CHAPTER FIFTEEN: CALIBER .357 MAGNUM

The sky was still dark outside his room window when Carter woke up. Although he felt utterly exhausted when he returned to the inn from his meeting with the Reeve, he managed to get only a few hours of sleep. Try as hard as he might, he just could not get back to sleep. Eventually, he gave up on the idea and got out of bed. He lit the candle on the lamp by his bedside, illuminating the small rented room in soft, yellow light.

Carter sat down on the bed and placed a hand on his bandaged belly. Although he had bought some sleepwear from Logher’s, he chose not to wear them last night since he had been too tired to change. Instead, along with the bandages, he wore only his underwear to bed.

His fingers traced around the cloth covering his torso and he realized that there was no pain at all coming from the stab wound he had suffered earlier that night. He quickly removed the bandages, revealing pristine, unblemished skin beneath. There was no sign of injury, not even a scar; the wound had completely vanished. Even the blood that had stained the bandages was gone, leaving only clean, white fabric.

“Magic is bullshit,” he thought to himself. Bullshit, but useful.

Carter tossed the wrappings onto the floor next to his bed. He was about to get up and get dressed when his eyes spotted the small, black shape lying on top of the bedside table. It was the black Witch Arm. Dorothea the Ebon. The reason that he was now in a whole heap of trouble.

If Reeve Lannok was to be believed (and he had been honest with Carter so far) then everyone and their mother would be after this thing. Supposedly, Witch Arms were legendary weapons. They were rare and powerful and gave their wielder the power of a witch. Just how much power a witch had, Carter had no idea. It had to be a lot given how much of a big deal everyone was giving these things.

Thus, some very powerful people would most definitely want it. And Lannok said that the only way to gain ownership of the weapon was to kill the current owner. That was something that Carter wanted to avoid at all costs.

And dying wasn’t his only worry. Rann’s father had warned him last night that everyone who had ever owned the black Witch Arm had gone insane. With how the black knight Dervon had behaved, Carter was very much inclined to believe him.

But yet, despite all of the complications that came with owning the Witch Arm, it also brought some very specific benefits. First of all, he now had a working gun on him. This would allow him to defend himself much better than with the sword he had bought. Hell, it was probably the only gun on the entire planet. With him using it, nobody would be able to take him on in a fair fight. Well, as fair as bringing a gun to a swordfight could be.

Secondly was the healing effect. Carter wasn’t quite sure if that ability had actually come from the black weapon or not; he had healed the cuts and punctures on his hands pretty fast before he had even laid eyes on the Witch Arm, after all. But ever since he had received it, his body had been healing at a miraculously quick rate. His almost fatal stab wound had vanished in just a few hours.

Carter leaned across the bed to pick up the Witch Arm. He held the black weapon in his hands, examining the magical item with no small sense of wonder. Despite its solid shape and being constructed completely from metal, it was extremely lightweight. The matte-black surface seemed to absorb all the light that touched it, and in the dim glow of the room’s single candle, the gun looked like a solid black chunk of pure darkness.

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It was still uncanny how the weapon looked just like the revolver he had owned back home, except it was more… “simple.” Like the black knight’s sword had been. It had the basic size and shape of his old revolver, but all the fine details had been left out. While his old gun had factory markings, a serial number, and other adornments on the frame and barrel, the Witch Arm was completely bare. His old gun also had a rubberized grip; this one’s grip was metal, the same material as the rest of the gun. And finally, while his old revolver had a fluted cylinder, this one had a cylinder that was smooth and round, completely without fluting.

It was like whatever magic that had transformed the weapon had taken a blurry photograph of his gun and used it as the basis to construct its current shape. It had the same medium-sized frame, the same shrouded, four-inch barrel, and the same six chambers in the cylinder. All the important parts that made a gun a gun were still there; it was just the embellishments that were missing.

Carter grasped the revolver in both hands and aimed it at the wall. He made sure to keep his finger outside the trigger guard to prevent any accidental pulls; he really didn’t want to wake up the entire inn, or worse, shoot his neighbor through the wood. He aligned the front and rear sights but found it difficult to see them in the dim light provided by the room's single candle. His old gun had fiber optic sights that made it easy to see even in low-light conditions. The Witch Arm’s sights were completely black so it was not very suitable in the gloom. They would work better during the day, but shooting at night might prove to be a problem.

Maybe he could paint the sights to make them brighter?

Ignoring that dilemma for now, Carter examined the rest of the gun. He saw the cylinder release and noted that it was in the right place. His thumb pressed down on it which caused the cylinder to swing out. With it open, Carter saw that all six chambers were still filled with ammunition. He pushed at the ejector rod and the cartridges popped out. He caught all six rounds in his open right palm before they could tumble to the floor.

Carter examined the cartridges in his hand. Like the gun itself, its ammunition was all black and made of the same type of unknown metal. They were the same size and shape as a .357 Magnum round, which was the caliber his old gun had used. He noted that half of the rounds had been spent, and quickly recalled the three shots he had fired earlier that night to end Ugly’s life.

“Shit,” Carter cursed. He had hoped that since the gun was magic he wouldn’t have to bother with ammo. Seeing the three empty cartridges in his hand brought him to the realization that such was not the case. Damn. Where the hell was he going to get more ammunition for this thing?

Carter dumped the six cartridges onto the top of the bedside table. He was about to examine the gun some more when the bullets on the table suddenly vanished into fine black mist. Carter almost dropped the gun in surprise. He then noticed that the chambers in the cylinder had magically become filled. Six new cartridges were now housed in each chamber, seemingly appearing out of thin air.

Carter pushed the extraction rod, ejecting the rounds once again. He caught them in his palm and saw that all of the black cartridges were now full, with bullets and new primers in each casing.

“No way,” the dark-haired man whispered in wonder.

He thought for a moment, then dropped the cartridges in his hand onto the bed. Within a second of bouncing onto the soft surface, the six pieces of ammunition vanished in a puff of black, only to miraculously reappear in the Witch Arm’s cylinder. Carter ejected them again and saw that the rounds remained unspent, looking exactly like brand-new factory-brand ammo except for the fact that they were all completely black and lacked a caliber designation at the base.

Carter laughed and tossed the rounds across the room. Even before the bullets could fall to the floor they vanished, reappearing inside the gun’s cylinder.

“Well, I guess that solved the ammunition problem,” he murmured to himself before shutting the cylinder.