> “When outleveled, cheat.”

* Silas Donagan

Warm spring rain fell from the fluffy white clouds above. In Cardona, flowers blossomed in window ledge gardens and fenced-in backyards. The worst of flu season was over, and taking a breath and inhaling pollen, sighing, and preparing for an onslaught of allergies.

swept the streets, polishing cobblestone in richer districts. and got ready to order, organize, clean, and otherwise mollycoddle a whole new season’s worth of clothes for their fussy employers, the rare overseeing their labor.

In the working-class districts, narrow streets were filled with folk in suspenders and stained, smudged, and wearied plain clothes, some with heads down, others whistling with a pep in their step, for spring was the traditional time for bonuses, leave, and-- even more importantly-- mass level ups. For, when the , , , and, Archons forbid, got together and formed their cartels and after the worst of the snow and cold had passed to negotiate with the various , , and suchlike, would need to be reforged, taken up again, and, on this nice day, a rainbow in the sky as the clouds cleared, action would be taken.

Two hundred stood outside Gyda Ironworks’s largest factory, signs held high, chanting a simple slogan.

“Fair wages for all! Fair wages for all!”

Outside, two , called to the scene urgently by Gyda’s , lounged beside the strike against a wall a couple building away, smoking cigars.

“I don’t know about you, but I’m not going over there. Isn’t our place to clean up Old Gyda’s missteps for him. He’s a grown man, with a hundred thousand Rooks to his name, he can pay someone to do it himself.”

“I don’t know, Sarge. What’re we gonna do if that weasley reports us to his superiors? God knows Gyda and the Throne are good friends. If we don’t…” The nervous young man was cut off by his Sargent.

“Look, son, here’s how I see it. If we do our jobs, we’re in the wrong, and we know it. If we go out of our way to help the little guy, we’ll be sure to lose our jobs. So it’s best just to stay out of it and wait for-- there he is.”

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The younger squeaked. “There who is?”

The sergeant tapped the side of his head. “. Good Talent. You probably can’t see him without it. You’re right when you say Gyda and the Throne are close. This factory pumps out blades and armor for Esulatare’s and ; it’s a vital piece of city infrastructure. So His Lordship sent his best man for the job.”

“The Storm Eater Mage?”

“No, worse. Devolion.”

A man in a black bowler hat and long black coat appeared. He wasn’t there one moment, and was there the next. Or-- was that just how you saw him. He didn’t speak a word when he was doing this kind of work, folk said, because he didn’t have to. He had a Talent that, so far as it was known, was unique to him.

.

He moved quickly-- too quickly for the normal human eye to track. Even just moving at a normal pace, your attention slid off of him, and you forgot about him immediately upon looking away, unless he wanted you to remember.

He clapped his hands together, and suddenly there was perfect silence. The young tried to say something, but no sound was heard. He brought his hand up and snapped his fingers next to his own ear, and heard nothing.

Caspian Devolion stood there, silently, and then spoke. His words were the only sound anyone could hear, his voice the only voice that could speak.

“Normally I would be nicer about this. I would negotiate, I would play the game of politics. But that is for kinder days, and the days are turning more cruel with each passing hour. So I will be concise.” In a moment, he had moved twenty feet, knocked aside a barricade, and lopped a man’s head from his body, before smoothly stepping out of the way of the spray of blood and returning to his place.

The crowd strained against the power of his Talent, rage and grief and disgust boiling in the air, kept from overflowing by the force of Devolion’s Class. “Riot if you want. You will be imprisoned, slaughtered, replaced as is necessary. I own Gyra. Which means I own you. I do not take kindly to my property refusing to do their jobs. So long as I breathe, this will be the last year that this idiotic tradition of the mob speaking for itself will ever transpire. I will have the ones who incited this useless charade forcibly Bound as an example to you all. Good day.” And without another word, he vanished.

Ten beats later, noise returned to the street like an avalanche, sounds as small as one’s own breathing seeming cacophonous in the wake of their absence. After the strikers had a breath to process what had just happened, they exploded with rage.

By the time the sun was low in the sky, seven new Bound had been made, thirty were dead, twice that many protesters were dead or injured, and more than a hundred were imprisoned. The riots only grew as word of the tyrannical debacle spread throughout the city, and soon things were in uproar.

All according to plan.