Iron Quill- Falling - A Shard of Soul

[ashenlion]

A Shard of Soul

"So what am I going to get in return for doing this suicide mission for you?"

Marshal Kreg narrowed his eyes at me. Or at least I think he did, it’s hard to tell under the wide-brimmed standard-issue hat. "It's part of your duty. Besides, with your skill set you are better suited."

"Don't preach to me about duty, Kreg. I know full well this one got bumped up to you because other members died trying. So what's in it for me?"

"How would you know that, Thane?”

I gave him a patent smile. "Word gets around. You know what I want."

"Not happening."

"Do we really need to dance around? I'll report this, people will check in, and you know how much we love those open-shut cases..."

“Fine,” he snapped, tossing me the file. I deftly caught it, doing my best not to let the grin get too big.

“Seems light. You mind me asking why?”

“Ask what’s left of the last team; the survivors aren’t being cooperative.”

“Is that all?” I chuckled as I shut the door. Figures that I'd get stuck with this; there was no lost love between us. Or any member of this section of the Guild. We don't work well with others.

***

The witch slammed the door in my face. "Oh come on!" I yelled through the door. "I don't care if you’re indecent!"

"Go away, Marek!" I heard her yell back, the sound of something breaking against the door.

“I brought cookies."

There was a pause. "Don't want them."

"You're adorable when you're angry."

"You're up to something."

“I got your last case. I thought you’d like to have a hand in revenge, and I’m here so I can get more information and make Kreg look bad.”

There was a pause, then the door opened slightly. Her amber eyes peered from the dark room, the shadows barely hiding she was wearing a near transparent nightgown. I, being gentlemanly, kept my eyes focused on her angular face, noting the sunken look and fresh cuts across the cheek.

"I simply want to get an idea of what I’m getting into, and I'll owe you a favor. Fair enough?"

"What kind of cookies again?"

I looked down at the box. "Gingerbread men, with extra icing."

Seren opened the door fully. "Alright, come in."

I ducked into the room and took off my hat respectfully, brushing auburn strands out of my eyes. The room was small, only allowing a kitchenette, living space and a water closet. She (regrettably) wrapped herself up in a bathrobe, gesturing towards the table. I set the items down and drew a chair out for her.

“I thought I was clear in my report.” She said, wincing as she settled.

“An account from an actual person is far more useful. Your team was in charge of finding the counterfeit soul stones, right?”

“If you believe such a thing could be faked.” She murmured. “It took weeks, but we tracked the original box to near in the western ruins. We suspected someone left it there for us to find on purpose.”

“What gave you that idea?”

Her lips curled in a grimace. “An item that the Guild makes exclusively theirs and then members dead after using them? Considering how popular we are?”

“Fair point. So what happened?”

She looked away. “We found another box, but it was rigged to go off when someone went near. Two of us barely had time to scream before they hit the ground. Was able to get a spell off, but the shards from the energy and glass killed another. And then we were attacked by something, I guess it must have been from the breach. It wasn’t human.” She lifted her bangs, showing me glass embedded in her face. “I was the lucky one.”

“You were.” I said, gently taking her hand. “You came back to warn the rest of us. So I’m going to make sure they are brought to justice. But I’m going to need something else.”

She looked at me suspiciously “Like what?”

***

Later that night, I headed towards the ruins. Buildings had toppled long before, a feeling a dread, wind and whispers dancing between the shadows around me.

I took out the blood spotted pouch, feeling the glass from Seren’s wound. I focused my will, blocking out the coldness about me and on the tiny slivers. I could feel her pain, but I could also feel it had been also handled by someone unidentifiable. My gut told me I was near where the other pieces were. My eyes filtered through the area for disturbance. You can't always rely on magic after all. A footprint here, a splatter of mud there indicating someone had been by recently. I knew I was even closer by the dried blood flecks. I turned a corner and saw what looked like more blood, but no bodies. More disturbing though was indications of something being dragged away. Then again, that made tracking easier.

Deeper among the ruins I crept, descending down crumbling steps to further darkness. Water trickled down walls, mildew and rot matching the feeling of dread creeping over the atmosphere. I carefully stepped over scraps of twisted metal, the sounds of whirling and metal clanking around me. Up ahead was a door illuminated, shadows moving about. The room was huge, tables covered in tools and materials thrown about. A man was there, covered by a welders mask and smoke, carefully working on something freakishly blasphemous.

I suppose a spider would be the closest descriptor, many metal legs, gears and flesh intertwined together. There was a face full of despair, a silent wail of agony from its bear trap maw.

"Almost fixed." whispered the man, caressing the blades. As I saw him pick up a glowing stone and harness into the monster, pieces fell rapidly into place.

I figured it would be a really bad idea to wait for him to finish ‘fixing’ it.

Not one for dramatic planning, I walked right in. The man, hearing my entry, turned. Though his expression was covered, I saw madness, surprise, but also grim delight. Not the best combination.

“So the Guild finally tracks me down.” He wheezed. I said nothing, slowly sidestepping, my eyes flickering between the two advisories.

“No vows of vengeance? Perhaps this will motivate you.” He whispered a word, and the eyes of the monster glowing red.

“Ah, hell.” was apparently all I could say before the thing threw the table.

As luck would have it, I was only grazed, but thrown off balance. I wanted to come up with a better retort, but the world was being annoyingly spinny. That and I was too busy trying not to get hit by the mechanized machination. It screamed, slashing at me with its scythes. I rolled out of the way, unsheathing my blade. Whispering a word, the blade gleamed a cold white light, the glare of it making the creature screech louder. I bounced back on my feet, bounding forward and struck. Black blood welled from the wound, burning as it hit my sword. Flicking the blade I spun and side stepped to slash again. It clawed towards me, catching my coat edge with a smooth slicing sound. Seeing the ends torn into neat shreds gave me just the motivation needed to dive again, ducking under the legs and digging my sword deep into its belly. It screamed again, blood dripping over my blade and burning in a torrent. It attempted to run before slumping over, the flesh and magic dissolving like ashes in wind, leaving smoking twisted scraps. I pulled out the sword and turned towards the man.

I had expected some sort of rant of revenge, but he immediately raised his hands in a sign of surrender. "Take me into custody and I'll gladly share my secrets."

I paused, thinking about it briefly. "Alright, I'll take you in."

***

"So you are saying that this bastard was able to siphon souls through one soul stone into another?"

"Yep."

"And then he'd use them to power monsters he created?"

"As I can tell, yes."

"And you agreed to take him into custody?"

"You could say that." I said, taking a soul stone from my pocket and setting in on the desk.

Kreg looked at it, then back to me. "Not changing your reputation a bit, are you?"

"I felt the sentence just, considering his crimes. So," I sat back, folding my arms, "about my reward then."

Kreg pulled out a file from under his desk. "Under my authority given to me by the Guild, you may now act as a free agent, to choose you assignments and to judge as you see fit."

"Excellent." I said, picking up the papers and getting ready to leave.

"That was seriously your goal the entire time?"

I gave a grim smile in return. "Justice is blind. I plan on going where she won't look."

Word count: 1499

Items: The Decent, Iceman (in passing and terrible pun), Underwear (also brief XD )

[edonil]

Interesting character, I really liked the way you did that. And the ending was really good, man, all four of you are kicking my butt at that! You did a great job with the atmosphere building for everything. Definitely a really well executed concept.

I'd suggest watching out for your tense changing. You kept it pretty solid, but there were a few points where you switched between present and past tense, just keep an eye on it.

I'd also keep an eye on how much space you dedicate to description in something this short. You did a great job with it, but your action scene at the end was fairly rushed. Pulling some of the description out and making it more vague would leave you more room to play with once you get there.

An excellent first showing, looking forward to seeing more from you!