Maskbound: The Ultimate Hunter

Frost reached his elbows, the Ironheart Greatsword shivering in his hands like a small creature trying very hard to hide. Inside the helm the cracks crept toward his temples, each one a wire pulling the mask away from his skin.

“Young man, I will hold this line until my plume falls off,” Clangor said bravely, “which it already has.”

“Hold it just a few more seconds, that is all I truly need.”

‘Two of Zinnia’s four are gone, my sword is a block of ice, and my best swordsman has a crack across his face.’

The Collector drew closer, his tape measure coiled in the air beside him like a snake. His shears opened and closed in a slow rhythm, as though he were practicing a lullaby.

“The first half minute is the worst, afterward you feel nothing at all,” he said kindly.

“Wear us both,” Zilch said.

“Double or nothing, kid, I have been waiting since the subway.”

“You’re cracked, you will not survive the strain, you are one good hit from a pile of porcelain,” Nilo whispered.

“Lazy men break slowly, I have a few good minutes left, enough for one honest cut.”

“Then we spend them all,” he said, his hand finding both hooks at once.

He tore Clangor free of his face, plate dissolving into silk as the greatsword clattered to the floor, trailing frost. Both masks swung toward him, the black half mask and the cracked traveler’s helm, humming like two struck tuning forks.

[ SKILL ]

[Double Mask: The Drifter and Zilch]

[Overload: severe]

[Duration: thirty seconds]

‘Thirty seconds, then the strain comes to collect.’

Two masks settled over his face together, the Drifter’s tattered coat bleeding into Zilch’s high black collar. His hair lengthened into a braid, Nightfall appearing at his hip, its edge too thin to follow.

“What is he doing?” Wavecrest muttered, the carving knife trembling in his fist.

“Something very foolish,” Ilse said softly, “something I recognize.”

A coin slipped from his glove, falling without a sound as Zilch’s silence swallowed the ring. His voice went with it, leaving only a pressure behind his teeth like a held breath.

‘Not a word, not a sound, a single cut… it has to be the right one.’

Zinnia read the change in him from across the floor, her eyes narrowing in understanding.

Throwing both arms wide, she shouted, “Reynard, bend them all, every mirror in this Hall, tell them to lie.”

Every panel in the Hall flashed gold all at once, the light folding itself into a thousand false doorways. Each reflection of the Collector stepped sideways into the wrong place, a perfect crowd of liars bowing in unison.

“Clever girl, so very clever,” the Collector murmured, turning in a slow circle.

The Master of the Gilded Foxes flung both hands upward, trying to pull his Hall’s light back into order. The glass answered him with a mocking shimmer, the lamps obeying a hand that was clearly not his own.

The Master said, appalled, “He has taken my mirrors.”

“Then we take them back one panel at a time, Father.”

Lord Steelhorn planted himself before the guests, rhino helm lowered, daring the mirrors to come any closer. Bruno slid in at his father’s shoulder, the Brass Bull flaring, neither of them saying a word.

“Steelhorns hold the center,” the old man said gruffly.

“Steelhorns hold it together, Father.”

Nilo did not move, the whole room seeming to lean toward that stillness like flowers toward a lamp. His eyes went flat, the world narrowing to seven doors, six lies, one seam in the third panel.

“Take your time, dear boy, I do admire a man who deliberates,” the Collector purred.

The Collector chose his exit, stepping toward the glass with the grace of a man leaving a dull party. Nightfall left its sheath in a line so quick that nothing, not even the sound of it, followed after.

The cut went through the panel, the pillar behind it, the tape measure, a ribbon of sleeve.

“Now,” Bruno whispered, “before he leaves.”

Black glass opened where the seam stood, the Collector hanging half through it, one sleeve neatly severed.

Frost fell from the greatsword in sheets, shattering against the floor like a dropped chandelier.

“Young man, I have never been so cold or so grateful,” Clangor said faintly from the rack.

The Collector staggered backward, a hairline seam suddenly splitting down his stitched face from brow to chin. For one heartbeat a ring-shaped eye glared out of the gap, the pleasant voice cracking in two.

“Impertinent… you have cost me a sleeve, I will take my fee in other coin.”

He lunged sideways across the floor faster than any eye could follow, shears flashing at Dessa’s reflection. Her silver wings ripped free from her hip, leaving her crumpled on the floor, face smoothed blank.

“Dessa—”

Another snip rang out, Pike of the Night Vipers dropping beside the champion, his mask gone. Venn knelt over him with her glove pressed to her mouth, shaking from shoulder to heel.

Venn shook him gently, “Pike, look at me, say anything.”

Lord Steelhorn’s charge shattered the empty panel where the Collector stood, spraying the ballroom with silver rain. Wavecrest swung the carving knife through open air, bellowing at the glass like a furious bull seal.

“He is in the door, cut it before it closes.”

Nilo lunged, but the overload slammed into him like a wave, his knees folding as the black glass slid shut. The Collector gave a courteous bow from the shrinking gap, a dozen new masks swinging gently from his apron hooks.

“A fine evening, Master Fox, do thank your daughter for the lesson,” he called softly.

The door closed with a sound like a page being turned.

Ganzo burst through the kitchen wall a heartbeat later, plaster flying, the forge hammer already blazing in his fists. He stood panting in the settling dust, staring at the empty panel and the six fallen Hunters around him.

“I came as fast as architecture allowed, children, I was still too slow, next time the walls will fall sooner,” he said hoarsely.

Nilo ripped both masks from his face, his voice crashing back into his throat with a gasp. Blood ran from his nose, his hands shook, every joint packed with broken glass and cold sweat.

“He took Dessa, he took Pike, I cut the door but not fast enough.”

“You cut it, that is more than anyone has done to him,” Zinnia said, kneeling beside the Fox champion with shaking hands.

“She counted my nine moves as ten, it was supposed to be her joke for another ten years,” she added, her voice cracking.

“She will hear it again, I will make sure of that.”

Venn lifted Pike’s head into her lap, stroking his hair, her usual swagger gone entirely now. Whatever lay inside that glove, she held it tightly against his chest now like a promise.

“He never took anything from me before,” she whispered, “he took it from my squad.”

“We will find who sent him,” Nilo said, “I swear it on the gold ribbon.”

Lord Steelhorn laid a gauntleted hand on Bruno’s shoulder, a gesture so awkward it looked borrowed from another man’s life. For the first time all night he looked at his son directly, without the Council or the crowd between them.

“You held, Bruno,” he said quietly.

“We held, Father, there were more of us than you counted,” Bruno answered.

Pipa slid in beside them with her gown torn at the hem, the rifle slung across her back. A line of Bureau medics stood frozen at the broken wall behind her, clutching their kits like shields.

“Chat, the medics are here, they are afraid of the mirrors, I told them to carry a spoon and think happy thoughts,” she said.

Matron Ilse laid her palm against Dessa’s smooth brow, her silver doves dimming one by one on her apron. Beside her Wavecrest stood with the carving knife hanging from his fist, his big sunburned face gone completely slack.

“Six,” the Matron whispered, “that makes six Hunters tonight.”

“I will tell my daughter it was a ball like any other, she would never believe the part about the mirrors or the sugar swans,” Wavecrest muttered.

“Count heads, name every missing mask, nobody leaves this room until I say so,” Ganzo ordered, his voice rolling like thunder.

The gold light bled out of the mirrors slowly, the glass settling back into plain silver. Reflections returned to their owners at last, every guest wearing exactly the face they arrived with.

“Kid, you cut a door out of a mirror, I have fought for forty years and nobody does that,” he added, gripping his shoulder.

“I cut it too late.”

“Father, what did he mean, thank your daughter for the lesson?” Zinnia asked, rising slowly.

“I do not know,” the Master said, “and I have never lied to you about the things I cannot answer.”

Zinnia held his gaze for a long moment, searching for a crack in the polished calm. When she found none, she let her breath out slowly, unconvinced and unable to say why.

“We will speak at your table, Father, once the night allows it,” she said.

Something small drifted down out of the cold dark above the shattered panel, turning slowly in the flickering lamplight. It landed on Nilo’s palm, a card marked with a single drawn ring and one line of careful script.

The Master of the Gilded Foxes read it over his shoulder, every drop of color leaving his face.

‘Seven masks on my rack, six hooks filled on his apron tonight… so whose is the seventh?’

“I was not afraid, much, I was only a little afraid in every direction,” Jingles whispered, trembling against the rack.

“The seventh hook,” the card said.