He had come up with the idea of blowing holes in mountains to get at seams of ore, and had made a dozen or so alchemic bombs to be tested during an initial mining expedition. Unfortunately that expedition never departed, but his inventions must have been a success in a way since his workshop had turned into a smoking crater overnight. And here Bardok was using one of the bloody things as a paperweight!
He quivered, about to buckle, then suddenly flipped to anger. He glared at me with a surge of aggression I hadn’t thought he’d had in him. He slammed a fist down on the desk, making the bomb jump. I almost soiled myself, but couldn’t let it show or I would compromise my position of power. “Get out of my shop,” he said. He spat on the floor, not seeming to care that it was his own. “You still owe me money, you cur. Think you can step all over me? You don’t know who you’re dealing with now.” He sneered as his hand reached for the underside of his desk, pressed his thumb against the activation crystal embedded there. He pressed it again, eyes darting down, then up to look at me in shock. His expression was everything I had hoped it would be.
“Something wrong?” I said, slouching back with a mocking smile plastered across my face, trying not to look at the bomb sitting three feet away from me.
He swallowed, stood, pointed towards the door. “If you are not here to buy something then get out,” he said. “I have friends in high places. You have no idea–”
“Sit,” I said.
And he did, slumping back into his chair and deflating into the weaselly coward I’d known and hated. “What do you want?” he said, rubbing his forehead with one hand as if we’d given him a headache.
“Lynas Granton,” Charra said.
I watched his expression change. Not guilt exactly, but he was definitely hiding something. “Who?” he said, fooling nobody. His reactions were too rapid, his emotions changing too quickly, like he had taken an alchemic.
“Bardok, Bardok, Bardok,” I said, wagging a finger at him. I leaned forward and patted his hand. “Don’t make me hurt you.” He knew I was alive now, so there was no point in my holding back, and nobody who mattered would lift a finger to help scum like him anyway. I eased open my Gift and reached for his mind, only to find myself plunging into a churning maelstrom of alchemically heightened emotion and magic. I flinched back in confusion and pain. Mageblood. I was certain of it.
Somehow he felt it and laughed at my suddenly queasy expression. “You think you are so dangerous with your petty magic tricks. You have no idea what real power is.”
Fine. I was in no mood to play. I tried again, forcing my way in past the pain. “Slap yourself.” His hand snapped up, cracking hard across his face. “Harder.” Smack. The next slap bloomed as a red hand-print across his face. He would tell me everything he knew, anything that meant I didn’t have to enter the Boneyards. I smirked, not showing the strain I felt invading his alchemic-addled mind. “And aga–”
“By the Night Bitch, stop it!” he cried.
“Lynas Granton,” Charra repeated.
“Fine!” Bardok said, rubbing his cheek. “Look, I don’t need the trouble. It’s got nothing to do with me. He was importing some goods for a client, that’s all, I swear.”
“Which client?” Charra asked.
He shrugged. “You think I ask for names in my line of business?”
“So what did he wear then?” she snarled. “Height? Accent?”
“Didn’t see his face, hid it under the hood of his robes,” he said. I exchanged glances with Charra. “Medium height, slim build, bad fake accent.”
“Fake accent?” Charra asked.
Bardok nodded. “Trying to sound like a Docklander, but he wasn’t. Was one o’ those rich slicks from the Old Town.”
I mulled that over for a few moments. “What was Lynas importing for you?”
“Expensive wines,” he said. I glared, so he swallowed and continued. “Leastways it came in big jars. Just a normal shipping contract, but it were right queer the way it was collected. I swear I don’t know more. The Harbourmaster – he’s the one who’d know where the things came from.”
“Is he also where you got the mageblood you’re on?” I asked.
He licked his lips, nodded. “I… yes. He’s the only one that has any supply in the whole city. He has contacts abroad.”
I frowned. “So what happened when these jars arrived?”
“Lynas came to notify me he had them in stock.”
Charra’s eyes lit up. “And then you contacted your client to pick it up?” she said. “Where?”
Bardok shook his head. “You got it wrong. He always contacted me after Lynas had been and gone. Guess he wanted a middleman for some reason.”
“How did he know they’d arrived?” I asked.
“Fuck knows,” Bardok said, scowling. “Ask all the godsdamned beggars. Somebody had eyes and ears on me. Now get out of my shop unless you are buying something. That’s all I know.” He was telling the truth for once, so I gladly pulled out of his cesspit of a mind.
“One last thing, Bardok,” I said. “When was the last time you saw this client?”
He scowled, hands twitching. “Not since the fat bastard got himself skinned.”
I went for him, but wasn’t nearly quick enough. Charra’s fist rammed into his face, flipping him and the chair over to crash to the floor. His feet rattled off the desk, sending his lamp and collection of objects spilling to the floor. Heart in my throat, I leapt forward to grab the alchemic bomb as the brass cone wobbled, then fell. I caught it with my fingertips and held the damn thing at arm’s length, sweating. Charra was oblivious to my terror, her boot pressing down on Bardok’s throat. He choked and scrabbled at her leg as his oil lamp teetered on the floor next to a pile of browning papers.
“If there’s something you haven’t mentioned, now is the time to tell us,” she said.
He choked a negative. She sighed and removed her foot from his neck.
I had everything I needed from Bardok, so now it was time to kill him. He had facilitated Lynas’ death, even if his hands were clean of the actual deed. I couldn’t afford to leave him free to spread tales of my death being greatly exaggerated, and he wasn’t worth the risk of using more magic on. Once I would have felt Lynas in the back of my mind urging mercy. I listened for it, but now there was nothing. I reached for Dissever, intent on slitting his throat. His eyes flew wide as he saw death bloom in my eyes.
Charra’s hand latched onto my wrist and refused to let go. “He’s not worth it, Walker. Leave him be. For now.” She stared me down until I reluctantly let go of the knife. As we made to leave I held the bomb ever-so-carefully in one hand and tossed a few silvers onto Bardok’s desk. “See, we did come here to buy something after all. Let’s hope we don’t need to come back for a refund.” I glanced at Charra. “You should be thanking her.”
He shuddered, nodded.
“We were never here,” Charra said, lifting two unlit oil lanterns off hooks on the wall, both sloshing with full reservoirs of oil. She didn’t offer him any coin.
He swallowed, grimaced, and clutched his bruised throat. “I beg of you, please fix my wards. They’ll kill me without them. Somebody is out to get me.”
I ignored him, and it felt good to slam the door behind us and leave that mouldy dungeon behind. I really didn’t do well in dark enclosed spaces below ground. It was surprising that Bardok was still alive. With Lynas dead surely his client had no more use for the greedy old weasel? Perhaps he’d thought Bardok didn’t know enough to implicate him, or maybe he hadn’t got around to ending him yet. I carefully slipped the alchemic bomb into my pocket. It was wildly dangerous, but something like that might prove useful.