Ghosts of Sanctuary

by Robert J. Crane

  A long slice of scarlet over the Machine leader’s arm gleamed red under the gaslight. Gaull staggered back and Curatio waited, patient, the hint of a smile on his lips.

  “I must thank you for this,” Curatio said as Gaull came at him and was rebuffed, taking another strike, this time to the leg, for his troubles. “My friends here have long labored under the perception that simply because I was unable to fight by the laws of our time, that I was, perhaps, unable to fight at all.”

  “No, I saw you wield that mace in the halls of Enterra,” Cyrus called back as Vara limped up to him, hand glowing red and weariness on her face. “We knew you could fight. We just didn’t know …” he waved his hand vaguely, “… that you could kick our asses so handily.”

  “I could kick all of your asses handily,” Curatio said, never taking his eyes off Gaull as the Machine leader came at him again. Praelior met the edge of Rodanthar, and Gaull received a spike from the mace to the face. He staggered back again, bleeding from the forehead. “Do you know how long I spent in war in my youth? It was endless; those were the days of battling elven tribes, the days before we discovered and turned magic to our own purposes. It was me with a sword in my hand and an effort to survive by being better than any other.”

  Furiously, Curatio moved in on Gaull. “Then came the days of my ambassadorship to the Protanians. Do you know why I became an arena fighter?” He struck, and Gaull took a long, bloody gash to his flank and spun as Curatio stood above him, sword raised. “Because I enjoyed it.”

  Curatio brought down Praelior, a thin smile perched on his lips. Gaull took the blow across the wrist and his hand was cleaved from his body with delicate strength and speed. With a backward swish, Curatio sent it in Cyrus’s direction. Rodanthar, still gripped by the severed limb, came to rest at Cyrus’s feet.

  Cyrus blinked, then stooped, picking up his father’s sword and discarding the hand still wrapped around the hilt like fetid garbage. “Well … look at that,” he said, brandishing it for Vara.

  “Very nice,” she said through a pained grimace, “to see it back where it belongs.”

  “No,” Gaull moaned, holding the stump where his hand had been. His knees hit the cobblestones, then he slumped to the ground.

  “Yes,” Curatio said, turning around and leaving Gaull in the middle of the street. “You see, this is the problem with relying only on skill and not having any passion, nor—indeed—wiser friends to fight alongside you.” His eyes glimmered with amusement as he made his way back to Cyrus and offered Praelior, hilt first, to the warrior. “Eventually, you will run into someone better, and then who do you fall back on?”

  “You should probably keep that for now,” Cyrus said, waving Rodanthar. “Just for the battle, you know.”

  “And maybe a while longer,” Vara said. “Until we’re out of peril.”

  “Well, that’d be forever,” Cyrus said in complaint. “And I really like that sword. I can use two, you know. I was, in fact, until somebody stole one off my belt—”

  “We can take up this discussion afterward,” Curatio said, smiling. “For now, though, perhaps you can take care of this one,” and he nodded at Gaull, “from here?”

  “Oh, yes,” Cyrus said with a smile of relish. “I think I can handle this modest challenge.” And he drew a pistol with his other hand.

  “Then I shall rejoin the battle inside,” Curatio said, walking toward the doors as Cyrus moved toward Gaull, who was gasping in the street.

  “Come,” Vara said, “let us be done with this,” and she led him out to Gaull.

  Gaull looked up at their approach, and stretched his remaining hand before him in austere defense. There was no escape, no hope. His teeth were clenched, and defeat was draped across his features with the pain.

  “I’d say ‘well met,’” Cyrus said, “or something similar, but really … poorly met. I wish Zarnn had gutted you a thousand years ago and hung your entrails all over the swamp.” He swung Rodanthar before Gaull’s eyes, and the Machine thug watched the sword as though it were his fondest hope come back to visit him. “You truly are among the most vicious scum I have ever met, Tirner Gaull, and I can only say that if I grant you a merciful death here, it’s because I wish you to be out of my presence, not because I think you deserve any measure of lessening in your suffering.”

  “I … could tell you things …” Gaull said, shaking, pain bleeding out along with the crimson life coming from his many wounds. “About the Machine. About who runs it.”

  “And I could listen,” Cyrus said, uncaring, “if I could tolerate you for a moment longer and had but a damn left to give.”

  He raised the pistol and leveled the sights on Gaull’s face. The flash of it firing was like summer lightning, illuminating the street more effectively than any gaslamp, but only for a moment. When it was done, Gaull was left twitching, a crushed hole in the top of his head the diameter of a good sword hilt at its widest point.

  Cyrus turned his back on the man as the guttering gasps replaced the dying sound of the shot, and he walked way, Vara at his side, toward the open doors of the old Goliath Guildhall, still a seat of evil after all this time—

  But not for much longer, he thought.

  58.

  Shirri

  “Tell me where it is.”

  McLarren had her by the throat; her mother and Dugras were already down, McLarren having taken particular pleasure in lashing out and striking down her mother as the older woman came at him in a futile physical attack.

  Shirri felt the hard pressure at her throat, the air failing to enter her lungs, the blackness clawing at the edges of her vision, spots of light dancing before her as consciousness waned.

  McLarren had her at his mercy, and his interrogation was merciless. His eyes stared into hers with the full expectation of answer. He raised the orb in his other hand and then pocketed it, bringing his now-free hand around to slap her. “Tell me where it is, and this can all be over.”

  “I don’t … want anything to be over,” Shirri said, clawing at his hand, surprising him so much that he dropped her. He stood back defensively, as Shirri fell to her knees and stayed there, looking up at him with the fury of a lifetime. “I want … to live my life without you … you people … always at my back. I want to live without your Machine constantly trying to keep me down … your men accosting us in the streets … your decisions in councils across this city … the thousands of them that you make that tangle in every aspect of our lives … I want to be free to be me … to live my life!” It was all coming out in a burst of raw anger. It was a lifetime they’d been here, on her back and the backs of every citizen of Reikonos that hadn’t participated in their little gang and thus reaped the rewards of corruption. “I just want to be left alone by you people … and you couldn’t let me have even that.”

  McLarren let out a low chuckle. “Because, you fool, you’re not a person, though you think you are. None of the citizens of Reikonos are people unto themselves. You’re part of a greater whole, you see … part of a great chain, and we could no more leave you alone than you could leave babes unsupervised. You belong to us—all of you.” McLarren’s eyes grew narrow. “There’s no hope in Reikonos—because who needs hope when we have the Machine? Hope is elusive, foolish—the Machine is a guarantee. As certain as the sunrise, we remain. You will render everything unto us … and then you will be allowed to die. There are no other options.”

  “I choose death, and will render nothing,” Shirri said, staggering to her feet. “I care not what you have planned for your Machine’s future—I don’t want you in mine. I would rather die than serve this fiendish thing you’ve built by giving you one iota of aid—and I’d rather choke to death on my own blood than ever give you that medallion.”

  McLarren stared at her, cold and smoky, but it seemed a decision had been made. He shrugged. “Fair enough,” he said and came at her—

  A blade sliced through his chest at heart level, and McLarren gasped. It was perfectly c
urved, like a half-moon of death, and it stuck out below McLarren’s breastbone. All the air went out of him, and he stared, open-mouthed, at it sticking out of him.

  “I found your office,” Dugras said, peeking out from McLarren’s side. “I wondered where my things had gone. I guess you were going to keep my tanto as a trophy?” The blade slipped out of McLarren’s chest, and the Machine man dropped to his knees, red drizzling down his front. Dugras stepped around and reached into McLarren’s pocket, emerging with the orb in hand. He nodded to Shirri and tossed it to her gently.

  She caught it, staring, and wondered at it for a moment. Wasn’t there a spell to activate objects such as this? Oh, right. She remembered the words now.

  With a whisper, the orb glowed for a moment, then went dark, its steely surface cold in her palm. Raising her hand at her mother, Shirri cast a healing spell, and the familiar glow was produced once more. It fell over her mother’s fallen figure, and Pamyra stirred.

  “You … can’t win …” McLarren said as Dugras came around, a small pistol drawn and in his hand. It was no single barrel, either; it had many independent barrels that rotated. Multiple hammers stuck out from the center of it like spokes from a wheel, and Dugras held his finger upon the trigger and thumbed back three of them in a row, keeping it pointed at McLarren. “Against us … against the Machine …” Blood trickled down the corner of McLarren’s mouth. “We’re too much for you. We … are always moving forward … and you can’t stop … the Machine … for we are … progress. We were here before you came … and the Machine will be here long after both of us have turned to dust …” He chortled, and a wet, hacking cough sprayed blood from his lips.

  “I’m half-elf,” Shirri said, and raised her hand to brush back the hair around her ears. “But I’d outlive your Machine even if I weren’t. The people out there,” and she waved her hand all around, to encompass the city outside these walls, “will see their freedom restored. They will walk these streets without fear of your kind. Because I’m not here to fight you alone, McLarren—though I would, now,” she said fiercely, “if it came to it. But I have help.” And the words stirred the heat in her soul, and some strange feeling of conviction came from within, burning its way out of her like her soul was on fire. “I have seen people rise against you, to knock back your Machine’s twisted ‘progress.’ You squeeze the life out of us and call it ‘progress.’ I know what you are, though,” she whispered, and stared him in the eye. “And I will not fear you—or your Machine—anymore.” Magic swirled around her fingers. “I will help break the gears of your Machine however I have to.”

  As the spell swirled around her hand, building, McLarren eyed it, dazedly, seemingly unable to move. “You won’t win … he won’t let y—”

  A burning blaze flew forth from Shirri’s fingers, some power she’d long feared to loose. She thought back to the alley, only days before, and the fear that had choked her as the toughs had closed in. Everything had seemed impossible then—and facing McLarren had seemed the most impossible thing of all.

  But as her spell magic faded, McLarren was dead. His legs toppled with a thump, dusting the floor with black ash like the smokestack refuse had found its way in here.

  “Not bad,” Dugras pronounced with a nod and turned. A dozen Machine thugs were standing there. “Oh. I didn’t realize you were here.” He raised his pistol and rattled off six shots in rapid succession, dropping several of them and then flicking a lever that broke the pistol down the middle. Pulling a small, metal pre-packed cartridge from his belt, he reloaded it quickly and flipped it closed with a satisfying click.

  It seemed unnecessary; the remaining toughs had broken and run, fleeing back the way they’d come. McLarren’s death by immolation must have made an impression, Shirri thought distantly, as her mother stirred and rose to her knees, clutching her head.

  “Did I miss anything good?” Pamyra asked, one eye still closed in pain.

  “Your daughter threw off the yolk of the Machine,” Dugras said with a half-smile.

  “That must have been something to see,” Pamyra said, rising to her feet with a helping hand from Shirri. She looked into Shirri’s eyes, and there was a faint smile there, as well. “Did you find something you lost, my daughter?”

  Shirri didn’t have to think long about it before answering. “Hope.” And she looked back down the hallway they’d come from. “We should probably get back to the others …” The shrieks and clangs of battle could still be heard in the distance, and that told her that Alaric and the others were still fighting the good fight. “You know … give that help we swore them, now that we have our magic again.”

  “And now that I’m not toothless anymore,” Dugras said, clicking his pistol closed cleanly. “I swear, you Arkarians and your primitive one-shot weapons …” He made a scoffing sound. “Shall we?” And his eyes glinted with mischief, dagger in one hand and his gun in the other.

  “We shall,” Shirri said, and with a nod at her mother she took the lead, surging in front of the dwarf, a spell ready on her lips for any unfortunate Machine thug who happened to cross her path between here and the members of Sanctuary who labored somewhere ahead.

  59.

  Vaste

  The sight of two rows of riflemen taking aim at them from the elevated balconies above was a worrisome sight for Vaste. These weapons were beyond dangerous, and though he did not subscribe to Alaric’s belief that they were necessarily dishonorable, he did want to curse them right now for being incredibly inconvenient to his continued drawing of breath.

  “Shits,” he said, and swiped out with his staff, cracking one of the wooden balcony pillars nearest him with all his strength.

  A fierce splintering ran through the pillar and echoed in the foyer; stone from floor to ceiling, bearing an ancient look, it broke cleanly as the wooden beam snapped cleanly in the middle.

  The whole balcony above on that side lurched, and all the riflemen lurched with it. A distraction, perhaps, but only that, Vaste knew. And it had worked on only half their number—

  He turned his head to look at the others, preparing himself to dodge the incoming hail of fire, but something was moving up there. Black fog was wafting off the upstairs balcony on the other side of the room. A sword was flashing, and there were cries he could not have picked out of the chaos. Something was happening, that much was sure, and it was—

  Alaric. Of course.

  The Ghost razored through the gunmen with godlike speed, striking through them as impressively as Birissa cut through a dinner. Vaste grunted and leapt forward, aiming for the next balcony support. It seemed Alaric had the other side of the room under control, which left him to deal with this one.

  He smashed the next support, causing the balcony to lurch further. Gun barrels hung over the edge, their wielders unable to get their balance to steady their aim. “Heh,” Vaste said, neatly spared from their wrath by being in the shadow of their weapons.

  “STOP HIM!” someone shouted—a Machine thug in a hat was pointing right at him. Vaste felt a bit singled out; there was so many of them in here, though their numbers were perhaps fading off a little now. Still, at least ten men swiveled on him as Vaste hurried toward the last pillar. They were in hot pursuit but lacked the speed granted by a godly weapon—

  Birissa swung her blade and cleaved five of them as they surged for him. Pieces of the men were flung through the air, Vaste paused, admiring what she’d done there. Her face was twisted in rage, lips snarled with anger—

  Gods, that was sexy.

  “Hihi,” he said to her, waving, as he swung his weapon like a hammer at the last pillar. It rang true as it found its target, and the beam burst, a grinding crack issuing from above him as Vaste threw himself past the five men sweeping toward him—

  The balcony he’d been standing in the shadow of a moment earlier broke loose and collapsed, swallowing up his pursuers in the resulting wreckage as he hot-footed it back to where Birissa and Hiressam were being joined by Curatio�
�with Praelior in hand, no less!—finishing the clean sweep of the dwindling Machine thugs making their way into the entry hall.

  “Seems you’ve about got things wrapped up in here,” Cyrus announced a moment later as he and Vara re-entered the hall. They both looked a little worse for the wear, but were standing and not bleeding torrentially, which—combined with Cyrus holding Rodanthar once more—suggested they’d been triumphant.

  “Looks like you avenged the honor of the last of the trolls,” Vaste said, nodding at the sword in Cyrus’s hand.

  Cyrus looked at him coolly. “Zarnn was hardly the last of the trolls, Vaste.” And his gaze flicked, subtly, to Birissa.

  “Perhaps not,” Vaste said, catching a lone Machine thug on his back swing and causing a geyser of skull matter to hit the ceiling. “Perhaps not, indeed.”

  “You killed them,” Shirri’s voice echoed over the room as the last of the thugs met their end with Alaric’s sword through his chest. The Ghost looked up and smiled as Pamyra, Dugras, and Shirri re-entered, looking a little bruised and bloody but still walking under their own power. Vaste considered that a win. Especially given how hard it was to heal non-ambulatory persons in these damnable days.

  “All that we could find,” Curatio said, “though I expect more are lurking within the depths of this place.”

  “We should root them out,” Vaste said. “You know, make sure Malpravus isn’t lurking somewhere in the dark, ready to spring upon us all.”

  Curatio gave him a quirk of a smile. “You’re just hoping to collect on that ill-advised bet of yours.”

  Vaste pursed his lips. “I’d also like to make sure they’re not keeping any other prisoners we should free before we burn this place to the ground, once and for all.” He let his gaze flick around a little. “But … yeah. I don’t really want to pay you any gold, so … best to be sure the necromancer isn’t hiding out in a dungeon room.”