Sunday 31 December 2017

Chapter 31, Part One: A tale of Candlewax.

Hope everyone had a great Christmas! As usual, warnings apply: This is the rough draft of a story with adult themes and situations. If you are offended by bad language and grammatical errors, gentle reader, read no further! For those of you who have decided to stay, thanks for reading. I hope you enjoy this week's chapter. See you all next year!



So, a Great Fire?” said Stirling, raising his eyebrows at Magnon. Magnon cocked an eye at Candlewax uneasily but went ahead.

“I’m not sure if you know this, but a sacrifice has always been a source of magic. Human and animal sacrifices are frowned upon lately, but that’s a recent development. The thing is, it isn’t just human or animal sacrifice that can be a source of magic. Anything that a person has put energy and effort in retains a bit of that energy. It can be used.”

“Back when buildings were mostly all made of wood and there weren’t such things as fire hydrants, a fire in a city could get out of hand fast. If a fire managed to kill someone who had magical talent, and if it took in enough human effort, it often became…” The crow paused to consider the right word, “aware.”

“They are the fires that somehow grew too fast to stop, or jumped streets to be a get a few steps ahead of the fire brigades. All the energy locked up in buildings, and all the people consumed get funnelled into a single being. It doesn’t happen often now, but there is a group of powerful beings that were born from some of the fires. Tokyo, Chicago, Boston, Chernobyl, Old London and New London, Dresden, Rome, San Fransisco, and ah, Vancouver.”

“So this guy…”

“Yes.”

“Not to be a dick,” said Stirling, noticing Candlewax’s flames had banked down again, “but why are you here.”

“I’m here because of that greasy little shit, Cordova, betrayed me.”

Stirling looked to Magnon for clarification.

“They were partners back in my time,” said Magnon

“What, like civil partners” He made the universal symbol for humping with his circled thumb and index finger.

“Eh? What’s this now?” asked Candlewax.

“Business partners!” Magnon quickly clarified.

“I’m going to need more background before I’m ready to think about springing Howling Mad Murdoch here,” he said nodding at Candlewax.

Candlewax squinted at him. “As you will, young master.” He took a seat in the nearest chair, his feet out in front of him, the bottle of rum held loosely on his knee.

“So this story goes back a ways. By the by, what year is it? With no light or dark in here, I must admit I’ve lost track of my days.”

“Two Thousand Eighteen.”

“Go on, don’t fuck with me now, lad.”

“It’s the truth.”

“Well blow me. Has it been that long?”

Candlewax sat back in his chair and puffed out his breath.

“Two Thousand and Eighteen, you say?”

Stirling nodded.

Candlewax looked at the bottle. “This thing’s a fucking antique!” he exclaimed. “Just like me now, I suppose. To your good health.” He raised the bottle to his lips and drained it in a long pull. Blue flame began spurting out of the fissures all across his chest and shoulders. He tossed the empty bottle over his shoulder to have it shatter on the wall behind him.

Stirling handed him another, which he accepted with a nod and an, “I thank ye.”

“So why am I here, with this very pretty prison chained around my leg?” he asked, his mouth limned with blue alcohol fire. “Well to answer that I need to go back to the days when I was younger. Back in those days, the arcane demimonde was not what you’d call, well-organized, and Vancouver itself was a ruddy mess.”

“Aside from being freshly burned to the ground, the arcane were working out in the open, bold as brass. There were Char Witches working openly as stokers on riverboats and the Fey acting like bloody native guides for the lads coming up for the Gold Rush. Something needed to be done about it. Much more of that malarkey and all the old secrets would’ve been out, and then we’d all have been right fucked.”

“Since nobody else was willing, I stepped up, and for the longest time, it was I doing the rounds about town. I made sure that the wheels stayed greased between us and the mundane, and if someone needed a fire lit under them, I was the one who oversaw the task. In return, I collected a small fee, nothing onerous you understand, just a pittance, a stipend for a job well done from the grateful community.”

“It went along like that for years until the winter of 1918 when a likely lad, Mormal de Cordova was his name, shows up on my doorstep. He was a bit green around the gills, but I loved him like the sickly son I never knew. My very own influenzic Tiny Tim. I raised him, taught him what I could, and for a while we were living in clover, he and I. It was good times until the Alchemists started to settle.”

He paused to uncork the second bottle and raised it to his lips. “That lot didn’t feel the services I provided were worthy of the cost, and they refused to contribute to the community pot when the collection plate got passed around. Now, I’m not the kind of man to it take well when the ones what can afford it most are the ones who give the least, and I made my displeasure with the situation known to them. We came to an accord, which is to say, they began to toss in the occasional shekel, the same as everyone else. What I didn’t know was that even then, the lying dogs were seducing my Cordova, whispering bitter poison in his ear, dazzling him with shiny baubles and buying his soul a drop at a time with their wretched potion.”

“When the Dust War was done and all your kind were dead or hiding,” he said sloshing the bottle in Stirling’s direction, “Cordova comes to me and says he’s got the last set of guest keys to the Skeleton Club, and why don’t we use it to have one last toast to the glorious dead.”

“Now, I always had a soft spot for you deadies, and it struck me hard to see your kind laid so low, so I agreed. One last piss-up at the Skeleton Club to send your lot off in style.

A dreamy look crossed his face. “It was a grand affair, all my crew were here.” he said, gesturing to the room, “It was a party the likes of which stories are told about for years after. We were all well into our cups when the crew starts disappearing one by one. I didn’t think much of it until it was too late for them. I was getting ready to make my own excuses when Cordova pulls out a bottle of rare Scotch Whisky he brought for the occasion and wants to share with me. I had an affection for the lad, and for whisky, so I decided to stay for just one more drink.”

“Now, I love me a drink or two, but it takes a strong spirit to put me on my back on account of how I burn it off faster than I can drink it.” He illustrated by taking another pull of the bottle and blowing a long plume of blue flame past his lips like a blowtorch.

“I can only guess that it was his Alchemist friends who made the brew, because it took me faster than any drink ever has, and before I knew it I was on my arse.”

“It can’t have been long but when I came to, I was in the lamentable state you see before you here,” he rattled his chain idly, “and in front of me are all the fucking Alchemists all lined up neat in a row.”
“It was Knox and Crocker of the White, Philip, and Elizabeth of the Gold, and Elanor of the Red, all with smiles on their mugs, wide as you please. Standing with them, the traitor Cordova, coughing into his new silk monogrammed snottinger like he was born to it.”

“They tell me the chain on my leg is their own foul work, planned in advance, and that heat will only make the metal stronger. It’s a pretty cage they’ve made for me and they know it. Since we used the last guest key to get in, and since by that point Necromancers were as rare as a sincere fart in church, they figure I’m good and fucked. To tell the truth, they weren’t wrong. Still though, I’ve got my crew, and a finer bunch you’ve never seen, or will again. If there’s a way to spring me, they’ll find it sharpish.”

“Now, as they joined my little club, I gave each new member of the crew a golden ring, a badge that that says here’s a stout lad or lass, worthy of trust and respect. That's when the Alchemists start pulling out the rings and tossing them to the ground in front of me. Seventeen in all, and the smell of blood still thick upon ‘em.”

“I’ll admit that at that moment I felt lower than a snake’s belly in a waggon rut. Chained with little hope of escape, my crew murdered, and in my enemy’s power. Still, they were ascared of doing me in right then, me being a Great Fire, and them not wanting to insult the others. So they took the craven’s route, they left me to burn out.”

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