Maskbound: The Ultimate Hunter

The Collector strolled across the floor as if the Hall were his shop, the guests his unsold stock. Every mirror tilted to follow him, a thousand doubles bowing as he passed the center of the room.

“Do not let me interrupt the music, ladies and gentlemen, a face is merely a coat that ought to be tailored,” he said, snipping the air twice.

Wavecrest hefted the carving knife, “Stand clear, Matron… I have wrestled eels with much better manners.”

“You will not wrestle this one, Brannoch, your mask is exactly what he came for,” Ilse said, dragging Reeve toward the pillars.

Three guards lunged from three sides, a Fox sentinel, a Rhino lieutenant and a Dove warder, their masks already blazing. The shears flashed once, twice, again, snipping at their reflections in the glass like a tailor trimming a loose thread.

“That is lovely work… some people take minutes,” the Collector murmured.

Three masks slid out of the panels, drifting like leaves, to settle on his apron hooks with soft clicks. The guards dropped where they stood, faces smoothed completely blank, before their armor finished ringing out against the tiles.

A gasp ran around the guests, then the quiet scrape of a thousand people backing away.

Matron Ilse pressed her palms to the nearest fallen guard, the silver doves on her apron glowing softly. Whatever she tried, the healing light slid off his blank face like rain from an old attic window.

“Nothing grows back where nothing is left,” she whispered, “they are not wounded, they are unfinished.”

Dessa’s glass wings snapped open at her hip, folding into a Silver shield between the guests and the glass. A thick silence rolled across the Hall, broken only by the creak of a chandelier swaying in its chains.

“Keep to the center, keep your eyes off the walls, blink as little as you can,” Zinnia called, her four copies sliding to guard the crowd.

High on the upper balcony a figure in a plain pale mask watched, then melted into the shadows.

The Master of the Gilded Foxes dropped from the balcony in a spiral of pale light, landing without a sound. His fox mask slid down over his face, gold whiskers blazing, the entire Hall suddenly brightening like a struck lamp.

“Collector, you are a guest in my house, I have written your name in the book of the unwelcome.”

“Master Fox, charmed, your Hall is a lovely loom, thank you for the invitation,” the Collector said.

A spear of focused light left the Master’s palm, crossing the Hall faster than any watching eye could possibly follow. The Collector caught it in a single panel, the beam bending into the glass like a river into a drain.

“My own light, returned with interest,” the Master said slowly, “the Hall is his tailor’s table tonight.”

Zinnia glanced at her father, a crease between her brows, then looked away as though she saw nothing.

Bruno muttered, “Your father is lit up like a lamp, should he be?”

“Only when he is furious or lying, I cannot tell which tonight.”

Lord Steelhorn tore the brass collar from his throat, a Mythic rhino helm blazing over his face. He crossed the Hall in four strides, shattering six panels with his shoulder before shards could fall.

The old man thundered, “A Steelhorn’s charge is not elegant, it is only final.”

“And a lovely charge it is, my lord, but I was never standing in that room,” the Collector called from the far wall.

“Then I shall break the next one,” the old man said, turning.

‘Three masks in six seconds, a Guild master turned aside with one mirror… I’ve faced worse, I just can’t remember when.’

Nilo thumbed a coin off his knuckle and let it drop, its bright ring echoing far across the ballroom floor. The Drifter settled over his face, hair lengthening, coat trailing, Nightfall appearing at his hip as though it never left.

“Cheap coin, good draw,” the Drifter drawled inside his head, “let us see what a tailor does with a katana.”

“Be gentle with him, he seems fragile,” Nilo said aloud.

The Collector turned his stitched face, delighted, “A swordsman, how wonderfully traditional.”

Nightfall left its sheath in one clean line, splitting the central panel from floor to ceiling in a breath. Silver glass slid apart like a dropped curtain, yet the Collector was already stepping sideways into the neighboring mirror.

“Early by a half beat, though a handsome stroke,” he called from behind them.

Nilo spun with his coat flaring wide, a second coin ringing down for the second draw. The blade met the shears in a shriek of sparks, the shock rippling through the glass.

“Hah, he parries a katana with a pair of scissors, I could almost admire him.”

“Darling, sing him a sonnet, perhaps he will weep and drop the shears.”

A third coin rang, Moonrise carved a crescent through a pillar, but the Collector slid beneath it. His shears snapped shut on empty space beside Nilo’s shoulder, the reflection in the nearest panel jerking.

“He dodged a moonrise, I like him less already,” the Drifter muttered.

Pain lanced across Nilo’s face as if a cold thumb were prying at the mask’s edge. The Drifter’s voice went thin and far away, a man falling backward down a long staircase.

[ WARDROBE ]

[Mask: The Drifter]

[Condition: cut line detected]

[Status: returning to rack]

“Not this one,” Nilo hissed, flicking his wrist.

The Quick Change took less than a second, the Drifter snapping back to its hook with a hairline crack. Plate rolled over his coat, his hair slicking steel gray, the Ironheart Greatsword rising between him and the glass.

“Young man, a gentleman does not let a tailor measure his collar,” Clangor said fiercely.

The jokes in Nilo’s head went out like lamps, leaving a flat gray calm and the count of what remained. Six masks left on the rack, the Drifter cracked, Clangor challenged, the tailor four steps away, closing through the glass.

“You touched the Drifter,” he said, level and low, “that was your one warning.”

“How very civil, a warning from a man holding a sword that is about to freeze,” the Collector replied.

He charged, the greatsword scything down in a single blow that would have flattened a loaded truck. The Collector caught it on his shears, his shoes sliding backward over the floor in two scars.

“Solid work, but honest, how refreshing,” the Collector said, wrenching the blade aside with a flick.

“You are the first Seat I could not measure,” he continued, circling slowly, “the glass shows nothing where your face should hang, only an empty hook.”

“That’s unkind, my face is lovely, ask anyone who remembers it,” Nilo said, parrying.

“Nobody does, that is the whole delight.”

Bruno hit him from the left with a roar, the Brass Bull slamming into his ribs hard. The man folded around the blow, skidded into a panel, then slid out of the next, smiling.

“Steelhorn, a very fine heirloom, perhaps later.”

“Hold still so I can hit you prop—” Bruno bellowed, as the glass swallowed the Collector whole.

Dessa threw her wings wide, the folded glass bursting into a thousand razor feathers across the floor. They struck every panel the Collector might choose, cracking the exits before he could walk through them.

Dessa flexed her fingers, “He owned nine exits a minute ago, darling, now he owns four.”

“Behind you,” Zilch said, flat and fast.

Nilo whirled and the shears clipped the plume from his helm, a rusty feather drifting down between them.

Pipa’s rifle cracked from the pillars, a husk round whining across the Hall to burst a panel. The Collector staggered with it, a single button pinging off his apron to roll at Zinnia’s feet.

“Chat, I just shot a mirror, that is seven years of bad luck, please do not sue me, I own eleven marks,” she whispered into her brooch.

The four copies surged in a ring, rapiers flickering, the Collector spinning among them like a man dancing a gavotte. Each time a blade came near he vanished into the glass, leaving a ripple, a snip, a copy fading out.

“His steps always end in the nearest reflection,” she gasped, “give me ten seconds and I will teach every mirror in this Hall to lie to him.”

“I’ll buy you eight.”

“Fall back to the center, Quartermaster, let the big ones do the swinging,” Wavecrest bellowed, hurling a sugar swan like a grenade.

The swan burst wide against a panel in a spray of sugar, the glass cracking like river ice. For one heartbeat the reflection flickered, Nilo swinging again to cleave a clean arc through the lowest strap.

A dozen masks spilled to the floor, rolling and clattering, every one of them warm.

“Tch, careless, that was a month of work,” the Collector said, the first edge of irritation cutting his voice.

Jingles babbled from the rack, “He has more hooks than a fishing shop and worse manners than a pike.”

He raised his shears, the tape measure lashing out like a whip to wrap the greatsword from hilt to point. Cold ran up the steel, frost spreading along the blade as the helm’s reflection began to crack in the glass.

“I regret the necessity, Mister Nilo, but a fitting must be completed,” the Collector said gently.

Zinnia shouted, “Five seconds, Nilo, hold him five more seconds,” her copies flickering at the edge of failing.

The cracks raced across the visor from the corners inward, a spiderweb of fine lines spreading over the reflection. Under the helm the same lines crawled over Nilo’s skin, cold as wire, as though the mask were leaving.

[ WARDROBE ]

[Mask: Sir Clangor]

[Condition: cut line detected]

[Bond: 5]

“Clangor, hold on,” Nilo said.

“I have never let go of a challenge in my life, young man, I do not intend to begin tonight.”

Bruno threw his full weight against the tape measure, brass horns scraping frost from the freezing steel. The cloth only coiled tighter around his forearm, pulling him toward the mirror like a patient fisherman.

“Darling, tell the tailor that frost is unflattering on a sword.”

Zilch spoke flat and urgent, “Cut the tape.”

‘Eight seconds, a frozen sword, a mask that wants to leave… think, think.’

“The sword is frozen to my hands, genius,” he hissed.

“Do keep still, a frozen blade is so much easier to hold,” the Collector said.

The frost climbed toward his gauntlets, the Collector smiling his stitched smile.

“Jester, Knight, Silent Blade, Opera, Wanderer, Rattle, Magpie,” he recited softly, “seven hooks filled, and one that is still empty.”