The Effaced: Chapter Forty-Four (Patreon)

I strolled down the street of the undercity, Hadiya’s anti-divination device floating over one shoulder. 

Against an enemy with the sheer resources that Nexus had, it was probably useless. Even Hadiya had admitted that, and was working on building a better version in her free time, but it was ultimately about the principle of the thing. If I was going to walk into a dangerous situation, doing it without any defenses was just foolish, and if they were going to scry on the meeting, then I’d at least make them burn some resources for it. 

On the surface, Sekou’s Noodle Bar looked like any other late night greasy spoon. A flickering magelight display in bright colors glowed against the dark of the undercity, but half the letters weren’t glowing anymore, making it look more like Eku’s Nod Ar. There wasn’t an obviously powerful thrum of magic, no more than anywhere else in the city, and I didn’t get the strange feeling of being right next to another realm the way I did in the manor house of the Contractor. 

When I stepped inside, nothing obviously changed. It still just looked like a late night diner. Admittedly, one specializing in a type of south-eastern spicy noodle soup with chicken, eggs, green onion, and a lot of oil, but… Still just another place. In fact, I was certain I’d been to a half dozen establishments just like it when I was in college. 

I swept my eyes over the restaurant. At three in the morning, there were only a couple gaggles of drunks, some teenagers out too late for their own good, and night shift workers looking to cram their dinner in before sleep. 

Then I spotted her. I wasn’t completely certain, of course, but a young woman, sitting alone near the cordon at three in the morning? That already indicated that she had either an abundance of power or confidence. 

As I watched her, she looked up at me and arched an eyebrow, which more or less confirmed it. 

“Oh, are you Miss Kahlon’s guest?” an older man asked, approaching with a menu and some cheap copper utensils. 

“I am,” I agreed. He led me to her table, and I crammed myself into the booth, my knees slamming into the top of the table. They were not built for someone over two meters tall…

“What do you want?” the worker asked, even though I clearly hadn’t had the time to read the menu yet.

“I’ll have whatever your most popular noodle soup is?” 

“Okay.” 

He snatched up the menu and walked away. I shifted around for a moment until I was a semblance of comfortable, then looked at Egress. 

“Kahlon, huh?” I asked. “That a pseudonym?” 

“No,” she said. “Devi Kahlon.” 

The fact she introduced herself with a real name, or at least, a name that wasn’t her title of Egress had some degree of importance. Nearly everyone with the power to rub two sticks together took on a title, mask, or epithet in the undercity, and there was a kind of understanding that sometimes people would take actions while wearing their mask that they wouldn’t as a person. The reverse was true as well – there were some things afforded to normal people that a mask of power and control couldn’t do. 

The fact that she was introducing herself as Devi Kahlon meant she was here as a person, rather than as a persona. 

Of course, she could be lying. Every rule in the world only applied until it didn’t, after all.

“Axel Font.” 

She extended a hand, and I shook it, then took her in. She was quite young, about nineteen or twenty, with her black hair short and tied in a ponytail. Her eyes were dark, and her skin was roughly the same shade as Hadiya’s, and her arms were covered in tattoos that I recognized as being especially common to druids in the south, curling around the markings of several boons or familiar marks. One of them was entirely filled with the chalky gray power of the Wandering Path, while the other was marked with a blend of purple that was probably the Dreamscape, and green that was probably from an angel or faerie? 

Color coordination was imprecise – the purple could have been an elemental for all I knew – but color, vague feelings, and observations were all those without archmage’s sight had to rely on. 

And there were scars, including one on her left cheek that was too distinct to not come from some gang that was trying to make it big. I felt a bit of pity leak out, but hardened my heart. There was every chance that Egress was here to kill me or trick me, after all. 

As I shook her hand, I saw her taking me in as well, flitting from my face, to the scars on my hand, to the metal plating in my coat, to the weapons I wore. 

“You’re a dangerous woman,” I observed. “The Contractor spoke well of you.” 

“Did he?” she asked, the faintest notes of surprise and excitement in her voice before she crushed them. “Well, I’d hope so. From what I understood, you were his hitman, before you left the undercity. I’ve stepped into the role for the past two or three years.” 

“Your aura awoke early, then.” 

“Fourteen,” she said candidly. “I was possessed by an angel of purification. Started me down my path.”

“That’s too young,” I said sadly, and she shook her head. 

“Not as young as you.” 

“Just because some people were forcibly awoken earlier than you doesn’t mean you shouldn’t have been forced to delve into magic as a child,” I said. 

Truth be told, she still looked like a child to me. She was barely older than Kelly or the Fake-Mist. 

“As if the world puts a single iota of importance on what should or shouldn’t happen,” Devi said. 

I inclined my head to her, acknowledging her point. 

“Why did you want to meet me?” I asked. 

“You wouldn’t believe me. Even if I laid out all my cards on the table, there’s no way that you would trust that I was telling the truth,” she said. A sardonic smile touched her face. “I wouldn’t. I would assume you were baiting me, or testing me somehow, or were looking for an excuse to kill me or turn me over and score reputation with Nexus.” 

“You’re looking to kill Nexus,” I said. 

A look of surprise came over her face, then she tamped it down.

“Yes. How did you…?” 

“It was pretty obvious,” I said with a shrug. “You’re a really skilled mage, and probably a better assassin than I am. But you’re not actually all that good at the subtlety part. Is the angel still in you?” 

“No, it died a long time ago,” she said. 

I grunted an affirmative. I didn’t know a lot about angels, but from what I understood, they had a strong tendency to do that. 

“Why?” I asked. I was interrupted by our bowls of soup arriving. Devi started digging into hers with rabid abandon, then looked up at me. 

“You would not believe how hard it is to get good food with them. All of Nexus’ food is like… ‘this is a cheese taken from a single lineage of goats bred to be as stinky as possible. We have taken the milk from this goat and bathed sixteen types of chicken taken from sixteen different breeds raised only in this one village in southeast Zheren in the milk, then left it in a single specific cave for thirty four years. If it is left one year less, it will kill you, and if it is left one year more, it explodes. It costs fifty thick panes to sniff the cheese’. Then everyone smells it to show off how sophisticated they are.” 

Despite the fact it was probably an intentional attempt to get me to let my guard down around her, I couldn’t help myself from smiling, just a little bit. 

“It’s not all wood smoked imported beef?” I asked, then split my consciousness. While I paid attention to the conversation with one half, I built a metal sensory spell in the other.

While not every poison was a metal, some were. More importantly, iron, silver, and lead were all incredibly common in potions, which meant there would be a good chance I could pick up on it. 

There was nothing. That didn’t mean that the soup was actually safe to eat, but at a certain point, I had to accept that this was already risky. Besides, I had Jessica to serve as backup. Even though I knew they didn’t exist, I wished I had a potion that just cleared out poisons and bad potions. 

“Oh, there’s plenty of that too. But enough about food,” Devi said. “You asked me why I want them gone?”

I took a bite. It was decent, about the same oily soup I’d expected when I’d walked in.

“I did. I’ve heard some… Stories… about angels of purity. They tend to possess people and go… badly.” 

She touched the scar on her cheek. 

“The first thing I did with it was kill the entire gang that ran the streets I grew up on,” she said. “I actually did it by ripping open a portal to the Fallen Void and throwing them in.”

“Not many kids can just copy a portal spell from a book and use it on their first try, even with the help of a ley line,” I commented. 

“Yeah, well. It burnt out the angel entirely, so it died, but I was left with its familiar gift, and the impulse to improve things.” 

“So you started working with Nexus to improve things?” I asked. 

“Hardly. I was given a six month sentence in jail. The judge ruled it was self defense, and I was a minor. Then when I got out, the streets were under the control of a new gang, and nothing had changed. I had a little more power, but not enough to really matter or change things.” 

I pressed my lips together. The story was sad, but not entirely unheard of. 

“I took things badly,” Devi said. “Started looking for every summoning spell I could get my hands on, legally or otherwise. Broke into a few places, and started spending a lot of time in the Wandering Path. Did you know that it’s geographically locked? For example, a portal opened in one spot typically won’t open at all if you move it just twenty miles. The things that get around that? They’re real expensive. We’re talking over a hundred thin-panes for a single opening, on top of the normal costs. Even the artifacts built to do it break down quickly.” 

“Somewhat. I’m not a druid. I’m assuming you used that to your advantage somehow?” 

“Something like that. Turns out, with the right set of skills, you can leave a claimed area of the Path, and get into the unclaimed. Wander around, nearly dying if you don’t have the right supplies, and use portal magic to break into the real world in a comparable point. Even break into other people’s claimed areas, if you’ve got the right skills, though you’ve got to understand how it was claimed, and adapt. An actively claimed one is too risky, but an enchantment? Well, getting one that can repel invaders is possible, but expensive. You’d be surprised how many people skip it.”

Though I was somewhat skeptical that it was anywhere near as easy as she made it sound, I was still impressed. Being able to break in and out of other worlds was hard, even with ley lines or the Wandering Path, which was the easiest realm to access, almost as if the entire planet was the ley line for it. 

“You’re not making a great case for yourself,” I said. 

“I think I am,” Devi disagreed, and her voice began to grow thicker with emotion. “They got me. I broke into the Chairman’s vault. Thought I was being real slick and clever, only for the defenses to seal me inside. I’m every bit as much of a slave to Nexus as you and your gaggle of friends are. Just the right combination of being able to send me to prison for life, paying me good money, and giving me the tools to fly forwards as a mage. That’s why I want Nexus gone. It ain’t some purehearted reason, or manipulation from a dead angel. I just don’t want to be a puppet no longer.”