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Chapter 12: The Interview
Part 2
“And that’s pretty much it,” said Viktor.
“You score more the closer it lands behind you, yes?” said June. “Looks like it’s illegal to send it downward.” The dirt covered contestant walked off to the side, shaking their head and muttering, while the others watched the rock seekers, waiting.
“Indeed,” said Vik. “The player with the farthest stone is usually eliminated. In this case, since a stone went down, the offender leaves. The would-be loser with the farthest stone will now have a strike against them in the event of a tie.”
“A tie? How often does that happen?”
“Well, once it gets past qualifiers and into tournament mode there are distance zones for the stones. So it gets a little more involved.”
“And she organized it all?”
“She did.”
Most of the spectators had gathered in six small groups, standing around each legally played stone. Presumably, someone took the score as the people threw the stones back to their starting places. Atrocity and Kelron hovered them back into place as they came flying in.
June and Vik watched until it was down to two very tired contenders. Both of their deflections were poor, stones zipping only a foot or so over their heads. But one person’s landed closer, and he was crowned the winner of the match. Vik motioned June to follow and walked over to Atrocity. Kelron saw them coming and smiled at June, but kept his distance.
“Bright day to you, Viktor,” said Atrocity as she noticed them. “Hello, Lady Chillcrafter.”
“You can call me Junelight.”
“If you have a moment, ‘City, Junelight would like to ask you a few questions. About the night of the pyre,” said Viktor.
Atrocity looked over at her crowd, then back to them. She tilted her head and said, “Alright. My carve shift doesn’t start for another hour or so.”
“I’ll leave you two to it then,” Vik said, and moved off towards Kelron.
“Can we walk?” asked June.
Atrocity drifted an upturned palm towards the town. June started back south, staying on the wide cut between the trees. Dead ahead, the rise of the great speckwood pyramid consumed the horizon. After they had moved in silence for a while, June said, “Thank you for making the time. I suppose I should tell you why I’m here.”
“People say you’ve been asking after a person, one who’s become uncharted, or unchartable.”
“Yes, that’s about right.”
“Are you a bounty hunter?”
Junelight chuckled. “Well I don’t receive a bounty, per se, for collecting this individual. But for all intents and purposes, I suppose you could say so.”
“That is a fascination, truly,” said Atrocity.
June looked sidelong at the young Roythan, and found a sincere gaze. “What are you thinking for your scholarright, Atrocity?”
“Oh, Puresear probably. As is the tradition around these lands and trees.”
“You don’t strike me as being like most people around here.”
The girl shrugged, and they moved on through the grass. The tree farm flowed by, and June watched the perfect parallax pattern.
After a few moments, Atrocity said, “How are you going to apprehend them?”
“First I need to find xem. I’ve narrowed it down to a radius within this part of the forest. Need to ask questions, triangulate, until I can eliminate towns one by one.”
“But what if xey slip out of your sleuthing circle? Or aren’t even in a town but in the Callipsus’ blanket of endless flora and chomping fauna? It’s a near endless leafscape out there. Lots of holes and nooks and teeth and stingers.”
“Ah, well. We have our contingency plans. But to say much more would broach protocol, you understand.”
“Certainly,” said the girl.
“But all this Falsesparker activity of late, it’s something that might complicate things. Which is why I’m very curious to know what you saw, and what happened. Both at the bridge and your second encounter.”
“It’s a fast ‘n’ flighty tale, as far as they go,” said Atrocity. “The eve of the bridge I was trying to corral my brother, Turner. He had up and disappeared, and I figured he might have went out floating as he does, as he is prone to wander. I caught up to him at the crossing. He was talking to someone, someone I guess he thought was a neighbour. But it was one of them. Perched up pretty on the railing of the bridge, perhaps enthralled by the waterlight dance. It glowed, under the bridge I mean—we had a crystal installed to help sturdy the structure against the transports.”
“Then what happened?”
“Turner was playing games, so I spun a Softshadow at him. This took the night’s cloak from the Falsesparker, and it spooked them, and then it was all a flurry. There was a bit of a fight, and it looked like he was going to go for Turner, so I…”
She stopped walking and massaged a palm with the thumb of her other hand. Junelight stopped with her and waited.
“I panicked, a mite,” Atrocity said. “I was too far from town to use much more Artwork so I charged him and knocked him over, he was spinning with a blade…”
“Sounds terrifying.”
“It was more… I felt…” she shook her head.
Junelight turned her shoulders, and Atrocity began to walk again.
“What happened after that?” June asked.
“Turns out Turner had sharded the transports; on occasion he’s not entirely useless.” Atrocity grinned. “The Falsesparker let us go, after he saw the lights. We ran and cleared the bridge a moment before they rendered it. Back at town, we had an emergency gathering, chaired by our Torchkeeper. I told them that we have to be ready for a second strike.”
“A second strike, how’d you figure that?”
“Observation, Lady Chillcrafter. I mean, Junelight. Falsesparkers raid in bursts. The first strike is usually to render something hard to fix, then the second to snatch the prize they’re really seeking once aspectral attention is aimed elsewhere.”
“This happens often to Wood Ribbon South?”
“Mm, no,” said Atrocity. “Maybe once every two or three years, and never anything serious.”
“How did you deduce the nature of their hunt then?”
“Oh, incident reports from all over the Callipsus are archived,” said the girl. “You have to put in some requests through the mindtether and be patient as a sprout on a cliffside, but it’s all there. I stopped routing direct to Pinedeck ages ago when I found out that some of the smaller cities keep copies. Much faster turnaround. Beacon Barrow is my current favourite.”
“Not bad, not bad. Doesn’t surprise me that it’s slow out of Pinedeck,” said June.
“Slow even for the Ghost Tide?”
“That’s classified, of course,” June said, “but let’s just say I’ve used workarounds similar to yours more than twice.”
Atrocity smiled and nodded. She said, “So, that same night, I convinced Vik to let me recruit some lookouts. It was late, so we had a heavy downcycle in the temple to prepare. A few of us set out at first light. I went along the trail that I figured would make the most sense to use. You know, if I were raiding.”
“And you were right.”
“Yeah. I was also frightfully foolish. Went alone, to reduce the odds of being spotted. I underestimated how tuned in those Falsesparkers are. I was resting and still when the first three went by me. I had little probes placed out, they didn’t feel those, but I think if I had been walking they would have had me.”
“And that’s when you sharded the signal?”
“Oh, no. Not then. Not for three of them. I let Viktor know that some were coming, and from which direction. Xe told me to head back.”
June said, “And you didn’t.”
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