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Chapter 22: Price of Memory

Chapter 22: Price of Memory

The man drew a weapon. At first, Mara mistook it for a narrow sword. Then the blue light passed over it and revealed a needle almost as long as the man’s arm. Its polished surface ended in a point fine enough to disappear when turned toward them.

The Reaper ran his tongue across his teeth and spat along the needle.

Purple liquid coated the metal.

Rook looked at the weapon, then at the man holding it.

"Huh. Died of poison.

The man lunged.

He crossed the distance more quickly than Mara expected. The long needle darted toward Rook’s throat, changing direction halfway through the thrust and descending toward his chest.

Rook twisted aside.

The point passed through the shoulder of his coat without touching flesh.

The Reaper reversed his grip and struck again. Rook deflected the needle using the flat of the falchion, stepped inside the man’s reach and drove one shoulder into his chest.

The impact threw the Reaper backwards, but he remained on his feet. His lantern swung from one hand, casting wild blue arcs across the ruins as he stabbed twice more.

Rook avoided the first thrust.

The second grazed his forearm.

The needle barely opened the skin, leaving a narrow purple line across it.

The Reaper sprang away before Rook could counter. He landed beside his companion, smiling as the poison entered the wound.

Mara saw the change almost immediately.

Rook’s fingers stiffened around the falchion. His grip loosened, tightened and then loosened again. The muscles beneath his forearm twitched as the poison spread toward his elbow.

He studied his hand.

"Paralytic."

The Reaper grinned. "Fast, isn’t it?"

Rook transferred the falchion into his other hand.

"Should’ve aimed for the head."

The man’s smile faltered.

Rook moved first.

The Reaper stabbed toward his face. Rook knocked the needle aside and continued forward, forcing the man to retreat. Another thrust came low toward his stomach. He turned his body, allowed the point to pass across his coat.

The Reaper opened his mouth and spat directly at Rook’s eyes.

Rook leaned aside.

Purple fluid passed his cheek and struck the ruined wall behind him. The stone hissed.

The Reaper seized the needle again and drove it forward.

Rook took one step to the left.

The falchion came down.

Its broad blade struck above the man’s elbow and passed through bone without stopping. The severed arm fell with the needle still gripped inside its hand.

The Reaper stared at the stump.

His expression held confusion before pain reached it. Then his mouth opened.

The Reaper spat.

Rook turned his face away, caught the man behind the neck and drove the pommel of the falchion into his jaw.

Bone cracked.

The lower half of the Reaper’s face twisted violently to one side. His jaw slipped from its joint and remained hanging at an angle, trapping the poison inside his mouth. A broken sound escaped him before Rook drove his knee into the man’s stomach and sent him collapsing beside his severed arm.

The second Reaper charged from behind.

Mara tried to warn Rook, but the man opened his mouth before she could speak.

Black smoke erupted from his throat.

It struck Rook across the back and spread through the street with impossible speed. Within moments, it swallowed the nearby ruins, the road and every lantern surrounding them. Even the blue light could not penetrate it.

Mara coughed as the smoke entered her lungs.

She staggered blindly, one arm held before her face. Her eyes watered, and the pale chain connecting her to Rook disappeared completely inside the black fog.

Something seized her around the waist.

Mara struck at it.

"Stop," Rook said.

He lifted her from the ground and carried her backwards beneath one arm. His own breathing had become rough, each breath dragging more smoke into a body that did not need it but still remembered suffocation well enough to suffer.

Another cloud rolled toward them.

Rook retreated faster.

"Bastard died from smoke inhalation," he muttered between coughs.

"How can smoke be this thick?" Mara asked.

"Because he remembers exactly how it felt."

Rook continued backing away until the darkness thinned. Blue light returned gradually, revealing the edge of the street and a field of broken stone beyond it. He set Mara down behind the coffin, then drove the falchion into the soil.

The fingers of his poisoned arm barely moved. He ignored them and reached into one of the pouches on the coffin using his other hand.

Mara expected an explosive.

Instead, he removed a tangled bundle of caltrops.

Rook separated them with a quick shake and hurled them into the smoke. The first handful scattered across the road. The second spread farther to the left, striking stone before settling with their points turned upward. He threw a third around the coffin and forced Mara several steps behind him.

Nothing emerged from the darkness.

The smoke continued spreading, slowly curling around the edge of the ruined street.

Rook waited.

A boot came down upon one of the caltrops.

The shout of pain was immediate.

Rook seized the falchion from the ground, turned toward the sound and threw it.

The blade vanished into the smoke.

A heavy impact followed, then a scream.

The black cloud trembled.

For an instant, its surface became thin enough for Mara to see the silhouette inside it. The falchion had buried itself through the Reaper’s shoulder, and the shock had broken his concentration. Smoke poured unevenly from his mouth, thinning in some places while becoming denser in others.

Rook ran into it.

The Reaper saw him too late.

Rook struck him around the waist and carried him several paces before driving him into the ground beside the coffin. Dust burst from beneath the man’s back. The remaining smoke left his mouth in a violent cough, and the cloud surrounding them began to collapse.

Rook planted one knee upon his chest.

The Reaper opened his mouth again.

Rook pulled an unlit thunder charge from his coat and shoved it between the man’s teeth.

The iron cylinder forced his jaw wide. Rook pushed it deeper until the flared cap caught behind the teeth and locked the charge in place.

The Reaper froze.

His eyes moved toward the fuse hanging from the end.

"That cap breaks under pressure," Rook said. "So don’t bite, cough or blow anything out of your mouth."

The man became perfectly still.

"Good. You learn faster than your friend."