The night they made their move, the moon was covered by clouds, casting the city in darkness. No one below could see Arkin clad in black as he scaled up the side of the building; he moved easily. His concealment spells blurred his outline to any that could see him. Without a sound he made it to the window. All was not quiet inside. Arkin peered in to what he presumed was the living room, seeing Henry pacing back and forth talking to himself. Seth had been watching the apartment ever since they decided Henry was the one they wanted to copy. Seth said that Henry was looking more and more agitated. Tom’s research showed that Henry killed about once a month. It had been three weeks since his last known kill, and Arkin assumed he was getting ready to do it again. Arkin watched, and after an hour, Henry calmed and slipped off to bed. Arkin spoke a spell and the window latch came undone.
He slid through the window and moved to the shadows. On a counter, Arkin saw a drawing of a young girl, the lines hard and harsh—almost hateful. Next to it were scrolls of text. Angry words jumped off the page. Presumably, Henry was documenting his feelings about the girl in the drawing.
How dare she kick me out of the Inn. There should be no closing time for regulars. She just wanted to be with that slob of a man. I’ll show her… I’ll show her what happens if you don’t show me respect…
Arkin read more of the text. It became more and more violent and descriptive.
Of all the reasons to kill someone,
he thought with disgust. Judging by the contents of the scrolls, Arkin figured Henry was about to change his method. His last few kills had shown more signs of suffering, Tom said, and judging by the plans on the paper, Arkin assumed he was going to keep escalating the violence. In truth, it was a little unbelievable Henry hadn’t been caught by now. Arkin pushed it from his mind. He didn’t know who the girl in the drawing was, and frankly he didn’t care. He didn’t want an innocent person to die, but he couldn’t obsess about every potential victim out there.
Besides, she’s not going to be a victim,
he thought. Creeping into the bedroom, Arkin saw the sleeping form of Henry. Bile bit at the back of his tongue. This was not the part he was looking forward to. It was one thing to kill someone who deserved it; Arkin had done that plenty. No, it was that Henry was Arkin’s practice. He would kill Henry the same way Henry killed all his victim’s. He would kill him and see if the authorities credited the murder to the serial killer they suspected. He sensed Seth enter the apartment to remove any evidence that proved Henry was the killer. Arkin breathed deeply and went to work.
After taking out Henry, his job moved quickly, and in the end the local law enforcement bought that Henry’s death was another serial murder. Stacey used one of her contacts at an organization that posted to bulletin boards in order to dub the murder the ‘Salez Slasher.’ The news caught on quickly, and before long the truth skewed and the citizens of Salez lived in fear, fear that was supported as Arkin took out some of the local trash, refining his killing style. Brian arranged for fliers to be made around the killings, some giving descriptions of the Slasher, others pointing fingers at city leadership for not stopping the killings, and more. The descriptions were vague to the extreme, and as a result people flooded law enforcement, accusing their neighbors and strangers, all claiming to have solved the case. The local authorities were utterly overwhelmed with the angry mobs, which made it impossible for them to do their job.
Arkin finished reading a statistical report published by Lord Sodomis’s office. He looked to Stacy. “Crime rates are rising fast, maybe even too fast. We don’t want too much attention yet.” Stacy shrugged. “You wanted to kick the hornets’ nest. How are the other cities doing?” She asked casually.
Stacy, like the others, knew their group was only a single cell of a larger organization, but she didn’t know much other than that. Arkin was controlling everything via a vast mental network. Other cities were coming along, but not at the rate Salez had. He would have never guessed that the Salez Slasher would have been able to make such a splash. He thought that perhaps there was always underling fear in the area, but he couldn’t see why. Now that law enforcement was crippled, the rest of the criminal underworld was taking full advantage, making things spin out of control. This was all part of the plan, but it wasn’t supposed to happen so fast.
Stacy interrupted his thoughts. “What I don’t get is why the Iumenta haven’t started using their Ascended more.”
“You know, you’re the only human I know that calls them that.”
“Calls them what?” She asked, confused.
“Ascended. Most people call them dragons. It’s just odd to hear another human call them ascended. The reason why, I suspect, is that they haven’t had much of a reason to send Dragons yet, but now that local law enforcement is overwhelmed and people are panicked, they may be forced to. Let’s hope all they do is use the Dragons to sooth the people, instead of the alternative.” The alternative was that the Iumenta would simply take over the investigation themsElves. Arkin covered his tracks well, but he didn’t want that kind of heat yet. He heard Seth in the front room announce that the shop would soon be closed and people needed to buy what they wanted or find somewhere else to loiter.
Stacy rolled her eyes. “He’s great at stealth, but customer service…” She shook her head.
A moment later they heard the door close and Seth came in the back room. “You know, I like people a lot more when I’m stealing their money, not earning it, ya know what I mean?” he asked Stacy and Arkin straight out.
“Guess this means you aren’t going straight?” Stacy poked. Seth laughed. “Not a chance honey, not a chance.”
Arkin rose. It would be dark soon, and tonight the Salez Slasher was going to make his first assassination.
Arkin and Stacy stood on a sloped roof on the east side of town. She adjusted the black cloth around her face and they spoke in their minds. “It looks like this place has a few guards. I suppose with all the attention and burglary going up lately we should have seen that coming,” she said.
They crept up the roof to where the building rose to another level. Just out of reach was the ledge of the window they would be entering in. Arkin reached around his back and produced an iron rod. Stacy had a similar one. She held hers about six inches from the wall and it glowed gold from magic for a moment. Arkin grasped the rod and pushed off the wall with his foot, lifting himself. He held his rod higher then Stacy’s, and it glowed green for a moment. “Come on,” he thought to Stacy.
They used the two rods like rungs of a ladder and made it to the window. It was open. As they slipped in the open window, both pulled on their magic, causing the rods to fly back to their masters. Once in the house they split, going on different missions. Stacy was to plant misinformation, and he was going to the master bedroom to take out a local politician. The house was silent tonight, and he had to work hard not to make any sound on the old wooden floors. He was hesitant to use more magic, but he risked a few spells to keep the floor from creaking.
Arkin peered into the room. His eyes swept to a large bed with the form of a sleeping man under the sheet—this was his target. Arkin made his way over to the bed. He raised his hand to place a spell on the man to keep him from screaming, when he heard a loud thud and a yell from the other room.
“HEY YOU, STOP THERE!” a booming voice yelled, and then in his mind he heard Stacy’s. “I’VE BEEN FOUND!” From the bed the sleeping man bolted upright from the noise and, taking one look at Arkin, screamed, “GUARDS!” Without a thought, Arkin shot a blot of green into the man’s face, silencing him, and then he grabbed the first sharp object he could find and stabbed him in the chest. The man gurgled but was unable to cry out again. He pawed at Arkin as blood gushed from his chest. The door burst open and a guard entered the room, followed by Stacy, who was followed by another guard. Arkin swore.
The first man didn’t seem to notice Stacy and came at Arkin with a balaclava raised high. Arkin sidestepped the blow and let the guard pass him, taking out a cabinet with his swing. Arkin wrapped his arm around the hulking man’s neck and wrenched him back, trying to make him pass out. Stacy screamed. Arkin turned his head to see her dodging wild swings of a sword form the other guard, who was equally large, but like his opponent, unskilled. The two guards spun, facing each other for a moment, and Stacy barked a spell. The swordsman’s eyes bulged as his blade flashed gold and shot forward in his hand, driving the blade deep in the belly of the other guard. Arkin let go, slipping off his opponent’s back right before the sword could make its way through its target, out the other side of the man and into him. Arkin fell back and only caught a glimpse of the guard he was fighting raise his weapon and bring it down on the other guard’s head. Both fell to the floor, one dead from a head wound, the other from bleeding out.
Arkin worked on instinct alone, wrenching a dagger from the belt of the bleeding man in front of him and driving it in the dead politician. Stacy, while a little ruffled, looked to be unharmed. “What are you…” she started “… making it look like one of these guys did it and the other caught him? Come on, we need to leave before others show up.” She didn’t argue and they darted from the room.
Arkin grabbed Stacy and pulled her into a room, moments before two more guards pounded their way up the hall. “This way,” he hissed.
He pushed her to a window and opened it. She looked out, seeing a thirty-foot drop. Arkin didn’t wait. With another bolt of green, Stacy was rendered mute. The look on her face was that of horror and confusion, and then he tossed her out the window. She looked up, a silent scream on her face, but right before she hit the ground he spoke a spell and she almost came to a complete stop before landing on the ground. He jumped, feeling the crisp night air rush by, and then he too slowed and hit the ground. It wasn’t a soft landing, but neither was hurt.
Stacy had countered his silencing spell, and as they ran she growled at him. “Could have told me I thought you were chucking me as evidence or something.” He didn’t respond. He was still thinking about the look on her face. She reached in his head when he didn’t answer, and saw what he was thinking. “It’s not funny, you jerk,” she said, punching his arm. They didn’t speak again all the way back to the shop, but he thought he heard her chuckle.
Chapter Thirteen
Converging Paths
“I wonder, do we truly understand just how we affect others? Somehow, I don’t think we can.”
- Conversations in the Garden
Legon and Sasha looked at a large map laid out on a conference room table. Sydin’s finger ran along the border of the Pawdin and Cona Empires as well as the Cona Republic lands. “So far things have been working well. We see a dramatic increase in activity here, here and here,” he said, pointing to various spots on the map.
While Arkin had been busy in Salez and with his new organization, others had also been hard at work. The border was now teeming with military, and was all but impossible to cross. This was bad, because refugees could no longer make it to safety, but good because all was going to plan. Barnin had been part of the initial attack, going deep into Cona lands wreaking havoc. Those activities had been scaled back considerably. Parkas was now guarding caravans with everything he could spare. Even now, Ascendeds flew the skies, making sure supply routes remained safe.
Sydin went on. “From what we can tell, there isn’t any Ascended being pulled from Cona lands yet to help secure the border, but that isn’t to say that there hasn’t been an increase in patrols.”
“Where are they coming from?” Sasha asked.
Iselin responded, her voice like honey to Legon. “They are coming from Impa air space. They know we can’t attack those lands. I suspect they are pulling reserves and sending them south.”
House Floren had come up with the idea of having Pawdin dragons fly in squads of five. As each house sent more and more Ascended to the border, the Pawdin Empire’s air presence had done its job. Before, Ascendeds flew on their own or in pairs, as did the Iumenta, but now they could be more offensive. The Elvin dragons would find solo Iumenta and five on one meant that the Elves didn’t take casualties, even when there was another Iumenta dragon. No matter how strong, the results were the same. As a result, in the last week alone the Iumenta had lost ten dragons, the highest amount of Ascended casualties either side had suffered in two thousand years.
“Do you think they know what we are doing?” Iselin asked the room.
“They know,” Legon said. “The question is, what can they do about it?” He pointed along the Pawdin border to a line of dots, each representing a dragon dome. “They can’t invade at this point, we are too strong and they know it. They won’t risk their society again. But I bet they are banking on us feeling the same. If I were them I would make a go for the Cona Republic. It’s a small victory, but it’s something.”
Sydin nodded. “I agree, they won’t attack the Mahj Proper,” he said, pointing to the line of dots. Higher on the map there was a similar line of dots around the Impa Empire, and it also represented the dragon domes that protected their lands. On the Pawdin side, when looking at only the dots of the various Mahj defensive lines, the country looked like the inside of a tree with rings of defense. Those defenses would take the Iumenta centuries to breach if they were to use human forces, and that was why they wouldn’t invade, yet. Sydin went on, “We have done all we can. All we can do from here is keep pressure on them. I don’t think it would be advisable to keep human forces going into Cona lands. We don’t want high casualties. Our goal is to waste Cona resources, not our people’s lives.”