“Then what do you suggest? This is the only way any of us has a chance!” Rababal’s venomous glare would be more intimidating without the quiver in his jowls. “Unless you have a better idea?”
And-
Son of a bitch.
It starts way down below my chest, below my stomach, down behind my navel. Somebody just now struck a match under my balls and set my guts on fire.
“Yeah, funny thing.” The burn creeps north and ignites a smile. “I do have a better idea.”
I look from one to the next: Rababal pale and sweating, Marade glowering glamorously, Stalton going narrow-eyed, Tizarre swiping hair across her brow with a trembling hand, Pretornio twisting his prayer chain between his fingers, and I wonder: Can they see it?
Can they see the flame in my head?
Because all that lumpy grey mush-all the dying here before I ever have a real career, the sinking dread and black despair and the whiny why-me-god-why-me-is melting, hissing, and just downright smoking the fuck away. Screw these shit-swallowing bit parts. I never expected to live this long anyway.
But I am for motherfucking sure gonna make a star-quality exit.
“Simple. .” I talk slowly, carefully, so even Pretornio can understand. “Simple: we can’t outrun them. We can’t hide from them. We can’t buy them off. There’s only one way any of us will live through this.”
Their empty stares wait for me to fill them with hope. Losers.
Fuck hope.
“One way: We have to convince them that hunting us is a bad idea.”
Marade’s eyes are the first to spark. “You’re saying-”
“I’m saying.” I let the flame kindle my voice. “I’m saying we have to hurt them.”
And it’s working. I can see them warm it up, imagining-not in detail, not yet, just tasting the concept-and I can see heat swell inside them to melt that ice-numb dread. I turn from them and lean on the parapet, willing them to follow my gaze out into the badlands. Out at the dust and the Black Knives. Willing them to think with me: Why not? Let’s fuck ’em up.
“You think-” Tizarre swallows the quaver in her voice and starts over. “You think we can do it?”
A good lie trumps a bad truth. “I know we can.”
“And this-” Rababal’s platinum disk flickers faster and faster through his fingers. “This is our best chance?”
“It’s our only chance. We have to step up and unleash severe fucking carnage. And we have to do it right.”
“What do you mean by right?”
I mean bend them in half and assbone them till their eyes bleed, but if I say so Marade’ll belt me and Pretornio will probably faint. “My way. No arguments. No committee. No goddamn debate.”
“Why your way? Marade’s order has been fighting ogrilloi for centuries. Pretornio’s an experienced infantry commander-”
“Hey, Marade-your people ever teach you what Black Knives do to thaumaturges?”
She half-turns away and sneaks a glance at Tizarre. Then she looks down at her gauntlets. Muscle bulges along her jaw, and she’s got nothing to say.
Me, I’m not so squeamish. I hook thumbs behind my belt and lean back to rest elbows on the parapet. “They call it the Black Knife Kiss: they lock lips onto your eye sockets and suck your eyeballs out. One at a time. Bite through your optic nerve. They figure if you can’t see, you can’t do magick.”
Rababal’s mouth works like he wants to say something but can’t remember any words.
“And then there’s your hands.” I look at his; he palms that platinum disk like I caught him scratching his dick. “They twist wire around your wrists tight enough to cut your circulation. Pretty soon your hands turn black. And die. Sometimes they let their khoshoi nibble on them, or strap your arms out wide to attract crows. Sometimes they just leave ’em. Dead. Rotting on your wrists.”
“Caine-” His voice quavers, and he swallows. “Still, I-”
“And if you somehow manage to try a spell anyway, they pound these long spikes into your skull. Big steel needles about as long as your forearm, big around as a horseshoe nail. Doesn’t kill you. Doesn’t even really hurt. But then they take a torch and hold it to the outside end of the spikes. One at a time. The spikes conduct heat pretty well. Still doesn’t hurt much; brain’s got no pain nerves. But it gives you a hell of a fever, y’know? Worst fucking fever anyone will ever have. Delusions. Hallucinations. A nightmare where you never wake up. You go to Hell while you’re still alive. And even through the fever, you can feel chunks of yourself dying. Slowly. Your brain cooks. One piece at a time.”
Rababal’s face has gone grey. Guess he’s got a vivid imagination.
Vivid enough to keep him from asking me how the hell I know all this, which is a really good thing because I don’t have a really good answer.
“But it’s not always that bad.” I offer a reassuring grin. “Sometimes they get enthusiastic with the torches and your brain boils instead.” I shrug. “At least it’s quick.”
I push myself off the wall and take one step, right into the middle of them. They shift unconsciously, spreading to give me space. That’s one good sign. They stand and wait to hear what I’m gonna say next. That’s another. “Know how ogrilloi wish each other luck? They say, Die fighting. You get it? That’s luck for us, too. The only luck we have left.”
I give them all a good long slow look at as many of my teeth as I can fit into a smile, and hold out my fist. “Die fighting.”
Marade’s eyes are the first to clear, and cold determination sharpens the elegant planes of her face. She squeezes a gauntlet into a jointed ball of steel, and extends it to touch my knuckles.
“Yes,” she says. “Yes. Die fighting.”
Figured I could count on her: Khryllians are suckers for that heroic laststand shit. And she is so beautiful right now that I better just keep my mouth right the fuck shut.
Stalton squints at me. “You look like you’re enjoying this.”
“Most fun you can have with your clothes on.”
Did I really just say that? Heat rises in my cheeks. Better not look at her either.
He shakes his head. “You’re completely insane.”
“That a problem for you?”
“Shit, no. I admire it.” He suddenly grins and adds his fist to ours. “Die fighting.”
Then Tizarre adds hers, and Pretornio, and finally even Rababal curls his stubby fingers and nods.
Howzafuckinbout that? Forget Marade. This is better.
I can feel it. I can smell it. I can roll it around in my mouth and you can fuck my left ear if I don’t like the taste. The partners all stand there. Looking. Waiting. Looking at me.Waiting for me to tell them what to do. Who knew it’d be this easy. .?
I don’t have to say it out loud. It sounds better in my head than it would from my mouth. No more bit-player suckassitude. Now, you yappy fucks, you gutless upcaste bean-counting ass-pirates-
Now, you’re the bit players.
I just made this into The Caine Show.
››scanning fwd››
Black Knives resolve out of heatshimmer and dust. They top a fold of the badlands a couple hundred yards away and stop. They can see me now.
I’ll never know what the Black Knives were expecting to find outside the gate of the vertical city, but I guarantee it didn’t resemble one lone skinny-ass human in black leather, standing on a little rise. Waiting for them.
From where they are, the perimeter wall of the vertical city will frame me in the red-smeared light of the setting sun, leathers stark against the bleached rubble of the ruined gate thirty yards to my rear. My stance contraposto. Relaxed. Careless. My hands open. Loose. Empty. Vivid as a dream.