smile
It’s the Endweek. Five days since springing Zako, and his future is still a question mark. I’ve used any spare moments I’ve found to work on the fishing-boat drawings for the Scarlets – the extra money will surely help, but I want them to be good; I want them to tell their friends about me.
At least Zako gets his wish to see Ruzi. Small victories, I tell myself.
Ruzi’s all jittery. We reach the Lugger mid-afternoon and hang our coats with Gracie’s and Renny’s in the kitchen. Kit ducks out of chopping onions long enough to lead us up to his room, past Mister Scarlet holding court with a few of the regulars in the bar.
They’re all laughing. Mister S grips one by the hand, twists it near a lantern. Kit told me he reads palms.
“Has Mister S ever read your palm?” I ask.
Kit looks back at us. “I won’t let him.”
“Load of balls?” Ruzi asks.
Kit looks askance. “But what if it’s true? I don’t want to know what happens. Makes it real. Or it spoils the surprise.”
I want to laugh. Our lives have been so full of unwelcome surprises.
We reach the right floor, and Kit pauses by a big linen closet.
“This will take you to Mister S’s study – through the guest wing.” He passes me a heavy iron key. “Go on round now. Mor, come see me before you go.”
“I will,” I nod. “Is Missus S gone?”
“Said she’d be out till sundown. Just act natural. Mora, you’ve already got your story about doing drawings for the Scarlets. Here.” He dumps an armful of bedclothes into Ruzi’s arms. “Anyone will think you’re staff.”
I glance at Ruzi. At least he looks all right, his checked shirt flat, tucked into neat trousers. Clean boots. He’s clutching a paper bag. He shifts it to accommodate the stack of sheets. I’ve tidied myself up too, but all my clothes are ragged and wrinkled compared to what the Lugger staff wear.
Ruzi hesitates, for all his itching to see Zako over the last five days. He bangs Kit awkwardly on the back, twice. “Thank you,” he says, frog in his throat. “Means a lot.”
Zako must hear the lock turn, but he’s not in the Scarlets’ living room. He knows to expect us, but he also knows to hide. They’ve made a nook in Missus Scarlet’s walk-in wardrobe, a space behind some crates that he can squeeze into.
I call hello and he appears on the threshold, eyes wide.
Ruzi goes still beside me.
Then he rushes forward like a wave, something big and inevitable. Like more than one man. A shoal or a flock, a murmuration of little squares on his shirt wrapping around Zako.
“My boy,” he says in Crozoni, actually lifting Zako’s feet off the floor.
“Papa.”
The name he used six years ago, in a language he barely speaks any more, syllables awkward.
Tears ambush me. So does envy. Ruzi’s crying too, but he gets it under control quickly.
“Can you even see your old man?” he teases. “Mora told us you need glasses now.” He fishes two pairs he chose from the ammedown shop yesterday from his trouser pocket.
Both have roundish lenses too big for Zako’s face, rimmed in copper wire. I know there can’t have been many to choose from.
Zako tries them in turn and settles for the weaker pair. We crowd round the mirror above Missus S’s chest of drawers. The copper frames suit him, setting off his amber eyes.
“You look like your mother.” Ruzi’s voice is just above a whisper. Like if he speaks too loudly, he’ll break the spell.
“He looks like you too,” I tell Ruzi.
“Mister S thinks I look like you,” Zako tells me.
I scoff. “We all look the same to them.”
Ruzi looks upset again. I offer to give the two of them some space, but he’s adamant I stay.
“You have to help us eat the biscuits!” he reminds me, and Zako’s dogged nods persuade me.
We crunch through the half a dozen meltingly lovely lavender shortbread biscuits Ruzi spent months of savings on from the bakery in Opal Alley.
Afterwards, Zako shows us a Skøl book Missus Scarlet’s given him called Blenny and Tornelius. It’s quite heavy going, I realize, leafing through – hard for Zako. The Venors never worked on his reading and writing, and the tale is written in a surprisingly florid style. I don’t know how he’s got through three chapters already.
“Missus S has been reading it to me,” he confesses.
“She has?”
“Said it’s that old she read it when she was a girl. And they read it to their son.”
“They have a son?”
“He’s grown and flown,” Zako says, and I can hear Missus Scarlet’s voice in his words.
“What’s it about, then?” Ruzi asks.
“There’s a boy called Blenny, separated from his family but on his way to meet them… Only a mighty storm wrecks the ship he’s on.” He lowers his voice. “Blenny alone miraculously survives, washed up on a strange shore with bits from the shipwreck. And then he finds another survivor – the ship’s hound, Tornelius. But we’re still at the beginning; I want to know what happens.” His eyes light up as he says to Ruzi, “Could you read some?”
Ruzi casts a slightly panicked look my way. I’m sure he reads Skøl better than Zako, but he still struggles.
“Let me.” I pluck the book from Zako.
“Chapter Four. In Which Blenny and Tornelius Explore Their Strange New Home…”
The sun that Blenny had considered a warm friend these fourteen years was altered in this place into a vicious, angry stranger. Here it beat upon the young fellow like a mallet. By the time he had finished dragging the heavy crates to the dubious shelter of the shaded grove, he was washed in more perspiration than seawater.
Tornelius lay panting, his tongue lolling almost to the sand...
“Makes you thirsty, doesn’t it?” Ruzi interjects.
I inch through several passages – it’s hot, boy and dog are running out of fresh water – but when I try to stop, Zako insists on hearing the rest of the chapter.
After a harrowing trek inland through forest replete with unnaturally aggressive spiders, peculiar foliage and so on, Blenny and Tornelius are delighted to find a small freshwater pool near a homey clearing, along with what appear to be a colony of wild chickens, very free with their eggs.
We leave them mid-afternoon, eating eggs at the close of the chapter, and Zako is satisfied.
In the real world, dusk has arrived. Time always moves quicker on an Endweek.
In the dark, Zako shows us how to spy unseen on the street below from the washroom window. We can watch the comings and goings through the front, but no one sees us through the tilted shutters.
When we spot Missus S coming back, Ruzi and I say our goodbyes and decamp. Zako’s content. He almost looks like he belongs, a small shape curled in the corner of the sofa, reaching for his book.
“I’m a blessed man,” Ruzi mutters as I pull the door shut behind us. “To see him again, when I never thought I… He’s a lovely lad, isn’t he? Ah, Mora. I feel light as a feather.”
He’s got tears in his eyes again. Bottled-up Ruzi, leaking two times in the same night. He collects himself. “You coming home now?”
“Kit wanted to talk,” I tell him. Regardless, I think we both need space after that. Ruzi nods and heads straight home, while I stop at the bar.
I pack away a great bowl of Kit’s spicy stew and nurse half an ale while he works. The Lugger’s not too busy, and still he’s flitting everywhere – serving food, fixing a broken game some of the young drinkers like to play in the quiet fikka lounge on the first floor, stacking away glasses, listening to one of the regulars read a letter out from his daughter back home. A young woman sits alone, eating, which is unusual.
We haven’t had a chance to chat, even in quiet Crozoni.
He’s wiping a puddle from the bar when the sinews in his hand stiffen. “Don’t look now,” he murmurs, “but brace yourself.”
It’s a pair of branders – the same two who took Ruzi and me to the station last week, now relaxed, off duty, but still in uniform. The taller one stops to my right, resting a heavy hand on my shoulder and leaning close. His fancy gun and his elektric prod nestle prominently in twin holsters, hilts twinkling pale gold.
“Good evening, lovers!” he says. His partner takes the stool to my left, dragging it close.
It’s only seven, and they’ve been in another tavern already. Sweat and drink come off them like steam. Their uniforms are crumpled, their too-close noses painted with red blood vessels.
“Any news about our boy yet?” asks the shorter one on my left. “He tried to get in touch?” He lays a meaty hand on my thigh.
“We’re mourning him,” I say coldly. “Let us be.”
They laugh, leaving their hands on me. “You’re mourning him? Bit early for that, isn’t it? We’re still out scouring the countryside for the vicious little head-hammerer. And the town.” He looks ostentatiously around the Lugger lounge and sniffs. “You makkies like this place, don’t you?” Me and Kit are the only makkies in here.
“He works here.” I point out the obvious, but they ignore me.
“Ten-grand boy’s your friend, isn’t he? Ten grand could come running into your friendly arms right here, but you’re in mourning! Just imagine.” The tall one shakes his head.
“I can help with your mourning,” says the other. His laugh is low and dirty.
“Can I get you a drink?” Kit offers. “Or are you just here to sweet-talk us?”
“Schinns, mate – doubles. And smile,” the taller one to my right answers. His partner takes his hand off my thigh and slides a crisp note on to the bar.
“Something to wet your tongue, girl?” he asks, putting his nauseating hand higher up. I struggle not to shudder.
“No, thank you,” I say.
“We’ve been watching you and the old man. Magistrate wanted any contacts of the boy followed, and you’re all he has.” I flinch. I didn’t see them following us. “You’re all up yourself, aren’t you?”
“Leave her be,” Kit snaps.
The man laughs. “Oh, this one’s feral. Pissing on our territory, are we?”
Kit pours schinn, the strong spirit favoured by the Skøl, into glass tumblers, his expression carefully blank.
“I’m no one’s territory.” I stand to push back my stool.
The taller one laughs, almost pleasantly. “You’re someone’s property, idiot.”
Kit stops fishing through the coin box and turns to look at me. I feel a sickening lurch, like this is where it could all go bad.
The Skøl woman I noticed eating alone earlier comes to join us at the bar. “I would like a half of the red ale, please,” she asks politely, though there’s a bite to her tone.
Her grist-brown hair is secured in a thick plait, apart from the fringe across her prominent forehead. She’s in her mid to late twenties, I guess.
“What’s all the excitement?” she asks the branders, twirling a gold ring set with an amber stone around one of her pale, pinkly freckled fingers.
The taller brander eyes her up. “If you’re from anywhere round here you’ll have heard about it. Wild boy tried to kill his owner – the Registry magistrate, soon to be our governor. These two knew the boy. They’re hiding something,” he tells her.
“I see. I did hear about that. So you’re asking questions in an official capacity, is that right, firebrand –” she consults the tag over his breast – “Seyll?” Her thin lips pull into a smile. “Because drinking on official business is against the branders’ code, isn’t it?”
“It’s none of your business, missus – no offence,” he shoots back.
“You’re probably right,” she says. “I just write about these things for the Evening Gazette.”
That makes an impression. It’s Skøland’s leading newspaper, based out of Rundvaer. Its Endweek edition sells here in some of the fancy tobacconists – even if it arrives more than a month out of date. I’ve never bought one – too expensive – though I’ve leafed through the odd discarded copy. It’s mostly impenetrable politics and high-society stories, but sometimes there’s an interesting crime.
A journalist for the Gazette – she’s important. Why, I wonder, is she here?
“I’m actually here to cover Magistrate Venor’s appointment to governor,” she goes on, like she’s answering my unspoken question. She considers them. “But maybe I could add some details about the officers pursuing the investigation and their tactics.” She pulls a stool close and sits down.
Kit puts a pile of coins in change on the bar in front of the shorter firebrand. He pulls the red ale.
“Ah, beautiful.” The journalist sighs when he passes it over.
“On your tab?” he asks, and the journalist nods.
The firebrands drain their schinn.
“Another?” asks Kit.
“No. Let’s go,” one mutters, eyeing the woman uneasily.
Very faintly, she winks at me, foam from the ale still clinging to her upper lip.
“I’ll forget the tab,” Kit tells her when they’re gone. “That one’s on the house, missus. Thought they were going to kick off for a minute there.”
“Please.” She wipes her lips with the back of her hand. “Anything but missus. You make me feel old. Felicity,” she insists.
“Felicity. I remember.” Kit goes to serve food.
“Felicity,” she says again, holding a bony hand to me. “Felicity Greave.”
“Mora Dezil.” I meet her firm grip. No Skøl has ever shaken my hand. It’s painful.
“Are you really writing a story?” I ask, dragging my stool back next to hers.
She takes a huge gulp of ale. Impressive. “I am. Writing about your glorious new governor-to-be.”
The Portcaye Post has been bleating about Venor’s swearing-in ceremony for months and there’s still months to wait. I suppose Felicity must be writing for Rundvaer’s readers.
“Clarion Lovemore’s first-ever tour of the colonies,” she gushes. “We’re going to witness history in the making.” Her grin is gleeful.
“Lovemore’s coming here? To Portcaye?” To this backwater, I think. The head of the beast herself.
Felicity nods enthusiastically. “Her ship should be sailing, even now!”
Of course she loves Clarion Lovemore. The papers can’t print enough about their Governor Most High. Not just her governing. Her clothes, her hair, the events she attends. Who’s in favour, who’s out of favour. The Gazette is full of her exploits.
Felicity sips the last of her ale more slowly, fixing her blue-grey eyes on me over the rim. “Do you work in manufactory?”
I look down at my worn trousers and boots.
“How did you guess?” I smile.
“Reporter nose.” She taps it, grinning.
“I’m at Green’s,” I tell her. “The Glassworks.”
“Oh! Isn’t that the place making the roof for the new Hexagon Hall?”
I nod, strangely proud.
“How wonderful.”
“So, will Clarion Lovemore get here for the ceremony? Venor’s signing-in at the new hall?” I ask.
“I would hope so,” Felicity laughs. “She’s sailing halfway round the world for it! And she’s to open the big showcase too, I understand.”
“Showcase?”
“The Exhibition of the Modern Age – haven’t you heard? They’ll have it up in the hall for a year, probably. Mark the momentous … turning point. Then they’ll make it a boutique market full of shops for rich people.” She smiles. “Didn’t you know what you were working on all this time?”
I shrug. “And you’re interviewing Venor?”
“As soon as he’s well enough. My boss wants a personal piece, so people get a feel for him as a man –” she gestures grandly with one arm – “out here, bringing civilization to the frontier – his words, not mine.”
“Right,” I say. Her tone is dry, but I don’t know how much of that she believes. She’s Skøl, after all, and they seem to think we’re all savages. “I’d be interested in your story.” The reporter’s cheerful voice pulls me back to her.
“Why?”
“I’m trying to include some other voices, so it’s not just Venor talking. A glassworker, a repayer coming of age in a new world, contributing to the construction of this groundbreaking building, symbol of the modern age, designed by a famous architect, site of the biggest political appointment of the century…” I’ve the sense she could go on for some time if she wanted to. “I’d read a story about her.”
There’s a beat, and her eyes meet mine. I look away.
“I don’t work the glass myself. I just cart it round. I drive the kine. I’m not that interesting.”
She yawns. “I disagree. Well, you know where I am if you change your mind.”
Kit’s back behind the bar. He takes the reporter’s empty glass.
“Well, I know it’s early, but I’ve had a long day. I’m done in,” she says, standing up.
I look at the clock and realize it’s half seven. Curfew is coming.
“I should have said,” she adds as she turns to go. “There might be a fee.”
“Goodnight,” I tell her.
I slide off the stool as Kit sidles up.
“Thick and Thicker are still out front,” he tells me, in Crozoni.
Through the window I can see the pair of firebrands lingering. Shadow shapes, puffs of grey smoke.
“Let’s go out the back way.”
I shrug into my coat and follow Kit to the kitchen.
“Can you cover for me, Gracie? I’m walking Mora home,” Kit tells her.
“No problem.” Gracie waves him off good-naturedly. “Don’t be late back yourself.”
“I’ve got a note,” Kit reassures her. Mister S has written him a few slips granting permission to be out after curfew, in case he gets stuck.
Kit goes to find his coat while I wait for him in the courtyard.
It feels like the bottom of a huge well. The bare branches of the Makaia plane tree reach like witches’ fingers to the sky, brown seed balls dangling. I look up at the Lugger’s windows. The Scarlets’ curtains are closed, but light seeps past the edges. Most of the guest rooms are dark, except the one where I suppose the reporter’s staying. Her curtains are open, her lanterns lit.
Suddenly Kit’s standing beside me, wrapped in his black wool coat. Caruq’s decided to join us. His claws clack on the paving – I should ask Zako to trim them.
We take the smaller alley to avoid the firebrands, and talk in hushed Crozoni.
“What do you think of our new resident reporter, then?”
I think of the way she dispatched the branders. Her quiet authority. I imagine what it would be like, not being scared of them. “Well … her articles are going to be awful, of course, but I quite like her.”
“You don’t like anyone.”
“I know. I’m baffled myself.”
He lowers his voice to a whisper even though we are completely alone. “Think I’ve found a captain who’d take Zako to Vester Shells for a fee – not an outrageous one. I’ve heard she runs Skøl over all the time. Mostly legitimate, but not always. I haven’t told her who she’s taking – just that it’s a runaway.”
“She might figure it out though. Can we trust her? What if she turns Zako in and collects the bounty?”
“She could, but then she’d be caught for her own sins.”
“What’s the fee?”
Kit sucks in a pained breath. “We don’t have it. Yet. But the Scarlets have said they can scrape some cash together on the quiet to cover maybe half. They don’t keep stacks at the ready, unfortunately. We’ll owe them, but I’d rather that than … the alternative.” He bumps my shoulder. “Plus you’re making money now, aren’t you?”
I’m trying. If the Scarlets like my drawings, they’ll tell their friends. There might be more work. But it’ll take months to save substantially.
I tell Kit, and he shrugs. “We can have enough sooner than that. I’ve found some extra work a few evenings.”
“Doing what?”
“Er … factory work.”
“Place in the Skates – needs someone for a bit of lifting and that.”
He doesn’t look at me, and I feel a prickle of unease. I don’t entirely believe him. But how can I push him when he’s doing so much for us? “I could do that interview for Felicity. She said there would be a fee.”
He hesitates, then nods. “All right. But be careful. She seems all right, but she’s a Skøl reporter after all. Stay on message. You know … grateful repayer, absolutely delighted to be working on Venor’s vanity glasshouse hexagon and all the rest.”
“Naturally.”
When we get to Opal Alley, Kit takes my arm. I see what he’s seen a second later.
The branders from earlier are waiting for me – Seyll and his partner – leaning a few houses down from the bakery, smoking again.
“Do you think they really suspect us?” I whisper.
“Or they’re just being cautious,” Kit says. “Still, I know how we can throw them off the track.”
Good evening, lovers, Seyll said.
That half-smile from Kit again. “How about a goodnight kiss?”
Oh. Do I imagine he looks pleased?
We’re standing in a puddle of darkness at the bottom of the stairs, but the branders are still hovering twenty feet away. I thread my hands behind Kit’s back.
“Goodnight, then.” My heart’s going like a mallet. It must be all over my face. I can’t meet his eyes.
He leans in to kiss me – a soft press of lips, a hand at my shoulder.
I freeze, my muscles all tensing at once.
He pulls away, touching his forehead to mine, and whispers, “Relax. You might enjoy it,” before pulling me closer for another, deeper kiss.
His tongue touches my lips like a question, slow and warm, and I open my mouth in response. The whole sensation surprises me. I’ve never kissed anyone. It’s like learning a dance, an easy one. His hand on my shoulder moves to my hair. His other hand hovers at my waist.
“Okay?” he whispers, drawing back. It’s too dark to see his expression properly.
I raise up on my toes slightly to bring my face closer to his.
I want to repeat the experiment.
He closes the small distance between our lips again, lingering, tender. When he pulls away, his eyelids are heavy.
“Very convincing,” I smile.