Ness looked, and sighed. "The Luscious Peach."
"Oh. Is that lady a peach?"
"No, bylashka, a peach is like an apple with fuzz but they taste different. They grow further south, along the river or in Laka."
"Oh."
"Come away now. That side of the building is the business side."
Megan winked at the painted face and pulled her head back in. Mama and Papa and the landlord were standing in front of a door. Their new home was a room on one below, a good location. Lower down there would have been the dampness and the dark and lack of air, with turkey cages close by, while any floors above ground were rickety and the wood walls were thin. Nobody would mind that in the summer because of the heat, but winter was much longer and more likely to kill you.
Three and four above would be colder yet because they extended above the other buildings and caught the wind. Papa said that up there, you'd "Freeze your as… behind off." Megan knew she wasn't supposed to hear because Mama had looked at him that way when he said it. But then Ness had smiled at him and hugged him as if she were afraid of losing him. She's been doing that a lot. I'm bigger now and I understand. He could have died.
The landlord had a scraggly beard and the top of his face was wider than the bottom, and he had three teeth missing from when he'd been the bouncer at the Peach. He smelled of sweat and old beer. His husband kept the turkeys and their wife sold them in the lesser market, Mama said. He showed them the combination to unlock the door, then left.
Inside, the room was painted a dirty brown/pink looking like what Megan imagined the inside of a nose would look like. The kitchen corner had dark purple tiles that were mostly whole, but had smears of hardened food on them. The brazier was missing a leg. It smelled like wet old people and, in the middle of the floor, someone had left a pile of dirt: mud and wood chips, bits of sacking and broom straws and splinters. A squishy green and pink flowered cushion, with white fuzz growing out of the seams lay in the mess.
Ness stood, looking around at the dirt rounding off the edges of the walls. They still had a small kraumak that Papa had retrieved from the ruins of the house, but it gave the room a greenish color. The door stuck in its frame and there was a gap under it big enough for Megan to push her hand through before Papa stopped her. There wasn't even proper wallbed but one built of wood, like a wardrobe standing against the right-hand wall. It smelled of mice.
"Well." Mama put her bundle down on the cleanest piece of floor. "A bit of work."
"Hallo, then!" A cheerful voice called behind them. A woman stood in the door whose tunic was definitely in bad taste; red and pink stripes that clashed with the predominant red tint of her hair.
"Welcome to the Flats! My name's Shenanya, called Stander. Or Wit. Pro'uy Half-Wit behind my back, but I get on better with half than most folks do with all of theirs." A door down the hall to the left slammed, pointedly. Shenanya shrugged and rolled her eyes, accepting the fact that the neighbors could hear everything. "You folks need any help, jus' ask away." She winked at Megan and giggled at Lixand, though she was too old for that sort of flirting.
"Thank you." Mama smiled at her. "Might I borrow an extra bucket and broom?"
Shenanya looked at what little they'd brought with them and Ness's smile went away at that look. All they owned in the world they'd carried on their backs; it wasn't enough to need a cart. But Shenanya didn't say anything except, "Av course, luv. All three of you, come over to my place. I'll have us a cup of chai ready and we'll all be back in a flash!" She waved them out into the hall. "Come on, I'm your neighbor on the right." She leaned close to Papa. "Watch the old haux on the left. She's a buzzard with constipation of the brain and runs of the mouth all at the same time. You'll see. Zazan's her name. My use-name for the bitch is sli—" Mama tsked but Shenanya didn't stop, though she changed what she was saying mid-word. "—Shucks-for-brains." The door down the nail slammed again, harder, and Shen laughed.
She sat them down and gave them a cup of bitter chai that Megan thought tasted like hot sweat. When no one was looking, she poured it into the cat's litter-box. "Gotta keep a cat or ferret or the mice'll eat the hair offn your head," Shen said.
She told them all about all the neighbors. "Lotta decent men and women at the Peach, like Jerya, well, she's paying to learn to read and figure and support her boy, Dmitrach who's the best on the block, and Kijo, who's saving to go home." She mentioned the neighborhood had gotten better since the people around cleaned out the Dusters, especially from Sour Note Street off Victory Square.
Then she rolled up her sleeves and came to help them clean up and move in. "Little work now, less later! That's my motto! Yup." She said that a lot, but Megan liked her despite it.
They settled in with help from Aunt Marte's friend, Journeyman Varik Borkyovych, a member of the River-merchant's Guild. Mama made new sitting cushions, with his help.
Ness went out with Shenanya for a while, and Megan stayed behind to look after Papa. "Papa," she said, twining her fingers in his beard.
"Yes, bylashka." He blinked and looked down at her. I'm almost too big to climb into his lap anymore.
"When are you going to be better?" He jumped as if Megan had stuck him with a pin. To Megan's mind her papa had always worked, was always busy. Now he was always home, so he must be sick again. I thought he was all better. He just sits and looks at the walls. Mama keeps saying, "You re not useless, Lixand. We love you. We need you," but he says, "Yes, yes, I love you, too," like he was asleep.
"I am well, Megan." He put his arm around her. "My stump healed up long ago."
"Then why is Mama doing everything?" He didn't say anything for such a long time that Megan clung to him, frightened by his silence, not knowing what she'd said wrong. He hadn't even gone on any walks around Cooper's Lane with Megan, so they didn't know where the shrines were, or the parks, or anything. She jumped when a spot of water fell on her head, wiped it off, and looked up.
Lixand was weeping. He held her close with his one arm and turned his face away but couldn't wipe his tears, so Megan reached up and did it with her small fingers. "S'all right, Papa. What's the matter? It's all right. I'm sorry. I'm sorry…" He shook his head and cried for such a long time that Megan didn't know what to do. It's all wrong. The world is all wrong where Papas cry.
"No. No, bylashka." He wiped his cheek on his shoulder. "I'm all right. I think I in better now. Yes, I have been sick in a way. I'll be better now."
"Did I… did I do anything bad?" She twisted at one of his buttons, and he couldn't put his hand under her chin while he hugged her.
"No. You did something good." He let go of Megan, reached up and poked her gently in the cheek with a finger. "Little solemn face."
She laughed and threw herself on him, tickling. "May we go for a walk? Just us?"
Smiling, he held her away out of tickle range. "Just us. Well find the nearest Ladyshrine, hmm?" he said, and Megan ran to get his boots. They had worn spots right over the toes and the soles were thin. She could never remember his shoes having been shabby before. Papa said he could get his patched but Megan's feet had growing to do. Megan helped him put them on. "Then tomorrow I'll go talk to Varik. He's been a good friend."
"I like him, Papa." He smiled.
Papa's all right again. Papa's all right again. She sang that phrase over and over as they went up the stairs to the street. Nothing bad can happen as long as Mama and Papa are all right.
"Child!" Megan stopped and looked back over her shoulder, stick in hand, which she'd been rattling along the old railings in the wall of the gallery. "Come here this instant!"
It was the lady on the left, Zazan, calling from her door, where she stood holding a long-haired yellow cat with snooty eyes.
She looks like she's sucking on a big pickle. There are wrinkles all around her mouth. "Stop that noise at once! Didn't your parents teach you manners? Well, I suppose you learned what you were showed. From out-city I suppose. Well. You are not to run past my door, you are
not to be noisy outside, I won't have it." She petted the cat absently. "Do you understand? Hmm? Well? Do you?"
I'd answer if she gave me time to. "Yes." That's all Megan said at first, because the cat lady was rude. She's nasty, so I can be rude too. Mama wouldn't like it though. "Yes, Teik."
"Humph. Go on then." She slammed the door with her foot.
I bet her manrauq is tiny. I bet she's a black witch who doesn't shine. Not like my mama and papa. Mama's a red witch and Papa's red-orange. Mama says that sometimes your gift is bigger the bigger your spirit is.
Megan left her stick and went to one of the open places in the wall, looking over to the bottom. There were more washing lines strung, full of bright clothes. Just down the hall at another opening a man wearing a blue satin loin-cloth hung his washing. He waved. Megan hesitated a minute. Her papa said that the neighbors were all right to talk to, at least during the day. Most people wore loin-cloths in the summer, but she'd never seen somebody in a blue satin one. He worked at the Luscious Peach, Megan guessed.
He pulled a clothes-peg out of his mouth to pin up a green and purple tunic. "Whal, you've met the old drag'n, eh?" he said in an out-city accent, smiling with one corner of his mouth. "Don't worr'ye about the aul biddy. She a dried up aul hoor. Her girl the Madame nu." He tossed his glossy black hair, putting on a careful city accent. "My name is Dmitrach." Then he stuck clothes pins back in his mouth and went back to his washing. Shenanya had said he was all right, he was the healer at the Peach.
"Hi. My name's Megan."
"Phlef chu…" He pulled the pins back out of his mouth, eyes twinkling. "Pleasured tah meet. Here, you wan talk, hold mah pins."
So Megan ended up helping. It's not bad, living here. Mama and Papa were talking like we'd be moving out-city or to Halya. There's lots of nice people here.
When Mama called her in, Dmitrach said thank you just as nicely as a Sysbat, even if he did say it in a rougher accent. "Been a good day, to met you little Teik. Goddess guard." He bowed as if he was a great courtier at the Nest and he and Megan were both Zingas. Megan bowed back and ran down the hall, home.
Over supper Papa said that he'd gotten a job as a storyteller, with his own corner at Zidium Lane. Megan thought Mama would be happy and Papa too, but they didn't talk much about it. Maybe hell buy something good to eat tomorrow. They'd been eating 'maranth tubers and soup without meat, and zahbeans.
Megan spooned the beans, thinking that tomorrow she was going to find Zidium Lane. She was big enough to go out by herself. After all, she had when she went to school. Mama would be out looking for work tomorrow and Papa would be at his new spot, so she'd be by herself. I'm supposed to go to Shenanya, but I'll tell her I'm big enough to go out, because I am.
Chapter Six
It was late summer by the time they settled in. Megan looked up from her book, the book Sysbat Tenara had given her. Mama and Papa had been helping her with lessons as much as they could, making sure she kept learning. The bock was called Maysharis Fables, and Megan was proud that she could read most stories in it by herself. The one she liked best was a cautionary tale about a dog and a bone and a pond.
Her parents couldn't help as much as they wanted to, with her Mama looking for work that was legal. It could be that she would have to try and find someone who would accept an adult as an apprentice.
"Be a good girl today, Megan."
"Yes'm."
When Papa and Megan had gone for their walk a few weeks ago they'd found Victory Square and a Bear cub shrine and a Dark Lord's shrine. Lixand had said that His priests could make all His shrines shine black with manrauq, but one could see it more if you were powerful yourself. If not, then it was more of a nasty, itchy feeling behind your eyes and you didn't want to be there. Besides, it's a year of the Dark Lord. He's the Year Kievir.
"Bye, Mama! Love you!" Ness gave her a kiss and a quick squeeze, making sure Megan remembered what order she had to pull the latch-strings to get back in.
Megan had been going out every day, because it was both stuffy and boring in the room with nothing to do but read the one book. First she'd explored the Flats from the roof down to the bottom of the atrium. Mama told me I was calling it wrong. It really stank down there, with the wet and the mud and the turkeys. There were both lands of turkeys in the cages, those with wings and those with four legs, though both were dumb, in Megan's opinion. The boards in the halls there were all rotten at the bottom, and people from upstairs sometimes threw garbage down, though they weren't supposed to, and the landlady, Teik Erham, would curse.
Then she'd explored the neighborhood. She'd found Zidium Lane, running between the Stairs and the corner of Victory Square and the Little Market, full of shoemakers and paper-makers. Her papa's mat was on the flagstones under a tall, spindly pine between two shoemakers. Her mama had been angry when she'd found out that Megan was going out in the street by herself, but Papa had sighed and said, "What are we to do? Keep her in the Flats? She found my place and sat beside me, listening." Megan had gotten bored and he couldn't pay her any mind, so she'd come home the long way. There were lots of alleys between Cooper's and Sour Note, between all the real streets.
Today she dawdled in the hall, deciding that the first place she'd go was down the alley to Sour Note Street, where all the instrument makers lived, then along Vischy Street to Zidium Lane and see if there were anyone to play with. There were lots of kids along Cooper's Lane and more around Sour Note, but they weren't being friendly. The kids fight a lot, I think. They yell a lot anyway. They all looked at me and Papa when we went through the first time, and I didn't pay any attention. I learned how to do that in school.
Megan locked the door behind her and went to say good morning to Shenanya and tell her she was going out, petting her skinny cat, Blue, who was really a bluish-grey, like a shadow on the snow. He only had one ear, was blind in one eye, and one of his fangs was missing because he got beat up a lot by other cats, Shen said. That was because he wasn't a fighter but a wuss who liked having his behind scratched. If you blew on his fur you could see the fleas run.
She climbed the steps, skipping the cracked one third down. Teik Varik was a good friend. Ness had said they could never have gotten such a good room for so little if Varik hadn't spoken to Teik Erham.
The door to outside had had patterned glass set in the doors at one time, but the spaces were all filled with good thick wood now, except one or two little pieces of glass over the outer door. Megan didn't like it dark and wet, and resolved that when she grew up she was going to live in bright places. Being too low underground was like being buried, the way naZak did their dead. I wouldn't like that either. I want my name to be called to the Goddess and have the wind and birds take me back to her. Being under all that dirt would be pretty bad.
The first alleyway had a small opening but widened further in. She wasn't afraid of the rats because when she stomped they ran away. Papa said that was because there were enough people who hunted them to eat, and Megan stuck her tongue out at the idea of having to eat a rat.
Farther down the alley a willow tree grew up beside a building, the wall bulging out from where the roots cracked the bricks. She climbed up because it was easy and at the top it wasn't dark. In the upper branches she was almost as high as the whole world, like being on Papa's shoulders.
She sat, pretending she was a bird sitting in a tree and could fly away if she wanted to. I wouldn't because Mama and Papa would be sad if I went away. The Garrison drum boomed the mid-morning guard change. She was hungry but didn't want to go back to Shen since there was only cold rice during the day. Megan climbed down, getting her hands all icky on the bark, snagging her braids.
She could go up the alley behind the Sharpener's shop and hear the grindstone squeal as he sharpened knives and scissors or even a two-fang or a naZak's sword; even if there weren't many naZak left in the City there was always a chance one might be there. That would mean she'd have to walk all the way around Victory Square.
Instead she went past the balika-maker's house at the end of Sour Note, next to the vacant lot. Someone had broken down the board fence, and people used it as a park or slept there in the summer because their rooms were damp and hot and dark and they didn't want their fingernails and toenails to fall off, which is what Sysbat Karlovna said damp and dirt could do.
Her papa was busy with a crowd. She could see his arm waving as he described something. It looked like he was telling "Summer's Ending." That one always made Megan shiver because the Goddess had to ask the Dark Lord's help to find Her son's soul in Halya—and the story "Bargain," where They wandered for three days in frost and fire.
She poked in the mud-puddle under the tap on the corner of Vichy and Zidium streets. The tap at Cooper's Lane was broken, for the third time this week. She watched the mosquito larva whip down to the bottom mud to hide and filled the puddle with a handful of mud before she went to watch the cooper put iron rims on wheels. She stood in the cooper's open door, watching her heat the rim in the fire so it would fit snugly on the wood when it cooled.
From behind her somebody yelled, "Yeah! And you got worms!"
"No, you got worms, wigglin' out'cher bum!"
"Don' you spit on me! I'll spit on you!"
"Gotta catch me first! Asshole, asshole, asshole!"
"I spit on you and you catch worms!"
Megan turned to see what was going on. Three kids were chasing each other around out on the street, dodging through the crowd. A big boy with the black hair and narrow face ran up over the tongue of a cart waiting to have the new wheel on, and the oxen stamped and bellowed so the carter yelled at him. The other two kids, a girl with hair almost as light as Sysbat Tenara and another boy who looked like the cat-monkey Megan had seen in the Great Market, chased after him. Watching them run around were a bunch of other kids sitting on the street marker stones, shouting encouragement.
Shadow's Daughter Page 7