Allegro 8: Questions

The most common talents that manifest are elemental and reactional: earth, water, air, fire, and lightning.

— Talents: The Weaker Powers

On foot, it took Linsan almost two hours to reach the center of town. As she did, she worked out how she would respond to any question or offer she imagined he would make. She figured the jobs she could accept and how far she would go to earn money.

But her thoughts kept going, getting more fantastic and improbable by the footstep. It wasn't long before her imagination was having her traveling across the world in an airship or working as a spy in another country. A small part of her knew that she was reliving the plots of her mother's plays but the familiar stories kept the knot in her stomach from eroding her courage.

By the time she was halfway there, she had exhausted her imagination. To avoid dwelling on hypotheticals not even possible on a stage, she entertained herself by admiring the architecture around the city. It looked like every fifth building was being torn down. The classic styles with carved pillars and reliefs were in the process of being replaced by two- and three-story buildings with intricate wrought iron, massive windows, and delicate stonework.

In the back of her head, she couldn't imagine how much the new construction cost or tamp down on the growing jealousy. Her family was struggling to pay the bills but everyone else seemed to be prospering.

Her confidence faded with doubt. Did Dukan already have skilled employees? She couldn't do much besides play a violin and dance and she wasn't sure if she had a place among the money being thrown around to build everything. She was just a poor girl from the edge of town, not the fancily dressed ladies walking around her.

She reached the city square. The center was a large park with plenty of places for picnics, galleries, and even a small zoo with “marvelous beasts from the forbidden deserts!”

Curiosity tugged at her to go inside to see the creatures but she didn't have the time and she needed the cukdins in her pocket for lunch.

Not wanting to tease herself with the zoo, she circled around until she spotted Dukan's bank on the far side. It was just like she remembered, a one-story building that reached deep into the block. Six thick pillars marked the entrance, each one depicting old men holding something in front of them. Each one was different: a stack of books, an intricate staff, a pair of coins, a large mechanical lock, a miniature house, and an equally small ship. She vaguely remembered them as heads of the various banking unions throughout Gepaul, but she didn't know their names or even the significance of each item.

Linsan hesitated on the opposite side of the road, one foot in the park and the other on the boardwalk that surrounded it. Around her, men in suits and ladies in dresses hurried along as they headed to their jobs and hobbies.

She felt scared and nervous. Tugging on her ratty coat, she couldn't decide if she should take it off or leave it on. It was warm but the sweat prickling her brow came from her nervousness, not the sunlight that rose above the roofs.

A high-pitched horn cut through the din. She turned to the sound as a vehicle came rolling around the corner. It was another of the automatic carriages, the black panels shining as the drivers honked their horns to chase horses and people out of the way.

Seeing the vehicles was another change that Linsan hadn't gotten used to yet. She knew only the rich could afford them but there were dozens on the road and more parked in front of buildings and houses. Even though horses still outnumbered the steam-belching devices by twenty to one, there were a lot more wealthy folk in town that she could have imagined.

The car's thin, rubber tires kicked up dirt and leaves onto the boardwalk as it drove dangerously close to pedestrians. Like a wave, people stepped away from the edge as the vehicle approach Linsan.

She stepped back to avoid it, but then bumped into someone walking behind her. She cringed as a surge of claustrophobia and fear slammed into her. She froze and prepared to get struck.

To her relief, the vehicle rolled past. The ground shook underneath her feet from its passing. A cloud of acidic steam followed after it along with the heavy scent of burning oil and wet leather.

The driver surprised her. It was a woman driving by herself. The slender lady wore a beautiful green dress with a matching gloves and hat. The hat had lace covering her face and a few large feathers brushing the roof of the car. Loose, black curls rolled off her silk-covered shoulders.

Linsan smiled to herself. It was an outfit Linsan's mother would have loved wearing on stage. She could almost picture it.

The car squealed and then came to a shuddering halt.

Linsan stepped away.

The lady driver slipped out smoothly and came around the back of the car. She had a small purse in her hand but looked like she was going to a formal dinner with the way she walked with almost perfect posture that left her back arched just slightly and neck held high.

Linsan couldn't help but smile again at the sight. After seeing her mother's craft, she could tell the driver strained slightly to keep herself in the right position and watched her steps from the corner of her eyes. She was showing off for the public but didn't have the years of physical practice.

Their eyes met for just a second and then the lady continued past the car without giving any indication that she saw Linsan. She headed around the backside with her black hair bouncing with every step. Her curls glistened in the sunlight.

A trio of carriages approached, driving fast with the horses in a lather.

The woman stopped to let them pass, but her gaze was focused on the bank. To Linsan, it was clear that she was heading inside.

Linsan watched with a sinking sensation. She couldn't just follow after someone as poised as that. She was plain and unassuming, even in her best dress. Pressing her lips into a thin line, she considered waiting fifteen minutes to let the lady driver do whatever errand she needed before she went inside.

She turned and looked back at the zoo. Maybe she could peek at the creatures? She had a few cukdins in her pocket.

“Linsan? Linsan Sterlig?”

She froze at her name coming from a voice that danced on the edge of recognition. Slowly, she turned around.

The woman had stopped in the road and turned around. She wore a slight smile as she came back to stop behind her car. She gave Linsan a quick look. “What are you doing here?”

Linsan opened her mouth but she didn't know what to say.

With a delicate step, the woman in green stepped into the boardwalk. “I haven't seen you in… what? Three years? Four?”

The look of amusement faded and a flicker of an old, familiar anger bubbled up. “You still have that ruined valley? Or that shitty home on the edge of town?”

It took only a heartbeat longer for Linsan to realize who she was talking to. The disdain and disgust that erased the culture from Brook's voice brought back memories.

Linsan's stomach clenched and she felt sick and humiliated. “Y… Yes.”

Brook snorted and pointedly looked at Linsan from head to toe, this time with disapproval. Her dark gaze could be felt more than seen. It took a long count before she looked up again. She just shook her head and gave an exasperated sigh.

Linsan blushed.

Brook looked around. “You by yourself?”

None of Linsan's “what if” scenarios had covered Brook. She stammered for a moment and then gestured toward the bank with a halfhearted gesture. “I was hoping to talk to your dad.”

Brook looked at her sharply. “Finally selling off your crap you shoved in our vaults?”

Linsan tensed. “Never.”

“Then what, begging for money?”

Linsan's blush grew hotter. She looked away to avoid Brook's gaze.

Brook snorted.

Linsan struggled to say something but then three men cut between them to cross the street.

All three wore leather dusters, long coats that were suited for traveling on the roads but rarely seen inside town. The smell of smoke clung to them and small motes of ash danced in the wind of their passing.

She leaned to the side to keep talking to Brook but then she caught sight of an instrument case slung over the lead man's back. It was clearly for a string instrument, with a long neck and wide body, but the proportions were off. She did a double-take and then peered at it.

The instrument was larger than a violin or viola but smaller than a cello. It had a broader body but with a thinner depth. The scuffed leather of the case had been ripped, torn, and repaired repeatedly. One corner looked like it had been used as a club judging from the crumbled end and dark stains.

It was not anything Linsan had seen before, neither in her father's books or from her own experiences.

Then she realized Brook was staring pointedly at her. With her cheeks burning, Linsan clasped her hands together and nodded. “Just a little more. We just need a bit more help.”

Brook scoffed. “It's been years, what makes you think it's going to get better now? A hundred cukdins more a month or even a thousand, your family is still going to be scraping the bottom of the barrel.”

“It isn't that.”

Brook pointed at the bank. “It is that! You have that stupid wooden… thing in the vault that would set you up for life. My dad said it was worth millions. Millions of Couple-damn cuks and your parents are so full of themselves that they can't see they could be as rich as us if they just let it go!”

Linsan couldn't respond to that.

In the distance, she heard someone playing music. A few chords of a melody drifted right at the edge of her hearing. The sound was a jangle of noise, not the hum of a violin but something harsher. It took her a moment to guess that whoever was playing had metal strings, not gut.

Brook stepped closer, her voice rising. She was slightly taller than Linsan in her boots and the smell of her flowery perfume surrounded Linsan. “You chose this.”

“We didn't—”

“You all made a choice to be poor and you know it. All you had to do was stop clinging to your past and you could be richer than us! But, you decided that it was more important to leave all that money gathering dust in a room than get on with your lives! Why?”

Linsan shivered with discomfort. She wanted to run away. Brook was right, she was asking for money like a fool. Tears burned in her eyes as she berated herself for even considering coming to the bank.

The music grew louder. It was a style of music that she had never heard before, punchy with a beat that teased her ears. She wanted to look back into the park to find the source but Brook kept her pinned with her presence.

“I—” Brook's face froze for a moment. Then the anger drained out of her and she sighed. “Just… leave,” she said while waving her hand dismissively. “There is no way Daddy is going to help you anymore.”

Linsan's jaw tightened with annoyance. Her right hand tightened into a fist.

Brook's eyes narrowed as some of the anger returned. “Try it. You throw a punch and I will have my attorney evicting your parents before you can run home.”

“You mean your father's?” snapped Linsan. She was rapidly losing all semblance of control in the conversation.

“No, mine. I pay them.” Brook leaned forward until Linsan had to step back. “Unlike you, I've actually done something with my life and I have a pretty nest egg of my own. It's right there in that bank next to that dusty, old piece of—”

The front doors of the bank burst open in a flash of light and a burst of air that kicked out clouds of dust and discarded papers.

Linsan jerked back reflexively.

Brook turned her head to look toward the bank but her shoulder struck Linsan. She spun back and shoved Linsan away. “You fucking bitch, I'm—”

The air around them grew heavy, pressing down on Linsan's skin. Linsan watched as a firestorm gathered inside the bank and then burst out of the windows and doors, howling as gasses jetted out of the now gaping openings.

With a gasp, Linsan looked at Brook who seemed to have forgotten the flash in her rage.

“—going to sue—”

There was no time. Linsan grabbed the front of Brook's dress. The material ripped as she clenched with all her might. Then she yanked Brook to the side, bouncing off the back of the car parked next to them before swinging her around the far side.

Brook's shoulder slammed into the back door, cracking the glass. Her mouth opened in surprise as she failed to pull Linsan's hands away. “Get—”

Linsan rolled around and then dropped down to hide behind the door. Her weight tore at Brook's dress even further, exposing the silk underclothes across her chest but Linsan's effort forced Brook to drop to one knee.

Brook drew back and shoved Linsan with both hands. “—off!”

An explosion drowned out anything else Brook said. The concussion wave crashed into the car, shoving it closer to the curb.

Brook screamed and covered her ears.

Linsan's foot caught on the wheel but she managed to pull it free before the car tilted toward them. Shattered glass from the windows rained down on them, the sharp edges cut across Linsan's face. Scalding liquid added to her cuts as a cup upended from inside the vehicle.

Another intense wave of heat blew past them, silencing Brook as she froze with wide eyes and an open mount.

Linsan panted in fear as she looked around. Her face was dripping and she could taste a strange sweetness on her lips. Licking it without thinking, she almost coughed on the bitter taste of tea and too much sugar. Her ears were ringing and she couldn't hear anything. In the park, almost everyone had been thrown to the ground and small fires were burning everywhere. Trees and grasses had been flatted by the explosion.

Blood ran down Brook's cheek. Linsan looked in concern but it looked like the glass had left shallow cuts. She frowned and reached up.

Brook smacked her hand away. Her mouth opened but no sound was coming out.

Linsan stood up gingerly. Her eyes turned immediately toward the bank, which was engulfed in flames. Hot jets of fire poured out of the windows and the door. The carved pillars were shattered and broken. The stone boat was half buried in the center of the road and the staff was buried in the chest of one of the statues.

Something tickled her hand. Glancing down, she saw rivulets of crimson pouring down her elbow. Shaking, she followed the blood up to where a large shard of glass was sticking out of the meat of her upper arm. The sharp edge glinted as she stared at it.

Dazed, Linsan reached up and pulled it out. She could feel the wet sucking before it popped free with a gout of blood. Her hand trembling, she tossed the glass aside and then looked around for something to stop the flow.

She couldn't tell why she wasn't panicking, or why it didn't hurt. She couldn't find anything obvious until she peered into Brook's hand. There was a blue scarf that looked like it was part of a fancy dress but it looked thick enough to staunch the flow. She grabbed it and then wrapped it around her arm, wincing without really feeling the pain.

Brook blinked, her body shaking just as violently as Linsan. She looked up with a tortured expression and then her lips moved a moment before the words came out. “… happened?”

Linsan's ears were ringing and she couldn't make out Brook's words. She gestured toward the bank. “The bank?”

Brook didn't respond.

Linsan repeated herself.

Brook mouthed the words. Then, her eyes widened as she scrambled to her feet. “Daddy?”

Spinning around, she gasped at the sight of the bank. “Daddy!” she screamed as she raced around the ruined car and sprinted toward the burning building.

Linsan wasn't expecting Brook to run toward the flames. She scrambled after Brook.

Brook raced across the burning street, her torn dress fluttering through small fires but moving fast enough to avoid setting herself aflame.

To Linsan's relief, Brook stopped on the sidewalk in front of the building. Even from that distance, the heat was intense. It beat against Linsan's face, billowing at her as they both stared into the inferno in shock.

“Daddy?” whimpered Brook.

Linsan looked around. “Where is the fire brigade? I… I….” She didn't know where to go.

A strange melody drifted through the howling flames. It was the metallic instrument she heard before. Confused, she followed the sounds until she spotted the man playing it.

There was a man standing in the middle of the flames, playing with no concern for the fires that roared around him. His leather duster was fluttering as he spun around, playing rapidly a foreign tune. His instrument didn't look like anything she had seen before. It looked almost like a mandolin except the shape was more angular than anyone she had seen and the sounds were compressed, taut and ringing. The metal strings glinted in the fires that surrounded him.

The man's fingers flew along the neck, leaving a squeak of flesh on metal. With each note plucked, ripples of power radiated along his fingertips until a powerful chord blasted away from the instrument in sheets of flame.

Linsan gasped. The stranger was causing or controlling the flames. She reached out and tapped Brook. “Look!”

Brook followed Linsan's gesture and then gasped herself. “What is he doing?”

The stranger turned and their eyes met. He smiled, his teeth shockingly white in the flames. Then he slammed his hands down across the strings and a chord of music ignited the air around him. It howled as it rushed toward them.

Brook and Linsan dodged in separate directions.

Linsan almost fell as she staggered forward. Then she turned around just as Brook was regaining her feet.

Storming forward with a scowl, Brook stopped in front of the open door. She ground her teeth together and drew her hands back. Then, she clapped them hard in front of her.

A blast of raw noise exploded from the impact, slamming into the fire and blowing it back. Large cracks formed in the plaster as eddies of wind and fire spun away from her.

Linsan staggered back from the force of Brook's magic.

Brook screamed and clapped her hands again, a powerful blow that snuffed flames. Embers flew in all directions—including toward Linsan.

Linsan raised her arm to protect her face.

When she peeked through her fingers she saw Brook stomping into the burning bank. Her hands clapped together and another explosion blasted smoke and flames away from her.

“Brook!” screamed Linsan and chased after her and into the building. She didn't have any ability to do anything, not without a musical instrument. She had left her own violin at home, never dreaming she would need it, but she couldn't leave Brook to fight the stranger alone. Even after the foul words directed at her, Linsan couldn't imagine abandoning her.

Inside, the heat was overwhelming. It sucked the air out of Linsan's lungs and caused her skin to crawl with sharp scratches and prickling dryness. Her vision blurred from the smoke and heat. The back of her throat stung with every breath.

The stranger picked himself up from the ground. His instrument swung around as he slapped it into place. He managed to blast off a chord with his right hand before Brook's clap punched into him. The force of the blow caused the ceiling to buckle as he was thrown back into the wall. Burning wood fell down around him as he managed to keep on his feet. The fires from his chord curled useless in the air around him.

He yelled “Gab! May! I need you!” before slamming out another chord. Flames shot out from his instrument, howling as it blasted toward Brook and Linsan.

Brook drew back to clap again but the other man's hands flew across the metal strings and sent off more waves of flame and heat in a riff of chords. Her eyes widened at the fireball racing toward them and gave a rapid smack of her hands to blow them away before they reached her.

Linsan glanced at the back of the bank. Palisis was in the vault, if she could reach it, then she could defend Brook in the fight. She inched to the side, looking for a path through the flames.

Then, one of the strangers came out of the door leading to the vault. He had a large pack over his shoulder. His eyes grew wide and he came to a sharp stop. He stared at the fight between the stranger and Brook. With a swear, he charged. His hands ignited into white flames as he threw himself in front of the stranger. As soon as he landed, he brought his hands together and punched the ground.

A wave of concussive force burst forward. Unlike Brooke's, it was directed only at the two women.

The first man belted out another chord, one that timed perfectly with the beat from the second man's wave of force.

Together, the two powers didn't snuff out each other. Instead, they appeared to magnify each other. The flames grew brighter and hotter as they burned away polished wood and evaporated plaster in an ever-expanding circle of fire.

Brook looked frightened as she clapped her hands again. Her gloves peeled back from the blast, leaving blood to splash onto the ground and sizzle in the heat. She staggered back, her feet scraping on the blackened floor.

A third man rushed in from one of the offices. He had an armful of bags in his hands. One bag spilled open, sending handfuls of cukdins to spill out across the floor. The currency cards ignited almost instantly in the heat. “Damn! What you need, Til?”

The one playing the instrument called out. “Gab! Car's out back, clear a path!”

Gab turned and then scooped at the ground, as if he was flinging it at the back of the bank.

The floor buckled and twisted. Shattered wood flew in all directions as a deep gouge tore through the floor and slammed into the back wall of the bank. Bricks and plaster blew out into the sudden light as the smoke streamed after it.

When the explosion faded, Linsan could see an alley filled with smouldering debris.

“Out!” he bellowed before racing down the opening he had just created.

Til stepped back, his fingers throwing out riffs with startling speed. Flames and music rose around him, shifting like a snake. It jerked to one side and then to the other.

Brook couldn't reach him with her power as she struggled against the man between them. Both of them were using concussive forces but their attacks couldn't penetrate the other's.

However, the repeated impacts were causing damage to the burning bank. Wood and embers plummeted around them. The floor beneath everyone cracked and shuddered with each thud of sound and power.

Linsan focused on the vault but the flames had risen up and blocked her way. She growled with frustration, she needed to help Brook and she was useless without an instrument; not that she had many skills against a man more adept at using music to attack.

The ground shuddered violently as boards split apart. Jets of flames rose up around all of them.

“Bring it down, May!” bellowed Til as he backed into the burning hole in the back.

May grinned and began to clap fast and hard, alternating between striking his palms, his thighs, and on the floor in front of him. Heat and fire gathered around him, punching the air as his powers hammered against Brook.

Brook clapped back, but she had to step back as the flames engulfed her.

Linsan had to move. “Shit,” she said before she turned away from the vault and sprinted toward Brook.

The floor collapsed underneath her, exposing a storage cellar of some sort.

She spun past, lightly kicking off a chair to dance around the flames. She landed without losing her balance and then jumped across the gaping opening as she worked her way back to Brook.

May suddenly drew his hands back and slammed them hard in front of him. A halo of energy flashed around his silhouette. The resulting concussion was not directed like his others, but blasting in all directions. It shattered furniture, blew away the last of the floorboards and tore out the ceiling above him.

Linsan grabbed Brook by her long hair and yanked back with all her might toward the door.

Brook screamed out in frustration as she fell back. “No! Daddy!”

The floor where she was standing burst into flames, the heat shoving them back both. Linsan pulled at Brook, trying to get her through the door before any more of the building collapsed.

Over Brook's thrashing form, she saw May step back before he turned around and raced for the hole in the back.

In the briefest of moments, as the fires brightened into brilliance, the buffeting winds beat against his back and she saw the distinctive shape of a violin against the cover of his bag before the smoke obscured his escape.

Then the remains of the bank collapsed in a wave of fire, wood, and smoke.

Linsan threw Brook and herself out the door and into the street.