"So good news," I said lookin' down at the man beneath Temjun's boot, one bundle of too-short tentacles trying and failing to rub the hand print on my face, "the torture has been postponed at the personal request of one of my allies."

  As I said it Temjun hid a laugh. Poorly.

  Meanwhile, his mother Margarette gave a flat, unamused stare that seemed to say 'really?'

  Cara didn't look too happy either. She was team torture.

  "But, that don't mean failin' to cooperate won't be bad for you. I've fed a lot of men to my pig, and that ain't technically torture," I smiled, but it slipped a little. Poor Moxie was still waitin' at the edge of this abyss. If I fucked up bad, if I died here, how long might she still wait?

  "Uh," Cordileone, that was his name, cleared his throat. I'd never known a snitch to sound anythin' but nervous and whiny, and this guy wasn't changin' that, "what?" He asked, his voice squeaky and high.

  "I said, you're going to take me to that Sussr Station while these good folks prepared to get us all a way out. Do that, and you'll get rope, pendin' trial. Refuse, and I'll make damned sure you live through all of this," I said castin' a stubble tentacle around, "I'll make sure you and me, even if no one else, see the sun rise far away from here." I said with all the conviction I could muster. Didn't take much. I wanted to live through this shit.

  He squirmed, his fat face contorted with fear and uncertainty, and then, he nodded. "O-okay. That sounds good, so why would I-"

  "The pig," Temjun cut in, "he'll just be savin' you for the pig."

  Cordileone's face paled.

  "Yup," I said, my lips curling up in an honest smile as I bent down, close enough to look him in the eye, close enough for the rat to see every bit of my monstrous mien, "and my Moxie? She's slow, messy eater." I made a chomping sound, and he flinched.

  Cara gave me a subtle thumbs up, the gesture hidden from Margarette's disapproving eyes. The captain did not have time for this kind of theatrics. Or so she though. I knew better though, this dark little show was as much for all them as it was for scarin' the yellow piss out of 'ol Cordy here.

  They needed the laughs, or at least the dark little smiles that rest on so many cracked and bloodied lips.

  I cleared my throat, "So? Either you get to live. Just a matter of how long, and how well."

  "Okay, okay, just stop. I'll do whatever I have to."

  I nodded, and Temjun stepped off, letting the man climb to his feet.

  "Now, tell me," I asked slowly, "what exactly is a Sussr Station?" I paused, "and more importantly, how do I get to it from here?"

  Cordileone straightened and brushed the dust from his uniform. Then gave me a look that would've earned a pistol whip. If I had a pistol. Or hands.

  "A Sussr Station, or Sussr Receiver, is an alchemically treated scry stone that is used for long distance communications. They're mostly used for trade and the military, since the devices are expensive to maintain and even more expensive to-"

  "Shut the fuck up," I said with a groan, "I don't care about who bought or sold it. I need to know about it. It sends messages, yes?"

  "Yes," he replied, "but that's not all it does. It's a scry, remember? It also receives them, and you can send images too. W-we could show the Empire, or, or whoever what's going on. Give them information to get us out."

  I nodded and managed to lead a stubby tentacle up to my chin to stroke the gorwin' stubble there, "and you know how to use it?" I asked.

  Cordileone nodded, "yes, well," I coughed, "I've seen it used. A lot."

  "So why haven't you already gone for it then?" I asked and Cordelione opened his mouth to answer, only to be shut down by Cara's viscious retort.

  "Because a fucking coward, Roche. Because he'd rather hide in this armor than-"

  "No," the traitor cut in, his voice low and small, "it's... it's because of what the Mayor's mage did. Before this all started."

  That made everyone go quiet.

  "What did he do?" I asked finally.

  His eyes flicked around the room, from me to Cara, even to Vin and the mute girls. He was afraid. Even more now than when I was promisin' to feed him alive to a razorback hog.

  "Before the first of the sick were culled, when everything was still kind of okay, he came to the station. He was... strange. Even for a mage, even for an Unwanted, never seen one of them with red skin," Unwanted? That was the decidedly less polite words Southern's used to describe the ground bound locals. Why was an Outcast workin' with the Empire at all? Plain greed or- "He looked at the station."

  "So?" Snapped Cara, cutting through the man's seemin' attempt to justify his cowardice, "Roche here breaks wards, and you-" she jammed an accusatory finger into his chest, "are a fucking officer. You'd have a cypher or key, or know where to find one."

  "I-I don't but that's not, that's not the problem, not the wards" he pleaded, "it's what he used to make them. That, black, roiling thing he was takin' out of the first few sick," Cordileone swallowed and I thought of the demon I saw in the mayor's mana, or the black bile that dwelt down in the laboratory pit.

  Then I thought of the ocean my Patron had thrown in my face, of the oily black that bled from his Gods' every being.

  Fuck. Hope that's a coincidence.

  "What did he do, Cordileone?" I asked, a bit of that fear in my own voice. It vanished as I shoved it down into the nothing, "What did he use to power those wards?"

  He was silent for a moment, all color gone from his face, eyes wide, pupils pinpricks of storied dark, "All the technicians, all the other mages..." he shuddered, "he used it on them. Made us guard watch. Said we needed to observe for a while, just a while, after he was done."

  I felt the cold of the void creep into my gut.

  "I..."

  Cara looked at him, long and hard, and I saw pity in her eyes. It was a small, almost unnoticeable thing, but it was there, and when she spoke it was almost soft, "That's why you sought us out. All of us that wanted to stop the mayor." Her lips curled downward, "you ran to us because of what you saw, but never once did you have the courage to tell the truth. Not until your own sorry hide was on the line."

  Cordileone nodded, and his voice was a hoarse whisper, "I couldn't. I couldn't talk about it. If he found out I did-"

  Cara moved faster than anyone could have expected. Her fist slammed into Cordileone's cheek, his head snapped to the side and then rocked back, his nose broken and bleeding. A swift knee moved to crack his skull like an egg but Temjun caught her, his hand easily wrapping around her wrist, jerkin' her off balance to fall on her ass.

  Tears streamed in her eyes as Cordileone gagged and spit blood, "You fucking coward! You fucking coward! Do you know how many people-"

  Stolen from its rightful place, this narrative is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

  "Cara," Temjun rumbled, his voice gentle but edged with a warning, "Cara, he will pay. But we need to live first." He looked at her, his dark eyes meeting hers, and the stormy sea of her gaze softened, calmed, and settled.

  I think he had a way with people about like I did with pigs. The whisper. I could see it in his face. The look of someone who saw things deeper, clearer, better than a mortal eye might. A man who saw souls, if that was the word.

  And I had thought him slow.

  She took a breath and stood, her face grim and hard, "I'm sorry, Tem, you're right." She looked at me, and then the traitor.

  "The station is two streets down, next to the old barracks, a tall tower sat up against the east wall." She looked to Cordileone, "The rope will be too good for you," she said quietly, "you'll drown instead. I'll see to it myself."

  With that she turned and left us, stompin' out of the room. The silence stretched until she was gone.

  "So," I cleared my throat, "two streets down, next to the barracks. Sounds easy enough. I'll be on it in a tick-"

  "No you won't." Temjun said with a heavy frown, "you're still too hurt."

  I paused and then a smile spread over my face as I bent down to Cordileone, offerin' a tentacle to haul him up to his feet.

  Or so it looked.

  "Am I?" I asked as the poor, traitorous little rat took my 'hand' and then let out a scream of pain, the moment my limbs began to dig.

  It was different, stealin' from a man, different than had been that strange exchange between the Songbird and I. That was intimidate, a dark exchange between two beings too touched by the world to truly be called people anymore. There was a poetry, a romance, a symmetry in that brutal exchange.

  In contrast, what I did to Cordileone was violation, naked and plain. The moment my stunted arms bore into the meat of is extended arm I felt the warmth of this lifeforce, felt the feeble pulse of mana in his now open veins.

  I felt it, and I fuckin' drank.

  The taste of him was thin but sharp. Like cheap whiskey watered by stingy bartender.

  Around me things slowed as I committed an act I was sure was a kind of heresy that scare few had even witnessed. Never had heard about this from the Church, and I'd been to enough services to know the major sins. Was eatin' a man's vitality as bad as murder? Rape? What about simply theft?

  Surely if beat theft.

  Anyway, they were too slow. By the time Margarette opened her mouth shout for her son to stop the monster in their midst, I'd already taken my fill. Cordileone was a healthy enough man. His extra weight might've have shaved a few decades off his sorry life, but for me it was just more fuel to the fire, and I felt the strength in me begin to build.

  My tenacles exploded in growth, bones knitting with a crack, a searing itch in what was left of my human skin as bites and cuts closed, scarred.

  In feat of speed I wouldn't have managed since the fallout of my first race through Murkwater, I cleanly dodge Temjun's swipin' arms.

  He hugged air as a barely alive Cordileone seized on the floor between us like a dying fish. The big man stared at me in shock, eyes wide and mouth open.

  "H-How?" He asked, his deep voice hoarse with shock, "Mister Roche?"

  I smiled and moved to one of the many warded cases sat against the walls, "I just took a little of the life he stole, just balance the scale of the world, is all." My smile was thin, my lips pulled taut across my shelled and scarred face.

  "Roche," growled Margarette, crossin' the distance between us with pure fury in her eyes, "you said you wouldn't harm-"

  "No!" I snapped, "I didn't say shit about harm. I said I wouldn't torture, wouldn't kill," I leaned in, close enough to smell the stale gin on her breath, "I did neither, and far fuckin' less than I wanted." I pointed back to Cordileone, who had begun to vomit, green sick mixin' with the foam that bubbled from his lips, "harm is all I do."

  I looked around, at the faces of the women and children in the room, and once again, they remembered I was a monster. I think the fear in Vin's eyes and the hurt in Temjuns, those were the worst.

  Oh well.

  Down into the nothing you go. Don't need no hurt, no fear right now. Only violence, only the will to save you, even if you hate me for it. Even if you never can look at me again, without sickness, without hate, I'll make you live through this anyway.

  A small, bitter smile pulled at my lips.

  "Now," I said, "let's see if I can't find some better gear for this little trip, eh?" I turned and found the case I wanted, the sigils on the wood glowin' a low, angry red.

  Yeah, I thought as I easily shattered the locks and wards that kept the contents safe from men like me, this'd do.

  A strange numbness lingered in my limbs as I ran a tentacle over the pair of heavy pistols sat within. Fine, Empire make, good iron and better steel, mana-tempered barrels. Fat Forties, two shot heavy caliber. Made to punch through soldiers in monster hide armor, and the brick wall behind him them.

  Turtle guns, some called them. Famously used to put down gator turtles in the cypress bogs of the far south coats of Karinwoad.

  I always preferred their third name to the rest though.

  Hollow Heart Hodaws.

  Fit to leave nothin' in a man chest but alchemical smoke, and hot lead.

  A deep tingle travelled up and down my tentacles as I retrieved the weapons. It wasn't awe or joy, or any of that. Instead, as the vitality I had stolen settled into place, I realized there was a limit to Deep's Embrace. I'd have to wait and see exactly what, and how long the Ability would be restricted, but for now I could feel that I wasn't up to it again.

  I looked around as the others filed out, their eyes either fixed on the floor, or borin' a hole through me as they left. That was fine. I was the only one who could break the locks anyway. Didn't need them.

  Found a small carton of heavy, finger length shells for the guns and cracked the breeches to load the express rounds with a pair of clean, well oiled clicks.

  Much as I appreciated the fine workmanship and simple elegance of the pair, another case, larger and longer than all the rest, stole my attention away. There, at the back of the armory lay a dusty old box, the runes that bound it dim with lost energy. I broke them without a thought, just finishin' what time and neglect had long ago started.

  I felt somethin' storage, as I lifted the heavy lid and looked down at the artifact of a bygone age within.

  Now listen, I know I'm goin' on about these firearms more'n I go on about most women, and some men, but I cannot impress upon anyone just how rare it was to see the kind of piece that had been locked away in this long forgotten armory.

  Back, damn near two centuries before, there had been a concerted effort by the Empire to drive my ancestors from the rich taiga plains between the thick and dangerous forests. At first they tried the direct approach, started burnin' Northman villages, and that worked, on those of them what planted roots.

  But to the nomads, those who walked the secret trails and rode Scathyr and swift drakes through the deep Wylds, it was merely a challenge. They struck back, cut supply lines, raided outposts. Stole everything they could and then more after that.

  And among the things my mama's people stole from cavalry men, like my daddy, technically, was the Empire's plan B. Their planned solution to the 'bronto' problem. The idea was, if takin' ground only drove back the settlin' Northman, there needed to be a way to strike at the nomads and the herders who kept the giant beasts that grazed the taiga.

  For that a bunch of egghead Imperial artificers, men who'd never seen a damn bronto, just heard tall tales and read of them, designed a rifle of immense size and power. Far too much, as it turned out. Firin' broke the shoulders of the Southern cavalry men. Their extreme range did in most fights, primarily because my mother's folk owned the terrain, and always picked a favorable distance.

  For the Empire, the Big Sixty was a failure. Worse, when the massive Northman started stealin' them like war brides in the night, they became a motherfuckin' menace.

  The Empire eventually started meltin' them down, destroying whole stocks of ammo to be rid of the damn things, but by then it was too late. My folk had adapted, learned to handle them, the cut crystals to make lookin' glasses and affixed them on top of the massive rifles. They volleys from high ground and impossible range to devastate units on the move. Assassinated officers, and in one instance, blew an Imperial duke's head clean off his shoulders, and all half mile, concealed in the very forest the Southerns feared.

  My mama had inherited hers from her father, and him from his. All three had used the heavy weapon to kill men, monsters and beasts, and I knew the weapon like I knew the bones of my fingers.

  Er, well, back when I had fingers.

  I pulled the laughably large rifle, easily as tall as I was, from its case. It was light, a newer model from the old beast my mama had promised to pass to me, before I ruined that life and left a prisoner to live this new one. Its barrel was shorter, thinner, better steel and modern techniques for makin' the whole thing lighter. The stock was a beautiful dark wood inlaid with silver and gold.

  A novelty, a toy to some dipshit with more money than sense.

  But to me? To me it was art. History and culture, a tenuous connection to something I sacrificed on the altar of my own fool self.

  I had no glass, no scope, but I didn't need one. My Arcane Soul pushed my vision past what any man might have. Martial Path or now. My new limbs were strong, supple enough to absorb the catastrophic recoil.

  And I even had a fix for the fact that no one, anywhere, bothered to pack sixty caliber wyvern express anymore. The amount of alchemical powder needed was absurd compared to a standard rifle round, and the iron jackets needed to be treated carefully so as not to melt when fired, furthering the cost.

  I reached an arm to my back, bored it into the flesh there, and drew out a hand length cartridge of black blood. Its surface was slick, oily, and I felt the deep, dark mana that flowed inside.

  As I worked the bolt back, and drove it home, I was certain-

  Damn sure, that no monster or man in this city would be safe from me.

  Not ever again.