by Sam Sykes
“Daiga tell you what this is?” I pressed the barrel up under his chin. “Daiga tell you about me?”
The kid, wide-eyed and slack-jawed, nodded feverishly back at me.
“You know what I’ve done with this, then,” I snarled. “You know I’m not going to ask you again. Where is he?”
“T-the old ruins,” he stammered. “Four hours east of here, at the foot of the mountain. I… I can show you if you—”
“I don’t.” I threw him to the ground. “I’m going to let you live, child. But you’re going to do something for me.”
“Y-yeah! Anything!”
“First, you’re going to tell me what you do for a living.”
“I’m an apprentice!” he said. “Scribe’s apprentice!”
“You need both hands for that?”
He looked at me weird. “Uh, no?”
And then he screamed as I brought the heel of my boot down on his hand and heard each finger break under it.
I suppose it would have been more poetic to make him swear to give up his life of crime. In truth, I’d tried that before in my more callow days. Enough scars and mistakes later, I learned that experience teaches best.
I didn’t kill kids, sure, but I also didn’t let them put weapons in my face and walk away unscathed, either.
“Second,” I said, leaning down. “You’re going to tell me what you’re going to tell your peacekeepers when they ask you who did this.”
Last thing you do if you want to know what a man is made of, you look him dead in the eye and listen when he says your name.
And the kid fumbled around it for a while, trying to find his way around the fear in his eyes and the pain in his hand, before he said to me:
“Sal the Cacophony.”
He sounded like he was going to piss himself.
I put my weapon away, pulled my scarf back up over my head, and made my way back out into the storm. There were going to be a lot of people here before too long with a lot of questions. I didn’t have time for that.
I had a mage to kill, after all.
THREE
THE SCAR
The rain cleared up fifteen minutes after I left Ralp’s, leaving me with the stink of damp earth and sodden grass.
Four hours later, just before dawn cringed and realized it had to look at the Scar one more day, I found the ruins.
And two minutes after that, I realized today wasn’t going to be a good day.
It had once been a fortress, I imagined—one of those collections of palisades, barracks, and towers that had once been crucial during the wars. Forts like these changed hands between the Imperium and the Revolution so frequently that no one could remember which side first built them. And after a few years of drenched autumns, freezing winters, and blazing summers had taken their toll, neither side wanted to claim the embarrassment of owning one.
Forts like these, you didn’t go to unless you had need for a ruinous, dangerous death trap of a hideout.
Daiga the Phantom, like any Vagrant, had plenty of need.
At the foot of the mountain, just like the kid said, there it was. Two big stone towers, their windows long dark and their stairs long crumbled, flanked a high stone wall, a great gash dividing it where cannon or magic had torn through it ages ago.
We came walking up to it slowly, my ears open and listening for any sound of ambush. When it didn’t come, I hopped off and took a good, long look over the ruined wreck of a fort.
“I figure he’s deep.” I pointed toward the towers. “He’s a Graspmage, so he’ll hide with things he can levitate. I bet he could pull those towers down on any mob that came looking for him. That’s the sort of effort he’s probably not willing to spend on one person, though.” I glanced back at her. “That makes sense, right?”
My mount glanced back at me. If she saw a flaw in my theory, she didn’t say anything.
Which made sense.
What with her being a giant fucking bird and all.
Four feet of legs ending in wicked talons, two feet of long, naked neck with big, angry eyes and a sharp, ugly beak, all connected by a fat sphere of coarse black feathers. Congeniality looked as mean, as dumb, and as angry as you would want a Badlander breed to look. The Scar isn’t a place for pretty birds.
At my continued stare, she let out a low gurgling sound.
“Glad we agree.”
I reached into her saddlebags, rooted around until I felt the familiar chill of three thick shells at the bottom of the bag. Thick as a rich man’s finger, made of pure silver, each one engraved with elegant bloodred script of a dead language.
Hellfire.
Hoarfrost.
Discordance.
Tried and true, with hundreds of corpses to testify. These were what you brought to fight a Vagrant. I pulled my gun free and flipped the cylinder out. I loaded all three chambers, fitting each one with a bullet, before I snapped him shut. I didn’t bother checking the sights or the hammer.
That sort of thing, the gun took care of for me.
I slipped him back into my belt, reached into the saddlebag one more time, and grabbed something limp and furry.
“Here you are, miss.” I tossed the dead rabbit to Congeniality. She watched it fall for a second before her neck went taut and her hooked beak caught the thing and started swallowing. “Not so fast, darling. Make it last.”
You can’t trust a Badlander to do much except survive. And I didn’t need this ornery girl running away, looking for food or doing anything except waiting patiently for me to kill a magical bastard. She’d take a few minutes to eat that rabbit, then at least an hour before she vomited the bones and fur back up.
Only one person would be leaving here alive today. It wouldn’t take that long to find out which.
Scarf pulled up around my face, mud under my feet, sky turning a pale blue, I went off to fight a man who could kill me with a thought.
The towers loomed large over me as I picked my way through the gap in the wall and through the ruin. The rain made the old wood stink of age, made the towers groan ominously as the moisture seeped out of them.
If I had any doubts that he was here before, the thought left me as I heard a faint sound weaving its way through the fort. A woman’s voice, deep and resonant, climbing to a high pitch as she sang a long and sad song, accompanied by the sound of violins sighing softly.
Opera. The Lady’s Lament, if I remembered correctly.
That told me three things.
Daiga had very old taste in music.
Daiga knew I was here.
Daiga didn’t give a shit.
I couldn’t blame him. Most of the barracks and storehouses had been burned away and looted over the years, leaving only a few piles of rubble and timber amid the skeletons of their old buildings. No place to ambush from. No way to sneak around. Any way I was coming, it would have to be direct.
And so that’s how I came.
And that’s how I found Daiga the Phantom.
Tall, slender, wrapped in elegant—if soiled—clothes of black and red, he sat in a pristine chair, reclining so the length of his body sprawled out over a rug on the damp earth. A necklace of trinkets—rings, folded-up letters, even a spoon—hung around his thin throat. His face was obscured by an opera mask in the shape of a leering demon, eyes black and hollow, mouth curled up in a toothy smile. He looked exactly like he did in his wanted poster.
Stacks of weapons—swords, spears, shields, bows—surrounded him like the hoard of some great beast. He had enough crates of sundries to feed the army that died here. But for all that, his attention was on the tiny table sitting in front of him, and the voccaphone playing on it, the dulcet opera music rising out of its horn.
He didn’t seem to notice me at all. Instead, he swayed to the music, his gloved fingers conducting an orchestra in his head.
“I’ve no particular use for the machinations of those barbarians in their Revolutionary farce.” Without looking at me, Daiga spoke in a voice so mell
ifluously cultured it probably wore a silk dress. “Weapons of war that strain to do what magic can do so effortlessly. Even this contraption is nothing compared to the real Cathama stage.” He sighed as the opera struck a high note. “But, stranded as one is outside the Empress’s good graces, it’s a blessing to still have a few reminders of civility, no?”
I stepped out into the courtyard—no sense in hiding. I stood as close as I dared, looking at the voccaphone while it blared its music. I shrugged.
“The machine cracks every time she hits a high note,” I said. “They can make a bow that fires ten bolts in three seconds, but they can never fix that fucking crack.”
“Language.” Daiga continued to conduct his imaginary orchestra. “You’ve been out here too long, I fear. No appreciation for a marvel such as this. Even the dim culture of this land is preferable to no culture at all, hmm?”
He waved a hand. His eyes glowed a faint purple behind his mask. From the table, a teacup rose of its own volition and into his hand. He took a long sip behind the mask, then made a chiding click of his tongue.
“Your pardon, madam.”
Another wave of a hand beckoned another cup from the table. It hovered toward me, hung in the air. I took it, nodding a polite gratitude, and tasted old jasmine. And for a very long time, we simply sat there, sharing a cup before we got to the business of killing each other.
“I did not expect to be found,” he said, voice solemn, like he spoke in the presence of the dead. “Not least by you.”
I stared at him for a moment. “You know me, then.”
“I have heard the stories.”
“Which ones?”
“I am only interested in one.” He stared back through the empty eyes of the opera mask. “Were you truly at Vigil?”
I nodded. “I was.”
“I see. And did you truly do what they say you did?”
I hesitated. “I did.”
“And now you are here for me.” His eyes turned away. “Did the Empress send you?”
He sounded almost hopeful, speaking through a voice ragged with disappointments. I shook my head, set the cup on a nearby crate.
“I came for another reason,” I said.
His head sank low, a sigh escaping the demon’s mouth. “I gave everything to the Imperium—my years, my body, and all the wisdom and violence that came with them. And now I am hunted, one more stray dog beset upon by hounds.”
“No one ever gets the death they want,” I replied. “Just the one they deserve.” I glanced at the glistening hoards of weapons across the courtyard. “Were you hoping for an army?”
“Every good lord requires vassals,” he muttered in response.
“Vagrants don’t get to be lords. And they usually get better vassals than children.”
The song lasted one last note, soft and fading. The voccaphone ran out, leaving nothing behind but that soft, crackling sound. Daiga’s hand hung in the air, paused on that last note.
“Did you kill them?” he asked, gentle.
“They won’t be coming to help you.”
He nodded, solemn. “They had hopes of purpose. I had hopes of giving it to them.” He gripped the armrests of his chair. “I had so many hopes.”
He rose out of his chair. I took a step back, reaching for my gun. Not smart to pull it on him yet, though. You can’t act twitchy around a mage, let alone one like Daiga.
“I shall commend them, once we are done. And you, too.” He stood his full height, his necklace of trinkets jangling as he rose. Through the hollow eyes of his mask, he stared at me. “I have heard a story that says you honor the old ways.”
That one wasn’t always true. But this time, it was. I nodded, pushed my cloak back, and exposed the hilt of my gun.
And in response, he spread his long limbs out wide, made a low bow, his empty eyes locked on me.
“Shall we?”
You didn’t often see people like Daiga anymore. Not in the Scar, anyway. Most people out here, let alone men in his circumstances, don’t do things the old way anymore. It’s all just ambushes, tricks, and murder these days. Only the Vagrants keep to the code, even when it’s not always smart to do so.
We grant each other that respect. No one else will.
“Ready when you are,” I said.
“Then may the Lady Merchant reward the worthy.”
He reached up, long fingers trailing across his necklace before they settled on a comb. A worn and well-used thing, missing a few teeth and engraved with the initials D.K.Y. It looked old.
That’s when I began to suspect I was fucked.
“Ocumani oth rethar.”
And that’s when I knew it.
The words boomed out of his mask like a clap of thunder. In the distance, I heard a faint sound like a ringing bell carried on the breeze. With terrifying swiftness, it rose in volume and became a sound that swept through my cloak, past my skin, and echoed in my very heart. The comb in his fingers disappeared in a flash of purple light, leaving behind only faint dust.
In less than two seconds, he had made his Barter.
And in less than three, I pointed my gun right between his eyes and squeezed the trigger.
But that second was all a Graspmage needed.
There was the crack of gunfire, a bright spark of fire exploding, the echoing sound of fiery laughter smothered by metal as something swallowed the fire.
Something like the iron shield hovering in front of him, blackened by flame.
He lowered his hand, guiding the shield away from his face. A faint glow ebbed from its surface as the wards inside it murmured to life. It hovered there, just over his chest, as his demon’s face leered over the rim at me. His other hand rose, and in response, the weapons crates stirred. Swords, spears, gunpikes, all of them rose into the air, pulled by nothing, and formed a halo of steel around his head. His mask grinned as I saw my own fear reflected back to me in a dozen blades.
And now you know why they call him the Phantom.
And why I was running for my life.
I heard the thrum of bows behind me. I felt the bolts whizz past my face. I saw the wet earth shudder before me as a long spear came hurtling over my head, narrowly missing it to impale itself in front of me.
I whirled, my blade leaping to my hand just in time to strike away the sword that came flying toward me. I sent it spinning with a spray of sparks just in time for the next one to come whistling at me. One after another, I parried blows from phantom blades, spitting curses over the sound of steel clanging. One swung low, angling toward my belly. I leapt backward, my heel catching on a fragment of shattered timber.
I fell backward over a pile of rubble, tumbling into a roll and then scrambling to slam up against it. It would have been shitty cover against any fool with a gun, let alone a Graspmage. But I didn’t have a lot of options available to me.
And I was about to use another one.
My gun was in my hand, metal blood pumping warm through brass skin. He rose, just as I raised him, and pointed him at the Phantom. I could tell where he was aiming—he always went right for the heart. It was only with a bit of pull that I aimed him lower and squeezed the trigger.
Daiga’s shield went up. But that wasn’t my target. The shell streaked low, struck the earth beneath him. A bright flash of blue swallowed the night. The earth turned white. A thick patch of frost blossomed in half a second. And in one more, four-foot-long spears of ice burst forth in a frigid white briar.
Hoarfrost. Takes a moment. But it’s worth it.
Daiga narrowly caught it. He leapt into the air to avoid the reaching spikes, hovered there, swung around to affix his empty eyes upon me.
“That weapon,” he hissed, all pretenses of formality gone from his voice. “You.”
“Me,” I said. I flipped the chamber open, loaded another shell, and raised him back up. “And this.”
He didn’t give me a chance to fire. He waved a hand. Arrows followed, singing from six bows and forcing me back
behind the barricade. I peered around, saw him reaching for his throat.
He tore another trinket from his necklace—the spoon, this time. He tossed it into the air. There was the wailing sound once more, the flash of purple light, the blast of dust.
And the six weapons hanging in the air were joined by twenty more from the crates.
More bows rose up, a halo of arrows rising with them. But there was something off about them. Across their wooden bellies, veins of blue light began to burst. Their strings pulled back, drawing arrows that crackled to life with electric light.
Wait. The thought came unbidden. The girl back at the bar. She’d said they’d hit an Imperial caravan, didn’t she? Imperial caravans carry magic. My eyes dawned with realization.
Fuck me, he’s got thunderbows.
And I was running.
The song of lightning followed me, an angry, screeching verse torn from twenty ragged throats. Arrows struck the earth in my wake, vibrating with electricity and bursting into bright flashes of sound and light, mud and earth torn screaming and tossed into the sky.
Another verse, of angry steel and wailing metal, followed. The air shrieked with the sounds of metal as swords came flying out, whirling in great sweeping arcs, trying to hack me to pieces as I ducked low and darted to the side. Spears fell in a great rain, in front of me, behind me, a few inches from my leg. Graspmages weren’t renowned for accuracy, but they didn’t have to be when they had power like Daiga.
That spoon must have been special to him.
With every flick of his hand, he pulled more weapons from their crate, sent more of them shooting, slicing, flying at me. I had to dart and dodge more and more. Eventually, I’d get tired, or I’d trip, or he’d pull the whole fucking fort down on me. I couldn’t do this much longer.
But I didn’t need much longer.
I skidded to a halt, brought up my gun.
Just in time to see a thunderbow, bristling with light and aimed right at me.
The howl of thunder. A scream struck from my lungs. I felt the arrow hit me right in the flank, striking my cloak and sending me flying with the explosion. I skidded across the earth, smoke rising from my body in plumes. The weapons hung in the air, expectant, as Daiga watched me, his mask’s smile drinking in the sight of his latest foe dead.