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“I need you to do something for me, Rod.”
My back stiffened. “I need” and “Rod” together were never a good sign. Especially when uttered by a she-wolf I’m indebted to. I know I’m an all-powerful master thief with incredible magical abilities, but I’m also a 5’6” Terran that doesn’t like death.
Not that there was much I could do about it. I was sworn to protect her and keep her alive. It didn’t mean I was her slave, per say, but I had already agreed to trick and trap an evil cult-master despite the fact that it would most likely cause a civil war among the non-human population. Terrans had a funny way of responding to the scent of violence, human or otherwise. As long as fulfilling this request would keep her alive, I had to follow through.
“Oh relax, dummy,” she snorted. “It’s not like I’m going to ask you to start World War Three.” She reached out and plucked Layla’s silver sword from the rotting counter between us, holding it out and watching the blade glow a pale blue. The dying sunlight crossed through a dingy window behind her, corrupting the light coming into the old smithy and turning her wiry body into a mere silhouette. This used to be a place of refuge before its owner abandoned it for a personal crusade. All he left behind was a small cottage with rooms upstairs and a forge downstairs, all of it rotting away from time.
“I need everything you can get me about this sword, and I need it ASAP,” the she-wolf stated, drawing my wandering attention back to her. An alien script glowed along the center of the sword, illuminated by dim light. I had seen this kind of language before; in fact, it’s why the she-wolf found me in the first place. She had run into a kid wanting to run a revenge crusade, and said kid had the most interesting sword. According to the two of them, it glowed in the moonlight and revealed a hidden script when it did so.
Of course, both of these ‘facts’ were being debunked as we talked, seeing as how there was no moonlight around and the sword was glowing anyway, proudly displaying its ‘secret message’.
I blew out a tense breath, relieved at the wiggle room this request granted me. Protecting her was one thing. Research was another. I leaned my elbows on the counter behind me, picking at a splinter sticking up from the front of the dying counter. “What else do you think I can get you? I’ve already translated the thing; it’s why we’re at the Smithy in the first place. In case you’ve forgotten, I’m already going along with your insane plan to antagonize Afanasiy the Russian sociopath. Now you want me to redo work I’ve already done?”
“Don’t play dumb,” she snapped. “I know there’s more to this than meets the eye. Don’t think I haven’t noticed the sword reacting right now with no moonlight around. And this metal doesn’t act like regular silver. If your research is right, my charge isn’t from Earth and so I doubt her sword is either, despite its appearance. So you’re going to do whatever you need to do. Lie. Steal. Kill. Do what you do best. Get me the info.”
Fine. She wanted me to pursue pointless information, I was going to make sure she thought it through. I scratched my head in thought, thick black hair feeling like the fur of a wild dog. “What about the kid?” I finally asked. “Layla’s going to notice when she comes back and her sword is missing.”
Olyvia shrugged. “You’ve already made a copy of it using a mirror shard and magic. Make another one before you leave.”
I barked a short laugh. “It’s her sword. Don’t you think she’ll notice?”
Olyvia snorted. “She barely knows the difference right now.”
I tapped at my temple, asking “and you?”
“I’m not that stupid, Rod.”
“Debatable,” I said, waving a dismissive hand, “but not what I mean. You and the elf are mentally linked, remember? If she knows what you know, and you know I made a copy and ran off with the original...”
Olyvia shot me a disapproving look, black eyes narrowing as a low growl emanated from her throat. “I’ll lie.”
“You can’t lie for that long.”
“I can still separate her memories from mine. Long as you get yourself back in time, there’ll be nothing for her to complain about.”
“What about our current plan?” I pressed. “You won’t have your escape route if I’ve absconded with the kid’s magical sword. I can’t be in two places at—” The smile creeping across her face stalled out my last bit of protest. I snorted. “No. You’re not seriously asking me to do what you specifically forbade me to do last time.”
She nodded. “You bet your magic hat I am. I don’t care about what happened last time. You need to be in two places at once, so be in two places at once.” What a liar; ‘Last time’ I managed to set off an explosion nearly killing her, and she isn’t the most forgiving creature in the world.
I gave off a sigh. “You realize how much magic it takes me to make a double, right?”
“As much as it takes to finish this conversation?”
“Fine, fine,” I said, putting my hands up in surrender. “But I won’t take responsibility for what happens.”
“Like you’ve ever taken responsibility for yourself,” Olyvia snorted with a small smile. She held the sword between us again, smile falling. “I need you to do this, Rod. Layla’s in trouble and my instinct tells me knowing more about her home world will help us. Her sword and the journal her father left behind are all we have, and I’m not taking both away from her. Do this for me. Please.”
That caught my attention. The she-wolf wasn’t big on saying the p-word.
Well. Now I really had no reason to refuse.
With a small flair, I accepted the sword’s hilt and rested the weapon on the counter. Pulling a bottle of water and a pair of needles from my long jacket’s pocket, I paused and gave Olyvia a pointed look.
“Do you mind?” I asked. “This is kind of private.”
She let out a short laugh. “Private? You?”
I huffed in feigned offence. “I have my secrets, and I intend to keep them.”
“Fine,” she said with a roll of her eyes. She spun and walked to the door, thick rope braid swinging as she glanced over her shoulder. “Next time I ask for privacy, I’d better get it.”
She shut the door before I could respond. Damn wolves always have to have the last word.
With a shake to refocus myself, I popped the top of the bottle, dumped it out in two puddles and pricked a finger with each needle. As it pooled on the rotting smithy floor, I squeezed out a few drops of blood. They landed with a tiny ripple, dark red staining the pools.
The ripples continued moving, the water shaking and twisting as I began pushing magic to the edges of my fingers. Concentrating on my magic flow, I reached out and dipped a finger in each puddle.
Unlike others in my field, I don’t do spells or incantations. Too complicated, and my magic too poor. It’s why I call myself a magician and not a wizard; it’s all in the tools.
Thankfully, my ‘tools’ are easy to come by. All I have to do is tap something with a little magic and BAM! I can get it to do anything it has potential to do. For example, water has the potential to hold any shape, so long as it has a container, and because my blood came out of me, it can carry enough of my genetic material to...
Nevermind. Why don’t I just let the water do the talking?
The water responded to my urging, shivering and twisting into unsteady liquid stalagmites. The rippling water spikes managed to reach my height, groaning as they morphed and reached their final shapes.
My shape.
Before long, I was looking at two mirror images of myself.
The top-hat, the long black coat, the black Komondor-styled hair...ye gods, am I usually so pale? Two pairs of ice-blue eyes stared back at me, the shades deepening until it settled at an unremarkable color. I squinted at the one across from me. “Why are the tips of your hair yellow?” he asked.
The one to my right turned and squinted too, letting out a snort. “It looks like three-year-old highlighters threw up on your head.”
Alright fine. They were usually my mirror image. I’ll admit, sometimes my magic could go a little wrong.
Pulling at the edges of his hair, the one across made a face as he discovered puke-yellow tipping the edges of his hair. “Well it’s not my fault,” he growled, flicking the bangs away from his round face. “I didn’t cast the spell, did I?”
“Ah,” the one on the left chuckled as he watched us. “Well nevermind, then.” He flipped the hat off his head, spinning it between two fingers as he smiled. “ So, who’s going where?”
“Olyvia,” I answered, pointing across the smithy and making a shooing motion. “I get the sword.”
“Me?”
“No, your uncle.”
“So what am I doing?” came an objection to my right.
“The other side of the research.”
“What? What other side?”
“Olyvia said she wants to know more about Layla’s home world. Somehow, she’s overlooked the fact that Afanasiy is from the same place. We’ve been faking a partnership with him for a while, and it’s time to cash in.”
“So I’m going to try and figure out why the fox tried to kidnap Layla, and what he knows about the weapons?”
I nodded. “We managed to cobble together a theory last time. Work off of it and report in when you can,” I said, digging out a small flip-phone. The other two pulled the same phone from their pockets, showing them. We three flipped the phones open and exchanged numbers, making sure our main lines of communication still worked.
“Right,” I said, “let’s get to work.”