Брайан Макклеллан - Wrath of Empire

“Powder,” Vlora gasped.

Flerring withdrew, appearing a few minutes later. Vlora felt something pressed to her lips, and tasted the bitter sulfur of powder, then felt the grit between her teeth. The powder trance took effect immediately, running through her blood like fire, snuffing away a thousand pains until they were a dull throb in the back of her head. She forced herself to lie still and calm her breathing, letting the trance do its work.

“Better?” Flerring asked.

“Much,” Vlora said. She tried to sit up, but the effort caused a sweat to break out on her brow without accomplishing anything. “How long have I been out?”

“It’s a bit past one in the morning now. So maybe sixteen hours or so?”

“What’s the damage?”

Flerring held a lead ball in front of Vlora’s face. “That’s the bullet I took out of your back. Embedded in the muscles back there. It didn’t hit anything important, but I can’t imagine you’re going to have full use of your upper body for some time. I’m not a great surgeon, but I think I got all the pieces of your shirt and jacket out. Hopefully that’ll help avoid an infection.”

“You think? ”

“I’m paid to blow stuff up, not perform impromptu surgery on powder mages. What the pit happened down there? I heard something yesterday about a duel, and then I woke up to see the whole damned city on fire.”

Vlora tried to think. The powder trance was great at deadening the pain, but she’d experienced enough blood loss to leave her brain in a confused fog regardless of the powder. “I dueled Jezzy’s champion – that powder mage I’ve been fighting with – and killed him. Jezzy accused me of cheating and then one of her boys shot me in the back. Once that gun fired, all pit broke loose. Jezzy and Burt’s people all started shooting.”

“I heard Jezzy’s dead,” Flerring said. “They’re saying you killed her. Blew up the powder of the men standing beside her.”

Vlora tried to feel bad about it – but it was Jezzy’s man who shot her in the back. Likely on her orders. “She had it coming.”

“I won’t argue that. Her lieutenants are still fighting, though. There’s armed gangs battlin’ all across the city, while the poor bastard miners and businessmen are trying to put the fires out. Last I heard we lost most of Main Street and half the Gurlish quarter, and the fires are still going.”

Vlora took a deep breath and held it, listening. They were a couple miles outside the city, but if she focused, she could still hear the occasional musket shot echoing across the valley. “Sounds like the whole city is tearing itself apart.”

“I’ve got a pretty good view from above the cabin, and it looks like the whole city is tearing itself apart.” Flerring got up, and Vlora heard the pouring of a cup of tea. “Here, drink this. It’ll knock you back out.”

“I can’t,” Vlora protested. “I’ve got to get moving. I need to contact my men. I need to find Taniel.”

Flerring put her elbow on Vlora’s shoulder, keeping her down, then forced her mouth open with one hand. “Drink,” she ordered.

The tea tasted like horseshit and seemed to get everywhere but in Vlora’s mouth. Flerring mopped up the spills and sat back while Vlora coughed, laughing. “I’ve got that promissory note, but I’d much rather take you back to Adro in one piece, sister. Is Taniel still rotting at the jail?”

“Yeah.”

“I’ll send one of my boys down. The deputies are gonna be working frantically to put out this wildfire you started. Shouldn’t be too hard to slip him out.”

Vlora almost protested that they needed him out legitimately, then discarded the thought with a sigh. What was the point? All their efforts at finding the godstone in secret had gone out the window. It was time for brute force. “Also, need you to send word to Olem. His scouts will have reported the fighting. He needs to know about Prime Lektor. If he brings the entire brigade in before we find Prime, it’ll get everyone killed.”

“I’ll send a few of my boys looking,” Flerring promised. “Until then, you need to rest.”

“I don’t have time to rest.”

Flerring grinned down at her. “You’re not gonna have a choice. Not with that tea and all the blood you lost. You’ll be out within minutes.” Without another word, Flerring blew her lantern out and shuffled off into the darkness.

Vlora lay still in frustration, staring at the ceiling, wishing she could move. She might be wounded, but she could still think. She had to formulate a plan to find Prime and figure out what she was going to do if they couldn’t destroy the stone with Flerring’s blasting oil.

She was halfway through the second thought when she again lost consciousness.

When Vlora came to, it was once again light outside. The cabin was quiet and cold, and she guessed that it was still early in the morning. Outside, she could hear Little Flerring shouting instructions at her workers and wondered if Flerring was beginning to shut down her operation. It would make sense, of course. Even if order were restored tomorrow, the gold mines were probably going to be all but empty until the city could rebuild enough to support all these miners.

The pain was back. It wasn’t bad, if Vlora didn’t move. Or breathe. She could feel something soft beneath her fingers, and realized that Flerring had left her a powder charge. Saying a silent word of thanks, she managed to bring it to her mouth, breaking it open and sprinkling the powder on her tongue. Granules bounced off her lips and rolled down her cheeks, and she gave a sigh of appreciation as the trance kicked in.

Gradually, the hairs on Vlora’s neck began to stand on end as she came to the slow realization that there was someone else in the room. “Who’s there?” she asked, listening to the soft sound of breathing.

There was a creak as someone got up from a chair, then heavy footsteps. Vlora grimaced through the pain and forced herself to roll onto her side, expecting to find one of Flerring’s workers keeping watch.

She froze at the sight of the man standing beside the bed. He was of medium height and heavy-set, with an aged, distinguished face marked by a purple birthmark that spidered across his bald head. He wore Privileged gloves on both hands, the runes gold and crimson, and frowned down at Vlora like a father might at a disruptive child.

It took all of Vlora’s strength not to call out. Prime could kill everyone here before they had the chance to aid her. No sense in all of them dying. “Prime,” she croaked, her throat dry.

“Little Vlora,” Prime said. He dragged the chair across the room and sat down beside the bed, folding his hands in his lap. “I understand that you’re Lady Flint now, is that true?”

“Yes.”

“Seems like just yesterday you were a street tramp, taken in by Tamas.” Prime snorted. “I’ve been following your exploits in the papers. First the Kez Civil War, then the Fatrastan frontier, then Landfall. Now I find you at the ass end of nowhere with a bounty on your head as if you’re a common outlaw and not a war hero with your own mercenary army.”

Vlora stared at the side of Prime’s face, trying to read him. His expression was neutral, his face grandfatherly, and she grabbed on to the sudden hope that perhaps he wasn’t here to kill her.

“When’s the last time we saw each other?” Prime asked. “The Adran-Kez War?”

“Right before you ran,” Vlora said coldly. She silently rebuked herself. She wasn’t going to fight her way out of this – her only chance was to talk. Unfortunately, she was not good at talking.

“Ah, yes,” Prime said, seemingly unbothered by the accusation of cowardice. “You have to understand, I’m not a violent man. I’ve never been good at war. And Kresimir was there! Pit, Kresimir scared me. You have no idea just how …” He trailed off, chuckling to himself as if he were relating a happy memory. “And then the god of the Nine was killed by mortals. If I’d known how that was going to end up, I might have stayed. But what’s done is done. I moved on to other work.”