PreCursive

  As I stared at the stone Sculpted lying motionless in a cage, it felt like I was waking up from a dream.

  From the moment I had departed the tavern to track the svers, it had felt like I was running on near autopilot. There had been no thought for what I was doing, about what the sequences might be. I had seen another person in a colr and had fallen into a rance. Slowly, something that had frozen solid in my core with hatred began to thaw.

  I…remembered what I had done, of course. I’d followed the men dragging the Sculpted sve to a warehouse, and finding no other entrahan the front door, had grappled to the roof. Slipping in through a window, I…think? I had only inteo find and free the sve inside.

  But…that’s not what happened.

  While sneaking through the warehouse, I’d nearly bumped into one of the guards inside. Before his eyes could even widen in surprise, I’d used the dagger that had somehow found its way into my hand to tear out his throat. The noise must have drawention of anuard though, because he’d e to iigate while I was standing over the man I’d…killed.

  He had died, too. But not before drawing the st guard in the warehouse.

  I’d met him with dagger in hand, and after a short exge of blows, I'd known I was outmatched in a straight-up right.

  So I'd tur into ohat wasn't.

  I'd used Grasping Roots for the first time in bat, and bound the warehouse guard in pce. As the thorned roots had dug into his legs, causing him to grunt in pain, I'd struck. My brilliantly burning spear had torn through his heart.

  After that, I’d…searched the bodies of the men I’d killed, finding a trol ste o guard.

  Then I’d goo find the sve.

  But…

  I could only stand there and stare at him bnkly, ste in one hand, dagger held limply iher. My gaze drifted down to the on I had created with my own two hands.

  I watched dully as blood dripped from the bde to nd on the wooden floor of the warehouse below me.

  I…’t quite be sure how long I stood there, watg the lifeblood of the men I’d murdered drip onto the floor.

  Eventually, I was knocked out of my trance by what sounded like a voice, ing to me far away. I let my gaze drift upwards, to find that the Sculpted had male up into a sitting position, and was looking at me with a wary gaze in his gss eyes.

  “Who…the bleedin’…hells…are…ye?” The stone Sculpted asked me slowly, as if it was difficult to speak.

  Bleeding. Heh.

  I drew in a shuddering breath. “I…I’m someone who doesn’t like svery,” I said roughly. Sheathing my still wet bde with a trembling hand, I k down to look at the lo the cage. I cursed to myself, as I didn’t have my lockpig tools on me. Fool, you should know better by now. I was going to have to brute-force it, if I wao get this guy out of here.

  Meanwhile, the Sculpted was still speaking to me. “That’s…all?” He said incredulously. “Ye saved me…because ye don’t like…svery?”

  “I think so,” I said to him in a low voice, bringing my hand up to rest on lock. Angling my hand away from the prone Sculpted, I cast Poisonthorn Shot on the lock from point bnk rahe thorn from my skill embedded itself into the iron of the lock, quickly beginning to corrode it. I dismissed the thorn after a few moments, and then reached and yanked hard on the lock. It broke apart easily in my hand.

  Standing up, I eased open the cage door with a shriek of iron on iron. Shuffling inside, I hesitantly id a hand on the mostly immobile Sculpted. “Are you…all right? What’s wrong? Did they do something to you?” He was almost ag like he’d been poisoned, but that was ridiculous. Were there even poisons that could affect Sculpted?

  “What d’ya think…they did, ye daft fool?” The Sculped said depressingly. “Put a colr around…me ned…branded me. This is what happens…when my kis fitted…with one. Me life…is over.”

  I took a deep breath and smiled behind the unnatural darkness of my hood. While I had fotten my lockpicks, there was something that I never fot t with me. Reag behind my bay ever-present pack, I withdrew the Bond Breaker I always kept on my person. “Not for long,” I said to him.

  His eyes tracked the oversized fork in my hands with a fused look in them, as I y the trol ste I’d found on the ground. They nearly bulged out of their stone sockets when I raised the Breaker above my head and drove it down at the ste. “Wait!” The Sculpted nearly screamed in desperation. He robably afraid I was going to actly activate the death entment in his colr.

  The Breaker punctured the surface of the ste, and I pressed the activation rune. With a fsh of blue-greeher, the trol ste detonated in an explosion of bck stone. Expeg it, I shielded my eyes. I heard a few pieces ricochet off of the Sculpted, though. That wasn’t all I heard, though.

  I heard the satisfying click of an opening sve colr. I lowered my arm from my face just in time to watch as the Sculpted’s sve colr tumbled to the ground. Even if he couldn’t move, his eyes still tracked the colr disbelievingly to where it hit the wooden floor of the warehouse with a king noise.

  “How…?” He breathed out, amazement thi his whistling voice.

  Even if he couldn’t see it, I still smiled at him. I remembered that feeling. I shook my head at him, though. “I’m not done. , your brand.”

  The Sculpted’s eyes grew ically wide at my words. “Ye do that?”

  I him, reag out to shift the Sculpted man onto his front. He tried to help me as much as he was able to, even with the way he struggled to move. It was easier than I thought it would be. For a man made pletely out of stone, he was surprisingly light.

  Tugging down the back of his shirt, I exposed the back of his left shoulder. Sure enough, seared into the honeyb-like surface of his stone skin was a familiar-looking brand. I couldn’t help but scowl at the sight of the S with a ssh through it. I’m guessing these pirates were selling to the Savoy, sidering they were using one of their brands. Whatever, that wasn’t what was important right now.

  I stabbed the Breaker down ione of the Sculpted man’s back, right over the brand. Thankfully, the inal design of the Breaker had been intended for Ward Stones, so it had no problem peing the stone. I pressed the activation rune, causing the brand to light up ihereal light for a moment, before dying down.

  Two things happehe moment I did so.

  First, the Sculpted mah jerked in pce, as if he had suddenly regained plete trol of his body. Still lying dowurned his head io give me an amazed look.

  The sed thing that happened?

  Well, sedly, the front door of the warehouse on the far wall exploded. I flinched, letting go of the Breaker and standing to look behind me. I looked just in time to see someone flying through the broken wall where a door used to be, sword brandished in front of them.

  Right at me.

  My eyes bulged, but I mao draw my dagger and fully extend it just in time to catch a downward chop from whoever this was in a block. The impact was so great though that it both drove the breath from my lungs, and me down to one knee. I desperately reinforced my strength with Sylvan Vigor at full power in order to halt the advance of their bde any further, but it wasn’t w. The bde was still advang on me, inch by inch. Whoever this was, they were way strohan I was.

  Straining, I looked up, trying to see the fay attacker. In the dim light of the warehouse, I thought they were a woman, but that was all I was able to make out. Only, they had reared back, and were driving their bde back down at me with a snarl on vaguely feminiures. Desperately, I tried to brace myself better from my bad position. I don’t know how many more of those I could take.

  “Stop! Stop,” I heard from behind me, moments before the woman’s bde could impact my spear. It instantly halted, inches from likely blowing right through my guard. Seds ter, the Sculpted that I had rescued scrambled over to stand iween the woman and I. Gently, he he woman’s cutss away from my spear. “Captain, it ain’t what ye think. This weirdo saved me.”

  Weirdo?

  The woman finally spoke, akiormy blue eyes off of me. I didn’t dare move under her pierg gaze. “Ye got a damn fork sti’ out of yer back, Pete,” She said in a low, smoky voice. “That don’t look like no kind of res’ I’ve ever seen.”

  Oh. I’d…kind of left the Breaker embedded in the Sculpted man’s back. Yeah, I could see how that looked bad. The Sculpted, apparently named ‘Pete’, grew a surprised look on his face, and groped uselessly behind him, trying to reach the Breaker. He couldn’t quite reach it, though.

  Suddenly, a familiar blue short sword snaked around the neck of the woman still standing over me. The woman stiffened in arm. With a shimmer of light, an illusion broke, revealing Sylvia standing right behind her her full stealth suit. My Sculpted friend leaned in closer to her. “And you’ve got a sword at your neck.” She hissed in her ear. “I’d advise you to think about your move carefully.”

  The tension in the room ratcheted up massively with the now three-way standoff. I was still kneeling, frozen in a guard while being threatened by the woman’s cutss. Pete had frozen in pce as well, right arm over his back. Out of the er of my eye, though, I noticed his left hand drifting closer to his waist.

  “That will be quite enough of that, I believe,” I heard a voice say from the shattered doorway. ing my head slightly to look beyond the woman, I found Grey standing there, uned about the rubble. I nearly sagged in relief at the sight of my mentor.

  He strode into the warehouse as if he ow, reag us in no hurry. “You let go of her, my dear,” He said to his daughter in a soothing voice. “I know this one.”

  Slowly, Sylvia withdrew her short sword from around the neck of the woman in front of me. She backed away until she was standing off to the side. She ook her eyes off the woman, nor sheathed her bde.

  Meanwhile, the woman sagged slightly, letting out a shuddering breath. Almost subsciously, she raised her unoccupied hand to rub at her throat where Sylvia’s bde had rested only moments ago. She paused, turning to face Grey in the dim light of the warehouse. “That voice…’t be,” She said in disbelief. She sheathed her sword, and with her now free hand, used it call forth a ball of light, bright as any LED from bae. I squinted in the bright light, my eyes adjusting to it. When I could see well again, I got my first good look at this woman.

  She…well she definitely looked like a pirate Captain.

  She was dressed astonishingly simir to the pirate leader I’d met earlier, Cassandra. She was wearing nearly identical bck leather armor across her form, except with a blue overcoat draped over her shoulders instead of a red one. On her head was a bd white tri-er hat, with a red feather in it. The woman itself had dark, nearly midnight bck hair cut into a shoulder-length bob. Her face was all sharp ers and high cheekbones with thin lips, but I wouldn’t say she was ugly. From my position, I was still able to see her dark, stormy blue eyes. All in all, I’d describe her as…striking.

  Said striking woman was still staring at Grey. “Whitegull?” She said, incredulous. “What business do ye have with these bggards?”

  Oi, woman. I just saved your friend. A little gratitude would be nice.

  Grey chortled to himself. “These ‘bggards’ are my daughter,” He said, nodding to Sylvia first. “And my apprentice. Of who is most definitely not supposed to have gone off on his own to rescue sves at the first opportunity.” He finished, fixih a raised eyebrow.

  I flushed, standing up from my croud colpsing my spear. I dismissed my cloak, since I didn’t think I anymore. When I did so, small drops of blood that had been lingering on it fell around me like raindrops to rest on the floorboards beh. “I…” I started, and then stopped. “I don’t…know what happened. I couldn’t stop myself,” I said quietly.

  My words caused Grey and Sylvia to look at me in . Grey walked over to me and put a hand on my shoulder. “Later,” He told me quietly, before turning around to face the Captain with a forced smile. “Isabel! How long has it been? Why, the st I saw of you, you were still apprentig with Cassandra.”

  The Captain, apparently ‘Isabel’, grimaced. “Don’t call me that,” She said, almost automatically.

  “These days, they call me Bel the Blue.”