The Forever Gate - By Isaac Hooke

CHAPTER ONE

Hoodwink stared at the sword that would take his head tonight.

The weapon was sealed away in a glass case for all to see, set there to remind the particular occupants of this section of jail what their short futures held. It was a simple sword of dual-edged copper, with a blunt point. The jailer had taken the blade to the whetstone this very morning, and those edges gleamed in brutal anticipation. Scenes of agonized victims and delighted torturers etched its surface. The blade seemed rusted in places, perhaps from years of bloodletting. But copper didn't rust, so those dark brown marks had to be something else. Maybe stains from the headless men who'd shit themselves.

Hoodwink fingered the metallic collar around his neck. If he didn't have that bronze bitch on he would've broken down the jail cell with a bolt of lightning, taken the sword, and cut his way out of here in a storm of electrical glory.

The torchlight flickered and a draft of cold air kissed his neck. The touch brought him back to the present, where, outside the bars, Briar had been blabbing the whole time.

"Are you listening to me?" Briar said.

Hoodwink nodded. "Listening for all I'm worth, I am." The long vertical bars embedded in the stone made Briar look thinner, somehow. Or maybe it was the rich, patterned silks he'd recently started wearing. Hoodwink recalled a time not too long ago when Briar had been the one in jail, and Hoodwink the one on the outside. Briar sure wasn't dressed in silks back then.

"Look," Briar said. "I've got the whoremongers lined up. Clerks, witnesses, and so on and so forth. Damn shame the judge is a gol though. He would have been the first to bribe. Ah well, just have to pay someone else to take the fall. You know how it is. So many poor folk in this town. Do anything to support their families. Even die." He winked conspiratorially.

Hoodwink squeezed his fingers tighter around the bars. "No."

Briar knotted his brow. "What did you say?"

"No." Hoodwink straightened his back, and stared the man down. "The only one who's taking the fall is me. You'll bribe no one, you won't." He had to protect her, no matter what.

"Oh please, don't you give me that holier-than-thou bullshit," Briar's face flushed scarlet. "This is hardly the time. It's your life we're talking about here."

"There's too many witnesses. They all saw me."

Briar threw up his hands. "They can be silenced. You know that. Each and every last one of them. And if they won't take the bribes..."

Hoodwink shook his head. "I don't want your help. Don't want no one's help. I don't. I'll take the blame for my actions." For her actions.

Briar shook his head, and his jowls trembled. His collar was almost buried in folds of neck fat. "You've gone mad then, haven't ye?" Those eyes widened in mock surprise. "He's gone mad."

Hoodwink nodded at Briar's throat. "You really ought to get that resized sometime."

"What," Briar said. "The bronze bitch?"

"No. Your neck." Normally he wouldn't insult Briar like that, but he just wanted him to go.

The simple-looking jailer came up. He wore black pants and a black vest over a white shirt. The middle of the shirt was stamped with the blood palm of his profession. He looked like a real person, as most gols did. Sometimes when you talked to them you could almost believe they were real, if you kept things light, superficial. But engage in any deeper conversation and you routed them out. Gols, the mindless working class of the city-state.

The jailer nodded at Briar. "Visiting hours are up, krub." He wiped drool from his mouth with one sleeve. You would have never seen a gol doing something like that five years ago. The gols were really degenerating these days.

"I heard you, gol," Briar said. "Jobe is it?"

The gol nodded. "My name is Jobe. Now get you to the surface, krub."

Briar smiled ironically, and glanced at Hoodwink. "Until later, then. Hopefully a few more hours in the asshole of the world will blast some sense into you."

Briar retrieved his fleece from the coat rack outside the cell, and ambled away down the torchlit tunnel. Hoodwink was suddenly aware of other eyes watching from the dark of nearby cells. Briar seemed oblivious, concerned only with moving his bulk up the tunnel. The man paused beside the display case that held the sword, and he shook his head, muttering something.

"Briar," Hoodwink said.

The man looked back.

Hoodwink almost didn't