The Heart of the Thief: Arrested

 Previous Chapter: A Visit to a Brothel in Wine Country
 Arrested
The Thief sat in the jail cell and watched as a rat traveled back and forth between the boundary of the bars. It had no fear of people—it scampered in between their feet without a moment’s hesitation—and it was clear that it was a regular, doing hard time like most of its species, scavenging the bits and pieces of detritus left by its human counterparts. There was a nice sized hole in the corner of the cell where the rat disappeared with whatever it was carrying. The Thief thought about tearing off a piece of his shirt to stuff into that hole, just to see what the rat would do when confronted with an obstacle blocking its merry highway. The Thief thought about doing this, but he didn’t. This rat was one of the good ones, he could tell. In the Duke’s Labyrinth, the rats were more akin to wolves than resourceful rodents like this one. He had fought and killed them in the total darkness as they tore at his flesh and nibbled his fingers while he tried to sleep in that sleepless place. He had eaten a few as well, though it was likely that they had taken far more of his number than he had taken of their own. It was said that you never leave the Labyrinth, and although he had proven them wrong, it was the truth, in a sense. Every time the Thief saw a rat, he was back in the darkness, feeling his way with his left hand, a femur clutched in his right.
    They had been in the jail for about an hour. Josun was taciturn, a grimace on his face as he repeatedly examined his damaged leg. It had bled a lot, but the jailers had provided a bandage which slowed the blood loss. Fergal, of course, had not stopped babbling since they’d been incarcerated. He babbled about his interaction with the prostitute, he babbled about the whereabouts of Cassilda, he babbled about how hopeless their present situation was. The Thief had finally had enough of it and had told him that if he didn’t stop talking, he would tell the jailers that Fergal was a notorious pervert wanted by Capetian authorities, guilty of voyeurism, seducing a minor, and indecent exposure. The threat shut him up, for a while, at least. The last thing he wanted Fergal to blab about was the Heart. He felt it beating solidly against his chest, a soothing, reassuring metronome. He didn’t want to say anything about it to the others, but he felt as though it was possibly the reason they had been detained, unless brothels had been outlawed in the last twenty-four hours.
    “Do you have a pin?” he asked Fergal. The Aiv stared at him stupidly. “A pin. A needle. Anything long, skinny, and pointy.”
    “I’ve got your long, skinny, and pointy right here, blackguard,” said a drunk in the next cell. He was their only other company, and he faded in and out of sleep.
    “Keep it to yourself, grandfather,” replied the Thief.
    “I had a needle and thread in my pack, but they’ve seized our possessions,” lamented Fergal. “Tell me, Thief. Do you think the spell will fade? I’ve just realized that Cassilda has done something to make me appear human. If they find out that I’m not human, what will they do to me?”
    “They’ll put you in the zoo you little fop,” said the drunk. “Charge admission. Have you deal out handjobs to make ends-meet.”
    Josun shrugged and smiled. The Thief spat outside the bars, trying to hit the drunk. It was no use. The old bastard had the protection the gods granted all drunks of questionable vintage.
    “I have an idea!” said Fergal. “The strength of the Barbarosie people is renowned throughout the world. Certainly you can bend these bars, Josun, enough to let me slide through. I shall retreat and find Cassilda to free you! What say ye?”
    Josun looked up from his wounded leg and squinted at the bars and shook his head.
    “You can’t do it?” whined Fergal.
    “Perhaps I could. It would require more concentration than I have now, and I don’t want the blood to start pouring from my leg. Besides, I think you may flee out of town and abandon us here to rot. Cassilda can find us without your help. She will want to find us,” he said, nodding towards the Thief.
    “She’ll find you in the ditch with all the other bums,” said the drunk. “The ditch! It rhymes with witch, bitch, stitch, itch! Pitch! Mitch!”
    “The gods save us from the wit and wisdom of this old wino,” said the Thief. “Perhaps he will die in his sleep.”
    “Nobody ever dies in their sleep. You’re awake for the whole thing. You see the lights coming for you, the darkness falling behind. You hear the voices of the people you love fading away. It’s cold and empty like a frozen glass shattering on the floor. There’s no peace in it, no resignation. It’s a horrible, terrible thing to die.”
    She stepped into the aisle between the cells, the tall woman in black with the boyish haircut. There was not a shred of humor in her ash-gray eyes. Her long, lean fingers grasped the bars of the company’s cell gingerly, slowly wrapping around the cool steel. The Thief could tell by the way she looked at them that they ought to take her as seriously as a knife pressed against their throats.
    “What do you want?” asked the Thief.
    “Your little friend here isn’t human. What are you? The spell that serves as your disguise can be wiped away with a snap of my fingers.”
    “Is it a crime to be a non-human in Hampton?” asked the Thief.
    “You. Barbarian. Your type usually doesn’t find its way this far east. Your race is composed of raiders, and raiders are good for nothing but murder and rape. We are overrun with refugees, if you haven’t noticed. There is plenty of murder and rape going on right now, both inside the limits of Hampton as well as out in the countryside of Beaune.”
    “So what’s wrong with me?” sneered the Thief.
    “Half-Zanj, scarred, walks and moves like someone who has committed a great deal of larceny and petty theft.”
    “You have misjudged us, madame. We are not the sum of our appearances,” said Fergal. “We are adventures seeking the port city of San-Elza, from whence we shall sail to faraway lands. I am part of an ancient people called the Huldufolk. We met on the road, us three, and our fortunes are entwined. Because of the length of our journey, we were seeking some diversion when…”
    “Where is the sorceress that cast the spell?” interrupted the woman. “What is her name?”
    “We didn’t know her well,” replied the Thief. “She traveled with us only briefly and went her own way after the whorehouse. Never gave a name.”
    “You lie well but not well enough. Let us stop playing games. My name is Hypatia Almagest, and I am the court magician of Count Oudinot, ruler of Beaune. We are currently at war, if you haven’t noticed, and we can’t have sorceresses passing through, especially when it is known that Rheine employs mercenaries. If you cooperate, you will be released, and your possessions will be returned. If you do not answer my questions to the best of your ability, I will have you hanged tomorrow morning. Do I make myself clear?”
    “Why do you need our cooperation?” asked Josun. “Why don’t you just take what you need?”
    “She can’t,” said the Thief. “I’m guessing that this one doesn’t read minds.”
    “That’s a relief,” said Fergal.
    “What is her name?” said Hypatia in a commanding voice. She could not read minds, but she could make them answer.
    “Cassilda,” said the Thief. He looked surprised as he said the name.
    “Don’t begrudge him a slip of the tongue, lads. He was compelled to answer.” She neglected to mention that it was a trick not likely to work again. Compulsion was a dark art, and though it would have been a useful skill, she was an Academia-trained magician, and such things had never been taught to her. The best she could do was demand an answer in a voice of authority.
    “I can tell that you all are rather fond of this sorceress, though she be an unlicensed practitioner of magic, and therefore an outlaw in all civilized lands. But are you sure that if the situation were reversed and she was here and you were wanted, that she would not cooperate with authorities? After all, we are dealing with a matter of life or death. Surely you would forgive her for speaking to save her life. I’m certain she would forgive you. After all, there is nothing really to fear. I simply want to have a discussion with this sorceress and confirm that she is not working with Rheineland. I will not drag her back to the Conventum at Bilbao. There is no time for that sort of thing, I assure you.”
    “We honestly know nothing of her whereabouts. We don’t know when or why she left the brothel. She was not keen on going, though she changed her mind suddenly. She is an impetuous woman,” explained Fergal.
    “What do you know about the Heart of Rankar?” asked Hypatia. Not one of them said a word, yet she saw the Thief’s eyes widen slightly at the mention of the artifact. Their cards are shown.
    “I must confess, I did not know much about it. While you all were sitting in this cell, I consulted my histories, which revealed that the Heart is a Capetian relic important to the religion of the city, as well as key to the sovereignty of its Dukedom. Capetia is a long way from here, my friends, far enough away that Beaune’s dealings with it are minor, consisting of matters of trade. However, it is not so far away that we can dismiss it and forget that it exists. If news got out that the Heart of Rankar was in Hampton, I am not so sure that an army would not sail across the sea of Katan to retrieve it. The Capetians have spilled much blood for their precious Heart. It is a magical relic, an eternal timekeeper, the last piece, they say, of the dead god that created the universe. Perhaps it’s true. I don’t know. Magicians, in general, are secular creatures.”
    “I’ll tell yous about sexual creatures,” said the old bum. “I got ‘em. I got ‘em right here. In my pants.”
    “You, sir, shall be silent and not speak again,” snapped Hypatia, making a quick gesture in his direction. The bum’s eyes fluttered and turned white before he slumped against the bars as though his bones had been turned to jelly.
    “So let me put your story together for you. You are accomplices of the sorceress Cassilda, who has stolen the Heart of Rankar from Capetia, and who now flees eastward towards Archaea with an unknown agenda. That is the gist of it, no? I take it back. You shall not be hanged. We’ll extradite you to the Capetians. They will come up with something much better than hanging for you.”
    “They’ll throw us in the Labyrinth after pulling off our fingernails and cutting off our tongues,” said the Thief, who stared not at Hypatia but at the rat which scurried past her feet. “We will be surrounded by utter darkness and rats that will strip the flesh from a man’s bones if he is too weak to stand. Most last just days but it is possible to linger on for months or maybe even years if one is willing to do anything to survive.”
    “That is something to think about,” said Hypatia, pulling away from the bars. She looked briefly at the bum, whose breathing was ragged, shook her head with disgust, and then walked out of view. As soon as they heard the door slam, the Thief turned to his companions and shook his head.
    “We’re screwed,” he said.
    “She’ll come for the Heart,” said Josun, his eyes closed, leg stretched out and tensed.
    “Yeah, but will she come for us?”
    No one wanted to debate that question.

    After leaving the whorehouse, Cassilda went back to the bar and drank a bottle of wine. She didn’t know why she did it; she was operating automatically, as though someone was pulling switches and levers inside her skull. When a man rudely propositioned her (he grabbed her ass and slobbered in her face), she made his hand burn like fire and swelled his face up so badly that his cheeks threatened to burst. A vengeful desire took hold, and she tore through the crowd and left the bar, stumbling through the night streets. In a few blocks she came upon a man being beaten in an alleyway by two disheveled soldiers. All she had to do was snap her fingers and they followed her like dogs. When they approached a grocery store, she made them break into it and fill their arms with as many provisions as they could. Then they went into the refugee camp and distributed the goods, prioritizing the women and children. After they were finished, she sent the two soldiers off to fall asleep in a ditch. For a brief second, she considered lighting them on fire—they were mediocre persons, guilty of cowardice and rape—but some of the anger collapsed inside, so they were spared. On the way back from the camp, she saw an old barn that looked as though it were waiting for a lightning strike. She was just about to summon fire and quench her thirst for arson when a visage appeared in the upstairs window, a wrinkled, skull-like apparition. Well hello there, pretty thing it said with lips like leeches. Don’t burn this whole place to the ground on account of me.
    Cassilda screamed, though she didn’t make a sound. He couldn’t be here she thought, not in Hampton, not in a stranger’s barn leering out the window like a graveyard creature. Yet the face was clear in the window. The ancient, wrinkled head, the sunken, hollow eyes—he was there, whether she liked it or not. She tried to run but tripped over a root and fell sprawling on her face. Sick, mirthless laughter rose up from the earth like a revenant. Why don’t you stay, and we’ll have a talk it said. We are friends after all. Old, good friends.
    Pressing herself up, she glanced at the window and saw Pliny the Black waving at her, cheerful as can be. Destiny is a bitch, my sweet, vengeful child. We will meet again only if you go to the jailhouse. We will meet again only if you fear the necromancer. We will meet again only if you usher in the end of the world. Don’t you wish to meet me again? Don’t you wish to have your revenge?
    Cassilda couldn’t answer, having been paralyzed with a rush of violent emotions. The earth came up in cold, wet clumps that slid through her hands like bits of gore. She could taste it suddenly—the sea air, the soft, worn wood of the deck, the blood running from her nose—but the remembrance angered her enough to prompt a rebuttal. Thunder echoed in the distance; the sky lit up with lightning. A burning sensation enveloped her body, heat dancing over her skin and drying her mouth. In the window Pliny continued to smile his rigor mortis grin. A blinding flash erupted from her person and a ball of molten lava struck the barn, annihilating the window, setting the structure aflame. Second and third strikes pummeled the building, melting the ancient oak timbers, sending the barn toppling to the ground. Staring at the rubble burning, the flames licking the ceiling of the sky, she felt vindicated somehow, as though her pointless actions had truly eradicated the evil which had poisoned her life. What do you have to laugh at now she thought, listening to the cracks and screams of the fire. Soon smoke rose from the pasture as little embers were lifted by the wind. In seconds the whole field was burning, the fire moving like water, rushing towards a fence which separated the pasture from its neighboring field. It took her too long to notice; heat surrounded her as the flames devoured the grass. You couldn’t burn a sorceress, but the smoke clogged her lungs and stung her eyes, so she fled, racing for higher ground. When she reached a hill, she saw that all the farmland in view was enveloped by the conflagration, and that the inferno was moving towards Hampton at an alarming speed. How could it have moved so fast? Was the grass drier than she thought? A sick feeling hit her stomach as she realized she could do nothing to stop the blaze. Ambierce could have summoned a rain but she was no rainmaker, only an instrument of destruction, an ax held by an unstable hand. She rushed through spells in her head, trying to think of anything that could halt or delay the fire’s progress. Droplets of water fell from her fingertips and moistened the hillside. She managed to construct a block of ice out of evaporating moisture, but it disappeared in the flames without any discernible effect. Out of ideas, Cassilda gave up and raced towards town, futilely crying out “fire!” at the top of her lungs. No one heard her. You couldn’t hear anything over the flames.

...

    “I smell burning,” said Josun. He struggled to sit up from the bench and look out the small barred window.
    “The refugees have probably had enough and set the whole damn town on fire,” said the Thief, who was staring at the rat hole. The rat hadn’t been seen in an hour. He wondered if this one kept particular hours.
    “Looks like it,” said Josun. “There are people running through the streets. Someone is shouting about a fire.”
    “Sounds like it would be a great time to get the hell out of here.” He went over to the rat hole and bent down and put his face to the floor.
     “Perhaps Cassilda is detained,”Josun said. He limped over to the bars, passing a sleeping Fergal, who snored and whimpered in an arrhythmic manner. Putting his hands on the steel, he sucked air into his chest and began to pull. His forearms bulged; his face grew red and veins stood out on his temple like swollen worms. His exertions woke the old drunk, who had not stirred since Hypatia had put him to sleep.
    “Keep ye at it! You’ll break ‘er down and get us all outta here!”
    “Damn it, I thought she had killed that bugger,” said the Thief. He had his hand in the rat hole, and the prospect of being bitten was very much on his mind.
    “She ain’t killed me! Wench will come back and work my pecker, just you wait. Just you wait…”
    Josun fell back from the bars, a grimace on his face. He had bent them slightly yet not enough for even Fergal to fit through.
    “Ahah!” said the Thief, pulling his hand free of the rat hole. He displayed a hair pin entangled in grass, thread, and hair as though it were a golden master key.
    “Can you pick the lock?” asked Josun, slumped against the bars.
    “We’ll find out.”

…

    Hampton was wailing when she finally reached the city. People flew through the streets, stumbling over one another, pushing, shoving, yelling for help. Smoke rose behind her like a great black shroud; children kept pausing to point and look, to remark on the glowing horizon as if it were a monster bearing down on them. Refugees rushed through the city, for the fire had already reached their camp, and was now licking the outskirts of the town. Carriages bearing barrels of water passed, a manic look of grim determination in the eyes of their drivers. She stopped and watched as they went, wondering if she should latch on to their train and help pump the water. Everyone had panicked, and instead of congregating together to fight the blaze, much of the citizenry decided to flee like frightened animals in the opposite direction of the flames. Moving again with the flow of traffic, Cassilda paused when she reached the Silver Cross. The establishment turned out to be vacant, so she sat down on a sofa and stared out the window, discombobulated, thinking of that skeletal visage in the window of the barn. The Heart; they are with the Heart. It took her a minute to realize that all she needed to do was cast a simple tracking spell. A green light appeared, blinking like a firefly, and she followed it back out into the street. No one noticed its conspicuous flickering until she reached the police station, and a woman grabbed her arm.
    “You are a magician,” she said, her eyes wide and smile forced. The light wove around the entrance to the station like a satellite, weaving an elliptical orbit.
    “I don’t see what business it is of yours,” said Cassilda, jerking her arm away.
    “It is my business to know everything that happens in Beaune. The smoke in the air has a magical odor about it, for instance. It smells of arson. You are a suspect.”
    Cassilda looked at her right arm and found an adamant pair of cuffs dangling around her wrist. The firefly flickered and fell from the sky, dissolving into nothingness. She acted without thinking, as she had done all night. A ball of emerald fire shot forth from her left hand with enough heat to incapacitate her target, if not kill her immediately. Stupid creature she thought as the fire crashed against a blinding white light. The fire splintered upon impact, sending tendrils every direction, bathing the street and the surrounding buildings in a deep green glow. A chunk of the police station disappeared; the pavement cracked like the shell of an egg. Of course she’s a witch thought Cassilda, as the woman stood before her, palms opened, and arms crossed in a ward sign. If she’s a witch, then there will be a retort… A force like a brick wall suddenly slammed into her, propelling her body backwards. She hit her head hard against a wall and bit her tongue. Blood dripped onto the pavement and swirled in little puddles like miniature whirlpools. How awfully bright it is. She had to think of something quick or the fight would be over as soon as it had begun.

...

    “Got it!” said the Thief, as the jail cell door swung open. At that moment the outer wall exploded in a burst of green light, flinging stones and filling the room with dust. The bum, who had managed to fit most of his right leg through the bars, was abruptly alighted in emerald fire. Energy danced upon his skin and his skeleton was visible for a moment before it left him, along with his life’s force. The intermingling stenches of roasting flesh and burning hair hung in the air. The Thief realized that someone was screaming, their shrieks piercing his eardrums worse than the sudden crack of the explosion. He grabbed Fergal by the collar, gave him a hard shake, and pointed towards the smoking ruin of the wall.
    “Outside,” he said. Josun was already limping through the man-sized hole.

...

    A huge wall of brick rushed towards Cassilda as she lay dazed, trying to plan her next move. Quickly casting a concussive blast, she shattered it into a million pieces that fell like hard, painful rain. You’ll have to do better than that. She had never engaged in one on one combat with another magician before, and despite the training she had received (Ambierce had emphasized the importance of timing and the necessity of wards), she was finding the practice more demanding than she had imagined. Her opponent was not as powerful as herself (her ward had struggled to deflect Cassilda’s fire ball, resulting in the splintering of the flames), yet she obviously was more experienced. Already the woman had dodged out of view, though bits of brick and stone still sprang up from the pavement. You want to fling rocks? Then we’ll fling rocks. She cast a fireball at the corner of the police station, taking out another wall, and used the resulting cloud of dust to retreat to the opposite corner of the street where a crowd had gathered. Crazy witch won’t risk the casualties she reasoned. Cassilda expected the crowd to part in fear; instead, she was greeted by menacing glares and balled fists. A woman to her left slapped the side of her face hard enough to make her stagger, and the man behind her stepped up to the sorceress and punched her in the gut. The crowd encircled Cassilda, each person delivering a meaty, precise blow, and it wasn’t until she was lying on the pavement with her face pressed against the street that she managed to whisper a repulsion spell that she hadn’t used since she was a novice. It worked well enough; the assailants flew backwards several feet as though an explosion had propelled them forth. Bruised and bloodied, the anger that had vanished with the sudden onset of the conflagration returned, and fire crackled in between the sorceress’s fingertips. I’m going to turn this witch into a pile of ash. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw the lean figure crouched behind a fallen street sign, the boyish mop of hair giving her away. With as much force as she could muster, Cassilda unleashed a torrent of fire in the witch’s direction. The volley hit home; the figure seized, limbs flailing like those of a marionette’s, while green energy writhed over its paralyzed frame. There. Be dead.
    When she reached the body, she knew something was wrong. The face was different—she could see that much behind the distorted features—the cheeks bones too high, the jaw too prominent. The witch had not been wearing a thin, white shirt and a pair of loose trousers. The hair was similar, but longer on the witch.
    She felt a shackle fasten around her left wrist. “He was a boy,” said the witch’s voice. “Probably about thirteen years old. Now he’s a corpse.”
    Cassilda didn’t say anything as they dragged her away.

Next Chapter: Making a Deal