The Twilight City Read online

  She removed another canister from the shelf and prepared to make the last mana dump of her shift. That will mean ninety-eight years and exactly eleven days to go, she thought bitterly. Think this calls for a celebration after work. The collar around her throat tingled with electric energy, reminding her of the magic enforcing her sentence.

  “Nera!” A familiar voice interrupted her reverie. Arron, Nera’s adopted brother, leaned over the catwalk above, grinning down at her.

  The gnomes had mercifully taken their conversation a short distance away.

  “Are you going to hit up the Zombie after shift?” he asked.

  Both of them had been unfortunate enough to be arrested by the Nexus Watch after their last job went sour.

  “Aye, I can use a drink.” She was hard pressed to think of a time recently when she didn’t feel the need for a drink. The Laughing Lunatic Zombie was their favorite watering hole, far away from the Industrial District and situated between the Magelight Market and the edge of the slums, which Nera called home.

  The golem launched its shovelful of coal into the furnace, sending an explosion of sparks around it. It stepped back and turned, returning to its place.

  “I’d love to stick around and chat, but I’ve already felt the lash once today.” She grimaced as she looked over her shoulder, trying to glimpse the ugly welt on her shoulder blade.

  “Right, see ya soon, Sister. I’ll be delivering a message to a work crew up on level fourteen.” Arron clambered away up a ladder and across another catwalk. The half-elf was a courier, delivering messages, tools, and sundry items throughout the foundry.

  Nera hoisted the canister, the lean muscles of her arms taut as she cradled it against her chest. Seeing her chance, she darted forward, past the retreating golem, and up to the furnace. The heat of the flames washed over her and would have severely burned anyone unprotected from the heat, but Nera’s heritage gave her some special abilities.

  Those abilities she considered a shite trade-off for having been born with the curse of demon blood in her veins, the result of a creature from the lower planes having dallied with a humanoid ancestor of hers. “Dallying” was a polite way to think of it. The reality had likely been a violent coupling that eventually resulted in the death of the woman during childbirth. Nera had found herself growing up on the streets as an orphan, abandoned, as nobody wanted to raise a plane-cursed child since it was said to bring ill-luck, along with all the trouble that came with a so-called cursed child.

  With practiced ease, she set the canister on the ledge by the furnace and unsnapped the latches holding the cap on. Mana was an invisible substance, unable to be seen by any except mages, but Nera felt a brief chill waft from the canister as she emptied the magical essence into the furnace. The flames turned from the normal red and orange and blazed a bright blue as the mana was added. She quickly withdrew after a few seconds when the scorching heat became uncomfortable even for her. Others would have been burned to a crisp at that distance, but Nera loved the way the heat soaked into her body. It made her feel imbued with a fiery strength, as she often imagined her ancestor from the lower planes was.

  After resealing the canister, Nera slung the lightened load over her shoulder. She tossed it into an empty bin nearby, where it would be hauled away and refilled.

  Where all the coal and mana came from, she didn’t know, nor did she question it. Whispered rumors told of a secret mana factory where criminal mages served out their sentences filling the canisters much as she unloaded them. The coal was likely imported from another plane as Nexus had no natural resources of its own.

  The mana-imbued flames of the foundry kept Nexus running, supplying the well-heeled with heated plumbing and magelight for the city. More importantly, the foundry powered the great Machine, buried under the city. The Machine’s function wasn’t widely known, but Nera knew it had something to do with the portals Nexus was famous for. In her brief visits to other realms, she had seen nothing like what Nexus offered its denizens.

  She donned her leather jerkin over her thin undershirt. Now, I just have to wait for Gurn to show up. Her eyes sought the door to the crew quarters, whence the next crew would emerge once they officially started their shift.

  Somewhere above, in the twisted nest of catwalks and scaffolding, came the distinctive snap of failing iron. Somebody cried out, and the gnomes chattered in alarm. Looking up, Nera watched as one of the catwalks gave way four levels above. The end closest to the furnace collapsed, spilling the worker who had been standing on it down to the level below.

  The man tumbled across the side of the catwalk, desperately scrabbling for purchase, before he managed to grasp the iron grating of the floor. Unfortunately, that left him hanging almost directly above one of the furnace vents.

  He won’t be able to hold on. That metal will sear his hand. He’s truly buggered… but alas, not my business.

  Workers died in the foundry on a daily basis. She was about to check to see if the next shift had arrived yet when the man looked down, eyes wide and pleading for help.

  Oh gods, it’s Arron! Nera shot to her feet in alarm. “Somebody help him!”

  Nera looked around, but nobody made any move to assist the half-elf. Arron would soon be another chalk mark on the board in the office of the foundry chief. Chalk marks indicated deaths on the job. Rumor had it that a good day was fewer than three chalk marks, a bad one anything over five. When it was a bad day, shite rolled downhill from the big boss to the foremen to the overseers. Then, of course, it landed with a vengeance on the simple workers.

  One of the gnomes above her was pointing a finger as the group gawked but made no move to help. Astrid, the scarred bitch of an overseer who was on duty, stood watching from her little booth, mouth agape in surprise. Nobody wanted to risk the lash for a low-life criminal serving a labor sentence.

  “Damn it!” Nera rushed over to the ladder and scrambled up. She raced past the gnomes and vaulted to the next level up, grabbing the edge of the floor and pulling herself up. After racing up to the overseer’s box, she snatched the whip off the desk in front of Astrid, who turned too late to see.

  “Hang on, Arron!” Nera shouted.

  Her brother was shrieking in pain as his hands were burned raw and his boots smoldered.

  “You little demon slut, get back here!” Astrid screamed behind her. “You’ll pay for this insubordination!”

  A quick glance over Nera’s shoulder revealed the overseer studying a panel covered with numerous sigils indicating which prisoners were which. Once Astrid found Nera’s sigil, her rescue attempt would be all over. She didn’t care in that moment about anything but saving Arron. I have to hurry before she activates the collar.

  Nera scrambled up to the third level, which swayed alarmingly, unsteady with the weight of the collapsed fourth-level catwalk resting on it. She uncoiled the whip and lashed out, ensnaring one of Arron’s wildly kicking legs by the ankle. She looped the butt end around a support post just as Arron let go with a cry of agony. He disappeared from view, and the whip snapped tight. The catwalk jolted with a groan of distressed metal from the half-elf’s sudden weight shift, but it was holding solid for the moment.

  Nera dashed to the end of the catwalk to see Arron swinging back and forth below. His face was beet red, and his long blond hair suddenly caught fire. He curled his body up to grasp at the whip with blistered hands, trying in vain to pull himself up away from the heat.

  A commotion broke out below as the next shift came onto the foundry floor and noticed the drama above, but Nera barely noticed. Ignoring everything but Arron’s plight, she slid smoothly under the railing of level three and dropped down to level two. I hope those damned gnomes stabilized this level, or it won’t be good for either one of us.

  The furnace below was a red-hot portal to the Abyss, the heat directly above the vents almost intolerable even for Nera. She grabbed Arron by the armpits and tried to shield him with her body as she fumbled with the whip, knotted around
his ankle, but she was unable to lift his dead weight enough to relieve the tension so she could unwrap the whip. Nera cursed in frustration as Arron groaned pitifully in her arms.

  “Somebody toss me a knife,” she ordered the gnomes in the common tongue.

  The humanoids watched her from a dozen paces away, their eyes wide behind the clear glass of their protective helmets. After a moment, one of them wobbled forward tentatively and held out a small utility knife.

  Nera snatched the knife, and the gnome quickly retreated. Relieved that the collar didn’t register it as a weapon, she slashed the whip, freeing Arron, and dragged him away from the furnace along the catwalk. The half-elf was nearly comatose, head cradled in his arms. Nera stripped off her jerkin again and wrapped it around his head and neck, smothering the last of the flames from his hair and shirt collar. His once-proud mane of blond hair was no more. Instead, his scalp was blistered and burned.

  Poor Arron. These arseholes had better get him to a healer.

  Nera pulled him gently to the ladder. Her replacement, Gurn, and a couple other workers crowded the ladder, their strong hands reaching up to pull Arron away to safety.

  Then Astrid activated the sigil, and Nera’s collar blazed with a blinding turquoise glow as electrical shocks flared through her slim body. Her muscles convulsed and then stopped working, and she toppled off the side of the catwalk, distantly aware of the workers below catching her too before everything turned black.

  ***

  “Am I dead?” Nera opened her eyes to see the faint glitter of stars overhead, obscured as always through the smoky air. Outside the foundry, the cool air was refreshing on her face.

  One of the foundry’s errand boys, Osric, leaned over her, grinning and revealing the yawning gap in his teeth. “Nope. You’re still here with us, Nera. Lucky for you, Arron is too.”

  “Aw, damn it. Here I was, hoping I died and went to another plane so I don’t have to spend the next ninety-eight years in this bloody hellhole.” Nera sat up and looked around, massaging her legs, which were still tingling from the collar’s shock.

  A few curious workers eyed the two of them but went about their business.

  “How long have I been out?”

  Osric shrugged. “Few minutes, I suppose. When I heard what happened, I ran down here, and Gurn and the others already had you pulled free. Astrid ordered them back to work, but I told Gurn I’d keep an eye on you.” He picked up her jerkin, which he evidently had rolled up to cushion her head as she lay unconscious.

  She smiled at the boy, touched by his and Gurn’s kindness. Hardly anyone showed kindness to a plane-cursed, except for others scorned by society, like orphan boys and criminals. Osric stared at her chest as she buttoned up her jerkin. Amused, Nera cleared her throat and caught his eye. The boy hastily looked away, face turning red.

  “How’s Arron?” she asked.

  “He’s alive, thanks to you. Other than that, didn’t seem to be in very good shape. They went and took him to the healers.” Osric grinned again and offered her a hand.

  Nera accepted the hand and got to her feet, wobbling slightly. Her head pounded from the effects of the magical collar. She was tempted to check on Arron but knew that it would be better to let the healers do their job. Her brother’s toughness was legendary among all who knew the half-elf.

  “I’ll pay him a visit before shift tomorrow.” Nera stretched and slapped Osric on the back. “See you later, luv.”

  “Bye, Nera.”

  She felt the boy’s eyes on her as she walked away. Her young friend was always begging her to hear stories of her thieving and adventuring days, short-lived and unimpressive though they might have been—compared to some legendary rogues, at any rate.

  That poor kid doesn’t know any life outside of this cursed foundry. He’s way too young to be collared already. The gods dealt him a pisser of a bad deal when he was sentenced to carry out the rest of his father’s sentence when the old man passed. For all practical purposes, Osric was a ward of the foundry.

  Nera sighed. My life could be worse, I reckon. At least I had a life before this. And I will again, she vowed silently. For lack of anything better to do, she started off for the Zombie. I could really use that drink about now.

  Chapter 2

  A pack of wild dogs snarled at Malek as he approached the crossroads. The canines lay spread around an ancient standing stone at the center of the Y-shaped intersection. The large stone was weathered and covered by moss on its shady side. Ancient runes, fading from the elements, had been carved into the stone.

  Giving the animals a wide berth, Malek noticed a number of bones scattered around on the ground—lots of bones, many fresh from the look of them. They had yet to turn yellow and brittle from age.

  Human bones.

  The dogs lay amidst the bones, cracking them open in their powerful jaws to suck at the marrow within. A large scarred gray mongrel showed its teeth at Malek as he circled around the pack. The dog was cradling what looked to be a cracked thigh bone between its massive paws. It obviously had some wolf in its bloodline as evidenced by its baleful yellow eyes. The beast’s growl was a low rumble deep in its throat. Beside the alpha’s haunch was a human skull grinning at Malek as if the situation were somehow humorous though he had yet to realize it.

  Malek shivered and pulled his cloak tighter. Despite the dawning of spring, the air retained a chill underneath the budding foliage of the trees. He realized the bones were surprisingly clean—no scrap of meat or gristle was evident, nor did any blood stain the ground nearby. Strange—as if these bones had just been dumped here, already picked clean. An ill omen.

  The young mage turned his attention from the animals and their prizes to the town of Hollowcliff, which he was approaching. Chimney smoke rose over the trees, and he could hear the creaking of a mill’s waterwheel in the distance. He walked out of the forest canopy and was met by an expanse of green pastures. The afternoon sunshine provided welcome warmth on his face as he continued toward the town. Up ahead towered the concave side of the red cliff the town was built against, whence it had gained its name.

  Malek’s footsteps thumped on the wooden planks of a short, arched bridge. A rippling stream bustled beneath the bridge, and about a hundred paces away, the water turned the creaky wheel of a stone mill.

  Looks like a nice enough town, at least. His thoughts went back to his quest. I hope this bard can aid me finding my master.

  Children laughed and ran past Malek as he reached the central town square. A couple young women were chatting as they drew water from a well in the square. A comely lass with chestnut hair smiled at him. A farmer was haggling with a shopkeeper over the price of a bushel of feed. Most of the activity seemed to be out in the fields as the farmers took advantage of the pleasant weather to get a start on the planting season.

  The Club and Cauldron was a squat stone building with a sagging thatch roof. Smoke puffed from a broad chimney, and the faint notes of music reached his ears from within. The place looked inviting enough.

  Malek entered the tavern and took a seat at the bar. A few patrons were scattered throughout the common room. A minstrel sat on the edge of a table near the wall, tuning a mandolin.

  “What’ll it be, stranger?” A barkeep with a lined yet kindly face was polishing the counter with a greasy rag.

  “Glass of wine.” Malek eyed the minstrel, wondering if that was the man he sought. Minstrels were common throughout Tyndaria, yet bards, the learned, storytelling scoundrels, were less so. He hoped this Angus was as knowledgeable as people claimed. “Is that Angus the Adverse?”

  The barkeep filled a glass with a cheap vintage of red wine and glanced over at the minstrel, annoyance flashing in his eyes. “Aye, that’s him. The knave spends more time downing my mead than he does entertaining the guests. He’s a popular one for strangers such as yourself that seek him for whatever wisdom he claims to impart. That’ll be two coppers, lad.”

  Malek slid the coins to the barkee
p. He took a sip of the wine, which was cheap but pleasant tasting.

  Angus apparently got his mandolin tuned to his satisfaction and broke into a bawdy song about a young maiden with an itch that couldn’t be scratched. The bard’s deep voice resonated as his fingers danced effortlessly over the strings.

  He’s quite talented. Malek temporarily forgot about his pressing quest as he got lost in the song.

  As the mandolin’s last notes faded, Malek shook himself back to reality and remembered why he was there. He took another sip of his wine and ordered the bard’s favorite drink from the barkeep.

  “That was quite the song,” Malek remarked, handing a fresh tankard of mead to the bard, who sat hunched over, staring at his instrument as if lost in thought.

  “Ah, thank you, lad.” Angus the Adverse showed Malek a smile missing a few teeth. The old man had straggly iron-gray hair, an unkempt beard, and a potbelly. His tunic was threadbare and stained. “I’m Angus… the Adverse as some ignorant few call me.” He snorted. “New in these parts, eh? Old Angus has a good memory for faces, and yours I’ve not seen before.” He eyed Malek’s robes curiously.

  “Yes, I’ve traveled some distance seeking a bard with a reputedly great knowledge of other places—faraway places. For one with your fame, it’s curious you linger in a nondescript town like Hollowcliff.”

  “And here I always thought great wealth was the mistress of fame, but alas I seem to find myself without companionship.” He plucked at his threadbare tunic and chuckled at his own joke.

  Malek smiled politely. “I’ve been told that you have some knowledge of doors.”

  “What kind of doors do you seek?” Angus gave him a shrewd look as he took a hearty swig of his mead.

  “The kind of door that, if you step through, you don’t come out the other side. On this world, at least.”