I could have stayed there longer, in the quiet of the cemetery, recovering from the fight, but I just didn't have the time - not with three dead bodies dotting the grass around me. So, after a minute or two had passed, I roused myself into a sitting position, then managed to stagger to my feet even though my twisted knee still throbbed with pain.
I looked at Mab's casket. It was closed just like it had been before the fight, although the dwarf's shovel was still stuck in the side of it, like an arrow in a target, scarring the black surface of the wood. But the sunburst rune on the side was still intact, the ruby in the middle just a shade brighter than the dwarves' blood that covered my clothes and body. The golden rays and faceted sides of the gem seemed to wink at me, like eyes opening and closing, as the afternoon sun reflected off them.
"What are you looking at?" I muttered.
The rune didn't respond. If anything, it just glinted a little brighter, almost like Mab was mocking me one final time.
Phillip Kincaid
I couldn't believe she'd killed the three dwarves.
Oh, I'd heard the rumors for weeks now about Gin Blanco. About how she was a powerful Ice and Stone elemental. About how she was really the assassin the Spider. And most especially about how she was the one who'd finally killed Mab.
Jonah McAllister had whispered those things and many more into my ears while trying to insinuate himself into my good graces. McAllister shouldn't have bothered sucking up to me. The cocky bastard had caused me far too many problems over the years while working for Mab for me to ever consider allying myself with him. Still, his information interested me enough to do my own digging into Gin Blanco. Family murdered, some time living on the Southtown streets, taken in and raised by an old man who was also rumored to be an assassin. What I found had only made me that much more curious about her.
She'd caught my attention earlier today when she ran toward the sniper in the tree instead of finding a tombstone to hide behind like most everyone else had. Not something a normal person would do. So when it became obvious that she wanted to say her good-byes to Mab alone, I pretended to leave the cemetery, then snuck in a back way and took up a position behind the same tree the sniper had been in earlier.
At first, nothing happened, except that Blanco said a few soft words to the coffin that I couldn't quite hear. Then the dwarves appeared. I thought they'd merely come to dig Mab's grave, but they crept up on Blanco and attacked while her back was turned.
I thought about shouting a warning, showing myself, and stepping into the fight, but Blanco didn't need my help. She moved with ease and grace, like the knife in her hand was a natural extension of her own body: Owen's work, I'd wager. He'd always enjoyed making weapons, and what better present to give his assassin lover than a knife or two?
It was one thing to think that Blanco was an assassin; it was another to see her handiwork for myself. She was as impressive and dangerous as McAllister claimed, striking quickly, brutally, and ruthlessly, with no wasted movements, no hesitation, and no remorse.
I watched Blanco stab the last dwarf to death. She slumped over his body and then rolled over onto the ground, and I thought she might be injured herself. But after a few seconds she got back up on her feet. She looked down at the dwarf, her face cold and dispassionate, then slid her bloody knife up her sleeve with no more thought than most people would give to tucking spare change into their pocket. Definitely no remorse there. I liked that about her.
"Wow," a voice whispered in my ear. "She really is an assassin. She really is the Spider. "
I looked at the giant hunkered down in the grass beside me: Antonio Mendez, my right-hand man and my friend, one of the few that I had these days.
"It appears so," I murmured. "For once, McAllister actually told the truth about something. "
Now all that was left was to decide what I was going to do with the information. Unlike McAllister, I didn't want Blanco dead. No, I had something else in mind for her. I'd heard some nasty rumors lately about an old enemy of mine who was coming back to Ashland, and I was thinking that Blanco was the perfect person to help me with my problem. I just needed to convince Blanco of that. But it wouldn't take much doing. Not when she realized who my enemy really was - and what a threat that person was going to be to her and what she loved.
I thought my enemy had shown her face here today - that mysterious woman in black. Rage had filled my whole body, and I was tempted to pull out my gun and start blasting at her. But I watched her, and I realized the mystery woman wasn't who I'd thought she was. Oh, no. My enemy wouldn't have been content to stay in the background like that. I didn't know who the mystery woman was, and I didn't really care. No, I had much bigger worries right now, like figuring out exactly when my enemy would return to Ashland - and finally come after me.
"Now what?" Antonio whispered, breaking into my thoughts.
I looked at Blanco, but all she did was face the coffin and lower her head to it again.
"Come on," I said. "Let's go and let her pay her respects in peace. I think she's earned it. "
Antonio and I slipped away from Mab's grave site. I wanted a few minutes to think about what I'd just seen, so I told Antonio that I'd walk to the front of the cemetery and meet him there. The giant nodded and went to get the car from where he'd parked it on the back side of the cemetery.
I slowly wandered through the cemetery, looking at all the tombstones and the names of those buried here. I should have been planted a long time ago in some pauper's grave, but I'd managed to survive against the odds. Something I had in common with Blanco, I supposed.
I was so engrossed in my thoughts about the assassin that I didn't even see Owen until I was twenty feet away from him.
He was leaning against his car, lost in his own thoughts, but he turned at the scuff of my footsteps in the grass. Owen straightened up at the sight of me. His whole body stiffened, and the old, familiar anger blazed in his eyes. Even now, after all these years, he still hated me for what he thought I'd done. I couldn't decide whether I despised him or pitied him for being such a fool, for not realizing that I wasn't the villain - that I never had been. We'd been friends once - brothers, even - but that was gone now, long gone, destroyed in an instant by vicious lies and Owen's inability to see through them.
Still, I couldn't stop myself from veering in his direction and halting right in front of him.
"Owen. " I nodded my head politely at him.
"Phillip," he muttered through clenched teeth.
"Come to pay your respects, I see. "
Owen shrugged.