Family Heirloom

Grim lived in a dank depression of town where the smog from the factories had settled and etched their way into the very brick of the buildings.  The streets were unpaved and already the deep ruts in the ground were starting to churn back into their daily mire as wagons rolled through and citizens did their best to stay away from the middle of the lane.  Langley picked her steps carefully, noting that already the hem of both her and Sabreur’s pants were streaked black from the dust and muck that lay around them.  Sabreur kept his head up and watched the people around them, as every single person seemed to be covertly eyeing the gold trim on Langley’s jacket, wondering what a skimmer captain would be doing in a place like this.

The apartment they were looking for was part of a renovated house that now bore three separate apartments.  Grim’s was in the cellar.  There was a small flight of crumbling stairs leading up to the landing of the two upper apartments and another, even smaller set, leading to a slanted door set in the ground and wall of the building.  Sabreur walked down while Langley watched the street and tested the handle.  It was locked and so he knocked.  There was no response and he glanced up at his sister and she shrugged.

“Shopkeeper said he didn’t get out much,” she said, “I say we just go on in.”

“I was just waiting for the word.”

He dug around in his pocket and pulled out a match.  Langley leaned casually on the rickety railing and stared at the street.  Anyone who passed by took one look and then made a point of looking elsewhere.  Sometimes it was best not to get involved.  Langley heard the sound of a match striking, then Sabreur talking under his breath for a moment, focusing his mind along the keywords of his ‘mancy and then releasing the power through the match.  There was the sound of shattering metal and wood, a couple pieces bounced past Langley’s feet, and then a shrill whine punctured the air, like a rusted gear starting to move after years of rest.  Langley half-turned, yelling at her brother to take cover, Sabreur half-turned, yelling at Langley to take cover, and then the ward exploded.

Sabreur went flying across the street.  Langley managed to duck to the side and the brunt of the explosion went past her and up the staircase instead.  The street quickly grew empty as people scattered away from the scene.  For a moment there was only the noise of Sabreur picking himself up, groaning, dusting out his jacket, and collecting the firebombs that had fallen off his belt.  Langley drew a pistol and peered around and into the stairway, pointing the pistol down at the doorway as the smoke cleared away.  The door still stood, a large chunk where the handle used to be missing, and a large circle of black charcoal was drawn in the middle of the door, the language of ‘mancy trailing out in the four cardinal directions.  After a moment her brother joined her, groaning and muttering in disgust.

“Forget to check for wards, did you?” Langley asked quietly.

“I saw it at the last moment…” he said, “I think the fact I blew up the lock instead of trying to pick it kept it from activating immediately.  You want to break it or should I?”

As the two watched the ‘mancy circle faded back into the wood and was gone again.  Langley sighed and shoved her pistol back in its holster and hopped down the steps.

“I’ll take care of it.  You already blew yourself up once today.”

“Not badly.”

“No need to go trying to break your record number of explosions in one day.”

“Langley,” he said, “My record is thirty-eight.  We’re not even close.”

“It’s still before noon, you’ve got time.”

With that, she pressed her hands to the door and traced the circle with her thumbs, feeling the lines of the ‘mancy that had been embedded in the door.  She moved inward from there, reading the runes.  Basic components, air to power the explosion, fire to start it, and gravity to repel any would-be intruders with the rather dramatic means that Sabreur discovered.  And something else.  Langley grinned.

“He’s not so good at basic ‘mancy,” she said, stepping back and putting her hand on her sword.  Sabreur tipped his head to the side, a bit confused on why she had just wrapped her hand around the longsword Crystal gave her instead of one of her rapiers.  “He must not have been able to get a persistent ward off his components so he embedded one directly in the door.  I can feel it just on the other side, right here.”

She stabbed a finger on the door and drew the sword.  It was not uncommon for complex wards to have components built right into the structure of them, to take some of the work out of the amount of ‘mancy that had to be scribed into the ward.  It was also a timesaving device and for novice ‘mancers a way of getting wards to actually work.  By her fourth year of Academy the professors were banning built-in components for most of the wards they required students to perform.

“Watch this.”

She wrapped both hands around the hilt of the sword.  Sabreur backed up, asking if she really knew what she was doing with that thing.  Langley didn’t reply, only licked her lips, grinned, and the eye on the sword opened and stared at the door.  It blinked.  Langley’s arm muscles twitched, her wrists snapped, and the sword came down into the door and out the other side with a resounding crunch.  There was a faint ting of something metal hitting the ground on the opposite end and when Langley wrenched the sword free the door just teetered in and slammed against the inside wall.  The charcoal ward was visible now and completely without power.  Sitting on the dusty stone floor was a lodestone, chipped in the center from where Langley’s sword had struck it.

“I didn’t think you could do something like that,” Sabreur marveled, “Not with a longsword?”

That caused Langley to pause.  She stopped, considered, and then put her hand back to the hilt of her rapier.  Furrowed her brow in thought and Sabreur walked past her into the room.

“Hello?” he called, “Grim?”

There was a scuffling sound from a back room.  The interior was dark, smelled slightly musty, and was decorated with overstuffed furniture and tables that had probably been picked from an alleyway somewhere.  The walls were brick and appeared to be decaying into pitted masses.  Or perhaps it was patches of mold.  Sabreur was hard-pressed to tell as the only light was from the doorway.  After some more noise a curtain hanging over the doorway to the further depths of the apartment was thrown aside and a thin face peered out of the darkness.

“You blew up my door!” he said in a wheeze.

“A little,” Sabreur admitted, “Just the lock.  Your ward made the bigger explosion.”

Langley walked inside and picked up the lodestone.  She tossed it at him and he tried to catch, missed, and the lodestone went bouncing past him and vanished.  He whirled around and glared at the twins.

“I won’t have intruders here!” he cried, “I’ll have the guards on you.”

“Oh, shut it,” Sabreur said, slamming the door shut behind them.  It just bounced back open and he glared at it.  With the ward gone and the lock blown up there was nothing left to hold it shut.  So he improvised with a nearby broomstick and the room was again plunged into foreboding darkness.  Langley found the nearest lantern and lit it while Grim spluttered in indignation.

“You won’t get the guards,” she said, adjusting the flow of oil to cast a warm and healthy glow along the room, “cause you don’t want them in here.  Right, ‘mancer?”

Grim tottered into the room.  He was thin and pasty white, like someone who avoided the sun as if it were a disease.  His hair was long and stringy and in need of a good washing.  Langley sniffed carefully and then made a mental note to not do that again.  His tattered robes were in need of a good washing as well.  Bad hygiene.  Superiority complex.  Poor skills at basic ‘mancy.  Stupid name.  And below all that, the faint reek of a kind of ‘mancy Langley had never dared touch but had seen many times over from her dealings with a certain daft girl under her care.

“Mihos was right,” she muttered under her breath and Grim’s head snapped up at the word, nearly jerking him out of his perpetual slouch.

“What do you know of the Avatar of Vengeance?” the man cried.  His voice was thin and reedy.

“More than you,” she replied, “So, necromancer, is it?”

Grim drew himself up in indignation, raising his hands in a menacing manner and Langley saw a bone in one of them.  He threw back the sleeves of his robe and drew a deep breath.

“Ingrates!” he cried, “I’ll make you pay for your intrusion.”

He got two more words out, keys to a ‘mancy working, before Sabreur fired his pistol.  The gunshot was deafening in the closed space but the noise that followed – the shrill scream of a terrified 115 pound man – was even worse.  Sabreur winced and began reloading his pistol.

“My hand!” he screamed, “MY HAND!”

“Shut it,” Langley groaned, drawing a sword and walking towards him.  The necromancer was doubled over, the bone he was about to use as a component in a pile of fine splinters and dust at his feet.  He clutched at his wrist and Langley was unable to tell if all of his fingers were attached as he kept squirming about and there was a good deal of blood.  Still, it was a nice shot on Sabreur’s part.

“Right,” she said, putting the sword cross the man’s neck, bringing her face close to his.  He smelled of formaldehyde and decay.  “We’re going to have a nice talk, then we’re going to torch your necromantic components, and then we’re taking you straight to the Cadre.  Understand?”

The necromancer took a deep breath, held it, and stared at the sword.  It was a longsword, it had an eye, and this eyeball was staring directly at him.  A very familiar weapon.  He swallowed hard and there was only the sound of a steady pat pat of blood dripping onto the floor for a moment.

“No,” he said, finally, calmly, “Minuo infestus nex.”

This time, he completed the phrase before Sabreur fired his pistol.

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