Price of Power

She felt a nudge which woke her up. She rubbed and opened her eyes, it was Caduka, she seemed a little worried. It was still early, the sun just went beyond the horizon.

"I didn’t want to wake you up, but you have to come to yourself soon, Relay and the rest are done delivering newspapers, he should come soon."

Lariska sat on the edge of the sofa.

"What now?" She asked with half-conscious tone.

"The citizens are rising and they will probably come for her, I don’t know what they will do but looks like they gained on temerity. Possible that our intervention will be necessary, wake up."

She rubbed her eyes again and stood up. She was glad that finally something has moved and soon they will be able to go to the next target. In the next room, Caduka was preparing her for breakfast what she has got from Relay’s family. When Lariska came in she told her to sit at the table.

"Modestly a bit, but there’s nothing more, sorry, I promise that once we are done here I will take you somewhere where we can eat decently."

She gave her poor-looking soup with a slice of bread, then she pulled out her mechanical horn which after a while started to glow violet to warm up it.

"Thank you ...and you do not need to."

"Yet I feel guilty that I force you to starvation and sleeping in such places."

"You did not force me to anything."

"But you won’t say that you would like to be here, just because."

She didn’t want. She started eating, it wasn’t tasting too good but she wasn’t picky. Caduka asked where she was last night but she couldn’t tell, except that everywhere. Nonetheless, when she asked her what she was doing for the rest of the day just to be polite, Caduka already had in her head the precise description of everything she remembered from that day spent with Relay. She wasn’t even in half when he walked to the room and Lariska was finishing her meal.

"How it went?" Caduka asked once he passed the doorstep.

"They captured her, few Violetcoats joined the crowd, the rest was probably defending her but she had nowhere to run. It looks like she ordered them to retreat and she freely gave herself up, they put her in the arrest." He responded.

"What? She is alive?" Lariska stood up.

"Yes, a slight majority was for it to spare her, they were convinced by that she can tell what she has done with food."

"Were there any victims?"

"No, they weren’t using their machines."

"We have to go." Lariska said.

"What? But why?" Caduka was confused.

"They will free her and they will do it soon, we have to get rid of her."

She put on her tailcoat, took her musket and was ready to go out.

"Lari wait! Azure’s done, she’s not a threat anymore. Tomorrow Sister will come, you don’t have to do this."

"They will free her by tomorrow, that is why she ordered them to retreat."

"Listen…"

"No, ones like her do not give up like that, if Sister wants her to be stopped she must be killed."

"I agree with her, the city can starve one more day, but Azure must pay for what has done to all of us." Relay added.

Caduka looked at him, then back at Lariska.

"So... I won’t be able to convince you?"

"Yes, we got a task."

"Fine, I ...you will find me."

"Are you not coming?"

"No, you will find her." Said Caduka lowering down her eyes.

After the last reconnaissance, she knew exactly where to go. She was standing before the building in which they were holding Azure Cloud. It was only an arrest in which the jailed ones were waiting for the trial or transposition to the real prison. Just the day before it was full of civilians who allegedly were 'stealing the food', or in other usually fabricated way were in bad odor with Violetcoats, but then only Azure was there. Those who were guarding her had an absolute prohibition to let anybody in, in case if somebody wanted to free her or kill. They were supposedly usual citizens, but someone had to, there was no police and everyone wearing anything violet was an enemy.

Four guards were wandering in front of Azure’s cell, they were clearly getting impatient. Lariska held the misericord from which the blood of its previous victim was still dripping, she had to do it fast. One, although she didn’t know his magic abilities could teleport away or just use magic to inform who he needed to. She sneaked and waited in hiding for a proper moment. Once all four turned back to her she jumped down on his throat noiselessly covering a distance between them. Before the other three realized what is happening she managed to stick the dagger in the neck of the second one. The third one wanted to catch her but she dodged and stabbed under his chin. The fourth one was too terrified to take any action, but she didn’t care and impaled him to the wall. It was too easy, with all certainty these were just casual civilians. Whatever, on the hook nearby were hanging keys and soon the iron door was no longer closed.

Azure was sitting on a wooden bench opposite the door. She had chains on her ankles, there was no windows in the cell, mattress was lying on the floor together with water cup which she couldn’t reach anyway and on top of that, there were feathers everywhere. Although she let herself be captured she still had bruises all over her body, even her silver hair was partly torn off, but she was calm. Not because she was waiting for the rescue. She was calm because she knew what she did and she could take the consequences of that. When she heard the lock being opened she raised her head.

"I did not expect that they will send precisely you, and so early." Said Azure with enthusiasm when she saw Lariska. She didn’t respond. First, without a hurry she took chains off her ankles, then she turned back to shut down the door. Azure at first was confounded, but she fast realized what was going on and then she asked calmly. "So it was you who set the citizens on me?"

"I showed them the truth and they did what they thought was right."

"And they didn’t meet your expectations so you decided to get rid of me personally?"

Lariska said nothing.

"If you want to kill me anyway, will you tell me at least from whose order?"

"How do you know I am not alone? I have my duty and you broke the rules, Azure, on a huge scale, do you know…"

"I know exactly what I did, if the temporary hunger has to open their eyes then so be it. But tell me, these rules, are to protect Sister before us? Or us before her?"

"They… they are to protect everyone."

"Really? Without me, the absolute lawlessness will take over the town. Maybe at first they will seek an agreement between each other, to drag it on I told them what I did with food, but it will end. Because of you my friend, soon, without a common enemy, someone to blame, they will turn against each other, craving for blood." She added to last words a perfidious note.

"Because you gave them a reason! If not you they would still live in peace, anyway, the Sister will take care of them."

"How do you know? To this time she did not bother to do anything, unless ...she ordered you to do this." She looked at her being glad that she managed to see through her. "Well, I am sorry that it has to end this way."

"I wish it was the end." She said with a heavy heart.

Lariska pulled out her musket and aimed it between her eyes. Azure looked straight into her iris and slowly pushed the gun baller towards her heart, after which she closed her eyes and then straightened up. For that, she wasn’t ready, but she couldn’t do anything anymore.

Caduka was sitting curled up on a roof before the townhall slurping a bottle of wine which she probably has stolen. The day fast became cloudy, light rain was dropping on her nose and she started to feel cold, but she didn’t care about that. There was almost empty down below, stray souls not knowing what to do with themselves were passing each other again and again. One of them could wonder what was this grey figure on the roof, only that they couldn’t see her. You could look just at the place where she was sitting and he wouldn’t see a thing. It was so because she wanted to be alone, not that she was invisible, but she knew that there’s something more to it than just 'she knew how to sneak'. She finished last drops from the bottle and put it down, but she had one more. Yeah, Elise was always repeating her that if she won’t be careful she will fall into alcoholism, and after her longer complaining, she listened, partly. But she had a strong head, what could possibly happen? ...this time.

She had no idea how much time has passed when Lariska sat down next to her. She looked at her with a half–sober smile and returned to the previous position. Lariska immediately noticed two bottles next to her, she didn’t know how to behave. She knew that she had a weakness for alcohol, but for the first time she was seeing her in such state. Yet to her surprise she was quite calm, unlike others. Nah, she was even calmer than usual.

"Lari," Caduka didn’t know how to begin. "why are you so cruel?"

"I… is it about Azure?"

"No, no about her, about you, you didn’t have to kill her, weren’t you taught forbearance? Maybe it’s my fault, but I never killed anybody, your father prefers to work behind the desk… I wonder what could have affected this that now you can just take lives without batting an eye."

'Maybe not so quite without a batting.' thought Lariska. There’s a huge difference between pulling a trigger from a distance and looking at someone you know when he’s taking his last breath.

"But you see what she has done here, someone had to stop her."

"And we did it, even if she would escape tomorrow she would be wanted in the whole kingdom, she wouldn’t make any more harm." She sniffed.

"We have got a task..."

"I know, sorry, let’s leave it." She got befuddled for a while, Sister wanted to just stop, her not necessarily kill, but she felt that further conversation on this topic, especially in her state had no point. Yet, the next Lariska’s question surprised her.

"And what has happened to Velvet?

"She’s ...with family."

"Sister let her go?

"Looks like yes, in the end, she gave her a choice. She could or return to the district and her duties or she would provide funds for her and her family to start a new life, including a new identity. But she didn’t want to run, she preferred to just return and announce her resignation." She sniffled again.

"For how long have you been sitting here? You are all wet." Lariska started to be a little worried.

"A bit."

"Then maybe let’s get out of this rain."

Caduka stood up casually and stretched her old legs a few times almost falling over during it. She looked at the distance and asked:

"Has Relay told you something when he walked you out?"

"He did not walk me out, I knew where to go."

"Well, maybe you’re right, there’s nothing left here for us, anyway ...I promised you something."

End of part two: Illusion.