“What are you doing here Brute?” Datura stepped out of the shadow behind Brute. He turned slowly a shadow falling over his face revealing his teal eyes and the three long scars on his left cheek. His cheekbones were rounder than she remembered from their youth. He smiled his charming one-sided grin. He removed his hat allowing the light of the street torch fall on his face shadowing his features to Datura. She instinctively stepped backward as he walked toward her.

“They are all gone.” Brute hung his bald head. “My girls are all gone.” His deep voice cracked. “Someone took them from me Datura. They were murdered.” He raised his head to look at her anger lighting up his eyes. “For seventeen years I have grieved Datura. Where were you?”

“I had no idea Brute; I have been busy-”

“You never wanted to see your nieces? They should be married now.” He clenched his teeth to stop the tears from pouring from his reddened eyes. “They should be holding their little ones right now. Smelling their babies' hair and kissing their soft skin.”

“Assassins don’t get married Brute.” Datura rolled her eyes.

Brute snatched her up by her throat and pulled her to his brow speaking through a clenched jaw.

“I was married Datura. I had two beautiful daughters.” His hand squeezed her throat, his fingers and thumb touching. Her eyes bulged and her face turned red as flame. He dropped her in a heap at his feet gasping for air. “I fasted and grieved at the mouth of the two rivers for months. I lived as a wild man in the caves for years. I hunted the great black dragon of the mountains and I found him too.” Brute tossed a black paw on the ground in front of her. It was covered in scales as black as the stone that hung from her neck. The talons could carve stone and the fingers could wrap around a bear’s leg. “He got away, but he will remember me. I traveled the seven hills from Larsa to Kish. No matter where I went, I could not escape their memory. So, I returned home this summer. I stood in the hall where I had found my daughters dead on the floor, still clutching their dolls. Then I went to the bed where I had slept beside my wife. Where I found her dead that day. I tore the room to pieces in my anger and when I fell down in anguish, and what do I find?” Brute dropped a small cork on the ground, and it rolled to Datura’s hand. Guess the only city in all of Summer to have corks?” Brute knelt down to look into her widening eyes as she coughed. “Windal,” He growled.

Datura crawled to her feet pushing herself up with her hands on her knees. “Just say what you want to say.” She looked at her brother's strong face brazenly.

“Looks like the cork from a poison vial.” He continued. “Of all the ways of murder, that was your favorite. I deem it the coward's way, but I figure you are too frail to do the job face to face.” He said this with a look on his face as if he tasted something foul.

“I am not the only murderer in the family, Brute.”

“You are the only one that uses poisons.” Brute stepped closer, towering over her. “Makes me suspicious that my family was poisoned.” His eyes narrowed.

“Father made poisons.” She paused and feeling nervous under his stare felt the need to fill the air with a lie. “I sell my poisons to traveling merchants Brute.” She spoke slowly to hide the quiver in her voice. “Anyone could get a hold of my vials. Have you thought how many enemies you must have?”

Brute began to pace. “Years I spent blaming myself. Wondering who had returned from the grave to take my family. Wondered which god had weighed me in the balances. When my daughters were born, I gave up murdering for profit. I planted an orchard on the river. I lived with my girls. I lived in peace. We watched the fireflies over the river on summer nights. We sang songs together and danced. I loved them the way I never knew I could love. We hurt no one. No one alive still sought me out. No one knew who I was, except you.” His final word poured out like hot coals.

“I love you Brute. You are my brother. How could you think such a thing of me?” Datura reached toward him with a gentle hand.

Brute reached up and snatched hold of the black stone that hung from her neck, and she flinched. His face wrinkled in anger. He looked back up into her eyes and pulled a stone from under the collar of his shirt. It was round smooth and clear as a drop of rain. Had Datura still had the ability to see color she would have seen the rainbow of colors that streaked through the clear crystal as it caught the light. It was a Spry stone.

Datura tugged her Imp stone from his hand and tucked it back into her shirt. “So, we serve different gods. That doesn’t make me the murderer of my own nieces.” She crossed her arms across her chest.

“I know the cost of the Imp.” Brute tucked the Spry stone back into his shirt.

“Do the Spry not also have demands?” She raised her brows sarcastically.

“Only one.” Brute sized his little sister up. “Have no kinship with wickedness.”

“That sounds rather drab Brute. Perhaps you should live a little. Don’t you remember the excitement of cutting purses? Chasing fairies? Hoping Tanner’s fence to boot the chickens through his bedroom window that night?”

Brute didn’t even flinch a smile. “You did it didn’t you?”

“Now what?” She continued as if she hadn’t heard him. “You’re some kind of Ever Light priest?”

“Didn’t you?” Brute growled.

“Don’t come looking for me because you want to feel more holy than you are. I know who you really are. I know what you have done. I have seen what you can do. You don’t belong with the Unstoppable any more than I.”

“Answer the question.” Brute clenched his fists at his side.

Datura glanced over her shoulder at the brightness of the shadow in the doorway behind her. Only a step away. She looked him in his eyes without blinking and after a tense pause, she answered, “The cost of an Imp is exorbitant, but the reward is invaluable.”

The stone at his chest shone like the sun through his leather vest and his hands lit up with fire. Datura glanced back to see the brightness of the shadow fading quickly behind her and she dropped back into the sliver that remained as Brute unleashed a ball of hot fire at her. She tripped over her chair and landed on her bed. Sweat rolled down her brow as she lay catching her breath for several moments before convincing herself it was safe to look out the window. She crept toward it silently as if he could hear her way up in her tower room. She saw his back as he stood panting in front of a blazing doorway below. She watched the black flames chew through the heavy wooden beams and cast their shadow on Brute. As the oily flames grew the large figure stood waiting for her to emerge or scream. Then another voice shouted from down the street. Others called out as they awoke from their slumber. Brute ran toward the city walls. She watched as he climbed the brightest corner of the walls, what would appear to him and others as the darkest. As nimble as an alley cat he climbed and pounced pausing at the top for only a moment to glance back at the flames. Then he slipped over the top and was gone.