Web of Chaos - Chapter 24: Breaking Point

Shit hit the fan later that night.

A group of Artisans struck the mayor’s home after sunset, and three civilians died in the crossfire. The news showed footage of the aftermath, including close-up shots of the corpses, half-buried beneath the stone rubble.

The Cult of Solidor was obviously behind this attack, just like that time they’d summoned Storm’s Eye for a dramatic showdown. The news loved beating that dead raptor to death, but Akari wasn’t surprised. It wouldn’t do if people thought the prime minister had summoned the mana spirit here, or that the Solidors had actually defended the city.

That begged the obvious question: if the Solidors had summoned Storm’s Eye, then what good were the stupid marks? And why were the Aeon cultists against the marks? But no one could ask that question in public. Doing so was as good as heresy these days.

Other groups had also begun protesting the mark mandate across the city, but those were mostly peaceful gatherings at this point. The news wouldn’t bother covering them until things turned violent.

Akari and Kalden held hands as they walked less than a block from their apartment. The sky was pitch black overhead, and streetlights painted the wet sidewalks in pools of gold. Her team had gone their separate ways for dinner. Arturo and Zukan went to the Foundry, which served massive plates of meat cooked over a raging fire. Zukan ate there at least three days a week, being the stereotypical dragon that he was.

Meanwhile, she and Kalden ate at Ramen 42 on Chapel Street; a little comfort food was just the thing after their crazy morning on campus. The owner, Mina, had always been against the marks, and the mayor’s speech hadn’t changed her mind. But even she’d looked worried tonight. Apparently, the city had begun issuing safety code violations to any small businesses that didn’t comply.

For Talek’s sake. Did they really have nothing better to do than go after little Shokenese grandmothers?

“What are we gonna do?” Akari asked Kalden as they walked. She couldn’t risk saying Relia’s name aloud, but she sent Kalden an image through their soulbond.

He shrugged. “We’re still not in a position to help. At least not until the Darklights come back.” The Darklights were in New Sakai right now, helping clean up the mess from the latest attack. But Kalden had called them that morning, and Elend thought they could slip back for a few hours tonight.

“I know,” Akari said. “But what do you think?” Kalden liked to process things before he formed an opinion, but Akari preferred to talk things through. She hadn’t known that about herself until recently, but it explained why she’d been so miserable all those years without any friends. Aside from the obvious reasons, of course.

“What part?” His eyes scanned the shadows as they walked.

“The invitation.”

“Ah, that.” Kalden paused for several paces. “I think we should assume she’s been compromised.”

Akari furrowed her brow. “She wouldn’t fall for dream mana.” Relia’s father wasn’t a dream artist, but Aeons had their own equivalent powers. She and Kalden didn’t have the time or resources to practice that skill, but Moonfire did.

“That’s not how dream mana works,” Kalden said. “Even the most competent people have weaknesses. A skilled dream artist can find those weaknesses and exploit them.”

“You can still build up general defenses,” Akari retorted. “You can train your mind to comb through every thought.”

‘Anyone can resist for a moment,’ Kalden said through their bond. ‘Maybe even a day, or a week. But it’s been months since Relia was captured. Besides, I never said she was compromised with dream mana.’

‘Then what? She’s too stubborn for anything else.’

‘A soulbond,’ Kalden said.

Akari felt a shiver threatening to shake her spine, and it had nothing to do with the cold Hexember evening. Soulbonds were still a mystery at this point, but she and Kalden had felt the effects firsthand. The way their thoughts and techniques blended together. What would happen if someone like Moonfire created that connection with Relia?

‘How do you make a soulbond?’ Akari asked. She and Kalden had essentially gotten theirs for free when Relyn Solidor split the Etherite collar, but she’d overheard Kalden asking Lena about it one day.

‘Spend time with someone in the Ethereal,’ he said, “and your souls will change. The patterns in the crystals become more aligned.’

‘Shit,’ Akari muttered. ‘Even against someone’s will?’

He nodded once. ‘Did you see her soul this morning?’

‘No.’ Akari hadn’t even thought to open her Silver Sight. She’d been too busy getting highjacked by her emotions, and the novelty of seeing her friend. Then again, she didn’t have Kalden’s aspect.

‘She’s close to the Master realm,’ Kalden said. ‘Closer than us. That means Moonfire is helping her advance.’

‘You think he was controlling her?’ Akari and Kalden were roughly equal in terms of power, but Moonfire was a Mystic, with decades more experience.

Kalden shook his head. ‘I think it’s more subtle than that. Have you noticed how . . .’ He trailed off as they stepped onto Cliff Street. Three squad cars blocked the road ahead, their red and blue lights cutting through the dark haze. A small crowd had gathered on the sidewalk across from their apartment building.

“What’s this?” Akari asked as they approached. Her team had lived in this building for half a year, and they’d never seen anything like this.

“I have an inkling,” Kalden said in a low voice. “But you won’t like it.”

They crossed the street and got a closer look. Roughly a dozen people stood with their backs against the wall of a brick building. Detective Trask paced in front of them, speaking into a portable radio. She couldn’t hear much from this distance, but her Artisan ears caught violations, processing, and Order Eighty-Four.

And of course, the detainees were all Novices and Apprentices.

Akari recognized a few faces from her building. An elderly man who always held the door for her. A young couple who practiced their techniques on the roof. Mrs. Nakano, who’d once baked her team cookies and thanked them for keeping the streets clean.

A young woman—barely older than Akari—sat on her knees on the wet sidewalk. She sobbed quietly as a uniformed man applied a blue mark to her forehead. Arturo said these things shouldn’t hurt, but Akari knew exactly how that girl felt. She’d been in that position two years ago, restrained at a public train station while the police stole the last of her money.

“Trask!” Akari pushed her way forward to the front of the crowd.

The detective glanced over his shoulder and met her eyes. So did a handful of his uniformed minions. “Zeller? What the hell are you doing here?”

“I live here.” She gestured over her shoulder with her thumb. “What’s your excuse?”

His jaw tightened. "This is official police business. I suggest you go back inside.”

“What’s the matter?” she said. “Scared to have a rematch?”

Trask exchanged some more words with his officers, then promptly ignored her taunts.

“They’re starting with the low-hanging fruit,” Kalden said. “The ones who can’t fight back.”

Akari nodded as she opened her Silver Sight, taking in her surroundings with greater detail. Not the physical world, but the currents of mana that flowed beneath it. She spotted six more Artisans in the crowd, two of them were unmarked. They knew this was wrong, just like she did. They couldn’t make laws, and they knew these thugs had no right to enforce it.

They knew, but they did nothing.

“This is already worse than Creta,” Akari said. At least people had fought back against the Dragonlord and the Grevandi. The Cretians might have been weaker than the average Espirian, but they weren’t afraid to get their hands dirty.

“I know,” Kalden said. “But we can’t go to war with the police.”

As usual, Kalden had already predicted her next move. And he was right; the KCPD had them outnumbered a thousand to one, and that was just the Artisans. The chiefs were all Masters, including Trask’s father.

"Let me go!" a man's voice rose above the crowd. "My wife’s in labor!” He looked in his late twenties, probably from South Espiria or Cadria. Akari didn’t see a pregnant woman in the line, so he must have been on his way to her.

Trask approached the man, rigid as an icicle. His voice was as cold as his techniques when he spoke. “Sir, you're being detained for violation of Order Eighty-Four.”

“She’s upstairs,” the man said in a shaky voice. “I’ll get your mark, but I need to—”

Akari missed the rest of his words as the crowd grew louder. Someone unleashed a wind technique from the other end of the line, knocking his attacker off his feet. The expectant father seized the distraction, breaking free from his captors with a sudden lurch.

He barely made it ten steps before Trask shot a ribbon of ice mana. It coiled around the man’s legs like a glowing white serpent, and he slammed into the street face-first. Blood splattered across the wet pavement as his nose broke on impact.

Two more techniques flew from the detective’s palm outstretched palm, securing the wind artist further down.

“That’s enough!” Mrs. Nakano stepped forward. Her sweater was damp with rain, and her black and gray hair sat plastered to her forehead.

“Get back in line,” Trask said.

"You know this is wrong.” The old Shokenese woman stretched out a hand, raising a Construct between him and the other prisoners. “We're citizens, not—”

Trask flicked his wrist and shattered her technique. A ribbon of ice mana flew out from his other hand, coiling around the woman. She lost her balance and fell backward.

“Attacking a police officer with mana,” Trask said. “That’s a class B felony. Anyone else else want to join her?”

Most of the crowd backed away, but a few angry shouts erupted from the chaos. Another group rushed to help Mrs. Nakano,

“Stop!” Trask unleashed two walls of ice mana, separating the crowd from his prisoners. These weren’t dangerous techniques, but the people jumped back as if they’d been burned. Unlike Akari and her team, these weren’t trained fighters. They’d gone their whole lives without having mana directed at them, and their brains struggled to process it.

“This area is under police jurisdiction,” Trask said. “Anyone who intervenes will be detained.”

No one moved after that.

Creta was a land forged by war, and its people knew violence like a troublesome neighbor. But Koreldon City was more like Arkala. A place of rules, systems, and propriety. You trusted the police, and you didn’t intervene when they attacked a group of people.

Even now, Akari felt a trickle of the crowd’s hesitation in herself. Fighting came naturally to her on a battlefield. Here, it felt strange to go off script and intervene—almost awkward. If these people weren’t guilty, then why had no one else stepped forward to help them?

Akari cycled her mana and stepped toward Trask. She knew exactly how those people felt, lined up by the wall with no hope. It was one thing to face injustice—far harder to watch the rest of the world stand by and pretend that treatment was normal.

And all it took was one misplaced technique. One ice Missile coiled around someone’s throat . . .

But Akari could help them. A few well-placed portals, and she could put everyone under her protection.

“Wait.” Kalden grabbed her arm before she could launch the first technique.

She rounded on him. “You gonna tell me I can’t defend innocent people? What’s the point of all this power if we don’t use it?” Her voice rose with each word, drawing glances from the others.

‘You’ll jeopardize our goals.’ Kalden spoke through their bond this time. ‘You’ll win this battle, but we’ll lose the—‘

‘Screw the war.’ She gestured to Mrs. Nakano lying by the car. To the man with the bloody nose, and the trembling girl with the mark she hadn’t asked for. ‘This is how my mom died.’

‘I understand how you feel, but we need to stay focused. We can’t help Relia if we’re fugitives.’

Akari ignored him as she spun back toward Trask. Her vision went red, and her mana was a storm, yearning to break free.

‘Last Haven.’ Kalden’s voice resonated through her head, filling every corner in her mental space. The sensation flowed through her channels like a counter sigil to her rage. Last Haven was the phrase they’d decided on last year. A reminder of the biggest mistake she’d ever made. A warning that she’d gone too far.

“Really?”Akari whipped around to face Kalden. “You’re gonna play that card?”

“If that’s what it takes,” Kalden said. “We make decisions together. As a team.”

Akari clenched her hands into fists to stop the shaking; her fingernails would have drawn blood if not for her Artisan skin. It still felt right to help these people. But . . . Talek. Kalden wasn’t totally wrong, either.

The fighter in her wanted to throw the code phrase back in his face—to tell him he was being too cautious, playing with innocent people’s lives, watching from the sidelines while Espiria burned. 

But he was right. Their goals were bigger than this. Bigger than this city, even.

She stopped cycling her mana, and her heart slowed at the same time. Even then, it took every ounce of her willpower to walk away.

“Fine,” she said to Kalden. “Then let’s talk.”