Twirling a copper cog around his finger with feigned nonchalance, Auggy rocked his chair back and pressed his boot against the beer-stained table in front of him. The hilt of a blade peeked out from his boot. A fight was spreading through the saloon. It looked like fun and Auggy was debating whether or not to join in. He spotted Mixie, Moxie's twin sister, through the crowd. She appeared to be having a grand old time.
Mixie dodged a punch then delivered a staggering blow to her opponent's solar plexus. The air whooshed out of him and he stumbled back, grasping at Mixie's clothes as he went down. Her tight-fitting half-bodice and bare midriff gave him no purchase, however, and his hands skidded down her front until they caught on the thick leather belt of her baggy pants. Mixie kneed him in the jaw, dislodging him before he found whatever weapons or treasures were hidden in those folds. She looked up and caught Auggy's gaze. Grinning, she gave him a finger wave. Brass knuckles glinted around her fingers.
Auggy grinned back but shook his head when she motioned for him to join her. Mixie raised a brow in surprise and then puffed her lower lip out in just about the cutest pout Auggy had ever seen. He laughed and waved her off, motioning to his empty beer mug as if he wanted another drink. Mixie gave him one of her dazzling smiles then slugged the man beside her. He looked like the good, law-abiding type, just the sort who would set Mixie off into a tirade about the injustices of the corrupt republic in which they lived.
Auggy's smile died abruptly. Maybe I should tell her that Cy's dead, he thought. He sighed and tossed the cog he had been twirling onto the table. The clatter of metal on wood was barely audible over the din of the crowd. Nah. Let Moxie do it. Playful, creative, tough-as-nails Mixie he could deal with, but a grief-stricken, sobbing Mixie demanding answers he didn't have? Hell no. Auggy had brought Cy's dying body back to her sister, and that had been bad enough. He'd done his good deed for the day. If Cy's God really was up in the sky keeping a tally, then Auggy may have even tipped himself over to the side of good today. Well, we can't have that. He made a mental note to commit more nefarious deeds this week to tip the balance back to where it should be.
Auggy patted his hands down his sleeveless leather coat, perusing the lumps from the multitude of trinkets, weapons, and lockpicks hidden amongst all the pockets and straps, and drew one out at random. It was a hollowed-out pocket watch with a grinning face on the front of it, worn smooth from years of finger oil and absent-minded rubbing. Auggy ran his thumb over the face then popped the case open. Damn. Inside was that chunk of strange white metal that Cy had given him a few weeks back because, apparently, when people found odd things, they thought of Auggy. Go figure.
He felt a pang, looking at it now. Was that... grief? No, surely not. Guilt then. Yes, guilt. He and Cy hadn't been friends; Auggy didn't have friends. He simply collected people who weren't as stupid or corrupt as all the rest. People like Mixie, clever little steamwright that she was, and Cy, who had become something like that damnable conscience that Auggy had discarded years ago. The boy had been gutter trash when Auggy had met him: a destitute sixteen-year-old forced to steal or starve because no one would hire a half-breed, no matter how pretty he was to look at. People are sick, Auggy thought. And that boy should know better by now. It had been eight years since Cy had tried to lift Auggy's wallet (he might have even succeeded had Auggy not been wearing an obscene number of pockets), and Auggy had watched him debase himself over and over again trying to find "honest work," just to stay on the right side of his morality, if not the law. Auggy had plenty of work for him, albeit of the illegal kind, and damn if that boy hadn't become the best lockpick he'd ever employed. Machines worked for Cy--or fell apart in his hands as the case may be--with uncanny ease. Auggy had never regretted hiring him, Cy had made sure of it. He worked hard and fast, and everything he did, amoral or not, he did with that wry smile, as if poverty and contempt were his due and he was somehow escaping it by working himself into an early grave. It pissed Auggy off to no end.
And I let that boy die.
Growling, Auggy stuffed the odd white metal back in the watch case. He had been rubbing the metal without even thinking about it, and now a fine sheen of silver coated his fingertips. He cast about for a cloth or something to wipe his fingers with and found himself staring into the plumpest, most perfect pair of breasts he'd ever seen. The bar maid reached across him, giving him an even better view of her bodice-enhanced cleavage--good Lord, how did those things stay in place?--and swapped out his empty beer mug for a fresh one. Foam spilled over the side, wetting the creamy skin of her delicate hand.
"Is there anything else I can do for you, sugar?" she asked. She gave one long, slow lick to the froth on her hand, keeping her brown-eyed gaze locked with his. Then her tongue flicked out, tasting the foam on her lips. "Anything at all?"
Auggy almost whimpered. Now, he knew he was a handsome man, what with his black hair, easy smile, and those soft, southern cheekbones and enchanting hazel eyes that he'd inherited from his mother, God bless her. Auggy used it to his advantage all the time, and he couldn't count how many women he'd bedded because of it. But this was ridiculous. This woman didn't even know his name, much less his reputation. Or did she? Auggy looked her up and down, from her old-fashioned bodice made modern with copper boning to her short ruffled skirt that showed too much leg, and then back up to her lovely face. He also noted the dagger hidden at her waist and the poisonous flowers pinned to her lapel. This little sex kitten had probably taken one of the contracts out on his life. His enemies were insidious that way.
Auggy gave her the sweetest smile he could muster and tossed a gold mark on her tray. "Yes, actually," he said, "there is something. How about you take the night off, sugar, and stick to serving beers?"
Outrage flared across the woman's face, rounding those kiss-me lips into a perfect O. Auggy gulped. Was he mistaken? Had his paranoia gotten the better of him--again? But then her palm slapped his cheek with a resounding smack, and he decided he didn't give a damn. "How dare you... you... mongrel!" she sputtered. "I am not a--"
"Leave."
Auggy blinked. The voice that had spoken felt like spidersilk brushing across his skin. It tangled up inside of him, muddling his brain, then smoothed into a most disconcerting caress. Cy? he wondered. His heart did this weird little leaping thing. The front legs of his chair hit the floor with a resounding thump as he clutched at his chest. What is this? A heart attack? I'm not that old.
The bar maid--assassin?--turned as if in a trance, and Auggy saw the sidhe standing behind her with his hands resting lightly on her shoulders. Not Cy then. This faerie's long, slender fingers were ghostly pale and tipped with razor-sharp claws. Silky, white-blond hair fell past his waist, framing a lean body and a face so lovely that it was painful to look at. Cy's faerie presence merely gave the unsettling impression of sunshine and autumn leaves brushing the skin; this creature made Auggy feel as if he had plunged into the icy depths of a lake on the blackest of nights. He shivered and clenched his jaw to keep his teeth from chattering. He had forgotten how alien these creatures really were. The sidhe's eyes had no whites, only pure black irises floating like beetles in pools of red as dark as blood. Black gashes cut across the sidhe's arms, baring flesh that should never have seen the light of day. They weren't injuries, but a natural part of his body, the faerie defect that showed just how twisted their magic had made their race.
A gasp escaped the woman's lips as she turned in the sidhe's arms. The faerie's hands dropped away, and she swayed, gazing up at him in open-mouthed wonder. Auggy wondered what image she was seeing because it sure as hell wasn't the same thing he was. No, definitely not, he thought as she moved to kiss the creature. The faerie's lip curled and he blurred. He was there one moment then two steps away the next, staring down at the woman with the look of supreme disdain that only the fey could manage. Then suddenly Auggy saw the woman disappearing into the crowd, moving with in the vacant manner of a human entranced. I'm losing time, he realized. That's not good.
[To be continued]
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