#diercasuana

    There was a sudden laugh from the person holding her, right in her ear, a thrilled, exultant sound. There was such joy in that outburst, that it seemed at odds with the absolute terror she was feeling. “That was a near flawless maneuver,” Dier said as his laughter subsided. “Two feet on the ground, a perfect grab, and then back in the air again. I don’t know that I’ve ever pulled that off so well.”

    He had one arm beneath her knees, the other wrapping under her shoulders and covering her mouth. After a moment, he moved that hand down, gripping her arm tightly instead for a more secure hold. Apparently he had decided they were high enough up that screaming wouldn’t do her much good.

    “Let me go, Dier!” She’d been hoping to sound assertive, but the tremble in the words undermined that entirely.

    He scoffed, though it was hard to read his expression from her angle. “We’re fairly high up, Ellie. But… if you insist.”

    He let his grip loosen and she could feel herself start to slip. Frantically, she threw her own arms around his neck, clutching him like a lifeline. He laughed again, but gripped her again, holding her tightly to make sure she wouldn’t fall.

    His arms felt too strong to be natural, his hold on her too secure. She’d thought she’d noticed something odd when he’d first grabbed her, but after his recovery when almost dropping her, it was even more obvious. This wasn’t average strength. He had pewter, she’d bet money on it.

    More metalfire, exactly what she didn’t need.

    “Glad to see you’ve decided to stick around for the ride, then. This would be much less fun without you. I have to ask though, because I’m terribly curious: are you scared of the heights or my Allomancy?”

    It was both, unfortunately, but she didn’t plan on letting him know that. “What do you w-want?”

    “I have to say, for someone who allegedly sells information for most of her living, you are rather bad at keeping secrets. I believe I made it explicitly clear that most of the details of our little arrangement were to be kept off the record.”

    Eliane felt a horrified chill that had nothing to do with the altitude. Was it Jace? Had he done something to provoke Dier? Had Emalyn slipped up and said something to tip him off? Surely Sinclar or Tessa hadn’t mentioned anything to him, though she had a sinking feeling Sinclar had figured out what was going on, if not the rest of them as well. Vic and Kal both thought he was bad news, and his aggravating both of them didn’t make anything better. Any number of things could have gone wrong.

    Or maybe this was about Ferra. She’d seen that look in his eyes in Northern Park the night the heiress had walked in. Eliane finding out his connections had been a major blow to his security. He’d lost some of his power over her and they both knew it. She wished to everything good in the world that she could just forget what she knew that about him, that they could go back to their uneven odds, the power stacked in his favor.

    Because they both knew, in the face of a loss like that, he would do something to try to get that power back.

    Despite her fear, her response flipped to anger instead. “It’s a little difficult to keep h-hidden with you stalking every person I know and lying to their faces. You think you can fire coins past me in the middle of Northern Park and no one would catch on that I wasn’t th-thrilled about you? Starting fights with Jace? Or Tessa? Getting your little friend to Soothe me from across the room? Really? You’re spending your time with Soothers now?”

    He blinked, glancing down at her while raising an eyebrow. “First of all, you’re one to talk about spending time with Soothers. Perhaps I thought yours looked so fun, I wanted to get one of my own, hmm?”

    She felt a bit like she’d been slapped. Emalyn. Did it say something about Emalyn that Eliane didn’t think of her as a Soother? Or did it say something about Eliane herself?

    “Second of all,” he said with a paternal air that made her sick, “you really should work on those reactions of yours. They’ll get you killed one of these days if you flinch every time an Allomancer’s around. I thought Luci might be able to ‘help.’ Thirdly, I’ve done nothing wrong in regards to our mutual acquaintances. We’re siblings, can’t we share? They’re all adults who can choose who they spend their time with.”

    He paused, looking thoughtful. “Well, most of them are. Leo and little Miss Linden are rather young. Emalyn thinks they make a cute couple though, and I’m inclined to agree. And Tessa’s son is quite adorable. Have you met Leiven, Ellie? You probably wouldn’t like him, as he’s a Slider, and you’ve got such terrible prejudices, but he’s really quite cute.”

    Eliane still had her arms wrapped around him, but she couldn’t help digging her nails in as he rattled off the names. “Leave them out of this, they’re innocent. If you so much as lay a finger on them--”

    His tone turned dark. “If you wanted to keep bystanders out of this, little Ellie, you should have kept a tighter hold on your secrets. I warned you something might happen. I’m just following through with my promises.”

    She tried not to look at the city while they were moving, hoping that by keeping her eyes shut, she might be able to forget how high up she was. All it really served to do was surprise her when they finally skidded to a stop. Blinking and looking around, she realized they were still high up. Dier had landed on an unfinished upper level of one of the skyscrapers going up around the banks of the 4th-5th. The construction area was abandoned this late in the day, with the sun already starting to set.

    No sooner had Dier’s feet touched down but he all but dropped her to the floor and grabbed her arm. She scrambled to get her feet underneath her as he dragged her by the wrist over to one of the exposed trusses of the building. She tried to fight against him, but he had no problem keeping control of her with the metalfire aiding him. She didn’t stand a chance. Something cold clicked into place around her left wrist, and Dier stepped back. She looked at her arm; he’d handcuffed her to the metal pole.

    He dusted his hands off. “Your friend Emalyn let slip that you’ve got a thing for handcuffs, so I had this pair specially made. You might notice that there aren’t any keyholes on this little model. This particular pair can only be opened with Allomancy. Seeing as you’re the roguish type, I had a feeling you might have some inconvenient skills regarding locks, and I didn’t want you getting any funny ideas about interfering.”

    She yanked on her arm a few times, just to check that it actually was locked, not that she had much hope of Dier messing that up. “Interfering with wh-what?” She had a sinking feeling she didn’t actually want to know.

    Dier walked across the bare concrete floor, stepping over some lengths of rebar. He stepped behind a wall, out of sight from her and she heard a small grunt. When he returned there was a man slung across his shoulder, not moving. Eliane’s eyes locked on the body, but he didn’t look familiar to her. Dier dropped him to the ground and she heard a groan from the slumped form. Not dead then. Drugged perhaps?

    Dier bent down, squatting on his heels and picked the man up by his hair, lightly slapping his face a few times. “Time to wake up. There’s someone I’d like to introduce you to.”

    Eliane watched silently, afraid to ask who this was. She was sure that was what he was waiting for, and she didn’t want to give him the satisfaction.

    He looked up at her, noting her confusion even if she wouldn’t speak it. “Don’t recognize him?” Her lack of response was answer enough. “I’m surprised. I thought you and little Ema were married. She never brought you home to meet your father-in-law?” He slapped the man’s face again. “Mr. Lekal. Your presence is requested.”

    Eliane took a step back, bumping into the pole, feeling horrified. Mr. Lekal’s eyelids opened slowly, revealing bloodshot eyes beneath. He groaned again, but still didn’t seem fully conscious. Dier grabbed his face and turned it toward Eliane, forcing him to look at her. She felt accused by the action, as though it was her fault that he was in this mess.

    “This is Eliane, Mr. Lekal,” Dier said, his tone cheerful and friendly. “She’s your daughter’s best friend. And you are here today because dear Eliane has not been keeping up on her end of the agreement that she and I made.”

    “Dier, don’t do this,” Eliane whispered. “Please, whatever you’re planning to do, you don’t have to do this.”

    “Little late for that now, sis,” he said. He stepped back, letting Emalyn’s dad fall back to the ground again. “Now, I’m going easy on you this time, because this is a warning. A relative of one of your friends, not the friend themselves. Next time I won’t be so nice.”

    He pulled out a gun, turning it over in his hand to inspect it. “I do so hate to use guns. Seems redundant for a Coinshot, but I’d rather not have anything that could be tied back to me as a suspect. My dear Kallie is already so suspicious… Do you know how difficult it was to get ahold of one of these? Police issue. Security on this model is incredibly tight. It ought to throw the EPD’s ballistics department a bit of a curveball though, which makes it worth every doxing.” He leveled it at the figure on the floor.

    She surged forward, her instincts telling her she had to do something, but the painful yank on her arm held her back. She panicked, for once not because of Allomancy. It was eerie, how the feeling was much the same: heart racing, shortness of breath, gripping terror that made it hard to think. “Okay! Okay, you’ve made your point! I.. I’ll do better next time! I won’t slip up! Please, Dier. Please, don’t go through with this. I’ll do anything you want!”

    His eyes met hers, the gun still trained on Mr. Lekal. “Yes. You will. I’m sure of it.”

    The shot rang out. It was like the shockwave of sound hit her physically. She screamed, but it was too late. Emalyn’s father went completely limp, the hole in his forehead already starting to leak blood onto the concrete. There was such a difference between an unconscious body and a dead one. She’d heard people say that the dead looked like they were sleeping. They were wrong.

    Her legs felt weak and she all but fell to her knees, handcuffed arm wrenched up behind her at an awkward angle. She didn’t care about how uncomfortable the position was. She could barely feel anything. This wasn’t happening. This couldn’t be happening.

    Dier lowered the gun after a moment, looking—if anything—dissatisfied. He touched the barrel lightly, checking to make sure it wasn’t too warm before shoving it back in the holster behind him. She could see now that the tassels of his mistvest covered it well enough to keep it from being noticeable. What an empty, useless thing to notice at a time like this.

    “Please,” she whispered, feeling tears start to form in her eyes. “Please, don’t do this… I’ll do anything… Please…” It was too late. She knew that, deep down. She didn’t know why she was talking. There was nothing she could do. People didn’t survive wounds like that, and Dier wouldn’t be sloppy enough to leave anyone alive that he wanted dead.

    He knelt down in front of her and went to grab her head, just as he’d done with Emalyn’s father a minute ago. An irrational thought seized her that he was going to shoot her too. She managed to pull away from him once, but there wasn’t anywhere she could go, and he just gripped her tighter the next time, forcing her to look at the body. His fingers dug into her face with that unnatural pewter strength.

    “This is what happens when you can’t hold up your end of the bargain,” he said, all humor gone from his voice. “People get hurt. And now, you’ve got a nice little reminder of why you need to keep me protected. Every time you see Emalyn crying about the loss of her dear father, I want you to see this picture. Every time your detective friends at the EPD mention looking into the case, I want you to think of me. I want this moment burned into you, so that you never forget what the consequences are of disappointing me.”

    “It is…” she whispered. As though she could forget something like this. As though she would ever forget.

    He let her go, stepping back and wiping his hand on his pant leg, like he had found touching her to be unpleasant. Imagine how it feels on my end, Dier. "You know, Ellie? I'm tempted to just leave you here for those detective friends of yours to find. It'd be fun to watch you try to come up wiht an alibi to get you out of this. I could let you try to explain to your best friend what you were doing at the scene of her father's murder.” He sneered. "But you're more useful to me when you're not in jail, so. I suppose it's your lucky day."

    He stood up, Pushing on the internal latch to release the cuff locked around the pole, though he left the one on her wrist be. "Think of it this way," he said with a twisted smile above her, "maybe you and Emalyn will grow closer as a result of all this. Friends are supposed to have things in common, right? The two of you can bond over the fact that you both lost your fathers after I decided to kill them."

    He pulled her up to her feet, hooking the handcuff around her other wrist behind her back in the traditional style. She didn’t have the energy to try to resist him anymore. What would she do, even if she could get away? "Of course, Emalyn's dad is a much nicer person than ours was. Or... I suppose he was a much nicer person. Grammar, yes?. It really is a shame he had to die, isn’t it?"

    She didn’t respond to the taunt. She felt distant, absent, detatched from herself. This all seemed like a horrible nightmare, something that couldn’t possibly be real. She knew she was crying, but only because she could feel the tears on her face. He’d think of her as weak for that. She couldn’t bring herself to care. She was weak. Forced to watch the consequences of her friendship with Emalyn, unable to do anything to stop it? She was the definition of weakness.

    She was thankful she’d worn her earring today as Dier dragged her back over to the edge of the roof, preparing to carry them back down to the ground and drop her off wherever he saw fit. She silently begged, pleading in prayer, that if Harmony truly was listening, if he was out there somewhere, that next time Dier trained his gun on someone, the bullet would find her instead and end this all.

    Better to die than let him drag the people she loved through this. Sparing them would be worth her life. She knew it wouldn’t happen, though. Dier thought she was too damn useful to kill. She was too cowardly to take her own life, even if doing so would protect her friends.

    Something wet tickled her legs and she noticed that her window was open, a thick layer of mist coating the floor. It swirled and spun, flowing towards the shadowed figure standing across the apartment from her. Drawn by his allomancy. There were some who thought of the mists as playful or protective.

    Eliane had always found them sinister.

    “I’ll give you one thing,” the allomancer said. He must have been anchoring himself using the appliances in her kitchen to keep her pressed to the door. “You’ve gotten slippery in our years apart. I didn’t think it’d take me nearly this long to find you. So that’s one point in your favor at least.”

    He stepped forward, finally close enough to make out his face in the dim evening gloom, not that she’d needed that to know who he was. Dier Cass. Her older brother. “It’s too bad that’s the only point in your favor, little sister.”

    He was well dressed, and looked calm and collected. Dark hair, even darker than hers, in a stylish cut, though the strands were haphazard and windblown. He'd been Pushing his way around the city before this, and she had a feeling he hadn't gotten into her apartment by climbing the stairs. A dark collared shirt tucked into black pants, and soft leather boots laced up his calves. She suspected there was very little metal, if any, in the ensemble at all.

    Most distinctive, however, was the article of clothing that he wore over that. It was sleeveless, and made of a dark leather. From the front, it looked like a waistcoat, short and vest-like, with two rows of wooden buttons, but the back of the garment was long, trailing almost down to his ankles, and was cut into ribbon-like streamers. The underside of the tassels and the turned collar revealed a midnight blue silk lining. Some kind of new, fashionable variation on a mistcoat.

    “D-Dier,” she said, still struggling with the upper bar, “what do you want with me?”

    “I’m here to say thank you, actually. For holding your tongue about what happened with Dad.” He walked closer to her as he spoke, each step sending little pulses of pressure on her bars. “I mean, it was probably wise that you did so, because if you’d snitched on me, this conversation would have been a lot less civil. As it is, we're friendly. We can just chat, can’t we?”

    “I don’t want any troubl--” she started, but he cut her off, grabbing one of her wrists.

    “No trouble, little Ellie. Just a chat, like I said.”

    “D-don’t call me that."

    He twisted her arm, forcing her to let go of the bar. With his other hand he took out two silvery bracers, like ones a feruchemist might use as metalminds. These, however, were each bent and dented. They had been roughly made, and the open gaps to slip hands through were only half finished, one side still jagged. It looked as though they had once been one large bracer, cut in half and then re-bent in a poor approximation of two cuffs.

Those gaps were not wide enough for her wrists to slip through, but he didn’t seem fazed by it. With a chill she realized that might have been exactly what they had been designed for.

    He forced one of the cuffs over her left wrist, and she cried out as the metal tore at her skin, then again as her arm was slammed back against the door. Her other arm received the same treatment, and the bar she’d been holding pressed against her neck, making it difficult to breathe. She tried in vain to pull her arms away from the door, but with the pain from her sliced up arms and fractured rib, and his support from the anchors behind, she didn’t have much of a chance of resisting.

    “There you go. Just something to keep you from doing anything that might… jeopardize our good mood.” he said, stepping back with a smile on his face. “You’ve been keeping yourself busy these past few years, haven’t you? Little Ellie, all grown up to be an informant? That’s quite an ambitious line of work for you, sis. Dangerous too.”

    Something made a beep from her desk. Her desktop computer, the one with all her database files. Dier held out a hand, and a small flash drive flipped through the air to his waiting hand. What? He’s a coinshot, he can’t Pull on metals! How could he…

    Metalfire. He had metalfire. Of course, he had metalfire.

    “See, I’ve made some powerful friends in the past few years. Made a name for myself, if you will. Important people like to make sure their deliveries and    messages are in capable hands, want to make sure things will reach their destinations quickly and safely. Coinshots are in high demand, especially ones who know how to protect themselves out there.”

    He brushed is mistvest off in what was probably supposed to be a dignified manner, then waved the flash drive in front of her. “And my powerful friends like powerful secrets. Secrets like these that you have so helpfully gathered. So, I’ve got a proposal for you, little Ellie. You keep finding these secrets for me and my friends, and I’ll let you live and keep going on about your merry way. You don't even have to worry about the market value of your intel dropping just because I’m getting the family discount. We're not selling. We'll be sure to keep everything 'in-house'.”

    His smile took on a sharp edge, reminding her of a cat that had just unsheathed its claws. “I wouldn’t recommend trying to hide from me again, either. Next time you make me go searching for you, I can promise I won’t be nearly as polite as this. Not to mention, I might just have to drop by and ask some of your friends where you’d disappeared off to. Lots of good information in these files of yours, Ellie. You noted that this Sinclar person seems very nice, a trustworthy kind of person. Or his apprentice? Emalyn? From your writings about her you two sound like you might actually be on your way to friendship. I’d hate to have to have to pay them a visit just because you decided to be uncooperative.”

    Eliane struggled against the bars and bracers again, ignoring the pain that flared up in her side and wrists as she did so. “Don’t even think about touching them! Th-they’re good people, Dier! Leave them out of this!”

    “Of course,” he said, spreading his hands in a placating manner. “So long as you don’t give me a reason to. Don’t snitch and don’t run. They’ll be perfectly safe. Easy enough, right?”

    “Y-you can’t do this,” she shouted, actually managing to pull her arms away from the door enough that they made a thump against the wood when they fell back. “You don’t know how hard I’ve worked for that intel! You can’t just sweep in her and t-take it!”

    His eyes narrowed, and he closed the distance between them again. The pressure on the bar against her neck increased again, cutting off her air almost entirely. “What exactly are you going to do about it? You can’t even move, little Ellie. So long as I’m pressing this bar, you can barely breathe. If I wanted to kill you, there’d be nothing you could do to stop me. I could take that pretty little Pathian earring out of your ear and send it through your skull.”

    She could feel his breath against her face as he continued, the humid warm air seeming a matched counterpart to the cold mists still curling around her legs. “I used to resent you, Ellie, back before. He never went after you like he did me. He never hit you as hard, he never pushed you the way I was pushed. Now, though, I’m glad he did it. I am what I am today because of him. He made me strong, strong enough to kill him. And if he hadn’t, I’d still be like you. Weak and powerless. Pathetic. Stepped on and walked over by those who are better than you.”

    She wasn’t getting enough air. Her mouth opened and her chest heaved as she tried to get some kind of breath, but the pressure at her neck was too much. Her vision was starting to go fuzzy and her head was ringing. “Pl… Please…” she gasped.

    He scoffed, stepping away. The pressure on her neck disappeared and the bar there fell to the ground, clanging against the two still pinning her on its way down. He tucked the flash drive into his pocket and threw back a vial of metal flakes, swishing the liquid around a moment before swallowing.

    “Like I said, pathetic.” He gave her a look of disgusted pity, then walked over toward the window. As he lost his anchors from the kitchen, he released his hold on the metal bars and bracers, and Eliane all but collapsed against the door. The three bars he’d used to hold her flipped across the room toward him and he tucked them behind his back as he caught them. The ability to push and pull metal. It was a dangerous combination indeed.

    "I like the name though. 'Casuana.' I agree, 'Cass' has too much of the old man in it still. You and I, we ought to make a name for ourselves, shouldn't we?" He stepped into the window frame, pushing the glass all the way open and letting in a fresh wave of mist. “You can keep those bracers. Consider them a gift. Girls like jewelry, right? I’ll be in touch, little Ellie. Try to keep yourself out of trouble.”

    With that, he let himself fall backward, out into the misty night. Her apartment was five floors up, but the distance wouldn’t bother someone like him. He’d gotten what he’d come for and now he was off to whatever other things he needed to do.

    For a little while, Eliane just sat on the floor, watching blood slowly drip from the cuts on her wrists and trying to calm down. She trembled, not even really able to feel the pain through the terrified adrenaline. She needed to move, needed to get out of here, needed to get help.

    With a faltering weakness underlying her every movement, she managed to push herself back to her feet after a few stumbling failed attempts. Groaning softly, grabbed her keys from where Dier had shot them.

    You have to go find someone. Someone you can trust…