The sun is well below the horizon when I approach our house on Saltball Street. I don’t mind traveling in darkness; as well as these blue robes disguise me, they are rather conspicuous. At least the hood hides my face, though it is not customary for brothers and sisters to wear their hoods up all the time.
I am surprised to find the house dark, and a queasiness slips around in my guts for just a moment. Calm yourself. No reason to think anything is amiss. Despite Bonner’s threats, the human sibling of a redwing is blameless. Anyone who has ever read Mother May can tell you that. That child is as innocent as a sunrise and, if anything, is to be pitied and protected because of her despicable twin. Now that I am dead, Jey has nothing to fear.
She has gone out with friends tonight, taking advantage of Papa’s absence to exercise her freedom, that is all. Just as I have. I must confess I am a little hurt she can be out reveling while I am, as far as she knows, still missing.
But my mind is uneasy as I walk the path to our door. Some part of it sees the overturned flowerpot, the kicked-up stones, but I don’t let myself admit something is wrong until I depress the latch on our door to find it swinging from one hinge.
A strange smell hits me as I enter the kitchen. No, more like the absence of smells. Papa’s earth-covered boots, the floral fragrance that clings to him, Jey’s perfume, coal dust from the cookstove, the lingering scents of breakfasts and suppers.
I take in the room. The heavy table askew. A chair on its back. The door to Jey’s room open wide, as she never would have left it.
No.
I rush through the doorway to find her bed unmade and her armoire full. A graceful, curving vase—a prized birthday present from our father—is in pieces on the floor, Jey’s meticulously ash-grown blue daisies scattered and broken.
She is gone.
Stomach churning, I gather what remains of the daisies and bring them into the kitchen. At the sink, I fill a tin cup with water and cut the broken stems with a pair of sharp scissors. My efforts don’t matter; their lives ended days ago. Still, as my nerves prick my skin and my mind swirls, it helps to do something.
I right the chair and lean forward, nausea overtaking me in little waves. The wood grain squirms as I gaze vaguely at our kitchen table.
I should have run back here.
As soon as I woke up in that pile of worms, I should have run to Saltball Street. Why did I waste so much time at the Temple? What terrible things were happening to Jey while I kissed a young man who shouldn’t even know I exist?
I sit, running my hands over the table’s uneven wooden surface. I’ve never been connected to a name before, the name this house bears, and now people know who I am—the Beautiful Ones, Nara Blake, Zahi, who knows who else? I have taken risks and exposed myself, and now my sister is gone.
But I will find her. And the first person I’ll ask is that son of a stritch, Bonner.
I rise, determination burning my lungs, and take two steps toward the door. A sudden crash from the Dome freezes me. Someone is here.
I move carefully to the ladder at the back of the kitchen and place a hand on a metal rung at shoulder height. I cast my ears into the ringing silence. Nothing more. Probably one of the raptors knocking my books over again.
I peer up into the darkness. “Jey?” The Dome breathes only silence for another moment, then—
CLANG.
The ladder shudders as a body thumps down, two rungs at a time, landing with a jarring knock. The woman is thin-framed but formidable, towering over me in a long, tight coat as black as night fog. “There you are,” she snaps; then her red mouth frowns. “What the hell happened here?”
I cross my arms. “Uh—you trashed my house?”
“Enough of this.” She draws a dull-surfaced pistol from a holster around her hips.
“Mol’s bulging coin purse!” I yelp, skidding across the floor toward the broken doorway.
“Damn it!” the woman yells, her voice edged with a rasp. “Get back here!”
No one in the history of the world has ever turned around in response to “get back here,” especially not when it is said in a menacing tone by someone holding a pistol. However, any inclination I might have had to accede to her request dies quickly when a bone-rattling explosion rocks my ears. She has fired the damn thing at me!
I kick the swinging door out of the way and stumble out into the night. A couple of raptors take off from the pitch of a roof across the street as I sprint through the beams of the streetlamp that guards our fence, the woman fast behind me. The cobblestones push on my feet, heavy with the gardener’s boots that miraculously survived the boiling lake.
The second bullet doesn’t miss. I feel the piercing flame the moment I hear the shot, an eruption of pain that staggers my whole body. At first, as I fall sideways into a low stone window frame, I don’t even know where I’ve been shot. But when I try to push forward, my left leg buckles. The ball is lodged somewhere in my thigh. Sweet Rasus, let it not bleed very much. This is the first prayer my brain slings forth. Boil me, slice my ears, cover me with maggots if you will. But black blood pouring from a bullet wound—no robes in all of Caldaras would cover that up.
I brace myself against the wall. No open doors, no busy market, no public park that might have offered a hiding place. I either run, or I—don’t.
I run. Left and right, through lamplight and shadow, the tilt of Caldaras City keeping my mind slanted and my elbows flapping for balance. My thigh screams, dripping hot down my leg under my robes, but I have no other choice. I lurch past couples, ladies in deep conversation, and dapper gentlemen, some of whom look at me sideways as though I might be a purse snatcher. But my priest’s attire is enough to keep the suspicious looks from becoming cries for a city guard.
The nighttime mist dampens my face. The woman in black keeps pace about a block behind me. Maybe she’s waiting to see where I run to, which is a decision I need to make quickly.
I think of Nara Blake. She wanted my help, promised to help me in return, but do I trust her? If Bonner does have something to do with Jey’s disappearance, my path probably leads back to the Temple of Rasus. Nara Blake has no love for priests; that much was clear. And I have to go somewhere.
The street spills out, as they all seem to do sooner or later, onto High Ra Square. Even after dark, when most citizens are indoors for fear of the rest of the citizens, the square is quietly humming with activity. Common people and priests of all ranks wander the smooth white flagstones, taking advantage of the city’s version of a pleasant evening. I slow down, insinuating myself in between two groups of priests and casting a glance over my shoulder, before mustering a final effort to sprint toward the fountain of Dal Roet and throw myself behind it.
I peek out from behind the curved marble. Priests everywhere. Blue, purple, a few black, all sizes and descriptions. Gentlemen and ladies, urchins and wealthy brats, stritches, pet parakeets, and showy, fat raptors. No figure approaches the fountain in a purposeful way. Is it possible I have lost my attacker?
I straighten up, one vertebra at a time, my thigh searing pain up and down my body. The fountain spits and bubbles; people speak easily amid patches of warm fog. I chance a few steps toward the edge of the square, where a dark alley promises some small measure of concealment.
Two priests in black stop speaking and regard me as I limp too close to their private sphere. I pause and nod briskly, muttering, “Breathe easy, Beloved.” The words come out a bit wincing and strangled, but I flash what I hope is an innocent smile.
The high priests’ faces are inscrutable for a moment, before one returns my nod and the other follows suit. “Breathe easy,” they say in unison.
At last, I reach the mouth of the alley and cast one final look over High Ra Square. Three young people sit on the edge of the fountain now, two boys with weak chins and a girl whose high-collared shirt is unbuttoned to well below her clavicle. They could easily be Jey and her friends, I think with a pang. But they are not. I know in my heart that, at this moment, Jey is not with anyone who could be called a friend.
My distraction has betrayed me. Eyes on the other side of the square flash in the light from the holy beacons set in the wall of the great Temple. The woman in black has found me.
I duck into the alley, weaving around old crates, stritch manure, and leaning sheet metal. It opens onto another, familiar alley. I press my back against a grubby wall and scan left and right.
Rubble is still strewn at the place where I melted the brick wall—I am close to the back door of the Daily Bulletin. I stagger to the gated end of the alleyway and yank on the door. Locked. In desperation, I pound my fists against the dented surface. “Hey! Daily Bulletin! I’m at the back door! Hey, there!” Bang, bang, bang. Nothing.
Waves of dizziness wash over me. I’m unsure how much longer I can remain vertical, and the woman in black will emerge at any moment. I doubt she will miss her shot here, and I have a strong suspicion that one bullet lodged in one’s flesh is more than enough.
A swell of laughter intrudes on the quiet, and I remember the Pump Room tavern—it must also back onto this dirt-packed passage. I find the door about halfway down, where the sounds from the pub start to mix with the muted buzz of Mad Lane.
This door is unlocked, and I pop it open with a clank. I close it behind me and, with much effort, shift the inside handle to the locked position. It is a bit corroded, and takes a couple good shoves with my shoulders before it creaks into place. Finally, a moment to breathe.
Or a moment to fall to the floor in agony.
Mol’s blazing buttocks! I pull up my robes and examine the wound on the outer part of my thigh. It is not too bad, actually. It’s bleeding, but not excessively. I poke at it a couple times with dirty fingers, but there is no sign of the little deformed piece of metal under the surface. I can remove it later, but for now I can at least get it bandaged.
Wash it first. I take in my surroundings. This back storage room is dim, crowded with barrels and crates, and the sound of the Pump Room’s evening crowd filters in through a slatted inner door. I crawl over to a shelf of jugs and grab the first one within reach. The golden liquid within stings down to the bone, but washes my incriminating blood away onto the straw-strewn floor.
I sacrifice a small sack of oats for a bandage, whispering apologies to the tavern keeper and dumping the evidence behind a stack of crates. Wrapped tightly in burlap, my leg feels a bit better, and I pull myself to my feet and wobble over to the inner door.
I peer between the slats, holding my breath. At the other end of a short hallway, I glimpse a crowded room, low lights, lots of movement and sound and color. The few faces I catch are flushed and bulging with laughter. I don’t see any other priest robes, but surely a place like this is for everyone. It’s just a matter of sneaking in when no one is—
A man starts down the hallway toward this storage room. I give a start, backing away from the slatted door. The last thing I want is to be mistaken for a thief and handed over to the city guard.
I have only seconds. Think, think. Hide. A row of large barrels stands against one wall, and I scramble into one and crouch, wincing. It would be nice to cover myself, but there is no time. The sides of the barrel are high enough to hide me as long as the man doesn’t look in.
As soon as I crouch down, I hear the slatted door open. The man saunters to the other side of the room, and after a moment, I hear the dull rasp of small wooden barrels—kegs, most likely—being shuffled around. I don’t dare breathe except with shallow sips, and I hold my knees to stop the fabric of my robes sliding against the edge of the barrel.
It isn’t long before the man’s footsteps take him in the direction of the slatted door once again, and I hold my lungs and my hands very still. Once he returns to the noisy common room, I’ll wait a few minutes and then try to slip in unnoticed. I wait for the sound of the slatted door clicking back into place.
But it doesn’t come. Could the man have left the door open and gone back down the hallway without my hearing him? I close my eyes, listening.
Two thudding footsteps, and a stern voice says, “What in wet hell are you doing in there?”
I gasp, startled, and raise my head a little.
The man is looking at me over the edge of the barrel, arms crossed. He reminds me of the stout, rosy-complexioned fruit vendor my father sometimes stops to talk with when we are out together. Only he wears an expression that promises wallops rather than peaches.
“You—you mean me,” I say.
“Your powers of deduction are staggering, Sister. What are you doing in my barrel?” he says gruffly. “Rather, what were you doing in my barrel, because you cannot possibly be sitting there still, even as I am preparing to call the guard and have you hauled away.”
I stand. “Oh. Right. I just—” I throw my good leg over the side and try to hoist myself out, but my robes catch the edge and the barrel tips over onto the floor with a crunch. “Rasus’s flaming ass!”
The man raises his eyebrows. “Not very nice language for a woman of the Temple.”
Shit. “Oh—” I scramble to my feet, the pain in my leg making my breath catch. “—well, I’m only a—” I look down at my robes. “—a blue one.”
The man nods. “Uh-huh.” He doesn’t sound convinced. “You mean a postulant?”
“Postulant! Right. I knew that.”
“That gives me hope for the future.” He leans back against the slatted door, eyes twinkling despite his stern expression. “What’s your name, Postulant? And think of a good one, or I’m calling the city guard. That was my favorite decrepit barrel.”
“I—” My mind is paralyzed. I won’t give him Jey’s name and I can’t give him my own, since I don’t have one. But he already knows I’m going to lie, so—I search my memory for a name, any name. “Nara Blake,” I say. “My name’s Nara Blake.”
The man straightens up. “What?” His tone is no longer light, and he peers at me shrewdly. “Did you say Nara Blake?”
That was apparently the wrong name. “No,” I stumble. “No, I said Dal Roet. My name’s Dal Roet. After my great-great-great-great—”
The man steps toward me and puts a callused hand on my shoulder. “How do you know Nara Blake?”
I back away. “I don’t! I don’t know what you’re talking about. I—”
“Get the hell out of here, Sister,” he spits. “Before I smack your head off your shoulders.”
“Sounds like a deal.” I limp over to the outer door, imploring all the gods I can think of to have sent the woman in black away by now.
“Mr. Orm!” a girl calls down the hallway. “Any more gin? We’ve got a wedding party!”
“Coming!” the man bellows back. But something sticks in my brain.
“Mr. Orm?” I turn around. Why do I know that name?
“Well,” he says. “Now you have the advantage of me, clearly. Nevertheless, I’m calling the guard in thirty seconds.”
“No, I— You know Nara Blake, don’t you?” My leg throbs and I put a hand to the warm wall, praying I don’t pass out.
“I know I don’t like questions.” Orm scowls, but he doesn’t move. He’s listening.
Risking everything is getting easier. I’m not sure that’s a good thing. But I have nowhere to go, and Nara Blake is the only person in this city who has offered me protection. Whatever her motivations are, she has to be a better bet than the guard or the temple. Or the gutter.
“Orm,” I say as the memory slides into focus, “did you help Nara’s brother Corvin after he was beat up in an alley? She was going to ask you to look in on him.”
He looks down his nose at me. “And how in Ver’s green land do you know that?”
“I’m the reason he got beat up. No—wait—I mean, he was helping me run off these two—um—ruffians.”
“You’re a damned liar.”
My sight is beginning to blur. I slide down the surface of the door and look up at Orm, who regards me with an expression I can’t interpret. “I need somewhere safe. I think Nara would help me if she were here. Please. My sister is missing.” I leave out the part about having been shot in the leg, though he must see I’m not exactly at my best. Maybe he thinks I’m drunk. Maybe a few dips in the ale barrel wouldn’t be a bad idea.
Orm doesn’t move. I find his face through my hazy vision. “Nara wanted my help. She said … may you always walk under the fog.”
Something in his face changes. “You—you can’t be— Curse you, you featherless little stritchlet,” he says. “We thought you were dead.” He takes a step to the right and lifts a hinged flap to reveal a handle set into the dingy wall. When he rotates it, a large panel slides back with a metallic click-click-click-click. Iron mesh stairs descend into darkness. I feel my eyes widen with astonishment. “It’s safe down there,” he grumbles. “Until Nara tells us what to do with you. Now, up.” He pulls me to my feet and I steady myself for a moment, then follow him through the secret doorway.
“Cozy,” I say as we clink our way downward. Already I am thinking of the white-gray sky through the glass of the Dome as I remember the dank nightmare of the dungeon of the Temple of Rasus.
At least there is gas down here. I can see its steady, pure light from under the studded door at the bottom of the stairs.
“I hope you like beer and sandwiches, because we don’t do anything else,” Orm says. I don’t ask what kind of sandwiches. Unless the Pump Room is a lot more upscale than its creaking door and rusty flooring would have me believe, the sandwiches will taste like smoke regardless of what they’re made of.
“Thank you,” I say. Orm takes a key from around his neck and rattles it into the keyhole, and after a moment we are stepping into the room beyond. The place called “safe.”
At first, I don’t see the furniture or the colors or the people. I only smell an evasive sweetness; it is thick in the air here, almost overpowering. The heat hits me, too. Of course it’s hot underground, but it feels unnaturally hot here, as though a fire were burning.
I steady myself, my hand against the heavy doorframe. A fire is burning, in a small hearth opposite the doorway. I begin to take in the rest of this round, brick-walled room. A row of books stands neatly on a graceful-legged side table flanked by stiff armchairs. A handful of people dot the room—men and women, my age, older, most of them wearing the dull colors of pump workers and mechanics. Some look me over appraisingly; some keep their heads down.
“Welcome to the Under House.” Orm crosses the floor. “I’ll show you the bunk room. It serves its purpose, but don’t expect the Copper Palace. Just through here.”
He pushes open an arched door. The bunk room is long and dark, and thankfully not so hot as the main room. A few cots jut from the edges, most of them covered by thin blankets of different colors. Metal hooks adorn the walls, some hanging dusters or scarves, some empty.
“There are spare clothes in here.” Orm pulls an old trunk from underneath one of the cots. “That is, unless you really are from the Temple.”
I give a little cough. “I, uh—”
“Oh, for the love of the Long Angel, you’re the worst liar I’ve ever met.” He shakes his head, but smiles and heads back through the arched doorway. “Washroom is through there.” He points to the other end of the bunk room.
“My sister—”
“We’ll find your sister,” Orm says, and for a moment his gentle, concerned face reminds me of my father. “Wash your face, put on something less goddamn conspicuous, and I’ll fetch Nara. We’ll see what she has to say about you.”
When he has gone, I creak open the trunk and start to paw through its modest offerings. Of course, everything smells like mothballs. I pull out a tatty muslin shirt and head to the washroom to rewrap my leg. At least it’s probably more hygienic than an old sack off the floor of a dirty storage room. Slightly more hygienic. And I do wash my face, my fingers relaxing a little as I test the fresh basinful of hot water.
Back in the bunk room, I throw my robes to the floor. The trunk’s modern underclothes feel better against my skin. I pull on an old pair of pants, simple and in good shape. They are from a time not so long ago as to be completely outdated, but their sturdy black twill doesn’t billow like the airy silks and light muslins that now pepper the streets. I find them a bit restrictive, but there are no other options. I button a worn shirt—why would anyone need so many buttons?—and tie my hair up, not as elegantly as Jey can do it, but in a way that at least implies domesticated.
A knock on the bunk room door. “Come in!” I call.
Nara Blake strides in. “Well,” she says, “you got yourself executed rather more quickly than I’d imagined.” She leans against the wall, arms crossed.
“That’s a hell of a greeting,” I say, wincing as I lower myself onto a cot. “Aren’t you even surprised to see me?”
“A bit,” she says lightly.
“I did get thrown into a boiling lake.” I draw myself up. “Most people might be a little impressed.”
She pushes herself off the wall with her shoulders. “I said I was surprised to see you.”
“And you couldn’t even be bothered to run a story about my execution?”
Nara shrugs. “Your execution was a secret. The Beautiful Ones don’t even exist. I don’t know about any of it, officially. Besides, what would I have said? ‘Onyx Staff Offs Another One’?”
I feel my jaw drop. “What?”
She takes a step toward me, eyebrows drawn. Her mouth is— Is she smirking? “My dear, don’t you know why everyone is afraid of the Onyx Staff?”
“I didn’t know everyone was afraid of him. I—my father told me not to speak to high priests.”
“Your father was right. The temples have a lot of power, especially the Temple of Rasus. The priests are very … devout. And people who displease the Onyx Staff—heretics, revolutionaries, criminals, newspaper editors who print the wrong story—they sometimes disappear. Poof! Like steam off the ass of an overworked stritch.”
“I could have lived without that image.” My leg throbs and I shift my weight. “But that’s—that has to be illegal. Right? No trial, no conviction? And only the gods can punish someone for heresy. Why doesn’t the Commandant do something?”
“Do something?” Nara sits on the edge of the cot opposite me. “Even if he wanted to take on the Temple of Rasus—which would be fairly insane, even for a politician—he couldn’t possibly prove anything.”
I lean forward. “What? Why not?”
“The Onyx Staff doesn’t bellow out orders like a dictator,” she says. “He insinuates, or he uses metaphor, or he talks about something else entirely. And people magically end up—well, some of them end up at the bottom of Lake Azure Wave.”
I don’t know how to respond. My shoulders slump back against the wall behind my cot.
Nara adjusts the front of her tidy jacket. “Sorry, does that spoil your squeaky-clean image of Caldaras City?”
I scowl. I’m pretty sure Nara Blake is on my side, if there are sides to be on. But that doesn’t mean she isn’t irritating. “Still. Secret or not, you did know what happened to me. And one would think your readers would have been mildly interested.”
Nara smirks. “Well, look at the recluse who wants to be famous now.”
I huff. “I am not a recluse, and I certainly don’t want to be famous. It’s just that I thought this whole thing might be a bigger deal since I’m a—you know.”
Now she gives me a hard look. “No, I don’t know. Are you trying to tell me something?”
I breathe in. Didn’t I decide to trust Nara Blake the moment I asked for her help?
I put a hand to my top button. No! my mind yells. Wrong! Stop! But my fingers pull the button loose, then the ones underneath, all the way down. I stand, slipping my arms out of their sleeves, and now I wear only the short chemise from the old trunk. I turn away to give Nara Blake a full view of my bare shoulders and naked upper back.
To her credit, Nara reacts nothing like the priests in the temple sanctuary. She glances at the door to the common room, then blinks, takes a deep breath, and steps toward me. I don’t move as she touches my back. “That part’s true, then,” she says. “The scars.”
“I’ve got the blood, too,” I say.
“So I’ve heard. I’ll have to take Corvin’s word for it, I suppose.”
I put on my shirt and start to button it back up. “I’m not opening a vein for you. Don’t even bother saying please.”
“Well. Good. Now that we’ve got that out of the way,” Nara says, “maybe you can do something worthy of a story in the Daily Bulletin.”
“I’m a bit out of tricks. Getting boiled alive was supposed to be my big finish.”
She snorts. “My friend, you don’t think you’re the only redwing the Onyx Staff has had thrown into Lake Azure Wave, do you?”
I put a hand to my forehead. “What in wet hell are you talking about? Of course I’m the only redwing he’s thrown in the lake. I’m the only goddamn redwing!”
“As far as we know, yes, you are,” Nara says. “And you know how rare—how impossible that seems, even to those of us who accept that real, living Others, straight out of a fairy tale, have visited this very city. But power needs fear to survive, and there is nothing in Caldaras more fearsome than a redwing. So to lend an artificial hand to his very real cause, the Onyx Staff sometimes … creates them.”
Wait, what? “Creates—?” But I stop myself. I remember the guards in the dungeon preparing to whip my back—and stopping when they realized the scars were already there. I remember the dagger that sliced my arm before the whole sanctuary, the cut that didn’t hurt and was miraculously healed when I awoke only days later, but that nevertheless produced a torrent of black blood for all to see. The cut, I realize, that was never there at all. And I remember the look of utter shock on the face of the Onyx Staff when one of his “redwings” actually fought back.
Nara rises and crosses to the door. “Well, welcome to the Under House.”
“That’s it? Opening your doors to a fearsome mythical creature like I’m a random tourist? Aren’t you supposed to be getting the vapors or something?”
“I’d rather help you free your sister.”
Relief—or is it hope?—balls in my throat. “Can you really?”
“I certainly hope so.”
I speak with more emotion than I intend. “Why help me, Nara?”
She blinks, and for the first time I notice the shadows under her eyes. “You are a rare thing, my friend. Unique in ways that make you extremely important to us, and to our enemies. We need your help.” She smiles weakly. “And … well, I wouldn’t want anyone kidnapping Corvin. It would make me quite angry. I imagine you feel the same way about your sister.”
“Yes. Thank you,” I say.
“Very well, then,” Nara says, businesslike. “But I’ll be honest—I’m afraid this might be dangerous.”
I smooth my hair and check my reflection in the glass of a framed landscape on the wall. “I’ve already been killed once.”
Now she turns to me, serious. “Yes. And the fact that you’re dead is the only reason you’re still alive.”
* * *
When Nara and I enter the common room, Orm and a woman are sitting at a long central table that holds collections of papers and pewter mugs. They rise when they see us, and the woman takes Nara’s hands in hers. Nara looks to Orm and says, “How is he today?”
Orm nods. “Right as rain. He’ll be here in a moment, I should think. I sent a boy to fetch him.”
Nara looks at the woman now, tall and delicate with shining blond hair, and says, “Elena. This is—is—” Nara looks at me. “Well, this is she.”
Now the blond woman turns her attention to me. She extends a hand, and I curl my fingers around hers.
“A living, breathing redwing!” she says, her eyes shining.
“This is a bit of luck, isn’t it?” Orm winks. “And to think, I almost had you hauled off.”
I shoot Nara a wide-eyed glance. Is it her intention for everyone in Caldaras to know what I am? She doesn’t respond.
“Welcome, friend,” Elena says, releasing Nara’s hands. Her voice and eyes are soft, the opposite of Nara’s steely exterior. “We are the Fog Walkers, those who leave the shelter of Mol’s warm breath only to protect his city from harm. There is great danger coming, but you may just give us a chance.”
I frown. “Danger?”
Nara makes a dismissive gesture. “She doesn’t know anything yet. And her sister’s gone missing.”
Elena’s face falls, the green of her shirt reflected in her eyes. “Oh, yes, of course. You must be positively climbing the walls. Come, sit.”
We gather around the long table—Nara, Elena, Orm and I, and the other residents of the Under House. They smile and make room for me, offering words of welcome. All the contact makes me light-headed. Or maybe it’s the pain in my wounded leg. I try to smile back, be normal. But they know what I am, these people. When does this dream end? When will I wake up, midair over Lake Azure Wave? I take a swig from my pewter mug, which contains a liquid that might once have been beer before it was wrung out of someone’s old watery stockings.
A moment later, Corvin emerges red-faced and weary from behind the studded door to the stairway. He gazes at me, astonished, then shoots Nara a questioning look.
“Sit,” Nara says. “Our redwing is not drowned after all.”
Still watching me, Corvin hastens to the table and lowers himself next to his sister. “You’re looking well for a dead person,” he says with ragged breath.
“You, too,” I say, which makes him gurgle-laugh.
“We lost you on Roet Island,” Corvin says, and Nara gives him a sharp look.
I lean forward. “You were watching me?”
Now Nara regards me dispassionately. “I told you we needed your help.” There is no cruelty in her features, but I realize with a shiver that Nara Blake is used to getting what she wants. I study her carefully painted eyes, her flawless, powdered skin. Something in me knows she is good, in the way a just law is good. But good doesn’t always mean right. Or kind.
Suddenly, the studded door crashes open and in strides a young woman, tall and striking, with glossy, unpinned hair and red lips, dressed all in black. On one hip hangs a long saber, on the other a pistol. She says nothing, but casts a sour glance over the room before sitting heavily at the table and pulling a mug toward her.
I jump to my feet. “You!”
She raises her eyes. “Oh, damn it.”
“What’s going on?” Elena says. “What’s the matter, Fir?”
The woman—Fir—has risen from her seat and gestures violently at me. “What is she doing here?” She looks at Corvin. “Don’t tell me you got her! I swear, if you’ve stepped on my toes again—”
I point. “You shot me in the flaming leg!”
“What?” Orm puts a palm to his forehead. “For the love of all that’s on fire, girl, why didn’t you say anything? I’ll have you fixed up—”
Corvin stands now. “What is all this about?”
Fir looks knives at me. “She was in the house.”
“In the house?” I look to Nara, Corvin, Orm. “You mean, in the house where I live? Who is this woman? Did you send her to kidnap me, too?”
“You weren’t supposed to shoot her!” Corvin looks horrified.
“She ran!” Fir says. “My assignment was to bring her back, and I wasn’t going to lose her the way you did!”
Elena speaks calmly. “You were meant to persuade her, Fir.”
“I was meant to produce her,” Fir hisses. “And when I get a job, it’s because persuasion has failed.”
“Enough of this!” Nara barks. “Fir, Redwing. Redwing, Fir. Now, everyone shut the hell up and sit down.”
Everyone sits, and I cast a wary eye over the room. Fir takes a swig from her mug. I guess the Fog Walkers really do need my help. It’s baffling.
“The Deep Dark is a week away.” Nara is all business now. “That’s what our priority is, to get the redwing to the Heart in time for Crepuscule. If Sunny’s information is correct, the bonescorch orchis will be a problem. But now that we have the redwing—”
“No.” I slap the table. The Fog Walkers are silent, eyes on me. Nara sets her mouth disapprovingly. “‘The Heart’?” I snap. “‘The orchis’? ‘The redwing’? I will not be an item on your scavenger hunt. Whatever it is you need of me, we rescue my sister first. And I must write to my father as soon as possible.”
“The work your father is doing with the blight is critical,” Nara says. “It’s best for him to stay where he is. Your sister has been taken to the Temple of Rasus. She is in no danger for now.”
“What?”
“She is in no danger.” Corvin’s tone looks to soothe my ruffles. “They are most likely keeping her for questioning, that is all.”
I glare at him. “I know exactly how their questioning goes.”
“In any case, the Heart takes precedence,” Nara says. “Then, I promise you, we will free your sister.”
I stand, even as my leg throbs. “I don’t know whose heart you’re so flaming interested in, or why you care about the Empress’s damned party, or why in Ver’s green land you need my help so much that you’re willing to send her”— I jut a thumb at Fir—“to ‘produce’ me. But I’m going to free my sister before I do one more blazing thing, and if you can’t help me, I’m walking out that door.” I fold my arms. “Choose.”
“Oh, Mol’s tongue, can’t you see what she’s doing?” A biting voice pierces the hot air. Fir scowls at me. She has risen from her seat and gestures. “We’re not seriously going to entertain the idea of a jailbreak at the Temple of Rasus!”
I rise and nod to the table. “I will take my leave, then.”
“Wait!” Nara and Elena speak in unison, then look at each other. I pause, a few steps from the door. Elena continues, “Of course we will help you free your sister. And if we have to do it now”—Fir swears and pounds the table, but Elena goes on—“if we have to do it now, then we will. That’s all there is to it.”
“And then what? She decides to help us out of the goodness of her heart and be our redwing savior?” Fir stabs a finger in Elena’s direction. “False hope is worse than no hope. You’re a bunch of fools if you think a redwing actually exists. She’s probably just another heretic with false scars.”
Corvin sets his mug down heavily. “You’re crossing a line, Fir.”
“Show us your bullet wound, redwing,” Orm says. “I’ll pull that deformed little metal bastard out of there, and Fir can see all the blood she wants.”
“Not good enough.” Fir points at me, takes two wide steps to where I am. “I’m sick of these rebel princesses from the Feather and Scuttle seeking us out. We’ve dealt with their tricks before. Sleight of hand, illusion. Just like the bloody Temple. She’s had plenty of time to ink her bandages.”
“I saw her blood,” Corvin says, resting a fist on the table. “Nara can vouch for it.”
“Nara and Corvin,” Fir scoffs, “and no one else.” She saunters over to me. “You’ve got a twin sister and you’re unmarked. That’s all we know.”
The room is quiet; even Orm holds his tongue as Fir goes nose to nose with me. I don’t back away. If this is some kind of test, I’m sure as wet hell not going to let her get the better of me. I let her lean in, the sweet, sharp scent on her making my nostrils tingle.
Her eyes narrow. “You know what I think?” she snarls. I don’t respond. She turns to the others. “That’s all there is to know. She needs help getting her goddamned unmarked twin out of the temple prison, that’s all. And isn’t that what we’re just about to do? Fools.”
The people around the table erupt into mutters, throwing me doubtful looks. Elena’s face is impassive. Orm looks at me as though I owe him some kind of response.
“So what’s your game, princess?” Fir unsheathes her long saber in one violently graceful motion. I don’t move. “Are you a spy?” she asks, soft and treacherous. “Or just a very stupid girl who thought killing priests would be fun?” Now she brings her saber to my throat. A few Fog Walkers gasp as the blade presses against my skin—just the right amount of pressure not to pierce. She knows what she’s doing.
I look into her flashing eyes and I know her. She has a space here, and I am not allowed in. But to call me human? If she only knew what I would give for that to be true!
I am no human. And if I am to exist at last, let it be as myself.
“Fir!” Nara stands, hands on hips. “Stop this!”
Fir turns, instantly playful. “Just a joke, Nara.” She looks at me again. “Fine. I’ll rescue your dear sister. Why don’t you stay here and I’ll write you when I’ve saved the day? Only—I didn’t get your name. Oh, right, your kind don’t have them.” She steps away, smiling sweetly at Nara and lowering her saber.
Almost lowering her saber.
I am too quick for her. I grasp the blade, still at my throat, and she staggers. She turns back, eyebrows drawn in surprise.
“My name?” I press the edge of the blade into my flesh until I can feel the blood trickling down my neck in thick, hot rivulets. The others jump to their feet. Mugs clatter to the floor. Fir’s eyes widen and she tries to back away.
I release the blade, now black with my extraordinary, unmistakable blood. “My name is Redwing.”