The Way of Caine (The Warcaster Chronicl

Caine cleared the summit of the rooftops with well-timed jumps. Below, his passage went unseen by the citizens of Merywyn. It gave him a rare déjà vu. He thought back to days gone by in Bainsmarket. From such heights, he had been in control of the world, free to prey upon his marks, whoever they might be. Then, as now perhaps. The night sky had begun to clear, and with it a cool breeze from the west. Unsettled though he was, he couldn’t deny it felt good to be running high once more.

Along the flat roof of a warehouse he made his way, gaining speed. With a tuck and roll, he blinked out of existence, to reappear over the open air of the chasm between buildings. His momentum carried with him, and his roll brought him over the buttress of a Morrowan cathedral. He landed like a cat on a solitary gargoyle.

He paused to crouch upon the sculpture, peering at the streets some five stories down. He consulted the scrap of paper Kreel had given him. He saw the steady bustle of the main street below, lined with horse drawn carriages and countless pedestrians going to and fro under gaslight, even at this late hour. At the end of the street, he watched a covered carriage approach. On the sides of its canvas covering, a name had been written with stenciled black paint. The same name that had been written on his scrap. Next to it was the icon of a milk bottle.

“Where are you delivering at this late hour I wonder?” Caine smiled.

In an instant, he had flashed away from his perch, to reappear on the eaves of the cathedral a short distance away. He began running to keep pace with the cart as it advanced the length of the avenue.

At the corner of the cathedral, he easily hopped the gap to the next building a few feet away. His feet rapped along the row of copper roofed townhouses, and he kept an eye on the cart as he went. He saw it near an alley, then slow down. He was soon close enough to hear the driver’s coarse voice call his horse to a stop.

From the alley, he saw shadows moving. They stepped out into the gaslight for a moment, three large men, as near as he could tell. Just as quickly as they had appeared, they piled into the back of the milk carriage, before the driver spurred his horse on. Caine had seen the glint of a pistol stuffed in the jacket of one of them. He scoffed to think what milkmen needed weapons for. He watched the carriage move off, turning right at the next intersection, and into a maze of warehouses. Beyond that were numerous buildings lined with great smokestacks and twisted scaffolding. He lunged forward, on the move again.

He leapt, sliding down the slant of a rooftop to keep pace with the carriage. Arriving at the lip of the roof, he leapt for a drainpipe and used it to slide down a story, and onto a lower roof. He leapt clear at the last second, setting down in a crouch, his heart now racing with the fast pace he’d kept. Just in time, he saw the wagon disappear into an old factory, some five stories high. The sprawling structure was crowned with three massive smokestacks and numerous conveyor lines. On the rooftops, he could faintly make out shadows moving.

The dairy plant.

By all appearances, Kreel’s information had been good. There was no question there was a gathering happening within, at an hour no one had any legitimate business afoot. Caine withdrew his Spellstorms from under his cloak. He cracked them open with a flick of the wrist, checking each one with a spin of the chambers before flicking them closed once again.



Caine was among them now. He could hear their loose talk on all sides, and he slinked down as he stepped lightly ahead. The first man he’d tailed had wandered too far from the pack, and he’d put the man down for good, but there were a half dozen more he counted spread out over the rooftop of the large factory. Occasionally, they stepped within the up-cast light of large skylights across the roof, allowing him a better glimpse of them. No less than a motley crew of dog-faced cutthroats by his estimation. There had been no sign of the rumored sniper, Zeke. Whoever was up here, he’d get to them. He had no intention of leaving guns on high once he got to work below.

Over a length of oversized ductwork, he saw a silhouette shuffling in the dark. “Louden? Where you at lad? You don’t want to piss off Zeke now do you?” Caine crouched low, and watched the shadow pass by. The man was armed with a basic long rifle, like the first had been. Across the way, he saw another pair of thugs over the largest skylight on the roof. They were talking, and staring down at the proceedings below.

An idea struck him.

The skylight they stood over had large glass panes he could open. That was his entrance, and the rafters within should give him a commanding view of things. Patiently, Caine waited for the man nearest him to get closer, and flipped a Spellstorm around in his hand. He loathed the idea of using his beautiful Spellstorm as a simple blackjack, but until he had eyes on the target, there was no sense in causing a commotion. The man drew closer in the darkness. Caine lunged.



Caine drew near the skylight, checking each corner of the roof as he went. To all appearances, the roof was his now. Just the same, he couldn’t shake the notion he was being watched. The thought was interrupted by a murmur by his feet, and a feeble hand reaching for his ankle.

“Easy now, chum,” he whispered.

Another strike with a Spellstorm turned club and the man fell silent. A second later, Caine stepped to the skylight and peered down. He saw large copper vats along one side, crates stacked three stories high on another. There were catwalks crisscrossed to the rafters, and circular gantries around the vats. There, in the center of the place, he saw twenty men in a loose circle around three wagons. The wagons looked exactly like the one he’d seen before. From what he could make out, not one of the men down there was a trollkin. No McCoy, no Zeke, he thought. Caine wondered if Kreel wasn’t as connected as he thought he was. Maybe it didn’t matter.

His target was down there, sure as sure could be.

On the factory floor, Thaddeus Montague, royal treasurer to King Rynnard himself stood out from the rogues’ gallery around him like a sore thumb. A slightly built and bespectacled man of early middle age, he nervously held a ledger while the others around him clutched at hand cannons. Moving from crate to crate and marking his ledger as he did, he opened each, revealing a breathtaking horde of gold. Caine looked at the man, lining him up along the iron sights of both Spellstorms. It could all be over so quickly. Just a pull of the trigger and the man’s brainpan would burst onto the floor, here and now.

Aye, but that is only half of the thing, he thought with a sigh.

Rebald had sent him here to find out what was in Montague’s head before he emptied it. With another look about the place, he sighed and re-holstered the Spellstorm. Even for him, a one man assault into the hornet’s nest below seemed near suicide. All in all, there were just too many angles, and too many exits. He had no idea how many men were in that tangle, and where the high priced talent was, if it was here at all.

Meanwhile, of course, his target was right in the middle of it.

Reluctantly, he slid in through the opened glass pane, and stepped down onto the crisscrossing network of rusting iron rafters to get a closer look. Carefully, he tested his weight on the old frame and then started to climb across it. Below, no one noticed. At least he’d have the element of surprise.

He didn’t hear the whistle of displaced air until it was too late.

Caine’s shoulder was on fire and with it his head. The shock of an impact sent him keeling over, just as he was within arm’s reach of the gantry. Reflexively, he tried flashing to safety, but something was wrong.

He couldn’t.

Magic was gone from his body, replaced entirely with pain. It spread voraciously from his shoulder, and he glanced there numbly.

Somehow, a tiny crossbow bolt was stuck in him. Even as he gaped at it, his forward momentum took him abruptly out of the rafters and into open space. The gantry became a blur beside him, and he regained his wits only at the last second, shooting a hand out. He managed two fingers on the dusty metal, but couldn’t keep the grip. Momentum swung him over a little before he resumed his perilous freefall. Cursing in midair, he saw a stack of crates rushing closer. He gritted his teeth, and braced for impact.

Over and over it came.

He fell like a ball bouncing between two stacks of crates, with each blow he sorely regretted what armor he had shed. He landed at last on the floor, bruised on all sides, groaning. In the fall, the bolt had come loose and lay on the floor next to him, smashed and bloody. He flared his arcantrik generator to full charge, and immediately a power-field surged around him. The snub little chimneys of the generator began to belch thick black smoke.

So much for stealth.

From his cover, Caine’s eyes darted back to the rafters. Where did that shot come from? He scanned every corner, but saw nothing.

As he rolled clear of the crates, he groaned to find he was now in plain sight of the assembled. His shoulder bled freely, but at least the fire in his head was gradually receding. Whoever had fired it was well equipped. The bloody thing had taken his magic, if even for a moment.

Magic he badly needed now.

Shots immediately bit at the ground and crates around him, and he got up with a grunt. He dove over a nearby pipeline, making for the vats along the far wall. In an instant, his pistols were out, and he cracked a few hasty shots at his enemies. Two of them found home, as men doubled over across the floor. Adrenaline began to course through his veins, and he risked a glance over the rusted pipeline. Buzzing ricochets chased him back down, but not before he had managed a quick glance at his target.

He cursed loud enough to be heard across the entire room.

Montague was breaking from the pack, running for the door on the far side of the room! He fought to pull his magic back. It was almost as if his leg had fallen asleep, and slowly the circulation returned. He squinted in concentration. If he could just flash away ... almost, but no.

A hammer, from out of nowhere, came smashing down at him.

He twisted clear of the blow at the last second, and watched as it buried itself in the rotted floorboards in a shower of splinters. Gripping the hammer, and now pulling it free, Caine saw a leering trollkin well over seven feet high, peculiarly dressed in an immaculate tailored suit. He did not look at all happy as the hammer came clear of the impact, and was raised high to strike again.

“McCoy, I presume?” Caine gasped.

“Ah!” The trollkin’s eyes lit up, pausing. “You have me at a disadvantage, sir. You are?”

“Leaving!”

Caine raised his pistols, and cracked two into the trollkin’s midriff, point blank. The beast winced at the kiss of twin Spellstorms, but to Caine’s surprise, he didn’t fall down. He paused a moment, as if savoring the pain, gradually grinding his teeth into a snaggle-toothed smile. His hammer still raised, the beast began to growl, and brought it down. Caine’s eyes were wide with horror. If ever there was a time.

He flashed away.

He appeared halfway across the room in cover, still cringing from a hammer that was now long gone. He sighed in relief, and shook his head. Looking up over a crate, he smiled to find Montague in the foreground, only a few yards away. Their eyes met and the shifty fellow yelped in dismay. Montague turned and dashed for a stairwell, still clutching his ledger. As he went, Caine noticed his new position had also flanked several thugs. They were shouting and pointing his way, but none of them had time to relocate. Caine took advantage, and cracked off a flurry of shots. Some gunmen fell screaming, leaving the rest to scramble for cover. In the confusion Caine made a dash across open floor to give chase to Montague. Rushing to a copper vat between him and the stairwell, he hit it with his good shoulder and rolled around behind it. Immediately the vat was pelted with shots, creating a cacophony of ricochets.

Caine glanced ahead to the stairwell from behind the vat. Montague was there, halfway up. Caine risked a salvo in the direction he was taking fire, then ducked back behind the vat. As more return fire struck his cover he conceived it was now or never to cross the no-man’s land between him and Montague. If there’s no cover, I’ll make my own, he thought. Drawing on his magic, his form became vague, shifting. Emboldened, Caine ran from the vat like a specter, firing as he went.

A volley of shots followed after him. So many, it was as though he was the only target in a carnival shooting gallery. Scores of shots chased after him as he went.

All of them missed, save one.

Caine convulsed forward in mid sprint, falling on his face next to some barrels. In his side, the sharp jab of another bolt, and with it that unbearable fire in his head. Where were those bloody things coming from? He bit his lip at the pain and scrambled to roll behind the barrels. With the bolt in his side, his magical cover dissipated like smoke around him.

He could see Montague had made the top of the stairs, and now pushed on the exit. Still reeling at the pain, Caine leveled a shaky Spellstorm after him in a lame attempt to wing the man.

Pursuit had already made it as far as the vat he’d used only moments ago, three men with clear shots despite the barrels he now lay behind. They leveled their hand cannons with cruel smiles. Grimacing with the pain of the bolt in his side and still on his back, he put each man down in turn with rune kissed hellfire. As the last of them fell to the ground, he looked back up the stairwell to see the door slamming shut.

It’s like that, is it, he sighed.

He couldn’t flash away, and all around him the shouts of more men closed in. It was clear he wasn’t going to take the stairs without getting hit; they offered no cover at all. Rolling away, he struck off in another direction, firing his Spellstorms wherever he saw movement.



Caine found a corridor ending in another stairwell up. Pausing, he looked down at his side. The bolt had tagged him by the barest margins, and he tugged it free with a grunt. Gradually the fire it put in him seemed to ebb. Daring to reload, he had made it halfway through when shouts came from around the corner. Slamming both Spellstorms shut, he moved on. He’d lost sight of his mark and he knew he was fading with every drop of blood that hit the ground. I’m not done yet. Taking the stairs, he pushed the burning pain from his head with sheer, stubborn anger. At the second floor landing, there was an access hatch to the side of the building. He seized upon it. Unbolting it, Caine looked out to find a long drainpipe running up the side of the outer wall.

There, below.

Caine saw Montague leaping from a fire escape to the alley. The panicked man started running, soon rounding a corner and out of sight. Caine looked across to the adjacent rooftop a story higher up, and stepped back.

You’re going to lose him, he thought, pain shooting across his body.

“The hell I am!”

With an oath, he lurched forward into a running leap, and pushed himself to flash just before he would have hit the wall. With relief, he vanished, only to reappear some ten feet higher in mid-air over the alley. As he came to a skidding stop on the adjacent roof, he looked back the way he’d come, panting with the effort. His head was throbbing, and he felt slightly dizzy. Just the same, he’d leapt not a moment too soon.

Shots from the hatch he’d left behind chased after him, buzzing wide into the night air. He squinted at the mob, spotting the trollkin with the hammer at the head of them. Caine shook his head in exasperation, and started along to the eaves to try and find his lost mark.



Fatigued though he was, Caine made his way round a silo, arriving at the north side of the building. Just in time he saw Montague stepping out onto the main street. The man stopped, leaning against the wall to catch his breath in ragged gasps, and looked the way he’d come for signs of pursuit.

Near as Caine could tell, it was just the two of them now. Montague was headed for the bright lights of the busy avenue, lined with taverns, carriages and foot traffic of all sorts. Caine leveled his pistol, stepping forward along the eaves, hoping once more for a leg shot to slow the man down. As he went, he failed to notice the small stove pipe underfoot. He was suddenly falling, the street yawned three stories below. Flailing, he kept his balance, but went down on a knee, a gasp in his throat. As he did, the unmistakable whoosh of another bolt flew in the place his head had been only a second ago.

He had not lost his tail. Not at all …

Caine cracked three shots in the direction the bolt had come before diving for a brick half-wall. He saw a shadow move from across the roof and with it the whistle of another bolt. The thing caught him by the coat as he dove, but no more. His own shot had cracked the stone facing of the wall behind the man, and he heard a hiss of anger as brick shards showered him. He glanced at the bolt protruding from his coat. He recognized the undamaged barb as Iosan, very rare. Very dangerous.

So that’s Zeke. The bastard’s some sort of elf mage hunter, he thought.

His pursuer might be in cover, but at least he had come out of hiding. He must think I’m done, Caine smiled grimly. Caine could just make him out at this range. He squinted to see the Iosan nock another bolt while leaning against his own brick half-wall. This was a fight he could win, as he saw it. He’d just have to get it over with quickly. Risking a glance over the side of the building, he saw Montague on the main street, approaching a taxi carriage. He glimpsed numbers stenciled on the side of the taxi.

“Two-nine-three-three,” he whispered.

Then promptly swore in shock. Up and over the side of the wall, McCoy climbed the fire escape only a few yards away. Getting his bearings, the trollkin turned and looked around. As he found Caine, he smiled his ugly snaggle-toothed smile. Caine groaned. He was about to get caught on both sides.

Zeke didn’t seem much pleased by the development either. From his cover, he shouted out at the arrival of his colleague.

“McCoy! I have him!” he cried out from behind cover.

McCoy grinned, hauling his hammer over his shoulder. “I think not!” he roared back. “This little one put a bullet in me. Two maybe! I will split his head over the affair.” The trollkin laughed deeply, brandishing his hammer to readiness. Caine was only a few strides away from the monster, and totally exposed. He raised a Spellstorm and fired. Three shots now found the trollkin, tearing into his midriff. Dark blood stains appeared in the silk white shirt and vest, but just the same, he only grunted, stepping forward as though walking into a strong wind. McCoy only smiled amicably at Caine as he came on, his hammer rising once more. Caine looked at his pistols hopelessly, then back up at the advancing Trollkin.

Across the rooftop, his colleague Zeke was undeterred. “Ten crowns you don’t touch him before I get a blade in him?”

“You’re on,” McCoy shouted back, only three strides away from Caine. He dared a glance back to Zeke, and found the elf was at once clear of his cover. His shadowy figure had become a fluid dance of movement, almost impossible to track. On and on he came, leaping and tumbling over the intervening obstacles. Somehow as he tumbled, a long curved blade had already made its way to his hand.

Caine nearly let panic take him. On one side, a rampaging monster, hammer ready to strike. On the other, the relentless Iosan hunter was ready to strike with blade and crossbow.

Death on both sides.

Caine’s mind raced. Focus shots one way, get taken from the other. Flash away, maybe, but lose the mark and certainly not get far enough to lose this pair.

No.

It had to stop. He just needed more time to think.

Caine recalled the Khadoran raid, and the lesson it had taught him. The path he’d found, that special magic that led him to the place between seconds. He was tired now, so very tired, but he could find it again. He had to. His head throbbed and was fit to burst. Immediately, he thought he’d pushed too hard. It wasn’t going to work …

The pain was gone. Sound too. Caine opened his eyes to a world of gray and glitter. Zeke and McCoy were radiant shapes on either side of him, their movement reduced to an impossible crawl. He felt the strength to stand. He had time enough to line them up. Not a second longer.

Time moved again.

They came screaming at him, wild eyed and open mouthed. With eyes closed and arms crossed, he squeezed a single shot from both Spellstorms. Thunder echoed across the rooftop, the muzzle flash of either barrel hung motionless, rapt in rune-halo.

Iosan and Trollkin alike were struck square in the forehead, and both were thrown back, their eyes wide. Caine blinked.

It was no dream, he had done the thing.

Both men were dead within feet of him, their lifeless eyes looking skyward in stunned silence. He could only chuckle, dropping to his knees.

Dazed, his eyes drifted down to the avenue below. He smiled weakly, watching the pedestrians moving to and fro. He noticed cabs moving along the avenue, their horses at a trot.

Clip Clop Clip Clop.

Caine snapped his head up, focusing his eyes. He scanned the traffic, to find a cab marked two-nine-three-three still in sight. With a groan, he struggled to his feet. Moving to the fire escape, he shimmied down, every muscle screaming in protest. He was soon jogging at street level, guns holstered in pursuit of the errant cab. Gritting his teeth against the pain, he pushed past the crowds along the avenue. He gasped. The cab was too far to catch. He didn’t have the strength left. His steps slowed. As another cab rushed alongside him in the same direction, he grabbed the running bar. Swinging into the passenger compartment, he shouted to the driver breathlessly, “Follow two-nine-three-three!”

That was when he noticed the cab was already occupied. He looked across the bench to find a middle aged man clutching a ledger, gaping in terror at the sight of him.

It was Montague.

Caine started laughing, and shaking his head. Montague made to leave with a whimper, his hand reaching for the door. Caine kicked his leg up, knocking the treasurer back to his seat. He already had a Spellstorm on him, and he cocked it slowly. Montague grimaced, clutching his ledger like a shield, but sat still.

“As you were driver,” Caine shouted after him, panting still.



“Please don’t kill me!” the bespectacled man pleaded in flawless Cygnaran. Caine reclined casually behind the man’s desk, his feet up. They were in the fourth floor study of a typical looking townhouse, in the well-to- do neighborhood of Ules. The place seemed unlived in except for this study, which had been well supplied, not least of which included a full liquor cabinet. Caine absently kept a Spellstorm trained on the man across from him as he flipped through his ledger, page by page.

“Why shouldn’t I?”

Montague only moaned, putting his head on the desk.

The facts were neatly laid out and immaculately detailed, in fact. There had been four shipments like the one tonight, already sent into Cygnar. It was incredible, really. The ledger included the name of each Cygnaran nobleman implicated, how much they’d been promised, and how much they had received. The names of a dozen mercenary companies, including the Von Baums were listed. Montague had been so thorough as to detail the stages of the operation for which the mercenaries would receive their pay, as appendices. Even if it did not list the exact agenda of the nobles, the fact that it detailed as much information as it did, left one readily capable of deduction.

Clearly, they were gathering diversionary forces across the periphery of Cygnar while a singular force gathered near her heart. Even more incredible, a payment history showed an earl in Caspia was taking the largest of the gold shipments. It inferred a bribe was in play. Caspia had never fallen. Caine knew that, hell, everyone did. It was the stuff of old stories. Of course, in those stories, the enemies were always on the other side of her thick walls. Was there really someone on the inside capable of compromising her defenses, and actually willing to do it? Caine looked up at the despondent man across from him, baffled.

This man was running the show? Really?

The chances he might actually be capable of moving this much gold out from under Rynnard’s nose without him knowing seemed incredible. Yet Rynnard was an old man. It was not impossible, and Thaddeus here might well be putting on a show for Caine. He looked up from the ledger, regarding the man before him as he might a card player.

“Oh, I suppose you should kill me. This was wrong from the beginning. I begged him against it!” Thaddeus lowered his head, pulling his spectacles from his head to rub the bridge of his nose.

“Who? Who did you beg?”

Thaddeus looked alarmed, instantly covering his mouth. Caine shook his head, rolling his eyes.

“This is Rynnard’s show, isn’t it?” Caine glared at Thaddeus over the top of the ledger. The treasurer said nothing, only keeping his head low.

Downstairs, there came a pounding at the door. Caine looked at Montague sharply, while Montague himself blanched. With a growl, Caine stood up and grabbed the treasurer by the scruff of his shirt, pulling him out to the balcony. Below, they could see a squad of city guard, knocking at the door. Caine pointed a Spellstorm in Montague’s face, then pointed to the roof above them. The man nodded, shivering in the cool night air. Caine boosted him up, and then flashed himself there an instant later. Montague jumped, startled by the display, but kept quiet. Below, they could hear the door being smashed open. Guards stormed in.

Caine kept the gun to Thaddeus forehead, and listened. Room by room they moved, calling for Montague. Finally, they were right below, looking out at the balcony.

“He’s not here, sir!” came the shout in Llaelese.

“I can see that, idiot. Would you like to inform his majesty of this yourself?”

“N-no. No, sir!” Then, as quickly as they had come, the guards stomped out.

Caine laughed at the timid man next to him, as the pair sat still on the roof.

“Why all this … subterfuge, Montague? If Rynnard wants Leto gone so bad, why not just supply the nobles without all this?” The distraught man nodded. A weight seemed to lift from him with each bob of his head.

“He wanted to be able to distance himself from it, if there was a chance it came to light. Plausible deniability. It’s ambitious. He knew it could blow up in his face, and we’re supposed to be your allies after all. You are Cygnaran, yes? The accent … from around Orven?”

“Bainsmarket, actually,” Caine corrected, as he glanced back at the ledger.

“I’m sorry. I’m so sorry,” Thaddeus sighed, despondent.

Caine looked up at the stars as the odd pair continued to sit on the sloped copper roof. Dawn was coming, maybe another couple of hours. By Morrow, what a night. He had the ledger and the man, too. By Rebald’s order, what came next was clear enough.

And yet.

His hand was reluctant to point a Spellstorm at Montague anymore. Instead, he holstered it, and reached into his pocket for a trinket he’d been given in Ceryl. He found it easily enough. Caine turned it over in his hand, and thought about the words of the man who’d given it to him: Lord Brigham Walder. Montague saw the gleam of it and looked over with interest.

“What is that?”

Caine looked up, as if breaking from a trance.

“I reckon it’s the reason I’m not going to kill you. No matter how dear that decision might cost me.”

Montague blinked.