The Sunken City Trilogy

by Phil Williams

“Of course you have,” Holly said. “How can we help?”

  “Stay out of it,” Pax insisted. “I’ll sort it out.”

  “Oh rot! I don’t know how people do things where you come from, except clearly not very well, but I’m going to –”

  “Watch that lorry!” Mix cried out, and Pax swerved with a screech from the car. They banked, but kept going, and she threw a terrified glance at the mirrors to see she was nowhere near hitting the massive vehicle they had passed. The fairy was laughing.

  “You little shit,” Pax hissed.

  “See her face? Dumb fucking humans.”

  “Not the time,” Fresko said, flying up to the rear-view mirror to join him. He sounded amused, despite the warning.

  Pax said, “You’re both shits.”

  “Who are you with . . .” Holly asked, worriedly. She recognised the voices. How could she not, when these little fiends had driven them into the sewer at gunpoint? “Pax . . .”

  “It’s complicated,” Pax told her. “But I’m safe, okay?” Notwithstanding hurtling along at high speeds in a metal box of death. “Listen, Holly, if the Ministry do come at you, ask for Casaria. He’s on our side. In his own weird way. As long as you tell him I said so.”

  “He came knocking at our house unannounced.”

  “He’s there now?”

  “No – I mean – never mind. What about Sam?”

  Pax was quiet. Good bloody question: why wasn’t Sam at the lido? “Is she with you?”

  “She had a call from her people. She insisted she’s on our side, Pax, but she answered their call, didn’t she?”

  “Uh-huh.” That was a dilemma Pax could scarcely unpack. However amiable Sam had been, she was a company girl, wasn’t she?

  “We’re heading home,” Holly carried on. “Go there, we’ll figure something out.”

  Pax wanted, deep down, to take up the offer, but couldn’t. “I’ll get back to you. Take care, Holly.”

  She ended the call, passing the turning for Hanton, towards New Thornton and, in its vicinity, the warehouse district. The harbour of criminals and fairies. This reckless escape was taking her closer to the threats. The Fae might spot her hurtling past on the raised highway, all of them coming after her in a swarm. Shooting at her from the sky. She asked her small companions, “Is there any way to avoid a shoot-first-ask-questions-later policy with your people?”

  Mix gave a belly laugh. Fresko scoffed, more disdainful, and answered, “What for? Who’s gonna believe the word of a human?”

  “You know I didn’t kill Edwing,” Pax said. “Don’t you have some kind of judicial system?” She recalled the way Letty had scolded her whenever she questioned Fae society. They had a university, working computers. “How do you hold trials back in the FTC?”

  “Simple,” Fresko said. “Hang a criminal someplace public, give everyone a chance to make judgements in passing. Good or bad.”

  “You hang them before a trial?”

  “In a cage, dumbass,” Mix replied. “You think a Fae ever got executed at the end of a rope? We can fly.”

  “It’s a trial by the public,” Fresko said. “Everyone’s welcome to have a go.”

  “Leading to some kind of judgement?” Pax said.

  “Usually a consensus gets reached, sure. Either, go on let him out then, or, you know, the other way. Sometimes in hours, days. Sometimes longer.”

  “Bana swung in his cage for eight years, the wretched shit,” Mix recalled. “No one could decide that one. Did he kill his mistress, didn’t he?”

  “Wasn’t so much no one could decide,” Fresko said. “No one cared. Bana and the woman weren’t well-liked. Usually those closest to the situation make the call. Doesn’t work so well when you’re dealing with loners.”

  “It’s some kind of due process,” Pax said. “A chance to be heard.” She slowed down, making the Fae look around. There was an exit coming up, a sign for Brimlane. The warehouse district.

  “The fuck are you doing?” Mix said. “Looking for the worst place to lie low?”

  “That’s the point, isn’t it?” Pax said. “I’m supposed to lie low. We’re all supposed to be fighting, blaming one another – no one talking. I’m being blamed for people I know getting into the Sunken City and we’re all too busy getting chased to ask exactly what happened. Dial Sam Ward for me.”

  Fresko and Mix exchanged a look, then had a quick, muttered argument, pushing each other to decide who was going to follow orders this time.

  “I’d suggest you, white shirt, seeing as you know what you’re doing!” Pax took charge. Fresko gave up; with a snort, he flew to the phone.

  Pax steered off the ring road and turned into a quieter street. Pulling up behind some parked cars, she held on to the steering wheel to calm herself. Fresko struggled with the touchscreen, looking like he was playing a game of Twister, so Pax reached for it herself. He scrambled out of the way with a hand shooting to the rifle slung across his back. “You fucking try –”

  She ignored him, finding he’d somehow brought up a weather app. Rain all day tomorrow. She dialled the number.

  “Sam Ward speaking,” Ward answered, anxiety masked by her impossibly polite phone-answering instinct.

  “Sam, it’s me.”

  “I know – Pax, what’s going on? If it’s some kind of misunderstanding, you –”

  “MEE policy would be to arrange a meeting and make sure I don’t talk, I’m sure.”

  Ward paused. “Certainly not my policy.” But that implied Pax wasn’t wrong.

  “That happens, or I run, and we fall into the same pattern,” Pax told her plainly. “I didn’t do whatever you think I did. I didn’t do what the Fae think I did, either. I don’t know if it’s the same person set me up twice, but I do know not knowing is the problem.”

  “So . . .”

  “Where are you?”

  “Hanton, heading to St Alphege’s. Where Obrington is.”

  “Casaria says your boss killed someone I know. You weren’t there?”

  “Absolutely not. But the intruders – is it – maybe you told them about the tunnels by mistake?”

  “I haven’t talked to –” Pax paused. She hadn’t stopped to think about it. Monroe, Bees, Jones. They knew the tunnels existed. They’d dropped the subject when she convinced them it wasn’t safe underground. Or because they didn’t need her to get in? Jones and Monroe had given her those cryptic comments, suggesting she had helped them out – somehow given them access? Pax slammed a hand into the steering wheel. “Bastards! This is Lightgate again – she saw me with them, she knew they knew me.”

  “Good,” Ward said. “We can do something about that.”

  “No, not good, because Monroe thinks I helped him. Your people go to him, they’ll believe the same. Shit. We need to get there first – figure out how she got to him, show it wasn’t me. Sam. Do you trust me?”

  There was hesitation, but it was short. “I do.”

  “Can I trust you?”

  “Definitely.”

  “Buy me some time. Send your people anywhere but after me.”

  “I can’t, Pax, I have to meet –”

  “I’m going to the warehouse district. I’d appreciate it if you’d join me. Only you. So at least someone’ll know if it goes tits up.”

  Ward was quiet for a moment. “I’ll come.” Another pause. “But Pax. The Fae? I heard your message . . .”

  “One catastrophe at a time, Sam. Please.”

  Barton clambered up the stairs back into daylight at a pace that was wearing his ankle back to breaking point. By his side hovered Rufaizu, ready to catch him at any moment, face full of concern. He swatted him away, leaning against a wall instead, squinting into the sunlight to see Holly finishing on the phone.

  “Anything?” Barton asked.

  “I spoke to Pax,” Holly said. “Then I got an address. The MEE switchboard told me where I could return Sam’s scanners. So we can at least go there and do what we can. Assuming Pax surviv
es the fairies, anyway. I heard them, Diz, on the phone with her – the ones that kidnapped Grace – and –”

  Barton heard the crack of the wall before he felt the pain in his knuckles, as he realised he’d punched brickwork. His chest heaved, shoulders rolling, those bloody Fae – he should’ve killed them before –

  Holly’s face told him to stop. “Can you engage your brain instead of your testicles?”

  Barton shook bits of chipped wall off his hand, cowed.

  Rufaizu said, “Where is the bar fly? Can we fly to her?”

  “I don’t know,” Holly said. “But whatever she thinks, I doubt we’re safe from this.”

  “I’m not running,” Barton said firmly. “They’ve been fucking with this city for far too long – the blue screens, the Ministry. I’ll go to their office and make them see sense.”

  From the way Holly stared at his clenched fist, his wife remained unimpressed, but she didn’t scold him this time. No better ideas of her own.

  “You go,” Barton continued. “Take Rufaizu back to Grace. I’ll –”

  Holly folded her arms. “I think you’ll find I can handle these people better than you.”

  11

  When Sam caught up to Obrington, she found the Ministry had created a crime scene out of a white van. Yellow police tape and bollards sectioned off the road, courtesy of one uniformed officer and a patrol car, and beyond that stood Obrington and Casaria, slightly apart from the vehicle, which was being searched by Landon and their tech-head, Dr Galler. Sam ducked under the tape and approached Obrington as he said, “Ah Ward, so good of you to join us.”

  “Apologies, sir, the traffic was –”

  “Don’t care.” Obrington gestured towards the van. “What do you know about this? Exactly how pervasive a system of lies have we got here in Ordshaw?”

  “Lies?” Sam looked from the van to Casaria, who slouched like a grounded teenager. “I haven’t had a chance to –”

  “Drug dealers in the Sunken City,” Obrington announced, “who conveniently got access right around the time their good friend Pax tells us to back off, distracting us with stories of the Fae. Arranging things at conveniently unmonitored card games.”

  Sam’s mouth was open, unbelieving. “Drug dealers?”

  “It’s the same van,” Landon said, approaching from behind. Sam gave him the slightest smile of a hello, good to see his familiar face, but his expression warned her worse was to come. “These people were outside Casaria’s, remember?”

  The issue they’d never fully resolved, his abduction, which he’d claimed was unrelated to the men at Pax’s apartment.

  “Like I said,” Casaria said, “I never got a good look. It could’ve been them. All I know is they wanted to leave me for dead in a rival gang’s territory.”

  “Yet somehow over the course of this home invasion and abduction,” Obrington said, “we get them happening upon a Sunken City entrance, and the means to deactivate our sensors. The same gentlemen who happened to burglarise Pax Kuranes’ flat?”

  “That’s how it seems.” Casaria wasn’t even trying to sound convincing.

  “You’re effectively Management now, Ward.” Obrington let his gaze rest on her. “What do you do in this situation?”

  Sam paused, trying to appear in thoughtful control, rather than internally panicking. Casaria had proven himself unreliable, but Pax? Could she have orchestrated anything like this? Why would either of them help criminals?

  “I’ll make it easier on you,” Obrington said. “Start with Mr Casaria. Who you seemed ready to forgive. Suspension, investigation, let him off?”

  The mister was an insult that made Casaria twitch. Sam gave him an assaying look. Blame him and they’d limit the growing complications of this situation. It would get Pax off the hook, at least. But words came out at odds with that grave chain of thought: “I’d keep him closer, sir. If he’s trustworthy, he’s an asset; if he’s not, he needs monitoring.”

  “An asset?” Obrington sounded surprised.

  “Unless proven guilty, he’s one of us,” Sam said. “Trained, capable.”

  Mouth open again, her superior looked down his nose at her, not what he wanted to hear. “Respectfully, I’d say his trustworthiness is well in doubt. I wouldn’t permit him to fart in the wind without a full account of his dealings this past week. But we shouldn’t let him out of our sight, certainly.” Before Sam could respond, he added, “Now where’s Kuranes?”

  “I honestly don’t see her involvement in this,” Sam said defensively. “Is it not possible these men, who intruded on her apartment, might have discovered this place without her knowing it?”

  Obrington fired back at once, “Are you a dyke, Ms Ward?”

  Sam tensed in shock. “That’s the second time, sir, and I –”

  “You seem awfully rosy thinking about Kuranes.” Obrington turned to confide this to Landon. “Had them together this morning, can’t say I didn’t notice a few sparks. Thought I was imagining it, but here, this is a funny old place to be, with a fugitive –”

  “You’re out of line,” Sam interrupted.

  Obrington looked amused. “Touched a nerve?”

  “Once was ignorant. Twice, it’s insulting. To me, to her and to your office.” Seeing Obrington’s stirring anger, Sam puffed herself up rather than back down, chest high, shoulders back. “How are we supposed to trust your judgement when you say things like that? Do you think it’s acceptable just because I’m a woman? Or that I must be driven by sex? That’d make it half the population you don’t understand.”

  Obrington’s open-mouthed grimace of disbelief was back, and Casaria had rediscovered his own grin. Landon made a noise of discomfort. If words failed Obrington long enough, Sam wondered, would he simply smack her face? His bear paws would flatten her. His goggling eyes vibrated, looking her up and down, until he settled on his best response. “Mathers really kept you in a box, didn’t he?”

  Sam glowered straight back, tight-lipped. No way she was going to let him dismiss this so blithely. “I respect Pax Kuranes. I believe the Ministry owes her a debt. Whatever you think you have against her, I suggest questioning it.”

  Obrington narrowed his eyes. “Why?”

  “Because she’s got a connection to the monsters that we don’t, you fat fuck,” Casaria blurted out, and it was Sam’s turn to stand shocked. Obrington didn’t turn to him at once, which was good because Casaria was grinning like he had no idea how else to wear his face. He hadn’t meant to say it; Sam’s outburst had drawn it out.

  With perfect timing, Dr Galler appeared, lightly saying, “Yup, definitely Fae shots.”

  Obrington’s broiling rage subsided in an instant. “What the bleeding hell does that mean?”

  “The van. You said check for everything – there’s bullets in the door. One in the wing mirror. Looks like your average scratch but that’s what this baby’s for.” Galler proudly held up what looked like a microscope from a children’s playset.

  “You’re telling me these mugs had a shootout with the Fae?” Obrington scowled.

  “Well, their van did.”

  Obrington rounded on Casaria. “And you wouldn’t know anything about that?”

  The answer was clear on Casaria’s face. Fully unprepared. He knew exactly who the criminals were and how they’d come to be shot at by fairies. Sam gave him a weak look. For all she’d said, Pax and Casaria had kept a lot back. Were her instincts wrong?

  “Care to revise your assessment?” Obrington asked her, considering the same.

  Sam shook her head but said nothing.

  Obrington’s pocket buzzed and he drew out his phone. He frowned at the Caller ID and held up the index finger of his free hand. “Getting more interesting by the second.” He answered. “Governor Valoria, I assume? Now is not –” The Fae governor interrupted, talking deeply but not loud enough for everyone to hear. Obrington’s brow folded. “Huh. That so.” He listened as the Fae railed on, then said, “You understand we�
��re willing to co-operate.” More listening. “It’s come to our attention, too.” He looked unhappy at the next comments. “That might be best for all of us. Good day.”

  Putting his phone away, Obrington looked at Sam. He adjusted his jacket, and said calmly, “Seems I owe you an apology, Ward.”

  Definitely a trap.

  “I was wrong about one thing. Ms Kuranes wasn’t spinning a yarn about her Fae connections. And it has got her in all sorts of fresh trouble. They’re connecting her to some kind of political assassination. And you weren’t with her at the time?”

  Sam’s doubts mounted. They’d planned to go to Tupsom together – but Pax had been keen to go on ahead, hadn’t she? Hell, why were there Fae bullets in this van? And these people knew how to get into the Sunken City – was it possible –

  “Know what we do with her now?” Obrington said, self-satisfied. “Besides marvelling at how big a cocking mess she’s producing.”

  The best Sam could do was stare back.

  “No?” Obrington said. “The Fae want us to hand her over, or otherwise handle her. They’re not above capital punishment, yes? Frankly, I’m not in Ordshaw to tango with gangsters and this kind of bloody politics. Remove Kuranes from the equation and it seems to me we’ve got a much clearer shot at the end goal, don’t we?”

  Sam shook her head, but still no words came.

  “Sounds settled to me. You two” – Obringinton indicated Casaria and Sam – “need a few lessons taught hard, but I can see you’ve been caught up beyond your station. Here’s a shot at redemption. Help make all this go away, including Kuranes, and you get to keep your jobs, and your freedom, how’s that? But we’ll leave hunting her to the boys, shall we, to make sure a proper job’s done, Meantime, how about all of us find this bloody Stacey Monroe, whoever he is, and see what he has to say about your star civilian. Casaria, you’re with me” – Obrington clicked his fingers at Landon – “and you’ll kindly follow on with Ms Ward. Get us a home address. Assuming none of you have any problem with that?”

  12

  Letty barged through a sleek entrance hall into an open-plan living area. Nimm was at a kitchen counter, startled from chopping vegetables, a gleaming knife in his hand. Pistol drawn, Letty sprang over the sofa then the counter with a quick wingbeat and the hum of the Clear Glider. She knocked the knife away and pushed Nimm into a stainless steel fridge, then jammed the barrel of her gun under his nose before checking the room.