The Defender: Elderwood

  ***

  Allan struck the back of his hand across the face of the big man. “Wake up!”

  The man shook his head. His eyes fluttered open. “What? What’s going on?”

  “You’re my prisoner, Davy.”

  “Who?” The man’s body shook. His eyes narrowed; he appeared to realize that his hands were tied behind his back. He blinked a few times, then gasped. “Who are you? Why are you wearing that mask?”

  “Perhaps you’ve heard of the Defender.”

  “You? You’re the man who took out Merrick’s and Simon’s boys?”

  “I am.”

  “What do you want with me?”

  Allan reached out. He cast a spell so that he pushed against the thug’s face without touching it. “Are you so thick, Davy? You beat up men to get them to pay gambling debts. You force shop owners to pay you for protection from your own Crew. If they don’t pay, you steal from them to make them pay.”

  “So what? Men have to make a living.”

  “Not by crime they don’t. If you won’t be honest men, then you ought to be rotting in jail.”

  “Who’s going to stop us? You?”

  Allan reached out again. This time his magic allowed him to lift up the other man’s legs. He pulled the man up from the floor slowly until the man was hanging upside down. Allan stood up and walked around the man. He smiled. “Yes, me.”

  “Put me down!”

  “Give me a reason why.”

  “This hurts!”

  “You live by hurting others, Davy. I don’t care if this hurts you a little.”

  “What if I let you in on a job?”

  “What kind of job?”

  “A Crew job. A big one.”

  “Tell me more.”

  “Set me down!”

  “Tell me more, and I’ll let you down. Tell me enough, and I won’t drop you.”

  “Fine! In the next week or so, the Crew will be raiding a warehouse.”

  “A warehouse? By the riverside?”

  “Where else?”

  “What warehouse are you going to raid?”

  “We haven’t been told which one yet.”

  “What are you supposed to steal?”

  “We haven’t been told, but it’s supposed to be the haul of a lifetime.”

  “Why would anyone tell you that?”

  “Boss Conner’s been keeping an eye on all of us. In a day or two he’s supposed to pick the men for this job. Only the best men get in and get a share. If you come with me, I’m sure we’ll both get picked.”

  Allan let out a breath. He closed his eyes, and dispelled the magic he’d used on the thug. The other man sank to the floor.

  “So, you’re going to come with me, right?” the man asked once he was on his back again.

  “No. You are going to keep answering my questions.”

  “What?”

  “Either answer my questions, or I’ll use my magic to turn you into a fish and toss you into the river.”

  Allan had to try not to laugh. The threat was absurd. There were no transmogrification spells in Damien’s books. The long-dead mage had hinted that such spells might be possible, but wrote that it might take a lifetime to come up with one.

  But the big man wouldn’t know that. Most people of Damien’s time, the mage had written, only had the slightest knowledge of how magic worked and what mages could do. They imagined far greater feats than were possible even with a group of mages working together. Their imaginations made them fearful, and many a mage was happy to exploit that fear to his advantage.

  Damien had written that, although he usually despised such fear, he conceded that it had its uses. Invoking that fear in someone who, deep down, was a coward, not only kept you safe from them, but was a way of getting the best of them. Bullies preyed on such fears, but if you made them fearful, you could bring those bullies down. One of Damien’s regrets was that other mages didn’t always try to invoke such fears in the nastier members of the nobility.

  “What a world we might have had if we were so wise,” he wrote with obvious sadness.

  That passage struck a nerve with Allan. He realized that criminals were bullies, and therefore cowards. Making other people fear them made them strong. Getting at their fears would weaken them.

  Allan forced himself to frown darkly at the thug after making his threat. “You felt me lift you into the air without my hands,” he continued. “You felt me push on your face without ever touching you. I can burn you or freeze you. Don’t think I won’t go farther if you don’t answer my questions.”

  “Fine, fine! What do you want to know?”

  “Let’s start with the names and faces of the other men in the Crew.” I need to know who I might have to deal with, if I’m going to do something about that warehouse raid.