Chapter 15

[Falconius]

wschwab 02/02/2026 22:22

Chapter 15 - Owen

I grit my teeth as I urinated into the bucket, grinding them together to keep a hoarse yell from breaking loose. Three days since the Sleeper, but it was still worming around inside of me. Leaning over to inspect the results winded me. The smell hit me first. The bucket reeked of ammonia and old fear. The cell’s poor light made it hard to see, but the urine seemed to be a brackish brown, an improvement over the streaks of blood that had been in it before. I finished, heart beating like a horse’s from the effort it took to use the bucket we called a chamber pot. Add the physical degradations to the list of Roddy’s crimes.

Lemmy looked over from the side of the cell, concern on his face. He looked away when he saw me staring back. I didn’t want anyone’s sympathy. I stopped a shudder in my hands from getting worse as I finished and got my pants in order in the dim light of the one lantern we were afforded in our cell.

I’d woken up here after another of that monster Sickle’s sessions. Apparently Lemmy had crawled back from being left for dead, only to get caught again when he’d decided I’d needed saving. I couldn’t figure out why he’d volunteer himself as my savior. We hadn’t even known each other for a week, and I’d introduced myself by taking half his money.

The cell had been a storeroom once. The outlines where shelves had been bolted to the walls were still visible, the holes in the stone filled with rust. A chemical smell clung to everything, turpentine maybe, or coal oil. The air was thick with it, made thicker by the stuffy heat. No windows. The door was new work, thick oak braced with iron, locks on the outside. Three of them. Lemmy said we were tucked away from the other prisoners. He suspected Roddy was hiding us from his boss.

🪣

A girl screamed. Not close, but the walls carried it. She’d been calling for her mama for two days now, hiccuping sobs that woke us in the small hours. Couldn’t be more than six. Same age as Amira would have been. I tried not to count how many days she’d been at it, tried not to imagine what would make her stop.

Lemmy’s eyes had that glassy look they got when the children cried. He’d lost weight. We both had. But it showed on him more, made his face all angles and shadows in the lantern light. I knew that look in his eyes though. Had worn it myself when I’d first understood what this place was. Children packed in cells like salt cod in barrels. A whole operation running, selling them to the highest bidder. I’d been conscious for one of Roddy’s visits. He’d made a point of describing the facility’s efficiency. How the “Boss” ran a tight operation. How nothing went to waste, not even the ones too damaged to sell. “Real shame about that,” he’d said, looking right at me. “Boss hates waste.”

He wanted me to ask what happened to the ones nobody bought. I didn’t.

Didn’t need to.

I leaned against the wall as I wheezed. The stone was slick with condensation, cold despite the stale air. There were worse fates than death. That truth had been settling into my bones for three days now. Better that Amira and Elane burned. Better that than this.

Lemmy’s head came up. His eyes flicked to me, then to the door. I pushed off the wall and shuffled closer, my legs still weak. Had to strain to hear over my own breathing and the ringing in my ears that hadn’t stopped since Sickle’s last visit.

Voices in the corridor. One of them was Roddy.

“…nothing of interest down here, I assure you. Just old storage.”

“Is that so?” The second voice made my skin prickle. Something wrong in the tone, like hearing words spoken backward.

“Absolutely. We can inspect the main holding cells if you’d like, but this area is-”

“I prefer to judge for myself, Rodenary.”

The fear in Roddy’s ensuing silence was the first good thing that had happened to me all day. Roddy was scared. I’d known him long enough to read the lack of a retort. The slime mold was getting a taste of his own medicine. Part of me wanted to bang on the door, let whoever was out there know exactly what Roddy was hiding. But if Roddy was scared, I knew that I didn’t want this new player’s attention either.

“It sounds like he’s losing,” Lemmy whispered.

Keys jangled. Multiple locks being worked, one after another. The door swung inward. Breeze stood in the opening, crossbow loaded, taking in the room with quick professional eyes. Making sure we weren’t trouble. I wasn’t. Couldn’t be if I wanted to. We both knew it.

“Behave,” Roddy said from the corridor. Warning me, or maybe begging.

The man who ducked through the doorway had to fold himself nearly in half to fit. When he straightened, he was a head taller than me even with my boots on. Gaunt didn’t cover it. He was skeletal, like something that had been buried and dug up, all wrong angles under an expensive overcoat. He wore gloves despite the heat. Something in the way he moved set my teeth on edge.

Then I saw his face.

No. First I saw the mask, fine porcelain, painted to look human. It sat slightly crooked, like it had been fitted to a different skull. Beneath it, where the mask didn’t quite cover, I caught glimpses of something else. Something that made my training kick in before conscious thought could catch up. That’s not human. Get clear. Find a weapon.

But I was locked in a cell with no weapon and legs that could barely hold me. So I stayed still and tried not to look like prey.

“Well,” the thing wearing human clothing said, “this does not have the distinct look of nothing, Rodenary.”

“I can explain-” Roddy started.

A gloved hand rose. Roddy’s mouth snapped shut mid-sentence like he’d been slapped.

“Oh no,” the creature continued, its voice all mock concern, “this looks like something indeed. What would the Finger say?” It shook its head, a movement with one too many joints in it. “What would he say?”

“I told you I might have-” Roddy tried again.

Another gesture. The thing never blinked. Its eyes, what I could see of them behind the mask, were flat and black like a lizard’s. Beneath the expensive tailoring it moved wrong, shoulders rolling in a way that turned my stomach.

“Of course,” it said, turning those dead eyes on us, “we might be able to ensure word doesn’t reach unfortunate ears.” It stepped closer. I could smell it now—something chemical and rotten beneath cologne. “I do have need of new… assistants.”

The pause before assistants made my skin crawl worse than Sickle ever had. At least with Sickle you knew the monster was a monster. This thing was pretending.

Roddy made a sound like he’d been gut-punched. “Listen. Fassogen. Please. I have plans for these two. Personal plans. There’s got to be something else-”

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Fassogen. So that was the demon’s name. The one that could make Roddy beg. I filed it away, along with the fear I heard. Might be useful if I lived long enough.

“Oh!” Fassogen clapped his hands together, delighted. “Very well then. Something else it is.” He turned toward the door like he was leaving. The threat was clear even to me: Give me your toys or I tell.

We were pawns in a game between two spoiled terrors, and the real children were crying somewhere in the dark.

My fists clenched. Couldn’t stop them.

Roddy let out a breath like he was dying. “How much do you want for them?”

Fassogen turned back, unblinking eyes sweeping over us. He moved closer to me, head cocked at that wrong angle. Reached out with one gloved hand. I forced myself to stay still as he gripped my jaw, turned my head side to side like he was checking a horse’s teeth.

“Hmm. Strong jaw. Good bones beneath the damage.” The glove was leather but it felt cold. Dead. “Once quite hale, I’d wager. Not anymore, but…” He released me and stepped back. “Yes. I can work with this.”

He hadn’t even looked at Lemmy.

“Thirty marks for the pair,” Fassogen said, hands clasped in front of him like he was discussing the weather.

The words hit me in the gut. Thirty marks. That’s what I was worth. What we were both worth. Slightly more than a decent cow. Less than a horse. I felt my jaw clench tight enough to crack teeth.

“Thirty marks?” Even Roddy sounded shocked.

“Thirty marks!” Fassogen’s grin stretched too wide. “Come now, Rodenary. They’re damaged goods. One can barely walk, the other is… well.” He waved a dismissive hand at Lemmy. “I’m doing you a favor.” The insinuation that the monster was somehow doing a kindness by merely fleecing Roddy for us instead of snitching hung in the air, unspoken but sharp as broken glass.

“Thirty marks,” Roddy said again. Flat now. Defeated. (edited)
🪙

My only consolation was that Roddy was losing everything. Whatever arrangements he’d made, whatever profit he’d planned, all of it was being stripped away for pocket change. Good. My only anxiety was that someone else might cave his face in before I got the chance.

“Thirty marks! Splendid!” Fassogen’s grin never wavered. The monster was lying, I could see it in that inhuman smile. He’d take the money and tattle anyway. Get everything he wanted while Roddy got nothing.

The creature turned those dead eyes back on us. I could see myself reflected in them, haggard and beaten. “You’ll walk with me now. Running would be tedious for everyone.” The word tedious came out like a threat.

I looked at Lemmy. His face was blank, that investigator’s mask he wore when he was reading a crime scene. Whatever he was thinking, he was keeping it locked down tight.

There was nothing to do but follow. Fassogen stepped out into the corridor, Breeze backing away to give him room. I shuffled after him, legs protesting every step. My mind was already working though, counting doors as we passed, memorizing turns. Cataloging the way Breeze held his crossbow, where Roddy stood, the layout of this place.

Fassogen might have bought me for thirty marks.

But I’d cost him more than that before this was done.
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