< Previous Chapter                                                                                                  Next Chapter >

After tacking aimlessly back and forth across miles of barren terrain, the monster finally spotted a goal whose existence seemed to drive it into a rage. Far out at the edge of its perception, at the very border of the Badlands, an old town huddled against the foothills of the Stalrange—mostly flat and practically invisible across such a distance except for its newest construction: the zeppelin dock, at which an airship was tied up, an unmissable target.

The necro-drake roared in mad fury and straightened its course, heading directly for Desolation at the greatest speed its unnatural flight could propel it. Thus fixated, it was oblivious to the shadow which fell across it from above.

“I can get you closer,” Razzavinax the Red offered, his voice lowered to a relatively discreet rumble, inaudible to the monstrosity below then and just barely heard over the noise of wind by his passenger.

“We’d better not risk it,” Gabriel replied. “This should be fine.”

The dragon snorted, emitting a gratuitous little puff of flame as he pumped his wings once to maintain altitude before settling back into an effortless glide. “It is quite a thing, after the life I have lived, to be reduced to a…taxi service.”

Grinning, Gabriel patted the crimson scales once. “Would you prefer to be reduced to the catapult stone?”

He launched himself off Razzavinax’s side, immediately ruined his attempt at a graceful dive by catching his foot on the dragon’s spines, and went tumbling into space, barely avoiding being clipped by the red’s wing.

“Smooth.”

“Shut up, Ariel.”

Fortunately the wind noise was too intense for the exchange to be audible to his erstwhile mount, now receding upward as Gabriel plummeted toward the necro-drake and the prairie below it. Even more fortunately, straightening out his descent in freefall was easier than regaining his footing on flat ground, at least now that he’d practiced it a few times.

The magic he carried—divine, arcane, and infernal—was protected from chaos by the direct attention of Vidius himself. Razzavinax had no such defense, and the necessity of keeping the dragons out of range of the necro-drake’s chaos effect was a strategic hardship, but he and Gabriel had found a way to use it to their advantage. The distance gave him ample time to straighten out and direct his fall, assisted by Ariel—not that he could spare the arcane energy for actual powered flight, a notoriously difficult feat, but Gabriel kept a grip on her handle and was able to channel their combined energies into subtle bursts of kinetic force that enabled him to adjust his course.

Angling his body, he pushed slightly to augment his forward momentum, which was starting to lag behind the necro-drake’s. Waiting until the last moment to draw his divine wand, he extended it to full scythe form just in time to bring it down overhead as he slammed into the monster from above.

Gabriel barely had time to feel the impact of its glass body against his own invulnerable legs before the magic of the scythe bit into it, finishing the job. Pure entropy tore the beast apart, snuffing out its animating magics and reducing its physical form to shards and dust before it had a chance to react.

Immediately it began trying to re-form; whatever the source of this thing’s animating power, it was resilient and not so easily dispatched, as they had discovered. But for a span of some seconds at least, the thing was shattered and vulnerable.

Despite Razzavinax’s complaints, the Conclave of the Winds had rendered far more aid than just transportation. The dragons knew ancient and powerful spells of every kind; it was Ampophrenon the Gold who had swiftly walked the paladins through the methods he knew of dealing with chaos through divine magic.

Calling on that knowledge now, Gabriel lit up a divine aura and pushed it outward, causing the tumbling fragments of glass to shimmer beautifully around him. His own attention he focused on the one all-important spot, the place where he could sense the disruption of the chaos source fighting against the direct power and attention of his god. He angled himself again in freefall, drifting that way with his hand outstretched and sparking a surge of Ariel’s arcane power to close the gap.

By the time Gabriel’s fingers closed on the shard of dragonbone from the skull of Belosiphon the Black, it was already sheathed in regrowing black glass as the necro-drake sought to reconstitute itself. He and Vidius did not give it that chance.

It was a trick of concentration Ampophrenon had taught them; he’d been the last of the three to get the hang of it, but he had it down now. Focusing the intent of the god onto one specific target was as simple as focusing his own, once it had clicked for him, and the gold dragon had said it should remain that way so long as it was only done with good and proper reason. Gods did not appreciate having their presence invoked frivolously, but none of the Trinity would begrudge having their aid called upon to snuff out chaos.

The god of death and duality exerted his will, and the dragonbone shard cracked neatly in half in Gabriel’s hand as the chaos within it was utterly purged. Instantly, the glass fragments around it shattered, falling away in slivers.

Of course, he was still plummeting toward the ground, but Gabriel had hit the planet from much higher up than this with little ill effect. And this time, he had help.

The enormous bulk of a dragon belied the sinuous grace with which they moved; Razzavinax’s massive shape swooped beneath him as fluidly as a waterfall, aligning himself flawlessly and matching Gabriel’s velocity in every direction for the moment it took the paladin to alight gently upon his back. Then he banked, descending less precipitously and pumping his wings to slow as they came to rest on the ragged terrain where the prairie trailed off into the Badlands.

“Neatly done,” Razzavinax rumbled as Gabriel slid off him again, landing much less clumsily this time on the ground. All around them, chunks of black glass were plummeting from the sky, harmlessly inert now—though still razor-sharp and moving alarmingly fast. They bounced off dragonscale with no effect; Gabriel’s half-hethelax skin would have been just as impervious, but he ignited an energy shield to prevent his clothing from being shredded.

“And yourself, my lord,” he replied, bowing. “For someone with vastly greater skills than taxi service, you do it well.”

“No task is too humble to deserve one’s best effort, if it is worth performing at all.” Razzavinax shrunk in seconds to his smaller form, in which he was a pale man with flame-red hair and featureless crimson eyes, dressed in a combination of tight leather pants and open-fronted frilled shirt which looked like something Professor Rafe would wear—an observation Gabe had not shared with him, as you never knew who Professor Rafe had managed to piss off but it was always somebody. “Let us report in and get our next marching orders.”

Gabriel nodded seriously and stepped up next to them. A full-sized dragon would have posed logistical problems, but two men were shaped and sized appropriately to make use of the designated teleportation pad at their improvised command center in the Conclave’s embassy in Tiraas.

The dragon laid a hand upon his shoulder the moment he stepped close enough, and then in a brief swell of shadow the two vanished, leaving behind nothing but a swath of prairie sprayed with shards of black glass.

Howling in mad, unearthly rage, the necro-drake flashed across the plain in pursuit of its tormentor, unleashing its feral roar far more continuously than a being with flesh and blood lungs could have managed.

For its trouble it was hammered by a fusillade of lightning bolts out of the clear sky, pounding it into the prairie below in pieces.

Of course, it immediately began to reassemble itself, already clawing and flailing out of the scorched depression and once more rising to the bait.

A blast of pure arcane energy zipped straight into it, but of course fizzled and spun away in a spray of what looked like confetti before it could impact.

“Oh, that one was just insulting,” the dragon complained. “Really, now, have a little dignity.”

The necro-drake howled at him, beating its skeletal wings furiously and launching itself aloft.

Zanzayed the Blue grinned and exhaled a blast of pure fire over his shoulder; like the lightning attack, it was nothing but mundane physical energy by the time it impacted and thus was not sent askew by the chaos effect, though it was even less effectual. The monster charged straight through it, following him again as he sped up. Both of them beat their wings furiously, the dragon deliberately keeping himself just out of range of the unnatural beast’s magic-disrupting effects.

He’d done his job, though, luring it down to skim directly over the surface of the prairie. And now he’d succeeded in bringing it to the target point.

Twisting his long neck to deliver a mocking grin over his shoulder, Zanzayed was suddenly lit by a corona of flashing arcane sparks, causing him to leave behind a trail like a comet for a brief second before he vanished.

For another second, the necro-drake hesitated, slowing and roaring in frustration. Immediately, though, it resumed course with renewed fury. With the dragon out of the way, there was another target dead ahead: a small and slim figure, but one blazing like the sun with a divine aura.

Screaming its challenge, the monster rose upward in order to meet its foe in a dive, glass claws extended. Standing upright in silence, she watched without fear as it fell upon her.

At the last second, the Hand of Avei was suddenly surrounded by a hardlight construct the size of a house: a single, huge fist of pure divine light.

The necro-drake plowed face-first into Avei’s unyielding power and was utterly pulverized by its own momentum. The force of the impact practically splattered it, sending shards of broken glass spraying in all directions.

Immediately she dropped the construct, golden wings flaring into place behind her even as the giant fist dissipated. Trissiny strode forward through the flattened tallgrass and the wreckage even as the necro-drake’s pieces tried to drag themselves back together.

She smashed one booted foot down on its skull, interrupting the process of its reformation, then bent and unerringly closed her gauntlet around the all-important chaos shard.

Straightening up, Trissiny clenched her fist and focused.

Avei’s presence and full attention descended, smashing into the piece of dragonbone with the force of her wrath. The taint of chaos was annihilated utterly, the shard itself reduced to atoms in the paladin’s grasp.

All around her, the pieces ceased trying to reconstitute themselves and tumbled to the ground where they were, leaving her standing amid the partially-reconstructed shape of a skeletal dragon made of broken black glass.

This time, the flicker of blue lights upon the air was much smaller, and when Zanzayed reappeared it was in his lesser form, complete with bejeweled robes and elaborate pinned hairdo. Somehow, his grin seemed no less broad for being a fraction of the size.

“Well, you don’t lack panache, do you?” he said cheerfully, clapping Trissiny on the back hard enough to maker her armor clang.

She grunted and opened her fingers. What had been a shard of Belosiphon’s skull immediately drifted away in the merest puff of breeze, dissipating in a fine powder of carbon, calcium, and elemental miscellany.

“Same goes. Does it have to be so flashy when you do that? When Tellwyrn teleports you almost can’t even tell anything happened.”

“Ugh.” His featureless blue eyes did not visibly roll, but Zanzayed made it a full gesture of his head and shoulders to make the effect unmistakable. “That’s because Arachne has gotten boring in her old age.”

“I’m telling her you said that,” Trissiny announced, turning her head to give him a mischievous smile.

“Good, then you can also tell her I want my copy of Planes of Plentitude back, and her mint chocolate souffle is overrated.”

“I dunno, that last one sounds a little too rich for my blood.”

“Well, she does have some sense in that little head, after all!”

He ruffled her hair by way of distraction, and in the next second the blue sparks flashed around them again and the world vanished. Both were now standing on the small antechamber in the embassy with two armored Conclave guards standing at attention near the door. At the appearance of a dragon before them, both women thumped their spears against the floor in unison and bowed.

“A little warning next time!” Trissiny exclaimed.

“Complain, complain, complain,” Zanzayed complained, already stepping off the marble platform which was their designated arrival and departure point. “You are so part of this family.”

“Oi, that’s below the belt.”

“Zanzayed, Avelea.” They were met approaching the other way by Razzavinax and Gabriel, returning from the next room. The red dragon nodded to each of them. “The word is we are gaining ground. She mentioned taking the opportunity to experiment while we have a little leeway.”

Trissiny raised an eyebrow. “She?”

“Yeah, by the way,” Gabriel said, clearing his throat. “My first instinct was to not poke into a dragon’s personal business, but, uh, just for the sake of insuring I don’t actually commit some huge breach of etiquette later on… I thought all dragons were male?”

“Biologically, from birth,” Razzavinax said with a shrug. “All dragons are definitely individualists. Beyond that, we do not pry into one another’s personal matters.”

“So…my first instinct was the right one? Damn, I don’t think that’s ever happened before.”

“You are young enough it is still not unimpressive,” the red replied with a small smile, “though on the other hand, that is sort of an obvious universal.”

“Yeah, that sounds more my speed. Knock ‘em dead, Triss.”

“Stay safe out there.”

As the two groups strode past each other, he held up one fist and she thumped her own against it, and then Trissiny and Zanzayed were striding down a short hallway while Razzavinax and Gabriel ascended onto the teleport platform and then vanished in another rise of shadows.

The chamber beyond was larger, occupied by more guards and several other Conclave personnel, all of whom seemed to be scribbling or organizing notes. The sole exception was a gnome with cerulean blue hair wearing a sharp suit of sapphire-colored fabric with thread-of-gold pinstripes, her back to the entry as she studied the huge map table which predominated the center of the room.

“Trissiny, may I present Mirinexes the Blue,” Zanzayed declaimed as they entered, “the Conclave’s newest member, and one we are very fortunate to have. She is the expert on chaos effects.”

“One of them, anyway,” the gnome replied, turning to shoot them a smile, eyes featureless blue orbs just like his. She was standing on a floating platform of pure arcane energy which fizzed constantly under the weight of her small feet. “Nor is the timing a coincidence. I had fully intended to sit back for a few decades and see how badly this Conclave thing crashed and burned before I formed so much as an opinion. But then all this kicked off, and imagine my amazement when my esteemed brothers stepped up to make themselves useful in a crisis! I’ll not stand for being upstaged.”

“A true dragon,” Zanzayed said approvingly. “What’ve you got for us, boss?”

Mirinexes turned back to the map table, frowning. It depicted the Empire, or more accurately the continent, and was clearly magical—and just as clearly malfunctioning. What its enchantments were meant to do Trissiny could not discern, but sections of it throughout the great plains surrounding the Golden Sea were clearly misfiring, obscured by shifting areas of blankness or small fountains of sparks or arcs of electricity.

“The good news is that there have been no more of the damned things emerging,” the blue dragon reported. “Once we finish this cleanup, it should be done—at least until the next batch, of which I am grimly certain there will be one. The more immediate news is also good, or at least better than when you set out. We have a bit of breathing room—not that we should dawdle, but none of the aberrations are currently close enough to inhabited territory that we must rush. At least not—ah, there, you see that section that just cleared up, near Saddle Ridge? That’ll be Caine and Ampophrenon polishing off their target. I’ve sent Razzavinax and Arquin to pick them up and take them to the next site before moving on to their own. I’m sure Ampophrenon can get about fairly quickly, but Razzavinax’s shadow-jumping is second to none and we should not waste time. On the subject of which, there’s something I’d like you two to try, in the interest of gathering more information on our foe before we dispatch them.”

“That’s incredible,” Trissiny murmured. “I thought these things were impossible to track by magic? At least, that was the word before we set out…”

“I didn’t call Mirinexes the expert just to butter her up,” Zanzayed replied, grinning.

“Yes, standard scrying such as this map table is meant to do wouldn’t be able to,” Mirinexes agreed, gesturing at it. “It would naturally try to compensate for the disruption of chaos effects by showing…nothing. A conscious scryer focusing on one directly risks deadly feedback. I’ve re-tuned it to display the errors where it can’t focus in, refined the margins around those and am using the disruptions themselves to track the chaos incidents on the move. It’s not terribly complicated but does require constant attention, and it’s less precise than I’d like, but there’s no real way around that. I’m sure the Empire is working on a similar method; I just happened to have developed this one already, some time ago. Here’s where I want you two next.”

She pointed at one patch of disruption crawling across the map’s surface just west of the Golden Sea.

“That little bastard in particular will come across a Rail line within the next ten minutes. I’d like you two to intercept and observe it discreetly before engaging. So far these things have reacted like demons, all aggression and no thought, but they are not demonic and whatever’s causing their…attitude problem is by definition not the same as infernal corruption. I want to have a look at our buddy’s cognitive abilities. It will either ignore the Rail, attack it, or—worst case—recognize its general purpose and follow it toward a bigger target.”

“We can do that,” Trissiny said warily. “If it attacks the Rail line while we’re hanging back to observe, though… I don’t know if we can intercept before it actually destroys the line.”

“The network itself is shut down, so there’s nobody on it.”

“Okay, but that’s still…”

“If you live in a prosperous country, never shy away from wrecking government property. Repairing it means buying materials and paying laborers. It’s good for the economy.”

“It must flow,” the paladin acknowledged, nodding.

Mirinexes looked up from the table, studying her face. “Hm. You’re a peculiar Hand of Avei, aren’t you?”

“I can live with peculiar.”

“Oh, it was the farthest thing from an insult,” the dragon clarified, grinning. “I’m a mage; the peculiar fascinates me.”

“It’s a shame about the timing, though. There were some women in Tiraas very recently whom I’d have loved to introduce you to. But I guess that ship has sailed.”

“And so should this one,” Zanzayed interjected. “Anything else we need to know, Mirinexes?”

“I’m sure I don’t need to tell a paladin of all people, but just for the record, humanitarian concerns trump intellectual curiosity. If there are any people in the line of fire, take that thing down fast and hard; we can experiment later. By the same token…” She pointed again at the map. “That Angelus thing is moving a lot more slowly than you three; it’s currently intercepting another necro-drake near the Green Belt. I realize it’s no less of a monster than the chaos creatures and based on the intelligence you’ve brought it was unleashed by the same man, but right now it is protecting people rather than attacking them, so I’d prefer you lot keep away and let it work.”

Trissiny bared her teeth, then rolled her shoulders and deliberately marshaled her expression. “Yes…right. Priorities. All right, Zanza, let’s get back to breaking rare and expensive objects.”

“We should party more often, cousin. I hear you like punch?”

“Stop.”

It had stopped…and it had not. Divine light suffused the area with an intensity that made the very air vibrate from the pressure of a god’s personal attention. Toby paced evenly forward through the tallgrass, as all around him the stalks perked up further and began to sprout green shoots despite the season, while tiny rocks and bits of dirt drifted up from the ground. In the localized area inundated by the holy nova, physics itself had become…subjective. There were no rules; there was only Omnu’s light, centered upon his Hand.

The necro-drake was held in place as firmly as if pinned, though nothing was exerting force directly upon it. Snapping its jaws and snarling, it shook its head like a dog trying to shed an ill-fitting collar, bellowing a challenge at Toby. But not attacking, or retreating.

He stepped forward slowly, eyes aglow, expression impassive. As he drew close enough, Toby held up one hand.

“Is this truly all there is to you?” he murmured, gently reaching forward as if to pat the monster’s nose. “Are you only rage, or do you have a mind? Is there anyone in there? If you can feel, if you know yourself, if you want something…then perhaps there is some accord that can be reached.”

It quivered, vibrating with restrained fury, but slowly lowering its head. Toby took the final step, extended his arm those last few inches—

The necro-drake howled savagely and snapped its jaws to cleave him in half. He was already flowing around it like the very air, however; his outstretched hand drifting away even as his other slashed forward in a spearpoint strike, directly between its eyes.

One touch was all it took, all of Omnu’s own power and direct regard channeled into that tiny point. The chaos-tainted shard was blasted from existence in the instant, and all the rest fell to the ground as so much twisted glass in the shape of bones.

Slowly Toby let the power recede, the crystalline music of divine magic fading to be replaced by the gentler sounds of winds through the dry winter tallgrass.

“Never have I seen such a thing,” Ampophrenon the Gold stated in apparent calm, stepping up behind him in mortal form. “Even Hands of Salyrene have seldom wielded the divine with such precision, or mastery. And…this was not done by technique, was it?”

“Not by…magical technique,” Toby whispered. “Damn it. I hoped… Well, I suppose we knew it was futile, but… Even demons have thoughts and agendas, you know? These things are so angry, at everything and nothing. That kind of anger always comes from pain.”

“Yes,” the dragon agreed, stepping up and laying a hand on his shoulder from behind. “And there are demons which can be exceptions to the rule. These are not demons, though. That anger, that pain… I see nothing else inside them. If they suffer, it is one more crime we shall lay at the feet of their creator, when the time comes to confront him. For now, the only kindness we can offer them is oblivion.”

“Omnu is paradox,” Toby said, staring at nothing. “There’s no true peace, except in death. To live is to hurt; the point is to make it mean something. The paradox is in everything that makes the pain worthwhile. I can’t accept that the only kindness is death; what’s the point of life if not to fight against that?”

“You are surprisingly full of both wisdom and doubt for one so young, Tobias.” Ampophrenon gave his shoulder a gentle shake. “It is good to mull these things and seek your answers rather than accept the blithe maunderings of your elders. There is a time and a place, however. We still have work today which no one else can do. When we have achieved a breather, I would be glad indeed to talk with you at more length.”

“Yes. Right.” Toby shook himself, drawing a deep breath. “No standing around being existential while monsters are attacking people. Sorry, all this just…it hits close to exactly the things I’ve been struggling with.”

The dragon nodded, squeezed his shoulder once more, and let his hand fall.

“Then let that be tomorrow’s battle. Today, we press on.”

< Previous Chapter                                                                                                  Next Chapter >

< Previous Chapter                                                                                                      Next Chapter >

7 Years Later

The scrapyard was just the right blend of order and chaos that Emilio had come to enjoy due to his experiences in the Omnist orphanage. A combination warehouse, smithy, and open market, the wide enclosed yard looked at first glance like utter lunacy, awash in cacophonous noise and bodies either milling about or rushing to and fro on urgent business. Only with some exposure and experience did the pattern begin to reveal itself; there were orderly stations and lines for everything from people selling scrap wood and metal to the house or buying it, stations where employees such as himself sorted the junk into categories, small stands where smiths and woodworkers and tinkerers crafted objects from the yard’s products, larger (but still small) facilities in the rear where scrap metal was smelted down and junk wood burned into charcoal. There were even stands capitalizing on the constant crowd to peddle food and drink, though they were banished to the street outside the yard proper; there was a rest area within the walls where employees spent union-mandated breaks and even some regular customers (mostly old men retired from one of the represented trades) liked to hang about all day. Of course, this meant employees dashing back and forth carrying loads of heavy wood, metal, and occasionally other valuables, and customers milling around either conducting their business or just getting in the way.

It was orderly, and because average people were both inconsiderate and fairly stupid, there was always enough chaos going on to keep him on his toes. Emilio rather liked the atmosphere, even if the nature of the work itself was pure drudgery. He was a picker, given heavy leather mitts and a place to stand and assigned to sort different kinds of metal and discard other, useless materials that found their way into the big loads the yard bought from the factories. There were haulers who’d take the filled boxes he produced to the various stations which would be their next stop, though depending on who was working and how busy it was, half the time he ended up having to do that himself. The picking was finicky and tedious labor; Emilio enjoyed the opportunity to exercise his muscles properly by harnessing himself to a wooden sled and dragging a load of metal to the smeltery, but at fourteen he was only barely old enough to legally work in the Empire and the union’s rules didn’t allow him to be assigned such heavy labor. He only got away with doing it sometimes because nobody actually cared that much about the rules, so long as he wasn’t on the books or under an officer’s eyes doing anything that’d cause legal trouble for the yard.

On this particular day the weather had first threatened a downpour, prompting a closing of half the stalls and decisions by the boss to send some of the haulers home. Two hours later the sun was shining brighter than it practically ever did in Tiraas, leaving the scrapyard understaffed, half-shuttered, and inundated with a heavy load of customers, all of which meant Emilio was going to be doing his own hauling today. In short, it would have been his favorite kind of day if not for the distraction which came barreling in an hour before noon.

“Emilio! You gotta help me, man!”

“Oh for the—Raoul, I’m working.”

The shorter boy slid right up to Emilio’s picking station, panting. “Yeah, I know, and you know I wouldn’t bother you on the job if it wasn’t a matter of life and death!”

“You’re probably bullshitting, so let me just assure you it is a matter of life and death, in that if you get me fired I’m shoving your skinny ass in a smelter.”

“Aw, you’d never hurt me, we’re bros. Anyway, I’m dead serious, he’s after—”

Raoul was continually glancing over his shoulder as he spoke and suddenly broke off, skittering around behind Emilio’s current pile of metal scrap to hide. Emilio didn’t stop working, though he did cast a quick gaze around the yard. Nobody in his line of sight seemed to be on the hunt, or particularly agitated, so he wrote that off as Raoul just being jumpy.

“All right, then,” he said with a sigh even as he hoisted the coil of rusted chain which was currently concealing Raoul’s face from the yard and transferred it to his box of iron scrap. “What’d you do this time?”

“Ah, ah,” Raoul chided, straightening up and grinning at him even as he resumed peering nervously about. “You know me better than that, man. It’s who I did.”

“And now he’s coming to chastise your performance.”

“Yeah, yeah, you’re hilarious. No, seriously, man, you’d have done the same if you’d been there. You remember that Stalweiss chick from the fair last week? Green eyes, body like a dryad, sixteen?”

“Well, I didn’t ask her age while I was manning the vegetable stand.”

“Only because Brother Tamir was watching.”

“Damn right. So not only did you steal a march on me, now you want me to save your butt, as usual. All right,” he sighed heavily. “Who is it this time? Father, brother, boyfriend?”

“None of the above! It’s just…well, y’know, a girl like that will invariably have other interested parties.”

“Uh huh. One of ‘em a sore loser, or…?”

Raoul cleared his throat awkwardly, still looking out for whoever had been pursuing him. “Okay, well, you gotta understand—I mean, you saw how hot she was, and naturally I was pretty pleased with myself. So, our paths crossed at the market this morning, and I may have indulged in a little light…taunting.”

“Yep, there it is.” Emilio shoved him lightly out of the way, turning to deposit a load of copper gears in the appropriate box. “Hey, Masi, gimme your full boxes. I’ll take a load back if you’ll watch my valuables.”

“I’m gonna pocket ‘em and tell the boss you did it,” the girl at the next station over immediately announced, even as she began loading boxes of scrap metal onto the sled Emilio had half-filled while he strapped himself into the harness.

“Funny stuff, Masi. You know this is why you’re single.”

“Yeah, it’s totally that and not my lack of tits.”

“It seriously is. Raoul, tell her.”

“I’d hit it,” Raoul chimed, immediately lounging against a support pillar and winking at her, a bold move considering Masi was three years older than he, two heads taller, and twice as broad in the shoulder. Despite those physical advantages, she much preferred to stand in place sorting scrap, so Emilio hauled for her as well on days when they had to do their own, letting her keep an eye on his station while he was away. “And that’s not idle boasting, baby. What time do you get off, and how much help would you like with that?”

“Your friend needs to learn not to punch above his weight class, Emilio,” Masi said right past Raoul, though not without a smile.

“Yeah, so I’ve told him.” In the next moment, Raoul yelped at receiving a kick from Emilio. “How about we deal with the fallout from your last conquest before you start working on the next one?”

“Then you will help me! I knew it, you are a true brother. By the way, what valuables were you talking about?”

“Oh, just valuable compared to junk metal,” Emilio grunted, dragging the sled out into the aisle and starting toward the smeltery in the back of the yard. “Mostly burned-out enchanting components that fall outta the old machinery. Back-alley ‘chanters have some use for it, I dunno. Also the occasional piece of rarer metal, some of the scrapped equipment has gold or silver parts they forget to strip out before selling ‘em off.”

“Oooh.”

“Tiny pieces, and that’s rare. It’s not worth stealing, Raoul. What you’d get from a pawn shop is less valuable for your time than if you just got a damn job like a normal person. Also, Boss Callin would break you in half.”

“Hey, I’m no thief! I was just thinking, y’know, hypothetically. I’ve got more pressing problems right now, speaking of which…”

“Yeah, this is sounding more and more like a you issue. I’ve got your back if it’s about a girl, we’ve all been there, but you deciding to gratuitously piss somebody off is something else.”

“Now, in my defense,” Raoul said reasonably, “I was not in possession of all the facts up front, which makes this not my fault. Obviously I wouldn’t have spoken to him in the same manner if I’d known he was Guild.”

Emilio actually stopped mid-trudge, the slid proceeding a few more inches on inertia before grinding to a halt behind him. He closed his eyes and drew in a slow breath. “Please tell me you mean the Right Honorable Guild of Scriveners and Copyists.”

“Right. Sure. Except, ah, not so much Scriveners as Thieves. But I hear tell they’re pretty honorable in their own—”

“Omnu’s dangly balls, Raoul!”

“OI!” another voice bellowed at them. From across the yard, Callin herself leveled an accusing finger. “Your friend can hang around if he doesn’t get in the way, Ezzaniel! Back to work or get rid of him!”

“Yes, boss,” Emilio shouted back, pulling the sled into motion again. “Just go home, man. This time I think you might wanna sack up and tell the monks what kind of trouble you’re in. They might ream you out, but not literally. Eserites are another fucking matter!”

“You think I didn’t already come to all those conclusions?” Raoul whined. “It’s not the Thieves’ Guild after me, it’s one pissed-off dude who’s in it. I don’t think I wanna lead him back to where we sleep. There’s kids there, man!”

“You mean, in addition to the kid whose fault all this is?” Emilio managed to sigh while dragging the sled. “Well, that’s not a bad point, I guess.”

“Also, he was right on me, and I don’t think I coulda made it all the way back there before— Oh, fuck.”

“Case in point, I take it?” Emilio muttered, again letting the sled grind to a stop so he could turn and look.

He was just in time to see Masi pointing at him and another fellow who he’d never seen before stomping in his direction. Burly, scruffy, and also a teenager by the look of him, though a good bit closer to twenty than Emilio and Raoul. He was very much aware of his awkward position on the road to manhood, though in Emilio’s case it had more to do with the kinds of work he was allowed to do, and the goods and services he could buy with the proceeds. Raoul’s indeterminate standing tended to manifest more as it was today: he was always going after women who should have been out of his league and getting in trouble with men who definitely were. At least he was still young enough that most of the women laughed him off. Emilio was seriously concerned the guy was going to get himself murdered before he was thirty.

“All right, where is he?” the scowling hulk of a boy in the ragged coat demanded, stalking right up to Emilio.

He looked around, the motion meant to express that there were people on all sides of them (several halting in their own business to watch this new show), but also noted that Raoul had managed to completely disappear in the last three seconds.

“Wanna narrow that down, bud?” he asked, keeping his tone deliberately mild. Situations like these were depressingly familiar to him by now; Emilio made it a point of both pride and strategic policy to remain calm when threatened. He’d had seven years of practice since getting an unexpected life lesson from a sorceress in an alley, and while the art of poise under pressure had not come naturally at first, by this point he had it mostly down. Convincing the monks to actually train him had helped a lot, though these days he was largely out of favor in the temple as he’d been forced to reveal that he didn’t plan to be initiated as a monk himself.

“Don’t get cute with me,” the bigger boy snarled, reaching for Emilio’s collar.

A rapid jab swatted his hand away hard enough to make him lean to regain his balance; the Eserite narrowed his eyes and Emilio had to concentrate on not gritting his teeth. He’d hoped this would be some muscle-brained fool who would lash out and provide an excuse for his own clobbering in self-defense, but this one clearly noted Emilio’s better-than-expected physical capability and revised his approach.

“I’m working here, man,” Emilio said, trying for a reasonable tone. “If you want help finding somebody, go talk to the boss over there. She gets paid enough to play tour guide. ‘Scuze me.”

He started to turn around and resume his course, and was not particularly surprised when the thief reached out again to prevent him. Had Emilio not been physically buckled to a heavy load of metal and in the process of turning away he was confident he could have deflected that as well, but as it was, he only managed to bring up his hand again and thump the back of his fist against a brawny forearm as he was grabbed by the shoulder and forcibly pulled back around.

“Don’t waste my time and I won’t waste yours, bud,” the Eserite said in a dangerous tone—a quiet one. Emilio was not intimidated by blustering oafs because it had been a year or so since he’d met one he couldn’t knock on their ass. Then again, he’d never scrapped with anyone in the Thieves’ Guild, for the simple reason that (unlike Raoul) he was not an idiot. This fellow was trained to intimidate, and undoubtedly to harm, which made him something Emilio had to take seriously.

If the thief didn’t kill Raoul, he might.

“Could you take your hand off me, please?” Emilio inquired politely.

The sausage-like fingers, predictably, tightened on his shoulder. “You know who I’m looking for, and you know where he is. Cough him up and I’ll get outta your hair. Otherwise—”

Emilio grabbed the hand and removed it, prompting an incongruous yelp of pain. He was pleased to discover that grip worked in real-world conditions, not having had the opportunity to test it before, but no amount of muscle was a match for simple leverage. Thumb pressed into the palm, bottom edge of the hand pushing down on the wrist; the thief had to either let his hand be pushed away or let his wrist be broken. Human reflexes being what they were, nobody ever took the second option.

“I asked you nicely,” Emilio reminded him, still wrenching the bigger boy’s hand in a painful grip.

Naturally, that wasn’t the end of it. He’d heard about techniques for de-escalation, things the Veskers and Vidians and even (supposedly) Omnists practiced, but that had been no part of his own courses of study. Emilio’s way of handling things meant somebody always got their ass kicked in the end, and this was shaping up to be no exception. It usually wasn’t him; he wasn’t quite as sure about this time.

The thief bared his teeth and drew back his other fist to deliver a blow which looked like it could knock him out. The upside was that the speed of his reactions demonstrated the guy relied on sheer brawn in a fight, and Emilio knew how to counter that. The downside was that all the counters to brute strength were hampered by him being harnessed to a sled full of scrap metal.

Then the other guy froze, his snarl dissolving into a blank face, and Emilio followed the suddenly changed direction of his gaze.

Boss Callin had appeared just behind him and to his left. Though she was a petite woman in the latter half of her forties, her lean arms were as taut and sinewy as a ship’s rigging, which itself didn’t make a huge difference at this moment as she was also pointing a wand directly at the thief’s face. Emilio immediately let go of his hand and took a step back. If Callin shot the guy, that would solve this problem, provided he was not physically holding onto him. Despite his own studies not emphasizing magical equipment, one didn’t train in any kind of combat in this day and age without learning exactly how lightning behaved.

“I don’t know what this is about and I do not give a fuck,” Callin stated. “You don’t fucking come into my scrapyard and try to manhandle one of my pickers. Get the fuck out, boy. Now.”

Released by Ezzaniel, the thief raised one hand in a gesture of surrender, the other occupied by producing a doubloon from within his sleeve. “Now, now, ma’am, let’s not go overboard. You have my apologies for the intrusion. But I think you should reconsider just who you’re pointing that piece at, hm?”

He had begun to roll the gold coin along the backs of his fingers in that thing Eserites always did (or so Emilio had heard, this was the first time he’d seen it in person). Whatever reaction he’d been expecting to that, he was clearly taken aback when Callin stepped forward and slapped it right off his hand.

“Do I look impressed, you little shit?” she spat. “I told you to get out, not to get shirty. You are now trespassing, which means I get to fry your ass and tell the constabulary why I did it. Last chance.”

“Now you’ve gone and escalated this,” the thief retorted, glowering. “If you wanna give me a hard time, fine. But you are not going to disrespect—hey!”

To the clear amazement of both himself and Emilio, someone threw another coin at him. A copper penny; it bounced right off his temple, effectively grabbing his attention. The Eserite rounded on the source of this, snarling once more, and the expression immediately melted from his face.

To the side, now, stood one of the regulars, who for whatever reason had chosen the clamor and hustle of the scrapyard’s picnic tables as his preferred hangout spot for shooting the breeze with fellow retirees. Emilio had seen him around but never paid him any mind; when you’d seen one sixtyish man in rumpled working-class attire, you’d seen ‘em all.

Now, though, the old man had planted himself so firmly in the aisle that the passing shoppers and yardworkers, those not already stopped to watch the unfolding spectacle, instinctively flowed around him. He had fixed the young thief with a steely expression, and was, himself, now rolling a doubloon across his knuckles.

“Son,” the old man said in a voice gravelly from years of smoking, “this is a place of business. You are being extremely rude. I do hope you’re not wasting these good folks’ time because of some personal affair?”

The younger man stared at him blankly, clearly taken aback, which afforded Emilio a few precious seconds to parse what he was seeing and fit it all into place.

Of course. He’d heard the Thieves’ Guild was only tolerated by merchants because they didn’t pick on people indiscriminately and put a firm stop to any disorganized crime in areas where they held sway. Between the crowds, the bustle, and the large number of conveniently pocket-sized items being rushed thither and yon, the scrapyard was a veritable pickpocket’s paradise. Naturally, the Guild would keep watchers here.

And apparently, Thieves’ Guild watchers counted the chastising of their errant members among their duties.

Slowly, the brawny young man drew in a deep breath and let it out. Without another word to his senior, he turned to Boss Callin and bowed.

“Humble apologies, ma’am. It seems I was out of line. I’ll just get out of your way. You folks have a fine day, now.”

He lingered just long enough to give Emilio a malicious stare, but turned and strode back to the scrapyard’s front gate. The old Eserite had already about-faced and was ambling in no great hurry back toward his usual spot at the tables, once more with the slightly shuffling gait of an elder who just wanted to lounge in the sun. Even viewed from the back, the transformation was striking. Completely gone was the straight-backed, hard-eyed enforcer who had just stared down an angry Guildsman.

Callin blew out a heavy breath of her own, then turned a dour look on Emilio. He cleared his throat and grabbed his leather harness, turning to resume hauling, but the boss stepped right in front of him. Not to chastise Emilio, though; she stalked right up to a heap of scrap metal, leaned bodily over it, and thrust her arm into the gap at the other side.

“Hey what ow ow ow!”

Boss Callin was even stronger than she looked; even being no taller than Raoul, she had no trouble hauling the boy physically upright by a grip on his hair.

“You wanna explain to me what fuckery you just dragged into my scrapyard in the middle of a workday, son?” she demanded, releasing him.

“I…uh, well. Madam, I won’t bullshit you.” Raoul roughly smoothed his hair back down, ducking his head and looking up at her through his eyelashes. “This all started over a girl.”

“Oh, for fuck’s fucking sake,” Callin groaned. To Emilio’s surprise, she didn’t seem actually angry. “You kids and your bullshit. Look, boy: this is a place of business. We’ve got shit to do, and if you disrupt my yard any further I will personally hurl your bony ass into the street. But, if you can avoid causing me any more headaches and stay out of everyone’s way, I don’t mind you being here. Clear?”

“Crystal!” Raoul saluted. “Lady, you are both saint and scholar and it is a privilege to bask in your radiance.”

“Omnu’s balls, he talks like a bard. You really hang out with this kid, Ezzaniel?”

“We were raised together,” Emilio explained. “Speaking of which, boss, we live in an Omnist temple. Not even the Thieves’ Guild is gonna go cause trouble there. You really don’t need to indulge him.”

“Traitor,” Raoul complained.

“You need to take better care of your friends, Ezzaniel,” Callin said severely. “Ninety percent of everything is bullshit, except the people who have your back. Now you get back to work, I don’t pay you to stand around getting life lessons.”

“Yes, boss,” he sighed, pressing forward into the harness and tugging the sled back into motion. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Raoul already making a beeline for the table area and the older Eserite once more seated there.

Because of course he was.

“They’re not useless swords, just over-specialized,” Emilio explained that evening as he and Raoul walked home from the scrapyard. He was carrying a length of polished wood which had turned up in the burnables pile and which he’d saved and bought for pennies, because he recognized its form. Hence this conversation.

“What’s specialized about it?” Raoul demanded, reaching over to flick the bokken now resting on Emilio’s shoulder. “I remember they looked like that, except metal. A sword’s a sharp metal stick which you put in the other guy before he puts one in you.”

“I know for a fact you only say these things to piss me off.”

“Yeah, and it was more fun before you realized that. Hey, d’you suppose this one came from that studio you went to? There can’t be many Sifanese martial arts schools in town, right?”

“This ‘town’ is huge and the capital of the Empire, so who knows? I can’t see Sensei throwing one out, especially since there’s nothing wrong with it.” Tugging the bokken away from Raoul’s prodding finger, he ran his own hand over its smooth length. About a yard long, curved, carved so that its convex side resembled a wedge though of course it wasn’t sharp enough to cut anything, and polished, it bore many dents and scratches from a lot of practice sparring, but certainly wasn’t damaged enough to deserve having been in the trash. Emilio did not strictly speaking have any need for the thing, it had just hurt his heart to see it destined for the charcoal burners. “Anyway, they’re specialized because they require that one very specific martial art style to use effectively.”

“What happens if you use a kanata the wrong way?”

“Katana, and like any specialized tool, it breaks. They’re made to cut traditional Sifanese armor in duels, which is cloth and wood because it’s made to block arrows rather than swords. And that’s because Sifan has these crazy powerful fairies called…uh, kitsies or something, I pretty much only memorized the martial arts terms. They have all these rules everybody there has to live by, one of which is the people there can’t mine very much iron. So there’s not enough for infantry swords or metal armor. So, specialized swords for nobles, made to cut cloth armor.”

“Shame. I remember seeing the ones the teacher had displayed, they were wicked cool lookin’.”

“Objectively true. But it doesn’t really matter how wicked cool a sword looks if it’s just gonna bend as soon as it hits a different kind of sword, or platemail—”

“Sorry to interrupt your history lesson, boys, but I think you owe me something.”

“Aw, fuck,” Raoul muttered, hunching his shoulders.

Emilio turned back around, unhurried, to behold the other reason he’d seized the serendipitous opportunity to snap up the wooden practice sword. Behind them stood the brawny young Eserite from before, which he had more than half expected, knowing a fair bit about the psychology of bullies.

“Have you seriously been waiting around out here all day?” he asked.

“Oh, it’s my day off. There wasn’t much to miss.” The youth idly swung a new acquisition of his own which had not been in evidence that morning: a brass-studded cudgel, also dented from considerable use and marked on its business end with ominous stains. “Now then. Where were we?”

“I think when we left off you were getting a reminder of the Thieves’ Guild policies about throwing your weight around on non-Guild business,” Raoul said, not so subtly edging behind Emilio.

“Yup. I was outta line,” the thief agreed, slowly whirling the cudgel at his side by its attached leather strap. He wasn’t spinning it fast, but the weight of it still made menacing whooshing sounds with each revolution. “My apologies for that. So just to clarify my position here, Tiny, me beating your ass is strictly personal, no religious business implied. That clear up your concern?”

“Well, not my chief concern,” Raoul muttered.

“How about if he just apologizes?” Emilio suggested.

“Fuck that and fuck him!” Raoul exclaimed.

“How about if you butt out?” the thug retorted. “I’m not gonna hate on a guy for backing up his friends, so I’ll tell you what, bud: don’t stick yourself into this again and I won’t give you a taste of your own, sound good?”

“Oh, buddy, you have no idea who you’re messing with,” Raoul crowed.

“Raoul,” Emilio said patiently, “if you don’t shut the fuck up I’m gonna personally hand you to him.”

“What’s it gonna be, smart guy?” demanded the tough, deftly catching his cudgel.

They weren’t on the busy street right outside the scrapyard, of course; the guy had apparently been following them since then, only making his move now that they were in a completely deserted side avenue too narrow for vehicle traffic and only better than an alley because all the tenements lining it had their doors on this side.

Psychology of bullies. Emilio had no interest in beating this guy up and certainly didn’t need the Thieves’ Guild getting a bug up its butt about him, but he recognized that this had already progressed far enough that the boy wasn’t going to drop this unless forcibly persuaded.

So, instead of answering, he flowed instantly into stance and swept the bokken at the club. Not, as nearly all sword forms demanded, at his opponent, but at the weapon. Wood clacked against wood hard enough to make the Eserite stumble; to Emilio’s disappointment, he had gripped the cudgel too tightly for it to be swept from his grip by the blow.

The thief staggered briefly, but caught himself just as quickly and grinned. “So that’s how you want it?”

Emilio raised the bokken to a ready position and waited. It wasn’t a proper kendo stance; he barely knew those, having had only three lessons before figuring out that such an esoteric martial art was too specialized to be much practical use to him when there were so many others to study. For example, he did know the relatively obscure Eagle Style longsword form. And despite his lecture of a minute ago, to a certain extent, a sword was a sword.

The Eserite swung at his head.

Emilio deflected it, whacked the bokken against his shoulder and then jabbed him hard in the solar plexus.

Those would have been disabling and then killing blows respectively had it been a bladed weapon; as it was, the man still didn’t even drop his club, nor collapse the way someone should on taking a hard jab to that spot. His coating of muscle was clearly no joke, and perhaps Emilio had been an inch or two off. As it was, he stumbled back, half-doubled over and staring up at Emilio in consternation.

Emilio surged forward, wooden sword upraised. The thief raised his club to block it; he changed his angle of attack and cracked the man’s wrist, finally making him drop the weapon.

Then, rather than pressing the advantage, he stepped back.

“We live at an Omnist temple, you know,” he said while the thief wheezed and clutched his bruised wrist. Hopefully he hadn’t broken the bones; you could do that with a wooden sword. In fact, you could kill with one if you hit the head or neck in just the right way. “Free room and board till we’re twenty. We can even earn some pocket money taking over extra chores; Raoul does. I don’t need a job, you see. I do the job to pay for my training. I take lessons in every fighting style that someone in Tiraas teaches. Any moment I’m not working, I’m learning ways to beat you within an inch of your life.”

He shrugged, and lowered the bokken, still held at the ready but in a less defensive stance while the bruised Eserite stared at him.

“Just thought you deserved to know what you were wading into, bud. It sucks getting blindsided. You still wanna push this?”

“Yeah, sucks to be you!” Raoul crowed. “C’mon, where’s all that bluster now, huh?”

Emilio smoothly stepped to one side, opening a space directly between the Eserite and Raoul, and turned a flat stare on his friend.

“Now, Raoul, apologize to the man.”

“Excuse you?” Raoul demanded, his own bluster evaporating instantly.

“You’re my friend; that means I have your back if you’re being picked on. It also means I’m not gonna sugar-coat it for you when you need and/or deserve to get your ass kicked. This guy is reasonably pissed off because you were acting like a cock. I’m not saying he’s handled it gracefully, but the man deserves an apology.”

It was hard to say which of them looked more incredulous.

After the stunned pause had drawn out for a few heartbeats, however, Raoul suddenly chuckled.

“Yeah. Y’know what? He’s not wrong. Look, man.” He stepped to the side, opening a wider space in which to get a full view of the Eserite. “I was bein’ an asshole to you, and it really wasn’t called for. So, I’m sorry. Sincerely.”

“Huh.” The thief had straightened back up and was now looking quizzically back and forth between Raoul and Emilio. “Well, then. All things considered, I guess my only reasonable choice here is to politely accept. Apology…accepted, then. And look, kid,” he added, annoyance creeping back into his face and voice. “It wasn’t really about the girl. Shit happens, I don’t believe in holding grudges over stuff like that. But you were seriously being a little shit over it.”

“I’m half curious exactly what you said,” Emilio commented.

“Hey, lesson learned!” Raoul held up both his hands, palms out. “Henceforth I shall be the very soul of grace in victory.

“You’re all right, man,” the thief continued, turning to Emilio. “Hey, you’re also good in a scrap. The Guild always needs—”

“Not a chance in hell.”

“Wow, don’t over-think it,” he drawled, bending to pick up his cudgel—with his left hand. “I wouldn’t want you to agonize on my account. Well, boys, you take care. See you ‘round.”

“Not if—” Raoul broke off at Emilio’s flat look, for once not needing to be whacked. Silence reigned while the Eserite turned and strolled off back the way he had come, leaving them alone in the narrow street.

“Why do I get the feeling,” Emilio asked, “that despite all the fires I’ve had to pull you out of, it’s gonna be me who ends up murdering you?”

“Aw, you love me,” Raoul grinned. “C’mon, let’s get outta here. This has been a triumphant day, I say we celebrate at the Shabby Quack. I’m tellin’ you, that waitress was giving you the eye last time.”

“Mm. You’re buying.”

“Oy, you’re the one with the big fancy job!”

Emilio gave him a look.

“On the other hand,” Raoul mused, “there is the fact that I’m buying. Gotta consider that.”

“That waitress was not giving me the eye, you perv. She was, like, twenty-five.”

“Aw, c’mon, don’t be like that. Live for the challenge, that’s what I say! Even if you don’t get under her skirt I bet she’s flattered enough by the effort to sell us alcohol. That’s how I get served in half the pubs in this district! Ladies have egos, too.”

“You ever pause to consider that maybe the way you act is the reason for all the trouble you get in?”

“Emilio, life’ll pass you by while you’re pausing to consider. Girls and booze, that’s where it’s at!”

“You can’t hold your drink, either. That’s how you got banned from half the pubs in this district. By the time you can legally drink you’ll have to ride the Rail to Madouris to find someone who’ll sell to you.”

Behind a resurgent layer of Tiraas’s infamous cloud cover, the sun sank below the level of the walls as the two of them sauntered on toward whatever the night held for them.

< Previous Chapter                                                                                                      Next Chapter >

< Previous Chapter                                                                                                        Next Chapter >

Raoul got back up, scrubbing a fist across his mouth. He didn’t try to run, and he still didn’t cry—just glared. So Emilio hit him again.

The smaller boy rocked back, staggered, but caught his feet. Raising his head, he sneered at Emilio. “Feel better?”

“Shut your little mouth!”

This time, Raoul dodged—the first two blows, anyway, before Emilio landed an uppercut on his chest, driving the air out of him in an audible whoosh. Raoul was lifted slightly off the pavement and fell back down in a slump, landing on his hands and knees. Emilio grinned down at him and pulled back his leg for a kick.

He wasn’t even completely sure…why. It wasn’t because Raoul was smaller—they were the same “probably about seven” the monks had vaguely decided, but definitely not growing at the same pace—or because he disliked the boy in particular. Emilio was big for his age, and also fast, which meant he’d gotten accustomed to venting his anger, whatever its cause, on whoever was nearby, just as the older boys did to him and anyone else they could. For a temple of Omnu, the orphan wing was host to a whole lot of petty violence whenever the monks happened not to be looking. Which was often; they seemed mostly concerned with their spiritual practices, doing their “duty” of providing a home for orphans and regular soup lines for the poor almost begrudgingly. In fact, they seemed to prefer having the orphans do that, as well as the lion’s share of the vegetable gardening, so they could meditate and practice martial arts. The kids got a very basic coaching in Omnist doctrine, enough to parrot the right answers, and then mostly left alone unless they were causing trouble or needed for chores.

Sariana had opined to Emilio that the Lower Ward Temple was home to some not-very-good Omnists. He hadn’t any basis for comparison, really, but he doubted any others were notably better. It was tough all over and adults were just generally disappointing.

This was just how it was. Life was kick-or-be-kicked, and Emilio knew which he preferred, and this little bastard Raoul always denied him the satisfaction by refusing to cry or flee or be cowed, no matter how one-sided their fights were. So he pulled back his foot in preparations for a hard blow to the boy’s ribs, anticipating the satisfaction of finally pounding some fear into the little brat, and so in the first instant after he was yanked physically off his feet and into the air he felt outrage at being thwarted before confusion or fear.

“What—hey! Let me go! Put me down!”

“Why don’t you make me, little man?”

He kicked, thrashed, and swiped, none of his limbs connecting as he was slowly spun in a full circle. It took him a few seconds to realize he wasn’t being picked up by a normal grip on his shirt as usual, but levitated off the ground. Even that didn’t click until he saw her standing there, a full three yards distant, holding up one hand in a lifting gesture and smirking at him.

Emilio paused in his struggling to stare. He’d never seen an elf this close before.

The way people talked about elves, he’d expected basically a person with Stalweiss coloration and pointed ears. Her ears were not only pointed, but long, sticking straight up through her blonde hair till their tips were even with the top of her head. Overall, her facial proportions were…off. Just a bit too fine-boned, features a hair too sharp, her green eyes seeming a little too large. You could meet a normal human with a face like that, but you’d look twice. There was nothing unusual about her clothes, just boots, pants and a vest over a collared shirt, but she wore striking gold-rimmed spectacles.

“Get outta here, elf witch!” Emilio shouted fruitlessly, swiping at her from yards away and only setting himself into a slow rotation in midair.

“Mage, actually.”

“Elves can’t be mages!”

She practically howled with laughter at that; fortunately his languid spin had put his back to her at that point so he didn’t have to watch. Unfortunately he was now facing Raoul, who was now grinning despite being partially doubled over in pain. Emilio kicked at him, too, but he was out of range.

“Yeah, doesn’t feel good, does it?” the elf commented. As Emilio drifted back around so that he could see her again, she made a contemptuous twirling motion with her finger, setting him to a faster spin. “Somebody with more power picking on you. Helpless. It’s not nearly as funny when you’re on the other end, huh? But then again…”

He suddenly stopped, then was bodily whipped around to face the street, whereupon he yelped, finding the elf had silently crossed the gap and was now almost nose-to-nose with him.

“Maybe you already know something about that.”

Emilio tried to punch her. Probably not the best move in that situation, but it was all he could think of. She caught his fist and held it effortlessly.

“Tell me, boy. Have you ever given any thought to why you do the things you do?”

“Let me go!”

“Make me,” she repeated.

He kicked at her midsection; she batted his foot aside with one lightning-quick swat of her free hand, then gave his fist a shove, sending him drifting away. Emilio found himself regretting—among other things—having cornered Raoul in this unoccupied cul-de-sac far enough from the street festival that there were no monks, patrolling soldiers, or adults in general. He could scream. There was always somebody not too far; it was Tiraas. But people who heard screams didn’t always care enough to do anything about it. It was, after all, Tiraas.

Anyway, screaming would be admitting weakness.

“Let me guess: your dad likes to smack you.” The elf cocked her head to one side, peering at him. “Big brother? Other boys at school?”

“He doesn’t have any of that,” Raoul piped up, finally straightening. “We live at the Omnist temple.”

“Ahh, an orphanage.” She nodded sagely. “That explains a lot. Why, your whole life is helplessness and people pushing you around, isn’t it? Hence…this. You can’t push back against the bigger powers around you, so you push down at whoever can’t stop you. And sure, while you’re pummeling the younger kid, for those few moments you feel like the big man.”

“I’m not younger!” Raoul said defensively. “Just…not as big!”

She shrugged. “Well, that’s what it all comes down to. But it’s never enough, is it? Never lasts long. Soon enough, you’re back to being the buttmonkey, storing up that anger till you can take it out again on somebody else who’s not big enough to fight back. Around and around and around, and what does it get you? A bully is a weakling, sonny boy. Strength is standing up to those who are stronger than you, not weaker. Long as you only pound on the small fry, you doom yourself to forever be small fry.”

“You don’t know anything!” Emilio shrieked. He hated how high his voice rose in pitch, hated the trembling behind it as tears of sheer frustration threatened.

“Yeah, that’s right, kid, I haven’t seen this a million times in my thousands of years on this world,” she chuckled. “Please, you think you’re special? You know how many hundreds of little buggers exactly like you are doing exactly this thing right now in this city alone? Well, I’ll give you this much: I’m in town to drop in on Theasia, but I honestly think this here is more interesting.”

“Th-the Empress?” Raoul stammered. “You’re on first name terms—”

“Oh, she is not a fan of me,” the elf cackled. “Truthfully I approve of the girl, broadly speaking, but she had the unmitigated gall to suggest, in public, that I wouldn’t dare show my face here, and obviously I can’t have that. Once people discover they can push you around, they never quit. You two know that as well as anyone, right?”

“Then why don’t you go pick on the Empress if you’re so special!” Emilio snarled.

“Because that would cause me a shit ton of problems,” the elf explained, now smiling with something akin to satisfaction. “Maybe enough to put me in real danger. An Empire is a hell of a thing to have mad at you, boys. See, that’s the thing about power: there’s never enough. Somebody always has more. If you live to chase power, it’ll eat you alive and you’ll never be satisfied. Instead… Well, let’s try a theoretical exercise. You are even more in my power than your little buddy here was before I came along. Tell me, boy, how would you prepare yourself to not be in this situation next time?”

Emilio growled at her, kicking at nothing in midair. Now she was holding him in position so he had to face her.

“Well,” Raoul mused, “I’d—”

“Ahp!” The elf held up a hand at him. “You don’t need this lesson. Well? Go on, boy, pitch me an idea.”

“Fine,” Emilio spat. “You want an idea? Then I’ll become a wizard. Or a warlock! I’ll learn enough magic to tie you up in the air and see how you like it!”

“Okay, sure,” she said, shrugging, and still wearing that infuriating little smile. “Let’s say, just for the sake of argument, that you have a chance in hell of ever being good enough at any school of magic to take me on. I’ll have a good cackle about that over tea later, but this is a theoretical exercise, after all. What about the next person? The next dragon, or paladin, or archmage, or whatever? Because it’s like I said: there’s always someone better. What’ll you do about them?”

“I’ll… I’ll just get more—”

“Until there’s no one more powerful than you?” She raised an eyebrow. “You know how many people have wasted their lives trying that exact thing? Most just destroyed themselves. A rare couple bumped up against the actual gods. There is always someone bigger, lad. No exceptions. Power is a dead end.”

“Easy for you to say!”

“Yes, it is,” she agreed, “because I have the power. But there are people more powerful than me, things in this world I wouldn’t dare screw with. Wanna know how I still get to be alive and as powerful as I am?”

“Because you’re too chicken to fight them?”

“Close!” She held up one finger. “So very close. Because I have no need to fight them. Because I’m not trying to shut up that little voice in the back of your head right now which is always angry and frightened over how weak you are.”

“Shut up!” he screamed.

“No,” the elf said implacably. “I’m about to tell you how to silence that voice; this is the important part. Instead of power, you need strength.”

“Uh…” Raoul blinked quizzically. “I don’t get it.”

“Power is the outward quality,” the elf lectured them. “The capacity to get stuff accomplished, to exert your will on others. Useful, to be sure; everybody needs some of it. But it doesn’t satisfy. If you have nothing in your heart but power, you’re imprisoned by your need to exert it on others, and your horror of having it exerted on you. Strength is the inner quality. Strength is expressed in calm, in courage. Strength is your capacity to be sufficient in yourself, unbroken by those who defeat you and free from the compulsion to defeat others.” She made a beckoning motion with one finger and Emilio found himself floating back toward her, though now he was, to his own surprise, listening closely. “It is strength that lets you know how much power you need, enables you to gain that much power, and then—and this is the really hard part, boys—stop. You wanna be free from the fear and anger others cause you, and free from the need to pound on the little ones? Then you need to be strong.”

“I’m…already stronger than them,” Emilio muttered.

She shook her head. “Nope, you’re just more powerful. You wanna learn about strength? Then you should ask him.”

The elf pointed at Raoul, who blinked. Emilio turned his head to stare at him in disbelief, and at that moment he was dropped. It wasn’t far to fall; he caught himself after a stagger, then turned back to stare up at the elf, a frown of confusion creasing his face.

“Small fry here is stronger than you are, right now,” she said.

Emilio scowled. “Huh?”

“That’s why you felt the need to pound on him, boy,” she said relentlessly. “Because no amount of pounding would break him. Because he took it, stood back up, and took more. Whatever you could dish out. Your need for power demands satisfaction, and someone with strength can deny you that. Strength beats power, every time; a powerful person can destroy a strong one, maybe, but they’ll be left with that feeling of weakness that you hate so much. Strength is the cure for that.”

“Wh…I…” He looked at her, then at Raoul, who seemed almost as confused as he did, then back. “How?”

“Well, hell, son, there are whole religions based on trying to figure that out,” the elf chuckled. “It’s not my specialty; I’m out to cure stupidity, not weakness. But I’ll tell you what: start where you are. You boys live in an Omnist temple, right? If you want to develop inner strength, one of the best things you can do is take up the martial arts.”

“They…the monks don’t teach us that,” Raoul said.

Her eyebrows drew together. “What?”

“Yeah, they’re not… Well, some of the kids, I guess,” Emilio muttered, sharing a sour look with Raoul. “The suck-ups who wanna learn their…monk stuff. They don’t have time for the rest of us, it’s just the religious ones they care about.”

“Huh. I hate to break it to you, boys, but it sounds like you live in a pretty shitty temple.”

“We know,” Raoul muttered.

“But there, again, is an opportunity,” she mused. “Omnism leans pretty heavily on meditation and inner peace; that’s its own kind of strength. My advice would to be do learn what you can from them, and do what you must to get them to teach you. Those are qualities you can then parlay into getting yourself out of there and into better opportunities. Meanwhile, mister, I’ll leave you with this thought.” She leveled an accusing finger right at Emilio’s nose. “Stop picking on the littler kids. A bully is, without exception, a pathetic weakling. Everybody understand that, on some level. Every time you do this, you leave behind a trail of everyone watching who knows how weak you are inside. You wanna stop feeling that way? Step one is to cut that shit out.”

Emilio scrubbed at his nose with his sleeve, saying nothing. He couldn’t find anything to say.

“Well, do what you want, I suppose,” the elf sighed. “I’ll admit I’m just venting my own frustrations, because I can’t damn well shake some manners into that Empress. Maybe this visit won’t be a complete waste of my time if somebody came out of it a little better for the benefit of my perspective. You remember what I said, now. Goes for you, too,” she added, pointing at Raoul. “Just cos you’ve stumbled onto a useful character trait doesn’t mean you’ve got no room to improve. It’s up to you now, boys. I have my own passel of dumb kids to handle.”

She winked, snapped her fingers, and was just…gone. There was the faintest puff of air, that was all; where there had been an elf, suddenly there stood nothing.

Emilio and Raoul jerked back in surprise, then both turned to peer around the little open-sided courtyard. They were alone; this was a quiet area, but the sounds of the city still drifted in over the rooftops and there was of course the omnipresent noise of the Wildfeast celebrations going on just one street over.

Their eyes met. Raoul made a wry face, and Emilio frowned, unconsciously clenching his fists.

“Hey, Emilio?”

“What.”

“I…I think that was Tellwyrn.”

He snorted. “Omnu’s balls, you’re stupid. Tellwyrn’s not a real person, that’s just a story.”

“She is too real! She’s a historical figure!”

“Yeah, whatever.”

“I’m gonna tell Brother Timon you’re cursing in Omnu’s name!”

Emilio took one step toward him, glaring and raising a fist.

Raoul puffed his chest up, which was rendered almost comical by the difference in their sizes. But he didn’t back away, or so much as flinch.

Emilio stopped, narrowing his eyes, and just stared down at the smaller boy for a few seconds. Then, slowly, lowered his fist and forced himself to relax it.

“Why are you…like that?”

“Like what? You mean my inner strength?” Raoul grinned, showing off the gaps in his teeth. “I’m just awesome, that’s all.”

“I’m gonna thump you.”

“Ooh, you’re gonna thump me. I wonder what that’ll be like. Maybe this time I’ll actually…nah, you’re still gonna walk away pissed off and not feeling any better.”

“Don’t tell me you believe that elfish crap!”

Raoul shrugged. “Made sense to me. You’re so big and like to punch so much, why don’t you ever hit back when Divradh takes your porridge?”

“He’s twelve! He’s twice my size! What do you know?!”

“You think I don’t know what it’s like? Seriously?” Raoul spread his arms wide in an incredulous gesture.

“That’s just what…everything’s like,” Emilio muttered, looking away. “Everybody gets hit. Everybody gets pushed around. You’re not special.”

“Yeah. Everybody gets pushed around. It’s gonna happen no matter who you are. So at least you can make sure they don’t get to enjoy it.” Again, Raoul grinned. “Try it sometime, Emilio. You know how much it pisses you off.”

“I did!” Emilio shouted. “He just kicked me till I couldn’t breathe, and laughed!”

“Yeah, and so next time, you didn’t fight back. So he got what he wanted. And did that stop him punching you?”

They stared at each other in silence again. Emilio scowled, but this time at his own thoughts more than at Raoul.

“How about this,” the smaller boy suggested. “Next time he steals your breakfast, toss it all right in his stupid face.”

Emilio had to laugh incredulously at that. “Are you nuts?”

He shrugged, grinning. “Well, you’re not gonna get to eat it anyway. What sounds better to you, letting Divradh get what he wants or ruining his whole morning?”

“He’ll beat my face in!”

“Yeah, and who gave you that bruise? Giving in sure doesn’t stop him! Tellwyrn was right—”

“That wasn’t Tellwyrn, you little weirdo! What would Tellwyrn be doing in some alley in Tiraas talking to the likes of us?”

“Whatever, she was still right.” He folded his arms self-importantly. “I’m the expert in this. I get my butt kicked three times a day, and you don’t see me crying about it. An’ you know what? Madi and Nomar and Brad don’t bother anymore. You wanna piss Divradh off as much as I piss you off? Just do the same.”

Emilio hesitated, considering. There was the urge, of course, to just put an end to the frustrating conversation by punching Raoul in the face. After being manhandled and talked down to by that witch he was definitely in a punching mood. But the idea…

“Yeah, okay,” he said at last. “And then what?”

< Previous Chapter                                                                                                        Next Chapter >

< Previous Chapter                                                                                                      Next Chapter >

Joe wasn’t really surprised that he had to wait for those explanations. Jenny had cited the need to make preparations and the fact that there would be plenty of time for long discussion while they traversed the Golden Sea, and while Joe knew a deflection when he heard it, that one had the benefit of making good, solid sense. He resolved to pin her down harder if she tried it again once they were out of town, but this didn’t seem the moment to push. You had to read the other player, know when to fold and when to hold.

Thus, he arrived at the head of Sarasio’s main street the following morning none the wiser about the adventure on which he’d agreed to embark, not to mention slightly bleary despite the strong black tea he’d downed before setting out. He had ended up cutting short his usual night at the poker table, for the sake of notifying the Sheriff of his plans—not that there was much she could do, but he’d promised—and then getting an early night’s sleep. He hated being poorly-rested for the same reason he didn’t drink: any condition which messed up the normal functioning of his brain made it amazingly uncomfortable to exist with his specific package of talents and perceptions. Joe required his body to immediately and precisely turn information into action, otherwise he felt naked, vulnerable, and stressed occasionally to the verge of panic.

Given what little he knew was going on, it was altogether not that surprising that the surprises began immediately.

“Jenny,” he greeted her with a nod, then tipped his hat fully to the other individual present. “Elder Sheyann. I confess I’m surprised t’see you here.”

“Always a pleasure, Joseph,” the elf replied with a warm smile that made the sentiment sound sincere. He enjoyed every opportunity to converse with elves; their facial expressions were so minutely detailed and varied. Joe wondered whether that was something they did deliberately or just the natural result of living for centuries, but had never thought of a polite way to ask. Elven and prairie folk manners alike emphasized minding one’s own business. “I could hardly pass up the opportunity to see the Shifter off. It is rare enough that we have been blessed to be her neighbors for a few years.”

“The Shifter, huh,” he drawled, turning back to Jenny.

She grimaced. “Morning, Joe. C’mon, Sheyann, you know I hate formalities.”

“We all have our little burdens to bear,” the Elder said with a serene smile. “It has long been a pet peeve of mine when immortals drag well-meaning souls into dangerous business without properly warning them. Perhaps recent events here and in the grove have left me more than usually sensitive to the issue.”

Jenny gave her a mulish look, and received a bland smile in reply.

Joe dutifully absorbed and filed away the layered implications in this exchange but decided the better part of wisdom was not to insert himself into whatever was going on between those two. Instead, he stepped around Jenny and carefully patted the third member of the party on the neck.

“Mornin’, Beans.”

The mule turned his head to give Joe a long look, then snorted, shook his mane and went back to staring glumly at the horizon. That was a positive interaction as far as Joe was concerned; the infamously cantankerous Beans was known to greet even people he knew by biting or kicking.

Jenny had hitched him up to a small cart, two-wheeled and comfortably sized for two people to ride in along with the pile of provisions and equipment for an extended camping trip she’d stowed in the back, but not big enough to use as a place to sleep on the trail. Joe looked this whole setup over with a critical eye, then cleared his throat.

“Don’t take this the wrong way, Jenny, but does Widow Milwood know her mule—”

“Yes, Joe, I bought him,” she answered, more amused than irked to judge by her tone. “Mrs. Milwood seemed altogether happier to have the doubloons than the mule. Can’t imagine why.” She patted Beans’s haunch; he smacked her with his tail.

“Thank you, Beans,” Elder Sheyann said, bowing to the mule. He snorted at her.

“Right.” Jenny stepped away from him, brushing stray tail hairs off her mouth and giving the elf a wry look. “Look, Sheyann, if you have some kind of problem…”

“This is not how I approach those against whom I bear a grudge,” the Elder interrupted her, still smiling. “I know you well, Jenny, and I know you have no malice. In truth, I trust you more than many of my own tribe who have no excuse for such inconsideration to move carefully among the people of this world. Sometimes, however, a reminder is needful.”

Both of them turned to look at Joe, who straightened his lapels.

“It’s a funny thing I’ve noticed,” he drawled. “Talkin’ with elves, a body can sometimes end up bein’ both the subject of a conversation an’ completely incidental to it.”

“See, you do it too,” Jenny said, nudging Sheyann with an elbow. “Don’t worry, Joe, I promise I’m gonna bring you up to speed on everything.”

“In any case,” Sheyann added, giving him a nod, “I’ve seen to it that you shall have aid on at least part of your journey. It is not impossible that Jenny’s intentions will suffice to draw others to you; such movements are just the sort of thing to ignite the interest of fae spirits, which is how I was forewarned of your intentions. You are leaving more than this town, are you not?”

“Yeah.” Jenny absently patted Beans again, though this time he just shuffled his hooves and ignored her; she had already half-turned to stare off into the distance, where beyond the last outbuildings of Sarasio the endless horizon of the Golden Sea lay. “It’s not something I do often, or lightly, but it’s time to leave this world entirely.”

“Here, now,” Joe said in alarm, “there are some things I will not sign on for! Do I needta sit on you or somethin’?”

“No, no!” she said hastily, turning back to him and raising both hands. “Omnu’s breath, Joe, I’m not killing myself! It’s…well, like I said, I will explain.”

“I’m glad to lend a little aid, and see you off,” Sheyann said, her expression more serious, “but I have my own motivation for being here, Jenny. If something has happened to provoke you to such an extreme measure, particularly this close to my grove, I would hear of it.”

“I doubt you’ll feel any ripples from this once I’ve gone,” Jenny assured her. “No, this is… This one’s my fault, I’m afraid. I’ve been careless. It’s just that the Tiraan Empire is so… It’s not usual.”

She gestured helplessly at the town, as if it were a stand-in for the Empire; Joe raised an eyebrow and peered around, not seeing anything amiss. People were just beginning to be out and about, and many gave curious looks to the trio standing with the mulecart up at the end of the street right where it departed Sarasio itself. None were approaching them yet—save Sheriff Langlin, who emerged from her office and set forth at an unhurried stroll even as he watched.

“Gods know there’ve been bigger empires,” Jenny said, pensive now, “and more powerful ones. But they don’t tend to last so long. It’s been, what, eleven centuries now? And they did it through the strength of their bureaucracies and logistics, not any of the usual things. That, and managing to turn every inevitable collapse so far into a rejuvenation. You just don’t see that very often, historically speaking. I guess Rome was just an outlier, not a complete fluke after all; the method can be repeated. But I’ve just been popping in here and there, going about my business and generally not being a big picture person, and now suddenly I find myself in the middle of a huge country with a thousand years of records collected in a central location with highly motivated people to sift through ‘em, and from there it’s a short jump to somebody taking an unhealthy interest in me. I let myself believe that was done with after the Arachne torpedoed that Ministry of Mysteries bullhockey, but…here we are again.”

“Occasionally useful as Arachne’s outbursts can be,” Sheyann murmured, “it seldom pays to rely on her to properly clean up after herself.”

“Hey, I’m sure she does her best,” Joe protested. Both women turned to give him long looks, and to his great annoyance, he flushed. Turning his back on them, he busied himself with tipping his hat in the direction of the footsteps approaching from behind. “Mornin’, Sheriff.”

“Jenkins. Jenny. Elder.” Langlin gave Sheyann the courtesy of a grave nod, receiving one in return. “’fraid you two might’ve left it too long. I just had my morning tea interrupted by a warning: the guests in town are on the move.”

“Which—aw, no,” Joe grumbled, resting one hand on his wand.

“Yes, I observed this, also,” said Sheyann. “You are wise not to take this lightly, Joseph, but do not worry yourself excessively. I have had my people observing the interlopers, and it seems they have miscalculated the situation.”

“You’ve set elves to spying on Imperial soldiers?” Langlin demanded with an edge to her tone.

“The spirits warned of false intent, bearing arms,” Sheyann replied, unruffled as ever. “Whereof they warn, I heed. Rest assured, Sheriff, it is not my intent to draw the ire of Tiraas, especially after recent events here, but the Empire is a huge and complex beast, rather infamous for not knowing how many hands it has, much less what each of them is doing. I do not believe these men are here reflecting the will of their Emperor.”

“That’s what the Marshal said, too,” Joe murmured to Langlin.

Sheyann nodded. “And I see, Sheriff, that your mind follows a similar current.”

Joe, of course, had already taken note of the additional movement as more of Sarasio’s residents than might ordinarily be out and about with the sun barely gleaming on the horizon were wandering into the streets. He had definitely noted that many of them were armed; Deputy Wilcox, who now strolled up to join them with a courteous tip of his hat, was actually carrying an Army-issue battlestaff.

“Uh, Sheriff? Did you…” Joe waved vaguely around the town. The White Riders were one thing; legitimate or not, he could foresee no good coming from any armed confrontation between townsfolk and Imperial soldiers.

“There’s nothing going on here that warrants invoking my authority to form a civilian posse,” Langlin drawled, tucking her thumbs into her belt. “I also feel no need to keep any secrets about the state of the town. Folks around here do a fine job of looking after themselves and each other.”

By that point he could her more footsteps—these in unison, and accompanied by the crunch of displaced tallgrass, signifying a sizable group marching around the town rather than through it. He couldn’t see them past the buildings yet, but to judge by the progress of the bootsteps they’d be in view within seconds.

“Joe,” Jenny said, quietly but urgently, and he paused in drawing his own wands. “The Avenists say a battle avoided is a battle won by the only ethical means.”

“I thought we established last night you’re not an Avenist,” he muttered back.

“But when it comes to war, you listen to them. I know you’re the best shot on the frontier, but trust me: sit this one out. It’s already won.”

“Hm.” He packed a wealth of doubt into one grunt, but after holding her eyes for a moment, slowly pushed his wands back into their holsters and released them. Sheyann gave him an encouraging nod.

Then they rounded the outlying building, and there was no more time for asides.

There wasn’t much to see, truthfully. If you’d seen one squad of soldiers, you’d seen them all; that was rather the point of uniforms and drills. Joe had seen quite a few Imperial troopers in the last few weeks and had it not been for multiple sources warning him that this batch were up to no good he’d never have taken them for anything different. He took a head count as they marched past the wall of the stables into the space where the main street of Sarasio turned into a trail of dust straggling away into the tallgrass. Twenty-two, one of the standard sizes for an Imperial Army squadron; the way other officers had explained it to Joe, the deployments varied by mission and type of unit, but these looked to be standard infantry, uniformed and each carrying a staff.

They efficiently changed formation on the move, arranging themselves in a double line that effectively blocked off the exit from the town. At this, rather than showing any sign of intimidation, the people of Sarasio began moving more purposefully toward the scene. And not just those out on the street; doors opened and individuals who had to have been watching from behind curtains slipped out and came forward. A lot of them were carrying weapons, too.

Joe held his peace with an effort. If the plan here was to set the locals against the troops… He chose to trust, for now, that Langlin and Sheyann knew their business better than he; they’d both provided enough evidence of it. And clearly there was more going on with Jenny than he’d ever suspected. Still, this looked a lot like everyone involved was angling for a shootout.

One man detached himself from the end of the line and strode forward, a fit-looking fellow with a colonel’s insignia in his middle years with a prominent mustache beginning to go gray in streaks, just bushy enough to conceal his mouth. Joe watched his eyes; the fine muscles surrounding them were often more revealing. This fellow was not happy about what he saw, particularly as he swept his glance across the gathering locals. Then he fixed it on one person.

“Jenny Everywhere.” The colonel projected well, in an accent that hinted at education and more than hinted at the Tiraan heartland down south. “You will come with us.”

“On whose—”

“Hush,” Langlin interrupted, patting Jenny heavily on the shoulder as she brushed past. The Sheriff planted herself between the rest of the onlookers and the soldiers, her deputy drifting silently along behind to stand at her shoulder as usual. Riker Wilcox was tall and good at looming ominously, and had no problem letting a woman take the lead; Joe suspected Langlin had deputized him as scenery as much as anything else. “I’m the law in Sarasio…” She made a show of squinting at his shoulder patch. “Colonel. If you’re planning to haul away one of my citizens, show me an arrest warrant.”

The soldier’s eyes narrowed and Joe detected a ruffling in his mustache as he let out a short, sharp breath. Annoyance, based on that and other situational cues.

“With all due respect, Sheriff, my authority supersedes your—”

“No, it doesn’t,” she interrupted, proving she could project as well as he. “An Imperial Marshal can make an arrest on his own authority. In the absence of martial law, which was rescinded in Sarasio four weeks ago, Imperial Army personnel have no such prerogative. Show me a warrant, or come back when you’ve got one.”

The man’s mustache fluttered again, and his grip on the staff he carried tightened. Behind him, a woman wearing captain’s stripes was glowering at the Sheriff; the rest of the soldiers were looking distinctly unhappy. He slowly moved his own hands to rest near, but not on, his wands. Joe didn’t chance a look behind him at the gathering townsfolk but he knew exactly how they would feel about this: the way he did, more or less. Any second, he expected those battlestaves to come up and…

And nothing. The colonel scowled as the silence stretched past tension and into awkwardness, and suddenly Joe understood.

That was why Sheyann had said the soldiers were unprepared, why Jenny said this was already won. This man and his troops had come here expecting to rely on their official presentation and show of force to capture their prey with no interference and, at most, mild physical resistance from Jenny herself, nothing they couldn’t overcome. They had no backup plan, and at the first encounter of a significant hurdle, their commander was left floundering.

The realization was…actually, it was reminiscent. Joe was reminded abruptly of the events of a month ago, when a handful of paladins, demigods, demons, and who knew what else had chosen to refrain from annihilating the White Riders as they easily could, and chosen to act more carefully. To work on the motivations of the people involved, instead of deploying force. The lesson was not entirely welcome, keenly aware as he was that this lay specifically outside his own strengths and, in fact, square in the realm of things with which he struggled.

But while Joe was chewing on that burst of insight, the colonel found his footing.

“The interests of national security trump such niceties, I’m afraid,” he said, gruff with his own irritation. “You may of course file a grievance with Imperial Command after we have left.”

“You’d better believe I’ll be doing exactly that,” Langlin replied. “And you will be leaving without what you came for. In this town, we follow the law. The people of Sarasio have had all they can stomach of bullies with battlestaves.”

The colonel bared his teeth so widely it was actually visible under his mustache. “My mandate does not require me to consult the people of Sarasio, Sheriff. The Tiraan Empire is not a democracy.”

“You know why that is, right?” Jenny piped up suddenly. Ignoring Langlin’s annoyed glance, she clambered onto the seat of the mulecart and stood, immediately making herself the focus of every eye. “Why Tiraas is so dead set against any whiff of democracy, I mean. You know the big secret behind it, the one thing all the nobles understand? It’s something you learn the first time you try to govern any group of people who aren’t having it.”

“I don’t have to listen—”

“Every country is a democracy,” Jenny barreled right over his interruption, grinning down at him. “End of the day? Power is consensus. The people always decide who gets to have it, and they can change their minds. It’s just that most people, most of the time, cannot be assed to vote, whatever political system they live in. The key to staying in power is to encourage that natural apathy. The last thing you want is to have your subjects take a notion to change things up. It’s only when you’ve failed to manage that much that you need to provide ballot boxes. Because once people decide they’re gonna go vote, you’d better let them do it at the polls. Otherwise they’ll do it with their weapons.”

She let the silence hang. All around, hard-eyed citizens of Sarasio had stepped closer and now stood in silence, close to the same numbers as the soldiers and more than two thirds armed.

Then Elder Sheyann pursed her lips and emitted a soft birdcall.

Instantly, blond heads appeared on the roofs all around as fifteen elves who had been lying flat suddenly stood and stared down at the soldiers, blank-faced and aloof as only elves could be. They were not carrying weapons…but they were elves, and no less than seven wore the clear accouterments of tribal shamans. That was enough.

The soldiers held their discipline, but they were suddenly a lot less stern-faced, many of them visibly nervous.

“Don’t call an election, Colonel,” Jenny said into the quiet she had created once she judged it had hung there long enough. “Those favor the incumbent.”

He met her eyes, glowering. “Don’t think you’ll evade the Empire forever, Shifter.” Holding her stare for another pointed moment, he finally turned and made a hand signal.

“Fall in,” the captain barked, and the soldiers stepped back and began to file away with the same impressive discipline as before.

“Colonel,” Sheriff Langlin called as he started to move. The man paused and half-turned to stare at her. “I know a little something about working around the bureaucracy. There’s always a way. If you’d been legitimate, you’d have tried to negotiate. I’ll be making a full complaint and demanding an investigation from Mathenon and ImCom. However long it takes me to write that up and walk to the scrolltower, that’s how long you’ve got to be outta my town and over the horizon. Unless you’re harboring some fool notion about stopping me.”

He stared at her in silence for a heartbeat, then snorted, turned, and strode off after his soldiers. Jenny, Joe, and the rest of the onlookers held still, watching as they filed back out of sight around the corner.

A small hand lightly touched Joe’s upper back, and he turned in surprise. He had, of course, known Sheyann’s position, but elves were usually persnickety about physical contact. The Elder leaned close, pitching her voice low.

“Jenny is a kind soul and a good friend; I have never known her intentions to be less than pure. But you should always be careful around beings who have a different perspective of life than yours. Those who move through time, or space, or worlds, in a way that you cannot will not share your frame of reference when it comes to attachments. For most young men on the cusp of an adventure, I would advise a careful distance from dreams of storybook heroics. In your case, Joseph, remember the stories you have heard, and be mindful of what sort may be unfolding around you. Even such as she may be impelled by greater powers.”

With a final smile, she stepped back and melted away into the crowd before he could respond. Joe glanced up and was unsurprised to see no sign of the elves on the rooftops anymore.

“I hope I don’t have to tell you two that man meant every one of his final words,” the Sheriff stated brusquely, alternating her stare between Joe and Jenny. “You have not seen the last of that—at least, not if you’re planning to head out into the prairie. If you stay in town a while longer—”

“Then the next attempt will be subtler,” Jenny interrupted. “That guy’s not the brains behind this, Sheriff. Whatever this is about, it started down in Tiraas, and I don’t want my business hurting the town. Sarasio’s been through enough.”

“Besides, it’s a pretty short ride to the frontier,” Joe added. “It ain’t like he can track us into the Sea itself. Nothing can.”

Langlin shook her head. “I hope you know what you’re getting into, Jenkins.”

“I am all but positive I haven’t the faintest inkling, Sheriff,” he said ruefully. “But…you know what it is. Some things you gotta do because they’re winnin’ propositions, and some because they just gotta be done. Ain’t always that we’re lucky enough one of ‘em’s both.”

Slowly, she nodded. “Well. I feel a little better, knowing you’ve actually given this some thought. As I just finished explaining, nobody who’s broken no laws is going to be held against their will in my town, so I can’t very well stop you. Just be careful, you two.”

“As much as we possibly can, Sheriff,” Jenny promised. “You can count on that, at least.”

Langlin tugged the brim of her hat, then turned without another word of farewell and headed back up the street toward her office, no doubt to get started on that report she’d declared her intent to make. Abigail Langlin did not issue idle threats.

With a sigh of his own, Joe hopped up onto the cart’s seat while Jenny finally sat down next to him. “All right, if we’re gonna do this harebrained thing, best not dally. Hep hep, Beans!”

He flicked the rains.

Beans swished his tail, laid his ears back, and very slowly turned his neck to give Joe a baleful look with one eye.

“C’mon, Beans, let’s go,” Jenny said in a gentler voice.

The mule snorted, then stepped forward, and in seconds the cart was bumping along the last few yards of road before they turned into prairie.

“Yep,” Joe muttered as they left the town behind, “this is off to a great start.”

< Previous Chapter                                                                                                      Next Chapter >