6. All Kinds of Predators
ALL KINDS OF PREDATORS
DAWN
Don’t go chasing dead dirt.
FRONTIER VERNACULAR, ORIGIN UNKNOWN
Dawn crouched by the water pump, savuthe smoke curling from her lips. Someone had scrubbed the square before firstlight, but they missed some spots. She could smell it. Under the blood and flux dust, a hint of vinegar. Sharp and wrong.
The sheriff’s report said one dead, but Sheriff Elm was a poor excuse for a lawman. She counted three stains in the dust. She’d bet anything, three bodies had fallen. So two missing. Plus the professional cleanup job? She didn’t like it.
She flicked the savuthe twist away and scanned the square. Old Brim and his boy Timber were replacing busted boards like any other morning. Merchants restocked their wares. Folks stepped around bloodstains without looking down. A whole damn city pretending they hadn’t seen a thing.
That’s when she spotted the girl. Fresh off a boat in a blood-splattered hoop skirt, heeled kid boots, flashy silver brooch.
She wasn’t beautiful, exactly, but Dawn was drawn to her.
She had the same coloring as most folks in Sovana, reddish brown hair pulled back in a braid.
Dark eyes that darted around like the world was brand new.
Her old-fashioned spectacles kept sliding down her nose.
Clearly well-off. No prospector, that one.
Definitely not a working girl. Had to be Lore’s scholar. Easy mark for any predator.
Damn. Dawn wanted to keep looking into what went down last night. But Lore would be pissed if she let this one slip. Dawn watched the girl head into Brindle’s flux shop. Not a minute later, Flint Jones ambled in after her. Speaking of predators.
“Fuck’s sake,” Dawn muttered, heading in after them.
Flint wasn’t half as clueless as his brothers, which made him twice as dangerous. Any luck, he wouldn’t know it was her that got Lorry arrested last night. He was likely to hang for it.
The air inside the shop was warm and metallic.
Shelves loomed over her as soon as she walked in.
Straight ahead, across from the door, was a narrow counter with a register and a door to a back room.
The rest of the shop was a maze of shelves packed with crystal bowls, shards in jars, bits of bone wired with copper.
The whole place pulsed, like a trapped heartbeat.
Flint stood a few shelves over from the counter, broad shoulders blocking half the aisle. Hat low. Hands in pockets. Watching the scholar. Dawn knew what a hunt looked like. The girl paused at a display of crystal fragments.
Flint made his move.
“Ever seen flux crystals before, sweetheart?” he asked as he sidled up behind her, voice soft and low.
The girl, clueless, smiled at him.
“Not quite like this. Flux is highly regulated in Sovana. Do these form naturally?”
Dawn slipped into the aisle next to them, pretending to study a jar of cracked relics. She didn’t step in. Not yet.
“These little ones?” he said. “Sure. Mines near town are all stripped, though, so these get dug up farther west. Dangerous work, you know. Folks die for crystals like this.”
He leaned in as she bent to look. Dawn smelled a shift in the air, musky with lust and something mean. That set of shelves ran clear to the back wall. Girl didn’t know she was cornered yet, but she’d find out soon.
“How do they get used?” she heard the girl ask. “Do you burn them, like in Sovana, or can you channel with them?”
Dawn went still.
Channel. That specific word. Not use or power. Sick climbed in her throat, and she swallowed hard. Someone must have taught her that word. But who? Anyone who knew about flux channeling was long dead.
Flint edged closer, voice dropping low. “Girl like you asking smart questions. Let me show you something special. Private stock.”
He gestured toward the back room. “Come on. It’s just through here.”
The girl hesitated, glanced at the exit. Flint shifted his weight, blocking the aisle.
“Unless you don’t have coin?” His smile went sharp. “That a problem, sweetheart? I’m sure we can work something out.”
He ran a finger, real slow, up the side of her arm. She tried to step around him. He moved with her. Still smiling. That’s enough of that. Dawn moved around the end of the shelf and stepped up behind him.
“Morning, Flint.” Dawn didn’t bother hiding her smirk.
He went stiff. His slow smile was all teeth as he turned. “Dawn. Didn’t see you there.”
“No? You distracted by something?” She bared her teeth right back.
The girl blinked between them, but Dawn didn’t look her way. Flint was getting pissed off, she could smell it on him. Good. Be mad.
“Hey, professor,” Dawn said, speaking to Talia while she kept staring Flint down. “Find somewhere else to shop.”
Flint’s nostrils flared. “The fuck you think you’re doing?”
His weight shifted before he took a swing. Dawn ducked, slammed her elbow into his gut, then brought the butt of one revolver across his jaw. Bone cracked. He crashed into a display and blue light skittered across the floor. The scholar yelped.
“Now would be a good time to run,” Dawn said all casual, brushing crystal shards off her shoulder.
The girl didn’t need to be told twice. She bolted for the door.
Flint got his feet under him and spat blood, grinning through it. “You just fucked up, Dawn. Do you know who that girl is? What she’s worth?”
She shoved the barrel under his chin. “Stay away from her.”
“Why? Lore Tavis want her for his weird sex cult?” His eyes glittered. “Cuz I can share.”
Aw, fuck. What’d he have to go and do that for?
Most folks in this town knew better than to insult Lore out loud.
If this bastard didn’t shut up, Lore would put him down, and she didn’t need two brothers dead back-to-back.
It was bad luck. Her finger tightened on the trigger.
She kept the first chamber empty around town, but this asshole didn’t know that.
Click.
Flint flinched hard.
“Next time, it’s loaded,” she said. “Stay away from the girl. Stay the fuck away from me.”
She stalked out of the shop, and his laughter followed her out, wet and ragged. “This ain’t over, sweetheart.”
Outside, Dawn lit a fresh twist of savuthe. It couldn’t be a coincidence the scholar had asked about channeling the day after a fluxborn attack. She had to be mixed up in it somehow.
Someone was caging fluxborn and wanted it buried, and someone had set Flint on the same girl Lore wanted safe. None of it added up. She fucking hated puzzles.
She took another drag and started walking. Lore’s scholar was alive for today, but it was going to be some work to keep her that way. Great. Just what Dawn didn’t need.