Iron Quill 2013 (The Starry Road) - Shattered

[ScrewedUpDice]

Shattered

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Blood mottled his hands, stains in brown and red running all the way down his forearms, and splattering the rolled back sleeves of his shirt. His palms and fingers were webbed with cuts, a map of a thousand little scars, overlaid and overlaid again with fresh wounds. Beneath them all the oldest mark still stood out, longer than the others, a new life-line criss-crossing his palm. Crimson droplets had seeped into the floorboards, and bloody hand prints marbled the garret, chronicling their age in the inextricable reduction of unscored flesh.

He stood by the room's sole window, and held two thin pieces of glass up to the light. The larger piece was palm-sized, its curves describing the sweep of a cheekbone, the edge of a smile and glitter of the eye, all terminating abruptly along its fractured border. The small piece was barely equal to a thumb nail, subtly curved. He held the two together, finding where they matched, never quite letting them touch. Palming the smaller piece he ran the ball of his thumb along the edge of the larger segment, blood welling up onto the glass. He bought the two pieces together again, and watched as they melded into one, the blood vanishing, along with any trace of a seam.

The face was one part amongst many. The dismembered parts of a glass woman were laid out on the floor, what little furniture there was pushed against the wall to make room. The care lavished upon her was at odds with the degradation of both surroundings and keeper. A jagged section of torso caught the weak sun in the folds of the glass cloth and gently curved waist, casting dappled light on the growing damp patches of the ceiling. Part of an arm and hand lay, three delicate fingers curled, and the lines of the forearm ending in edges of wicked sharpness. Beside it a leather case, mildew furring the words "Mr J Walsh. Restorer" embossed into its side. Locks of hair, captured in crystal, lay encircling the head and shoulders. And on and on, the room a glittering with glass edges. The hollowness in the space between them was almost palpable, the ache of a vacuum needing to be filled. Whatever sense of self preservation remained to had stopped Walsh from assembling her more.

Walsh turned from the window and regarded what he had wrought; a body built from glass fragments, each piece bought, bartered for, stolen or stumbled upon. Each one a fit for another, each one taking some small fragment of his life in the coupling, as he bled into the cracks between them, joints that would stretch for hundreds of yards laid out end to end. He felt the weight of the glass in his hand, the curve of the partially complete lips digging into his fingers, in a blood simulacrum of a kiss.

He held the face up, almost nose to nose with it, his own image ghosting in the glass, a pale shade with hollow cheeks, straggling, blood matted hair and stubble turning to patchy beard. Turning the mask banished the reflection, and he looked through its half complete eye, and found himself battling the urge to press the glass to his face. Something in his mind rebelled, and with trembling hands he placed the piece on the table, retreating to the bed.

#

Walsh's reverie was broken by the sound of mismatched footsteps in the stairwell. Whoever it was they weren't to be allowed to interfere with his work. Fumbling for the small pistol he'd abandoned on the dresser top, he took aim at the doorway and waited, positioning himself between any assailant and the glass body. It was a act he'd had to perform often, but as yet no one had defeated the heavy lock he'd installed.

Something struck the door, hard enough to shake flakes of plaster from the ceiling. The incongruous sound of metal grinding upon metal set Walsh's teeth on edge. He flexed his grip on the pistol, and drew a breath. There was the thud and jingle of something hitting the floor, and the door seemed to sag a little. Another punishing impact made the wood tremble, followed by more unwholesome wrenching. The door twisted inwards, propel by a heavy boot, pivoting upon the lock and hanging broken.

The crumbled remains of the hinge fell from her twitching mechanical fingers as she walked into the room, all black eyes and manic grin. Rail thin and with shock of white in her short hair Walsh recognised her immediately, as the girl from Leveticus'. The gun kicked in his hand, firing both shots wide, bullets lodging in the wall behind her. The girl just laughed, and lifted a pistol of her own, doubled barrelled, with a mechanism of ticking clockwork. Ignoring the gun pointed at her as she advanced on him.

"Sorry, should have knocked."

She giggled again, choking back a snort, and cracked the pistol butt into the side of his face. Walsh toppled backwards onto the floor, fighting unconsciousness. A boot connected with his chin, finishing the job.

"Glass jaw. Who'd have guessed?"

#

He awoke on his knees, to the feeling of the gun barrels pressed to his temple, iron fingers gripping his shoulder, and a boot pressing on his ankles. His jaw throbbed. He was knelt in the centre of her, amid the glass. The pull of the void inside her tugged at his mind.

The old man was sat in the chair, cane resting against his augmented leg, holding part of her glass face in his mechanical hand. Walsh's eyes locked on it. He tried to lunge forward, but the hand on his shoulder restrained him, fingers biting hard into flesh. Sense overtook instinct, with the recollection of the mangled hinges, and he found his tongue.

"What are you doing here Leveticus?"

"I was going to ask you that, but it's obvious. I would have thought my intentions were equally transparent."

"She's mine."

"I think you're labouring under a misapprehension. Do you think I wouldn't notice you stealing from me? Do you think Alyce would have let you make it to the door? Do you think your pursuit of this wouldn't have raised eyebrows? Would you have made it this far without my protection?"

"What protection? I don't need your help."

"More than you know. The pieces you stole have been on display for some time, waiting for one of my customers to take the Captivating part of the name more literally than is good for them. I've been greasing palms and cutting throats to keep the rest of this city off your back, and letting you find the rest of the pieces. You've been like a bloodhound following her trail. I expect some return on my experiment."

Leveticus seemed to remember the fragment of glass he was holding, weighing the piece in his hand for a moment, before bringing it down on the edge of the table. The glass didn't break, despite the force of the blow; instead it was the table that was marked. Walsh bucked in Alyce's mechanical grip, a scream wrenched from his throat, and blood suddenly streaming down his face.

"You've given her too much of yourself Walsh. Too much by far. Unhappily for you that suits my purpose." Leveticus slipped into the tone he's used for lecturing Walsh when he'd visited the shop. "The glass prison was a punishment reserved for those practising forbidden magics. There's only one recorded incident of it, but everything the Guild pertaining to it has been expunged, apart from the fact of its happening. Only her cell remains. There's Soulstone dust melted into the glass they encased her in. Imprisoned in a cage as tight as her own flesh, and left to die, is it any wonder it absorbed so much of her? She longs to be reformed, and I'm inclined to help her. The road to hell is paved with good intentions Walsh. Whatever opening she found when she lured you into picking her up has lead you here."

Leveticus spoke to the glass, not the man.

"You've not been able to push him far enough have you? Given time he might have bent to your will, but I can offer you his body now."

Leveticus stood, augmented leg creaking. Alyce holstered her pistol, and seized Walsh's wrists. The old man pressed the cold glass to Walsh's face. He could feeling his bones shift beneath its touch, their dull cracks echoing in his skull, felt more than heard. His cheekbone raised itself, and his chin narrowed, conforming to the inner contours of the woman's face.

"If we reassemble you, you'll work for me. I'll require insight, and something a bit more practical from you. You might even get some revenge on the Guild. Do you accept?"

Walsh nodded mechanically, but behind the glass his eyes were wide and scared. Leveticus reached for another piece of glass, and drawing blood began to reassemble the shattered prison.

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Mystery Ingredients

Character: The Glass Man

Item: Clockwork Pistol

Line: The road to hell is paved with good intentions

Word Count: 1502

I'm about as happy as I'll be with this without pulling it apart, or exceeding the word limit.

Edited January 25, 2013 by ScrewedUpDice