Heart of Veridon

by Tim Akers

  Walking through the old avenues reminded me of home. We were uncomfortably close to the Burn family grounds. Tomb was near the top of Veridon, but great old Burn made his lands farther from the thick walls of the old city. I saw the eternal lights of Tower Burn looming in crimson stained glory over the other buildings on its terrace. I hurried on.

  Emily drew up beside me. She had her hands in her pockets. Wilson was a shadow behind us.

  “Jacob, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean for it to go like this.”

  I kept my eyes forward. “Sure. You had your reasons for doing things.”

  “No, I mean it.” She plucked at the sleeve of my coat, an irritated gesture. “Don’t get all noble on me. It was a gamble, but I figured you were up to it. I figured that if the Tombs were involved, well.” She shrugged. “That’s just the sort of job you were born for, isn’t it?”

  “Born and raised. But next time you gamble with my skin, lady, maybe let me know.”

  “You might have turned down the job.”

  “I might have. But I might have gone in better prepared. When did it occur to you that Tomb might be trying to get a hold of me, Em? When those men came looking for me, in your office? When the Badge chased me out of your apartment?” I turned to look at her. Her face was pale, like winterglass. “Was it when you sent me into the Manor Tomb, to fetch that Cog?”

  “No!” she hissed. She turned her shoulders to me. Her face was pale, sure, but it was anger. She slammed her finger into my ribs. “Damn it, no. I wouldn’t sell you out like that. If I thought it, before then, if I thought it was a trap… who else has been with you since the start, Jacob Burn? Since you fell from your fancy house? Valentine? Cacher? Old Man Burn? No, cogsdammit, it’s me. If you ever, ever once, accuse me of selling out on you I’ll gut you and hang your noble god damn head on my wall. Emily Haskin doesn’t sell out her people.”

  We had stopped walking. Wilson disappeared, probably scrabbling up some wall to get away.

  “Okay, Em. Forget it. Forget I said anything.”

  She balled her fist and lay her knuckles lightly against my jaw line, then let her nails brush my cheek.

  “Forgotten.”

  She marched down the road, disappearing between two buildings while I stood, my hands still in my pockets, the lightning burn of her touch traced across my face. Wilson was back. He patted me on the shoulder as he went by.

  “This is good, the two of you. It’s good.”

  “Shut up.”

  He laughed, a sound like an ungreased winch, breaking.

  “Just shut up.”

  VERIDON WAS A city of terraces, streets and avenues that crossed canals, canals that became aqueducts and then tunnels and pipes. There were locks that raised and lowered the domesticated rivers of the city. Waterfalls spilled into plazas, fed pools that drained into cisterns which in turn burst out at lower terraces to rush in torrents along bricked canals through the streets. River and tunnel, the flow and the fall, but everywhere there was water, rushing and collecting, in deep stagnant pools or wild torrents, driven by gravity or muscled along by ancient pumps that seemed to pre-date the city on their shoulders.

  The city had settled in layers over this veinwork of water, leveling out and spreading further toward the shore. Parts of Veridon extended far into the river Reine, held up by piers and pillars that kept the lower wards from sinking into the water. A brisk trade was done there, on the river beneath the city, tarblackened boats with shuttered lamps creeping in to secret docks beneath nondescript buildings. I rode those boats, in the messy, early days of my exile. Before Emily, and Valentine.

  The truly secret places of the city, though, were higher up. Between the streets and the stones were hundreds of miles of cisterns, piped canals, aqueducts that had been strapped down with bridge after building until there was no daylight to reach their grimy currents.

  We hid ourselves in the guts of the city. It took hours to find the right place, somewhere that had been abandoned by the service crews and criminals alike. We ended up on a stone pier that stretched into a cistern, the water deep and still, the walls smooth stone that echoed with our voices. It made us feel less alone. It was hard to believe that the city had ever been this low, or the river this high. We collapsed on the pier, wrapped ourselves in jackets, and slept like the dead. When I woke up the tip of my nose was frigid, and my back was stiff. Acceptable, for a man who should have died twice in as many weeks. Three times, if you count the Glory.

  Wilson had already left. I spun up the frictionlamp to find his coat in a rumpled heap, the rest of his belongings carefully stashed in notches along the wall. Emily was asleep nearby, breathing quietly. I crept over to Wilson’s things and searched them carefully. There were bottles and envelopes of dust, a glass rod that was warm to the touch and seemed to vibrate against my fingernail, other mysterious things that could have been tiny machines or just rare insects, killed and dried. His shortrifle was there, loaded. He had taken that wicked knife.

  “He went out, about an hour ago. Said he needed something. Instruments or whatnot,” Emily said. She had turned to face me, her eyes puffy with sleep. “Said he’d be back in a few hours.”

  “Maybe he’ll bring us some dinner. Though I’m not sure I look forward to discovering the joys of anansi appetite.” I returned Wilson’s things to their proper place.

  “Oh, he’s not a monster, you know.”

  “If you say. But if he brings me a sandwich of fly wings, you know who I’m going to blame.”

  She snorted and sat up. “You’re a ridiculous man.”

  “If you say.” I rumpled Wilson’s jacket, to make it look as it had when I first touched it, then stood up and stretched. “Emily, how well do you know him?”

  “Wilson? Well enough. Feeling suspicious?”

  I shrugged. “The Badge showed up, right on his heels. And maybe he let them know I was going to visit the Manor Tomb, for the Cog.”

  “You said yourself, they saw you go in. You walked right past them, up to the gate. You announced yourself, Jacob.” She rubbed sleep from her face and stretched, luxuriously. “No, Jacob. I think that whoever is pushing the Badge around figured out Tomb had the Cog. You just forced their hand, showing up like that.”

  “You’re probably right.” I sat on the pier, my feet over the water. “Still. You trust him?”

  “I do. Not every rock hides a snake, Jacob.”

  “Just the rock that kills you, picking it up.”

  She snorted again and stood, adjusting her riding skirt. How she kept up with us in that thing was a mystery to me. She sat next to me and sighed.

  “What now, Jacob Burn?”

  “Lots of stuff I want to know. Why Angela shot me. Who sent me that gun up on the Heights. What this…” I had a panicked moment, a stab of suspicion as I patted my pockets, searched frantically, found the Cog with a sigh and held it in my hand. “What this thing has to do with it all. I mean, if you’re right and Tomb set me up, well. She had the Cog. What does she need me for?” I fiddled with the Cog absently, running my finger down its edge. The metal hummed at my touch, sending smooth fire into my bones. It felt nice. My chest seemed to almost vibrate with calm.

  “Tomb. Sloane. Marcus. Wellons.” I took the slip of paper out of my pocket. “Not a very likely bunch of companions. And I don’t know anyone else on this list.”

  “Can I see?” Emily asked. I gave her the paper. She flattened it out and then traced her finger down the list of names. “Is this an exact copy?”

  “No. I just took down the relevant details.”

  “So, ‘Hire: 4,’ there was no other indication what that might mean?”

  I looked over at the paper. Emily had her finger over the second to last line, just above where Tomb was listed as the Council Approval.

  “No idea. I think it might have been spelled out, rather than the number.”

  “Because the rest of these names, with the exception of Wellons, are all common criminals.”
/>   “Right. So?”

  “I don’t know Sloane. Never heard of him before this mess. And I know everyone in the crime market. Is Angela the kind of girl who hangs out with criminals?”

  “Gods, no. Not her particular social circle.”

  “I didn’t think so. So someone else made the contacts.”

  “Makes sense,” I said.

  “Jacob. Four.”

  I looked at her, and it hit me. I was a fucking idiot.

  “I’m a fucking idiot,” I said. Matthew Four was an old friend of the Families, and probably the first criminal I’d ever met. He provided Veridon’s rich with whatever gray market items they needed, without disturbing the social fabric of their expensive parties. If Angela needed to hire a bunch of roughs, of course she’d go to Matthew. “Godsdamn it, Em.”

  “I’ll forgive you. But he seems like someone worth talking to.”

  “Yeah, yeah. And he might know who gave you that music box, too.”

  “I thought we decided it was Tomb’s doing. Getting you up there, trapping you.”

  “Oh, she had her part in it. Sure. But other forces intervened. The angel, for one, in the form of the Summer Girl. And the gun. Someone sent that to me, either as a warning or a threat.”

  “Do you think it was the actual pistol, the one from the Glory?”

  “I don’t know that it matters. Someone was telling me that they know what happened up there, that night, they know what I did to Marcus. I didn’t tell anyone.”

  “You told me,” she said.

  “Is that what happened, Em? Did you mail me a secret package, then send your angelic minion to kill me before I figured it out?” I grinned a little grin.

  She laughed and leaned back, resting on her elbows, kicking her boots out over the water. She arched her back and smiled.

  “Yes, darling, you have me. I’m the secret angel minion killer. I’ve been in the business of killing my friends with secret angel minions since I was a wee child. My father, you see, was heavily involved in the sale and maintenance of secret angel minions.”

  I smiled and twisted to look at her. My arm brushed the warm strength of her belly. Her eyes flashed.

  “You’re a ridiculous woman,” I said.

  “Perhaps.”

  We sat there for a moment, quietly. The water beneath us was very still, the stone cold.

  “So,” Emily said. “What now.”

  “I’m going to talk to Matthew. See if I can find out where the package came from. What happened to that girl.”

  She flashed her dark eyes down to my hands, the holster on my belt, then settled on my face.

  “And me?”

  “You? I think you should stay here. Watch this.” I set the Cog on the pier between us. “Wilson will be back.”

  “Sooner or later.” She pulled her hair from its knot, let it fall as sunshine cascaded across her face and down her neck. Her body was stretched, the muscles taut beneath the soft comfort of her dress. She smiled at my distraction.

  “I think I’m going to take a bath,” she said quietly. “I’m in desperate need.”

  I stood awkwardly and busied myself with my belt, fitting the holster more comfortably.

  “I’ll, uh. Be back,” I said. She laughed, a delightful lilt that glanced down my spine and stuck in my bones. “Watch the Cog.”

  “Attentively,” she called to my retreating back.

  Behind me I could hear fabric falling, water splashing. I closed my eyes and hurried out.

  I GOT EMILY’S laughter out of my head by walking. I stitched my way across the city, crossing bridges and riding carriages, climbing the gentle avenues that led up to higher terraces or descended to the city’s lower districts closer to the river, traveling randomly to lose the image of her stepping into the water, her dress falling away, hair loose as the water rose up her legs, the warm hum of the frictionlamp the only light on her skin.

  I sighed and signaled for the busser to pull over. I was where I needed to be, where the guy I wanted to talk to was most likely to be found. I got out of the carriage, paid, and lost myself in the crowd. Plenty of crowd, even this time of night, here in the Three Bells. In other parts of the city, this many people on the street was usually the preamble to a riot. Three Bells, though, this is just what happened at night. Drinking, carousing, art. I used to be comfortable in this crowd.

  The crowd slowed around the BlackIron Theater. The show was getting ready to start, and folks were trying to sneak in before the gate closed. I edged my way around the logjam until I was standing by the reserved gate. Reserve ticketholders arrived when they wanted to, sat where they wanted to. Trick was, reserve tickets couldn’t be bought. Something you had to be born into. I went up to the gate.

  “Evening, sir,” said the well pressed guard behind the iron bars. He looked over my clothes with little respect. “This gate is for reserved seats. Main entrance is that way.”

  “I’m familiar with the arrangement. I’ll be claiming the Burn seats this evening.”

  “Ah. I don’t know that I’m acquainted with your claim, sir.”

  “My claim? Should I bleed out a little nobility for you? Or are you unfamiliar with the Family Burn? We have a tower, don’t we, right over that goddamn hill. Would you like a tour of the grounds, perhaps, a short walk through the Deep Furnace? Would that suffice? Sir?”

  The man had gone pleasantly white. “Ah, no, no. What I mean, sir, is that the Family Burn is here frequently. Just the other night. And, ah, I am… I know them all, sir.”

  I tilted my chin, hooked my thumb in the loop on my holster in the traditional dueling stance of the Families, and stared him down.

  “I am Jacob Hastings Burn, first son of Alexander, formerly of the Highship Fastidious.”

  His face fell. He looked me over again, trying to decide if he could turn me down based on my history, my unsure place in the complicated world of obligation and honor that ruled among the Families.

  “No weapons in the theater, sir?” It was a desperate try.

  “Bullshit. Every father’s son in there has his iron. Don’t think to lock me out on that.”

  He looked down, fiddled with the baubles on his cuffs, worried the corners of a program that he had picked up.

  “So what’s the show, friend?” I asked.

  “The Ascension of Camilla.”

  “Swell.” I stuck my hand out for the program. “Let’s see it.”

  He looked at the program in his hand, deflated, and handed it to me through the bars. With a clatter he slid the gate open and showed me inside.

  “This way, sir.”

  “I know the way.” I shouldered him aside and disappeared into the velvet darkness of the theater. The BlackIron was a remarkably complicated building. A complicated entertainment, really, but it served to show off the city’s extravagant innovation. It was a majestically conceited engine.

  The main hall was cool and dark when I slipped inside. The show had started, and the terraced rows of booths were bathed in the reflected light of the stage. It was just enough light to find my way. I spent a lot of time here in the fragile days of my youth, but it had been a while. I stood by the entrance while my eyes adjusted, scanning the rows of booths. Matthew Four put in an appearance at the BlackIron almost every night. He was in the business of being available to the Families. Probably the first criminal I had ever met.

  Tonight’s story was of young and imperfect Camilla, and her being raised by the Church of the Algorithm. It was one of the thinner propagandas, but the trappings were remarkable. Unlike the more primitive theaters, the stage of the BlackIron was at an angle, slightly steeper than the terraced seats of the audience. There were dozens of trapdoors and metal tracks, whipping cables of wire and rope gathered up by pulleys, all of it painted black to give the impression of a blank slate, the empty table of storytelling.

  Into this emptiness came the contraptions of the Theater. Moved along the tracks or across the pulley-lines, the actors of the
BlackIron told the story of little Camilla, following her from childhood, portraying the struggles of her family, the conditions of their poverty at the hands of an uncaring king, a distant court. I had seen the play a hundred times. It was an old favorite of the city, a familiar tale repeated until it was ritual. Much like The Summer Girl, come to think of it. I shuddered, only half watching the production.

  They told the story well, precisely, hitting every cue, reciting every line. But of course, their perfection was the conceit, for these were not the actors of just any theater. This was the BlackIron, renowned and remembered, the pride of Veridon. These actors were artwork, engines of cogwork and performance, assembled especially for each show, half-made and remade every night.

  As I stood in the dim hall, Camilla herself was taking the stage. The preamble was over, and the ascension was beginning. I had seen it dozens of times, but it always held my attention. The director here was a clever man, personally rebuilding the performanceengines each night, bringing out some new reaction from the cogwork, so that every show was slightly different, slightly more… perfect.

  Camilla appeared from the central trapdoor, high up on the stage’s palette. She unfolded, unbound by the rules of biology, shuffling open to her full size, exaggerated to aid the viewing of the audience. No bad seats at the BlackIron. The girl’s voice was gentle, quiet, but utterly clear. She sang about her family, gone over the falls, swept away by flood. Her voice wavered as she went on, describing her sickness, the rot of her lungs, the weakness of her heart. My heart is falling, winding down. My heart is empty, falling down. I whispered along.

  Another voice, offstage, joined her. The churchman, the Wright. His brown robes and oil-grimed hands whirred into view along a track. Their voices joined, the song continued on, rising until the hall shook with her sickness, with his solution. The complicated trick that was the center of the spectacle began, her arms first folding out, unbecoming, the Wright adding, replacing, creating. Making her something more, something complicated.