30 – Clues and Bullets

Ward gingerly tried to step on wooden planks that weren’t smeared with blood as he entered the scene of the murder. “What a shitshow.” He held his rough-spun sleeve over his nose, grimacing at the thick, acrid tang of drying blood and bile. He’d left Fay downstairs chatting with the neighbor lady and was just talking to himself, but it wasn’t a great surprise when Grace cleared her throat and replied.

“Whoever did this wasn’t any sort of professional.”

Ward turned toward the sound of her voice and frowned. “Where have you been?”

“I told you! Resting. Don’t ask me to explain it, but being with you—being conscious—takes effort. I don’t know how it wears me out, considering I don’t have a body, but it does.”

“Well, help me spot some clues in this damn mess.” The room was a disaster. It wasn’t just the blood, either. While the dark smears were awful and numerous—on the floors, staining the bed sheets, splashed on the walls—they were only part of it. A broken chair, shattered vase, chunks of plaster knocked off the walls, and clumps of feathers from a ruptured pillow all contributed to the chaotic mess.

Ward carefully stepped around the thicker blood stains, though he wasn’t sure why—he could see that the city guards, the doctor, and probably the mayor and neighbors had all walked through the room. Despite that, he could sort of pick out where the majority of the fighting had taken place and where Haley’s parents had died—one in the bed and one against the wall near the door. He could tell because of the thick, coagulating pools of blood. He stepped around the bed to the wall with the large chunks of missing plaster, noting how they’d scattered on the floor. “Looks like he tried to stab one of ‘em here. They dodged, and he drove the point of his knife into the plaster. Shit, three times.”

“Probably Haley; I can’t see her old dad being that nimble.”

“Yeah.” Ward walked around some more, noting the smears and handprints on the floor leading to the biggest pool of coagulated blood. “Dad went down here, crawled his way to the wall there, and I think our killer gave him a few extra holes in his back for good measure.”

“Does this remind you of any crime scenes you’ve seen?”

“Yeah, sure. I’ve worked a few murder scenes. This one’s a lot messier than the killer planned, I’ll tell you that much. I wish I’d seen the bodies, but I bet the mom didn’t get stabbed more than once or twice.” Ward walked over to the bed, pointing to the deep red stain on the sheets, still moist at the center. “He got her in an artery or the heart. She bled out here quickly—didn’t move at all. I bet that’s when Dad woke up, realized what was happening, and started fighting and yelling.”

“Where’d the killer run when he thought he’d killed Haley?” Grace moved over to the window and pointed near the sill. “I think he came in and out through here; the bottom of the window’s all chipped up.”

Ward went to confirm, lifting the window open, and sure enough, he could see where a prybar had broken the latch. He stuck his head outside and looked around. “Yeah. Garden shed backs up to the house here. Killer could’ve climbed up onto it, then in through this window. He’d have to be fit enough to do a pull-up or two.” Ward scanned the ground around the shed, noting the fresh mulch in the flower bed leading into the backyard garden. “What am I doing, anyway? We can’t do prints, can’t do DNA, I’m not gonna find any cameras or anything. I guess I need a bloodhound or something.”

“Well, I think you were hoping to find a scrap of clothing or the murder weapon, maybe. What did Haley tell you about the killer?”

“You didn’t listen at all?”

“I was—”

“Resting. Right. Forget it. She gave me some clues. Said the killer had black stains on his hands, said she broke some bones and left him some wounds that’ll scar on his ribs here.” Ward slapped his palm against his lower left side. “Hmm, he’s about my size with a big black beard and dark eyes.”

“Seems like a lot to go on. Well, if his hands were stained and not just, you know, dirty, I’d say he’s either someone who works with pitch or ink. From the rest of the description, I’d lean toward pitch.”

“Pitch? As in tar?”

Grace nodded. “Yeah. People who work with the stuff usually have stained hands; I saw plenty of ‘em back in the day when I was with Hamlin, er, when he was my host. It’s used for waterproofing—boats, roofs, that kind of thing.”

“Well, as there’s no dock in this town, I’m going to go with a roofer.” Ward clapped his hands, rubbing them together briskly. “Nice work, Grace! We’ve got our first lead.” He turned and, trying to avoid the blood splatters, hurried back down the hall and into the foyer. Fay was nibbling on a dry-looking biscuit, still standing near the hallway chatting with the neighbor lady. “Let’s go, Fay.” When he pulled the door open, he turned back to the neighbor. “Um, Minerva, was it?”

“Minerra.” She smiled with her eyes as she corrected him, and Ward nodded quickly.

“Right, right. Well, Minerra, thanks for looking after Haley. We’ll—er, at least I’ll be back.”

“Oh, I’m coming back, too! Like I said earlier, I’ll help clean the place up. Poor girl shouldn’t have to see all that when she gets up!”

“That’s a fact.” Ward pulled the door open wide and motioned for Fay to precede him out. “Speak to you soon.”

“Walk safely. Mind the shadows if you truly are hunting the killer!”

Ward reflected on the lady’s parting words. Was that something people said in this world—mind the shadows?

He pushed the door shut, and Fay asked, “Did you find anything?”

“Not really. The scene was a mess. Tell me about the law around here; what’s the deal with the marshal?”

“Oh, marshals work for the Assembly. He won’t be here anytime soon.”

“Assembly?”

“The Vainglory Assembly? They’re . . . well, I guess they’re the rulers of this system. I’ve never seen one of the delegates, not up close anyway. Tarnish has one, of course, being a city with a challenge. I didn’t vote, though. What does it matter to me if the rich lady from Bee’s End or the rich man from Rivercrest Row represents the city? I’ve never seen any difference in my life when our delegate changed.”

Ward was starting to fill in the blanks. “So, they’re like a republic or something? A government for all the worlds? Who can be a member?”

“Cities or groups of cities that manage one of the challenges. I think there are a hundred and fifty-two delegates. Yeah, that sounds right to me.” She nodded to herself, looking up at the pale blue sky as they walked.

“And marshals work for them. So, the marshal doesn’t live nearby?”

“Oh no! He’ll be coming out of Port Granite.” When Ward frowned at her, she laughed and waved her hand off to the left, “That’s a city quite a bit larger than Tarnish to the north.”

Ward mulled over her words for a few minutes while they walked. None of it mattered in the near term; he had to find the killer because he wanted justice for Haley and because he wanted to know if Nevkin had been involved. If he had, that meant Ward needed to have an eye open for a similar kind of attack. It made no difference to him if some representative from the government would be coming along to “investigate.” No, he needed to get this sorted soon, not on some bureaucrat’s timeline. “Can we stop by a store? I mean, like a general store. I need some personal items.”

The tale has been illicitly lifted; should you spot it on Amazon, report the violation.

“Sure. There’s one near the inn. Oh! Do you mind if we stop by Mr. Frine’s?”

“Mr. Frine?”

Fay playfully smacked herself on the forehead. “He’s the artificer I told you about. The man who’s making my teeth. We’re close to his shop.”

“Oh, definitely! I was hoping to meet him.” Ward was interested in Fay’s teeth but equally interested in what else the artificer might be able to craft. He had a feeling someone with that kind of talent might have some better ideas about bullets for his .357. His new spear was decent, but it was also a bulky pain in the ass. Walking around with it, dealing with going into shops and houses, he was already starting to regret his choice. Almost as a case in point for his current thoughts, he had to leave the spear leaning against the awning post of Mr. Frine’s shop; his doorway was narrow and low, and the interior ceiling barely cleared Ward’s head.

“Mr. Frine?” Fay called, wending between glass display cases that displayed jewelry and trinkets of all sorts, from rings and necklaces to watches to smoking pipes and carved figurines.

“Just a moment!” a high-pitched, piping voice called from the back of the shop. Ward followed Fay to the counter and leaned against the smooth, well-oiled, butcherblock-style top. A moment later, a very small man came through a pair of swinging doors, carrying a foil-wrapped jar that ticked and hissed as he set it on the counter. “Ah! Fayella! I’ve never been happier to finish a project. You see these gray hairs?” He brushed a finger through his thick, bushy, salt-and-pepper sideburns. “Those are due to you!”

“Oh, Mr. Frine! I wasn’t that bad, was I? I made a point not to stop by more than once a day!” Fay grinned, displaying her missing teeth with a mischievous glint in her eye.

Mr. Frine was more than small; he looked like a child with an adult face. His hair looked tousled or like he’d just woken up, and his dapper, collared shirt and apron were stained with dozens of colors. Ward couldn’t tell if the stains were ink, food, or some other concoction. Ward held out a hand. “I’m Ward.” Mr. Frine looked him up and down, frowning, before taking hold of it in a surprisingly firm grip.

“Rul Frine.” He nodded, released Ward’s hand, and then turned back to Fay. “Well? Are you ready?”

“Yes!”

“Okay, this’ll just take a minute and shouldn’t hurt too badly. Nevertheless, I’ll give you a numbing tonic.” Fay didn’t respond but leaned closer, and her grin widened. Mr. Frine rummaged under the counter for a minute, then produced a small, clear vial with pale blue fluid inside. “Hold this in your mouth, swishing it around, until I tell you to stop.” Ward watched while Fay complied, tipping the little container to her lips and noisily swishing it with puffed-out cheeks. Meanwhile, Mr. Frine produced a pair of tweezers and carefully began removing the foil from the sizzling jar. “I added a bit more catalyst than I wanted, but it sped up the mana gathering in the teeth.”

“Why wouldn’t you want to add more catalyst?” Ward asked, curious how this whole thing worked.

“The expense,” Mr. Frine scowled at Fay, “and, sometimes, if you gather mana too quickly, you can cause the medium to fail—turning to dust. Luckily, I skirted that line.” He watched Fay for another few seconds. “You can swallow now.”’

Fay swallowed noisily, then stuck out her tongue, “Blech! Bitter!” Mr. Frine didn’t reply, but Ward saw a corner of his mouth quirk upward in a half smile. He reached into the jar with his tweezers, pulling out a small, shiny object that Ward took to be one of Fay’s new teeth. Rather than the traditional roots you see on dental brochures, this one had a single, sharp point on the top.

“As soon as it feels your blood, it’ll start to grow into place, so you need to hold still!”

“I will,” Fay said, slurring and drooling. Ward snorted in laughter, and Mr. Frine sighed heavily.

“Open up and be still!” Fay complied, resting her elbows on the counter and leaning forward. She opened her mouth wide. Mr. Frine maneuvered the tooth with the tweezers, turning it so it faced the right way, then gently sliding it into the upper gap in Fay’s dentition. Ward watched, fascinated, as the little man pushed the pointy end into her gum, immediately bringing forth a bead of blood that ran down over the shiny tooth. Fay held still but grunted, “Ung!”

“Be still! It’s taking root.” Mr. Frine let go of the tooth and reached into the jar to pull out the other. “Good, Fayella! If I’d known this would keep you quiet, I’d have found a way to do this sooner.” While Fay scowled and drooled out the corners of her mouth, he placed the second tooth in her lower gap. He set the tweezers down and nodded. “That’ll work nicely! Hold still that way for another few minutes.”

“Hey,” Ward interjected, “While we’re waiting for her teeth to get settled, do you mind if I ask your opinion on a project?”

“Of course, but only if you promise that if we do business, you’ll have more patience than Fayella here.”

“Yeah, I think I can manage that.” Ward winked at Fay and gave her a jostle with his elbow. Then he reached into his shoulder holster and pulled out his revolver. “I have this gun that I’m pretty fond of, but I can’t find ammunition for it around here.”

“Oh?” The little man watched intently while Ward popped open the cylinder and shook out four empty casings and his last two live rounds. He set them on the counter beside the pistol.

“I’ve got fifteen or so empty casings like that, but you can see the bullets are a bit more sophisticated than the guns around here use.” Ward picked up one of the live rounds and tilted it, showing Mr. Frine the primer. “My gun’s hammer hits this primer, which ignites the powder, propelling the bullet through the barrel. I guess much of that is similar in principle to the breech-loaders around here.”

“Yes. The guns here use alchemical fire and are ignited with a spark. Though if we made one of those bullets this small, it wouldn’t do much damage.” Mr. Frine picked up one of the pistol rounds and turned it over in his fingers.

“Yeah, that’s the thing; these bullets are a hell of a lot faster and more accurate than those I’ve seen around here. They do a lot more damage, too. It’s down to the gunpowder—the, uh, alchemical fire. The stuff in my bullets is more powerful than what you folks use.”

Mr. Frine picked up the gun, slowly nodding. He turned it around in his hands, admiring the smooth clicking of the cylinder, and peered through the barrel. “Quite a piece of craftsmanship. If what you say is true and these little bullets are more powerful, I can see why you’d want to replicate them. Having six shots in one load would be quite advantageous.”

“I spoke to a tinker a while back who said he had an alchemist buddy who might be able to replicate them. He had some crazy notions of using unstable chemical mixtures for the primers, though.” Ward shrugged, shaking his head. “I don’t need my bullets blowing up if I jostle ‘em wrong, you understand?”

Mr. Frine nodded, still examining the pistol. He pulled back the hammer and watched it slam home when he pulled the trigger. “You call this part the hammer?” Ward nodded, and he set the gun down, picking up an empty casing. “I understand what you mean. I could artifice casings for you that, when struck by your pistol’s hammer, would emit fire on the inside. They’d be reusable; the ‘primer’ wouldn’t be spent with one application of the hammer. Of course, you’d need to reload the casing with a new bullet and alchemical fire, but that would solve one of your problems, at least.”

“That would definitely make things easier; I could talk to an alchemist about some more potent alchemical fire, right?”

“Certainly. There are many grades of the stuff.” Mr. Frine set the casing down, picked up the gun again, and peered through the barrel. “What are these tiny, swirling lines inside the barrel? Do they serve a purpose?”

At the question, Ward had a sudden, unexpected moral quandary. Was it right for him to explain rifling to this man? Would he be unleashing a new era of gun dominance upon this quaintly backward world? Thinking about the monks he’d seen dueling in the street and remembering that Cinder was the “lowest” of the Vainglory worlds, he decided it was a pointless worry; he didn’t think ordinary bullets would serve him for long once he began to advance up the ladder, assuming he lived that long. In the meantime, machining a barrel with rifling wasn’t an easy task, and he didn’t see them being mass-produced anytime soon. “That’s called rifling. It makes the bullet spin, which adds to its accuracy.”

“Aha! Is that why the bullets in those live rounds aren’t round?”

“Yeah, I guess. I’m not a bullet expert, but I think the rifling keeps the bullet from tumbling; it flies straight. Speaking of which, do you know someone who can forge me a bunch of lead bullets shaped like this?”

“I have a small forge. As you see, I craft jewelry and tinker with small devices. I can also source the alchemical fire for you. I have many contacts.” Mr. Frine looked at Fay, and Ward followed his gaze. She was still holding her mouth open, leaning forward, drooling prodigiously. “You can close your mouth, Fayella, but don’t speak yet. Let your new teeth settle into your jaw.” He winked so quickly and surreptitiously at Ward that he almost missed it.

Ward felt a little sorry for Fay, but he couldn’t deny the humor in Mr. Frine’s harmless retribution for her pestering. Masking his grin by rubbing his chin, he asked, “So, what are we talking about, price-wise?”

“If you promise not to harass me during the process, I’ll make you twenty casings for a thousand glories.”

“And they’ll be reusable?”

“Oh yes. Many times. I’ll load them for you, too, free of charge, and after I’ve gotten the composition just right, I’ll provide some extra alchemical fire and the formula.”

Ward thought about it; after purchasing his spear, armor, and new clothing, he had something like twenty-five hundred glories. Were a thousand glories worth it to get more bullets for his pistol? Considering they might prove obsolete if he kept working through the challenges like Grace wanted, he wasn’t sure. On the other hand, he’d made his money pretty damn easily, too, and didn’t it stand to reason that the further challenges would reward him even more? “All right, deal.” Ward held out his hand, and Mr. Frine quickly clasped it.

“I’ll need one of your unfired bullets.”

Ward slid one of his last two bullets toward the little man, then picked up the rest. As he holstered his gun, he put an arm around Fay’s shoulders, turning her toward the door. “Come on, Fay. Let’s go buy me a toothbrush and a few other things, and then we’ll get you back to the inn before your aunt hires a bounty hunter.”