[CONTINUES FROM PREVIOUS CHAPTER]

“I haven’t lied you mostly by omission,” Iketek begins, her hands around the cup. “I was really born in a shitty Riverlands town, two hundred kilometers from Landfall, and my family really moved to Landfall and ended up in relative poverty.

“When I broke through the Veil, my parents wanted me to join the Council, while I meant to hide my powers - all the more because I soon realized I was a Mind-mage. In the end, they called ThauCon on me. I fled, mostly out of confusion, but I soon realized that in doing that, I had marked myself as guilty. I kept fleeing, because I was scared about what would happen to me in re-ed, without a wealthy family bribing ThauCon into sending me to one of the least bad camps.

“As with many rogue mages, the more I fled, the more I had reasons to flee. I never made a conscious decision to go rogue, but at some point, I had no way back.”

She takes a long sip of tea, and I can tell she dreads talking about what comes next.

“The part where I lied to you, as Korentis guessed, is when I claimed that I developed my powers without guidance. As I told you, the fact that you two could develop your powers in peace was highly unusual. Here in Rakavdon, the magical factions are weak for some reason, and the ThauCon base is a joke. In most of the world, things are different.

“When a rogue mage starts drawing as much attention as you did, in the Riverlands, it’s a race between ThauCon and the magical factions to get hold of them. If ThauCon gets you, it’s re-ed. If the Schools find you, they whisk you away into their hidden bubble-worlds.”

Abyss, that sounds so cool. But I force down the questions, with some effort - people don’t like to be interrupted when they’re talking about serious stuff, I try to remember that.

“But the Syndicates found me first,” Iketek says, gravely. “A group known as the Sacred Song Society. They offered me protection and magical training, in return for service. I thought my choice was between them or ThauCon, at the time. Now I know they’d have killed me on the spot, if I had refused. But still, I had a choice. And I chose them.”

Daravoi flinches. I really, really should look up something about the Syndicates. For now, I’ll assume they’re super-evil and make burgers out of adorable puppies.

“It wasn’t that bad, at first,” Iketek says. “They brought me to a safe house, gave me clothes, food and a new ID chip. An old man taught me magic - the Syndicates have their own magical lore, even if not as refined as the Council’s or the Schools’, and it rarely gets written down.

“The higher-ups became very interested in me when they realized I was a mind-mage. They were vague about what kind of task I’d perform for them, though. They spoke about long-distance communication, stealing secrets from rival cartels, and the like.”

She takes a long pause, inhales. Her eyes are distant.

“I knew they were lying. As a side effect of my powers, I get a rough feeling of what others think. And I can always tell when people lie - except with you, Korentis, incidentally. So, I knew they weren’t being honest with me, but I didn’t worry too much about it. With the new powers I had, I was confident I could run away easily, if need be.

“May the Gunner shoot me for my arrogance. You can’t get away from the Syndicates that easily, of course. Their whole existence is based on their ability to exploit mages - even the Syndicates run by mages, like Sacred Song, work like pyramid scams, with those above controlling those below.

“They started making me work for them. Harmless operations at first - stealing secrets, sending messages, as they had claimed. But that’s not how the Syndicates keep their power, especially the big ones. They have so many enemies - ThauCon, the police, regular gangs, even the Faceless Army hates them with a passion. They survive by being ruthless. Cruel.

“There are… really dark things a mind-mage can do. Especially a Puppeteer, like me - my specialty is to force other people to behave as I want. I can also tear away memories from their minds, or change memories, even if I’m less skilled with that. Sacred Song bases its strength in never showing itself. You don’t pay for their protection? You burn down your own home. You investigate one of their businesses? You kill your own child, and you might scream and scream that it was magic, that it wasn’t you, but there’s never any proof, and who is going to investigate further?”

Her hands shake the tiniest bit as she talks.

“I told them I wouldn’t. I’d help them in other ways, but I wouldn’t do… some of those things. The ones I did before refusing were bad enough. But I had some lines I wouldn’t cross. Except it was no longer my choice. My teacher, who had seemed kind and supportive, had sunk his hooks deep into my mind. The first time I tried to stand up to the bosses, he made me take a kitchen knife, and stab my own hand.”

She raises her hand, showing us the back first. There’s a thin scar there, healed cleanly. Then she turns her hand, and there’s a matching scar on her palm, where the point of the knife must have cut through. I have a horrifying vivid image of Iketek stabbing her own hand, and I bite my tongue, fighting a wave of sickness.

“My master explained to me, as I screamed and bled, that I literally couldn’t disobey Sacred Song. Slowly, exploiting my inexperience, he had planted a spell in my mind. Like a backdoor. By then I was as powerful as him and more skilled, but I couldn’t fight him at all. He had full access to my thoughts, my memories, my actions. I begged him to let me go, to break the spell, and he laughed - he said his own handler wouldn’t let him.”

Iketek talks faster now, as if now that she opened up, she couldn’t stop the words coming out of her mouth.

“To punish me, they didn’t even need to do anything. Once I backtalked a Monk - that’s one of their stupid ranks - and I felt myself apologize, walk away to my room, and just sit there. I sat on the floor, and couldn’t move a single muscle for a full day. Not even to eat or drink.”

She stops, and takes a long breath.

“Fuck,” Daravoi says. “That’s… I’m sorry. You don’t need to tell us more, okay?”

“It’s in the past,” she says, steel in her voice. “And given the current events, I think you should know. If only to understand how dangerous the magical factions are.”

The story has been taken without consent; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.

She drinks more tea - it’s getting lukewarm and I haven’t touched mine yet, I fear I’ll vomit if I swallow.

“Sacred Song’s agents were monsters,” she says, “and I had no way out. I tried to bargain, to plead, but the point was, they didn’t need me to be a willing servant. The opposite was true, in a way - the bosses liked to make a show of how even a talented mind-mage like me was under their total control. I tried to kill myself, at some point, but they didn’t let me do even that.

“The best I managed was to hide some thoughts from my handler. He wasn’t much of a mage, I realize now - barely second level, and not very skilled. I found how to make… a kind of pocket in my mind. Not enough to resist him, but enough to hide some thoughts. I didn’t dare use it often, though, because had he noticed, he’d have controlled me even more tightly. And I’d be punished. It’s hard to explain how much I dreaded punishment, by then.

“With time, I managed to gain some room for maneuver. My idea was to beg the Hidden Schools, or even the Council, for help, as soon as I met one of their members. I’d have gladly accepted a death sentence, as long as they took down my handler.

“One day, I was taken to a meeting with a potential new contact. My duty was to assess if he was being honest during a conversation. He was a strange man, a trafficker in precursor Relics. I couldn’t read his mind, though - the Prop Master isn’t a mage, but he has… his own resources. He noticed my attempt, though. And must have noticed something about my mental state. He mind-communicated with me, asked if I was all right.

“In retrospect, I was stupid to trust him. I had no reason to, most people who deal with the Syndicates are just as bad as them. But I was desperate, and I told him I was being forced to be there, and to please help me.”

Well, this is unexpected. Who is the Prop Master, really? But that’s a question for another day.

“The Prop Master didn’t answer me, but after sealing the deal, he asked about me. He said he was looking for a mage to hire, to help with his business, and since I looked young and probably didn’t know too many Syndicate secrets yet, maybe I could be interested. He said he was willing to pay handsomely.

“My handler took control of me immediately, made me smile and decline the offer. The Monk who was talking with the Prop Master also made clear the Syndicate doesn’t sell or rent mages. The Prop Master shrugged, like it was no big thing. My handler was suspicious, but I managed to hide our short exchange. I thought I had run a big risk for nothing.

“The day after, I woke with… a horrible pain, as if I’d been stabbed through the chest. I thought I was dying. Then I felt something in my mind rip, and I knew my handler could no longer control me. I ran out of my room, still in my underwear, not even thinking to take anything with me - I only wanted to run away.

“The Prop Master was in the living room, smiling at me, calm and friendly in his impeccable suit. My handler was on the floor, dead, blood pooling from the wound in his chest. The residing Monk was dead, too, while two Mundane guards had been paid off to change job, quickly.”

“Wait,” I say, “the hell? The Prop Master? And…. he isn’t a mage? How did he…?”

“I was equally surprised at first,” Iketek says. “I know more about his resources now, and I understand how he could overwhelm two mages and a couple of armed gangsters. Let’s say you shouldn’t cross him. But believe it or not, he’s a good, honorable person. If he wants to kill you, it means you deserve death.”

She says it as a fact, like the sky is blue and the moon is broken. But after having listened to her story, I understand her ferocious loyalty.

How do I know that what she told us is the truth, though? Unlike Iketek, I can’t tell when people lie.

But she doesn’t strike me as a good actor. She had no real reason to give us explanations. And while I can’t afford to be naive, I don’t want to become the kind of person who hears a story of terrible suffering, and immediately questions it.

“He told me I could stay with him, or I could just run away, whichever I wanted,” Iketek continues, the frantic intensity gone from her voice. “He told me he was sorry for killing my handler, that he was mostly a victim too. But I had asked for help, my handler hadn’t. So, we left, together. He couldn’t work with the Syndicates anymore, of course, and we had to avoid any region with a strong Sacred Song presence.”

I raise my hand like in a classroom. “Ok, stupid question time,” I say. “Why would you want to stick with us, instead of him? He seems both a better person and way more powerful than we are.”

“It’s a while that we mean to part ways,” she answers, a pained expression on her face. “You know three of the strongest Karesian Syndicates united in a cartel, right? One of those is Sacred Song. We’re still on their hit list. The Prop Master can change identity easily, he could disappear for a while, and pop out as a completely different person who just happens to trade in relics. He won’t deal with any Syndicate ever again, but they won’t hunt him, either. For me, it’s not so easy. I need to lie very low or find protection.”

She is a bad liar – I’m pretty sure this isn’t the whole reason. But I’ve pushed her enough for the day.

“So, if we stay with you, we’ll have magical super-assassins chasing us?” I ask. That does sound like the kind of thing she should have mentioned earlier.

“I’d have told you soon anyway,” she says, defensive. “And without me, you’d both have ended up in re-ed, at best. I’d have let you walk away at any point. If there’s one thing I’ve no intention of doing, it's manipulating others for my own gain. I did enough of that.”

Daravoi sips his tea. “Good enough for me.”

“Fine,” I say. “And sorry, Iketek. That whole thing… really sucks. Like, a lot. I’ll be happy to stick together for a while. We owe you, and honestly, you’re our best chance to survive, especially since everything I learn about the magical factions is scary as fuck. If you think going on with the job is the best thing to do, I’ll trust you.”

She takes a deep breath. She’s exhausted, I realize.

“I’m not sure at all,” she says. “I mean, if there is a war, we’d be better off fleeing to some town in the mountains, as soon as possible. But if Valanes is an isolated event, it won’t change much for our job. The Prop Master will just loan us the book if I ask, honestly. But I’d prefer keeping my part of the deal, and the money would help a lot, too.”

“Well, we don’t have to hurry, right?” I say. “We need to practice our cover stories, study enough thaumo-archaeology to at least look like students, and stuff like that. So, we could have the night off.”

“Yeah, I feel like I’d need a full night's sleep,” Iketek says.

“Or,” I say, raising a finger, “we could play video games. There’s a screen, and we’ve got enough money to pay for a game feed.”

“You want to play?” Daravoi asks. “Like… after all of this?.”

“And beside that,” Iketek adds, “you just listed several important, urgent things we need to do to set up the operation.”

She says that because she loves being the serious, responsible one, but I can tell her heart isn’t in it.

I can tell when people want to be distracted from awful thoughts. That’s my favorite coping strategy, after all. And Iketek is like that tonight. She enjoys gaming, she was looking critically at full-sim consoles while we were shopping.

But she’ll feel better if it’s me, the irresponsible idiot, pushing for it. Big Sis was like that sometimes.

“Look,” I say, “we can’t stop the war, if it comes. And did you actually mean to do any of those urgent, important things now?”

Daravoi shrugs.

“Games it is,” he says, as if accepting a chore. “I never played them much, datasphere feeds suck on airships, and it’s even worse in Kalester. Time to learn.”

“This is so childish,” Iketek says, disdainful. “But I used to love gaming, you know? There should be some controllers in the bottom drawer. I’ll destroy you at whatever game you pick.”