ItCP15

## Chapter 15

**Chapter 15** of **Into the Crooked Place** told by **Karam**.

## **Full Version**

GETTING SHOT HURT. FALLING to your death from over a thousand feet hurt a little more.

Karam’s face scraped against the concrete, bones crumbling like pastries as the ground slammed into her. And that was what it felt like—not her crashing to the earth, but the earth crashing into her.

The magic slowed their fall, which was handy, since Karam didn’t think dying would suit her. And if she did die, she really didn’t want to do it outside of the consort’s headquarters holding Wesley’s hand. But, though the so-called hover charm had taken the speed off their descent and Saxony’s magic had broken their fall somewhat, Karam still felt like the fall had broken her face.

“Get up,” Karam said. “We have to get to the tracks.”

Wesley rubbed his neck and when he pulled his hand away, it was wet with blood. “Give me a minute,” he said. “It’s my first time jumping from a building.”

He smoothed the dust off his clothes ruefully.

“I really liked this suit.”

“Karam, are you okay?” Saxony asked.

She was standing taller than them, looking mostly unharmed, except for a small scratch across her cheek, but even that had begun to heal.

Either Crafters were invincible, or Saxony had used most of her magic to keep her own collision to a minimum.

Karam stood, grabbing her shoulder where the bullet hit. She wasn’t bleeding as much as she would have if it clipped an artery, and she wasn’t as dead as she would have been if it clipped her heart, so she counted herself lucky.

“Let’s split up,” Wesley said. “Divide their attention and rendezvous with the rest of the buskers in an hour like we agreed.”

“What about Tavia?” Saxony asked. “We can’t just leave her.”

“She told us to,” Karam said. “We cannot save her. There is no way back into the building now that it is locked down.”

Wesley looked up. Even from this far they could hear gunshots and see the bursts of light from the bullets scatter like dozens of tiny blinking suns.

“Tavia can take care of herself,” Wesley said. “She has enough magic to protect her. She’ll be okay.”

“That’s crap,” Saxony all but spat. “You won’t really leave her behind.”

Karam could see something on the cusp of Wesley’s face, a slight smear of humanity that was fighting to take hold. If any of them were righteous or good or even half-loyal, they would have tried, somehow, to go back up to that building and tried, even in vain, to rescue her.

Wesley readjusted his cuff links.

The humanity in him quickly faded.

“Anyone can get left behind,” he said.

Because not a one of them was truly righteous or good or even half-loyal.

NEARLY AN hour after Karam had split from the others, she approached the old train tracks. Though she’d lost the guards in the lower towns, she’d traveled through alleys and city nooks to be sure they didn’t catch her trace.

The old tracks were rugged, to say the least.

Since the expansion of the floating railways across the realms, they had become nothing more than a gimmick for tourists with little better to do. They were a museum to the past, ferreting visitors from one place to the next in guided tours that could take days.

When Karam spotted their train, she sucked in a breath and watched the black smoke bellow into the air.

It was bronzed from cold and age, with a plow attached haphazardly to the front, ready to clear snow from the lines, and large twin tracks that hid the wheels in a triangular arc. Its corroded face was like a spear, guns peeking from every window like cannons. Perhaps it was clunky, but it seemed to have enough firepower to wipe out a small city. Or a very large Kingpin.

Wesley’s fifty chosen buskers meandered pitifully around the train. Some sat atop, nearly obscured by the smoke, throwing trick bags at one another and laughing loud enough that they may as well have sent up a flare for their location.

If this was the sorry state of their army, Karam was going to have to get to grips with her own mortality pretty soon. There was little chance of her doing the legend of her family and the Rekhi d’Rihsni justice with these people for soldiers.

Karam stepped onto the tracks, glancing around the other side to see if Saxony was anywhere in sight.

Nothing.

Then again, Wesley, for all his bravado about leaving anyone behind, was also nowhere to be seen.

Only one busker idled, his back to Karam, cupping a small bat in his hands. He leaned down to whisper something in the creature’s ear.

It was what the Uskhanyans called a *delg* bat. The daytime messenger. Because it was not nocturnal like the rest of its species, but a creature of magic that slept only in the briefest moments of twilight.

The creature cried in acknowledgment before leaping from the busker’s fingers and flying hastily out of view.

The busker turned.

Karam stared.

Falk.

The man Tavia liked to call Wesley’s weasel. Up close, Karam could see why.

“What are you doing?” Karam asked him. “Wesley told you to send a bat right now?”

Who was he spiriting messages to at a time like this?

“We cannot trust anyone,” Karam said. “And you will give away our location with that thing, if the rest of your comrades have not already.”

Falk opened his mouth to make some sort of an excuse, but the next voice Karam heard was not his. It was a smooth Rishiyat drawl that carried the hint of a smile.

“Relax,” Saxony said. “He’s just doing what he’s told.”

Karam spun to find her leaning against the front of the train, eyes sparking almost playfully. A bead of sweat readied to drip from her collarbone, and Karam could make out a thin silver line from one of her Crafter staves peeking through her shirt.

“Nice of you to show up by the way,” Saxony said. “One more minute and I could have been worried.”

Karam ignored her. “We cannot be sending bats right now.”

Saxony only shrugged. “You know what the underboss is like.”

“So he has you following orders too?”

Saxony’s smile flickered, as if the very idea were an insult. “Wesley doesn’t order me to do anything,” she said.

“Good for you.”

Karam stepped back across the tracks, making for the front cab of the train.

Saxony meandered after her. “You know, if you need some help relaxing, then I’m happy to oblige,” she said playfully.

This didn’t seem like a time for jokes, but that was always when Saxony most liked to make them.

“This is not the Crook and I am not ordering a Brandy,” Karam said. “Do not be sleazy.”

“If that’s your definition of sleazy, then stay out of the Crook,” Saxony said.

Karam crossed her arms over her chest.

She may have brought it up, but the last thing she wanted to talk about with Saxony was the Crook.

*Some people aren’t made to be happy*, Saxony had said just two months before, under the lights of the old clock tower. She hadn’t been sure if Saxony was talking about Karam or herself, but either way, it hurt.

Either way, nobody deserved to be dumped under a disco ball.

“Wesley thinks that just because he is in Creije that he is untouchable,” Karam said. “He needs to know that we cannot relax our guard and that we must—”

Saxony grabbed her hand.

Karam stopped walking.

Her fingers curled instinctively around Saxony’s and her breath got caught somewhere in her throat.

“I told you not to worry,” Saxony said.

But the truth was, Karam worried all the time.

She worried that she would never live up to her family’s legacy and that Ashwood would find Saxony and see her as just another shiny new brick to build his empire.

It was in Karam’s blood to make sure that didn’t happen.

Back in her realm, people worshipped Crafters as holy conduits of the Indescribable God, and Karam’s family had spent generations protecting them. Her grandparents were part of the Rekhi d’Rihsni. They lived as sacred warriors and died trying to save true magic.

It was why Karam had grown up wanting to be a fighter, rather than teaching at temple like her parents. They thought peace was the new way, but Karam couldn’t fathom such a reality. She and her friend Arjun were just kids when they vowed to bring back the Rekhi d’Rihsni and deliver war to the Kingpins. They played warriors together, with Karam vowing to storm castles and Arjun promising to bring them down alongside her.

Karam left her realm not just because of her parents, but because she and Arjun decided that Uskhanya was where she could best learn to be a warrior worthy of the sacred cause. Protecting Saxony was literally her birthright.

Some days, it even struck Karam that part of her connection to Saxony might be because of that legacy. She worried that the thirst to be near her might be misplaced duty.

Other days, when Saxony would merely glance at her, for a second or less, and the realms felt like they might explode, Karam knew that wasn’t possible.

Maybe she and Saxony were tied by destiny, but Karam was sure she had chosen that destiny. And she would again, in any other life.

“I am trying to keep us alive,” Karam said now. “Worrying is what does that.”

Saxony smiled. “No matter what happens, I’ll protect you.”

Karam almost snorted, as though she would ever be the one who needed protecting, but before she could catch her breath for long enough to come up with a reply, Wesley emerged from the train.

He stared at their entwined hands and Karam quickly pulled her grip from Saxony’s. It seemed odd to be affectionate in front of her boss. In front of the person who had helped her become a warrior.

“Let’s not make a habit of cutting things so tight,” Wesley said.

Karam supposed that was his way of being glad she’d arrived safely.

“I did not realize Falk was one of the buskers we chose,” she said.

“He’s not.” Wesley sat on the train steps. “He’s our driver until we reach the realm of Wrenyal. Since Schulze wasn’t going to provide a *civilian*, I had to go with the only guy I know who can work the old trains. Falk’s obsessed with old tech. Besides, he’s helping me on a little side-project. He’s one of us.”

Karam held back her comments on that.

If Tavia were here, she would have made them for her, saying something awful that Karam would have agreed with. Silently, of course, because Tavia’s ego didn’t need feeding.

“We should get going,” Karam said. “Since we are all here.”

“We’re not all here,” Saxony said.

Wesley adjusted his tie. “No, we’re not.”

“You both want to wait for Tavia?”

“I’m a man of my word,” Wesley said. “I promised an hour, so we wait an hour. Time’s not up yet.”

Karam expected this from Saxony, because her odd friendship with Tavia was one of the few familiarities she had in Creije. But Wesley—*hei reb*—Wesley Thornton Walcott of all people. The man whose mere name seemed to be made of the same magic he sold, practically resolute as he checked their lives against Tavia’s.

Karam often thought Wesley was as much a myth of Creije as he was the master of it, but when it came to Tavia, sometimes that myth really was nothing more than a man.

“The consort’s guards could be here any minute,” Karam said.

“And so could Tavia,” Wesley countered.

Karam wasn’t sure how he could be optimistic. “The consort’s people will try and check all routes out of the city and it is only a matter of time before they think to look at this one. We cannot risk all of that on the hopes of a dead girl.”

It was not kind, but it was true. The chances of Tavia having survived an assault from the consort’s guards were slim. Tavia was smart, not bulletproof.

Wesley didn’t flinch. “Even the dead deserve five minutes,” he said.

He turned to the buskers meandering around the train and with just one look they promptly stopped throwing tricks at one another and threw their cigarettes to the ground. They were as straight as soldiers, ready to walk into battle.

“Why are you all staring at me like we’re on a date?” Wesley asked. “Make yourselves useful.”

“How so, sir?” one of the buskers asked.

“I don’t care. Just do something. Shoot someone. Fire-gates, shoot each other for all I care.”

“Or,” Saxony said, “shoot them.”

She pointed to the warehouse in the distance and, as if on cue, a choir of bullets exploded against the train’s smoke box.

The consort’s guards rushed toward them with more weaponry than Karam had ever seen. And they weren’t alone.

There were two dozen buskers by their side. Ones Wesley hadn’t trusted enough to invite along. They threw charms at the side of the train like they were trying to score points in a game of darts.

They weren’t afraid of the amityguards seeing, or being thrown into cells. These people were out for blood.

“Disloyal bastards,” Wesley said. “You kill one consort and everyone loses their minds.”

He pulled his gun out and aimed a shot.

In the distance a busker fell.

Karam hated to admit how good his aim was, but *spirits damn*.

“I told you to shoot someone!” Wesley yelled. “Don’t make me repeat myself!”

In an instant, the train opened fire.

Their army was only fifty strong, but each and every one of them had a gun and magic. Bullets exploded from the train windows where the buskers took aim. Those on the ground whipped rifles and pistols out from places Karam didn’t even know someone could hide a gun.

And the magic.

*Hei reb*, there was magic everywhere.

Buskers stood on top of the train and threw back their arms in wide arches, attacking with everything from blinding trick bags to charms that seemed to melt the skin off the guards’ faces.

Karam ducked and rolled under the train and to the other side, sheltering from the stream of bullets. She couldn’t do much at this range. She needed something to stab or hit or kick. She’d never relied on guns to fight before.

Karam tuned to Wesley, who had joined her on the other side. His foot was nooked in the train window and he perched over the roof, firing bullets with one hand and charm after charm with his other.

It was as if he had a lever under his sleeve, shooting them out with as much speed as the bullets. They imploded at the guards’ feet, shot ice through their hearts, catapulted others what seemed like a mile back.

A bullet smashed through the window by Karam’s head.

Saxony screamed her name.

And suddenly Saxony was on the roof with dozens of buskers, skin newly ablaze, turning from brown to molten yellow.

Saxony didn’t just hold fire in her hands, her hands were made of fire itself. She propelled them backward and then lurched ahead like she was pushing the flame out of her soul.

It spat across the dirt and engulfed a row of the guards.

The buskers around her followed suit, throwing fire charms like cannons at their enemies. Some screamed in victory, others screamed in a cry of agony before their bodies fell to the ground like raindrops.

One. Two.

“We must get the train moving!” Karam yelled.

Wesley, suit still smooth as he aimed another shot, said, “I don’t remember giving you permission to order my people around.”

Karam didn’t know what to make of that.

Surely he wasn’t still thinking about Tavia? Even if she hadn’t died back there—and that was a big *if*—there was no way she could get past their attackers to board the train. And there was no way they could afford to wait for her to try.

“She’s right!” Saxony yelled above the roar of her fire. “Your arrogance will get us killed.”

“Better my arrogance than your disloyalty.”

Saxony heaved another ball of flame in her hands. “Tavia wouldn’t want us to die for her. And where was your loyalty when you abandoned her in the first place?”

Wesley started to pull himself up onto the roof and Karam could smell the magic on him as much as she could see it in Saxony. A constant power struggle between them. But Karam wasn’t going to gamble her life on pride, no matter whose it was.

She reached out to grab Wesley.

“Sir,” she said. “Anyone can get left behind.”

Wesley shook his arm from hers, outraged at the move, but the sound of his own words repeated back gave Wesley pause. His eyes pulsed as he weighed any honor he might have with their chances of survival.

Another busker tumbled from the rooftop and fell to the floor beside them, spitting up dirt as he landed.

With a snarl Wesley let off a shot that took down a guard trying to board the back of the train, and said, “Someone get this pile of junk moving!”

It didn’t take long for Falk to make the train jerk and rumble under their feet. Their buskers were still firing—guns and cannons and charms—as the train churned and sputtered.

Those not already on board jumped in through the doorways or clung onto the open windows. Karam could count three bodies on the ground, but she didn’t have time to dwell on their losses once a few of the guards jumped on board too, trying their luck as the train broke away.

When seven filtered into the cabin Karam was in, she smiled.

Even with a bullet rammed in her shoulder, this would be a piece of cake.

She took the first three in seconds and the other four gathered around her. The buskers aboard were still firing their magic as the train sped out of the station, but this was Karam’s chance to fight.

She’d stood back and watched them get attacked without being able to lift a hand.

Now she wanted retribution.

Karam seized the fingers of the guard closest to her right, bending them back until he cowered on his knees. In a swift movement, she cut her knife across his neck and leaped over his lifeless body to plunge toward the second. It only took one well-placed kick to the stomach for the guard to fall.

Never one to miss an opportunity, Karam rolled over the woman’s back to crack her foot against the third’s face. Then turned to slice her blade across the second’s spine.

Karam cut through the guards like they were trees, feeling their blood soak her lips and edge under her fingernails.

When she was finished, she was aware of how she must have looked, painted in her kill. The buskers in the cab whispered and stepped back, Karam’s heavy breathing like a roar.

Wesley clapped as he stepped over the altar of bodies.

“You never get rusty,” he said. “Couldn’t ask for a better bodyguard. Remind me to give you a raise.”

Karam wiped the blood and sweat from her forehead and leaned out the window.

Saxony was still on the roof. Her head tipped back, gathering wind in her grasp, as Falk chugged the train from the station and propelled them onward.

It was like Saxony held the world in her hands, and when she threw her head forward, her eyes were blanketed white.

Karam’s spine went rigid.

There was so much magic inside Saxony and she’d never let Karam see it clearly before now. It commanded her and suddenly Karam realized that the magic wasn’t just part of Saxony, or something she used like Wesley and Tavia did.

Saxony *was* the magic.

Crafters weren’t made from skin and bone like the rest of them. They were forged from spells.

A burst of light hit the old station, where guards were still attacking at long range, and Karam swiveled, spying a figure on the roof of a nearby warehouse, throwing magic like bread for birds. Flashes and flashes of light until the guards were on their knees, blinded, and some were thrown high enough into the air for Karam not to see them come back down.

The figure turned and Karam leaned farther out the window, squinting. But the train was traveling too fast and night had descended. The figure backed up a few steps, teetering on the edge of the warehouse, and then made a run for it.

“Impossible,” Karam said.

The figure leaped from the building.

Karam’s jaw dropped.

Rather than fall they floated, running through the air like it was road.

Karam blinked and turned to look at the others, to make sure she wasn’t losing her mind. That she hadn’t, perhaps, gotten blood poisoning from that bullet. But they were staring too, watching the strange figure run through the air and toward them.

It was only when they crashed onto the roof beside Saxony with a flourish that Karam could make out their ally’s smarmy face.

Tavia stood, brushed off her trousers, and peered down at the faces that gawked from the windows.

“Leaving so soon?” she asked.