Running south took Abbee around the western wall of Akken. She remembered seeing Akken from a low hill further south, the night Ipsu had spirited her out of the ruined city. Remembered the shattered Tower and the broken walls and the holes where alcoves had been. The walls were still there and still towered twenty meters over her head, but the alcoves were gone. The walls were smooth all the way across, save for the occasional gate. New Bend didn’t have a wall. It was easy to get into the work camp from outside, but to get into Akken proper, Abbee had to use a gate. Akken never slept, and the gates never closed, but that didn’t mean they were unguarded. Akken’s gate security was better now than it had been when the Tower had been in charge. Veronna took guard patrols seriously. Constables manned each one.

Abbee headed to the Southwest Gate, where New Bend intersected with Akken. Only a few people passing through at this time of night, mostly heading out toward New Bend and not the other way. She reached the gate and hopped up on an empty porch nearby to watch for a few minutes. Watched the constables. Two of them. One outside and one inside the guard hut. The one in the hut looked a little familiar, but they spent most of their time in the hut, and Abbee couldn’t get a good look. She watched who else watched them. The angle of the moon cast everything on this side of the wall in shadow. Lots of places to sit and watch. Abbee suspected there might be someone watching and she’d not know.

She was painfully aware of the satchel on her back. She didn’t need anybody searching it on her way through the gate. During the day, the gate was too busy for constables to check everybody, so they didn’t bother. But at night, there were fewer people, and constables got nosier. Everybody thought the dangerous people went through the gates at night. Night crossers had bad timing. Dangerous people knew to go in during the day.

Abbee couldn’t sit there forever. She stepped off the porch and crossed the courtyard. She kept her hood down. The constable in the center of the road watched Abbee coming.

She held up her hand when Abbee got close. “Where are you headed so late?”

“I have an errand in the city tonight,” Abbee said.

“Is that so? What kind of errand?”

“The kind that will go to someone else if I don’t show.”

“That sounds suspicious,” a man said in a familiar voice. A round face poked out of the hut and split into a wide grin. “Dunno if it’s a good idea to let the infamous Abbee Danner into the city in the dark.”

The other constable’s brows shot up, and she tensed. Abbee felt a flash of relief all the same. Sergeant Shamus Potts. She’d get through the checkpoint. There might be some grumbling, and she might have to agree to some sort of bribe, but she’d get through.

“Shamus? How come you’re working the gate?”

“My turn tonight. Everyone pulls a shift once a month.”

“Really?”

“New thing. Old man says that if there are jobs only a few people do, then those are the jobs nobody will know how to do when it comes time to do them.”

“That sounds like something he’d say,” Abbee said. “I don’t see him out here on the gate with you, though.”

“You don’t, do you?” Shamus said. “And that’s a good thing for you. He doesn’t like you much. Doesn’t like you at all.”

Abbee grunted. “The feeling’s mutual.”

“What’s this?” the other constable asked.

“They didn’t tell you, Mela?” Shamus asked. “The Butcher of Graywall here was a constable once.”

“You can’t be serious,” Mela said.

“Special constable,” Abbee corrected. “For a day. Ask your precious first constable about it sometime.”

“Don’t,” Shamus warned. “Not unless you want to be stuck on gate duty for a month.”

“Is it true that the first night in Graywall, they dropped you in the pit?” Mela asked. “Sounds like rubbish. They wouldn’t make a mistake like that.”

“No mistake. It happened. That’s the night I got the nickname.”

“Ten, right?” Shamus asked.

“Fifteen,” Abbee corrected.

“Fifteen what?” Mela asked.

Shamus dragged his finger across his throat.

Mela goggled at Abbee. “You killed fifteen men? In Graywall?”

“In the pit,” Shamus said. “Body parts everywhere.” He grimaced and flexed his legs together. “I heard that one man was even missing his—”

“You going to let me through or not?” Abbee asked.

Mela frowned in disbelief. She gestured at Abbee’s trousers. “Where’d that blood come from?”

Abbee looked down in chagrin at the dark stains on her clothing. She couldn’t believe she hadn’t noticed Ipsu’s blood all over her. She’d put her knees in his blood pool, and he’d coughed on her. She realized she’d not felt any damp. That didn’t make any sense—it was enough to soak through. She should’ve been aware of cold, clammy cloth touching her skin. The stains had set already. They were dry. The golem. She felt a pit form in her stomach. Maybe Lem had been right. The golem had been dry and had sucked the water out of the bloodstains before moving on to the hunters. But Abbee hadn’t aged at all. Something had happened to her, and she didn’t know what, but Abbee wasn’t going to figure that out while trying to talk her way past two constables.

“Oh,” she said. “I had a bout tonight. I was on the ground a couple times. The floor of the bout hall is gross. I don’t think they ever clean it.”

Mela wrinkled her nose. “Is it true you’ve got a healer in the crowd?”

“House soldiers keep looking, but they’ve not found one,” Abbee said. “Can I pass? I promise to be on my best behavior.”

“What do you think, Mela?” Shamus asked his companion. “Should I let her in?”

“Don’t put me in the middle of this,” Mela said. “This is all you, Sergeant.”

Shamus waved Abbee in. “Don’t make me regret this.”

Abbee tried not to hurry as she walked past him. “Don’t worry. I’m going straight to my destination and staying there for the night.”

“I thought you said you had an errand in the city,” Mela said.

“Yep, and that’s the errand. You have a good night.”

“Remember what I said, Abbee,” Shamus said. “Don’t make—”

“You won’t regret it,” Abbee said.

Maybe Davo would keep the quarry business quiet. Maybe she hadn’t just lied to two constables. Abbee turned the first corner she found to break line of sight before either of them changed their mind.

Several blocks from the gate, Abbee hooked a left down an alley. Reached a small courtyard tucked away in the back, with four unmarked doors set into the surrounding buildings. An even smaller alley further in, with a set of stairs heading down to a basement door. Abbee slowed when she saw three young men in a cluster at the bottom. They looked up in surprise. Abbee worried that they were breaking into the basement, but the door looked untouched. She surmised that she’d interrupted some sort of deal. They weren’t very good. Hadn’t even posted a lookout.

“Beat it,” she told them.

One flashed a small knife. “You beat it,” he growled.

“Don’t make me come down there and take that away from you.” Abbee stood off to one side. “Make yourselves scarce.”

“There’s three of us and one of you,” another warned.

The third young man leaned over to the first. Whispered something. Abbee didn’t catch it. The first man started. The knife vanished. “Let’s go.” He and the whisperer trotted up the stairs, leaving the second man standing at the bottom.

“Where you going?” the man at the bottom demanded.

The two men at the top gave Abbee a wide berth. “We’re good?”

Abbee nodded. “We’re good if your friend goes with you.”

“Larkin, let’s go.”

“What for?” Larkin asked. “She’s half your size. What—”

“That’s Abbee Danner, you idiot.”

Larkin yelped and took three steps at a time. The three of them hustled out of the alley, whispering to each other as they went.

Abbee watched them go with annoyance. They’d tell everyone they knew that they had run into her tonight. Where it had happened. Davo might hear about it. Abbee decided Davo wouldn’t hear about it until tomorrow, if ever. Davo wasn’t talking to three small-timers in the North Bend, and the North Bend gangs didn’t get along with New Bend ones.

She walked down the steps. The door had a heavy lock and graffiti all over it. Abbee bent down and pulled a loose brick out of the wall. Reached in behind it. Felt around. There. Her hand came out with the key. She replaced the brick, unlocked the door, and pushed her way inside. She closed the door and pulled down the crossbar she’d put nearby. The air smelled musty.

Abbee shuffled forward two steps until she banged into a table with her hip. Reached across the table and found a lamp. Clicked the starter. A flame appeared and illuminated a small one-room basement with a low ceiling. A plain wooden table with a single chair, and a narrow cot over in the corner. A heavy door on the other side with another crossbar. Under the cot was a cask of water and a bag with some medical supplies. Some salted meat that Abbee wasn’t hungry enough to chance.

This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road. If you spot it on Amazon, please report it.

She had three of these bolt-holes scattered around the city. A second in the River District, and a third in the Yards. She’d set them up a year ago, when she had been feeling paranoid about an old job. Paid for the space up front. This was the first time she’d been in any of them. A seedy inn would’ve sufficed as well, but all the seedy inns were in New Bend. That wasn’t safe.

Abbee put Ipsu’s satchel on the table. Opened it and pulled out its contents, inspecting each item in the steady lamplight. The repeating bolt thrower came out first. Abbee kept the business end pointed away from her. A small sewing kit, a whetstone, and a worn flint and steel came out next. A pair of wool socks. A curious oval stone with a hinged lid and some cloth around its edges. Abbee thumbed it open and was rewarded with a bright light in the face. She almost dropped it in astonishment.

Ipsu had been carrying a thumb light. One that still worked. The light looked brand new and made the table lamp look dark in comparison. This one looked like a shiny new Kivan lamp. The edge of the lid had thick felt on it to create a tight seal. Abbee closed the lid and set the thumb light on the table. The plain stone oval was worth more than all the money she’d made since getting out of prison.

Abbee reached into the satchel and pulled out a small cloth bag with a drawstring. The bag’s contents seemed of various sizes. They clicked against each other. Was Ipsu carrying a bag of pebbles? Abbee pried open the drawstring and peered inside. Colors peered back at her. She gasped and dumped the contents of the bag out on the table.

Not pebbles. Gemstones. Rubies, diamonds, sapphires, emeralds. Dozens of them glittered there on the table.

Abbee had no idea why Ipsu had been carrying so much wealth. He eschewed money, and here he had been, running around with enough to buy a golem. Maybe this was why the hunters had been after him. Had he stolen from them? Why would he do that in the first place?

Abbee swept the gems back into their bag. The last one to go in was a diamond the size of her thumb. Two golems. She could buy two golems. Abbee grinned. She’d never have to work again.

She pulled the message rod out of her pocket and set it on the table. Message rods came in various sizes and materials, but they were all generally the same. A thin cylinder with a cork or cap on one end. Easy to carry. Waterproof. This one was small, no longer than Abbee’s palm. She pried off the cork—or tried to. It wouldn’t come loose. She peered at the cork. Looked like any regular old cork, but it was as hard as a rock. She picked at it with her fingernail. Her nail lost material, not the cork. Abbee shook the rod next to her ear. She couldn’t tell if there was anything inside. The rod could be empty, for all she knew. It wasn’t. This was sealed tight with magic. Had to be. There was an important message in there, and she couldn’t get to it. Abbee didn’t know where Ipsu had been all this time, but between the message rod and the thumb light, she knew that he’d found a wizard. The gray wizard.

Abbee peered into the satchel. Scraped her fingers into the corners. She turned it inside out. Empty. She looked at the pile of loot on the table. Something was missing. She knew it was here. Ipsu hadn’t had anything else on him, and he wouldn’t have gone anywhere without it. She eyed the socks. Abbee reached out and grabbed them. Put her hand in each one and turned them inside out. The first sock, nothing. The second sock, something. Two things.

Abbee fished out a small metal rod with quartz on one end. It was about as big as her index finger. She was astonished to be holding it and half expected to get rapped on the head. This was the one possession of Ipsu’s she hadn’t been allowed to touch. Ever. She still remembered the thrashing he’d given her the single time he’d caught her holding it. Still felt the sting of his hand on her face. They’d sparred countless times, and she’d felt his fists all over her body, but that one time had been dreadful. She remembered his expression. He’d been frightened. It had been frightening seeing Ipsu’s fear. The man had been her rock, and now he was gone.

Tears welled in Abbee’s eyes. She dashed them away. She was still mad at him. Abbee didn’t know what was so important about the rod with the quartz end. It didn’t light up. It didn’t do anything. It was an automatic beating, and Abbee didn’t like touching it.

The second thing to come out of the sock was a silver ring. Heavy. She tried to fit it to her fingers. It was too big for all of them. The ring had strange markings on it, and Abbee peered at them. They looked chiseled into the metal, but the script was too delicate in places for tools. The markings wrapped around the outside and the inside of the ring. Abbee turned the band over and over, trying to follow them. They seemed to go on forever, rotating and turning around and around. Abbee lost track of how long she sat there, trying to find the end of the markings on that ring, but her eyes were dry when she finally blinked.

Abbee set the ring down on the table. She rubbed her eyes with her fingertips. Leaned back and stared at the pile in front of her. Abbee had a message rod she couldn’t open, a bag of gemstones, a curious silver ring, Ipsu’s quartz-tipped hit-Abbee-if-she-touches-it stick, a brand-new thumb light, and a repeating bolt thrower she’d stolen from a dead wizard hunter. One of two hunters she’d crushed an hour ago with a golem. Which had been dry. And here Abbee had thought that letting someone break her jaw in a bout was going to be the most exciting event of her evening.

Had Ipsu been helping the gray wizard escape the hunters? Or been trying to get to him, and the hunters had caught up to Ipsu first? Who was Abbee supposed to give the message rod to? The gray wizard? Only if I get to kill him after.

Abbee stretched and yawned. She wouldn’t figure it out tonight. She needed rest. She put the ring and the quartz-tipped rod back into the sock and stuffed everything back into the satchel. She turned off the lamp, took the satchel, and went to the cot. She wore the bag on her side, ready to jump up and run at a moment’s notice. Abbee lay down on the cot and listened to the building overhead. Silence. It was a bookstore, and nobody was up there. The owners lived in the River District. She fell asleep wondering what to buy with those gems first.

Abbee dreamed an old dream. The same dream. She woke up screaming and clutching at her heart. It was pitch black, and it took her a moment to remember where she was. The basement. She groaned. The nightmare again. She wanted to believe it was a dream and none of it had been real. It wasn’t a dream. A memory. She hoped to someday find the man who’d always said, “Again,” and inflict her nightmare on him. Do to him what he had done to her.

A familiar itch tickled her back, between her shoulder blades. Abbee rotated her shoulders, trying to make it go away, but it only strengthened. She growled and rolled onto her side. The satchel had migrated during the night to her belly, and the strap tugged painfully on her neck. Abbee stretched her arm, fighting the strap and trying to reach the itch. No use. She swore and stood up. Tried to use the satchel’s strap like a saw, but the itch evaded her efforts. Abbee stepped over to the corner of a wall and rubbed her back against the cool stone before finally finding relief.

Daylight peeked under the basement door. She’d gotten several hours of sleep. Her stomach grumbled at her. She needed food. Abbee positioned the satchel on her hip, over her jerkin. She stretched. Didn’t like how the satchel tugged her weight to one side. She didn’t like how it hung on her hip. Abbee was used to moving more freely. She wondered if she should replace the satchel’s leather strap with a chain. She could use its weight as a weapon, but Abbee wasn’t used to fighting like that. She’d end up getting pulled off-balance. Too risky. That, and it might break open during a fight and spill its precious contents.

She walked back to the table, turned on the lamp, and emptied the satchel onto the surface. Abbee had two pockets in her trousers and two pouches on her belt. She’d stitched her pockets herself. They wouldn’t break, but things slipped out of pockets. That meant her pouches. One had her money in it. Some bills and coins. Not much. If she hadn’t found the gemstones, Abbee would’ve had to take a job or fight in the bouts again in a few days. Her money pouch had room for the thumb light and the silver ring, but she couldn’t carry all the gemstones in it. She couldn’t believe she carried too many gems to fit in her money pouch. She could carry fifty coins in there.

Her second pouch sat at the small of her back, under her jerkin. Her jobs case. Odd jobs, more like. Abbee sometimes carried messages for people. Sensitive messages nobody wanted to entrust to repeaters or DotPost. Things they didn’t want the constables or House soldiers to find. They trusted Abbee because she was reliable and durable. And fast. She ran for a living.

Abbee wanted to carry as much as she could on her own person. She transferred the thumb light and the silver ring to her money pouch. Ipsu’s quartz-tipped stick was too long. It stuck out. That, along with the message rod, went into her jobs case. She hefted the bag of gems and crammed them into the case too. Too full. If it broke open … Abbee split up the gems. Slipped several of the bigger rubies into her money pouch, along with several sapphires.

She pushed the wool socks, whetstone, flint and steel, and the sewing kit back into the satchel. She didn’t need them. All that remained was the repeating bolt thrower. Abbee wasn’t wearing it over her leather bracer. She’d get stopped for sure.

Under it?

She unlaced her bracer. The bolt thrower was small enough to fit under it and still allow the bracer to be laced up. Barely. She’d have to get longer laces at some point. Anyone looking probably wouldn’t be able to tell that she had a bolt thrower under her bracer, but they’d know something was there. Maybe it should sit against the underside of her forearm.

Abbee loosened the laces and repositioned the bolt thrower. Her bracer still rode a little high from the bolt thrower’s straps, and her arm hung a little strangely, but it wasn’t as noticeable. She’d need a longer cloak or sleeves for something more permanent. Abbee discarded that idea. She didn’t want anything more permanent. She just wanted to carry the bolt thrower on her person long enough to sell it.

But … it was a repeating bolt thrower.

She wouldn’t get a weapon like it ever again. It was too valuable to sell. Still, Abbee didn’t like carrying it under her wrist. She worried about shooting herself in the hand with it. Maybe a custom bracer would conceal it better. She’d been in some tough scrapes in the past few years where the bolt thrower would’ve come in handy. Abbee didn’t have to decide right this second. She’d figure that out later. It was also a weapon. Abbee didn’t carry weapons anymore. Too dangerous. Movers. She hated them.

Abbee figured the repeating bolt thrower was safe from movers for two reasons. One, because hunters carried it in the first place and presumably shot bolts at movers without fear. And two, because the bolt thrower didn’t carry bolts to grab. No room inside the housing.

She felt a little charge of happiness that she’d managed to take what she wanted from the satchel and leave everything she didn’t. The bolt thrower sat a little strangely on her arm, and her jobs case was filled nearly to bursting, but she was happy with the item distribution. One last look around the bolt-hole to make sure she hadn’t left anything.

She went through the satchel one more time, feeling at all the seams for hidden compartments. Satisfied she’d taken all items of value, Abbee left the satchel on the table. She lifted the crossbar and opened the door. No hoodlums out on the steps. She locked the door behind her, replaced the key behind the loose brick, and walked up the stairs. Paused at the edge of the alley. Plenty of midmorning foot traffic and cart traffic out on the road to hide herself in. She scanned the street, looking for threats. Two constables walking around the corner to the west. Abbee went in the opposite direction.

She found food sellers two blocks east. Bought a meat pie. Spiced pork in flat bread. Some fumbling with her money pouch—Abbee almost pulled out a fat ruby by accident. She inhaled the pork in three steps. Spotted a frosty bread seller at the other end of the block, by the telltale gout of flame from nowhere. Abbee knew nearly every bread seller in Akken was a torch, because none of the old magical furnaces still worked. Torches also served as their own protection, ever since Arold from Veronna had moved in and plied his harassment game in Akken. Arold’s crispies, the delivery crew, had harassed the bread carts early on. A brief price war had broken out, followed by an actual war, until the Council had stepped in and put a stop to it. Today, crispies weren’t allowed to interfere with the bread sellers, and the bread sellers weren’t allowed to set the crispies on fire.

Abbee neared the bread seller. Two people in line. She was about to join them when the man in front said, “I’ll take one crispy bread.”

The seller rolled his eyes. “That’s extra.”

“I know.”

“And extra time.”

“I know that too. It’s for my pa. He’s lame. Otherwise, I’d make him come down here and get it.”

The person behind them groaned and walked away from the cart. The bread seller watched them go and fixed his current customer with a baleful stare. “I’ve half a mind to charge you double now.”

The customer snorted. “Then I’d go to the Arold’s down the street, and you’d have nothing.”

“How come you didn’t go there to begin with? They love making crispy bread.”

“Because you’re right here and they’re all the way down there.” The customer slapped bills onto the cart. “Quit complaining and just make it, will you? My pa will complain my ear off if I take too long.”

Abbee wasn’t waiting for the man’s crispy bread. There was an allotted time limit for frosty bread, and crispy bread ruined it. Not to mention it added a faint hint of ash to every piece of frosty bread cooked in the oil for ten minutes after.

She got some frosty bread a couple of blocks later. Carried it out onto the bridge overlooking the Charrin. She paused halfway over to eat. The sun was shining, and a nice breeze washed over the river.

Abbee stood on Charcer Bridge, the middle one. She looked north and spied a familiar pier under the North Bridge. It looked the same. Still no bridgies. Abbee figured her name was still chiseled on stone. She wondered if it had five strikes on it. She bet it did. Sammy wouldn’t have let the others imagine she could come back. She finished her frosty bread and pushed off the railing. Time to buy some trousers without any bloodstains.

She turned to head east and saw two constables walking toward her. They saw her. Saw her face. Abbee didn’t recognize either of them, but it was clear they knew her. Brows dropped. Hands went to swords. They were three paces away.

“Hold it, Danner,” one of them barked.