Chapter 2: Sabers and Shadow

An hour after sunset, I set out into the streets once more.

It was half past eight by the radium dials of my watch, but the streets were already quiet. The specter of war has a way of exhausting people. Farmers labor to the last glimmer of twilight, lest an army (enemy or otherwise) harvest it instead, town merchants hawk their wares to refugees from dawn to dusk to liquidate stock lest it be “requisitioned”, and even the beggars and vagabonds find work a-plenty, scraping new arrow-shafts straight and waxing crossbow strings. And when their weary eyes can no longer make out their work in the feeble light of the rush candles, the ale in the taverns flows fast and they sleep deeply – while they still can. Only the town watch shared the streets; few in number because of doubled watch on the walls and yawning from their own day’s vigil. I gained the town square without incident.

The half-moon’s weak lambent light seemed to sink into the gray cobblestones and the wattle-and-daub walls ringing the square. Only the girl’s white shift dress caught the light; for a moment seeming to stand alone; a tiny beacon in a shadowed void – and then the scudding clouds slipped over the moon and she faded into another shade.

I’d left my cloak behind in case I needed to move fast, but the chill I felt had nothing to do with the cold night air. I crept ‘cross the square, walking heel-to-toe for silence, minding my step on the wet stone.

I was within ten paces, squinting for the engravings in the stone that encircled the post, when she spat out something in an unintelligible tongue with vigor and hatred enough to transcend the language barrier handily.

“If you’d waited a moment,” I replied as I crept ‘round the post to stand in front of her, “you could’ve spit on me at the same time.”

Dark eyes flashed from beneath her bangs and she tried just that – with impressive aim, too, but it splattered against an invisible wall between us.

I reached out gingerly with my boot-toe and tapped – it had a little give to it, spongy. But just a little.

“I assume a so-called witch knows magic, right?” I tipped my head at the circle and geometric crossing lines within that surrounded the post. “Any idea how to break that?”

She invited me to perform some anatomically improbable maneuvers.

“Damn,” I said. “That must cast one hell of a spell. What do you call it, the Aristocrats?”

Chains clinked in the gloom as she raised her face all the way to look at me properly rather than just enough to glare. The clouds opened to let the moon through again, the woman taking me in from head to toe at once.

“W-who th-the b-b-blazes are y-you?” she demanded. Without the impassioned hate driving it, her voice was notably hoarse and shaken by her shivering – she was still soaking-wet from the earlier rain.

I shrugged. “Doesn’t matter. Anyway, I’m gonna break you out.”

Her eyes went wide – then she shook her head. “G-g-get o-out of h-here. Run. Now!”

I sighed. “Apologies for not riding to the rescue on my trusty steed but would you rather a discount-rate rescue or none at all?”

“You’re being watched, you idiot,” she hissed. “I was framed by the Dushsoyuzniki!”

“I figured as much, hence the res-”

“It’s not just a magistrate that’s a collaborator, they’re–” she froze, looking past me. I pivoted on my heel to see two cloaked and hooded men approaching across the square. I took two steps to place the post and the invisible cage to my left and waited. My hand rode on my right hip, but when their cloaks open sabers came out, so I drew mine.

Best to do this quietly.

At twenty paces distance they flung their cloaks off; mail armor glinting in the moonlight, and charged. I backstepped ‘round the invisible shield to my left to block the first man as I engaged the second, trading three or four attacks before his friend could sprint out to his left, but I sprang back again, still circling the magic barrier. The man closest to it misjudged its location, a wild swing from the shoulder clanking as his saber tip halted in mid-air. I lunged long, crossing the distance between us in a single flash of silvered steel, one knee almost brushing the cobbles. I withdrew and snapped a blow out to the right from the wrist immediately, sending the second man skidding away, then I was twirling my blade through diagonal cross-cuts quickly to ward myself as I found my footing, and only then did I see I’d scored; the other assailant lying motionless as blood flowed from his throat.

His companion roared like an animal, eyes crazed and mouth snarling, saber crashing into my guard with the weight of a mace. He pressed me back against the barrier, chopping at me like a lumberjack, blows scarcely slower for being delivered wildly from the shoulder. I stepped back diagonally, using the invisible shield against his right arm again. He sprinted out into the courtyard to get clear of the barrier, inhuman roars growing ever louder, and this time I stepped out to meet him head on. His blade was more curved than mine, wild blows offering openings for riposte, for lunge, but I found myself matching him, mirroring him, my slashes meeting his mid-air. Sabers flashed in the moonlight as they twirled through one diagonal cut back into another, tracing criss-crosses and forming brief X’s with every clash.

I felt his growing rage, reading his rhythm, and took my moment. I stepped in, catching his falling #1 diagonal cut on the forte of my blade, near the hilt where leverage trounced frenzied strength. I dropped my swordpoint even as I backstepped, his blade caught on my crossguard, and rotated ‘round his blade till my point was beneath his wrist. He felt the edge slip from my crossguard and lunged for me but he hadn’t the reach, and the sharpened back edge of my saber’s tip cut deep into the underside of his sword-hand. The curved blade clattered to the cobbles -

- and then he was upon me, good hand seizing my throat and squeezing, having run himself up to the hilt of my blade before I’d even begun the final thrust. Madness danced in his eyes even as the light left them, teeth bared savagely.

I slammed a fist upwards into his wrist, breaking his grasp, then kicked him off my blade, where the sonofabitch finally lay still.

I turned and scanned the square – nothing afoot – then to the woman.

“Either that sumbitch takes his vitamins, or you really pissed them off,” I panted. I knelt to wipe my saber clean on the dead man’s shirt, then sheathed it. “Think we can deal with the magic circle now?”

She stared at me like she was shell-shocked.

“Any day now, sweetheart.”

She squeezed her eyes shut and shook her head vigorously, wet hair slapping about. “O-okay, it’s… shitty glyph, amateur work. T-th-they c-couldn’t even b-b-bother t-to g-g-get m-m-ountain-t-top s-st-one–” Indeed, the glyph had been shallowly etched right into cheap limestone – far easier than cobbles to polish flat enough for acid-etching. “W-wh-what t-tools d-do you h-have on you?”

“Acid,” I replied, “and fire, and a hatchet and muscle, if that’s worth anything.”

“H-how strong an a-acid?”

“Decent.”

“Okay.” She closed her eyes, hands balling into white-knuckled fists, and her shivering subsided a bit. “Kneel b-by the barrier, r-right in front of me.”

I did so.

“U-uncork the acid and press the vial a-against th-the barrier r-right above the stone.”

The vial contained the same nitric acid merchants used for touch-stone tests – except they diluted theirs to 20% or so. The town hadn’t an alchemist so I’d resorted to buying several vials straight from merchant’s test kits, overcoming their reluctance by dint of egregious overcompensation. Word had spread about my mysterious silver dollar, which helped, and besides, it wasn’t my money anyway. I’d spent most of the evening very, very carefully steaming off the water from the acid in the flame of an oil lamp – it was probably closer to fifty percent, maybe fifty-five now.

“T-the thick line heading t-to your r-right a-at a th-thirty-degree angle, do th-that one...” the manacle chains were clinking slightly now, muscles in her slender arms tensed taught and quaking as her fists squeezed even tighter; blood trickling from her lip where she was biting down. Even her breath paused –

– and I felt the slight squishiness of the barrier suddenly soften, my hand sinking into the barrier like it was thick mud. Soon as I was through I tipped the vial and carefully trickled it over the engraved line she’d indicated.

“Got it.”

She went slack in her chains, heaving weakly for breath, and I felt the barrier solidify ‘round my wrist like stone.

Well, shit, I thought, wondering if I should’ve simmered the acid a bit stronger, till I saw brown fumes – but it was fizzing encouragingly. I noted rainwater had beaded up on the limestone’s surface rather than sinking in – it seemed to have been waxed like a kitchen floor, probably to protect from weathering – and then it started to bubble vigorously; CO2 offgassing from the limestone as the acid etched into it. With a faint pop! I felt rather than heard, the barrier vanished.

“I s-s-ssurr h-hope y-y-yuh c-c-an p-p-pick l-l-locks,” she slurred. She was deathly pale and shivering like a leaf now; whatever reserves of energy she had now spent.

“Do you one better,” From my pocket I produced a paper package – the guts of two parachute flares, crushed to powder with a loose stone and packed together. Fishing my lighter from my breast pocket I lit a short piece of candle wick, then hastily slipped my saber’s tip under the string I’d used to tie the packet shut. I managed to scrape it off on the top of the post before the candle wick reached the part I’d rolled in a little of the flare powder.

The ‘witch’ started and yipped as a stray spark caught her arm even as I snatched her off the ground with haste; wrapping my arms ‘round her thighs and hoisting her till her raised wrists were level with the post’s top, stepping back far as the chains length would allow.

I’d looked away to spare my night vision, but had to squeeze my eyes shut anyway when the main charge ignited, lighting up the town square with brilliant white light bright enough to rival noonday. If the shouting of that mad bastard Dushnik hadn’t tipped anyone off, then this should do the trick. I leaned back, pulling at the poor girl like I was playing tug-of-war with the post, counting down the seconds as cold sweat dripped down my spine –

– and at last the wrought-iron gave way. I staggered as her torso fell backwards, catching her with one hand under the small of her back before her head could hit the stone, then flung her over my shoulder for a fireman’s carry. I heard noise from the buildings, voices – a cry of “fire!” – and I was off like a cannon-shot. The girl hardly slowed me – she didn’t look a hair over five foot and wasn’t over a hundred pounds, soaking-wet (which she was) and I’d had plenty of practice running for my life with loads like that. Before I gained the streets I heard rather more pointed cries and before I could wonder if they were intended for me, a distant report and the low hum of a musket ball creasing the air overhead removed all doubt.

For long minutes I fled, heart pounding hard in my ears as I sprinted down alleyways and side roads, the clattering of hobnailed boots on cobblestones never far behind. The clouds scudding over the half-moon threw the town into gentle glowing relief one moment; two-tone landscapes of silver moonlight and soft-edged shadow – and plunged me into darkness the next; only the silhouette of buildings against the lighter sky offering any guidance. The sound of my footfalls seemed to mingle with the shouts of pursuers as they echoed through the canyons of buildings crowding close along the narrow side-streets. For lack of better options I trusted to memory, to luck, to the sixth sense and somehow it led me to a shadow within an alleyway that whickered at me with mild exasperation.

I draped the limp woman over the front of my saddle, mounted up behind her, and without taking a pause to breathe, spurred him on.

We tore out of the alley like a Bugatti at the Indy 500, Duke’s rubber-clad hooves clinging to the slippery cobbles without issue. Turning into a main street we encountered a party of town watchmen, and without any encouragement from me Duke charged straight through them, whinnying with sadistic glee as he sent men diving every which way. Gaining the main way once again we rode like madmen for the second gate, covering the distance in what felt like heartbeats. Duke skidded to a halt just before the gate, closed for the night. I fairly leaped from the saddle, flinging the locking bar away from the wicket gate and bolting through in what felt like one motion. Duke ducked his head and trotted through carefully, unfazed by the unusual passage as he was with most things, up to and including cannon fire. Only the dreaded Paper Bag Blown On The Wind could spook my stalwart steed, and in his nemesis’s absence he was fearless, bearing us away from the town at full gallop as tardy musket balls hummed through the air well wide of us. The empty road yawned wide before us – against all odds, we were free.

I let Duke have his head, and he thundered down the dirt track merrily, flinging mud high behind us as he indulged himself for a bit. When I felt him starting to flag a little I reigned in – his stamina was mighty but I dare not let him sweat. ‘Twas late summer but the first chill of autumn was creeping into the nights, and it’d only get colder as the hours ticked towards dawn. Slowing him to a walk, I steered him off the road, then dismounted to lead him into the forest.

“Hey,” I said softly, shaking the woman’s shoulder. “You okay?”

She was breathing, but no answer came. I felt her cheek – ice-cold. She wasn’t even shivering anymore, and that was bad.

I had to navigate far enough into the forest to hide from pursuers riding the road, get a fire going in a rain-soaked forest, and get her warmed up… and I had to do it fast.