19. Hull - The Cost of a Card (Patreon)

Chapter 19

The Cost of a Card

Basil gripped me hard by the elbow as the attackers pelted toward us. “Strike first,” he said.

My heart raced. “We’re not set up!”

He summoned another Soul, checked his cards in hand, and cursed softly. “We push with what we have and figure it out as we go.” His Shieldbearer stepped in front of him, and his new summons, a Metal Golem, rushed out to meet the attackers as Basil pointed the way.

I meant to send my Ghastly in after him, but I was overwhelmed and frightened by the mass of Souls approaching us. The Gremlin wasn’t a good first play, but it was what I had out, and I wasn’t going to waste it on an attack when I needed blockers right now. I could see Priyam, Merrun, and Jubal all in the back ranks with sources circling their heads and looks of flat murder on their faces. And there in the rear were Dachs and Kernona, side-by-side and sending their summons after me – the summons I’d taken from them and entrusted to Harker. Sons of bitches. They’d all turned on me at once. I should have guessed it would come to this. I summoned my Hammer and braced myself as three Souls converged on me. 

My mind was going a mile a minute. I had just enough time to put my cards on the float, pull the brass knuckles Artifact from my pocket, and extend the claws before the impact. I didn’t have any Nether to juice the knucks with, but they’d hit decently hard all on their own, and they could swing freely. 

None of the Souls were coordinating, and neither were the Summoners behind them, and I sent a prayer up to Fate for making Ticosi’s lieutenants such suspicious, independent hardasses. I knew Kernona had a Shieldbearer, Dachs had the Soldier with Unit, and there were probably half a dozen other Souls that would synergize well together if only their owners got their shit together and worked as a team. As it was, maybe Basil and I stood a chance of surviving. I steered my Ghastly Gremlin toward the Headsman, swung my Hammer at the Soldier, and lashed out at the Troglodyte Spitter with my brass knuckle claws. Off to one side Basil was doing much the same sort of thing at the center of a knot of attacking Souls. No time for that; I had to worry about my own skin for a second. 

The Headsman and Gremlin destroyed each other, and my claws took the throat out of the troggie, sending a glittering spray of light into the night. Its claws scored my ribs, and I used the one Ravening Hatchling I had in hand to block the blow, knowing I’d get it back in just a few moments.

My Hammer took the Soldier in the chest, and I braced for another blow in return, knowing in advance that I’d take the hit on the deck – I wanted to keep everything I had in hand. I was having a hard time thinking very far ahead like I’d learned to do in my duels – everything moved so much faster and more chaotically with this many Summoners in the mix.

The Soldier’s hit never fell. Instead I heard a clang, and there was Basil’s Master Shieldbearer, one round shield extended in front of my face to take the hit from the Soldier. It dented the shield, but the Soul merely nodded to me, its eyes inscrutable inside its full helm, and then spun away back to its owner.

“Thanks,” I gasped at Basil. He gave a distracted little hand flip that might have been an acknowledgement – he was too hard-pressed to do anything more.

More Souls pressed forward, eyes blank and weapons at the ready. The lieutenants were still keeping their distance, but if I could weather another round or two, I could get my feet under me. I had enough source now to start putting out my bigger cards. I wanted to get a Marauder on the field – I had one in hand – but it made better sense to do something else while I was still on the back foot.

The damage from the Imp began to power up my Talisman, and I used it to summon my other Ghastly Gremlin from hand, sending both the Souls into the fray. I pointed the flying Imp over the heads of the warring Souls directly at Dachs. They’d all put everything they had on the field in the hopes of overwhelming me – which they were on the verge of doing – but that meant a single hit from the Imp could end him. I’d hesitated to kill the man before, but with chaos ringing in my ears and Basil grunting in panic at my back, I decided I had changed my mind. 

Unfortunately, the bastard’s damned little Kestrel swooped in at the last second to deflect the attack, and both Souls died in a shower of sparkling shards. My charging Gremlin bounced off an Uncommon Shieldbearer, doing some damage but not breaking through before it died.

I followed up against the wounded Shieldbearer, swiping first with my clawed knuckles and then slamming down with my Hammer. I felt a surge of power pass through the sparkling shards of the dying Soul to slam into its Summoner, and Jubal cried out and went to one knee. A sense of fierce satisfaction boiled in me. I only wished I’d had enough Nether free to charge up the hit and to take him out of the fight entirely.

I looked over to Basil and felt my righteous anger spike into alarm. He was fully surrounded, and his Master Shieldbearer was gone. He was still summoning – his Condor was swooping down on a Summoner behind the lines – but he was in real trouble, shedding card confetti left and right as no fewer than five Souls whacked away at him. Even Commons could spell the end of a good duelist if there were enough of them all at once. Not even stopping to think about it, I devoted my one available Nether and threw my Sucking Void in his direction as it summoned, willing it to him instead of myself.

I breathed a sigh of relief as the starlight casing settled about him and he straightened, watching in obvious amazement as the Souls that were attacking him no longer did any harm. He didn’t waste any time on useless thanks, though – he summoned another Metal Golem and sent it into the mix. A second later a new type of bird joined it.

I wondered whether my deck or his would disappear at the end of 3 turns. Edaine had said that we’d be doing 2-on-2 fights soon, but Basil and I were getting an early lesson on the fly, and if it went poorly, it’d be our last one. The Hammer lightened in my hand, and I turned my attention back to the Souls nearest to me.

I blinked in surprise when Roshum’s little sweeper girl Bryll popped into existence literally out of nowhere, appearing right behind a regular Troglodyte with a broken cobblestone in her hand, which she smashed on its head. It swiped her with its claws as it shattered, leaving her hissing in pain and clutching at her bloodied shirt, and then she vanished.

What the hell? The girl had a soul card, apparently, and a damn good one. What was she doing? I looked around to see where she’d gone, and my jaw dropped when I saw half a dozen pint-sized urchins darting in and out amongst the fighting Souls, one with a dagger, another with a nail-studded club. One skinny little boy had Fire source circling his head! That one pulled up short and slapped his hands together as his 3 flame spheres dimmed. A source firebolt whistled across the street and took Boramun, the squirreliest of Ticosi’s enforcers, square in the face. He dropped like the dead man he suddenly was, and a couple of Souls vanished from view. That little urchin bugger had just killed one of the most powerful people in the Lows. Where did these kids come from?

Curses and cries rose from Priyam and the others, and I saw the burly thug lash out with a knife at a passing child, who screamed and crumpled. “Stop it!” I raged. Attacking me made sense, but going after the kids made my vision go red. I pulled the Night Terror and readied myself to summon it. Play time was over; this fight had to end now.

“Don’t summon anything for a second,” Basil said urgently.

“Have you looked around?” I snapped.

“Trust me,” he said, holding up a card. “If only I’d drawn this one sooner.”

Giant scales rose up from the ground, sweeping up the gaggle of fighting Souls still harassing us on one side and only Basil’s wounded Condor on the other. Then the scales dropped to the ground, and a good eight or nine enemy Souls shattered into light, leaving only one bewildered Guard standing right by me. A swipe of my Hammer with a hefty infusion of Nether dropped him and sent a bolt of energy through to Kernona, who fell to her hands and knees gushing blood from her mouth – it looked like the hit had crushed her chest. The lieutenants still on their feet turned tail and ran. The fight was over.

Tall, commanding Priyam had other ideas. He had Order and Fire circling his head and a crazed look in his eye. “You cowards!” he shouted after them. “You’re missing the best part!” He pulled on his Fire source all at once.

I should have guessed that they’d get their hands on more powerful cards if they could – Ticosi wasn’t here to stop them. The Soul was ten feet tall. It crackled and hissed when it moved, and the wooden walls fifteen feet on either side started to smolder. If it stayed summoned for more than a minute, the whole street would go up in flames. 

“Like my new card, you little asshole?” he screamed at me. “I’m going to roast you alive and eat your eyeballs.” He pointed straight at me. “That one! Kill him!”

The great elemental lumbered forward, its maw opening in a frightful shriek that sounded like sizzling pine sap and the death cry of a thousand forest animals. I braced for it. I could take the hit off my deck if I needed to, but it was probably a better idea to summon the Night Terror and let them kill each other.

“I think not,” Basil said primly.

The Elemental sank to one knee, hissing at us in some language I didn’t understand. I ignored it entirely, my eyes catching on the pathetic heap of skinny limbs at Priyam’s feet. Those dirty, underfed legs lay in a spreading pool of blood and stuck out of an old potato sack I’d seen just a couple of days before. 

It was Pekka, the little boy I’d told Bryll to get medicine for. Whatever she’d given him must have gotten him back on his feet quick. No physiker’s tincture would help him now.

Priyam faced me with his head high. “You’ll never run the Lows. If you were in my shoes, you’d have done the same.”

A great sadness filled me. I’d tried so hard to show these fools a better way, and all they’d seen was a kid scrambling for power. They’d never learn. I should have made my Night Terror smash the building with them inside that first day when I confronted them; it would have turned out better for everyone. Especially Pekka.

I wouldn’t make the same mistake twice. “If I could kill you a hundred times, it still wouldn’t be enough,” I told him. I pulled all my remaining source.

Priyam disappeared in an explosion of purple, and the walls on all sides turned red with blood and bits of flesh. The Elemental vanished.

“Twins,” Basil breathed. “Hull, you… Twins shelter me.” 

The blowback from the Spell knocked the Ravening Hatchling and both Demon Marauders from my hand, and the Talisman hummed on my chest, all charged up with nowhere to go now that the fighting was done. I barely noticed any of it. The blood on the walls looked almost black in the light pouring from Roshum’s shop. I’d seen plenty of death before, but nothing like this. I’d considered Priyam’s death, thought it through, and then made it happen. Sure, I’d killed Ticosi and let my demons eat him, and that had been gruesome, but… this felt like a very different thing. Weightier. Sadder. More adult. My heart hurt. It felt swollen inside of me.

The worst part was that I wasn’t done yet.

Bryll trotted up looking grimly satisfied. “About time you did something useful,” she said.

“What were you thinking, charging in like that?” I demanded. “I don’t care what fancy soul ability you’ve got – and we’re going to have a talk about that, you’d better believe it – but you can’t just jump in where big folk are slinging cards and start throwing rocks. How did you stay alive all these years? What kind of stupid are you?”

Her face folded up into a scowl. “The kind that saved your ass, Little Big Man.”

“You could have died!” I said, dimly realizing that I was shouting. “Look!” I flung a shaking finger at Pekka’s body. “Look what happens.”

She saw the boy’s body for the first time, and her mouth screwed up in a knot, blonde hair falling across her face. “Shit. I told him not to come. Shit.” She dashed the back of her hand across her eyes angrily. “They were hurting Roshum. We wanted to help.”

I took a deep breath, fists clenched, a flood of hurt and rage ready to fall out of my mouth. But then I saw how she couldn’t look away from Pekka’s body, how the tears streaked her dirty face despite her efforts not to cry, and the air came back out of me in a silent rush. “I know, kid. Twins take me. You did help. You tipped the scales.” She didn’t need a grown-up yelling at her right now. Twins, when did I become one of the grown-ups? I looked over to the skinny little Fire kid who was hovering right beside the nearest alley like he might dart away at any second. “How’d you end up with 3 Fire, kid? Never seen a street boy do that before.”

He gave a shy smile and held up his hands. In the light from Roshum’s shop I could see that his palms and fingers were a solid mass of burn scars, slick and shiny-looking.

“Twins,” I said, wincing. “D’you fall into a fire?”

He shook his head, saying nothing.

I waited, but the silence stretched on. “Not a big talker, are you?”

“He held his hands over a candle,” Bryll said, sounding proud. “A little at a time every day for more than a year. He’s Naydarin. Says he wants to be a Sourcerer.”

I shook my head, bemused. These kids were a damn sight sharper than I’d ever been. I may have gotten more source, but it mostly just happened, and I never even heard the word Sourcerer until I got to War Camp. “You’ve got good aim, Naydarin. Don’t go burning things that don’t need it, though.”

He gave me a withering look of scorn that only a child could manage, and I left him be. My heart still felt oversized and achy in my chest. I wanted to see how Roshum had fared. Inside the shop I saw broken glass littering the floor, and the chair where the old man usually sat was in splinters in the corner. The Relicsmith was bent over one of his tools – a source well, he’d told me, used for trapping any shreds of source that weren’t of the type you were working with while you focused the right kind into a card. It was bent in half, its prism-holding swing arms tilting crazily in every direction. His lip was split, there was blood in his hair, and one eye was blacked, but from his furious mutters, he couldn’t have been too badly hurt.

“Hey there, boss,” I said gently. “Thanks for using the blue lights. I’d have stepped the shit without that.”

He threw the source well down on the counter. “You did step in it, you ass. Look around! You think this is business as usual?”

I crossed to him and put a careful hand on his shoulder. He was trembling like a leaf. “How bad are you hurt?”

From behind me, Basil murmured, “I’m sorry I don’t have any Life source yet. If I did, I could heal him.”

Roshum passed a shaky hand over his brow, looking at the blood that smeared onto his hand in surprise and disgust. “No, young master, there’s no need. I’ve taken worse hurts. It’s just when you see things changing for the better, you hope they’ll stay that way, and they never do. I’m too old to be getting my hopes up anymore.”

“I brought trouble to your door,” I said, a pang of distress making my hands clench. That feeling of something being wrong inside me – swollen – got a little worse. “If I weren’t hanging around here to learn, they never would have come here.”

“True enough,” Roshum muttered, snatching a broom from the floor. “An apprentice is supposed to make their master money, not cost them.”

I sighed. I had such great plans of learning Relicsmithing – at least enough to break down my Chaos cards – but I was being unfair to the old fellow. “I understand. I’ll stop coming around.”

“Don’t you dare,” he snapped. “You’re one of the quickest studies I’ve seen in years. Don’t give those shits what they want.”

Bryll marched in and snatched the broom out of Roshum’s hands, glaring at me as if I’d ordered the old man to clean up. Then she set to sweeping up the broken glass.

A groan came from behind the cabinet that separated the storeroom shelves from the work area. Roshum grunted. “Forgot about that. Damned woman.”

Curious, I peeked around the corner. Hogtied on the floor, a huge purpling goose egg on her forehead, lay Harker. Anger swelled in my already-pained heart, and I crouched beside her, roughly yanking the gag out of her mouth. “Fancy meeting you here. Looks like the Big Man’s second has been sneaking around behind his back.”

“What..?” she slurred, eyes unfocused. “Hull? Alive?”

“No thanks to you,” I said, fighting to keep from snarling. “Imagine my surprise when Dachs and Kernona came at me with the cards I’d taken back. The ones I gave to you.”

“Gave them back,” she groaned, laying her head back on the floor. “Said they’d follow me.”

I nodded, feeling both a hurt and an anger at having my suspicions confirmed. “If Hull’s stripping cards from the enforcers, it’s time to get rid of him, right?”

“Just wanted to plan,” she said, her words sounding clearer as she regained consciousness. “I wasn’t ready to make a move – not enough cards. Lieutenants were still split. But Priyam caught us meeting. I think Dachs sold me out.”

A harsh laugh escaped me. “Everybody competing to betray the Big Man. Looks like you weren’t very good at the whole conspiracy thing.”

She wormed her way into a sitting position against the shelves. She looked utterly defeated. “I told them not to do it. Attacking now was suicide.” She touched the lump on her head gingerly. “They disagreed.”

“You had the right of it,” I said, standing. “Priyam’s insides are painting the walls, Boramun’s dead and maybe Kernona, and the rest are running for their lives.”

“Gotta kill them,” she said flatly.

I stopped in my tracks. “Them?” I made my voice as cold as I could.

She nodded wearily. “Me too. I get it. But if you let them go to ground, you’ll just have to do this again, and the longer it goes the more cards they might get their hands on.”

The tiny Sourcerer boy slipped into the rear of the shop next to me and silently handed me a thin stack of cards.

“What’s this?” I said.

He pointed mutely out toward the street, and somehow I knew he meant he’d collected the cards from the dead enforcers in the streets. 

“Did they have soul cards?” I asked him. 

He shook his head and held out his other hand, delivering a pile of Basic shards. I wasn’t surprised. Working for Ticosi wasn’t exactly the kind of thing that elevated a person, not even in bad ways. 

I slipped the shards into a pocket. “Thanks, Nay. Stick around for a bit.” I flipped through the cards. I’d seen Kernona’s before – so she was dead – but both Boramun’s and Priyam’s were new to me.

 There wasn’t a single chance in all Fortune’s turnings that Ticosi let Priyam have an Epic. He must have been planning and saving for a while to get his hands on such a powerful Soul. Harker’s words came back to me and rang true in my vibrating, expanded heart. If I didn’t hunt down the rest of the enforcers, I’d face more of the same, and they’d probably be smarter about it next time.

First things first, though. “Roshum,” I called. “Will you come back here?”

The old man shuffled into view, looking from me to Harker hesitantly. He’d probably worried he’d find the woman dead and me telling him to clean up the mess. I tried not to take it personally. Ticosi had trained us all to expect the worst from each other.

I held out the Salamander. “Would this help with melting down metals for your Relics?”

His mouth gaped open, and he reached for the card hesitantly. “I… yes, it most certainly would. Running my little forge makes it hot as hell in here, and it takes more hands than I have.”

He let the card dangle between our hands, and I took mine away so he was forced to take possession of the thing. “You have Fire source?”

“No, but I have a fabricator I use sometimes. Hull, what… why are you giving this to me?”

“Because you can put it to good use,” I said roughly. “That’s what cards are for, not hoarding.” I spotted Bryll peeking past the old man. “You too, kid. Come here.”

She approached warily.

“Your soul has to be Rare at least, am I right?”

She looked suspicious, but she finally nodded.

“You have source?”

“Two Order,” she said grudgingly.

“Good.” I handed her the Human Guard. She reached for it eagerly, but I held onto it tightly, pulling her closer. When she scowled at me, I said, “You put yourself in harm’s way to protect people, and I want you to do it more, do it better. That’s why I’m giving you this. If I hear that you or your little friends are lording it over anybody and making trouble, there’s a demon with your name on it. Understand?” I let go of the card, and she cradled it. “Don’t let your people end up like Pekka.”

She nodded, suddenly solemn.

I held the Kobold out to Naydarin. “Same goes for you, little man. You could have run off with these cards, but you brought them to the Big Man instead. Keep doing the right thing.”

I was surprised when he shook his head firmly.

“This will make you one of the most powerful people in the neighborhood,” I said. “You’ll be like those assholes you helped me fight, except you don’t have to be an asshole.”

“He wants to be a Sourcerer,” Bryll says. “He wouldn’t even take the Epic if you tried to give it to him.”

I shrugged. “Rules are still the same, whether it’s cards or source. You with me?”

Naydarin nodded, a gleam in his eye.

“Madness,” Harker whispered. “They’ll turn on you.”

“No, that’s you,” I said. “I tried to tell you this was how the Lows works now, but you refused to believe me.”

She struggled to her feet, still bound hand and foot. “Get it over with, then.”

Snorting, I pulled my knife – the multiplying one I’d taken off of Ticosi’s body – and slashed the cords holding her. “You’re not getting off that easy.”

I pulled her out into the street, and the others followed. My source still circled my head. I’d dismissed my Hammer and put away my brass knuckles, but my cards still floated beside me. I focused what I needed and summoned the Soul I had between my fingers.

“I’ve missed all the fun,” the huge demon boomed, looking at the dead bodies in the street. “How dare you not summon me for the blood-letting?”

“There’s more to come,” I told it. “And when it’s done, you owe me information.” I’d gotten precious little of that from my mother when I’d actually seen her, and I hoped the wily demon would fill in some blanks for me. I rubbed my aching chest. The discomfort was getting worse. Am I having a heart seizure? I’m not some fat old man.

Harker was looking up at the demon in horror. “Not like this. Please. Just cut my throat.”

“Oh, shut up,” I said. “You’re going with him, and you’re going to hunt down every last one of the enforcers that ran. He kills them and then you find the next. You don’t stop ‘til it’s done. I don’t care if it takes weeks; he’ll stay summoned. Try to run and he’ll step on you.” Craning my head up toward the Night Terror, I said, “You only kill the ones she points out. If you have to knock down a building, you let her clear it first. Understand?”

“The truest art occurs under the harshest restrictions,” the great demon said. “I will paint a masterpiece in blood.” The massive head cocked to one side. “And when it is done? Is this one to be the grace note on my symphony of screams?”

I looked to Harker. She had her jaw set and was looking at nothing. She fully expected to die. Ticosi would have strung her up already. “No.”

She stared at me in shock.

“Your cards,” I said, holding out a hand. I kept massaging my chest with the other.

Numbly, looking confused, she pulled five cards from behind her ear, piling them into my outstretched palm. 

“When it’s done, send the demon back to me with their cards and leave. You’ve helped me as much as you’ve hurt, and I think you’re smart enough not to be like Dachs and Kernona. Am I right?”

She nodded jerkily, looking like she’d just taken another hard blow to the head. 

“Goodbye, Harker. Go find some other place to live, and let’s never think of each other again.”

She wandered away as if she were walking through fog, and the Night Terror boomed away after her one slow step at a time.

“Had I known how the night was going to progress, I might have stayed with A’cia,” Basil said dryly. “You epitomize the saying ‘Out of the frying pan, into the fire.’”

I couldn’t help but laugh. “I’m glad you were here, though.” I turned back toward the shop, and suddenly my knees buckled beneath me, and I pitched forward onto the cobblestones, gasping. My chest burned. I clutched at myself, gasping. Am I dying? The sense of expansion crested and then rose even higher, and it felt like my whole torso was about to explode just like Priyam had done.

“Hull!” Basil shrilled. “What is it?”

I opened my mouth to scream, but instead a concussive force rushed out, spreading into the open air in visible waves. A great sense of release washed through me, and I collapsed flat on my back on the street, breathing as if I’d run a race.

“Twins,” I gasped. “So that’s what that feels like. It really takes all that? Not sure it’s worth it.”

“You elevated?” my friend asked in relief, kneeling over me.

I closed my eyes and looked inside, reveling at the new and beautiful sight I’d never believed could occur. “I’ve got a new soul card.”