Twig

by wildbow

  Duncan’s response was cut short. Ashton ran into the room like the mounted legions of hell were after him, scrambling so fast that even his walking shoes slid on the floor. He made a beeline for Mary’s maze of pillars and targets.

  Helen followed him into the room. She moved more like a jungle cat, with confidence and easy, graceful movements. The sight of her filled Duncan with very complicated feelings ranging from terror to awe and, again, that stirring of adolescent feelings that anyone would feel when faced with something that looked like a perfect girl, and that only made him feel more terror.

  Ever since the incident with Ibott, he’d felt like he was her prey. He’d shown a moment of weakness, and now there was no escape.

  He was already reciting Wollstone’s ratios in his head, so as to avoid another moment of bad politics, as he’d come to term it, when Helen tackled Ashton to the ground. She squirmed around on top of him, pinning him by weight rather than by grip, and smothered his neck and face with kisses.

  He couldn’t help but imagine himself in Ashton’s situation, and that didn’t do anything to improve his situation.

  Not just reciting Wollstone’s ratios then. He started the chemical conversions and listing conversion methods in his head.

  A glance at his hand showed a red, yellow, and faint blue bar. Assuming the blue was a false positive, then at least Ashton was enjoying himself. All an act, he told himself, some charade the two familiar, not dissimilar experiments had concocted between them.

  “We have a job,” Duncan announced.

  Helen, mercifully, stopped messing around.

  He had their attention.

  “Sylvester,” Lillian said, as if it was already known.

  “How did you know?” he asked.

  “Timing feels right. It’s felt right for a while now, but when my mom came into my room three years ago and sat on the corner of my bed, I knew right away it was my grandmother. That she’d died. I know this like I knew that.”

  “Yeah,” Duncan said. He drew in a breath, then said, “Listen… the headmaster said this is low pressure. We’re going into this as a reconnaissance job, to figure out what Sylvester is doing. We can fail. If we do this right, the headmaster will okay a more serious job, and relax restrictions on the Lambs.”

  “He’s desperate,” Mary said. “Spooked, even. We’re leaving soon, I take it?”

  “Looks like we’ll be out and about for a while, a few likely cities to check out,” Duncan confirmed.

  “Help me get ready?” Lillian asked Mary. She pulled off her apron. She moved over to a side table, and began collecting straps and assorted items and trinkets. A tooth, earrings, scalpels, syringes, vials, and packets of paper. She held up a round band.

  “What’s all that?” Duncan asked.

  “This?” Lillian replied. “Is a garter. These things are preparations. Whatever Sylvester is up to, he’ll be anticipating us, but we’ve been anticipating him too, right?”

  “Ah, yes,” Duncan agreed.

  Lillian shifted position, hands on her hips. Mary matched it, arms folded, both of them staring him down.

  Had they read his mind? Did they know there was something he hadn’t yet shared?

  It was such a hard topic to broach.

  Lillian gestured, pointing down, and making a small circle with her finger.

  “I thought I’d learned all of the gestures, but that one’s lost on me,” Duncan said.

  “Garter. Read between the lines. We’re getting our weapons and tools on and getting changed in the process. Turn around, sir.”

  Ah. Not a gesture, then.

  Flushing, he turned his back to the pair.

  He heard rustling, and began reciting Wollstone’s ratios in his head again. In the meantime, Helen sauntered around, walking slowly, hands behind her back, skirt swaying, taunting, stalking.

  He shut his eyes, and heard an amused sound from the experiment.

  Females were terrifying. At least Ashton was an ally.

  “Bringing your work?” he asked, conversationally.

  “Yes. The arms, at least. I’ve got a compact version I can use. It’ll help. You?”

  “I was thinking about it. But I’ve got to go to my lab and figure out how to transport it, and I’ve got to go to my dorm room to get clothes, get packed.”

  “How long?” Mary asked, voice sharp.

  “Thirty minutes? Forty? I don’t know. No more than an hour, I imagine.”

  “I’ll be ready to leave in two minutes,” Mary said. “I have a bag stowed here.”

  “Same,” Lillian said. “Maybe as many as five. I’ve got to figure out how to get some of this on. Can you help me attach this to my skirt, Mary? Thank you.”

  Duncan flushed a little, not at any lustful feelings, but at the rebuke. His pride was pricked. He hadn’t known he would need to be ready to go so soon.

  “Lillian commands the team while we’re outside of combat or confrontation,” Mary stated, like it was fact. “I’ll handle orders while we’re in combat.”

  “Yes,” Helen said. Ashton echoed her.

  “We know his weak points, but he’ll have adapted. Don’t take anything for granted, he may have adjusted his parameters,” Lillian said. “Jamie is problematic for other reasons, but I don’t know how he’ll come into play. I think of what he did in Lugh, the skills he demonstrated, and he was very good at some things. If he’s practiced at all, he could be dangerous. Skilled in a very different way from Sylvester. Inflexible, but supremely reliable in whatever action he’s taking.”

  A sick feeling welled in Duncan’s gut. Why hadn’t he mentioned the death earlier?

  Because he actually liked the Lambs, even the ones that terrified him, and he knew how this news would be received.

  But every second he waited made it worse.

  He almost said something, but then Mary beat him to it.

  “I’m looking forward to seeing what Jamie brings to the table.”

  “Um!” Duncan cut in. His voice caught.

  “Jamie is dead,” Ashton said.

  The conversation died with those words, and all of the energy that had filled the room became something cold and empty.

  “That,” Duncan said, feebly. He fumbled in his pocket, suddenly clumsy, collecting the paper. “A woman dropped this off, earlier, Ashton brought it to me—”

  The paper was snatched out of his hand the moment it was free of his pocket. He turned to look, and it was Lillian. Disheveled in fashion with some buttons remaining to be done up, but still clothed, she stared down at the page, the short message.

  Jamie died to the red plague. I’m managing, but I’m not handling it well. Seeing things, talking to ghosts of people who are alive. I thought you should know what happened. This may be my goodbye, depending. The anger won’t die. I’m hoping that a monumental action with some dramatic flourish will make for a good send off.—S

  Lillians hands shook. Calmly, almost mechanically, she passed on the papers to Mary.

  Then, in the next heartbeat, she was a fury. She struck him, then shoved him, then shoved him again.

  “You told Hayle before you told us!?”

  Life was so good, he felt so triumphant, so secure, up until the Lambs became involved. Every bad moment in the past year had been some involvement with the Lambs. Twenty-threeing himself, Ibott, nearly dying a half-dozen times…

  “I thought—”

  His protest was cut off by the tears he saw in her eyes.

  “You prat! You’re the worst!”

  “It made sense!”

  “No!” Lillian shouted, her voice raw. She pushed him again. “No! No it doesn’t! We’re supposed to trust and rely on each other! Even if Sylvester ran, he still understood that on a level, and I have no doubt he thought he was helping us on some level, or he at least thought about us every step of the way! Jamie understood too—it’s why he left!”

  “Ashton agreed,” Duncan protested. He backed up enough that he wasn’t b
eing assaulted. “And telling the headmaster first meant he went easy on us, like I said before, this being only reconnaissance, mild penalties for failure.”

  “I didn’t agree,” Ashton said. “I didn’t disagree. I thought we should tell the Lambs first.”

  “Because the woman told you to.”

  “No,” Ashton said. “That’s what you said, not what I said. I thought we should tell the other Lambs because the Lambs should know first. Jamie mattered most to them. Us. I liked Jamie. He helped me a lot early on.”

  “You’re an idiot,” Lillian said, voice raw. “This was important, on so many levels. You got what Hayle was willing to give us, not what we could’ve taken. We’ve been waiting months, and everything about what we do and how the Academy handles us depended on who got to make the first move, on how.”

  “Information,” Mary said, simply. There was no anger or bitterness in her voice, only a firm, horrible coldness. “Control of information. The only power we have is the power we take for ourselves. There are few things more important to being a Lamb than coordinating. Being able to trust one another. Being able to discuss, be on the same page, and handle things as a group. You handled this alone.”

  “I handled it with the group in mind. I know Sylvester got some discretion to take leaps and do things on behalf of the group without coordinating, I know you get some discretion. What about me? Do I need to pass some imaginary metric before I get some leeway? I’m a Lamb!”

  “You are not a Lamb,” Lillian retorted. She seemed to startle. “And oh my god, I’ve become Sylvester from four years ago.”

  Duncan seized on the opportunity, “You railed about how unfair that was, how he treated you when you were new.”

  He startled as he felt hands on his shoulders. He startled more when he realized, by process of elimination, that it was Helen.

  “The difference,” Helen said, calmly, sweetly, “Is that Lillian never claimed to be a Lamb. She earned her place.”

  “I kind of did claim,” Lillian said, bitterly.

  “Not like that,” Helen said. The gentle, diplomatic tone cut like a knife. “And you never broke our trust.”

  Lillian pressed her lips together firmly, dropping her head in some faint semblance of a nod.

  Duncan shrugged his way free, backing away a few paces, so he could look at all of the Lambs. “Fine. I made a mistake. Are you saying none of you did, when you were new?”

  He could see them react to that, and braced himself for a fresh barrage of criticism. That feeling of being horribly out of his depth had swelled, and now he felt like he was drowning. He’d never felt so out of place, as a cog in the machine.

  So many things hinged on this, on his participation in the program. He couldn’t lose this.

  “Let’s stop here,” Lillian said, eyes on the ground, barely restraining the emotion in her voice. “Jamie’s dead. I don’t want this to be how I remember the day I learned that. Why don’t you go and get ready, Duncan? Since it sounds like you’ll need some time and we won’t be able to leave right away. Get your pets, get yourself sorted out, and get your head in the game. I’m not criticizing you when I say that you’re the weakest link, you’re new, you’re inexperienced, and you’re not augmented. He’ll target that. Be ready.”

  Duncan riled a bit at that, but bit his tongue.

  “I’m the next weakest link,” Lillian said, as if to soften the impact of that last statement. “He’ll target me too. There’s no pride or shame in that. It’s the nature of this particular confrontation.”

  “I’m surprised you’re even inviting me along,” Duncan said. “Given all of this, my mistake.”

  It was Mary who responded. “Like Lillian said. You’re new, inexperienced, and not augmented. He’ll target that.”

  “Especially because he never liked you,” Helen added.

  “I’m bait?”

  “Are you complaining?”

  He shook his head. He set his jaw, and said, “However I can help.”

  “Thank you,” Lillian said.

  “Then I’ll take my leave,” he said, stiff, and turned to leave. Indignation and frustration welled in his chest, and he suppressed it. This job was important. It was hell, difficult, dangerous, and entirely not his element, but he couldn’t back down now. Better to endure, survive it, and achieve something better in the future.

  Angry, bitter, he stopped where he was, just outside the door, for a breather, so nobody would see him so emotional. The door sat slightly ajar beside him.

  He could overhear, past the noise of water rushing through the walls, and the dull thuds throughout the complex.

  “He just ruined so many opportunities,” Lillian said. “Ways to put ourselves in a better situation, sell our merits to the powers above, and get resources. It’s like he doesn’t understand. He raised himself to a better position, rather than help the Lambs. How are we supposed to trust that?”

  “He doesn’t understand,” Mary said. “Even you had to learn. I had to. This is a tricky thing to manage, where we scrape out handholds. Take a deep breath.”

  A pause.

  “I don’t feel better. This was different from the mistakes you and I made while we learned.”

  “I know. But we’re all different. Now, let’s focus on the positives.”

  “They’re alive,” Helen said.

  “They’re alive?” Ashton’s voice could be heard.

  “Sy wouldn’t tell us like that,” Lillian said. “It’s maneuvering. Giving us the information to spread or leak as we need to.”

  They sounded so certain.

  Was this what they were talking about? Coordination?

  Mary said, “It offers the added benefit of getting the bounty hunters off his trail, which he doesn’t want and we don’t want. If Hayle wants the loose end tied up, he has to use in-house resources. We’re sent to chase him.”

  “Probably rollicking good fun for him. The little bastard,” Lillian added.

  “Probably,” Mary said.

  There was more talk, about logistics, about getting things together, and what would work best for dealing with Sylvester. Duncan barely heard any of it.

  His pride stung. He felt bitter.

  The paper in his pocket with the address on it. He still had it.

  He could take it to the headmaster. Another tidbit of information, one that might lead back to Sylvester. A sick feeling stirred in his gut at the feeling.

  Instead, he turned around. He opened the door.

  He could see the reaction as they saw him. Only Helen was stone-faced. She should have heard him. Had the ambient noise misled her, or had she simply not listened?

  Nobody asked the question, ‘did you overhear?’ ‘did you eavesdrop?’.

  He reached into his pocket, and withdrew the slip of paper with the address. He handed it to Helen, who was closest.

  “Oh. The address of the woman who brought the letter,” Ashton said.

  Duncan could see eyes light up at that. A morsel of information, but it was important.

  “It won’t lead back to Sylvester,” Duncan said. “He wouldn’t leave a trail like that.”

  “Everything he does at this stage, he does for a reason,” Mary said. “Including sending the letter to us, not to the Academy. Just so it’s clear why we were upset. This? This matters.”

  “Thank you,” Lillian said. She still looked angry. To think she’d once been a friend of his. “This is a big step forward.”

  I gave it to you because Ashton might have told you about it at some point.

  The only reason I didn’t give it to the headmaster is because I was too preoccupied, and forgot.

  “Thank you,” he said. He couldn’t meet anyone’s eyes. “I’ll go get ready.”

  Previous Next

  Dyed in the Wool—12.1

  Three bounty hunters flanked me. All three had crocodile skin, two of them were women, twins, while the third was a man, proportioned like a Bruno. Each member of the trio
had long, greasy hair that looked like it hadn’t been cut or washed in the last few years, and each had scant clothing, which was probably a blessing, given how they tended to operate. I was still dripping wet with mud up to my knees, while they had more or less dried off in the walk here.

  The older brother who went by Scale. Given the crocodile theme, I might have expected them to have wider mouths, riddled with sharp teeth, but Scale’s mouth was smaller than mine, the lipless top and bottom of his mouth pressing together into a firm, grim line. His hair was tied back into a long ponytail, while the girls simply let their hair drape over their faces, in part. One of them had swords at her side, bent ones meant for hacking at vegetation, while the other had pouches clipped to her belt.

  Scale held the chain of my cuffs in one fist, and the rough-scaled hand was large enough to simply encompass the chain, one side of his hand rasping against my left wrist as we walked, the other side scraping against my right wrist. He held me so my arms were stretched out directly behind me and up a bit, my shoulders threatening to get wrenched out of my sockets. My feet barely felt like they touched the ground, which was more illusion than fact, and mud squelched in my shoes with every step.

  In this manner, my nose bleeding to the point that droplets formed at my chin and dropped down to stairs, doorstep, and then floor, I was led into the building that served as West Corinth’s Crown Courthouse and police station. Crown officers and service members turned their heads for the trio, but the ones that stared stared because of me. I saw some glances go from my face to the wanted poster on the wall. Jamie’s face was still beside mine, there. Still his artwork. Old Jamie’s artwork.

  I struggled a bit, and Scales shook me, hard. I winced at the pain in my shoulders. He grabbed me by the neck, and still holding the chains with the other hand, he hauled me up and draped me across the first available desk. The officer there stared.

  “Get your superior,” Scales ordered.

  The officer looked down at me, up at Scales, then waved another man down.

  “Or, alternatively—” I said.