The Ruby Curse

By Makayla Yokley

Heroes come in all shapes and sizes... though they're not usually escaped convicts.
Just like seventeen-year-old Violet Seymour, whose got a criminal record so thick you could use it as a doorstop. Being the only person to ever escape the highest maximum security prison in the steam-and-clockwork powered nation of Arcova, everyone and their mother wants Violet's head on a plate. So when Violet is suddenly thrust into a heroic role, being a link in an ancient bloodline of heroes, she's a teensie bit skeptic.
But Violet isn't the only one with problems, no matter how much she likes to think so. Mages are disappearing left and right, over a dozen have disappeared over a short amount of time. There are whispers that it's got something to do with the disappearance of the Ruby Scourge, an artifact from the ancient world. It's the perfect start to Violet's new career as a hero!
Too bad her primary concern is looking out for number one, and she only embraces this whole "hero" thing when she can get something out of it.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Makayla Yokley
• Release date: Jul 20, 2012
• ISBN: 9781476180533

Makayla Yokley

Makayla Yokley is a college student who lives in Kansas with her somewhat evil cat named Cujo. She likes to write fiction of all genres. Currently she is majoring in Liberal Arts.

Book preview

The next thing I knew was the smell of piss and rotting wood.

A dull throb pulsated in the back of my head, moving to the front in an almost wave-like motion. Through the haze I tried to remember where I was and how I had gotten there. The last thing I could recall was being bashed on the head and little black dots peppering my vision, stealing the world away into darkness. If I tried to remember more, a shock of pain erupted without warning until I was subdued once again.

There are no questions here in the kingdom of concussion.

I remember I was doing something bad. Hardly anything to get in a tizzy about when it’s me doing it, but being able to remember anything at all was an accomplishment. In the grand scheme of things it didn’t really matter. I was still in a place where the floor— or at least what I assumed was the floor— was warm and metallic against my back.

A gob of blood sat idle under my tongue. I tried not to swallow it but some things were easier said than done. Just when I was sure I had no other choice, I tilted my head askew and spat it out. I could feel the warm, sticky wetness trailing out of the corner of my mouth and streaking across my cheek. I could still taste the bitter, coppery sensation on my tongue.

Somewhere in the darkness that condensed the entire world into a tiny, limited space, a disembodied voice floated up and pierced through the dizzy haze.

Oi! Look there! She’s awake!

It was a man. I was certain of that much. His voice was rough, irritable, and had an accent that at first seemed very strange to me, but I soon recognized it as the kind of vocal slur usually found in the south. The important thing was, though, he was undeniably Arcovan.

Hey! Hey you! You ain’t dead?

Another man joined in and his accent matched the other man’s to the syllable. But his voice was lighter and gave the impression of being off balance.

Clearly! the deeper-voiced man said. If she is dead then she’s a zombie, and that’s rubbish. Don’t be stupid!

Oi! Who you callin’ stupid? the lighter-pitched man asked.

This bloody stupid fool right ‘ere!

The sounds of their voices faded away into obscurity, depriving me of certain bits and pieces of the conversation until I could no longer follow what they were going on about. Through the pain I willed my eyes to open. The edges of things blurred together into a great unintelligible mass that hung around me like a soupy haze.

But then things started to take shape. Artificial light from the gas lamps outside streamed in through the thick black bars that made up the window at the very top of the room. Fat copper pipes ran every which way on the ceiling. A puff of white steam shot out of a loose valve and settled down on my face in little wet speckles.

With my remaining strength, I pushed myself up to a sitting position. I used my arms to keep myself propped up. Against my fingers, which peeked out of their little burrows on my gray wool gloves, I could feel the unsettling roughness of crystalline specks coating the metal floor. That probably explained the smell. Thick black prison bars and a short distance separated me from the two idiots.

I could hear rats squeaking excitedly as they ran across the floor, trying to see who could get closest to the humans without being bashed on the head. An exciting game, for sure, but probably considered a dangerous pleasure in the rat community.

My memory seemed completely dependent on how long I could keep my vision from blurring over. The longer I was able to hold in place the defining lines that separated one thing from the next, the more I started to remember how I’d gotten there. But the second I let my mind wander too far off and things began to bleed together again; it suddenly became harder to think straight.

I’d been robbing a bakery. That’s right. I remember luring the unsuspecting baker out of his shop by telling him my father had been trapped under a car… or something… and that he would be rewarded handsomely if he could find it in his heart to help my dear, old father. I’ve found throughout my life that most people are selfish and greedy, so it’s necessary to grease their palms with the promise of being paid for any and all good deeds. So when the baker ran out of his shop headlong into the business of heroism he hardly noticed for a second that I wasn’t behind him.

With a dark grin on my face I went into his shop and helped myself to whatever money I found in the register— sixty pounds— and to as much bread as I could carry. Both of which I inevitably lost.

I was a bit fuzzy on the details but I figure, given the obvious outcome, that the baker came back before I could finish the job and called the guards. Did I outrun them? Obviously not. How far did I get? Who knows? The only thing that mattered was where I was now and it wasn’t a good place to be.

My vision slowly gained the ability to sustain itself without conscious effort on my part. When I was able to see the finer details of things surrounding me, I strained my eyes to see the features of my fellow prison mates. The man with the deep voice was plump and had a scraggly gray beard hanging from his face like the vines of a weeping willow. His more soprano companion was the exact opposite. He was thin, tall, and almost completely clean shaven, although I suspected he had a few prickles of facial hair sticking out of his chin that I couldn’t see. Men like them didn’t tend to be truly clean shaven. It was how we in the lower circle of life differentiated between the rich and the poor.

I dragged myself over to the slimy wall and when I was properly situated I put a hand to my forehead.

Where am I? I asked.

Arcova Slim— that is to say, the skinny man— was the one who answered. Coredale.

I figured that. But where in Coredale?

Yeah, stupid! She’s got to know what town she’s in to get locked up! Fatty said. His profession of Slim’s stupidity prompted another superficial argument between them. I painfully endured, fighting back the urge to curl up and lay back down on the floor. I probably had a concussion. I was lucky to wake up at all and it was greedy to hope for the same miracle twice.

But it seemed like such a good idea, despite the very real possibility that I’d never wake up. Right around the time I decided that I didn’t care, the two men’s argument had died down and their attention once again turned to me.

So is it true what the guards said? Slim said.

That depends, I said. What’d the guards say?

That you was the one who escaped Erabium.

Don’t be stupid! The guard was just being an ass. Fatty said. Of all the people who go to Erabium, why would one worthless little girl be the one to escape?

Safely hidden in the shadows of my cell, I grinned. It was because I was so little and worthless that I’d been able to escape, but I wouldn’t tell them that. I owed them no explanation.

Arcova Slim took a moment to consider Fatty’s logic and, after apparently finding it irrefutable, he nodded slowly. I s’pose you’re right. You got’s the eye don’t cha? The one the girl on the posters gots?

The girl on the posters also has a name. I thought to myself half-bitterly. It’s Violet. Violet Seymour. There’s just a little bit more to me than just ‘the girl who escaped Erabium’. Not much, but a little.

That’s right, I said. My decision to tell the truth came from some sort of sadist desire to make them squirm. Any prisoner, no matter how tough they thought they were, would shit their trousers at the thought of sitting just a few feet away from the most wanted murderess in Arcova. Trust me. I’ve seen it happen.

See! I told you! Slim cheered.

You believe anything anyone tells you! That’s how we got locked up in this place! Fatty snapped.

It wasn’t my fault!

So your saying it’s my fault that, when that guard caught you trying to steal that lady’s purse and you told him it was yours and you were taking it back, you actually believed him when he said he was just going to take us to fill out a theft report?

I grinned. Idiots.

Well he looked like he believed me! How was I supposed to know? Slim asked.

How ‘bout when he didn’t arrest the lady right then and there?

What about you? I asked. Their shadow’s shifted against the dim glow of the candles against the far wall.

What?

You heard me. What about you? Why didn’t you say something? Or how about grabbing your friend there and running when you saw the guard?

That shut them up. Shocked, probably, that I had introduced such obvious logic that neither had considered before.

Hey yeah! Slim said once the gears in his mind clicked. What ‘bout you?

I waited eagerly for Fatty’s answer. Had he realized he was just as stupid as his accomplice or was he trying to come up with a reason why he’d gotten them both arrested, despite knowing everything Slim didn’t.

When he didn’t say anything, I decided to. We’re waiting.

Shut your hole! he shouted at me, practically growling.

Just admit it, I said. You’re no smarter than your stupid little friend there.

Yeah! Just admit it! the high-pitched man said.

If I wasn’t stuck in this cell, I’d kill you!

Something was crawling up my throat from deep down inside me. It was out before I could stop it. I laughed.

You? Please. I’ve killed hundreds of people with my bare hands. I’ve watched the life bleed from their eyes until there was nothing left but an empty shell. You’ve got to be at least a little intelligent to kill that many people without being caught. You? You’re not smart enough to do it.

Without being caught? You’re in jail! You’re going to hang tomorrow, you know. Guardsman called Erabium today and got permission.

Good thing I won’t be here tomorrow, then.

All of a sudden the jailhouse was filled with stunned silence. I could hear steam hissing out from every loose part in the piping it could find, and the sounds of cars and people moving around in a busy motion outside became so much louder than it had been before.

Then the two men started laughing.

And what are you planning to do? Turn into steam and fly away? Fatty asked through fits of laughter. I grinned to myself. I loved it when the men laughed at me before I made some grand escape. Somehow that makes the looks on their faces when I pull it off all the sweeter. But that might’ve just been the sadist in me rearing her ugly head again.

Something like that.

Something like that indeed. When I felt able to crawl across the floor towards the metal bars, I sat on my knees in front of them, took off my gloves, and carefully set them down next to me.

I gripped the bars, feeling the subtle serration in the slick metal. Slowly I took in a deep breath of air, sticky with the summer heat, and released it slowly and with great focus. Nothing else mattered but the almost painful constriction of my lungs beneath my ribcage.

A supernatural warmth rushed over me, riding on the back of each breath. I felt it soaking my muscles and my blood. It was euphoric.

Bones snapped mercilessly under my skin. They shifted and twisted and grew. I bit on the inside of my cheek to keep from screaming, but ended up drawing blood instead.

My fingernails grew slowly, sharpening until they were four small knives slicing my palm open. Blood flowed freely down the length of my hand. I knew that strange, warm wetness anywhere. It dribbled off my wrists and onto the floor.

Hot wind pressed against my face — or maybe my temperature was rising. The flames of Hell licked my face, jarring my consciousness awake to the sensation of cold moisture beading my face like dew. I focused on it—obsessed over it. Keeping aware of it kept my mind tethered to where I was and what I was doing. If I ever let my mind wander too far…

One feeling always begets another. When each breath became a labored chore and I felt my shoulders grinding together, separating and morphing my tiny frame into something else entirely, I yelled and my eyes flew open.

The bars— which had been standing so steady and definite before— were bent apart as if they were straws. But even as I admired my handiwork, I couldn’t help but catch a glimpse of the damage.

My hands had swelled five times their normal size, and nothing about them even whispered at the idea that they belonged to a young girl. The pigmentation, which was usually very pale for someone who spent so much time outside, had turned almost completely black. Edges of dark blue shaded where the natural skin began to blend in with the unnatural. Little hairs had sprouted on my knuckles and along the length of my fingers. The whites of my fingernails were just as I imagined them to be— long, sharp, and deadly.

After several deep breaths the process reversed. My bones shrank and snapped back into place, my skin became all one color again, and my fingernails returned to normal size. Long, jagged wounds stretched across my palms like ribbons. Blood was beginning to crust under my now tiny fingernails.

I grabbed my gloves and hurried to pull them on. The feeling of the fabric against my open wounds bothered me, even as I crawled out of the hole I’d just made for myself. I crept over to the cell where the two men sat, huddled up against the furthest wall, and practically shoved my face into the bars separating us. I held open my right eye and let them get a good hard look at the steel plating that so identified me.

I told you was all I said. I tore myself away from them and pushed their horrified faces out of my mind. I wasn’t surprised. Everyone was scared of what I was.

Sitting on the metal table several steps away from the collection of four prison cells were my goggles. Brass and leather Godsends to those of us with criminal records and mechanical eyes. Next to them were my long elbow-blades wrapped in my red velvet riding hood. I snatched them off the table, having secured the base gauntlets of my blades to my forearms, and hurried up the short flight of stairs.

One problem waited for me right next to the only escape route. It was five feet seven inches tall, metal, and rolled about on a single wheel that gave it and others like it a surprising amount of speed, given their tendencies to be top-heavy. It was a Defendron-9 model, one of the more common models that was, as far as I knew, currently the most-wanted model on the market.

It would be easy enough to get around it. The thing I had to worry about was the laser it had built into both wrists. Even if I somehow managed to disable the head, the arms were on rotators that could allow it to shoot me no matter what side it had fallen on. It was one of the reasons they were so popular.

There was only one way around it and I had to be quick, lest I run the risk of getting a limb blown off.

I pulled my goggles up over my eyes, bathing the world in a dark-blue tint, and ran.

Defendron-9 screamed when its oversized metal body hit the ground.

The siren inside of it wailed with such high-pitched intensity that I had to cover my ears to keep from going deaf. Within moments the nearby guards were shouting orders at each other and the thundering of their footsteps sounded behind me.

Drunken men staggered out of a bar I passed, some with women helping them out and some still clutching the neck of a whisky bottle. The sounds of loud, joyous laughter followed the alcoholics.

I dove into an alley further down the street and followed it as far as it would go. The buildings, which had seemed so much like giants before, were shadows rising up from the streets to mar the beauty of the crescent moon. Black smoke veiled the stars, a stage curtain where all the little ballerinas hide before the show begins.

I ran until my legs ached and I couldn’t breathe. Their voices were lost to the gas lamps and I knew I was alone.

Alone…and lost.

Chapter Two

Bright yellow sunlight bathed the city in early morning. With the nighttime receding, the cracks in the dirty brick buildings became swollen and noticeable. Had the darkness, in an attempt to escape the light, in fact broken off pieces of the brick and made the fractures larger? I wouldn’t have been surprised; shadows are tricky like that. You need to watch them close or they’ll steal your sweets and push your dear old granny down the stairs.

The E. Coligny Butcher shop was just waking up as I passed. The owner, a man who I assumed was the ‘E’ in ‘E. Coligny’, came out to sweep a few rogue leaves off his cobblestone walkway. The apron tied around his protruding belly was already stained with blood— and it probably wasn’t new blood. It was also stained with grime spots and what I hoped to God wasn’t a certain substance that is infamous for pouring out one’s nose. I hurried past.

A yawn of cold morning air rushed past my arms and sent goose bumps up my spine. You’d never guess based on how cold mornings could be that it was probably going to reach over seventy degrees before two in the afternoon. Knowing that this coolness wouldn’t last made me savor it more. I looked up into the sky, where dirigibles floated lazily by, and watched the breeze push along patches of clouds.

At the end of the street was a building with a sign that swung loudly in the breeze. The chains that held it to the short metal pole sticking out above the door badly needed oiled. It had a picture of a dog on it, so I guessed it was pretty safe to assume it was the dog pound I’d been looking for. If not, then they really needed a better sign.

I headed towards the building with the dog sign. It seemed like as good a place as any to look. I tried not to let the state of the building bother me. Just because it had a window that was broken out and patched up with a plastic bag and industrial tape didn’t mean it was all bad. Right?

From behind an unevenly stout; yellow brick building with a crumbling side, an old man stepped out into the street. He wasn’t all that old, I supposed, but everyone over the tragic age of twenty-five was old to seventeen year olds like me. His skin was darkened by a lifetime of sweat and what I guessed was miner’s coal. His eyes had even gone black like the little rocks he no doubt shoveled for a living. He came walking towards me in an uneven, drunken slosh. It didn’t take anyone of special intelligence to know he’d just been pissing in the alley. He was zipping up the crotch of his trousers as he walked up the street but it had done little good. His little man swayed to and fro, breathing in the morning light.

Heat crept up the length of my neck and scorched my cheeks. I averted my eyes, desperate to find anything else to look at. He grumbled as he walked past. He either didn’t notice that he was exposing himself, or maybe he just didn’t care. Honestly, it could go either way. A neighborhood of dilapidated buildings and puffs of dead grass poking out in between the cracks of the sidewalk didn’t exactly inspire confidence.

Speaking of the sidewalk; there was a specific patch of crunchy brown grass that had its tendrils wrapped around something that glimmered in the light. Guided purely by compulsion, I knelt down and untangled the sparkly piece from the grass. Shiny often meant valuable, and I was an avid collector of valuable shiny things. All that glitters might not be gold, but sometimes it sure as hell sold as well.

It had been one pound. Not as important as I had hoped, but something was better than nothing. The Calla-Lilly etching had its face buried into the dirt. I didn’t like to pick up coins face-down if I could help it; being bad luck and all. But money was money and I was in no position to pass it up just because of a silly superstition. Although… I did have a lot of bad luck. Maybe I should have cared?

Either way I pocketed the money. It was already picked up, no point in wasting it. I continued on.

A little brass bell jingled cheerily when I stepped into the pound. A quick glance around the room was all I needed to confirm that’s where I was. An ugly green desk was along the same wall as the door; covered in forms, loose leaf papers, manila folders, and other assorted desk decorations. The floor was coated in a thin layer of grime and the cork board on the other side of the room had missing dog posters tacked to it. A metal door was on the same wall as the corkboard. The heat of the day hadn’t even woken up yet and it was already stuffy and hard to breathe in that little building.

We’re not open yet, said an old man who was going through the filing cabinet next to the corkboard. He was fanning himself with a little paper fan with some sort of Makabe oriental artwork on it. I didn’t see why he needed a hand-held fan; he had an electric one rotating on his desk. Though all it did was push the hot air around. If you want a dog, you’ll have to come back at te—

I put the length of my blade against the old man’s leathery neck. He never even saw me coming, too busy in his own head to notice the predator sneaking up on him. He went stiff in my grip, barely brave enough to shake from fear. Smart move, mister. One wrong move and you were good as dead.

I’m just here to get what’s mine, I said into his ear. Bundles of gray hairs were peeking out from within. I tried to pretend I didn’t see them. Now, we can do this the easy way or we can do it the hard way. It’s your choice. You don’t have to die, you know. Just let me take a quick peek into your back room and find my dog, alright?

He whimpered. I took that as a ‘yes’.

My blade shinked back into place when I moved it away from his neck. With his eyes on me, I pushed my way into the back room.

Dogs of every breed and size were locked away in rusted, wire cages. On both sides of the small room they were stacked into levels of four that reached the ceiling where sunlight poured in through a small barred window. They whined and pleaded with me, begging to set them free. I tried to keep my eyes on the grimy, not-so-white linoleum floor. Seeing their torment was too painful. This was a place better suited to someone who was strictly a cat person.

Sweat beaded across my brow and along the rim of my goggles. I tried not to breathe as much as I wanted. The air was too thin, too stuffy to be greedy.

The ground, my only alternative, wasn’t any kinder than looking the dogs straight in the eyes. It was slick with fresh dog urine, and every once in a while my eyes would wander a bit too far over to one side and I’d see the motionless corpse of a dog long gone up to heaven to be with the prophetess Ariadne. My heart wrenched painfully in my chest, caught in the clawing teeth of a metal vice and left to bleed until there was nothing left.

What if Morrigan is dead too?

The thought crept into my mind before I could silence it. I tried to push it as far back as it would go. No, I wouldn’t allow myself to think of such a thing. She was alright. She had to be. It was blasphemous to think otherwise.

But the idea was always there, always reminding me that I could very well have lost the one thing in the world I valued and that I knew valued me in return. It crept along the back of my skull, whispering sweet nothings of death and loneliness in my ear.

At the bottom of the last row on the left side was a dog with black-and-white fur curled up. I tiptoed closer, trying to figure out whether the dog was dead or just sleeping. But what dog, in all this commotion, would stay asleep? He had to put in his bid to be set free too, unless he had just completely resigned to his fate. When a dog checks out of life before the game is truly over it’s a sign that life really isn’t worth living. Even if it wasn’t Morrigan I prayed it was alive. If it wasn’t, I prayed it wasn’t her.

Morrigan? I said loudly over the pitiful barks and whines of all the other dogs. Morrigan it’s me!

The dog stirred. At least it wasn’t dead.

I said Morrigan’s name again, louder this time. I was practically screaming it over the canine cacophony. The dog stirred again, this time finding it in itself to turn around and see what the commotion was about.

Morrigan’s big, blue eyes looked straight at me. They were wide as her black lips pulled back into a smile.

I fell to my knees in front of her disgusting cage. I hugged her as best I could through the bars, which is to say she rubbed her head along my fingers. Small wire squares weren’t good for hugging.

She stepped back from my fingers and I was able to get a look at her. The cage was far too small for her, and she had practically been stuffed in. How she was able to turn around at all was beyond me, but I was too focused on the dirt and rust flakes caked into the white of her fur, staining it some impure color. The black parts of her fur were left unblemished as black is ought to do.

Her cage was sealed with a sliding metal lock. When I tried to slide it the other way to free her, it jammed up half-way. I pulled on the lock with all my strength, trying to summon anything inside that might be strong enough to break the lock. Anything but what had helped me free myself from jail. I’d just as soon sit here for the rest of my life fighting with the lock than resort to using that. It was incredibly selfish, I know, but I stand by it. Perseverance trumps selfishness, doesn’t it?

A metallic pain burned into my side. It tore into me, burrowing deeper into my flesh until I could feel the slick metal on my rib. I screamed and crumpled over onto the filthy linoleum, watching through lenses of tears as the dog pound owner placed his boot deep under my ribcage and yanked the flimsy kitchen knife out.

Oh god, the tip had broken off. It was swimming somewhere inside of me. A weird thing for someone like me to panic about, but I tended to not like things being broken inside of me.

I couldn’t breathe. A lethal combination of the thin air, the blood pooling around me at an alarming rate, and sheer terror had its hands wrapped around my neck and was pressing down on my windpipe with its thumbs.

The dog pound owner stuck the knife in again, twisting it until the blood came out in more violent bursts. Morrigan was barking wildly in her cage, suddenly not hindered by its size. I turned my head to look at her, feeling the tears spill down off the bridge of my nose.

She tore into the metal with her teeth, seeming to ignore the probably awful taste of rust on her tongue. She scratched at it with her paws and used them as leverage until the wires bent under the will of a fifty-five pound Ferrianni husky running on pure adrenaline. She leapt out of the cage and knocked the dog pound owner to the ground. I could only listen to his painful gurgling as she ripped his throat out bit by bit.

On all sides of me dogs were cheering. Their terrible captor had finally been felled in the most poetic way possible.

The knife sat a few feet away; having skidded across the floor when Morrigan knocked him down, leaving a trail of blood in its wake. Blood gushed out of the wound. I tried to keep it in by applying pressure with my hands. My gloves were soaked to the bone, but that was hardly of any consequence at the time.

Morrigan got off him when she was sure he was dead and came to help me to my feet, whimpering all the while. The white fur around her mouth was stained red, and bits of larynx were stuck in-between her teeth. It would’ve been a disgusting sight to anyone else. Personally I was just glad the bastard was dead.

Good girl. I said as I tried to find enough strength in my legs to hold myself up without Morrigan’s help. They were weak and wobbly. Blood loss was coming on fast; I needed to find something to patch myself up with. What that was, exactly, was beyond me. Come on, let’s get out of here.

The dogs, who had been so excited to see the pound owner dead, suddenly retreated back into desperate grief. They argued with me as I limped out of the back room, begging to be saved. Wait, You’re leaving? No! No you can’t leave yet! What about us? You can’t leave us here!

It broke my heart to leave them behind, but I lived through it by convincing myself that someone would come and set them free eventually. They would all find good homes and would eventually learn to put the terrible acts of that man behind them. Maybe they would even make some little girl happy. But that toxic voice in the back of my mind wouldn’t stop telling me that they could also be left here alone. Who knows how often that man gets checked up on?

Morrigan came to my side when I wavered. She kept me balanced as best she could as we went back into the main room and finally outside into the bright morning light. It had grown in intensity since I’d gone into the back room. Surely I hadn’t been back there that long. But then again, it wasn’t bright enough to be early afternoon yet. It was some confusing medium between that and sunrise.

Two guards stood outside. Guns drawn and pointed at me.

Chapter Three

Knives of bright, painful light sparkled off the polished edges of their red metal armor. I almost wanted to ask them to please step a little more to the left so that maybe it wouldn’t shine right in my eye. Somehow I didn’t think they’d acquiesce.

I knew the drill—hands behind my head, turn around, down on my knees. It had gotten considerably warmer since I’d gone into the dog pound. When a gust of air flew by and got my hair all riled up, it was hot and almost left behind a tail of sweat. Peachy, just peachy. Now not only was I staring down the unflattering end of a weapon and bleeding my guts out, but I was going to start sweating soon too. It really was impossible for me to catch a break, wasn’t it?

The grooves in the cobblestone hurt my knees. A tingling sensation shot up the length of my leg and made me think for a moment that I had dislocated it somehow. I knew I didn’t, but it didn’t help the feeling of pins and needles to subside. Somewhere in the distance, perhaps even a little further down the street, a newsboy shouted Extra! Extra! Read all about it! Another mage goes missing in Amea! Authorities are baffled and at present have no suspects! If anyone has any information as to the whereabouts of the mages they are strongly urged to contact their nearest police station at once!

Peeking over my shoulder, a painful action that left the muscles in my neck strained, enlightened me as to the exact face of my captors. One was a considerably older man with skin baked brown from long hours in the summer sun. Deep lines creased his face, defining the area around his mouth and eyes. His black hair was cut close to his face; fading along his neck until there was nothing left but a few sparse flicks of hair no longer than the peach fuzz along the jaw of his partner.

The other hardly seemed old enough to be out of primary school. Baby fat hadn’t completely left his features just yet, especially along his jawline where it seemed more prominent than anywhere else on his face. He must not have been much of an outdoors person before now because he was considerably paler than his superior. Several strands of black hair hung in his face while the rest of it was pulled back into a low pony-tail with a long piece of strong twine.

His big brown eyes stared at my back catatonically with fascinated horror. Was I his first criminal? I was honored. I’m always happy to use my incredible talents to help guide a young man through his first time. I wondered if I could scare him if I turned around and went Boo!

… Nah, I probably shouldn’t. He’d just piss his trousers.

Light fell across the length of the younger guard’s breastplate. It reflected off the etching of a calla lily on the right side of the armor as if that was a point of importance. I turned away simply because I didn’t like the light in my eyes.

I slowly began to stand up. Come gentlemen; we can be civil, can we not? I just came to get back what was mine, and since I’ve done that I think I’ll just be— I lowered my hands, swung around on my heel, and started trying to walk around them. But I was stopped by the dramatic thrusting of