upon me.
I dropped the brassbow and switched my stave to my right hand. I crouched low, falling into the second stanza just as I had the night before, when I didn’t have Scoundrel.
Single feather floats
The spinning cyclone awaits
Cannot pass a wall
The men slowed as they approached me, obviously wary. In the background, Brendan was grunting, trying to see how bad the shot had been.
On the ground, the slender man was screaming, “Kill him! Kill the judicar!”
I wondered that he wasn’t raising everyone in the street.
“I didn’t bring you here to be fecking cowards! Kill him!”
Ely had shot the one man that I hadn’t paid much heed. Unlike me, she had struck centri corpus. That barbed pin was embedded in the right side of his chest. Just a glance was enough to tell me that the man probably did not have long for this world. He was crying out, frantically working at the pin, but he was lung shot, bleeding from the mouth and nose, and one way or the other, wouldn’t live long.
Of course, the crank on the cliffcaster was still just as relentless as it had been before. Because Ely was above me, she was actually drawing the man toward me. Typically, in his frantic throes, he didn’t have much mind for me, but the problem was he didn’t have much mind for anyone. His terror was so overwhelming that in trying to get the pin from his chest, he stumbled across the slender man on the ground.
He stumbled and fell. It took me a long moment to realize what that fall meant.
All I heard was the tinkling of broken glass.
“Jarôme!” The slender man was horrified. “Stop—”
Naturally, it was already too late.
Apparently, my slender friend had more of the Ferric Rime than he had thrown in the window. Perhaps he felt he hadn’t needed all of it, but his reasoning scarcely mattered now. The man that Ely had hooked had stumbled across my slender friend’s bag and had apparently shattered at least one container of the stuff.
Both men screamed in agony. There was a flash of hungry, azure light.
This horrified everyone present, but only the brave judicar had the presence of mind to use this particular catastrophe.
With all the salt in me, I spun toward one of the remaining standing men. I swung my stave and connected solidly with the side of the man’s face.
It crunched beneath my stave with a sound that was both wet and agonizing. His cry was as much a gurgle, coming as it did through the blood he was currently gagging upon. The man crumpled like he was made from wet straw.
That left one man standing.
“Friend, you might pay attention to your options. By my tally you just dropped from five-on-one to one-on-two over the course of a few heartbeats.” I raised an eyebrow at him. “Perhaps this isn’t your fight.”
The man looked around wildly, first at the man that I had dropped with a single stroke, then at Brendan with his entire left side soaked in blood from his shoulder, then to the two men in the center who were still screaming. The slender man was frantically trying to scurry away from the Ferric Rime while his friend who had stumbled was inexorably being dragged toward me as the Rime ate at him where he had fallen into it.
Their clothing had become brittle and shattered where it had touched the Rime. Just as Ely had said, the skin beneath was black, burned by the intense cold.
The man I was facing took two steps back. His eyes were wild, casting all about.
I kept my gaze upon him. “Here’s the deal, chum. As of late last night I knew that someone was hunting for me, but I didn’t know who. Now, thanks to my good friend Brendan I know that it’s the Blades.”