Chương 13: Not Gerald (Assassin Apprentice's POV)

I had gotten better at watching things without being watched myself. It was less a matter of technique and more a simple truth I'd learned the hard way: most people didn't look at treelines unless they had a reason to. My job was making sure I never gave anyone one. I stayed pressed against my tree, half a mile back from the ridge, and watched that bastard cross the border between Stonebrook and Millhaven. From up here he looked like an ant. No, an indistinguishable speck of booger. I squinted. It didn't help.

This is not cowardice, I told myself, for what had to be the hundredth time since I'd started trailing him. This is tactical cowardice. There was a difference. A coward ran and stayed running. I was just waiting. Waiting for the one thing the system had promised me: a red thread, a chance to kill him, some sign that the universe had finally decided to stop protecting him. I will strike once it appears. Not before. Rushing in now would just add me to his body count. But it hadn't shown up. Not once.

Not in the weeks since Shira died. Not through every forest I'd tailed him to. Close enough to hate him and far enough to do nothing about it. Does this Vengeance skill even work? Maybe the system had oversold it. Maybe "once a chance presents itself" meant a chance that was never actually going to present itself, and I'd just been handed a very expensive way to feel like I was doing something. Then my vision lurched forward on its own. It happened in the space of a blink.

One moment I was staring at a smudge of color half a mile off, and the next I was close enough to count the stitching on Faust's gloves. Is this also part of the Vengeance skill? I thought it was useless. [Yes and no.] The system sounded offended. Hmm… Convenient. Unsettling, but convenient. And apparently the skill came with audio included, because I could suddenly hear every sound from down there as clearly as if I were standing three feet away.

Except they weren't talking, so what I actually got was the ambient noise of two places layered on top of each other. From my branch, the chirping of chicks fighting into their nest about who would fall and who would inherit the family legacy. From Faust's position, the low growl of monsters. Bafun, a local monster of Millhaven. All of them had their backs turned to me, which meant I could clearly see their naked butts. A pointless quirk of the species. Nyx moved through them.

One Bafun lunged, and her blade made out of stone caught it across the throat. One stroke and it dropped. A second came at her from the side, faster, smarter, trying to use the first one's death as cover. She turned and took her two strokes this time, but it went down just the same, folding sideways into the dirt. She didn't look tired at all. Between kills, her stance reset itself like a machine returning to its starting position, waiting for the next input. Faust hadn't moved the entire time.

He stood at the center of it all with his staff planted in the ground, watching the carnage like a man watching the weather. I counted four Bafun down. Then five. Whatever pack this was, it was thinning fast, and Nyx hadn't so much as broken a sweat. Come on. Come on, one of you get through. A sixth one came in low, out from the treeline on Nyx's blind spot. Her blade was still finishing its arc from the last kill. Her weight shifted the wrong way.

The Bafun's shoulder caught her clean and sent her stumbling half a step off balance. It wasn't much. A half step. But it was enough. The Bafun surged past her, straight for Faust. Yes! I pumped my fist against the bark. Hard enough that a piece of it came away under my knuckles. Finally, something in this world was going to go wrong for him. Its hand rose above Faust's head. When it came down, there it was again — my hated barrier.

It bloomed into existence like it had been waiting the whole time for exactly this moment to ruin my day. Faust set his palm flat against the Bafun's chest, right through the barrier.

"Fire Arrow." The Bafun went flying backward. A hole where its chest used to be, wide enough to see the daylight through. The remaining Bafuns took one look at what remained of it and decided retreat was the better career move. I ground my teeth. I need to find a way to counter that barrier. Something shrieked, loud and sudden, below me. I looked down. My eyes went wide. This narrative has been purloined without the author's approval. Report any appearances on Amazon.

A red-haired girl was holding up some kind of cicada with one hand, turning it in the light like she'd just hit a jackpot. I dropped from the branch, stumbled on the landing — just barely — and closed the distance before my brain had finished deciding this was a terrible idea. I clapped a hand over her mouth and hauled her behind the nearest tree.

"Who's there?!" Faust's voice cracked out from the distance. I stared at the girl. There's no way… Shira killed her… But if she is still breathing, still standing, still holding an annoying cicada, maybe I can use her… Footsteps started closing in before I could finish the thought. Damn it. Nyx must have seen me. And Faust definitely knows her face. I racked my brain for something, anything. Then I remembered, in my entire career, being Faust's stalker… follower? Wait, that sounded wrong.

Anyway, I had never once heard Nyx speak. Not a word. Can I bet on her being mute? It was a thin thread to hang a plan on, but it was the only one I had. The footsteps grew louder.

"Stay here," I whispered to the girl, snatched the cicada out of her hand, and stepped out to greet them. My mentor's killers.

"H-hello!" I raised my hand, waving the cicada around as it shrieked furiously in protest. Now that I looked at it closely, its mouth was shaped like a trumpet. Definitely an annoying variant.

"What is an assassin doing here? Are you spying on us?" Faust glared at me. I wanted to glare back. I made myself not.

"Of course not. I'm here on a bug-catching quest, with this very annoying little bastard." I shot the cicada a look instead, which was, in fairness, entirely deserved. It had, after all, put me in this shitty situation. Nyx drifted closer. Too close. She leaned in and started sniffing me, working her way down toward my waist. I reached into my side pocket and pulled out a wrapped sandwich. She followed the movement immediately. I threw it. She fetched it. Faust let out a long breath. He turned.

"Let's go." Nyx trotted after him, already eating my sandwich. Then she stopped. She turned. My heart skipped a beat. I stopped breathing.

"Thanks," she said and turned back, following Faust. I remembered to breathe. I waved at their backs like an idiot, grin frozen behind my mask. They kept walking, past the gate of Millhaven, then beyond it. Most likely headed straight for Aethre, the city of magic, where the Mage Guild made its home. The moment I couldn't see them, my legs gave out.

"What am I doing?" I asked myself as I stared at the empty sky. I stood up, patted the leaves out of my cloak, and adjusted my mask. I walked back around the tree to where I'd left the girl. She was sitting there, calmly eating a… beetle? Now that I looked at her closer, something didn't add up. That archer-mage doesn't wear a rock. Are they even the same person?

"Are you Ruina?" I asked. She nodded, still chewing. I clenched my fist.

"I'm—" I stopped. Shira had told me, repeatedly, not to drop names. It was pre-basic. The foundations of the basics. The first lesson you learned before you became an assassin. Shira was gone. His lesson wasn't.

"Hmm… You can call me Not Gerald." She swallowed.

"Nice to meet you, Not Gerald." Oh… She bought it… She held out a hand, palm up.

"Can I have the cicada back? I need it for the quest."

"S-sure." I set it in her palm. She dropped it into a container, where it kept right on shrieking its objections. Then, without looking up, she said, "You're with the one who killed me, right?"

"Ehm—" Of course she remembered! I sighed.

"Fine. I'll tell you everything. That man from earlier, Faust." I gritted my teeth just saying the name.

"He's the one who hired my mentor to kill you. Then killed him after."

"I see." She stood, brushing dirt off her knees.

"Do you want to take revenge together, Ruina?" I offered my hand.

"I don't want to." She walked past me.

"Of course you do." I nodded, already agreeing with myself. Then I caught up with what she'd actually said and stopped. I stared at my own hand hanging in the air. I spun around.

"Wait, what?! Don't you hate him?!" She paused and looked back at me. Something in her expression softened into a small smile.

"Nope." She kept walking. I watched her get smaller against the treeline like she hadn't just been told the name of the man who wanted her dead. Is it really that easy? To just — forgive? I thought about Shira. About the sound his body had made hitting the floor. I thought about finding someone who'd lost something to Faust too, someone who understood, someone who'd say "yes, let's take his life together" without a second of hesitation. I hadn't rehearsed for a "nope."

I hadn't rehearsed her just walking away like the whole conversation had cost her less than the cicada had. Maybe she was a coward. Maybe she was stronger than me. Or maybe whatever had happened to her had burned the anger out of her along with everything else. I didn't know which one it was. I wasn't sure it mattered. What mattered was that I still felt it. That ugly, patient thing sitting behind my ribs, waiting. It hadn't gone anywhere just because she'd decided to let hers go. I clenched my fist. Fine.

If the red thread wouldn't show itself on its own, I'd stop waiting for it. I'd get stronger, and I'd force that thread into existence myself. I let out a deep sigh, looking up at the sun, already fully risen. But first, I need to eat breakfast. I reached into my pocket. It was empty. Not just sandwich-empty, totally empty, not even a stray coin rattling inside. Maybe I should register as an adventurer while I'm at it and earn some money. I followed her toward the gates of Millhaven.

I hoped there wasn't a registration fee.