Rojan Dizon 03 - Last to Rise

by Francis Knight

  “And ignored, right?”

  I shrugged – she had me there. But she was my sister, still young enough to worry about me, and it shone plain as plain in her eyes. So, being a good big brother, I said, “I will, I promise. Later,” and gave her shoulders a squeeze with my good hand. “You too.”

  “Hmph. I will, because I know I can’t work right if I don’t. You, I’m not so sure.”

  She glared at me, promising a future tongue-lashing should I dare to ignore her, but she said nothing else before I left. And not for my lumpy sofa.

  Chapter Eight

  The office was quiet at that time of night, which I was grateful for. Lastri had gone home; the walkway outside was empty. The only sounds were Dendal humming and scratching away in his corner and a series of boom-shudders that made all the pens on my desk roll on to the floor.

  It was all very well for everyone to tell me to sleep, to eat. But there was almost nothing to eat, nothing I wanted to eat certainly, only the half-dream, half-dastardly promise of Perak’s that out there, somewhere, was bacon walking around. Sleep wasn’t going to happen either. So I dunked my head in icy water from the tap in the kitchen to wake myself up, grabbed the note with the possible address of a possible mage on it and headed out. At least having an address meant I shouldn’t have to fire up any more juice, my hand could have a rest and I was doing something to take my mind off everything else. Sod Perak telling me to stay put, to stay safe. I did a little bit of rearrangement, made my face someone else’s, and went.

  Going down into Boundary was an education. I’d lived in those shitty parts of the city most of my life, seen all sorts, from murders and gangs running wild to riots and priests going crazy because they couldn’t believe the Goddess would allow such awfulness. But I’d never seen the walkways so full of silent fear, never smelled it so sharply in the crappy air, and long before I made it into Boundary.

  I made a slight detour – there was something I wanted to see. On the other side of the city from where the Storad were camped there was another gate, a mirror of it. Small, almost unnoticed until recently. Not unnoticed now, because everyone I saw on the street was heading towards it, towards what they’d until lately thought was just a dead end, because Outside officially didn’t exist. Far-off, mythical, unreal. But with missiles arrowing their way in from what was patently not inside the city, the populace had rapidly accepted the unofficial idea that Outside was real, and if there was an Outside, there must be a way to get to it that didn’t involve getting shot by the Storad.

  There was. The Mishan gate.

  The streets on the city side of the inner gates were a heaving crush of people that cringed together at every boom-shudder that came across from the Storad gate. The Mishan gate itself wasn’t open – if it were, those people would have been through in a flash – but a small postern was, with a heavy metal grille across it. Mishan guards stood behind the grille, and a string of them kept the crowd away from the front, though they were in danger of being crushed by the sheer panic of the press behind them. Being in Mahala was being a rat in a trap just then, and this gate was the only hope for thousands, though it was hope for almost none. No one was being let through. Not here at least. I had no doubt there was another entrance somewhere else, somewhere quiet, somewhere Over. Somewhere the cardinals could sneak through and hand over their bribes, get the hell out before everyone died. At least I hadn’t been one of the bribes. Not yet anyway.

  Rumours abounded in the crowd – the Mishans would let you through if you had money, if you had connections. The Mishans weren’t letting anyone through. The Storad would leave Under alone, had no desire to attack the downtrodden masses. The Storad would rip through Under like fire in a forest. The Storad ate babies. We should let the Storad in, let them kill every Ministry man they found, and then we’d all be all right. The moon was made of cheese.

  These and other even more outlandish rumours flashed along the cramped streets and walkways that shivered with the load, the whispering of them the only sound. The gate looked half formed and vague in the darkness. Once it had looked much like any other part of the city, hidden in plain sight, but now it was laid bare so all could see what it was. Like an optical illusion, once you saw the trick you wondered how you couldn’t have seen it before. Because people hadn’t believed in Outside or ways to get to it, the gate hadn’t been there. Now they did believe, now no one was hiding it but flaunting it, it was obvious.

  Frost-rimed arrow slits disguised as light-wells. Heavy, clanking gates that had once looked like the entrance to just another secured factory but now, when you looked a certain way, just had to be something more. Little puffs of chilly breath marked the guards – ours and theirs – that now stood openly in front of it.

  News-sheets made their way from hand to hand among the crowds, saying much the same as the rumours. The news-sheets were – well, they weren’t unbiased, let’s put it like that. They were unofficial rumour mills for the things certain cardinals wanted people to believe, or would be prepared to believe, rather than actual truth. Propaganda. And while not everyone believed all of it, enough believed enough of it. Funny how Perak’s really officially official news-sheet, detailing calmly and rationally what was going on, what he intended to do and what people could do to help themselves and Mahala, was mostly ignored as being the far-fetched ravings of a loony. We’d had all the other stuff shoved down our necks for so long, people found it hard to believe the truth when it bit them on the nose.

  Someone thrust a copy of one of the more virulent sheets into my hand and I stopped dead when I saw my own ugly mug there, down near the bottom.

  Wanted: Rojan Dizon, pain-mage and heretic.

  All information received in confidence, and paid for in cash.

  I glanced over it, noted the name of the cardinal who had sponsored the sheet – that bold cardinal from before, who wondered whether Perak would protect me if I weren’t his brother – and ripped that sucker into bits. The bit about me was bad enough, if not a shock. That cardinal must be getting desperate. The rest though – what a load of old bollocks. The people Under were safe, it said, the guards and Specials had everything in hand. The Storad had no interest in destroying the city, only debilitating our trade – this at least was a hope I had, but I didn’t set much store by hope, from long and dark experience. The sheet went on to tell people how to protect themselves in their own homes, to trust in Ministry, and to iterate very strongly indeed that the Mishans would let no one through their gates. Similar spiels had been spouted at many a temple over the last days, cardinal-propelled sops to keep the rabble quiet. Perak had tried to get it to stop, but each temple had its own patron cardinal and they toed that cardinal’s line like it was a lift into heaven.

  If the spurious news-sheets were saying all this then it meant that the Mishans would let a few people through – the cardinals who sponsored the news-sheets and temples almost certainly. Anyone who couldn’t afford to pay through the nose, which meant anyone from Under, was fresh out of luck.

  After the sheets had made their rounds, and after a few choice words from some of the Mishan guards, the crowd loosened its stranglehold on the gates. Some stayed, but more drifted away. Murmuring about what they could do now, speculating on what the sheets had said, that they’d be safe if they stayed Under, wouldn’t they? Then looking at a different sheet, sponsored by a different cardinal, reading about all the things the Storad would do to them when they got in…

  I threw the ripped sheet away and made my way down.

  Another boom-shudder – it was worse down here, a hundred times worse, for all that the sound was fainter. The rumble shook through me and all the buildings that crowded around. Reminded me how many buildings sat above, waiting to crush the life out of me if they fell. The walkway beneath my feet swayed – not as solid down here, more likely to be rotten with rust, more likely to break, tip me down a couple of dozen or so floors. Less far to fall this far down, but that was still enough to splat me
. I grabbed hold of the nearest building and held on for grim death. Something pinged past my face and I hoped like hell it wasn’t one of the bolts holding the walkway in place. I kept my eyes shut. Stupid, I know, because it was as dark as Namrat’s heart all around me, but that didn’t stop the image of a long drop making me want to scream. Almost took my mind off keeping an eye out for any would-be kidnappers. Almost.

  After a time the walkway settled and so did my heartbeat, though I made sure I kept hold of something solid as I carried on. I was glad when I came to one of the few Glow globes that lit the walkways. Even gladder when I got to the house I was after. Inside I’d be able to pretend long drops were things that didn’t happen.

  Another boom-shudder. Was it me or where they getting closer together? It didn’t really matter because the walkway lurched under me and I fell into the door rather than knocking on it. I tried to hold myself together when the door opened, because I wasn’t going to give a good impression by screaming like a baby. It kind of worked. The scream came out as a squeak, which still wasn’t very professional but better, and I managed to avoid falling through the doorway too.

  “What do you want?” The door opener didn’t look a welcoming sort of guy. He was big and beefy, or perhaps had been before starvation had taken hold. He still had wide shoulders that now had no spare flesh on them, and a face that seemed like life had chipped its way into it with chisels and a hammer, his dark hair crudely shorn and patchy. Not a Downsider – must have been one of the few Upsiders still left in this area. Probably too damned poor to get anywhere else, because the Downsiders had been shoved into all the very worst places, naturally. Also possibly one of the “poor but proud so don’t give me any of your charity or I’ll feed it to you, with your teeth”. Careful handling would be required. I wondered whether I was up to it.

  He caught sight of my allover in the dim light of a rend-nut-oil lamp that was busy stinking the place up behind him. His face changed from not welcoming to a mix of outright fear and barely suppressed anger.

  “It’s… delicate,” I said. “Can I come in?”

  That seemed to throw him. He obviously thought I was a Special, and Specials didn’t need to ask, but at least he opened the door wide enough for me to squeeze past.

  “We haven’t done nothing,” he said behind me as I took in the one-room hovel he called home. Synth-tainted damp dripped from the walls, though someone had tried their best with some whitewash that was now streaked with black. “And you can’t prove otherwise.”

  A teenage boy shot up from what was presumably his bed – a damp and ragged collection of blankets. A large bandage, spotted with blood and more grey now than white, had been clumsily wrapped around his right hand.

  “If I was a Special, I wouldn’t need to prove much at all,” I said without turning. “So it’s probably good that I’m not one, isn’t it? Though you might prefer that I was when I’m done. Hurt yourself?”

  The boy shot a look at what was presumably his father, seemed to get an OK to answer and said, “Yeah. Climbing in the Slump. There’s some good salvage if you know where to look. Cut my hand on a bit of metal.”

  If nothing else, that was enough to show me just how screwed-over these guys were. The Slump was a mangled mess of metal and wood, a nest of squirming, plump rats and the bodies they fed on – the Ministry used it as a dumping ground for anyone who died whose family couldn’t afford a proper crypt, which was pretty much everyone. If you needed to salvage in amongst that, you were as desperate as it gets.

  “Bet some really weird shit has been happening since, right?” I said.

  The boy shot another glance at his father, terrified this time. His father seemed to feel it too, because all of a sudden the feeble light was blocked out while he loomed over me. Enough to make me wonder why I’d been stupid enough to come on my own.

  “Who’ve you been talking to? That bitch down on the stairwell corner? I told her I’d pay her back. Goddess’s tits, it was only a spoon! Not half as bad as what happened to the cat. Old bag said she’d dob us in, and I suppose she has, but you’re on your own and I reckon I could take one Special, especially a piss-ant little one like you. You aren’t arresting either of us.”

  I backed up a step – he looked really pissed off and, now I came to look, his knuckles seemed well used. I didn’t want him using them on me, so I tried a placating smile, which made his face twist even further. His fists seemed to be twitching too, like he was contemplating using them.

  “I’m not a Special. I promise.” Something by the crappy little stove caught my eye. A mound of bones that still had slivers of cooked meat on them. Small bones, with a long, thin, fur-free tail attached. Namrat’s arse, I’d known there wasn’t much food, but this? Still, it gave me a tiny bit of leverage. “I’m not taking you anywhere, or at least, not anywhere you don’t want to go. And if you go, you should get something other than rats to eat.”

  A guilty, shamed look between the two of them, and the father backed off.

  They didn’t look like they’d hand me over to a cardinal any time soon, so I took a risk, and to hell with it. “My name’s Rojan.” I gripped my pulse pistol, my lucky charm, with my good hand and shuffled round so the door was within reach – you never knew how someone was going to take this and getting the fuck out is certainly the better part of not getting your head stove in. “I’m a pain-mage.”

  It was touch-and-go there for a while, whether the father was going to kick my bollocks off for being a mage or laugh in relief I wasn’t a Special there to arrest them. In the end he settled for a spat: “And?”

  I cast a glance over at the boy, who looked like a light had just gone on in his head.

  “And so’s he, I think.”

  Before I knew what was happening, the father had grabbed the front of my allover and lifted me off the ground. I had to try, very hard, not to lash out, with pistol or with magic.

  “My boy’s no hell-damned mage.” He rattled me against the wall with every word. I hoped like hell the wall could take it. “You hear me? He’s a good boy, not some dirty mage, and you aren’t taking him away.”

  As previously noted, I am not a tactful man and I’d used up the day’s supply, plus my hand was throbbing like a bastard. I had all this juice sloshing round and a black chuckle in the back of my head saying Do it, go on, show the stupid sod. And, well, I had this inexplicable aversion to being called dirty, unholy or all those other things they called mages. Made me cranky.

  The spell was going to be something small but impressive. I’d discovered that rearranging air could have some pretty spectacular effects and it was just a little thing – use a blast of air to push him away, maybe rearrange my face from my disguise to look like his for a moment. Nothing much, just enough to show him what I was about, and perhaps shut him up about how mages were dirty.

  I’ve never been one for restraint, though, and Dendal’s sermons on mastery and control couldn’t quite overcome my stinging ego, so what actually happened was he ended up blasted into the other wall, bringing down a shower of damp plaster and knocking a small and badly done picture of the Goddess face-first on to the pile of rat bones. The lack of restraint hadn’t done wonders for my head either. Little black spots kept swimming past my eyes on their way to somewhere.

  The father glared up at me with his mouth open, and looked at his own face on mine. It’s handy for freaking people out, satisfying if petty. Another boom-shudder pierced the sudden silence, brought another shower of plaster raining on his head and made the hovel shiver like an old man with ague. A chunk of ceiling made a bid for freedom, smashed the picture of the Goddess through the rat bones, and I wondered just how safe this building was. The superstructure should be all right – barring a catastrophe such as me going batshit, it had been built to withstand a lot. But individual buildings, bolted on an age ago, bolts probably rusty, or synth-eaten… maybe not so much. I began a swift calculation of how far it would be to fall if the floor gave way. Too far for
my liking.

  But after a few heart-stopping moments of absolute terror, everything settled back to almost normal. The boy sat, gobsmacked and speechless, his gaze pinging between me and his father. I had less luck with the father as he got up.

  I used my best weapon: my oversized mouth. “Yes, I think he’s a mage, and no, we aren’t dirty, or unholy or any of those other things Ministry told you to believe. We’re men and women who can… do a little extra. Bet you get a bit of work in Trade when you can, right?”

  A moody shrug, wary but belligerent still. Then again, I was feeling pretty belligerent myself.

  “Who do you think got the factories running again so you could work? So you could earn a pittance, yes, I know, but better than the fuck-all you earned while they weren’t running. Who do you think is lighting the streets? Helping heat this place so we don’t all freeze our bollocks off? It’s not much, but it’s something. I don’t know how much you know about what happened with the Glow, with the ’Pit, but most of it’s probably crap. The news-sheets print what their patron cardinals tell them to, and it’s bullshit. What isn’t bullshit is: mages make Glow. Mages power Trade. Mages might be all we’ve got to beat the Storad off and we need them. Need. Right now. So are you going to tell me how dirty I am, in which case I shall showcase some of my better spells, which you will regret, quite possibly over a protracted period of time? Or will you let me train your son so he can help us all out of this mess? If not, you let the Storad just walk in and fuck us all over, worse than even Ministry. Because they will if they get the chance. They care about Trade, about machines, and factories. Maybe they don’t eat babies, but they don’t give a shit about what’s down here, or who, and while they may not come down and kill us outright, I don’t see them coming over all charitable and feeding us.”

  This little speech seemed to terrify the boy even more, but the father beetled his brows like he was really thinking. Another boom-shudder that rattled the walls – they were definitely getting closer together – gave a bit of added weight to what I’d just said.