A Stillness of the Sun: Crowmakers, #1

By L. E. Erickson

He'll make them into weapons. It will be up to them to become heroes.

A dark journey toward redemption through a bleak but beautifully-rendered world where monsters are real—and the worst of them might be us.

Philadelphia, 1806. Tales of water ghosts haunt the docks, violence stalks the streets, and Indian uprisings fill the news. Kellen Ward and Vincent Bradley are down on their luck and low on options. When Vincent is offered a job outside the city, he has to take it—even though it means leaving Kellen behind. 

Alone in Philadelphia, Kellen struggles to stay a step ahead of a murderous supernatural threat and an equally murderous madman. Meanwhile, Vincent gets caught up in the plots of a charismatic military leader with big plans for the men he's recruited—plans which include experimental and irreversible changes to their bodies and minds that might make more of them than they ever dreamed.

If it doesn't kill them first.

Fans of Brandon Sanderson's The Alloy of Law, Brent Weeks' Lightbringer series, Django Wexler's Shadow Campaigns series, or Brian McClellan's Powder Mage trilogy will enjoy this military fantasy with historical fiction roots and a taste of the occult. Buy the book and get drawn into the lives of complex, engaging characters you will root for despite their flaws.

• Language: English
• Publisher: JMA Publishing
• Release date: Jan 23, 2018
• ISBN: 9781540174284

Book preview

3

STANDING

on the wharf at dawn, Vincent breathed the taunting, earthy smell of spring. That bare promise wasn’t enough to drive away the despairing sensation of being always chilled, never quite warm. He was starting to believe he’d never catch a break.

Ahead of Vincent, piers jutted like stumpy fingers into the Delaware River, of differing lengths and allowing varying amounts of water between them. The original river’s edge followed, more or less, the line of Water Street, but it had vanished years ago as waterfront owners created wharves by building box-like casements and filling them with soil and stone. Over time, old wharves became solid ground on which new structures were built, and new docks and piers and ferry landings continually grew out into the water. The spot where Vincent stood had once been part of the river he faced.

Rising over that river, the sun glowed around silhouettes of a forested island midstream and Camden on the far shore. A brisk breeze whistled in tune with the screech and cry of gulls and the creak of moored ships, spreading cold along Philadelphia’s waterfront with merry abandon.

That same wind cut through the worn fabric of Vincent’s coat and nipped at his exposed wrists. The only break from the cold came from the proximity of the other wharfmen pressed together, and that break came with the stink of barely-washed bodies and hopelessness. A vague longing to be somewhere—anywhere—else crawled restlessly across the back of Vincent’s neck.

This wasn’t enough. It would never be enough, but damned if he knew what he could do differently. If he and Kellen both got enough day work, if they kept scraping together their coins and not spending them, then—

Then what? That’s what they’d been doing for nearly half their lives. It hadn’t gotten them anything except a few years older. Maybe that was all he ever should have hoped for—survival. Who was he to think there could be anything more? Vincent glanced up at the gulls wheeling in the freezing sky and hated them because they could fly.

Vincent shaped up at the lower wharf most days, along with more or less the same gathering of hopeful workers. Anglicans and Lutherans and Catholics, Blacks and Dutchmen and Lithuanian—they all huddled on the same patch of packed gravel, they all stood straighter when the foremen came to hire their day workers, and they all hoped to end that evening with a coin more than they’d had in the morning.

Vincent didn’t call any of those other men friend. As a rule, he just plain didn’t like other people very much, and looking at those other hapless, hopeless men was too much like looking into a mirror. Being accepted as one of them was too much like giving up hope that he’d ever be anything else. And maybe it was time to give up that stupid hope, but the thought didn’t make him feel any more like smiling or talking to anyone else. He pulled his coat sleeves down to cover his freezing fingertips and took his place with the rest of the dock men.

Someone jostled Vincent from behind.

Vincent tensed. As the someone moved past, Vincent saw that while the man was as tall and nearly as broad as Ripley, his hair was a darker shade of blonde. Vincent relaxed. Jan Bosch wasn’t the friendliest of men, but he was no Burke Ripley.

Ripley would be here somewhere—he nearly always shaped up down here, too. Vincent resisted the urge to look around, because appearing nervous was a sure way to draw unwanted attention to yourself. But he knew that somewhere nearby, Ripley would be standing with his massive arms crossed over his chest, eyes half open and heavily lidded like those of a sleeping beast waiting only for the opportunity to wake and lash out.

Bosch, by comparison, was apparently not content to even pretend patience. He pushed forward through the clump of men a few more steps, using his size to make other men move. Then he ran up against William Jennett. Jennett, whose hair was almost as pale as Ripley’s, looked back as Bosch shoved up behind him. He did not smile.

Vincent edged a little to his right. No point in being too close if fists started flying.

Jennett stood a head shorter than Bosch and was more wiry than broad. Just as his hair was more blonde than Bosch’s, his eyes were also more blue. He turned those eyes toward Bosch, and Bosch froze under Jennett’s icy stare as abruptly as if he’d come up against a larger man.

You can wait. Jennett snapped the words out like physical blows. Just like the rest of us.

Bosch stared at Jennett a moment and then pulled himself up to his full height and leaned forward, looming very effectively over Jennett.

Stop, a quieter voice said.

Both Bosch and Jennett turned their heads slightly, although they kept their eyes on each other. Vincent followed the voice’s source to Viktor Kalvis, a middle-aged Lithuanian with scraggly blonde hair and hard lines etched around his blue eyes.

You want to behave as children? Kalvis eyed the two younger men with a long-suffering expression. Go home and play under your mama’s watch. The rest of us, we need this work. Don’t bring your trouble here.

To Vincent’s right, someone laughed, a gritty and gleeful sound. Vincent glanced that way, just one quick look, and then fixed his gaze straight ahead again.

Alvie Fox stood only a few paces to Vincent’s side, with just three men crammed into the space between them. Fox, as lanky and squint-eyed as his namesake animal, generally rode in Ripley’s wake and hoped for a fight. Vincent didn’t glance around to see if Ripley was also close, not quickly, not at all, not even the slightest turn of the head to suggest he might be looking. No borrowing trouble.

In the city at Vincent’s back, the church bells started in, tolling the hour with deep chimes that nearly out-rang the clank of ship bells.

Not too many ship bells today, Vincent noticed, as the foremen stomped to a halt in front of their would-be crews. That meant not all, and possibly not even many, of the waiting men would find work. Vincent hoped fervently to be one of those called.

Listen up, one of the foremen called out. The other foremen, four of them altogether, stepped up. All the waiting dock men stood straighter and puffed out their chests, angling to get themselves directly in sight.

All four of the foremen started in at once. Not a one did more than barely raise his voice, but everyone fell silent and listened as they called crews for the day.

When the foremen walked away again with the chosen dockers trailing behind them, Vincent stayed where he was, along with the others who hadn’t been called.

No pay for today, then. Along with most of the rest, Vincent would come back at midday in case a foreman needed more men. He didn’t hold much hope for that, but not much was still better than none at all. The lack of work wasn’t any foreman’s fault—they couldn’t help the number of ships that made it to port on any given day. And the Widow’s need to charge more room and board wasn’t really her fault, either, although Vincent could let himself hate her a little—whatever hardships she faced, they didn’t include the possibility of letting someone you loved be turned out into the streets to be raped or murdered.

Sometimes Vincent understood Burke Ripley’s inclination to simply bloody whatever stood in front of him.

Maybe Kellen had gotten hired, at least. Vincent hated hoping for that almost as much as he’d have hated her not getting hired. She was his to take care of, not the other way around. She should’ve been able to count on him. Vincent clenched his numb fingers into fists.

The men left behind along with Vincent shuffled feet and muttered and began to disperse. Time to go home and pray tomorrow would be different. As he passed Vincent, Viktor Kalvis coughed into hands that were bare and reddened from the cold. Kalvis didn’t complain—he never did—but his nose and ears were as ruddy as his hands.

Kalvis stopped suddenly, looked up and to his left. Other men, in the act of leaving, stopped and looked, too. A gradual wave of shifting attention and murmurs of notice rippled through the men.

Vincent turned and looked, too.

The cause of the disturbance turned out to be a well-dressed man standing alone at the foot of the street, holding the reins of his horse. The man wore a cropped riding coat and dark breeches tucked into boots. Gloves, too—Vincent’s fingers twinged in envy. The man’s hair swept away from his face in arrogant waves. He held his hat tucked under one arm. Everything around him—the hazy shades of gray sky, the weathered storefronts and warehouses, the worn clothing of the sorry lot of men facing him—seemed drab and faded, as though this one man was a real man and all the others were ghosts.

Gentlemen. Good morning.

The man’s words ran rich and strong as brandy through the cold. Given the tall, straight way he stood and the way his voice rang clear through the rumbles of the day workers before him, Vincent thought the man was used to being listened to.

I have work to offer you.

The murmurs surrounding Vincent fell and rose again. The man lifted one hand, palm out, and the gathered workers gradually quieted.

I am Tucker Ellis, the man said. And I have work for you—those of you willing to undertake it.

It wasn’t like Vincent had anyplace else to be. He edged forward with other men doing the same. His shoulders bumped against a solid bulk and rebounded. Bosch, Vincent assumed.

Then he saw Bosch’s broad shoulders and dark blonde hair a few steps ahead. A low snarl like a disturbed beast followed, and Vincent recalled Alvie Fox standing nearby—Alvie Fox, who never traveled far from Burke Ripley.

Time to be on the far side of the pack of men moving forward toward Ellis. Vincent didn’t even pause to look behind him and confirm his suspicion. He pressed past Kalvis and up alongside Bosch and Jennett.

Watch yourself. William Jennett turned icy pale eyes on Vincent. Then he glanced past Vincent, scowled, and faced forward without another word.

If you prove to be the kind of men I’m looking for, Ellis was saying, then I can promise you jobs. Real jobs, not day work. Real pay. Meals and board. A career, perhaps.

A bony, fair-haired youth beyond Jennett prodded a mountainous, dark-skinned man beside him and grinned. A career. Maybe he’s gonna make us lawyers. I bet that’s it.

Vincent had been thinking of less glamorous labor. Philadelphia was a free city with no slave trade, so men like Ellis would have to hire men for any variety of backbreaking lifting or digging. But career? That was an interesting choice of words.

Anything’s gotta be better than fucking standing around on these fucking docks every fucking morning, Jennett muttered as Vincent eased around him. Bosch grunted what sounded like agreement.

Vincent had gotten more room between himself and Ripley—and more importantly, he’d gotten Jennett and Bosch between him and Ripley—but he ran up against a thicker knot of men standing closer to the front. Vincent edged around them, too, moving slowly, losing himself in the crowd in hopes Ripley would forget who had enraged him, or that someone else would enrage him more. The smarter move would be to slip away altogether, up the steps between Water and Front streets and into the alleys before Ripley could catch up to him.

But he wanted to hear what this Mr. Ellis had to say.

Ellis’s gaze swept the crowd before him.

Soldiers. I require solid, reliable men for my militia.

Excitement and disappointment simultaneously rose and fell in Vincent’s gut. It wasn’t that soldiering didn’t hold its appeal—Vincent sometimes watched Macpherson’s Blues when they mustered to display arms. He’d only been a boy when they’d gone west to put a stop to the Whiskey Insurrection, but when they’d marched for Northampton, he’d been sorely tempted to join up. The idea of putting on a uniform and walking out of Philadelphia, on to distant places and adventures, held some appeal.

It held a lot of appeal. But he couldn’t leave Kellen any more now than he could have then.

Militia for what? someone behind Vincent called out.

Ellis smiled as though the man had asked exactly what Ellis had wished him to ask.

Take your pick, someone in the crowd said. Ain’t like the states got any shortage of enemies.

A rumble of agreement rolled through the gathering. Ellis spoke again without raising his voice, and they just as quickly hushed again, listening.

Our exact assignment will vary, depending on the need of our country.

Vincent was distracted from the rest of Ellis’s reply by the sound of shuffling feet and the grunts of men being shoved. Without moving his head, Vincent glanced to the side.

A head taller than anyone else and broader than most, Ripley was impossible to miss. Shaggy white-blonde hair hung loose around his square face. Menace gleamed in his pale eyes.

Those eyes were fixed on Vincent. Scrawny Alvie Fox bobbed along behind Ripley, wearing a yellowed grin.

Vincent took one deep breath and reminded himself to move slowly—never make it look like you were running, that was the rule. Never let them sense your fear.

Vincent’s slighter frame worked to his advantage as he edged through the crowd—slowly. Patiently. Gaze fixed on Ellis and nothing else, as though Ripley’s approach meant nothing and Vincent only wanted to move closer, hear better.

Our barracks are located just outside the city.

Ellis’s gaze swept the crowd again. Did it linger a moment on Ripley and the trouble boiling in his wake? If so, he never missed a beat in his speech.

You would be required to reside at the barracks. Leave might be available, but it is not guaranteed.

And that was that. This career Ellis talked about, it wasn’t for Vincent. Vincent had lingered too long, and for nothing. And now Vincent could measure Ripley’s approach not only by the grunts and shuffle of people being shoved aside, but by a cold sense of doom drilling into the back of his neck.

Vincent had worked his way very nearly to the front of the crowd. A single row of men stood between Vincent and Tucker Ellis, with his pretty clothes and fancy speech-making. Vincent stopped and stood perfectly still, staring at Ellis and listening carefully to the sounds of Ripley bullying his way through the crowd.

Close, now. Vincent could picture Ripley, an arm’s-length away. Fat hands reaching, still moving, leading with his head like a charging bull.

Vincent hated Ripley, abruptly. Ripley was one more thing Vincent could never really escape.

He waited a fraction of a heartbeat longer.

Now. One step to the side. One quick extension of his leg—not even a real kick, toes barely connecting, just enough to put Ripley’s forward charge out of balance.

Ripley tripped past Vincent and crashed into the men in front of him. He staggered into the open near Tucker Ellis and bellowed in wordless anger.

You. Ellis’s clipped, brandy-powerful voice cracked like breaking ice in the brittle air.

Ripley’s permanent sneer thinned. He got his feet under him and turned toward Ellis.

Ellis stared at Ripley with a fearless cold Vincent had never seen from anyone.

I am seeking muscle, but intelligent muscle. Disdain dripped from Ellis’s voice. Thank you for providing a prime example of what I am not looking for. You are dismissed.

Silence. Ripley’s sneer wavered, nearly vanished altogether. Ellis maintained his icy demeanor, still staring at Ripley.

Ellis was waiting for Ripley to obey, Vincent realized. Vincent froze as neatly as Ripley, caught by a flash of insight.

For all his fancy clothes and fancier words, Tucker Ellis was a man who held power. No one had ever handed him a thing. A man like that took what belonged to him, and no one argued with him.

Ripley hesitated a moment longer. Then his sneer reasserted itself.

Fuck yourself bloody, Ripley said. Who wants your damn job?

Ripley shot a look at Vincent, his pale eyes squinted into hell-blazing pinpricks.

Still caught up in an awestruck moment of wanting to be as powerful and fearless as Tucker Ellis, Vincent stared back. Then self-preservation instinct returned, and Vincent lowered his gaze.

He’d been stupid, so very stupid. He’d done exactly the sort of thing he’d warned Kellen against doing. Now he was Ripley’s number one target—and if he wasn’t careful, he’d be taking a beating for two. Ripley couldn’t touch Tucker Ellis, but that wouldn’t keep Ripley from taking out his fury on someone else.

Vincent didn’t see Ripley storm off the dock, but the sound of boots stomped away. The lighter patter of Fox’s hurried steps followed after.

Intelligent muscle, Ellis repeated into the silence Ripley’s stalking departure left behind. Men who can move mountains not only with their backs but with their minds.

Vincent lifted his gaze, but Ellis wasn’t looking at anyone in particular. He certainly wasn’t looking at Vincent. Vincent couldn’t run off to join Ellis’s silly little army and leave Kellen behind. What did he even know about Ellis or his militia? He didn’t know anything.

A dozen men, Ellis said. Only twelve. If you’re willing to accept the terms and believe yourself qualified, you will be at the north end of the Centre Square at daybreak tomorrow. You will not be late, and you will be prepared to leave on the spot, should you be chosen.

Ellis looked the men over one last time.

For one perfectly silent fraction of a second, Ellis’s eyes landed on Vincent’s face. Vincent felt a shudder of something he might have termed a calling, if he had any religion.

A steady job. Money. Stability.

A chance to get out—away from the wharves, away from Burke Ripley, away from the trap Philadelphia had become.

Ellis turned around. Vincent watched the man’s expensive boots strike the worn cobblestones of the street as he led his horse a few steps before mounting and riding up the hill into the city.

I want that job, Vincent caught himself thinking. God help me, but I want it.

4

CRATES.

Barrels. Sacks. Inside the ship’s hold, the stevedores lifted and hauled and stacked. Kellen came behind them to knot the cargo into secure bundles before they were winched up and then lowered from the ships. From there, other dockers would put the goods into the barrows and shove the barrows to the warehouses.

After crawling in the holds all day, Kellen’s knees ached. Her fingers cramped and twitched from working the knots, and her back felt fractured nearly to splinters.

But it paid, and that beat going home empty-handed. And something to do was surely better than worrying whether what few coins she earned would be enough.

Vincent would figure something out. He always did.

Kellen dragged herself out of the close, smelly warmth of the Mary Katherine’s hold and into a world of gray skies and rolling deck. Freezing wind blasted her face, forcing her to squint against it. She hunched her shoulders and lifted her collar and started along the rail toward the gangplank. All around her, other dockers grumbled and shouted to each other as they left their day’s work.

Kellen, lass! What’s what?

Brian Byrne, black-haired and blue-eyed and nonchalant as the day was long, tilted an easy smile at Kellen. Byrne was a good foot taller than Kellen, but the way he slouched put him near to eye level. From cap to coat to frayed trousers and the short knife he wore on his belt, Byrne was dressed much like Kellen—much like every other dock man on the wharves.

Kellen smiled. Talking to Byrne was as easy as breathing. Listening to his rolling brogue was easier yet, which was a good thing since it was hard to escape. He’d gotten hired on at midday, and from where she worked deep in the hold, Kellen had heard his tongue wagging pretty much nonstop since then.

Day’s done. She fell into step with Byrne and they started across the deck. And that’s better than the start by a long shot.

Byrne grinned. Can’t argue that. A mite chilly on deck, though.

Breathing ice is better than smelling pig shit and walking through piss-poor spilled ale.

As Kellen spoke, Em Jacobs—Jeremiah Jacobs, but most everyone called him Em—stomped across the deck and came up beside Byrne.

The wind whipped straw-blonde hair into Em’s eyes. He squinted through it and smiled one of his vague, half-witted smiles at Kellen. Em was sweet, but he could be outright stupid. He swung a mean cargo hook, though, and he worked every second from the time he was told to start until the time he was told to stop.

Byrne’s gaze slid sideways toward Em, and his smile turned sly. Did y’hear that, Emmy? Did you hear what Kellen thinks of you? You stink like pig shite and piss.

Byrne, Kellen said.

Em’s brow furrowed.

I think she meant that’s what the hold smells like. Em’s reply was utterly serious. Not me. I don’t smell like that.

Byrne’s lackadaisical grin deepened. Kellen refused to grin back, but she also remembered how Byrne and his fists had calmly and efficiently taken care of Alvie Fox the last time he messed with Em. No one was as loyal as Byrne. She guessed he’d earned his right to be obnoxious.

Byrne flashed a wink at Kellen and slapped Em on the shoulder as he turned toward the gangplank.

That’s my Emmy. Come on, you two. It’s well and good to let the fresh air blow the stink off you, but frankly, it’s damnable cold. Let’s get off this boat and go home.

Em’s forehead smoothed out briefly and then furrowed again into irritated determination—a sure sign that Em was about to try to out-clever Byrne. Em hurried after Byrne, and Kellen picked her careful way across the deck behind the two of them.

They eased down the gangplank, over the dark water lurking between the Mary Katherine’s hull and the wharf it was moored to. Byrne walked a little ahead of Kellen and Em, calling out greetings to other men they knew. Em strolled quietly beside Kellen, still frowning. They joined the press of men pouring off other ships and making for the pay lines. The mass of bodies blocked the wind some, at least.

Colley, me friend! Byrne called out as he tramped ahead of Kellen and Em. What’s the news?

Patrick Colley stopped and turned. Although shorter than Byrne, Colley was every bit as dark-haired and blue-eyed an Irishman. Colley’s eyes were too big for his narrow face, lending him a permanently startled expression. A hesitant smile flickered at the corners of his mouth.

Last blast of winter, that’s the news. Em butted in before Colley could answer. He gave his blonde head an exaggerated toss and rolled his eyes. Damn, Byrne, you don’t have to be a brilliant intellect like Colley to figure that one out.

Aye. Byrne glanced back and caught Kellen’s eye before answering Em with a perfectly deadpan expression. And you’re a towering example of not-a-brilliant-intellect if ever I saw one, so you ought to know.

Kellen frowned at Byrne.

Em scowled and declared, That’s cold, Byrne. That’s well and truly cold.

Byrne slapped Em’s shoulder again as they fell into step with Colley on the wharf. Em heaved a good-natured, long-suffering sigh.

"Most of the day’s news has been about the weather. Despite the hesitance of his smile, when Colley spoke it was with quiet authority. He was one of the few dock men Kellen knew who could read, and the only one willing to spend his hard-earned coin on newspapers. The thaw, if it ever comes, will bring flooding. God alone knows if the bridges over Schuylkill side will stay put or wash away."

The Schuylkill River flowed along the western side of Philadelphia, but it could have been across the ocean so far as Kellen was concerned. She’d never laid eyes on it. Everything she’d ever known or needed was in the blocks of the city clustered up close to the Delaware.

Em flashed a triumphant smile at Byrne. You see? The weather. Told you.

Byrne only slid a sideways look at Kellen and smirked.

"Some sailors off the Lovely Sisters were telling about ghosts in the water, Em said. Slow-moving ‘cause of the cold, but doing a lot of hissing and whispering."

Ghosts. Kellen snorted.

Where I come from, that’s called ‘wind,’ Byrne said.

You think it’s the wind. Em nodded with grave earnestness. But it’s ghosts in the water.

Ghosts in your head, Byrne cheerfully replied.

Em sighed, and Colley smiled one of his quiet little smiles.

Byrne laughed. And what else, Colley?

News? Aside from the weather? The usual heckle and jibe between Federalists and Jeffersonians.

"If even half those fools were waving weapons instead of words, the world would be shy