Juice, she said. Like energy, or spell power, or mana, I assumed. But more importantly, she brought up “the last time” yet again.
“You’re doing it again,” I said. “What happened the last time?”
“Nothing. God!” Bastion threw his hands up, exasperated. “Fine. You two wusses stand back. Let the big guns do their work.”
Prudence chuckled to herself, then, to my surprise, stood a clear two feet behind Bastion. “You might want to join me over here,” she said. I did as I was told.
There wasn’t much ceremony to whatever it was Bastion did to that door. He stood with his legs apart, in a way that I knew he thought was cool, how a superhero might pose. Then he held out a single hand, palm out, towards the center of the door. A pale white light flashed, and a sound, dulled and bass-filled, thumped just the once.
The door exploded into pieces, like a cannonball had just punched its way through the wood. Whatever was left of it clattered to the ground in a shower of splinters and sawdust. Bastion looked over his shoulder at me – like an asshole – and favored me with his smarmiest grin.
“You like that?”
“Shut up.” I swallowed my envy. “So what are your gloves for? It’s not like your hands need protecting. Why even wear them?”
He looked at me, his eyes incredulous, then raised both leather-gloved hands to his face. “Because they look awesome. Duh.”
I meant to say something snippy. I probably had something on the tip of my tongue ready to fly, but there wasn’t any room to be a smart-ass. Bastion was plenty distracted enough when a gout of flame the size of a basketball shot its way past his head.
“Hey,” he cried out, stumbling.
“Whoa,” I shouted, watching as the fireball soared across the alley and slammed into the wall, leaving a huge, black scorch mark in the brick.
“Well crap,” Prudence said, raising her fist, her knuckles already bathed in that same bluish energy as she ran for the doorway. “Dustin. Get in through one of the windows. Break in, or step in through the shadows, I don’t care. Just get the damn sword. Let us handle this.”
“Gladly,” I said, ducking away from the doorway, half-expecting another fireball to soar out of the darkness. At least I knew there were plenty of shadows in there. All I needed was a shadow out in the alley to step into. Thea had told me that some of the less experienced Wings – teleporters, specifically – preferred to only move between spots they could see.
That’s how I meant to do things, by only shadowstepping short distances between areas within my line of sight. Sure, it limited my range, but it sounded far too dangerous otherwise. Stories abounded of Wings who took a blind ’port and ended up partially embedded in some concrete. This was my first trip out, and I sure as hell wasn’t going to end it dead with my ass stuck in a wall.
But it was evening, and I was spoiled for choice. First thing I saw was the shadow cast by a dumpster. Glamorous. I focused my senses on the inside of the building – trying to forget that it was where the fireballs were coming from – and I stepped.
Chapter 11
I hurried through the darkness. In my mind, in the days since Thea had come to train me, I’d learned to think of it as the Dark Room, the tunnel of shadows I had to pass through whenever I needed to step from point A to point B. It helped to give it that kind of tether in my head, to sort of chain my brain to reality, because how the hell else was anyone supposed to explain where my body went, what I could do?
Or worse, what would ever happen if I got stuck there?
That. That was always the last thing I wanted to think of. I shoved the thought away and raced towards the nearest point of light the tunnel showed me, the interior of the abandoned building still in my mind.
I looked at my right foot as it landed, not on a cloud bank of black smoke as it would in the Dark Room, but on concrete. Dusty, filthy concrete. Perfect. I made it. And as I always did, I patted myself down, just to make sure everything was fine. Two arms, two legs, a nose, and, well, my package, because that mattered. Shut up. As my body materialized, so did the rest of my senses. Starting with smell.
Oh God, the smell. I didn’t know much about Hubert, but the guy must have had some policy about never cleaning out the damn place because it was a hovel. Call that abandoned building whatever you want – a former warehouse, from the looks of the stacks of unmoved, empty crates and pallets – but holy shit. What a disaster area. The floor was carpeted in old burger wrappers, empty packets of chips, and occasional puddles of substance I specifically held my breath in order to avoid identifying.
Then sound came flooding back, and maybe that was the most crucial of the senses I needed in play just then, because the near-dark conditions of the warehouse made damn certain I didn’t know my bearings. I turned to the left in time to catch Bastion and Prudence’s voices, and a third one, this one dissonant, croaking, strained.
“You’ll never take me alive!”
I whipped in the direction of Hubert’s voice. Not the best idea. The darkness parted as another orange globe of fire burst forth, illuminating Bastion’s face – his eyes wide with surprise, and maybe a bit of terror – as it sailed past and slammed against the far wall.
Now, I’m no expert, but I knew that much more of that kind of activity was going to present very real problems very soon considering we were in an enclosed space with lots of wood. Lots and lots of wood. Didn’t matter what was in the crates, they were just kindling for the big-ass balls of fire Hubert kept launching from what I could finally make out as some kind of rod. It looked like a lead pipe at first, but it was too long, reaching to the ground, and the way he brandished it put me in mind of a wizard. Hell, basically everything about Hubert did.
He wore a tattered hooded jacket, its lining undone and spilling down his legs so that it looked like a robe. He had more jackets and shirts tied up around his waist, bundled there with what looked like a huge assortment of fanny packs and belt bags, like some kind of contemporary alchemist, all those pockets filled with dark and horrible and presumably absolutely disgusting mysteries. Hubert even had the face to match – huge, crazed eyes peering out of a wrinkled prune of a head, with a wild, unkempt beard growing out of his chin in a long, hairy spout. Told you. Wizard.
But instinctively I knew that Hubert was the farthest thing from it, nothing like the more learned, controlled mages I’d met over the days at the Lorica. There was no better way to understand what Thea meant about magic falling into the wrong hands. This guy was definitely at least a little off his rocker, based on his flailing desperation, or even judging from the way he kept toting that staff.
“Stay away,” Hubert shouted. “Keep away or I swear I’ll blow your head off.” Like basically every action movie I’d ever seen, except instead of a revolver, Hubert had an enchanted flamethrower in his hand. And the worst part was not knowing when – or if – he’d ever run out of ammo.
“We do this every month, Hubert,” Prudence said, her fists glowing blue as she advanced in a low crouch. “It always ends the same. You gotta stop with the smuggling. It never goes well for you.”