by Jamie Davis
No amount of denial had quelled the fear and anger surging from the middling population as they grasped for reason in the madness. They greatly outnumbered chanters, and there were now reports of gangs of middlings roaming the streets, randomly chasing and sometimes beating chanters as they went about their daily chores or work.
Winnie had heard of a few incidents directly from her friends Cait and Tris. They had witnessed a few ugly episodes in person. Cait had been forced to use her military self-defense training to fend off a group of toughs wanting to express their displeasure on a pair of chanter women they saw disembarking the bus. In the end, the girls had escaped the gang and had reached safety in the Enclave, where groups of chanter leaders patrolled in groups to discourage middlings from entering the area.
There was a noise down the hallway. Winnie looked up from her cup and saw her mom. Elaine was using her cane to support her weight as she walked with care down the hallway. Her arthritis had practically crippled her, but she was determined to make her own way around the apartment. A strong-willed woman, Elaine had insisted that she get back on her feet soon after regaining consciousness from her recent hospitalization. Winnie was proud of her mother’s resilience, but worried about the unrelenting illness. She was getting worse, and the medicine needed to avoid further deterioration was getting more expensive by the month.
Elaine entered the kitchen and eased herself into a chair across from Winnie. “What are you doing up, dear? Still having those nightmares?”
“It’s nothing to worry about, Mom. I’ll be fine.”
“No, you won’t. At least not on your own. I wish you would tell me what happened. It’s been weeks and you still won’t give me a hint. I warned you that getting involved with Artos would lead to trouble. That man and his Sable trading are nothing to fool with.”
“Mom, just let it go, alright?”
“I can’t. It’s not like we keep secrets from each other, Winnie. We’ve always been honest. But now it feels like you’re hiding a lot more from me than your illegal little side-business.”
“Just leave it be, okay?” Winnie stood and set her empty mug in the sink. She didn’t like keeping things from her mother. But how could she tell her about the pregnancy, the loss, and her near death in some hair-brained rescue attempt against the Department of Magic Containment and the Red Legs?
No. Elaine was too frail to deal with that now.
A loud sigh from behind her. “I don’t like this, Winnie. Have you watched the news lately? Dust storms are almost constant. Demonstrations against chanters and magic have made it even more dangerous to be outside the Enclave. And you still want to be out there running charms?”
Winnie turned and met her mother’s eyes. “We have to make money somehow. The Red Legs closed our shop. I can’t get it up and running again, even if I wanted to. Working for Artos is the only way for us to get by.”
“It’s dangerous, Winnie. And against the law. There are more than a hundred people from the Enclave missing — including Joey — and the authorities aren’t even trying to search for them.”
Winnie wanted to shout at her mother: It’s because they’re all dead.
Instead, she said, “Everything we chanters do is against the law now. We can’t cross the street without people blaming us for something. You know we have nothing to do with these dust storms.”
“We have to wait until decent people step up and do the right thing. There are good middlings out there — they’ll stop these demonstrations and help us get justice.”
“Justice might be whatever we can get for ourselves, Mom.”
“So, what, you’re some kind of freedom fighter now?”
“No.” Winnie gave her mother a wry laugh. “I’ll never be that kind of idiot. All I’ve ever wanted is to make sure that you and I can get by.”
“I’m worried. You shouldn’t have to support us both like this. I don’t want to see you end up in jail, or worse.”
Winnie returned to the table, sat beside her mother, took one of her gnarled hands, and looked her right in the eyes. “I promise to be careful, and I’ll make sure we have what we need. You’ve always taken care of me. Now it’s my turn to take care of you.”
Elaine shook her head. This conversation was going nowhere.
“Let me walk you back to bed, then I’ll lie down, too. We could both stand to get some more rest before morning comes.”
“Promise you’ll go back to sleep?”
“Yes, Mom,” Winnie lied.
Once up from the nightmares, Winnie could never settle enough to fall back asleep. But she would lie down. And maybe tonight would be different.
Winnie helped her mother stand, then steadied her as she reached for her cane. They eased down the hallway towards their bedrooms and whatever else was waiting for them in the darkness.
CHAPTER 4
The next morning, after she got her mother settled with breakfast, Winnie headed to the shop where Charmed had been located. The walk and short bus ride were uneventful, and Winnie was relieved to arrive early. She, Tris, and Cait were planning to plot their next moves going forward. They wanted to continue their charm running with Artos, despite their losses.
Winnie considered those losses as she unlocked the door and went inside. They weren’t the happy-go-lucky crew they once were. Joey was dead. Winnie always saw his startled face in her nightmares, when the Red Leg had snapped his neck with a twist of his head.
Morgan was a traitor. That betrayal hurt more than when she’d believed that Danny had turned against her. Seeing her half-sister dressed in a Red Leg uniform, standing next to Constable Holmes with Director Kane nearby, had been devastating. Winnie and her sister had had their moments over the years, but she had never suspected the girl would become one of the Department of Magical Containment’s most hated minions — the person informing on them all along. Now Winnie knew that it had never been Danny.
They hadn’t recovered his body at the steel mill. If they had, Danny’s parents would have been in mourning rather than frantically looking for him. She hoped he would turn up like he always had before, his easy smile turning her insides to liquid and letting her know that everything would be fine. Winnie couldn’t stop wondering what had happened to Danny after he was taken from the mill by Director Kane, Constable Holmes, and her sister.
A wild thought occurred to Winnie: Should she call Morgan?
She could try and use her to learn what had happened to Danny. They shared a father, and were surely still connected. Winnie pulled out her phone, punched Morgan’s number, and contemplated making the call.
Her thumb hovered over the send button, but before she could press it, the front door opened. Tris and Cait entered together, deep in conversation. The sky behind them was orange — another dust storm coming.
Tris was mid-argument. “It’s all connected, Cait. I know it. The storms, the declining city systems, the way magic’s been waning for years.”
Cait shook her head. “It doesn’t matter if it’s connected or not. It only matters that magic is involved. That gives the middling demonstrators a reason to vent their anger and fear on us and every chanter out there.”
Winnie stowed her phone. She didn’t want either of her friends to know who she was considering talking to. Morgan had betrayed them, too. They had all been strapped into that machine, having the souls sucked from their bodies. No … she’d wait and think on it before calling Morgan for help.
Winnie turned to her friends. “What are you two arguing about now?”
Cait hooked a thumb over her shoulder at Tris. “She’s convinced the storms, the harvesting machine, and the explosion all have something to do with the recent changes in magic.”
“It makes sense,” Tris said. “The city systems were starting to fail before the explosion. So, the magic was already changing somehow. Then we destroyed … well, Winnie, you destroyed the Harvester, before all the storms started up and down the coast. It can’t be a coincidence.”
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br /> “What can’t be a coincidence?” Winnie didn’t want to hear any answer that might imply she had somehow broken magic when fighting that infernal machine. She remembered feeling something different after she opened herself to the storm of magic raging around the Harvester. She also remembered her strange vision of the lady by the lake. She’d said her name was Brigid and that Winnie must “make the world right again.”
Maybe she did have something to do with the changes wrought by the storms, if only to repair the damage magic use was inflicting on the world.
Tris approached Winnie, sitting on a tall stool by the old store counter. “We knew that magic wasn’t working the way it should. I was way busier than I should’ve been, repairing old building systems. The magic kept changing even after its repair. I’d have to come back and fix the system again a few weeks later, as if the enchantments lacked permanence. The magic running the city’s buildings is among the oldest and most stable magic we have, drawing far more power than our simple charms.” Tris looked from Winnie to Cait, then back again.
Winnie gave her a blank look, not seeing where Tris was headed with her line of thought.
Tris sighed. “Come on, guys. Don’t you see? It’s like the magic is failing. Maybe the Harvester and the sudden release of magic stored in those tanks caused some sort of backlash and broke the magic somehow.”
“What do you mean broke?” Winnie could still touch the magic, same as before. In some ways, it felt like she could hold even more. Still, Tris had a better idea of how the city’s infrastructure was working — or, in this case, not.
“I’m still not sure. I need to do some research. I worked it out so I could spend some time working at the Archives Building during one of my upcoming shifts. I’ll know more after I look into a few things.”
Cait was doodling on a piece of scrap paper while Tris described her discovery. The girl was easily bored. Winnie looked over and saw her sketching a face, surprised by her friend’s artistic ability. She’d always seen Cait as an athlete and soldier.
It took her a moment to recognize the face. She laid a hand on Cait’s shoulder. “I miss Joey, too.”
Cait stopped drawing and looked at Winnie. “I felt so helpless there. We went there to save those people, but we were too late for most of them. Then, all of the pain … I still wake up screaming.”
“Believe me, I understand,” Tris said. “I don’t think any of us are sleeping well since the steel mill. That’s why we have to do something. We can’t just stand by, or return to business as usual.”
“What did you have in mind, Tris?” Cait asked. “It’s not like we have a lot of resources to draw on.”
“And yet we managed to break the machine anyway.” Tris was the group’s scholar, and Winnie wasn’t used to seeing her speak with such fire in her eyes.
“Winnie did that, though I don’t know how. I could barely hold onto my sanity. And I’m not sure I succeeded.” Cait gave a dry laugh, then turned to Winnie and asked her the same thing she’d already wondered out loud a hundred times before: “How did you manage to overload that thing like you did?”
Winnie shook her head. “I have no idea. I was angry and exhausted. In pain. I was desperate it all to stop. Everything went kind of fuzzy until you guys woke me back up.” Winnie said nothing about her vision, or the lady at the lake.
“Well, whatever you did,” Tris continued, “you showed what we’re capable of. We need to do more to stop Kane and his thugs.”
“We’re not militants or revolutionaries, Tris,” Winnie said. “Let’s move slowly and with care here. I want to get some of our operation back up and running. The shop’s lease is paid through the year. We can use it as a base of operations moving forward.”
Cait looked back and forth between her friends. “You want to jump back into that frying pan? They know who we are and what we’re doing. What makes you think the Red Legs won’t shut us down the second we start running charms?
“Let me worry about that,” Winnie said. “I’m going to meet with Artos and see what he says. People still want what we can provide. This is supply and demand. We had something good going on. I don’t want to give it up.”
“But we don’t have Joey or Danny, and Morgan is playing for the other side,” Cait complained. “We’re at half strength. In the military, we called that a depleted company. Nobody goes to war with less than their full strength.”
Winnie winced at the mention of Danny, still worried about where he was and what might be happening to him. The sting of Morgan’s betrayal and Joey’s death were fresh wounds for them all. Still, both Tris and Cait had showed up here at the shop when she asked them to meet her. They wanted to do something. They might be resistant, like Cait, or have different motives, like Tris, but they were here. All Winnie had to do was conjure a plan to get them back in business.
She felt bad about manipulating them. But she needed them in her crew, and they had to run charms. In the end, Winnie needed enough to buy her mom’s medicine. And she’d do whatever it took to get it.
Winnie was about to articulate her plans when the wind picked up outside the shop. She looked out the storefront’s window. The sky had darkened to an angry tangerine as another furious dust storm settled in like a lid atop the city. This one was bad, swiftly turning afternoon to midnight outside the shop. Winnie was glad for the lights inside as she went to check that the door was secured against the wind.
A fine dust was forcing its way under the door despite the weather stripping seals, the incredible force of the storm buffeting the door. There was a muffled shout outside as a courageous, or perhaps foolish, pedestrian ventured by, hurrying on their way to whatever took them out in this abysmal storm — what looked to be the worst one she’d seen so far.
Winnie finished checking the locks and was turning back to face her friends when the electricity died and sent them into total darkness.
CHAPTER 5
The three friends waited out the storm for several hours. The storms had caused blackouts in the city before, but only for ten or fifteen minutes at the most before power was restored. Winnie wasn’t sure if it was the storm’s fury that kept the power out longer, but even after it subsided, they had to wait another hour for the lights to return.
The friends plotted as they waited. Knowing they had been short-handed for their confrontation in the steel mill, they went back to basics. Tris had contacts in the downtown district. She would reach out to let them know they could start supplying charms again. Winnie would concentrate on securing their supply from Artos, or crafting the charms herself. Cait would take care of delivery and security.
They had everything worked out by the time the power returned, ready to start moving product again. Winnie was pleased with the progress, and secretly grateful for the storm and power outage that had provided a distraction from their differences of opinion. They would have to address them at some point, especially Tris’s new militant streak, but that could wait for later.
For now, they would focus on recovering their momentum and serving their original customer base. They would expand as opportunity presented itself, but not until she was sure they could handle additional volume.
Winnie was crunching numbers as the three of them gathered their things. The front door opened and Winnie whirled around and saw three strange men standing there. They weren’t cops or Red Legs, which was what Winnie feared the most; the men were dressed in overcoats hanging to their knees, surgical masks over their faces to protect them from residual dust. The one in front was short for a man, barely taller than Winnie. The other two were taller with broad shoulders and chests, masks obscuring their faces.
“I’m sorry, gentlemen, but the shop is closed indefinitely.” Winnie walked forward, smiling. She sensed Cait and Tris coming up behind her.
The smallest one reached up and pulled his mask away from his mouth and nose. He had a pencil-thin mustache over his lip and a crooked smile. He looked back over his shoulder out the window
. “I think the storms are worse down here than at home. I was a bit concerned at how fast that last one blew up on us. I didn’t think we’d make it.” The man looked up at the men behind him and nudged one with an elbow. “Garraldi, Dugan, take off your masks. Where are your manners? These ladies might think we’re sticking up the joint.”
“Sorry, gentlemen, but we’ve nothing to sell, and I’ll have to ask you to leave.” Winnie took another tentative step forward. “The storm has passed and I’m sure you can find your way.”
“Oh, we found our way fine,” said the little guy. “I’ve come looking for you, Winnie Durham. You’re quite famous in certain circles.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about. Who are you?”
“I’m so sorry. Where are my manners? Name’s Jimmy Constantini. Friends call me Cricket.”
He stepped forward, extending a hand. Winnie shook it, then stepped back and waited for the man to continue.
Cricket stroked one side of his mustache with the back of a finger, still smiling. “My boys and I are here to meet you, and maybe, if the opportunity presents itself, to offer you a job with my boss. He’s intrigued with you, Winnie.” He paused and smiled again. “I’m sorry. May I call you Winnie?”
She nodded and he continued.
“Well, Winnie. Like I said, my friends and I came here to meet you and to see if you’d like to meet my boss, and maybe come to work for him. He can be … persuasive, and generous to those he takes under his wing.”
“And who is your boss?” Winnie asked.
“Mr. Cleaver Yorke.”
Cait and Tris both drew in a sharp breath.
They knew the name. So did she.
“What in the world does the head of the New Amsterdam Sable trade want with me?” Winnie looked around and gestured at the ransacked store. “In case you hadn’t noticed, we’re small potatoes here.”