Minimum Wage Magic (DFZ Book 1)

by Rachel Aaron

  It was also not deep enough.

  “There’s another way down to your left,” Sibyl whispered in my ear. “Beside the synth-sushi shop.”

  I nodded and motioned for Nik to follow me, turning sideways to squeeze down the maintenance tunnel where the restaurant stored its trashcans. Once we got past that, the tunnel started going down, taking us away from the blocked-off storm pipe into another system of tunnels. One that wasn’t on Sibyl’s map.

  “Where are we?” Nik asked, looking at the curved, water-stained walls.

  I switched on the lights on my goggles so I could see. “I think it’s one of the old train tunnels,” I said, pointing at the metal rails that were still embedded in the crumbling floor. “There were a couple that followed the river in Old Detroit so freight could move through the city without turning it into a train yard. I’m not sure if this is part of the Windsor Tunnel or the old Michigan Central Line since things down here have gotten pretty shuffled in the last eighty years, but it’s got to be over a hundred and fifty years old.”

  “How do you know all this stuff?” Nik asked, jogging up beside me. “I’ve lived in the DFZ since I was thirteen, and I’ve never heard anything about underground train tunnels.”

  I shrugged. “I read about it. I like history, and Detroit’s was fascinating even before magic and spirits got involved. This city is full of hidden places. Just make sure you watch out for eyes in the dark. There’s a lot of magical beasties who live down here.”

  That wasn’t a joke. Judging from the size of the tracks in the mud on the tunnel’s floor, this place was a highway for some pretty big specimens. I wasn’t a good enough tracker to say which ones exactly, but I’d seen every season of DFZ Sewer Hunters, so I knew all that stuff about giant alligators and lampreys and rats the size of dump trucks wasn’t just made up to sell tours. Hunting the things that lived under the DFZ was big business. How else did all those illegal pet shops get their mana-eater larvae and giant alligator eggs?

  “I know better than to let my guard down in the dark,” Nik said, looking over his shoulder to keep an eye on the tunnel behind us. “I’ve fought the sort of stuff that lives down here before. It’s not fun.”

  “Did you used to be a hunter?” I asked.

  Nik shook his head. “No, never.”

  “Why not?” Given Nik’s metal coating, skill at violence, and love of money, hunting monsters for cash seemed like it would be a natural choice, but he just winced.

  “I don’t like being underground.”

  I gaped at him. “But you live in a hole in the ground.”

  “I live in an apartment,” Nik said sharply. “That’s a far cry from this.”

  “Fair enough,” I said, looking up at the rounded ceiling dripping with water that was seeping down from the city above. “But are you going to be okay?” Nik was jumpy enough under normal circumstances. I didn’t want to think of what would happen if he really freaked out.

  “I’ll be fine,” he said stubbornly. “I don’t have to be comfortable to be effective. I’m just saying I wouldn’t want to be down here all day. And speaking of, are we close? My hand is getting really jumpy.”

  “That’s a better indicator than I’ve got,” I said, checking my map. “We’re in the middle of the thickest cluster of recorded sightings for this area. According to the information I’ve got, the Gnarls can open anywhere along here. Assuming they even appear in this part of town today, of course.”

  “We’ll just have to hope we get lucky,” Nik said, pulling a flashlight of his own out of his bag.

  Going by my last five months, that wasn’t a good hope, but there was no point in being a downer. This was where we’d chosen to make our play, so I turned up my lights and started searching down the tunnels, muttering a prayer to the DFZ under my breath.

  Please, I whispered. Please, great city, I need this to work. I just started my life here. I don’t want it to be over. Please help me out. I don’t want to lose.

  I didn’t want to go back under my father’s claw.

  I was still whispering different variations of my fears to myself when I felt something move behind me. There was no sound, no flicker. It was more like a change in the air. Nik must have felt it too, though, because he whirled around even faster than I did only to stop cold. When I finally managed to turn around, I saw why.

  There was a cathedral behind us.

  I’m fully aware of how nuts that sounds. It looked even crazier. The entire span of the old train tunnel we’d been walking down for the last five minutes was now completely blocked off by what could only be described as the ornate front of a Gothic cathedral, complete with weathered stone steps, rusted iron railings, and red-painted doors. It looked as if the whole building had been teleported into the ground, and we were just looking at a tiny sliver of it that happened to contain the front door. Even the stained-glass windows were still intact, though very scratched up. Whatever this place was, it was old, and it had been through a lot. But despite the damage, it was still standing strong, lighting up the dark tunnel with the warm glow of light through its windows.

  “What the hell is that?” Nik said.

  I had no idea. Fortunately, Sibyl did. “That’s the Wandering Cathedral!” she said excitedly. “The one from the urban legends!”

  “You’re going to have to be more precise,” I said shakily. “The DFZ has a lot of urban legends.” So many even I hadn’t read them all.

  “This one’s special,” my AI promised, filling my augmented reality with pictures showing the Gothic cathedral in the middle of a highway or shoved into an underpass or in the middle of a parking lot and lots of other places a giant historic church wasn’t supposed to be.

  “According to the internet, it’s one of the few cathedrals from Old Detroit that survived Algonquin’s initial flooding. It made it sixty more years through the first DFZ Underground only to be destroyed during the Second Mana Crash. Apparently, the DFZ was so upset, she rebuilt the whole thing brick by brick and added it to her private collection. There’s all sorts of theories about why it surfaces when and where it does, most of which are crazy, but everyone agrees that it’s one of the best entrances to the Gnarls.”

  “Why didn’t you say that part first?” I yelled at her, grabbing Nik’s arm. “These things only stay open for a few minutes!”

  “I was just trying to answer your question,” Sibyl said, but I wasn’t paying attention. I was too busy running up the cathedral steps. The door was locked when I tried the handle, so I banged on it with my open hand, making the wood rattle against the metal frame.

  “Hello?” I cried. “We need to get inside. We’re looking for the Gnarls. It’s very important!”

  “Who are you talking to?” Nik hissed, pulling back his leg for a kick. “Just break it down.”

  “No!” I shouted, throwing myself between him and the door. “This is one of the DFZ’s personal buildings! You don’t get into the Gnarls by breaking things that belong to the god who controls them!”

  “Then what are we supposed to do?”

  “I don’t know,” I said, turning back to the door. “It’s not like there’s instructions…”

  My voice faded. Now that I was no longer running at or beating on the door, I could see there were, in fact, instructions in the form of a small slip of paper pasted to the wall beside the doors. Entry fee required, it read. Please pay below.

  “What the—” Nik said, pushing past me to read the sign for himself. “There’s an entry fee for the legendary magical tunnel system?!”

  “This is the DFZ,” I reminded him with a sigh. “Nothing’s free here.”

  I just hoped I wasn’t screwed.

  I glanced down at the battered plastic pay pad attached to the stone below the sign, sorely regretting my decision to spend the last of my money gorging on pancakes. Still uncomfortably full stomach sinking, I reached out to touch the pad, blinking in real surprise when a perfectly normal payment interface popped up in my
AR. There was no amount listed, but I didn’t have a lot of options. My bank account consisted of exactly eighty-eight cents, so that was what I paid, dropping every last virtual penny into the receptor.

  The moment I touched the Pay button, I felt something bump into my foot. When I looked down, there was a red paper ticket lying on the stone floor with my name printed on it. I picked it up with shaking fingers, not in the least surprised when I felt the bite of magic through my gloves. If the magically appearing cathedral hadn’t been a big enough tip-off, this was proof that we were dealing with serious power, which meant there was no room for shenanigans.

  “Get your ticket,” I told Nik, stepping aside so he could access the payment pad. “Hurry.”

  “How much was it?” he asked, pulling out his battered phone.

  “Eighty-eight cents.”

  His expression brightened enormously. “That’s not bad,” he said, tapping the number into the payment interface, which appeared on his phone screen since he was a savage who didn’t have AR. “I was worried it was going to ask for my soul or my firstborn or—”

  He cut off with a curse as a bright red error message appeared on his screen. “‘Eighty-eight cents is insufficient!’” he read in a furious voice. “Why? That’s what you paid!”

  I shrugged. “Maybe it’s different based on the person.”

  “Why would that be?”

  “It’s a magical moving cathedral,” I said helplessly. “I don’t know, just keep trying.”

  Muttering angrily under his breath, Nik did as I asked, entering higher and higher numbers into the payment screen. Finally, when he got to one hundred dollars, the button turned green, and a ticket just like mine but with his name on it appeared at our feet.

  “This is extortion,” Nik growled, snatching the ticket off the ground. “Why did mine cost so much more than yours?”

  “Because she paid more than you.”

  We both jumped. The voice was as creaky and old as the cathedral itself, but it wasn’t in my head like the Empty Wind’s had been. A few breathless seconds later, I realized it wasn’t a spirit at all. It belonged to a short, pale figure with a stooped back, stringy gray hair, gray skin, and white eyes that reminded me of a blind cave fish’s that blinked at me when the cathedral door opened.

  “Opal paid all that she had,” the person went on, their voice so old and scratchy, I couldn’t tell if they were a man or a woman, or if it even mattered. “Be glad the cathedral did not charge you the same, Nikola Kos.”

  Nik took a step back. “Right,” he said meekly. “Thank you for the discount, then.”

  “Can we come in?” I asked nervously. The way into the Gnarls was only supposed to appear for a few minutes, and we’d wasted most of that trying to pay Nik’s entry fee. It would be just my luck if the cathedral vanished just when we got the door open.

  Rather than answer, the cave-fish person stepped back, which I took as an invitation to rush inside. Nik was right behind me, getting through just before the cathedral doors slammed on his back. A heartbeat later, I felt the same sensation of movement I’d noticed earlier, only now it was all around me, making my stomach roll as the Wandering Cathedral left the tunnel and went who knew where.

  “Um,” I said, looking around at the cavernous church. “So now that we’re in, could you please tell us what this place is, exactly?”

  “And who you are?” Nik added with a glare.

  I elbowed him in the ribs for being rude, which I’m pretty sure hurt me way more than it bothered him. His armor plating was hard. I was rubbing my bruised elbow when the bent figure laughed.

  “Death gods aren’t the only ones who’ve picked up priests,” they said, hobbling up the aisle toward the place where the altar would have been if this had still been a functioning church. Now, the space between the choir pews was decorated like a living room, complete with a couch, where, after a bit of groping around to find the right spot, our host sat down.

  “I am Nameless,” they continued when they’d gotten comfy.

  Nik arched an eyebrow. “Is Nameless your name or a description?”

  “Both,” Nameless said. “Sexton of the Wandering Cathedral and Blind Priest of the DFZ.” One of the white cave-fish eyes winked at me. “The ‘blind’ part was my own addition. I like to differentiate myself from the others.”

  “Others?” Nik said. “How many more of you are there?”

  “Quite a few,” Nameless replied. “It is a city of millions. The DFZ can’t do everything herself, so she outsources. You should be familiar with that since you’re both Cleaners. The priesthood’s the same. We take care of the idiots who are always trying to worm their way into the city’s secret spaces, and in return, the city gives us a cut of the entry fees.” The priest’s wrinkled face broke into a toothless smile. “It’s good business for everyone involved, but between you and me, I have the best office.”

  “You absolutely do,” I assured Nameless, speaking quickly before Nik could say anything to antagonize our host further. “But I promise we’re not here to steal the city’s secrets. We’re actually looking for something that was hidden in the Gnarls by someone else, a man named Dr. Theodore Lyle.”

  “I have no idea who that is,” Nameless said with a shrug. “But you’re welcome to search all you like. Understand, though, that everything in the Gnarls is property of the DFZ by default. Even if you find what you’re looking for, unless you can prove ownership, you won’t be able to take it out.”

  I started sweating bullets. I hadn’t counted on ownership being an issue. Before I could come up with something, though, Nik answered for me.

  “That’s no problem,” he said, pointing at me with his thumb. “When she bought Dr. Lyle’s safe house at a Cleaning auction, his dead body was still inside it. Rather than issue a refund, Broker told her she could take her fee out of stuff inside, but all she found was a bunch of papers. They aren’t worth a twentieth of what she paid for the place, which means she’s still short. Since the DFZ has already formally declined to offer her a refund via the Cleaning office, I feel it’s reasonable to say that everything related to those papers belongs to her as valid compensation for services rendered.”

  By the time he finished, my jaw was on the ground.

  Nik scowled. “Why do you look so shocked?”

  “Well,” I said, scrambling. “That was, I mean…I didn’t expect you to go all lawyer on me.”

  “I’m not a lawyer,” he said. “I’m a Cleaner. The DFZ doesn’t have a lot of laws, but a lot of the ones it does have apply to our business, so I made it my business to learn them. That’s just common sense.”

  Not common enough, apparently, because it had never occurred to me. I hadn’t even considered that I might have a legal claim on Dr. Lyle’s ritual, but I was so, so glad that Nik had.

  “Yeah!” I said enthusiastically, turning back to Nameless. “What he said!”

  Nameless scratched the wispy white hairs on their chin thoughtfully. “It sounds plausible enough,” they said at last. “But it’s not my call. The DFZ will make the final decision, but so long as there’s no one with a stronger claim, I’d say you’re safe.”

  “My claim is the strongest,” I said confidently, pointing at Nik’s second left hand. “We’re here with the blessing of the deceased as communicated by the Empty Wind. Finding Dr. Lyle’s ritual and reclaiming it is the best way to honor his memory. It’s practically a religious rite.”

  That was stretching the truth a bit, but Nameless didn’t seem to care. “The Empty Wind is none of my concern,” they said. “My business is with the living city, not the dead. If you want to go into the Gnarls, be my guest. You’ve already bought your tickets, so I couldn’t stop you even if I wanted.”

  “All right,” I said nervously. Then, because it seemed like something I should ask, I added, “Are there any rules we need to follow? Things we should know before we go in?”

  The priest burst out laughing. “Where do you think yo
u are, girlie? You’re stepping into the heart of the DFZ! There’s no rules here, though if you want to survive, you’d do well to remember that the city is not, and never will be, your friend.”

  Nik snorted. “Why would we ever think that?”

  “People think all kinds of things,” the priest said with a shrug. “Including that calling a city their home is a two-way street. But the DFZ doesn’t work that way. She’s not kind. Not moral or fair. She has no compassion, no sympathy for the plight of those who live within her. That’s not her fault. She doesn’t have the freedoms we mortals enjoy. Her mind, her soul, even her body does not belong to her. She is not an individual. She is a spirit, the soul of a living city. She can only be what we’ve made her. Do you understand?”

  I wasn’t sure that I did. I’d always thought of the DFZ as a whimsical god who did whatever she liked without caring how it affected the ants she crushed under her moving buildings. To hear Nameless say it, though, the city sounded almost pitiable. A prisoner of other people’s expectations. “What does she care about, then?”

  “Opportunity,” Nameless said, giving me a smile. “From the moment it rose from the soggy ruins of Old Detroit, the DFZ has been a city where anything is possible. A city of freedom where people can be as horrible or as wonderful as they wish with no authority standing in their way. It’s a place where everyone’s an outsider, anyone can start afresh, and nothing can be taken for granted. That is the DFZ. She’s not an easy god to love, but you must understand her at least a little, because you’re both still here.”

  I didn’t know about that. I’d come to the DFZ because it was across the ocean and because my father hated it. He thought it was a callous, dirty pit that humanity had dug for itself and deserved to wallow in. Honestly, when I’d first moved here, I’d agreed. I knew I was moving into hell; I’d just preferred this hell to the one I’d left back home. Now, three and a half years in, I still didn’t think my father was wrong, but I understood the nuances better. The DFZ was cruel and chaotic, but there were times when it was wonderful, too. That wasn’t enough to make me worship her as Nameless did, but I finally felt like I understood what the Gnarls were. They were the DFZ in her purest form, and if that was the case, then I knew how to survive here.