DASH
She nods.
One sharp dip of her chin. Water streaming down her face, mascara running in twin black rivers, that ridiculous soaked bridesmaid dress clinging to every curve. She looks like a drowned goddess. She looks like a verdict.
That's all I need.
I bring Mark down from overhead. Not gently. I sling his folded weight over my right shoulder, his face bouncing against my shoulder blade, his legs kicking uselessly against me. His broken fingers scrabble at the back of my jacket. The wet fabric of his tuxedo squelches against my ear.
"Put me down," he wheezes. "Put me down right now, you animal, I will call the Magistrate, I will have your mercenary license revoked, I will?—"
I start walking.
The aisle runner squelches under my dress shoes. Two hundred guests track my movement in perfect unison, heads swiveling like spectators at a tennis match. The string quartet has stopped playing. The cellist's bow hangs frozen three inches above the strings. The officiant, a tall silver-haired Elf with robes down to his ankles, presses himself to the altar as I pass.
"Excuse me," I say.
He nods rapidly.
Mark's kicks grow weaker. His protests dissolve into a continuous, breathy monologue directed at nobody.
"—assault charges, I have witnesses, two hundred witnesses, my father is on the Arcane Commerce Board, you think you can just?—"
I hang a left past the rose trellis.
The lawn stretches ahead. Pristine. Manicured to a level that borders on violence against grass. Each blade stands at identical height, enchanted to stay emerald green regardless of season. My shoes leave deep gouges in the turf. The groundskeeper, a squat gnome in overalls, looks on from behind an ornamental hedge. His mouth falls open. I nod to him. He nods back.
"—and furthermore the Mercenary Guild has very specific bylaws about physical altercation outside of contracted combat zones, Section Fourteen, Paragraph Nine?—"
I adjust his weight. He weighs nothing. A hundred and sixty pounds of wet linen and bad decisions.
The service path curves behind the main clubhouse. Gravel now. The crunch of it under my feet. The air changes. Kitchen exhaust. Rotting flower arrangements from yesterday's rehearsal dinner. The sharp chemical bite of industrial cleaning solution.
And there it is.
The country club's dumpster sits against the back wall of the kitchen wing. Massive. Industrial green steel, eight feet long, four feet deep, with a heavy rubber lid propped open by a broken wooden pallet. Inside: black garbage bags, wilted centerpieces, the charred remains of the original wedding cake, and what appears to be an entire crate of empty champagne bottles from last night.
Perfect.
"—calling my lawyer the instant my feet touch the ground, do you hear me, you oversized?—"
"They're about to."
I plant my back foot. Shift my grip from his waist to his belt and the back of his collar. He goes rigid.
I throw him.
Not hard. Not with everything I have. That would put him through the steel wall on the far side. I use perhaps eight percent of my full strength. A controlled, arcing lob. A gentle parabola. Almost graceful, if you squint.
Mark sails through the air. His arms and legs spread in four desperate directions. His mouth opens. No sound comes out. He hangs at the apex for one perfect, suspended heartbeat, backlit by the afternoon sun, his wet tuxedo jacket flapping behind him like broken wings.
He drops.
The impact sounds like a bass drum stuffed with cottage cheese. Glass bottles shatter underneath him. Garbage bags rupture. A cloud of charred cake ash erupts from the dumpster in a gray mushroom plume. Mark vanishes entirely beneath the debris for two full seconds.
Then his head surfaces.
Eggshells in his hair. Coffee grounds smeared across his forehead. A long strip of wilted lily draped over one ear. His eyes are perfectly round. His mouth works soundlessly.
