Wintercraft: Blackwatch

by Jenna Burtenshaw

  ‘Why?’

  Kate could feel something building close by; a tiny vibration at the very edge of her senses. Then she heard the scream.

  The crowd turned as one to look towards the source of the noise. A second scream followed the first and a woman standing next to a glove stall pointed up at the ceiling with terror in her eyes. Kate followed her gaze and saw what she was looking at for herself.

  ‘She can see them,’ she said.

  ‘See what?’

  A group of shades were moving across the ceiling, tumbling like spiders down into the people below. There were four of them, doing what they had done for many years: reliving the very last moments their tormented spirits could remember, the moment of their deaths. Those who could see them panicked, and those who couldn’t tried to calm the others down. Some people tried to laugh it off, patting the frightened woman on the shoulder and looking at her with pity, and the stallholders were quick to assure their customers that there was nothing to worry about.

  ‘It’s the sickness,’ someone whispered nearby. ‘It’s spreading again.’

  Kate tried not to look at the shades. They might only have been shadows, but the sight of them plummeting to their deaths over and over again was still unsettling to watch. ‘There are shades on the ceiling,’ she explained to Edgar. ‘How can they see them?’

  Someone was already leading the woman who had screamed away, and one of the stallholders pointed accusingly at the Skilled.

  ‘You did this,’ he said. ‘You brought the sickness here.’

  Baltin looked down at the stallholder with clear dislike. ‘We have done nothing,’ he said.

  ‘My customers are seeing creeps and ghouls and who knows what else, while you and your kind hole up safe somewhere, and you’re tellin’ me it’s nothing to do with you?’

  ‘That’s right.’

  ‘Why aren’t you helping people like ’er? That’s what you’re supposed to do, isn’t it?’

  Someone laughed beside him. ‘They won’t do anything,’ she said. ‘They’re cowards. Leeches. I won’t be takin’ their coin.’

  ‘We did not offer you any coin,’ said Baltin. ‘We have no interest in any of you. We are looking for someone. Someone I am hoping you might have seen.’

  ‘And why would we tell you if we had?’

  ‘Because the girl we are looking for is dangerous, and if we do not find her you will have far more to worry about than a few “creeps and ghouls”.’

  ‘Is that a threat? He just threatened me!’

  Baltin held his hands up in peace. ‘I am sure you have all heard about what happened in the city square on the Night of Souls?’

  A whisper of fear ran through the crowd. ‘Those rich types got what they deserved,’ said one. ‘A good scare never harmed anyone. We get worse than that down here every day.’

  ‘What they saw was more than just a scare,’ said Baltin. ‘It was the beginning of something. Something that has to be stopped. We can prevent a great tragedy from happening within this city, but to do so we need to find this girl.’

  The man with him held up a poster with a drawing of Kate’s face and her name in black letters with smaller writing underneath. It was an official poster, stamped by the High Council, one that had to have been taken from the streets of Fume. Kate sank further back into the dark. She should have expected it, but seeing it for herself made it horribly real. She was wanted by the council. A price had been put on her head. Who knew how many people were watching for her in the streets above, and how many collectors were already prowling the tunnels of the City Below, hunting for her in the dark?

  ‘The wardens are offerin’ the freedom of the city to people who tell them where she is,’ said the stallholder. ‘What are you offerin’?’

  ‘A promise,’ said Baltin. ‘If this girl escapes, the glimpses of the dead which you see as an inconvenience today will become a way of life before long. You all live and work in the sleeping place of the dead. This city was not meant for us, it was meant for them. The veil is weakening. If it continues to do so, life here will not only be difficult, it will be impossible. Not just here, but right across Albion as well.’

  ‘And this girl of yours is a part of all that?’

  ‘She does not know what damage she is doing,’ said Baltin, ‘but the veil is certainly weakening more quickly in her presence. None of you trust the High Council, and you all know that any “freedom” they offer you will be taken away as soon as the girl is in their hands. We have always helped ourselves here in the City Below. We may not like our neighbours, but we share these caverns and we have made them our home. Help us find this girl. Do not allow her to tear what we have built here apart.’

  With one short speech Baltin’s presence in the Shadowmarket had gone from being a threat to being an opportunity. Kate felt as if every eye was about to turn upon her, every hand point her out and deliver her to a man who wanted to kill her. But no one turned, no one looked. The poster was passed from hand to hand around the gathered crowd, and whispers spread back through the market, relaying what Baltin had said to those too far away to hear him speak. The marketgoers soon softened to his words, and as they whispered together Baltin struck the final blow to any hope Kate had of being left in peace.

  ‘You should also know,’ he said, ‘that this girl has been convicted of murder.’

  Silence fell across the nearest stalls.

  ‘She is responsible for the death of the High Councilwoman, Da’ru Marr, upon the Night of Souls. She was an accomplice in an attack on two boatmen on the Thieves’ Way that same day, in which one of them died, and I lost one of my own greatest friends at her hand. Three murders – perhaps more that we do not yet know of – and who knows how many more to come.’

  The crowd spoke up loudly in answer to Baltin’s words and he held his hands up for quiet.

  ‘Kate Winters is a very devious young woman,’ he said. ‘She will lie to you, she may even attempt to bargain with you, but she is not to be trusted. Help me find her, and it will be best for everyone.’

  Baltin did not wait for the crowd’s reaction. He strode between them, his sharp eyes flashing from side to side as he walked, eager to snatch any sign of Kate he could find.

  ‘What do you think?’ asked Edgar.

  ‘I think we’re in trouble,’ said Kate.

  ‘The market should close soon, and I’ll bet it gets locked up at night. I say we wait.’

  ‘You think we should get ourselves locked in?’

  ‘It would be safer, wouldn’t it?’ said Edgar. ‘No one would be able to get in and find us.’

  ‘Unless they decide to stay inside too,’ said Kate. ‘Once word gets back to the gatekeeper that there’s a murderer in here somewhere, don’t you think he’ll let the Skilled look round once everyone’s gone?’

  ‘What do you think we should do, then?’

  ‘Stay out of sight as long as we can, then move on.’

  ‘Even if we do find someone who can point us in the right direction, we don’t have anything to trade for the information,’ said Edgar. ‘And everyone will be looking for us now.’

  ‘We can’t just stay here, can we?’ said Kate. ‘I know what I’m doing. Follow me.’

  The Shadowmarket thrummed with noise and chatter as Kate headed towards the walls where the stalls were much quieter and they could move more freely. Lanterns glowed dimly just above her head and people were sitting in pairs at small tables which had been set up against the wall, leaning over gaming boards, too engrossed in the movements of tiny playing pieces to notice her and Edgar walking by.

  Kate kept her head down and walked with purpose, trying not to draw attention to herself, which worked well until a stack of used crates forced her to step aside and she found herself face to face with the woman who had been pointing up at the shades.

  ‘You can see ’em,’ she said, snapping her head round to look straight into Kate’s eyes. ‘You’re a Skilled! You saw’em too, didn’t you?
It can’t be the sickness. Can’t be. You tell ’em. Maybe they’ll listen to you.’

  Kate looked up at the ceiling. The shades were gone, but the woman was still staring upwards, waiting for them to emerge again.

  ‘No one’s going to listen to us, lady,’ said Edgar. ‘Just don’t go shouting about whatever you’re seeing and you’ll be fine.’

  ‘Fine? You call this fine?’ The woman held up one of her wrists, which was shackled by a thin chain to a stall beside her. ‘They’re cartin’ me off! Sick, they say. Don’t want it spreadin’. If seein’ things makes ya sick, why aren’t they cartin’ young lassie here off too?’ She glared at Kate, and waggled a finger at her, suddenly recognising her face. ‘You! You’re her! The one Mr High-and-Mighty was talking about.’

  Kate started walking away, more quickly this time.

  ‘Sorry,’ said Edgar. ‘You must be thinking about someone else.’

  ‘She’s here!’ the woman shouted. ‘The girl you want. It’s her!’

  ‘Keep going,’ said Edgar, as dozens of faces looked their way. ‘Don’t look back.’

  ‘Kate?’ Baltin’s voice carried across the market. ‘Seal the doors! Find her!’

  ‘Don’t worry,’ said Edgar, taking hold of Kate’s hand as they hurried along. ‘No one’s going to listen to him.’

  But they did.

  People chattered excitedly as word of the hunt spread through the market. There were people everywhere. Kate headed back to the cavern wall, but she could not see a way out. A few people climbed up on to stall roofs to act as lookouts, hoping to catch sight of a fleeing girl, but Kate was still walking, forcing her feet to stay calm even though she was desperate to run. So long as she kept her eyes low, few people gave her a second glance.

  Ghostly shapes moved in the corners of her eyes and dim figures wandered along the walls ahead of her. At first she thought they were traders, but their faces were unclear and their bodies shone gently with faint energy. They were old spirits; shades of people who had died long ago. Their link to the living world was barely strong enough for any of them to appear to her for very long and they faded in and out of sight, oblivious of the clamouring throng of lives being lived around them. Every one of them was looking at the same place, focusing their attention on the same thing.

  What looked like the broken stub of an old stone pillar stood out a few feet from the wall up ahead. It was waist high and ground to a flat surface at the top. Kate only looked at it for a second, but the book she was carrying became heavier as she drew closer to it. The veil had more influence there. Kate could feel it as she had in the skull room, like a window opening in her mind. She did not notice the prickle of frost on her fingertips, or the noise of the market fading around her. Soon her feet were slowing down, shortening the gap between her and the Skilled following behind.

  ‘There’s being inconspicuous, and there’s stopping,’ said Edgar, pulling her along. Kate could barely hear him through the pounding of blood in her ears. Her head felt as if it was being squeezed tight by two invisible hands. The veil was everywhere, and for a moment she saw the memories of everything that had happened in that cavern flashing through her mind.

  The cavern’s many doors flickered between being freshly hung and being decayed by centuries of neglect. Many of the shades around her disappeared. They had never walked here during their lifetimes, but the shades near the ceiling continued falling to their deaths one by one. Kate saw them clearly now: ordinary men and women who had lost their footing on a narrow walkway that once spanned the upper level of the cavern.

  The veil carried her back further, until she saw bonemen carrying loosely wrapped bodies across the floor, each one coffinless and nameless, with no friends or family to miss them out in the world. And then there were the fiery braziers, set to burn beneath two separate openings in the ceiling. Their purpose was soon made clear as dead bodies were laid out upon them, set alight and left to burn down to the bone.

  People buried in this cavern were not treated with the same care and ritual as those in the rest of Fume. Their charred bones were bundled together and pushed into the open mouths of the doorways in the walls, bundle after bundle, piled up on top of one another across the centuries. They were the bodies of wanderers, strangers, murderers and thieves, all loaded on to the Night Train and sent to their rest by towns who did not want anything to do with them or the responsibility of their remains.

  This was a tormented place. Fear dripped from the walls, making it cold and uninviting. No matter how many traders and customers gathered in that market, the living could never outnumber the dead who still walked there. The tunnels around it were quiet: the only souls within its walls were those who were sealed there, trapped within that cavern, forced to walk its stones for eternity. The presence of so many living people acted as a buffer against the anguish of the lingering dead, but anyone who stayed in the market alone – Skilled or not – would soon sense the creeping pressure of thousands of souls still lurking within the dark.

  Kate was just a few steps away from the broken stone when a group of people appeared around it. They were all shadowy and indistinct, each one dressed in the familiar grey robes, and they were talking to one another. Kate could not hear what they were saying, but one of them was clearly in charge, and when he looked up his image became as solid and real as a living person standing right in front of her. His eyes met hers and were instantly familiar, their surface glazed with a hint of silver, just like hers. The man turned away slowly, his mouth moving to silent words as something emerged on top of the stone. Kate stopped and stood beside it. A spiral was carved upon the stone’s flat dusty face and the veil showed her something resting upon it. An open book, solid and real in the shades’ time but just a shadow of its original self as its image bled into her own world. It was a book filled with words and warnings. A book that Kate knew very well.

  ‘I think we should speed up a bit,’ said Edgar, wheezing beside her. The sound of his voice broke Kate suddenly out of the memory. The spiral in the stone was still there, but the book and the people around it were gone. Edgar looked back towards Baltin’s head, which was still cutting through the market crowd, gaining all the time.

  ‘There were Walkers down here,’ said Kate, her senses still caught within the veil. ‘They were working with the bonemen. I think they were trying to use Wintercraft in this cavern.’

  ‘Not really useful right now,’ said Edgar. ‘All we need is to get out of here. I think Baltin’s got at least four more people with him. What are you looking at?’

  ‘I’m not sure.’

  Kate closed her eyes, trying to separate her mind from the veil, but when she opened them again the silver-eyed man was standing right beside her.

  She refused to react. She had seen far worse things than a shade that wandered too close, but part of her knew that the man was more than just a memory and much more than a shade. She recognised him as the murdered man whose soul had been bound into one of the spirit wheels, and, despite the centuries that separated their two lives, he was watching her.

  Wintercraft trembled in Kate’s pocket as the man picked his own veil-bound book from the stone and held it between his hands. He had been one of Wintercraft’s protectors in his own time. He had guarded the very book Kate was carrying, just as she did. She had carried it back to a place where it had been used in the past and the veil was reacting to its presence.

  Any doubts Kate might have had that Wintercraft was far more than an ordinary book dissipated in that moment. She wondered how many of its protectors’ lives had ended brutally, and suddenly feared that her own life could be destined to end in the same way.

  ‘Whatever it is, it can wait,’ said Edgar. ‘We have to move.’

  Kate turned away from the silver-eyed man and the veil pulled back from her. The sudden noise of the bustling Shadowmarket returned and she and Edgar ran together, following the cavern wall, searching for another way out.

  Edgar was already ou
t of breath. The further back they went, the quieter the market became. It was only a matter of time before someone realised what was happening and spotted the two of them. If they kept following the wall they would end up back where they started and Kate did not want to be captured by people who thought she was a murderer. She looked at the doors of the old tombs above her and made a decision.

  ‘Blow out the lanterns,’ she said, opening the glass door of the little light closest to her and extinguishing the flame. ‘We have to climb.’

  ‘What? You want us to go up there?’

  ‘They’re going to find us eventually if we stay down here,’ said Kate. ‘We can climb fast and hide behind one of those doors. If we’re lucky, no one will see us.’