The Facefaker's Game

by Chandler J. Birch

  Blimey closed the book so carefully it made hardly any noise at all and turned around in his chair. He rubbed his eyes and grinned.

  “Who’d you rob tonight?”

  “No idea,” Ashes lied. “Jack doesn’t tell me their names much. Says it’d be a breach in security.”

  “Anything good?”

  “Just bits of paper today,” Ashes said. “Lots of it, though. Whole books of the stuff. These Ivorish, I swear they write everything down.” He grinned, though Blimey didn’t seem to find it very funny. “What’re you reading tonight?”

  “History,” Blimey said absently. “I’m in the late Reconstruction right now.”

  “Any new words?”

  “Nothing very interesting, unless you ever try to swindle a scholar,” Blimey said. “How’s Synder?”

  “Eh?” Ashes felt himself tense. It took a conscious effort to relax. “Fine. We haven’t talked much. It’s been busy.”

  Blimey nodded, but his smile had faded. “Eh. You have been real busy.”

  “Care for a game?” Ashes asked, nodding toward the Artificial chess set.

  Blimey shook his head. “I’m tired. Reckon I’d rather go to bed.”

  “I’ll count that as a forfeit, then,” Ashes said with a forced smile. “Seems about the only way I’ll get a win these days.”

  “I’ll make sure I note it,” Blimey said woodenly. He climbed onto his bed and lay on his back, kicking his legs up against the wall. Ashes busied himself making his own bed, a nest of dirty cloths not unlike the one he’d slept in back at the Fortress.

  “Ashes.”

  “Eh, mate?”

  “Have you thought any more about my idea?” Blimey’s voice didn’t tremble, but it was a near thing. Whatever foundations of courage it stood on were perilously fragile.

  Ashes tensed. Of course Blimey would get up the gumption to talk about something that frightened him on a night when Ashes was already exhausted and busy. But Ashes owed him a hearing at least. Whatever Blimey or Synder thought, Ashes wasn’t a jailor.

  He kept his voice level, not wanting to scare the boy. “Which idea’d that be?”

  “About me trying what you do,” Blimey said. “Hustling. Confidence games. Those things. With chess.”

  Ashes bit his lip. “Eh. I’ve been thinking about it. I think—probably not yet, Blimey.”

  Blimey’s face took on a serious cast. “I’ve been practicing,” he said. “I could play it off like it was just a fluke, I’m sure of it.”

  “It’s not just about that,” Ashes said, hating himself. “There’s other things you’d need to worry about, mate.”

  Blimey set his jaw. “Like what? You keep telling me that. But you never say what I’ve got to be so worried about.”

  “Like that if you got caught, you’d be stuck in an actual prison,” Ashes said, trying to keep cool. “No books. No way out. And prison’s your best hope, too. If they throw you back into Burroughside like they do with most of the gutter-rats . . .” Ragged would find you. And you’d be dead for true this time.

  “I’ve kept my face out of Burroughside half a year already,” Blimey said. “Ragged wouldn’t off me just like that for mucking up once—”

  “He damn well would,” Ashes said sharply, feeling his neck get hot. “Ragged would kill you if he saw you.”

  Blimey’s eyes darted down, searching for an answer. “Maybe we could increase our dues to him?” he suggested. “I could be like one of his thieves.”

  “No again,” Ashes said.

  “Why not try, though?” Blimey asked, nearly begging now. “Ragged’s not a fool. I’m more useful to him if I’m bringing in coin.”

  “He won’t care. You’re forbidden to be seen in Burroughside,” Ashes said firmly. “That’s the deal we made. We break it, he kills us both.”

  “But it’s a stupid promise to make,” Blimey said. “Especially when I haven’t done anything to him!”

  “You think you know Ragged better than me, mate?” Ashes said quietly. “If you’re ever seen, we’re dead. If we ask for different terms, we’re dead. If we ever try to do it differently than he wants, we’re dead.”

  “You’re so pessimistic,” Blimey said, with almost enough humor to make it a joke.

  “That’s the way it is,” Ashes said. “So long as Ragged’s in charge of anything, we’ve got no other move. We have to keep you hidden or get away from Burroughside for good. It’s the only way for you to be safe.”

  Blimey shifted to a seated position, resting his back against the wall. “I lived half a year in that tower trying to stay safe,” he said, looking into space. “And I’ve lived two whole months here under the ground. And I’m tired of it. I’m tired of hiding in holes and crannies. Ragged’s left me alone all this time, hasn’t he? What’s he going to mind if I leave Burroughside for good?”

  “Blimey, stop.”

  “No,” Blimey said. “I want to leave. I want to be away from here. Ragged—”

  “He’s left you alone because he thinks you’re dead!” Ashes snapped. “You’ve got to stay here because if he found out you were alive—if anybody saw you, just in the street, if you slipped out of the disguise for a second—he’d kill you. The only reason he stopped looking for you is that he thought I killed you.”

  Blimey stared wordlessly at the opposite wall. “I thought you said Ragged was going to let me go so long as I never bothered him.”

  “I had to tell you that, didn’t I? So that you’d not feel scared all the time.”

  “No, Ashes. You really didn’t.”

  Silence stretched between them, a miserable and uncomfortable thing. Finally, Blimey said, “Ashes, I’m just tired of being here. I want to see the city. I want to meet people.” He chuckled softly. “I never thought I’d say that. I used to hate meeting people.”

  Ashes felt like his insides were being wrung out. “I know it’s awful,” he said. “But we’ve got to just endure it. It’s what’s best.”

  Blimey looked at him, jaw bulging. “What did you say to Synder?”

  The question caught him off guard. “What’re you talking about?”

  “She came by today,” Blimey said. “While you were out. Told me she’s sorry, but she can’t visit anymore. She said things have gotten all sorts of busy, and she won’t be able to come by much. Maybe at all. So what’d you say to her?”

  Ashes faltered. Was there anything Blimey would believe? No, he thought. Not now he’s seen me stop to think. “I told her she should stop filling your head with talk about leaving here,” he said.

  “Because you don’t mean for me ever to leave?” Blimey asked flatly.

  “Not yet,” Ashes said lamely. “It’s not safe.”

  “I’m starting to wonder if that even matters,” Blimey said. He looked away from Ashes and chewed on his tongue. “You probably ought to leave.”

  Ashes grinned weakly, though he knew it wouldn’t do any good. “It’s time for bed, mate. I’m going to sleep.”

  “I know you’re not really going to sleep,” Blimey said. “Did you think I hadn’t noticed? You always make a big fuss about fixing your bed and then an hour later you slip outside again. I’m not stupid, Ashes.”

  Ashes clenched his jaw. “I didn’t want you to worry.”

  “There’s a lot of things you don’t want me to do.”

  “I wasn’t trying to keep secrets,” Ashes said lamely.

  “You don’t really need to try, do you?”

  “I’ve been working on a way to get you out of here,” Ashes admitted. “I’m trying to get rid of Ragged. I didn’t want to tell you, because—”

  “Because it’s too much for my fragile little heart,” Blimey said bitterly. “I’m glad you’ve got yourself a good way to fill the time up, Ashes. Best get to it. Don’t let me hold you up.”

  “Stop being an idiot,” Ashes said sharply.

  Blimey threw the thin blanket over his head and lay down. “I’ll work on it. You should get go
ing, Mr. Smoke. I’d hate to slow you down.”

  Ashes stalked through Burroughside in his shadow-bound cloak, paying no attention at all to his route or his surroundings. Nearly invisible and habitually noiseless, he had little to fear from Burroughside anymore.

  He couldn’t focus. He felt his head ought to have been spinning, but everything was horridly, painfully clear. Blimey wanted to be free. He wanted to escape. And he didn’t care in the slightest that Ashes was working on just that. So far as his friend was concerned, Ashes was nothing but a jailor, keeping him confined simply to—what, to appease some protective impulse?

  Why couldn’t Blimey understand that Ashes was doing everything he could? Ragged was the thing preventing Blimey’s freedom, the only one that mattered: once he was removed from power, everything else would be all right. Ashes had a treaty with Bonnie the Lass. He’d sent Saintly scrabbling under the sewers. He was doing things! It wasn’t as if he was sitting on his backside all day long, opining how much better things would be if Ragged would hurry up and leave already. Ashes had made progress. Ragged’s power base was crumbling. If Blimey could only see those things . . .

  Fuming, he slipped into a deeper shadow at the passing of a group of Ravagers. This was all Synder’s fault. Blimey had been fine until she showed up, telling him he ought to leave, telling him he could live with Jack’s company. Ashes didn’t even live with Jack’s company! It was absurd!

  Furies, what a mess, he thought, stepping under the eave of a dilapidated building. He rested his back against the wall. His forehead pounded. He could feel his heartbeat in his ears.

  Whatever else happened, he couldn’t lose focus: that much, at least, he’d learned from Jack. He was set against Ragged. Everything else was a distraction. He could still make this work. Blimey would hate him for a few weeks, perhaps a few months, but he trusted Ashes enough to stay in Annie’s basement until the work was done. Soon Bonnie would find real evidence of Ragged’s treachery, and she’d sweep through Burroughside like a summer storm. Ragged would be gone. Saintly would be gone. Everything would be all right again.

  He heard voices around the corner, and jerked up. People moving about at this hour of the night in Burroughside? Either mad, under orders, or stupidly confident. He stood, adjusting the shadow-bound cloak to make sure the construct would hide him in the darkness.

  A trio of men came down the street, bearing a sickly-green light: the same color Jack had used to frighten away the Ravagers. Ashes’s eyes widened as he realized who held it: gullible, feeble-hearted Reynard Bullface. The two enormous boys walking beside him weren’t familiar to Ashes, but they moved with the kind of confidence that came with the ability to kill whatever annoyed you.

  “I’m just saying,” Bullface muttered, “you two don’t really understand what we’ve got into. I hope we don’t find him.”

  “You’ve the stomach of a little gull,” said his partner to the left, in a thick Ysonne accent.

  “It’s girl,” said the other. “You got the stomach of a girl, Bullface.”

  “Say what you want,” Bullface grumbled. “But I’ve met him. He makes your bones go soupy, he does. He knows what you’re thinking. Knows what you’re afraid of. He can get in and out of your head like that.”

  Ashes smiled viciously and dug around in his pocket.

  “I shall say what I like,” said the Ysonne. “Getting inside your head cannot be deeficult. It is like log. Thick outside, but naseenk inside it.”

  “Gods above, you’re unbearable—”

  “Pardon me, gentlemen,” Ashes said, stepping into their path and sweeping back his hood. He wore his demon face, and his smile must have cut Reynard Bullface’s spirits in half. He’d made a number of improvements to the construct in the last few weeks, he looked nearly six feet tall and brutish. “But you wouldn’t be looking for me, would you?”

  “Smoke!”

  “Get him!”

  “I—uh—”

  Ashes stepped forward, putting himself inside the circle of larger boys. He had barely a moment to move, if that, but he wasn’t worried. Adrenaline burned in his bloodstream. Time was crawling.

  No need to worry about Reynard, said part of his mind. Too busy pissing himself. The Ysonne is too close by half, but that’s nothing to worry about. His arms are too long to be much use this nearby, and he’ll aim too high anyway. That leaves you, Mr. On-the-Right . . .

  Ashes punched upward, striking the boy on the right in the nose. He felt a satisfying crunch, and then a warm spurt of liquid on his hand. He laughed aloud as the boy stumbled backward, a laugh he’d practiced alone for hours. It was high and wild, crazed enough to put a chill to the bones.

  A punch whistled over his head, passing through the illusion of his head and missing its true target by several convenient inches. Ashes whirled, kicked the Ysonne in the shin, and then again in the knee. The boy stumbled backward, yelping. Ashes took a quick step forward, placing the bulk of his weight on the Ysonne’s foot, and drove a flat palm into the boy’s throat. The Ysonne gagged and fell to the ground in a heap.

  Ashes spun to strike at Reynard, letting the cloak flare out dramatically, but Bullface had retreated nearly ten feet. He was shaking, visibly sweating. Ashes took a menacing step forward and then saw the pistol in Reynard’s hands.

  “You’ve nothing to scare me with, boy,” Ashes bluffed, eyeing where the boy was aiming. This was a difficult thing to assess: Reynard was shaking so badly that the gun’s snout kept moving in a jerky circle. Most of that circle, though, was Ashes. Reynard was aiming at Mr. Smoke’s heart, and Ashes was just tall enough that a bullet aimed there could cause him significant discomfort.

  “Y-you look scared,” Reynard said bravely. “You’re stopped, aren’t you?”

  “Fire that gun and I’ll take it as a personal insult,” Ashes said, taking a careful step. He glanced over his shoulder; the other two boys were getting to their feet, scowling, but moving gingerly from their injuries. “I’m stopped because you don’t seem the sort that would survive me feeling personally insulted.”

  “Don’t take another step.”

  “Shoot him, Bullface!” said Righty.

  “Do not be an eediot!”

  “Don’t be a fool, Reynard,” Ashes said, taking one more step forward. Reynard clicked the hammer back, but it was too late. Ashes dropped the glass marble, and a burning light exploded in the street. This time, the light was accompanied by an appropriately ear-bursting noise, as Reynard, surprised, clenched the trigger. Ashes dropped to the ground and thought he felt the wind as the bullet sped over him.

  He heard the Ysonne screaming, but he had no moments to waste on interpreting his cries. He sprinted forward and took Reynard by the collar. Bullface was blinking helplessly, moaning, “I’m blind, I’ve gone blind, he’s taken my eyes—”

  “Not your eyes today, Reynard,” Ashes snapped, and pressed his hands against the boy’s face, covering as much as he could. He felt the magic surge inside him, fueled by his rage, his frustration, his fear, and when he ripped his hands away Reynard was screaming. His face looked burned and blackened, as if someone had branded him with hot iron in the shape of hands.

  “My face!” the boy cried. “My face, what’d you do to my face!”

  Idiot, Ashes thought. If you stopped whimpering for ten seconds you’d realize it doesn’t even hurt.

  Ashes whirled, seeking a new target. The Ysonne was on the ground, whimpering and surrounded by something wet and red, but Righty was on his feet, squinting, his hands raised in readiness to fight.

  “Stop fighting,” Ashes offered, “and you won’t suffer my anger.”

  The boy’s grim look faltered. Ashes leveled Reynard’s gun at him.

  “I surrender,” the boy said, throwing his hands up.

  “Drop your weapons,” Ashes said. “And recognize that any little voice in your head saying You can outsmart him is gonna get you killed. I’ll know if you keep even one of them hid.”

 
The boy produced a makeshift knife and another gun, setting them on the ground before getting to his feet and holding his hands over his head.

  Two guns for three of them? Ashes wondered. Is Ragged arming them? Where does he get the money?

  The Ysonne was whimpering again, clutching his shoulder. Ashes realized where Reynard’s bullet must have gone. Reynard was sobbing.

  “Get on your belly,” Ashes commanded Righty. The boy obeyed, spreading his limbs out obligingly. Ashes put a foot between his shoulders, keeping the gun aimed at him.

  “Furies!” Reynard screamed. “Gods, my face!”

  “You going to kill me?” the boy asked. He did not sound frightened; he was almost resigned.

  “Don’t intend to, boy,” Ashes said, kneeling. He put a hand against the boy’s cheek, summoned the magic still roiling inside him, and Stitched. Another burned face, like Reynard’s, to tell Ragged this really was the work of Mr. Smoke—

  The boy screamed.

  Ashes jerked back, shocked, and then realized it must have been a trick, the boy would throw him off in just a moment. Ashes leveled the gun at him again, preparing for the attack—

  But nothing came. The boy remained under Ashes’s knee, panting, eyes rolling wildly.

  “Bastard,” Righty snapped at him, venom in his voice. “You’re as bad as Ragged.”

  Ashes jumped away from him and ran.

  PERHAPS an hour passed. Perhaps less. Ashes didn’t remember it at all.

  He’d thrown the gun away somewhere—he couldn’t remember where. Now that he thought about it, leaving something like that in an alleyway somewhere in Burroughside had been a damned stupid thing to do. There was nothing for it now. He didn’t even remember getting rid of it.

  He felt exhausted in every way it was possible to be. His breath was coming hard, burning in his chest. His head spun, all his focus stripped away and left to smolder on the roadside. His head had not ached this badly since he’d started studying Artifice.

  The only thoughts he could manage were What and the and hell.