by T. A. White
“I was hoping to gain information that would get me in good with Lucius.”
She squinted at him, knowing it was a plausible explanation. He and his friend had failed in their job so to make up for it he sought to get leverage on Lucius’ rival. She’d seen similar instances work in the past. But now he had even better information, if he was right about her. Still, if he, like her, had put all the clues about the key together why had he helped her against Blade?
It also seemed important that he chose the Red Lady’s den to infiltrate. Furthermore, he’d known an awful lot about the prison and the way she ran business.
“Night told me you’re like him,” Dewdrop said. Tate’s eyebrows came together as she tried to figure out what he meant. “You’re one of the sleepers and don’t remember anything from before you woke up in the tunnels.”
Tate was suspicious of the sudden change in topic. “Yeah. Why do you care?”
Dewdrop’s smile made him seem like the 14-year-old boy he was instead of the street tough urchin. “I’ve heard of such things before.”
Tate gestured for him to continue.
“The Uppers like to pretend that the only races are the humans, Silva, and Kairi but most of the Lowers know that’s not entirely true,” he said sliding down the wall until he rested on his butt. “There have been… people… with strange abilities crawling up out of the tunnels to merge with the normal’s for years. All with the same story. They woke from a long sleep with no memories of a time before they slept. All of them had strange abilities.”
“You seem to be very well informed for a street urchin,” Tate said, not entirely believing his story.
A wistful expression crossed his face. “I wasn’t always a thief.”
Tate had a feeling she’d picked at an old wound and wasn’t sure how to respond.
He recovered from his melancholy quickly, though, and continued. “The people I come from are travelers. Always moving from one city to another in great caravans. Many of them with abilities like mine.” He smiled sadly. “When I was a kid, I can remember my mother telling me bedtime stories about the first travelers and their beginnings. I’d always wanted to meet someone like them.”
He looked uncomfortable about what he’d revealed. It was on the tip of her tongue to ask how he ended up here, scrounging for scraps, but sensed it was a painful tale, one he wasn’t ready to share with her.
“Is that why you decided to save me?” she finally asked.
He shrugged and ducked his head, not meeting her eyes. “I was curious. You’re not like anybody else I’ve met.”
She’d heard that one before.
She still wasn’t sure if he was trustworthy or not. “And now? You just helped me escape Lucius’ men again. I doubt they’ll let you come back.”
He was quiet. Tate was about to give up on getting answers when he spoke, “You’re strong. I’m a good thief, but it’s easy for others to take what I steal because I’m so small. That’s why I wanted to hook up with Lucius. No one dares mess with his men.”
“And you were hoping, what? That I’d be your protector, there to beat off would-be rivals.”
He shook his head, flustered. “No. I’m not explaining this very well.” He sighed. “You’re small like me, but even Thane treats you with caution and respect.”
Thane? Tate mouthed silently.
“The guy you keep calling Blade,” Dewdrop said.
Oh, that’s right. So his name was Thane, huh? She liked her name for him much better.
“I was hoping you could teach me some of your tricks,” Dewdrop said lifting a shoulder.
Tate arched an eyebrow. “Look, its not that I’m not flattered, but I don’t think that’d be a good idea.”
She didn’t want to be responsible for another person. Not with all the problems she had. Nor was she convinced she had anything worth teaching.
“Look,” he said standing. “You wouldn’t have to do much, just let me tag along. I can be of use to you.”
“I don’t know,” she said. “It’s going to be dangerous for a little while.”
He opened his hands and held them up to her. “I don’t care. I can handle it.
“You’re a child.”
He shook his head at her. “I haven’t been a child since I was sold to the Red Lady.” He stepped closer and pleaded earnestly. “Please! I can help. For instance, you don’t know your way around the city. I can help you with that. I know where every cutpurse, hired sword and enforcer in the city likes to go. I know whose allegiances are held by whom and all of the players.”
His face was mulish as he glared up at her, and she could feel herself softening. She stiffened and gave him a cold look, not ready to concede the battle quite yet.
“What about that scream trick you do?” she asked. “Doesn’t that work to incapacitate bullies?”
He shook his head. “It works at first. If a lot come or they get close enough to shut my mouth, there’s not much I can do.”
Tate folded her arms and leaned against the wall. She resisted the urge to bang her head against it. Having someone watch her for pointers wasn’t on her list of things to do before she died, but he’d been pretty helpful up until now. If she thought about it, he’d saved her twice now, once in the tunnels and now from whatever Ryu had planned.
Put that way, she owed him. She wasn’t the type to welsh on a debt so she resigned herself to getting used to him.
“I don’t know about teaching you. I’m not even sure some of the things I do can be taught.” His face fell and she admitted grudgingly, “I can, however, let you watch how I do things. Maybe you can pick up a few things that way.”
“Like partners?” he asked excitedly.
Her lips quirked. “Yeah, like partners.”
He pumped his fist in the air and jumped to his feet. She had to admit the prospect was a little exciting for her too.
“We can’t go back to the room, so we’ll have to figure something else out. I want off the street for now. Lucius probably has men out looking for us,” she said.
“What about Night?”
She shook her head. “He doesn’t have anything to do with this, really. He’s a bystander so I doubt Ryu is going to do anything to him. He and his family are probably safest at Colton’s Place.”
“I have a hideout we can use,” Dewdrop suggested.
Tate considered his offer but ended up shaking her head no. “We can’t use anything Lucius or his men know about. That includes known hangouts.”
His focus turned inward as he ran through possibilities. “I know a place,” he said slowly. “I hope you can climb, though.”
***
“This is where you want to hide?” Tate asked looking up in disbelief. She pointed at the stone steps cut into the side of the cliff face. It had taken the better part of two hours using back alleys and rooftops to work their way over to the cliff the city butted up against.
Tate was sweating under her shirt from the exertion and didn’t see how his hideout could possibly work. She looked up a long line of steps that had been worn smooth with the passage of thousands of feet. It continued straight up until it disappeared from view. Dewdrop assured her it went all the way up to the Upper City and had a thousand steps in total. Though it had been heavily used as a passage connecting the Upper and Lower cities, in the past few hundred years it had fallen into disuse with the advent of an elevator and the more gentle hill climb at the rear of the city.
“Nobody comes this way anymore,” Dewdrop was saying. “About a quarter of the way up, there’s a ledge we can climb that will hide us from view.”
Tate did the math in her head. That was roughly 250 stairs. While not impossible, her legs ached from walking and running all over the city for the past two days. They didn’t want to go up one step let alone 250.
“Wait for me,” she called to Dewdrop who had already started up the stairs. He waved and kept climbing. Resigned, Tate started up after him. At least they were
n’t going back underground.
She was breathing hard when she finally made it to where Dewdrop waited. He was breathing heavily and had one hand planted on his hip as he looked down at her. It was gratifying to see she wasn’t the only one out of breath.
He flew up the cliff using natural hand and foot holds. She groaned and started after him. He had way too much energy.
The ledge he’d spoken of wasn’t terribly big but would work for a short amount of time as it had plenty of space for both to sit or stretch out on. She flopped down on her back sucking in air. Thank the Saviors that she could rest.
After a period of time, when her breathing evened out and her legs stopped burning she sat up and looked down at the city. The view was breathtaking. She could only see the part of the city surrounding the port but the tiny crescent was breathtaking against the bay and sky.
“How did you find this?” Tate asked.
“Luck.” He shrugged. “And desperation.”
“It’s beautiful.”
He came to look over her shoulder at the city spread before them. After the events of the previous night and that morning, Tate felt a sense of peace and calm steal through her at the view. It felt like a bit of balance was being restored and she felt the same hopefulness she’d had standing on Jost’s ship looking at Aurelia only three days ago.
Because of how deep into the cliffs the stairs had been cut, their little ledge remained in shadow even in the middle of the day. Though hungry, Tate didn’t want to climb down to find food, instead content to luxuriate in the delicate feeling of peace their ledge offered.
Dewdrop pulled out things he’d stored in a small nook while Tate dangled her feet off the edge.
“We should get some rest,” she finally said breaking the silence. “It’s going to be a busy night.”
“What’s happening tonight?”
Tate leaned back and looked up at the sky. “We’re going to find the fulcrum.”
Chapter Fourteen
As they waited for night to fall, Tate explained what she had overheard before her torture session with the Red Lady. She hoped having the fulcrum would give her enough bargaining power to get a couple of her enemies off her back.
Their captors had let it slip that the fulcrum was being hid near the docks. Dewdrop said he knew several places on the waterfront that were ideal for holing up in if one was trying to avoid the law. They decided to narrow the search parameters to warehouses that were easily accessible by boat. That left them with more than a few to search. It wasn’t the best plan, admittedly, but without more information it was the only one they had. Hopefully, through some stroke of luck, they would find the right one before Umi and her men.
As the last rays of light faded from the world, the two crept from their hiding place and made their way down to the docks. The streets were jammed with people celebrating the Donza Festival. Tate stuck close to Dewdrop, not wanting to get lost in the shuffle.
Street performers had roped off areas and put on elaborate shows attracting crowds of people. Tate stumbled to a stop when a man abruptly stepped in front of her, handing her a small, round transparent ball with a glow light rattling around inside it. With a vacant smile, he went on his way.
“What’s this for?” She held the lantern up.
Dewdrop glanced back. “At midnight everybody releases the lanterns. There’s magic attached to them to make them float into the air. People even take boats out into the harbor to watch them go up. It’s one of the best things about the festival.”
Tate noticed all the people around them seemed to have the lanterns as well, attached to belts or looped onto necklaces. Others had softly glowing lines wrapped around their arms or threaded into their hair. It looked as if the stars had come down from their heavens to adorn the city’s people.
Her eyes nearly popped from her head trying to take it all in, and it was with regret that they moved into less populated areas to search. With the gaiety and vibrancy of the festival behind them, they moved onto the docks, methodically searching for their quarry.
They started with the places Dewdrop deemed the most likely for someone to hole up in. After running through over half their list and encountering several little gangs in the midst of smuggling operations, Tate was ready to call it a night. They had very little information to go on, and the city was just too vast to search in one night. She knew Umi already had several advantages over her, knowing where and what the fulcrum actually was.
Dewdrop dropped lightly to the ground beside her where she was waiting in a darkened alley right off the harbor’s edge.
“Nothing.”
She took the news with an expressionless face and sighed inwardly. It had been a long shot anyways.
Voices alerted them to the presence of others, and they sank back into the shadows. Tate didn’t want to advertise their presence, figuring anybody on the waterfront at this time of night was probably up to no good.
As the voice’s owners got closer, Tate chanced edging closer to the mouth of the alley. One of the voices sounded very familiar. She hissed silently when the man passed into view.
Danny.
She couldn’t be entirely sure, considering the darkness, but the body height and shape were right. When she saw the slight figure beside him, she was convinced. She couldn’t fight the sinking sensation in the pit of her stomach nor the small voice inside crying out and telling her to run. When she’d made her final decision to leave the Marauder, she hadn’t thought she’d be tangling with its crew just days afterward.
She ducked back into the alley and held her head in her hands. Given Ryu’s involvement and the secrecy surrounding their return, she was willing to bet they were mixed up in this somehow. She swore silently. What should she do now? On the one hand she now had someone to lead her to the fulcrum. On the other, doing this closed a lot of options to her. Joss would never pardon someone who stole from him.
She could still walk away. Pretend she hadn’t seen anything and disappear. Even as she thought it, she knew she wouldn’t do it. Not when the Red Lady’s face still haunted her and not when Umi had the chance to succeed at whatever she had planned. Tate had never before let someone betray her and get away with it; she wasn’t about to start now.
She hardened her heart against any misgivings about stealing from Joss. They’d fired the first salvo by hiding their actions, and she’d be damned to the abyss before she’d roll over.
Tapping Dewdrop on the shoulder, she motioned for him to follow her. She was careful as she moved from shadow to shadow, never exposing herself for too long. She made sure she kept an eye out for men who’d been positioned to watch for people tailing anyone returning to the hideout. She’d been on lookout more than once herself and knew the favored spots.
She pointed one out to Dewdrop before ducking into an alley and running along a parallel street to catch up to Danny again. They had to detour several more times for similar reasons before Danny and his friend disappeared into a small wooden building built on one of the piers. It was more of a boathouse than a warehouse, a place where fishermen could unload their catch directly into rooms specially built to freeze the fish. There’d even be room for a small boat in case they needed to escape.
“Is this it?”
She nodded. The boy had done a pretty good job following her lead and hadn’t asked a lot of questions. He was adept at slipping unseen through shadows and had pointed out more than one sentry. She was beginning to like the idea of them teaming up more and more.
“This wasn’t even on my list,” he grumbled.
She snorted. Probably not. Jost was incredibly good at keeping operations hidden. He had to be to avoid heat from the Emperor’s justice. It was sheer luck they’d happened on Danny and Trent and were able to follow them back to their hideout.
Tate’s hands were sweating, and she wiped them on her pants. She hadn’t thought she’d be this nervous. But she had first hand experience with how careful Jost was when setting up a
perimeter. In the time she’d traveled with him he’d never had a cargo lifted, and there were plenty of people who tried. A big part of her wanted to walk away and forget about the fulcrum. If she did that she’d have to leave Aurelia. She considered that for a moment. She had no real ties to the city. No friends, no connections. It would be easy to leave and find somewhere else to settle.
She just couldn’t do that. There was a stubborn piece of her that refused to relinquish her spot here. She had learned more about her past in the three days she had been in town than in the entire eight months she spent traveling. She couldn’t help but hope that staying meant learning more pieces of the puzzle.
Dewdrop didn’t look any more convinced of their success than she did and regarded the boathouse with a skeptical expression. He’d heard stories of the Pirate Captain Jost and how ruthless he was. Stealing his cargo seemed a sure way to a shortened life span.
“Are you sure you want to do this?” he asked echoing Tate’s thoughts.
Not wanting to be exposed while they did their planning, they’d broken into a building across the street. Each had staked out their own window and peered out of it, careful not to be seen by any on the street. He crawled under his window and over to Tate, sitting with his back against the wall at her feet.
“Yes.” No. “We need a bargaining chip. It’ll be fine.” It probably wouldn’t. “I’ll understand if you don’t want to help. Angering Jost isn’t something you signed up for.” She hadn’t either.
He stared out the window. She couldn’t really blame him. She had to do this, and even she had doubts. For someone who had no real vested interest in events, it would take a lot of courage or stupidity to walk the path she was about to travel.
She went back to looking out the window. There was no way to make it across the street to the boathouse without being seen. A distraction might get her across, but it wouldn’t last long enough to get in and out without getting caught.
How should she do this?
Her eyes caught movement in the water. At first, she couldn’t quite make out what the objects were, but as her eyes adjusted she could see boats, hundreds of them as they floated in the harbor. Dim lights bobbed among the waves.
