Nightfire | The Whispering Wall #1 - Chapter 58: Chapter 58

Hot wine and a pair of slippers were a luxury when one served in Lord Harkenn's city guard.
The former captain of the guard posts in both Kona and the merchants' quarter was trying very hard not to think about how he had earned them.
Blane settled lower into his chair. His wife was upstairs somewhere, doing whatever mysterious things she usually did when he wasn't there, and he was enjoying the quiet. If only his mind would stop replaying his conversation with the sergeant last week, he might have called himself content.
We can't have the men in charge having nervous breakdowns at the posts, captain. Why don't you take a couple of weeks off and rest?
Blane knew what that meant. He was being put away, and when he returned he would be quietly tacked on to the lowest rung of the ranking ladder so he could be monitored. Nervous breakdown, indeed. Anyone who had seen a dead Unspoken would be shaken up, and that was if it wasn't followed by weeks of meetings and correspondence with the Guild of the deceased, a near-miss with a Fleshmonger, and a cadre of useless new recruits to train up.
Blane thought his response had been perfectly reasonable, all things considered.
At least he was getting paid. His wife might not have been half as patient with having him at home if he wasn't.
He sighed and drained the last of his wine. Despite the fire in the grate, the front room was cold. He'd have to go and get more timber soon; their ration was running low. Blane was sure it was colder than it had been in previous years, but perhaps his sense of time had been skewed by being off duty. There was a rime of frost on the windows, creeping over the lattice like feathery fingers. If he squinted his eyes just so, he thought he could make out the outline of the rune he knew was on the glass, but when he blinked it vanished again. He probably hadn't seen it in the first place. Maybe it was another symptom of his nervous breakdown.
He got up. The cold seeped into his bones and made them stiff. At first he had thought that a couple of weeks off duty would be good for his health, but it only made him feel old, only drew attention to the ever-increasing protests his body made as it aged. Whenever one of the younger members of the city guard hurried past the window, Blane got the most childish urge to throw something after them and make it clang off their helmets.
Maybe he was just going senile.
His wife was tidying in the bedroom, so Blane veered down the hall to his daughter's old room instead. She had left home a few years ago, married a tailor's apprentice and was already pregnant, which left the best view in the house free. Her window overlooked a courtyard which his house shared with several others arranged in a square. Laundry dried stiff and cold in the open space above the yard. Their direct opposite neighbour had left a blanket out too long; it swung in the breeze by the pegs, flexible as a wooden board.
"Going out," his wife called. At some point she'd gone downstairs, but Blane hadn't noticed.
"Fine. Be safe."
He fumbled in his robe for his pipe. It was an old habit, one he'd abandoned when he joined the guard, but being at home was terribly boring.
He would never admit that he was secretly quite glad he wasn't patrolling during the dark season, but staring out at the relentless gloom, he indulged it a little. During the dark days, city guard patrols worked in close proximity to the Unspoken, and squadrons in the quarters nearest the mountains all had an Unspoken with them at all times. The demons were bad enough by themselves. Blane respected the demon hunters – rather them than him any day – but preferred to work at a healthy distance, not least because the Unspoken were always closest to where the demons were.
A noise in the courtyard drew his eye downwards. There was very little light aside from that emanating from the windows of the surrounding houses, and at first he didn't see anything. He took another deep drag of his pipe, and through the cloud of smoke he saw something move.
He swatted away the pipe smoke and pressed his nose against the glass, straining against the gloom. Something hunched in the corner of the courtyard, a shadow within the shadow, which he only spotted because something glinted in the light from a nearby window as it moved.
"Bloody louts," he muttered. Thievery became rife in the dark season; not everyone was content to live within their means or keep to the rationing system. Guard post jail cells were never empty at this time of year.
He crossed quickly to the hallway and hurried into his own bedroom, where his truncheon leant against the bedpost. He hadn't been allowed to keep his sword while he wasn't on duty, but no one had said anything about the club, and it never hurt to have a bit of extra protection. A thrill went through him as he picked it up. The past few weeks had pushed him to his limit; it felt good to be back at the usual routine. No horrifically murdered Unspoken this time, no glowing sky holes; just a straightforward job intercepting a robbery.
He pulled on a padded vest over his robe and hurried back downstairs, listening all the way for the sound of shattering glass or screaming. When he reached the courtyard door and peered through the window, he worried for a moment that his quarry had already made a move while he'd been getting ready, but then he saw a shadow disappear around the corner.
He threw the door wide and hurried out, truncheon clutched tight at his side. He stalked across the courtyard. His opposite neighbour's front door was situated down a small alleyway that gave access to the street beyond, too, and the intruder was squatting in it, backlit by a distant streetlamp.
It wasn't a robber.
"Oh, Kiel preserve me," Blane breathed, as the Haunt rose on its haunches and sniffed at the door. It didn't seem to have noticed him.
Blane had only seen Haunts one or twice as a child, when he was living in the outer districts. They simply didn't come into the city – except, apparently, this one – and that was a blessing. Any variety of Geist could cause a catastrophe by itself.
Unspoken. Blane blinked and focused his thoughts. Need to find an Unspoken.
Yet he stayed where he was, transfixed by the horror in front of him. Haunts weren't the ugliest of demons, but they weren't pretty to look at. They were spindly, long-limbed and bony; they could fit into narrow spaces and cling to walls and ceilings, waiting to drop on prey from above. Its thin face was dominated by a huge pair of milky eyes and a lower jaw that unhinged. Skin bunched under its chin and rippled when it moved, a shrivelled bag that could stretch to horrifying proportions. Blane could only thank the gods he'd never seen one hunt, but he knew of its methods and he had no desire to see it in action, or worse, attract its attention and become a meal himself.
For the moment, the Haunt seemed distracted by the rune-warding on the door. Blane backed away, grateful that he'd worn his slippers outside and even more grateful that Haunts didn't have the hearing of a Listener. He only took a breath when the door was shut behind him, and once that barrier was between them, the spell broke and he was able to think clearly. Unspoken. He had to find a demon hunter, and fast. The demon had been staring much too intently at that particular door, which meant it sensed a weakness. It couldn't be allowed to get inside.
He ran out into the street, where it was thankfully better lit. The pavement on his street was warded, and he had always counted himself damn lucky to be living on it, but never more so than he did now. He paused on his front step, unsure where to start. Might as well pick a direction and run. He had to come across a hunter eventually.
People stared as he ran past. He realised he was still clutching his truncheon in one hand, and must have looked a madman hurtling along the streets in a padded military-issue vest and his slippers.
"Stay on the wards!" he cried. "Stay on the wards, night take me!"
He could only assume his cries were what alerted the Unspoken to his search, because he found one very quickly, and they didn't seem at all surprised when he skidded to a stop in front of them, panting and sweating. They had an apprentice with them. Blane hoped to every god listening that he hadn't just run into that abrasive pucker of an arsehole, Yddris.
Blane had nothing against the Unspoken, but Yddris was a shit and no mistake.
"Well met," the Unspoken said evenly, revealing themselves to be male and, thankfully, not Yddris.
"There's a Haunt in my courtyard," Blane snapped, not in the mood for pleasantries. "It's trying to get inside my neighbour's house."
"A Haunt?" the man asked, sounding troubled. "Are you sure?"
"Sure as I have eyes," Blane growled. He spat into a gutter. He was too old to be running around like that anymore.
"Astra," the Unspoken said to his apprentice, without looking away from Blane, "Nika is patrolling on the North Way tonight. Would you go and fetch him, please?"
His apprentice nodded and took off down the street, making it look a breeze. Blane scowled after her, massaging his aching spine.
"Would you take me?" the Unspoken said. He was already moving. Blane forced his protesting joints back into motion, drawing alongside with a great deal of effort. Kiel's teeth, his back ached. When all this was over, he was taking a bath, and his wife could whine about it all she liked. Just like her to disappear right before a Haunt pitched up at the back door.
He was still grumbling to himself when they reached his house, and he paused as the severity of the situation began to sink in once more. People could die today if they weren't careful, and he was complaining about his back.
"Do we need to wait for your, ah, colleague?" Blane asked, letting them inside. He couldn't say he had ever had an Unspoken inside his house before. By the night, this one was tall. Or perhaps it was just claustrophobic, what with the man taking up all the space with his strange crackling.
"No need to wait." The demon hunter crossed to Blane's back door and peered out. "I just want him to look at the corpse."
"I see." Blane paused. "Why?"
"Haunts shouldn't come into cities. There hasn't been a city sighting in decades. I'm very much hoping that this one is sick and addled and that we don't have to anticipate coming across more of them."
"Oh, I hope so too." The Deaths were bad enough. The city had a hard enough time with just the one type of Geist; the mountains could keep the rest of them.
"My colleague is a physician," the Unspoken continued. "But has some expertise in demon anatomy as well. Better than anyone else has, at any rate." He took a sharp breath. "Night take me, it's definitely a Haunt."
"That's what I said." Blane frowned.
"Are they well off, your neighbours? I would advise getting that net checked as soon as possible, if they can afford it." Without waiting for a response, the Unspoken opened the back door and strode out, green flames flaring to life around him. Blane hurried to the doorway, but didn't dare cross the threshold, and his hand tightened on the door in readiness to slam it shut if the need arose.
The Haunt hissed, chilling him to the bone. He couldn't see the creature past the Unspoken, but he heard its claws on the cobbles, its low growling. It shrieked, piercing and loud enough for the whole street to hear it. Faces appeared in several windows around the courtyard.
Splintering wood. Blane strained his sight, but couldn't see what had broken until the Unspoken pitched forward and disappeared through the gaping hole that used to be the neighbour's front door. Bright green flashed in the windows; a shout; another screech. Cold air touched the back of Blane's head and he shuddered, temporarily distracted.
"Is it dead yet?" a voice said at his shoulder, and Blane near jumped out of his skin. He hadn't heard the Unspoken approach, or the front door close. He bit his tongue on the foul abuse that bubbled up his throat in response.
"I don't think so," he said tightly, through gritted teeth. "Night take me, you're quiet."
"Apologies," the Unspoken called Nika replied, not sounding sorry in the least. "I thought you heard me knock."
You didn't bloody knock.
The apprentice pushed past Blane and hurried out into the courtyard.
"Astra," Nika called, but the girl wasn't listening. With a heavy sigh, Nika followed, muttering. "These bloody apprentices..."
Blane hovered in the doorway, fear warring with an odd sense of duty. It was the break messing with his head, he was sure of it, but a life in the city guard made sitting on the side-lines an unappealing prospect.
If he hadn't been watching anxiously for the three Unspoken to emerge, Blane might not have spotted the figure creeping up the alleyway towards the ruined front door. They were dressed all in black, and at first Blane wondered if the apprentice had fetched every demon hunter in the vicinity. But there was something not right about them; they were cloaked, but it wasn't the distinctive cut of traditional Unspoken garb. The cowl was pointed, and not near so deep, but he still couldn't make out a face from this distance. Blane raised a hand to hail them, warn them not to enter the building in case the Haunt was still alive, but something stopped him. His fingers curled, cold stealing down his spine.
"Hey," he croaked, raising his truncheon in fingers suddenly weak with fear. This was no Unspoken. He wasn't even sure why he was so scared, only he was sure that something awful was about to happen. The figure shifted at the sound of his voice, startled, and a blade flashed at him. "Civilians are not permitted to carry swords, sir." He started at a brisk trot across the courtyard, dismissing his nerves as superstition as his training kicked in. "I'm afraid I will have to relieve you of your weapon."
The figure gave no response, but Blane knew he was watched. Drawn by the sound of voices, presumably, the apprentice stepped outside.
The next few moments passed in a blur.
The figure moved like a flash of lightning, blade spinning, aiming for the girl. Blane shook off his stupor and charged forward with a bellow, truncheon raised high above his head.
Astra's tutor appeared, stepping swiftly in front of her, magic flaring. The blade came down. Blane skidded to a stop. At the touch of the sword, the Unspoken's magic had gone out without warning; the Unspoken looked as stunned as Blane felt. His mouth swung open, and no one moved for what felt like an age. In that moment of hesitation, the stranger darted forward, and within the next blink the glittering point of the sword was sticking out of the Unspoken man's back, glinting crimson.
Blane didn't remember moving. One moment, he was watching a nightmare unfold, and the next he stood over the figure, prone and still at his feet, a dark pool spreading from under the hood. His hand was still buzzing from the force with which he had swung his truncheon.
A soft sigh as the Unspoken man collapsed. A sword clattered on the ground. Nika's voice gasped a hoarse curse from the doorway.
Astra began to scream.