By the time the fifth bell tolled, the sun had banished the last of the morning mist. Thin, bright clouds rolled across the sky.
We waited for Millie on the corner of Rose and Hyacinth. Oak trees lined the streets in the Morkith District of Minor West, and the ground was littered with acorns and crushed leaves. Horse-drawn cabs rattled past. A squirrel hopped from branch to branch, and a fat house cat followed its movements from the windowsill of a grocer, tail twitching.
I pulled blades of grass from the pavement and arranged them into circles on my knees, while Finn leaned against the tree and read through the Resounder. As he had anticipated, Millie was late.
“A man has gone missing in the Berai province. Enforcement requests anyone with information to come forward,” he said, tracing a finger across the text. “Food prices are expected to rise … Oh, that’s interesting. The Council is planning to hold a symposium on the subject of the drought. They’re calling for contributions from the public.”
“Huh. Where is it?”
“The Tivaria Community Hall. ‘Sources say that the dry spell is heating up existing conflicts within the Council. Reverend Deselle Somme of Food Management continues to push for greater rationing and water pressure reduction, but she has been met with fierce resistance from the Department of Memories and the Department of Public Health, who are against Somme’s austerity policies. Enforcement has reputedly thrown its weight behind Food Management, although it remains to be seen how the other nine Council members cast their votes. With Moon Tide approaching, some experts predict that the Sisterhood may call a halt to the festivities.’”
“So we should,” I said sourly.
“It’s that bad?”
“I am not authorised to give an official statement.”
He chewed on his lip. “It’ll cause a riot if they cancel Moon Tide.”
“Oh, they know. That’s why the Reverends are arguing. Allegedly. According to some sources.”
“Which side is winning?”
“Hard to say.” I gazed up at the sky. “But if they take too long, the weather will make the decisions for them.”
“It could still rain.”
“It could. But counting on it is…”
“Stupid?” he proposed.
“Ill-advised.” I sighed and brushed the grass off my legs. “Listen, I wanted to talk to you about something.”
Finn lowered the newspaper. “Sounds ominous.”
“Not really. Yesterday, I had a conversation with Reverend Cyde of the Moon House.”
“You mentioned her last night, and the name was familiar.”
“She used to be friends with my mother.”
“Ah, that must be why.” He looked past my shoulder. “Hold that thought; Millie’s here.”
I turned and saw her stepping down from a cab at the end of Hyacinth. She flashed me a quick smile. In one arm, she held a bunch of colourful flowers.
“We can talk about it later,” I said.
Millie paid the driver and strolled over to us. The fabric of her long sundress fluttered in the breeze.
“Hi, gorgeous.” She selected a single blue chrysanthemum from her bouquet and handed it to me. “You are looking especially lovely today.”
Millie had darker hair than her brother, but the same blue eyes. Her skin was liberally dusted with nut-brown freckles, concentrated across her nose and cheeks. Today she had twined a constellation of tiny white flowers into her loose plait.
“You appear to have a dandruff problem,” said Finn.
She smacked him over the head with her free hand.
“It looks beautiful,” I said.
“Why, thank you. They took a while but, you know, I have to look my best for you.”
“Was that why you left us waiting for an hour?”
Millie ignored her brother. She offered me a hand and pulled me to my feet. “How was the Haunt hunt?”
“What Haunt?”
“Yes, very convincing. Daje and Hanna should be in the Gardens already. Maybe you can save the details for them?”
“You know I won’t tell you anything about the incident, right?”
“She says now.” Millie looped her arm through mine. Her skin was sun-warmed, and she was wearing perfume, something light and feminine and sweet. “Sounds like a challenge.”
The Central Gardens were only a few blocks away. They formed a belt of lush greenery between the eastern and western sides of the city. Huge stepped terraces jutted up from the Major Quadrants, and a maze of stairs, ladders, and bridges connected the different levels. At the base of the Gardens were the city greenhouses, row upon row of glass rectangles packed with ripening vegetation. Food Management had plans to build more to decrease the Sisterhood’s dependence on the farms. It was one of Reverend Somme’s more ambitious projects, and an ongoing headache for me.
“… want to see the Moult perform. I hear they’ve planned an act for Moon Tide.” Millie had been talking for some time.
“Are they the illusionists?” I asked.
“Yeah. Daje saw one of their performances a few months ago.” She squeezed my arm. “You seem distracted. Something on your mind?”
“Sorry. I was thinking about Sisterhood problems.”
“Ah.” She smiled. “Should have known.”
We reached the Iron Gate, the main entrance to the Gardens in Minor West. A few people milled around the shaded path and an Enforcer leaned against the fence, an expression of extreme boredom plastered across her face. A labourer read a book in the sunshine.
“Over here.”
Hanna waved from a little way up the path. She was a short woman with a heart-shaped face and multiple piercings. Although the two of us feigned friendliness for Millie’s sake, our relationship was civil at best. The coolness between us was probably my fault.
“You took a while, sunshine. I was getting bored.” Hanna kissed Millie’s cheek and nodded to me in greeting.
“Hello,” I said, perhaps a shade too cheerfully.
The Gardens were busy, with civilians making the best of the cooler weather. Children played tag along the walkways, and the elderly practised stretching exercises beneath broad trellises. A trio of Sisters from the Department of Water and Sanitation sat on a bench in the shade, engrossed in conversation. I had heard that the department was in a state of turmoil ahead of Reverend Kisme’s martyrdom. Reverend Belia Verje was set to replace her next month, and rumours suggested that the new Head intended to reshuffle the entire Department.
Hanna led us across the dry lawns to a smaller path through the trees. She had linked arms with Millie, and the two of them were discussing people I did not know. I fell back to give them space.
Finn caught my eye.
“Something the matter?” he asked quietly.
I was silent for a while, thinking. Millie laughed at something Hanna said, and shoved her playfully. It was difficult to put words to my feelings.
“Some days, I want to…” I shook my head. “It doesn’t matter.”
“But you seem sad,” he murmured.
“I’m not. Just caught up in my own head.”
Deeper in the Gardens, a man broke out in song. Finn glanced backwards.
“El,” he stopped and cleared his throat. “Look, if you and Millie wanted to, uh … This isn’t the most comfortable topic for me. But if you feel…”
“Please stop.”
“Got it. Gladly.”
I laughed, and my melancholy retreated. Finn looked over his shoulder a second time. His eyes narrowed.
“Why do you keep doing that?” I asked.
He did not answer me immediately, but at the bend in the path, he paused.
“I think someone is following us,” he said.
“What?”
“It could be my imagination.” He nodded toward the stairs leading to the lower levels of the Gardens. “Check once we reach the steps.”
“It’s probably just someone heading the same way. Why would anyone follow us?”
“I don’t know.”
For some reason, I felt certain that Finn was lying to me. More than anything else, that made me uneasy. I had lace to spare, so there was little danger, especially in such a public place. And yet he was clearly nervous.
“A friend of yours?” I asked lightly.
He flinched. “No.”
Interesting. I filed away his reaction for later consideration. At the top of the stairs, I bent to retie the laces of my shoe and glanced back down the path.
It was the same man I had seen reading a book at the Iron Gate. He strolled toward us, hands buried in his pockets. There wasn’t anything particularly remarkable about him; he had medium brown skin and deep-set eyes, five or so years older than me. Easy to overlook in a crowd, indistinguishable from hundreds of other men in the city. Our eyes met.
To my surprise, he grinned and tipped his hat. I quickly turned away, as if he had caught me doing something wrong, and the man walked past the stairs and toward the Winter Gardens.
“That was weird.” Finn shrugged. “Sorry. I guess I was wrong.”
I wasn’t so sure. There had been a kind of camaraderie in the stranger’s grin, like we shared a secret, or played a hidden game. I know you see me, he seemed to say, but what are you going to do about it?
I straightened. “Can you tell Millie that I’ll catch up with her?”
“What are you planning to do?”
“I’m not sure. I just want to see where he’s going. Like you said, it’s probably nothing.”
“Yeah, well…” Finn’s frown deepened.
“What’s with you today?”
“Nothing.”
“Uh-huh.” I elbowed him. “Then stop worrying me. I won’t be long.”
“Who’s worrying who?” He rolled his eyes, although his nonchalance felt forced. It gave me pause; he seemed strangely vulnerable, almost afraid, and I could not understand why. But I didn’t want to lose sight of the stranger either, so I shook my head and hurried down the path. I would talk to Finn later.
The man had disappeared around the corner. I walked faster. This was likely a waste of time and, of course, I didn’t know what I would actually do if I caught up to him. Demand an explanation? An explanation for what? I climbed the broad flight of stairs to the upper eastern sector of the Gardens, taking them two steps at a time. No law prohibited smiling.
An Enforcer greeted me at the archway to the Winter Gardens. I nodded to her. Beyond the arch, wooden walkways snaked between the evergreen trees. Luck chimes clinked in the breeze.
The Winter Gardens were the one sector that stayed green all year round, which made it amongst the most popular areas in the Gardens. As a child I had climbed these trees with Finn while my mother met with her friends on the benches below. We had invented all kinds of fantasies back then, about what we would become when we grew up. Stupid childhood dreams.
The man was waiting, standing in the shade at the first fork in the path. When he saw me coming, he smirked and beckoned.
That caught me off-guard, and was irritating enough to overcome my natural reticence. I advanced toward him.
“Excuse me,” I said. “I’m not sure…”
“Corpse eater,” he called.
I stopped in my tracks. A nearby woman’s head whipped around.
“Uh…” I wet my lips. “Sir, I think…”
“You are a corpse eater.” He pronounced the words carefully, as if speaking to a child. He was still smiling. “Isn’t that right, Acolyte Elfreda Raughn?”
He’s mad, I thought, reeling. To so casually blaspheme against the Sisterhood was insane. And how does he know who I am?
The handful of people in the vicinity were all staring at us.
“Did you hear me? I can say it louder,” he said.
“I heard you.”
Although my words were soft, a shiver rippled through the onlookers. The Winter Gardens had become very quiet.
“So?”
What was this? With so many witnesses, I knew I needed to respond. His behaviour verged on the treasonous. Actually, it probably was treasonous. And yet he clearly wanted me to react, which meant that this had to be some kind of trap. Absurd. My anger, always close to the surface, spilled over.
“I don’t know who you are,” I said, still without raising my voice, “but you seem to be under the impression that I give a damn about your opinions.”
“Oh, but you do, corpse eater.”
“Don’t test me.”
“Or what?” He knew that he had gotten under my skin. “Gonna send me to the Renewal Wards?”
It was a push too far. I drew on my lace and slammed a rope into his torso, intending to throw him off his feet.
Instead, my power hit an invisible wall and rebounded.
I took a step backwards.
He laughed. “What’s wrong?”
I tried again; wound the lace tighter and stronger this time. Again, it snapped away from him like a repulsed magnet. The civilians whispered. To them, it looked like I was doing nothing at all. A horrible feeling of helplessness welled up from the pit of my stomach.
“Anything to say?”
I took a step toward him.
“Don’t test me,” he mocked, and snapped his fingers.
An invisible rope caught me around the shoulders. I jerked to a halt. My anger and shock made it difficult to weave lace; it turned slick and slipped away from me. As I fumbled to sever the first rope, another took its place.
I was outmatched.
“How are you doing that?” I growled.
The man feigned a look of innocence. One of the civilians edged closer to him, apparently with the intention of tackling him from behind. She came to an abrupt stop.
“Please stay back,” I said to the onlookers. Where is Enforcement?
“Very noble of you.” The man walked toward me.
I smiled thinly. “You must realise that the Sisterhood will not tolerate this. There’s no way you can evade us.”
He patted me on the head as he passed.
“Want to bet?” he whispered.
Outrage rendered me speechless. I drew on my power and hacked at the rope until it disintegrated. How dare he? The power binding me fell away. The civilian woman stumbled as I freed her.
“Please do not leave the area!” I shouted to the onlookers, as I turned on heel. “You may be required to serve as witnesses!”
The man was already at the arch. Eater, he was fast. I ran after him, my feet pounding on the walkway. The Enforcer shouted in surprise, her body stiffening as if paralysed. This made no sense; only Sisters could use lace, and yet those had definitely been lacework bindings. I balled my fists. Humiliated. He had treated me like a child in front of civilians.
Through the arch, and past the Enforcer. The man was halfway down the stairs.
Even though the distance was too great, I threw a lacework rope at him. The binding fell short, but clipped his ankle. He staggered sideways and knocked into the balustrade. For a moment, I thought that he might fall over the edge. There was a twenty-foot drop to the level below, enough to break his neck. My stomach lurched. Then he caught himself and stumbled on down the stairs.
“Stop right there, Acolyte!”
The Enforcer had worked her way free from the binding and caught up to me.
“Let him go,” she panted. “I’ve triggered the alarm. Enforcement will apprehend him at the gates.”
“But…” The man had reached the base of the stairs.
“We don’t know what he’s capable of, Acolyte.”
Another person to identify me without my robes, I thought, as the man vanished into the lower Gardens. For the first time it struck me that the woman did not resemble an Enforcer. Although she wore the sharp-cut maroon uniform of their order, she had black lace-ups instead of work boots, and the brief run had left her out of breath. A suspicion formed in my mind.
“Understood,” I said. I gestured regret with my hands. “I’m sorry for getting in your way.”
The woman shook her head. “No need to apologize; there wasn’t anything I could have done anyway.”
She’s lying, I thought. There was something slightly false about her expression, too much emphasis behind her words.
“You’ll have to make a witness statement at the Detainment Offices. Ask for Herald Rhyanon Hayder.” The woman sighed heavily. “I must reassure the civilians. Please excuse me.”
Rhyanon Hayder did not work in the Detainment Office; she was Deputy Chief of Civil Obligations. But I nodded anyway.
“Eater’s grace upon you,” I said.
I watched the Enforcer walk toward the Winter Gardens. The man was long gone now, and I stood alone at the top of the stairs. A breeze rustled through the trees.
I wasn’t sure why she had tried to deceive me. But it looked an awful lot like both she and Herald Hayder were impersonating Enforcement staff. That interested me.
I turned right and headed toward Minor West and the Detainment Offices. Time to find some answers.