Bloodlight Read online

  BLOODLIGHT

  Edward Nile

  MechWizard Press

  www.mechwizardpress.com

  A MechWizard Press book

  Copyright © 2019 Edward Nile

  All rights reserved.

  Cover art by Manthos Lappas

  For my lover, my best friend, my guiding light.

  For my shining Star.

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  My condolences to those poor souls, the captive audiences of friends and loved ones forced to hear my rants and complaints throughout the creation of this book. My heart goes out to those of you, in particular, who had to read my disastrous early drafts. I regret to announce you'll have to go through the nightmare all over again.

  And I love you all for it.

  CONTENTS

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Chapter 38

  Chapter 39

  Chapter 40

  Chapter 41

  Chapter 42

  Chapter 43

  Chapter 44

  Chapter 45

  Chapter 46

  Chapter 47

  Chapter 48

  Chapter 49

  Chapter 50

  Chapter 51

  Chapter 52

  Chapter 53

  Chapter 54

  Chapter 55

  Chapter 56

  Chapter 57

  Chapter 58

  Chapter 59

  Dear Reader:

  Chapter 1

  Freezing rain drenched an alley in Crow’s Quarter.

  Each drop stung Ludin’s swelling face. Blood from his nose was washed away with the pattering downpour.

  His friends’ grunts and gasps of pain mingled with the taunting laughter of the victors.

  Ulsi clutched her gut and fell to her knees. Had she been stabbed?

  Ludin crawled toward her. She caught his eye and shook her head. Not stabbed, then. In pain, scared, but not dying. Yet.

  Kennan went down next, falling spread-eagle into a nearby pool of sludge. The big man’s head flopped to one side, eyes fluttering. Kennan’s chest rose and fell. He didn't move to get up.

  A piece of fruit rolled past, an incongruent splash of color in the alley’s gray and brown palette, rivaled only by bright bloodstains splattered across bricks and cobblestones.

  Halser, Ludin's friend and the leader of their small group, groaned as Grinwal kicked him in the ribs again. That at least proved Halser was still breathing. For now.

  “What’s this, Hal?” Grinwal held up a peach, its peel mottled yellow and red. “I miss somethin’? Did the deal change without nobody telling me?”

  “Didn’t mean it like that Grin, I swea-“

  Grinwal struck Halser in the mouth, his fist weighted by the fruit.

  “Tsk, look at that, perfectly good peach gone to waste.” Grinwal tossed the mangled remnant aside and wiped his hand on Halser’s shirt. Shining blood trickled from Halser’s mouth and mingled with the smeared pulp on his chin.

  “Didn’t mean what, Hal?” Grinwal continued. “Didn’t mean to steal on my block? Tough to believe. Get yourself lost?”

  His gang snickered as if on cue.

  Halser squeezed his eyes shut. “No... No, Grin.”

  Grinwal formed a silent ‘O’ with his mouth and nodded. “I see. So you knew you were on my turf, and decided to go ‘head and do it all the same.”

  “We just...” Halser coughed out a wad of bloodied spit. “We just needed some food.”

  “Nah, nah.” Grinwal knelt beside Halser. “Need to eat, eh? Come to me and take a loan, square up later. You’ll pay interest but that won’t cost you so much as stealin’ from me. ‘Cause that’s what you did, Hal. Stole from me.” He jabbed a thumb at his own chest. “Take from the idiots who stumble into the Quarter to slum it, okay. That’s life, that’s how we make it. Take from the businesses in my block, I call that stealin’. Makes us look bad when you hit a shop we squeeze for protection; loses us business. Wanna talk food? You took straight out of our bellies with this stunt. Who do you think that veggie slinger called after your bunch took off with his goods? Constables? Bloody Investigators?”

  Grinwal shook his head. “Nah, Hal, he told me. He told me ‘cause I’m the one what takes his money and says he won’t get hit by no one else. He gets looted by some pissant crew from Crow’s Quarter, that doesn’t make me n’ my boys look too reliable. Can’t have it happen, Hal.”

  “It-it won’t. I promise, Grin. I’ve learned my lesson.”

  “Oh, I know you have.” Grinwal took up another peach as his people formed a circle around them. Grinwal leaned in as if to whisper in Halser’s ear. His words carried.

  “Now you’ll help me teach your friends theirs.”

  Two of Grinwal’s subordinates pinned a struggling Halser down. Grinwal shoved the peach between Halser’s teeth and clamped a hand over his mouth. Ludin watched Halser’s legs splash about as he choked.

  He’s killing Hal. The thought belonged to another person, in another world. Ludin’s friend was dying right before his eyes, and it didn’t feel real.

  Halser had known the risks when he planned this.

  They all had…

  “We need to eat.”

  They huddled around a fire in their basement hovel. The remnants of a condemned building, it sported spots of mold and holes in the rotting ceiling, some crudely patched with scraps of canvas.

  Flickering firelight made Halser’s face gaunter than it was, but not by much. Ludin didn’t remember the last time he’d studied himself in a mirror. He doubted he looked any better.

  “But it’s Grinwal’s turf,” Ulsi said. “What if we’re caught?”

  “What can we do if we starve?” Halser scoffed. “From where I’m looking, we’re out of options.”

  “There are rules,” Ulsi insisted. “Grinwal’s crew doesn’t come into our block- “

  “Why would he?” Hal snapped. “He’s got a corner of Market Square, twice as many shops in one block as in the whole Quarter. No one comes to our block, because there’s nothing here to steal.”

  Rumor had it Halser had hopped between crews before starting his own in the northern end of Crow’s Quarter. Why he hadn’t stuck with other gangs, what his former leaders had done to drive him away, he never mentioned. In the end, he’d come here and gathered his little group in a derelict block, far enough from the other gangs not to pose a threat. Too far from anything of value to eke a living.

  Few voiced any objection, and fewer challenged him for the area. Halser probably had Kennan’s hulking form to thank for that, though one wouldn’t think it to see the starved giant now.

  For his part, Ludin liked Halser. He was a decent person, a twenty-something year old man who genuinely wanted to keep his friends alive. But Halser wasn’t leadership material, that was plain to see. Not for a Crow’s Quarter gang.

  “There has to be another way,” argued Ulsi. “Kennan, back me up here.”

  The big man’s eyes widened. “I don’t know...” His hesitant voice was a deep, low rumble. “But I think Hal’s right. We need food.”

  It was especially true of the big man. Kennan’s shirt grew baggier by the week, hanging off a form designed to hold far more muscle than his diet could sustain.

  “At what cost? Come on, Ken, what if we’re caught? You going to fight Grin’s crew?”

  “I...” Kennan looked to Hal and Ludin in turn. His eyes dropped to his palms, laying open on his lap. “I’ll do whatever Hal decides.”

  “Lu?” Ulsi rounded on him.

  Ludin’s stomach growled as he met her gaze. He looked away just as fast. “I wish there was another option,” he said. “And we’ll have to find a better solution, another day. But we won’t have another day if we don’t eat. I’m with Hal on this.”

  “Really?” Ulsi snapped. “You don't have anything to add to the conversation? Any other ideas?”

  Ludin shook his head. He fidgeted with his pant leg, his hand itching to reach into his pocket. Instead he stared into the fire, feeling Ulsi's eyes bore into him.

  “Leave him alone,” Halser interjected. “If you don’t want in on this, Ulsi, I won’t force you. But it’s happening.”

  She sniffed. “If I let you idiots go alone, you’ll definitely die.”

  “That mean you’ll help?” Ludin couldn’t tell if Halser’s tone was apprehensive, or hopeful. He had a habit of trying to shield her from the riskier jobs.

  Ulsi shrugged. “I’m not ready to go back to the way things were. And that’s what’ll happen, if I try to make it on my own. So yeah, I’m in. But we have to be careful
.”

  Halser nodded. “Of course. I don’t plan on dying tonight.”

  Ludin was the spotter. He was always the damned spotter. At a few inches over five feet, he wasn’t large or particularly strong. When it came to anything smelling like a fight, Halser made sure to keep Ludin on the sidelines. But Ludin had other uses. He was quick-thinking, and fast on his feet.

  Ulsi strolled beneath the awning, wearing a clean dress she kept aside just for this type of job. No amount of foundation or rouge could hide the hollowness of her cheeks, but that dress, along with the yellow scarf to mask just how thin she was, would hopefully keep the vendor from getting too suspicious. Some people were just the sickly sort, after all.

  Most importantly, the makeup covered her lineage. Ulsi also wore tinted glasses, crucial for this type of venture. If the shopkeeper saw Ulsi’s race, it’d be over.

  Ludin darted glances toward the corridors of produce stands forming their own little maze beneath the awning, but was careful not to let his gaze stray too often. His job was to watch the street, to be alert for any hidden security they might have missed. A simple produce salesman wasn’t likely to have hired muscle on duty to catch shoplifters. Still, stranger things happened.

  The vendor was an old man, bald except for stray wisps of gray hair sticking out at odd angles behind his ears. He sat with his sleeves rolled up, and when he wasn’t rubbing flaky red spots on his elbows, he scratched at the washboard-flat surface of his stomach. His watery eyes roved everywhere at once beneath drooping brows, darting Ludin’s way several times.

  Ludin remained just at the edge of the man’s wares, not paying any obvious attention to the arrayed goods.

  The old man spared plenty of suspicion for his patrons as well. There was a handful other than Ulsi, quietly looking through piled fruits and vegetables as rain continued its incessant patter against the awning. Thankfully, he didn’t single Ulsi out.

  Rain and winter’s chill made a bad combination. With Ludin’s rough sweater soaked in frigid water, he wondered if he’d be better off naked. He shivered and rubbed at his arms in vain, blinking cold drops from his eyes.

  Inclement weather did nothing to slow down commerce in Market Square, any more than twilight did. Ludin often wondered if it was a cruel joke that Delstad’s center of trade, an area in business day and night, was situated right beside the slums, where it was not unheard of to see a parent crying in the street upon finding their child dead in their sleep.

  Voices and drumming rain bled into an indecipherable cacophony, at odds with the squealing of a badly tuned fiddle somewhere in the throng. It made for a garish clash of noise, as unsettling as the smell of spices and produce mingled with sweat, mildew, and piss.

  Ludin scanned the crowd for the gray of a constable’s uniform. Moreover, he searched for others who might blend in with the press or emerge from an alley. He didn’t recognize any faces from Grinwal’s crew. He prayed he wouldn’t.

  Kennan and Halser appeared, stumbling arm and arm. An earthenware crock passed hands between them, sloshing its rainwater contents about with every exaggerated drunken swig. It was an old, trick, but not something a produce salesman would expect over a few pieces of fruit. Hopefully.

  Even with his back to the old man, Ludin could virtually feel his attention turn to the newcomers. With an inconspicuous glance over his shoulder, Ludin saw the vendor unfold like a spider.

  Here we go. It wasn’t too late to turn back. They could play safe and abandon this scheme.

  Ludin’s stomach groaned, audible even over the rain and the chattering marketplace. He clenched his teeth. Fuck Grinwal. We need this.

  “Don’t have nothing for your kind,” the old man’s rasp was no doubt an effect of the pipe he took from between his teeth. It trailed a thin ribbon of smoke as he gestured Ludin’s friends away.

  “C’mon, don’t be like that." Halser faked a hiccough and pointed at a box of cantaloupes. “I’ll take some of, uh, whatever dos tings are.” Kennan let out a booming laugh and slapped Halser on the back. His huge hand knocked Halser into one of the stands. Halser, and the stand, crashed to the ground.

  This was Ludin’s cue. He spun around to find Ulsi making her move. She grabbed the end of a wooden box. Ludin took hold of the other end, and they ran with the goods held between them. The old man shouted after them, but by then they’d reached the end of the block.

  Halser and Kennan met them in an alley back in Crow’s Quarter. The four of them fell on the stolen bounty, gnawing into the wrinkled peaches like animals.

  By the time they saw Grinwal’s group, it was too late…

  “Get down,” Ulsi hissed.

  Ludin didn’t remember standing. He watched Halser thrash about, gargling as he choked.

  The glow in Hal’s veins pulsed. His light flared and waned, the dormant power of Bloodlight straining to break free. It wasn’t enough. Glowing blood did nothing but mark him for what he was. What they all were.

  What we must have been like, Ludin thought as he watched the barbaric display.

  Grinwal grit his teeth with the effort of suffocating Halser, whose struggles grew weaker by the second. Grinwal’s own light flared with passion, bright with the rush of the kill.

  How tall we must have stood. Now we’re just animals. Dogs fighting for scraps.

  “Lu, stop.”

  Ludin turned to Ulsi, confused. Somehow, he’d moved farther from her and closer to the violence. Rain washed her makeup away in streaks, revealing the luminescence of her veins beneath paper-white skin. Her glasses lay shattered from a boot heel in the initial struggle, her wig torn from her head. Ulsi was bared to the world for what she was. A lightblood, with glowing eyes and white hair. Like Ludin, like Grinwal and his thugs.

  Ludin kept walking, getting closer to Grinwal. He didn’t know what he was doing or why. Somewhere, in another world, his stomach roiled, the ache of hunger contending with his bruises. All his pain, all his fear, belonged to someone else.

  “What d’ya think you’re doin’?” One of the thugs, near twice Ludin’s size, stepped forward and raised his club. Ludin looked past him at Halser’s bulging eyes, their light flashing and dimming with terror.

  For all his good intentions, Halser still let them starve. Whether or not his was the only death tonight, they’d all suffer the same fate sooner or later, to be killed or enveloped into gangs like Grinwal’s. Ludin remembered rough hands in the night, remembered the pain and shame of violations by those stronger than him, who figured he was too small, too timid to do anything about it.

  Halser never did that. With him, we were safe. But safe, as it turned out, wasn’t worth shit.

  “I said what do ya think you’re do-“

  “Look at him.” Another one of them took a step back. “Something isn’t right. Grin.”

  Grinwal took his hands off Halser and stood.

  Halser didn’t move.

  “Get back, Little Lu,” Grinwal snapped.

  Seeing the twinge of apprehension in Grinwal’s eyes, the nervous flicker of his light, Ludin was surprised to realize the gang leader wasn’t much older than him. How had he never noticed that before? What is it he sees? Ludin felt strange. Distant, numb, barely aware of his injuries. Everything else, however, everything Ludin saw and heard, became astoundingly clear. Am I dying? He heard something, a sound at the periphery of his senses. A high-pitched ring, growing more piercing by the moment.

  “Hit him!”

  The thug swung his club.

  Ludin raised an arm over his head, bracing himself for the blow.

  The weapon exploded.

  Ludin’s world slowed down. The club disintegrated into hundreds of splinters, blossoming outward like a flower. Wood shrapnel broke against stone walls, its clattering muffled beneath the ring in Ludin’s ears. Everything moved at a lethargic speed, as though the air had turned to soup.

  Things sped up in a rush. Splinters from the sundered weapon blasted into Ludin’s attacker.

  The thug stumbled back, the glow in his wide eyes going dim. Spots of luminescent blood sprouted where shards stuck in his flesh like jagged pins. With a gurgling sound not so different from Halser’s choking moments ago, he flopped to the ground.

  “F-fuck!” Grinwal backed away and tripped over Halser. The gang leader splashed into a puddle and crawled on his hands through the sludge.

  Grinwal’s remaining lackeys dashed off.