Tim Akers

Dead of Veridon

Chapter One

He was a Crow, He was a Crane

T HERE ARE PEOPLE you should shoot the first time you meet them. Just to keep it simple. And you usually don't know it until it's well too late, and well more complicated than you ever wanted it to be. Ezekiel Crane is a man I should have shot, first time I laid eyes on him. Pound of trouble that would have saved.

Gray Anderson and I had been working odd jobs for the past year. We were never going to get above petty criminal, and while I was okay with never drawing the kind of attention my past had afforded me, Gray had ambition. Nice word for 'recklessness,' and Gray wasn't the kind of guy who could get himself cleanly out of trouble. It was why he brought me along, honestly. I had a way of getting into trouble, and eventually that gives you a way of getting out of trouble. Certain skills you acquire.

Trouble was, getting out of all that trouble had given Gray the idea that he was getting good at it. That he could take the big risks, the bad deals, and old Jacob would get him clear of it when the walls caught on fire and the guns were drawn. Kept taking worse jobs, for better money, and we were getting a reputation as a reckless crew. A wrecking crew. It was going nowhere good.

And that's how we met Mr. Crane. Worst job Gray ever took. Worst trouble I ever got us out of.

It was a Tuesday. Pissing rain. Kind of night I liked to hunker down in some familiar pub and stare into the fire until they made me buy a beer. I could usually afford a couple. Point was, I didn't like standing in the rain, or even under an eave in the wet street while the rain hammered the cobbles and drenched my boots. Basically, I didn't like everything that I'd been doing all night, running from shelter to shelter as Gray led me across the city to some meeting.

Worse, he was in a great mood. Gray Anderson has earned his first name, mostly by moping about the weather or mourning the loss of the love of some great lady he's never actually met. That's how I like the man. Sullen. Morbid. Levity sat awkwardly on his frame. But here he was, ducking his head before dashing across the street, cackling with glee as he splashed through the sheets of runoff. It was miserable.

"Grand night, Jacob! Glorious night! A night we'll remember, I dare say."

"For the pneumonia that killed us?" I asked. No matter how high I shrugged my overcoat over my shoulders, an icy spike of water ran down my back with each sprint into the rain. I was beginning to doubt the coat's willingness to perform its duty. "Or for a more general misery that ruins our happiness, but fails to kill us?"

"For the fortune that we'll be packing away, Jacob!" Gray stopped in the middle of the road and raised his arms, as though he were greeting the sun. "The fortune!"

"That's our job tonight? Packing away fortune?" I smirked. "That's a pretty good job. Surprised they're just giving that one away to anyone."

"Don't be a glum bastard, Burnie. This is just a step to the fortune. But gods, such a step it is." He poked me in the shoulder as I hurried past him into the next bit of shelter. "Though to be honest, hardly any fortune in this particular job. You understand. It's a step. But there's fortune behind it. This fellow, this Crane chap, he has the money."

"Then why haven't I heard of him, Gray?" I paused under our most recent shelter and fixed my usually sullen compatriot with an unhappy glare. "I know a lot of rich people in this town. You might say I know all of them. By name. None of them go by Erat-a-tat Crane."

"Ezekiel. Ezekiel Crane. Jacob, you need to learn to show some respect. He's an out-of-town interest. And wherever he's from, it is lined in vaults of money and style and class." He broke into an ugly grin that revealed a youth spent in direct rebellion to all forms of oral surgery. "Our man Crane has it dripping it off him."

"Well. I can't imagine how this could go wrong, Gray. Mysterious out of town richie reaches out to the criminal underclass for the sole purpose of making them filthy rich." I clapped Gray on the shoulder. "Your plan is impeccable, my man Gray. Without flaw."

"You're such a shit. But I'm not going to let it get to me, Jacob. Not tonight. And he didn't just reach out to the criminal underclass. He reached out to you, my boy. Jacob Burn."

"Pardon me?"

"Asked for you by name. Well, good as. Heard who I was working with, and his man came to me. Sought me out, you understand." Gray poked me solidly in the chest and laughed. "Always knew that sticking with you was the right move."

I didn't like this. I didn't like people who wanted to know me. Never had a good reason for it. Never had a reason that agreed with me.

"Gray, I want you to listen to me very closely. This is a bad thing. The people in this city who want to work with me, they usually want to kill me while they're at it. Do you understand? I can't imagine why someone from out of town would be any better."

"Leave it alone, Jacob. You scare easy. And I understand that, what with your…" — he waved one hand — "your history. But this is going to work out. It's a good job. It's a good step for us to take. Stop worrying about everything."

"It's what I do, Gray. It's why we're not dead. I worry about these things." I pulled him away from the road, staring unhappily down toward our eventual destination. Our meeting with this Mr. Crane. "And I'm telling you, this is not a good thing for us."

"Jacob," Gray said sternly, his fractured smile slipping for just a second. "Listen to me. We're getting nowhere. The jobs we do, the people we work for… they're shit. The pay's terrible, the work's terrible. Everything about them is just terrible. And someday, probably soon, they're going to get us killed."

"Working for a rich man doesn't make that any less likely," I muttered.

"No. But I'd rather die in clean clothes, with my belly full of meat, than in some damn ditch." He pulled himself free of my grasp and adjusted his natty brown suit. "Now come on."

The place didn't look like much from the outside. A wooden house, planking old and black and stained, dark red curtains drawn. No sign of light on the inside. No guard at the front, no knocker on the door. Gray shuffled through the mud and banged on the door with his meaty fist, and it opened to a thin gentleman in spectacles, his face curiously smooth. We went inside.

"You're Mister Crane, then?" Gray asked the thin gentleman. The guy didn't say anything, didn't answer, just walked out of the room. I was about to follow when he closed the door behind him.

"You've not met the guy?" I asked, looking around. Small foyer, the walls bare wood, two empty bookshelves that could have been there for a hundred years, sagging under their own weight. The door we had come in, the door Mr. Thin had gone out. One light: an old fashioned oil lamp that flickered and danced in the drafts. The rain outside was hammering on windows in other rooms, and under that harsh background noise I could hear movement. Bodies moving across floors, joists creaking, doors opening and conversations being had. It was hard to get my bearings in this place. Could have been mostly empty. Could have been packed with people. Hard to say.

"Met him? No. Met with an associate, who had met with this Crane guy's associate. Roundabout." Gray shook the rain off his coat and shrugged. "You know how business gets done."

Gray and I stood in opposite corners of the little room, generally being unhappy with each other. A lot of the jobs Gray got, he got because he knew me. I was his ticket up. The fact that I didn't want to go up, had been up and was finished with it, presented a lot of problems in our relationship. That wasn't my problem, but it made things awkward sometimes.

So why did I hang out with him? He's curious. Story on the street is that Gray used to be a Wright of the Holy Algorithm, and had quit. And that's not something people do. I had probed this little bit of history, but it's not something he talks about. He had the hands for it, though. Big meaty hands, eternally lined in grease, and he was more than comfortable around machines. Had that divine touch about him, when it came to cogwork. But still. The Church of the Algorithm didn't just let their people go. A Wright stayed in the Church, or died in its service. Only other way free was to take the pump implant in your head, and since Gray could still talk and didn't soil himself too regularly, I didn't think that had been his path. So. He makes me curious.

We stood around awkwardly until the door opened again, and Mr. Thin came through. For all the movement I heard in the house, I swear I didn't hear him walk away from the door, or approach it again. But there he was. He nodded to us, then disappeared into the hallway. We waited for a second, then followed.

The hallway beyond was narrow and low, like a long wooden tunnel dug in a hill. Doors led off, but none of the rooms seemed to be lit. Occupied, though. That's for sure. People moved in those rooms, light or no light. I had a bad moment about what we were getting into, whether anyone would hear from us again, but none of the doors seemed to have locks. I kept my hand near the revolver, just in case.

Mr. Thin led us to the center of the house, near as I could tell. I had yet to see a stairway, but there was definitely an upper level to this place. It actually sounded like someone was walking the hallway above us, keeping pace. We got to a door that was bigger than the rest, its wide face varnished red, with brass fittings. Light under the sill. Our quiet friend opened the door, bowed, and didn't move. Gray winked at me, then went inside.

The room was warm. Tropical, almost. There was a fireplace on the opposite wall, its roaring light drowning out much of the detail in the rest of the room. Nice furniture, turn-of-the-era stuff. Might be original to the house. This district had been nice, once. Like much of Veridon. Once.

At the center of the room was a table, papers spread out all over it, their curling edges held in place by bottles and candlesticks, and a forest of waxy candles that had melted in place. They were all lit, although the light and heat of the fireplace was a sun to their stars. Facing us was our man, our Mister Crane. He stood hunched over the table, his long arms spread wide across its surface. He had a soft face, the skin white and smooth, his features rather bookish. Neatly trimmed black hair, wire rim glasses that were spotted with the reflections of the sea of candles on the table. He looked lost in thought. Gray Anderson stepped forward and cleared his throat.

"Mr. Crane, is it? We've…"

"I heard you enter, you know." His voice was soft and precise, much older than his face would claim. He reminded me of a schoolmaster I had in the country, back when the Burn family fortune was enough to afford semesters away. "I've just been following a particularly elusive thought, and I didn't want to lose it." He straightened and removed his glasses, folding them in his large hands with a creak. "Which, sadly, I have."

He watched us with clinical interest for a dozen breaths, his soft eyes narrowed slightly, as if in concentration. Finally he tapped the table with his glasses, then set them down and straightened even more, standing. He had apparently been sitting on a bench. I leaned back, startled at how tall and how gaunt he was. His neat hair nearly touched the ceiling.

"Bloody hell," Gray muttered. "See how you got your name, friend."

Crane smiled patiently. "It's quite an old family name, actually. But yes. I do seem to have grown into it."

He came around the table and motioned to a set of chairs near the fire. Folded himself into one of them. We arranged ourselves opposite.

"So," Crane said, "Jacob Burn, yes?"

"And Gray Anderson, sir. Gray's not my given name, of course, but it's what everyone calls me."

"I was terribly sorry to hear about the decline of your family, Jacob. Politics in Veridon can be a cruel joke, sometimes."

"Sorry," I said, arranging myself in the chair so that the revolver wasn't too obvious. "Gray said that you were from out of town."

"I am. Very much from out of town. Just came down the river last month. I was very fortunate to be able to secure these lodgings with so little hassle. But I keep track of the doings of decent folk." He scratched his head and peered pensively into the fire. "You could consider it something of a hobby of mine."

"And what brings you to town?" I asked.

"Business. Family business. The Cranes have had very little to do with Veridon for years. Not very fond of this town," he held up a hand, "Nothing personal. Not fond of cities in general. Hopefully I won't be long at this."

"And that's where we come in," Gray said, trying to edge himself into the conversation. Mister Crane gave him a polite nod and turned his attention back to me.

"You'll forgive me for asking, I hope. Your friend Valentine? He is no longer your friend?"

"You know a lot about Veridon, for being here only a month."

"I do my research, Mr. Burn. I make a study of things, before I make a plan. So, you no longer work for Valentine. Have no contact with him."

"Correct."

He leaned back in his chair, looking at me very carefully. Weighing me.

"Fair enough. And your partner here?"

"Valentine doesn't know Gray exists. We're not big enough to draw his attention. Only thing that keeps me alive. Can I ask why that matters?"

"And would you say that you hate him?" Ignoring my question. "Or that he hates you?"

"There's no love in our dealings," I said. Not since he'd used me as bait in a bad bit of business, then left me to save my own skin. Stepped back in when it had looked profitable to him, offered his help. I had declined. Violently. "What are you getting at?"

"I need something done, nothing drastic. But I need it done without Valentine's involvement, and without his knowledge. It's very difficult to find competent people in this town who aren't beholden to that clockwork abomination."

"He kills folks he doesn't agree with," I said. A little surprised at the way he'd said 'clockwork.' Like a curse.

"And yet he hasn't killed you," Crane said, quietly. "Hm. Well. His business, I suppose."

"Are you saying you would have, in his position?" I leaned forward in my chair. "Killed me?"

"My dear Jacob," Crane said as he folded his hands across his sharp knees. "I am not in the business of killing. But I find it useful to understand people who are in that business. And not killing you does not line up with what I know of that man. That is all." He stood and went to the table.

"So, this job…" Gray said.

"This job," Crane fixed Gray with a narrow eye and picked up his glasses. "This job is fairly simple. But as I said, it needs to be done discreetly." He ran his hands over the table until he found an envelope, then turned and handed it to Gray. "This is the number that was discussed."

Gray opened the envelope and paled, then tucked it into his jacket. That was all the answer Crane needed. From the table he took another envelope and, once again ignoring Gray, handed it to me. It was waxy, like it had been waterproofed, and was sealed shut.

"Two things I need delivered to an address. This is the first. The second I will arrange for you to pick up, tomorrow morning."

"What sort of thing is it?" I asked.

"A complicated thing. It is still being built, according to my specifications. I have been assured that it will be finished tonight." He folded the glasses away and leaned against the table. He was still a good head taller than me. "Someone will come to you with directions. And you're going to need to make your own travel arrangements. I don't want my name involved in that."

"Travel? Are we leaving the city?"

"Hardly at all. But you are going to a somewhat difficult place. You will need to get your hands on the appropriate equipment. And soon. I need this delivery made the morning after next."

"What sort of equipment?" I asked. "Where are we going?"

In answer, Ezekiel Crane smiled the sharpest smile I had seen in quite a while.

"The river," he said. "You're going to be visiting the Fehn."

"Under the river, hm?" I said, sliding the envelope into my coat pocket. "Well. I have a friend who can help with that."

The river Reine shrugged dark shoulders under a coat of fog. Veridon was behind us, its constellation of lights dim through the mists, the sounds of the harbor muffled through the cold, wet air. I shivered and pulled the worn collar of my coat closer to my neck. I had one hand on the railing, the chill of the iron stinging the tips of my fingers. My other hand was resting on the revolver in my belt. This was a good place to drop a body, and I didn't know the crew. They were over my shoulder, talking quietly among themselves.

My morning had started early, and dark. Gray and I had met my friend Wilson at the docks. Wilson was good with machines, good with coming up with machines that could do very peculiar things. Like let a man travel underwater without drowning. And he had showed up with a crate and a smile. We left Gray on the dock, to tell Crane that the delivery was being made. Wilson and I traveled on, on this damn boat, and its damn whispering crew.

"I don't like all the deals you make, Gray," I muttered to no one. Beside me, Wilson snorted.

"Yeah, well. You don't get to be picky. You make friends like that, you're going to end up in some bad deals."

I glanced over at him. He had both hands on the rail, his nose to the breeze like a damn tourist. Wearing a neat vest and coat, pressed and clean. Looking more like a professor than a criminal. Add to that the fact that he was anansi, his hunched shoulders concealing six long, sharply taloned spider limbs that grew like wings from his back, and Wilson made for a very strange sight indeed. I sighed and turned back to the water.

"Maybe not. Doesn't mean he has to take everything that comes along."

"Doesn't mean that you have to follow wherever he goes." He glanced at me and smiled. His mouth was full of row after row of tiny, sharp teeth. "There are better paths for a man like you."

And that was Wilson. Always agitating to get me back into the kind of trouble I left behind. The kind of trouble that got the only woman I ever loved killed, the kind of trouble that would draw the attention of the Council. I swear, if I didn't know better, I'd think that boy wanted a revolution. Or at least a good blooding of society's higher ranks.

"Leave it alone, Wilson."

"You can't keep away from it forever. You've got responsibilities, no matter what your father says. Responsibilities to your name, yes. But responsibilities to the city as well."

"I brought you along to make sure your engine runs. If I wanted a lecture on my responsibilities to my family, I would have brought my father." I rubbed the cold out of my face and grimaced. "Maybe just to throw him over the side. Not a bad idea, come to think of it."

"Jacob, I'm disappointed. You don't contact me for a year, and then you want my help. I was hoping things were looking up." He looked around the ship and smiled. "And it turns out all you need is a mechanic. Well. All you want is a mechanic. I can't begin to go into your needs."

"Gods in hell, Wilson. Leave it alone."

He held up his hands and sighed.

"Never mind, Jacob. Forget I said anything." He grimaced and looked out at the river. "Let's just get your little job done, and get out of each other's hair."

"This is the place," the captain said from above. I looked up at the crew tower. I could just make out the rusty corona of the captain's bearded face, leaning out from his window.

"This is it?" I asked. "How can you tell?"

"It's what you paid for, Mr. Burn. Reliable passage to the Fehn, away from the docks. It's what you paid me to do."

"Reliable, covert passage, Mr. Hamilton." I looked over at the crew, suddenly busy with the crate we'd brought along. "And no trouble getting back."

The captain cleared his throat and spat out into the fog. "No trouble, Mr. Burn. You're not a man I want crossing me."

"Hear that?" Wilson asked, nudging me. "You've got that reputation to look after. Dangerous man."

"Yes, well." There were plenty others who might pay to have me crossed. There was good money in that kind of business. I watched the crew dismantle the box and remove the bulky iron man. Its chest creaked open, spilling hoses and dials onto the deck. "Not the best reputation to have."

The old man grunted, then closed his window. Wilson and I went over to the iron man. It was fat and bulbous, the head as wide as the shoulders and made of smooth, thick glass. The crew stepped back nervously, their eyes drifting between me and the cumbersome metal form. I took off my coat.

"You sure about this thing?" I asked.

Wilson nodded happily. Knelt next to the iron suit and started unstrapping the arms and adjusting dials.

"Absolutely. Safe as falling in love with a whore." He punched me in the arm, glint in his eyes. "Just as expensive, too."

"Fine. Let's have this done," I said, refusing to rise to his jab, then stepped into the iron man's embrace. It closed around me. There was a creaking sound as the thing sealed up, and suddenly the air was forge-hot. The crew gathered behind Wilson's strangely hunched shoulders, looking at me through the thick glass. I waved a heavy arm and they cleared away. Wilson led me to the rail and gave me a little push over the edge. The Reine took me without a sound.

It was like that for a while. Dark and darker, cold and colder. I fell through the water in absolute silence, my breathing swallowed by the tubes and metal of the iron man. I stared at my own face in the glass, reflected by some dim light from the machine's quiet engines.

My eyes looked dead, my hair a rambling mess across my head, my face pale and tired. I had aged ten years in the last two. Business had been bad. Ever since I'd held a pistol to the head of Veridon's top criminal and ended our complicated friendship, things had been bad for me. My contacts stopped talking to me. My regular clients stopped calling by my office. I was reduced to taking jobs from people I didn't trust, jobs I didn't want to do, working with people like Gray, getting myself into situations I wasn't sure I could get out of. Jobs like this one. Situations like this one.

A dead face bumped against the glass, his skin saggy and white, his eyes smooth pale marbles. I startled, banging my head against the suit. He put his hands against the glass, running them down the edge until he found a grip. He watched me with empty eyes. Other hands came out of the darkness and held my back, slipped around my arms. My first instinct was to struggle. I had to fight down the panic and let those riverbloated arms take me. They led me down. There were lights, a wide ring of them fading into the darkness. A door, flat and round, against a wall of barnacled iron. It irised open and we went inside. My guides drifted back out into the cold currents and I was alone in a small chamber. I drifted against the floor. A heavy thud and the water seemed to vibrate around me, then slowly drained away. The suit was heavy on my shoulders, and I struggled free of it. The air here was cold and sterile.

I let the iron man fall away and rummaged in the small leather satchel I had brought with me. My fingers were numb and I realized how cold I was. I fumbled the frictionlamp a couple times, then got it spun up. I stood. The room was full of bodies, standing close to me, closer than I would have believed. Dozens of them. It took me a second to realize that I was in a room of glass windows, looking out at the murky waters of the river Reine. On this side of the glass was my tiny, dry room, and out there, waving slightly in the currents of the river, hordes and hordes of the Fehn.

The Fehn… well. The Fehn freak me out. I had done business with them before, even counted a friend among them. Wright Morgan, though I hadn't seen him in a while. Perhaps he had passed from the ranks of the individual Fehn and joined the shambling choir of those who had lost their personalities and minds to the group consciousness of the Fehn hive. I suppressed a shudder as I surveyed my audience, their eyes loose in their heads, mouths open to the cold water of the river.

"Are we so foul?" a voice asked from behind me. I turned to see one of the Fehn rising from a ladderway in the floor. His clothes were mostly dry, and his eyes still held the spark of sentience. He crossed the floor and held out his hands in supplication. "Is our presence so awful, Jacob Burn?"

"Well," I said, glancing at the crowded windows around us. "It can be a little unnerving. For a man in my position."

"Mm." He drew a steel cylinder from his belt and unscrewed it, then took a long drink. Water splashed around his mouth and ran down his cheek. "A man in your position. As in, a man trapped in a small room, underwater, surrounded by the dead of Veridon."

"Yes, well. Something like that."

He nodded and drank again, then crossed to the nearest window and looked out at the tableau of slack faces and loose limbs waving like grass in the breeze.

"Do you know any of them, Jacob? Are any of your friends here? A man like you must have lost a fair number of friends to our beloved river?"

And that was the trick, the thing that made the Fehn so unsettling. They were our dead. Anyone who died in the river, drowned or dumped from some harbor back alley, any body that slipped beneath the Reine's dark waters became their property. Their citizenry. The Fehn were a symbiotic race, their mother-form hidden away in the depths of the river, but they infected the bodies of the drowned. For a while those bodies maintained their personalities, their minds, as with my friend Morgan. Sometimes they were able to last for months, or years… maybe decades. I never knew Morgan's age, but had the feeling he had been around for even longer than that. Something about the symbiote kept the bodies fresh. But eventually their minds would go, and they would become one of the numberless, mindless creatures even now floating outside this window.

"None of these, no. Most of my friends die on land."

"Fortunate," he said, turning to me. He drank a long pull of water. "For you, at least. Less fortunate for us."

"Yeah, well." I bent to the iron man and unfolded the package. "I'm kind of on a schedule here."

"Really? A busy man, are you?"

"Sure," I said.

"I've heard different. I've heard that times haven't been too good to Jacob Burn." He leaned idly against the glass of the window. Behind him the silent choir raised their hands and stroked the glass, as if to touch his shoulder. "Ever since you pissed off your man Valentine, and the Council, and the Church… I've heard that business is a little light."

I stood up, holding the dull metal box I had been hired to deliver. "I get by. I'm working now, aren't I?"

"Sure. But this is a shitty job, Jacob. It doesn't pay well, and no one wants to do it. Times must be bad, for a man of your stature to serve as delivery boy for the river."

Something about the way he said it, something in his voice or his face. Something sinister.

"Do I know you?" I asked. The river had blunted his features, but I didn't think the guy looked familiar.

"Not really. Not anymore. I was one of your father's servants, a while ago." He raised one bloated hand and held it out. "Anthony Flowers."

"The Beggar's Feast barge," I said, pointedly ignoring the proffered hand. "You and your family drowned, along with most of the kitchen staff. I'm so sorry."

"We've gotten over it." He grimaced and lowered his hand, clenched it into a fist a couple of times, then tossed his head towards the window. "My kids, my wife, they're out there somewhere. I don't see them anymore. Don't really go looking."

"Yeah."

"Anyway. I hope we didn't ruin your Beggar's."

I shook my head and held out the package. "I was only a child."

"Yeah. So were they." He took the box and set it on a modest table built into the floor. "So what were you hired to bring us?"

"Not my business," I said.

"You're not curious?"

"Not in the business of being curious, Mr. Flowers. Is there anything else you need from me?"

He looked me over, then sighed and picked up the box. "I guess not. Get on your way, then. The room will flood once you have your clever suit on."

I nodded and turned back to the suit. He went down the ladderway, then a door closed and I was alone with the quiet walls of the dead. Without looking up, I clambered back into my suit and made ready for my return to the surface. I hoped the captain and his whispering crew were still around. That they hadn't jumped Wilson and thrown him over, then left me alone in the middle of the Reine. Never wanted to die in the river, and now I wanted it even less.

Chapter Two

Black Blood from the River

"Do you mind if I ask you something, sir?"

I looked away from the steamer's tiny window and turned to the captain. He was looking dead ahead, as if I weren't even there. I nodded.

"Go ahead."

"You were one of Valentine's boys?"

"Yeah."

"But not any longer?"

"Not any longer, no." I looked back out the window. The river was rolling in deep, heavy swells. The fog had cleared out some, but there wasn't much traffic out yet. I could see the climbing towers of Veridon above the gauzy bank of mists. I knew where this question was going.

"Most folks I hear about, they work for Valentine, they don't stop working for him." He glanced over at me, then back to the prow of his boat. "Not without getting killed."

"Not killed yet, am I?"

"No, sir. That's why I'm asking. You're not working for him still?"

"I'm not."

"Because if you were, you see, it'd do good if you could say a word for us. For our service here. Always good to do an honor for someone like Valentine. Or one of his boys."

"Well, next time I see him, I'll be sure to give the good word. Right after he finishes shooting at me, or whatever it is he's set his mind to doing."

"Ah, well." The old man nodded. "I was just thinking. If you were still working for him."

"Yeah." I opened the tiny door that led out to the lookout rail. "Well, I'm not."

Outside was better. Outside didn't smell like canned grease and desperation. Outside was cool and wet, the thin lines of fog streaming over the deck. Wilson was strolling across the deck, both hands shoved in the pockets of his coat. He looked nervous. The crew was nowhere to be seen. I let my eyes wander over the water, wondering at the life of the Fehn, at the fate of Wright Morgan and all the other people who ended up in the cold, dark river. I rested my elbows against the rail of the captain's little tower. Good thing I was braced, too. I barely heard the call of "Overboard" before the ship shuddered to the right and cut power. I nearly fell, if not for the rail. Wilson had fallen, but was already bouncing up and scurrying to the edge of the boat.

"Overboard, ahoy!" someone yelled to my right. I ran over to that side of the ship and looked down. There was a cluster of crewmen by the ship's rail, looking down into the water.

"Where is he?" the captain roared from his window behind me. The crew looked up at the two of us.

"One, sir, just off the rail. Don't know who it is."

"One of ours? Someone see him fall?"

"No, sir. Kelly spotted him. No other ships out here."

"Could be a floater, from the city," I said to the captain. I spotted the subject of the excitement, shirtless and bobbing with the gentle swell of the river. He didn't look alive. He was floating closer to the boat with each second. "He doesn't look too good."

"Could be just a body," one of the crew agreed. There was business, and a long hook was produced. They were poking at the shiny white flesh of the guy's back, and not getting much response.

"Overboard!" someone else shouted, and we all turned. One kid, standing up in the prow of the boat, pointing away to our left. I squinted my eyes and saw it. Another body. Then another. Half a dozen, all mostly naked, the pallid skin bobbing peacefully with the waves.

"Something's up," I said to the captain. He was peering out into the water, doing a count. I raised my voice. "Wilson, what'd you think?" He wasn't looking up at me, wouldn't look away from the water.

"Shipwreck?" the captain asked. "Fog's awful bad."

"We would have heard something," I said. "Open your engine and get us back to shore. These are bodies, captain. No one out here to be saved."

"We should bring 'em in. I'd want to be brought in, if my body was on the water like that." He pulled at the brim of his cap and turned to the controls. "Wouldn't want to be left, to pay the Fehn's percent."

I grimaced and turned back to the water. Couldn't blame him, not after the meeting I'd just been through. I made a note to die on high ground, away from the Fehn and their immortal drowning. Still, I wanted to be back to shore. I gripped the railing tight and watched the crew go about the grim work of rescuing corpses. Wilson was still at the rail, looking down. One hand was on the brace of knives on his belt.

I was staring at the water when something deep beneath us sighed and slithered toward the surface. It was only a lightening of the depths for a second, a grayness among the black. It quickly resolved into a roiling mass of white and gray and then we were swamped, a boiling leviathan of corpses breached the surface, bodies and arms and faces, dead and white, bubbling to the surface, their skin pale and shiny against the slate blackness of the Reine. They bumped dully against the bottom of the boat, slithering up the sides and churning against the prop in bloodless chop. The crew had abandoned their places against the rail, screaming as they sought the shelter of the pilot's deck. I pushed past them, down to the deck, down to Wilson.

We were adrift in a shoal of dead bodies, formerly the Fehn. The spaces between their bodies were slick with the flat black worms of their symbiotes. A living Fehn was choked to the lungs with those things, squirming in their veins and organs in place of blood and air and brains. The worms glistened in oily death, sloughing out of slack mouths to splash dully into the water. And for every body I saw, ten more were just bobbing to the surface, pushing aside their brothers. Our engines shuddered to a halt. We were befouled.

"I don't like this," Wilson whispered when I got to him. He was shaking, one hand on his knives.

"Who would like it?" I asked.

"No, I mean, I really don't like it. What if… what if we…" He looked up at me, his face slack.

What if we did this, he was asking. What if our little delivery had just killed off the river's dead? What kind of trouble would that be?

"Get out, ya slugs! Get back to stations!" the captain howled from his cabin. The crew cowered on the stairs, looking out on the becalmed sea of bodies. The air smelled like river rot, tinged with the burned flesh rising from our own choked propeller. The captain pushed the last of the crew down onto the deck and retreated to his nest. Hesitantly, some of the crew went below decks to see to the engines. The rest stood beside us at the railing.

"What in hell is this?" one of them whispered. I didn't have an answer, or an inkling of one. We just stared at the lumpy shoal, shivering in the breeze. The fog closed in on us, leaving just the bodies and our ship.

"Get hooks to the propeller, see if you can clear it!" the captain yelled from his comfortable perch. A few of the crew roused themselves and went aft. We all seemed to be moving in a dream. You could hardly see water for all the bodies.

"We should light a flare," I said, turning to one of the crew. "Or maybe the horn. Warn any other ships coming this way."

"Captain won't have it. Not until we're closer to the dock, where we've a right to be." The man touched his forehead in some kind of benediction. "Signals bring Badge. Not something we want."

"Better than being ridden under by a cargo barge," I whispered, and looked up at the cabin. The captain was fiddling with some kind of control panel and shouting into a speaking tube. The oily reek of smoke leaked up from belowdecks.

"Should you go down to help?" I asked the man standing next to me.

"Sir? I'd rather not." A quick succession of bangs ran through the deck, and the engine roared into brief and angry life before sputtering to a halt. "All seems well in hand. Besides, I'm keeping watch."

"Right." I nodded and leaned against the rail. "I wonder if we'll be quarantined."

"For what?"

"Something killed them," I said, nodding to the reef of dead bodies all around us. "Maybe a disease, maybe some weapon."

"Maybe the thing you delivered to them?" the man said cheerily, before realizing what he had said. "I mean, sir, not that you meant to. You know. Meant to kill them, sir."

Wilson and I stared him down until he ducked his head and went back to staring out at the river. The fog was even closer now. I looked down at the nearest corpse, rubbing its knobby back up against our hull. Didn't look that different from the mindless creatures I'd encountered below the surface. Only now they were insensate, immobile. As the dead should be, I suppose. Perhaps the Fehn had just lost whatever grip they held on their hosts. We knew so little about them, just that they had been in this river longer than Veridon had perched on its shore.

"Sir," the man whispered. I looked up. His face was slack, looking out over the water. I looked. The surface rippled and lurched. Something was crawling out from between the bodies. Hands rose up, pulled up, dragged clear shoulders and heads and pearl-white torsos. They clambered onto the bodies of their fallen brothers and lurched forward.

"Oh, shit, Jacob," Wilson whispered. "What the hell?"

"What the hell, indeed," I said. The revolver was in my hand.

"Sir!" the crewman shouted, backpedaling to the center of the boat. I looked around. There were more of them, many more. Only one for every dozen bodies floating around us, but there were hundreds of bodies, dozens of hundreds.

They were different, though. Still Fehn, or former members of that river-dead race. But unlike any other Fehn I'd ever seen, they bled. Black pitch tears flowed from their eyes, drooled from their tarry gums and colored their ragged teeth. It leaked in stiff rivers from torn fingernails and punctured bellies, and smeared foully across their shiny, white bodies as they stumbled over the slick landscape of their former brothers.

"Captain!" I shrieked, then loosed my iron and fired. The report was swallowed in the fog and water. The bullet struck the closest revenant square in the jaw. He stumbled, black blood slopping from the shattered bone like molasses, and then he came on. My second shot stopped him, but there were dozens more. I ran back to the small tower of the crew cabin.

"We need to get the engines started!" I yelled. The crewman I had been talking to was standing numbly against the stairs, his hand over his mouth. There was vomit at his feet. "Crewman! Get below and get that engine going!"

Wilson ran past me, clambering down the stairs to the engine room, swearing the kind of arcane oaths I rarely heard from him. The engine was now in good hands. Or at least desperate, competent hands.

I vaulted up the stairs to the captain's perch, then bounced off the door. Behind the window I could see the captain, holding a shotgun, the barrel and stock cut close for boarding actions. He had jammed the lock on his door, and was staring at me with wide, white eyes.

"You need to get this boat moving, captain! We need to get to shore. Now."

He shook his head like a man dreaming, backing against the far wall of the cabin. I grimaced and ran back down the stairs. They had reached the boat now, climbing over the rail with bloodslicked hands. Blood or oil, I couldn't tell.

It didn't really matter.

I smashed open a toolbox at the foot of the stairs and pulled out a splicing blade. It was heavy, a long, thick blade used to cut snarled lines and stray nets that might get tangled in the prop. On a ship like this it might also see use in a boarding action. I hefted it in my hand, giving it a couple of experimental swings to get used to its weight. A quick count put not more than ten on the decks, but dozens more nearly to us, and dozens of dozens still struggling to reach us.

"The engines, captain!" I yelled, throwing myself at the shambling horrors.

I took the first one down with the blade, two quick blows across his chest, cracking ribs and splitting maggot-pale skin. It was the blood that scared me, blood as black as pitch and hot as it splashed onto my arm. The Fehn don't bleed. The Fehn are cold and dead as river mud. He fell back against the rail and toppled over. Another one came up behind him, the river running off his bony shoulders in sheets. I kicked him in the teeth, winced as they cracked like china, then turned to the others. Many aboard, and more by the minute.

I fought my way back to the cabins. It was slow going, the creatures in my way clumsy but tough as driftwood. It took a heavy hand to put them down. When I got there, some of the crew were defending the stairs down into the ship's belly with coal shovels and line hooks. The monsters had clambered up to the captain's perch, and were beating against the glass with flat, swollen hands. The captain lost his nerve. A shotgun blast blew out one of the windows, scattering several of the creatures. The remaining revenants clambered to the new opening and started crawling through. A second blast left little but corpses and pitch black blood on the stairs. I turned to one of the crewmates standing before the engine room.

"What luck down there?"

"Drive shaft's buckled. Your friend is setting it true, but who knows if it'll hold!"

"It'll hold," I said. "Celestes help us, it better hold. I've never wanted a water burial."

"Aye," he said, and then we were busy fighting to get back to land.

Things turned quickly against us. The waves of creatures became a flood. I heard a number of blasts from above, followed by the unmistakable cracking of a doorframe and the captain's horrified screams. I couldn't get to him, couldn't fight past the walls of clawing, mewling, dead-eyed monsters on the deck. The men around me blanched and refused to look at one another. One by one we began to fall. Hard to look ahead when such horrible things are happening, just out of reach, just out of help. Hard to keep going, and some of the crew couldn't, stood gaping at the butchery for a brief second before they were torn down. Some kind of motivation in that.

Finally it was just two of us, me and a young kid with thick arms and scared eyes. He fell, stumbled down the stairs behind me and landed with a loud crunch. I couldn't look back, but I couldn't hold the stairwell on my own. I started backing down the stairs. The creatures followed, slowly, clumsily. Blood on their hands and in their mouths.

I got to the doorway to the engine room and stood there for a handful of breaths. Someone had dragged the kid inside. That meant there was more crew behind me, though none of them were rushing to my aid. I thrashed forward in one last flurry of blade and blood, then fell back and threw the heavy iron door shut.

The engine room was small and crowded. Those of the crew who had not died on the decks above were stuffed into the spaces between pistons and turbines. The air was half smoke and half the stink of fear and adrenalin. All of them were looking at me in abject horror, all but Wilson. He looked fully alive for the first time in a long time. Coat thrown aside, sleeves rolled up to reveal thin arms, sweat drenching the smooth white egg of his long head, Wilson was bent over the dissected heart of the boat, elbow deep in gears. His eyes were alive and sharp.

"Wilson," I snapped. "What's the word on getting these engines going?"

He ignored me. Something banged against the door behind me. Everyone jumped.

"Could be the captain," one of the crew said meekly, hoping someone else would come up with a reason that it wasn't the captain, that they wouldn't have to open the door. I had a reason.

"He's dead," I said. "Or dying, which in these circumstances amounts to the same thing. Wilson!" He glanced up. "The engines?"

"If you'd all just," he whispered, grimacing. "If you'd all just leave me alone, give me a little quiet." He bent to the task again.

"Okay, you heard the man. Everyone outside." I stood aside and gestured to the door. No one moved. "No? Okay, then. Wilson, you'll just have to fix the engines in our unbearable presence. Sorry about that."

"Always such a damn comedian, Jacob." He tore something loose and tossed it to the floor. "You think this is easy?"

"I'm the one covered in blood, friend. So yeah, I think you should quit your bitching and…"

The door rang with another impact and I wheeled back to face it. Steel. Good, honest steel. As long as we stayed in here, we'd probably be okay.

"Just get it fixed, Wilson," I whispered. "Before they start in on the hull."

The crew shuffled nervously around the room. I hefted the blade from hand to hand, shaking out my fingers with each transition. The revenant blood smeared across my arms was still warm. My skin was beginning to itch with it.

"Seriously, Wilson, we need…"

The engine roared to life, incomprehensibly loud in the wake of our nervous silence. Wilson slammed the engine shut and bolted things down. He looked at me and started talking. His voice was lost in the noise. I shook my head and stepped forward. He leaned in to me.

"I got it going," he yelled.

"Okay," I yelled back. "Now what?"

He looked at me with a complete lack of understanding, then shrugged.

"We ship out of here?" he asked.

"The captain's dead, and we can't get topside. Can we control the ship from down here?"

He looked around the room, at the grim faces, the closed door, finally settling on the black gore on my hands and blade. Realization settled across his face.

"Oh. Hell."

I nodded. "Can we do it?"

"No," he said, shaking his head. "I've got engine power, but no rudder. We need the con for that."

"So you can go, but you can't turn."

"Yeah."

I looked around the room. The crew stood at mute attention, adrift without their captain. They looked like scared children.

"Anyone know which direction we were facing when we became mired in this… unpleasantness?"

"East south east," someone answered. "But we could have drifted."

"We've certainly drifted," another growled.

I grimaced. Drift could have us pointing down toward the waterfall, or maybe upriver. There was no way of knowing.

"Any volunteers to go out there and secure the con?" I asked. Silence, or as much silence as you could get in an engine room. I nodded. One guy stepped forward, his eyes on the deck.

"Sir, if you were… that is, if you go out there, the least we could do. The least I could do, I mean, is have your back. Sir."

"Brave of you. But hell if I'm going out there." I turned to Wilson and smiled. "Open it up all the way. Let it run for five minutes, then let's cut power and see where we are."

Wilson messed with some pistons, then wound up a flywheel and threw a gear. We lurched forward. There was a hammering chop from the prop. Bodies in our wake. It was a couple minutes until the sound stopped, and the engine stayed strong. I was just turning to Wilson to tell him to cut the power when a low, urgent drone filled the room. I looked around in confusion.

"What's…"

"Proximity horn!" someone yelled. Wilson swore and threw the engine off. We were still moving though, our speed bleeding off into the water. Another horn sounded, and another, each one more desperate, more panicked. I imagined the poor shipman, laying on the horn as we barreled at him.

"Brace!" I yelled.

We crashed into something, accompanied by a chorus of snapping wood and distant screams. The ship pitched crazily and I was thrown to the deck.

A long creaking groan settled over the ship, then we were still. I stood.

"Another ship? Or the docks?" I asked no one in particular. The crew, coming carefully to their feet, just stared around the room. These people were a special kind of worthless. The ship rumbled and shifted again, pitching at a bad angle to one side. There was more shouting outside, and the distinct, muffled roar of a shotgun blast. I found the blade that I had dropped when we hit, then went to the door.

"We can't stay here. Either we're sinking or the Badge is rushing the decks with some very sharp questions." I nodded to Wilson, then glanced at the rest of the crew. "Best get out of here while you can."

Wilson took my meaning and grabbed up a hammer. We were fighting our way out, whether it meant chopping down revenants or Badgemen. I threw open the portal.

A lazy slop of water sloshed over the frame and splashed against the engine. It hissed into steam as it cascaded over the machinery. The room quickly started to fill up. I ran up the stairs, which were little more than steps in a waterfall. The anansi was on my heels, the crew close behind.

We were sinking. The ship was pitched up at an angle, most of its starboard side underwater. We had hit a supply raft, and were only still afloat because we were lodged on its deck. The great flat expanse of the craft was taking on water as well, and the carefully stacked crates of its cargo were sprayed into a chaotic jumble. I ran up the uneven deck and hurled myself onto the raft. There was about a foot of water swirling lazily over the tarry wooden deck. The crew of the raft was struggling to dislodge our ship, to save their own. Crates were shifting slowly towards the sinking corner, further unbalancing the raft and adding water to the deck.

Our friends had come with us.

They wandered across the deck, killing and dying. The crew of the raft was having trouble coping with the two-fold disaster. Most had gone to deal with the problem they understood, and were clustered around our stricken craft, trying to dislodge it from their deck. Only a few were dealing with the more horrific problem, the score of living dead who were slowly killing their way across the raft.

I threw myself into the fight. A handful of the creatures were fighting their way past some toppled crates that had become an improvised barricade. I came at them from behind, cracking open skulls and severing long-dead limbs with my blade. The rest of the crew, with Wilson at their head, smashed into the revenants with frantic energy. They howled like madmen, desperate to get this nightmare behind them.

Together we broke the last of the revenants. Around us in the water were bodies, but apparently none of them were still animated. I was gathering my thoughts and looking for the captain of this raft when there was a horrific crashing sound and our doomed ship tore free from the raft. More crates bounced loose as we bobbed up, the water on our deck spilling over the edge as we righted. I ran to the side to watch the ship go down, and to see if anything came back up.

The ship slid quickly into the water, leaving nothing but flotsam and pearl-white corpses in its wake. Nothing moved. I was surrounded by the former crew, staring silently as the crew tower disappeared. The last thing we saw was the blank eyes of the captain's blown-out cabin, windows ringed in shattered glass and singed by his shotgun.

One of the raft's junior officers rushed up to us, his face flushed red with fury.

"What was the meaning of that! Ramming us, traveling at such speed in this fog! Have you lost your damn minds!" He was shuddering in his ill-fitting black suit, the cheap epaulets on his shoulders wrinkled from too much wear and not enough cleaning. "I demand — demand! — to speak to your captain."

I looked down at the blade in my hand. The black blood of the revenants was slick along its length, pooling and dripping onto the deck of the raft. As it fell it coagulated before my eyes, crystallizing into tiny gears that clattered noisily at my feet. I stared at the snowflake-delicate gears swirling peacefully in the pools of water left behind, mixing with the blood of the crew who had died in the fight, along with my own, leaking from numerous cuts and bruises.

"Captain's dead," I said to the frantic little man. I looked up at the swirling eddy that marked the last resting place of the ship, her captain, and much of her crew. Wilson stood next to me, his knuckles white on the grimy shaft of the hammer he had picked up.

"For now," he whispered, turning away.

Chapter Three

Draw Iron, Draw Steel

There was a very brief but very sharp argument, when the captain of the raft decided that we should circle around and look for survivors. Wilson and I showed him the remains of the cog-dead on his deck, made it clear that there weren't survivors, and made some quiet threats about what would happen if he tried to turn the raft back. He took it poorly, but he also didn't touch the wheel. That's all I cared about.

The Ebd-side harbor ghosted into view through the thick morning fog. Our raft was trailing wreckage, a flotilla of broken wood and smashed crates and broken bodies bobbing in our wake. Wilson and I huddled on the front of the raft, as far away from the accident as we could manage. They brought us blankets and coffee. The raft wasn't fast, and I wanted nothing more than to be fast and off the water. The coffee mug in my hand shook, from the cold or the adrenalin. Not the fear.

"What are we going to do?" Wilson asked me, away from the rest of the crew. It was clear what they were going to do. Drink, and forget, and maybe find a new line of work away from the river. Sounded good to me.

"We're going to talk. Talk to Crane, talk to the elder Burn." I drank some coffee. "Maybe talk to Valentine."

"Valentine will be difficult, Jacob. He hasn't forgiven you. That man keeps his grudges like clockwork."

I snorted. He was clockwork, after all. "Maybe. But Crane went to a lot of trouble to keep this job out of Valentine's sight. Took a chance working with me, didn't he? I'm famously unreliable."

"You're famously in trouble, Jacob. Not the same thing." Wilson readjusted the blanket across his multitude of shoulders and stared at the slowly approaching docks. "Not the same thing at all."

"Still. Be interested to hear what Valentine knows of the guy." I stood up and stretched my legs. The many wounds I'd taken in our fight were starting to get stiff. "Be more interested to hear what the guy has to say for himself."

"Yeah. Me too." Wilson grinned, and I shivered a little more. Wilson was kind of creepy when he smiled. All those teeth, small and sharp and so incredibly… uncivilized. "But I think…"

There was a pause of some seconds, then he stood.

"Jacob?" he asked.

"Yeah?" I was staring down into the water, trying to not see floating faces and pearl-white fists grubbing to the surface. I blinked and it was just water again. Turned to Wilson, then looked where he was pointing.

The docks were swarming with Badge. Most of the harbor was shut down, the workers and shipmen shoved away from the water and cordoned off. The whole fleet bobbed quietly on the water, tied down and shuttered.

"What's going on?" I asked.

"After what we saw?" Wilson asked. "Gods know."

Signal flags came out as we got close. Quarantine. The raft shuddered to a halt, and a rapid semaphore flashed from boat to shore. I didn't know the language well enough to follow it, but I saw the quarantine fly a couple times. Wilson shook my shoulder.

"Over there," he said. There were a couple ships that looked poorly treated, anchored off the dock. One of them was burned down to the shell. There were bodies across the deck. Skin white as pearls.

"Looks like we're going to be famous," I muttered.

"Famously in trouble," Wilson agreed.

An impact siren spun up behind us, out in the fog. A smallboat, narrow and fast, came tearing toward the docks. It ripped past us, its engine groaning. The deck was a horror show of gorey crewmen and white-skinned dead, struggling. The crew held the tiny cabin, and that at bloody cost. The captain had his fist down on the throttle, all ahead full, and no amount of flagging was going slow him down.

The crowds of Badge on the dock began yelling and ordering and counterordering. There was a warning shot, then another, then a firing line was drawn up. A crackling report and the water and wood of the ship danced with lead. The throttle was still down.

The smallboat bounced off an anchored barge, scraping metal plates with a wrenching sound that screamed across the water. That slowed the vessel, but still it crashed into the docks and skipped up into the air, collapsing onto a barricade of crates that the Badge set up.

The officers were quick. The firing line reformed, bolstered by other units. They advanced, weapons hot, firing as they marched. The ship danced, the bodies got redder, sparks glittered whenever lead struck metal. Not a minute it took, not more than a handful of heartbeats. Then they stopped firing, and not a living thing remained on that ruined ship.

"I'm not sticking around for that," I said. Wilson agreed. Panic had a firm handle on those men. Panic and fear, and a deep belief that such things could be handled with firearms. I shucked my blanket and crept to the side of the barge, out of sight of the docks. When we were good and close, Wilson and I slipped into the water and started to swim.

Tough thing to do, to slip into that cold, black water after what we had just been through. All the way in I kept imagining dead fingers slipping around my legs, kept seeing bloated faces just beneath me in the water. I fought the urge to go straight in. We swam to one of the burned-out wrecks that were tied down just beyond the docks. The water around them was thick with ash and wreckage. Stopped long to rest our lungs, refusing to look down into the water, our arms draped over the charred remains of a barrel.

By then our raft was taking on agents of the Badge. They came out in tiny boats, yelling at the captain through bullhorns and bristling with longrifles. I waited until they were fully occupied with the boarding process before I nodded to Wilson and pushed off towards the docks.

One of the tricks to the Ebd-side harbor has to do with its inlets. The Ebd feeds into the much larger Reine, providing ship access to both rivers. Smaller vessels from the outer provinces travel the Ebd to where it meets the Reine, then transfer their cargo to one of the huge rafts that ply the wider river.

This meant a lot of cranes, and not just cranes but towering monsters that lived out in the water so the Ebd boats could pull right up next to the Reine-bound rafts and have their cargo offloaded directly to the larger vessels. This meant that the Ebd-side harbor was an archipelago of cranes and drawbridges and iron towers, an infinitely permeable system of platforms and docks. Quarantine depended on the goodwill of the ship captains, rather than the iron rule of the Badge. We didn't have to go far before we found a crane tower that had been abandoned in the excitement, and hauled ourselves up to its covered platform. The iron belly of the engine was still warm. Wilson huddled next to it, his thin arms shivering against his ribs.

"We can't stay here," he said. I nodded and stripped off, laying my shirt and pants across the warm shell of the engine. He grimaced impatiently. "Jacob, the men on that boat know our names. The Badge is going to ask questions, and then they're going to notice that we're not around. They're going to figure out that we slipped off before they boarded."

"That they are," I said. There was a stack of fire blankets by the engine, for smothering embers. I unfolded one and tossed it to Wilson, then wrapped myself in another and sat on the other end of the engine, my back against the metal.

We sat quietly for a while. Steam from my clothes mixed with the fog that curled across the platform. We lost sight of the raft, but could still hear the voices of the Badge. Other horns sounded in the distance as ships came in to dock and were quarantined.

"What do you think is going on out there?" Wilson asked quietly, after about twenty minutes. The fog was starting to burn away.

"I think our little event wasn't isolated. I think that whatever happened to the Fehn, it happened to a lot of them. I'm guessing lots of boats went through what we went through." I turned to Wilson and sighed. "And I'm guessing a lot of them didn't make it out."

"If it was all the Fehn, everywhere," Wilson scratched his eye and peered out at the ghosts of other towers and ships that were finally becoming visible. "That means a lot more than just the river. There are Fehn in the cisterns, in the canals. They're all through the lower city."

"Yeah. Which means the Badge has a lot on its plate right now." I stood up and peeled my clothes off the engine. They were warm and stiff. "It's going to be a while before they start asking questions."

"Not forever, though."

"Nope. They'll come looking for us, eventually." I finished dressing and shook the last numbness out of my fingers. "So let's go find some answers, before they ask them."

It was worse than we imagined, out on the crane. There was a collapsible raft in the emergency cabinet of the tower. The seals had gone rotten, so our boots got wet on the way in, but it didn't sink until we were safely on dry land. No one saw us make shore because they had other things on their mind. Lower Veridon was in chaos.

Veridon is a city of terraces. The old city sits in stony quiet at the top of the delta, draped in gentle waterfalls and ancient canals. The canals travel the whole length of the delta in a series of locks or decorative waterfalls, sometimes disappearing into cisterns or underground rivers and pipes, until they finally feed into one of the city's three rivers. The Reine itself continues into parts of the city, where the streets are built up over stone arches. Many of the homes in Lower Veridon have private docks in their basements that lead to some tributary of the Reine or Ebd.

When the Fehn rose from the water, their bloated hands suddenly violent, those private docks became gates into the city. The monsters tore their way through living rooms and formal dens to spill out into the streets. The result was horror, evenly spread throughout the Lower City.

We climbed out of the river about half a mile from where the raft was quarantined. Wilson looked terrible, between the fight and the soaking we had taken. I couldn't look much better. But the streets were crowded with panicked citizens, flushed from their houses by fear of their own basements, all of them in various states of dress and injury. Some had been in fights, some had just woken up when the screaming started. All of them were very nervous.

"Right out of the basement," one man whispered to his neighbor. "Just right through the door like it wasn't there. Molly dropped her breakfast and started screaming. It was the screaming that snapped me out of it."

"Godsbless the Badge, though," the woman I assumed was Molly said, standing nearby. "Godsbless them. If they hadn't come in the front door I don't know if we would've made it out."

"To hell with the Badge," her husband answered. "If I hadn't cleaned and loaded the hunting rifle that morning, we'd still be in there. Bleeding to death."

"You won't talk like that in front of the children, Howard, you won't!" The woman was nearly in tears. She had blood on her face and hands. I didn't see any children. "If the Badge hadn't come in when they did…"

We moved on. Similar conversations were happening everywhere. Lots of folks were armed. The whispering quickly became an angry murmur. For all that people were willing to bless or curse the Badge, there didn't seem to be any officers around to hear it. No one here but citizens.

"This could get nasty," Wilson said. "If even one of our drowned friends stumbles into this crowd."

"Yeah. Nothing like panic to make everything infinitely worse. Come on."

We left the crowd behind. There were others like it, mobs of nervous fathers and mothers standing in their morning clothes, clutching brooms and shotguns and peering nervously at their own houses like they were seeing a nightmare. Which they probably were.

"You there!" someone hailed us. "You! What have you seen of the river?"

Hard to deny we hadn't been near the river that morning, not in our state. I turned to see who was talking. A very proper man, improperly dressed. He was unarmed, but the crowd behind him was bristling with antique hunting rifles and polo mallets. We had moved into a more expensive neighborhood, then.

"Hard to say, in the fog. Something's happened, though. What about here?"

"Bloody Fehn, trying to take over the city. We've killed a dozen here." He nodded over his shoulder and the crowd murmured. "The dead stay dead on Barling Street."

"Heard much from the rest of the city?" I asked.

"No. Folks are staying to their own. Badge is a damn mess, running around. Never around when you need them, but always there when you don't." He didn't seem like the kind of man to get into the kind of trouble where he wouldn't want the Badge around. I smiled, and he took it for agreement. "What district are you from? Where are you headed?"

"Just trying to get away from the river. Think I might head up, maybe to the Torch."

Before he could answer there was a shout from the crowd, and then a shot. I ducked and looked behind me.

One of the Fehn, the legitimate Fehn, his skin gray and soft, was creeping out of an alleyway. He turned toward us, startled, then disappeared.

"After him, boys!" the proper gentleman yelled, like a master at the hunt. The crowd whooped and gave chase, pushing past us.

"Jacob," Wilson said, his voice nervous.

"Yeah. That guy wasn't changed yet." I turned to the proper gentleman, who was beaming after his little war party. "You have to stop them."

"Yes, we do. We'll stop them all, one at a time. The dead stay dead."

"No!" I shouted, grabbing the silk lapels of his morning coat. "Not that. Your little friends, they're going to kill that guy. He's not one of them!"

"My boy, if you don't know what the Fehn look like, then…"

I turned and ran after the party. There was shooting up ahead, and yells. The alley was short, and opened onto a warren of back roads and tiny passages. It was the kind of roadway servants used, to get packages between buildings without spoiling the master's view with their presence.

The crowd was surging through this tiny space like a flood, running down alleyways and kicking over trash cans in their excitement. More than one shot was fired, all from different directions. The narrow passageways didn't allow for much traffic.

"Screw this," Wilson spat, then cast aside his jacket and flipped his array of arms open. Just like a spider, he scrambled up one of the walls and made his way over the heads of the crowd, dagger-like talons finding purchase on both sides of the passageway. I struggled to keep him in sight.

"Bug!" someone screamed, and now the shooting turned toward Wilson. He flinched and disappeared around a corner. I yelled at the shooters, but they weren't listening. Things were getting out of hand.

I pushed through the press of bodies, shoving the crowd aside to get to Wilson. A scattered popping marked his passage, gun shot rattling off the tight alleys, voices raised above the din. Why were they even chasing him? How easily startled were these posh gentlemen, with their antique rifles? There was a crowd up ahead, surrounding a boarded-up shack, beating on the shutters and door with their priceless weapons. The men around me surged, and I fell against the wall and slid down to the muddy cobbles. They swept past.

The world trembled around me. A muster siren from some Badge station droned under the clouds, and the mob roared with it. Wood was breaking, and other screams joined the cacophony. Terrible screams. I pulled myself up and looked around for something to fight with. A club, a bar… anything. Anything to use against the madness of the crowd.

Wilson flashed past above, jumping from one building to the next, giving me a nervous look as he passed. I looked back down at the mob, tearing the shack to pieces with their bare hands, then followed Wilson's path. My heart was hammering. I tried to not hear the screams of terror behind me. I hadn't gone far before they stopped.

Wilson waited for me in a dark alley, perched above a tiny barricade of trash cans. His eyes were dark.

"I thought they had you," I said.

"Keep your voice down," he spat. Rows of tiny teeth glittered wetly in the dark. "Those are old men. Fox hunters, and gamesmen. Do I look like a fox to you? Do I look like game?"

"No, I just…"

"Quiet." He unfolded from the wall and walked with exaggerated care around the cans, motioning for me to follow.

The Fehn was there, curled into a ball, making soft, horrible sounds. I shook him by the shoulder. His skin was nearly dry. It took several seconds for him to realize I was there, and several more to stop shaking in fear. His eyes, when he finally looked at me, were a thousand miles away.

"Are you okay?" I asked, or tried to ask. He wasn't hearing me. And when he answered, it was in a voice that was a dry trickle in the back of his throat. He was out of water. The Fehn drink water like I breathe, their lungs are full of it, their voices are wet and sloppy. He coughed at me, a sound like mud settling in a creek bed. I pulled him to his feet. He could barely stand.

"He's been out of the river for a while. He might not even have been there during the attack," Wilson said.

"Look at him. Look at his eyes. He was there. We need to get him some water, and then some shelter." I pulled his arm over my shoulder. "Let's get going."

"Let's not," said a voice at the end of the alley. The proper man.

"Leave him alone," Wilson said. His voice was silken and dangerous. I understood why people feared the anansi, even the tame ones. Especially the tame ones. "He's not one of them."

"He's not? Fascinating." The man strolled into the alley, some of his compatriots sneering behind him. "Tell me, Mr. Not-Fehn. What brings you to our lovely city this morning? Was it a long trip?" He poked at the Fehn with the tip of a ruined spear, the barbs poking at his naked chest. "You look wretchedly thirsty. Don't you think, boys?"

"Of course he's Fehn, idiot." I stood as tall as I could, tried to summon a little of the old Burn family charm. "He's not one of them, though. Look at him. He couldn't harm anyone. Now, if you'll let us through we'll be on our way."

"Oh, of course. Immediately." He turned to his nervous friends. "Boys. Let these gentlemen through, will you?"

They raised their rifles and smiled. Wilson drew steel, and I drew iron. The Fehn tore away from my shoulder and ran.

The mob hesitated. They weren't really a mob, after all. Just some proper gentlemen riled into a frenzy by a great deal of fear and a little encouragement from their leader. I stepped forward and popped the old boy on the chin. He went down, but that seemed to do it for the crowd. They steeled their nerves, sighted their rifles, and fired. I bowled into Wilson and we went down.

The Fehn didn't get far. There was a lot of lead in the air, and a lot of it went into him. Still, he stumbled on down the alleyway, howling in that silent dry cough. The mob rushed forward, not bothering to reload their weapons, and fell upon him.

The sound was awful, a hollow thumping like rotten logs crashing together, over and over, and then a crackling like kindling being crushed. They screamed in triumph, lifted the limp form above their heads and swept down the alley into the street. They were still yelling when I got to my feet. The proper gentleman was still there, on one knee, glaring at me. His lip was bloodied.

"What the hell's wrong with you?" he asked. "Standing with a bug, defending one of those… one of those monsters? What's wrong with you?"

I dusted off my pants and retrieved my pistol. Realized it was damp all the way through. Never would have fired, even if it had come to that. Wilson was already stalking down the alley, away from the scene of the murder. I flipped the pistol in my hand, then put it through the gentleman's teeth. He crumpled.

"Gentlemen need to stand, sometimes," I said. "Gentlemen don't need mobs."

I put away the revolver and ran to catch up with Wilson. We walked past the tiny shed that the mob had shattered. There was blood on the wood, pooling between the cobbles, making a sluggish stream to the drain. Neither of us stopped.

T HERE WAS NO need to talk about where we were going, or where we had been. We walked in silence, Wilson's hands thrust into the damp pockets of his coat, his thin face turned down. The fog cleared, the clouds parted, and the sun came out. It did nothing for our mood, or for the scent of madness that settled over the city. The air smelled like smoke, but not woodsmoke. Unnatural things were burning, somewhere.

The streets weren't safe. The citizens of Veridon had taken protection into their own hands, each street watching out for itself, enforcing their own idea of who should be safe. We stuck to the houses. No one was inside, not in the Lower City. Several of the houses we walked through showed signs of struggle. One house, there was something banging around in the parlor. The door was nailed shut, a couch leaned against the frame. There were bodies, too. Fehn and regular folks, some of our pearl-white friends who used to be Fehn, as well.

"They're running," Wilson whispered, as we looked down at the bloated remains of a Fehn. There was none of the tar-black blood we had seen during our fight out on the river. "Something's happened, and they're trying to get out of the river as quickly as possible."

"Coming up in people's homes, or at the docks. Throw in a couple reports of these cog-dead, and suddenly every Fehn is a monster." I rubbed my eyes and looked around the house. It had been looted at least once. The city's thieves saw what was happening, and they weren't wasting any time. "This is going to be a hell of a thing to get past."

Wilson grunted and went to the back door. A quick hop across the alley and he picked the lock of another house. We walked on.

The closer we got to our destination, the more Badge we saw. The gray-coated officers held important intersections or patrolled in tight, heavily armed groups. There were plenty of them around the canals, too. We avoided the lot of them, going extra wide around the barricades and staying away from the water. Tough to do in Veridon, and it was taking us forever to make our way across the city. By the time we got where we were headed it was well past noon. People were settling down, repopulating their homes, leaving the streets to the Badge. There was a lot of hammering, as basements were secured or sealed off completely.

Finally, we stepped out of our last looted building and skulked across the street. The house stood opposite, black and broken as when I'd first seen it. The house on Marlowe street, where I'd first met Mr. Ezekiel Crane.

"Wish we'd had time to stop for a dry pistol," I said. I took my revolver out and shook it. Even the wood grip felt soggy.

"What you get for depending on powder, son," Wilson said, drawing the wicked steel blades from his vest. He shrugged off his coat and dropped it to the street, extending his six bonewhite spider arms like a bird shaking out its wings. "You'll just have to be more traditionally brutal."

"Suppose so." A quick look up and down the street showed no witnesses. "Ready?"

"Ready enough," Wilson answered, then rushed the front door in a clattering flutter of arms and legs and razor's edge. The door splintered on impact. I ran after him, yelling and brandishing the damp revolver like a club.

The tiny foyer was empty. The bookcases were splintered, their contents reduced to pulp. The oil lamp was gone. And something had dug ruts into the walls around each of the doors, like a beast trying to dig its way out. Wilson paused long enough to give me a nervous look, then rushed down the hallway Gray and I had taken to meet Mr. Crane. Still low, still narrow, like a tunnel burrowed in a tree. The walls were scorched, and the oil lamp from the foyer lay smashed on the floor in the middle of the room. Its glass hood crunched under our boots as we ran, faster and faster, into the final room.

Empty. It showed all the signs of a thorough looting, the kind of job professionals do if they're looking for something, or trying to hide something. A little random vandalism thrown in to make it look like a casual job.

The fireplace was still warm, the last embers smoldering under a curtain of ash. The furniture was overturned but undamaged, and the massive table was clean of paperwork, though the forest of candles remained. As soon as I saw the papers were gone, I went to the fireplace and poked through it with the barrel of my revolver.

"Awfully confident that powder's ruined, aren't you?" Wilson asked, wincing. I muttered something noncommittal and continued my search. Got nothing for it but a barrel full of ash. Banged it out against my thigh, then grimaced down at the mess it made on my pants. Wilson was giggling at me.

"What's this look like to you?" I asked him, ignoring his joviality.

"What it is. A professional job. Someone wanted us to think it was theft." He tipped one of the delicate chairs up and sat. "But it's not. Thief would have slit these cushions. Thief would have taken the chairs, maybe even the table." He peered at me with his insect-curious eyes, his hundred teeth glittering in the light from the window. "Thief would not have taken all the papers. Papers are not money."

"No, they're not." I sat on the table and swung my legs. "And the stuff in the hallway. Theater?"

He nodded. "Theater. Those doors did not lock. There was no need for something to try to claw its way in. If the doors were barricaded, we would see evidence of the barricade. And the lamp was dropped in the one place it probably wouldn't spread to the rest of the house."

"If someone, and I'm assuming it's Crane we're talking about, if Crane wanted to cover his tracks, why not just burn the place?"

Wilson watched me for a dozen heartbeats, though I don't think he was really seeing me. Finally, he stood up and walked to the table. With those long, articulate fingers of his, he plucked something from among the candles and presented it to me. Crane's glasses, carefully folded shut and hidden.

"Because he expected someone to come by. Because he wanted us to search the house."

I grimaced. I didn't like that. Didn't like being led, being part of someone else's game. Didn't like someone else playing me. I took the glasses from Wilson. They were light, the rims incredibly delicate. The lenses were very thin. I held them up to my face. No distortion. They were false glasses, just for show. Just for theater. I dropped them to the floor and put my boot on them.

"Then I guess we search," I said.

Chapter Four

A Mask, Black, Words in Iron Across its Face

My first visit to this house left me nervous. I came out with the impression of a house full of dark rooms, rooms that may be full of silent people or completely empty. It was a house of strange noises and unsettling quiet. That had changed, but not in a good way. Walking through the house now, I felt like I was sitting in a room with a dead man. No sound, and all the more maddening for the quiet.

There wasn't much to the first floor. The doors off the hallway were empty. There wasn't even dust to disturb. Crane was the tidy sort of criminal. Other than the staged items in the foyer, the hallway and the fireplace room, there was not one scrap of personal detritus. The whole first floor could have been deserted when we held our meeting with Crane. I began to think the whole thing was a set up, until we found the stairs and went up. Things were different upstairs.

It didn't seem like the same house. Everything was painted white, walls to ceiling; even the floor had been drenched in a thick, tacky coat of white paint. The stairs came up in a central room that was ringed by eight doors. Six of them had heavy padlocks that were hanging open. The two without were on opposite sides of the room. One corner of the room was littered with children's toys. Wilson crossed quickly to the toys and poked through them with absolute attention.

"They're all broken," he said with clinical detachment. "Some in quite ingenious ways. Do you think Crane had a child up here?"

"No. I think he kept those for himself, Wilson." I crept to the nearest door without a padlock and put my ear against it. Quiet. "How the hell do I know?"

"Don't you want to do the locked rooms first?" he asked.

"Those are obviously empty. Hopefully. They're hopefully empty." I shrugged and nodded to the door I was standing next to. "Come on."

Wilson put down his toys and stood behind me. The door opened easily. Inside was a bedroom, or something like a bedroom. A room with a bed, at least. A bed, a dresser, and two traveling cases, like you would take on a cruise. Their lids were bound in brass, and the wood showed a great deal of wear. The bed was iron, with a thin mattress and the barest of covers. It was the cheapest piece of furniture we'd seen in the house yet. Where the rest of the house had been compulsively tidy, the covers on the bed were twisted and stained, like they held a madman and his nightmares, night after night. There were no pillows. The dressers were empty.

"That leaves these," Wilson said, and bent to pick up the traveling cases. He scrabbled at the first for a while, fishing around in the tumbler, his face slack with concentration. Longest I'd ever seen him take on a lock.

"Having trouble there, master thief?"

"Yup."

"You want me to handle it?"

"Handle it?" His voice was barely a whisper, barely more than the inhalation of breath. "Shut up. I'll get it."

"Because it looks like you're having trouble there. With the lock."

He let the pick clatter to the floor and sighed.

"Jacob, you're just about the biggest-," he said, turning to look up at me. His eyes locked beyond my shoulder and his body stilled. "Ah."

"Ah?" I asked, then turned quickly. I couldn't see anything. "Ah, what?"

He stood and went to the bed, standing on the sweat-stained mattress to reach the ceiling. Something was nailed to the boards there, just above the theoretical sleeper's head. Wilson pried it free and peered at it.

"Ah," he said.

"What is it?" What I could see was that it was black, about the size of two hands together. He handed it to me.

A mask, black. There were words in iron etched across the face. Other than the eye holes, there were no other features.

"What the hell is this?" I asked.

Wilson came down from the bed and sat wearily on the chest he had failed to pick. I knew the look on his face. It was his scholar look.

"That is what we were meant to find." He drew a pair of reading glasses from one of the innumerable pockets in his vest, rubbed some river water off them, then returned them to the pocket. "We can look in the other rooms if you'd like, but that's going to be it."

"Doesn't answer my question, Wilson." I held out the mask. The words meant nothing to me. Even the letters looked funny. "What is it?"

"I'm not sure. But the lettering is Celestean. It roughly translates into 'Cull.' Or 'Purge,' I suppose. Yes, purge is probably a better translation." He ran his tongue across his hundred teeth, deep in thought. "The image imposed is of a tree stump, burned down to the roots."

"You read Celestean?"

"Tricky question. It's not really a language." He stood and took the mask, holding it at arm's length. "The Celesteans seemed to communicate in unformed ideas. Images. The pictograms we use to program foetal metal cogwork are a derivation of their form. The idea is to let the words interact with the unconscious part of your brain. They impose meaning directly into your…" he searched for the word. "Soul, I guess. Directly into your heart."

"That was perfectly clear," I sniped. He grimaced like a schoolmarm.

"Hold still," he said, then held the mask about an arm's length away from my face. "Look at the words without looking at them. Unfocus. Just let your head talk directly to the…"

"Look, this is bullshit. You told me what it means. Cull. I get it. I don't need to…"

It fell on me like a nightmare. The room disappeared and I was filled with the smell of blood and fire. Ashes in my mouth and the sky was coiling cinder. The earth below me sagged under the weight of blood and my veins crumbled like dry leaves. I gasped, but the only air was thick as steel wool, and just as harsh. On my knees and I could feel the life being dug out of me, out of my heart, out of my blood. Behind me I felt death reaching back for generations, rooting out everything I had known or been or remembered. It was like a fire that burned through time. And before me, nothing, nothing, just the empty night and nothing.

And then I really was on my knees, and Wilson was shaking me with both his stone-hard hands. The mask was on the floor between us, the words in my head coiling like that sky of cinder. I hurled myself back and banged into the cheap iron of the bed.

"Well," Wilson said, standing. "That's the thing about the Celesteans. They said different things to different people." He carefully picked up the mask and wrapped it in a bit of sheet he tore from the bed. I realized I was still staring at him, and tried to compose myself. "Don't. Just relax. Let it get through you. Let it go."

I watched him numbly as he went around the room. He got the chests open, finally. He went through them meticulously, unfolding and then refolding things, rearranging the contents, open pouches, sniffing, closing. My mind was a smooth stone in a babbling brook, the room around me sliding coldly over without penetrating. It was minutes before I understood the things I looked at. I stood.

"What the hell is that thing?" I asked. My voice was harsh, like I'd been crying.

"What we were supposed to find," Wilson answered. "The question is why. And if we were the ones who were supposed to find it, or if he left it for someone else."

I rubbed my hands together and stretched my shoulders.

"I'm ready to go," I said. Wilson shook his head.

"Not yet. This is what we were meant to find, but…"

"I'm ready to go, Wilson. As in, we're going."

He put a hand on my shoulder and squeezed. It hurt.

"Jacob. This isn't the worst thing we've seen. It's likely not to be the worst we'll see before this is over. You need to pull yourself together."

"Sure. But first we're going to go somewhere else." I made for the door. Wilson stopped me.

"First we're going to search the rest of this house. Then we can go."

"You said that we wouldn't find anything else. That we were meant to find that. So. We found it."

"We did." He gestured to the chests. "But what about those?"

I looked over his shoulder. "Looks like clothes to me."

"Yes. Clothes that have been recently packed, and then left behind." He spread his hands in a question. "Why?"

"I don't know. Maybe he forgot them."

"Jacob. Is there anything about Ezekiel Crane that makes you think he would just forget his clothes?"

Grudgingly, I admitted he was right. I didn't say anything, though.

"Which means that he left them behind. By mistake or by plan. And there's nothing in them to make me think it was planned. To me it looks like he brought them here from some great distance, unpacked them while he was here, and then repacked them with the intention of taking them somewhere else. And then he didn't."

"So," I said, slumping my shoulders. "We search the rest of the place."

Wilson nodded. I gave the bundled lump of the mask one more nervous look.

"Locked rooms first, please?" I said.

"That's fine with me. And look," he said, then opened one of the chests. There was a revolver laying on top of the carefully folded shirts. "A present."

I tossed my water-logged iron on the bed and holstered the new revolver. Didn't bother checking the load, or the balance. Just hoped I wouldn't have to draw it. Mostly wasn't sure that I had the heart to draw iron right now. The Celestean nightmare was still howling at the edges of my mind. I didn't trust myself with a weapon. Distastefully, Wilson picked up my old pistol from the bed and stowed it in his coat.

"Always leaving things around, Jacob. You should know better."

"Whatever," I said, heading for the door. "Let's get this over with."

Whatever had been locked in those rooms was long gone. The rooms were devoid of furniture, although the windows were boarded up from the inside. The paint on the floors showed heavy wear, like someone spent all their time pacing back and forth, window to door to window to corner to door. That was the only difference in each of the rooms, actually. The pattern of wear on the floor was of varying complexity. And all of the rooms smelled, though not unpleasantly. Like fresh soil, and the harvest. It reminded me of summers in my youth, out on the estate. Back when we had an estate, and I had summers. Wilson stood in the door to each room, sniffing carefully at the air and studying the floor. He never went in. After the third room I got tired of standing in the hallway and pushed past him into the room. He frowned, but let me go.

"So, he was keeping someone in here?"

"Maybe. It doesn't seem like security was terribly good."

"A padlock doesn't strike you as good security?"

He shrugged his complexity of shoulders. "Those windows could be opened pretty easily. The nails are tiny and the boards aren't flush." Grimly he walked into the room and went to the window. With two fingers he tore a board free and peered out into the light. "Easy enough to undo."

"Remember the toys. Maybe these were kids he had in here. They wouldn't have been strong enough to do that."

"Cheery thought," Wilson said with a sigh. "The foot traffic isn't consistent with that. Big feet made these tracks. Heavy feet."

"Maybe. So if the window isn't any good, why the lock on the door?"

"Maybe it wasn't to keep people in here. Maybe it was to keep people out of here."

"You think Crane had a lot of curious visitors?" I asked.

"Don't you find him curious, Jacob?" Wilson set down the board and quickly exited the room. "I think you're right. I think it's time for us to be on our way. This place makes me oddly uncomfortable. Let's finish up."

The last of the locked rooms provided no additional insight. Without much hope, we turned the knob on the second of the unlocked rooms and threw open the door. It was the smell that got me first, before the door was even fully open. That butcher's smell: spilled meat and blood.

There was only one body, in the center of the room, arms and legs spread and chest bloody. Wilson bounded into the room, steel out, spider arms flickering across the floor and walls. I had the new revolver in my hand. The balance was good, I noticed without noticing, the nightmare forgotten.

"No one else," Wilson said. "Come on."

Of course Wilson didn't recognize him. He'd only seen Gray the one time, on the docks. And the way Gray Anderson looked right now, his own mother would have turned aside.

His eyes were twisted in fear and shock, but the rest of his body looked perfectly relaxed, in spite of the blood. Someone had shoved a ball of twine into his mouth. He was dressed in the Wright's vestments, simple brown and black. I always knew Gray claimed to be a Wright who got away from the Algorithm, but I had never imagined him dressed like this. I wondered how he would have felt, to be found like this. Also wondered why someone had taken the time to dress him up, just to kill him.

There was a single wound, an improbably large puncture wound to the center of his chest. The weapon that made it was still there. From here it looked like a copper tube, plugged with glass. Around the injury was a sticky ring of blood, dry and black. Nasty.

Wilson was ignoring the body. Naturally, because the rest of the room looked like a mad scientist's drunken fantasy, in the process of being dissected. Brass pipes lined the walls, stacked to various depths and of progressive height. Bits of the ceiling had been knocked out, to accommodate the larger items. Each pipe was enclosed in a tangle of tubing that led to the next pipe, or fed from the previous one. Each pipe was open at the top, and cut at an angle, away from the center of the room. Something was passing between the pipes, a sound, like a hurricane heard from far away.

"I don't think this is what he was expecting, when we took this job," I said. Wilson was circling the room, touching the pipes lightly with the talon tips of his spider arms. "Guess I couldn't get him out of this trouble."

He stopped and looked down at the body, recognized him finally. "He was coming back here, wasn't he? After we left on the boat this morning?"

"Yeah. Damn it, Gray. Why couldn't you just be happy living in shitty little houses, doing shitty little jobs?"

Wilson came and stood next to me. He laid an arm across my shoulders.

"Because he isn't you, Jacob. Most folks want to better themselves."

I shrugged his arm off. "Maybe don't give me shit right now, Jacob. This guy was my friend."

"You're a terrible person to friend, Jacob." He turned back to pipes. "Friends of yours keep ending up dead."

"Show a little respect for the dead guy in the room, man."

"Dead guy'll still be dead tomorrow. There's something with these pipes."

"Is there something about them that could have shoved a copper tube through Gray's chest?" I asked. "Because if not, I'm not sure they're immediately relevant."

"Could be," he answered, shrugging. "See if you can find some kind of valve. Or a control panel. Or maybe — "

He stopped moving, but his voice continued around the room, ghosting from pipe to pipe, quieter and quieter. Wilson turned to look at me. Rather needlessly, he held a finger to his lips. Quiet. Got it.

The anansi's voice tumbled away into silence, but the background hurricane kept rolling. I bent my head to it, trying to pick up snatches of sound. My eye was drawn uncomfortably to Gray's restful corpse at the center of the room. Maybe his voice, the last seconds of his terrified life, caught up in this garden of pipes and held forever in brass? I shivered and put a hand on Wilson's shoulder. Pulling him close, I whispered directly into his ear.

"Why do you think Crane would leave this contraption behind?" I asked. Wilson's voice, when he replied, smelled like insect wings and dust.

"Because it's heavy, idiot." His lips hardly moved when he spoke, though his teeth were bared. I was reminded of just how many teeth he had. Wasn't usually this close to them. Their bright white enamel was veined in black that seemed to pulse with each word. "You don't just lug equipment like this around every time you get spooked."

"Which means he might come back for it? Or that he planned to be here for a while?"

Wilson shrugged. The noise in the room was picking up. He squinted at me nervously.

"Or that he doesn't mind it being found. Like the mask. He wants someone to find this." He looked around at the pipes and their tangled feet. "I can't for the life of me tell what it's meant to do, though."

"Can we get back to the dead guy at…" I stopped, because something tapped against my foot. I looked down to see a ball of twine, sticky with spittle and blood. I looked over at the body. It was looking at me, running a dry tongue over its lips. Gray's lifeless, bloodless lips.

"You have forgotten so much about us, Veridon," it said. "What we are. What we do." The body struggled to one elbow, it head lolling across its chest. "How we do it. I am disappointed."

The pipes behind me jangled as I backed into them, my hand clenched around Wilson's shoulder. He shrugged me off and shuffled around the perimeter of the room. The body followed him with one lazy eye, then turned back to me.

"Although I hadn't expected to see you again, Jacob Burn. I really thought the river would take you. Appropriate, I suppose. Unexpected." It coughed, and dryness filled the air, like a tomb unfolding. "Your friend can stop that."

I looked up at Wilson. He was fiddling with the pipes, though he didn't seem to have much direction. Just pulling on tubes, rattling brass. He shot me an angry look and kept at it.

When I looked back at the body, something had changed. The face was bulking up, the skin blossoming in a frost that spread until the skin was pale and bright. The skull lengthened and became narrow. I was reminded of The Summer Girl, the child becoming the woman becoming the singer. The body locked eyes with me and smiled.

"He doesn't have to. It was just advice." The voice expanded, filled the room, the words resonating through the air and into my bones like lightning, close and dangerous. "Something to keep him from hurting himself."

Wilson stumbled back, falling over, his head coming to rest against the body. That heavy voice rolled with laughter, and the legs began to twitch. Wilson jumped up and circled back to me. He gave a meaningful look at my hand. Of course. The revolver. What was I thinking?

I raised my iron and sighted. The body watched me do this, calmly, appraising each action. As I cocked, it nodded once, the smile unwavering. The report shook the room, flash and bang washing out the spiritual whirlwind of the pipes. When I lowered my hand, part of the body's face was missing. I watched as it grew back, like water closing over a blade. The edges of the wound skittered as they sealed shut.

"Just so, Jacob. Just so." He pushed himself into a sitting position, all his weight on one thin arm. He looked at us like a drunk, fallen in the street and propped up, his legs numb on the ground. "So much has been forgotten. Cut out from the history books. Much like the Burns, yes? Much like the many fallen families."

"I know you," I said, recognizing the long face, the narrow mouth. "Ezekiel Crane. I know who you are."

"You do and you don't," the body answered. The voice seemed to vibrate out of the pipes around us, music from an organ, and descend upon the body. I felt like I was hearing the voice in my bones a half breath before the dead man's mouth formed the words. "Your father may know me, but again. Not really."

I fired again, because I'm an optimist. Bullets sometimes work the second time. This one passed through his arm and dented a pipe beyond. The voice warbled for a second, then came back, louder than ever.

"I meant for the river to have you, Jacob. But it might be better this way. More honest." Struggling to his feet, the body hunched forward as he addressed me. "This way, maybe you can be more than just a joke I tell myself." Straightened up and looked me in the eye. "Maybe this time around, you'll be the one wearing the mask."

Wilson jumped forward and put his knife once, twice, three times, fast, into the chest. The body laughed, staggered, and then swatted the thin anansi aside. His knife clattered between the pipes, out of reach.

"I'm not going to kill you. Tried that, and it didn't work. So maybe you're some kind of cosmic gift, Jacob. Jacob and his annoying bug friend. Maybe, in time, you'll understand what I'm doing. Why I'm doing it. You're not the one I expected to come here, although I'm sure they're on their way." The body rested his hands on his hips and looked toward the door. "We can wait, if you want. Not what I would do if I were you. But it's your call."

"We'll wait," I said. "Whoever it is, at least they don't hide in dead bodies and try to kill me."

The body smiled and cocked his head at me.

"Don't they? Isn't that exactly what they do, Jacob? Isn't that exactly what they've done?"

I fired again, this shot hitting his throat. The eyes bulged for a second as the soft column of flesh reformed. I swear I saw the briefest vision of wings, fluttering across the gaping wound.

"You've got to stop doing that, Jacob. I'm patient, but it won't last forever. Maybe I reset this encounter. Kill you and your friend, and let the proper people find the mask. I try to not question the universe, but you're proving to be a little difficult."

"Summer Girl," I said, realization washing over me as I lowered my revolver until it was pointing at the glass plug in his chest. "But I've heard that song."

Three fast shots, then the hammer fell on an empty chamber. The lead buried itself into the glass. It was the second shot before Crane realized what I was doing, dead hands jerking over his chest. Too late. Just a bit too late. The pipe burst, and his life came fluttering out on dry paper wings.

The room filled with a cloud of insects, pouring from the body's newly reopened wound. Smooth, black and shiny, like jeweled honey, buzzing angrily out of his chest. The body flailed and jerked, but the face was supremely calm. Almost pleased. He gave me one last look, utter satisfaction, and then the illusion fell away in sticky slabs of false meat. The facade collapsed, pulled away from the animated flesh, and the body tumbled once more to the floor. The cloud of insects swarmed across the pipes, sucking the last whispering madness from their echoes, then fell to the ground. Dead.

"Maker beetles," Wilson said, running his toe through the dry husks. "Huh."

"So he's some kind of cogwork carrier?" I asked, kneeling down by the body. A few stragglers crawled up out of his mouth. The wounds Wilson and I gave him were back, ragged flesh torn open by bullet and blade. "Some kind of artificer trick?"

"Not like any trick I've ever seen," Wilson answered. He pried open the mouth with curious fingers, then felt around the bloody plug in his chest. The brass tube came free with a sucking pop. Nothing special about it, just a glass vial sheathed in metal. Only thing of note was that it had been driven violently into my friend's chest. "Nothing but what you'd usually find inside a dead man. No cogwork, no foetal metal. Nothing to run… whatever that was."

He tossed the vial to the ground and watched it roll away.

"What are we doing, Wilson?" I asked. "What the hell is happening here?"

"From the sound of it, someone is coming to find this mask." He fished his knife out from the machinery, gave the body one last look, and then headed to the door. "And I'd like to be well gone before they get here."

It was Gray's face looking back at me, once again. I cycled the chamber of my revolver, dumped the shells onto the floor, and then reloaded. I wasn't a good friend. Wasn't a good person to be friends with. You end up dead, then you end up coming back from the dead, and I have to shoot you in the chest. Not a good friend.

Wilson was already downstairs before I left the room. I think I was the only one who heard the pipes laughing as I clattered down the stairs. But I probably didn't hear that. Probably just in my head.

A Maker Beetle is kind of a leftover miracle. A scrap from something that came before us, that we don't fully understand. The only people who had any knowledge of such things belonged to the Artificers Guild, and they only knew the bare minimum. There was a time when the Guild was a broader interest, with offices at the Academy of Thought and Practice, and apprentices and masters and a bustling trade of scientific inquiry. Now all that was left of that was the Council-sanctioned Guild. They were mostly for entertainments, like The Summer Girl or the other engram singers, who performed a very specific series of songs or plays, the memories clipped from the original players and recreated for generations.

Those memories were somehow stored in the beetles. Wilson tried to explain it to me, once. How Wilson knew is its own mystery, and maybe he didn't really know, because I couldn't really understand it. But basically, a memory could be engraved in the queen beetle, the pattern of the singer and the song, what it felt like to be that person and do that thing. And then the queen could be implanted in an engram singer, and her hive of maker beetles would… well… remake the singer into that memory. There was a lot of cogwork involved, since the singer need to be able to accommodate a whole hive of scuttling beetles. The details of how those machines worked was a closely guarded secret within the Guild. Understandable. The Academy didn't advertise how they made the PilotEngine, either.

The end result was a memory that could be played out in flesh. With the help of the beetles, an engram singer could become a specific singer, and perform a song exactly as it was sung decades ago. Even hundreds of years, as long as the queens were well bred. That's what the Guild did these days. Breed queen beetles, maintain hives, and teach little girls to sing like memories.

We watched them arrive at Crane's house from a couple blocks away, sitting in the second floor of an atrium bar. An automaton pillar in the center of the atrium was playing out all the bawdy scenes from "The Fifty Nights of Winter" in clacking, whirring earnest. Even the painted wooden whores looked embarrassed. Wilson and I drank coffee and looked out the window.

They arrived in a sealed carriage. The engine was nice and new, brass plates shuffling behind the baffles in quick time. Not the kind of carriage you usually saw in this district. Which was sloppy. It was memorable. Unless they didn't care if people knew they were dealing with Crane.

Three figures went inside, dressed in heavy black coats and hoods. No-one I recognized, although at this distance I wouldn't have recognized myself in a coat and hood. Not a minute later one of them came out and signaled down the road. More carriages, bearing the sigil of the Badge.

"Council people, then?" I asked. There weren't a lot of other patrons at this hour, but I kept my voice low.

"Could be. Badge has become awfully mercenary in the last couple years." Wilson drank from his cup and grimaced. "Could just be someone with the right amount of coin."

I murmured something about getting a price list and finished my coffee. The waitress came by to fill the cup, all smiles and bust. When she was gone I turned back to the window.

"So where next? To the Artificers? I don't know anyone in that set."

Wilson held his cup about halfway to his mouth, staring idly out the window. Not sure he was seeing anything.

"I'd rather not. We have other leads to follow. The mask, for example."

"What was that about, do you think? What Crane said?"

Wilson shrugged. "Maybe you'll be wearing the mask this time? Who knows. I think our friend Crane may be a little insane."

"Yes. A little," I smiled. "It was the bit where he animated my dead friend so he could have a conversation with us that sold me on it. Before then, you know, with the thing where he changed all the Fehn into mad corpses, that wasn't quite insane enough."

"You have very high standards, Mr. Burn," Wilson said.

"I have to. Look at the people I hang out with."

Wilson snorted and put his coffee down. "I take it you've recovered fully from looking into the mask, then?"

"Not at all," I answered, shivering. "Not even a little."

"What did you see?" he asked.

I told him, as best I could. It was the feeling of being rooted out and cast aside that was the hardest to communicate. I felt like a tree, torn out at the root and thrown on a fire of absolute heat. The brightest fire ever imagined. Just talking about it made me sweat.

"Well. That's not completely different from what I saw. Just more," Wilson paused, considering his next words, trying not to look me in the face. Finally he raised his eyes. "More personal. Like it was written for you, and not me."

"Written for me? That's good to know. Should we go around the city showing it to people, to see how they react? Maybe we could figure out what it means by triangulating how terrified different people are of it. We could start with my dad, couldn't we? He's been a bit mad in the head ever since…" I stumbled. Ever since I had lost Emily, ever since he had finally, utterly thrown me out of the family. Ever since he swore he would never see me again, and shut himself up in the house, and refused to acknowledge he even had a son. Ever since then. "Yeah. Maybe that extra bit of madness would do him some good. Do you think?"

Wilson wasn't listening to me. He was absolutely still, the coffee cup gripped firmly in his fingers, staring out the window.

"Wilson? Are you even hearing me?"

"Jacob. The young lady out there, the one talking to the Badge. Does she look familiar?"

I looked. All smiles and bust.

"No wonder no one's refilled my cup," I spat. As we watched, the girl turned and pointed back to the bar. The Badge turned with her, then set off towards us at a trot.

"Time we were going," Wilson said. We stood and took two steps toward the iron corkscrew stairs that led to the main floor, and the exit. There was someone standing at the top of the stairs, looking at us. Waiting for us.

She was young, or at least had the body of a young woman. Dressed scandalously in pants and a vest, all cinched closely to her form. It reminded me of how factory workers secure every flap of clothing, to keep it from the hungry machines. An odd contrast. The vest was covered in button-flap pockets, and her belt was wide and black. Many weapons hung at her hips. She wore bulky gloves that contrasted sharply with the grace and cut of her form.

Her face was bound in an iron mask, fitted with brass around the eyes and along the jaw. Eyes hidden by matte black goggles that flexed and whirred as we stood there, staring at each other. A single thick braid of dark hair coiled down her back. She reached toward me, and put a hand to her belt.

"Back door," Wilson barked, and we jumped across the floor, toppling narrow tables in our wake. She followed us through the broken glassware, the jangling forks, and the yells of the Badge who were just now reaching the iron stairs.

Chapter Five

A Girl in Iron

Bars like thiS have a lot of back doors. It's sensible. The sort of place where, if the Badge comes in the front door, there are going to be a lot of people who might want out of the building. Quickly. Wilson and I fit this description exactly, with maybe double emphasis on the quickly. The girl was of a like mind, though possibly of opposite intent. I assumed Wilson would just head to one of these many doors. Incorrectly.

Wilson just ran to the window, snatching up a chair for protection as he went, and plunged straight through. No time to adjust, once I knew what he was doing, so I stuttered to a halt and fell through the open window. Of course, the next window over was a fire escape. Nice, reliable ladder, just out of reach. Wilson snagged it with his spindly spider arms and swung away. I fell.

Just far enough that it hurt when I got a hand around the iron filigree that lined the second floor. Hurt a lot. The skin of my hand opened up, my shoulder wrenched, and then I swung like a battering ram into the wall. Winded, my grip slick with my own blood, I was sliding down before I could get a better handle. Hit the floor with both boots and my knees crumpled. I curled onto the ground and gasped until my lungs opened up. Wilson landed next to me and started pulling at my elbow.

"Get up, man. Get to your feet," he hissed without looking at me. I tried to convey the seriousness of my wounds, and how a lot of it was his damn fault for leading me through a window, but all I could get out was a squeaking wheeze. Finally he looked down at me. "Stop screwing around, Jacob. We're very interesting to all the wrong people."

I looked up and saw the girl, leaning out over the blood-spattered railing. She had her strange eyes on the street below. I followed her eyes. A second group of the Badge were nearly on us. I could hear the ones who had rushed inside still yelling. Our waitress was nowhere to be seen. Typical. The girl looked down at us, almost curiously, then disappeared.

"Come on," I croaked. "We should be going."

"I've been saying that," Wilson said. We went in opposite directions, then I stumbled to a halt and ran after him.

"Remember next time," I yelled after him. "Walls. Windows. Open pits." I spat a wad of blood onto the cobbles. "I need ladders for that sort of thing."

"You need to learn to adapt, Jacob. Take some risks."

I muttered nonsensically, because that's all I could think of. We scrambled around a corner and lit off down an alley. The Badge was behind us, clumsily pushing past the stacked crates and rubbish bins. Those jackets of theirs were not made for pursuit. They needed to rethink their uniforms.

"So who do you think that was?" Wilson asked me as we came out into a wider avenue and I caught up with him. I looked over at him with wide eyes. Still trying to catch my breath after that fall.

"Talk about it. Later. Now is running," I gasped.

"Fair enough. But it's an interesting question. I mean, was our waitress trying to get the Badge because of her, or because of us? Or did she send the waitress to get the Badge, to help capture us?"

"Fascinating," I puffed. "Run."

"Yes, yes. This way," he said, then darted into a side alley. Again I stumbled to a stop, had to double back to follow. We were going to have a talk when this was over.

The alley went about ten feet, turned sharply twice, then ended in a high, brick canyon. No ladder.

"Oh, for the love of gods, Wilson," I was bent over, hand on my knees, trying to find some oxygen that could do the job of completely filling my lungs. "We talked about this. Walls. I can't just…" I fluttered my fingers. "I'm not a damn butterfly."

"I would never have mistaken you for one. You know, you're really out of practice with this stuff. Like you've forgotten your buddy Wilson here plans for this sort of thing."

He bounded up the wall, spider arms clattering against the bricks. He disappeared over the lip of the building. A second later a knotted rope coiled down the wall, landing at my feet. Wilson's narrow face and sharp smile reappeared.

"Up, up," he said, then was gone.

I put a hand around the rope and gave it a tug. It wasn't too far up, but farther than I'd climbed in a while.

"Not much better, buddy," I whispered. Didn't want him to hear me. Cutting the rope wasn't out of the question, if he got in one of his moods. Arm over arm, feet pressed against the bricks like a mountain climber, I went up. Halfway there, the Badge arrived.

"You!" they yelled, because there were so many other people they could be talking to. "On the rope! Come down from there!"

Wilson reappeared, counted heads, and drew his knife. He jerked his head, indicating that I should hurry, because clearly I had been taking my time. This was like a vacation for me. Words, Wilson. We were going to have words.

"Come down or we'll fire!" one of them yelled. He drew a shortrifle, to emphasize the point. I found that I could go faster. Another of them started up after me. A healthy lad, who had not recently fallen from a window. He was making good time.

"Come on, come on, son. Up, up!" Wilson spat. My arms were getting numb, and I couldn't keep my boots on the wall. Everything that wasn't numb was on fire. I tried to give him an angry look, but I suspect it came out as plumb exhaustion. He grimaced, sheathed the knife and then disappeared behind the lip of the building.

A second later the rope shook. I almost let go, but then Wilson's straining face popped into view.

"Hold on!" he said through tiny, gritted teeth. I held. He pulled with all his many arms and his unnaturally hard legs. Up I went. The Badgeman yelped and fell. The first bullet skittered off the brick just as I rolled onto the roof. Wilson and I lay in a tangle of very many arms. The rope tensed again, and Wilson casually leaned over and cut it.

"You're in terrible shape," he said. "Getting soft in your criminal ways."

"Falling from a window does that to me," I said, still trying to get my breath sorted. I took the loose end of the rope in my hand and gave it a shake. "You have these all over the city?"

"Escape routes? Some. Not as many as I used to. It's been a quiet couple of years for us." He stood, and pulled me to my feet, though I'm not sure I was ready for that much verticality. "Good to be at it again, huh?"

"Huh," I answered. Dared a peek over the edge, ducked back when all I saw were shortrifles pointing at me. A couple shots went off, but nothing too close. "Well. What now?"

"They'll go around in a minute. Come up the stairs or something. We should try to get to the next. Huh."

"Huh?" I repeated. Looked at him, then where he was looking.

The girl was several buildings over, moving across the roof with a dancer's grace. She came to the edge and leaped, like a gazelle clearing a pond. Beautiful to look at, if not for the mask. If not for the chase. If not for the fact that everything about her stank of predator, not prey.

"Interesting," Wilson whispered. I grabbed his coat and pulled him away.

"Interesting later," I spat, and we ran. So much running today. I really was out of shape.

We went rooftop-to-rooftop for a while, until it became clear that I was the weak link in that exchange. She was fast, Wilson was fast. I was tired. Wilson pried open a rooftop hatch and we clambered down into a shuttered factory. It was set up to manufacture the sort of machinery that cogwork couldn't replicate. The first ladder took us to a catwalk that creaked dangerously under our feet. The factory floor was bisected by machinery that was draped in white sheets and dust. A partially dissected assembly line snaked between the ghost machines. The only light was what little leaked in from the stained skylights in the roof. In that semi-dusk glow, the draped machines loomed in a field of darkness.

At the prompting of the unstable catwalk, Wilson and I found a ladder down to the main floor. We'd barely touched boot to concrete when we heard footsteps on the shingled roof. I pulled the anansi into the forest of machinery and ducked under some of the drapery. Dust puffed up around us. The floor was littered with dead bugs that crunched underfoot. I tried to not think about the dead body in Crane's room, and its plume of maker beetles.

The footsteps on the roof slowed, the ceiling beams creaking with the girl's passage. Finally they stopped. Wilson and I sat still, breathing in dust and dead bugs. Wilson probably didn't mind, but I was getting uncomfortable. Minutes passed, and then the footsteps continued. The hatch groaned open, then footsteps on the ladder. The catwalk creaked under her feet.

"Did you see an exit anywhere?" Wilson whispered to me. It sounded deafening in the shuttered factory. I shook my head and waited for the footsteps overhead to stop. They didn't. The girl kept walking slowly along the catwalk. Several minutes, and her progress continued. She had to be halfway across the factory by now. The catwalk sounded terrible, the metal pinging and groaning under her feet.

"She's past us," Wilson breathed in my ear, then scooted a little distance away and pulled the drapery up so he could look out.

"What are you doing?" I hissed, pulling him back in. He shrugged me off. How was she not hearing this?

"Looking for a way out. We can't just sit here forever."

"Maybe we can. Maybe the catwalk will collapse and then she'll stop being our problem."

Wilson looked thoughtfully up at the ceiling, then shrugged. "I'm not sure that would stop her from being our problem."

He went back to looking out from under the machine, then slipped completely out. I heard him cross the aisle to another mothballed unit. I sat there cursing under my breath, then followed.

Either my eyes had adjusted to the artificial dusk of the factory floor, or there was more light in here now. I could clearly see the skeletal framework of the catwalk, criss-crossing the building. There were many machines on the floor that had not been draped, too. They stood out as blacker blacks in the darkness. Glad we hadn't run into any of those on our way to our hiding place.

Wilson was crouched behind one such machine, his hands lightly on its surface, peaking out around the corner. I got behind him, then stretched up to look over the machine. There was the girl, high up among the catwalks. She was almost to the other side of the building.

"Can we get back to the ladder and get out of here?" I asked.

"Not without her noticing. And then we're right back where we were, jumping from roof to roof." He looked at me over his shoulder. "Have you suddenly developed a preternatural ability to keep up with me?" I grimaced, which somehow he saw. "So we need to find an exit on this floor, and a quiet way to get to it."

I stood up a little taller, risking a look around the factory floor. Lots of these mothballed machines, and a raised track that once moved some kind of product from station to station. Carriage factory? It was impossible to tell in this condition. Worse, all the machinery prevented me from clearly seeing the walls. After several seconds of frustration, I found the closest thing to a door. Pulling Wilson back, I explained.

"Whatever they made here, it was pretty big. At the end of the assembly line there's a galley door. Fifteen feet tall, with sliding shutters."

"That's it?"

"That's all I can see. Best news is that it's on our end of the factory. The line starts down there, where she is. Comes out over here," I said, pointing.

"Galley door will be bolted shut," Wilson said. "Probably from the outside."

"You're saying you can't pick a lock through a wall?" I asked.

"No, Jacob. There's the wall to contend with, and…" he stopped when he realized I wasn't serious. Gave me a look. Probably the same look he gave to things he was about to kill and eat. "Point is, even if we get to it, we can't get through it."

"You've never worked in a factory, I take it," I said. "There'll be an entrance beside the galley."

"Like a cat door," Wilson answered. "Fine. That will be more traditionally locked." He peered back around the machine. The girl was standing immobile, facing the wall opposite us. She had her hands open, as though in a benediction. "Strange girl. But I think she'll still hear us."

"She seems to be pretty distracted," I said. "I think we could make a break for it."

"Sure," Wilson said. "You first."

"You're the one who's going to be picking the lock."

"Which is why it's important that you go first. In case she hears you, you can run off in some other direction and distract her while I get the door open."

"Seriously?" I asked. Wilson shrugged.

"I just don't want to go first," he said.

"What happened to 'Good to be back at it,' huh?"

"It was better on the roofs. I knew what I was doing." He folded into himself a little and shivered. "This place is like a damn tomb."

"Tomb," I said, quietly. "Dead bodies. Trying to kill me."

"What?" Wilson asked.

"Nothing," I said. Rubbed my face and checked where the girl was one more time. "Nothing. Let's go. Like you said, if she notices me I'll jump off the other way. Get the door open and I'll come around."

"If who notices," he asked. Nervously.

"The girl, Wilson," I said, then I noticed the way he was staring past me. Back to where the girl was. Had been. Was gone.

"Oh, hell," I whispered. I stood up. A room full of ghost machines and black shadows, the floor littered with the dry shells of bugs. "Just get to the door. Go."

"Jacob, this is getting weird fast. Maybe we should…"

"Go!" I yelled, pulling my revolver out and giving the anansi a shove. He stumbled gracelessly, then gathered himself and skittered off toward the galley door. His footsteps pattered and echoed off the high rafters. Another sound, too. Smooth, even, soft. Another set of feet. Hard to tell where it was coming from.

"Wilson, quiet for a second. Quiet!"

"What?" he hissed, loudly.

"Be quiet!"

He was. We stood twenty feet apart, immobile, but I could have sworn I could hear his heartbeat. Nearly as loud as mine. No other sound. Nothing. We stayed that way for a half-handful of heartbeats, then I nodded at him to continue. He crept off, much quieter this time. I could barely hear it. And then, footsteps. Over there.

I pulled myself quickly up onto the machine I had been hiding behind to get a better look. The girl's strange head bounced smoothly into view, moving along the far wall, one hand against it. I took an off-balance shot that got nowhere near her. She went down.

"Get her?" Wilson yelled from somewhere close to the door.

"No," I yelled back. "I think she knows we're here, though."

"Yeah," Wilson answered.

My eyes were getting used to the light of the factory. I squatted down and moved laterally, edging closer to where I'd seen our lovely pursuer. Away from Wilson, in case she decided to follow the anansi. Give me a chance to sneak up behind her. And if she followed me, then he had more time to get the door open. Quietly, I crept from machine to machine, my feet barely dusting the floor. I held the revolver in front of me and stepped around a corner, sighting into the darkness.

Abruptly, the revolver was no longer in front of me, and a moment later pain registered throughout my hand. The hand was no longer in front of me, for that matter, and then the pain was in my jaw and chest. Dimly, I recognized the sound of a pistol clattering to the floor and sliding some distance away. Also a boot, moving through the air in a way I usually associate with birds of prey. I was on my back, scrambling away like a crab. She came around the corner. In the darkness the lenses of her eyes glittered like lightning through distant thunderheads.

"Wilson!" I yelled, although it wasn't as loud or as urgent as I wanted. I tried to get to my feet while still retreating, and only managed to cartwheel flat on my back. Dust haloed around me and the breath left me. Twice in one day. Good times. I got the heels of my hands under my back and sat up. She stopped, just out of reach, weight on her back heel, the toes of her front leg barely off the ground. Like an insect, a spider, tasting the web. Waiting to strike.

The lights came on, accompanied by several rolling booms around the perimeter of the factory floor. Smoke rose up. I threw my arm over my head to shield my eyes from the sudden brightness. The girl didn't move, other than to cock her head to one side.

"Badge!" a machine-enhanced voice rolled out from all sides of the building. "We have the room surrounded and all exits blocked. Come out and submit yourself to the Council's justice!" The words echoed through the building, crashing against each other and distorting in the high places of the factory. Carefully, I got to my feet, never taking my eyes off the girl.

She ignored me. As soon as the noise of the machine-voice settled down, a wave of crashing boots shuffled through dozens of doors that we couldn't see. They were in the building, all sides of it, from the sound of it. She gave up her fighting stance and stared at the ceiling for two heartbeats. I saw my pistol, under the fluttering sheet of the machine just behind me. Decided not to go for it yet.

The girl stared at the machine behind me, then the next one, then another. She walked to the last one with stiff determination. She ripped off the sheet that covered it, revealing an antique-looking control panel, all switches and valves and dials that looked like they hadn't been used in a generation. Without pause she began throwing switches, going from lever to lever like it was a memorized routine and she was being timed. The switches threw with a satisfyingly mechanical clack, like primitive musical instruments. She went through a half-dozen complicated motions, then put her hand on a throw-wheel and looked back at me. I had been going for the pistol. I stopped; she looked from me to the revolver, then back to my face. I couldn't read anything in that iron mask. I wasn't even sure she was alive, the way she moved. Like a routine, like a show. Finally she spun the wheel.

The factory roared into wild mechanical life. The sheets blew off the machines or were consumed and shredded, spewed up into the air like linen snow. The sound was tremendous, the tearing of cloth, the grinding howl of engines that hadn't been maintained, suddenly awake and shuddering with disuse. With a clattering moan, the track that crisscrossed the factory floor lurched into motion.

The engine that I was standing next to unfolded like a spider on its back. I rolled to the ground, scooped up my pistol and scrambled, face to the floor, away from its spinning arms. When I got to my feet, the girl was gone. The Badge, though, was everywhere.

They took the restart of the factory as some kind of initiation of hostilities, and were taking no chances. The tiny open space where I stood was pinned in on three sides by whirling machinery, going through the motions of assembling and production. The fourth side was bordered by the rattling assembly track. Beyond, I could see a unit of Badgemen advancing, shortrifles leveled, ballistic shields strapped to their arms. They hadn't seen me yet. In fact, they seemed to be advancing on a pile of crates that had somehow survived the animation of the engines around them.

I hunched below the lip of the assembly track, creeping as close as I dared without risking getting caught in its gears. The air was filled with shreds of linen, floating down like confetti. Some of them were alight, and there was a great deal of smoke billowing up from the floor. Either a friction fire, or exhaust from the primitive engines, I wasn't sure. A large section of sheet slumped to the ground near the patrolmen, temporarily blocking their view of the crates. The girl hopped out from where she had apparently been hiding, landed near the still collapsing sheet, and then charged through its fluttering edges and into the Badgemen. Chaos and gunfire ensued, and then she was past them, bounding between machinery to disappear among the burning linen and screaming engines. The patrol was a shambles, several of them down, more still trying to react to the sudden assault. They huddled like a tortoise, shields out, shortrifles flicking back and forth. Yelling. Lots of yelling.

"There's one here," from behind me, and I turned. Three officers on the other side of the whirling spider-machine. "Come on out, lad," they said from behind the barrels of their weapons. I jumped up on the track, thinking to make it to the other side and try my luck with the frightened tortoise. But the track was not smooth, and not to be jumped on lightly by someone like me. The iron girl probably could have managed it. The surface was articulated, a series of thin levers that depressed and gripped whenever pressure was applied. I applied pressure with my foot, and the thing ate my leg up to the shin. I stumbled, went down, submitted hands and elbows and face into the hungry track. Metal pinched flesh and drew blood. Bullets sang off the track around me, and then something sharp and unyielding went into my ribs, stitched a line up to my shoulder. I finally got free, to see that I was in the process of being unmade by the newly awakened factory. The track had traveled a good bit while I was struggling with it, and the tortoise was too far away to be much more than a nuisance. It was the factory itself that I had to worry about.

This part of the track was the most heavily populated with machinery. There was no friendly shore to hop off, no clearance on either side of the track. Engine after engine lurched at me, some still wrapped in the burning remains of their covers, some so far out of balance that they were just twisting and thrashing at the conveyor. I ducked under an array of fitting arms and right-sizers. And then one of the machines downtrack of me stopped its assault, seized up and collapsed across the track. Like a branch across a river, and I grabbed for it. The metal was still hot, and bits of smoldering linen burned my skin, but I pulled myself free of the track and onto the machine. Gasping for my breath in the smoke-thick air, I slumped onto the factory floor and lay there, looking up at the ceiling and wondering how I'd gotten to this horribly uncomfortable stage in life. Wasted childhood, perhaps. I know there's some way to blame my father for all this. Surely.

Groaning, I pushed myself into a sitting position and looked around. I had no idea where Wilson had gotten to, where the girl was, or how I was going to get out of here. The Badge was everywhere. Although none of them could see me, I could hear them calling out to each other, tightening their search. The machine-voice was still booming incoherently over the cacophony of the awakened factory. I got to my heels, squatted and drew my revolver. At least I still had that. I looked up, into the eyes of the iron girl.

She was hidden in the lee of a particularly large machine. It was all boiler and flywheel, the moving parts safely on the other side of the engine. She was folded neatly into the gap below the tank. It must be terribly hot there, but she didn't seem to mind. What she did seem to mind, however, was my attention. It seemed like she was glaring at me, through those matte black lenses. Impossible to tell, really.

I yelped and stood, bringing the iron up to fire. She was on me in a breath, slapping the revolver to the side and striking across my chest and legs. Treated me just like she had the control panel, each movement as if she had choreographed and practiced it her whole life. Fist came down on my leg moments before I was able to balance on it, elbow against my throat a heartbeat before I could yell, knee striking forearm once, twice, each blow disrupting my aim just enough to keep the barrel of my gun away from her. I fired anyway, but the blast did more to distract me than to bother her. Finally she set her heel behind my leg and shoved me in the hips and shoulder, and I was impossibly overbalanced. As I went down she snatched the pistol from my flailing arm. I was on my back, looking up at my own pistol.

She stood there for a moment. I finally detected the slight movement of breath in her chest. So she was alive, at least. A pleasant change, considering the last day. When she was done glaring down at me, she flipped the revolver in her hand, slapped the chamber open and emptied the shells harmlessly onto my face. Then she brought her hands together, did something complicated, and when she spread her arms again the pieces of my revolver scattered across the floor. Like a party trick. With her hands still wide, she backed away. Right into Wilson's tackle.

The anansi came over the top of the big boiler she had been hiding under, the six long, thin limbs that sprouted from his back carrying him up and over the cast iron dome. His regular hands were empty, and his clothes looked a little charred. Must have been working on the door when the Badge made their appearance in force. The din of the factory drowned out the sound of his approach. He pounced, as only a spider can.

He hit her in stride, and they went down in a heap of legs and iron. She rolled to her feet, but Wilson swiped them away, first one then the other. She did this odd hopping dance, regaining one foot as he took the other, three or four times as he kept striking and she kept recovering. It would have been funny if not for the look on Wilson's face, the frustration and fear. Finally he gave up on unbalancing her and turned his many-armed attention to doing the girl harm. Eight arms in all, six tipped in sharp talons, two hard as rocks. Something about anansi bones made them super dense. For all that Wilson was a tall, skinny, bookish looking guy, he was incredibly strong. And that strength came out and he struck with the six arms that hung over his shoulders, each one darting in, only to be brushed aside by the girl's close defense. She didn't move an inch more than she had to, deflecting each attack with armored forearms or the knife-edge of her hands. Each talon that flashed past her whipped back to strike again, to be deflected again, to whip back again. It was dizzying to watch.

The iron girl was moving backwards, herded by the ferocity of Wilson's attack. Smoke was getting heavy in the air. Something was burning, and not just scraps of sheet and cranky gearshafts. I rolled heavily to my feet, abandoned the dissected remains of my stolen revolver, and tried to find something that could make a difference in the dazzling melee that was going on before me. Needn't have worried. I heard a shout and looked up to see Wilson drawing back, bloody on the tip of one of his talons. His eyes were on fire with hungry triumph. The iron girl's sleeve was torn, the dark tan skin beneath gashed open. Wilson howled and redoubled his attack.

Several more blows landed in the next few breaths. The iron girl was tiring, pushing the attacks farther away than was absolutely necessary. Hard to imagine using this word to describe the nearly mechanical precision of her actions, but she was getting sloppy, and Wilson was taking advantage.

It was the Badge that saved her, and nearly finished us all. The two combatants were making enough noise now to draw the attention of even the most casual of patrolmen; the guys coming at us in riotplate were not terribly casual. They ignored me and set up a firing line on the other side of the assembly track. They couldn't have had more than an obscured view of the fight, but it was enough to convince them this was one of those 'shoot first, questions later' kind of situations. They shot.

I mentioned the boiler. It was big, iron. Incredibly old. Iron enough that the first two slugs did nothing more than flake rust and dimple the skin. Old enough that the third, fourth and tenth slugs went inside. Inside, where the fire was. The fire came out. Rapidly.

Wilson and the iron girl both turned their heads when the first shots impacted the boiler. Situational awareness, they call that. I saw them looking concerned, and I've been around Wilson enough to know that his concern is my concern. When the acrobats-militant flipped out of the way and threw themselves to the ground, I did the same. The fire washed over me in a sheet of angry heat. It treated the rest of the factory poorly, including those riotplated Badgemen.

It was all noise to me. Screaming, tearing metal, the rapid rush and roar of consumed air and guttering fire. Engines tearing free of their moorings to bounce playfully across the floor. More screaming. Wilson pulled me up, shook me. Looked concerned when I opened my eyes. He was talking but I couldn't hear anything over the din of the factory. I looked around the floor. Dimpled concrete where there had been machines. Fire where there had been Badgemen. Nothing where there had been an iron girl.

He shook me again. I got the idea. We had to go. Now.

Chapter Six

The Formal Engine

I was in worse shape than I thought. It took Wilson's help to get me through the wreckage of the factory floor to the ladder that led up to the catwalk. The building was still surrounded. We might have made it out in the smoke and the confusion, but the Badge was keeping the fire brigade away from the flames, so they were pretty serious about the cordon. Don't know why they wanted us so badly.

Wilson got me to the ladder and followed up to the roof. Sections of the steel sheeting had already fallen in, and pillars of smoke were climbing out of the building. We crawled carefully to one of the alley-side edges and peered down. Badge, all over the place.

"I can make the jump," Wilson said, as if there was ever any doubt. "You?"

"I don't know," I said. My leg was numb, and something was throbbing in my hip. Probably nothing broken, but still. Pain. That would have been embarrassing. Broken hip, jump like my great aunt Ada. "I'm pretty banged up."

Wilson looked nervously around the building. More of the roof was collapsing, more smoke pouring out. Clouds of cinder swirled up from the shattered skylights, like swarms of burning insects. I thought of the dry husks that littered the floor down there, and the eruption of maker beetles from the body. This was going to lead to some weird dreams, I could tell.

"They're not going to let us off the roof any other way," Wilson said. I realized he'd been talking for a while. "So either we jump, or we signal them and surrender."

"Or we do both," I said. He gave me a look.

"You take the mask and get out of here. Keep it away from the girl. I can't help but think that she's the one Crane was expecting." I rolled over onto my back and closed my eyes. "I'm going to stay here. Turn myself in to the Badge. We haven't really done anything wrong."

"You think that matters to the Badge?" Wilson asked.

"No. But it'll matter to the Council. If anyone can talk their way out of something like this, it's me. And honestly, there are some people in the Council I'd like to talk to. Some questions I'd like to ask." I rubbed the ash out of my eyes and grimaced. "Some folks in that chamber know more than a little about things Celestean."

"You sure you're going to be okay?"

"Oh yeah. Ruined my leg, almost got eaten by a bunch of dead river people, talked to a man full of insects, discovered an ancient and possibly homicidal artifact." I gave him a big thumbs up. "I'm going to be great!"

"Your enthusiasm is admirable," Wilson said with a thin smile. "Well. Don't fall thirty feet into the burning factory. Though the falling part would probably kill you, I'd hate for your dad to have to bury a pile of ashes in your memory."

"You are the courage-maker, Wilson."

He thumped me on my shoulder, then scrambled across the roof and onto the next building. I watched until he disappeared around a chimney. When he was good and gone, I pulled myself to the lip of the roof and yelled down.

"Gentlemen of the Badge! I have come to terms with the inevitability of my capture. Please stop burning buildings in my pursuit!" A handful of faces looked up at me. None of them moved. "I surrender," I said to emphasize the point. "And please get a ladder. This roof is getting hot."

When people first came to the Veridon delta on the river Reine, they found things. Old things. Mostly it was buried buildings and broken machines and an undeniable heaviness to the air that made the place feel like a museum that had been cracked open and laid out to the sky. And some of the people who came to the delta found a way to use some of those things. My many-times great grandfather, for example, uncovered a buried furnace as big as several houses, and managed to harness the power to fuel the initial boom of the city of Veridon. That was our ticket into politics, got our name on the Founder's Charter, our seat on the first Council of Veridon. The Tombs used to have a different name, something to do with fishing or shipping. I forget. But then old Patron Tomb made his deal and then didn't die, and people changed the way they talked about the family. We even changed their name on the Charter. That's how we treat history, here in Veridon. Something to be mined, and changed, and used. That's how we treat everything.

We found other things, too. Living things, or at least undying things. The Celestes. Seven of them, spread out across the delta. They looked like people, their features a little more perfect than we could imagine, their skin whiter than any of ours would ever be. Like light, sculpted onto their bones. They hovered above the ground, oblivious to the dirty-faced crowds of the early Veridians, gathered around. We gave them names. The Singer, The Watchman, The Warrior, The Mourning Bride, The Forgotten Love, the Queen Alone. And the Eternal, who looked dead and yet animate, the blow to his chest going all the way to his heart; and yet his eyes watched you steadily, no matter where you stood.

We called them gods. We worshiped them, scryed by them, studied them, formed false histories or revealed narratives. We named them Celestes. This was their city, and we thanked them for the gifts they had left behind. There were priests, and an infrastructure of rite and ritual that went along with the name. It was Veridon's first religion.

Others came and went, but the Celestes remained. Even the Artificers challenged their influence for a while, making a temple of the Academy and a ritual of the contemplative life. Oddly, it was a new religion that was not yet a religion that ended that. It was called The Algorithm at the time, a new group that was studying certain debris that could be gathered from the river. Together with the priesthood of the Celestes, they denounced the practices of the Artificers, their study of the dead and the living, of the lines that crossed between those worlds. It was a Council decree that ended the Guild, signed by three hands. The Lord of the Council, the Highest of the Celestean Sight, and the Master Wright of the Algorithm.

Later, The Algorithm took on the name Church, and slowly drove worship of the Celestes out of the minds of Veridon. Not by condemnation, or decree, but by apathy and forgetfulness. The Church of the Algorithm offered real glories, in the form of cogwork and machination, clothed in the language of miracles. Eventually it was their narrative that became the history of Veridon, a story about a girl who was an angel, swept down the river until she was rescued by the Wrights of the Algorithm. They healed her with what they had learned from the river, and she was so grateful that she showed them the true mysteries of the Algorithm. That was the history we all accepted.

And the Celestes were forgotten. Their domes still stand, but their priests are gone. The Wrights of the Algorithm have gathered such influence that, although there is no law against the Celestean Sight, no one who aspires to power or riches will admit to worshiping the ancient mysteries. And yet there are some, behind closed doors, in secret rooms, who keep the old ways. Who light heavy candles that smell like hot sand, and trace their fingers over icons that have been with their families for as long as anyone can remember. There are still adherents, though they hide. There are still those who know the old languages, the old rites.

My father, for example. Alexander Burn, last of his line, and Councilor of the city of Veridon.

They took me to an old lockup and put me away. I don't know if any of my guards recognized me. Don't know if they would have treated me better or worse if they did, and I didn't feel like pressing the point. Having a father on the Council should have gotten me certain rights with the Badge. Having been disowned by a father who sat on the Council was another matter.

I hurt, that kind of low grade ache that felt like a hangover or the flu or like my skeleton had been used as a tuning fork. Or all of those things. Shoulder was pretty bad, too. At least it wasn't my shooting arm, but it was my lean-against-the-wall-looking-casual arm, so I was sitting on the bench muttering when the duty-officer came in to talk to me. Well. To yell at me.

"Jacob Burn, ain't ya?" he boomed, before he had the door fully open. I winced and nodded. "Figured. Kind of person we pick up in a burning factory amid reports of mad cartwheeling women and bugs." He squinted at me over a clipboard. "Another one of your killer angels, is it?"

"It is not," I said.

"Better not be another one of them angel killing things," he muttered, marking things off on his clipboard, completely ignoring me. "That's all I'm going to say on the matter."

"Whoever she was, I feel confident that she is not 'another one of them angel killing things.' Not by a long shot."

"Well," he said, again mostly to himself. "Be that as it may. Better not."

"Am I being charged with something, or is this just an opportunity for you to meet a famous person?"

"Famous person? Famous?" He poked the clipboard at my face and snarled. "Don't get out of your head, Jacob Burn. Don't think you're famous, just because you made up a bunch of stories and got a bunch of good people killed. Don't be thinking that."

And there it was. Two years ago some pretty crazy stuff happened to me, and I made the mistake of being completely honest about it with everyone I met. And other people, people with an interest in that crazy stuff staying quiet, had gone to some length to make me out for a fool. Now half the city thought I was a little insane, or a liar who got into some trouble and spun it into a good story to cover his guilt. Blamed me for the people who died in that mess, or at least thought I was trying to hide what actually happened.

One of those people who died? The one woman I loved, had ever loved. Would ever love. Killed her with my own hands, because something horrible was taking her over, was turning her inside out. Was going to kill a lot more people. So I killed her. There it was.

"Famous," I said bitterly, and shot him a look that would burn stones. "Or you wouldn't know my name. Would you?"

He grimaced, like he'd drunk sour milk.

"Don't get out of your head," he said, but quieter. He returned to his clipboard, mutely crossing things off and writing things down. "You want to protest the charges?"

"What charges?"

"Destruction of property. Theft." He squinted as he ran his finger down the page. "Something here about conspiracy, but I don't think that one's going to hold. Think Matt threw that one in just because it was you." He scrubbed at the page with the blunt end of the pencil. "Just a joker, that Matthew."

"I didn't burn down that factory. Badge was as responsible for that as anyone."

"Your friend, the jumpy one. It's on her. You're on that team, though. The boat…"

"Boat?" I snapped.

"Let's see." He ran his finger across the page. "Boat. Service Vessel Bandycoat, sunk this morning in the Ebd-side harbor, catching fire and damaging one supply raft and a number of other vessels." He flipped the page over, read a few more lines, and then looked at me over the board. "All hands lost or unaccounted."

"The boat that I was on. That sunk under me, that boat? The Badge can't seriously hold me responsible for what happened there." I had a picture in my head of the lines of Badgemen, lined up and firing into the water. All hands lost. Of the pearl-white bodies boiling out of the river, clawing onto deck, the howls of the captain as they broke into the cabin. Lost or unaccounted. "They have to know what happened. Right?"

"Says here there was a fire on board. Something you brought on as cargo went up in flames when you tried to use it." He was staring at me, not looking at the paper. "Says here you started the whole thing."

"How does it say that, officer, if all hands are lost or unaccounted?"

He was about to answer me when the door rattled and another man came into the room. Smooth-looking guy, his Badge uniform tailor-fit to his broad shoulders and substantial arms. Guy like him, you expect to see calluses on his knuckles, or at least the crooked evidence of a broken nose. His hands were folded at his waist, smooth and white.

"Well, that's what makes it a conspiracy, doesn't it?" he said. His voice was clipped, his enunciation perfect. He walked past the clipboard man and peered down at me on my dirty little bench. "Other people, working together. We don't need to talk to anyone who was on the boat to know what you did there, Jacob. We just have to talk to the people you planned this with. So. Just to be clear, you are Jacob Burn."

"We've been through this. You were probably listening from the other room."

"Of course. But statements require official witnesses. Listening from the other room does not qualify as witnessing, in a court of law."

"Am I making a statement, then?" I asked.

He smiled tolerantly, then held out one hand, as though to help me up.

"You are Jacob Burn," he repeated.

"I am."

"And you transported a device onto the ship known commercially as the Bandycoot. And that device was provided to you by a third party, with the intention that you would activate it at a predetermined time and place."

"Why do you think they named it the Bandycoot?" I asked. "It seems like a terrible name for a boat. Isn't that some kind of rat?"

"Mr. Burn, please answer the questions as asked." His hand stayed in front of me, unwavering. "They are simple enough questions, aren't they?"

"Simple enough, sure. But tricky. 'Yes' can mean a lot of things." I leaned back against the wall, wincing as my shoulder touched stone. "I take it you're Matthew the Joker. Or do you prefer Matt?"

Officer Matthew gave the clipboard man a disapproving glare, then turned his attention to me.

"Let me summarize things for you, Jacob. We know where this device came from. We know who had it made, and we know they provided it to you. We have spoken to the people involved."

"You have?" I asked. Once again I heard that beetle-driven voice in my head, the pipes thrumming in time with his every word. "That's interesting."

"We have. Their involvement with the Council is well known to us. Their interest in you and your family is well documented. Believe me, we understand." His hand inched forward, palm up. "There's nothing we can do for you, though, if you don't help us first."

I looked from his hand to his face, earnest with officially mandated concern. Clipboard man stood at his side, looking nervous. I smiled.

"What the hell are you talking about?" I asked. I didn't like where his questions were going. Mostly because I didn't like it when the Badge pretended to care about me, like I was in danger and they just wanted to help out. That I was in danger was beyond question. I kind of assumed they were the ones putting me in it. My memories of the past hour seemed to revolve around officers shooting at me, chasing me and then arresting me. Awful clever way to show concern.

A wave of disappointment washed over his face. He turned to the clipboard man and shrugged.

"Get some kind of statement out of him, then file the paperwork. The charges will stick long enough for us to get to the bottom of this."

And then Matthew the Joker left. Clipboard man grimaced at me, shuffling his papers. We were quiet for a long time before he did anything.

"You're going to contest the charges, then," he said.

"Is that going to matter?"

"No, Jacob," said a voice from just beyond the door. "It's not."

We both looked up as she walked in, clattering.

"Hello, Angela," I said. "You're looking like a nightmare."

Not a nice thing to say, but I had no reason to be nice to Angela Tomb. And she had no reason to be nice to me. We had taken turns almost killing each other for the last couple years. I had done a better job of it.

The Tombs were one of the Founding Families of Veridon. Like most of the Founders, they had fallen on hard luck in recent years, and were struggling to maintain their grip on power in the Council. Their Right of Name guaranteed them a certain amount of sway, and they were lucky to still have it. Lots of Founders had mortgaged their Rights, once they had nothing else to sell. Burn was no exception. Our Right was all we had left. Gave us a seat on the Council, and certain privileges in the city. It wasn't much.

Patron Tomb, Angela's many-times-great grandfather, had done an unexpected thing, though. He sold the Tomb Right generations ago, before Angela was even born. The Right would pass into other hands as soon as the elder Tomb breathed his last. Those were the conditions of the contract. The unexpected thing was what Tomb had done next. He hadn't died. Turns out the Tombs had access to some arcanely morbid technology. The old man lived on, sealed up in his namesake, living a life of dying every day.

A couple years ago, something similar happened to Angela. She and I had… well. A disagreement. Something to do with that business with the angels that had everyone thinking I was crazy. And that disagreement ended with her falling off a balcony and landing on the cold, hard stone. Last I saw of her, there was a lot of blood, and a lot of angles under her skin that didn't look natural. A season after that, and Angela walks into the Grand Chamber of the Council. Looking like a nightmare.

She was wearing the formal engine. Before her accident, Angela had been a pretty girl, the kind of pretty that only a life of privilege could manage. Delicate, in a cultivated way. And that pretty was still under there, under the metal and tubing, burdened by a brass tank that groaned and gasped whenever she talked. The bulk of the engine had been disguised to look like a ballgown, a wide dome of metal leaves that mimicked ruffles and crenellations and bustle. Angela was clamped into this device at the hips, her legs apparently either clipped away or curled fetal inside. She moved smoothly across the floor, some collection of a hundred tiny feet tapping against the stone like an army of piston-driven centipedes. The metal leaves of the dress flexed and hissed as she came at us, parting briefly to reveal exhaust vents that puffed steam into the room. She settled before us and smiled. Horribly.

From the waist up, and in a dark room, Angela could be mistaken for a normal girl at a party. But that would require a very dark room. From the front she looked merely stiff. She was wearing a subdued blouse, tightly corseted and complementing the enameled leaves of her locomotive dress quite nicely. I assumed those leaves could be changed out, because I had seen her in the formal engine a dozen times, and never had the color been the same. A concession to the girl she had been. None of her movements were natural, and the reason for that loomed behind her like a stalker. From the bustle of the locomotive dress sprouted a brass tank and tower that reached to just below the nape of Angela's smooth neck. The tower looked like a kebob of brass spiders, their legs sinking smoothly into Angela's back, twitching as she moved, either assisting her actions or dictating them. The last of the spiders held the Lady Tomb's head like a precious egg, delicate brass pistons clutching the line of her jaw, spreading like a corona across her skull. Her hairdresser put a lot of work into integrating that machine with Angela's sun-golden locks, and they did just enough of a job to make it truly vile.

When she smiled, there was nothing human to it, like a doll that could switch one face for another. Angela looked at us with diamond sharp eyes and raised a hand, almost offering it to me, but not quite. As though she were prepared to receive a kiss or deflect a blow. I shivered at the carefully formed familiarity of the action, and the utter sterility of its precision.

"Such a charming boy, Jacob." She looked down at me, crossing her pretty arms across her chest. "But never the smartest."

"Never the luckiest, either. You here to gloat over my predicament, or is this a social call?"

"All of my calls are social calls, Jacob."

"Then you're here on business." I stood up. Angela was the kind of girl who made society her business. Society and trying to run the city, whatever the cost. The clipboard man retreated to the corner of the room. He could be snide about famous people, but he knew to get out of the way when the players started to play. "What business could you and I possibly have?"

"Let's at least pretend to follow the niceties, shall we?" she said. Her voice was like air emptying through a wet valve. "How have you been? Keeping busy?"

"I've been great, Ange. Poor, kicked out, in a lot of fights and forgotten about. But great." I smiled my happiest smile. "Mostly I haven't been dead, Lady Tomb. How about you?"

She stiffened, if that was possible for a woman who was mostly metal and the memory of flesh.

"You can be clever if you like, Jacob. But there's no need to be rude."

"You shot me," I answered.

"You threw me off a balcony," she countered.

"You fell off a balcony. I just happened to be there. Either way, I seem to have come out ahead in that deal."

She raised her eyebrows, accompanied by a symphony of twitching from the spiders that lined her back. "I suppose you did. Though I think we'll have to wait for the final account to be settled before we compare scores. Have we given up on being polite, then?"

"I have to be honest, Angela. I never put a great deal of effort into it."

"No. I suppose not." She pulled off the long silk gloves that she had been wearing and draped them over her arm. Her hands were extraordinarily thin, and held together by narrow splints of some glossy black material that shimmered whenever she flexed her fingers. "I don't suppose either of us really did."

She looked tired. Hard to see the girl I used to know in this contraption, the girl I grew up with, went to balls and summer estates with. But she was still in there, wrapped in brass and some ugly history. Most of our social circle spun apart on reaching adulthood. We were no different.

"What do you want, Angela?" I asked, quietly. She looked at me with her tired eyes, then snapped out of it. Pulled the gloves back on and straightened her back.

"You keep turning up in interesting places, Jacob. I'll admit, after our last little trouble, I was pleased that the Council was able to make a fool of you. That no one believed your side of the story. You disappeared into the city, and I was hoping that was the last of you." She dragged her eyes away, seeming to notice the clipboard man for the first time. When she looked back at me, there was none of the little girl in her face. "For a while I even thought you might have left the city."

"I thought about it. But what would I do downfalls? I'm not a farmer."

"No. Not much of a frontiersman, are you?" She cocked her head at me. "It'll always be the city for you. But I had my hopes. Anyway. Then you started showing up, you and that bug."

"Wilson. His name is Wilson."

"I don't care what his name is, Jacob." Back to Angela the nightmare, now. Angela the Tomb. "You and your friend started making an appearance in certain reports that I get. And then you made a new friend." She spread her hands wide. "And now we're here."

"Ezekiel Crane," I said, nodding. "Though I wouldn't call him a friend."

"Is that his name? Because he's someone whose name I do care about."

"Tall, thin guy, glasses?" I made an unfolding motion. "I mean, really tall."

"We've never met. To me, he's more a presence in the data than he is a person. It became clear about six months ago that someone else was moving levers around in the city. I've been looking for him ever since."

"Well, you just missed him. That house you were at, just before the factory fire? He was there this morning." I thought of the beetle-swarmed corpse, that voice. "Or some part of him, at least."

"House?" Head cocked again.

"I assume that was you, with the Badge. Down in Nettingway, by the bar where the iron girl found us. You know all about that chase, right, and the Badge cornering us in the factory? How she burned it down, and I got picked up." I spread my hands in careful mimic of her action. "And now we're here."

Nothing for several heartbeats, her face and body carefully neutral. Finally she offered me her arm, like we were at a ball.

"You say the most fascinating things, Jacob Burn. We're going to have to talk this through, you and I."

I took her arm with a bow. Halfway to the door, the clipboard man cleared his throat. This surprised me.

"There is the matter of the charges against his lordship, ma'am. We have a list here…"

"Kindly forward the citations to the Council, officer. Or just forget about them. I don't really care. Whichever is easier for you," she said, giving the man the briefest of nods. "And see that Mr. Burn's possessions are sent to him. Especially his revolver. I feel that the gentleman will have need of his revolver."

"He wasn't armed, ma'am," he said. Angela turned to me, her eyebrows arched.

"Jacob. That is so unlike you. It's as if I didn't know you at all."

"Believe me," I said, thinking of the iron girl's party trick hands, and the scattered bits of my weapon clattering off the floor. "It wasn't intentional."

"Well. I'm sure that's something we can correct."

And with that we swept out of the room, and on into the street. Arm in arm. Just like we were children again, and not at all like we actually were.

Chapter Seven

The Silent Garden

Her carriage was waiting for us in the street outside. I saw good old Matthew on my way to the door, sitting stiffly behind a desk. He watched us go with a look of complete calm on his face, but his fists were clenched on his desk. I tried not to smile.

I felt a lot less like smiling once I was sitting in the carriage, alone with Angela. The interior had been modified to account for the Lady's peculiar form. Most of the compartment was open, with buckles that unceremoniously secured the bulk of the formal engine to the floor. What little space remained was given over to a padded bench. Once we were all as comfortable as we were going to get, Angela drew the curtains and then closed her eyes. The carriage lurched forward. I hung on to the bench and watched the Lady Tomb. She showed no interest in conversation, so I let my mind wander.

There were some cracks in my usual cheery, optimistic demeanor. Starting off with a morning swim among the dead had done little for my happiness, but it was the things that happened since that disturbed me the most. I've spent years getting into the kind of trouble you can shoot your way out of, and our friends from the river seemed, at their most basic level, to be that sort of trouble. There were probably more complicated problems behind them, but the straight-forward situation of a horde of living dead monsters crawling out of the river and ransacking the city could be handled with skills that I was very adept at deploying. I wasn't going to lose any sleep over that. Some teeth, maybe. But no sleep.

What bothered me more was what might be behind these attacks, and what various people in the city seemed to know about them. Take our friend Matthew, for example. Nevermind that he thought I was involved in some grand conspiracy. That's just a Badge thing. Ever since the trouble I got into with the Academy and the Algorithm two years ago, it had become a hobby of certain elements within the Badge to blame me for anything that stumped them. So let's just pretend that bias is shining through. The other stuff he said though, about the device and the fire at the docks, that I didn't like. Because of course there had been a device that Crane gave me. I didn't set it off, and it didn't start any fires, but it was a pretty good bet that whatever was in that canister had something to do with the Fehn and their newly discovered love of murder. Matthew said he had been in contact with the people who created that device. If that was true, then I'd give anything to have a conversation of my own with those people. Badge probably had them locked away, or hidden in some safehouse, depending on whether or not they were cooperating.

For all that Matthew claimed secret knowledge about the device and its origins, he didn't seem to know anything about what had actually happened at the docks that morning. Both he and the clipboard man seemed to believe that the device had started a fire that had swept through the docks, killing all sorts of people. Didn't seem to know about the cog-dead at all, or the fact that units of Badgemen were gunning down ships that were trying to get to shore. Didn't speak well for his knowledge. Unless he was lying about that, but why would that be? I was there, wasn't I? Not like he had to hide those events from one of the witnesses. Led me to think he didn't know that stuff, which led me to wonder why he didn't know what the Badge was doing.

And that brought us to Angela. To say that we weren't friendly was a social grace. A lot of the horrible things that happened to me two years ago were at her hand, at least indirectly. It was her greed for power that had brought some of that trouble into the city, and her unwillingness to share the secrets that might lead to that power that had got me so deeply involved. If there was anyone I blamed for Emily dying, it was Angela. So, no. We weren't on friendly terms.

Everything she did, though, she did for a reason. As long as I had a handle on her reasons, I could stay clear of her doings. Angela Tomb would always act in the best interest of her family, and then the other Founder Families, and then the Council as a whole. It was the Council that gave her power in the city, it was her alliances with the other Founders that gave her power in the Council. And without her family, well, it was doubtful Angela would even be alive today. I looked over at her limp form, pinned in place by the glittering tower that traveled up her spine, the thin wires that burrowed into her skin, the slack curve of her jaw. Not sure she was even alive now, honestly. But that's the Tomb family way.

I sat back on my bench and closed my eyes. Too much going on. I never liked the job for Crane, but I didn't think it would end up here. I wanted nothing to do with trouble in the Council, and I wanted less to do with Angela Tomb. Best thing I could do was open the door, roll out of the carriage, and disappear into the city. Somehow, I didn't think it would be that easy to step away from this one. Not yet, at least.

When I opened my eyes, Angela was staring at me. I nodded at her.

"Getting my beauty rest," I muttered.

"That never works for me, anymore," she said. "Tell me, Jacob. Is there anything I should know about your involvement in this? Before we go any further."

"You're asking if I'm working for Crane?"

She shrugged, a motion made difficult by the wires in her back. "I'm asking you to give me a reason to trust you. I'm asking you to put everything on the table, so that later on I'm not forced to make a decision that neither of us will enjoy."

"Oh," I said, nodding. "This is a threat. Good. I was getting a little worried about you."

"It isn't a threat. You're not a man I need to threaten. We both know how I fix problems, especially ones that I'm not expecting. Is there anything that I should expect, Jacob?"

I looked across the carriage at her, listened to the wheels grind across cobbles, felt the heat washing off the engine at my back. Tried not to shiver at the emptiness of her eyes.

"You know I'm not a man you need to threaten," I conceded. She lingered for a second, then turned her head as though she were looking out the shuttered window.

"Fair enough," she said.

"Fair enough," I agreed.

Fortunately, we didn't have to sit in the silence that followed our display of neighborly love for too long. The carriage changed gear and rattled to a halt. Without looking at me, Angela undid the clasps that held her in place, then unfolded the extra wide door and slid out of the compartment. All I could see past the shimmering bulk of her formal engine was darkness. I set my shoulders and got out.

We were in the dank confines of a stable. There were several carriages tucked into parking berths against the near wall, facing several empty pens. The horses were gone, although the sweet stink in the air hinted at that being a recent absence. Behind us, two stablehands were pulling down the garage door with a clatter. Once the door was down, we were wrapped in darkness. I stood still as my eyes adjusted. The deeper shadow of Angela Tomb brushed against me.

"Like when we were kids, Jacob?" she asked. Her voice was strangely giddy. She breathed deeply and then sighed, a strange sound coming from lungs of brass and leather. "Sneaking off to the stables while the grown-ups danced."

"Long time ago, Ange," I whispered. "Where are we?"

"So anxious." She wrapped her fingers around my hand. "Stand with me for a minute, will you?"

Not sure what was making her so melancholy. For a woman who wouldn't have cared if I lived or died two weeks ago, she was awfully interested in reliving our childhood all of a sudden. I was uncomfortably aware of the driver, the stableboys. Whoever else might be out there in the darkness. Aware of the formal engine, too, huffing air into her body and venting steam and a smell like refrigerated meat. I pried my fingers loose and sighed.

"Where are we, Angela?" I asked again.

Silence. Several people moving around the room, shifting nervously, unbuckling straps or sweeping floors. Other feet, too, in other rooms.

"Can we get some light in here?" Angela asked. As if waiting for the command, several frictionlamps whirred up to brilliant life. I blinked in the sudden light.

Everything I had seen before, but more people. In the wall in front of our carriage, there was a short staircase leading up to a door. Several guards stood on the stairs, and another stood directly in front of the door. Two more guards had stepped from the empty pens. I saw that the stableboys were actually grown men, and were armed as well. I didn't recognize the livery of their uniforms, but they looked like more than thugs in fancy dress. Lot of iron in this room. I began to regret not stopping for a revolver of my own. I turned to Angela. She was looking at me expectantly. Whatever she was looking for, she didn't get. After a second her eyes softened and she looked around the room.

"This is the garage of a building on Owens, near the Lamplight. It used to be a private residence. One of the older buildings in Veridon, actually." She sniffed the air and grimaced. "Seen better days. It's changed hands many times, has been many things. Until recently it was acting as a rent house, owned by one of the minor families in the Council." Again she sniffed and gave me a look. "Industrialists."

"Until recently," I repeated, ignoring her comment about industrialists.

She nodded and motioned toward the stairs. The guards cleared the way and she swept forward, her hundred tiny, piston-like feet performing with an agility I would not have expected. Soon as she opened the door I smelled that familiar smell. Butcher-shop, tinged with dust.

Other than the smell, the house looked normal enough. Shabby, but you could still see the glory of its early days. A lot of care had been put into the decorations on the door lintels, in the crown molding and the baseboards. A lot of detail, a lot of hand carving. The floorboards were broad and brightly polished, laid in tightly woven carpet runners. However old this house was, and the boards still didn't creak. Good construction. The Manor Burn was full of creaky old floors and loose doors, but we had a special kind of neglect that we applied to our holdings. At least people were living in this place.

Or had been. The first body was down the hall, his feet in the hallway, the rest of him stretched out in a tiny kitchen. His hands were clutched around his face. The guards, I noticed, stayed in the garage. It was just me and Angela. We went down the hallway to the kitchen, stepping through a doorway that had been burst in from the outside. Other numbered doors opened to either side of the kitchen, and I saw other hallways, other kitchens. Some of it looked like new construction, like the recent owners had taken large rooms and cut them into smaller ones. We stopped by the dead man's feet, Angela hanging back a little to let me get a good look.

There was something wrong with the body. Hard to say at first. Dead bodies never looked right to me. Always bent in some inhuman way, their faces horribly twisted or impossibly peaceful, considering the state of the rest of their body. They always had such stillness to them. It was hard to get used to.

It was the hands. I glanced back at Angela, but her eyes were fixed on the body. I squatted to get a closer look. They were bumpy. No. They were bumps. The hands were made up of small, rice-sized lozenges of flesh-colored… something. I took a penknife from my pocket and touched it to the dead man's hand. His skin dissolved like a sandcastle, hissing as it slid to the floor. I stood up, probably quicker than was necessary.

"What happened to him?"

Angela nodded back to the body. The dissolution had continued, even accelerated. A hissing pile of dead skin was sloughing off both hands. When it got to his face, other things began to slide free of the carcass. Beetles, dry and dead and hollow of life. Without realizing it, I was behind Angela, one hand on the reassuring metal bulk of the formal engine. By the time the little horror show on the floor ended, both hands and part of the face were gone. Several dozen dead beetles had worked their way free, and were now lying on the floor around the body.

"Is there some reason you're showing this to me?" I asked, wiping my face. "Other than the obvious fact that it will give me some pretty brilliant nightmares, I'm not sure what this has to do with my little problem."

"This is one of the lesser ones. Whatever it was didn't take in this man. Not that it really mattered to him. But his wife, who was in here making dinner, might be grateful." She looked around the room with distaste, as though more offended by the decor than the corpse of packed sand on the floor. "Might be. She had a chance to escape before the others found her."

"So what happened to the others?"

Angela motioned and I followed, into one of the other numbered doors. She was right. The woman whose husband had turned to beetle-riddled sand at her feet was probably happy. At least she was able to get out of the building. How she would sleep, who knows. But she was alive.

This apartment held two kinds of bodies. The kind of bodies I was used to fell into the first group. People who had been killed in horrible ways, mostly through blunt force trauma, though several looked as if they had been torn open. As though they had been attacked by something with powerful jaws and blunt teeth. Old men, children, more than one woman with a bloody kitchen utensil in her hands. Defense wounds, and then other wounds that had been delivered after death.

The second kind of body was of a type that I was beginning to become familiar with. Smooth white skin, pearly and bright. Wounds that bled clumpy, black blood that dried into flakes of cog and gear. The cog-dead. These had been killed by gunshot and blade. I saw no weapons among the casualties. Badge, probably, responding to a horrified call.

"So the Fehn got in here, too," I said, looking around the apartment. "I take it there's a basement dock of some nature?"

"There is not. The foundation of this house is solid stone. Not even a basement. The original owner preferred to live in open spaces. The original floorplan even included a number of open gardens on the top floors. All closed off now, of course." Angela stepped delicately over a body, the formal engine again showing more maneuverability than I thought possible. She was very familiar with its controls, of course, since it was hard to tell where Angela ended and the engine began. "In fact, there is no evidence that these creatures came from the river at all."

"How did they get in here, then?"

Angela swept out of the apartment, pausing to spin in place and fix me with her empty eyes.

"These are the residents, Jacob. Something changed them into this."

She was gone before I could respond, but that was okay. I didn't have much to say. Had a lot to think about, though.

I gave the rooms one more look, the butchered family and the cog-dead, together on the floor. All one family. I shivered and left, catching up with Angela in the hall.

"I assumed that because it was the Fehn this happened to first, that it had something to do with them already being dead. That it was just another host in their body, something that drove out the Fehn's symbiotes and took over."

"We made the same assumption, when it first started to happen."

"First started to happen? Angela," I hissed and pulled ineffectively at her metal dress. She obliged me by stopping and turning around. "First? How long has this been going on?"

"We're not sure. Weeks. Maybe more than a month. This is the fourth attack that we're aware of, including the events on the docks this morning."

"All of them like this?"

"None of them like this." She glanced over her shoulder at the open door that led to the garage, then lowered her voice. "None of them alike at all. Which is why it took us so long to connect the events. The only similarity is a cleverness of mind, and ruthlessness of intent."

"Ruthlessness I see," I said. I gestured to the boots of the sandy man at the other end of the hallway. "But what's so clever about this?"

She pressed her lips into a thin line.

"Upstairs," she said.

I expected something much worse. When Angela Tomb makes that kind of face, the expression that she pulled before she opened the door at the top of the stairs and escorted me into the second floor of the building, you expect something pretty horrible. So I was pleasantly surprised to find myself in a garden. Not the most natural garden, seeing as how it was confined to the second floor of a rent house in one of the poorer districts of Veridon, but still. It was a nice garden.

The whole floor was more open than the lower level. There was some evidence of plaster walls that once separated the space into apartments and hallways, but they were cracked and crumbling, serving as low benches for the plantlife. Creepers spread across the walls and ceiling like drapery, and the warm, green fuzz of moss made most of the furniture that remained into soft, indistinct shapes. The broad faces of sunflowers bobbed gently in one corner of the first room. There were many plants, in reds and greens, velvet black petals shivering on stalks, yellow flowers like eyes blinking at us between wide leaves. Some were tropical, some arboreal, and some looked completely alien, as though they had been drawn from the mind of a madman. The air was heavy with life, tight and close in the claustrophobic chambers of the building.

It seemed that some greater architecture still defined the floor, but all of the temporary stuff that had been thrown together by the present owners had dissolved into this tiny horticultural explosion. Plants like this couldn't last long in this sort of environment. I could see no pots, no soil. The roots seemed to bury themselves into the wood of the floor, or cling to the plaster of the walls, as if they could suck life out of these dead things. There was no light here, either, other than the muted glow of the frictionlamp that Angela had taken from one of the guards on our way upstairs.

"Well, I must say," I took a careful step into the room and sighed. "This is not what I was expecting. The way you set your jaw, I thought I was going to step into a room full of bodies."

"No," Angela said quietly. "There are no bodies on this floor. Nothing but what you see."

"All of the rooms are like this?" I asked.

"Those that we've seen. There are no pathways, and some of the plants are difficult to get around."

"Then cut through them. Something may be hidden in the farther chambers," I turned to the stairs. "I'm sure there's some sort of blade in the stables, isn't there? A shearing knife or something."

"Jacob, listen to me." Angela nodded to the room. "There are no bodies. Nobody died up here. Not yet."

I paused at the head of the stairs and looked back. The flowers blinked at me, their heads bobbing silently in the flat glow of the frictionlamp.

"These are the tenants?" I whispered.

"The tenants, their friends, and a couple officers of the Badge who were first on the scene. You can see why we've been reluctant to explore more fully."

"Are they still… can they…"

"Are they alive?" Angela said firmly. "Can they hear us? We assume so, on both accounts. Since our encounters with the Guaran, the Council has decided to err on the side of caution."

I nodded, then stepped carefully out of the room and onto the stairs.

"Is there anything for us to see up here, Angela?"

"Nothing else," she said. "I just wanted to be clear on what we're dealing with. The sort of things this person is willing to do to achieve his — or her — goal."

"Goal?" I asked.

"Well," Angela gave the room of bobbing flowers one last, sad look, then closed the door and followed me down the stairs. "We assume he has a goal. We assume he's not just a madman."

"He just turned a house of innocent people into flowers, Ange. That's one hell of an assumption."

The solitude of the bizarre garden upstairs was broken by an argument, coming from the still-open door to the garage. Several voices going back and forth in tense whispers as we came downstairs. When the considerable bulk of Angela's engine reached the hallway, the voices cut off and a woman stepped into view. Quite a woman.

She had a lot of very dark hair that fell in broad curls over her shoulders and across her face. She had the tall, broad frame of a woman who could become heavy if given to a life of sloth, but everything about her spoke of a life lived out of doors. Her skin was dark with the sun, her face dusted in freckles, her arms strong and long. She was wearing a riding dress and shoulder shrug, the coat coming to the middle of her torso. The colors were muted, greens and blacks and browns that would have looked common if they had not been so finely cut, so expertly tailored. She put her hands on her hips and stood in the middle of the hallway, blocking our path.

"Lady Tomb. I see that you've taken your liberty with our property again," she said. Her words were precise and clear, the anger in them packaged in courtly politeness. Clearly she and Angela were cut from similar cloth, if perhaps by different tailors, for different reasons.

"Veronica. I am here on Council business, and as such have free access to any property that might pertain to our current investigations. If you insist…"

"I insist, Angela. I insist that you notify the Bright estate whenever you intend to conduct Council business on our property. I insist that you have a family escort during your investigation; if not a member of the Brights, then someone we can agree is trustworthy and will not merely serve the interests of the Founders. I insist…"

"Enough, girl," Angela snapped. "I will not stand here and suffer your insinuations. This is a matter for the Council, and for the committee duly appointed to handle this situation. If you have a problem with that, you can bring it up in the chamber. Until then, I ask you to step aside."

"The committee duly appointed, eh?" The girl named Veronica sneered, a look that sat strangely on her face. "Are you referring to the committee that you created from your friends, the committee that operated without the full knowledge of the Council for months, that did not come to the light of day until" — she hurled her arms around the hallway, indicating the whole house — "until this attack made it necessary for you to share with the industrial families. That committee?"

"It was unclear if it was a matter for the full Council until…"

"Enough. We have filed an order of dissolution for the committee. The votes are with us. You are going to turn over your findings" — she stabbed at Angela with her finger — "with documentation to support your claims. This has been a witch-hunt, conducted in the shadows by you and your friends. And when I read those documents, Angela, I expect to find a report detailing your reason for being here today."

"She was just showing me around," I mumbled. Veronica turned to look at me, as though I had just popped out of the wall.

"Another one of your lackeys, I assume? Does this one know how to properly search a house without killing the witnesses?"

"Veronica Bright, I'd like to introduce you to Jacob Burn." Angela nodded between us, presenting me with a flick of her hand. "Jacob, Veronica."

Veronica stared at me with open tension. I wondered if my father had done something to offend her, or if she'd merely heard the stories of my exciting and disaster-laden youth.

"Another one of your Founders. Of course. Is this the one being groomed to fill Alexander's seat?"

"My father is more than capable of holding his seat in the Council, ma'am. And when the time comes, I doubt he'll be passing that honor on to me."

She gaped at me like a fish, then rounded on Angela.

"He sounds perfect, Lady Tomb. Where did you dig him up? Somewhere downriver? He has that perfect scent of blind ignorance and entitled arrogance I've come to expect from the Founders. Will you sign his birthright yourself, or is Alexander still capable of that?"

"Veronica, please. Jacob is the legitimate heir of Alexander Burn, and more than capable of sitting the Council." She shot me a look that promised violence. Well. Violence she would get. "What the elder Burn intended cannot be disregarded, of course, but there are considerations that must be weighed. In fact…"

"Whoa, whoa, whoa," I said, stepping angrily between the women. "I think I can say pretty clearly that my father has no intention of naming me heir to anything other than his contempt. He was pretty clear about that, the last time we spoke."

"And tell me, Jacob — it's Jacob, right? I do remember that Alexander had a wayward child by that name, though honestly when he had you struck from the histories I was a little surprised." Veronica Bright smiled smugly. "When was the last time you spoke to your father?"

"He and I are not on what you'd call speaking terms."

"Hm, yes," she said, then nodded to Angela. "He is quite well done, Tomb. It's a pity Alexander won't be able to appreciate your work." She turned to me and gave a little bow. "A pleasure meeting you, young Burn. I'm sure we'll be speaking again."

She left, going into the garage where she resumed her argument. Within seconds the garage door rattled open and her voice receded. When it was quiet again, I turned to Angela.

"Lovely girl. What did she mean about my father not appreciating your work?"

"Alexander can be a difficult man," she said, sighing as she retrieved her gloves from her pocket and flipped them in her hands. "More difficult than most. You should know that by now."

"That doesn't really answer my question," I said.

"Perhaps not. Perhaps I'm not the one who should be answering. Come, we have things to do. Things to discuss." She moved to the door.

"No we don't."

That stopped her. She turned back to me, rotating like a top on the hundred little feet of the engine. Her face was neutral, but she was wringing the gloves.

"You're after something, Angela. You said this was only the second attack, but that girl claimed your little committee had been around for months. There have to have been others."

"Don't listen to Veronica, Jacob. She wants nothing more than to bring the Founders down to her level. To make trouble." She clattered closer to me. "The Council is fragile. Our hold on power…"

"Your hold on power. No, Angela, something is going on here. She may be playing politics, but I know you are. And that's a game I'd rather stay out of."

"Don't think you can run from this one, Jacob. This isn't the kind of trouble that goes away on its own. It'll find you."

"Maybe. Or maybe I'll find it. Either way, I'm going to do it on my own."

"I can help you, Jacob," she said, her cold hands curled into fists. "Don't throw that away."

"Any help you give me is only going to be because it's to your advantage. No, I'll do this myself, or not at all." I pushed past her, down the hallway. This place had to have a front door. "Thanks for taking time out of your busy schedule to show me a house full of dead bodies and corpse-plants. It's been special."

She watched me go. I had to step over a couple of bodies, but I found the front door. Got out. From outside, the house looked like any other, the facade dirty and black, the stones of its foundation muddy. Nothing to indicate the horror inside.

I had a list in my head. People I wanted to talk to, people I wanted to avoid. Things I wanted to know. Top of that list: find Wilson, and get my hands on that mask. And then maybe talk to this Veronica lady. Or my dad.

I didn't really want to talk to old Alexander. I shoved that one further down the list, then headed to where I thought Wilson might be. Which could be anywhere.

Chapter Eight

A Talking of Crows

Good thing about Wilson. He anticipated trouble. Trick he learned early on, from what little I knew of his history, a lesson that had been sharpened by the events of two years ago. He and I and Emily spent the better part of two weeks living in basements and cisterns while the Badge turned the city upside down looking for us. Now he kept little hiding spots all over the city, sometimes nothing more than a rope at the end of an alley, sometimes cached weapons and the kind of living quarters we could have used back then, tucked between buildings or suspended from little-used foot bridges. Soon as I had the stink of the Brights' rent house out of my nostrils, I turned to the closest of these hiding spots and put my head down. The crowds here were thick, but everyone was keeping to their own business. Wasn't long before he found me.

"Been following you," he said as he swung down from a shed roof, landing and matching my stride perfectly. The crowd never even noticed that there was another body among them. "And I'm not alone in that."

"You saying that I have a tail?"

"I'm saying that we're not going to lead this guy to my hiding spot, as was your clear destination." He put an arm over my shoulder, like we were old drinking buddies, smiled with his thousand teeth. "Turn here."

I turned. It was a short alley, the far end cluttered with barrels. We stopped and turned back to the alley's mouth. Wilson stood there with his arms crossed, waiting.

The guy came around the corner at a fast clip. Worried about losing us, maybe. He wore a halfcoat and shiner's cap, pulled way down over his eyes. His shoulders were hunched. Saw our feet first and stopped dead in his tracks. When he looked up I almost laughed.

"They're hiring them awful young these days," I said. The kid was baby-faced, his mouth hanging open, fat quivering around his jowls. Looked ready to piss himself. "You lose your way, son?"

"No, no sir. But. I guess. I think I took a wrong turn," he stuttered, backing towards the street. Wilson grimaced at him, and it was all the kid could do not to yelp. "Wrong."

He was back around the corner and gone with the speed of the truly terrified. Wilson and I exchanged an amused look, and went back to the street.

"We should have caught him. See what he knew," I said.

"Maybe. Just a kid, like you said. Someone hired him in a dark alley, or at a candy shop." Wilson adjusted his vest and looked up and down the street. "Anyway. He's well gone now."

"Yeah. So, you get away okay?" I asked.

"No. They caught me, branded me, scooped out my brains and then sent my reanimated dead body to hunt you down," he said, with not even a quiver of humor in his voice. "I'm going to hold you here until my masters in the Badge show up."

"Seriously," I said.

"They didn't chase me at all. And I never saw the girl again." He looked at me and shrugged. "After a while I doubled back to see what they were doing with you. Followed you here from the prison, been waiting outside that house for you to come out. You and Angela have a nice roll in the hay?"

"Don't even joke about that. You could have made yourself known earlier. You would have found that place interesting."

"No thanks," he said. "Something about Angela doesn't sit right with me. Maybe it's the way she tried to kill us all, back in the day. Maybe it's the fact that she's a half-dead bitch, living in a dress made of steel and abomination. Hard to say. But it's something."

"You're such a snob," I laughed. "No wonder you don't have any friends."

"I don't have any friends because you people killed them all, or locked them in cages." He glanced at me, his odd smile lightening the comment. "Now, come on. There's something you should see."

"Is it something like that mask? Because I've seen plenty of that."

He patted his vest, and I heard the mask clang dully. "No. Not sure there's anything quite like this thing. I got bored while I was running from the Badge. Or thought I was running from the Badge. Did some looking around."

"What'd you find?" I asked.

"Oh. This is really something you should see for yourself. Gonna take some climbing."

"I've been hiding in bars and drinking myself into shape, in anticipation of just such an event," I said. "Let's go climb something tall to look at something mysterious, rather than just have you tell me what it is. Sounds great."

"Seriously, Jacob." He gave me a vaguely nervous look. "This you should see."

Like most of the Founders' Estates, the Manor Tomb sat in the middle of a district that was once quite opulent, and had since fallen to decrepitude. Those Founders who could afford to move had settled in better parts of the city. The Burns stayed because there was no money for a move. The Tombs stayed because the Patron was in the basement, and he was never going to move again.

The manor itself was ringed in a low wall, enough to keep out prying eyes and lazy thieves. Of course, no one broke into the Tomb estate, because the thieves in Veridon were superstitious. And there was nothing more superstitious than an ever-living Founder and his progeny of undead Councilors. They had the money to keep a small army on the premises, too. That army was in good array today, standing guard and patrolling and generally looking very fit to fight. Back when there had been trouble, the Manor Tomb served as something of a battleground, and their guard hadn't been up to the task. This was no longer the case.

We were observing all of this from a church spire, one of the many empty institutions of some dead religion that dotted the city. People came, brought their gods, built their temples, then fell under the sway of the Algorithm. Hard to argue with a god that made that kind of money, and produced that quantity of miracles. Wilson was perched comfortably on the side of the belltower, his foot hanging breezily over a forty-foot drop. I was clutching the railing like I wanted to kill it. I did want to kill it. I wanted to kill this entire expedition and get down to the nice, smooth ground.

"Is there some reason we're spying on the family that was just so kind as to break me out of jail, Wilson? Because we could probably knock on the door," I said through gritted teeth. "I've been formally introduced to their daughter."

"You used to be brave, you know?" Wilson gave me an amused eye and then shook his head. "You used to be all about the crazy plans."

"Brave got me nowhere," I said. Brave got Emily killed, I didn't say. "Just show me what needs showing and then let's get out of here."

"Might be a while. I swung by here, thinking I'd lose the Badge, maybe get them thinking I was hiding among the Family Tomb. I like making trouble for that girl. But then I saw something up in the tower. The window happened to be open."

I peered in the direction he indicated. One of the old solar towers of the estate was well lit, even in the midday sun. The curtains were all drawn shut, haloing the lights inside. The balcony was crowded with birdcages, their occupants black and squawking. Crows.

"Am I looking at the crows? I've seen crows, Wilson."

"You're waiting for the windows to open. Like I said, it might be a while."

"Honestly, I'm just going to go down there and remind Angela that we were just talking a minute ago, and ask what's in the tower. Because it's clear that you're not going to tell me."

But I was done talking, and Wilson was ignoring me. I sighed and tried to relax my arms, but my hands were having none of it. The anansi hung over the open air, swinging his leg and humming to himself.

"It's not that I'm not brave," I said, finally. "I just like things to be simple. This doesn't strike me as simple."

"Anything in Veridon strike you as simple anymore, Jacob?"

I sighed, but didn't have an answer for that. I was working on something clever to say when the curtains of the mysterious tower twitched open. Wilson tutted at me and pointed. As if I had forgotten why I was up there, risking my life.

Ezekiel Crane came out onto the balcony, stretching his arms, as though he had just gotten up from a nap. While I watched, my mouth open, he bent and spoke to one of the crows. Then he cocked his head, stood straight as a knife and spoke harshly to the bird. And then he turned and looked right at us. I could see his smile from here.

"Is this the part where we get the hell out of here?" I asked.

"Sure looks like it."

Wilson followed me down the stairs, breathing heavily on my neck as I clumped my nervous legs along. We ran through the crowd of homeless men living in the sanctuary, then got out the door and tried to look nonchalant as we hurried down the street, busy getting lost in the afternoon rush. It was ten minutes of quiet, desperate flight before we realized there was no pursuit.

"It was the crow," Wilson said, breaking the silence.

"What?" I gasped. I hadn't been breathing as I should. I stopped next to a soup cart and used the one stool that was open. The owner gave me an ugly look until Wilson dropped some silver on the counter. We got a dirty bowl of chowder that didn't look completely dead. Brave was something I had given up, so I pushed it to Wilson.

"The crow," he said, picking up the chowder but making no move to eat. "That's how he knew we were there."

"Crows don't talk," I said.

"Neither do dead bodies. Neither do pipes in an empty house," Wilson answered. "Jacob, all the crazy stuff we've seen, you're seriously going to argue over whether that freak can talk to crows?"

I shrugged. Wilson stared at me until, forgetting himself, he put some of the chowder into his mouth. Without chewing, he re-opened his mouth and let the contents slop back into the bowl, which he returned to the counter. The cart owner swept it away, probably to serve it to another eager customer.

"I paid good silver for that," he muttered.

"We all make mistakes, Wilson. Now. What are we going to do next?"

He stood there looking thoughtful for a minute, leaning against the cart and working his mouth silently. Probably still regretting the loss of that silver. Finally, without turning to me, he spoke.

"Say. What was in that house, anyway? The one you and Angela spent so much time inside?"

I was hoping he wouldn't ask. I told him, leaving out a lot of the details and focusing on the conversation between the two ladies of the Council. I knew that if I included the other stuff, the cog-dead and the flower-corpses, if I made those things sound as interesting and bizarre as they actually were, that Wilson would want to go back there. Take some samples. I wanted no part in that. He seemed to know I was holding back, but kept his response to a rude smile.

"So, this really interesting conversation you had with the Lady Bright, while standing in this absolutely dull and nondescript building which, according to your story, may have had a couple bodies in it." He straightened out and shook his head. "What was that about? The stuff about your dad, and you maybe being groomed to take his spot on the Council?"

"Yeah, I'm not sure. It's like she doesn't know the story between me and Alexander." I stayed out of Council politics; even stayed away from the periphery of Council business. Alexander had disowned me, twice now. With the turnover rate in the Council, I was sure there were people in that chamber who didn't even know he had a son. Veronica Bright seemed to be one of them. "What I really didn't like was the bit about how Alexander might not be in any kind of shape to approve of what Angela's doing."

Wilson squinted at me. Alexander had been complicit in some things Angela did a couple years ago, might even have been directly involved. He was usually pretty deeply involved in the dirty side of Council politics. If he was no longer paying that close attention to the chamber games, I wondered what he was doing with his time.

"When's the last time you talked to the old man?" Wilson asked, delicately.

"Probably shortly after he kicked me out of the house." I stared out into the crowd. "Does shouting count?"

We sat quietly for a minute, the cart owner increasing the severity and frequency of his angry stares, until Wilson finally clapped me on the shoulder.

"Let's have a word with Alexander, perhaps?"

"Sure. I can't imagine that going wrong." I stood up and dusted the memory of that horrible chowder from my mind. "But seriously, first we're going to stop somewhere and pick me up a revolver. Just in case."

The old house stood on a little hill, nothing more than a jumble of rocks that rose up out of the street to break up the monotony of town houses and warehouses. No soil on those rocks, except what generations of Burns had brought in, and the ground was hot. We had always had trouble maintaining the formal gardens that were expected of the Founders' estates. Now that the money was gone, nothing remained of those gardens but withered shrubs that clung to the stony ground like dead spiders. Rain and the heat that radiated from the ground had washed the rest away.

The house itself looked like those bushes. Dried out and twisted, roots clinging desperately to the hill, all the color washed out. I remembered grander days, and although the house was no smaller than it had been back then, the whole estate looked like it had collapsed in on itself. And the air, that smell, like burning dust. The ground thrummed with the warm engines of the Deep Furnace. I never noticed the smell when I was a kid. Used to it, I guess.

I don't know who I thought I was kidding. Coming back here, even now, was a waste of time. Alexander had given me his speech, he had said the words that he felt needed saying. I wasn't welcome here. I would never be welcome here. And yet, what that girl had said. Veronica. The way she talked about my father, as though Angela had him by the shirt strings and was just leading him around. I had to know what that meant. I had to know what had become of my father.

He didn't even bother locking the gate anymore. There was nothing to steal here, people knew. What we'd had was mortgaged or sold. Just the house, and the history of our name. Still. You'd think he would lock the gate. Wilson hung back a little bit, his hand resting on the rusted iron of the gate as I walked up to the front door. The cobbles of the walk were uneven, the mortar washed away and the stones pushed up by weeds and erosion, until it was a challenge to walk across them. Have to get that fixed, someday.

I banged on the knocker and waited. A long time, honestly, and when the door opened it protested the unexpected change. Williamson, our family's long time servant, stood with his hand on the door, staring at me.

"Bil… Williamson," I said, remembering how much he hated being called Billy. "Long time since I've seen you. What brings you here?"

"What brings… ha!" He laughed, which was not something he usually did. "What brings me here. Brilliant, Master Jacob. Brilliant!" He shuffled out onto the front porch and put an arm over my shoulder. "Come in, come in. Do come in!"

There was a little hysteria in his voice, and he nearly shut the door on Wilson in his haste to throw the latch. Once we were all in, he rattled a number of locks and then stood with his back against the door, his joviality abandoned.

"This had better be damned good, Jacob Burn," he said, a fresh glimmer of sweat beading across his balding head. "The old man's going to assume you're here to kill him."

"Kill him? You're kidding, right? I mean, not that I wouldn't kill him if it was justified, you understand, I just don't think this is the time for it."

"Don't even joke about it." Billy pushed himself away from the door with an effort and walked to an archway that had once been a coat room. He slid a nasty looking knife from his cuff and slid it into a sheath hanging just inside the arch. This bit of sleight-of-hand got an appreciative look from Wilson, but made me nervous. Last time I'd seen Billy, he had no more been capable of holding a fighting knife properly than of flying. "Let's get everyone a drink, then, and we can figure out what to tell your father about this little visit."

"What to tell him? Tell him that I want to see how he's doing."

"Funny. Two years without a breath from you, and you drop by in the middle of all this," he said. "That'll bring a smile to his face."

"Billy, what the hell is going on around here? Where's my father?"

"Upstairs. Where you're not going, until you know something more about this. Let's get that drink." He walked past us, completely ignoring Wilson, other than to nod as he went by. Last time Billy met the anansi, he had nearly pissed himself. "You still drink, don't you, Jacob?"

"I've yet to be given a good reason to stop," I answered.

"I imagine today will provide plenty of reasons to keep the habit," he muttered, then disappeared down the hall. Wilson popped one of his happier smiles, then bowed and motioned me forward. First time in a while I hadn't been looking forward to a drink.

One of the jewels of the Manor Burn was its bar. This room stood as one of the gatehouses of my childhood. Early memories were of a dark room, sheathed in leather and stained wood, where my father and his friends would retreat from the women and children to discuss important matters. I would sneak down the hall to listen to them drink and laugh and joke. Most of these important matters seemed to involve women who were not mother, but once in a while I would overhear some bit of serious news, some murder or political strategy that had gone amiss. I treasured these early memories, because they had been the last time I looked with awe on my father's role in society.

It was also in this room that father gave me the news that I had been accepted to the Academy, where he told me he had arranged for my PilotEngine surgery personally, and later where he had dressed me down for my expulsion and the disgrace that had followed. Not one word of the people who died in the accident, nor one hint that it was my father's personal surgeons who had planted the seeds of my failure during that surgery, that my PilotEngine was actually an artifact hidden in my chest at the behest of the Church of the Algorithm. But I've told that story.

This is where I came when I moved back into the house, no longer welcome in the barracks or among my supposed friends. This is where he greeted me, where he told me that mother was leaving, that my brother was dead. That I would never be the heir of the Burn line, because he would rather the name die out than pass to someone like me. Anyway.

Through it all, the room remained the same. Too warm in the summer, too cool in the winter. The rows of leatherbound books untouched on the walls. And the bar, broad and shiny, with its glittering glass display shelves, underlit, so that the bottles of rare and expensive liquor sparkled in the dark room. Constellations of intoxication. Even when the money was gone, father did not get rid of the collection, except for what he drank. Which, apparently, had become quite a lot.

Billy was helping, clearly. He laid out three glasses and selected a fine whiskey from the shelves. Fewer bottles now, and those that remained were mostly empty. Billy poured us up and stoppered the bottle, but left it on the bar. Wilson and I sat down and watched my father's faithful servant drain his glass and pour another.

"I have trouble believing that things have gotten tougher than they were," I said.

"More difficult? Probably not. But certainly more immediate." Billy stared at his glass as though it were an oracle speaking wisdom. His eyes were watery and old. I wondered how much of the household he was running these days, how much of the burden of the Burn problem was his to manage. "There has always been an element of the inevitable in what we do, here. The father is getting older. One son is dead, the other" — he glanced at me — "unwelcome. Just a matter of time before things came to a head."

"What, exactly, has come to a head?" Wilson asked.

Billy looked between us. I couldn't tell if he didn't know how to answer, or just didn't know how much he wanted to say in front of Wilson. He took a slow drink from his glass and sighed.

"Jacob, your father is an old man. A troubled man. The events of the last two years have worn him quite thin. And I worry now that he might be breaking."

I drank, to give myself a breath to think out what I wanted to say next. My immediate response wouldn't be appropriate. The whiskey was a good, complicated dram, and I let it sit on my tongue and burn my eyes while I turned the conversation over in my head. Wilson spoke up before I could come up with something polite.

"Mr. Williamson, sir, as much as I enjoy sitting in the wreckage of aristocracy and mourning the passing of an age of privilege and expensive tastes by drinking the master's very fine whiskey, Jacob and I don't really have time for this sort of conversation. There are things that we need to know, and unless you're attending Council meetings, I seriously doubt you're going to be able to answer our questions." He drank the whole glass in front of him with a snort, then slammed the glass on the bar. "We must speak to Jacob's father, immediately."

Billy smiled at that, a kind of sad smile that reminded me of my father on his better days.

"Alexander hasn't been going to many meetings, himself. And as to his ability to answer your questions, well. I suppose that depends on the questions, and how you ask them."

"Do we need to write them on little slips of paper and stuff them under his door?" Wilson asked angrily. "Or maybe give them to you, and let you scurry off like a priest at an oracle? Or do we go to the man, and ask him directly? Because that's how I prefer to ask my questions."

"I can't imagine why the two of you get in so much trouble," Billy said quietly, looking down at the glass that had paused on his lip. "With such subtlety of form and intention. You would do so well in the Council."

"Perhaps the Council could do with a little less subtlety," I said, trying to insert myself between Wilson's rant and Billy's nostalgia. "Might get something done."

"Oh. The Council gave up on subtlety, at least as far as the Family Burn is concerned."

"Hence the jack-knife in your coat room," I asked. "And all the secrecy as to my father's wellbeing? What's going on, Billy? What's got you so badly spooked?"

"Your father," he answered. He looked at me with eyes that were almost apologetic. "That man scares the living hell out of me, Jacob."

"He's become violent?" I asked.

"Not at all. Worse." Billy shakily drank the rest of his glass and stared at the bottle, steeling himself. "He's become a prophet. Or mad. Probably both."

"That one you're going to have to explain," I said.

"It started maybe a year ago. Maybe less." He put his hand on the bottle, thoughtfully tapping his finger against the glass neck. "Just part of Council business. But it required him to review some military records. He came across the accounts of your brother's death. He had read them before, of course, immediately after. But it seemed different, this time. His reaction. Alexander kept the report aside, after his business with Council was over. Kept it in his office. I found it on his desk. Shortly after that, he was required to travel upriver. Again, on business."

"Did he go that far?" I asked, carefully. My brother Noah was in the navy, part of the Exploratory Corps that tested the edges of Veridon's empire in the wilds upriver. He died in something that might have been a skirmish, or it might have been a massacre. The Eranti had been blamed, but no acts of war were ever drawn up. In the end, the whole mess was buried and forgotten. Like my brother.

"Not quite. But he went well beyond the usual borders of the empire. Some sort of trade agreement. They were out of communication for weeks. And when he returned, there was something different about him." A decision resolved behind Billy's eyes. He took his hands off the bottle and folded them on the bar in front of him. "He never indicated anything odd happened on the trip until months later. That's when the visions started."

"We could just cut to the marrow and say that he's going mad," Wilson said. He took the bottle of whiskey and poured himself another. "Here, let me prophesy, tell me how I do. Alexander has seen visions of his dead son, his wife, his lost grandchildren and maybe even one Jacob Burn. He regrets betraying the one, losing the other and alienating the last, in no particular order." The anansi sipped at his whiskey and smiled. "Let's be honest. Alexander Burn is single-handedly responsible for the demise of his family and the loss of its prestige in the Council. This place is falling apart, and it's entirely his fault. Frankly I'm shocked he didn't go mad years ago."

"You shouldn't be so glib about this," Billy said, bitterly.

"No, you shouldn't be so serious about it. I know you're loyal to the man, but he's gone off the rails. What are we going to see if we go upstairs, eh? Does old Alexander walk around in penitent's garb, tearing at the few remaining wisps of his hair and crying out to the darkness? Or has he gone for something more dramatic?"

"That is my father you're talking about," I said. "Maybe we should give him a chance to explain himself?"

Billy sighed, staring at the floor. "No, you have it right. He's fashioned himself a… well. A costume."

"A costume," Wilson crooned happily. "Oh, that's grand. Tell me, is it the robes of a king, or a jester, or maybe one of the Celestes? Or, maybe, just maybe, old Alexander goes around in women's things? Please tell me it's women's things."

"He mutters a lot about fires in the city, and the dead. And sometimes he's right about things, weeks before they happen." Billy covered his face with his hand. "Sometimes it seems like he's talking to the dead, or those who are about to die, or have been dead for generations. And he's taken to wearing a mask. Black. There are words across the face of it, but I don't know the language."

I didn't hear the glass snap in my hand, but I felt the bite of the whiskey as it mixed with the blood lacing its way down my wrist. I turned to look at Wilson, but he was gone, heading to the stairs. I followed. Billy stayed at the bar, talking to us as we left, but I couldn't hear what he was saying.

Chapter Nine

The Two Voices

Like most homes of a certain age, the Manor Burn had more rooms than the family had ever used. The ambitions of the architect outstretched the progeny of the elder Burns, and whole wings had alternately been shuttered and rehabilitated in the generations my family had been living here. As a child I used to make a game of the empty chambers, searching for ghosts or treasure, or making up stories about the ancestors who'd once lived in those dusty rooms.

This only got worse as the family's fortunes declined. No servants meant no servant quarters. No parties meant no formal dining room. No money meant no library, no stockhouse, no stables. All of those rooms had been sealed away or just left empty, until the Manor Burn was mostly a graveyard of bedrooms and corridors and closets.

So when Billy said that father was upstairs, I assumed that meant in one of the recently lived-in sections of the house. Before I left, my father and mother made their quarters in the master suites, just off the solar on the second floor. I found it abandoned. The solar itself looked well used, but not recently. I wondered if someone had been squatting in the semi-outdoor space, judging by the bedroll and primitive fire in one corner. That's where Billy found us.

"Those are his," he said. "When he came back from the upriver, he couldn't stand to be away from the stars. So he claimed." Billy toed the bedroll. I couldn't imagine my rotund father sleeping out here, on the ground. "I think something about the house frightened him. The way his eyes moved, always looking in corners, down empty halls. I should have known something was going on. Things have been so strange."

"Where is he, Billy?" I asked sharply. Billy collapsed a little bit.

"Follow me. Just" — he held up a hand — "just don't judge him."

"I think it's going to be lady's things," Wilson whispered behind me. I shushed him, then nodded my assent to Billy. The old servant led us deeper into the house, and higher up.

These were corridors I hadn't seen in a long time. Even with the thrumming power of the Deep Forge at our feet, it was difficult to heat these spaces in the winter. Besides, any scrap of power that went into the house was a scrap that wasn't being sold to the city. And while the market had collapsed, the rates people were willing to pay now a mere whisper of what they had once been, every scrap counted. More than ever, now.

Billy took us about as high up as the manor went. I remembered some of these rooms from my childhood wanderings. Especially the room where we stopped: the grand solar. Its glass dome was speckled with wooden planks, where the tiny jewel-like panes of glass had fallen out over the years. Somewhere along the way, even this mediocre repair work had ceased, and much of the dome blinked up into the sky. I was startled to realize that it was full night, stars glittering down at us through the dome. There was little light in the grand solar, other than what washed in from the city outside. Billy went to a side cabinet and began fumbling with a frictionlamp.

"No engines, Williamson. Leave us in the dark."

The voice came from the center of the room. Unquestionably my father's, and different from what I was expecting. With all these stories of madness and prophecy, I expected to hear his voice tinged with hysteria or disease. Instead, he sounded tired. Much like he sounded in the bar, each time he'd brought me there to describe the depth of his disappointment, either in me or the world. Billy stepped away from the cabinet.

"You have visitors, your lordship."

"How many years have you been with me? 'Lordship'?" A shadow moved in the dark, coming closer. "Since when do we… Ah. I see. You have brought me the boy."

"Hi, dad," I said. Silence answered me. The darkness swelled as my eyes struggled to adjust. Now that my father was still, I couldn't even be sure of where he was standing. Too many shadows, and nothing to distinguish his from any other. Finally his form turned away from me and disappeared back toward the center of the room. I gave Billy a nervous look, then followed.

"We came to talk to you, dad. Wilson and I. There's something going on, and I've heard some things. Stuff about you, and the Council." It felt weird talking to my dad about Council business. Usually we just yelled at one another until someone got tired and left. "And then Billy said some stuff, about Noah. He said that you were hearing voices."

That stopped him. I couldn't see what he was wearing, other than to know that it wasn't his usual suit. He had lost some weight, that's for sure. Even his face was obscured in the darkness. When he turned to me, all I could see was a black expanse.

"Voices. Two of them," he muttered. "Two voices. And then one. You probably think I'm mad."

"I should get a light," Billy said from the door. He rattled away down the hall. Wilson stood silently behind me, barely breathing. I crossed my arms and faced my father.

"I don't know what to think. Angela Tomb seems to think she has you around her finger."

"Tomb be damned. The Council be damned." He retreated from me, drifting back to the center of the room. My eyes were nearly adjusted to the light. He was wearing robes, and something over his face. "What have they told you about me?"

"Curiously, nothing. Angela made a special point of not discussing you."

"And why are you talking to that bitch again?" He asked it without spite, without violence.

"She got me out of jail." I moved to the cabinet, where Billy had been assembling the frictionlamp. "Listen, Alexander. I would really like to have some light in here."

"Not with those machines!" he snapped, and I found the edge of hysteria I had been expecting. He got dangerously close to the light from the hallway. I could almost see what was over his face. He realized it, and shied back. "I won't stand those machines. I wouldn't let you up here if your engine were still working, Jacob, son or no son. Even now, I can hear it in your chest, mewling like a sick cat."

"The cogwork is talking to you?" Wilson asked. There was a touch of reverence in his voice. "You can hear them talking?"

"It's not the engines, no. I know what you're thinking, bug." Alexander strode forcefully away. Once his back was to us, his hands went to his face. I hear metal and leather, straps, and then the shuffling of fabric. "I can hear it in your voice. No, it's something else. Talking through the engines. Some damn voice, like the dead, singing up from their graves."

I wrinkled my brow and looked back at Wilson. He was limned in the light from the hallway. My father wasn't a poetic man, even at his best. I couldn't read Wilson's expression, though, so I pressed on.

"Billy said this all started while you were upriver." I said, walking toward him. "On some kind of business for the Council. You mind telling me what you were about, up there?"

"Trade routes. The Council has become restless, Jacob." He turned towards me, and I could see that whatever had been covering his face was no longer there. "Restless and hungry. They are no longer content with controlling the routes down the water fall. They want the routes upriver, too. And they sent me to make the deal."

"Why you?" I asked. Not fifteen feet from him, now. Getting closer. I had half a mind to try to subdue him, drag him out into the light. Something. This was just too creepy.

"Because it was dangerous," he answered. Alexander was standing next to some kind of furniture, a lounge or a bed, resting one hand on it. "Because we're expendable to them."

"Since when were members of the Council expendable?"

"Not simply members of the Council. Us. The Family Burn." He shrugged in the darkness. "We haven't much to lose, have we?"

"A cheery way of putting it. And then?" I prompted.

He didn't move. Didn't look up, didn't drop his hand from the bed. But he seemed to deflate. Become insubstantial.

"I don't remember. There was a man, among the delegation. He reminded me of your brother." And there was that edge of hysteria. "I meant to speak to him, but I lost him in the alleyways of DelHaran. You've been there?"

"No, father. But that's where Noah died."

"Noah died," he answered, his voice faltering. "Yes. Yes, he did. I couldn't keep up with him."

There was a lot of stock in the 'going mad' school of thought, as far as I was concerned. I got as close to him as I dared and balled my hands into fists, just in case. I had struck my father before, of course, but usually we were both drunk for it.

Cue Billy running in with a torch. An actual torch, guttering and drooling pitch on the stone floor. It was like some penny-pulp scene, the villagers bursting in on the monster's den with their pitchforks and period-appropriate lighting devices.

Alexander looked like he always looked. Put out by my presence, other things on his mind. Formerly regal. What I thought were robes turned out to be a bathrobe, pulled tight around his belly. He had lost some weight and gained some wrinkles, but there was nothing in his bearing that hinted at madness. He looked down at my fists, half-raised into a fighting stance, and chuckled.

"You were going to punch me, Jacob? And you wonder why I wrote you out of the will. Honestly." He turned from me to Billy. "Get us something to eat, will you? A light lunch, perhaps."

"It's well past supper, sir."

"Well, then consult your books of etiquette and see if there's some way you can possibly bring me a sandwich and a warm beer and pretend that it's supper without all of us getting arrested by whatever powers enforce these social niceties, okay?" He turned away and strolled among his collection of furniture. "Because I could murder a sandwich, right now."

Billy looked from Alexander to me, even to Wilson. I shrugged and nodded. He set the torch in a stand that was apparently there for just that purpose, and then went back downstairs. I turned my attention back to father.

He was sitting at a desk. There were other bits of furniture around; a bed, a long table that was cluttered with plates and books and more than a few bottles from the bar downstairs. They were arranged haphazardly around the room. It looked as though he had simply dragged them as far as he could and then given up. I went to stand behind him.

"You're in my light," he said. I moved to the side to see what he was reading. A journal, quite old. There were drawings of wildlife and plants, alongside graphs of measurements. Typical scientist's stuff.

"What's that?" I asked.

"Something I've been reading. A journal of an unnamed scientist, from early in Veridon's history. I think he might have been part of the group that eventually became the Artificers Guild." He absentmindedly flipped the page and looked up at me. "Why are you here, Jacob?"

"I could ask you the same thing," I said, not yet willing to get to the heart of it. "Last I checked, there were perfectly good bedrooms downstairs."

He snorted and turned back to the journal. "Too close to the streets, to the carriages. To the Deep Furnace. I had to get away from the voice."

"You said two voices, before."

"Yes. They've told you I'm mad, of course."

"They?"

He twisted in his seat to look up at me. "The Council. Angela. Whoever it is she's trying to replace me with, or maybe the industrial families, trying to get our seat revoked."

I thought of the argument between Veronica and the Lady Tomb. It seemed father was aware enough to know forces were moving against him in the Council.

"You're living in a dark room, alone, and telling everyone that you're hearing a voice from out of the cogwork. What do you think they told me?"

He chuckled again.

"So they sent you to check in on me? Get me declared insane, is it?" He stood up from the desk and went to the table. He put it between us, put his hands on the surface. "Would that be revenge enough for you, Jacob?"

"I've given up on revenge, Alexander. There's nothing I could do that would make us even."

"Noble of you to feel that way. Very egocentric." He grimaced. "Maybe there's hope for you yet."

"No one sent me, dad. There was some bad trouble on the docks today, and I got caught up in it. Seems like the Council knows more about it than they're letting on. I thought I'd see what you knew. See if you could help me."

"Was it another one of those attacks?" he asked.

I told him about the ship, and Crane. I left out some stuff, because it was a complicated enough tale, and I wasn't yet sure he was in his full mind. I didn't mention Angela, or Veronica, or the iron girl.

"And the mask," Wilson said. I was just about to get to it, hadn't decided if I was going to include it or not. Wilson sensed it and made the decision for me. "We found a mask in Crane's place."

That caught his attention. He held out his hand, and with some small hesitation, Wilson gave it over. Alexander sat on the bed, holding the mask in both hands and staring at the words. Finally, he reached into his costumey robes and produced another mask. It was a cheap imitation of the mask we had found, made of hammered tin and child's paint.

"I've been having dreams," he whispered. "I've been seeing things in my dreams. It won't let me sleep."

"What is it?" I asked after a while.

"The Rite of Purge," he answered, his voice far away. "Something we haven't had in Veridon for quite a while. Hopefully never again."

"Oh," Wilson said. "Ah. Maybe that explains your vision, Jacob."

"Vision?" Alexander asked. "You've been having visions, and you accuse me of madness for hearing voices. Typical."

"It was the words there that triggered it." I tried to explain what I had seen. Alexander nodded the whole way through. "So what is this Rite of Purge about?"

"Used to be there was only one punishment that the Council could bring against its members. Now we have fines and restrictions and tax brackets," he said, waving his hand. "Now it's nice and complicated. But back at the Founding, the Councilors were above all reproach. We could do no wrong. If someone did do something wrong, it was so wrong that there could only be one punishment."

"Death?"

"Erasure." He looked up at me with those old eyes, stared hard at me. "Absolute removal from the city. From the history of the city. A complete purge of the family from the story of Veridon."

"How often has this happened?" Wilson asked.

"How would we know? Even the decision was removed from the books. Only the people who were there would know, and it was in their interest to forget. Hasn't happened in my lifetime. I suspect not in several generations. And this," he said, lifting the mask. "This is the symbol of office. Worn by the man charged with removal. It's a butcher's mask."

"Do you think Crane fancies himself an instrument of the Council?" Wilson asked. "Sent to purge one of the families?"

"Who's to say he isn't? Whole point of the mask is to invest the Council's power in one man." Alexander tossed the mask onto his bed and rested his head in his hands. "That mask is a mandate. Crane had this. Who knows what resources he has at his disposal?"

"He had it, but he left it behind," Wilson said. "So was it given to him, or did he take it from someone?"

"I'm getting tired of this," Alexander said. He was leaning against the table with his full weight, arms spread wide, head drooping to his chest. "I'm getting tired of these games."

"Kinda late for that," I said.

"Kind of. Yes." He placed the mask gingerly on the table, straightened the edge of it so it lined up with the table. "There are things I should have left for you, son. Other than obligations."

"And mind-numbing debt," I laughed. "Good news on the debt part. Since I've been written out of the will, that won't be my problem either."

Alexander lifted a square of paper from the table and tapped it against the mask. When he raised his head, I thought for one startling second that he was crying. He slid the paper toward me, then sat at the table and crossed his arms.

When it became clear that I wasn't going to move, Wilson went and got the paper. He laughed as he read it, then held it up for me to read.

I got the words "Right of Name," "Councilor-in-Standing" and "Son, Jacob Burn" through my head before I turned and walked out of the room, leaving the letter behind. Wilson followed, laughing all the way, with a touch of hysteria.

Just a reminder. My father, Alexander Burn, betrayed me. He sold a part of me to the Church of the Algorithm, buried one of their secrets in my flesh and then cast me out of the house when I didn't show the proper gratitude. When his little compromise got some of my friends killed, I acted against his will. Directly against his will. This is what got me shot by Angela, got Emily killed, got me a bad name in the city of Veridon. Everything that man has done has in some way acted against me. And this was his last shot. He took everything from me, spent it all, and now he was giving me the bill.

"We should get a drink," Wilson yelled from behind me as I pushed through the busy streets of DowningTown. "Celebrate. You've been reinstated!"

I gave him a nasty look over my shoulder. He was all smiles and teeth.

"You know damn well that it's too late for that," I yelled back. The crowds were loud tonight. Rumors of the attacks at the dock this morning were driving a certain madness through the air. "The Burn family name died a long time ago. That skeleton has just been rattling along."

"So it's up to you to bury it. Shouldn't be that hard."

I grimaced and kept trudging through the crowd. Lots of pushing, lots of noise. The Down wasn't usually this busy, even on festival nights. People were seriously spooked, if they were treating this like some kind of holiday from sanity. But who was I to talk? One thing Wilson had right. Way things were going, we should seriously get a drink.

We chose a place I used to frequent in my days as a serious criminal. I didn't think they'd recognize me. Hoped not, at least. Some people I pissed off back then, they might pay folks to let them know I was around. Come by and have a swing at my head. Or maybe that's just what I needed. A good fight to clear the head. Wilson seemed like he could do with the same. Seemed edgy, and there was nothing quite as intimidating as an edgy bug. All those teeth, that smiling, nervous energy. The knives bulging under his vest. We made a good pair.

I got our drinks and found a table in the corner. Wilson sat across from me. Still grinning.

"Cut it out," I said.

"What?"

"That smile. You're happy about this." I drank and wiped my face with the back of my hand. "You like to see me suffer."

"Not exactly. I like to see you when you get like this, though."

"Like what?" I asked.

He spread his hands around the room. People were giving us our space, for all that the rest of the tavern was knees to nuts.

"Dangerous," he said. "People can smell it. You're a man who isn't thinking straight."

"I'm thinking just fine."

"We had questions for your father. Lots of questions, really. Best thing we could do is go back to that morbid house, climb up to that room and sit in the dark with your father. Asking questions."

"Maybe," I conceded.

"But we're not going to do that, are we?"

I was quiet. His smile widened. My beer was empty, but another appeared without having to ask. The barmaid wouldn't meet my eyes. Hurried away. She could smell it on me.

"No," I said. "We're not."

"We left the mask behind. You think we might want that later on?" Wilson sipped his beer and rubbernecked around the room like a tourist. "I think we'll need it. But no matter."

Again, I didn't answer. I wasn't going back to that house. Not now, not ever. I had been under the gloom of the Burn name for years now. Some folks blamed me for the noble family's fall from grace, some folks blamed my father, or the industrialists who were squeezing the Founding Families out of the Council. Out of power. Last thing I wanted was the responsibility of righting that ship. Or worse, standing at the helm when she finally slipped under the water. Thinking that reminded me of the morning's fight on the river, and the crawling dead. I shivered. It also made me realize I'd been up for a lot of hours in a row, here, and a lot had happened in a day. Suddenly, fatigue plucked at my bones. I settled into my chair and stared at my beer. I was feeling unapologetically bad for myself.

"Why did he do that?" I asked no one in particular. "Why'd he reinstate me? What happened to letting the name disappear before he'd hand it over to the likes of me?"

"You may not have noticed this, but your father is in a peculiar state of mind." Wilson folded his hands around his mug. "I don't really understand what he meant by hearing voices. I think we can trace that pretty directly to our boy Crane, don't you?"

"I thought of that. Wasn't sure how to put it to him, though."

"I'm not sure you should have." Wilson sipped his beer, as though it was hot, and licked his lips. "We're in an unusual position, Jacob. I think we have more information than most of the people involved in this."

I blinked at him across the table. Fatigue was really pulling me down.

"Sure doesn't feel that way," I said. "Feels like we don't know the first damn thing."

He laughed, but kept the mirth from his eyes. There was something uncomfortable in the way he was sitting, like he was trying to balance on a very tiny chair.

"We know Crane is working with Tomb. We know that he is somehow connected with a Rite of Purge, and that a lot of the abilities he's demonstrated align with your father's sudden case of madness." He drank, then slid his mug slowly around the table, making patterns in the condensation. "And Crane took the time to hire you for a job that was probably going to get you killed."

"I don't like where you're going with this," I muttered.

"I'm not going anywhere with it. I'm just laying out some facts."

"You're implying that a Rite of Purge has been written out with the Burn name on it."

"I'm not sure that I am," he said. "Although that is a possibility. From what your father described, though, it doesn't sound like the kind of thing the Council would enact. Unless your family has done something heinous that we're just not aware of."

I leaned back in my chair and rubbed my face. "You never know. Dad likes his secret plans."

"Let's discount that for a moment. This Rite of Purge thing seems pretty extreme, even for Angela Tomb. I don't think she'd take the time to bring it in front of the full Council. If she was serious about snuffing out the Burn name, I mean… there are really only two of you left. Your mother's not going to contest the Right, your siblings are dead or married. Honestly, you didn't really count toward the total until your father reinstated you."

"Maybe that's why he did it," I said. "He's worried Angela is trying to get him out of the way, so he brought me back into the family. Putting the crosshairs on my head would force my involvement. Force them to act against me, and me to react against them. That'd be typical of him."

"Doesn't explain the purge mask, though," Wilson said.

I shrugged. It did seem a little theatrical for Angela's style. She was much more the type to just pull out a pistol and shoot you in the chest, without preamble or warning. Which was also the problem with Crane's theoretical role in Alexander's madness. If the Tombs wanted Alexander dead, they would shoot him. Unless they needed to discredit him first. I really needed to know more about what was going on in the Council.

"What about this Bright girl?" I asked. "What do you know about her?"

"Not much. They're a recent addition to the Council. Her father has very diversified interests. One of which, curiously, is not the Council. It was her brother that worked to get them a seat in the chamber. And as far as I know, he's the one who sits it. Aaron, his name is, I think. She acts as his second."

"I take it they hate all Founders, everywhere, and would do everything in their power to bring us down?"

"Beats me." Wilson finished his beer then carefully turned the mug on its head and rested his hands on top of it. "But it sure seems she has no love for the Tombs. Maybe she'd talk to you. Tell me," he said, looking around the bar. "Does this all seem strange to you?"

I finished my beer and pushed the glass away. It left a wet trail on the table, like a slug.

"Does what seem strange to me?"

"This crowd. What is tonight, Tuesday? Tuesday's not usually a big drinking night."

I put a hand on the girl's wrist when she brought me the next round. She stiffened, but met my eyes.

"What's with all the people?" I asked. She answered, but it was too quiet for me to hear. I gave her a tug, until she bent close.

"They're coming for you," she groaned. Voice like a graveyard cracking open, rattling up from the deep parts of her chest.

"What?" I asked, squeezing hard. Wilson squinted at me and leaned in to listen. The girl blinked and looked at me like I was an idiot.

"I said, people are cutting loose before the curfew. Council's shutting the city down tomorrow. Some kind of Badge thing."

"First I've heard of it," I said. "I've never known them to shut down the whole city."

"Not since the red fever came through here," Wilson said, looking mournfully at his upturned mug. "It's pretty strange."

"Anyway," the barmaid fluttered her eyes at me. "Much as I enjoy being held by such a fine gentleman, I do have other tables."

"I really doubt you've been held by many gentlemen," I muttered.

She gave me a look, then twisted her arm free and slapped her palm flat across my cheek before stalking away.

"What was that about?" Wilson asked, eyes twinkling.

"Nothing," I said. "Let's get out of here."

"Aren't you going to finish your beer?" he asked.

"Nope."

"Aren't you going to pay for the beers you finished?"

"Nope."

"Woo, it's a party! We're on a tear!" Wilson jumped up and slapped me on the back. "Skipping out on checks and walking out on your father. Next thing we'll be beating up kids for their allowance!"

"What the hell has gotten into you?" I snapped.

"I'm just glad to see you making mistakes again. You're more fun when you make mistakes." He grabbed me by the shoulder with his iron-hard fingers and kept me from walking away from him. "Seriously. What'd the bitch say the first time? I thought your face was going to fall off."

"I don't know what she said," I answered, looking nervously around the room. "But someone made a threat, through her. A threat or a warning."

Wilson's smile broke, but only for a moment. He looked for the barmaid, but couldn't find her. Without another word he started pushing for the front door.

"Did she look like she had cogwork?" he asked.

"She looked like she had great tits. That's as far as I got."

"You're not helpful," he hissed.

"I thought I was more fun when I made mistakes."

"That has its limits. Let's get somewhere quieter and…"

The sirens started. Out in the streets, the drunken crowd gave a whoop and a holler, and then gunfire sprinkled the air and people started screaming. We stopped talking, and just ran.

Chapter Ten

Needing a Hero

This is what I wanted to do; what I was going to do. I wanted to run as far from this bullshit as modern transportation would take me. Grew up the pawn of my old man, played the game according to his rules, according to the rules of this little society we had formed on this godscursed river. And he played me, betrayed me, cut me off. Everything that man had ever done was meant to shape me into a tool for his name. And when I broke, when the tool fell clattering to the floor of his shop, he cast me aside and went looking for someone else.

And now he had no one else, and he was coming back to me. Reinstating me into the family would only do one thing, it would get me killed. So here I was, dragged back into the chaos of Council politics, into the backstabbing and the plotting. Into the game. And I was done playing.

Somewhere outside of Veridon there was a morning where I could wake up and not worry about whether my name was about to get me killed. There was a town that had never heard of the family Burn, never heard of the wastrel of a son who disappointed his scheming father. There was a place where I was a nobody, worth nothing. Not worth killing. I was going to find that place. Now.

To hell with this place. To hell with Veridon.

Outside, it was like a festival. The street was stuffed with people, some of them screaming, some of them laughing. All of them drunk. The gunfire was distant, the sirens howling over the crowd like a trumpet call. The air was crackling with a hot spring breeze. Flares had gone up, lining the clouds of an early season storm in unnatural pinks and reds. Lightning shuddered across the sky. Wilson was still smiling.

There was a line of officers of the Badge moving down the street, steadily compacting the revelers into tighter and tighter quarters. The gunshots came from them, firing their shortrifles into the air as they proceeded. Wilson and I went with the flow of traffic, rippling in the other direction. It felt as if we were being herded.

"So, whatever ghost voice talked to you through the girl," Wilson yelled into my ear — it was hard to hear anything over the crowd and the sirens — "do you think it was the Badge they were warning you about?"

"Nope," I answered. My shoulders were hunched tight under my jacket. I was getting pressed from all sides.

"Me neither," Wilson said. "Because it's pretty obvious that they're coming. Don't need to be warned away from that ruckus. Which leaves us with the interesting question."

"Which is?"

Wilson looked around at the crowd, then back to me.

"What's the real threat, and where are they?" He muscled an arm free of the press and used it to clear some space around us. "And how long before they stab us in the back, among all these idiots?"

"That's not a very interesting question," I said. "At least, I'm not interested in it."

"You're not?" He gave me a quizzical look. "Feeling suicidal?"

"No. I'm feeling finished." I pushed to the side of the crowd, against one of the walls. The shop behind me had been boarded up, in eerily accurate anticipation of the riot. The keep had clearly seen this kind of weather in the air before. I stood with my back against the boards, watching the Badge get closer. Wilson fought his way next to me and stared into my face.

"Finished? Just like that? You're giving up."

"I'm just getting out, Wilson. I'm sick of this. Sick of my father."

"Oh, your father," he nodded. "That's what this is about. That's all you care about, isn't it?"

"You're missing the point, buddy. That's all I don't care about. I'd like to keep myself alive, and I'd like him to stop getting in the way of that." The crowd was getting awfully tight. Wilson was pushed right up against me. I could feel the brace of knives in his vest, poking me in the ribs. "I tried doing it in the city. Stayed low. Got forgotten. And that worked for a while. Now it seems to have stopped working."

"Don't give me that shit, Jacob." He bared his hundred teeth at me, biting off each word with a snap. "He would have taken you back, but you didn't give him the chance. You took the path that went through every bar in Veridon, and half the whores. I know, Jacob, because I followed you through that path. That's what friends do."

"We're friends now? I thought you were waiting for me to start making mistakes again. Because it amuses you."

He shook his long, bald head at me and spat. The line of Badge was getting close. Wilson noticed and pushed me aside, then began prying off the boards on the shop door.

"So what's your plan, genius? Get arrested again?" He snapped a board in half and began working on the lock beneath. "Because that's what's going to happen if you don't get moving."

"Doesn't sound like a bad idea. Settle into a nice cell until this blows over."

"You think they're going to let you do that? Angela's already sprung you once. Who knows what would come for you this time!" The lock snapped open, and Wilson pulled the door wide, tearing the boards from the frame as he pulled. So it wasn't the best barricade job. The shopkeeper hadn't matched his prescience with good carpentry. You can't have everything. Wilson stood in the door, staring down at me.

"Stay out here and get arrested, or come through here with me. But if you follow me, by gods, you have to fight with me."

"What makes you so all-fire righteous all of a sudden, Wilson?" I demanded. "You can't tell me that you honestly care about what happens in the Council. Or to my father, for that matter."

He laughed.

"Don't care? It's all I care about, Jacob. You can go traipsing off into some pastoral fantasy about milkmaids and sleeping in and maybe doing a little fishing," he snarled, making the word 'milkmaids' sound particularly vicious. "But some of us are stuck here. Some of us can't drop everything and disappear."

"That's not my fault. That's not my responsibility. And what the hell is keeping you here, anyway? Not like you've got family obligations."

There was murder in his eyes. I had always been afraid of his teeth, and his iron hard fingers, and those knives, and the sharp talons of his spider hands. I added his eyes to the list.

"Oi, you there! You lads!" shouted one of the officers. "We'd like a word with you, if you have the time." As if we were standing in the street, loitering. Not in the middle of a riot.

Wilson stepped inside the shop, gave me a significant look. I shrugged and brushed past him, further into the darkness within. He turned to the line of officers who were struggling to get closer.

"I will thank you kind gentleman to do something about this rabble," Wilson shouted back. "I am a respectable citizen of the city, and the proprietor of this fine shop. Please remove these people from my doorstep and see that nothing is damaged. I have some very fine" — he paused to look around at the shelves nearest him — "some very fine pottery that must be protected at all costs. And what appears to be a hookah… never mind, thank you for your time."

And he slammed the door and threw the bolt, and then whirled on me.

"Let's say that it's not me who's stuck here. You clearly care nothing for me, or my feelings, so let's imagine it's someone else. Anyone else. What would have happened if you hadn't stepped up two years ago, huh? What would have happened to the city?"

"Maybe that was a mistake. Maybe I should have let Camilla have her heart back, and let the chips fall where they may."

"Really?" He stalked closer to me, backing me up against the very fine pottery. "Really, Jacob? You don't care that she would have burned a hole through this city a mile wide and two deep? All the people who would have died, all the tomorrows that would have been lost; that doesn't matter to you at all?"

"Maybe it doesn't matter to me anymore." I pushed him back a little, enough to get my footing. "Maybe I didn't do as much good as you think. Things could have turned out differently. Things could have turned out better."

"For who, Jacob? For you? For the Council? Who would be better off now, if you hadn't done what you did?"

And there it was, hanging between us in the air, the name neither of us would say. Would either of us dare play that name; did we care about this argument enough to tear open that wound?

Emily. Emily would be better off. But I couldn't say that. Couldn't even think it.

I retreated to the back of the shop, looking for another door. People were pounding on the bolted front of the shop, Badgemen or crushed rioters or maybe even the cogdead. Who could tell anymore? The silence and that name hung in the air like a thunderbolt.

"I don't know what good I did back then, Wilson, but I know what evil. I know how many men I've killed. How many women." I found a door and started fiddling with the lock. "I know how many lives I've ruined, how many bones I've crushed. Both for Valentine, and later for myself."

"But think about how many more would have died, Jacob." Wilson came over and put a hand on the door. Didn't matter. I couldn't get the damn lock to budge, anyway. "And how many more will die this time around. You can do something, out there."

I had to laugh. Put a hand on his arm and smiled.

"You're talking like I'm a fucking hero, Wilson. Let's not tell that lie, okay? My dad got me involved in this because he knows I'm not a hero. He knows I'm a coward, and a violent man, and I do violent things when I'm scared. And I don't want to be that man, not now. Maybe not ever." I pulled my hand away and crossed my arms over my chest. "But certainly not today, and certainly not for him."

Wilson pressed his lips into a thin, furious line. He pushed me aside and, with contemptuous ease, tumbled the lock and threw open the door.

"Fine, Jacob. Go. Hide. Leave us alone."

I stared at him for a dozen breaths, and then stepped out into the alley. It was quiet and dark, the shouts of the rioters and the Badge confined to the other side of the buildings. I put my hands in my pockets and hurried down the road. The clouds above grumbled menacingly, and the first heavy drops of a serious spring rain splattered to the cobbles around me. I hunched my shoulders, tucked my chin into my coat, and kept my eyes down. With luck I could be inside before it hit.

That was where I got unlucky. The day I decided to finally put this place behind me, to get out, shake the dust from my shoes and make a new life somewhere else, that was the day the Badge locked down the whole city with a strict curfew. Also, the rain started long before I got anywhere near shelter and as a final note, I had been awake for nearly twenty hours, and I had spent most of those hours either running for my life, fighting for my life, or drinking. It was beginning to show.

I didn't get more than two blocks before I had to turn around. I wanted to get to the zep docks, get a ticket and a cabin and a bed. But part of a curfew means locking the city down, and that means controlling the most common means of retreat. The entrances to the pneumatic train were guarded, and the main avenues of approach to the docks, the gates of the city and the massive bridge that led up to the Torchlight and the zep docks were all heavily patrolled. On top of that, there were roaming patrols of very curious and helpful Badgemen. A couple minutes after midnight the sirens stopped howling, the last of the rioters were tucked comfortably into padlocked carriages, and the Badge had the streets to themselves.

This was what I didn't understand. Why was the Badge locking the city down? I mean, I understood that it had been a pretty hectic day, what with the massacre on the docks. Still thought it was weird that the investigator who interviewed me this morning didn't know anything about that. Seemed to think it was some kind of fire that killed all those people. Angela knew, though. Figured.

Stop it, stop it, stop it. Stop thinking about this. Focus on getting out of the city. Or maybe to a decent bed, somewhere no one will come looking for you, and try again in the morning. But if I don't get out tonight, who's to say that I'll have the will to get out tomorrow? Tonight, and then sleep outside the city.

It was becoming increasingly difficult to stay out of the way of those patrols. Veridon was a labyrinth of alleys and streets and underground rivers, and there were only so many Badgemen on the payroll, but a lone pedestrian moving through the city at midnight, when the streets have been cleared, is going to draw the eye. Most of the honest citizens were in bed, cursing a siren at midnight for waking them up, and the dishonest citizens had gotten drunk and ended up in a riot. That just left the stragglers, like me and Wilson, folks who were up to serious mischief, and the truly determined drunks. There were pockets of these people lurking in alleyways, huddled around fire barrels, vigorously getting their bottles empty. I ducked into one such alley, its narrow walls high enough to block out all but the most direct rain. A group of drunks started when they saw me, drawing knives, until their bleary eyes figured out I wasn't there to arrest them. They stood in a tight ring around a fire barrel, sharing the heat and a bottle.

"Bad night for a walk, buddy," one of them said. He had a raincloak of slick leather, the hood pulled tight around his face. He turned away from me and clapped his hands over the smoldering barrel, but edged to one side to give me some room. I hunched my shoulders and squeezed in. The warmth was nice.

"Wasn't my plan," I said. "Out for a drink when all those sirens went off."

"Yeah," another one of my new companions said. I was surprised to see that it was a girl, young and thin and well groomed. She wore the kind of clothes that rich girls wore when they went slumming. "Badge is crawling around like lice tonight. Something has their hackles up."

"Nothing to do with us," the first one said. "Just an excuse to interrupt a perfectly good drunk."

I looked at the third member of their rain-soaked party. A boy, maybe a little younger than the girl. His eyes were glassy, and he swayed dangerously close to the fire. The girl saw my look of concern and laughed.

"Ricky's birthday today. He's a man now, aren't you Rick?"

Rick didn't answer. The older guy chuckled and passed the bottle to the girl. I took the bottle after her. Bitter and sharp in my mouth, its fire bursting through my chest. A couple shots rang out, far down the street. The girl winced and the man shook his head.

"Don't know what they're on about," he said. "Not like people need a reason to hate the Badge. Getting drunk in the rain shouldn't be a crime."

"Shouldn't it?" the girl asked, with a trill of mischief in her voice. "I'm feeling pretty damn criminal, I'll tell you."

I saw it in her, that childish glee at being in trouble. Being troublesome. I probably went to school with her mother, if the money in her bearing came from Founder stock rather than the industrialists. Did that matter, though? Which side of the Chamber her money came from? I imagined rich parents were just as overbearing, regardless of whether they'd earned their money or inherited it. The kids rebelled in the same predictable ways.

"You don't look like a pretty damn criminal to me," I said.

My two mostly sober new friends turned to me, a little uncomfortable.

"Now just you listen, bud," the man said, snatching the bottle from my hand. "There's no reason to be rude to the lady, just because we gave you a drink."

"Rude to the lady? We're standing in an alleyway, in the rain, drinking from a bottle of rotgut. And I suspect you brought her here, and got her brother drunk, and I suspect you had a good reason for doing that."

The man flushed and busied himself with the bottle. Who was he? An older friend? A servant? It wouldn't matter, in the end.

"What the hell are you talking about?" the girl said. "Jeremy is here at my request, and for my protection. It was Ricky's birthday, and I wanted the three of us to have a night out."

You could almost hear the pout in her voice. Jeremy didn't say anything.

"For your protection. Right." I took the bottle from Jeremy's loose hands and drank up. "Have some sense, girl, and get inside with the other good children. And take Ricky with you."

"Not every girl needs a hero, you know!" she shrilled.

The words hit me. An alley, when I was young and foolish, rushing to the aid of a girl I had only just met. Emily. That's what she said to me, when I thought to rescue her from an attacker, and she stood over his body, knife in hand. Not every girl needed a hero.

My hand was on the fire barrel, the pain barely getting to me through a wall of fuzzy numbness. I looked down at the smoldering cuff of my coat, then to the bottle, and up to the man in the hooded cloak. I was tired, sure, but not this tired. Back to the girl. Her eyes had gone wide, her hand to her face, gasping as she collapsed. Not every girl, no. But this girl does.

"You drugged us," I slurred. "You have no idea how bad that is."

"You should have stopped in a different alley," the man said. He batted the bottle from my hand. It shattered when it hit the cobbles, its tainted contents disappearing into the rain. "Or gotten properly drunk and gone to sleep, like everyone else."

Such a petty criminal. Such a stupid way for this stupid day to end. I backed into the wall, using it to hold me up. The man went to check on Ricky and the girl, both of whom were limp on the ground. Then he turned his attention to me.

"Look, I know what you're thinking," he said. Glanced at the girl, most of her leg exposed and muddy, back to me. "And I'd be lying if I said that didn't play a part. But mostly it's him. The boy's at the age of majority tonight, and that makes him an heir. Bad night to be an heir."

"I agree. Terrible night."My words were thick in my mouth. I blinked away the shadows that were clinging to my eyes, ran my hand across my face.

He gave me a funny look, then shrugged.

"Anyway. Bad luck for you, running into us. I hoped to have this all done before the curfew, but it's hard getting them away from crowds. Turned out that waiting until everyone was safely at home or tucked away in jail worked out. Other than you showing up. And that's your problem more than mine, honestly."

I steadied myself on the wall and tried to rub the drugged fatigue from my head. He chuckled, and when I looked up he was holding a knife. The barrel was still between us, and I probably could have gotten into the street. He might not have chased me, not with his two charges unconscious on the ground, but he seemed like the kind of guy who couldn't afford any witnesses. Didn't matter. I had my gun in my hand without really thinking of the consequences.

That surprised him. Maybe he was new to this business, or maybe victims who fought back weren't really his usual thing. He adapted well enough. Ducked behind the barrel, and when he came up it was with the girl's limp body under his arm, knife against her throat. Her head lolled over the blade, already drawing blood.

"How the hell does this happen to me?" I muttered. The damn gun was heavy in my hand. The poison was dragging me down. "What is it that I do to get in these situations?"

"This can still end well," he said. I don't think he knew what he was talking about. "You can just walk away. I promise you the girl isn't going to get hurt."

"Somehow I have trouble taking the word of the guy who drugged her in the first place." My sight was blurry, but I did my best to keep the barrel in the general direction of his head. Best if he thought I could pull off that shot, even if I knew better. "In fact the only way I see this ending is with blood. And it's not going to be mine, so you best start coming up with ways it doesn't have to be yours, either."

"Somehow I have trouble taking a threat from a man who can barely hold his head up." There was snide contempt in his voice. "So maybe you should start coming up with ways you walk out of this alive. Like, maybe if you just put the gun down, turn around and walk out."

"Let's figure that out, right after you stop hiding behind an unconscious girl."

He spat, but didn't move. Man, I love standoffs. Especially when I'm drunk, drugged and haven't slept in twenty hours. Best kind of standoffs. And no Wilson to pull my ass out of the fire.

"How about this," he said. "How about you take the girl, and I take young master Richard, and we just go our separate ways."

"I don't think I'd be a very good friend if I let you take her brother. How about you put that knife in your eye and save me the trouble of having to kill you."

"Whoa, whoa, no one said anything about killing." He pressed the knife more firmly against the girl's lolling head, just to make it clear that this whole conversation was, in fact, about killing. "What the hell do you care, anyway?"

"Well, at first I thought you meant to rape her, and I had it in my mind that I was going to be some kind of hero about it. But then you drugged me, and I take that kind of thing personally. Would have been okay if you'd just dropped the knife when I pulled iron. Instead you hide behind the girl, put your knife to her throat." The darkness in my head was closing in on me fast. Good thing I could talk in my sleep. Or at least, I could threaten in my sleep. "It offends me on a professional level."

"What would have been better is if you had drunk more and fallen asleep with the kids." He was edging around the barrel, putting it firmly between us. He straddled Ricky's unconscious form and hitched the girl further up, so her feet were off the ground. "Then everyone involved could have woken up tomorrow with a bad hangover, and you could have kept out of my business."

"You'd have slit my throat. Unless you're particularly bad at this job which, honestly, I'm beginning to think might be the case. Besides, you didn't put enough juice in that bottle to take down a man my size. You had to drink it, too, or the kids would have gotten suspicious."

"Listen to you, all clear-headed and analytical." He smiled grimly. "You know this kind of work. So why don't you just turn around and walk…"

He stopped talking and I stopped breathing, because we both heard it at the same time. Feet, lots of them, and the idle chatter of bored officers. Badge patrol. They weren't on our street, maybe on one of the cross streets, but certainly not more than a block or two away. They could turn and come this way, or they could wander off somewhere else. Tricky situation.

"Don't do it," he hissed. "Don't make a sound, don't call out, and don't fire that iron. Because if you do, I promise you, I promise, I'm going to cut this girl open and I'm going to run like hell. You think you can explain all this to the cops?"

"You think you can run faster than I can shoot you?" I asked, but I kept my voice down. I knew I couldn't run, and even if I could explain all this, I would still end up in custody and right back in the system. He gave me a sharp look and squeezed the girl for emphasis. I held up my hand.

They went the other way. Voices faded, footsteps became muffled. We stood staring at each other for two minutes after the last hint of their presence went away, then relaxed.

"See, this can still all be okay," he said, resting the girl against his knee and wiping his mouth with the back of the hand holding the knife. "We can work this out, you and me."

It was just enough of an opening, his tired arm resting, the girl folding limply forward, the knife away from her throat. Only opening I was going to get. I pushed the tension and fatigue from my mind and, loosely as I could, raised the revolver and squeezed two shots into his chest.

First one took him in the shoulder. He looked startled, dropped the knife, his eyes wide. He tried to hug the girl back to his body but I was already pulling the trigger on the second shot. Faster than him. Better than him. He dropped, and the girl dropped with him. I stumbled around the barrel, kicked her away from his bloody chest, kicked the knife down the alley, then took his shirt in my hand, knelt, and raised him off the ground.

"This was never a negotiation," I said. Then I punched him once, my hand wrapped around the cylinder of the revolver. Twice, teeth and blood across my knuckles. Three times, but he was already dead. I dropped him and turned to the girl.

She was still out, would be out for a while. A shout went up a couple streets over, then another. Patrol had heard the shot and was looking for the source. I didn't have a lot of time. I turned her so that she was on her side, in case something in the drug made her puke. Then I pulled her coat over her legs, made sure Ricky was comfortable, then turned back to the guy.

A bit of metal caught my eye. It was stuffed in an inner pocket of his coat, torn open by my shot. A familiar shape, stitched to a stiff black wallet. I picked it up.

Seal of the Badge, iron and pewter. My bullet had nicked the leather, biting a circle out of it. Why had he been scared of being found by the patrol, then? I looked down at the girl, at Ricky, at the dead man they trusted. The patrol was getting closer. Running out of time.

I pocketed the emblem, pulled my coat around my shoulders and trotted drunkenly down the alley. Just like a hero.

Chapter Eleven

The Nightmare Bright

Morning came with a backache and a hangover and more blood on my shirt than I expected. I was wrapped in a canvas tarp, stolen from a stack of crates. I remembered breaking into a warehouse the night before, at the end of a long, stumbling retreat through some pretty dodgy parts of Veridon.

It was all I could do to pull myself upright without groaning in pain. And then, I groaned anyway. I sat on the floor, hidden from the main floor of the warehouse by a pallet of barrels, and tried to gather my senses.

Today was the day of the curfew. I saw the start of it last night, the round-ups and the empty streets. Still didn't know why there was a curfew. Just that it meant I wasn't getting out of the city until tomorrow, at the earliest. Probably best to just lie low until the zep dock opened up. I got up and stumbled my way through the warehouse, looking for food. There was a break room for the workers, and some lockers. Wilson would have done a better job of it, but with the warehouse closed and no one coming in today, I had plenty of time to tumble the locks and go through the contents. When I had a suitable hodgepodge of foods and two nearly-empty bottles of wine from the manager's stash, I went back into the warehouse and made a little nest for my meal.

What must this be costing? Hundreds of warehouses like this one closed, no material moving through the city, no manufacturing or commerce of any kind. How do you shut down an entire city without crippling it? Why do you do such a thing?

Too much like work, that sort of thinking. I had resolved to run, and I was sticking to it. I pushed those questions from my mind and settled in to the business of filling my stomach on pilfered goods. Unfortunately, that didn't take long, and soon I was sitting looking out over the warehouse with nothing to hold my attention but a half-bottle of wine that had to last me all day. I sipped slowly, and my mind eventually returned to those questions.

It was the cost I couldn't get over. If this was imposed by the Council, and it had to be if the Badge was enforcing it, then it had the approval of the industrialists. This warehouse was probably run by one of the families on the Council. What was so important that those families were willing to take this kind of loss? I knew that there had been other attacks in the city, other instances of those weird cog-dead monsters sprouting up, but it would have to be really widespread to justify this kind of response. And any attack that was that widespread would have the attention of the public, unless the Badge had done a remarkably good job of covering it up. I hadn't heard anything in my wanderings last night. So it couldn't be that.

Another possibility was that the Council had lost control of the Badge. Or that a very small portion of the Council had seized control of the Badge and this was some kind of power grab. I could see Angela doing that. Something similar happened two years ago. The Council had put some controls in place to prevent that from happening again, but since they were the ones who wrote the rules, I imagined they knew how to get around them. If it came to force of arms, though, each of the Families had personal guards that wouldn't give up without a fight. It might be a day of small, violent battles fought behind the walls of the great manors of Veridon. That would be interesting.

Interesting, but unlikely. The Council had plenty of tools at its disposal. The Families didn't need to shoot each other to gain or lose control in the city. That was probably the only thing that kept them from open war, honestly. Of course, the Founders had been on the wane for years now, and a lot of the tools of the Council translated into money and political influence.

And Crane. How did Crane fit into all this? That purge mask, that might have something to do with the curfew. If the Council decided they were going to wipe one of the Families from the history books, now was the perfect time to do it.

I had been wandering the warehouse floor while I thought, taking careful sips from the bottle. Now I was standing by the window I had broken to get in, last night. The clouds were dark and low, the whole city vibrating with the threat of truly heavy weather. The air had that smell of electricity and rain that preceded the worst storms of the season. I rubbed my head and looked down at the empty bottle. What was going on out there? What was happening in the city, while the rest of us hid inside and waited for the rain to pass?

"Who am I kidding?" I muttered, tossing the bottle aside. I emptied the two shells I had put into Jeremy the Badge last night, reloaded, and stretched the stiffness out of my back. "I'm just no good at running."

I hoisted myself up to the window and hopped down to the street. Thunder echoed down the delta, rolling through the empty avenues of Veridon like a bell tolling the last man's funeral in an empty city. Let it rain. Let the storm fall. I was ready.

Everything was wrong. It wasn't just that I had never seen Veridon like this: quiet, dead, the streets empty and the factories shuttered. I couldn't imagine what kind of political pressure had to be applied to turn the madness of my city into this still, empty thing. That was wrong, of course, but there was something more. Deeper.

Because of the curfew, I had to travel on side streets and in the underground passages that no honest citizen even knew about. Veridon had been built over the bones of a river delta, marbled with tributaries and creeks that fed into the three larger rivers that defined the boundaries of the city. Bridges and streets had been built over these bodies, and sometimes the water was diverted, either intentionally or by some architectural blunder. There were a lot of dry rivers under the city of Veridon, and a lot of flooded cisterns, too. Lots of ways to get from place to place, as long as you didn't mind walking through darkness. I was used to it.

I hadn't really expected to be alone, either. Curfew or no, the underground markets were going to keep moving. Especially with the legitimate harbors cut off, I thought that the dark passages would be alive with contraband smugglers and the kind of underhanded merchants I had spent most of the last six years doing business with. There was nothing. The passages were empty, the cisterns echoed my footsteps, no matter how quietly I stepped, and the dry rivers were mine to wander alone. There was more going on here than a curfew. The city had been paralyzed, like a patient on a table. Still and cold, as good as dead.

I started my expedition with no real purpose in mind. Just wanted to get back among the criminals. Someone who might know something about what was going on and be willing to talk about it directly, rather than as part of some political game. An hour of dreary wandering made it clear that there wasn't anyone down here to talk to. And an hour after that, I saw why.

Veridon lies at the foot of the river Reine, by far the largest of the three rivers that border the city. Both the Edb and Dunje flow into it, bringing trade down from the high plains to the east of Veridon. The Reine itself flows to the south, until it tumbles over the enormous waterfall that once marked the edge of the known world. It was the discovery of the zepliner that opened up the market downfalls, and gave Veridon a certain amount of political power, power that it eventually translated into absolute dominance. The Reine itself is a deep and mysterious river. Its waters hold the strange wreckage that the Church of the Algorithm treat as found revelation, as well as the underwater dwellings of the Fehn.

Part of the city extends over the Reine, held up by the piles of piers that laced together to become streets and houses and, eventually, just another part of the city. But underneath the houses, the river still flowed. There was a shore, a miles-long floodwall of dark stone, cut and shaped at the birth of the city. It was at the floodwall that I found the traffic I expected. Sort of.

They looked like a congregation of the dead. Thousands of pearl-white heads, standing shoulder to shoulder, facing out into the river. Perfectly still. Their numbers continued over the wall, disappearing slowly into the tide until they were just beneath the water, their heads breaking the surface with each wave like a morbid reef. They were silent, standing guard. The city was cut off from the river, at least by this route. They stood ten deep in some places, all along the bank. Without a word, I crept away from them. Whatever magic commanded their attention, it didn't ask them to turn around. All that saved me, probably.

There were other ways to the river. Many houses built over the river had a private dock built into their basements. But whatever force had organized this blockade wouldn't have ignored that, not if they'd taken so much trouble to block the whole bank under the city. I shuddered to think what had become of those households, what steps had been taken.

This was more than a curfew. It was a blockade. We were quarantined from the rest of the world. Why? What was going on in Veridon, that we needed to be sealed in until it was over?

Did I want to know, or did I want to find a place deep enough to ride it out, and bury myself? I had the feeling that the people I wanted to talk to, the criminals and professional troublemakers, had smelled the trouble in the air and done just that. And three years ago I would have been with them. Hell, this morning I would have been with them. I left Wilson in a huff last night with the full intention of getting the hell out of town. Hide. Run.

And now I was considering finding the wrong people, the ones who might actually know what was going on, and finding out for myself. Maybe do something about it. What had happened?

I stopped in an open cistern, one that had drained years ago and was now nothing more than an empty stone room deep under the streets. The corners were piled with trash, and a little light trickled in from a grate high up in the wall. Probably a street vent on some curb, something people walked by everyday without considering. Without looking down. I sighed and rubbed my face, then put my hands in my pockets and pulled the coat up around my shoulders. Cold down here.

My hand brushed against something cold in my pocket. I took it out. The badge, with the tiny bullet-nick in the side. Chance encounters, I thought. The kind of chance encounter that changes your life. Maybe. I laughed. Chance, like that kind of thing ever happened to me.

I stopped laughing. It couldn't have been chance. It was too weird, too sudden. Not that I had stumbled upon them, that was just Jeremy the Badge's bad luck. When I stumbled into people, it was usually bad luck for them. But that that happened the night before the curfew. What had he said? Ricky became an heir last night. Bad night to be an heir.

I tapped the badge against my hand, staring up at the grate. Where was I, exactly? Somewhere in the lower third of the city, maybe near the barge market? I could count two families who made their homes in this district, both of them industrialists. I probably wouldn't get the friendliest reception at either house. Nearest Founder was Tomb, and there was no way I was going there. Not going home, either. Never going home. Anyone else was just too far to risk during the curfew.

I sighed, slipped the bullet-gnawed badge into my pocket, and started the long climb back up to daylight.

They weren't expecting someone at the door. Why would they, with the whole town shut down? And these were the people who had shut it down, so they knew the extent of the blockade. If anyone wasn't expecting company today, it was these people.

There weren't any guards, which surprised me. I know this was one of the Councilors' estates because it was the hereditary home of the Nailers. Nailer and his wife never had any kids, after five generations of slim procreation, and so they sold the seat while it was still worth something and took off to the country. One of the happier succession stories. No one died, no one went broke. It was my understanding that the seat had changed hands a couple times since then, some of those transitions peaceful, some quite violent. But when I walked up to the gates, I had to check the address and my memory. The exterior was well maintained. Not like it was abandoned. But no guards, and the lock on the gate looked like it had been forced. Not a good sign. Still, I was a little surprised to be met by the barrel of a shotgun when the door eventually opened.

"You don't know me," I said to the pair of eyes peering at me through the crack in the door.

"Not the best thing to say," shotgun-eyes said. A young voice. Wonders never cease. I judged the height of the eyes and the angle of the shotgun. Just a kid, really.

"Is mom home, kiddo?" I asked.

"Mom isn't," said a voice from my side. "But his sister is."

I turned to see the lovely Veronica Bright, leading four housies out of the bushes, all of them with short rifles trained at my heart.

"We meet in interesting places," I said. "Under interesting circumstances."

"No," she said. "We don't. Who are you, again?"

"Jacob Burn. Son of Alexander, fifth of my line."

"Ah. I've got two more men on the roof. My best shots."

"I see," I said, rubbing my nose. "Is that relevant to the conversation? I mean, beyond the four guys here, about to put lead through my chest. Do the two guys on the roof somehow make that more or less important?"

"You're being a smartass."

"Oh, love," I said, spreading my arms. "You have no idea."

"Take his gun. And check for anything he might have hidden."

They gave me a thorough going over, then gave Ms. Bright my revolver and the badge. Wish they hadn't found the badge. She gave it a puzzled look and was on the verge of asking some embarrassing questions, so I cut her off.

"This is quite a reception for just knocking on your door," I looked around at the four shortrifles, the shotgun at the crack in the door. Tried to see the theoretical snipers up on the roof. "Some special occasion?"

"I'm just going to assume that you're an idiot. I'll ask again, and then I'm throwing you out into the street. Without your little pistol." She offered me the badge. "What do you want?"

"This isn't mine, by the way. Wouldn't want you to get the wrong impression. I took it off a guy."

"Explains the bullet hole," she muttered.

"Yeah, uh. Look. Can we go inside? I know this is your property and everything, but I really don't think we should be outside during the curfew."

She looked uncertainly at me, then the empty street at the end of the drive. Finally, she shrugged and nodded at the door. It opened. It really was a kid, holding that shotgun. A young girl.

Inside was pretty much what you'd expect of the new rich. A perfectly good generations-old somber grandeur was shattered with a crowd of brand new furniture, contemporary art hangings, even an autonomic sculpture that writhed liquidly in the center of the foyer. Veronica dropped my revolver onto a stand by the door that held a startling number of similar weapons, then pushed me towards the drawing room. The little girl with the shotgun followed us to the door, then locked us in and disappeared.

"What the hell is going on around here?" I asked.

"I really can't stress this enough," she said, rattling ice into a tumbler and pouring herself a glass of whiskey. "I'm not going to answer any of your questions. Not today. So you need to decide what you're going to tell me about your visit, and start telling it." She drank and winced. "Because today is not the kind of day where I'm going to take a lot of shit."

"I can see why you and Angela get along so well. Fine. Last night I ran into some people. Two kids, looked like they were rich kids slumming, and an older guy. Their chaperone. Only he was drugging them, and then he drugged me, and talked a lot about how it was just bad luck."

"Oh! You mean Richard Holbern. Yeah, the cops found him and his sister and one of their servants. Servant was shot dead. The girl said something about a homeless guy stumbling out of the dark and threatening them all."

"Homeless guy? Honestly, do I look homeless to you?"

"You look homeless to a pampered girl who's drunk too much. So it was you? You shot their man Jeremy?"

"He drugged me! He drugged the girl." I was seated on a bench by the window. The door was locked and I couldn't see any other way out, so if this conversation went badly enough I might have to dive through the glass. Wouldn't be the first time. "And that guy, Jeremy whatever. I don't think he was on the up-and-up."

"Uh huh. Look, if you'll just stay right here, I'm going to go get some guards and they'll…"

"No, you won't. Not because you think I shot that guy, at least. Look around this place. You're all on lastrites alert, every damn person I've seen is carrying a gun or a rifle or… for gods' sake, or a shotgun," I snapped, pointing out to the foyer where I assumed the little girl was still standing guard. "If you really thought I was a threat, you would have just put me down on the door mat. So you don't think that, do you?"

She didn't move much, just stood there leaning against the drinks cabinet, holding the glass against the fat swell of her lower lip and looking me up and down. Finally she sighed.

"Might not matter what I think, Mister Burn." She finished the glass and set it on the cabinet, then pushed herself to her feet. "Kind of day we're having, it might just be useful having a guy like you in our back pocket."

"What kind of day are you having, then? Because everyone around here looks scared as hell, yet you let a complete stranger, an armed man, into your drawing room. Then you stand in here with him, alone, drinking."

The door burst open then, and I almost screamed. The lady who came through deserved to be screamed about. She was older, her hair wild and loose, and she was dressed in a blood-stained house dress. She held her hands in front of her. At first I thought she was wearing red lace gloves that ran down to her elbows. It was blood. She was covered in it.

"Veronica, quit fucking around and give me a hand with…" She stopped when she saw me. I must have looked white as a sheet. Without realizing it, I had backed to the opposite side of the room from her and her exquisitely bloody hands. "Who's the wetnurse?"

"Mother, this is Jacob Burn. Fifth of his line, I believe?" She crossed to her mother, walked past her and out of the room. She called back to me as she left. "Perhaps, Jacob, you're just not the kind of man I find very frightening. Wait here, will you?"

She left, and her mother with her. The door closed with a click. The door handles were slick with that blood, like paint smeared across brass.

I sat by the window, making myself drink after drink, and seriously thinking about taking a header through the window. Crashing through and running out the garden. Maybe even going home. Maybe going to Angela. Just getting out of here.

When the door opened again, maybe ten minutes later, it was the little girl. She didn't have the shotgun.

"You aren't one of them," she said, her little voice lilting and soft.

"One of whom?" I asked. I don't know what it is about kids that brings out the grammar. I hoped it was right.

"The black teeth men. The smiley guys," she answered, then smiled in a way that showed all her teeth and made a noise like the world's cutest porcupine being poked in the belly with a hot poker. " Rrrruuuugghhrrrr."

"Ah. No, I am not one of them," I said, and smiled broadly to show her that my teeth were not black. She nodded.

"You want a sandwich?" she asked.

I hesitated to take food in a house where everyone ran around with blood on their hands. I demurred. "Not hungry. What's your name?"

"I'm not going to tell you. You might be gone later, and then you'll forget it, and I'll have to tell you again. I don't care for that."

"Oh. Kay. Um. And where is your mother? Or your sister?" Frankly, where is anyone but you, child? Where is an adult?

Happily, Veronica walked in. She didn't look blood-speckled at all, which was a relief. Or perhaps she had the sense to wear gloves when she was butchering. She patted the nameless child on the head and shooed her out into the foyer, but didn't close the door. An exciting development.

"Her sister is here, Mr. Burn. Sorry for the interruption. Now, you were trying to explain how you hadn't shot Jeremy Whatever-his-name-is."

"No, I did. I shot him right dead. And took that badge off him."

"Which is a silly thing to say, because Jeremy is not a cop. He's a manservant to his Lordship, the Duke Holbern. Try again."

"I swear, I didn't expect it either. One second he's passing the bottle around, the next he's got a knife to the girl's throat and offering to exchange her if I'll just go away and leave him with the boy."

She gave me the kind of look that statement deserved, I know, but life is sometimes weird. Especially around me. I tried again.

"Last night was Richard's birthday, right?"

She shrugged. "I guess. That's the sort of thing the secretary keeps track of. I'm sure we sent something very nice."

"It was his majority birthday. That's what they both said. He was officially an heir at that point. And that's why Jeremy snatched him. His words. Bad night to be an heir."

She stopped smiling, or at least stopped regarding me with cold amusement, for the briefest instant. When the smile snapped back in place, she was clearly unsettled.

"Strange thing to say. I've always found it good to be an heir."

"From what I understand, your father doesn't count his daughters, does he? Your brother is the heir. You're just his helper," I said. Because, let's be honest, I know how to be a dick. I know how to get to someone. And I got to her. She stiffened up, crossed her arms across what I was beginning to realize was a marvelous chest, and frowned. Good start, Jacob. Way to get the girl talking.

"What I mean is, shouldn't he be here? What we're talking about is Council business. Isn't that his department?"

"He's busy. You'll have to do with his helper girl." She walked to the drink cabinet and efficiently went about the business of putting the glasses and whiskey away. She talked to me over her shoulder. "What was your plan here, Jacob? Come in, insult the host, hope she shoots you before the really dangerous people show up?"

"Look, that was a misstep. Okay?" I started to walk toward her, but thought better of it. I ended up hovering in the middle of the room. "What's going on out there isn't natural. It isn't normal. And I haven't yet heard anyone give me a good reason why the whole city is under curfew, much less blockade."

Veronica put the last glass away and turned to me.

"Blockade? They've shut the port, that's all."

"They've done more than that, whoever they are. This whole town is cut off from the rest of the world. No one's getting out of here."

"I assure you, the Council order was for a curfew. Nothing more."

"Well," I said, folding my arms. "You may be in for a surprise. There might be more going on at the Council than you know."

She scowled again, but didn't look me in the eye.

"I suppose we're going to find out, aren't we?"

"We are?" I asked.

"Councilor Tomb has called an emergency session. The martial law has been extended. She's opening a vote to have the whole city militarized."

"Martial law? Is that what this is about?"

"Mostly. The little horror-show she took you to." Her eyes flitted up to mine, just briefly. "That's barely the beginning of it. The Council has been bickering about it for months. And now that action is being taken, well" — she threw her arms up — "they're overreacting. They're scared."

"I've asked this a thousand times, Ms. Bright, and I'll ask it a thousand more unless someone answers me. What the hell is going on?"

She sighed and looked me over. Made up her mind.

"A Council meeting. You can come with me."

"Are we going to accompany your brother?" I asked, then kicked myself as her face hardened.

"Yes. Let's go get him, shall we?"

She marched out of the room. I followed. We took a turn, then another, and finally walked into what must have once been a grand dining room. It was a butchery. The food was still on the table, eggs and ham and coffee had gone cold. The bodies had been moved, but not far. They lay on the floor, side by side, covered in spotted sheets. Mother stood near the head of the table, her face a mask of tragedy.

Veronica walked to the table and flicked a sheet aside. A young man, a masculine version of her, his face white and empty. She looked down at him softly, then up at me. Not as softly.

"Maybe he won't be able to make it today. I suppose I'll have to stand in his place."

"Veronica, I'm sorry. I had no idea. You can't go to a Council meeting when your family has just been… when they're all…"

"That's all I can do, actually. Staying here isn't going to make it any better." She walked up to me, her cold eyes burning into my face. "Besides, I want to take my new friend Jacob Burn with me. Introduce him to all my old friends."

I felt the iron on my wrists and looked down. Realized I was blinking away tears as the cuffs clicked into place.

"There's a warrant for you, Mr. Burn. We can talk about it on the way. And you better talk well, because I'm not really in the mood for clever boys."

Chapter Twelve

Old Names, Old Ink

The rain began to come down in earnest, long before we got to the Council Chamber. Veronica and I sat in opposite corners of her carriage, looking out the windows. She spent a lot of time folding and then refolding a pair of long, satin gloves in her lap. There was a box on the floor between her feet, and she kept moving her leg to check it was still there, like a child looking for comfort from some icon. We had guards, lots of them, running alongside us in the rain. It slowed us down, but the Lady Bright was clearly in no hurry to get to the Council.

"How many have there been?" I asked.

"Dead brothers? Just the one."

"You're awfully flip about this," I said, shifting in my seat to face her. "There were a lot of bodies in there. How many of them were family?"

"Everyone under my roof is my family, one way or another." She put her hands on top of the gloves and sighed. "Should I mourn them less if they were only a friend, or a servant? Should my father's brother's third daughter mean more to me than the man who poured my wine every night for the last eight years?" She looked at me and shrugged. "People die, Jacob. These people just died quite suddenly, over breakfast."

"You're out of your fucking mind."

"Oh, love. You have no idea."

I squeezed against the side of the carriage, trying to put as much space between us as I could. She sat as comfortable as you please, looking out the window, her hands folded demurely in her lap. Her toe tap-tap-tapped against the box.

"I meant, how many attacks have there been? I know the Council is hiding them from the public. I don't know exactly what happened at the docks, but what happened and what the Badge says happened are two very different things."

"Six," she said, finally, as we came around the last bend before our stop. "Six attacks. Most of them very isolated events. Isolated is the wrong word. Very precise events."

"They were targeted," I said.

"Yes. Targeted." She cocked her head like an animal. "But not logically. No real pattern. It was like the murderer is singing a song in a language none of us know. The pattern is lost on us. What you said about the docks." She paused and then turned her head to me. "What happened there?"

"You're kidding, right?"

She shook her head. "I felt there might be some connection. It seems unlikely that a fire could cause so many deaths. So many, in fact, that no one who survived has reported a fire at all."

I settled myself against the seat. What to tell her? What to be honest about, and what to hide?

"The Badge says they have witnesses who will swear that I set off a device, and that device started the fire." I gave her a hard eye, trying to weight her reaction. "There was a device, but not a fire. And I didn't set it off. I delivered it."

"To whom?" she asked.

"The Fehn. That was the contract."

"It seems unlikely to me that a device delivered to the Fehn could then cause a fire on the docks. There is a great deal of river between those two places." She stared distractedly out the front of the carriage. "Tell me, who contracted you to do this thing?"

I thought of Crane, up in the tower of Angela's grand home. What would this industrialist do with that knowledge?

"I don't really know, not yet. The guy who hired me, he was probably a ruse. Just passing the thing on to me. I'm sure there's someone above him. Just trying to figure out who it is."

"Could it be someone in the Council?" she asked carefully.

"Seems to me that there's not much that goes on in this city that doesn't get touched by someone in the Council."

"That's a very roundabout way of saying that you don't know, but that you intend to find out." She smiled. "And if anything I've heard about you is even vaguely true, you will find out by knocking people over and kicking them until they tell you what you want to know."

I snorted. "I like to think I'm a little more subtle than that," I said.

"I don't think you are, Jacob. I think you're a blunt instrument, accustomed to bloody work." She held up a hand when I frowned. "Don't get me wrong. I think there's a place for that. But I think that this matter may be a great deal more nuanced than you are prepared to manage."

I was quiet for a minute. We were making terrible time toward the Massif. It was in sight, but we were crawling toward it. I stared out at the guards who surrounded us. They were paying special attention to a nearby alleyway, and talking among themselves. I looked that way.

"These six attacks. How many of them were like this morning?" I asked.

"How many of them involved the wholesale butchering of a family of the Council? None," she answered. "Like I said, Jacob. Too blunt. Like the rent house, or the docks. They were attacks on properties that didn't seem to be connected to any special thing. There was no pattern."

"It wasn't an attack on the docks. It was an attack on the Fehn. And if they're so wildly different, how do you know they're all from the same attacker? Veridon can be a violent city. To say that the horror of your rent house, or the cog-dead crawling up from the river and sinking a boat, or even the madness that's afflicting my father are all…"

"So your father is going mad? We've been wondering."

I folded my arms. Always politics. Always stories told or untold, and secrets held.

"Does it matter, really?"

"He holds one of the few Founder's seats remaining on the Council. Every one counts. If they lose him, they lose much of their ability to influence the Council. So, yes. It matters. Besides, he's your father. Shouldn't it matter at least to you?"

"This from the woman whose family was just killed en masse, and who doesn't seem to give a damn."

"Jacob, we've covered this. I'm out of my fucking mind," she said stiffly, then clenched her hands in her lap. "Or I've spent my whole life learning to carry on in the face of tragedy, and doing whatever is necessary to advance the family. To put the strong face forward, no matter what. Which is its own sort of madness, isn't it?"

I stared her down. I honestly couldn't tell if she was finally opening up a little bit, or just being crazier. Strange girl. Strange family, what was left of it.

"What does the Church say about all this? If anyone's going to see a pattern in something, it's those old apopheniacs."

"I think you made up that word," she said. "But I like it. The Church of the Algorithm has been quite silent on this one. None of the attacks have touched them, that we know of."

"But they could have."

"Of course. They lie as well as us. After all, they're hiding an angel in their basement, aren't they, Jacob?" She smiled at me. No one believed my stories from two years ago, especially not the industrialists. They could afford not to believe me. "But we have agents. I think we would know."

"Do you know the guy living in the Manor Tomb? Up in that old tower on the west side?"

She squinted at me, trying to make a decision. Secrets to tell, secrets to keep.

"That has something to do with the balance of power in the Council, Jacob. Are you sure you want to know about it?"

"I asked. I could knock you down and kick you until you tell me what I want to know, if you'd rather."

"Not really to my taste," she said, smiling wickedly. I decided right there and then that I never wanted to find out what was to this girl's taste. "Fair enough. There has been a rumor circulating that the Patron Tomb is finally dying. And not just in the process of dying, but really, nearly dead. You know he's been on the Council since before the Church rose to power? Before the Artificers Guild was disbanded and its leaders strung up, even."

"How could I possibly not know that, Lady Bright? I'm the son of a Founder, remember."

"So easy to forget sometimes, what with your rough and tumble ways, Mr. Burn." She looked down at her fingers, preened away some bit of dust from her nails. "But yes. The Patron is dying. And that's what makes your father's condition so interesting. Because if the Patron dies, Burn becomes the premier Founder seat."

"What does this have to do with the guy in the tower?" I asked.

"That's someone the family has brought in to sustain the old man's life," she answered. "Someone from outside the city. An expert. Of what, no one seems willing to say."

I felt my heart sink. I began to suspect what kind of expert he was.

"Anyway," she continued. "There are two ways this plays out. First, the Patron dies. Per the terms of their contract, the Patron's death will move the Tomb Right of Name on to the Family Verde, who bought it from him all those generations ago. And the Tombs are out of the Council."

"Seems like Angela would do everything she could to prevent that."

"Yes. Unless…" she held up a second finger.

"Unless?" I prompted.

"Unless the Family Burn is declared incapable of performing their duties. Say, if it was shown that their seat was held by a madman, with no declared heir. Angela has positioned herself to be declared the ward of that seat, in perpetuity. The Tombs would maintain their position in the Council."

"And if the son were reinstated?" I asked, the barest quaver in my voice. "What then?"

"The son?" she asked. "You mean the criminal, the murderer, the thug who takes rides with dangerous girls, who is wanted for conspiracy and theft and, oh, a thousand other things? That son?"

"I see your point."

"Maybe. But that son would still have a legal right to the seat. If he were reinstated, of course." Her eyes glittered and she leaned closer to me. "And he didn't get himself killed in the process."

"I really can't tell if you're threatening me, or offering to help."

She laughed. "Such a blunt object, Mr. Burn. It's going to be a joy, watching you crash through the Council. Assuming you take up your father's letter and claim your right in the Massif."

"How do you know about that?" I asked, sternly.

"Like I said. We have agents."

"Sure. Your agents are everywhere, all seeing. That's why you know about the wall of dead cutting this city off from the rest of the world."

"Wall of dead? You're being dramatic, Jacob."

"Wall of dead. I was under the city, I saw them. There's an army of the cog-dead standing watch on the shores of the Reine, keeping even clever boys like me inside today. Tell me," I looked back out the window, at the looming hulk of the Chamber Massif. "Is that part of your Council-ordained curfew?"

"It is not," she said carefully.

"So. Maybe you don't have all the cards."

"Maybe." She unfolded the gloves one last time, then pulled them on her thin fingers. "But I have you."

We were getting very close to the Chamber, now. I shifted nervously in my seat.

"What's the warrant on me for?" I asked.

"Murder, conspiracy, insurrection." She laughed with her eyes. "There's something in there about our black-toothed friends. They're holding you responsible for a lot of this trouble."

"Do you think I did that stuff?"

"Not at all. But I think the Founders would like to see the Family Burn raised up or gone forever. Either one works for them. And I guess you're the key to that." Again the smile, hopelessly dead of normal emotion. "What with your father and all."

"Is that why you're turning me in? Something to do with getting back at the Founders?"

"Who said I was turning you in, Jacob?" She pounded her fist on the carriage wall, and we stopped. The Chamber wasn't more than a block away. It was a dark shape, sketched in light from the windows, barely seen through the driving rain. It was still early in the day, but the storm had brought an early night. "I'm giving you a choice. You want to know what's going on, I know. You wouldn't have risked coming to me, otherwise. Come with me, risk arrest, and see what's going on in the Council. Or get out of the carriage, and never show your face in this city again."

"Hell of a choice," I said.

"Hell of a choice," she agreed.

I stared down at the old building. The Chamber Massif was a dangerous place, especially for a guy like me. What were they going to do? Arrest me. Try me right there. They had that kind of power. And someone in that room was keyed in to what was going on in the city, not just the curfew, not just the attacks. Answers inside, and nothing out here but the rain and a chance to get away. Hell of a choice.

"Can you do something about these?" I asked, holding my wrists in front of me. "And maybe get my revolver back? Don't want to go in naked."

She smiled nastily. "Cuffs, no. Revolver, yes," she said, producing the weapon from the folds of her riding dress and tucking it backwards into my vest pocket.

"Well," I said. "Thanks for the ride, ma'am."

I popped the door and stepped out. It was coming down, cold and hard. Veronica Bright tutted at me as I stepped into the rain.

"Jacob, you disappoint me."

"Yeah," I yelled over the driving rain. "That happens."

I ran to the alley, getting some cover from the rain in the sloped walls of the building. The carriage door closed behind me. A few moments later the engine clattered back to life, and they continued on. I watched them disappear into the Massif's covered barbican. Hell of a choice.

"Took you long enough," Wilson said. He stepped from the shadows, knives in his hands.

"I really thought they were going to see you," I said. I had been following his shadow from rooftop to alleyway since we left the Manor Bright. I raised my still-shackled hands. "Something you can do about this?"

"Maybe. Why are you here?"

"I'm done running, Wilson. I couldn't do it. I mean, seriously, I couldn't do it. The docks were all closed. But once I realized I was stuck here, well. I guess I realized a lot of other stuff. Like maybe there's more to being a hero than — "

"Shut it," Wilson said. He bent to the cuffs and had them off in a second. "Nothing I hate more than a thug who thinks he's a poet. What's the plan?"

"Do you honestly think I have a plan?"

"I think you have an idea. That's enough for me."

"Well then." I rubbed my wrists and looked longingly at the bright lights of the Massif. "Here's my idea."

The Manor Tomb hunched under the storm clouds, rain sheeting off its slate roof like a waterfall. The lights were on, all of them, glowing through the gloom. Wilson and I huddled across the street, counting the guards and the intervals of their patrol.

"Usually have more time to plan this kind of stunt, Jacob," Wilson said. He'd been grumpy ever since we left the Chamber Massif without stabbing or shooting a single person. He liked my idea less and less, the further we got into it. "Not the kind of thing you do off the cuff."

"That's what makes it interesting," I said. "Not something they'll expect."

I looked up at the tower. The crows were all inside or flown away. There was a light on, and shadows moving behind the curtains. Crane was close.

"Whatever he's planning, I have to believe that having the Council meet in the middle of the curfew is part of it. Angela called the session." I turned to Wilson. He was looking up at the window, whetting his knife on a stone. "Don't know if he's doing her bidding, or the other way around."

"Don't know that it matters," Wilson said. "Let's get to it."

"Yeah." I turned my attention to the gate. Tired of counting intervals. Tired of waiting. "Let's."

I was across the street and climbing the fence without another word. Wilson followed, then passed me. He was over the gate and into the guards before I was to the top. I meant to say something about not hurting the guards because, hey, they were just guards. Just guys drawing a paycheck. I'm not sure if it would have mattered to Wilson, anyway. He laid into them, fists and knives. Didn't even shrug out of his coat to get the spider arms involved. They went down like dropped meat.

"You didn't have to kill them," I said, landing heavily in the muddy yard.

"Probably not," he answered. "They didn't have to fight back, either."

It didn't look like they'd done much fighting back. Matter for another day. We double-timed toward the house, avoiding the main door and looking for a kitchen entrance, or servants' gate. Halfway across the garden, Wilson's handiwork was discovered. The cry went up.

"Can I kill them now?" he asked. I didn't answer. He had that look in his eye. Didn't matter what I said.

There were surprisingly few guards, and those that there were we just avoided. They didn't really seem to be guarding anything anymore. Mostly creeping from bush to bush, pillar to shrub, weapons out. Skittish. They spent as much time looking back toward the house as out into the perimeter of the estate. Something had them spooked.

"Guess with Angela gone, there's not much inside to guard."

"There's the Patron," I said. "And, you know, generations' worth of accumulated wealth. Nice furniture and stuff."

"Not a good day to steal furniture. Ruin the upholstery."

"Good point." I ducked as one of the skittish patrols crept past us. Never even looked our way. The two guards bee-lined for the wall and, as we watched, hitched over the gate and out into the streets.

"Jacob," Wilson said. "Unless I'm mistaken, those gentleman just fled the scene."

"Yes. They did."

"Perhaps they know something we don't?"

"Perhaps. But I'd rather find out for myself."

Wilson sighed, but still seemed pretty anxious to cut someone. We got to the house and snuck into the kitchens. The ovens were cold, and there was no one around.

"Not too typical," I said. "Unless the Tombs are having the sort of staffing problems the Burns are having."

"Tomb always managed the descent better than you lot," Wilson said. "Always managed to keep up appearances. Then again, they've managed to keep their place on the Council, too."

"We haven't lost our seat," I said. "Just no one around to sit it, right now."

"Sure. Right now."

We stopped talking and listened, because we both heard it. Hurried footsteps, and the rushing of the wind. I got behind a cabinet. Wilson just disappeared into the drafty beams of the ceiling.

A serving girl rushed into the room. She had both hands wrapped around a kitchen knife, and her face was as white as a sheet. She slid on the tiled floor and fell behind a counter, and the knife went clattering away. She crawled toward it until the wind got much closer. Terrified, she froze, her hand halfway to the knife.

A great darkness filled the doorway. It slithered past at tremendous speed, a shadow of glossy black feathers and iron-hard beaks, eyes that stared like beads of oil and claws that were red with fresh blood. The sound was incredible, a thousand wings, beating the air. It sounded like the shuffling of velvet cards, amplified a hundred times over. Deafening and soft, thunder wrapped in soft leather. The rushing darkness passed and passed, a seemingly endless parade of wings and beaks that flowed like a skyborne river of ink. Distant yelling, the thudding of doors, then a sharp splintering sound and they were away. The hallway was silent.

The girl was panting in terror. Slowly she stood, hands on knees, until she was straight. She stared out at the empty hallway, the fluttering ghost of a feather all that remained of the thunderous visitor.

"Now, love," Wilson said as he lowered himself from the ceiling on his spider arms. "I want you to not shout at all."

She shouted a great deal, mostly in terror. She backed away from him, until she bumped into me. I took her by the arms and spun her around.

"It's okay, alright? Everything's fine. We just…"

She fainted. I sighed and let her fold onto the floor gently.

"That was well done. When are you going to get it?" I asked. "Look at you. People are terrified of you, Wilson. Especially when you drop from the ceiling like that."

"Not my problem," he said, picking up the girl's kitchen knife and stowing it into his vest of blades. "Those were crows."

"Yes, they were."

"Meaning he's still here."

"Meaning his pets are still here," I said. "And maybe him. That's what I'm hoping."

"Yes," Wilson said, grinning his thousand-tooth grin. "Hoping."

"Don't kill him outright," I begged. "Just this once, don't kill him outright. There are probably some questions we should ask."

"Probably. But let's find him first. Crane and his little army of crows."

We put the kitchen girl into a cabinet and hoped that wasn't some kind of death sentence. That makes two unconscious girls I've left in certain danger in the last eight hours. Just like a hero.

It was pretty clear why those two house guards had gone over the wall at their first chance. There were dead housies scattered throughout the living quarters, and a whole pile of them in the dining room. I wondered if Angela had even made it to the Council session, but saw no evidence of any family members. Just guards and servants. Most of them looked to be resting peacefully, only the group in the dining room showing wounds. Those guys died violently. Everyone else might have just lain down, with their eyes open and looks of terror on their faces, and just stopped moving.

"Our friend Crane, he likes to find a variety of ways to kill," Wilson said. We were standing at the foot of the grand stairwell. This would get us to the fourth floor. We'd have to look around for the tower stairs from there. Wilson bent to examine the body of a manservant draped at the bottom of the stairs. He had taken a tumble, but nothing that looked fatal. "Interesting."

"Too many things in this venture can be described as 'interesting,'" I said. "I don't like it."

"Perhaps you should hang out with people who are interested in less morbid things," Wilson said. He produced a pair of long tweezers and used them to fish around in the servant's gaping mouth. With a tug that pulled at something deep in the servant's chest, Wilson held up the tweezers. They were grasping a twig. "You can't tell me this isn't interesting."

"I can, and I will," I said, sweating nervously. "About as interesting as getting fatally shot, at the moment."

"Mm. Yes." Wilson dropped the twig into a specimen tube and tucked it happily into his vest. "Alrighty, then. Shall we continue?"

"Cheerfully."

The rest of the main house seemed deserted. The higher we got, the more nervous I got. The stranger our surroundings got, too. The carpets were so plush under our feet they seemed rotten, like swollen sponges. Several of the household plants that the Tombs kept carefully manicured in various sidehalls had grown fetid, spilling out from their containers and crawling up the walls. One midget oak had burst its blue and white ceramic vase with an exuberance of root growth, and the branches scratched at the ceiling and walls with their dry leaves.

"It's a lively place," Wilson said.

"Clever. This isn't natural, is it?" I asked.

"Oh, definitely not natural." Wilson paused to examine the oak, brushing the enormous leaves with the back of his hand. "Perhaps Mr. Crane is some sort of nature enthusiast?"

"He didn't seem the type," I said. "And again, this isn't natural."

I pointed out a clock that hung from the wall of the hallway. The cogs had sprung free and unraveled into looping cords of ivy. As we watched, the pendulum burst like a seed pod, a thin fuzz littering the escapement as it collapsed.

"I'm getting nervous about breathing this in," I said.

"Don't be," Wilson answered cheerfully. "We've been breathing it in for most of the last half hour. If it's going to kill us, the damage is already done."

"Couldn't you lie or something? Pretend that it's perfectly safe?"

"You know better than that, Jacob. Come on."

We continued to the top floor of the main house. Since the decline of their fortune, many families had shut up unused areas of their vast manors, and Tomb was no exception. The last two levels of the house were sealed off. Stiff tarp covered the archways off the stairwell that would usually lead to those halls. I was tempted to cut them open and see what might be hidden beyond, what fecund growths had taken root among the linens and the dust. My urgency to get to Crane and end this kept my curiosity in check.

The fact that everything was closed up made finding the path to Crane's tower simple enough. His was the only hallway that was open, and his was the only door that hadn't been sealed. Odd that they would put him way up here, so far from his supposed charge. Then again, if a man like Ezekiel Crane was in my house, I would want as much distance between us as possible. Distance and padlocks.

There was no way we were going to be able to sneak up on him. The staircase was a tightly coiled stone spiral, the steps worn by years of use. One of the original structures of the manor, I suspected, from back when the estates of the Founding Families were by necessity armed fortresses, rather than luxurious manors. Our feet were loud on the steps, and there was no other sound to mask them. Wilson led the way, walking carefully, his spider talons touching the walls on either side of the passage. Our hope was that he would be able to react more quickly to an ambush or sudden encounter. We needn't have worried about it.

Crane's room was empty. The walls were lined in empty cages and bird shit. The center of the room was occupied by a narrow bed, pushed up next to a desk. Books and papers were strewn across the desk, held in place by dripping candles and empty bottles of wine. It was a familiar scene. This time I was able to get a good look at the contents of the desk. I didn't understand them, other than to be sickened.

"Anatomical drawings, diagrams. Something that looks very much like a template for cogwork of some nature," Wilson said, flipping through the papers. "A genus of flora, overlaid with the typical mortal tree. Unusual stuff. Doesn't explain the ivy clock, or his dead friends in the river."

"Is there anything we can use? Any clue as to what he might be after?"

Wilson shook his head grimly. "Hard to say. Maybe if I had a week, or a month, I might be able to glean something from all this. This is not anything I'm familiar with. Not a traditionally taught science, whatever it is that he's practicing."

"Take what you can. What you think looks promising." I glanced at the stairway we had just left. This was the only way out. "He's downstairs somewhere. I don't really care why he's doing what he's doing. I just want to stop him. Maybe if we…"

I drifted off. A very old piece of paper hung, framed, above the door. I reached up and took it down, laying it on the desk.

"Lettering's faded. This thing is old." Wilson picked it up. No dust on the frame, or on the glass. He squinted at the paper. "Like, 'historical document' old. And the language is hard to make out."

"Is it Celestean?" I asked, averting my eyes.

"No, no. Nothing that exotic. Just old. Letters change, over time. Descenders shorten, people get lazy with…"

"What does it say, Wilson?"

He spun it around to face me.

"You're an adult. You can read."

It took me a second to adjust to the lettering, like he said. It was some sort of official document. There was a crumbling seal at the bottom, and many signatures in florid hands. But I picked out the words I needed.

"It's a Right of Name. These are supposed to be engraved in stone, or steel. I've never seen one on paper."

"Perhaps the original was destroyed. And the name, Maker. I've never heard of them."

"That's not possible. Every Founder's history is preserved by the Council. This must be some kind of forgery."

"Or," Wilson said, "the original was destroyed."

Things fell into place.

"There aren't many families left from that time," Wilson said. "But two of them — "

"— are Burn and Tomb," I finished for him, then ran to the door. The Tombs weren't just left from that time. Patron Tomb was still alive back then. Back before he took on his cloak of mausoleum, before his family came to depend on him staying alive to keep their seat. He was the last living link to that time. He might know who this guy was, who the Makers were, and why they were purged.

And unless I missed my guess, the Patron was alone right now, in the care of the last remaining scion of the Maker line.

Chapter Thirteen

His Son, His Revolver

I had only been to the Patron's chamber once before, and that was in the middle of an emergency. I remembered a secret door, and a stone corridor that snaked between the walls, but very little about the exact route. It took a while before I realized that the dining room where all those house guard had died was the room I was looking for. It took a fair amount of banging on walls before we found the false panel, and then some violence to get it open. While we were tearing the plaster from its moorings, a distant siren started up, cutting through the quiet air that hung over the city. Wilson and I exchanged a look. He rushed to the window.

"Someone else's problem," I said, getting back to the door. "We have enough on our plate."

"There's smoke in the air. Black column rolling straight up into the sky," he said.

"I don't care, Wilson. We need to get downstairs."

"Jacob." Something in his voice. "It's coming from the direction of the Burn estate."

That stopped me. I went to the window, numbly. Sure enough, there was a single column of smoke, black as night, about where the Manor Burn should be. Where home should be. Even against the dark clouds of the storm, it stood out like an inky tornado.

"Someone else's problem," I said again, more quietly. "Let's get downstairs."

The last of the panel came away, revealing the stone corridor I remembered from two years ago. Angela and I had fled down here when the Manor Tomb had been attacked. That time it was because some rogue agent in the Council had wrested control of the Badge and was using it to lay siege to the Tombs. I had been the ultimate target of that attack. Angela shot me, to keep them from catching me.

I realized I was lost in memory, just standing dumbly in the mouth of the corridor. "Come on," I said, and rushed forward. But it was dark, and after about twenty feet we had to turn back and scrounge up a frictionlamp to see where we were going. Not a good start to our heroic charge into the depths of the Manor Tomb.

The corridor was much as I remembered. Narrow and dusty, with smaller branches that snaked between the walls of the house. There were listening posts, places where a dozen vents brought voices from different rooms to a single location. We went by several of these, each one haunted by the chaotic activity apparently still going on in the Manor Tomb. There were sounds of fighting, of terror, of screaming and the multitudinous flapping of wings. The Manor was under attack, it seemed, although Wilson and I had seen no one on our flight from the tower to here. Maybe these were the ghosts of disasters past, trapped between the walls and echoing only in these secret paths. Either that, or things were getting violent fast.

We finally came to the stairs down. These I remembered. They were just as narrow as the rest of the corridor, but much older. I suspect that, like the tower we had just left, this part of the house went back to the days of the founding of Veridon. I wondered if this had once been a mausoleum of sorts, apart from the main house. There were stories of the origin of the Tomb name, but I always assumed they were just stories.

I led Wilson down the stairs. Just as I remembered, there was a wide door at the bottom, but this door was different, a new door. Two years ago a mad angel had pursued me here. When I escaped, he was beating a hole through the original door. This one was iron, bound in arms of slithering cogwork.

"Now that's a complicated lock," Wilson said, admiringly.

"Fall in love later. Just open it."

"Oh, there's no chance of that." He placed a hand against the iron door and whistled. "These bands here, they're unformed foetal metal. They haven't been given a complete pattern. They'll only open for someone who has the completed pattern. They probably have to remake them every time they open this door. Nasty."

"Which means they haven't been opened since they were remade," I said. "Meaning he's not down here."

"I guess not," Wilson backed away from the door, sticking his hands into his pockets. "At least the Patron is safe, right?"

"Small comfort," I said. "So what now?"

"Now you will go inside, Jacob." We whirled to face the voice behind us. It was Crane. He stood on the stairs, his shoulders swarming with crows. He held a shotgun in his long, thin hands. "And we will have a little talk with the Patron."

"I have trouble believing that Angela gave you a key to this room," I snarled. I thought for a second about going for the revolver at my hip, but his finger was on the trigger of his shotgun.

"She didn't have to. I made the lock." He smiled and touched a broach at his throat. A single beetle rose from his chest and flew above us, smacking loudly into the door. Its chitinous shell dissolved and melted into the bands of foetal metal. The whole door sagged, then settled into its tracks. "Give it a push, will you, son?"

Wilson turned and gave the door a shove. It slid smoothly into the wall. The room beyond was dark, except for a single light that hung over the Patron. I remembered the room being bowl shaped, like an auditorium. The Patron sat at the bottom of the bowl, his body preserved inside a living coffin, shaped like a giant head looking up at the ceiling. The light hung just over the metal forehead, and rows of glittering lines ran all around the bowl, like concentric bands of jewels set into the sides. I raised the frictionlamp and stepped inside.

The dead Fehn, their faces white, their black eyes shimmering in the light, turned to face me. Hundreds of them. They stood shoulder to shoulder, back to chest, like a silent congregation. Their eyes looked past me to Crane, and there was a flash of hatred, then passivity. They turned back to the Patron.

"So, you see, I no longer really need this," Crane said, swinging the shotgun like a child's bat. He tapped me on the shoulder with the barrel. "If you'll go on down, please. Time to say 'hi' to our friend the Patron Tomb."

The dead parted for us, without word or signal. I wondered what sort of control Crane had over them. How he maintained it. He seemed cheerful enough, not under any sort of strain. There was a tightness in the air, like static. I wondered if the storm outside was getting serious, or if something else was causing that. I glanced at Wilson and saw that his shoulders were hunched tightly beneath his coat. He looked terribly uncomfortable, like something was scratching at his nerves. A flash of his face in the blue-tinged light from the friction, and I realized that he looked sick.

"Everything okay?" I whispered.

"We're buried in a room under the Manor Tomb, surrounded by the recently dead. Also, this guy has a shotgun, but he doesn't seem to feel like he needs it. So I imagine we're in some serious shit. Other than that? Yeah, everything's great."

"Oh, well. Okay then. Long as you're feeling okay."

"You two," Crane said. "Like old lovers. Come, come, gather close."

Crane led us to the Patron's final home. It was as I remembered, although a great number of the tubes that once led from under the head had been replaced with clear glass pipes. They were flowing with something that looked like storm clouds. Pure foetal metal. I had seen something like this once before, under the Church of the Algorithm, feeding a partially dissected angel.

"So, Patron," Crane chirped. "How are we feeling?"

The Patron was enclosed in a giant head, iron and cold. It rested against the floor of the bowl, splintered wood around the edge like it had been dropped from some height. The eyes were half-open, their lids hanging over glass panes that revealed the central tank of the Patron's prison. The liquid there, once bright and green, was murky and clouded with sediment. I caught a glimpse of the body, pale and bloated in the suspension. Dark veins stood out on the flesh, like black veins in snow. The Patron did not answer Crane's question. For all I knew he was already dead.

Ezekiel Crane walked around the Patron, running his hand along the iron cheekbone, until he reached the forehead. There was a scaffolding there, which Crane mounted until he was standing over the head. He sat on the edge of the scaffold like he was dangling his feet over a pier, then reached down and cycled open a door. The room filled with a smell like swamp water and illness. I didn't know if this was what was killing the Patron, or simply a symptom of his death.

"I assure you, the Patron is still with us," Crane said. "I am familiar with all sorts of death, Mr. Burn. The Patron's kind of dying is unique, I will admit, but he is still among the living. For now."

"Why do you think I care about that?" I said. "He and I have never been friends."

"No. But you have been allies. And you will be allies again. In name at least." Crane unslung the shotgun and rested the tip of the barrel on the edge of the hatch. "Besides, if he wasn't alive, I wouldn't have the opportunity to threaten him. And I do enjoy threatening my old friend Tomb."

"What is happening?" the Patron rumbled. His voice was like grinding stones. It shivered through my skeleton. Wilson took a step back. Tomb continued, "I know that boy. Alexander's son."

"There we go," Crane said cheerfully, prodding the water with the tip of the shotgun. "That's the Patron we all know and love."

"Is this your doing, Burn? Was it not enough to destroy the girl? Did you send this man to us? We trusted him to heal me, to make me new. Whatever darkness has passed between us, nothing is worth this torture. You mean to destroy my line, and I won't have it. We will stop you. Angela will stop you."

"As much as I am amused by the petty squabbling of the Council, I would like a little credit in this. You are not dying because of some power struggle in the Chamber Massif. You are dying because I am killing you. In my particular fashion."

"Why bother with him?" I asked. "I'm the one you want, aren't I?"

"You? While I have found it amusing to play with your good father, I have little interest in you. It was an accident that you survived the attack on the Fehn. And an accident that you found the mask, and my little messenger in the house." He lifted the dripping barrel of the shotgun and poked it at me. "No, things have not gone exactly according to my plan. But you are done interfering. And you may yet play your part."

"I'm curious about the, uh, little messenger," Wilson purred from behind my shoulder. "I have little interest in your motives, Mr. Crane. But I would like to know how that trick was accomplished."

"I imagine you would. You have something of the tinkerer in you, eh? Something of the Maker." He held a hand up and waved it around his head. "House lights, please."

The lights came up. I was unsure if he had help in the rafters, or something trickier. The hordes of cog-dead around us didn't seem like the type to turn on lights and bring you a drink when you asked for it. There were frictionlamps scattered around the room, and their lightning-tinged glow filled the bowl.

There were pipes, just like the ones we had seen in Crane's house, ringing the room. I knew what that feeling was in the air, now. Crane was broadcasting, either his consciousness, or something similar.

"Impressive, yes? I built this to heal the Patron. With the right tone, the right music, I can project a mind into the city. There are many willing vessels in Veridon. Well. Willing isn't the right word. Available, perhaps."

"This is where you were when we met you in your house," Wilson said. "I see. But how does it work?"

"Jacob may be able to tell you something about this. Tell me, Mr. Burn, do you remember much from your Academy days?"

"How can I forget? Best days of my life."

"I imagine they were the last good days of your life. You know, I've studied you. I don't think we're that different. My grudge might be older than yours, but the sources are the same. And look how we ended up. Anyway. The pilot of a zepliner is sealed into his ship, yes? And what happens to him when he's locked in to the prime chamber?"

"He takes on the consciousness of the ship. His mind moves through the zep, controls it. Feels through it."

"It's more than that. He becomes the ship. The device used to accomplish this is called the soul cog. I heard about your accident, two years ago. Such an interesting event. The pilot was murdered while he was sealed in, and his soul became trapped in the pipes. Nasty, don't you think?"

"He got us over the falls," I said. "He died trying to save the passengers and crew."

"Ah, but he failed. And you were the only survivor. You must feel very lucky. Anyway, the soul cog. Do you know where that technology came from?"

"Where everything comes from," Wilson answered for me. He could tell I was pretty pissed off about this whole thing. Didn't like being lectured. "From the Church of the Algorithm."

"I really expected more from you, anansi. Thought you had a better idea of the history of these things. No, that technology came from the Artificers Guild. The original Guild, the one they shut down."

The tension in the air cycled up a notch. It felt like there was an echo in my teeth, Crane's voice scratching through my skull.

"Who are you projecting this to?" I snapped. "I understand that you're trying to make some kind of statement. Toying with us as your petty little revenge scheme comes together. I don't like being toyed with."

"Oh, ho, ho. Jacob Burn has lost his patience. I'm sure we're all surprised by that." Crane poked the shotgun at me one last time, then settled back on the scaffolding and returned the weapon to pointing at the Patron's tank. "You'll sit and listen like the rest of the audience. I've waited long enough to have my say. I'll let you know when I'm done."

"You mentioned the Artificers Guild. I thought they were disbanded for interfering with the dead."

Crane grimaced at me, but returned his attention to Wilson. "The living and the dead. We dealt with the very stuff of life. Which is why I was able to convince the Family Tomb that I could perform a miracle here." He kicked his legs like a child. "And why I am able to kill the good Patron in such a unique fashion."

"You'll never kill me," the Patron groaned. "I cannot be killed."

"True. Whoever bound you to this tomb did an amazing job. But there will come a point where what you are doing can no longer really be called living, either."

"Whoever bound him. That was me," Wilson said. "Or my family. I believe I know you, Maker. And I can tell you that what you are doing, while elegant, will not work."

Crane's eyes went wide. The shotgun slipped, but he recovered it quickly enough.

"You know nothing of my work, bug! This is the work of a generation, of the finest Artificer alive. The final Artificer! I have formed this plan since my birth, and nothing you say is going to change that. I have struck a blow at the heart of Veridon! I will strike this city dead!"

"By killing the Patron of a dying house? By driving my father mad? Honestly?" I took a step forward, putting my boot on the enormous chin of the Tomb. "For all your talk about the history of Veridon, I don't think you have any damn idea how this city works. Others will step in. The city will change, sure. But nothing is going to end this place."

"Such a blunt child," Crane said. "This just isn't your game, Jacob. It's almost sad, watching you try to work it out." He turned to Wilson. "And you. Anansi. There were your kind among our number during the purge, but they left us. The Artificer's gift has left your people behind. I am the last Artificer in Veridon, as we were the first."

"The Guild still exists, idiot."

"An amputated child, kept for the amusement of the rich." Crane shouldered the shotgun and pointed angrily at me. "Their engram singers are a fragment of my glory. Don't insult my lineage by calling them Artificers."

"And that's what I was waiting for," I said, drawing iron and putting a shot into his chest before he could bring the shotgun back down. His chest shimmered and bled. He began to laugh.

"Oh, Jacob. Such" — he coughed — "such enthusiasm. But so much to learn. Here to save the Patron, but he's already dead. And look at what you've lost."

He fell to his knees, the shotgun clattering across the floor before it slid to a halt near my boot. As I watched, Crane's body shuffled and collapsed, his skin falling in fist-sized clumps onto the scaffolding. Each drop curled open and fluttered away, darkening as they flew. Crows. His whole body exploded into a murder of crows, clamoring as they swirled through the room before bursting out into the corridor and away.

The body that he left behind, now that the facade of his Artificer-formed possession was disrupted, was that of my father. The shot had gone through Alexander's chest, right into the heart. His eyes clouded as he fell.

My only hope was that he was dead before he saw me. Before he saw his son, and the revolver.

I always had trouble separating the father I knew from the father I remembered. My childhood was filled with memories of this man, this giant. Lifting me over his head, howling with laughter. The smell of his leather coat as we hunched behind a longrifle on my first hunt, powder stains on his hands as he taught me to load the weapon; standing beside me when the first shot missed and I tried to reload as the boar charged, his steady voice talking me through the steps as my quavering hands spilled gunpowder all over the element, the muzzle. The bullet dropped from my fingers and as I scrambled in the dry leaves for it he took the shot, the tone in his voice never hinting at disappointment. Practice loading, he said, or hit with the first one next time.

This, compared with the shrunken failure who sat in his empty library, berating me for getting kicked out of the Academy. Throwing me out of his house. This man, who couldn't even talk to me without swearing. His every word laced with failure. Mine, and his. Our histories so thoroughly meshed, and nothing I could do was good enough, and nothing he could do would help that. The father I knew, who couldn't even look me in the eye, who wouldn't talk to his friends about me, who never answered their questions about where I was, what had become of me. The father who would pass me in the street without a second look.

And the father I remembered. Guiding me, strengthening me, pulling me up when I fell. Always careful to watch me fall, and show me why, and give me a boost on to the next thing. The pillar of strength in my childhood, and the pillar of disappointment as I became a man.

Now they were the same man. All I had was a father to remember, and never know again.

I stood over my father's body, trembling. The revolver was no longer in my hand. Whether I had dropped it, or thrown it away, I didn't know. Wilson stood beside me, his hand on my shoulder.

"Jacob," he said, his voice laced with sorrow. "We're going to have to fight our way out of here."

"You can't give me a minute to mourn?"

"Not when it'll get us killed, no." He tugged at the collar of my coat. "Now get up. Come on. You didn't even like the guy. Gods know he didn't like you."

'Get up' because I was on my knees now. Get up because there were tears in my eyes, and I was unarmed, and there was a room of shambling horrors at my back. Get up because the city was falling apart, and somehow that was my problem. Just get up.

"Still my father," I said, blinking tears away. "Still my dad."

"Then do something about it." Wilson was facing away from me now. "Soon enough, you won't be able to do anything at all."

I stood and lifted the shotgun that Crane had dropped. My father had dropped. It was a Regetta Model No. 5, manual feed magazine. By the weight and balance, all ten rounds of the magazine were full, lined up under the barrel like soldiers. I turned and slipped the safety clear.

"Okay," I said. "I'm ready."

The horrific congregation just stood there, looking at us. Wavering slightly, like they'd been standing too long and were getting tired. The dead don't get tired. Wilson stood next to me, knives held loosely at his waist.

"What do you think? Did we disrupt his control, or something? Or are they just waiting for us to make a move?" Wilson asked.

"Beats me. You wanna just start shooting, see where that gets us?"

"Sounds good." He loosened his shoulders and then unfurled the long, sharp arms of his spider-self. "After you, kid."

"We gonna just leave the Patron here?"

"Are you going to carry him out?" Wilson asked.

"I guess not. Okay," I said, trying to work myself up to it. My mind was clean and bright. I hadn't been this clear in days. Raised the shotgun and sighted at the closest cog-dead. Ten shells. There were more than ten of them. A lot more. "Okay."

The shotgun shuddered against my shoulder, the report echoing through the concave space of the chamber. I flinched. The buck tore into the front line of the cog-dead, shredding pale flesh and opening wounds that gushed tarblack blood. Three of them stumbled, one missing most of his shoulder and neck, his head hanging by a flap.

The rest didn't move. Stood there, staring at us.

"Okay," Wilson said. "Save your shot, I guess."

He walked forward and pushed a path through the room. I followed, holding the shotgun in front of me like the prow of a ship. The limp arms and legs bumped against me, weak hands clutching at my coat, several of them slipping and tumbling over as we pushed through. They looked at us with terrified eyes, eyes that remembered and saw and understood, but robbed of volition. They were robbed of their bodies, but they had their eyes. I paused.

"Wilson, I think… I think they're coming out of it."

He paused and looked. The cog-dead he had just pushed out of the way limped back to him, put two soft arms on his chest and leaned forward. His mouth, gaping and drooling that thick, black ichor, got closer and closer to the anansi's face. I tightened my grip on the shotgun.

"Hu, huh, hu," it said, a whisper, a prayer. "huh, hu."

"'Help,'" Wilson answered. "Gods damn us, Jacob. 'Help.'"

The cog-dead nearly collapsed into Wilson's arms.

"I don't want the responsibility of this, Jacob," Wilson whispered. "I don't want to deal with this."

"We don't get to choose what comes to us, Wilson."

"No, but still."

A high, piercing note rang through the room, vibrating from the scattered pipes, singing through the chamber. The cog-dead became anxious. Afraid.

"Huh, huh, hhhaaaaah," the one in Wilson's arms screamed, and then his grip tightened and he lunged at Wilson's face. The anansi ducked, then brought his knives around and cut him down. The pearl-white body fell to its knees, holding up ruined arms. "Huhl, hahl, puh…"

Wilson kicked him in the face and sprinted for the exit. I was right behind him, the congregation of pale faces suddenly animate as the pipe music snapped into an even tone that threatened to deafen us. The room shook with the sound. They were on us, grabbing, biting, tearing at our clothes and our skin. Neither of us could strike. Neither of us could look back, afraid we would see the horror in their eyes, hear them begging under the oppressive clamor of those pipes.

We reached the door and threw it shut behind us. The last thing I saw as I struggled against the press of bodies was the stage far below, and my father's body spread out over the Patron's tomb, and a sea of terrified eyes, screaming and tearing and crying as they came at us. The door boomed shut and the music stopped. It was quiet in the stone chamber, deep under the Manor. We stayed there for a minute, catching our breath, shaking the adrenalin out of our limbs, and trying to forget what we had seen. What we had done.

Chapter Fourteen

The Fifteen Seats of Veridon

There were crows.

We made the trip from the Manor Tomb to the square outside the Council chambers with little effort. I expected patrols of Badge officers on every street corner enforcing the curfew, but the streets were abandoned. Something else was keeping folks inside their houses today. The storm played a part, I'm sure, but the air tasted like violence and fear. Given a choice, I'd be inside. But I was never given a choice, not really.

The Chamber Massif was one of the older buildings in Veridon. Originally constructed as a great hall, intended to provide for the mutual defense of all the families of Veridon, it had evolved into a community center of sorts, and finally the heart of government. It showed its origins as a monument to war, though, in its facade. Strong stone and arrowslits looked down on the square below. Statues had been raised on either side of the wide gate, but they were merely ornaments on a house of war.

Appropriate, considering the battles that went on inside. There should be nothing beautiful about the Council, I thought. Nothing to disguise its nature. The Massif was a battleground.

More so than usual today, perhaps.

The courtyard and facade of the Massif were carpeted with crows. The inky black birds hopped and squawked across the cobbles, draping themselves over the statues by the gate, starting briefly into the air and swirling back down to the ground. It was loud and, given our recent encounter in the Manor Tomb, very unnerving.

"Never thought I'd be afraid of birds," Wilson whispered to me. We stood at the edge of the square, looking across the sea of crows to the Massif's gate.

"Nothing to be scared of," I said, loudly so I'd believe it. "Crane's nothing but a coward with some clever tricks."

"Yeah," Wilson said, motioning toward the gate. "So. After you."

"Yeah. After me."

I squared my shoulders and started walking slowly across the square. The crows fluttered out of my way, but did nothing to stop us. So far, so good.

"You figured out how he does his little trick yet?" I asked. Wilson was just behind me, a little to the left.

"What makes you think I can figure something like that out?"

"You're a clever guy. A curious guy. I'm sure you have your theories." The crows seemed to be giving us more room. I wasn't sure if that was encouraging, or the first sign of a very complicated trap. "So tell me. What's your theory?"

Wilson sighed over my shoulder. He was hunched forward, like he was stalking something.

"We don't know a lot about what the Artificers were truly capable of, in their heyday. Myths, mostly. The Church accused them of witchcraft, tampering with the bodies of the dead. Necromancy, they called it back then. Truth is, the Council at the time was concerned that the Guild was becoming too powerful, and used the Church's rabble-rousing as an excuse. An alliance of convenience. It's interesting, because before then the Church and the Council were often opposed to one another. Most Councilors worshiped the Celestes, didn't trust this new religion of garbagemuckers."

"Fascinating stuff, Wilson," I snapped, "but is there anything you're going to say that might get us across this square and into the Massif? Because if so, maybe you should get to saying those things, rather than meditating on the lessons of the past."

"You asked what I knew of the Artificers Guild. This is what I know. That the Church accused them of some pretty dreadful things, got the Council behind it, and between the two of them they were able to uproot one of the most powerful institutions in Veridon. Converted the Academy into a military school, clipped the Guild's powers, executed the leaders as heretics. And, apparently, declared a Rite of Purge on the Founding Family that supported the Guild."

"Which brings us here." I looked nervously around at the crows. Was Crane watching us through their eyes, just waiting for the moment to strike? Shivers ran down my arm. "You know, I've shot this guy through the heart twice now. I'm used to that solving matters."

"Bullets can't solve everything, Jacob. But yes, he might be a tricky one to pin down. Not sure how we're going to know that we've finally put an end to Mr. Crane, and not one of his possessions."

"Seems the possessed ones fall apart," I noted. Had a brief image of my father's face emerging from the collapsing body of Ezekiel Crane. Realized I had stopped walking when Wilson bumped into me. "Sorry. Just making some plans for Crane."

"You and me both," he whispered.

We were halfway across the square now. I could see a pair of nervous guards at the gate, watching our progress. As long as they didn't start shooting, either at us or at the crows, I was pretty sure we were going to be okay. Unless Crane decided to wait until we were nearly there before he ordered his feathery minions to attack. He seemed to enjoy that kind of cruelty.

"If he really is broadcasting his consciousness, if that's how his possessions work, then it's just a matter of figuring out where he's broadcasting from and going there." Wilson said. "The crows are clearly acting in the same role as the maker beetles. I never thought about it, but I suppose you could use anything for the makers. We don't really know enough about the technology to say what it is that makes them special."

"Apparently Crane does."

"Apparently."

"Is it just a matter of killing the crows?" I asked. Wilson shot me a nervous look and inched closer.

"Too many of them," he whispered. "How many do you have to kill, how many does it take to hold his consciousness? There's too much we don't know. And those pipes play some kind of role, too. Some kind of antenna."

"What's an antenna?" I asked.

"Like a lightning rod, but for sound." Wilson shrugged. "I've never seen one, actually."

"Another myth. We don't have much to go on here. We did manage to disrupt his signal for a while there, in the Manor Tomb."

"Yeah. Maybe something to do with how violently the possession ended." Wilson sheathed his knives and wiped his palms on his pants. I had to admit, I was sweating pretty good now, too. "Might be that it caused him some kind of pain that he had to recover from."

"I like the sound of that." The guards were edging away from us. The crows were still parting along our way, but I got the feeling that they were closing the gap behind us. I turned around. Yeah, the whole damn flock was on our tail. "Though maybe he doesn't."

Wilson turned to see what I was looking at, and the color went from his face.

"Is it too late to just run?" he asked.

"Probably. And those boys aren't going to just open the door for us." I raised my voice and waved to the guards. "Hi there! Hello! Uh… they aren't with us."

The two boys in guard uniforms were pale and getting paler with each step we took toward them. I held my hands up, then realized I was still holding the shotgun. Slung that over my shoulder, and gave Wilson a look. He swallowed nervously and sheathed his knives.

"We're just here to, uh. To talk to the Council. We're friends."

They weren't buying it, and the crows behind us were crowding our heels. I started walking faster. That didn't seem to make the guards feel any better.

"You're sure we can't run?" Wilson hissed.

"Positive," I whispered out of the corner of my mouth, then addressed the guards. "Look, I'm Jacob Burn. My father is…" Dead, I thought. Lying face down in the basement of the Manor Tomb, surrounded by a horde of the mad, ravening dead. "Alexander Burn. I'm here on his business."

"We have orders to keep you two out," one of them said, finally finding his voice. I stopped walking when he held up his shortrifle. "Specific orders."

When I stopped walking, the crows bunched up behind me. They began to flap their wings in frustration. Started clamoring up my legs, fluttering onto my shoulders. Their hard talons cut into my coat. I tried not to move.

"Listen," I said, doing my best not to shout. "I'm a little freaked out right now, and I'm sure you are, too. What I want, more than anything, is to get these godsdamn birds off of me and get inside. So just open the door, okay?"

"Gods, yes, please open the door," Wilson gasped.

It was the other guard who broke. Dropped his shortrifle and jumped for the small sally-gate cut into the larger door. He threw it open and dived through. Since he didn't bar it behind him, I took that as invitation enough.

"Yaaaa!" I yelled, throwing my arms over my heads and startling the crows away. Wilson's spider-arms sprung out, clearing his shoulders and the cobbles around us. We both leaped for the door. The second guard watched us go, the weapon in his hands forgotten.

"I have orders…" he started, then realized that he was about to be left alone with all those crows. He was right behind us in a breath. He threw the door shut and slammed the lock home. We lay there on the floor staring at each other. Waiting.

Outside, there was the sound of a thousand crows taking off at once, a sound like a tornado of shuffling velvet. They did a pass around the square, cawing and brushing against the gates, terrible and loud. And then they were gone. It was quiet, inside and out.

"Now," I said, standing up and brushing the fear from my lapels. I addressed myself to the guard who had sensibly run inside. "I have business with the Council. If you'll just escort us there."

"You'll need to leave your weapons with us," he said.

"Nonsense. This is not the kind of day I feel like being unarmed. Wilson?"

Wilson stood up and produced knives and talons. They took the hint and, gathering as much dignity and authority as they could manage, led us into the Chamber Massif.

The fifteen seats. It was originally eight, or possibly nine. Certain early accounts mention the nine heads of Veridon, but at some point there were only eight. I wondered if those early accounts were mentions of the purged family of the Makers that had missed the historian's blotter. In time, eight became ten, then eleven. Finally fifteen. The additional seats were purchased or declared into existence by Council writ, as the two factions in the Council wrestled for power, waned and waxed. Old families that had lost their seats were brought back into the Council by majority vote, some of those votes purchased or extorted. And new families came into the fold from the ranks of the freshly rich, the appropriate votes again purchased or threatened into existence. I know that my father had voted to raise up some rich rabble, all to pay the mortgage on the estate, or keep the Furnace running for another year or three.

So now there were fifteen. The Founders held six of those seats, with two more families who were so old that they thought of themselves as Founders, no matter what their peers said behind their backs. The rest were held by industrialists. Alliances wavered, votes were sold, but those two factions were the status quo.

As was arguing. Always arguing. As they were when we walked in, prodigal and monster, escorted by two terrified guards who didn't know what their role in this fiasco should be.

The Chamber itself was designed to hold eight (or possibly nine) grand seats, each on its own dais. As the Council had grown, so too had the number of seats. But not the room. For all of its vaulted height, leading up to a glass dome that had been commissioned to give the room a sense of majesty that was lacking in the original martial fittings, the floor of the Chamber was crowded. And there had to be room for pontificating, so the fifteen daises of the Council members were clustered around the walls of the circular room, allowing plenty of room for the current speaker to strut around the center and berate all of his fellow Councilors equally. And while only one speaker was supposed to hold the floor at a time, there were currently three people down there. Two men and a woman. If that's the word for Angela Tomb. Two men and a nightmare.

I don't know what they were arguing about. Whatever it was, they were serious enough about it to not notice a couple of armed thugs who in the past had threatened more than one person in this room. The guards paused at the edge of the ring indicating the beginning of the Chamber, blubbering as if to announce our entrance. I clapped them on the shoulders and walked past, keeping to the side of the floor, circling around to my family's traditional seat. Each of the daises had an emblem carved into the front, proclaiming the family who held it. The empty seat I was heading toward showed a long, narrow pyramid with the top chopped off, and a curl of fire at the base. The symbol of the Deep Furnace, and the traditional logo of the family Burn. Made me smile to see it.

No matter how engaged the three on the floor were in their argument, and how much conversation was passing between the still seated Councilors all around, it didn't take long for people to see me. First one fell silent, then another. Someone yelled, either in alarm or disgust. Eventually all the voices were silent. They watched me climb the narrow stairs to my seat, set the shotgun across the podium, and settle into the cushion that my father held for so long. I could smell him in the chair, well-oiled leather and alcohol, smoke that hung in the bar hours after the rest of the family was asleep. The sting of gunpowder on my cheek as he took the shot that kept me alive, then helping me to my feet. I shook myself out of my reverie and looked around the room. Everyone was looking at me, with a mixture of surprise, horror and amused calculation.

"Carry on," I said.

"What is the meaning of this?" demanded one fat bastard whom I didn't recognize. Plammer, maybe? I could never keep all the names straight, especially of the new families.

"I heard there was a meeting. I thought I should be involved."

"This… this is… it's preposterous!" Plammer yelled, his jowls flobbering.

"I would have been supremely disappointed if you had said anything less… typical, Mr. Plammer," I answered.

"Plumer!" he shrieked. "The boy doesn't even know the names of his royal Councilors, and he's sitting in Alexander's chair!" He stumbled down his dais to join the three who had abandoned their argument for the new interruption. "I ask you, my brethren, are we going to stand for this?"

"Can you stand for this?" I asked, "I mean, for terribly long. You don't seem to have the necessary constitution."

"Jacob, we appreciate the fact that you're a complete smartass," Angela said, facing me with her hands on her metal hips. "But really. The adults are talking."

"Oh, right. I guess this requires some kind of formal declaration." I stood, cradling the shotgun in my arms. "I understand. So let's see. How should this go?"

"I don't want to say that I told you so," Wilson whispered to me from his position just behind the seat, where the Councilor's servants and advisors were to stand. "But this would be an ideal time to have that letter of reinstatement."

I ignored him and cleared my throat.

"I am Jacob Burn, son of Alexander, son of Tiberus, many times son of Constance Burn, Founder of Veridon. I have come to claim my right of name, and hold the seat of Council in this chamber. As did my father before me, so I claim this right, by my blood, by my birth. Such is the law."

"Such is the right," they all murmured in automatic response. I smiled. At least they hadn't shot me yet. They recovered their sense of indignation quickly enough.

"Again, I say, are we going to stand for this?" Plumer said, walking toward me. "This Council does not recognize you, Jacob. Your name has been purged from the rolls of this chamber. Your father had you expunged from the record."

"As is his right. Just as it is his right to reinstate me."

That was met with a round of whispers. Only Plumer, Tomb and, surprisingly, Bright did not take their gaze from me. I nodded to Veronica. She frowned.

"Jacob," Angela said smoothly, "the Manor Burn is… poetically… burning as we speak. Your father is nowhere to be found. Do you have any proof of your right to stand here?"

You damn well know I do, bitch. You've been engineering this moment from the start, hoping either Alexander would die without returning me to the fold, or that I would take up the baton and prove as dangerous and unpredictable as was my way. And now the card has been played, and you're going to follow through. I hope you find me nothing but a disappointment, Angela. I hope to do nothing more than ruin your plans in this chamber.

But that's not what I said, of course.

"He produced a letter of reinstatement. It was in his…" His crazy room? The old ballroom where he was hiding from the talking engines? What to say? "In his desk. Considering the state of the Manor, I'm not sure what became of the letter."

"Not sure what became of the letter," Angela repeated. "And then you come to us armed, and in the company of a foreigner. What are we supposed to do with this, Jacob?"

Here was the tricky part. My father was dead. Patron Tomb was, mostly likely, dead. Neither Angela nor I had any standing in the Chamber. Not officially. So it was a matter of brute personality and tradition, and deciding how much information to make public.

"I swear to you, the last thing I want is to be standing here. This is not the role I would choose for myself. Not in this city, and not with my history. But we don't always get to choose what comes to us, do we?" I held the shotgun loosely in my right hand, resting my left on the podium. Kept my eyes moving around the room, looking at each startled Councilor in turn. Still, only Bright looked comfortable. Angela looked unsure, so that was a start. "My father is dead. He died today, defending himself against the scourge that has gripped our city. A scourge, I would like to point out, that this Council has hidden from the city at large. My father loved this city. Gave his life to it, to growing its power and securing its citizens. He died for it. And there is nothing he would want more than for his son to continue that task. So I am here, not because I want this seat, nor because it is my duty. I stand before you because you need me. This city needs me. And I was raised to stand up when I was needed."

And I sat down.

They didn't buy it, most of them. A couple of the Founder's were wet-eyed, and at least Lady Bright was nodding to herself. Angela looked pensive. Plumer was having none of it.

"You're a brat, and an egomaniac. This Council has done fine without you and, frankly, has been doing fine without your father ever since his little trip. So, thank you for the interruption, it was amusing, but I'll ask you to get the hell out of this Chamber."

"He deserves a vote," Veronica said. Plumer whirled on her.

"You! You're supporting this" — he threw an arm at me — "criminal? Do you honestly believe he can be a Councilor in Veridon?"

"I don't know," she answered. "But apparently his father did."

"His father!" Plumer shouted, strutting around the circle. The three original speakers had returned to their chairs, except for Angela. She stood still, watching me. Watching my trick unfold. "For all of this young man's pretty words, I think we knew Alexander Burn. Knew who he was, and what he stood for. I hardly think that he could be trusted to name a successor, not in his state of mind." He squinted at me and made his mistake. "Died for the city? Hardly. Died in the dark, drunk and crazy, more likely."

I vaulted the podium, sensibly leaving the shotgun on my chair, and landed softly about five feet from the fat man. I strode at him, hands calmly in pockets, hurrying into his space. He stumbled backwards, and I followed.

"There are a great many things I will tolerate, Mr. Councilor. You can insult me all day, and twice on Saturday. You can degrade my family name. You can question my taste in clothes, or wines, or gods. You can even threaten me, although I wouldn't suggest it." By now we were nearly to his dais. He pressed his back flat against the marble stairs, his emblem of two feathers aflame poking out from behind his chubby shoulders. I smiled. "But I will not have you speaking poorly of my father. Not today. We will have our differences, you and I. We will have our agreements. Let's start this relationship off with an understanding, though. You do not say such things about my father. Agreed?"

"Agreed," he whispered. I backed up.

"Frankly, I don't care if you vote for me," I said, addressing the room, although I still stared at Plumer's fat face. "I don't care if you think you can manage this without me. But you're wrong. You're all locked in here, talking about what might be happening outside. Trading pieces of information for political favor, acting against each other all the while. Gambling the good of the city to gain a little more power for yourselves." I began to walk around the room, slowly, looking at the Councilors as I passed. "You're doing it right now. Trying to decide what advantage it will be to you, if I claim this seat."

Some of them wouldn't meet my eyes, either out of fear or contempt. Some did. There was amusement, there was fear. There was maybe a little hope. I didn't like the burden that brought to me, to my name, but hey. We don't always get to choose what comes to us.

"I'll tell you this. There is no advantage. I'm not here to play your games. I'm here because everything is falling apart, and unless you act immediately to put it back together, you will not recover your city." I stopped in the center of the room and turned slowly in place. "Veridon will be lost to you."

"Listen," Plumer said. He had crawled back into his seat, and seemed to take comfort in being able to look down at me. His voice still quavered when I looked at him. "Listen, I know things are dire. We are here in emergency session, after all. Many of us left our families undefended to be here. We're taking this very seriously."

"Undefended, yes… tell me about this curfew. Who's enforcing it?"

"The Badge, of course."

"And yet on my way over here I didn't see a single agent of that fine institution. Why is that?" Confused looks around the room, then realization, then embarrassment. "None of you left your estates undefended, did you? You each selected units from the Badge to reinforce your own house guards. Didn't you? Issued false orders about patrol routes and roadblocks, most likely in your rival's territories, and reassigned those units to your homes. And between the fifteen seats of the Council, you have emptied this city of its only defense."

"Now look, certainly that couldn't account for the entire force. Could it?" Plumer asked. Angela answered him. She was still on the floor, watching me strut around. I wondered if they had to install a special ramp, or some kind of mechanical lift, for her dais.

"Probably not the entire force, no," she said. "But enough. And something could have happened to the balance."

"Something?" I said. "Something, Ms. Tomb? Tell me, what happened on the docks yesterday morning. What is the official report?"

"A fire," she answered, keeping her face calm. "The conflagration swept the docks, killing many poor citizens of the city. And quite a few officers, for that matter."

"Quite a few. But we both know that isn't what happened. Because I was there. And the officers I had the opportunity to speak with about this" — I turned to Plumer and smiled — "while incarcerated, I'll admit, Mr. Plumer; I do have a reputation to maintain — those officers believed that that is what happened. Which means that the Badge itself doesn't know the truth of the matter."

"The truth of what matter?" another of the Councilors asked. Angela didn't take her eyes off me, didn't move. Waited. I nodded to her and addressed the Council.

"There was another attack on the river. An attack by these cog-laced dead, the former Fehn. It was brought about by a device that I was hired to deliver, a device that apparently transformed most if not all of the Fehn into these creatures."

"So it's the Fehn that are attacking us?" one old lady asked, fluttering a fan at her face.

"No, my dear. Not of their own will, at least. They have been changed, by a man recently come to our city. A man who claims to hold the power of the Artificers in his hands." I held up my hands. "Before you gasp and exclaim that the Artificers have been gone for a hundred years or more, please consider the nature of the attacks that you have seen." I let my eyes linger on Lady Bright. "Consider what force could do such a thing. What sort of power it takes to move the living and the dead."

"Who is he?" Veronica spat, and I saw a little of the madness in her. "You've met him, so tell us who he is. We'll hunt him into the earth."

I turned to Angela and held a hand out to her. She gave me a quizzical look. Didn't she know? She had to know. Didn't she?

"His name is Ezekiel Crane," I said. "And he is in the employ of the Family Tomb."

Chapter Fifteen

Tearing Apart the God

She didn't know.

Angela stood staring at me, as much shock on her face as her little brass pistons could manage. The rest of the room exploded. There were calls to arrest her, to unhand her, calls for guards, guards. They were all met with silence.

At the middle of the storm, I stood with Angela.

"What are you doing to me?" she asked.

"You didn't know it was him?"

"No," she shook her head. "I didn't… I had no idea. He was a doctor, for papa. He's very sick."

Papa. Not a word I'd ever heard her say. Ever expected to hear her say. Strange little machine-girl, and her papa-in-a-tomb. Tried to get my head around that.

"I think he followed Alexander in," I said. "Met him on that trip upriver. He… gods, it's loud in here."

Wilson slid up next to me, nodded to the Lady Tomb, then handed me my shotgun.

"Are you sure you weren't a butler in a past life?" I asked him.

"Be serious, Jacob. I was a monster in a past life."

"Well, either way. Thank you."

I raised the shotgun and fired into the air. The report reverberated through the chamber, and the buck went up into that priceless stained glass dome, shattering it. The splinters seemed to hang in the air for a second, and then rained down on us in glittering shards of pure light. When the last of the panes had scattered on the marble floor, I raised my head and looked up at the raging sky.

"Forgot that was there," I said.

Angela giggled (actually giggled!) and held her hand over her mouth.

"Oh, Jacob. You make such a mess of things."

"I do, don't I?" I shouldered the shotgun and walked around the circle, glass crunching under my boots. "Listen, people. She was deceived, just like my father was deceived. And yes, Alexander was nearly mad by the end of it, and the Tombs were tricked into thinking that this man Crane could save the Patron from his inevitable death." I stopped on my heel and turned to Angela. "And he couldn't."

It took a second for that to settle into the minds of the Councilors. Plumer got it first.

"The Patron is dead," he whispered.

Another round of hubbub, Angela shaking her head at me all the while. I went to her.

"No more time for politics, Angela. See what Crane has done to you. Done to the city. This Council is still yours, as it always was." I handed her the shotgun. "Take them, and avenge yourself on Ezekiel Crane."

She grimaced at me, at the weapon in her hand. A coldness came over her face. I stepped away, taking Wilson with me. We returned to the Burn dais and settled in for the show.

"Enough!" she yelled. There was still some conversation, most of it among the industrialists. Angela scurried across the room and put the butt of the gun heavily into the dais of the Trotter-Heights. It resounded like a gong. "Enough!"

They stopped, and they looked at her. It was all she needed.

"The succession will continue. Tomorrow, if there's still a city. Tomorrow, if we're still alive to surrender the seat. The Patron clung to life, but mostly he clung to the Council. Let's not throw him off without a fight. Ezekiel Crane has done my family a great harm. I would harm him back."

"It was you called the curfew, Tomb. It was you who suggested we hide the attacks and separate a portion of the Badge to suppress it. It's you they report to, Lady Tomb." The speaker was the Councilor for one of the older industrialist families. He saw a Founder falling, and he loved it. Wanted to stand where she fell. "Tell us why we don't throw you out of the Chamber this very second, and take our own direction."

"Your own direction? Nathan, you couldn't take your own piss. We have talked enough. Jacob is right. The time has come to act against this threat."

"Your honor, with all due respect…" Nathan protested, with enunciation as sharp as the shattered glass on the floor.

"With due respect," Angela interrupted, "you can throw me out tomorrow, if you can get your nerve up by then. Councilor Burn," she said, turning to me. "You have the most experience with this man, excluding the ruse he has been playing on my family's hospitality. What can you tell us of him? What are his goals, his intentions?"

I sat up from where I had been lounging in my Council seat. Honestly, I had felt like my part in this conversation was done. I was hoping that Angela would just take the authority and run with it, and let me scuttle back into the shadows. Oh well.

"He has revenge on his mind. Best we've been able to piece together, he's the last remnant of one of the Founding Families, come back to knock Veridon on its ass."

"Which family?" Plumer asked. "One of the lines that fell out of favor, probably. Let's see, who among us died out? Lever? Mastingway? The Hoat?"

"Maker," I said. They met me with blank stares.

"That must be a stage name, or something," Nathan said. "My family's records of the lineages of Veridon are quite extensive, as you all know. The name means nothing to me."

"They won't be in your books. Nor will they be mentioned in the histories of the city, or on the plagues of Memory. They have been removed. Utterly."

"But how is that…" Nathan began, then understood. "A Rite of Purge."

"Correct. Maker seems to have been allied with the Artificers Guild. Not sure what their role was in the trials, if they were accused or merely worked to defend the Guild. Either way, it seems that the result was pretty severe."

"A Rite of Purge is very thorough, Jacob," Angela said. "If one was leveled at these Makers, there wouldn't be any left."

"Or any survivors would have to live in such isolation that the subsequent centuries would have driven them mad," I answered. They settled back in their chairs, thought about what they'd seen in the past few months. They were beginning to see it.

"But what is his goal?" Angela said. "Surely there's more to it than this?"

"He has shut the city down and apparently murdered two of the most prominent members of this Council," Nathan said nervously. "I hardly think that's insignificant."

"He made it clear to us that he intended to strike down the heart of Veridon. I don't think he wants to level the city, or kill massive numbers of the population. But he wants to change the city forever." I spread my hands. "Whether that means upsetting the balance of power, or making the Council that purged his family irrelevant to the future of the city, I don't know."

"Make us irrelevant?" Plumer squawked, much like the crows outside. "How could he do such a thing?"

"He could start by killing all of us," Angela said. That settled the room down some. "So, what do you think, Jacob?"

"I think there's more going on in this room than most of you are admitting. Tomb and Burn have suffered losses," I looked around the room, my eyes only briefly pausing on Veronica Bright. "Have any other families been struck?"

There was nervous shuffling of papers, proud Councilors unwilling to make eye contact. Finally Plumer sighed and stood.

"We have lost three sons. The next three in succession." This fat man had no sons of his own, I remembered. It was his brother who was mourning. "But not today. This happened two weeks ago. We didn't think it had anything to do with the attacks. It seemed to be the work of a human agent." He glanced up at me. "They were shot, while on cruise on the Reine."

"Hardly seems Crane's style. But perhaps it's relevant. Wilson and I saw a strange woman near Crane's house. She wore an iron mask, perhaps a reference to the Purge Mask. Maybe she is somehow involved in these attacks."

"You well know that we lost many, Mr. Burn," Veronica spoke up. "Nearly all. There are younger children left, those who were eating in a different room. But for practical purposes, I am the last Bright who can hold this seat."

"I did not wish to force your hand, Lady Bright," I said, nodding to her. "Anyone else?"

They all had stories. There had been assassinations, suspicious accidents and outright murders going back three months. They all seemed aimed at weakening each family's grip on power in the Council. Suddenly my father's madness didn't look so bad. The Families had not shared this information because the attacks seemed politically motivated. And there had been counterstrikes, though no one would admit to it. Heirs had been lost, and assassins had been hired to retaliate. One reason that the Badge had been assigned to guard each Family's estate was that everyone expected their rivals to use the curfew as cover for their final strike. And maybe that was happening, right now. More than one Councilor called for servants to hurry messages out into the city. Perhaps assassinations were being called off, or at least delayed. Hopefully we could stop killing each other, at least for a day.

"It seems to me," Angela said quietly, after people had stopped talking, "that we have been played for a fool. Crane, or Maker, or whatever his name is… Ezekiel has set us against each other. It doesn't take much to put us at each other's throats, does it?"

"Apparently not," I said. "And you were worried about letting me into your august company. Hardly seems worth discussing, to add another murderer to your ranks."

"Hardly necessary, Mr. Burn," Nathan said. "But it doesn't matter. We have seen through Crane's scheme, and stand united. He tried to get us to kill each other. Instead he has driven us together. Fortunate that you escaped his clutches, Councilor."

It took me a second to realize he meant me. I chuckled at the title. Uncomfortably.

"I would hardly say I escaped him, sir," I said. "Time and again he had me, and time and again he let me go. I think he was hoping to implicate me in the Patron's death. Nearly succeeded, too. At the end we were able to disrupt his control of the cog-dead just long enough to slip free. Near thing."

Wilson came around the edge of my chair and cleared his throat. Being good aristocrats, and mistaking the anansi for my manservant, the other Councilors ignored him.

"It hardly matters now how you did it, young Burn. But I suppose that once this is all over we'll need to hunt the scoundrel down and give him a good thrashing." Nathan removed his glasses and cleaned them with the edge of a cloth that hung from his belt, apparently for precisely that purpose. "I suppose you'll want to lead that hunt, eh?"

"Jacob," Wilson said. Before I could turn to him, Plumer stepped forward.

"Oh, I would think the Badge should handle that. Though I suppose a formal hunting party, sort of a parade or something. I suppose we could approve that. Do you think, Nathan?"

"Jacob," Wilson hissed in my ear.

"In fact, I think we should make a day of it…" Nathan began.

"For gods' sake, Jacob!" Wilson grabbed me by the elbow and turned me around. There were gasps, at least one from me. Wilson was strong. "What if we didn't disrupt his control, as you said? We never did understand how that worked."

"We don't understand most of what he did, Wilson. Why?"

"What if he let us go? What if he held them at bay, just long enough to make it look good when we did get out? Enough to make our escape feel real."

"Why in hell would be do that?" I asked.

"So we could come here. So we could reveal his plan to the Council. So we could foil his little scheme."

"Well. That would be terribly clever of him, I must admit. That's exactly what he's accomplished. Look," I said, waving an arm around the Chamber. "Council's in session, no cog-dead ravaging through the hall, and we're not killing each other. Just as he planned."

"Jacob," he said. "The crows. They let us through."

"Maybe he… maybe he doesn't have as much control of those things as we thought?" Wilson just stared at me. "Maybe he didn't expect them to believe me, thought they would throw me out and go at each others' throats the second my ass hit the pavement. Maybe…"

I had nothing else. He was right. It didn't make sense.

"What is your man implying?" Plumer asked.

"I'm not his man," Wilson growled. "And I'm implying that we're still being played. We're holed up in here, and the Badge is patrolling your estates. The rest of the city is empty of authority. He could be anywhere, doing anything."

"Well," Nathan said, "that may be. But it sounds to me like we've got the important stuff covered."

"I'll be sure to relay your sympathies to the rest of the citizenry of Veridon," I spat. "He could be butchering the population and turning them into an army of the cog-dead."

The Council paled, except for Angela. She was pretty pale to begin with. And Veronica. She just sat there, thinking.

"What did Crane say to you?" she asked. "Specifically. You said before, but I need to hear it again."

"He said that he meant to strike at the heart of Veridon. To level the city, or something."

"The heart. Gentlemen, and Lady" — Veronica stood — "we are not the heart of Veridon. If you'll excuse me, I have a service to attend." And she exited.

"Never knew the Brights to be the religious type," Nathan said. "But, you know, in the face of fear. It's the natural reaction, I suppose."

"The Church," I said, and addressed myself to Angela. "What does the Church know of the attacks?"

"Nothing," she said. "We hid them from everyone. None of them affected the Church directly."

"None of the attacks that you know about," I countered. "If we can keep incidents hidden from them, surely they can do the same to us."

"Perhaps. But they're aware of the curfew. We sent a messenger, alerting them of the procedure and explaining its purpose."

"You heard back?" I asked.

"No, but we took their silence as tacit approval. They're rarely verbose, especially to the Council."

"I've heard enough." I stood and crossed to Angela's dais. Holding out my hands, I said, "Ma'am, I'm going to need my iron back."

She looked at me crossly, but handed the shotgun over. We left the chamber without further comment.

"Excitable lad, isn't he?" Nathan said as I left. "The Council will be an interesting place, with him voting."

"Perhaps," Plumer said. "As long as he remembers to vote, and not just rush off…"

I was most of the way to the door before I heard a mechanical clattering behind me. Angela was on my heels, and making good speed in the formal engine. She rumbled past me and turned to block my path.

"Jacob!" she yelled. "Don't go charging into anything just yet. You'll need help."

"I can't imagine what you're going to offer me, but I suspect I'm better off on my own. Thanks, though." I tried to push past her.

"Nonsense. You're very stubborn, but you're also very much just one guy with a shotgun. You think he's doing something at the Algorithm?"

"It makes sense, doesn't it? That cog, the Wrights even call it the heart. Or maybe he's after Camilla. It doesn't matter, though, does it? It was the Algorithm that got the Council to ban the Artificers. It was the Algorithm that replaced the Guild as the driving force of technology in Veridon." I snapped my fingers and pointed to Wilson. "In the Manor Tomb, when we were rushing upstairs. All the technology had turned into plants and stuff. Imagine what would happen if he did something like that in the Church."

"We'd all be worshiping trees, I get it. But you can't think you'll be able to stop him on your own. I've sent for the Badge officers who are protecting the Manor. If what you've said is true, there's nothing there for them to guard, anyway." She paused, then drew nearer. "Is it true? Is the Patron dead?"

"He looked awfully sick," I said, measuring my words. "And you left him in the care of a man who intended to kill him, and who had access to technology we don't even begin to understand. I can't imagine he survived."

"Actually," Wilson said, imposing himself on the conversation. "Crane said that he couldn't kill him. Just that what the Patron was becoming couldn't be called living, after a certain point."

"I'm not sure that's any better," Angela whispered.

"Listen. We'll get this sorted out. And you have my sympathy. But the last time I talked to him, the Patron didn't seem too happy with the state of things."

She didn't answer, just nodded and backed away. We went to the door.

"They'll meet you at the Church," she said. "It's not much, but it's all I can offer."

I smiled and went outside. "It's more than I expected," I said to no one in particular. Wilson pretended to not hear.

The streets were less empty than they had been earlier. Curious mothers and frightened fathers stood at the doors of their houses, looking up, or gathered at the cross-streets, talking quietly to neighbors. Many were armed. The city had the feel of a place under siege. Veridon's walls had always been the rivers, but it felt like the rivers themselves were attacking us. People knew what was going on, although they hadn't been told. Blood was in the air. Blood and fear.

More than one group hailed us as we passed. It was like they could sense the Council's authority on my shoulders. Usually, with the tattered condition of my clothes and my general miscreant's bearing, these people would either ignore me or shirk away. Today they called out, and asked what the Council was doing. What was going on. I didn't answer. Although I suppose rushing down the street, fully armed, with an equally well-armed anansi in my wake was its own answer. That we were clearly heading toward the Church of the Algorithm probably meant something to them, too.

Things changed once we got to Hallowsward, the district around the Algorithm. No one was standing in their doors, or gathering at the crosses. The windows were boarded up from the inside. There were a couple homes that had been barricaded at their front gates, the approaches guarded by men with guns. This was a richer district than most of Veridon. These people could afford guards. Something must have spooked them. Something more than a general sense of uneasiness. I approached one of the barricades, shotgun on my back, hands in the air.

"Hello up there! Jacob Burn, Councilor of Veridon! What news?"

I was met with silence. The men behind the barricade were scanning their rifles across the street, although the barrels spent more time lingering over me than I liked.

"I'm on Council business!" I yelled. "What have you seen?"

"All manner of things," one of them finally answered. "Would you be fetching the Badge, then?"

"Badge are occupied throughout the city," I lied. Well. I misdirected. Since they weren't actively shooting at me, I approached the barricade. "I'm here to assess the situation in this district, and do what I can to resolve matters. What can you tell me?"

The men were well-dressed. Butlers or horsemen, the type of servant expected to look good in front of the master. But they handled their rifles well enough. I only got so close before one of them poked his weapon in my direction. I stopped, hands still in the air.

"Could've used the Badge earlier. Not sure but you're too late. Noise has mostly gone away."

"What noise?" I asked.

He nodded down the street, in the direction of the Church.

"Awful sounds," he said. "Like metal tearing. Like an engine the size of a building. And crows like you wouldn't believe. Crows to block out the sky. We've been hunkered down ever since."

"Engine the size of a building," I repeated. "Thanks for your time, sir. Best of luck with your barricade."

Only one engine that big, and these men knew it. The Wrights of the Algorithm had been putting together an engine for the last several hundred years inside their church. Taken random bits of machinery and found cogwork that they had dredged up from the river Reine, assembling it according to some pattern that looked a lot like guesswork. To them, the pattern was god. It was a divine assembly, conjured from their souls and meshing with their hearts.

And from the sound of it, their god was suffering.

For once, the Badge beat us there. A squad of officers was huddled in the lee of a warehouse that overlooked the Church of the Algorithm. The Church itself hunched over the Ebd river like some complicated nautilus that had washed to shore and broken open. Water flowed through its many chambers, feeding or cooling boilers far beneath the surface. Domes bubbled out of the architecture, bristling with bell towers, and walkways led into the open courtyards between buildings. The Church grew every year, just as the mechanical algorithm that chewed through its corridors grew. New buildings were added, or even grown, at a breathtaking rate. And that was just the development that was plainly visible. The majority of the Church was submerged beneath the river. The waterline upriver of the Church rose and dropped with chaotic frequency, as the obstruction grew and new channels were opened to prevent flooding. I wondered if anyone in the Council knew the depth and breadth of this place.

Despite my fears, though, the Church of the Algorithm looked quiet. At least as quiet as it ever did. The engines of god were rumbling, the chimneys spewed steam into the air. The boilers boiled. Nothing about that swirling cancer of architecture looked any different from what I was used to seeing. Wilson and I finished our descent to the river and went to talk to the Badgemen who had been sent to assist us. There was an old friend among them.

"Curious Mr. Matthew," I said, smiling. "Matthew the Joker. I don't think it's any coincidence that Lady Tomb sent you to help us out, do you?"

"I volunteered for the duty," he said. This was the man who had questioned me after the factory fire. I didn't see him as an ordinary beat cop. The crash gear he wore looked custom-fitted, though, so maybe he liked to play brutal boy every once in a while. "When it was obvious that the Council Families were dividing our forces and keeping us away from the Church, I made sure I was on the team that went to the Tombs. And when we saw what we saw there, I made sure I got put on the team that came down here."

"What exactly did you see there?" I asked.

"Don't be cute, Burn." He turned from me and addressed himself to the Church. "Going to be a hell of a nut to crack."

"Seriously, I want to know what you saw." I pulled him around and poked his chest. "I'm holding the Burn seat on the Council; answer my questions."

"You want to know, you read the report," he said. "And if you're really on the Council then I'm sure this conversation is over. We've got business here, with the Algorithm. That's as far as your authority with me lies, Burn."

"What the hell has gotten into everyone today?" I asked. "Okay, fine. You want to be a smart ass, I can understand that. What have you seen of the Church?"

"Nothing," he said. "Nothing different, at least. But we've got reports of a tremendous noise, and lots of blackbirds circling the building before diving in. Then nothing else."

"Crows," Wilson said. "Not blackbirds."

"Same thing, smart ass."

"It doesn't matter," I cut them off. "We have to assume that Crane is inside. I don't like that we haven't heard any fighting. The Wrights should have at least put up a struggle."

"Assuming that they're fighting," Matthew said. "Assuming that they haven't been in on this thing from the beginning."

"That's actually an interesting thought," Wilson said, stepping in. "Angela said that there have been no known attacks on the Church. While it's possible that they could have simply been hiding them from us, it's also true that a lot of the technology of the Artificers is compatible with the technology produced by the Wrights. The engram singers, for example, must be implanted with cogwork engines for the maker beetles to take effect."

"What's also an interesting thought," Matthew said. "Is that they're a bunch of weaselly little cog-lovers, and I don't trust them as far as I could throw them."

"Well, your obvious lack of distrust of technology is adorable, in a down-to-earth, rough-guy sort of way," Wilson said, "but that doesn't mean that you haven't had a good idea. Purely by chance, of course, but there it is."

"I have half a mind to arrest you," Matthew fumed.

"You can't arrest him. He's here with me, and I'm here representing the Council," I said.

"Jacob Burn, the last time I saw you, you were in custody for acts of terrorism. That you were sprung by that monster Tomb does nothing to raise my opinion of you." He spat over his shoulder and gave me a little shove. "For all I know you're here to disrupt my investigation, break into the Church of the Algorithm, and steal some bit of magic coggery to undo whatever it is that happened to Patron Tomb and take over the Council."

"I want to get back to the part where the Church and Crane were in on this from the beginning," Wilson said. Stubborn, stubborn bug. "Because that has legs. Maybe they've had some trouble with their source of cogwork and are trying to supplement their Algorithm with work from the Artificers. Or maybe they've finally decided to cast off the Council and take over the city. That seems entirely possible."

"Enough bright ideas," I said. "We've got enough trouble without trying to make up new conspiracies." I began ticking points off on my fingers. "Crane is the last remnant of a family of Artificers, purged out when the Guild was exiled. He's back to get revenge on the city. He's killed a bunch of Councilors, and now he's trying to destroy the religion that got the Guild in trouble in the first place." I held up my hand, showing my fingers to Wilson, Matthew, and the gathered officers of the Badge. "That's the story we're sticking to. Everyone got it?"

Numb nods all around. Poor guys had probably thought they were dealing with a simple power struggle in the Council. Only Matthew looked unconvinced.

"Good enough," I said. "So we're going to go in there, find Ezekiel Crane, and we're going to kill him. I don't want to know anything more about his motives, I don't want to give him a fair trial in a court of his peers, I don't want to question him to find anything out. I want him shot. And if that doesn't kill him, I want him shot again. Any questions?"

None of them bothered to nod. They just stared back at me.

"Okay, then. The front door is as good a place as any to start. Suit up, check your ammunition, and follow me."

Chapter Sixteen

A Mad Angel Among Us

Matthew had the best with him, that was obvious. They moved across the courtyard efficiently. Covering corners, communicating through hand signals, staying low and fast. I had never seen anything like it. Probably good that the average Badgeman wasn't this well trained. We'd have no decent crime in the whole city.

The original seat of the Church of the Algorithm was a tiny stone chapel that still served as a side entrance to the complex. If it wasn't attached to this seething, nightmare architecture, the chapel could have fit in on the street of any tiny country hamlet. It looked out of place, though. I think the Wrights kept it out of nostalgia, instead of tearing it down and rebuilding it, as they had with the other buildings they had absorbed over the years. This tiny chapel had a low wall, and a courtyard, and then a tall wooden door that led into the nave. The nave itself was choked with machinery, but legend says that it was the first chamber of the Algorithm, the first room where the pattern had formed.

We rushed across the courtyard, Matthew's team leading the way. Secured the gate, then the wall, then the front door of the chapel. I let them do their job, but when it came time to charge in to the chapel itself, I felt it was my duty to be in front. So how's that for a change? Leading a charge of cops, into a church. Not my usual approach.

Wilson and I huddled outside the door. We had seen nothing of the Wrights, or Crane, or his small army of crows. Large army. I don't know how big an army of crows is supposed to be, but I felt Ezekiel had a lot of crows.

"What's the plan?" Wilson asked. Matthew and his team were close by, watching windows and alleyways.

"Have you ever asked me that and had me tell you something useful?" I answered.

"Not really."

"Then let's stick with that. We're just going to go in there and figure out what's going on. We're going to find Crane. Probably shoot him." I checked the load on my shotgun for the fortieth time and settled my back against the stone wall. "Mostly we're not going to get killed. And we're going to save the city."

"Right," Wilson said, skeptically. "And that's all you have?"

"That's it."

Wilson looked to Matthew. They both shrugged.

"Let me try," Matthew said. "We go in. We secure our immediate area and assess the situation. Then we make a decision."

"That's pretty much what I said."

"He said it more clearly," Wilson pointed out. "Either way. They both start with 'We go in.'"

"Agreed." I stood up and gathered Matthew's team behind me. When everyone looked ready, I gave the nod. One of his bully boys smashed in the door with a hammer bigger than my leg. I rushed in after him.

The room was dark and silent. The only light was from the transepts of the old chapel, four arms that crossed the central chamber. Each transept held some kind of altar, and each altar was glowing faintly in the darkness. The altars themselves appeared to be idling machines, the light coming from the internal workings, pulsing with heat and energy. The rest of the chapel bristled with cogwork, walls that were mosaics of gears, columns that looked like camshafts. The whole space looked like a thousand clocks had exploded at its center, and the shrapnel was embedded in the walls. And all of it was still.

I stumbled to a halt about halfway through the room. Wilson and Matthew bracketed me as the team secured the entrances. We looked around at the machinery in a kind of awe.

"Is it all like this?" Matthew asked. Civilians were rarely allowed into the inner spaces of the Church of the Algorithm.

"Almost none of it," I answered. As a member of the Founding Families, I had seen much of the upper levels of the Church. And, of course, I had broken in with Emily, two years ago. I winced at the memory. "In fact, I'm not sure this part of it is like this. These mosaics should be moving. The whole building should be."

"Yeah. The whole Church is supposed to be one giant puzzle of cogwork, always in action, always running. Calculating the algorithm, or expressing it. Or something." Wilson stared around the room like a kid in a candy store. "It's definitely never supposed to stop."

"So that's item one in our assessment of the situation," I said. "The Church is broken."

One of Matthew's enthusiastic little soldiers gave a signal that I took to mean 'all clear.' Matthew stood up and wandered the room like a tourist.

"I don't like this," I said. "I mean, it's fine that the Algorithm has stopped. What I don't like is that there are no Wrights here."

"It's a big building, and they're obviously having problems. Maybe they're somewhere else, trying to get the engine going again."

"Trying to jumpstart your god," I muttered. "I can't imagine that's a good thing."

Wilson shrugged. "If they're not here, that means they're not stopping us from looking around."

Matthew came back and made some complicated hand gestures.

"You can just talk to us," I said. "That's probably going to be quicker."

"We're ready to move. There are no signs of struggle here. Main door is secured, and we've got two exits. One goes up, the other goes down."

"Down it is," I said. Much as I didn't like the idea, if there was trouble, it would probably be deep inside the Church.

We formed up and started down. Matthew's team was very efficient, and very annoying to be around. After about two rooms of clearing corners and signaling fire lanes, I got bored and walked on ahead. Matthew gave me a nasty look, just before I lost sight of him around a corner.

"Do you think this is wise?" Wilson asked, trotting behind me. "Those guys seemed to know what they were doing."

"Maybe. But we'll never get anywhere at that rate. I don't think they appreciate how enormous this place is."

Enormous, and empty. The Church was always a cacophonous place, full of motion and noise, and the ever-present Wrights of the Algorithm. Because my previous visits had either been guided tours or criminal intrusions, I had come to expect a Wright around every corner. Now the whole Church lay dormant. Every time I came into a new room, I expected to find a clutch of engineer-priests kneeling over some contraption. Or maybe even dead on the floor. It seemed like some violence had occurred, given the state of the engine, but I had yet to see even the faintest trace of a struggle. Wrights were big guys. They spent their lives assembling a god out of giant metal parts. Any fight they were involved in would have gotten bloody. But there was nothing.

Worse, the silence inside didn't match the business outside. From the warehouse, the Church had looked perfectly normal. As if all the engines were running and the boilers churning. But from in here, the engine of god seemed dead. Silent. What kind of deception was that, and how could it be made to work?

We kept moving, getting farther ahead of Matthew's team and deeper into the cathedral. We found our first evidence of a fight about ten minutes later, in a hallway holding reliquaries of broken machinery. Several candelabras were on the ground, their wicks burned into the carpet, and a splattering of blood marred one of the reliquaries. We followed a path of similar evidence, a broken relic here, a torn carpet there, to a small hallway with an incredibly high ceiling. The walls rose up into the gloom of gears above. At the end of the hallway was an arch, and in it stood a figure, silhouetted against a flickering light. He held a revolver.

"Come to take advantage?" he asked when we entered the hall. "Come to kick us while we're down?"

"No, sir, not at all," I said, walking forward carefully. "My name is Jacob Burn. I'm here on the Council's business. We believe we know who has attacked you, and…"

He started laughing. It ended in a ragged cough that doubled him over, spraying blood on the carpet.

"You know who has attacked us. That's nice. Come, Councilor Burn. Come closer. Tell me who this madman is, who would attack the Algorithm of God."

I stopped. Something about his mien didn't feel right.

"It's a man named Ezekiel Crane. We think he's an Artificer, from the time before they were exiled. He's…"

"Closer, Jacob Burn," the Wright said. "You must come closer."

I edge forward, my heart in my throat. I raised my hands in supplication.

"I know this doesn't look good. I know the Council has had trouble with the Church in the past, and I might not be the best representative. But I'm here to help, I swear. And if you'll put the revolver down-"

A shadow separated itself from the darkness behind the man, a brief vision of a woman and a thick coil of hair, light glinting off iron, and then the man crumpled. I yelled in shock.

"She killed him!" I exclaimed. "Dear gods, she came out of nowhere! Did you see that?"

Wilson rushed past me, hopping over the dying Wright and pursuing the iron girl. Behind me, Matthew came skidding around the corner.

"We heard yelling," he said, then saw the Wright. I waved my hand.

"Have your men see to him. The rest of you, follow me!" I ran after Wilson. "She's here! She's working with Crane!"

I jumped over the Wright. He looked in pretty bad shape, but his eyes followed me as I rushed past. That was a good sign. The hallway was dark, but I could hear Wilson ahead of me, and Matthew behind. The girl must be somewhere ahead. I ran recklessly forward, hoping that Wilson would say something about any obstructions. There was a light ahead.

We all skidded into the lit room at about the same speed, the iron girl in the lead. This was an assembly room of some nature, long and low, crossed by workbenches that ran the length of the floor. The benches were crowded with lines of gears and other mechanical bits, all neatly laid out by size or shape, even color. The light came from frictionlamps on stands at the end of each bench, and several more that hung from the ceiling. While it had the look of a room built for work, a room that was usually bustling with activity, there was no one here.

The girl was running hurt: she had on the same lightly bounded coverall, but the belt was missing, and there were tears along her upper arms and down one leg, the canvas lined with blood. There was the slightest hint of a limp in her springing gait. She tried to hurdle one of the tables and clipped the edge, scattering tools and falling to the floor in a crash. Wilson pounced on her, and Matthew and I stopped short, unable to get a clear shot in the tangle.

"Who is she?" Matthew snapped. The girl and Wilson were trading trips and counterstrikes between the tables, neither able to establish a dominant position. Matthew's shortrifle hovered over the scene. I batted the barrel toward the floor.

"Been following us for the last two days. First picked her up outside Crane's place in the Wettingwary." Wilson delivered a series of blows that she barely deflected, each attack from the anansi's spider arms shuddering into the table behind her. Even injured, she was unbelievably dangerous. "She was at the factory, just before you guys picked me up."

"Your friend's going to need help," Matthew said. And he was right. The iron girl was gaining the upper hand. She kept pressing him, her expressionless iron face showing no pain, no fatigue. It was only in her arms that you could see any weakness.

"Yeah," I answered. "You wanna go in there?"

"Not really."

The rest of Matthew's team showed up, minus two. Probably left behind to care for the injured Wright. All eyes went to the bizarre fight at the center of the room. Another table went over, the tools and gears sliding to the floor like ringing bells.

"Okay, fine." I looked around and picked up a discarded wrench that was nearly as long as my arm. Tossed the shotgun to Matthew. "Hold this."

It wasn't easy finding an opening. As soon as I stepped forward, the girl looked at me once, then turned back to Wilson. But from then on she maneuvered to keep the anansi between us, or direct his attacks in such a way that I'd have to scramble to stay safe.

"Come on, Burn. You've got a reputation to uphold," Matthew joked. I shot him a look, then just threw myself into the fight.

Not sure what happened. Pretty sure it wasn't Wilson who struck me down, but there was no way to tell. I stepped into the range of the melee, holding the wrench defensively in both hands. A blow struck the metal, knocking it back into my face, and as I was shaking that off another blow came in to my leg, then my knee. I buckled and hit the ground. Saw the next strike coming in, this one clearly from the iron girl. I got the wrench in the way, bracing it with both hands and catching her boot with the shaft. The force of it rang through my arms, leaving my hands stinging. I lurched to my heels, squatting and trying to maintain my balance. Without looking at me, the iron girl threw another kick at me, then another. I blocked what I could, absorbed what I couldn't. I was about to stand when she connected with my chin, throwing me backwards. When I stopped rolling, I was on my back, staring up at the smiling faces of Matthew's team of Badgemen.

"You get the idea," I said, struggling to my feet. I picked up the wrench and limped into the attack. "Come on."

Grumbling, the officers set down their weapons and drew the short cudgels every Badgeman was issued; at birth, was the story. We crowded forward and rushed in. It went well at first. Several blows struck the girl, once in the head, but mostly in the body or shoulder. Wilson hung back, getting a rest as we took over. I was feeling pretty good about it, even as I took a shot in the belly that staggered me. And then the Badge boys were getting in each other's way, and their cudgels found more friendly targets than the girl, and suddenly they were falling back. The style of her attack changed, focusing on diverting her enemies into each other, rather than striking them herself. Soon everyone was disarmed, and most of them were on their knees. One last round of blows from the girl, long leg kicks that pushed us back, and then we were standing in a ring around her, gasping for breath.

"Well," Wilson grumbled as he loosened his shoulders and prepared to go back in. "That was a nice break."

To our surprise, the iron girl held up a hand, then put her fingers under her chin and, with a shriek of pain, ripped the mask from her face. It clattered to the ground like a discarded plate. To my surprise there were clusters of writhing wires on the inside of the mask, over the eyes and mouth, slick with blood. The girl's face was pale and slick with her own blood, streaks of it running from her mouth, even from her eyes. But I recognized her.

"Lady Bright," I said, still gasping for breath. "I should have marked you for a traitor from the start."

"I'm not your traitor," Veronica said. "But I am very tired. If you'll just give me a chance to explain."

"Explain to the Wright you stabbed back in the hallway," I spat. "I know murder when I see it. Tell me, was it you who butchered your family at their meal?"

"Watch your words, Jacob Burn," she answered, assuming a fighting stance. "And if you will bring me the Wright, I will gladly explain to him."

"He'll be lucky to live," Matthew said. "My men are caring for him, where you struck him down."

"Then you should see to your men, Investigator."

Matthew looked warily between us. I edged away, trying to get to my shotgun, which was leaning on a bench about ten feet away.

"Leave the weapon, Burn. And Investigator, I mean that quite literally. You may even consider that an order, from a Councilor."

"You have to be kidding me," I said. "Matthew, she tried to kill a Wright of the Church. You can't possibly be considering taking orders from her."

"I've seen your stat sheet, Burn," he said. "You can't claim any sort of moral high-ground here."

"I've had enough of talking," Wilson said. "I'm ready to go if you are, lady."

"Yeah, put her down, Wilson," I sneered at Veronica. "I'll bet you're not so tough without your magical iron face, are you?"

Without a word she shuffled forward, if lightning can shuffle. Two strikes, once to my chest, the second an open-handed slap across my face. When I picked myself up off the ground she was back where she had been, as if she had never moved.

"The mask helps. But I'm better than you, Jacob, because I have trained for this my entire life. I don't need magic tricks to put you down."

"I've really had enough of this," I wheezed, holding my chest. "Wilson, knock this bitch down a notch. Matthew, go get your men and get them in here. We need to keep moving."

"What about the Wright?" he asked.

"We have taken care of our brother," a voice said from the shadows of the hallway behind us. We turned to see a collection of Wrights, led by an Elder of the Church, filing into the room.

"I've been wondering where you jokers had gotten to," I said. "You probably already know this, but there's this crazy Artificer trying to break your little god. This one was helping him."

"Yes. We have seen to Mr. Crane, although the girl was proving elusive. We do have our own defenses, you know, Mr. Burn."

"I remember," I said. I walked over and snatched my shotgun from the ground. Other Wrights began to appear in the room, entering from hidden doors. They all looked very calm, very quiet. "Look, if you don't mind, we'd like to get this Crane thing taken care of. He's caused a lot of trouble for the Council, enough trouble that they've let me join their club." I smiled. The Elder didn't bat an eye. "Because that's how desperate they are. See? Nevermind. We need to see Crane, put him in custody."

"Ezekiel Crane won't be leaving this building. We have dealt with him."

"Killed him, you mean? Because, just to be clear, I'm perfectly fine with that. I've gone that route myself a couple of times in the last two days. But he's a tricky guy, and I'd really like to confirm that he's truly 'taken care of,' you know. So," I motioned to Veronica, "if you'll just take custody of her, show us the body, and we'll get out of your hair."

"You haven't taken custody of me yet," Veronica spat.

"Matter of time. Lots of Wrights in this room, Lady Bright. How many of them do you think you can take down?"

"How many do you think you can take down?" she asked. "Because I think we're going to make a little game of it."

"Jacob!" Wilson snapped. I turned around to see the Elder reaching for my shotgun. His skin was pale, and black tar lined his teeth. I put the butt of the shotgun into his face without thinking about it, then fell back until I was standing next to Bright. Matthew was staring at me.

"He's got them!" I yelled. "Crane has them all!"

"On the contrary," the Elder said. "We've got him. Or the parts of him that count."

I leveled the shotgun at his face and pulled the trigger. He fell in a black, bloody mess. A pair of crows, their feathers smeared with gore, dug themselves up out of his chest. Each one was nesting in a brass cage in the dead man's lungs, the pipes of the hollow bars trilling like soggy wind chimes as the black birds burrowed their way free. I cycled the shell and fired again, ending the birds. Another Wright stepped into the Elder's place.

"Very good. Two shots, and you've put one of us down. Count your shells, gentlemen, and count us." He smiled wickedly. "If you're holy enough, you might see the pattern."

"I was doing really well here," Veronica whispered, "until you geniuses came along."

"You can't blame us. And you could have explained yourself."

"Can't talk in the mask. And a second ago you were going to turn me over to these guys. Now you're standing beside me, trying to figure how many of them we can take down before they kill us." She snorted. "Is that what criminals mean when they talk about loyalty?"

"Situations change, lady. We do what we can to survive."

"You're going to do great in the Council. Your father would have been so proud."

"Can we tear my family apart a little later on? Maybe after we get out of this?"

"Everyone shut up," Wilson snapped. "Gods! Humans, they won't shut up. The worse things are, the more they natter on."

"I think we would all appreciate a little silence," the Wright said. "So here's what we're going to do. We promise that if you surrender your weapons and come quietly, you will not be harmed. We must detain you for the next day, maybe two, but then we'll release you back into the city."

"I'm going with option two, whatever the hell that is," I said.

"Because you're an idiot, and stubborn as a child," the Wright said, nodding. "As we expected. Perhaps if we swear on something very important?"

"There is no oath you can take that will secure my surrender, Wright. You will fight us here, and we will die, but there will be a fight."

"Perhaps if they swear to you on my name?" a girl's voice asked.

The crowds of Wrights parted, and a child walked through them and into our presence. She looked to be eight, maybe nine. Most of her wasn't there. Her shoulders and arms were stripped to the bone, tiles of porcelain smooth skin jigsawing down her neck like a mosaic that had begun to fall apart. Ribs crumbled in place like fine china that was being ground invisibly to dust. Her face was perfect, though, delicate and bright. And behind her, new wings of black wire, swirling with electric grace. Her legs and hips looked new, too, freshly fashioned from the miles of gearwork and engine parts that were scattered throughout the Church of the Algorithm.

Camilla, the Angel of Veridon.

The last time I had seen her, she was pinned in place, deep beneath the Church of the Algorithm, kept alive by a tenuous thread that connected her to her mechanical heart. Now the whirling cog of pattern and power spun in her chest. And between the framework of her skeleton, behind the ribs and down her arms, swirled an angry horde of crows. She looked like a restless shadow, blackness edged in feather and beak and glassy eye. When she talked, I could even see a ghost of feather between her teeth, and her hair fluttered restlessly on her head.

"Did you think I would go away, Jacob? After I failed to secure the destroyer's heart from you, did you think I would just stop trying? You went out of here, you buried your dead, and you forgot about me."

"Cam, that's just not true. I told everyone. They didn't believe me."

"I don't really care, Jacob. As you can see, I take care of myself."

"What is… what…" Matthew stammered. For him, the little angel Camilla was a fairy tale, something everyone was told about as a child and then stopped believing when they grew up. The Church used it as part of their origin story. That an angel had come to the city and offered her help, that the Wrights of the Algorithm had used their knowledge of cogwork to heal her of some sickness, and in her gratitude the angel sacrificed herself to bring knowledge to the city of Veridon.

The trick was, it was true. Except for the gratitude part. The Church had captured this angel, and spent the better part of two centuries taking her apart and using the knowledge gleaned from her dissection to power their engines of god. And now the angel was out.

"So I was right," Wilson beamed. "The Church was in on it all along."

"Not at all," Camilla said. "This was just a lucky break. Crane really did come back here to destroy the Church. But I'm better than him. After I figured out what he was, and what he was doing, I lured him into the chambers below and convinced him that only I could truly destroy the city. Which is true. Just not in the way he planned."

"Where is he?" I asked.

"I take care of my servants, Jacob. Ezekiel Crane is going to live a very long and interesting life." She held up her arm and smiled at the birds. "Amazing breakthrough, don't you think? The foetal metal is suspended in their essence. The metal and the life are one thing. I never knew the Artificers. Hadn't figured out how to communicate with anyone outside of the Church, by the time they were banned and exiled. But I have to say, they were some clever people."

"So, what now? You're going to kill us and then level the city, like you promised to do, back when you were trying to get the heart from me?"

"Hardly, Jacob. This has been a long time coming. These…" She shuddered. "These damned holy men have held me for a long time. And they've collected many of the things that we sent down the river. None of this" — she spread her arms, indicating the whole of the Church of the Algorithm, the centuries of accumulated cogwork, the pattern of god itself — "was meant for you. Meant for this place. You're like a blocked artery in the veins of divinity. And I'm going to clear it out."

"Which means that if we just get our things and get out of your way…" I started.

"I heard about Emily, Jacob. Heard that the last angel possessed her. That you had to kill her." Her centuries young face pouted at me. "I felt bad about that. And you buried her in the river, didn't you? Put her in a boat and sent her over the falls, along with the Destroyer's heart. I thought that was such a beautiful thing to do." Her face changed, suddenly angry. "So damned poetic, throwing the heart away like that. So damned beautiful."

Her arm snapped forward and a column of blackness, lined in the shapes of crows, shot forward. It swallowed me, filled me, darkened me. I fell, and the world fell around me.

Chapter Seventeen

An Orrery of Memory

I woke up in a coffin with a woman in my arms. It seemed like she'd been trying to get out of my arms for quite a while, because we were tied together, and it felt like she'd been using my spine to try to wear through the ropes. She was doing it right now.

"Stop that, please," I mumbled. My throat was sore and dry, and my head was swimming. I had trouble moving my tongue. My muscles all felt like they'd been packed with kindling and then broken.

She screamed once, loudly, directly into my ear. I winced, but that just led to me banging my head against the wall of the coffin. I assumed it was a coffin, at least. Not many small, wooden things you would put people into.

"Gods, I thought you were dead," she said. It was Veronica. Great. "You haven't moved in half an hour. Haven't even breathed. Can you get your arms free?"

"Maybe I am dead. Maybe they stuffed a bird down my throat and they're controlling my every move. I feel bad enough to believe it."

"Will you stop screwing around and try to get your arms free!" she yelled.

"I don't think we're going anywhere. I mean, even if we get free. What's the matter, Lady Bright? You don't like holding me?" The coffin lurched and I banged my head again. "What was that?" I asked groggily.

"A wave. Because we're on a boat."

"That sounds bad," I said.

"It is bad. That crazy kid wouldn't shut up about how you floated some damn piece of cogwork down the river, then she had a barrel brought in and stuffed you in it."

"And then you jumped in to save me and they closed the top?"

"She got it in her head that it would more damned poetic if there was a girl, and I was the only one who qualified. Something about a lady named Emily." She started sawing at my backbone with her bound wrists again. "Now stop talking and do something about getting us free."

"Wilson will probably save us," I said. "Just be cool."

"No one is going to save us. Do you understand, they put us in a barrel and then in a boat, and now we're out on the river somewhere," she hissed into my ear. "And they're going to float us down the river and over the falls."

"Oh. Oh, I see where she's going with that. Because of the heart. Right." I shook my head, but that did nothing for the vertigo. "Look, I'm sorry. I'm really not at the top of my game. Something happened to my head."

"Something happened to your whole body, idiot. Like I said, you haven't even been breathing."

"Well. I'm breathing now. I'm going to assume that you've screamed for help?"

We hit another lurch and then the whole barrel rolled a couple times. We landed with a splash. Even inside the barrel, I was pretty sure that I couldn't hear the roar of the waterfall. We had a little while.

"Listen. Calm down for a minute. We don't want to break out of this thing just yet," I said.

"Yes," she answered. "I do."

"No, you don't. That boat of guys just dropped us into the river. If we pop out right now they'll just pick us up again and then we're back in the barrel. Or they'll just shoot us. Anything in your lifetime of training gonna keep you from dying when you get shot?"

She was silent.

"Right. So we're going to get out of these ropes and then we're…"

"That's what I've been trying to do! All the way over here I've been trying to use a corpse's backbone to saw my way out of these ropes, so I could get out!" I knew it. "Do you not think I want to do this? Is there something about my commitment to the idea of escape that is eluding you?"

"Stop. Panicking."

"There's water coming into the barrel."

"We're in the river," I pointed out. "It's natural."

"It's kind of a lot of water."

She was right. There was a lot of water sloshing around in here. And I was on the bottom, so things were looking less than rosy for me. Not that they had been looking that great beforehand.

"Well, the good thing about that is that we're not going to go over the waterfall. Because we're going to sink right here." I started kicking at the barrel. "So there's that."

"You're not very good at optimism."

"Oh, love," I snarled. "You have no idea."

I kept kicking at the barrel, from about where it felt like most of the water was coming from. This had the unexpected benefit of bringing more water into our little vessel. This was rapidly becoming a race between how quickly the barrel would fill up versus how quickly I could get a hole big enough to squirm through. And Veronica picked up on that, because she started kicking too.

"You're too high," I said. "The water's coming in over here."

"I'm trying to loosen the iron bands. If we can slip one of those off, the whole thing will splinter open."

"You're talking about kicking iron bands," I said, then remembered how hard she had hit me earlier. "Nevermind. You do what you're doing."

And she did, and we were both remarkably successful at getting water to flood the barrel at a tremendous rate. Which meant that we sank, and fast.

"One more breath," I gasped. "One more breath. One more."

"Shut up," she hissed. And with that we were underwater. It felt like we were sinking a lot faster than we should have been, but I didn't have a lot of experience in drowning. When I fell, it was usually out of the sky. But I was pressed hard against Veronica, and she was flat against the barrel, and we were both thrashing madly against the boards. There was some slippage between the boards, but it wasn't going to be enough, considering how fast we were sinking.

And then, suddenly, we were moving sideways and up, fast. We broke the surface with a smack. Water rushed from the split boards of the barrel. I craned my neck to get my mouth into the air as soon as it was clear, breathing in deep, clean breaths. Veronica, shorter than me, hitched herself up on my shoulders to get to the new pocket of air.

We weren't out of the water yet. There were maybe six inches of clearance at the top of the barrel, and the rest was still flooded. I noticed an iron barb that had pierced the end of the barrel, and that I had in fact cut myself on when I was struggling for air. Veronica was looking at it, too. It could easily have pegged one of our skulls.

"Hey, hello!" I yelled, when my lungs were done spasming. "There are people in here!"

"Quiet down there," a voice said. Dangerously familiar. Iron springs and tuning forks, struck to mimic a human voice. An artificial voice. "We know you're in there. Play it cool."

"I'll play it cool when I'm out of this river," Veronica snapped. There was silence above us, then a low, trilling laughter.

"You always travel with women, don't you, Jacob?"

"They know you," she said.

"Yeah. And I hope it's not who I think it is."

Seconds later a rough, noisy machine fired up and the barrel rose out of the water. Wood and steel groaned at the weight of the barrel, full of us and the river. The engine changed gears, and we swung in to the deck. It was a full minute before we were on solid ground, and by then only half of the barrel had drained.

"Stand away from here," a regular human voice said, tapping on the wall of the barrel. We hunched over. The staves on that side splintered, and then the shiny head of an ax protruded into our compartment. Soon the whole barrel cracked open like an egg, and we tumbled to the deck of a tiny fishing boat. Rough hands pulled us over, cutting ropes with the efficiency of men accustomed to cleaning fish.

"A pretty one, too. What do you think, Cacher? Would she be a good replacement for Emily?"

I rolled onto my butt and looked up. Valentine stood over me, Cacher at his side. Both of them were armed with skinning knives. Cacher had an ax looped over his shoulder. We were not on land, but on Valentine's boat.

"Hey, boss," I said.

"There are two things you will never call me again, Jacob. 'Boss,' and 'friend.'" He leaned down and slapped me casually across the cheek, his heavy metal hand spinning me over and cutting my cheek against my teeth. My mouth filled with blood. "In case you are unclear on our arrangement."

Metal hand, because Valentine was a metal man. I don't know at what point in the modification process Valentine stopped being meat, but it was a long time ago. His memories were engrams, stored on metal coils. His voice was a trick of springs, the kind of voice a harp might have. And his face was a work of art. Carved darkwood sketched the merest hint of cheekbones, chin, jawline, eyebrows. These pieces moved on hidden tracks, shifting as he talked, or scowled, or laughed. Everything behind the sculptured mask was shadow, his head an orrery of memories and thought.

He was also my former boss, and someone I had pissed off mightily. Right before I got Emily killed, in fact. Oh, and Cacher, standing there next to Valentine? He was Emily's boyfriend, technically. So we were all old friends, and none of us had to go looking for reasons to hate each other.

Veronica stood up and stepped between us. Noble of her, but she wasn't a noble girl. Probably just counting her allies and trying to keep things even. I turned over and spat blood onto the deck.

"I'll have you know that I'm the Lady Bright, Councilor of Veridon. And that man is also a member of the Council, although you already seem to know his name. To whom am I addressing myself?"

"Hanging out with Councilors now, is it?" Valentine asked.

"S'alright," Cacher said. "Councilors can be whores, too. And this one's got the tits for it."

Cacher was on his back, the knife cartwheeling across the deck and splashing into the river. The ax was in Veronica's hand, resting lightly against Cacher's knee. Valentine roared with laughter.

"Well, it's clear what kind of rough Jacob likes in his women. So." He clapped his hands together. "How shall we proceed?"

"Boss," a man said from the back of the boat. "Not my place, but maybe could you keep them down. We've been spotted."

We all looked upriver. The boat that I assumed dumped us was just visible through the coils of fog that walked across the surface of the Reine. They were turning slowly around, to come our way.

"Inevitable that this would happen. Jacob, Lady Bright. If you would be so kind as to get into the forecabin. There are clothes, although we were only expecting one, and not a lady. My apologies for your sensibilities." Valentine held up a hand. "And before we go, please apologize to Mr. Cacher. He's a rough man, but that's no way to thank someone for saving your life."

"You have to be kidding," Veronica said.

"It is not in my nature to kid. Your brief demonstration was impressive, and I'm sure you're more than capable of handling yourself. However, I promise you, I can have you over the side of this boat in half a breath. Now. Please apologize."

"I'm sorry I don't like being talked about like a piece of meat, and won't tolerate your bullshit. Thanks for saving my life."

Cacher pulled himself to his feet and, mumbling, sketched a short bow to the Lady Bright. Valentine smiled.

"Sufficient. Now, let's be about our business, shall we?"

"Valentine, what the hell are you doing out here? Did you follow us?"

"All shall be answered. Let's leave it at saying that I offered you help once before, and you declined it. And that cost Emily her life, and nearly cost the city its god. I will not take that risk again."

"If you're offering me assistance again, I'm going to go ahead and decline. Thanks for saving our lives and all, but we'd rather you set us in a lifeboat and let us go on our way."

"You misunderstand. This time I am not giving you the opportunity to decline. You will help me address the current crisis, or I will put you away and deal with it myself."

We stared at each other for a second, his empty eyes churning darkly in that beautiful face. Veronica grabbed me by the shoulder and pulled me into the forecabin. She was stripping off before I had a chance to turn around.

"It's not a horrible thing to see," she muttered. "You're going to make a girl feel bad."

"It's not that. It's complicated. Never mind." I started fumbling with my shirt. The clothes available were simple fisherman's garb, but there were several mismatched shirts and pants in a pile. We would both be able to find something that fit.

"And who are these strange friends of yours?" she asked, her voice muffled as she pulled a shirt over her head.

I told her; explained how Valentine was my boss when the famous events of two years ago went down, how he had my back until things got too complicated, then shoved me to the dogs. And when it became advantageous for him again, came back and offered to help. How I took that offer poorly, and held a gun to his head. Told him we were done being friends.

"He doesn't hunt me," I said. "That's the best thing I can say about the relationship."

"So what's he doing here now?" she asked.

Before I could answer, Cacher opened the door without knocking. Leered at us as he held out two pistols, grip first.

"You're arming us?" I asked.

"Boss says. Jacob Burn ain't the same man without a little iron dick to wave around."

I took the revolver. Veronica took hers, but held it daintily. Without another word, Cacher closed the door.

"Beats the hell out of me," I said, answering Veronica's question of a moment ago. "But we should find out."

Dressed, and with our weapons tucked into waistbands under baggy vests, we went back out on the deck. The fog had lifted some. We could even see the distant majesty of the Church of the Algorithm, perched on the banks at the confluence of the Ebd and the Reine. The other boat was awfully close, and steaming at us.

"We gonna get out of their way, Valentine?" I asked. He was standing on the edge of the boat, resting his hands lightly on the side. Staring down the other vessel as it approached. He turned his head slightly to me, then back to the boat.

"I have strange allies, Jacob. Are things prepared, Mr. Vaunt?"

I looked down and nearly jumped out of my skin when a face slid out of the water. Green and bloated, with teeth like popcorn.

"They are, sir," the face said with a voice that was all water and mud.

"Then let us end this encounter, shall we?" He waved jauntily to the boarding party that was gathering at the rail of the other boat, bristling with longrifles.

There was a thump that I felt in my knees, and a boiling tumor of water rose up from the side of other boat. Its hull tore like party paper, and the whole thing bent. Suddenly heavy, it leaned to one side, its bow pointing sharply away from us, and then it ripped open. A second thump, and deep inside, something exploded. Fire rolled along the deck, and she was sinking.

"There. Doesn't that feel good?" he asked, turning to face us. "All those bad men who put you in a box and rolled you into the river? They're on fire now!"

"What happened to you?" I asked nervously.

"I've started taking action. I've always been a brutal man, Jacob. I've just become very intentional in my brutality. Now, if you'll come with me."

We followed him to the back of the boat. Several floating corpses pulled themselves from the water and approached us.

"You're working with the Fehn?" I asked.

"Of course. I had a number of loyal subjects among their race. When," he looked at me funny, "the event occurred the other morning, they came to me for solace. There's something I've learned from you, Jacob. Never turn an ally away, no matter what the consequences may be. They can be so useful."

"A little late for that to be much use to me," I muttered, thinking of the time he had kicked me to the street, just as I needed his protection the most.

"But it's not, Jacob. I've learned a lot in the last two days. Probably more than you, in fact."

"This I doubt. But try me."

"I know that there's an Artificer in town," he said, cocking his head.

"Not news."

"There are many dead on the Council. Several of the families are said to be near the brink of war. And the Patron Tomb is about to die."

"Oh, gods, Valentine. I used to have such respect for you." I watched the shattered remains of the other boat slip beneath the river. "The last son of a purged and exiled Founding Family, associated with the Artificers, came back to Veridon to take revenge on those who did his family wrong. He killed people who held their former property, toyed with and murdered those on the Council whose ancestors originally declared a purge on his ancestors. Including my father and, yes, the Patron Tomb. But his true target was the Church. And when he struck, the Angel Camilla was waiting for him."

Valentine looked at me with unmasked awe, even through that nearly blank face. His eyes went to Veronica.

"Near as I can determine, Camilla has somehow absorbed him and is using the Artificer's magic to hold herself together."

There was a moment of stunned silence around the tiny boat. Even the Fehn looked shocked. I smiled and crossed my arms.

"So what have you got, Valentine? What do you know that I don't?"

"Well," he started, and took several breaths to collect himself. "For one thing, I knew you were floating down the river in a barrel. And I think that ought to count for something."

"Granted."

"And I know what the Fehn have told me," he said, giving me a sly look. "Which is the only thing that really matters right now."

I looked to the popcorn-toothed Vaunt and shivered.

"What have they told you?"

Valentine strutted around the deck, his hands in his pockets. "Besides the unusual arrival of a barrel from the Church, a barrel that screamed when they loaded it? Well, they told me that whatever you delivered to them, Jacob, was like a disease. It spread quickly, it killed many. Those who survived either bunkered down in the underwater hives that house the Mother…"

"Mother?" I asked.

"The prime Fehn. Slug zero," he said, then waved the matter away with his hand. "Anyway. They either bunkered down, or they hid on the surface with their friends. These gentlemen of the river came to me. They were quite shocked by the attack." He placed a hand on the Fehn's soggy shoulder. "In fact, they're quite unhappy with you, Mr. Burn."

"They can get in line, Valentine. I was tricked, just like the Tombs. Just like my father."

"Yes, well." He folded his hands in front of him. "The point is, while they were at first in communication with their brethren beneath the river, the situation has changed."

"Changed?" I asked.

"They have lost touch."

"The Mother is silent," Popcorn Mouth said. "The histories are empty."

"Histories are empty," I repeated.

"All of the past is closed to use. All of the present." The Fehn looked shaken, as distressed as a soggy corpse can look. "We have nothing but these limited forms."

We were all quiet for a minute. The Fehn was inching closer to me, his hands out as though to rest his fingers against my chest. I stepped back.

"Do you know what the hell he's talking about?" I asked Valentine.

"Only in very limited ways. The Fehn have a sort of hive mind…"

"That's a gross misunderstanding," Veronica said. We turned to her.

"I'm sorry, I didn't realize we had a scholar among us," Valentine said. "Please, continue. I happily yield the floor."

Valentine does not happily yield anything. I tried to warn Veronica, but she seemed immune to my glares and subtle hand motions.

"Well, it's more like…" She held her palms up, her vision unfocused and slack. She was looking for the words. "I'll start with your analogy, Mr. Valentine…"

"Simply Valentine," he murmured.

"Valentine, then. It's like a library. The Fehn seem to be units in a larger, continuous organism. Like books in a library, or notes in a song. They're not a hive mind, not at all. But they are in harmony. I would go so far as to say that they are a harmony. And all of it comes from the Mother, as you say. The prime slug."

Mr. Vaunt the Fehn stared at her, open mouthed. His hands were still hovering over my chest.

"Yes," he said, eventually. "The song of history. Yes. That is what we are."

"And that song has been disrupted," Valentine said, resuming his role as moderator. "Which has never happened, in however many centuries the Fehn have drifted through our fine river. These gentlemen have lost contact with the Mother. It didn't happen until well after the cog-dead virus worked its way through their population. Something else plucked the Mother from their minds."

"Like what?" I prompted.

"It seems that someone, and I assume that it is this Mr. Crane you mentioned, has been screwing around with the Mother Fehn. Tapping it for knowledge. And using that knowledge to get inside the Church. That was the whole point of the attack you participated in. Because of the peculiar way the Fehn communicate, taking control of a large portion of their population gave Crane a kind of back door into the Mother."

"Why would that matter? Why would the Fehn know the first damn thing about the Church of the Algorithm?"

"We know everything," Vaunt said. "We know what this valley looked like when the city was born. What the river tasted like, and why it tastes different now. We know what is upriver, and down. We know why the sky fell, and when it will fall again. All of these things, mortal. And so many more."

"Okay." I cocked an eye at Valentine. He shrugged.

"I have learned that whatever the Fehn are now, they were once something very much like a library. And the Mother, as they call it, is the only fragment of that library left. And while it has gone a little mad, it still collects data, and stories, and preserves them as best it can."

"And Crane? What has he learned from her?"

"Who knows? But you say that Camilla was waiting for him. As if he didn't know she was there? I promise you this. Anyone who has had access to the Mother Fehn would know everything there is to know about Camilla. More even then our little angel knows about herself, I suspect."

This gave me pause. I wasn't sure which was worse; Camilla tricking Ezekiel Crane into freeing her and giving her his power, or Crane tricking Camilla into thinking she had tricked him. Too much tricking. Too much thinking things through.

"So is Camilla free," I asked, "or is Crane manipulating her? And if so, to what end?"

"He was pretty clear about that," Veronica said. "The end of Veridon."

"Which is why I'm not willing to take 'no' for an answer, Mr. Burn." Valentine put his heavy arm around my shoulders. I nearly buckled under the weight. "You are going to solve this problem. I'm going to see to it."

"In case you missed it, she's already kicked me out of the Church once. And she has Wilson. And an entire army of zombified holy men." I shrugged Valentine's arm off and crossed my arms. "I'm happy for your help, I really am. But there's no way we're getting into…"

I stopped, because I had been through another door to the Church of the Algorithm. Going out, but I'm sure it went both ways.

"Mr. Valentine, I'm going to need a favor from your underwater friends," I said. "And maybe a little guidance."

"Of course," he bowed. "You have a way in."

"I do. There's a passage that leads into Camilla's chamber under the Church. Last time I was there, one of the Fehn helped me escape. An old friend." I turned to Mr. Vaunt. "Wright Morgan. Do you know him?"

"He has passed into the histories," he said, the words slurred and wet. "But his story is very old."

"Fair enough. That was almost an answer." I addressed Valentine. "There's an iron suit that sank to the bottom of the river, along with the wreckage of the Bandicoot the other morning. If your friends can get it for me, I think I can get at Camilla."

"And what do you intend to do then?" he asked. "I only ask because I need to protect my investment, here. Not because I don't trust you, Jacob."

"Although you don't," I said.

"Not at all," he confirmed.

"Glad you pulled me out of the river, Valentine, but I kind of feel like you could pick it up a little in the support category."

"Stop screwing around, Jacob. What are you going to do when you get inside?"

"I'm not going to the Church," I said. "Too much resistance there. If what your water-logged friend says is true, Ezekiel isn't even there." I turned to Veronica. "Every time there was a possession, there were a series of pipes. Kind of like organ pipes, only more spread out. Wilson never could figure out what they were doing, but it was clear enough that Crane was somehow projecting himself through them. It seemed a lot like he was reversing the process that is used to record engram-songs. Like he's broadcasting himself, rather than recording the actions of someone else."

"If that's the case, and he's possessing Camilla, shouldn't there be these pipes somewhere in the Church?" Veronica asked.

"Remember when I shot that Elder? The two crows, and the brass cages inside?"

"You think he's broadcasting himself through the Wrights of the Algorithm?" She squinted and got that far away look again. "Rebuilding them somehow. Not a bad idea."

"Are you suggesting we go in and wipe out the entire population of the Church of the Algorithm?" Valentine asked. "Because, while I'm not opposed to the idea in theory, the practice of it could be tricky. Morally."

"Valentine, afraid to carry out a little brutal mass-murder?" I chuckled. "What has become of you, old man? No, you're right. I wouldn't do that. Even if they are possessed by Crane, I'm pretty sure that these cog-dead maintain something of themselves. Wilson and I managed to disrupt Crane's control, and the cog-dead that were around us seemed to snap out of it. Just long enough to beg for help. Once free of Crane's influence, the Wrights of the Algorithm will go back to judging us and being holy for it."

"How did you do it?" Veronica asked. "Disrupt Crane's control?"

"Killed the body he was possessing. Seems to be several levels of control. He seems to maintain a small presence in the minds of the cog-dead. He appeared once, in his house, possessing a dead body, but that was a minor possession. Not a lot of movement, just talking. This last one, though, I could have sworn it was actually him. And the body he was possessing was still alive, unlike the first. So we need to find who he's possessing, right now, before he finishes building those pipes in the bodies of the Algorithm. Because if he manages to project himself in Camilla, we're in a lot more trouble than I can manage."

"So who is it?" Valentine asked.

I turned to the Fehn, who were standing glumly by.

"This is why I'm going to need two things from you guys. I need you to recover the iron suit that I lost when that boat sank. And I'm going to need your forgiveness."

They found it in the wreckage, covered in burned timbers and dead bodies. There were a lot of ships on the floor of the harbor. All of them charred, all of them with their crews still on board. It even shook the Fehn. Nothing shakes a corpse, but this did.

I wasn't anxious to get back in it. Some bad memories had started in this thing. It was just yesterday, but it seemed like so long ago. I stepped into the iron man's embrace and let it seal around me. Again, that metal clank as it shut, a creaking that filled my ears, and then the air around me was as hot as a forge. Valentine watched me seal myself in, then gave me a nod.

"Your girlfriend never came back," he yelled, so I could hear through the thick faceplate.

"Not my girlfriend. And she knows what she needs to do. I trust her." I checked the gauges that lined the collar under my chin. "What are you going to do, while we're in there?"

"Stay out of the way," Valentine said. "Today seems like a good day for a cruise up the river."

"So you fish me out of the river, demand that I accept your assistance, then once we have a plan together you're going to drop me back in the water and head up the river to hide."

"'Hide' is a tricky word. I'm staying clear of the potential damage, Jacob."

"Right," I said. My checks were done. There was nothing left but to get into the river. "Well, Valentine, let me be the first to say that I can appreciate a little situational cowardice."

I stepped into the water and sank, fast and straight. Again, those ghost faces came out of the water. Vaunt, and his smiling, popcorn teeth. Hands gripped the heavily armored shoulders of my suit and pulled me effortlessly forward, into the river. Into the dark.

Chapter Eighteen

The Madness in the River

The Mother Fehn was farther down the river than I expected. Quite near the waterfall, in fact. Near enough that I was nervous. The current tugged at my suit, the great mass of water rushing over me, dragging silt and debris along the river bottom like a sandstorm. Vaunt and his companions would only take me so far. Abruptly, their hands were gone and I was drifting in the current. I looked back and saw their rapidly receding forms. I panicked.

What if they just brought me out here and dropped me in the current? Valentine wasn't tracking my progress. There was no way for him to know that I failed because his associates dropped me off the waterfall, rather than because I took a bullet in some subterranean chamber or something. Maybe I shouldn't have told them that I might have to kill the Mother. My mistake.

The water here was much darker, the silt stirred up by the current clouding my vision. The lights on my helmet were nothing more than cones of cloud in front of my face. It was like walking through a fire. I quickly lost all sense of up or down. All I could tell was that I was falling forward, ever forward, the waterfall sucking me down to its horrible mouth.

My boot bounced off something hard, and I spun head over heels. A brief flash of stone and iron, then I was past it. I thrashed my arms, trying desperately to sink to the bottom of the river, but I could no longer tell which way that was. I finally got my feet aligned to the direction of the current. This meant I was either facing straight down, or straight up. Or sideways, I suppose. I was lost. Completely lost.

Faces flittered past my lights. Crushed heads, mouths gaping in horror, teeth bright in the fog of silt and sludge. I grabbed out for them, and my fingers crushed them like they were china-delicate. The bones turned to dust and joined the current, falling down. I scissored my legs and found purchase. Like a strongman towing a train, I strained against my feet, leaning forward, slipping in the raging current. My hands and feet found the river floor. It was littered with bodies that were barely husks. Ribs and skulls burst when I touched them, only their skin left. The hollow husks of beetles burst out from the crushed remains, slipping downstream like bullets. I was still losing ground, barely able to find any sort of purchase on this terrain. My hands were digging through the hollow remains of the Fehn like plows. Their skin was soft under my hands, and no matter how deeply I thrust into them, all I found were more bodies, more yielding skulls, more beetles. The river was choked with the dead.

Just as I was making enough traction to slow down, my feet fell off the edge. I looked back, expecting to see the bright edge of the waterfall. But no, the current wasn't that strong, not yet. I was on some kind of ledge, the river bed falling away for some distance before slowly sloping up. The water was clearer here. Before I could figure out what was going on I was over the ledge and in open water again. The current eddied down and I sank, the force of the water driving me into the pit. I landed flat, driving the air out of me. I gasped into the burning hot air of the suit, trying to choke down even a breath of that forge. Slowly my breathing calmed, and I forced myself to my hands and knees.

The floor here was just as morbid as it had been before the gap. Crushed bodies around me, the hollow shells of the Fehn scattering from my impact. They were all lying face up, arms reaching back upriver. I looked up, and the beams of my lights played off an iron door, round and black, inset below the ridge I had just fallen over. There was almost no turbulence here, despite the current all around. Unnatural. The Fehn lay here in perfect, dead, peace. They were all reaching for that door, the ones closest to it even dying with their fingers scratching at its cold metal. Trying to get in, trying to get away from the river, from the virus I had apparently unleashed upon them.

Trying to get back to the Mother.

This part I hadn't really planned for. Since the Mother was apparently so ancient, I imagined her living in some cave, deep beneath the river. Hadn't expected something quite so… technological. And this door was some serious technology. There were muted panes of frosted glass in the center, a circular window cut into slices like a pie, that undulated with warm blue light. Something like a piano keyboard lay flush beneath the pie. Everything looked clean and new, not as if it had been lying at the bottom of a river for the last dozen generations. Longer, probably. Unless Crane did something to clean them when he got here. I looked around at all the dead Fehn. No, this door was shut during the attack. Probably as soon as the Mother figured out what was going on, before these Fehn could get inside. Some kind of emergency procedure, like the pressure doors in warships. But if that was true, and Valentine's companion Fehn had somehow been in communication with those inside after the attack, only to lose contact later… how did Crane get in there? Assuming he was in here at all, that I wasn't wasting my time down here while Camilla picked the city apart up top.

I rested my hand against the door. Valentine said that Crane got access to the Mother because he controlled some critical mass of the Fehn, what I had taken to calling the cog-dead. I thought about the rows of them standing along the shoreline beneath Water Street. Maybe I was wrong about them. Maybe they weren't guarding the shoreline, but rather projecting Crane's consciousness into the river. Into this bunker, deep beneath the Reine.

There was a sudden vibration in the door. I jerked my hand back, even though I could barely feel the movement through the iron suit. As soon as I was out of contact with the door, the vibration stopped. Carefully, I returned my hand. The vibration started up again. It was like the scratching of a record, the sound you might hear if a towel was stuffed down the speaker horn. I closed my eyes and listened.

A voice. Voices. It was Crane. I remembered that whenever we were near a possession, his voice would come scratching through those pipes. Which meant he was either in there, projecting out, or he was somewhere else, broadcasting into the bunker.

Neither of which mattered, if I couldn't get this door open.

Traveling hand over hand, I pulled myself along the edge of the door to see if there was a seam between the metal and the rock. In the suit it was impossible to get any tactile sense of my surroundings, but it seemed like the join was smooth. As my hands drifted over the door the vibration-voices continued. I paused when it seemed like they were getting louder. Sure enough, the higher I went, the louder the voices and the clearer their words. By the time I got to the top of the door, the words were clear enough for me to be sure it was Crane talking. Crane, and something else that spoke in perfect monotone. I couldn't understand the nature of their conversation. Something about servitors, and initiation sequences.

My search brought me quite close to the top of the ledge. Just feet above me, the current ripped along. Securing myself to the door with a piston-run grapple, I stuck my fingers up into the current. Quite strong. I really had no idea how I was going to get out of here. But I noticed an odd thing. The suit had a pincer arm in the wrist of the left arm, a slow grapple powered by heavy gears that could seize onto the lip of the door. With the pincer firmly gripping the door and the other up in the current, my whole suit hummed with the monotone voice.

"Calibration is dependent on noetic impression of the operator," it droned. "Sufficient interference will recalibrate, regardless of impression."

I snatched my arm back, and the voice subsided. The rock here was knobbly, offering enough grip to secure the grapple higher up. I set the vise firmly into the rock, then hauled my head over the edge. The current battered me, but I held firm. My lights were dim in the silt, but I looked around. Hard to make anything out upriver. I turned and looked downstream. The pit sloped gently up to the normal level of the river, but other than that there wasn't much to see. I was about to turn back when something reddish and brassy caught my eye. The voices had stopped, but as I was peering downriver at this flicker of light, they returned. With my helmet and lamps over the ledge, I touched my boot to the door. The voice returned, and a surge of power pulsed through the suit. My lamps flared into impossible brilliance for a half breath, then faded.

In that fraction of a second I saw pipes. A dozen of them, arranged into two rows perpendicular to the current, their heights and arrangement staggered in almost random ways. They were a new construction, the rock at their bases raw, their brass untouched by time or river.

Crane had installed them. There was his broadcasting facility. That's how he was getting his voice into the Mother.

I pulled myself back down into the calm waters of the pit. Step by step, I worked my way up the sloped incline toward the pipe array. About halfway up I noticed that the ground clutter of smashed skulls and hollow ribs was mostly clear. Here, the rock floor was a webwork of conduit. It was flush with the rock, and freshly laid. More of Crane's work. I felt nothing when I touched it, though, so it must have been insulated. The voices diminished the farther I got from the door, and the current was dragging on me again, now that I was out of the lee of the pit. This was beginning to look like a bad idea.

A gust of the current lifted me and slammed me back into the rock. I gasped, then slammed the slow-closing grapple into the conduit. Another rope of current got under me, and again I was nearly cast back into the river. The grapple finally closed on the metal and I was able to secure myself. The suit only had the one pincer arm, though. What I wouldn't have done for a drill, or a jacksaw.

If I left my hand grappled and bent my legs, so that I was standing in a threepoint stance, I could clearly see the pipe array. If I had something large enough, a net or a log, I could have thrown them down river and tangled them in the pipes. If they were just brass, the additional drag from the log would have… never mind. It was just hopeful thinking. There was no 'log' accessory in the iron suit. I sighed and craned my neck for a better view.

The current almost took me, lifting my feet off the ground and flipping me over like a see-saw. My wrist torqued, and I heard the grapple groan unhappily against the metal conduit. The current slammed me onto the riverbed, nearly dislodging me. I hung there like a flag in a hurricane, screaming at the top of my lungs. Eventually I was able to pull myself down and, dragging along with both arms and the cog-assisted strength of the iron suit, got back into my original situation. I was about to release the grapple and scurry back into the safety of the door when I noticed that my little accident had done a great deal of damage to the conduit. It was pried free of the rock and the thick sheathing had burst. Its metallic guts were exposed to the river. They looked like jellybeans, clear and red and smashed together. I brushed my hand against them.

The suit glowed, the lights flaring again before popping out. The voice came back to my head, loudly.

"What was that?" Crane asked the air. I pulled my hand away, and the lights inside my suit died back to their tranquil glow. The externals didn't come back at all.

Crane wasn't inside. He was in the city, somewhere, communicating with the Fehn via these pipes. And something about the conduits that connected the pipes to the Fehn interacted with the suit. Well. Time to go for broke.

I grappled myself to a different part of the riverbed, then thrust my hand deep into the bubbly red material inside the conduit. There was an immediate snap as the suit surged, all of the systems redlining, the heat sudden and unbearable. Even the grappler creaked as it began to crush the rock beneath it. Crane's voice filled my head, urgent and frightened and then in pain, such pain. Between my fingers the smooth red pebbles in the conduit shivered and grew. The grappling hand snapped shut, grinding the stone into dust that was swept away in the current.

And then the suit went dark. Completely dark. The systems shut down, the internal lights faded into nothing, and I was crushed by an incredible weight. Without power-assisted joints, the iron suit crushed me to the riverbed. The last thing I saw as the glass dome of my helmet cracked into the rock was the bubbly red material in my right hand. The smooth pebbles shivered once more, then went dark, fading from brilliant red to black in the blink of an eye. The fingers of that hand were suddenly cold, and then I was on the floor and couldn't turn my head. Had more important things on my mind.

For example, the air quality quickly went from poor to intolerable. Wilson had said something about the oxygen being recycled and refreshed by something in the suit. If that wasn't happening anymore, I only had the small pockets of air between my body and the suit. If the quality of the air I was gasping right now was any indication, that wouldn't hold out for long.

And the suit itself was heavy. Now that the initial shock of losing control had passed, I was able to push myself up a little. Easier in water, would have been impossible on land, but even in the river it was quite a task. Every joint met with resistance. Getting my hand uncurled so I could get a proper pushup going used muscles in my hand and wrist that I didn't even know I had. And I had to fight against the current as well as the suit. All this effort was using up my air pretty quick.

I thought about throwing myself into the current. That would at least get me downriver. Maybe a lucky eddy would wash me up on shore. That was unlikely. Lurch forward now and I'd end up over the waterfall, nine times out of ten. Well. At least I'd get to open my helmet and breath sweet, sweet air one last time.

Since I was on an incline, I just let my shoulder collapse and roll me down the hill toward the massive door of the Fehn. That would get me out of the current, at least. Of course, it also got me into the carpet of cog-dead who had perished on the Mother's doorstep. It was like a slow motion horror show as I tumbled through that detritus, bones popping as my limp arms thrashed through them. The water filled with a sediment of broken jaws and separated legs and scraps of hair. With the lights out, I could only see this as a patchwork against my helmet.

But there was light. Struggling and gasping for air, I propped myself up and turned toward the bluish glow of the doors. Those pie-shaped bits of glass were pulsing, brighter and brighter, until they locked into a constant brilliance. The rock beneath me shook, and the door separated into six wide slices that met in the middle and, like a fist unclenching, opened. There was a brief current as water was sucked toward the opening, and air belched out. Inside there was light and, apparently, the possibility of air. It was all I had.

Slowly, painfully, I pulled myself to the door and inside the bunker. My arms and legs were bleeding, pinched by the unpowered joints of the suit. My head was pounding. The air was nearly gone, each breath a long, thin gasp that left my lungs hungry. When I collapsed to the floor, the doors began to close. I thought it was too late. That I couldn't even move to unseal the suit and let air in. That the doors were closing too slowly. That I was going to die here, on the bottom of the Reine, with a carpet of the undead as my funeral pillow. That it was getting awfully dark, and awfully cold.

I woke up shivering. The light around me was even and warm. Very white. When I breathed in, the air was clean and cold. I opened my eyes. Still in the suit, but the seams were open. My helmet was unsealed, the glass leaves of the dome pulled back. The edges of my vision were spotted, but otherwise I felt okay.

Not spotted. There were tiny black circles on the glass of the helmet. I raised my arm, freeing it from the unbuttoned sleeve of the suit, and a rain of oblong black forms cascaded from my skin. I sat up and tried to shout, but my mouth was clogged. Hadn't I been breathing clean air, so sweet, just a second ago? I gagged, and wriggling black slugs fell into my lap. I screamed again, and this time got it off. A nice, high pitched shriek. I was sitting in the middle of a sea of the squirmy little bastards. They cleared away from me like I'd dropped fire on their heads, rippling away like a scabrous pond.

The room I was in was small, the walls and floor apparently metal. I say apparently, because all I could see was the small area around the suit, where I had just scared away all those little slugs. They were a couple inches long, about an inch wide. Black. They writhed over each other, blindly sensing each other. They clustered around the corners of the room.

These were the Fehn in their purest form. The walking dead that we usually referred to as Fehn were really just symbiotes. Carriers. Those who died in the river risked joining their ranks. The slugs filled them, choked their lungs and veins, ate out their brains and leeched onto their muscles. They maintained something like their living personalities, only infinitely older. Sadder. And they spoke as one, with the river.

You usually didn't see them naked like this. Every once in a while there would be a report of a vein of squirming blackness among the currents of the river. People would stay off the river for a week. Then everyone would go back to normal, and we'd forget about it.

The light in the room came from a globe, about three feet in diameter, supported on a pillar of the writhing Fehn-slugs. The globe was held in a carapace of silver, a framework of plates and pipes that looked like armor, only they did nothing to conceal the brilliant globe of light within. Perhaps it was some kind of containment device, like the filament structure that held the element in a frictionlamp. The pillar shifted liquidly, and the globe got closer. Turned to me, like a giant eye.

"Apologies, user. Certain subroutines are proactive." The voice came out of the room, as though the walls were talking. Perfect monotone, no inflection. And very few words that I understood.

"Certain sub-teens are damned creepy," I muttered. "I take it you're the Mother Fehn."

Globe-on-a-stick rotated slightly, precisely, then back, a dozen times. Like an escapement, each rotation very crisp.

"Acceptable," it replied.

"Right. Acceptable." I stood up, shivering as a handful of Fehn-slugs clattered to the floor, falling from hidden folds of my person. "Sorry about those pipes. Hope I didn't cause you any discomfort."

"The fetters. The user was disconcerted about their removal. His displeasure was measured corporeally." Rotate, spin, slither closer. "Remunerations are due."

"Uh, so." I backed away, stepping carefully out of the suit. "You're upset by this?"

"Remunerations are due, and the balance will be paid." The whole pillar undulated as the Mother approached, its base a carpet of slugs. As it approached, the carpet overran my suit. Halfway through consuming it the Mother paused and lowered her eye-globe to the ground. "New schematic. Processing."

The slugs in the room shifted, then dived for the suit. I pranced out of the way as they swarmed over the iron carapace. I wasn't going to be able to get back in there, no matter what. The memory of wriggling slugs in my throat was too much, and watching them treat the suit like a lunch buffet was disconcerting. That could be me, if I hadn't woken up.

"Archived," the Mother declared, then returned her attention to me. "Remuneration."

I held out my hands. I didn't want to be remunerated, whether that meant the Mother intended to pay me, or if it felt I owed it something. Didn't want to know what sort of currency the Mother of the Fehn dealt in.

"The man who fettered you — wait a second." She was still approaching me. "The man who installed those pipes and killed all of your children, his name is Ezekiel Crane. Or Maker, if you know that name."

That stopped her. If a giant globe of light on top of a pillar of squirming slugs could ever be called curious, then the Mother Fehn was curious.

"The Family Maker was exiled in the eightieth year of the Reclamation, as declared by the Founders of the city. Their kin was purged. Their tree was burned to the root."

Strange to hear such an alien creature speaking in metaphor. I shrugged, then explained what I knew of Crane. What he had done, and what he was trying to do. She waited attentively until I was done. I ended with my theory that Crane had allowed himself to be captured by the angel Camilla, although I could only speculate as to what end. The Mother didn't move for several seconds, then turned to face me with its broad, glowing eye.

"These are relevant historical notes. Thank you for entering them into the archive. Will user be available to supplement the archive following the events at the Church of the Algorithm?"

"Supplement?" I asked.

"This line of history is not complete. We would like our records to be accurate."

"I'm not recording this for history. I want to know if there's anything you can do about it."

"Record. Archive. Report," the Mother said. "What we have always done."

"Is there anything you can tell me about how to stop it?"

"Disambiguate. Stop recording. Stop archiving. Stop ambient lighting function. Stop communications…"

"Stop it," I snapped, then realized that would just require further disambiguation. "I need to know how to stop Crane from destroying the city. I need to know what he's done to Camilla, or what he plans to do."

"Conjecture. Outside of parameters. Restate."

"Gods in hell, this was a valuable outing." I rubbed my face, then started when I opened my eyes. The slugs had formed a circle around me, leaving only a few feet in all directions. "Get these damned things away from me!"

"Clarify range requirements."

"Away!"

"Estimating," the Mother said, then rotated slightly. The slugs backed off. Four inches.

"Much, much farther away," I snapped. The slugs fled to the far corners of the room. I sighed. "Good enough. Now. What was it that Valentine said about you. That you were something like a library, only a mad little bit of one? That seems pretty accurate. Mother, what do you know about Crane's plans for Camilla?"

"Cross-referencing previous user with queries regarding the servitor colloquially known as Camilla. Result. Transcript begins…"

"Summarize," I said.

"Summary. There are three hundred fifty three direct instances of nodal activity on this subject. Fifty-two additional instances can be related to similar…"

"Never mind. Give me the transcript."

"Verbal or printed?"

"Printed?"

Paper appeared. For all the world, it looked like a pile of slugs in the corner vomited a neat stack of papers, and there were fewer slugs in that area afterward. It was as creepy a bit of administrative work as I've ever seen.

But the transcript was fascinating. Crane spent a lot of time struggling with the Mother's peculiar way of communicating. He kept interrupting her and restating his questions in continually more complicated ways. I lost the train of their conversation frequently. But so did Crane, if the number of times he had to start his line of questioning over from the beginning was any indication.

A pattern emerged. There were two lines of inquiry. First, Crane asked a lot of questions about the connection between how cogwork and the Artificers' magic worked. Apparently they were the same discipline, differently practiced. I didn't know enough about that to really understand it, other than to say that Wilson's theory was correct. Ezekiel's crows served the same purpose as the maker beetles, providing material and schematics to whatever the user was trying to create. Where he lost me was the connection between the maker beetles and foetal metal.

Cogwork was created through the use of foetal metal, a silvery liquid similar to mercury, only more pewter in color. Some sort of pattern was imposed on the metal, usually through the use of memorized calculations and other near-mystic mental techniques. Understanding how those patterns were formed was the Wright's talent, supposedly gifted to him by his years of study in the revelation of the Algorithm. The metal was then injected into the subject, and cogwork formed like crystals in suspension. This was why cogwork only functioned in living creatures, why the zepliners required the living machine of the pilot to function. Something about the blood, or the flesh.

And apparently the Artificers worked in similar ways, except they seemed to believe that the foetal metal was already in all living things, and only needed to be tapped. I would call it crazy, but I had lost track of the meaning of that word in the last couple days. After all, I was having a conversation with a ball of light and a pillar of slugs. Crazy was relative.

Crane's second line of questioning involved the workings of something called a servitor. The Mother Fehn had referred to Camilla as a servitor, I recalled. There was nothing about her that seemed very servant-like to me. Then again, when we had spoken two years ago she referred to herself as a messenger, and the one pursuing me as a destroyer. As though she had been built for one purpose, and he had been built for another. And the key to those roles had been their cog-hearts. The pattern of their design depended on those hearts. Without them, they could not hold together for long. With them, they could rewrite themselves into different tasks, depending on the heart. Camilla had wanted the destroyer's heart, so she could free herself and wreak a little vengeance on the city.

The connection hit me like a bolt out of the sky. Camilla and her angel-kind used the most complicated patterns the city of Veridon had ever seen. Every technology, every bit of cogwork, was simply a derivation on those patterns. A cutting from the mother tree. We had never been able to access the true pattern at the center of the heart. Never would, since it was far too complicated for the memorization tricks that the Wrights employed. The pattern had to been held in your mind, while the foetal metal was applied.

But if the foetal metal could be applied directly to the pattern, what then? What would come of that? And if the Artificers were right, and that metal was really just a distillation of something that existed in all living creatures, who's to say that you couldn't apply someone directly to the pattern? That must be how the Artificer's magic was done. It explained how Crane was able to possess my father, even though dad didn't have any cogwork. Usually Artificers had to perform their tricks on carefully cogged and manipulated volunteers. To forcefully take over a creature without the assistance of cogwork implied that the pattern was being applied directly to the flesh.

Crane must be trying to get his hands on the angel's heart. To apply it to his flesh. To become something else. But what? And more importantly, how to stop him? I didn't even know where he was. Camilla was relatively free, powered by the foetal metal provided by Crane's murder of crows, surrounded by his cog-dead Wrights, and intent on disassembling the Church of the Algorithm. What was he waiting for? Was the pattern of the heart somehow incomplete, from having been separated from Camilla for so many years? Or was he simply waiting to strike when she was distracted with other tasks?

Whatever happened, it was going to happen at the Church of the Algorithm. I had a vague sense of what was going on, and what it implied. I imagined that if I could get this information to Wilson, or that mad bitch Veronica, they could do more with it than merely speculate. But I was trapped here. The suit was fried, and even if I could get it to work again, I had no way to fight my way against the current.

I put the papers down and rubbed my eyes. The Mother was looming over me.

"Don't you have something else you could be doing?" I asked. "Something not quite so creepy?"

"Restate."

I sighed and stood up. How long had I been sitting there, reading? How bad had things gotten up top, while I hid in an underwater bunker with a room full of slugs and made up stories about what might be happening?

"I think Crane is trying to make himself into a god. Or a reasonable pattern of one."

"Your superstitions are of interest to me. Would you like to sit and record them for me?"

"No, I wouldn't. I don't want to add to your archive, any more than I already have." I tried to walk around it, but the Mother had placed itself in an awkward place in the room, so I couldn't get past without stepping on its rubbery carpet of slugs. "You don't get many guests here, do you?"

"Very few who are still cognizant of their situation." The globe followed me as I tip-toed around it. "You are done with the record?"

"Unless you have something that can get me up to the Church," I said.

"You are lost. Recommended actions include retracing your steps. Alternatively, shelter where you are and wait for help to arrive."

"There are people up there, sheltering, waiting for me to arrive. I'm the help, get it?"

"Confirm. Recommend return via previous path."

I laughed. Like I was getting in that suit after it had been covered in slugs, even if it worked. I gave the helmet a kick.

"Suit's busted," I said.

"Assessment incomplete. Scanning. Evaluation negative due to primitive condition of the sample set. Do you require an analog?"

"You can fix the suit?"

"No. Archival samples must remain pristine, for future reference."

"You can't fix the suit, so what the hell can you do?"

The globe passed its gaze over me a dozen times in half a breath.

"There are many broken things. All of them can be repaired."

I rubbed my face. I was beginning to regret not drifting off in the pleasant blackness of oxygen deprivation, out there on the river floor. That seemed so much simpler.

"Whatever. Fix what you have to. Just get me up to the Church."

"Disambiguation. Do you want to go to the Church of the Algorithm, or do you want the suit to go to the Church of the Algorithm."

"I haven't seen the suit in a fight, but I'm willing to bet I could lick it. I need to get up there, Mother."

"Clarified. Please remain still."

The whole pillar of slugs shifted toward me. I took a step back.

"Clarification. Any movement on your part could result in severe and permanent damage, including but not limited to death." The globe paused for half a breath, then repeated. "Please remain still."

"What the fuck?" I yelped. The next time it slithered forward, I practically ran away. Not a lot of room to run, but I made up for the lack of distance with speed. "Get away from me."

"Clarification. Do. Not. Move."

The globe pulsed, the plates and pipes that clasped the core of light rattling like a windchime, and then the room was pure light and heat. And then blackness, and I was gone.

Twice in a row. I got in here with my lights out. I was getting out the same way.

Chapter Nineteen

Burning Bright

I felt alive. Alive like I'd never been, alive like a star falling out of the sky. Burning alive. My lungs were on fire, and my blood was glowing in my veins. The rational part of my mind said this was all very bad, but I didn't care. Everything felt good.

I rode a column of wriggling black slugs up out of the river. They got me to the shore, miles downriver of the city's gate and within sight of the waterfall that had nearly claimed my life. The far horizon was filled with the broad fields of the Arbarra Rare, the distant land that we had seen for generations but never reached until the invention of the zepliner. I pulled myself onto the muddy bank of the Reine and turned my face to Veridon. And ran.

I don't know what the Mother Fehn did to me, but it was amazing. Didn't get tired, didn't hurt. My hands were clean and new, like she had washed them clean of a lifetime of scabs and calluses and work. That's how I felt, all the way down to my bones. New. Clean. I trotted down the river road toward Veridon, and my legs ate up the distance. In no time at all I was passing through the scattered homes leading up to the city, and then the city gate itself. The broad gate was closed. Rare enough, in these days of zepliners and automated carriages, long years since siegecraft was even practiced. The gate was no challenge. I took it hand over hand, scaling the iron grating and hauling myself over the unmanned gatehouse. Didn't stop to think how unlikely that was, how it was a good ten feet from the top of the gate to the top of the wall, and that I had just swung myself up there like it was nothing. Of course I could manage that. Feeling as good as I did, I could manage anything.

From the gatehouse I could see the city laid out in front of me, the streets still empty in the wake of the curfew. All of my fatigue was gone, all my doubt. Three things caught my eye: the column of smoke that rose from the Manor Burn; the black, circling bands of crows around the Church of the Algorithm on the far side of the city; and, finally, the cracked husk of the Manor Tomb. A grand tree was growing out of it, wretched and knobbly, poking through the windows and shrugging aside walls like a giant. The tree was bare, and stood half again as tall as the Manor itself. It looked like a seed pod that had burst its shell.

I knew instinctively. That was the Patron, or what was left of him. Not dying, but living in such a way that he couldn't really be called alive. Crane had eradicated the Family Tomb, their lineage, their place on the Council, and their holdings. All in one blow.

Trouble for later. I turned my face to the Church of the Algorithm, and hopped from the gatehouse down to the street below. Thirty feet, and I landed without a bruise. Pushed that into the back of my mind, and just ran.

Everything seemed brighter. Clouds still hung low and heavy across the city, but the frictionlamps that lined the streets burned sharp in my mind. I lost myself in the smooth effort of running, the cobblestone streets passing under my feet like a dream. I breathed, and the city breathed with me. Faces peered out at me from closed houses, eyes wide, as I rushed past. I thought about waving, to reassure them, but I wasn't sure that would help. Wasn't sure what I looked like. A madman running through the streets, faster than thought.

Valentine had given me a revolver. I had forgotten. As I crested the last terrace and began my descent to the Church, I unholstered the piece and checked the load. Looked good. There were additional rounds in my belt, shiny against the dark leather. Worry about their time in the river vanished under the all-consuming optimism of whatever was flowing through my veins. My clothes weren't wet. Why would my shells be damaged?

Why weren't my clothes wet? Never mind, just run. Run and run and run.

There was the Church. The engines had stopped, finally ground shut by whatever Camilla — or Crane — was doing deep below. The courtyard was clear, but there were Wrights standing at the gates. Wrights with guns. I adjusted my track to keep buildings between us, but they had already seen me. Signals were given. Rifles were raised. I grinned and ran on.

Ran faster, in fact. I was having trouble keeping up with my feet. Felt like something was running through me, some vast eye that was burning through my body. My grin had become stiff, my hands quaking from the presence of that terrible mind. The Wrights' first shots danced off the cobbles by my feet, off the walls, whistled high overhead. Warning shots, or poor aim. Rational Jacob would have ducked for cover and found a better way to approach. Rational Jacob would have tricked his way in, or given up and floated down the river. Rational Jacob would not smile and run straight at them. I was not Rational Jacob.

I came out of the street that opened onto the courtyard in front of the Church, dodging to one side as I hit the cobbles. There was a wagon, a supply wain that had been left there by its owner, prior to the curfew. I ducked behind it and kicked the stops out from its wheels. With a great, groaning heave, I set my shoulder against it and started it moving. Faster and faster, each time I shoved my shoulder into it. Once I had some speed I fluttered the brakes on the inside wheel and turned the wagon toward the gates. Slightly offset, so I would have cover for most of the approach. There was enough of an incline that I didn't have to give it much, once inertia took over. I drew my revolver and threw my arm around the edge, firing blindly. Bullets clattered at the wheels of the wagon, ricocheting up into the wood, or past my legs. Good shots, these Wrights. I put a hand on the corner of the wagon and kept pushing, accelerating toward the gate. Still grinning.

One of the Wrights got smart and maneuvered for position. I saw him scrambling between barrels, getting far enough to the side that the wagon was no longer between us. But line of sight goes both ways. I put a shot into his shoulder, and another into his leg, and then the hammer fell on an empty cylinder. Still running, I tossed the cylinder open and thumbed six fresh rounds into the slots. By the time I'd reloaded, I could see the wall of the Church gate over the top of the wagon.

Impact.

The wagon went sideways into the bars and smashed. Splinters went into my arm as I covered my face. I vaulted the wreckage of the wagon and kicked at the gate. It was already bent beyond its limits, and my boot struck the perfect spot. The right hand gate creaked and fell into the Church courtyard, rattling like a dropped saucer.

The second Wright stood up from where he had taken cover from the wreck, rifle at his shoulder. I put a shot into his chest even before he had the rifle clear. Good shots, these two, but poor at close tactics. Probably not a lot of cause for small-unit maneuvers inside the Church.

I dropped into the Church grounds and started walking toward the chapel's side door. These were wooden doors, cheap. A recent addition, bolted on as the Algorithm inside grew and swelled and new entrances were needed as old ones were choked shut by the engines of god. I was more careful now. Surely the crash would have been heard inside. They knew I was coming, or that someone was coming. There were a lot of windows looking down into the courtyard, but I didn't see any faces.

No way but the direct way. I rested my hand on the wrought iron handle of the door, breathing deeply. The iron was cold and my palms were sweating. Nothing to hear inside. Nothing to do but go at it. I pulled the door open and stepped inside.

The chamber was dark and cold. I had never been in here when the engines of the Algorithm weren't going. It made sense that the Engine would stop — the whole place ran on the angel's heart, and if Camilla had reclaimed that cog, then it should all shut down — but the lights should still be on. I walked forward carefully, keeping the pistol close to my hip, the other arm up to foil any attempts at disarming me. My boots were loud on the slate floor.

With just the light from the door, the gears and cogwork that crowded the chamber were reduced to spiny shadows. After a dozen steps I lost track of the clear path through the room. I bumped into a pillar bristling with machinery. The impact shifted some of the clockwork forward, setting off a series of clinking actions above me. I knelt down, in case someone with better vision heard me and looked this way. Not like I hadn't been silhouetted every step of the way. When I heard no other movement, I crept around the pillar, hand trailing along the ground.

They started by putting a boot down on that hand. I looked up at the crushing pain, just in time to see a boot swinging at the pistol in my other hand.

I was fast enough to deflect that, the boot just glancing off my forearm. I tried to stand, but my hand was trapped. Heavy, whoever it was. Another shadow stepped around the pillar and raised something long and heavy-looking over its head. I barreled into the body standing on my hand, crashing into a pair of legs and then something that felt like a pew. Behind me, the second shadow swung his weapon at the floor. A shower of sparks flowered in the darkness, and I could see that my assailants were robed, and large.

The guy I had bowled over grabbed me by the back of my neck and hugged me toward him, smothering my face against a chest that smelled like raw meat. Before I could bring the revolver around, he pinned that hand against the floor. I punched him twice with my injured left hand, right into the armpit. Probably hurt me more than him, but I was still riding whatever it was the Mother had done to me. Tried to stand, just in time to take a shot across my back from the second attacker. He over-reached his swing, but there was something sharp on the head of that club, like an ax or pick. Metal cut into my ribs as he pulled back to swing again. Enough screwing around.

I rolled toward my pinned gun hand, pulling the first attacker over me like a big, meaty blanket. The other guy had already swung; I heard the impact and the oaths when he realized he had his own guy. I squirmed until the revolver came free, then squeezed off two shots without worrying about where the barrel was pointed. The shots went wide, clanging loudly off the gearwork all around, but the muzzle flash did the job. With a smell of burned flesh, the guy on top of me jumped back. I lay an elbow against his neck and pushed him into his friend. They went down and I stood, emptying the cylinder into their dark shadows. The flash lit up the room like a lightning strike. Just two guys in robes, their eyes wide as the lead went home.

Still grinning. Really wishing I could do something about that. I felt hot all over, and there was a sheen of sweat across my brow, even though the room was cold. Freezing, even.

Lights started coming on in the hallways leading into the chamber. There was shouting, too, but that was coming from outside. Couldn't stay where I was, and I didn't want to go down either of the lit hallways. In the ambient light I was able to find a dark corridor. Good enough for me. Took the time to slot six more shots into the revolver, then jogged down the new corridor with one arm outstretched. Little chance I was going to surprise many more folks, not the way I was going.

This hall went up, which wasn't ideal. Getting caught was less ideal. I quickly found myself among the living quarters of the Wrights, all abandoned. Signs of struggle, blood on the walls, barricades that had been broken open. So his control of the Wrighthood was incomplete, or had been. Maybe Crane was stretching himself beyond his capacity. A lot of dead Fehn in the river for him to track, plus all the Wrights. Plus whatever he had going on with Camilla. She clearly thought she was the one in control, so maybe he was having to keep a low profile.

I came to a hallway lined with arched windows on both sides. It was a walkway between two parts of the building. The light was a relief, but it really wasn't much light. The skies outside were nearly night-dark, and rain was beating against the glass with heavy hands. Even in the miserable weather, a lazy spiral of crows orbited the Church. It seemed like more and more of the birds gathered with each passing minute. Was Crane using them as his eyes, or were these just soldiers, waiting for their orders? No telling. Not from in here, at least, and I had no desire to go out there and interrogate them. The whole lot of them seemed to be circling the lower terraces of the Church, the river-side of the building, where the Wrights kept their greenhouses. Almost like they were pointing to something, or waiting.

Or standing guard. I had seen him possess my father, but I hadn't seen the real Crane since he spotted us with his crows while Wilson and I were spying on him. If that had really been him. But he had to be somewhere, broadcasting his attention through these damn birds. For a while now, I had been assuming that he was holed up in some nondescript warehouse somewhere, locked into a crate or a vault or just hidden in plain sight. There was too much geography in Veridon to really do a thorough search, not with the kind of time we had. So I opted to head off his plans, rather than hunt down the man himself.

But what's to say that he wasn't in the Church somewhere? If he really meant to make a play for the angel, that would be a delicate operation. Maybe he needed to be on site? Camilla seemed pretty confident that they had captured Crane. And maybe they had, or at least he had allowed himself to be taken, so that he could be close when the next phase of his plan went down. Whatever that was.

I looked from the lazy cyclone of crows to the bulbous domes where I had left Wilson in Camilla's custody. Would he still be there? Different directions. I could get to both, but I had to pick which one to hit first. Save Wilson, kill Crane.

They seemed like the same thing, to my addled mind. That grin came back, stiff and tight. Shells clattered to the floor and I reloaded. Gotta be careful with my shots. Not many bright little shells left on my belt, and I had so many people to shoot. So many people to put down.

But first, Crane. Like I should have when we first met. Such trouble that would have saved.

Mottled gray light glimmered through the thick panes of the greenhouse, illuminating the room in a dull, pewter-like glow. There was no other light. Rows of wretched shrubbery huddled under the vaulted glass ceiling. It was cold in here, colder than the rest of the building. Like the glass panes were made of ice, sucking the warmth out of the damp, foggy air. Raised crosswalks ran between the plants, so that I was walking among their leaves. Below me was dirt and the creaking pipes of the irrigation system. Above me, beyond the greenhouse ceiling, the crows circled.

Crane was here, under guard. From the entrance to the greenhouse I could see four small fires at the center of the room, glimmering in their brass braziers. Crane stood in the middle of them, bound tightly in a tall cage, not much wider than his chest. His arms were bound to the bars, and his head was bolted into an iron box. Around him stood a dozen former Wrights, all of them showing signs of having changed into the cog-dead. These were presumably still under Camilla's control.

Logical Jacob would have dropped down among the trees and snuck up to the central platform. Taken them from below. But that grin was in place, and whatever fire the Mother Fehn had kindled in my blood was having no patience with stealth. I walked right down the center of the aisle, revolver in hand. Didn't take them long to see me. One waved and came to meet me halfway, leaving his brothers behind. It was a former Elder, his lips smeared in the stiff black gore of the cog-dead.

"Jacob Burn," he said. "We wondered if you would return. As poetic as your execution was, we began to doubt it would be sufficient to kill you off. Did the girl survive?"

"She did. Don't know where she is now, though."

"Of course. Why keep track of your ladies?" he said, smiling. When he was about ten feet away I raised the revolver and he stopped, hands up. "Calmly, Jacob. This is something we can talk through."

"I'm here to kill Crane, your master," I said. "So I don't really have time for talking."

"You always seem to have time for talking, Jacob. And you're mistaken. Camilla is in our hearts, and in our souls. This man Crane is merely the conduit."

"You're about to get bitten by your conduit, Cam." I addressed the cage. "He's had access to the Mother Fehn. He knew you were here. You're the one who's trapped."

"She can't hear you, Jacob. The connection's not that good." The Elder folded his arms and cocked his head at me. "But we really can't let you kill this man. He's proving very useful."

"As useful as he wants to be," I said. "Useful until he's figured his way into your angel's head. Then we'll see how useful he is to you."

"Listen, I know you're the hero type and all, but we really do have things properly in hand, here. You're nothing but a distraction, Jacob. That must be terribly disappointing, hmm? Not being anything more than in the way?"

"Listen to me. Crane knew Camilla was here. He didn't fly into a trap, no matter what Camilla thinks. He came here to get close to the angel, to figure her out. Right now, in that cage, he's worming his way into her. Through you, most likely."

"Jacob, you offend me. As if we know nothing of our opponent." He raised a hand dramatically to the cage, sweeping to take in the whole room. "You're right, the Church is a dangerous place for him. His power seems to derive from cogwork, and we have more than a little of that here. But not in this room. Nothing but plants and glass. We even have fires to light our vigil, rather than frictionlamps. So, as you can see, everything is under control." He turned back to me. "Now. Get out of the Church, or we're going to have to kill you."

"It'll take more than an Elder and a dozen dead Wrights to stop me, sir."

"We know. That's why we've been talking, you and I." His face became serious, all of the genial glee washed out. "Chatting away while my friends showed up."

Light from below. Torches. The room was filled with Wrights, each holding a torch, creeping along the paths between the trees, under the crosswalks. Dozens of them. Maybe a hundred. Maybe more.

"Yeah," I whispered, looking down and flexing my free hand. "That's probably enough."

"Right. Crane has played with you, Jacob. He got you to deliver the virus to the Fehn, he got you to disrupt the Council enough that they turned their attention inward, instead of looking for the threat from outside. They spent so much energy wondering if you were working for the other Families, trying to start a civil war in their midst, that they never saw Crane. Right under their eyes. And now he's arranged events to convince you that you need to kill his body. I don't know why, or what purpose it could serve. But Camilla has seen enough of this game to know that whatever you're doing, no matter how clever you think you're being, it's just Crane pulling your strings. So if you'll just surrender your weapon and come with us, we can get past this bit of unpleasantness and proceed with Camilla's plans for you."

"I said 'probably,' Elder." And snapped the pistol up, put one in his forehead, bulled him off the edge of the platform and made a break for Crane.

They rushed me, but the platform was only so big. The dozen that were up here already were the only ones that had a chance to stop me. I only had so many bullets and the quarters were tight, so I wrapped my fist around the cylinder of the revolver and used it like iron knuckles, battering my way forward.

They had hammers, but the Wrights were clumsy. Clumsy and strong. The first one I punched twice in the face, each blow shattering bone, but it wasn't until the third strike that he stumbled backwards. Didn't fall. Just stumbled. And then his companion was on me, hammers swinging. I dodged to the side, then jumped forward to get under the arc of the backswing. Caught his elbow with my shoulder, ducked under and lay the barrel of the revolver against his armpit. The shot came out the top of his skull and he slumped. One less bullet, and still ten guys up here, and dozens more at my feet, clambering up the support girders to the crosswalk.

I snatched up the fallen Wright's hammer in my other hand, flipped the revolver around so I could use it as a sap, and turned back to the guy whose face I had dented. He was swaying, arms outstretched, waving about. I came at him from the side, switching blows with the hammer and the grip, drumming his head until he keeled over. Two down. I turned back to Crane.

The rest of the Wrights had gotten organized. They stood in a loose half-circle between me and the cage. I was hurt, my rational mind could feel the bruises where hammers had skidded off my shoulder and arm, but the Mother burning through my veins was still grinning. Still going. I supposed I should be glad for that. Rational Jacob would be down on his knees, howling. Then again, Rational Jacob probably wouldn't get me killed. I had no idea what the Mother burning through me was planning, but it felt kind of terminal.

Beneath me, the crosswalk shuddered. The dozens of Wright who were climbing up it clenched their fists and hugged the metal, but a couple fell screaming to the dirt below. I almost lost my feet. The clumsy Wrights squatted and looked around, bewildered.

Not sure what caused that. Not sure I cared. It was all the opening I was going to get. I threw myself at the center of their little arc, shouldered into the lead guy and spun around once. I put each of my tools, the hammer and the gun, into the side of his knee. As he buckled I grabbed the hem of his robe and pulled him over me like a cape, putting him between me and the fastest-reacting of his companions. His pal swung with abandon, doing him a lot of harm, even after I rolled clear. Took them a second to refocus on me, and by then I was circling behind the cage. They closed on me like a pincer.

The one to my left looked a little weaker, in the sense that he actually had a neck and fairly average shoulders, as opposed the rest of the brutes. Camilla had picked her biggest Wrights for this little duty, and they were all built like pack-mules. But this guy was the least pack-mulish of the bunch, so I jumped at him.

He was clearly chosen for his speed. While the others were strong and slow, he was strong and fast. Worst choice I could have made, attacking this guy. Just add it to the list. He dodged my attack and put the flat of his hammer between my shoulder blades. Only thing that saved me was the fact that I tripped, so the blow skipped off my back like a stone on water. Hurt like hell, though.

Down on my hands and knees, I decided that maybe this guy warranted a bullet. I rolled onto my hip and brought the revolver up, flipping it around so that the barrel was pointing in the right direction. He had a similar idea, or at least recognized the possibility. Hadn't even gotten my finger properly inside the trigger guard before his boot came up, slapping the revolver off target. I didn't drop it, but it was a close thing. He followed through, stomping on my gun hand, crushing it between the revolver and the iron crosswalk. I screamed, in pain and frustration, the animal rage of the Mother in my veins. The Wright smiled.

"Enough out of you, Jacob Burn," he growled. Wrapped both meaty hands around his hammer and raised it up. The others crowded eagerly in. "Enough trouble out of you."

I leaned back, then brought my forehead into his crotch. Good news, that works on the cog-dead, too. Wasn't sure if it would. He winced and stumbled, enough that I could work the revolver out from under his foot. I drove the elbow of that arm into his inner thigh, then, standing and putting the full force of my legs and back into it, I smashed the grip of the revolver under his chin. He crumpled.

His friends looked briefly disappointed, then murderous. This wasn't going to last much longer. Had to find a linchpin, or they were just going to butcher me here and let my blood feed the trees.

I shot the first one, then the second. That was enough of a gap for me to push through, even before their bodies hit the grating. Still had the hammer in my other hand, and I brought it down on the lock that held Crane in. It shattered with a satisfying flower of sparks, and Crane fell out of the cage. His arms were still bound, so he hung awkwardly by his shoulders, face down, like a man waiting for the ax. I provided the ax. A quick blow on the lock freed him from the iron box holding his head, and then I put the barrel behind his ear and held my other hand up.

"Crane is your conduit," I yelled as loud as I could. "Stop, or you're all dead."

They stopped, more from uncertainty than any kind of fear. All I could ask for.

"The Elder said that Crane was serving as Camilla's conduit," I said as loudly as I could. My breath was coming in ragged gasps, and my arms were shaking. The Mother was burning out of me. "Stands to reason that if he dies, the tap dies with him. And whatever power he's using to keep you alive goes with it. Camilla loses her loyal little army. So, back off."

"You're out of bullets," the nearest Wright sneered.

"I can count, buddy. Four shots. Two left. I could miss and still end him. But really," I shoved the barrel against Crane's skull. "Do you think I'm going to miss?"

They didn't move. Thinking it out. This was working. It was going to work. All I needed to do was get Crane out of here and then kill him at my leisure. It was working.

A cold hand closed around my wrist. I looked down. Crane had slipped his bonds and was straightening up. Shocked, I pulled the trigger. The gun crumbled into rust in my hand, the flakes gritty between my fingers. Crane patted me on the shoulder.

"Wasn't sure I had that in me. Off-the-cuff transmutations can be tricky, but you gave me just enough time with your tough talk. Good work, Jacob. Such a good lad."

Chapter Twenty

The Silent Chorus

I swung the hammer at his face. He caught my wrist in his other hand and, with a twist of his shoulders, threw me to the floor at the feet of the Wrights. They reached for me.

"Now, now. You can kill him when I'm done. Shouldn't be long, now." He waved a hand dismissively, and they fell back as if a wave of force had bowled them over. They lay lifeless on the ground. One was left hanging limply over the edge of the walkway; slowly, he slid over the edge and hit the dirt with a dull thud. I scrambled to my feet and switched the hammer to my right hand.

"You may put up a fight, Jacob. I admire that kind of energy. Speaks well for the Fehn, too, don't you think?"

"I don't know what you're talking about," I said through my tight grin. "This is me killing you, Crane. No one else."

"Oh, no. I know better. I can smell her in you. By the way, I like what you did with the masts, down there in the river. I wasn't sure how you were going to figure that out, but if there's one thing I've learned about you, Jacob, it's that you can be trusted to work your way out of difficult situations. You're almost as adept at that as you are at getting into those situations. Marvelous talent."

I like it when they talk. Keeps them from paying attention to me. While Crane was picking bits of rust off his palms, I slid forward and came at him with the hammer. The first two swings bounced off his forearms, quick blocks that overbalanced me, then he drove a fist into my gut, just below my bellybutton. My bladder voided and I sat down. Inglorious.

"For example, I wasn't sure if you'd take Valentine up on his offer. He can be persuasive, but you can be stubborn. See, I was running out of time. The Mother was never going to give me what I needed. Could see right through me, that one. Awfully clever for a memetic library." He picked up a hammer from one of the fallen Wrights and twirled it in his hands, curiously. "But I knew that if I could get you in there, convince her that you sincerely wanted me dead. Well. I was sure she'd give you what I needed, if only to help you kill me. Bitch never liked me."

I stood, still bent over in pain. Still had the hammer, though.

"I don't know what you're talking about," I said.

"No, you probably don't. Because if you knew, you wouldn't risk coming here. Wouldn't come within a thousand miles of me, or Camilla either, for that matter. You see, Jacob, the Mother is very old. Older than Veridon. Older than Camilla, or the Algorithm, or that curious city downfalls that your Council discovered. The one on the map, that the angels refer to as 'home.' And she knows a lot of things. More than even she realizes, I think."

I pulled myself upright and came at him. He casually knocked me aside, took the hammer, then laid it heavily across my face. I crumpled. He kicked me down and leaned over me.

"This is what she did, whether she realized it or not. She wanted you to kill me. Wanted to help you do that. Which was nice of her. And she knew enough about my plans up here to know that no mere mortal could face me. So she rebuilt you, at a very fundamental level. It helps that there was already some pattern there, traces left over from the heart Camilla gave you, and from your encounters with the Destroyer two years ago. Yes, you were an ideal vessel. She would have seen that, and the pattern she gave you would have been quite impressive."

I rolled onto my face and pushed up onto my hands and knees. Blood drooled from my busted lips. I coughed, and deep things moved wetly in my chest.

"Not impressive enough," I gasped. He laughed.

"No, not quite. But the Mother couldn't have had the full scope of it." He straightened and raised his arms. "What did the Elder say? My power seems to derive from cogwork. Well, yes and no. Mostly no."

I looked up at him, and things fell into place. This room, the trees. Living things.

"Yes, you see it. The Artificer is like the cogworker, except he realizes that what you refer to as foetal metal is actually the distillation of something that seems to flow through all living things. Maker beetles, my crows. Your flesh. And, most important to our current situation, trees." His smile was startlingly bright in the gloom. He seemed to grow larger. "I think it's a leftover from the time of the Celesteans. They were people, you know. Just people, with a very fundamentally different way of viewing the world. It's like they could see to the heart of a thing, and change it. Amazing people. I like to think that what I'm doing is just an extension of their empire. Interrupted by a period of barbarism, of course."

"You're full of shit," I spat.

"Always with the snappy comeback. What I am full of, Jacob, is cogwork. Or its essential elements, at least. I think the Celesteans weaved this material, whatever it is, into the world. They could remake the world at a touch, turn one thing into another. Turn themselves into other things. Fill their lungs with machines, or their eyes with crystals. Who knows? The possibilities seem endless. And what do we do with it?" He raised a hand to the Church on the cliffs above us. "We don't understand it. So we worship it. Typical. But yes, Camilla thought that putting me in this room would separate me from the source of my power, when in fact she was wrapping me up in the purest form of it. All I needed was a sufficiently powerful pattern to fill it with. And you, Jacob, have provided that pattern. Straight from the Mother Fehn, and before her, the Celesteans themselves."

I sat down, bloody hands in my bloody lap. I had nothing left. Nothing but anger, and the feeling that I'd been played right from the beginning of this.

"Just… go to hell, Crane," I said tiredly. "Leave the city alone."

"Oh, I couldn't possibly do that. Not after all we've been through together. Now. As for that pattern." He raised his head and breathed in, deeply. The trees around us seemed to shrink, as if the essence was being sucked out of them. When he breathed out again, it was in a primal scream that rang off the glass above and cut through my skin like a knife. I fell back and the sound filled me, vibrating against my bones, filling my lungs and my blood with a dull hum. The trees rose up and covered me, roots tapping lightly against my skin, leaves sticking to me like leeches, and then the forest was dissolving into me, the veins of the leaves and the veins of my skin becoming one. I felt Crane's horrible presence now, and behind him something older, unthinkably older. The Celesteans echoing through him, their science and their religion wrapped up into this mystery of cogwork in my blood.

And then it was over. Crane was standing above me, his hands pressed to his skull. Smiling that manic grin that had been ripped from my face.

"Very good, very good. Very… old," he said. "Very pure." He looked down at me and saluted. "Well done, Mr. Burn. Veridon will thank you, when I'm done with it."

"I don't think that's true," I whispered.

"Perhaps not. Not this Veridon, at least. But the one I'm about to build, yes. That Veridon will have no choice but to thank you." He stretched his shoulders, grew larger, more feral. "I'll see to it."

To my surprise, the Wrights stirred. To Crane's surprise, too.

"Interesting. The girl still has some control over them. Quick learner. But what would you expect from the last remnant of the Brilliant in the city of Veridon, hm? Yes, adding her to me is going to complete this cycle, and then I can get on with things." He raised his hands and the trees rose, grew, swelled, until their limbs hung over the crosswalk. The sound of their growth was loud, a creaking that reminded me of the sound of metal, torquing under stress. The trees took the barely conscious Wrights in their arms and, at Crane's command, burst them like grapes. I edged my way to the center of the platform. Crane saw and chuckled.

"No, Jacob. You've meant too much to me. I intend to preserve you, if only as an example. Call it nostalgia." He flipped a hand, and two limbs wrapped around me, gently squeezing the air out of me. I couldn't move. "You'll just need to stay here. I'll be back for you, once I've added Camilla's pattern to my own, and the Celesteans'. How about that, Jacob? Two gods in one person. Isn't that going to be grand?"

Smiling, he stepped into the swollen forest. Limbs bent to carry him, and he walked across the room like he was on a conveyor belt. The last I saw of him, he was whistling to himself, twirling the hammer like a gentleman's cane. Above, the canopy of trees pressed against the glass shell of the greenhouse. The building creaked, and then the panes splintered and burst.

A murder of crows swarmed in and followed Crane, loud and inky and black.

"We're going to make a deal, Jacob."

I had been daydreaming. Fever dreaming, maybe. There was a lot of my blood on the floor, and Crane's extraction had taken something very deep from me. I was hanging in the grip of his preternatural trees like a rag. When I looked up, it was all I could do to muster even faint surprise at seeing Veronica Bright standing on the platform, hands on hips.

"Veronica," I whispered. "Not sure I have a lot to offer."

"It's Albert, for now. Veronica handed over control shortly after Crane left. She felt it best if I had this conversation with you."

"What?"

Veronica stepped toward me. Something about the way she walked, like she was wearing brand new shoes. Awkward.

"Veronica Bright is the last of our family. But she is also all of our family. It's a very old Artificer trick, only one of many we've managed to uncover these last few years. There was a man, years ago, by the name of David Walking. One of the first Artificers. He was murdered, but he managed to transfer himself to a flock of crows. It was the first time the theory was proven, and led quite directly to the Artificers Guild being banned."

"You're an Artificer?" I asked.

"We are poor figments of Artificers, Jacob. And I say we, because when the men of our family were killed, they were able to transfer to… other hosts."

"To you, you mean."

"To Veronica, yes. And Amelie, the young girl. Mother wouldn't have any of us, so my father chose to pass on. My name's Albert. I was Veronica's brother."

"That is so. Fucking. Weird."

"Perhaps. But it is better than dying. And I'm telling you this to make it clear to you how powerful we are. How useful we could be as allies, and how dangerous as enemies."

"Buddy, I'm pretty much at the end of my rope with threats today. Are you going to cut me down or not?"

Veronica/Albert smiled and paced around the platform. That was definitely someone else in her body. Whoever was doing the walking wasn't used to the way her hips moved, didn't know where her center of gravity was. Definitely wasn't used to those pants.

"As I said. First there must be a deal." She turned on her heel, nearly stumbled, and faced me. "When this is over, the girl Camilla must come to us. Not to the Church, nor the Council. She will be lost in the wreckage of this conflict. And then we will find her. Do you understand?"

"So you can spend another generation torturing her, until the next time she gets out and tears her way through the city?" I shook my head lazily. "I don't think so."

"You're not in a position to negotiate, Jacob."

"I think I am. I think you wouldn't be here if you could do this without me. So, tell me. Why do you need me at all? If you're such a powerful crew of Artificers, why aren't you bringing Crane down on your own? Why do I have to be involved?"

Veronica/Albert thought for a while. She stood in front of me with her arms folded under her breasts, clearly uncomfortable with that. I had to laugh.

"You know what, let me talk to your sister. You're screwing this up, Albert. Besides, I don't know you from any other thug. Can she hear me?"

"No," she said.

"Then turn the body over to her. You're much too comical, trying so hard to not touch yourself. Wondering where your balls went. Let me talk to the bitch. I may not trust her, but at least I know her."

"I don't think… never mind. Fine." She went limp for a second then returned. Veronica looked at me and, once more comfortable in her body, arched an eyebrow at me. "So we have an agreement?"

"Sure thing, sweet cakes. Just get me down from here."

"He explained your role?" she asked.

"Absolutely. I'm the perfect man for the job," I said, smiling.

"You're the only man for the job. Now." she unfolded an enormous knife from her belt and set to my woody bonds. "Let's be about our business."

"That's weird, you know that. Living in your sister's body."

"He won't be there forever. Although I doubt he'll be much happier in his new house, either."

"Yeah," I said, chewing on that. "I suspect not."

It took us longer to get through the preternatural forest than Crane. By the time we got to the main dome, the show had already started. Veronica had her iron face back on. It kept her from talking, or asking me questions, at least. When we were almost there she produced the purge mask from an inner pouch and handed it to me. Where the hell had she gotten this? And what was I supposed to do with it? I nodded and tucked it away, then pantomimed a pistol and showed her my empty holster. She shook her head and shrugged. Great.

We made it to a balcony overlooking the main hall of the Algorithm. After the chaos I caused two years ago, Camilla's heart had been moved from the chamber upstairs into this larger, more easily protected space. It had meant a lot of retooling of the machinery, but the Wrights were usually eager for that sort of project. Now that Camilla had reclaimed her heart, though, this room hung empty. The balcony where we perched was above a sloping wall of still clockwork. Veronica crawled to the edge of the balcony and looked over, then signaled for me to come up. I crawled up on my belly and looked down.

Crane was already here, along with a lot of dead Wrights and one very angry angel. After his trick in the greenhouse, I wasn't sure the Wrights were dead, but the effect was the same. They weren't doing anything to help their mistress.

"I put you down once, Ezekiel Crane. I'll do it again," Camilla spat. She was larger, manifesting sharper wings and a kind of halo that hung in the air behind her back. Her voice reverberated through the hall. The clouds of crows that had swirled menacingly through her body were still there, more numerous. Beside her, Crane looked like a child.

"You've been taking lessons from Mr. Burn, haven't you? Making empty threats." He raised one hand, like he was conducting an orchestra. "But you're not to blame. You don't really know what forces are aligned against you."

"A bitter old man with some clever tricks. A mortal. An outcast." Camilla sneered. "I've seen a thousand like you, and I'll see a thousand more. You are one man."

"One man," Crane said. "And an army."

He lifted his hand higher, and the Wrights rose up, like puppets on their string. They didn't seem to be all there, like sleep walkers or drunks. Crane twisted his hand and they all turned to face the angel.

"You'll need better than that. I could break the meat of your army with my voice."

"Perhaps. But I don't mean to fight you with them. Just retrieve the crows you've stolen from me." His voice was getting louder, and I realized that it was coming from every mouth in the room. All those Wrights, speaking as one. "Give them back, Camilla."

"Parlor tricks!" Camilla shrieked. She lunged forward. Crane raised his voice in some wordless command.

Camilla burst, the crows fleeing her body like a flock startled from a tree. She howled, and Crane laughed. But they only went so far, still swirling around her in a tight vortex. She was holding them, if incompletely. Pain washed across Crane's face, and he began to sweat.

"Very… interesting," he said, leaning forward. "Very persistent."

Camilla stood perfectly still, her eyes closed in concentration, her mouth open. A battle of wills, bending themselves to the raw material that rippled through Crane's artificial flock of black birds. They stood close, their arms outstretched, the Wrights all around them swaying with the force of the energies channeling through them.

Veronica tapped me on the shoulder without looking my way. She held out three fingers, then two, then one. Then she pointed at the two in the center of the room. When I didn't move she glanced in my direction, her head cocked curiously to one side. Time to make something up.

"Oh, you meant go. I forgot that was the signal. Albert said… never mind." I hopped down the incline and slid uncomfortably over the tapestry of clockwork to land roughly on the floor. No one looked at me. Probably too absorbed in their little mystic fight to even see me. I cleared my throat and approached the pair.

"This is it!" I yelled, hoping there was someone else in the chamber to hear me. "This is me, killing you, Crane! Right here!" I pulled out the purge mask and held it like a badge. "Yeah, that's right. With this! I think."

There was a loud banging from behind me. I turned and saw Veronica jumping in place. She grabbed her bodice and pulled on it, like she was trying to flash me. Curious. I turned back to the two combatants. They had taken notice of me, watching me from the corners of their eyes. They looked paralyzed, but terrified. By now the patterns of the crows had changed. They weren't so tight to Camilla. Some of them were switching orbits to Crane, passing over him before they returned to Camilla. She was losing them, slowly, inevitably. Her control was imperfect.

It was the mask. They were looking at the mask, not me. I turned it over in my hands. This wasn't the purge mask I had retrieved from Crane's house. He left that as a signal. That one had probably been the original mask, used by whoever came to kill his family. How he had gotten it, how he had even survived that pursuit, was a mystery. Would always be a mystery. But this mask was newly minted. I looked back up at Veronica, now wearing her own iron mask. Just another secret they had uncovered, I suspected. But who was this for? Who was supposed to wear this?

The mask squirmed in my hands. I looked at the back. It had sprouted long, thin tentacles of liquid metal, lashing out hungrily in the air. This was for me. Whatever the Mother had done to me, it was compatible with this ancient technology. What would I become? What could I do, with these joined magics? What had Crane said? Two gods in one man. I looked back up at Veronica. She was watching me. Tense. Ready to pounce.

"This is too much," I spat. "Too many people with too many plans."

I turned to the closest Wright and dragged him around to face me. He was an older man, his loose jowls quivering with Crane's metaphysical voice. I gripped the back of his head with my other hand, and shoved the mask onto his face.

The voices changed.

Not all of them, not even the majority. But the guy I had in my hands, and the couple around him. They fell out of Crane's voice and were silent, then started up on something else. It was familiar, although I hadn't heard it in a while. The voice of the Singer, from the Celestean religion that so many had forgotten. That my family still kept, right up until the end. I stepped back. Behind me, I heard Veronica clambering down the clockwork tapestry.

I had been meant as bait. A third god, something to catch Crane's attention, to draw him away from Camilla. After all, the angel was just a creation of the Celesteans. If their pattern could be introduced to the Algorithm, wouldn't Crane jump at that instead? He would think about it at least. And that moment of distraction was what the Brights had wanted.

So they could snatch Camilla. I looked around and saw them, their operatives, hidden among the Wrights. Moving forward, their mouths closed. And behind me, Veronica, full of rage. And the interference I had introduced into Crane's little chorus had tipped the balance. Camilla was winning, the crows spinning tighter and tighter toward her. She looked at me with a gleam of triumph in her eyes.

"Sorry, love," I said. "Can't let that happen. No one gets what they want today."

I tackled her out from the center of her vortex of crows and rolled. She clattered into pieces as I took her heart away from the support of the crows. Just her arms and chest, and the hollow structure of her head, remained. Much yelling behind me. Crows were flying all over the place.

I picked up the remnants of the girl and ran. I knew a place. The room was in chaos when I left, crows scratching at Wrights, Veronica howling through her iron mask, and above it all the song of the Singer, beautiful and clear.

The shock wore off about two minutes later. Camilla started fighting me in earnest. I put her down on a plinth and wiped the blood from my eyes with a cloth.

"What are you doing, Jacob?" she hissed.

"Running away. I thought that was pretty clear."

"With me! What the hell are you thinking? Crane will win, now."

I shook my head. The sounds of battle had died down, but I was pretty sure the Brights were still hunting the old Artificer. Let them tear each other apart.

"The Brights know what they're doing. They know his limits. At the very least, they'll be able to hold him off. And hopefully, he'll be enough of a handful that we can slip away in the struggle."

"I had him, Jacob! I had Crane by the throat."

"No, you didn't." I held up my hand. "Two outcomes back there. One, Crane eventually wears you down, takes the crows and then steals your pattern. You would have spent the rest of your life as a cog in his engine. Two, the Brights interfere and somehow steal you away. And I think steal Crane, too, but I'm less clear on that part."

"They could have done that?" she asked.

"Yeah. But I was integral to the plan, so it really had no hope of succeeding. Listen, I'm going to get you out of here. But only if you help, you understand?"

"Why would I want that?" she asked.

"Because your alternative is an eternity in the basement of the family Bright. It won't be as nice as the eternity you spent in this place. They're certainly not going to worship you."

"An eternity is less time that you think," she said, coldly. "I've already been through two of those, and lived a third before that. Fine. I won't have my revenge in this eternity. Perhaps the next. Where will you take me?"

"I know a place. Now. What did you do with Wilson?" I asked.

"He's safe."

"Define safe."

"Not dead. Not dying. Probably not awake enough to know the difference."

"Let me clarify some things for you." I spat. "You need to stop giving me smartass answers. Smartass answers are going to get you killed. Did. You. Hurt. Wilson."

"I did, Jacob. I hurt him very badly. Probably in a permanent way. For what the two of you did two years ago, the last time I had a chance to escape. And I would do it again, and I would do it to you, if you gave me the chance." She crossed her thin arms over her dissected chest. "Are you sure you don't want to take me back there and give me a chance with the Brights?"

I sat there, staring at her and smoldering. "You little bitch…"

"Careful, Jacob. You're supposed to be saving me, remember?" She smiled prettily. "You don't threaten the girl you're trying to save."

"You've misunderstood the nature of this rescue, Camilla." I stood abruptly and picked her up. She wrapped her arms around my shoulders, and hugged me with the remnants of her wings. "I can't let the Brights have you. But I can't let you free, either."

"Well, then. Whatever are you going to do with me?"

"Something pretty horrible," I said. "For whatever you've done to Wilson."

"Honestly, I'd almost think you didn't like me. Live my life, Jacob. For one day. And then decide what you would do, given the chance."

I grimaced, but didn't answer. Instead I headed down, down into the Church, down toward the chamber of the heart. I hoped the Mother Fehn had one more trick.

The chamber was as I remembered it. Spherical, cold. The cage of pipes at the center had been torn open, from when Camilla had gained her freedom. There was a thin pool of foetal metal on the floor. It had gone stiff in the cold, clinging to my boots like tar. Camilla looked down at it wistfully.

"I could rebuild you, Jacob. I could restore your heart," she said. "I could make you fly again."

"Promises, promises," I answered. "Now where's that door?"

Last time I was here, there had been a secret passageway. One of the Fehn, a friend of mine by the name of Morgan, had come through it to lead me out. Camilla had used him to negotiate with the Council, and to lead me to safety, when it was in her interest. I was hoping it was still here.

"The Fehn stopped talking to me," she said. "They controlled the door."

"They've stopped talking to anyone," I said. "On account of Crane killing most of them. It should be right around here. Somewhere."

At no prompt from me, the door opened. Wright Morgan, undead of the river Reine, stood in the entrance.

"Jacob," he said.

"Morgan. Haven't seen you in years. Thought you'd joined the silent chorus."

"I've been away. Looking for your girl, actually."

"Emily?" I asked. Afraid of the answer.

"Emily. And the heart you gave her. The cog."

"And?"

"Still gone, Jacob. You got good and rid of her."

I sighed. Of course I had. Jacob Burn never screwed something up halfway.

"Why are you here now?" I asked.

"You were looking for the way out, weren't you?"

"Sure, but I suspected the Mother wouldn't be interested in helping me anymore. Not after what happened with Crane."

"She isn't," he said, then held out his hand. To Camilla. "I'm here for her. You're just coming along."

There was darkness, and water. The flat slugs of the Fehn filled my mouth and my lungs, but I struggled not to panic. When we came up, the Mother Fehn was waiting. Wright Morgan had left us behind, long before we got to the current of the waterfall. Said something about never going down there again. I had an anchored rope that would get me back to the calm water, after all this was over.

The Mother Fehn was waiting. I vomited her children up on the floor as that globe of light watched impassively. Camilla lay on the metal floor, bewildered.

"Where are we?" she asked.

"Central Processing," Mother answered. "Servitor colloquially known as Camilla. Welcome."

"That didn't make sense," Camilla said.

"I'm glad to see you just as baffled," I said. "I think so, at least. This thing is very old."

"Time frame relative. Iterations occur regularly, central fragmentation makes referencing source dates irrelevant. There were many of us. Now there is one. This unit is still getting used to its vessel."

"What is that thing?" she asked.

"This, my dear monster, is the Mother Fehn. She knows a lot about you."

"I would know more," the Mother answered.

"Which is why we're here," I said, standing up. "Initiate your subteens, you crazy old bitch."

The globe turned to face me, then strobed its attention over Camilla. The pillar of slugs slithered forward.

"Jacob, what's happening?" Camilla shrilled. I smiled.

"She's about to know more," I said. "Put yourself in my shoes, Cam. Live my life for a day, or a year, or a brief, mortal span. What would you do?"

The carpet of squirming Fehn-slugs surged across the room like a tide, covering Camilla. She was screaming when they got to her mouth, and then there was silence. The Mother was still processing when I let myself out.

Content

Tim Akers
Dead of Veridon

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen

Chapter Sixteen

Chapter Seventeen

Chapter Eighteen

Chapter Nineteen

Chapter Twenty