Blade Singer

by Martha Wells

  "I don't know," she admitted, taking the cup from him. "I hope so."

  Manny guessed it was good that she was being honest with him. Though at the moment, a comforting lie would have been nice.

  They took a last turn down an alley that opened into the street where their tavern was. As they got within sight of the building, Adriana stopped abruptly, motioning Manny to stay back. He poked his head out to see around her.

  At first the tavern looked normal, the courtyard lit by oil lamps, light still showing from the drinking rooms in the main building. It was more quiet than it had been before, but Manny figured it was pretty late at night, even for drunks and carousers. He whispered, "What's wrong?"

  "The door to our rooms is open," she said softly. Manny looked and bit his lip. Now he could see it. She was right, the door was standing open against the dark wall. She said, "Wait here."

  Adriana slipped across the street, and Manny lost sight of her as she ducked behind a wagon and a stack of barrels. He waited impatiently, staying back in the shadows. The rest of the wood and stone buildings along the street were quiet. He heard a dog bark somewhere, and a baby crying sleepily in the house next to the alley. Finally Adriana returned, easing back around the wagon and walking quickly across the street toward him.

  "Our rooms have been searched," she said as she reached him. "From the smell, at least one of Morrigan's Redcaps is still inside, lying in wait for us. She must have got word already of our failure. We can't stay here tonight."

  Manny nodded, but his heart sank as he remembered the goblins in Morrigan's chamber. Standing still this long had also given him a chance to realize how cold and tired he was. His feet felt like blocks of ice. This had been a very, very long day, and he felt like he had spent most of it with various people and monsters trying to kill him. "Where do we go?"

  He had meant to sound brave, but a little of his despair must have crept into his voice, because Adriana squeezed his shoulder reassuringly. "It's all right, I know a place."

  "Okay." As Manny followed her back down the alley, he told her, "I don't like stealing anymore."

  She sighed. "I admit, neither do I."

  ****

  The place Adriana led him to turned out to be in the cellar of an empty house that had been destroyed by fire years ago. It was dark, dank, mossy, and smelled funny. When Adriana dug some candles out of a hiding place near the door and got them lit, Manny saw it also had spiders in the corners. Big spiders. Maybe they were faerie spiders, because Manny didn't think there were spiders that big outside of Australia or South America. The only furniture was some broken ceramic jugs and empty barrels, singed and blackened by the long-ago fire. A passage in the wall led to a room with a collapsed ceiling, and a stairway up to the ruins of the house was blocked by rubble.

  Adriana tossed her satchel on a pile of old blankets, and said, "It's not much, but it's served Remy and me well in the past. The rumor is that a powerful Fae sorcerer lived here and was killed in the fire; fear of his ghost keeps everyone away, human and Sidhe alike."

  "Oh." Manny looked around uneasily. "So it's really not haunted?"

  She hesitated just long enough to make him nervous. "No, no, it's not haunted."

  Manny shook out the blankets to get rid of the beetles and dirt and dragged them into the center of the cellar, as far away from the spiders as possible. As he piled them up to make a softer if not very clean bed, Adriana went through their belongings. They didn't have much, just her burglar tools minus the rope. The only loot they had managed to hold onto was the silver cup. It wasn't studded with gems, but it was heavy and obviously the work of a very skilled craftsman. "It looks really expensive. Do you think it's worth a lot?" Manny asked her as she examined it.

  "It won't buy regular passage on a skyship, that's for certain. But I might be able to negotiate for space in the cargo hold, or better yet, for berths as part of the crew."

  "A skyship?" Manny liked the sound of that.

  "Yes, a vessel that sails through the air," replied Adriana. "Don't they have things like that wherever you're from?"

  "Actually, they do," said Manny, "but I didn't think you guys had them here." He wondered if leaving the city and going to Hispania would put him further away from finding a way home. He didn't know for certain that whatever had brought him here was somewhere in this city, but it was the assumption that made the most sense. And he really, really wanted to go home. It might be morning there now, and Tia Licha would be getting ready to go to work. She always made sure Manny got up on time, and stood over him until he at least ate a bowl of cereal. Sometimes Beto got up early and went to get breakfast tacos from the cafe a few blocks away.

  Adriana tucked the cup away in the satchel. "I'll take this to Heinze in the morning and see how much I can get for it."

  Manny sank down on the blankets, watching her expression carefully. He thought there was a good chance she was lying to make him feel better. "What if it isn't enough? Can we walk to Hispania?"

  Adriana sighed and took a seat on the edge of the blankets. "We'd never make it. Morrigan's Redcaps are like hounds. They would track us. Why do you think we need a skyship? We have to get as far away from here as quickly as we can. Out on the open road or even on a slower sea-going vessel, we'd be an easy target. Morrigan's reach is very long."

  "Oh." Manny bit his lip. Adriana looked weary, her face drawn. In the flickering candlelight, he could see the faint lines at the corner of her eyes, just like his mother had had. Except she wasn't his mother, any more than Etienne was his father. Your parents aren't here. They're dead, back home. And you could be stuck here forever.

  The exhaustion of the very long, very strange day began to claim him and he yawned.

  Adriana glanced at him. "Perhaps it's best if you get some rest."

  He nodded and turned away from her, curling up on the blankets and squeezing his eyes shut. "Good night, Adriana," he murmured.

  Adriana sat there in silence. Then she started to sing softly. It was a song Manny hadn't heard before, and he didn't recognize all the words but it seemed to be about a maiden and the moon. His mother had sung him to sleep when he was little, and it made him remember that vividly. Her tender touch, her breathy voice...

  As he drifted off to sleep, the room grew blurry, dissolved, and transformed into his old bedroom in his parents' house. For a few precious heartbeats, he was back home, his mother near him, singing him to sleep. He was in a place where the terrible accident had never happened, where his life had not been turned into a painful mess, where his troubles were minor and easy to overcome.

  Manny smiled as he fell asleep.

  Chapter Twelve

  The creature was stalking him.

  Manny crept along the dark, mist-filled halls of his old school. Pale moonlight poured through the windows, gathering in ghostly pools on the floor. Manny slipped past them to hide in the shadows. He tried to be as quiet as possible, but he was afraid the creature could sense him. It was ravenous for his blood, yet it enjoyed the hunt and Manny's terror.

  The mist clung to Manny's legs like webs, pulled at him, slowed him down. The creature's shadow scuttled along the walls, spidery legs like skeletal fingers tasting the air, scenting him.

  Manny pressed himself against the wall beside a bank of lockers. His heart hammered in his ears. The cold mist chilled his bones and turned his sweat to ice.

  Then he realized someone stood near him. Manny turned to stare at the dark figure. It was so close its shoulder touched Manny's. It was just a featureless dark shape, but Manny wasn't afraid of it. The figure leaned close to whisper.

  "Don't panic," it said, and its voice was familiar. "It feeds on that. You can hide from it, trick it. It can't catch you if you use your head. Trust your instincts."

  The words reassured Manny, made him bold. He looked away from the figure and scanned the halls. He could smell a heavy stench and hear the click of the creature's claws as it skittered along the linoleum.

&nbs
p; His shadow companion whispered desperately, "You've got to keep moving. If it corners you, all will be lost. Go!"

  Manny darted down the hall toward the gym. Again he stuck to the patches of darkness. He wasn't afraid of the shadows. He knew the creature hid there, but so could he. The darkness could protect him. He hurried to the gym's doors, his shadow companion right on his heels.

  "That's it," it urged. "You're fast, you're clever, a shadow dancer. It knows you can hurt it. Remember that." Manny knew its voice. He had heard it his entire life. It was his own, even though the words were not.

  Easing open one of the push bar doors, Manny slipped into the empty gym. A large, tattered tarp lay in a heap in the center of the basketball court, like a jagged wound in the floor. He glanced at the bleachers. They would provide good cover and give him the freedom to move around. But something about the dirty tarp made him nervous.

  Carefully edging around it, Manny kept his eyes on the wrinkled canvas. Its surface was slick and oily and it had a weird musky odor. As he stumbled, Manny's toe nudged the edge and the canvas recoiled, curled in on itself. Manny froze. He knew exactly what this was.

  The canvas erupted into flapping leather. Manny jerked back, his sneakers squeaking on the polished floor, and bolted for the bleachers. The bat-winged horror that was Morrigan lunged for him with a savage snarl, her sharp teeth bared.

  Sharp claws scooped Manny up and carried him, kicking and struggling, to the Sidhe hag's nightmarish face.

  "I know where you come from! I know who you are!" Her gnashing teeth made a sound like knives being drawn across metal, her breath made Manny retch. She held Manny a few inches from her rictus of a mouth and licked her cracked lips with a snake-like tongue.

  "You can't hide from me, boy!" She squeezed Manny until he gasped for breath, her talons digging into his skin.

  "Manny!" Morrigan shrieked, her bloodshot eyes burning into his. "Your name is Manny!"

  ****

  Manny woke flailing and kicking at the shape leaning over him.

  "Manny, it's me!"

  The room swam into focus. Adriana knelt beside him, shaking him awake. He glanced around, disoriented, still feeling the painful press of Morrigan's claws on his ribs. They were in the abandoned cellar. Adriana and let go of his shoulders, relieved. "You were dreaming."

  He sat up and rubbed his eyes. They burned, like waking up with a bad fever. "Sorry..."

  "That must have been some nightmare." Adriana reached for a small basket sitting next to her. "Here, maybe a little food will make you feel better. I brought some roasted pork and bread." She pulled back the cloth covering the basket.

  The smell of the freshly baked bread helped to clear Manny's fuzzy brain. The basket held steaming rolls that resembled the bread used to make sub sandwiches. The sweet aroma smelled like a real bakery, much better than the one at the grocery store.

  She set the basket in front of him and took one of the rolls, then picked up one of the slices of pork. "How do you like to eat again? Show me."

  Manny held out his hand. "Your knife." Adriana put the pork back into the basket and handed her knife over. He took her roll and sliced it in half, then sliced another for himself. He handed her knife back. "Now observe carefully." Taking several of the pork slices, he made two sandwiches and offered one to Adriana. She took it but kept watching him closely.

  "It's called a 'sandwich'." Manny pronounced the word slowly. "Or as my aunt calls them, a 'torta.'"

  "A torta," Adriana repeated and took a bite. Juice ran down her chin and she wiped it away with her sleeve. "Good way to keep your fingers clean."

  "Exactly," Manny replied, his mouth full of bread and savory meat.

  Adriana uncorked a bottle, and took a deep drink. "It's wine, in case you were wondering." She offered the bottle to him.

  Manny took it, sniffed the opening, then took a tentative sip. "Ugh, I don't know how people can like this stuff," he said with a grimace. "I'd kill for a black cherry soda." He took another drink from the bottle then noticed Adriana looking at him quizzically. "It's wine for kids where I come from," Manny explained.

  As they ate, Manny asked, "So did you sell the cup?"

  Adriana shook her head. "Heinze's shop was closed. There was no one about and the house seemed abandoned. I fear Morrigan's Redcaps paid him a visit."

  Manny's looked down at his half-eaten sandwich. "Oh..." He hadn't cared much for the scheming kobold but the thought of him in Morrigan's claws turned his stomach. He didn't want to see that happen to anyone. "So what do we do now?"

  "I know a few other fences," said Adriana, not seeming disturbed by Heinze's probable fate. "But I wanted to make sure you were safe first. I'll go see someone else when we're packed and ready to go."

  "I'm ready to go," replied Manny. "Most of our stuff is already packed, except for these dirty blankets. And I'm totally okay with leaving them behind." He glanced at the spiders, which had retreated into the corners of their webs. "The spiders might like them." He felt a chill as he remembered his dream.

  Adriana brushed her hands clean and stood up. "Fine, but you're staying here while I conduct this business."

  "What? No way!" Manny pushed to his feet.

  "It's too dangerous, Manny. We're being hunted by some of the most deadly Unseelie in the world." Adriana rooted around in one of their packs.

  "Un-what?" said Manny.

  "The Redcaps," answered Adriana. "They're Dark Fae, the Shadow Folk, the Unseelie."

  Manny muttered the word under his breath. He did know it, or rather Remy did. He was Seelie, one of the Light Fae, the cousins and the bitter enemies of the Dark Fae. Or was he? He wasn't sure if there was a name for someone like him, a Sidhe who was in transition between Light and Dark. That's Remy, not you, he reminded himself.

  Adriana pulled a short-barreled pistol out of their pack, along with a tarnished brass container shaped like a bulb and a leather bundle. She unrolled it, revealing several luminous, silver ball bearings and a couple of long, thin metal rods and brushes.

  "Wow," said Manny, reaching for one of the ball bearings. "Is that a musket ball? Why are they glowing like—"

  Adriana smacked his hand. "Don't touch. That's Fae silver. It'll make you sick." She loaded the pistol, pouring gunpowder from the brass container down the barrel, then wrapping one of the musket balls in a small square of dirty cloth. She rammed the ball down the barrel with the rod.

  Manny watched the procedure with fascination. He had seen muskets being loaded in various movies, but never in real life. "Will a Fae silver bullet kill a Redcap?"

  Adriana tucked the pistol into her vest, her expression preoccupied. "Redcaps are easy enough to kill with ordinary weapons. This is for tougher enemies. Like Lothair."

  "Or Morrigan?" Manny asked hopefully.

  Adriana shot him a sharp look, then stood and took up her walking staff. "I'm not sure what would kill her, or even if she can be killed." She rubbed her reddened eyes. She didn't look as if she had slept much, and he wondered if she had sat up all night, waiting and watching for someone to come after them.

  Manny hesitated. "We need help, Adriana. We can't take all those guys on by ourselves." It seemed obvious to him, but he wasn't sure if she could bring herself to admit it.

  Adriana thumped her staff on the floor, exasperated. "And who do you think is going to help us?" But there was a desperation in Adriana's voice that she couldn't hide. Maybe she wasn't even trying to anymore. "No one is coming to our rescue."

  "Etienne." The elf cavalier's name along with the image of his father popped into Manny's head. "He'd help us. I know he would."

  "The King's Chevalier?" Adriana snorted. "Now you're jesting."

  "He's some kind of royal guard, isn't he? They're like the FBI," Manny insisted.

  "The what?" snapped Adriana. "You're not making sense."

  "Where I come from," said Manny, "the FBI are like special police—"

  Adriana's confused scowl deepened and she sh
ook her head, moving toward the door. Manny hurried to block her exit. "Police are like guards." He held out his hands to stop her. "They hunt criminals and stop crimes."

  "We are criminals," Adriana said, obviously trying to hold onto her patience. "We're members of the Hands of Shadow, wanted thieves. We can't go to the Chevaliers for help, we'd be arrested. Or worse, shot on sight." She took Manny by the shoulders. "I know it's not like that for you where you come from, but you're here now, and you have to listen to me. I can get us out of Lutetia today but I need you to stay in hiding. I don't want to push our luck."

  Manny started to protest but Adriana shook him gently. "Manny, you must remember that this body does not belong to you. Neither one of us knows what would happen if you were to be killed. Would Remy be forever trapped in your realm? Would I ever see him again? If you place yourself in danger, you risk Remy as well."

  Pulling away from her, Manny frowned. "So you don't care about me. You only care about getting Remy back."

  "Manny..." She rubbed her face, then grabbed his shoulders, her expression serious. "Remy has been my friend for a long time. I'm practically his— I'm the closest thing to family he has. But I want to see you returned to your family as well. They must be as worried about you as I am about Remy."

  Manny walked back to the blankets and dropped down, his back to Adriana. He folded his arms. I'm practically his— she had started to say. Manny knew how that sentence ended. Practically his mother. He knew he was jealous of Remy, and he knew it was stupid, and childish, but he couldn't help it. "Do whatever you need to do," he said, but couldn't make himself sound happy about it.

  Adriana was silent. When she spoke, her voice was distant and Manny wasn't even sure if her words were meant for him. "I'll be back soon. I will never abandon you. I promise."

  When he finally glanced back, she was gone. Manny's shoulders slumped and he sighed. Maybe she was right. He thought about his unpleasant encounter with Etienne. The Chevalier had threatened to throw Manny into the Foundry if he kept pestering him. Manny had no idea what that was but it sure didn't sound good. But he couldn't shake the image of his father's smiling face or forget the sound of his laugh. He closed his eyes. He's not my dad. Get that into your thick head. Just like Adriana is not my mom.