39

I darted to the bedroom door, poked my head around the edge, and surveyed the landscape. Two of the officers who’d joined us in the lift lay on the floor, one of them motionless and with a growing pool of blood seeping onto the tiles around them, the other writhing in agony, clutching his abdomen as blood stained his jacket black. A group of five goons crowded the penthouse’s entrance. Water dripped from their clothes and their hair, forming puddles at their feet. All of them wore heavy leather vests and combat boots, held crossbows, and had long dirks strapped at their belts. Two of them were busy reloading, while the others held their weapons at the ready.

Markeville stood in their center, an evil sneer stretching his lips. He, too, held a crossbow, which he aimed down the middle of the room. The bolt shot free with a twang, thudding as it embedded itself in the topmost cushion of the couch nearest the windows.

“Come out, Captain,” said Markeville, handing his empty crossbow to a crony in exchange for a fresh one. “You, too, Detectives Daggers and Steele. No point in delaying the inevitable.”

The Captain’s voice called out from behind the couch, and I noticed a hint of her faded auburn hair poking over the top. “Who’s delaying the inevitable, Markeville? You think you’ll walk out of here a free man? We’ve mobilized the city against you. Police. Fire. Military. The Strategic Magical Response Teams. They’re on their way as we speak.”

“But they’re not here yet, are they?” he said. “Which makes your boast all the more ironic.”

“No it doesn’t,” I called. “It makes her boast anemic, or flaccid, or any other of numerous adjectives that could apply both to a poor bargaining position and your own manhood.”

Markeville’s gaze shifted toward my doorframe. “Really, Detective? Now, of all times, you’re going to resort to childish insults?”

I glanced at the far side of the room. Shay had called out that she’d cleared the kitchen. Which door led there? The goons hadn’t spread out yet, had they? And the other officer who’d come with us—where was she?

“If now’s not the time, then I don’t know when is,” I said. “Might as well get them in before I die. A nice whiskey sour would hit the spot, too.”

“I’m not planning on killing you yet, Detective, though we are getting tantalizingly close to that moment. I want you to see the futility of your actions before you die. See the world you’ve worked so hard to craft rot and crumble before you.”

I considered my options. I had to assume Shay was alive. The Captain was too, but we wouldn’t be for long. My fear of being caught weaponless in a combat situation had been realized far too quickly, and as much confidence as I had in my ability to take Markeville one on one in a fair fight, his troop of goons armed with blades and crossbows tilted the scales in his direction. There wasn’t much of anything I could do against that many bows. Not with the mayor’s home so open, so cavernous. I might get lucky and avoid a shot if I dove behind a couch like the Captain had, but I’d never close on them before sprouting several bolts from my chest and neck.

Of course, I did have the brandy bombs. I’d hoped to save those in the event I had to dance with the wind elemental again, but they were missiles, after all. I could pitch them across the room and create carnage. They might provide enough of a distraction for me to close on the goons—at which point they’d cut me to pieces with their blades, while the rest of my friends and colleagues burned to death in a fiery inferno after failing to evacuate a burning building fifteen stories above ground.

There had to be a better strategy, but what? I needed to do something. Sitting around twiddling my thumbs wouldn’t get me anywhere…or would it? Markeville and his buddies must’ve come down from the roof, after all. Their sodden clothing gave it away, even if the mayor’s presence above didn’t.

“I can’t wait to see it,” I called back.

“Excuse me?” said Markeville.

“The death and destruction and ruin. Can’t wait.”

“Are you being sarcastic, Detective?”

“A little. More ironic, though. I figured you could use a few pointers on how to use that rhetorical device properly.”

Markeville laughed, a bone-chilling, hollow guffaw that echoed around the mayor’s home with all the warmth of a banshee’s shriek. “It’s a shame I have to kill you, Detective. I’m going to miss your banter. So many of the antagonists I’ve faced over the years have possessed the mental capacity of a gnat. You’re on the level of an ant, at least.”

“And yet you’re the one who doesn’t understand irony,” I said. “You know what? Screw it. While we’re both alive, let me give you a broader lesson, because irony isn’t as cut and dry as most people think. You see, you’ve got your verbal irony, which is what most people classify as regular irony, but it’s also the most commonly misconstrued. That’s when you say one thing but mean another. You get a lot of ironic similes of that sort. Clear as mud. Sharp as a bowling ball. That kind of thing.”

The Captain hissed at me. “Daggers, what the hell are you doing?”

I waved her back from the confines of my doorframe. “Then you’ve got your situational irony. That occurs when an action results in the opposite desired effect. Like, say, if you tried to kill me and ended up dead yourself. Oh, how sweetly ironic that would be.”

“I tire of this, Detective,” said Markeville. “Maybe I was wrong. Gnat seems more appropriate after all.”

“Wait,” I said. “I haven’t even gotten to tragic and dramatic irony, yet. You’re going to love those. Well, you will if you assume we’re all pawns in some omnipotent being’s grasp, our fates already sealed, signed, and delivered.”

A crossbow twanged, and a bolt sprouted from the doorjamb opposite me.

“Men,” said Markeville. “Advance. Cripple him if you must, but don’t kill the Detective. Same for Steele, wherever she’s hiding. Murder the rest.”

Crap… I reached into my jacket for the bombs and matches, hoping I’d be able to light one before being gutted, when time finally caught up with Markeville.

I’d expected our backup to burst into the mayor’s office with a collective roar. Instead, I heard a swish and a crack of bone, followed by a howl of pain before everything exploded into a cacophony of yells and crashes.

I turned the corner and darted into the action, unprepared for the full extent of the melee into which I’d be diving. Crossbow bolts flew as readily as curses. Blades and truncheons cut through the air as Rodgers, Quinto, and the rest of the officers pushed Markeville and his goons into the room, but the thugs fought back with unbridled ferocity. Already the elven officer lay on the ground, clutching a wide gash in his side. Quinto slammed a fist into one of the thug’s faces even as a crossbow bolt slammed into his shoulder, causing him to cry out in pain.

I narrowed in on the closest gangbanger. Take them one at a time, and try not to die. That was what any brawl or battle boiled down to, but it was hard not to worry about the forest when facing a single tree.

Shay darted out from a doorway as I bore down on the thug from behind, a honing steel in hand. Her eyes flickered toward me, taking stock of me, the thug, and the rest of the situation in a fraction of a second, same as I had.

The goon noticed us a moment too late. He turned toward me, slicing the air with his long knife in an effort to cut the arm of my oncoming fist.

Lucky for me, I’d decided to kick him. My boot landed on the side of his knee. He wobbled and grunted as Shay’s honing steel took him on the back of his neck, between the shoulder blades. He spun on his good foot, tying to use his momentum to cut Steele open from ear to ear, but I used my momentum too. I kept going, catching his forearm and slamming the rest of my weight into his shoulder joint. Something popped, and he screamed. Shay’s second honing steel blast caught him across the nose. It shut him up.

Shay and I simultaneously turned toward the fighting, but somehow it had already ended. Two more officers lay on the floor, bloodied but conscious. Two of the goons joined them, one with a crossbow bolt sticking through his chest, another with his neck twisted to the side at an unnatural angle. Rodgers and the orc hybrid, Officer Djorkert, I think, were tag teaming one of the others, beating him into submission with truncheons. Quinto had the last in a one-armed headlock, slowly choking the life out of him. Blood streaked his coat underneath the bolt that sprouted from his shoulder, the arm hanging limp at his side.

The Captain shouted at us as she popped from behind the couch. “Get Markeville! Go! I’ll help Quinto!”

Officer Djorkert ran to the door as Rodgers blasted the goon underneath him with one last boot to the face. Shay and I ran to the hallway, too.

We paused there for a second. The lift stood at the ready, meaning Markeville had taken to the stairs. The question was up or down.

It wasn’t much of a question, really. Winds howled and rain echoed down the stairwell from above.

“Follow me,” I said as I hopped up the stairs. Bare electrical globes illuminated the concrete steps, four sets of ten as I raced toward the heavens. The last set were slick from rain.

I paused a couple steps shy of the open door. Wind howled past it, carrying with it driving rain. The cyclone’s angry dark clouds churned and spun. I couldn’t believe how close they appeared, looming over the tall spire of a building like an apocalyptic prophecy. Had the height of the building brought us so close to the storm, or had the storm travelled to us? By the gods, was the cyclone specifically targeting the Freemont Plaza Building?

“I see him!” said Officer Djorkert.

I did, too. Markeville stood there, near the edge of the roof, the winds and rain howling and whipping around him. Despite their ferocity, he seemed at ease. His body didn’t tilt when the winds blew past. His hair, damp though it was, didn’t flutter, nor did his shirt and jacket. He simply stood there, uncaring, as if the storm didn’t exist, as if none of the violent carnage from the mayor’s apartment had come to pass.

“Come on,” shouted Officer Djorkert over the roar. “Let’s get him!”

“Wait!” I said, but Djorkert had already rushed into the rain. She stumbled across the roof, bearing down on Markeville, truncheon in hand.

And then the wind intensified. Djorkert hunched and dug her heels into the concrete, but it wasn’t enough. With an ear-splitting shriek, the wind pushed Djorkert to the side. She toppled and fell, skidding across the roof. I thought I caught a hint of a scream as she flew over the side, disappearing into the empty night.

Shay swore behind me. “Gods…”

The wind shrieked and swirled, whipping rain into the stairwell, and once again I saw the face. The beady eyes and wide open mouth. The same one I’d seen at the chief’s house, now free of smoke and debris but otherwise the same. It rushed toward the open door, howling with rage, but at the last moment, it pulled away, the eyes wide and the mouth puckered.

I think it recognized me.

I turned my back to the door and pulled one of the fire bombs and matches from my jacket. “I’m going out there.”

“Are you crazy?” said Steele. “You saw what happened to our officer, right?”

Rodgers knelt behind Shay, a look of fear pitting his face. “You don’t need to be a hero, Daggers…”

I struck a match against the side of the box. Nothing. “I’m not trying to be a hero. I’m out here doing my job, same as everyone else.”

“Nobody else has a death wish!” said Steele.

I struck another match. Still nothing. “I don’t have a death wish. But we have a duty to defend the city. To serve and protect against all forces that would seek to do harm to the citizens of New Welwic. All forces. Right now, Markeville is the least of my worries. It’s that elemental we need to stop. It’ll tear the city apart if we don’t stop it, and call me crazy, but I think that’s exactly what Markeville wants. But the quickest way to it is through him.”

“You want to kill him?” said Rodgers. “Knock him out? Whatever. Doesn’t matter. Fine. Let’s grab a crossbow from downstairs. I’m a decent enough shot. I can pick him off from here.”

The wind roared behind me. I struck another match. It caught.

I lit the cocktail’s wick, which took quickly thanks to the brandy that soaked it. “You saw what the wind did to Djorkert. It can push a crossbow bolt out of Markeville’s path if it wants to. But the spirit is scared of me. I can see it in its face, which means I can take him.”

“Daggers, please…” Shay’s face was wet, but only partly because of the driving rain.

“Do you trust me?” I said.

“Of course.”

I leaned in and kissed her, a quick peck on the lips. “This won’t take long. Promise.”

I plucked a second cocktail from my coat and lit it with the first, then turned toward the door. The wind roared by, swirling before coming to a stop ten paces beyond the exit.

I stepped into the squall with more confidence than I’d thought I could muster. The wind bellowed and blew, but it didn’t push me off my feet.

I took aim at a spot immediately underneath the wind spirit’s hovering face, threw my bomb, and prayed. It flew true, enveloping the face in a gout of flame that licked hungrily up into the sky.

The wind whipped around the fire, the elemental’s face flying with it. The thing’s mouth widened, and the wind slowed.

I pulled the last bottle from my coat, lit it, and tossed the second. The flames engulfed the spirit’s face again. It shrieked, a more high-pitched sound than I’d heard earlier, and it shifted toward the building’s lip. I followed it with my third and final cocktail. The flames licked the edge of the building, and the face shot into the darkness with a panicked whine.

The bright lights of the explosions only now seemed to register with Markeville. He turned as I started to run toward him, calling out through the whipping winds.

“You don’t know when to quit, do you Daggers? Don’t you know when you’re outclassed? Outmatched? Out—”

I hit him at full speed, planting both of my hands square in his chest and pushing with all my might. He flew backward, his arms flailing as he toppled over the edge of the building. His scream cut through the shrieking winds, fading as he plummeted toward the ground.

“Gods, that asshole doesn’t know when to shut up.” I brushed my hands on my pants, hearing another shout somewhere on the wings of the wind.

I turned, wondering what I’d forgotten. That’s when I spotted the makeshift crane and remembered that the mayor was dangling sixteen stories in the air.