Thieves' War

by Clayton Snyder

  “In a manner of speaking, we all did, my dear,” he said.

  We walked a little further in silence.

  “Why did you show me that?” I asked.

  “Because not all weapons are edged. You should recognize them when they pop up. Lies cut as deep as any blade, and divide just as effectively.”

  “Like the Mane posters in Midian?”

  “Yeah, like that.”

  We moved deeper into the city. The streets dropped lower, the canals between them long forgotten or since diverted. Only dirty sludge moved between their banks, leaves and insects skittering and pocking the surface. Cord wore a look of determination.

  “Where we going now?” I asked.

  “One last stop,” he said.

  I looked around. Tattered flyers and propaganda clung to the walls of buildings here. What shops there were stood half-abandoned, homes with boarded-up windows.

  “You take me all the nice places,” I said.

  He grunted and led us down an alley and onto a street with a wide building on one side. A sign on the façade read Veteran’s Care. Or it had. Some of the letters had fallen off, and someone had painted over parts until it read Veteran Cunts.

  “Classy,” I said.

  Cord led us inside. The interior was an open space from wall to wall, rows of beds occupying the floor with narrow aisles between. The tile underfoot was dirty and stained in several places in suspicious red-brown splotches. Most of the beds were occupied by wounded men and women. The interior smelled of blood and rot. Moans came from deeper in the building, and medics moved from cot to cot, administering what medications they could, and where they couldn’t, carting bodies away.

  We stood there in silence, until I could no longer, and stepped outside. Cord followed. For a long while, we did not speak. What was there to say? What could you say about a nation that treated those who had sacrificed so much this way?

  We took the long way back to the hotel, passing by the central round and its dick fountain and statues once again.

  “What’s with the dicks?” I asked.

  “Those aren’t dicks,” Cord said.

  “What?”

  “Yeah. Harrowers don’t have penises. They have ovipositors.”

  My mouth filled with bile, and I dry-heaved.

  “Yeah, that was my reaction,” Cord said. “Oh look! This’ll be a treat. Vignonian4 justice is something else.”

  A cage, half the height of a man, had been erected on a dais in the round. Two guards stood beside it, a naked man between them. He looked frightened and disheveled. Another, in black robes, holding an unfurled scroll, stood before them.

  “For the bad stuff, they still hang or decapitate you. But for the others, well…”

  The crier interrupted him. “Hear ye! On this, the thirtieth day of Juvens, the criminal Bez did conspire to defraud the state of taxes due. In addition, the criminal Bez did also conspire to harbor known fugitives, to wit, the slaves known as Yek, Fen, and Hon. Their punishment is served and executed. This punishment is due forthwith.”

  A crowd gathered during the pronouncement, and the crier rolled up the scroll and stepped to the side. A commotion came from another street as a burly man led a gorilla down the avenue, a thick chain around its neck. It glared at the crowd, but otherwise moved ahead on its knuckles, eager for its destination.

  The crier called out once again as the beast gained the platform.

  “The punishment, as decreed by the Houses of the Holy5: The transgressor is to choose! Choose his fate! The gorilla—” at that, the gorilla raised its arms and roared. “—or the syrup!”

  One of the guards held up a gallon-sized jug and a funnel.

  “Choose now!” the crier shouted.

  A guard pushed the accused forward. Sweat stood out in visible beads on his skin. Across his chest they’d tattooed TRANSGRESSOR. His penis had shrunk to the size of a grape, testicles cradling it as if to say a fond farewell. His head swiveled between the gorilla and the cage. Still, no decision escaped his lips. A tiny fart did, however. It sounded like someone had stepped on a chihuahua.

  “You must choose, you jackass!” the crier shouted.

  “I couldn’t fuck a gorilla!” The man sobbed.

  “Syrup it is!” the crier proclaimed.

  The guards bent the man in two and stuffed him into the cage, shackling wrists to ankles. When they finished, he was contorted painfully, ass in the air. The guard on the left pressed the funnel into the prisoner’s open end, while the other upended the jug. Viscous fluid spilled out with an audible glug into the funnel. The man groaned, and the guards chanted:

  Pour some syrup in your butt

  Come on, be that gorilla’s slut

  Pour some syrup in your butt

  Gorilla gonna get that nut

  The last of the syrup left the bottle in a thick stream, and they discarded the container, plucking the funnel from his hole with an audible pop. The crowd picked up a new chant as soon as the jug hit the ground.

  “Clench! Clench! Cleeeeench!”

  The man moaned again, and quiet at first, his cries of nonononononono soon filled the plaza. His ass muscles tightened, but to no avail. Another fart escaped, the sound like someone gargling pudding, and a bubble appeared between his cheeks, thick and brown. It popped, and the man let out a sob.

  “Release the gorilla6!” the crier shouted.

  The gorilla roared in joy. The man screamed. We didn’t stay.

  “What the actual fuck?” I asked Cord once we were away from the round.

  He shrugged. “The gods are disturbed, Nenn. But men are disturbed more.”

  We hurried down the street.

  Warren of the Sad Trombone

  The Gentian Plain

  Crood and Xel swept across the eastern Gentian plains, hills rolling below. The forest stretched to the north, and somewhere beyond it, the camps of Hestia. To the south, the plains crumbled to rock and tide, waves cresting the broken shore in blankets of foam. Here were the tombs of the Busk Kings, the forgotten demigods of eld, forgers of the first Harbinger Blades. As if it knew he was thinking of it, Horcrux spoke up from his back.

  “There, below. A hut, you know?”

  Crood sighed heavily and spurred Xel toward the structure erected within a circle of broken stones. The great dragon alit, wheezing heavily. Crood dismounted and glared at him with contempt.

  “A poor specimen of a once-proud race, you are.”

  “And a smelly fuck of a brute, you are,” Xel replied.

  Crood grunted and stomped toward the hut, a ramshackle collection of discarded timbers lashed with rope, the roof made with a thin layer of leather. Crood frowned, stopping some distance away. Horcrux spoke up again.

  “That roof’s skin, you better not go in!”

  “Silence, you useless turd,” Crood said.

  He stepped over toppled markers that may have been headstones at one time, or perhaps road markers. He raised one meaty fist to hammer the wood to flinders and froze. He grunted in annoyance, and made to draw Horcrux, but his body refused any and all orders given it.

  “Beneath you, a rune! I can no longer sing this tune!”

  Crood’s eyes wandered downward, and he saw etched upon the threshold a rune of Hrrrgbble Warren. His heart thrashed against the cage of its chest. His eyes snapped up as the door opened with a creak. A man stood there, hair in long curly disarray, one eye red, the other blue. He smiled, and a chill crept up Crood’s spine.

  “Yes?” the man said mildly.

  Crood found he could still talk. “Master Yenn. I’ve come in supplication. A villain stalks this world, one who would undo all our efforts.”

  Yenn cocked his head, a small smirk lingering on his lips. “Our efforts?”

  Crood wet his lips. “The Seven, of course.”

  Yenn nodded. Ferd, dead. Oros, lost. Mane, dead. That left himself and the Triad in Vignon. He had heard the news, indeed. The movements smacked of Camor’s interference,
and Their pawn, Cord. Sweat stood out on Crood’s forehead. Yenn inspected the man. A crude tool. A weapon of a bygone age. Straightforward. An asset on the battlefield. A liability against the unpredictable. An oversight that would need correcting. He grinned, showing the man a full mouth of pointed teeth.

  “You are just in time, Crood. I was hoping to have someone for dinner.”

  Crood struggled, but to no avail.

  The moons had slipped over the horizon by the time Yenn spat the last fingerbone of Calamine Crood into a pile beside the man’s other bits. He gave the sword, Horcrux, a searching look, and picked it up, as though the steel weighed little more than a small fowl. It immediately burst into song.

  “Dancin’ queen, young and sweet, only seventeeeeeen!”

  “Bah,” Yenn exclaimed. “I have no use for you, foul thing.”

  He swept the sword down, flat leading, and smashed it to shards against a nearby boulder. The singing ended with a sharp scream, and a torrent of souls poured free. Yenn stretched his jaw wide and devoured each as it attempted to flee, long fingers wrapping them like gossamer. He ate well past satiation. When finished, Yenn rubbed his overfull stomach and tossed the blade away, then stalked over to Xel. The dragon woke from its slumber, eyeing him apprehensively. Yenn reached forward and stroked its snout.

  “He was cruel to you. This I know. You need not fear that any longer.”

  A quick snap of the shoulder sent his arm past the dragon’s eye, bursting it in a splash of hot vitreous fluid, and into its brain. Xel’s good eye rolled up, and the dragon shuddered once, then lay still. Yenn pulled his arm free and shook the slime from it. He looked up at the moons and slipped his hands into his pockets. It was a nice night. A pleasant night. He strolled away from the cabin, and across the grassy hills. Soon, a tuneless melody entered his head, and he hummed along, the sound like a dirge across the countryside.

  Goddamn Nuns

  Our gear was packed, Rek and Lux lounging in the suite’s living area when we got back to the hotel. I marveled again at Rek’s ability to evade the guards—despite being a big man, and sticking out like a sore on a lip, he had an uncanny knack of slipping pursuit.

  “All ready?” Cord asked.

  I looked from them to Cord. I hadn’t been let in on a lot of this little outing and was starting to wonder what he was keeping from me, and why.

  “Ready for what?” I asked.

  “A little trip,” Cord said, hoisting his bag to his shoulder. “This is a Harrower city, and we haven’t much time before they start to twig that I’m here.”

  “So, we’re running away?” I asked.

  “I don’t run away. I make strategic retreats. But in this case, no. We’re gonna have to do some things that call for a little less finesse, and a little more… Nenn,” he said.

  “Hey. I’ve got finesse coming out my ass,” I said.

  “You’re also subtle,” Rek teased.

  I flipped him the finger. “So, where to, then?”

  The others stood and gathered their things. My knives lay in a neat row, belts freshly oiled, the blades looking wicked even in their sheathes.

  “There’s a place a few miles west of here. A reliquary, of sorts,” Cord said.

  I looked up from my blades. “What’s in it?”

  “The core of the Harrower system. And Fela’s bones. We’ll need both.”

  “Oh good. A Harrower complex.”

  “Bring your knives,” Cord said on his way out, the others following.

  I strapped the belts on.

  “Like I was not gonna bring my knives,” I muttered, and ran to catch up.

  We were headed out of town when a group of bravos crossed our path. Rough men, and in a town like Vignon, likely veterans of countless skirmishes. They spread out across the road, the hills to either side cutting off an easy escape. My hands drifted closer to my blades. Cord stepped to the fore of the group while Rek, Lux, and I spread out behind him. Six to four. I looked closer at the men—scarred, with serviceable weapons—no fancy hilts or embossed scabbards here. Likely a fair fight then. I hated that.

  Cord spread his hands. “Is there a problem, gentlemen?”

  The leader, a man with a crooked nose and muddy eyes, stepped forward. A scar ran from under one ear and wrapped around the front of his throat. Someone had tried to open his carotid, and he’d survived. Lucky bastard. Or mean.

  “Looks like you’ve got a couple unlicensed there,” the man said.

  “Unlicensed what?” Cord said. An edge crept into his tone. I knew that sound. It was dangerous.

  “Assistants. Housemen. Especially that one.” He lifted his chin toward Rek.

  I pulled my blades without thinking. The leader saw it, gestured. Two more men appeared atop the nearby hills. They wielded bows, and were in a good position to pin us like bugs on a board.

  “Ah, you have us at a disadvantage,” Cord said. “Clearly, you would like something we have. An agreement, then? Surely we’re all civilized here.”

  The leader nodded. “Savages would take want they want. Clearly we are not savages.” His eyes never left Rek as he said this, giving the word savages a slight inflection.

  Cord looked back, as though considering. His eyes met Lux’s, and he gave a slight nod. Lux’s magic drew static from the air, and I tensed as the hairs on the back of my neck rose. I edged toward Rek.

  “Aybemay ovemay ackbay a ewfay eetfay.”

  “What?” He asked, brow furrowing in a landslide.

  I ignored him. Cord was saying something else. “… and then I’ll fuck your mother with the rutabaga. And when I’m done, I’ll make a nice stew and feed it to your dog.”

  The leader’s face contorted and he raised his hand to signal the archers to shoot us down.

  The air crackled, and twin bolts of lightning blared to life, burning the world white. The men on the hills arched their backs for a split second as electricity coursed through them, then they exploded, chunks of flesh raining down. It was like an industrial accident in a ham factory.

  Lux gestured again, and I missed what happened, but the road was filled with slithering pieces of meat. Two of the men broke, fleeing down the road. A third was coated in the reanimated meat, and I watched as it slithered across his face, forcing his mouth open, and oozing inside. He died coughing and retching.

  Another tried to attack Cord, but the old thief was too fast for him, and Cord moved from his path. He stuck a foot out, sending his attacker sprawling, and once down, Cord hopped on his back. He proceeded to use the man’s face to flatten that particular square of roadway until it was coated in red mud.

  The fourth jumped Rek. The big man relieved him of the burden of his arms and legs.

  The leader went for me. I planted a knife in his windpipe and ripped upward, opening him like a Cruciatas Day turkey. He went down, wheezing and spraying gore.

  The two that had fled stopped some distance away, and looked like they were considering their options.

  “Lux,” Cord said.

  She grinned, all teeth and feral intent, and peeled them like grapes with a word.

  It was over in seconds.

  “Holy fuck,” I breathed.

  Cord stood and dusted his hands. “That was fun,” he agreed.

  We left the bodies behind, and I did my best to quash my unease at the new brutality my family had displayed.

  We retrieved the carriage from a nearby copse, Lux having stashed it while Cord and I were out. In a matter of minutes, we were underway again, the great black lacquered thing lumbering across the countryside. We sat in silence for a few minutes before Cord broke it.

  “You know what Harrowers are?”

  “Fucked up wizard things,” I said with a little shrug.

  “Close enough. But they’re also the children of Oros. Each bears a piece of him, whether they’re aware or not. The ones that are, like Ferd, and the Triad, do everything they can to seize power. Way back, way way back, seven avatars of the mad god
got together and decided they would set the world right. Right to them of course, being Harrower rule under Oros’ direction.

  “I don’t know the end goal. Oros’ original purpose was to bring down the Tvint Empire. He succeeded, but it broke him when they imprisoned him. See, the problem with madness is it’s unpredictable. You can’t fight that. Except with more madness. Camor saw what was happening and chose a few of us to fight back. Directed insanity. I’ll never be right, Nenn. Nor Lux. Rek, well, he’s Rek. You two came to us later, though.”

  He peered at me, leaning forward. “But it’s in you, too. That rage. That impulse to bleed the world. It’s a gift, Nenn. You just need to harness it. That’s why I’m showing you these things. Right and wrong, truth and deception—means to an end. In this case, the end is to kill a god.”

  “So, I’m some sort of fucking chosen one?”

  He leaned back and waved a hand. “Oh gods no. You’re just angry enough, with a moral compass that points in roughly the right direction. And I want to make this clear. I am no savior either. I’m just a guy someone gave a job, and I intend to see it through. Chosen one? I’ve seen what happens when someone declares themselves that. Death, war, misery. Fuck, no. We’re just the cleanup crew.”

  I was quiet for a bit. “So, we kill Oros and make the world right?”

  He shook his head, and for a moment, sadness slipped across his features, aging him a century. It passed, and he turned to me with a grin. “No, the world will always be fucked up. But the Harrowers will be done, and we can go back to making money.”

  “Is there any good news to this?”

  “We’ve already killed three.”

  I leaned back.

  “Works for me,” I said.

  The carriage rumbled to a halt, and while Rek and Cord piled out, I rounded on Lux, trapping her in the driver’s seat.

  “What’s your fucking problem?” I asked. “You’ve been avoiding me since you came back.”