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WITH MA AWAY FROM THE house, Ade began to feel as though a millstone that had been hung permanently from his neck had finally been snipped loose. He was used to bad heads and feeling out-of-sorts all the time. Ma had told him it came of being a sickly baby, and that he’d never grown right. She blamed most of the things wrong with Ade on when he was a baby, but it was strange now how he felt suddenly calmer, his thoughts clear and not muddied up like silted water. A refreshing change, though not one he got any time to appreciate.
Now that Ma wasn’t there to keep a sharp eye, there was no stopping Door. Ade was kept busy with carrying the extra work and by the end of most days he was too tired to do anything more than sleep with a blanket pulled over his head. Even the sound of Perrin sewing seemed too loud. She tried to walk softly through the house, but it didn’t help all that much. Ade had to wonder what perversity there was in babes that they all wanted to get born at awkward hours.
The days galloped past with Ade pulling double duty. All the babes in the Stilts had decided on their time the moment Ma’s wherry pulled up and away from the docks, sails raised. At least there had been no further sign of magic, so that was one small relief.
Mornings and nights started to look the same, and Ade could barely tell breakfast from tea. Door was gone most of the time, disappearing like mist, and only coming back to eat and sleep. If it weren’t for Perry stepping in and helping him as best she could, Ade would probably have fallen down in a corner somewhere and fair starved to death. Beyond that, she was also helping with Nan, and running the house, and Ade wasn’t fool enough to think it made her happy. She had better things to do. Even if Ade didn’t know all her haunts and ways, he knew she was seeing less of her friends. Perry was a hard one to read sometimes, but it didn’t take a Saint to know she was chafing.
Ade sighed, and rolled over, his cheek pressed into his lumpy pillow. The sleep he was hoping to catch was thin and quick as a marsh boggert, and the clanks and cries of the Hoblings at play, their feet drumming on the plank bridges, the whistles of workers and the far off clucking of the little black bog-hens were enough to keep him wakeful. He was worried about more than just his sisters, anywise.
Nan had taken to looking all withered up and not-there the past few weeks, and now she’d started on with a cough. Just a small one, but it was wet and harsh in a way Ade didn’t like. It was constant and rough as a saw blade through greenwood. Ade hated himself for letting the sound get to him, stop him from sleeping. It was hardly Nan’s fault she’d caught a cough.
The hacking sound kept grating, slivering away the last of Ade’s attempt to sleep. He shoved the cocoon of blankets off his head. It didn’t look like he was going to get any rest today. “Nan?”
She coughed again into her fist, the sound sticky with mucus, and Ade’s stomach knotted.
“’M, fine,” Nan rasped.
Perrin got up off the edge of her bed where she was sitting, and set down her sewing. Her house dress was almost done. Soon Perrin would be off to go find work as a shop girl or a maid. There had to be more for a mind like hers than smiling at people as she served them, or mucking up after Lammer rich. “I’m making tea.”
“Good thing.”
The smell of cut lemon rose sharply, and Ade knew then that Perrin was as worried as he was. Lemon and honey for the cough, and it wouldn’t be enough, not if Nan had the Lung. Don’t think about it, Ade told himself. No one in their family ever caught the Black Lung, it just didn’t happen. Nan had caught cold, and that’s all it was. He forced himself up and out of bed and pulled his washed and mended trousers on under his sleep shirt. There had to be a good way to thank Perrin for all she’d done. Maybe he could make a trip into town and go buy her a book filled with facts and figures. Ma wasn’t there to stop him, and he could have a look out for Door to see what she was up to at the same time.
Perry had laid out Ade’s shirt and vest and socks too, and he grinned weakly across the room at her. “You’re getting good training for working, I suppose.”
Perry scowled.
Once he was dressed, Ade went over to Nan, who was sitting huddled up on a wicker-work chair. She’d wrapped herself in a blanket and was knitting fast, her knobbled fingers dipping and rising while the sleeve of the jersey she was working on spilled over her lap. The wool was thick and oily-blue.
“You doing all right, Nan?”
She nodded, and her fingers never stopped, the bone needles click-clacking. “Right as rain, it’s naught but a bad chest. Here.” She held out her knitting. “Give me your arm.” She stretched the sleeve along Ade’s arm then nodded again to herself.
“I thought you were making it for Da?”
Nan snorted, then counted her stitches. “That feckless thing? If he ever comes back I’ll knit him a new jersey. You’ve outgrown yours.”
It was true. Ade had stayed small for so long that when his growth finally came, it had surprised everyone. He’d been wearing his Da’s old clothes, which were not the right fit, but still had several years’ wear in them, so he’d never thought to ask for new ones. “Thank you,” Ade said.
He remembered what Door had said the day Ma left. It’s true, he didn’t ask Nan the right questions. There were pieces of her he’d never bothered to put in place, and sooner or later, Nan’s time would be up and she would go to her Long Sleep. Already he’d watched her leave for funerals of friends she’d had since girlhood. The thought churned. “Do you have any stories from when you were a girl?”
Perrin joined them with bowls of tea, and they settled into a comfortable little circle—Ade and Perrin on the floor, while Nan sat at the head. Ade leaned his shoulder against one leg and felt small and safe like a child for just a moment.
Nan packed her knitting away and took the tea. “You don’t want to hear old nonsense.”
“Mayhap we do.” Ade never asked for stories, not even when he’d been a Hobling, knee-high to a nilly. Ma had never had time for that nonsense, she’d told him.
Nan laughed in a throaty cluck then turned to coughing. “Well, I’ll tell you, when I was young like Perrin and Doreen, I had my fun. More than that, I can’t say.” Nan grinned wicked, and Ade could see the traces of the girl she was. Not like Ma at all. Once Nan had been a wildling thing, fast and sharp. “And I was like you a little.” She touched Ade’s hair. “Last thing I wanted was to be the Onnery. Though I had it easier than you.”
“What did you want to be?” Perrin asked. Some of the sulk had gone out of her face. None of them were happy with the path they were on. Even if they didn’t know what else there was, it didn’t matter. Ma had decided.
“Oh, I had grand plans.” Nan smiled a little, dreamy-like, before her body was racked by another spate of coughs.
Ade wondered if he should go to a healer and ask them to come look in on Nan. Not that she’d appreciate him treating her like she was an invalid. “That don’t tell us much,” he pointed out, then breathed in the sweet honey and lemon steam from his tea. Still too hot to drink, but the bowl kept his hands warm. Some of the sleepy-fuzz was clearing from his mind, the bone-deep tiredness seeping away.
“As much as you need to know, you rascal—”
A banging on the door rattled the building, and they all stilled.
“Another one for you, brother dear,” Perry said. “Lucky thing.” Her tone was dry, edged with sympathy.
Ade set down his tea without even having had a chance to drink it. He’d wanted a little more time to get his head together before the next babe demanded his time. There weren’t any births due now, and he was only going later to see on the Hilldrop girl, who was a bit on the young side, but healthy enough. If it was about her, then it wouldn’t be good news—the babe was still far too small and early. “No rest for the Onnery.” It felt strange to say it. He was always the Onnery-Next.
“I’ll pack you some food.” Perrin rose with him.
It wasn’t what he’d expected. Ade opened the door to find a red-headed Lammer youth leaning one-handed against the frame, his other hand pressed to his side. It wasn’t that first unexpected visitor, but he was familiar all the same. Doreen’s friend, the pack-lad, Gil. He looked younger out here in the Stilts away from his home turf, a child that had wandered and got lost, bleating for its ma. Ade scowled. No good could come of Lammers treading to their house every other day. Good thing Doreen had made off early that morning; it made telling the truth easier.
“She’s not here,” Ade said. “And don’t come back again.”
Before Ade could close the door, Gil stopped it with his foot.
“You gotta come.” His face was yellow-scared, and his shirt was damp with sweat. His ribs were heaving and his breath came puffing and panting like an over-worked nilly.
A cold feeling trickled down Ade’s back. “Did you just run all the way here?”
Too out of breath to say more, Gil simply nodded, grimacing as he pressed at the stitch under his ribs.
Doreen. “What’s happened to her?” Ade kept his voice low so that Nan and Perrin couldn’t hear.
“Sharif.”
He didn’t need to say another thing. If the Sharif had picked up Door for something—anything—then she was probably better off dead. They hated Hobs, more than they hated just about anyone else. Little men with big sticks, puffed up in fat-bellied power. Ade shivered, thinking what they could do to Door, what they’d put her through, and how there was nothing she could say to stop them. “Wait here.” He rushed back into the gloomy house and grabbed his outer jacket.
“What’s wrong?” Perrin was wide-eyed. “Doreen?”
“It’s nothing. I’ll be back in a bit. You stay here with Nan.” It wouldn’t do to make them worry, perhaps it was all a big mistake and he could sort it before things got worse.
“Don’t you go giving me orders, Ade Onnery,” Perrin snapped. “What’s going on—it’s Doreen—what’s happened to her?”
“I don’t know yet.” Worry bubbled in his head—all the things that could have happened. Ade knew, more or less, what Door had been up to, even if Perrin only half guessed. “Look, don’t worry none. I’m sure it’s going to turn out to be nothing.”
A frown pulled at Perrin’s face. “Stop lying to me.”
“Look. I don’t know.” Ade glanced at the doorway, where Gil was waiting for him, one hand still massaging away his stitch. “Just, don’t let Nan fret. It’ll do her health no good.” And with that, Ade closed the door on Perrin’s worry. It would have been useful if he could do the same with his own.
“Where are they keeping her?” Ade asked as they raced down the slippery catwalks, boots thudding on the wet boards. A brace of geese burst clattering and honking out from under the bridges, all indignant at the disturbance.
“Sharif station on the corner of Crookwell and Third,” Gil panted.
Ade knew Pelimburg proper about as well as he knew the ins and outs of the Great Houses, so all he could do was trust that Gil could lead him there, no problem. By the time they hit the edges of Old Town, Ade’s legs were burning, his chest hurt, and his face was pounding and hot. It turned out he wasn’t half as fit as Gil, who did plenty of running in and about town, but fear had given Ade a spurt of energy he didn’t think he’d had in him. It wasn’t that Ade was weak, not any more, but birthing rooms needed a different kind of strength to what Gil’s trade called for.
“’S’not that far now,” Gil said as they slowed down.
Good thing too, because Ade wasn’t going to go much longer without falling flat on his face. Usually he had no call to go running this way and that for miles and miles. His mind scrambled this way and that, thinking what to do, what to tell Ma when she came back. No one was going to listen to him, especially not the Sharif. He should have taken Perrin with. She was sharper than a bone needle; she’d have worked it all out faster than he could have.
Ade cursed himself for being a stupid mollycot idiot who didn’t know nothing from nothing. This was why Ma didn’t expect much from him; she knew he was too slow and muddle-brained to make good choices under pressure.
They reached Crookwell, walking slow and careful, catching their breath and trying not to look like crims or anything suspicious. The street was crawling with Sharif—on patrol, or leaning against buildings with their tea and smokes or sitting on upturned crates, talking together, white uniforms like threats. Even though Ade had never done a thing wrong in his life, an itch threaded all down his skin, as though he had to be guilty of something.
The Sharif watched them pass then flicked all their attention back to their smokes or games of Red Hand, gambling for brass and favours.
The Central Sharif Station was a vast tall building that occupied several city blocks, made from white stone that had long since gone grey with smoke and dirt. Its angles were sharp as warnings. Ade couldn’t help staring at it like it was going to fall on him at any moment. The full crushing weight of the law. “Big.”
“Big enough to keep all the little crims in,” Gil told him. “They got a court in there and all, for small trials.”
No need to go bothering the Great Houses with things as unimportant as a Hobling stealing a lemon off a cart, Ade supposed. In the Great Courts where the high-Lammers had their own set of rules, they had a peer-jury as well as a judge. Here in the Central Sharif Station the low-Lammers and Hobs got the right to speak their piece, and then the right to shut up and accept whatever the sentence was.
And his sister was locked up in there. What would Perrin or Ma do in his place? They’d go in with all the facts, and act like they were disgusted that they had to even set foot in a place as crim as the Sharif building. Ma would be in her best dress. Ade looked down at his own tat—worn hand-me-downs mended at the knee and cuffs, too big and loose and ill fitting. The Sharif would never even give him the time of day. And his face. They’d mock him. Call him slow and mollycot and monster.
And none of that mattered if Door was in there. “What did she do?”
“Caught lifting a purse.”
A hand. That was the sentence for thieving. A deep ache spread all the way down to Ade’s marrow.
“Well, no point lolly-gagging,” Gil said, and Ade followed him up to the big wide door, three times as tall as any Hob.
The two halves of the giant door flanked the steps going up. They were iron-plated, and the fierce heat of them baked against Ade’s skin. How did the Sharif stand being around so much iron? How did the prisoners down below in the cells with their iron bars stand it? It would have driven Ade mad with the constant pressing heat, the threat of pain.
The Sharif didn’t stop Gil and Ade from walking in, but they eyed them, some laughing. Sweat trickled down Ade’s face, and he fought the need to raise his hand and cover up his disfigurement.
The inside of the building was lined with pillars stained yellow-grey. People shuffled in throngs, heads down, or stood in the corners with the whites of their eyes gleaming from the shadows. There were no signs and no one look inclined to offer any help.
“Where do we go?”
“Information.” Gil led him to a long counter with several queues, until they reached the barrier where a skinny Sharif stared blankly at the wall while he picked his teeth.
He ignored them, and Gil waited without comment, strangely patient, while Ade fretted and sweated and itched. He was about ready to run away, or start screaming, but a faint touch at his wrists pulled him back to himself. Ade looked down to see Gil resting the tips of his fingers against Ade’s arm in silent warning.
After a while, the Sharif decided they’d stood there long enough. “What?”
“We’re come about a girl who got rounded up today,” said Gil. “It were a mistake.”
“Always is, always is. What she do?”
“Nothing,” said Gill. “This here’s her brother and he can vouch for her. She’s from a good family. Midwives.”
Ade nodded. His throat felt too thick for words.
“There’s no such thing as good family with Hobs. You think I’m stupid.” The skinny Sharif turned his attention to Ade and studied him, eyes squinted up in thought. “He got some disease? Bringing illness right out of the Stilts into places where decent folk live.” He spat across the table, warding off whatever illness he thought Ade was carrying.
“No—no disease,” Ade managed. The iron all around made his head feel too big and hot, and he had to fight to not cover his face, to bend his back and shake. Ade hadn’t had a proper fit in years, but he could still remember what they felt like. He swallowed over and over, trying to get the sour-metal taste out of his mouth. He thought Ma had beat those fits all out of him. Ade concentrated on his breath going in and out. This was for Doreen, and he needed to keep calm, or he’d do her no good. “My sister, p-please.” The shaking feeling slowed, and passed, and his heart stopped its mad dance.
With a long-suffering sigh, the Sharif made a show of shuffling through his papers. “What’s her name?”
“Doreen Onnery,” Ade said.
“Speak up, or speak slow or something. Bloody Hobs, can’t say a damn thing properly.”
Ade coughed into his fist and spoke louder, slower, careful to enunciate each word precisely. “My sister’s name is Doreen, and her family name is Onnery.”
The Sharif looked down the list. “Oh, thief girl, eh? Caught her red-handed. You can say anything you like about whatever you want but it’s not going to change nothing. Leastwise she’ll learn her lesson now, won’t she?” He smiled so his yellow teeth showed, long and stained like the pillars.
It was a dismissal. Ade knew he was supposed to walk away now. He and Gil were meant to turn around and leave while the damn Sharif watched and smiled. Ade coughed again, trying to clear the little toad that seemed to have crawled down his throat and lodged there. The last twinges of the almost-fit were going away now, leaving him feeling hollow but calm. It gave him a little confidence, that he could fight it down if he tried hard enough. “I need to see her.”
“I need to see her, please, Sir. Didn’t your mother teach you manners?”
Ade kept his head steady and tried not to look at the Sharif so the little man wouldn’t see how much hate Ade had collecting in his eyes, and he repeated the words.
“That’s better. Maybe you Stilt Hobs can learn a thing or two. Or you’re one of the smart ones.” He leaned forward and Ade caught a gust of liquorice root and garlic and mint all mingled. “There’s a charge, you know that.”
Gil looked sidelong at Ade.
The Sharif warmed to his game. “Like when you go to the animal gardens, you got to pay your ticket, right? This is the same.”
“How much?” Ade asked softly. “Sir.”
“Well now, that all depends on how badly you wanna see her.”
“Seven brass,” said Gil. “That’s all I got on me.”
The Sharif looked to Gil, then to Ade, waiting.
“I’ve brass at home.” Ade’s stomach sank. Even if they were able to run all the way back and here again, the offices would be closed for the day, and there was no way Ade would be able to anyway. Feverishly, he considered how to go about hiring a coach—if a coach driver would even carry a Hob out to the Stilts.
“Looks like the animals gardens are closed then, don’t it.” The thin Sharif leaned back and watched them, a leering grin of triumph pasted onto his narrow face. “Next.”
A small, round woman with a peeled apple face trudged up behind them and crooked her head, indicating for them to be on their way. Ade let go the counter, not even realizing he’d been holding on to it as though he were was crossing a bridge and trying not to fall.
“Fuckers,” said Gil when they were out the station, standing out in the pale sun and blinking at each other.
“I’ll have to go home. I didn’t think.” You never think, Ade, said his Ma’s voice, clear in his head. She was right. Ever since he was little, Ade had done everything wrong. No wonder she was always disappointed in him.
“Nah, should’ve warned you. It’s my own bloody fault—I know what the Sharif are like.” Gil kicked at the cobbles on the pavement, brushing the leathers of his boots against the edge of the curb. “You any good at Red Hand?”
Cards weren’t exactly allowed in the Onnery household. Even Nan snuck off to her friends when she wanted to play a round. Ade shook his head. “My Ma don’t hold with gambling.”
“She got you tied to the apron good and proper, don’t she?” Gil crooked his head. “You ever do anything you’re not supposed to?” He took off his cap and scratched at his red hair. “Look here, I’m sharp on the cards, but there’s no one here stupid enough to play ’gainst me.”
“I’ve money at home,” Ade repeated.
“Yeah, and? No time for that. You need to see Doreen before they process her.”
“Process.” The word came out flat and hard like a blunt knife. Here Ade was worrying about leaving her one night in the cells, but truth was, for all his imaginings, he had no idea what would happen behind that iron door.
“Yeah. I wanna get a look at what cell she’s in before tonight.”
“Why?”
Gil stopped scratching at his head and squinted at Ade. “So we can bust her out, you fool cotquean.”
The words almost sprang straight out: “You can’t.”
But what if Gil could? Even Ma wouldn’t nod and put her hands on her hips and say, “Well she got as she deserved,” like she normally would. Because family was always different. They might be the ones who hurt you most, but that was their right. No family would ever leave one of their own to suffer at the hands of others. “All right,” Ade said, slowly. “So what do we do?”