“Eggs only!” Cedric shouted from the kitchen in Cephan.
Humans can’t speak Cephan—well, not very well. It consists of guttural clacks and grunts easily produced by the cephel’s unique beak. It also works well underwater. While humans can’t clack and grunt like a cephel we can learn enough to understand.
“Wal!” said a voice from behind the bar and Essie rushed around to throw her arms around me and planted a long kiss on my lips. There was all sorts of emotion in that kiss: concern, kindness, longing. I returned her kiss and enjoyed the warmth that spread across my cheeks and down my neck and chest.
She stepped back, eyes sparkling, and then wrapped her arms around my chest in a tight hug.
“Easy.” I winced around a smile. “Easy, Essie.”
She pulled back and looked at me, seeming to notice the new coat. I reached a hand up to my chest where the bandage lay.
“You okay?” she asked.
“No,” I said. “Ran into some trouble. I need to crash. Lay low for a while. Can I use your place?”
“What’s going on?”
“It’s nothing,” I lied. “I’ll explain later. When I can think straight.”
“Okay,” she said, giving me a long look.
“I’ll be okay. I just haven’t slept.”
She fished a key out from under her apron, pressed it into my hand, and gave me a kiss on the cheek.
“I’m off in a few hours. You get some sleep.” She looked at me again. “You sure you’re okay?”
“Yeah,” I said, flashing a smile. “I’m sure.”
Essie woke me from a deep sleep hours later. I had returned to her place careful to check for any prying eyes before I slipped through her building’s door and climbed the stairs to her small room. I hadn’t wasted time. I threw my coat over a chair, peeled off my new shirt and my jeans, and climbed under the covers. I fell asleep almost immediately. A thick dreamless sleep.
My eyes slowly focused as I looked into Essie’s face. She had climbed into bed with me, pulling the covers over herself so only her head peeked out. She smiled and said nothing, and I smiled back.
I turned and looked out the single window. It was getting dark. I had slept most of the day away. The sodium light that hung from the ceiling outside the window had dimmed to twilight levels. A few glittering icicles hung from its bulge, sending shards of cold light through the alley.
I let out a yawn and turned to look down my chest at Essie. She had shed her waitress outfit and I could see the hem of a gray sweater peeking up from under the blankets. Her hair was tousled and pulled back. She smiled and her nose crinkled slightly. I could see the twinges of concern in her dark brown eyes.
“How long was I out?” I asked.
“I got home a few hours ago and you were snoring away. I figured you could use the company and a nap sounded nice.”
“Thanks for the bed,” I said. “How was work?”
“Quiet. There’s riots all over the city. The streets are nearly empty.”
“Yeah, I noticed that,” I said.
She glanced out the window towards the cold alley. I knew what she was thinking.
“Something’s got to break,” I said. “Maybe these riots will force the mayor to abandon the Grovedare Span and reopen trade. I know there’s a ton of caravans in Syringa poised to rush over here. There was talk that a few had already set out. Were planning to camp right behind the Syringan camp. Add extra pressure.”
“Let’s hope it works,” she said. “Cedric’s closing up shop. We were down to eggs only today. No point running a diner without food.”
I sighed. If established restaurants were out of luck then the carts and the alley vendors were done. The city was officially starving.
“Okay, enough chitchat,” she said, looking me in the eye. “You want to tell me what’s going on?” She reached out and touched the bandage on my chest.
“Oh, this,” I said, looking at the white linen. “It’s a long story.”
She laughed and looked around the room. “I think we have time.”
I wasn’t so sure we did. I ran a hand through my hair and lay back on a pillow. “Remember me mentioning the Broken Road?”
“You’ve mentioned it... But I never heard the whole story.”
I studied her. Essie was strong. It was one of the things I liked about her. She had tenacity. But did I really want to inflict that tale on her life? It was brutal, gory stuff. It’s bad enough people lost their lives with us on that road. I thought about it until something Samantha had said out there, on that road, rang in my ears: This isn’t Wal versus the world. She was right then, and it was true now. There was no way to do this alone.
So I told her about the Broken Road. Why we left Syringa. Why we went down that path. The disappearances. The forest of the dead. Curwen torturing the people of the town. How he had burned. How Wensem had broken his leg. How we brought what was left of Methow with us. Our return to the city. When I was finished she sat next to me. Silent. Studying my face, her eyes tight around the edges.
“By the Firsts, Wal,” she said, her voice near a whisper. “I had no idea it was that bad.”
I turned and looked out the window, trying to tamp down the emotions welling up inside of me.
“So...,” she huffed out a long breath. “That is a lot to take in.”
“Yeah, the papers didn’t really cover it. They couldn’t.”
I had left out the gargoyles, and the part about Curwen being a First. Even the strongest among us still associate that sort of talk with madness. She had enough of the story. Now, to explain why Argentum had come after me.
“So, there’s more,” I said, interrupting her thoughts. “Shaler’s father blames me for Margaret’s death.”
“Is he in Lovat? Did he do this to you?” She gingerly touched the bandage.
I shook my head. “No, but he’s connected... I think. Maybe.” To be honest, I was questioning whether Shaler even knew about the contract. “I owe him for the failed delivery but the claim is that I now owe for the death of his daughter. They say I’m in remiss. The Society’s involved. I was on my way to a chapterhouse to see about a payment program and...”
I let the word hang, and nodded down at my chest. Her eyes met mine and then went to the bandage. Then she gasped, covered her mouth with her hand, and backed up, edging out from under the blankets.
“Carter’s cross,” she swore.
“A collector—or at least a dauger pretending to be one, I don’t know for sure—Rulon Argentum. He found me first. Didn’t like the notion of me going to a chapterhouse...”
“Oh, no. No, no, no, no,” Essie stammered. She was shaking her head. “You came here.”
“I couldn’t go anywhere else,” I said, sitting up, ignoring the flare of pain from under my bandages and rising from the bed. “Essie, what is it?” I asked.
She held out an arm and shook her head, her hair disentangling from the loose bun. I swallowed the lump that had formed in my throat. Her eyes were wild with anger and fear. “You can’t stay here. You can’t bring them here! You shouldn’t have come here.” She pointed at the apartment floor.
“Wait, Essie...,” I said, stepping close to her.
She backed up into the wall, knocking a framed photo to the floor. Her hand hadn’t left her mouth, and she pushed me away with the other. I stepped back.
“Essie.”
“No. I mean it, Wal. You’re wanted by the Society! You can’t stay here! He’ll... find you here.” She nearly whispered the last part.
I was reeling. Didn’t she understand what she was to me? Didn’t she realize? I looked in her face and saw only fear. My puzzled expression must have triggered something in her. She marched across the apartment and threw open the door.
“Essie, I’m... I’m sorry. I don’t—”
“Wal, you need to leave now. You can’t stay here,” she repeated.
“Essie.” I repeated her name. The cold air from the hallway flowed
over my toes.
“Now.”
FOURTEEN
“LOOKS LIKE THE NEAREST CHAPTERHOUSE IS IN DEMETRIOS. Up north. Twenty-fourth and—”
“Thanks,” I said, interrupting the directory agent. He was a small dauger with a plain black-iron mask. He was shivering in the cold. I had wanted to collect the address and let him close his shutters, but he seemed undeterred.
“Don’t know why you’d want to go there,” he said, his tone conversational. “Them collectors are queer folk with their contracts and their knives. I’m surprised LPD still lets them operate. Barbaric. Tantamount to murder, if you ask me.”
“Mhm,” I mumbled, slipping him a lira. He tapped the spot on the map for me and I committed it to memory. “Thanks for the info. I’ll let you get back to the warmth.”
“My pleasure,” he said. He closed the huge tome he was referencing and lifted it back into place on one of the shelves that lined the walls of his small booth.
“I meant what I said, son. Steer clear of them butchers.” He pulled down the shutter. It clanged loudly and echoed around the empty street. A sign that read: “KNOCK FOR ASSISTANCE” had been pasted crookedly on the outside of the shutter. I smiled, knowing its cockeyed application would have driven Samantha nuts.
The directory agents were a necessity born of desperate need in an ever-changing city. With so many businesses moving in and out all the time it was impossible to keep track of it all and even harder to inform every citizen. Instead of printing compendiums of information, the directory companies opted for agents placed around the city, offering location services for a small fee. It kept printing costs down and made them a hell of a lot of money.
I considered catching a rickshaw to Demetrios but decided a walk would do me good. Clear my head. I was still reeling from Essie kicking me out of her apartment.
Over and over like a skipping record. Then she got quiet and refused to respond. Eventually I quit trying. I just stood there, outside her door, boots and jacket in hand, still bleary from sleep and just stared off at nothing. It had been one of her neighbors who had snapped me out of my daze. Cracking some joke about upsetting the missus. I left.
The temperature had dropped as night set in.
Level Three was quiet. A few people hurriedly walked about, silhouettes against the steam that leaked from pipes and rose from somewhere below. I flipped up the collar of my coat, jammed my hands deep into my warm pockets, and trudged down the street. I could hear the loud rumble of something in the distance. A distant protest maybe? I couldn’t be sure. As I rounded a corner I could also hear a wavery radio crackling along as some maero crooner belted out a jazz number I didn’t recognize. I felt on edge. I nervously expected a gargoyle to leap out from the shadows, finally make contact with me, but I didn’t see one. I was almost disappointed. It took me an hour walking north and then eventually east to get into Demetrios.
Demetrios is a sleepy little warren at the north end of Broadway Island. In ages past, massive housing projects had been constructed here and they now made up the bulk of its lower levels. A portion of the warren’s north side had been sheared off along a canal that ran through Level Two. Heavy cranes leaned out from the rears of canneries, export terminals, and warehouses all along the edge. Narrow streets tenaciously crossed the gap between the levels but no buildings dared. The canal was a jagged tear through the core of the city.
Here Level Four was six or seven stories tall and lined with thick brick buildings. They were pressed tightly together leaving no room for alleys. A few enterprising citizens had taken to smashing long toll hallways through a few buildings to provide access between streets. Above, catwalks cut across the street, Auseil branches and banners hanging from their platforms. Decorative Zann hymns were sealed along their railings, the bright wax glowing against tarnished steel.
I found a lift near Twenty-First Avenue and stood next to a small cluster of women waiting for it to arrive. Few people met my eyes and fewer seemed willing to stop. The mood around the warren was tense. Everyone was on a mission.
When the doors to the lift dinged open I let out a long sigh of relief. It was jam-packed. If Argentum found me again it wouldn’t be on a crowded public lift.
We boarded the lift and I took position along one of its walls. The ride up was quiet. The people on board all wore similar serious expressions. Their eyes would glance around rapidly, never settling. A few coughed, someone cleared their throat. Conversation was minimal, hushed and conspiratorial.
My stomach growled. Hunger had begun to creep in on the edges but I couldn’t dwell on it. Besides, with the way people were behaving about food, it would be impossible to find anything right now.
“We’re all hungry, friend,” said a maero standing near me. His voice was deep and quiet.
I looked up at him.
“Your stomach, I heard it growl. I know the feeling. We all do.” He motioned to the crowd.
“Yeah?” I said. I glanced at the Breakers armband he had around his bicep.
He noticed me looking. “Yeah. I’m with the Breakers. A lot of us are.” He glanced around. “We got word that some elevated asshole got the LPD to guard his cannery. Cans and cans of salt fish.”
This was the crowd that Wensem had gone off to join. Instead of heading south to break the Purity Movement’s blockade these ones were fighting a war within the city itself.
“So, you’re going to break in? Steal it?”
He rubbed his eye. “The city’s starving.”
“And what about the law?”
“Screw the law. There’s kids starving.” He had me there. As much as I wanted to play the law-abiding citizen, his cause was more righteous.
“You should join us.”
I considered it, briefly. In a different time I would have joined in. I shook my head. There were other things I had to do first. I wasn’t much good to anybody if I didn’t clear things up with the Society. Then I could go and find Samantha, Hannah, and Hagen without having to worry about Argentum coming down on me. Then we could start figuring out everything else.
“Level Six!” shouted the conductor and the doors to the lift slid open.
“About damn time,” said a thick human in a bowler hat.
The crowd all pushed out of the lift at once, passing me and moving down a street named Roanoke. The same direction I was going.
“It’s over here!” said bowler hat, pointing down a street.
“Come on!” said the maero who had tried to recruit me.
The crowd roared in unison and rushed past me, pouring around the corner of Roanoke. People nearby saw them go and moved to join them. I continued to follow, pacing but not drawing too close. It seemed to be only about a hundred people. I could slip past and head down Twenty-Fourth Avenue in a moment.
Shouts echoed from around the corner as I turned.
“I got kids to feed!”
“Let us in!”
“We’re hungry!”
“I have a family!”
The cannery was a red building that occupied the majority of the north side of the street. A neon sign of a smiling red fish waved at passersby above white letters that blazed: “Bonheur Seafoods.” Most of the building’s lower windows had been boarded up from the inside and a set of steps dominated the front and center of the place. As I had suspected it was located on the edge of Level Six and near the cut that allowed the cranes to raise and lower shipments from the barges far below. The whole warren smelled like fish.
Four nervous-looking cops stood outside the door at the top of the stairs. All of them were armed with rifles, their clubs hanging at their hips. It was a surprise to see the LPD carrying guns. They tended to stick to clubs.
“You folks get back! This is private property,” said the officer in front, a wiry dimanian with two tusk-like horns extending forward from his cheeks.
I stopped and watched as more people joined the growing crowd. A few of the newcomers sported the red armbands of the Breakers, o
thers looked like curious locals. The shouting increased, drawing in others. The crowd seemed to be doubling in size.
Two officers spoke briefly and one ran off, pushing past the angry crowd and disappearing. Going for backup, most likely.
“Get back!” shouted another officer, this one human.
Everyone was clearly on edge. I needed to get past them. I turned, thinking I could double back and wrap around, avoid the hostile crowd altogether but suddenly, a mass of people was coming my way. They pressed me back and I found myself in the middle of the churning crowd.
“We’re hungry!”
“We’re all hungry,” the lead officer yelled back. “Doesn’t give you the right to loot people’s businesses. Stay back!”
“Let us in!”
“Open the Big Ninety!” someone shouted.
“Let us eat!” screamed another.
“I got kids to feed!”
The officers planted their feet. “Disperse immediately or you’ll be arrested.”
Fists were raised. I pushed forward, pressing myself between bodies. Moving past angry faces who were sneering up at the three remaining officers on the stairs.
“They’re bringing in more police!” someone shouted from behind me, and the crowd turned. A mass of police had appeared down the street, wearing helmets and carrying clubs and small shields. The officer who had left was leading them, his rifle held at the ready.
“Let us in! We’re hungry!”
“We’re not criminals! We just need food!”
Get out of here, I told myself. Now.
I kept pressing forward. I passed Twenty-First Avenue on the right, then Twenty-Second where more and more people were streaming towards the cannery and the standoff with the police. Humans, dauger, maero, kresh, cephel, even a contingent of shadowy umbra were there, demanding to be let into the cannery. The cops cursed at the crowd, shoved back an old man who had approached them, knocking him down.
More shouts echoed from behind me. A few cops began to tussle with the Breakers. I heard the sickening thumps as club met skull.
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