Flicker and Mist

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by Mary G. Thompson


  “May the Waters hear me,” he said. He wasn’t speaking loudly, but in the silence of the night, I could hear every word. “My friend Orphos is with you now. I know you will carry him. He is deserving, and you are just. There is only one thing more that I ask. Advance your justice against the man who has sent him to you before his time. Show me how to find him, so that we may allow him to be judged by you.”

  The couple on the bench stopped talking and watched Caster. The silence around all of us seemed to grow.

  “Grant me the patience to love those who deserve love and judge only those who are against you. Let me not believe lies about your wishes when it is only you who know them.”

  A ghostly figure came into view on the opposite side of the fountain.

  I tossed a small stone into the water—​our signal. As it broke the surface, Caster raised his head.

  “Grant me strength.”

  The man came closer. Closer. Closer.

  I threw another stone, larger. It missed the water and hit the edge of the fountain, only a foot from Caster’s knees.

  The invisible man was behind him.

  Caster thrust an arm back, and the dagger connected with the man’s flesh.

  The man howled in pain but didn’t retreat. He wrapped his arms around Caster’s neck.

  “Caster!” Porti ran forward.

  I ran forward.

  Caster thrust the blade in.

  The man flickered, in and out, in and out. And then finally, in.

  Just as he became visible, three guardsmen rushed around a hedge into the square.

  “Out!” one shouted to the couple. They fled the way the guardsmen had come, looking back in awe.

  I could do nothing. I could only stare at the man who now stumbled back from Caster, the white handle of the dagger sticking from his midsection.

  Caster pulled the weapon out of the man’s flesh and shoved it back into his jacket, spewing droplets of blood.

  The man faltered but remained standing. He was nearly the same height as Caster and had the same dark hair and olive skin. I couldn’t see his eyes, but I knew them to be dark brown. I knew his arms to be strong and his voice to be deep. It was Brach, the guardsman. The one who had attacked me and spat at my feet.

  Caster pulled the prezine cuffs from his pocket and slapped one on the guardsman’s wrist. “You’ll not . . .” His voice shook. “Not . . .”

  “Did a beast chew out your tongue, Mr. Ripkin?” Brach asked. His jaw clenched. With the arm that wasn’t cuffed, he held a hand over his bleeding stomach.

  “How . . .” Caster stared at Brach as though the man were a changeling. Which I supposed he must be. How else could a Plat flicker, unless he was no Plat at all?

  “Why?” Porti demanded. She stepped between Brach and Caster. “Why Caster? Why Orphos?”

  “Porti!” Caster pulled her back.

  Brach leaned in.

  Two guardsmen stood behind him, each one gripping an arm.

  Brach spat. The liquid landed on Porti’s neck, just above the line of her modest gown. It spread down until it dropped into her bosom.

  Brach smiled.

  “Let’s go!” one of the guardsmen said.

  “I’m sorry,” Caster said to the men. “I know you’ll take heat for this. But it was the only way.”

  “You might have clued us in to your plan, Mr. Ripkin,” the guardsman said. “Rather than convincing each man that another was with you.” His face was twisted with disgust, his eyes wide with horror as he gazed upon his former comrade.

  Brach slumped in the guardsmen’s grasp, his hand falling from his wound. Blood dripped onto the square.

  “I’m sorry,” Caster said again. “I’ll talk to my father, make him understand it’s my fault.”

  The guardsmen lifted Brach by the feet and shoulders and carried him away, and Porti and Caster went after them. I followed a few feet behind them. A flickering Plat guardsman was the last thing we had expected, and it didn’t make any sense. Only Lefties could flicker; it was a solid truth. But there were no changelings. Brach was a Plat and a Flickerkin.

  Porti stayed with the guardsmen. “Why did you do it?” she shouted at Brach.

  But Brach had passed out; he didn’t answer.

  “Why? Why?” Porti’s cries roused the citizens from their homes. Faces appeared at doors and windows. “Why?”

  The question lingered in the air.

  Twenty-Three

  THE GUARDSMEN TOOK BRACH TO THE MEDICAL CENTER, still cuffed with prezine so he couldn’t flicker or mist. From the half of the voicebox call we heard between the guardsmen and the Deputy, it seemed that he would survive.

  On the way back, Caster had managed to slip me the dagger, and I had found a safe place to flicker in. The story was that I had snuck out to find Caster and Porti. I wasn’t supposed to have seen anything, and I had to feign new shock upon learning that the Flickerkin who most likely had murdered Orphos and attempted to murder Caster was a Plat, and not only that, but a Plat guard.

  Caster, Porti, and I waited in the sitting room as the Deputy ended his call. The dagger in my pocket was a hard lump against my skin.

  “Myra wasn’t involved in this,” said Caster. “Can you please spare her the flames I see in your eyes?”

  “I would like to speak to Miss Hailfast alone,” said the Deputy.

  “Father, it was my idea,” said Caster.

  “Yes, you are a right fool,” said the Deputy. “Give me the weapon.”

  “I’m sorry, Father,” said Caster. “It was the only way to catch him.” He pulled a dull kitchen knife out of his jacket pocket. “One good thrust, and nearly anything will do.”

  The Deputy took the knife from Caster’s hand. “I see you had time to wash the blood off.” He shook his head and sighed. “Go. Both of you.” He barely looked at Porti.

  “It’s all right,” I said.

  “We’ll be outside,” Caster said. “Scream if you need to.” He gave his father a little smile, and he and Porti left the room. Porti looked back at me as if to say, Say nothing. But by the Waters, what could I say?

  The Deputy pulled a heavy chair from its spot opposite the sofa and sat down, leaning forward so we were eye to eye. He lost the advantage of his great height and yet gained the advantage of close up and personal intimidation. His eyes focused on mine. I braced myself to deny that I had the dagger, to profess my ignorance of where Caster could have obtained the cuffs.

  “The man Brach is awake,” he said. “He has confessed to the murder of Orphos as well as to causing the disturbances.”

  I stared at him.

  “His exact words were, ‘It was meant to be Caster Ripkin.’ ”

  A chill ran through me. We had guessed that already, but it was another thing to hear it confirmed.

  “He claims he is in league with no one, that he has acted alone.” He paused, waiting for that to sink in. And it dawned on me, finally, what he was saying.

  “He has cleared my parents,” I said.

  The Deputy nodded. “It seems so.”

  We locked eyes. I didn’t see fire in his anymore. Instead, they seemed tired.

  “I can’t simply take the man’s word for it,” he said. “Nor is it solely up to me. They are confined by order of the full Council.” We’ll get this unpleasant business taken care of. The Deputy’s words and voice burst unbidden into my head, the way he had casually plucked the prezine cuffs from the desk.

  I leaned back on the sofa. I could run. I could flicker and run.

  “But I believe I can convince them to vote in our favor.”

  “Our favor?”

  “Yes, Myra,” the Deputy said. “I wish nothing but the best for you and your parents. I hope you can believe that. I know what I said yesterday in the heat of anger, but I don’t wish to destroy all Flickerkin. I wish only for the people of the Upland to sleep safe in their beds.”

  “Do you intend to release them, then—​to restore my father’s po
sition, to allow my mother her life back?”

  “The Flicker Laws have been in place since long before my time, Myra.”

  “So that is a no.”

  “But without the crimes that Brach has confessed to, the penalty of banishment may pass the vote.” He attempted to make eye contact with me again, but I wouldn’t look at him. I scooted along the couch, leaving myself space in case I should decide to bolt.

  “You look as if you want something from me,” I said. “But it’s in your hands. If you banish them, they’ll have to go.”

  “Because I won’t ask the Council to spare your parents unless sparing them will protect New Heart City,” he said.

  “I don’t understand.”

  “If I release our Flickerkin prisoners, I must be assured that those who support them will leave the city.”

  “I don’t understand,” I repeated. My heart took on a life of its own. Blood mixed with pinpricks. What was he saying? What was he hinting that he knew?

  “Brach, of course, will get the dip,” he said. “We will attach stones to his feet to help the Waters with their Judgment. I will personally tie them on, and I will stand on the cliff and watch him sink.”

  Goose bumps spread on my skin. I could barely hear the Deputy over my own pulse, barely see the room around me.

  “I hope so,” I whispered.

  “I know you do,” said the Deputy. “You are proof that a Flickerkin can be a good citizen.”

  “I’m not—”

  “If you lie to me again, you will regret it. Your film showed three fingers missing, and it is recorded.” He looked me in the eyes, his face cold.

  The room seemed to spin. I couldn’t contain the pinpricks; I flickered out. I tried desperately to become visible, and it seemed to take long minutes. When I finally managed to flicker in, he was still glaring at me. I wiped tears away. If he took me to jail, I must go with dignity. I must make my mother proud.

  “You and your friend Miss Vale, even my son, seem to think I’m a fool. Did you think I wouldn’t wonder where you got a pair of prezine cuffs or a white dagger? Did your mother think I’d never suspect that you Lefties practice the test? That Flicker—” He stopped short of repeating the insult he’d spoken to Caster that night in the arena.

  You weren’t smart enough to catch us then, I thought. His hate dried my tears. I would not go with dignity. I would mist. He would never catch me.

  “I wish the best for you, Myra,” he said. “And for your parents, because they are both people of the Upland, and they are my responsibility. If you also wish the best for them, you will do what I ask.”

  “What is that?” I asked. I met his eyes.

  “You must take my offer to the Flickerkin who as we speak wait somewhere outside the city.”

  I could say nothing. I couldn’t admit that I knew of them or where they were. Even if I agreed, how could I convince them to leave? My grandmother and her kin barely knew me.

  “Tomorrow twilight, your parents and the clothmakers live, Brach dies, and the Flickerkin return to the Eye. That is the offer.”

  I maintained eye contact, and his eyes bored into me.

  “Or we will bring the full force of New Heart City against every Flickerkin and every harborer. We are one state. One Upland. Anyone who threatens that will be stopped.”

  The Deputy stood and walked a few steps toward the door. Then he turned back to me. “Miss Hailfast, you may not believe that you are the person to accomplish this goal. But you are the only person who can. You stand in the eye of a great storm; you are part of it but not its cause. Sometimes it’s hard for those in the swirl of wind to see a way out.”

  He watched me for a moment as if waiting for a response, but I couldn’t speak. He gave me a little nod and then walked out of the sitting room, leaving me alone.

  I felt the hard press of the dagger against my stomach. The weapon had given me a way to set my parents free—​but only if I could convince people I didn’t know to take a deal they might not like. And it wasn’t only about my parents. I now knew without a doubt that if I didn’t get the Deputy what he wanted, he would be personally attaching stones to my own feet.

  Twenty-Four

  I COULDN’T TELL CASTER AND PORTI WHAT THE DEPUTY had said to me, could I? I couldn’t be sure the Deputy knew that the Flickerkin were waiting at Heart’s End in their invisible tents. What if he only suspected their presence and was setting me up to give them away? Perhaps he suggested that I could make peace so he could follow me to the tents and send all the Flickerkin to their watery graves. If that was the case, then I couldn’t go there. If I left the apartment, he might have me followed. I couldn’t imply in any way that he was right.

  But he had offered to set my parents free if I performed this task and threatened to kill them if I didn’t. How could I sit in my room and do nothing in the face of that?

  Caster had set up Porti in her own room. I should go to her and confess all, I thought. She had never failed to support me so far. She would help me figure out what to do.

  I must ask that woman, my grandmother, how Brach could be a Flickerkin.

  I must get my thoughts together.

  I must stand up and do something.

  The radio was playing in the background. I thought I heard my name and turned up the volume.

  “Well, I don’t know about that,” said a man whose voice I didn’t recognize. “There are Lefties who perform necessary services. Those clothmakers who were revealed as traitors did the best business in the city, and who hasn’t wished they were still open?”

  “But that’s the thing,” said another man. “We allowed ourselves to rely on those Lefties, and look where it got us. Imagine if it weren’t clothmakers but workers at the prezine refinery who were Flickerkin? The city might be without lights. The city must remove all Lefties from any position of even minor importance. It’s a travesty that the Council hasn’t done so already.”

  Apparently, the news of Brach’s capture was not out yet.

  “As I said, we must think of Lefties like Myra Hailfast,” said the first man. “She saved the life of the Deputy’s son, did she not? Shouldn’t she be allowed to work with prezine if that were her vocation?”

  “Myra Hailfast is an anomaly,” said the second man. “Her father is Donray Hailfast, by the Waters. What other Leftie can say that? Her actions mean nothing in the larger context.”

  “The same Donray Hailfast whom you denounced as a traitor on this very program?”

  “Well, he’s still a Plat; perhaps he has taught her some of our ways.”

  “So you agree that a Leftie may be taught to be part of New Heart City society?”

  “I am speaking of this one girl. As I said, she means nothing.”

  I threw the radio across the room. It crashed into the wall, releasing a shower of errant parts. I meant nothing? Partly, I wished it were true. I wished I did not have to do anything, that I could mean nothing back in my own bed with my parents near me.

  Caster knocked on the door. “Hello?”

  “Come in,” I said.

  “Ah, you’re still in one piece,” he said. But he saw how I looked. “Or perhaps not.” He glanced at the broken radio.

  “He has either given me an opportunity to save my parents or asked me to condemn them,” I said.

  “The man has confessed,” said Caster. “I heard it through my new shadow of a bodyguard. The guardsman’s life is staked on me not dodging again.”

  “Yes.” What did it matter if I told Caster? He already knew enough to sink me. But he didn’t know what I knew about Nolan and the other Flickerkin. The Deputy might need that information.

  Caster sat next to me on the bed. But he didn’t touch me. He left three long inches between us.

  I recalled what Porti had told him, about not judging when you could understand. Perhaps that was why he was here. Perhaps I shouldn’t judge him. I wanted to trust him, and I still did. Our friendship was real. I had to believe that.<
br />
  “There is a group of Flickerkin outside the city,” I said. “They say they are waiting to rescue my parents and Nolan’s parents, should the Council choose to toss the prisoners in. But the Flickerkin are hiding, and I don’t know if they tell me the truth. Your father wants me to go to them with a deal: they must leave in exchange for the lives of my parents and the Drachmans, and they must not protest Brach’s death. I don’t know if your father is being honest with me or if he wants me to reveal their location so that he may kill all of them and then me. He knows I’m a Flickerkin—​he said so and frightened me so that I flickered.” I had to pause at that and breathe. I still hadn’t processed the fact that now I faced the same danger as my parents. “I fear that no one is being honest, but perhaps they all are. Perhaps I am meant to mediate an end to the disturbance in the Eye and all of this. Or perhaps this is my last night alive.”

  Caster’s brow’s furrowed. He seemed to be holding his breath, and then exhaled in a long whistle.

  “Say something.” Say it’s all right. Say you understand why I lied. Tell me what I should do.

  “My father won’t kill you.”

  “I’m sorry I couldn’t tell you,” I said. “I don’t know if I should be telling you now. It’s not my secret to reveal, but I don’t know what to do. I don’t know these Flickerkin. I didn’t like what I saw of them. Your father will kill anyone who stands in the way of what he wants, even me.”

  “No, he won’t. If he said that, he was bluffing. Myra, he sees you as a child, like he sees me. I know I’ve had my conflicts with him, and yes, he believes in separation of Plats and Lefties. The Waters know he hates Flickerkin. But that doesn’t mean he wants you dead.”

  “He said I was the eye of the storm,” I said, “able to see what the wind could not.”

  “It makes sense that someone who is part of both worlds could do some good here,” said Caster.

  “Then why does he not put me in a cart and ride me out to them, so that we might do this in the open? Why make me travel in secret, wondering how much he knows?”

 

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