5. Caspyn
Chapter 5
Icould smell the bloody bastard.
Smell the tang and rot that lingered in the air whenever their kind was near, feel the sliver of a current that waved over my skin. It pulled and tugged in a blazing heat that crackled like lightning. Each fork of power sizzled over my skin, pulling me toward the bastard.
Showing me right where my prey was.
The Fae.
It had taken me years to realize that was what I had been feeling that night as a child, the tingle rippled over me as it pulled me toward someplace in the world. It was a warning system, telling me what monster was coming and what I should do with it. It wasn’t the only skill I mastered after that night, or the only one I had been given. But right then, it was the only one that mattered. The stronger the tingle, the closer the murderous Fae was to my knife.
This one was close.
I had been tracking the Fae through the forest for three days, the creature's motions bringing me closer and closer to the capital and the terrible Runturin that housed my true prize. I would be there soon enough. I would face her soon enough. But first, I would kill as many Fae as I could. This one was next on my list.
I had caught the vile stench of Fae two days ago in an inn on a Qit near Fynnd. The floating fishing villages were a haven for Fae as they tried to go undetected in Okivo; with so many workers and merchants coming in and out, it was easy to go undetected. Well, it was easy if I wasn’t there to sense the Fae. That tingle, that lightning sense, only made the Qits the best places to hunt.
This one was unlucky, seeing as I had been on the Qit of Fynnd for a completely different reason.
I had been hired to kill a wealthy landowner over a squabble and debt and had just finished the job when my skin had begun to pull, when I felt that rattle in my veins. I should have gone home to Waide, reported on the completion of the job I had left, but I couldn’t deny that pull. I couldn’t deny the way my blood screamed to end the Fae, to watch the foul blood gurgle from his neck in waves of purple.
The pull that was now everywhere.
Pushing my shaggy hair out of my eyes, I kept myself low to the ground, the tattered cloak I had taken to wearing fluttering over the dirt and twigs like a wave of smoke, my well-oiled boots not making so much as a noise as I moved forward, careful to place my foot so as to stay silent. My skin zinged, the sensation so strong he couldn’t be more than a few steps away now.
So close. Soon he would be mine.
My senses tingled as a sharp crack of a twig echoed from somewhere in the darkening forest ahead, the sound sending a bay of yellow and black birds into the pinkish sky of the setting sun. If I was hunting anything else, I would think the monster was stopping to make a fire and camp for the night.
Except the Fae do not camp.
The Fae do not make noise.
The scum knew I was hunting him.
This was about to get very, very entertaining.
Perfect. I liked it when it was fun.
Dropping to a low crouch, I pulled one of my long, curved blades out of its sheath, moving my heavy cloak out of the way as I held the ornate weapon before me. The sharp golden blade was inlaid with jewels and silver, the hilt perfectly fitted to the palm of my hand. This blade, and its twin, were priceless weapons forged in the high mountains of Dám, where the snow never stopped, and given to me after a decade of service among the assassins there.
The perfect weapon to kill Fae.
To kill a queen.
The shimmering gold of the blade glinted against the last of the sun as I wiped it against my well-worn bearskin breeches and scanned the trees. The Fae would be too smart to give their position away as I became the hunted, but it didn’t matter. It wasn’t the Fae I was looking for now. The beast was going to find me regardless. Right then, I was in need of some time.
There was a bush within reaching distance, the twisted wood and bright green leaves exactly what I needed. Still scanning the trees, I reached out, wrapping my fingers around the scratchy trunk of the gnarled thing. The lifeforce of the foliage vibrated and thrummed through me in waves of energy, of life. It was a heartbeat of power, a breath of eternity, and it was mine. That steady thrum pulsed in time with my heart as my magic tugged at the plant, the icy hand of this magic wrapping around me as my multicolored eyes both slid to the bright blue shade of ice and death that denoted this power. With each breath, I watched the tree as I pulled the last of the plant’s life out of it, pulled its time. Leaves withered and died, the withered trunk turning to ash beneath my grip.
One moment, it was there, the next, it was a few specs of dust on the wind as my skin buzzed and my soul throbbed.
This was the other power I had gained, the other magic I had learned to wield and control and bend to my will. That of time. It was how I had moved back to this time, and how I slaughtered the Fae.
Magic throbbing and buzzing in preparation, I remained frozen where I had crouched, my cloak flapping softly as an unnatural breeze whooshed from behind. As the idiot gave himself away.
“I thought I smelled a rat.” The lilting tone of the Fae was filled with malice as he came up behind me, the air ripe with the zing of his sword as he unsheathed it. “You were a fool to think you could take me.”
I couldn’t help it. I smiled. Stupid, arrogant Fae. He hadn’t revealed his power yet, but it didn’t matter.
“That’s where you are wrong,” I said as the high-pitched tone of his sword hit my ears, the air cutting as he brought it down atop me, ready to sever my head from my shoulders.
He sliced through air instead.
My magic screamed joyfully as I brought it to life, all of the power and time I sucked from the bush flowing through me as I let it take me through the black of nothing and plunged myself through the Ether and forward in time.
The magic of a Sypher.
Everything around me froze, the Fae’s sword only inches from my head as the edges around the Fae became hazy. The Sypher magic was alight in my veins as I stepped around the rippled shadow of the Fae on a phantom breath, his gasp of surprise puncturing the heaviness of the air like a boom. With a small tug of my magic, the Fae moved again, this time at a quickened pace as time moved around me, me staring through the Ether as I remained unseen.
As though I was watching the scene through water, the Fae’s sword rippled in shadow as it dug into air and dirt where I had been and sent the Fae stumbling forward. His face screwed up in confusion as he stood, looking around while the air rippled around him in waves. I expected him to use the magic I saw in so many of them, but he simply stood with a dumb look of confusion on his face.
Fae magic was strong but rare, and unlike the broken fragments of my kind, the descendants of the Lynar, had been left with after the war between the Goddess and the Sister, the magic requiring two to ignite it, the Fae held their magic all on their own.
Much the way I did. Except mine was due to my sister giving her power to me. By putting both Catalyst and Requisite together I could access the magic of fíra all on my own. I’d rather have my sister back than magic like the Fae, but I could not change the hand I was dealt.
The Fae turned, still no sign of whatever power he held as his blond hair swung down to his waist, his vile pointed ears sticking up like a flag, begging me to end him. If it wasn’t for those ears, he would look like any other man. It was their ruse, after all.
The Fae looked one way, then the other, dumbfounded as he tried to figure out where I had gone and how I had vanished.
This was going to be easier than I thought.
I released my hold on the power, knowing I would need to conserve it, and slid from the Ether. The ripples of the world fell away as time caught up with me. It had been minutes for the Fae but less than a breath of time for me. I stood from where I had been previously crouched, grabbing the Fae from behind as he stood, staring into the nothing.
“I win.” I growled in his ear, and he stiffened.
The fool, in his confusion, had left himself completely exposed. It would be so easy to kill him now, to slice my blade across his throat and watch his eyes and mouth fall in horror. But where would the fun be in that?
Playing with my kill before removing their heads from their shoulders was always more entertaining. I plunged the sharp curve of my blade into his shoulder, aiming to injure but not to kill.
He screamed with a sound that was high-pitched agony as I dragged the wicked sword down and he spun, my blade pulling from his flesh and the elegant clothes he wore, leaving a growing splotch of indigo behind.
You would think he saw a ghost with how he looked at me, his sword hanging limp from useless fingers.
“How?” the Fae gasped as I lunged, nearly knocking the sword from his hand with one clang.
Dodging his blade a second time, I stepped closer, letting my blade sink again into his shoulder and sending him screaming as the musky aroma of his blood drowned at the pine of the forest.
My face reflected in the wide, dark eyes of the Fae, indigo specks of his blood covering my pale skin, my jaw tight and square. That wasn’t what he was staring at, though. It was my eyes. One like ice, the other returning to its deep blue hue. The color was already fading as my magic released its hold on what little time I was storing from the plant.
“I simply used what your kind tried to steal from us,” I settled, lifting my blade again. This time, he was ready. He lifted his own sword, the hold stronger as the long, slender rapier collided with my dagger with a zing.
He grit his teeth and winced, still obviously in pain. A fine line of fire rippled down the side of his sword. There was his magic, if you could call it that. The power of fíra was weak, flimsy.
I nearly laughed. Instead, I pulled up the other side of my magic, both eyes sliding to the deep blue shade as I pulled my own fire from the fíra side of my power, the brilliant lines of gold and red rippling down the edge of my blade as well.
Except where his was a pitiful trickle, mine was an inferno.
“Nice sword,” I taunted, slicing the long edge of his blade down and pushing his sword back with ease. His flame went out with one swipe. “Useful if you want to keep your enemy at arm’s length. I like to get nice and close.”
I swiped again with my blade, fire rippling dangerously through the air as I stepped dangerously close to him. The Fae’s eyes grew wide as I lunged, preparing to sink my blade into his gut. He blocked, his arm moving faster than his sword. My blade sliced against that instead, fabric and skin singeing as I pulled the flame from my blade and back into me. He screamed at both the slice and the flame, the fine silken green fabric of his tunic and shirt singed black and gray as it stained further with the deep purple of his foul Fae blood.
“Even the Ramal’s army knows better than to wield those ancient monstrosities. Did you think you would get far with that rotten piece of metal? Or do you carry it because it's easier to kill and take our children that way?” I hissed and swiped again, this time aiming for the cut on his arm. He was already struggling to hold the sword, but one more swipe, and it fell to the ground with a thud against dirt and underbrush.
The Fae tried not to scream as my blade cut down to the bone, dark musky blood pouring everywhere. I thankfully stepped back before any of the vile stuff landed on me.It smelled far worse after it dried.
“The children? We don’t?—”
“Lies!” I cut him off with a roar, grabbing the identical brother to my blade from where I stashed it on my back. “Trust me. You do. Well, not yet. But you will.”
His eyes grew wide as I approached him, golden daggers held out to either side. He didn’t even try to flee. He just stood there staring.
“Wait. It’s not her. It’s you! No! Don’t—!” I didn’t let him finish. I sliced the head from his shoulders with one quick motion.
The second my blades went through, I let the last of the magic flare, the gift pulling me into the Ether as the ripples of time moved in shadow around me. His blood went everywhere, his head sliding to the ground as the rest of him crumpled into a pile of twisted, lifeless limbs. My magic snapped back into place as the last of his blood fell to the ground, leaving me perfectly clean.
Well, almost.
“Damn Fae,” I shook my foot to the side, sneering at the large drop of purple blood that had landed on the toe of my boot. I had run out of magic too soon. “That’s going to be hard to get out.”
Jayse would not be happy. Her biggest gripe was cleaning Fae blood, and for good reason. The stuff smelled fowl, the stains it left behind nearly impossible to remove. Most wouldn’t recognize the smell of rotted wood that lingered in that deep indigo shade of their blood, but some would.
Those who would, would also cause trouble for me.
I threw some dirt on the blood before it fully congealed and cleaned my blades on the clothes of the now headless Fae. Fae never wore cloaks, something that made them easier to track. That, and their overly gaudy clothes. They wore the silks and soft materials of the royals, even as they tried to move on Qits and through villages as though they belonged there. Same with the rapiers. They were no good with them, so it never made any sense why they had them. They were better fighting hand-to-hand or with their magic. But I had yet to meet any of them who could best my power. Perhaps it was cheating, catching them off guard the way I did, but as long as I got my head in the end, I didn’t care.
I didn’t care about any of it. I didn’t care what they wore. I didn’t care how they fought. I didn’t care about them. All that mattered was that I stopped as many of them as I could before the queen turned them into her own personal army. That, and they got me close to the queen. If I killed enough, if word of me spread enough, I could see myself into the Runturin, into her court.
I could bow before her as The Wanderer, the notorious Fae killer. Her servant. Then I could kill her right there on her throne, end her before any of the Red Wave and the massacres that haunted my childhood began.
I simply had to kill enough Fae to get there.
It never made sense to me years ago, when she had announced paid bounties for every Fae head that was brought to the palace. The monsters were to be her army, after all. But I wasn’t going to question. It was what I had needed to gain clout to stand before her, to end her, so I would kill them. Seeing as they were the ones who killed my family, it would be my pleasure to end them.
So, I would keep killing them. Killing what would be her army, and killing to end her.
“You’ll do nicely for that,” I growled as I lifted the head by the hair, the open eyes and mouth making the monster's face look almost comical. “I’ll kill you all if I have to.”
Stuffing the head in the thick transport bag Jayse had made me, I checked his pockets for anything good. They never had money, but sometimes I could find trinkets Jayse and I could sell for fair coin.
Today I found what looked like a sapphire on a chain, a comb with a few rubies on the handle, and a locket bearing the small painting of a Fae female and a babe.
The quality of the miniature was exquisite. The female’s smiling face was freckled, her eyes bright as she grinned with teeth straighter than I had ever seen. Odd.
I pocketed all three and also stripped the Fae of his belt, the leather workmanship far beyond what I had seen in the Qits. Taking that and his stupid sword, I removed his shoes, placing it all in a separate bag before I stood and let my magic surge through me.
I had only ever heard of fíra, vio, ?r, and the others. Never this power. This power of time was all mine. The power of the Sypher, as that murderous Fae had called it. But there was another, that of fire and destruction, that Lily had left me with.
I could almost feel both eyes slide to her deep shade of blue as I pulled at the energy in the air and turned the remains of the Fae to ash. In one blink, he was gone, floating away on the wind as my eyes returned to their usual dual shade.
My own icy blue paired with the darker color of my sister. The colors shifted depending on which magic I used but remained in a dual shade otherwise. Beautiful, unless you were trying to go unnoticed.
Which I always was. Which also made them a problem.
Hitching up my bags and sheathing the sword, I followed my path back out of the forest.
It had been decades of hunting, of trying to find a way into the palace and to the queen. As a child, I had known I needed to train to be able to take the queen, to be able to help Princess Elara in her fight when the time came. I not only needed to find a way into the Runturin to be ready for that day; I needed to make sure my magic was ready, too.
So, I had trained in killing, in tracking, in every way to fight. I had journeyed to the assassins in the snow-capped world of the North and learned their ways, then spent years with the feral hunters in the south to find answers to my power and perfect the skills I had. I had ventured among the witches in the hopes of finding more lessons in the skill of a Sypher. I found out nothing of them and was only to be chased from their camps on threat of death. I had lived more lives than were my own, taking when needed and pulling myself back in time again and again. I should be an old man with all the lives and time I had moved through, but my body had stopped aging years before. So, even when I spent a lifetime learning to kill on the Isle of Dám, when I returned, it had only been a fortnight to Jayse.
It had all been for the purpose of helping the princess defeat the queen. Of saving Lily. Even if it wasn’t me in this life, that would be with her. She deserved to live a full life, just like all the others.
It didn’t matter who died in the process, I would give her the life she deserved. I would give all the Catalysts a life.
One vile head at a time.
My purpose, my goal, rattled through my mind on repeat as I stomped through the forest and back toward Kivon Road, the winding main road of Okivo. The road stretched all along the far coast, connecting the Qits on one side and the villages on the other. Some called it Spine Road, the roads that stretched from it to the people looking like bones on a back. Far ahead, at the top of the spine, like some gaudy head, was the palace, and down on the other end of the Realm, the great Temple of the Sister. The head and the heart of this festering country.
The Runturin was a fortress of black stone that stretched and sliced apart the sky, the home of the Ramal and his family nearly impenetrable. The Temple, on the other hand, was open to all, the white stone rumored to look like clouds on a plane. The immense temple was where everyone in Okivo would travel to pay their respects and receive blessings from the Goddess on the grounds where she had destroyed the Sister and the Fae in the end of The Black War, the final battle over magic when magic was split.
Well, where the Book of the Goddess said she had eradicated them, anyway. If that history was true, I wouldn’t be hunting the bastards, would I?
The sun had long since set when I emerged from the forest, the golden light of dawn already peaking over the distant horizon when I arrived at Kivon Road. I had journeyed too far this time, the hunt taking me far from my Qit and from home. It would be a five-day journey on horse to reach the village, and by then, the head would start to smell. Even worse, I had no horse.
Kicking my feet against the loose pebbles on the road, I let the dirt from the well-worn path cover the last of the blood on my boots.
“Fucking Fae,” I snarled, silently wishing I could kick the head into oblivion. If I didn’t need the bounty for those damn ears I would leave it there to rot instead of taking it with me to draw every bloodthirsty beast out of the forest and into my camp.
There would be no sleep until I reached home.
I had wished for a horse before, but a horse on a Qit was a ridiculous notion, even if we could afford it. What I could pull off the Fae, the bounty we would receive from the head and my odd jobs, and what Jayse sold in the shop only covered enough to survive. Much like the rest of the Realm.
When that woman had given me that roll in the town square, there was a part of me that thought things would be better in this time, that food and safety would exist in bounds. In a way, it was. There was no black guard, and no Red Wave. There was still starvation, however. There was still not enough food to go around. Many in our Qit would take the month-long trip to the Temple of the Sister to worship the Goddess and ask for blessings and plenty. I hadn’t the heart to tell them it was only going to get worse.
“Eh, Friend! Need a board?” I turned at the familiar lilt of the Wave Walkers, the call pulling me out of my thoughts with a start. The head thumped to the ground as I reached for my swords, my mind pulling through the quickest way to end the fool that had walked up behind me. I froze the second I saw the carriage, the tall wood-paneled pack wagon that the Wave Walkers used for transport pulled down the road by a lumbering old horse and a man who looked to be as old and wary as his mount.
The wagon creaked and screamed of age and ill repair the closer it lumbered, the sound loud enough that many of the birds in the marshy meadow Spine Road cut through took flight. I hadn’t even heard the transport carriage approach. That was not good.
I must be more tired than I thought.
Covering my reach and grabbing the head, I turned, fixing the widest grin I could on my face, the stretch uncomfortable and foreign.
“Ay, mawn. Oo gon’ Triskin way? I be headin’ t’ords Waide of the water.” I slid into the vernacular easily. The Wave Walkers were my people more than any others, after all. Even Jayse.
Usually, I would walk, but if I was tired enough not to hear them coming, I was too tired to be traveling alone. Besides, I didn’t want to let this head rot too far, or they would pay us less for the bounty.
“Hop in de bawk. Tiz a coin!” I threw him the asked amount and slunk toward the back.
I had barely hefted myself onto the large carriage when the driver kicked the massive horses back into a trot, the windowless void of the panel wagon swallowing me whole.
“Ay! Who we’d haf here ’dem?” One of the voices drifted toward me as my eyes began to adjust. Thankfully it was dim enough in there that no one would be able to see my eyes.
Normally I would wear my hood low around others, but it was already too stifling for something like that to be comfortable.
“Name’s Jack,” I said, giving the name I always did on the road. It was my way of remembering him, I suppose. Or perhaps I was simply hiding behind him.
Hiding behind what I had done.
They all mumbled a welcome, a few of them giving their names, which I didn’t bother to commit to memory.
Wave Walkers moved from Qit to Qit as quickly as the waves they were named after. Few traveled together, and seeing as I always traveled alone, rarely did any of them cross my path a second time. Not that they ever recognized me when they did.
They dressed in sun-bleached cotton that was riddled with holes and stains, and always smelled of salt and fish. Their hair was long and scraggly, the beards on their faces grown out to protect them from the sun. Very few were clean-shaven, like myself, but I had been known to grow a beard on a long job, especially if I needed to be hidden more.
My lack of beard was possibly making me stand out on this occasion, seeing as one of the men across from me had already begun to stare.
Look away, boy, or I’ll gut you like a fish in front of everyone.
I tried to smile again, but this time, my mind was much too full of exactly how I would slice him down, what I would do with the last dregs of his life that I would suck away… It all beamed from my eyes as I stared back at him. His gaze darted down, his hand going to his sides, right where a knife would be stored if he had one.
“We bin swapin’ tales. You ’erd of the Wandre’r, Jack?” the man next to the staring bloke asked. I think he had said his name was Kint. “We was jus’ tawkin’ ‘bout the Wandre’r.”
Ah, the Wanderer, the character I had created of myself years ago. Over the years, the simple tale I had weaved about a man who killed Fae had mutated from a story swapped by travelers to a story told to children to keep them in line. I sat up straighter, my nerves prickling as to which version of myself I would hear about today.
“An’ I was jus’ sayin’ ee don’ exist. Naw one like that cu’d be real,” a younger man in the depths of the wagon piped up.
“He is. I hear the tales of how he kill them Fae, of how he save’n us.” Odd. He was almost talking about me as though he was awed. I’d never heard that tone before. I stiffened before laughing it off like a great joke with some of the others.
“Have a lark, will ya?” the man next to me caroled, still laughing.
“’Tis naw a lark. ’Tis true. He goze from Qit ta Qit, killin’ doze Fae monsters for da qween.” Kint made a squelching noise as he pantomimed my blades moving through the air to remove the head from a Fae.
It seemed my most recent addition to my lore was taking hold nicely. I may not work for the queen, but it might help the stories of me reach her faster. It might help me reach her faster.
“He haz deez eyes, two diffren’ blues that look out and see everything—” Kint was cut off by the sharp laugh of the man next to him, a man with eyes so grey they looked like storm clouds in the middle of his sun-scorched face.
I, however, froze; the scorching stagnant heat of the wagon turned icy. I hadn’t added that to the tale. In fact, I had specifically left that out. Eyes of different shades were too noticeable, too rare, and impossible to hide. It would tie me to the story too easily. It wasn't just that, however. That fact had been placed on my bounty posters several years before, when I had been seen on my first job and had been wanted for the death of a crime lord I had been paid to kill.
It was my first hit, and everything had gone wrong. Not only was I seen, but Jack had been lost in a crossfire I couldn’t stop.
I didn’t want the same thing to happen again. I didn’t want to lose again.
Bringing up that fact would tie me to things I needed left in the past.
I had left it there. I had taken all of the training I had given myself to kill the queen and put it to use becoming the best assassin in the Realm, sought out by any who needed a dirty job done. I had mastered killing. I reveled in it. I enjoyed it.
The assassin I was could not be linked to the Fae hunter, however. An assassin would never receive an invitation to the Runturin. To have them connected, to have been seen…
I fought the urge to pull up my hood, simultaneously fighting the need to kill everyone in the pack wagon. I would start first with that same man who had been staring at me before. A simple swipe across his neck would do the trick. The filthy bearded fellow was still staring with those grey eyes, his focus narrowing as though he had already seen my eyes; as though he already knew who, or what, I was.
Perhaps I could simply follow him off this wagon and end him anyway.
“Ever’yting ya?” the grey eyed man scoffed. “Dey see that fish ya trew back las’ week?”
Everyone laughed, the sound reverberating over the wood and through the darkness.
“Wuh say you, Jack?” Kint asked, leaning forward as everyone piped down. Such was the way of the Wave Walkers. They all moved so much, and they often didn’t meet anyone new, so to their groups, the stories and opinions anyone new would bring were treated like gold.
I would oblige, but if I said much more, or if they did notice my eyes, I would have two options: kill them all, or go back to walking my way home to Waide.
I wasn’t necessarily against killing them all—I had killed more for less—but I had exhausted myself hunting and fighting a Fae. Luckily for all of these men, they were going to survive simply due to my fatigue.
“I say I’d be wishin’ to sleep an’ dream of da ladies who be wanton’ a good tumpin’,” I responded with ease, pulling up my hood before anyone truly caught sight of my eyes.
It was my usual response to these stories, and it worked a charm, the statement riling them up into wild laughter as the conversation devolved to who put their cocks in who and how.
I let it all drown over me, the voices a hum as I looked not at Kint, but at the man sitting next to him, the one who kept looking my way. My skin tingled slightly, warning me this man was Fae. Except if he was, that tingle would be screaming through every nerve ending with how close he was.
I met his penetrating gaze, my warning clear even as my skin buzzed, even as that darkness inside of me begged to end him.