by Dan Stout
Marguiles stepped away, unclipping a walkie talkie from his belt and demanding status updates. Katie walked out of the room. I considered following her, but instead I approached Thomas. Squatting over him, I felt for a pulse, half expecting it had all been an elaborate ploy. But no, the terror of the underworld was dead, gutted on the floor of his own castle.
“Get away from him.” Katie had returned, a tablecloth from one of the dining area tables draped over one arm. She stared at me with fire in her eyes. “Don’t you ever touch him again.”
I stepped aside, and Katie draped the cloth over her brother’s corpse. The bleached-white fabric hid his face, though its fringe bore a red handprint. Katie had collected it while still dripping with her brother’s blood.
She stood there for a heartbeat, then pushed past me. I made no move to stop her. I didn’t have the strength, and it wasn’t like she was going far—I had no doubt she was headed straight for the stage. I thought of Glouchester’s story about the twins’ murdered older brother, and wondered if the reporter had gotten it wrong. Had Katie lied to protect her twin, or had Thomas taken the fall for his sister? Which one of them was the mad dog, and which one had held the leash?
From down the hall rescue teams called for survivors as they worked to clear the building. I signaled to them, and slipped an arm under Weston’s shoulder, helping him to his feet. A moment later the first responders led the way outside, into the longest night of the year.
* * *
In the alternating red and white ambulance lights, the living were tended to while the dead waited their turn. I sat on the tail end of an ambulance, watching the medic walk away to another bus to check on Jax. The other occupants of the CaCuri stronghold were examined, triaged, and either sent to hospital or released. The wounded police went through the same procedure, but none of us were free to go home. Jax and Talena were a few ambulances over. They’d put up with my barrage of questions, until I was satisfied they were both okay. Now they sat side by side, sharing a blanket and a quiet conversation. It was one of the few pleasant things I’d seen all day.
Behind me footsteps crunched, expensive bootheels crushing the grit that hid in the crevices of the tar roof. Paulus approached, slowing only slightly as she reached my side. She stared at Tenebrae’s broken body impaled on the stage, and the team of halfhearted techs erecting a tent to shield it from the photographers and television crews.
“He was about to kill you.” Her voice was light and mocking. “I saved your life.” Then, louder and over her shoulder: “Isn’t that right?”
From a shadowed doorway, Gellica emerged and nodded. Her lips moved, but if she spoke, I didn’t hear it.
“See? I even have a witness, just like your little salt plains princess did.” Paulus leaned in, hot breath whispering in my ear. “Everyone around you ends up dead sooner or later, don’t they?” She looked me over and seemed to find me lacking. “You’re bad news, Carter.” She tipped her head toward Gellica, curled her lip, and added, “Don’t go near my property again.”
I said nothing, and after a moment Paulus hummed a note of self-satisfaction. “It’s for the best,” she said. “Though I’m not quite sure what happened to him before I put him out of his misery.” She looked from me to Gellica and back again. The tattoos on her arms pulsed, creatures of ink slithered and bared their teeth in silent growls. “We’ll speak more of that later,” she said. “When we won’t be overheard.”
Paulus walked away, the click-clack of her bootheels tracking her departure. When they faded, it was still another long moment before I gathered the courage to look at Gellica, half expecting her to be gone.
Gellica stood with her hip pressed against an ambulance frame, blanket wrapped around her shoulders, head down, dangling hair hiding her face. As the emergency techs moved around us, I walked toward her. She didn’t raise her eyes, though there was no way she didn’t know I was there.
I took a breath, meaning to say, “Hey” or “Let’s talk” or maybe just whisper her name, but the life drained from the words, and their sound sat dead on my tongue.
Head still down, she said, “You promised me you’d wait.”
There was a coppery taste on my lips, and I wondered if I’d bitten my tongue.
“But you didn’t, and you put all those people who depend on me at risk. All those lives, and everything I’ve been working for, to finally find a way for me to be free. Flushed away.” She raised her head, eyes red and wet, as if she were holding the tears back by an extreme act of will. “Why?”
“I had to.”
She winced like she’d been slapped, mouth working, as if repeating the conversation to make sure she’d understood me. I wished that I could say something fast and funny and with precisely the right amount of remorse. I wished the whole damn thing hadn’t happened. . . . Except it had. And I knew that if I were in the same position, I couldn’t trust myself not to do it again. I’d never look a killer in the eye and let him go free, no matter how bad it hurt me.
But I hadn’t only hurt myself. I’d hurt someone I cared for, someone who wanted to care for me in return.
“I didn’t have a choice,” I said. “Because—”
“Because you turn your back on the living,” she said. “In order to serve the dead.”
I flexed my hand, felt the reddened flesh of my face. Minor cuts and burns that would heal in a few days. Not like the pain I’d caused Gellica. I tried to sit a little taller, to find some way to explain myself. She watched and waited, but in the end I only fidgeted in place. Gellica let out a single, humorless chuckle.
“It’s lonely being like us,” she said. “The difference is, you prefer it that way.”
I didn’t have anything to say, and I’m not sure she had it in her to listen to my excuses. She turned and walked away, and I sat on the ambulance’s tailgate, back against the door, and wondered if the flames in the building beside us would spread, and grow, and consume me where I sat, so that for once I wouldn’t have to deal with the consequences of my decisions.
36
TWO WEEKS SINCE JANE HAD been killed, and the world went on like nothing had changed.
Titan’s Day dawned. The sun came out ever so slightly earlier than it had the day before, and the city declared it a holiday. After the chaos at the street festival, Katie CaCuri sacrificing her brother to save a cop’s life led the evening news and was the headline on all the morning papers. And Tenebrae’s indictment of the military encampment didn’t do the AFS faction any favors. The fact that an unidentified woman found in an alley off Ringsridge Road had found justice didn’t make the papers at all.
CaCuri’s supporters were already making the media rounds, appearing on morning talk shows trying to paint her as a martyr to the cause, a true patriot who’d put the good of the city ahead of everything, even her own brother’s life. And after all, they said, isn’t that exactly who we need in office right now?
When the talking heads on the news began declaring Katie CaCuri the projected winner at the polls, there was a loud knock on my door. I turned off the television and padded over to the door. A pair of burly Gillmyn stood in the hall. They had a delivery for me.
I can’t say it was a complete surprise. After all, Gellica had told me what she’d do if she didn’t want me coming to see her anymore. I tipped the deliverymen and they dragged away my old couch. I sat in my apartment, listening to records with Rumple perched behind me, idly tracing the quality stitching of floral patterns as Titan’s Day faded to black.
* * *
The next morning was cold and crisp, with a surprising lack of mist slithering through the streets. I arrived at the morgue a couple hours after it opened and asked about Jane’s remains. It seemed like the least I could do was to arrange for her body to be set to rest with dignity.
I was still massaging away my headache when the clerk told me that the remains had alr
eady been claimed.
“What do you mean claimed?” I said. “No one knows who she is.”
The clerk poked the clipboard, as if it were the supreme arbitrator of all disputes. “First thing this morning,” he said, a ragged thumbnail indicating a scrawled signature: Allura Shade.
“Alright,” I said. “You got a phone I can use?”
It took twenty minutes of working my way through the telephone directory, but I finally found what I was looking for.
* * *
By the time I got to the guidepost, they’d already started the ceremony. I walked in, the only person in attendance besides the guide and the woman who’d claimed Jane’s remains.
Lillian Moller stood alone, eyes downcast. Her usual outfit of black on black seemed slightly more subdued than the last time I’d seen her. Maybe there were fewer buckles on the jacket.
I stood next to her, and she gave me the briefest of dark looks.
“Fuck off, cop.”
There was absolutely no fire in her voice. The anger and arrogance in which she tried to dress her words were merely distractions from what she really felt. That true feeling, hidden someplace deep and cold, was something I could relate to. After all, I’d spent decades with my own secret trove of regret.
So I didn’t go anywhere; she didn’t say anything else. And together we stood for Jane.
When the guide finished her speech, Moller collected Jane’s ashes in the discount urn provided by the crematorium. She didn’t look at me as she walked past. I didn’t ask what she was going to do with them.
Moller had never said a proper good-bye to Jane. I’d never gotten to say hello.
* * *
Two days later I spotted the graffiti on a big building on Crater Road near Sullivan. It stopped me in my tracks, a pair of coffees cooling in my hands as the sea of pedestrians was forced to part around me. I stood before a newsstand, its wire racks filled with headlines screaming about the special election and stoking fears about possible secession from the AFS and threats of military intervention. But I didn’t care about that. I only had eyes for the mural above.
It took up the entire side of the office building. A portrait of a beautiful Mollenkampi woman, head plates a startling shade of red, her eyes defiant and hopeful. The eyes of someone who saw more beauty in this town than it deserved. With a little help from Lillian Moller, it was Jane’s last statement of love and hope and freedom.
My pager buzzed, calling to me from its resting place deep in my coat pocket. Farther down the street Jax waited by the Hasam. He’d probably already responded to the page, asking questions over the radio and jotting notes about another body found in an alley, or apartment, or abandoned car. It was another day in Titanshade, another step forward on the well-trodden path we all walk until we retire or get carted off in a hearse.
I took one step, then another. It was all I could do. It’s all anyone can do.
Jane watched over my shoulder as I walked toward the Mount, my partner, my job. I was glad to have her blessing.
I figured we’d be needing it.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
I’VE BEEN TOLD THAT HAVING a second child is ten times as difficult as the first. I can’t speak to that, but it definitely holds true for novels. This was a tough book to bring into the world, and I never could have done it without the support of many generous individuals. The full list is too long to include here, but here are some of the people I’d like to single out.
First, my parents, Jim and Maryann Stout. My mom has always supported me and cheered me on, even from my earliest attempts at storytelling, when she patiently wrote down the narrated adventures of my toys. And while my dad may be gone, I like to think he’s smiling down at these books.
Mandy Fox is my best friend, partner in crime, and love of my life. A fantastic storyteller and teacher, she regularly consults with me on tricky plot issues, many of them two-pint problems that can only be resolved in our Over the Counter corner office.
My agent Nat Sobel, who suffered through my earliest drafts. His notes and efforts are greatly appreciated, along with the rest of the Sobel-Weber family: Judith Weber, Adia Wright, and Sara Henry.
Once again, I’m immensely indebted to my editor, Sheila Gilbert. Sheila was extremely patient as I found my way through this sophomore novel, and she has an incredible knack for knowing exactly what to bring into focus to make a story shine. And the rest of the DAW family never ceases to amaze me with their kindness and skill. Huge thanks to Betsy Wollheim, Katie Hoffman, Joshua Starr, Mary Flower, Leah Spann, Jessica Plummer, Alexis Nixon, and Stephanie Felty.
Chris McGrath managed to bring life to Carter and Titanshade with another phenomenal cover illustration, while Katie Andersen and the DAW team’s design work perfectly captured the book’s aesthetic.
Massive thanks to the kind and generous beta readers who provided feedback and guidance during this drafting process. Thanks to all the members of Writeshop, especially Holly Bell, Matthew Cook, Sandra J. Kachurek, Jordan Kurella, Dan Lissman, David Palmer, Jerry L. Robinette, and Catherine Vignolini. Also, huge thanks to my Novel Buddies group: Jodi Henry, Stephanie Lorée, and Paul Nabil Matthis. (Paul is also the official Titan’s Day music consultant.) Along with the Buckeye Crime Writers, these groups have been hugely helpful to me. If you’re a writer just exploring the creative waters, it’s well worth the effort to find quality in-person and on-line critique groups.
Special thanks to Elizabeth Vaughan for her continued advice and support, and critical insight into what makes the perfect eggs benedict.
The Debut 19 group kept me sane and focused during my debut year. I started to list everyone from that group who’d helped me out, but quickly ran out of space. So thanks to them all! The friendship and camaraderie I’ve found there has been invaluable.
I’m a little in awe of the bloggers, podcasters, book clubs, and reviewers who helped spread the word about this series. I’m moved anytime someone connects with my books enough to share their thoughts, and I do my best to read every one of them.
Lastly, thanks to everyone who holds this book in their hands. Stories are joint efforts, ephemeral things created by reader and writer in equal measure. Whether you picked this book up new, from a library, or in a second-hand store twenty years after its release, you are just as much a part of this story as I am. I hope you enjoyed it, I hope it moved you, and I hope you carry some small part of it with you going forward.
Thank you!
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Dan Stout writes about fever dreams and half-glimpsed shapes in the shadows. His fiction draws on travels throughout Europe, Asia, and the Pacific Rim as well as an employment history spanning everything from subpoena server to assistant well driller. Dan's stories have appeared in publications such as The Saturday Evening Post, Nature, and Intergalactic Medicine Show.
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