6
“I see by
the expression on your face that you know if not who I am, then who I
represent.”
Jordan nodded, not trusting himself
to speak at the present moment. His thoughts raced, and there was no way that
he could articulate them, not without meshing them together into an
unrecognisable blur. He chose the safe course instead, the course that Melvin
elected to ignore just a few moments earlier.
The train continued to hurtle
through the night towards Ma’arnar. Only its rattling motion disturbed the
quiet. Clattering creaks and grinds that might, in a different situation, have
been soothing enough to rock oneself to sleep. Now they were loud and
disturbing, the grinding of a mechanical giant’s teeth, or even the sound of
impending doom.
He
is one of the Three, Jordan reminded himself—not that he really needed
reminding. It was more a reality check than anything else. One of the Three… on the train to Ma’arnar… in my carriage.
It wasn’t exactly the momentary
insanity that swamps one when they’re in the presence of a celebrity that
Jordan felt right now, for indeed, the word celebrity was not one you’d use to
describe the illustrious company Jordan now found himself in. No, what the
Three represented went far beyond celebrity and the call of fame. Indeed, it
was only in very small and very tight circles that the mentioning of the Three
drew any power at all. And because any mentioning of the Three was done in no
more than an awed whisper told these small and tight cliques that a visit by
any one of the Three members was an auspicious occasion…
…and now one of them sat no more
than six feet away from Maurice Jordan!
His racing thoughts were swiftly
congealing into something that resembled rationality. The process was much like
a swamp toad snatching random gnats out of the air with its tongue, only Jordan
then had to arrange the random thoughts into a coherent progression.
The Three. The highest order of the
Black Hoods. This man sitting across the carriage from him was an assassin par-excellence. A myriad would have
fallen, be it from his blade, from poison, or from some other contrivance, each
death adding to this man’s reputation, to his aura, elevating him in the eyes
of his peers to a master. He’d have survived countless attempts at his own
life, from friend and foe alike, for what better way of usurping someone’s
prestige than by bumping them off the same way that they’d bumped off countless
others to climb that ladder? Only this man wasn’t just a successful killer… not by any stretch of the imagination. Even
sulky old sixteen-going-on-twenty-two Melvin was a successful killer. Hell, taking someone else’s life wasn’t hard,
especially after you’ve got the first one under your belt. No, it wasn’t the
act of killing alone that separated you from ordinary assassins. It was the art
more than it was the message, for in every death the message was the same and
the ensuing panic was the same.
The differences between master and
the student were subtle but telling. It was the subtleties that told those who
found the bodies that a master had struck. There were signs to be on the outlook
for, little nuances in the murder scene, each one a deft stroke like an
artist’s paintbrush on a canvas. The unskilled couldn’t read these little
nuances. To those untrained eyes, it was yet another scene of death. But to the
masters and those whose aspirations ran toward mastery (and Jordan most
definitely classed himself in the latter) reading the scene was like turning
the pages of a well-crafted novel. Personality, that’s essentially what it came
down to. Leaving a little of yourself at the scene, your trademark if you will,
so that you could write another page of your legacy.
Once you reach a certain point where
word of your deeds causes even the hardest of assassins to let loose an
involuntary shiver, a unanimous vote elevates you to being one of the Three.
The position was for the remainder of one’s life, which in the trade of dealing
in death didn’t usually encompass too many consecutive years. In fact one of
the ways to secure yourself a position as one of the Three was by ridding the
world of any one of the three members currently in place. This was no mean
task, but neither was it an impossible one, not if all endless rounds of voting
were any indication. Just this year, two of the Three had met unfortunate ends;
if this wasn’t an indication of how perilous the position was, then Jordan
didn’t know.
But enough of the glossing over of
the prestige; anyone with their ambition set to climbing the ranks knew of the
Three and the machinations behind their illustriousness. What was of most
concern to Jordan now was the fact that one of the Three was currently sharing
this carriage with him and somehow Jordan doubted it was one of the newly
appointed members. The gurgling and churning in his guts told him that this
wasn’t likely to be a congenial visit, either. With the Three, it was never
congenial. It was business… and if not business…
Jordan heard his throat click as he
swallowed. It was a death rattle, overly loud, like a breaking bone. Beads of
sweat dotted his brow just below his hairline. Further sweat, this of the
clammy, clinging kind, appeared in his palms and glued his shirt to his back.
This reaction was instantaneous. The thoughts that burst into his head led one
to the other in barely recognisable seconds. In the train, probably no more than
ten seconds had passed. In Jordan’s mind, he’d almost relived his own life in
slow, graphic detail.
The stranger had continued to turn
the envelope in his hands as Jordan succumbed to his fancy. Impending doom had
a way of etching itself upon one’s face and it was probably very obvious to the
man sitting before him. In his position, he’d have seen it often enough
regardless of how well the next possible victim could control their features.
You could smell fear, too. Thick and cloying. He tried again to swallow, found
he couldn’t. It hurt too much.
The stranger spoke, destroying the
silence that had brewed in the carriage: “still thy heart,” he said. There was
the tiniest hint of humour in his voice. “I am not here to end your life.”
Jordan stared. More seconds passed.
He dropped his eyes, noticed that he’d been wringing his hands. It took an
enormous strength of will to stop them gyrating in his lap. Above him, Melvin
snored; the drama and tension happening below him was nothing.
While his fears were momentarily
allayed, Jordan nonetheless jumped when the stranger drew a knife from the
folds of his cloak. He popped the seal on the envelope and the knife
disappeared as quickly as it had appeared. Gingerly, his fingers withdrew the
documents from the envelope fanned them out like overly large playing cards.
“Your mission,” he said. He’d been looking down at the papers when he said the
last. When he looked up, his dark eyes sparkled with some species of
mischievous knowledge. In fact he looked much younger as if years had been
stripped from the lines of his face. It was as if the workings of Black Hood
machinations served as some kind of elixir of youth. “Your mission has been
compromised.”
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