Sebastian shot across the room like a harpoon with wings. Between two of the last bookshelves still upright, huddled on the floor against the wall, was Argall’s assistant, Miss Primrose Stewart. A slim young human woman, that looked no older than twenty at most, and absolutely not accustom to what had happened.

The young lady looked like she had been attacked by a wild chimney. 

Her skin was covered in haphazard smudges. Soot stains were scattered across her once lively green and white dress, and muted the colors. Bits of hair that hung loose from her once proper bun were singed at different lengths. 

Miss Primrose nearly screamed when we appeared, but recognized us at the last moment. Instead of a yell, she hugged her knees while she stared at us wide-eyed. Sebastian wasn’t deterred. My gargoyle padded over, then nudged her leg with his muzzle, after which he looked at me with a worried whimper. 

I knelt down in front of her. “Señorita Primrose, what happened? Who did this?”

The young woman shuddered like someone had stepped on her grave.

“I don’t know! There were two men, sailors, I think. They just rushed into the main room when I was shelving books. I don’t know where they came from! Their blades glowed … like their eyes.” She touched her forehead to her knees while she shuddered again. “Oh god, their eyes were boiling out fire.” 

Lysander glanced out into the devastation, then swapped a concerned look with me.

“Señorita, please, go on. Are they still here?” I asked softly. “What about your employer, Señor Argall?”

Miss Primrose shook her head frantically. The young woman was at the end of her nerves, but to her credit, she took a deep breath to get her thoughts together. “I don’t know, Doctor. Last I saw him, he was in his office. Those… men… they ransacked this room, then charged to the back for Mr. Argall. I tried to stop them.”

She shuddered once more.

“They tried to stab me. Even the shadows clawed at me. There were just so many shadows. I ran to here and for some reason, they left me alone.”

“I’ll check on Argall,” I told Lysander, then stood and stepped away from the pair.

Something heavy hit the floor from the direction of Argall’s office.

Lysander nodded toward the back room. “Go! I’ll take care of her.”

I tossed him a crimson vial from my belt. 

“For any of her light injuries,” I called over my shoulder while I ran out from between the bookshelves and down the hall. Sebastian was right on my heels. 

If anything, the back room was worse than the front of the shop. Shadows dripped from the walls like a poisonous ink. Books and trinkets were scattered over the tattered carpet like the front room, only these came with a sharp, rancid smell.

Argall himself lay on the floor in a rumpled heap beside his overturned desk. Something was clutched to his chest, but I couldn’t see what it was. The man’s clothes were cut, even singed in places. Next to him lay his glasses, with one lens cracked. He didn’t move. 

I glanced to either side of the doorway, then rushed inside. 

Sebastian barked to my right the instant I took a step. I dropped into a low crouch, just as a cutlass sliced across where I had been a second ago.

The blade itself glowed with a sickly, green-white light, as if the metal burned with death’s own eyes. I sidestepped to my left, while Sebastian spit a furious steaming ball of tar at the figure. It slapped the assassin in the side and ruined his charge. It also knocked him into view.

He wasn’t quite human, thayan, or anything else. I wasn’t sure he was even alive.

What was he? A problem. That was all I had.

The assassin was human enough, male, and gaunt, with death-white skin, wearing singed and torn clothes of a common sailor. Sickly green-white flames boiled out the man’s eyes like a furnace as he swung for my neck with a rasping scream. 

I sidestepped again with a shudder, then parried, even though my hands shook. Steel sparked against steel before I shoved his blade aside. The thing stumbled, and I stabbed him in the ribs. It felt like I had just stabbed a stack of wet paper. A black ichor oozed down around my blade.

At the same time, the scars under my glove burned like fire. I clutched my sword hand while I backed away. 

“What in the hell are you?” I demanded.

I managed one more step before the thing moved. He was so fast, I barely noticed it before he backhanded me with the hilt of his sword. My world exploded into stars. The force of the blow slammed me back against the door frame, while sparks danced at the edge of my vision.

He, the creature, hissed at me, then tried to rush in and stab me. Another hot ball of tar into the thing’s chest from Sebastian put an end to that.

“You’re very fast, señor,” I said in a low tone while I rubbed my eyes.

Was it false bravado? Of course. I was desperate to get away with both Sebastian and Argall, but I needed more time and space for that. My vision was blurry, but I could still see the creature. His burning eyes made him hard to miss. The rest was a blurry, grinning ghoul eager to murder me. 

I snatched a gray vial from my belt and smashed it to the carpet. Fog and smoke swallowed the air as I melted into the smoke, then moved to my left.

The ghoul barreled right through it all at me like a supernatural mad bull, as if I hadn’t done a thing. So much for that idea. 

A quick parry knocked his cutlass aside, then a kick hurled him back against the door frame. The ghoul lunged at me again, only to get slapped in the face with a hot tar. He staggered back, clawing at the tar with one hand while trying a wild swing at Sebastian with the other.

The ghoul was fast. Sebastian was faster. Another ball of hot tar slapped the ghoul in the face again before my gargoyle bounced aside in a flurry of wings.

But it bought me the time I needed. As the ghoul staggered back to claw at the fresh tar, I got my feet under me and stabbed for the gut. He turned sideways, and I missed, but I was able to get a solid backhand across the side of the ghoul’s face not painted with tar.

He shrieked the instant I hit him, wide-eyed, as emerald green flames ran along his withered jaw. Before I could react, the ghoul raced out of the room for the shop’s front. I tore after him.

“Lysander! Assassin!” I yelled out. There was a muffled reply, but I was too focused on running down the tattered figure in front of me to pay attention. 

The creature burst through the doorway into the main room just as one of Lysander’s arcane shields snapped to life to partially block the space past the door. There was a sharp crunch and howl of rage. The shield held, but the ghoul didn’t. He bounced off, then stumbled into the mess of books in the middle of the room. The creature turned to shriek at me when I hurried in a second later.

All at once, those scattered books around the creature rose off the floor, then spun around him like a tornado. Pages and binders glowed with an eerie storm of arcane power from blues and greens to a lurid red. Colored lightning snapped and danced between the books like an untethered storm. 

“Know… you! Remember … you!” the creature hissed at me, then cackled with jagged, broken teeth. 

“A portal?” I yelled out over the storm while I shielded my eyes with a free hand.

“Not possible!” Lysander yelled back, then pulled back his glowing shield to protect himself and Miss Primrose. “The Etherwave would have swallowed him for trying already!”

Then the giggling ghoul shot out a hand to grab at one of the bolts of power.

Why? I don’t know. Didn’t care. It just seemed like a bad idea.

“Oh, no you don’t, señor!”

I snatched a vial from my belt and hurled it at the creature. Glass shattered as acid painted itself across the ghoul’s outstretched hand with a hard sizzle. I followed right behind with a quick slice, but only landed a small cut. More black ooze splattered over my blade and also my coat. The ghoul grabbed his hand and let out a shriek that could shatter the window panes while I stepped back.

Only I was a heartbeat too slow.

The ghoul’s clammy hand lashed out in a blur and clamped down on my throat. I tried to stab him, but he caught my wrist. His grip on my throat was like an iron vise on my neck. I gasped, desperate to breathe.

“Know… you!” the ghoul repeated. His grip tightened as he dragged me closer. 

White arcane constructs from Lysander flew at the thing but couldn’t penetrate the storm. My vision grew dim, as air became a precious memory.

Then a sword, hot with a blue-white aura, sliced into the creature from behind. The ghoul arched its back and shrieked in pain to shake both heaven and hell. It dropped me to the floor as I heard a sound like wet paper being severed. After that, the ghoul dropped to his knees. 

Just behind the creature, at the edge of the arcane storm, Captain Elara Blackwater stood with her dragonfly wings out and ghost blade drawn. Black ichor from the ghoul burned away from her blade with a sharp sizzle like cooking bacon. Arcane winds stirred her captain’s coat while she stalked toward the ghoul with a hard frown. There wasn’t murder in her eyes, but righteous fury. 

I crawled backwards, searching for my own sword with a free hand. Elara advanced on the ghoul like a mythical valkyrie in battle. One slice, then two, separated the ghoul’s head from its body.

The storm, ghoul and all detonated like a ship’s powder room on fire. Almost anyone, or anything not rooted to the spot, was thrown against the nearest wall or furniture. That is, except for Elara.

Captain Elara Blackwater stood firmly at the edge of a burned pile of ash on the ruined carpet. 

“No one,” she growled at the dust, “manhandles my alchemist! My crew!” She turned in a slow circle, eyes bright with determination to end any new threat that might appear.

The explosion had hurled me against the wall, then the floor like a battered, discarded bag. I had done a lot of that lately, and worried it had become a habit. 

Savaged books were tossed in all directions. Smoke from burnt pages, and the sharp smell of broiled skin, wandered the air with gleeful abandon. I dragged the back of a hand against my nose for all the good it did. No stench like to be denied. They were stubborn that way. Across the room, I saw the glimmer of Lysander’s arcane shield over himself and Miss Primrose. 

Everyone seemed safe.

“Thank you,” I croaked to Elara with a smile.

She sheathed her sword then started straight for me; her face a mask of worry. 

“Pedro, how bad are you hurt?”

“Enough,” I sighed as I found my sword.

A groan from the back room caught my ears, followed by a frantic barking. 

“Sebastian? Señor Argall!” I coughed as I hauled myself to my feet with a painful grunt.

“Pedro!” I heard Elara and Lysander call out behind me. But I kept running. 

This time when I ran into the back office, nothing tried to kill me. The novelty was nice. 

Sebastian skidded across the floor to my feet, pawed at my boot, then raced back to Argall. I sheathed my own sword and hurried after. 

The bookseller was still in a rumpled heap on the floor next to his desk. Only now, he was slightly more awake, but he still resembled a beaten sack of potatoes. I ignored the chorus of aches while I knelt down to inspect the man’s injuries. There was plenty and none looked good. I saw at least a dozen cuts along his arms. What wasn’t cut had been burned as if with acid.

“Señor, can you move?” I reached for one of the vials in a belt loop. “I have a curative that should help with the pain until…”

Argall cut off anything else I had to say.

“No! Listen!” He rasped with a wild look on face. 

The bookseller shoved a crumpled piece of paper into my hands. It looked like a page from a journal, filthy with scribbled notes in the margin. Argall gripped my hand and that page. His hands shuddered.

“The Codex,” Argall wheezed. “You were right. Someone else wanted it. Please, get it back. He must not use it!”

“What?” A cold chill stabbed me in the chest. I tried again to reach for that vial. “Señor, we can talk later…”

“No!” he rasped at me. “Not later! Now! The Codex is more than just maps. It’s an ancient blueprint! A guide for something terrible!”

I scowled at that.

“A guide? Who are you taking about? Who attacked you, señor?”

“The Wood-boned man!”