by Julian North
My eyes drifted over each of my neighbors. “So this is what a blood gang looks like in Manhattan?”
“You bet,” Alissa assured me. “What do you think?”
“Stay in Manhattan.”
The other three laughed. I didn’t.
“Well?” Alissa asked again.
I dug into my spaghetti, the sauce thick and rich with garlic. These kids had no idea. They stared at me. I swallowed too much and told them what happened. “Your precious honor code isn’t quite as iron-clad as you made out, Alissa.”
She rubbed her chin, thoughtful. “Drake’s brother is a council prefect. He likes to throw that around. But it’s crap. They’d still throw him out if he gets too far out of line. Havelock has a vote as well.”
I sucked in more of my lunch. “Anyway, Kris happened along.”
“Oh, Kris, is it?” Nythan interjected. “Ain’t you girls been buds since your early days at her daddy’s company?”
“She saved you from her fellow highborn goons?” Alissa shook her head. “The empress never misses a chance to extend her domain.”
I felt my face harden. “She didn’t save me from anything. I could’ve handled them. But she has a way…of calming things down. For everyone.”
Nythan coughed in derision. Lara’s face was a twist of scowls. That expression wasn’t dislike—it was hatred. But Alissa nodded sagely.
“She urged me to give this place a chance.”
“She and I agree on that, at least,” Alissa told me, her tone soft.
“And you took her advice and decided to make friends with her brother?” Nythan asked. “I’m not even sure those two like each other, although they hide it well. What did the self-proclaimed future ruler of the world have to say?”
“He wants to race me again.”
Three chins dropped. I went back to my lunch.
Alissa and Lara switched the topic to some big allocator event I didn’t know or care about while I cleaned my plate. I didn’t linger. They were still talking when I left.
Script was my first class after lunch. I walked swiftly and arrived early. The room was still empty. Unlike my other classes, Script had no assigned seats, so I chose a heavy wooden table near the back. I slipped inside, drowsy from carbohydrates. Nythan startled me awake moments later, nearly jumping into the desk beside me.
“This whole notion of handwriting with ink is barbaric,” he said to me.
I looked around the room. “The money these antique materials cost…for what? A rich person’s vanity.”
Nythan’s face told me the words bit more than I intended. Still, I didn’t apologize for the truth.
“It matters to the alumni who donate money. Tradition is very important at Tuck.”
I didn’t answer. I didn’t know what to say.
Students streamed into the room. They came in all shapes and hair colors, but my gaze locked on one in particular: Drake Pillis-Smith. He’d been just another face to me yesterday. Today, he flashed his jackal’s teeth before taking the seat directly in front of me.
Muscles that had no place on a boy his age bulged beneath his uniform. Mr. Yadlow entered the room, his thick leathery hair dripping onto a once-handsome face that had yielded to time.
“We’ll be doing Jefferson’s Declaration of Independence today,” he announced. “Dip pen and ink are to be used. And I want to see precise script. We’re learning patience and precision here, ladies and gentlemen. Form orderly lines for the supplies, please. Conduct yourselves appropriately.”
I was the last person to fetch the ink and pen. The instrument was a garish silvery thing with a golden nib that probably cost more than it would’ve to get Mateo in to see a real doctor. I eyed the ink pot as I might a witch’s cauldron. The ancient document displayed on my digiBook was daunting. I had heard of the Declaration of Independence but had never read it. I did so now, initially to procrastinate, but then with interest. When I had finished reading, I looked to see if anyone else had noticed the hypocrisy of the document—a paper revered for its history, its sentiments against oppression forgotten. Everyone else had their head down, focused on penmanship.
I dipped my pen and began to scrawl. The instrument felt like a lead weight. The ink flowed unevenly, worsening my already challenged script. I concentrated on one flowing letter at a time, trying to emulate the elegant penmanship of the author, paying no mind to the intended meaning. Deep into the second passage, my desktop jerked. I scrawled down the page, lines of ink ruining the past half-hour of work. I looked up in time to catch Drake twisting back into his regular position. Fire ignited within me. I put aside my ruined work and stood, the silver pen clutched in my right hand like a knife. Drake kept his back to me even though I was sure he knew I stood behind him.
A violent coughing fit erupted to my right. Several pasty fingers wrapped themselves around my arm.
“I’m so sorry, Daniela,” Nythan stammered between huffs. “I think I bumped your desk. I just needed some water. It’s completely my fault.”
“What the hell are you doing?” I hissed.
“Just not feeling well.” Nythan let off another rattling fit.
Mr. Yadlow ambled over, hands tucked behind his back as if out for a country stroll. “A problem, pupils?”
“No problem, sir,” Nythan assured him. “I may have accidently bumped Daniela’s desk.” He punctuated his faux confession with a sharp hack.
“Ah, well, no great loss,” Mr. Yadlow declared, glancing over at my scribbles. “Plenty of time to finish tomorrow. Collect your water, then return to work as you are able, Mr. Royce. In fact, you might want to start over as well.” Yadlow strolled away with the same easy gait. I glanced at Nythan’s writing; even without ink stains, it was worse than mine.
Nythan returned with a glass of fresh water from the hall dispenser and new sheets of paper for both of us. “Go gently,” he told me. I took a hard, unhappy breath, looking everywhere but at Nythan. My viser vibrated soon afterwards, signaling the end of class.
Drake didn’t turn around as he got up to leave, but I could feel the smug look on his face. I stayed at my seat as the class filed out. Nythan bent down beside me.
“We fight differently here,” he whispered. “Know the difference between a battle and a war.”
I flushed, nodding reluctantly as I got up to leave. I whispered Mateo’s name to myself several times as I walked away.
I had History next, then Chemistry. I didn’t pay attention in either.
Alissa hooked her arm into mine immediately after the final signal, guiding me into the hall. Eager students flowed around us like we were giant rocks in rapids.
“We’re headed to the park,” she informed me. “Won’t be many more days as nice as this. Come with us.”
“Can’t,” I said, looking at her as I might a dancing cobra.
“Thursday then,” she said.
“Listen, Alissa…you may mean well, but—”
She pretended not to hear me. “And come to my place for dinner after.”
Something caught in my throat. “What?”
“People do eat in Manhattan. Knives, forks, the usual. I’ve seen that you know how to use them, based on what you did to your lunch. I’m sure you’ll manage to get the hang of eating with us. No excuses.”
I felt my palms grow moist. I shook my head violently.
Alissa waited for me to stop squirming. Her eyes found mine. “Don’t try to do this on your own, Daniela.” I held her stare. “Think about it.”
She left me alone after that. I wrestled with my feelings about Alissa’s invitation all the way back to Bronx City. Kortilla met me at the station again, and I told her about it—all of it. The confession reminded me of the last time I went to church, back when I was seven. I had told the pale priest that I hated my father for never knowing me, and my mother for being gone. Telling him didn’t change anything. I never went to church again.
“You remember Guapo John?” Kortilla asked.
&
nbsp; “Dung-eating psycho,” I spat the words, remembering the blood, the tears, the grave. “After what he did to Francis, I’ll never forget him.”
“Remember how quick he moved? How strong he was? Even his loose temper served him well—nobody messed with Guapo John. He was the most dangerous dealer in southern Bronx City, and everyone knew it.”
“Yeah, but his parts are floating in the Harlem River somewhere, none of them attached to each other,” I pointed out.
“Because he was alone, an independent; because no one else could stand him. As big and as mean a bastard as he was, he couldn’t handle the Corazones by himself. He put Francis down, but what my brother’s blood did to him was worse.”
“I’m not Guapo John.”
“Even you need people, Dee. Or you will end up like Guapo John.”
Kortilla’s advice stung. It usually did. She slung an arm around me.
I pinged Alissa on my way home: See you at dinner tomorrow.
CHAPTER
THIRTEEN
The next day started off ordinary, which was rather extraordinary. I went through each of my morning classes without incident. The lessons ranged from fascinating to dull. There were students who knew more than me, but plenty who knew less. I even had people to talk to, if I had wanted to talk.
I received a gracious nod from Kris as I passed her in the hall, one among countless others. For a few precious moments during the day, I almost forgot where I was. Then came Script. Nythan sat next to me again. Drake relocated to a safer distance, huddled among cronies, people of beauty and spite. I resumed my work transcribing the Declaration of Independence, trying to improve on the work Mr. Yadlow had deemed unworthy yesterday. It wasn’t shaping up any better.
About halfway through class, a delicious curse cut through the silence. Drake Pillis-Smith stood over his desk, his hands and uniform drenched in runny black ink. I judged his tirade worthy of a Bronx City street corner brawl, even if I didn’t know what a “pendelnut-jack-A” was.
“Decorum, Mr. Pillis-Smith,” Mr. Yadlow reminded him, his voice stern. “Your clumsiness and some spilled ink is no reason to act like a savage.”
Drake turned hard on his heels, his arms held stiffly in front as if the ink had frozen his hands. He glowered with rage as he looked at me. I smiled innocently.
“You,” he mouthed.
Nythan emitted something between a cough and a laugh that was neither. It was a claim. Nythan had done it, somehow, without leaving his desk. And he wanted Drake to know it. The burly highborn turned his glare towards Nythan. I had seen looks like the one Drake wore in the barrio. It never ended well.
“You’re excused to change uniforms and clean up,” Mr. Yadlow told Drake. “Please return in a better condition.”
He stomped out of the class, the door slamming hard behind him. I got back to my scribbling. My writing was still lousy, but my mood had improved.
We met on the great steps of Tuck after school, Alissa, Lara, Nythan, and I. These, if not my friends, then my allies.
Only Nythan and Lara had familiars. The machines hovered above us as we walked toward Central Park, like children’s balloons without the string. I glanced upward, uneasy. I wasn’t sure Nythan or Lara remembered the drones were there, watching us all. But they had never been chased by the Authority’s metal monsters.
It was one of those fall days in the Five Cities when the wind was just cool enough to refresh beneath a not-too-hot sun. The pampered trees lining Eighty-Ninth Street shed their leaves as we strolled along. I thought about the people with so much money they could buy clean water for growing ornaments rather than having to rely on ration cards. People like those I walked beside.
We passed beneath the awnings of buildings that sheltered the rich and powerful of Manhattan. We all looked like we belonged in our Tuck uniforms, accompanied by familiars; a few of the doormen smiled, even at me. They wouldn’t have if they knew where I lived.
We crossed Fifth Avenue. I stared over the low brick wall into the unimaginable lushness of Central Park. Pathways traveled up hills and across green fields. Leaves, some with the barest hints of yellow, adorned the branches that peeked over the park’s boundary. I thought of my mother, our trips here. I had clearer images of this place in my head than I did of her. The memories were precious, dream-like. My legs faltered. They didn’t want me to go any further.
“It’s even better inside,” Nythan promised, misreading my hesitation.
“I’ve been here before,” I said, my words sharp.
“Then what’s the issue?”
His eyes, clear and genuine, made me bite back a dismissive reply. “Nothing,” I told him, forcing one foot in front of the other.
We crossed the threshold of the park at Eighty-Fourth Street, merging into a steady trickle of people, many wearing the uniforms of Manhattan’s elite private schools, all seeking the greenery.
“How did you do it?” I asked Nythan.
“Do what?” He reeked of satisfaction.
“Fine. I guess Drake is a clumsy oaf then.”
Nythan held out for about ten seconds. “Fabricated polytetrafluoroethylene, with a little twist of my own design.”
“Huh?”
“You just need to know that it’s one of the slipperiest substances in existence, especially when adapted by yours truly so it could be rubbed on an ink pot by some handsome genius.”
I thought about the prank, chewing my bottom lip. “Yadlow will notice you did something to the ink pot. They’ll have evidence.”
“It turns back into a gas in less than an hour. Gave me something to do in one of my labs today.”
“How many labs do you have?”
“Two.”
“I thought we only could have one.”
“I’ve got special permission from Havelock to foster my creative mind,” Nythan informed me, his teeth as white as his skin. “One at Tuck, I do the other at Lenox in a research lab.”
We reached the great lawn. Hundreds of people, many of them students, hunkered down in groups across the grassy meadow. Some threw flying disks at each other, others sat in circles, stroking their visers like pets. More familiars than I cared to count clogged the airspace above them. All that was missing were slaves to feed them grapes.
“Did you do that to Drake because of what he did to me?” I asked Nythan, not sure if I wanted the answer.
“I don’t like Drake Pillis-Smith.”
“Him in particular? Or all highborn?”
Hints of a smile tickled the corners of Nythan’s mouth. “It’s refreshing to meet someone who hasn’t been raised in this cesspool, who doesn’t come in knowing everyone’s backstory.”
“Why should I care?”
“You’re one of us now, Bronx girl,” he proclaimed. “Did you not know that Drake Pillis-Smith’s father is Atkin Pillis-Smith, Mayor of Manhattan?”
“Can’t say I did. Or that I care now that I do.” I nibbled at my lip again. “What does that matter to you?”
“My father was the mayor of New York City, a long time ago. Back when there was still a New York City,” Nythan said. “Drake’s dad ran against him in elections, twice. Old Atkin lost both times.”
“There hasn’t been a New York City in over a decade. Seems a long time to hold a grudge.”
Nythan shook his head. “It was just yesterday in Manhattan. Families hold grudges for generations. Some misguided notion of family honor. But this one is a bit fresher. Atkin is an Orderist, same as our dear President. He, along with Landrew Foster-Rose-Hart, got the Taxation for Representation Amendment through, under questionable circumstances. That’s when California broke off. As part of the payback for Atkin’s help in bringing much of the Northeast into line, New York City was broken into five legally distinct cities. Manhattan became the new capital of the remaining forty-nine states. President Ryan-Hayes got his amendment, won the next election, and every one since. Our perpetual President.”
I stifled a yawn. “Richie p
olitics. The allocators and the government found more ways to screw with us, and each other, making themselves even richer. But they were doing that long before Cali broke away, long before the Five Cities. Nothing new.”
Nythan’s jaw grew taut. “My dad didn’t give up as easily as you. He didn’t accept what they had done. He organized the unions, the workers, anyone he could. In the outer boroughs—Staten Island, Queen, the Bronx, Brooklyn, a lot of city employees backed him, including most of the old police. He organized marches, sit-ins, strikes…and other things.”
The moisture emptied from my mouth and throat. I was breathing, but it felt like I wasn’t getting any air. “When was this?”
“About fifteen years ago, around the time we were born,” Nythan said.
The words knocked the breath out of me. “My dad died in those marches. For your father’s lost cause. Richie fighting richie. But it’s the regular folks who paid.” I bit off the last words.
Nythan looked away from me. “Your father wasn’t the only person who paid. My dad spent ten years in prison, on crap charges. He got stabbed in the back by another prisoner. Paralyzed from the waist down. They let him out a few years ago.” He said it into the wind, but I heard the bitterness clearly.
“The Mayor did that?”
Nythan’s face shone red when he turned back to me. “The Mayor, the Orderists, it’s all the same. They said they would be the party that governed, restored an orderly nation. Success through merit alone. Economic rationalism. Prosperity through order.’” He snickered. “Finally, a party that kept their campaign promises. Judges, politicians, leaders of any kind were jailed, intimidated, or paid off. Just about every major news service was bought out by Orderist supporters. What was left was mostly drowned out.”
I sensed a kinship of hate with Nythan. “So you have a blood feud with Drake and his family? With all the Orderists?”
