Suited

by Jo Anderton

  So I nodded, expressionless, and tried to silence her, to push her down until she was little more than a memory. Faint, like a scar.

  “Wait for me at Evenbell. I will meet you outside, by the stairs.”

  To my surprise, Kichlan’s closeness, the brush of his breath on my ear and the warmth that radiated from his body, shut her up instantly.

  Despite everything I felt a strange delight as I waited for Kichlan outside the home I shared with Valya. I had even changed into clean clothes: a fresh scarf, pale shirt beneath my jacket, and the best pair of pants I owned – only two patches on these, hidden at the hem. When he appeared, grinning, bounce in his step, I realised he must feel the same.

  “Lovely evening for a little reconnaissance, wouldn’t you say?” He produced a parcel from his coat with a flourish. Still warm, wrapped in cloth. Eugeny’s cooking. Valya had, of course, already fed me for the night. But something in Kichlan’s closeness set off my hunger anew.

  “Do you know where we are going?” I unwrapped as we walked. Thickly stewed plums encased in pastry, rich with sugar and cinnamon.

  He nodded, and I offered him a bite of the pastry. He tucked his hands into his jacket. “Oh no, Lad and Eugeny made that one for you.”

  “But I would like to share.”

  His look turned sheepish. “I’ve already had three.”

  “Three?” I laughed, and devoured it. “How could you possibly eat three of these?”

  A wink, a cheeky grin. “Practice.”

  Kichlan led the way, keeping to well-lit streets rather than our usual back-alley haunts. But then, we weren’t hunting for debris. It felt strange, to be following him like this, without any jars in hand.

  “What did you tell Lad?” I asked. “How did you convince him not to come?”

  “I didn’t need to.” He stopped beneath a rusted but legible street sign, before glancing at the old bronze numbers mounted on the walls of nearby buildings. Most signposts in Movoc-under-Keeper were written in pions now, not bronze or smooth, painted enamel. It made navigating around the city difficult for people like us, who couldn’t read them. Some of the richer Rills maintained the old signs and numbers – like this one – as a kind of quaint, historical decoration. Though not well enough to stop them from crusting over. Still, it was better than nothing.

  Kichlan had led us closer to the Tear River, down a Rill rather than an Effluent, so the buildings here were of better quality. Apartment complexes built onto the foundations of old, pre-revolution warehouses, contrasting the rough, hand-chipped sandstone blocks with large sheets of river stone, wide reflective glass windows and small balconies hidden by intricate latticework. Little engravings of the Keeper Mountain patterned each of the ancient, sandstone blocks, and had been copied in garish crystal flecked with gold on the new doors and the corner of each street.

  I paused briefly to stare at one of those stylised mountains. It was melting, spilling shining, liquefied metal all over the street. Kichlan took my hand and helped me step clear of it. A bizarre sight, especially in what was obviously a wealthy Rill. I’d have expected such a blatant disruption of complex pion bindings to be fixed as soon as possible. But the street was dark – a quick check down and I realised half the lamps weren’t even working – and empty, apart from Kichlan and me. Stranger still.

  “Lad didn’t even want to come.” Kichlan stopped and pointed to a door. As gaudily decorated as all the rest, it took me a moment to realise that instead of the usual crystalline screen of a pion lock mounted on the wall beside it, this door needed a key. “This must be the one. Fedor said it would stand out.” He glanced around, then herded me across the street. “Now we wait.”

  We huddled together on the stairs of an opposite building, hidden in the darkness of a malfunctioning lamp. Kichlan dug into his jacket again, and this time he produced a small flask. “To keep us warm.”

  Mulled wine, so heavily spiced I couldn’t taste the original quality. That was probably the point. I almost choked over the first mouthful, and covered my face with my hands trying to stifle the sound. Kichlan chuckled, took the flask and drank heavily. “There’s nothing like Eugeny’s recipe.”

  “I hope not,” I managed to say, around coughs and tearing eyes. “Lad didn’t want to come?” I asked, when I could breathe. “That’s unusual, isn’t it?”

  Kichlan offered the flask again. This time, I sipped delicately. “He just said ‘You and Tan should go by yourselves,’ and then told me to make sure you ate your pastry.”

  That didn’t sound like Lad. At the very least, he’d want to make sure he fulfilled the duty his brother gave him, and look after me. “Did you tell him what we were doing tonight?”

  “Oh, a bit.” Kichlan skirted the edges of any real answer. But he leaned against me as he did so, and the warm pressure of his body was so pleasant in the evening chill that I quickly decided I didn’t care. Time alone with Kichlan was rare. Extremely rare. No Lad, no Unbound, no Keeper or lurking puppet men. Just Kichlan. “Although,” he said, and pressed closer still. “If I realised how enjoyable revolution could be, I think I would have joined the Unbound a long time ago.”

  I didn’t think this was really what revolution looked like, but decided not to make that comment. I was far too comfortable to do that. “I thought you didn’t trust the Unbound?”

  “I don’t.” He wrapped a gloved hand around mine, entwined our fingers. “But it’s a nice excuse to spend an evening with you. Good food. Good wine–”

  “I wouldn’t call that good wine.”

  He just grinned “–and you.”

  Heat flushed up to my face. He held my hand tighter. He rested a clean-shaven cheek against my hair. He must have shaved before coming to meet me, Kichlan’s jaw was never so smooth by this time of night. What exactly was going on here? I thought we were helping the Unbound return enough debris to the Keeper to seal the doors closed. Why did I get the impression that Kichlan’s mind was on other things?

  And should I really feel this relaxed? With my suit trying to control me, and the baby I may or may not be carrying, and the broken Keeper, and the quota we could not fill. But all I could really focus on was Kichlan. He made it easy to forget all those things, and I was more than willing to give in.

  “Look.” He tucked the flask away, but did not release my hand. “This is it.”

  On the other side of the street, a small group of technicians were unlocking the gold-adorned door with a set of large, iron keys. The two bored-looking enforcers with them didn’t seem to notice us, hiding in the shadows, but Kichlan drew me against him anyway. He pressed my face into his chest and held me there, embracing me for far longer than seemed necessary. Finally, when he released me and whispered, “We need to follow them,” I couldn’t care less about the technicians, their collecting jars, Fedor and his Unbound. I would have quite happily remained in Kichlan’s arms.

  The technicians loaded their jars into a long black landau that floated low to the ground and travelled Movoc’s twisting streets at high speed. So Kichlan and I ran after them, still joined by our hands, from corner to corner, hugging what shadows we could find. Every time the carriage slowed, even a little, we hid, bodies pressed up against walls, arms wrapped around each other, my face on his chest and his mouth in my hair. Soon, I could hardly breathe, but not from the running, and he was smiling, eyes flashing, wild, excited. Free.

  Finally, the landau halted beside a wide, fat-looking building. For all the prodigious colourless wall space the building had only two large doors, their glass windows a pale green. In the moonlight and unsteady glare from a nearby lamp, it looked ugly and sluggish. And familiar. A debris technician laboratory, it had to be.

  Kichlan’s smile faded as we watched, still hiding, while more enforcers emerged from inside the laboratory to unload the jars.

  “This is what Fedor wanted to know?” I whispered, wishing our frantic chase had not come to an end. I didn’t fully understand what Kichlan was doing, why sp
ying for the Unbound had involved food, drink and his body so close to mine. But I had enjoyed it.

  He nodded. “Fedor wanted to know where the jars were taken, and how many.”

  I hadn’t counted any jars, or been paying attention to the street names or building numbers as we ran, and could only hope that Kichlan had. “You will tell him tomorrow?”

  Another nod, this time silent.

  We watched until the landau was emptied, and glided away. Then Kichlan took me home. He did not offer the flask again, and did not speak, but at least he held my hand.

  “Will Fedor have another task for us?” I asked, as we approached Valya’s stairs. I had no idea how late the bell was, but no desire to climb those steps quite yet, at least not on my own. “Soon would be good, don’t you think?”

  Kichlan glanced at me in surprise. “I’m not sure. He didn’t say. You– you would like that?” He swallowed loudly. “To spend another evening with me?” He coughed, looked away. “For the revolution, I suppose. The Keeper and the–”

  “No.” I released Kichlan’s hand, and stepped so close to him our chests were touching again. At first he hardly seemed to breathe, then drew air deeply, slowly into his lungs so the very movement pressed us closer together.

  The feeling made it difficult to speak. A lump in my throat, just like his. Foolishness. I was hardly new at this, was I? But with Kichlan, it felt different, unstable. Since he found me wandering Darkwater all those moons ago, lost, bandaged, and swearing at inanimate objects, I’d known many different aspects of Kichlan. From the humourless man who’d judged me before he even met me, to the possessive but loving brother to Lad, the strong collecting team leader and, finally, a friend who believed me when no one else would. I rather liked where we’d ended up. A place of closeness and trust. If I took this down the paths I so very much wanted to tread, I could lose it all with a single misstep.

  Like, say, if he learned about my pregnancy. Possible pregnancy.

  So I shivered, not just with the Movoc chill. It was terrifying, to think that I could lose him. Far more frightening than it should have been. But then I glanced up to the curve of his jaw and the arch of his neck, and before I could stop myself I was touching him, his skin soft and hot beneath my fingers.

  “I couldn’t care less about revolution,” the words spilled from me, uncontrollable. “Right now, I just want to be with you.”

  He held his breath until I dropped my hand, then said, “Well, then, perhaps we should just spend another evening together anyway.” His voice was very deep, and I could feel it echo through me. Chest to chest.

  “I would like that. So very much.”

  Kichlan kissed me.

  His lips tasted of sweet pastry and spicy wine, and he shook, ever so slightly. I kissed him back, wondering what I tasted like. Not – oh please not – like the suit’s metallic tang.

  We kissed beneath a lamp’s weak light. We kissed in Movoc’s cold night air. We kissed until nothing really mattered any more, not revolution, not the Keeper, not the doors, not the life or the death within me. There was Kichlan, only Kichlan, as he always should have been. What I’d wanted for so long, I realised, but not been able to admit to myself.

  When we said goodnight, eventually, at the base of Valya’s stairs, I could still feel him on my mouth, my chest, my hands. I carried him with me, and slept well for the remainder of that night. For once, without worry.

  The remainder of the sixnight was slow, burdened by Natasha’s ever-increasing concern over the small amount of debris we collected and brightened only by those few moments when I passed Lad over to Kichlan’s care, and our hands touched. Even the briefest brush of his gloved fingers against mine set me shivering. Kichlan smiled at me then, a small, shy smile, and I knew I replied with just the same expression. Fedor had thanked us for our information, but did not give us any more assignments. At first I chaffed for another excuse to spend the evening together, for the closeness it had brought us. I wanted more of it, so much more – like Kichlan was food and I was starving. But exhaustion dogged me as the days wore on, and Kichlan’s shy smile grew to worry as Lad whispered in his ear. What was he repeating? How many times I had almost tripped over my own feet, saved only by Lad’s constant attention and steadying hand?

  When Rest finally came, I got none of it. Early morning light had just woken me when Mizra, Uzdal and Sofia came knocking.

  “How are you feeling, Tanyana?” Sofia asked with a don’t-even-think-about-lying-to-me expression.

  I sighed, and tried not to think about how the day would have been spent if Kichlan had appeared at my doorstep instead. “I could have done with more sleep.”

  That look deepened. “You know what I’m talking about.”

  I balled my hands into fists and tucked them deep inside my pockets. “I’m exhausted, I feel sick most of the time, and I’m sore just about everywhere. Answer your question?”

  “It’s early on,” Mizra said, where he and his brother walked ahead of us. “Maybe things will settle down.”

  I thought of the suit, and didn’t think that would happen.

  “You look absolutely terrible,” Sofia said.

  I glared at her. “Well, thank you.”

  “And Mizra told us about your collapse a few days ago. It worries me, Tanyana.”

  For a long moment we walked in silence, the scrape of our boots against icy streets the only sound. It sent shivers up my spine. “It worries me too.” More than I would say.

  “I’m sorry we have been so forceful about this.” Sofia even had the decency to avoid my gaze when she said that. “But your health is important to us.”

  “And the health of–” unable to say it, I gestured to my stomach.

  “Yes,” Uzdal answered. “And the health of your child.”

  “Possible child.”

  With a sad look over his shoulder, Uzdal nodded.

  Sofia, Mizra and Uzdal did not lead me to the Tear River. This surprised me. I had assumed that we would catch a ferry up the Tear to the centre of the city and a university or healer’s college. Instead, we marched further from the river, down the stark and dirty streets of outer Rills and Effluents.

  “This, ah, healer,” I murmured. “He is accredited, I assume?”

  “Of course.” Sofia flashed me a disdainful look. “But you’re a collector now, remember? Collectors don’t go to colleges under the bluestone of the bridge. Collectors take what help they can afford.”

  “Well, yes. But still.” I glanced up at the blackened windows of a rundown block of apartments. The entire western side of the edifice had crumbled, crashing into bricks and broken mortar on the street. It left the steel framework and windowpanes naked like bones, bare in the face of the wind whipping up from the river down the narrow streets. “If I’m going to let someone prod at me, I’d rather they knew what they were doing.”

  We stopped at another complex a few doors down. This one was not in quite so bad condition, but cracks still wound their way through the walls. Mould coated the walls of its airless stairway, the steps littered with the desiccated corpses of unfortunate insects.

  A short, round man with thin stands of dark hair and unkempt stumble over his chin opened the door to an apartment on the top floor. An unhealthy pion lock by the handle buzzed constantly. Of all the lights down the long hallway, only two worked, and they were faint. “Sofia,” he said. “Not having problems, are you?” When he spoke, he reeked of something like very old onions. I reared back, but Mizra and Uzdal at my shoulders kept me from turning around and giving up on the whole idea.

  Sofia shook her head. “No, I am well. I am here for a friend.” And she pointed to me.

  The healer looked me up and down with red, tired-looking eyes. He coughed loud and wetly into a hand. “All right.” He said, fished out a kerchief and spat into it. “You’d better come in.” He turned, and lumbered away into a dim room.

  I didn’t move. “And this is your idea of a bad joke, right?” />
  Sofia gave me a sorry shake of her head. “Edik might not look it, but he is a good healer.”

  “We would not bring you here otherwise,” Mizra said.

  I allowed myself to be led inside.

  Edik’s apartment was large, larger than I would have expected so far from the Tear River. But that was where any resemblance to luxury ended. The windows were all shuttered. Dust floated in the few narrow beams of light that crept past them. The room was filled with old furniture: leathers split, fabrics unravelling, wood stained and peeling. Slides were piled haphazardly in corners, some cracked, most heavily burdened by dust. I wondered when the words and images stored by pions inside their thin glass had last been read. Sofia led us down a hallway, just as dusty and rubbish-filled, to a wide room with a tiled floor. A tap dripped over a stained sink in one corner. A hard bed on wheels, covered with dirty blankets and surrounded by trays and metal instruments, took up most of the space. It reminded me of the metal table on which the puppet men had suited me, and I stopped at the sight of it.

  “So, what’s the problem?” Edik sat on a stool that looked far too flimsy for his weight, and it creaked worryingly beneath him. It seemed he was alone in this apartment, that he did not belong to a circle – not even a three point – and did not care much about basic cleanliness. “Not another one like her, are you?” He unwrapped a handful of seeds and nuts in a paper bag, and started chewing, spitting out any husks on the floor.

  “Like her?” I tried not to gag as I spoke. The room stank of drains and stagnant water and not enough air.

  Sofia sighed. “Yes, Edik. We think she’s pregnant too.”

  “Think?” he asked.

  “Too?” I turned to Sofia.

  She couldn’t quite meet my eyes. “I told you Edik was a good healer. I can personally recommend him.”

  “Do you remember when she fell?” Uzdal said, his voice quiet. “Your first emergency, all those moons ago. She was hurt, came here, found out something more than a fracture to her wrist.”