Peter Van Suer cracked the barrels of his new Slagter Tweeledig open, exposing two brass shells gleaming within. He smirked—the twins had done it again.

  Unlike the more conventional Slagter Prime, the Tweeledig stacked two vertical barrels, enabling two shots per reload. Similar to the Prime, the Tweeledig fired the same barbed slugs designed to shred internal organs—perfect for killing ghouls.

  Someone cried out. It sounded like an elderly woman, pleading, one street over. Idiots; the civilians were supposed to have evacuated.

  He snapped the weapon shut, the dual hammers cocking back automatically as it locked. He exhaled.

  He tugged his hat tight onto his head and parted the filthy curtains, allowing a sliver of light to shine into the dark hut.

  “Please! No!” A woman fell to the ground, scrambling away from a Rahashelian overseer.

  “Get up!” the overseer barked. The man was Nosmerian, a turncoat who’d turned to Rahashel’s side, nothing more than scum who was willing to feed his countrymen to Rahashel’s ghoul machine in exchange for power.

  Peter squinted through the smudged glass. Dry feet scraped against stone as two ghouls fell in step behind the man as he towered over the woman.

  Peter cracked his neck before bracing the absurdly large hand cannon on his shoulder.

  "This will hurt. That’s okay. I can take it,” he whispered. The mantra had evolved into a pre-fight ritual.

  He stepped into the street.

  With a proper glimpse of the road, he found another overseer and four more ghouls forcing a group of eight people towards the center of the Tedrith—the small village north of Julleck.

  The overseer who had grabbed at the fallen woman had his white hair pulled back under his slouch hat.

  “Get up now!” he snarled, dragging her to her feet.

  His companion, a bent, bald man with a face etched with age, brandished a Slagter threateningly at their other prisoners.

  Neither of them seemed to notice Peter, or, if they did, he looked enough like an overseer himself that they probably assumed he was an ally.

  No liches commanded this squad. Nine Fingers and the House of Nyamar had destroyed most of Rahashel’s commanding officers, so human enforcers and overseers controlled these undead foot soldiers.

  Peter’s eyes flashed in rage at the sight of the men, herding their own to short lives as crops—mindless batteries to generate time for Rahashel’s armies.

  Peter’s left hand curled into a fist, the empty gap where his ring finger had once been, itching.

  He had worn a crop ring once, wandering as little more than a semi-sentient cow. In six months, the cursed ring had syphoned over six decades from him, changing him from a teenager into an old man. He paid a finger to remove the cursed time leech.

  “Get up, grandma!” Grey Hair snapped, drawing a Slagter as the woman slumped back to her knees, weeping openly as she cradled her wrist. “You’ve already got a foot in the grave. Make this easy, or I’ll smoke you.”

  “Just do it,” the bald man mumbled. “She’s not worth it. Too old.”

  Peter should have stayed silent. He should have slipped back into hiding. He hadn’t gotten the signal yet, but if he didn’t act, they’d execute the woman.

  “So?” Peter called, voice rising. “How does it feel to betray your species?”

  The overseers spun, faces hardening in suspicion.

  “You!” the bald one snapped. “Get in line!” He jerked his Slagter, motioning for Peter to join the cowering civilians.

  The one with a slouched hat put a hand on his companion’s shoulder as he noticed the considerably bigger Tweeledig braced on Peter’s shoulder.

  “Drop the weapon, kid.” He waved his hand, and the six silent ghouls fell into a protective formation before them.

  The reanimated bodies obeyed without any semblance of will. They were Sentinels—the Nine Finger’s designation for Rahashel’s rank and file ghouls.

  Dark-tarred wrappings coated their flesh, their dark eyes flashing behind the protection of their shields and spears. These corpses were Peter’s countrymen, bodies treated and converted into killing machines.

  The head overseer took shelter behind one of the ghouls, peering at Peter from over its shoulder.

  “Now there, son. No need to die here. Just come with us, and Rahashel will let you live.”

  Peter snorted, rolling his well-muscled, much younger shoulders. “Why, so he can leech me? No thanks, I’ve done my time.” He held up his left hand, showing his missing finger.

  “Nine Fingers!” the bald one hissed, flinching back.

  Peter frowned. “You’re pretty old. Too old. Rahashel leached you, didn’t he?”

  “What’s it to you, hisspipe?” the bald overseer snapped, scanning the road, probably searching for other members of the resistance group. He wouldn’t find them.

  “We emptied his time vault,” Peter continued academically. “His armies need juice, so he took it from you.”

  The glare confirmed his hypothesis. Peter laughed. “So what? How old are you? Twenty? Thirty? You could be my grandpa.”

  “Kill him,” Slouch Hat snapped, apparently not in the mood to be mocked.

  Two ghouls detached from the line, spears lowered as they wordlessly moved at Peter.

  "This will hurt. That’s okay. I can take it.” The words slipped out under his breath. He leveled his Tweeledig and gave the trigger a half-pull.

  Tsshhhssss.

  Sickly sweet premernox gas filled the alley as the slug zipped past the ghouls and slammed into Baldy’s shoulder.

  He screamed, dropping his Slagter, clutching the wound.

  Peter compressed the trigger again, and the top barrel fired, the round slamming into the lead ghoul’s shield.

  Peter gritted his teeth and jammed his double-barreled Slagter into its holster.

  Lowered spears sped towards him.

  He ripped a bayonet from its scabbard on his thigh, his fingers slipping into the spiked brass knuckle guards built into the hilt.

  As the ghouls got within six feet of Peter, violet luminescent vapors snaked from the corpses, syphoning into him—an infernal wail, like damned voices slithering through the air. As the ghouls closed, the streams flashed brighter, flickering across the alley.

  The ghouls didn’t flinch, but thrust.

  Peter parried a spear, lunging in and slashing the one in the lead across the eyes.

  The second spear darted, taking him in the arm.

  Fiery pain bloomed in his bicep as the second ghoul jerked the blade free. The one in front slammed his shield forward, breaking Peter’s nose and sending him staggering back.

  The ghoul in front staggered, then collapsed as the final wisps of time sucked into Peter’s chest. The second one dropped immediately after.

  The gash on Peter’s arm disappeared. It didn’t heal or close; it simply vanished between eyeblinks.

  Peter looked up, frowning. Despite his wound vanishing, adrenaline surged through him, his nerves clinging to pain that no longer existed.

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  “You—you’re him!” Baldy croaked, dark blood oozing between his fingers, tight on his shoulder.

  “The Court? Van Suer?” Slouch Hat whimpered. “He’s supposed to be old.”

  “We robbed your time vault, retchgaskets,” Peter said, prodding the bloody gash on his coat. “I took my years back.”

  Baldy fell back a step, turning and scanning the street. “We need to get out of here, Joris!”

  “And what?” Grey Hair—apparently Joris—snapped. “Let Rahashel drain us dry? We can’t afford another failure.” His gaze darkened on Peter. “No, we need to get that.”

  “What, this?” Peter held up his right arm, fingers still tight through the brass loops on the hilt of his bayonet. His sleeve dropped, exposing a band with flickering violet glyphs inset in the metal. “The Bedorvan’s yours. You just need to come over here and get it.”

  He was playing with them, being more cruel than they realized. He was better than that, but these men were willing to sell the innocent for favor with an alien invader. In many ways, they were much worse than the ghouls that simply carried out orders like thinking machines.

  Joris hefted his Slagter, cowering prisoners forgotten. “This is our chance, let’s get it!”

  Baldy was smarter; he inched back, face drawn tight in pain.

  “Go, get the Bedorvan!” Joris ordered, and his remaining ghouls charged.

  The four undead puppets charged, and Peter braced.

  Tsshhhssss.

  A slug from Joris’ Slagter deflected off of Peter’s shin, twisting and blooming and lodging in his calf.

  Peter cried out, stumbling as the slug slopped the muscle from working. He stumbled.

  “This is going to hur—”

  A spear slammed into his chest, the point sprouting from his back. He gagged, fountaining blood from his mouth. In most cases, getting stabbed in the chest felt the same every time. He thought the pain would stop surprising him. It didn’t.

  Still, the reps counted for something; while he still hadn’t gotten used to the pain, he was getting better at forcing natural reactions away. He wanted to scream, collapse, or just weep. Instead, he snarled, grabbed the spear haft, and forced it in deeper.

  The leech glare flared bright as he pulled himself face-to-face with the ghoul and slammed his hand down on its face.

  A fully fueled ghoul standing six feet from Peter, at the edge of his leech radius, would drain in about fifteen seconds; any closer, and it happened faster. If he could touch them, they’d be gone in four.

  This one dropped instantly.

  His wounds vanished, but the slug lodged in his calf, and the shaft through his chest remained. His lungs filled with blood, which would vanish in a disturbing cycle of impossibility.

  The next ghoul lunged, and Peter opened his arms, angling so it would take him in the heart.

  It did.

  He dropped to his knees, hoping he’d die before he could heal. Not to end the pain, but for a more practical purpose.

  His head slumped, his leech flair sputtering as his vision faded—

  He lurched to his feet, both spear shaft and the slug burning away as he died. Reorienting himself after dying took effort. Like remembering where you were after waking up from a particularly deep dream, but he was getting better at it.

  He bellowed as he caught the ghoul’s shield, throwing it wide and plunging his bayonet into its heart.

  Dark smoke whiffed off its shoulders as it dropped—not drained but killed. Without a functional heart, a ghoul was just a corpse.

  “One!” he barked. No ghoul could survive in his presence, but he refused to stand idly by and let the leech do the killing.

  He parried another spear and tried to pull the next ghoul’s shield open, but it rammed him back.

  Tsshhhssss.

  Another slug from Joris slammed into his wrist, twisting and lodging between tendons.

  The leech streams harmonized disconcertingly from both ghouls as he pulled his arm light to his chest.

  Had to kill them quickly—before they drained. It was his challenge, his expectation for himself. A twisted game that gave purpose to the agony.

  Peter howled and kicked into one of the shields. His body, artificially aged to approximately twenty-three years old, was much fuller and more solid than it would have been if he had worn his true years of eighteen.

  His weight slammed the ghoul back, and he slipped a spear from its partner before exploding up and slamming the blade into an open armpit.

  Steel met its heart, and its eyes burned out as it collapsed.

  The reeling ghoul caught itself and turned to him as the time syphon cut off. It collapsed, out of power.

  Peter cursed himself as he panted. He had wanted to destroy three personally.

  The two overseers, suddenly alone, regarded him in dread.

  Peter glanced at his forearm, a slug half-buried in skin. The wound had vanished, sealing the jagged round in place. He itched to ‘reset’. But he was trying not to do that. If he was killed in combat, that was one thing, but killing himself out of convenience—

  Julian had asked him to stop, and so he had.

  Peter glared as he grabbed his thick wool lapel and forced it between his teeth. He glanced at the petrified overseers before digging it out with the point of his bayonet.

  He bit down on his coat, groaning as he worked the blade into the meat. Thankfully, the slug pinged to the road before the wound glinched from existence.

  He spat the lapel free before shifting back to the overseers. “Well?”

  Baldy ran. Joris fumbled for a new slug.

  Peter dropped the bayonet and jerked his Tweeledig from its holster. He snapped it open, and the shells sprang free, ejecting themselves. Bless the twins for dumping their prototypes onto him. This was much better than burning his fingers every time he pulled the old casing free.

  Peter hooked the barrels under two shells clipped to his belt and popped them free with a jerk of the wrist. The brass dropped, seating into their breeches, and he snapped the hinge shut, the hammers mechanically self cocking from the motion.

  Joris thumbed his hammer, and their guns came up at the same time.

  Tsshhhssss.

  Tsshhhssss.

  Joris fired first, but only Peter hit his target.

  The overseer’s head snapped back, his slouch hat tumbling from his head.

  Peter turned the Slagter Tweeledig on Baldy.

  Tsshhhssss.

  The aged overseer screamed as he dropped, crimson blooming on his thigh.

  Peter picked up his bayonet, resheathing it as he started after the man who crawled away on his forearms.

  Peter reloaded, a casual walk bringing him to the smeared track of red on the road.

  “Please!” Baldy croaked, spinning onto his back.

  The air blurred as the very edge of Peter’s leach field activated.

  “Please?” Peter demanded, stepping closer. “Why?” The blur grew into a faint purple vapor, drawing from the man and into him.

  The man’s chest heaved, eyes locked onto the time as it abandoned him. “I got a family, man!”

  “That makes it worse!” Peter snapped. “What about their families?” He motioned to the villagers who watched the exchange in slack-jawed awe.

  Peter stepped closer, the light brightening. When humans were leeched, they didn’t simply run dry and die. They aged. Already, the man looked to be well into his nineties.

  “I—I,” his voice croaked, growing strained. Lines on his face sagged into bags, liver spots pockmarking his skin, which sagged.

  “I’m—one of you. Human,” he croaked, his hair thinning.

  “You were one of us,” Peter said, stepping closer. A blood rage, drowning the nauseating guilt as he performed his battlefield execution. “Now, you’re a collaborator. And I will erase anyone who sells us to him.”

  Peter should have been finishing school, writing book reports, or perhaps finding his first real job. Less than a year ago, that’s what he would have expected of himself. But that was before the Courts fell. He shouldn’t have been stealing this man’s time, taking pleasure as he watched the traitor’s light go out. But he did. He meant every word. He’d avenge his mother, he’d avenge Nosmeria, and all those whom they had lost. With or without a Bedorvan. That was his vow.

  The vapor vanished, leaving the overseer little more than skin and bones.

  Peter’s shoulders heaved as he clenched his fists. Then he turned to the villagers. “Everything’s going to be okay.”

  The pathetic figures shrank away from him. All except for a young boy, maybe twelve. He stepped forward. “You’re him, aren’t you? Our Court. Court Van Seur?”

  That marvel, the wonder—it all made him feel like a fraud. Peter shook his head. “Don’t call me Court. That’s their word. It’s Corporal Van Suer, of Nine Fingers. Or the House of Nyamar, I guess. I’m sort of jointly owned.”

  The others shifted, probably startled by how human he suddenly seemed. The boy stepped forward, reaching for him.

  Peter shifted away, holding up a hand. “Stay back. If you get too close, I’ll leech you. That’s not a threat, it’s just—I can’t control it.”

  “What do we do now?” the old woman asked, rubbing her wrist as she picked herself up.

  Finally, Peter found his irritation. “Why are you all still here? Nine Fingers announced they wanted Tedrith empty.”

  A woman shifted uncomfortably. “We’re not the only ones. A lot of people stayed. We figured—” She hugged herself. “If enough people left, they’d leave us alone.”

  Voices raised on a parallel street, more overseers barking orders. More dry ghoul feet scraped the ground.

  Peter threw himself against a wall, motioning for the survivors to get down.

  Further north, premernox gas hissed, probably from a hopeless last stand of another pocket of civilians.

  The approaching group barked orders, shifting their path to the new disturbance.

  Peter waited, his heart pounding. Given time, he could clear out the Rahashelians, but not while shielding civilians.

  At length, he turned back to the group. “Foolish. Nine Fingers isn’t a circus. When they tell you to leave, you leave. Do you understand?”

  “Yes,” the boy said, nodding emphatically.

  Peter sighed. “Leave town. Take the south road. When you pass the road, cut west. You’ll run into Cinder Engineering Company. Commandant De Zwart is accepting refugees. I’ll circle back to you later.”

  The group shuffled as if waiting for permission, looking southward.

  “Go now,” Peter ordered. “We no longer live in a world where you can be complacent. Move with a purpose.”

  The boy took the lead, jogging away.

  Peter watched them go, only regretting that he couldn’t escort them in person. This was why he fought.

  Something shuffled to the side, and Peter’s eyes snapped over to find Joris stumbling away, head bleeding profusely.

  Peter raised his Slagter as the overseer rounded a corner.

  “Attagon’s ash,” he cursed, running after him. “Spall!”

  “Court!” Joris screamed. “Van Suer is here!”