by Daryl Banner
0292 Halvesand
The walk was long.
Up eight flights of stairs. Down three endless halls. Then down a flight of stairs. Then back up a different stairwell that twisted about so tightly, Halves had trouble keeping his neck from turning.
But now he stands before a great double door made of off-white stone. The man with the black scarf wrapped about his head, tails of the silk tumbling down his back like hair, pulls open the great doors.
What stands before Halvesand is a great hall that is perfectly dark save for one bright, white-flamed brazier at its very end. Halves walks the length of it, observing as much as he can through the edges of his eyes. The hall is so dark, it doesn’t seem to have walls on either side, the darkness making it look infinite. He catches glimpses of white stone, perhaps statues and art, tiny stone faces and hands poking out from the darkness, catching a bit of the white firelight.
Next to the white-flamed brazier stands a woman who looks a whole foot taller than Halvesand. She is dressed in an elegant white gown that pools at her feet like a gooey, viscous cream. Her hair is grey with white streaks, and her skin is as pale as bone. Her back is to Halvesand, and she doesn’t move an inch even when he stops at the foot of the stage upon which she stands, the brazier next to her. Only a handful of stone steps and a couple arms’ reach separate the two of them.
“My apologies, Queen,” says his escort, “but I have just learned that the one called Lesser cannot speak. He will be unable to reply to you, as is evidenced by the great … monstrosity about his neck. He is the one our contact agreed would … be the most cooperative.”
“You may leave,” the Queen then states, her big voice strong, womanly, and willful as a Queen’s ought to be. “Head back to your home before they start wondering.”
The young man nods slowly, which appears more like a bow, then turns on his heel and saunters off. The big doors shut at Halves’ back, leaving him alone with the Queen of the Abandon.
She only half-turns her head, still keeping her back to him. “I am told your name is Lesser. And as I have just now been informed, you cannot speak. A pity, but not a thing I cannot work with. In fact, it may be just what I need: a man who, for once, keeps himself shut up.”
Then she turns.
Her face pierces him at once.
Steely grey eyes like two shiny pearls. Sunken cheeks and lofty cheekbones, dusted with a pinch of rose powder. A necklace made of pearls upon her chest. Two earrings, also pearls.
Halvesand’s lips part despite himself, parting only the half inch that his neck armor will allow. He recognizes her. She looks like—
“That is true, is it not?” she asks, now facing him. “You cannot speak? What you are told remains within you, now and always?”
He won’t very well point out that all it would take to spill a secret is a pen and paper, or a typing device, or a person who knows hand language, but seeing as Halves likes his hands and doesn’t wish to be deprived of them, he merely blinks once firmly, hoping that she takes that to be his answer.
For a moment, she doesn’t seem to acknowledge his blink at all. Then she purses her lips. “You are unable to nod as well, it seems. Does your neck inhibit you? Are you unable to look either way?”
Halvesand, in lieu of answering, decides to demonstrate. He turns his torso quickly to the left, then quickly to the right, then brings his view back to her, eyes narrowed challengingly.
She doesn’t seem impressed. Of course, Halves is also certain that if his pants dropped and his cock turned into a glowing, magical beam of light that cut the room in two, the Queen of the Abandon would still be unimpressed. If this woman is who he thinks she is, she was never one for parlor tricks or performances.
“Mani, Myxen, and Kyra told me about your fighting them. As did the man who escorted you here.” She smirks. “Mani doesn’t very much like you. You cut his shoulder, poor thing.”
The way she says “poor thing” doesn’t make Halvesand think she harbors much sympathy at all for the cloning boy. He swallows once, feels the burn and pain of it, then steels himself for whatever punishment she may be concocting for his actions.
“But I don’t take you for a person who throws a knife at such close range and misses.” She folds her hands before her. Her fingers are long and bony, the skin like wrinkled paper. No less than seven rings decorate them. “You intended to subdue him, pinning him in place so that you could manage the situation. You didn’t intend to harm him at all, did you.”
It is a question, but it is asked like a statement, for the Queen clearly knows the answer already. Halvesand keeps his jaw tight, his eyes steady on hers.
“Well?” Apparently she is awaiting an answer. “Blink if it’s so.”
Halvesand blinks forcefully. It was so.
The Queen nods once. “You managed to secure a chrome from no less than seven charging teenagers. Mani really tested you. And you protected that silly old man at nearly all costs.”
Does she know that Lord Liaff is not just another Guardian? Even despite as lightly armored as Liaff was, he can’t be sure if any of their assailants realized—or realize now—what their actual mission was.
“You’ve a protective instinct, Lesser.” She considers him. “And I was also informed that you have a Legacy that can … somehow prevent movement. Is that so?”
Halvesand blinks.
“You are like a big, thick human wall if you wish it, yes?”
Halvesand blinks again.
She gives him one nod, then takes a couple of steps toward him, her heels clacking along the stone. “It just so happens, we all share a common interest. You are of Guardian, and so your ultimate job is to protect the Queen of Atlas. As it so happens, Guardian is currently separated from their mother seat of Sanctum, sadly due to a madman and now a silly child pretending to hold the throne.” The Queen puts a look of superiority on her face. “I suspect you know exactly who I am, from the look of smarts in your eyes.”
Halvesand hesitates only a moment, then blinks once, affirming.
“Kael Mirand-Thrin,” she states grandly, “former heir to the throne of Atlas … but I am not called that these days. My presence cannot be known, not until it is time for us to take back Sanctum.”
Former To-Be-Queen Kael Mirand-Thrin, aunt of Ruena Netheris, daughter of the late King Greymyn. I cannot believe it, even when she stands before my very eyes. She survived. She’s been alive all this time.
“The day the Lord’s Garden exploded and I fell from the sky, my life took a most unexpected path that has led me directly into Atlas’s deep history. I realize now what must be done to save Atlas, and it is no easy task, and it cannot be accomplished overnight. I will need the assistance of brave souls like yourself with protective instincts. Perhaps your friends as well, if they are so cooperative as you. If they are not, well …” Her lips twitch. “I have other uses.”
Halvesand blinks, though he isn’t sure what he’s confirming or saying yes to. Yes, they will be cooperative. They fucking better be, once they realize who we are in the presence of.
“You are working it over in your head,” she decides, watching him. “Yes. You see the predicament. It is like a game of sorts, isn’t it? Had Lord’s Garden not fallen, I would be sitting that throne today, and we never would have had a Mad King Impis destroying our city. I feel your sense of trust swelling, Halvesand. Let it swell. You are in the hands of allies, and if you serve us, you serve Atlas itself.”
Halvesand, in the space of a day, has gone from serving a King to serving a Queen. He thought his life was about to be taken from him, and now he wonders if he will be behind the force that will save Atlas from the chaos.
But it can’t be so easy. Not everyone holds love for the Netheris bloodline, considering the resentment and anger that the Banshee King nurtured among Atlas’s citizenry. Though many were happy to see Ruena rise to the throne, now she is dead, and somehow, Halves doubts that her cold, emotionless aunt will inspire much love amo
ng the people. Others have built forces all across Atlas, others who think they can do a better job than the presumed-dead Netheris family. The Coalition in the first, second, and third wards, which, if rumor has it, also includes the fourth now, ruled by the so-called Slum King. The peaceful band of free folk who maintain order from the ninth all the way out to the Greens, with whom Guardian has some kind of unofficial alliance, overseen by a mysterious Charmer named Arrow. A militant group of women and rebellious teenagers who have taken over the sixth ward and call themselves the Wall Breakers. Various gangs and back-alley organizations and bands of brigands on the streets who obey no authority and answer to no King or Queen.
How can Kael, Queen of the Abandon or not, possibly have an upper hand over all of those adversaries?
“If you so wish to devote yourself to our cause,” she states, “and continue your official duties as Guardian, then we will invite you to stay among us. And if you prove yourself worthy, you may very well be first upon our Sky Guard, charged with protecting the Queen and King at all costs.”
Funny. That is the same promise Forrest made to him of To-Be-King Liaff, that Halves would be first upon his Sky Guard.
Wait. Queen and King?
“Will you prove yourself to us, Lesser?” she asks evenly. “Will you lay your sword and your life down for us?”
Halvesand has no choice. If this is the real Kael Mirand-Thrin and not some elaborate trick of Legacy or mind or shadow, then he is quite certain that declining her offer will mean that he may join the statues lining the walls of this dark hall. She can turn a person into white stone with a single flash of her eyes. Either I stop the thing, or she will stop me forever.
He lifts his eyes to meet hers, then blinks once resolutely.
She doesn’t smile. Halves wonders if she ever does. “Good,” she states curtly. “Of course, before you can dream of being Sky Guard, you must first become Shadow Guard, down here among us in the Abandon, until the Lifted City is rightly reclaimed.”
He blinks again with meaning.
Kael smirks—the closest thing she’s given to a smile—and then she shakes her head. “That fool child Mani. He doesn’t realize you saved his life. A nick in the neck and all he can do is cry over blood.” She gives Halvesand a dismissive wave of her hand. “You may leave. Your escort will take you to a kinder, more appropriate lodging. Off, now. Off, off.”
Halvesand, slightly bewildered, turns about and walks down the hall from whence he came. The darkness on either side of him feels less threatening somehow, even the white hands and faces that stare at him and reach for him like ghosts, less scary.
He’s met by a man who also wears a black scarf over his head—a different man—and taken off through a long labyrinth of hallways, stairwells, and stony corridors. All the while, he can’t stop thinking of Kael Mirand-Thrin’s words. They weren’t aimed at him, yet struck him deeply in the heart. A nick in the neck and all he can do is cry over blood. Halvesand walks with the man, the words circling in his skull. That fool child Mani. He doesn’t realize you saved his life.
Is he supposed to think that Mercy saved his? In the fateful end, did Mercy, in fact, grant Halvesand the greatest mercy of all?
0293 Tide
Someone soiled all the fruit in the market while the stock was left unattended for an hour.
The next morning, graffiti is found sprayed across a whole row of houses that accuses the Slum King of being a fraud.
The word “fraud” is spelled “frod”.
A day later, there’s a dead, starved dog found hanging by a cable in the middle of an intersection with a giant paper sign around its neck that reads: ‘U R NEXT’.
“I don’t like the sound of that,” frets Dog as he worries over the stew he’s making the two of them. “The sign was on a dog, too.”
Tide keeps taking peeks out the window, hairs prickling on the back of his thick neck, like tiny spiders weave a web of worry there.
“It’s not my real name, of course,” Dog adds. “Dog, that is.”
Tide doesn’t reply. He keeps pulling the curtain of the window back by a hand, peering out at the street. The sun is going down and he doesn’t want to walk about tonight. Everything is unsettled. Things are happening everywhere in the Coalition, and Tide thinks it’s all Gin’s doing, even if no one will listen to him.
Least of all the Marshals.
Or Chole.
The man hasn’t spoken to Tide nor invited him to any meetings in the Ferns since they returned from the Lifted City. Tide was given no reason. He only found out because, on a stroll to the market, he spotted all the Marshals departing the Ferns together. Tide stopped and stared at them, hard-eyed, and realized right then that they had just hosted a meeting he was not invited to.
How many other meetings have they had without him?
Fuck him, Tide thinks for the twentieth time today as he stares out the window, fuming. He’s spineless. He’s weak. He’s nothing.
“Would you like anything in particular in your stew?” asks Dog.
Tide still doesn’t acknowledge him, staring out the window. He feels like the moment he lets his guard down, Gin will appear at their door with a knife.
Tide suffers a vision of her rushing toward him, fusing her hand with his face, then pulling it straight off.
He shivers and backs away from the window, slapping his own face, as if to ensure it’s still there. He squats down on the floor and shudders, frustrated and angry.
Dog is behind him at once, rubbing and massaging his back. “I know, I know, you’re very stressed, your position as Head of Crews is very stressful. The King has put a lot on your shoulders.”
“I’m Head of nothing now,” groans Tide.
Dog moves his hands up to the base of Tide’s thick neck. It’s clearly an effort for his small hands to massage his housemate’s big shoulders. “Oh, no. Did Chole dismiss you from your post?”
“No, idiot.”
“What happened?”
“I showed my nerve, that’s what happened. It was too much for the wimp King Chole. I should’ve let Gin kill him.”
Dog’s massaging stops.
Tide barks over his shoulder: “What’d you stop for?”
“Sorry.” Dog resumes.
“If I’d let the nasty girl kill him, then she’d be dead, and I would have nothing holding me here nor there. Shadows and Abandon and White Robes and fuck-it-all.” Tide hears a noise at the window, rises up to take a peek, and sees it’s nothing. Fucking paranoia has me.
Dog had risen just as quickly as Tide did, the tireless shoulder-massaging uninterrupted. “Don’t think on such awful things.”
“I didn’t ask for your opinion, Dog.”
“My name is Dag.”
Tide turns on him at once with a scowl. “Excuse me?”
Dog crosses his arms, then uncrosses them, then crosses them again, his indecision on whether or not to stand up to Tide apparent on his too-soft, flushed boyish face.
“I … I was just meaning that I …” Dog swallows. He is clearly very nervous from the shaking of his voice. “I was just … s-saying …”
Tide finds he doesn’t have the same leverage he enjoyed before. He once had Marshals and a King looking to him for questions and for strength and for whatever else kept him in those Ferns. Perhaps he ought to throw the dog a bone, as it were.
“You prefer it if I call you your given name?” Tide finishes for him. “Dag? You prefer Dag?”
“It’s only that I think it may help you.”
Tide’s face wrinkles up at that. “And how does it help me?”
“I am named after the common weapon.” He lifts his big brown eyes up to Tide’s. “Dagger. My … My name is Dagger. Dagger Mant.”
“Mant?” grunts Tide. “The fuck kind of last name is Mant?”
Dog shrugs. “I … suppose it’s the kind who’d have the first name of Dagger.”
Tide studies him, peering down his nose at the boy. “So how is th
at supposed to help me? Calling you Dag?”
“So you remember that you’re never alone, and you’re never without arms.” He smooths out his shirt, which is wrinkled in the front. “I can be your arms.”
Tide isn’t sure he follows Dog’s complicated metaphor, but in a matter of seconds, he finds he just doesn’t care enough to argue. “I’ll call you Dag, then, if it gives you such a boner.”
Dag smiles, then nods toward the window. “Do you mind telling me what it is you’re checking outside for? I can stand out there and wait for it, if it’s a delivery, or a person, or—”
“No. You’re staying right here. And so am I.” Tide glances at the door. “And we’re getting you a fucking lock.”
Dag picks at a nail, sighs, says, “I hate shutting the world out.”
“Well, we’re shutting it out, lest it invites itself in and fuses its hand to your fucking dick.” With that, Tide goes for the creaky chair near the side door, picks it up, and shoves it under the door’s handle, preventing exit or entry. Then he goes for a heavy wooden crate on which they usually eat, thrusts off the makeshift tablecloth, throws it aside, and pushes the crate against the front door.
Dag looks over Tide’s efforts with mounting concern. “Is there someone out there planning to harm us?” He sighs despairingly. “Is it Gin? You mentioned f-fusing hand to d-d-d—”
“Fuck Gin. Fuck her from here to the Abandon where she damn well belongs, the ugly … beast she is.” With that, Tide moves across the room, plops on the couch, then grunts, “The stew ready yet, or is it still cooking itself?”
Dag hurries to the kitchen to resume his task. Over the steam of his pot bubbling, he excitedly reports, “Five more minutes, I’d say!”
Five minutes too long. “Hurry, boy. I’m hungry.” He kicks up his feet on the coffee table, which is just two side-by-side crates with a length of green and yellow checkered fabric thrown over them. “And my feet are fucking weary.”
