by David Gunn
Chapter 20
The bars on our window are as thick as a child’s wrist.
Beyond them, the jumble of roofs fades into darkness. A narrow street, more of a back alley really, lies empty below us. The air stinks, because the air in Farlight always stinks.
The house opposite is lower than this one. A light shows from one window. A lamp, presumably. We can’t see into the room because its shutters are closed for the night. That’s to be expected, since the cathedral clock just struck eleven.
A quick scrape with my nail reveals rust under the paint of the bars. Another scrape reveals dull steel beneath.
‘Sven.’ Anton’s voice is hoarse. ‘What are you doing?’
Plainly he’s talking to me again.
Apart from being hacked off I didn’t collect the Aux on my way down . . .? I’m thinking. I know it’s a novelty. I’m sure the SIG would have something to say about that. But I’m trying to get us out of here. I don’t say that to Anton, obviously. But why not think? Nothing else is working.
‘Grab one of these,’ I order.
Anton wraps his hands round the central bar and tugs. Gripping the bar next to it, I pull in the opposite direction. We were right first time, the bars are beyond bending.
‘And again.’
Grit drops onto my fingers.
‘Help me off with my shirt,’ I tell Sergeant Leona.
The blade in its neoprene sheath between my shoulders is narrow. This is a knife for stabbing or throwing, rather than slashing. That’s good, because I need the point to be fine.
Positioning the blade parallel to a bar, I jab at the ring of mortar around its upper end and smile when more grit drops onto my fingers. Too much pressure and the blade’s end will blunt. Wrong angle and it’ll snap.
The others have the sense to let me work in silence.
If you’ve ever built a jail, you’ll know the deepest hole for the bars always goes at the top. The bar slots into that and drops into a shallower hole in the lintel below. Otherwise the weight of the bars sinks them into the setting mortar.
That’s how these are fixed.
About an inch in, the mortar becomes softer. Between scraping mortar free, I sharpen the point of my knife on the wall beyond the window. I could use the lintel, but the street below is empty and I’m hoping to get out of here without leaving too many clues how we did it.
‘Right,’ I say. ‘Grab this and twist.’
They do, until the bar turns slightly.
So I tell them to twist it back and repeat until I tell them to stop . . .
The room’s hot, the night is muggy in a way only central Farlight can manage, and they’ve been worrying the bar so long sweat runs down their faces and sticks their clothes to their bodies. I can smell Leona from where I stand.
When she thinks I’m not looking, she examines her hands. Their palms are blistered and raw.
‘Piss on your fingers,’ I say.
She thinks I’m joking.
‘Leona,’ I say, ‘you’ve been squirming half an hour . . .’
Now I’ve embarrassed her as well. Can’t think why. You need to piss, you need to piss. She might as well do something useful with it like harden the sores on her fingers. Although, come to think of it . . .
‘Cross your legs for another minute.’
Anton looks appalled.
Sergeant Leona simply nods.
Gripping the central bar, I twist until the muscles lock in my back and ligaments pop in my shoulder. I can almost hear flesh tear.
‘Sir . . .’
‘Almost there.’
With a squeal, the bar turns one complete rotation. And then another and another until I can turn it freely. After that, all Anton has to do is push upwards as he turns it. So the end of the bar buried in the lintel grinds against its mortar.
Eventually the bar works free.
‘All right,’ I tell Leona. ‘Now you can piss. Bring a handful over here when you’re done.’ I’m going to mix it with the grit to make new mortar.
‘We’ll turn our backs,’ Anton reassures her.
I do what Anton suggests. But only because I want a proper look at the wall outside now the bar is gone. I need to know how hard it is going to be for us to reach the roof above.
The answer is, impossible.
Chapter 21
The wall above our window rises twenty feet to a low parapet that probably runs around the entire building. The wall’s flat, no ledge, no drainpipes and no handholds. The plaster I stab flakes to reveal stone beneath. No way can we cut holes in this.
Even the hiss of Leona pissing isn’t enough to raise my spirits.
‘What about that?’ Anton says.
Yes, I’ve seen it.
Fifteen feet below, a rusting girder straddles the street.
It stops the back wall of the building opposite from collapsing into this house. As cheap fixes go it’s effective. And for all I know it’s been there since the original virus bowed the walls round here into their current state. Has to have historic value. Or someone would have replaced it with something less ugly.
If I’m wrong about the house opposite not having bars, we’re fucked. But we’re fucked if we stay and fucked if we fall. So we might as well try using the girder as a bridge. Not least because the other house is lower than this one, and the girder ends five feet below an attic window.
Anton winces at my reasoning.
‘Sir . . .’
A slick of liquid stains the tiles. And Leona’s cupping a handful of piss so rank it would poison rats. I’m not surprised: it’s hot and we’ve been sweating and no one’s bothered to bring us water.
‘Here,’ I say.
She dribbles liquid into the little mound of grit I’ve made on the windowsill and I have my mortar.
‘Right. You go first.’
‘Yes, sir.’
That’s when it occurs to me she doesn’t know about our girder. Leona thinks I’m telling her to drop four floors. The fact she’s willing to obey impresses me. Anton is looking at her as if she’s insane.
‘There’s a metal strut,’ he says. ‘About ten feet below us.’
‘Fifteen.’
‘If you say so.’
‘Yeah,’ I say. ‘I do.’
Climbing onto the ledge, Leona wriggles between the bars, grips my hand and winces. Her palms are sticky with blood.
‘Ready when you are, sir.’
She finds herself dangling four floors above the street, with her boots a few feet above the girder. Looking up, she gives me a twisted smile, and nods.
So I let go.
Landing on the girder, Leona tries to balance, loses her nerve and panics, throwing herself forward to wrap her arms round the rusting bar. Her yelp of pain when she hits is louder than I’d like.
I think she’s going to fall to the street below, but she locks her hands and holds tight. It’s not enough to stop her slipping sideways.
‘Fuck,’ Anton says.
As we watch, Leona tips off the edge and finds herself hanging. Should have locked her knees round the girder first.
‘You can do it,’ Anton says.
‘Swing your legs up. Lock your knees. Work your way round.’
She nods at my order. It takes her longer than it should to scrabble upright. When she does, her face is white with pain.
‘Ribs,’ she says. ‘Sorry, sir.’
‘Broken?’
‘Yes, sir. Sorry, sir.’
‘They’ll mend.’
She rewards me with a sour smile.
Anton drops next. He’s taller than Leona, so once we’ve locked wrists and he’s dropped over the ledge, his boot almost touches the girder. All the same, he decides against Leona’s plan. No balancing for Anton. Opening his legs, he lands on the girder as if riding a gyrobike.
‘Shit . . .’
Not sure it’s a method I’d choose.
The girder is old and rusting and fixed in place with only three bolts at
each end. No point Anton and Sergeant Leona having their brains dashed out if my weight is too much and the bolts decide to give.
‘Crawl towards the attic window. Make yourselves secure.’
My first problem comes when I try to get through the bars. Even with one bar missing, the gap is tight. Gripping the window frame, I drag myself through, one-handed, and hear ribs crack. Feels like Leona got her revenge.
My next problem is staying put while I repair the bars. Sliding the missing bar into its upper slot and bedding it down is easy. Replacing the mortar is harder. Scraping what I don’t use off the ledge with my knife, I flick it to the street below. Should have crumbled it. Still, it looks like dog shit from this distance. So maybe we’ll get lucky.
‘Sir,’ Leona hisses.
Three soldiers are turning into the street.
Give me three bricks and I could kill them all. But we’re out of bricks and don’t want to attract attention. So I wait until they’re gone, before dropping from my position to hang by my one hand from the window ledge.
Sven,is this wise?
For a second, with metal creaking and dry mortar trickling from the three bolts at each end of the girder as I hit rusting steel and cling fast, I feel icy smoke swirl through my thoughts. Then it fades.
The air is hot and Farlight breathless.
Night hangs heavy, and sweat slides down my ribs. It drips from my eyebrows and runs through my cropped hair. As the kyp roils with excitement in my throat, a fever tries to shake me free from my perch.
‘You OK?’ Anton whispers.
‘Of course I’m fucking-’
What’s the point of saying OctoV is watching me?
Even if it is true, which isn’t definite . . . But a wave of static makes the kyp sour my throat, and I suspect it is. The kyp’s faulty. Can’t remember if I mentioned that. It’s been faulty since it was fitted.
Gaining a kyp is a one-time action. Well, mostly. You could replace it. But then you’d need to rip out my throat and give me another.
I’ve never been worth that kind of money.
‘Catch,’ I tell Leona.
A second later, she’s balanced at the far end of the girder, gripping a shutter with one hand. We all hear the click as she uses my knife to lift its lock. What happens now depends on what we find.
Legba is kind.
Our attic has no bars. And its window is partly open. Lifting it, Leona tumbles through the gap. Anton follows.
Takes me longer. Reaching back, I close the shutters and click their latch in place. Then I shut the window and lock that.
‘Sir,’ Leona says.
Something strange about her voice.
A young woman struggles in my sergeant’s grip. Leona has one hand over the girl’s mouth and my dagger to her neck. She’s young, with blonde curls falling across her naked shoulders. Her dress is low-cut. So low, her breasts threaten to spill free as she struggles.
Anton’s spellbound.
‘Deal with it,’ I tell Leona crossly.
Dropping my blade, she digs her thumb into the girl’s elbow and grips. When Leona lets go, the girl’s too shocked by the pain to resume struggling.
Works for me.
‘Scream,’ I say, ‘and we’ll kill you.’
‘Sven!’
I ignore Anton. ‘Understand me?’
Blue eyes grow huge with tears.
This girl is pretty, in a useless sort of way. Some men like that. From the look on Anton’s face he’s one of them.
‘Do you understand?’
She nods.
‘OK,’ I say. ‘Release her.’
As the girl fills her lungs to shout, Leona muffles her. The look Leona gives me says it all.
‘You’re not listening,’ I say, picking up my blade.
Now the girl’s watching the knife.
Very carefully.
And she’s still watching when Leona removes her hand to leave the four of us alone in the attic with silence.
‘Anton,’ I whisper. ‘Try the door.’
It’s locked. Now how did I know that?
The attic is clean. Someone recently scrubbed its floor, but badly. There’s a bed, with a mattress, both old. There are no clothes on hangers, no hangers come to that. This isn’t a room for living in. It’s a place families dump junk they can’t be bothered to throw away.
‘You being punished?’
That’s the usual reason to be locked up in places like this.
‘No,’ she whispers. ‘At least, I don’t think so . . .’
‘My dear.’ Anton comes forward.
His face is grave. Something about her worries him. I should have known it would be her accent. ‘What’s your name?’
‘Sef Kam- Lady Serafina Kama.’
Leona slides me a glance. My face is neutral.
‘That’s high clan?’ I say.
‘Obviously,’ Serafina says. Then mutters an apology. Can’t work out why she’s bothering, until I remember she’s seen me tell Anton what to do. And he’s obviously from her world. So . . .
So simple these people.
‘Have you come to rescue me?’
‘Do you need rescuing?’ Anton asks.
Since she asked, the answer is obviously yes. But Anton and Sef are too busy being polite to follow the logic of that. The captive has a lamp by her bed. An old-fashioned lamp with a wick.
Power cut. Lamp.
What are the chances of that?
The attic has a small alcove containing a lavatory. So this was a bedroom once, before it was a storeroom. I do what my old lieutenant told me to do when entering any new situation. Take an inventory.
One door in, locked. One window, now bolted.
Shutters safely closed and locked.
One skylight in the alcove, too small to let me or Anton through. Although Sergeant Leona might manage it.
‘I could climb out, drop down, unlock the door from the other side,’ the sergeant says. She’s obviously been watching me read the attic. Bar, brothel, bedroom or battlefield, doesn’t matter which, there are times you need to lock them down or get out fast. First rule of anything: Know where you are. Second rule: Know how to get somewhere else.
I glance at Sef Kama.
‘What?’ she asks, seeing me look.
‘Nothing.’ The fact she hasn’t tried escaping through the skylight tells me all I need about how much use she’s going to be. ‘How often do you get fed?’
Her mouth is open, but it’s not saying anything.
‘You got fed this afternoon?’
‘Pancakes.’
‘Last night?’
She shakes her head. ‘I wasn’t . . . I only . . .’
OK, she’s only been here for a day, and hasn’t yet got her head round the fact she might be here some time. Except, she won’t be. Because Anton is telling her she’ll be all right now he’s here.
He shuts up when I glare at him.
‘I can’t believe it,’ Sef says.
Anton wastes a couple of minutes coaxing out what she can’t believe. Apparently she’s been locked in by Paulo. She breaks off telling him this to ask why Paulo would do such a thing. Since Anton doesn’t know who Paulo is, it’s a pointless question.
When asked, she says Paulo designs dresses.
Doesn’t sound that dangerous to me.
Lady Serafina is only here because her aunt insisted more lace was needed for the dress.
‘What dress?’ Sergeant Leona demands.
Sef’s glance is cold. ‘I’m getting married.’ You can see she thinks talking to Leona is beneath her. ‘In the cathedral.’
‘Who’s the lucky man?’
‘Vijay Jaxx. You wouldn’t know him.’
Anton grabs me before I can finish wrapping my fingers round her throat. And then he’s on the floor, clutching his gut, and Sef is wailing and Leona is trying very hard not to show any expression at all.
‘How long have you known him?’ I demand.
> ‘All my life. We’ve been engaged since childhood.’
‘We’re talking about Vijay? Been away recently? Only just come back?’
‘Landed this morning,’ she says. ‘Why?’
Because, I’m going to kill the little shit. And a Jaxx or not, I’m going to cut off his tackle and fuck him with his own bits first. Don’t realize I’ve said it aloud, until Leona grins and Sef starts wailing.
‘What’s he ever done to you?’
It’s what he’s done to Aptitude that pisses me off.
Anton’s dragging himself to his feet. He looks sick, but not upset enough for someone who’s just discovered his daughter’s fiance is cheating. I’m getting ready to call him on it, when Leona grabs Sef and chokes off her wails.
‘Sir . . .’
We hear footsteps on the stairs.
‘We’ll be in there,’ she tells Sef, pointing at the bathroom. ‘With the door slightly open. Betray us and it won’t just be Paulo’s throat we cut . . .’
She really is a girl after my own heart.
Chapter 22
A key turns and the door opens. The man who enters is balding, middle-aged, and slightly thick about the waist. He wears small spectacles, a flowery shirt and carries a bottle of water and a glass.
Not my idea of a kidnapper.
‘My lady,’ he says. ‘I heard you moving around.’
Not sure what Paulo sees in Sef’s face, but his voice falters. Putting down his offering, he begins to back towards the door. He’s not doing this because he thinks Sef might attack. It’s embarrassment that keeps him bent double.
‘Try to get some sleep,’ he suggests.
‘What?’
‘It’s for the best.’
‘Paulo,’ Sef says. ‘You locked me in.’
‘Lady Isadora said-’
Shouts from General Luc’s house stop anyone finding out what Sef’s Aunt Isadora said. Scurrying to the window, Paulo slides it up and throws back its shutters. A street door opposite opens hard enough to hit the wall. The Wolf has returned to find us gone.
At a sound of feet on his stairs, Paulo freezes.
No chance it’s General Luc. He’s still busy issuing orders on the street below, his voice tight and angry. He sounds a bad man to have as a CO.