On the top
floor of Thorn Tower, the tallest skyscraper in Chelandia, a very important man
looked at very important figures on a floating display. He did not like what the figures were telling
him, and he decided to take his frustration out on his imp. He gathered up a ball of energy in one hand
and threw it through the wall of his office.
A muffled “ow” on the other side told him his aim had been true.
A
minute later, his imp, a worthless little scab named Ganna or something, bled
through his office door rubbing a spot on his tiny orange head.
“Now
I have told you about using the door as a door,” the man, whose name was Lukas
Thorne, and who was the head of ThornCorp, and who was a very busy and important man,
admonished the imp.
“Sorry,
Mr. Thorne. What can I help you
with?” The imp's reedy voice spiked into
Lukas Thorne's brain like a metaphor he had no time to come up with right now.
“Take
care of these,” said Lukas, and pointed at a teetering pile of paperwork that
Lukas had hexed to prevent it falling over.
“I was just getting to that, sir, but you said you wanted me to
work on -”
Lukas
shut the vile creature up with a simple look, one that told the imp that he
wasn't even worthy of Lukas's words right now.
“Yes,
sir,” said the imp, who gathered the paperwork in an energy sphere and bobbed
it in front of him as he left the office. Lukas was glad to see the imp
carefully use the doorknob, open the door, and then close it behind him. He hated that the imp could bleed through
solid matter, and had often questioned whether he needed such a blatant
security risk sitting so close to his inner sanctum. In the end, though, he really enjoyed
humiliating the little bastard, and he had other security measures in place
that ensured the imp would never be able to find or steal anything of value
from Lukas's office.
Lukas
stood and stared out the glass wall of his office at the virescent skyline of
Chelandia, the last bit of red daylight boiling away into darkness. His darkness. He owned the light pouring out
of the buildings into the night sky, painting the low cloud layer a deep
emerald. He owned it, and he owned the
method for creating it. He'd even named
it after himself. So when he looked out
of his office window, he saw an empire he had the power to turn off at a
moment's notice.
He
turned back around and leaned over his glass desk, studying the floating
figures again. He winced at all the red
pouring out of his earnings from the constant Guild inspections since the westside
energy plant had gone critical, nearly sending an entire neighborhood into an
alternate dimension of pain and torment.
Nearly. Nearly. But the damned Guild couldn’t see that the
difference between near disaster and disaster was quite a bit more than a
faulty fellbolt.
He
needed a drink, and he needed not to be here, staring at these floating
numbers, telling him that his business was floundering in a sea of bad magic
and bad mojo. And he needed to get to
the bottom of something itching at the base of his brain.
He
gathered up another ball of energy to unleash on his imp, but then dissipated
it. He’d tortured the poor creature
enough tonight. Instead, he used the
intercom. Sure, he could always use the
intercom, but energy balls had so much more of an impact.
He
pressed the button on the intercom.
“Yes
sir?”
“Make
me a reservation at Kass, and invite Wendy Potter. She's on 40.
Make sure she says yes, but don’t hurt her.”
Lukas
disconnected the intercom. He waved away
the display, which poofed itself off in a shower of virtual sparks and an
actual “poof” sound, a thoroughly unnecessary flourish that the software
designers had insisted on and Lukas hated.
He leaned back in his chair, pulled a blue cylinder from behind his ear,
and lit it with a flame he clicked out of his right index finger. He dragged deep of the sweet suggarette and
relaxed, exhaling a multicolored cloud that danced and bobbed around him.
Soon
his office filled with the pepper and jasmine smell of sugga, and a rainbow haze
swirled its way along the ceiling. Lukas
stubbed out the butt in the overflowing silver ashtray on his desk.
A
few minutes later, his imp reappeared, opening and closing the door behind him
with sarcastic care. Lukas frowned at
him.
The imp was accompanied by a series of
enticing curves and legs that came together under a smiling face framed by long
blonde hair.
"Wendy
Potter, Mr. Thorne," said the imp by way both of announcement and
introduction.
Lukas
stood, and Wendy walked forward and shook his proffered hand.
"Nice
to meet you, Mr. Thorne," she said.
"No,
nice to meet you, my dear," he responded. He waved away the imp, who stood orange and
awkward in the doorway awaiting instruction.
The imp turned on his claws and prepared to leave.
"Oh,
hey, imp," Lukas said to the retreating figure, who stopped and turned
again.
"Go
get my car and have it downstairs in 20 minutes." Lukas threw the imp a set of keys. The imp caught it and nodded, and then left
the office.
"Now,
Ms. Potter, what can you tell me about the Gray Sisterhood?”
She
was silent for a minute. An eyebrow
raised and lowered itself as if by its own volition.
“I’m
afraid I don’t quite know what you’re
asking me.”
“What
element of the question I asked you are you having trouble with - the words
themselves, or the order I put them in?”
“I—”
“Listen,
my dear, you now know that I know that you know the answer to my question. So…get on with it.”
She
reached for the coat she’d lain across a chair in the corner of the
office. “I’m just going to…”
“Go? But I made dinner reservations. Best restaurant in town. Tasty stuff.
You can’t pass up a free meal, can you?”
“Yes,
I rather think I can.” She proceeded to
walk toward the door.
Lukas
held out his hand and projected a mental image, replaying a conversation he'd
had with a guy who knew a guy who knew about the Sisterhood. It was a circuitous way to find information,
but Lukas didn't have access to anyone closer.
As the image played, Wendy turned around and watched it, her eyes
wide.
It
had been a cold night, and green streetlights pooled foggy circles on the
pavement. Lukas and the informant, a guy
named Guy, were standing in a shadowshroud so as to be hidden from prying eyes
and ears, a circle of darkness that looked like someone had pulled an extra
layer of shadow up over them like a...well, like a shroud. He fast forwarded the image to the proper
moment.
"...new
members of the Sisterhood?" Lukas had asked Guy.
"Yeah,
there have been a few. One works for
you. Wendy Potter. She just joined a few weeks ago, going to be
some kind of special agent for them.”
"Where
does she work in my organization?” Lukas
asked.
Guy
shook his head. "Don't rightly
know."
"So
what will she be doing for the Sisters?"
“Don't
know that either. They have an
initiation period, and then they'll give her an assignment. Sabotage, probably.”
"So
what's the Sisters' game, then?"
Guy
shrugged. "The only thing I know
about the Sisters is that they have some kind of a problem with magic. Their
actual plans are cloaked. Difficult to
penetrate."
Lukas
lowered his hand and the telepagraph dissipated.
"You
want to tell me what your Sisters are up to?
Over that nice dinner I’ve already arranged, perhaps?"
Wendy
Potter’s eyes were frozen fire.
“Consider this my resignation, Mr. Thorne.”
