by wildbow
I turned my head, staring out across the streets of Lugh. More lanterns and lights were being ignited, many set beneath covers and awnings to protect them from the rain.
“He cared about you. Above all else, you were his best friend. That came first. Whatever you might have said, I think he knew you well enough to know your words or actions didn’t come from the heart.”
“They still hurt him.”
“Yep,” Jamie said. “And you deserve to feel bad about that. But I think you’ve agonized over it for long enough to do it penance. If my opinion counts for anything.”
“It counts,” I said. “I’m not convinced, but thank you.”
He nodded.
I watched as more lights went up around Lugh. Some clever dick had had the bright idea of putting a large lamp within the eye socket of the titanic warbeast that loomed over the southwest end of the city, so it glowed as it gazed out over us. The rain made the light form halos.
The tension was gone. Angry Sy, Crybaby Sy and Clever Sy didn’t feel like such different creatures, anymore.
The girl still sat on the steps, trying not to participate or get caught up in the discussion. She hunched forward, shoulders drawn forward, getting wet.
I pulled off my jacket, and I draped it over her.
Jamie reached out. He put a hand on my shoulder, and I didn’t flinch or pull away. I even found the courage to meet him in the eye. I felt the now-familiar pain at seeing Jamie’s ghost.
The pain and the anger were there, to be sure, the warbeast still in its cage.
Maybe it was a beast I could tame, now, and grow easy with.
“We should reunite with the others,” Jamie said. “It’s getting past time to rendezvous.”
I nodded. “Come on, kid. Let’s go find your dad and get you something to eat.”
She gave me a wary look.
All of that must have been so confusing, I thought. My thumb touched the ring, a reminder.
“Sorry,” I told her.
The wary look remained.
“You mentioned helping to kill someone,” Jamie murmured, as we walked. “She heard that.”
If the girl heard the murmur, she didn’t react. Her eyes were fixed forward, her profile still small.
“Oh,” I said. “They deserved it though. They always do.”
If she heard that, then she gave no sign.
The others were gathered as we got back to the rendezvous. They were warm and dry, sitting on the covered patio of a stout, sturdy building. A tiny fire blazed on a portable stove between them, little more than a can with firewood in it and a grate over the top. It looked like the others were finishing their meals.
The little girl I’d sniffed shucked off her coat, letting it fall to the ground, as she reunited with her sister. Not so much her dad.
“Luck?” Gordon asked.
“I have a plan,” I said.
“Good,” Gordon said. “Because we chased five different leads, and they didn’t turn up anything.”
“Sit down, Sy,” Lillian said, patting the seat on the bench next to her. “Warm up and dry off before you catch your death of cold.”
I did, crossing the distance and plopping myself down.
Lillian rested her head on my shoulder. The very top of her head pressed against my cheek.
“I’m wet,” I said. “You’re going to get wet by proxy, getting close like this.”
“I know,” she said. She dropped her voice. “But I thought you might need it.”
Her left hand found my right hand and held it.
“I’m supposed to look after the Lambs,” she said. “Keep ’em in the best shape possible. I’m expanding my repertoire, when it comes to you.”
I nodded. Jamie was taking the mystery meat and putting it at the stove’s edge to heat up again.
“You’re good at what you do,” I said, staring into the fire.
She made a happy sound.
Hubris was edging closer to the meat on the stove.
“I’ll give you some, Hubris,” Jamie said. “Don’t worry.”
Hubris relaxed.
“The plan,” I said. I immediately had the attention of the Lambs, minus Hubris, who was still keeping an eye on the meat. “It puts you at risk, Lillian, front and center.”
“Is it a good plan?”
“Not a polished one, but it’s the best one I can figure out to get results. If you don’t want to, we’ll figure something else out. This is your mission, you take point.”
She nodded, giving my leg a pat. “Okay, Sy. How long do we have to figure it out?”
“‘Til midnight,” I said. “We’re going to sell you into slavery, and I’m fairly sure the guy that’s buying has a small army of thugs under his control. But he’ll have answers we want.”
“That’ll do,” Gordon said. He reached forward to tear off a bit of meat and throw it to his dog.
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Bleeding Edge—8.6
We approached the meeting place. It was down by the water. The ‘head’ of the mummified sea monster of Lugh loomed over us as we made our way down to the warehouses. A short bridge allowed easier passage over a tendril that lay across, between, and through buildings. The smell of the ocean that filled Lugh was overpowered by a smell of rotting seaweed and fish. I’d made the mistake of opening my mouth, and the smell became a taste, clinging to my tongue. I wasn’t alone; Hubris kept snorting, as if trying to clear his airways.
Lanterns lit up a warehouse and a cast of figures. Ratface was there with his bodyguards, standing off to one side, ostensibly the mediator, middleman and negotiating official.
The buyer was there too. I’d briefed the others based on what Ratface had told us. He went by Giles, and he had money to spend. He owned several homes in one of the nicer parts of Lugh, up the rocky hills above the sea monster’s body, and had refitted several to be labs with dormitory-like setups for the people who worked for him.
The placement of the homes was interesting. As far as I could tell, the setup meant that if and when the Academy got serious about cleaning up Lugh, they had to make their way through the entire city, past Giles’ eyes on the street, through the awkward little maze of routes that spilled out beneath the dead warbeast’s body. That would get them as far as the foot of the mountain—they still had to climb the steep and winding road to get up the mountain a ways to the houses poised on the rocky edges. By the time they got that far, the homes would be empty of anything incriminating.
Making one’s way down and away would be equally troubling. The people who worked for him most likely weren’t given the freedom to make day trips to the city.
From a tactical standpoint, the little bit of information we’d been able to pick up told us that Giles was known to the local underworld as the Fishmonger. He had a small army of thugs, and a set of modified humans as his elite soldiers. One sixth of Lugh belonged to him, which wasn’t as much as some, but his sixth included the harbor. Ships that didn’t pay the price to the men on the docks ran the risk of expensive collisions and complications.
Big bucks.
“Lil,” I murmured. “From here on out, I might be a bit of an asshole.”
“You say that like it’s new,” Gordon said.
“Ha ha ha,” I said, monotone, before turning back to Lillian, “A lot of this depends on how well you sell it.”
She huffed out a sigh. Nervous.
I kept my eyes forward and didn’t touch her to reassure. “Right now, this is an opportunity. Think about how you felt when you were going to meet the Gages. If you’re nervous, tap into that, these are scary guys, you’re a bit unsure now that you’re here. Right?”
“Right,” Lillian said, quiet.
“When they close the net, seize you, whatever it is, you’ve got to tap into something else. Do you remember the argument in Brechwell?”
“I remember.”
“You really, genuinely thought I wanted to support Fray, ignoring what you were sayi
ng about the dangers these books pose. Might be a starting point.”
“Okay.”
“Don’t try to fake believing. Let yourself believe. Let the walls down.”
“I think I focus on reality too much to fall into the fantasy like that,” Lillian said.
“Would be easier if Helen was here. She could give you good tips. Here we are.”
We were getting close enough to be within earshot.
The Fishmonger. He was average height for a man, but had a stooped posture and a strange shape about him that made him appear shorter than he was. He was built like a lump, the edges of his chin merging into a thick neck, which merged into narrow shoulders in turn. His fingers were stumpy as they stuck out of his sleeves, his thumbs hooked on the pockets of his coat. His face was heavy, with jowls, a pug nose, and lower eyelids so thick and droopy they looked as though they’d been badly grafted on over his existing pair. His thick coat hung down nearly to his ankles.
He didn’t look wealthy. The wide-brimmed hat he wore and the coat were the same sorts the poorer people on the street wore. I guessed he was the sort to pinch pennies, except where food was concerned. If I assumed he’d dressed up for this, then he usually looked worse.
If he was looking to be incognito, he’d gone the wrong way about it. Of the group of people with him, four were heavily modified. Two had had their skin swapped out for thick scales. One was covered in spines, and both spines and skin were a ghastly, unhealthy pallor. The fourth was big, slouching against a wall, a head taller than the tallest of the other three beefy, augmented foot soldiers. His skin was oil-slick black and glossy.
All four wore the same coats the six unaltered thugs of the group did, the one with the spines being the only one to buck a trend of heavy raincoats and brimmed hats. Spines wore something more suited to winter weather, puffy, and wore no hat. He didn’t look happy, and I wondered if it was solely because of the wet and cold.
“Glad you could make it,” Ratface said to me. The look he gave me was intended to communicate something. That the plan was still on, probably. I was more focused on Giles the Fishmonger.
The Fishmonger extended a stubby finger, letting it rove over our group. Jamie and Gordon were with us, as was Hubris. Two of the adults from our recruited group were with as well.
Giles’ short finger pointed at Lillian. “You’re her?”
“Yes,” Lillian said.
“Fifteen?”
“Yes sir,” she said.
“How many years at the Academy?”
“Three, but I took classes at a preparation school before. I’m—I was a year and a half ahead of my peers. I guess I still am?”
Good. But she sounded terrified. Uncertain, to the point where I could imagine Giles calling her a liar, and her reflexively agreeing.
“A year and a half ahead,” Giles said. “That’s a problem.”
“A problem?”
Come on, Lil, stay on track here.
I would have elbowed her if I could’ve done it without being seen.
Instead, I raised my hand up, well within Lillian’s field of view, and fixed my hood. The sudden motion made several of the Fishmonger’s bozos move their hands in the direction of their waistbands.
Fishmonger Giles wasn’t watching them, but saw Lillian’s reaction. He turned his head and looked at his men. “Don’t you worry about them. You’re new to Lugh, you don’t have a grasp of the local politics yet. Trust me, if you end up working for me, then you’ll be happy to have protection like them.”
Happy? That rang out as a lie in my ears. The only protection they would offer would be protecting Giles’ investment.
“You said there’s a problem? Please, sir, we really need money. We haven’t been able to get much, and it disappears so fast. I’m hungrier than I’ve ever been in my life. I’m good at what I do. I’m a fast learner, if I don’t know something already.”
“You might be too good.”
“That’s not possible,” Lillian said. Then she seemed to realize what she’d said. “Sorry, sir, for speaking out of turn.”
That came across as real, but it was real. It had dug past the act and the moment to prick at the real Lillian, the part of her that likely connected with Mary on a level. She connected with Mary because the both of them believed that there was no such thing as being overqualified, too good, working too hard, knowing too much. Though their paths were very different ones.
The Fishmonger wagged a finger. Not as a reprimand, but gesticulating. “I’ll show you.”
He gestured, and his altered bodyguards parted, opening a way. Spines pulled a door open as he stepped aside.
The Fishmonger made his way into the building, raising one hand to beckon us with a finger.
The trap awaits.
“Sir?” Lillian asked, “Could you tell me instead? We’re outnumbered, and—”
“It’s fine,” I said. “That guy there—”
Ratface gave me a nasty look.
“Cecil,” Jamie supplied.
“Cecil said Mr. Giles was trustworthy. We asked around before we met you at the rendezvous point, and he’s popular around town. He’s the richest man in the city, which is why he needs bodyguards.”
All lies, but lies that made sense, built up my end of the scenario, that I’d put her to work.
“I understand, but—”
I reached out to take her hand. “You promised, Lil. That you would help us out. We’ve gotten you food, we’ve kept you safe, don’t spoil this now that we’ve got a chance.”
Giles watched us out of the corner of his eye, waiting.
I squeezed.
“Okay,” Lillian said.
I let go of her hand and gave her a push.
Walk into the trap.
The key thing to do here was to keep options open. I could have followed her, but if something happened, or if he had a specialized means of securing her, I didn’t want to get caught by it, whether it was a tranquilizer or a net. I needed to be free to move to help her.
Instead, I followed her halfway, so she wouldn’t walk forward and see us standing still, my pace slowing as she got closer to the door.
She reached the doorway, and I saw her hands go to her mouth. She made an incoherent noise.
My heart skipped a beat. Against my better judgment, I approached, until I stood right behind her, Spines to one side of me, one of the scaly men to the other.
The inside of the warehouse was well lit, but the lights flickered and gave the interior a yellow cast. I could see black things swimming in the liquid of the long lightbulbs, long and snakelike.
Lying across a table was a man. He was strapped down, and now and again he jerked a limb, straining the leather straps to their limit. His back arched, and I could see his naked torso, where something moved beneath his skin.
“He got on the wrong side of one of my other people’s experiments,” Giles said. “Don’t know how or why, but the poor bastard might have thought he could steal from me. Take in a parasite, make a run for the edge of town, get it out, and sell it. Very valuable, these.”
The man wasn’t breathing. Instead, his back arched, then bucked the other way, as his head rose up as far as he could manage, throat distending.
Ratface spoke, right behind me. “He might not have been smuggling, might have been in the wrong place at the wrong time.”
“Mm hmm,” the Fishmonger said. “Which would mean security is lacking. Something to think about.”
The man on the table heaved, to no avail. The thing that wormed its way out of his mouth took its own time, revealing itself by flailing around in the air before wrapping around half of the man’s face. Something like a leech or a maggot. It was as big around than his head was, and half-again as long, but apparently capable of squeezing through small spaces. The man thrashed, gasping for breath now, his head whipping from left to right, but he failed to dislodge the greasy blob of flesh from his face. Arms pulled against restraints.
&n
bsp; “This was to be your test, little girl. Save him. Preserve the specimen.”
“This is inhuman,” Lillian said.
“I don’t believe in humanity,” the Fishmonger said. “I believe in what comes next.”
It was, in an eerie way, very similar to a sentiment I’d voiced before.
Lillian looked back over her shoulder at me, as if reading my mind, or thinking along similar lines.
I put a look of wide-eyed horror on my face. No words I could say would help this situation or sell the gambit.
The parasite was working its way into the man’s ear. Far too large an object for so narrow an aperture, but it was somehow doing it. The man struggled, thrashing, raising his head up and smashing it down, as if he could kill the thing by smashing his own head against it, or swipe it against the table’s edge and dislodge it.
“But, like I said,” the Fishmonger said, finger raised, “A problem. The test might prove too easy, if you’re as advanced as you say.”
“Please. Just let me help him.”
“He tried to help himself, you know,” the Fishmonger said. “Took a knife to his own stomach, trying to reach inside and get the thing out. We fixed the damage and got it so he wouldn’t die before you got here.”
He drew a knife.
“No!” Lillian said.
“I’m severing the sutures, is all. Back to square one, and—”
“Stop!”
The knife flicked. A spatter of blood sailed through the air. The patient screamed, voice hoarse.
“Now you have a time limit.”
Lillian hesitated.
“The longer you wait, the more he suffers,” the Fishmonger said.
Lillian shook her head. She started rolling up her sleeves, running to the table, her satchel bouncing at her hip.
“There are tools ready for you.”
“I have my own,” Lillian said. “Simon, help me.”
I was surprised she had the presence of mind to call me by my fake name. I hurried to her side.
Bag out, on the table, and she was getting her tools out.
“I’m interested in the fact that you didn’t sell those,” the Fishmonger said, “Desperate for money as you are.”