Paimon interjected gently, “It is the custom of the Haðraaða family to rest within my environs, madama, even after death. You have seen the Cloakroom of the Abyss.”
“But they didn’t move then. I mean, they were all just lying there. Corpses!” I said. Hardhands was staring at me with an avid look that I didn’t particularly like, as though I were a scrumptious cupcake and he had a craving for sugar. “Except the last time, when they weren’t even there.”
“Then, they were assisting me in the defense of Bilskinir House,” Paimon answered. “Today, it is a special occasion, a new Head of the House, so of course the entire family is excited and animated. Normally the Animas are not so active. Georgiana Segunda was very concerned with family lineage; it was she who decided to use that as my underpinnings, the source of my continuing power, and so she spent much time tracking down the Anima of those Haðraaðas—and Bilskinirs—who had gone before us all, and bringing their Animas here, and containing them within my walls.”
“You mean they are ghosts?” I asked, aghast. “Or reanimated corpses? Are they trapped in their bodies, like Georgiana Segunda was? That’s horrible—”
“Ghosts!” Hardhands snorted. “Reanimated corpses! Listen to me, dolly—”
“Listen to you!” A voice behind him jeered, and he moved aside to allow entry to another familiar figure, who looked much, much better than I had last seen her: Georgiana Segunda. A ghoul no longer, she looked young and fresh. I realized now that we had the same color hair, coppery red, and just as curly, though her curls had been tamed into a mass of ringlets and mine were frizzy corkscrews. The enamel feathers of the Pontifexa crown on her white brow glimmered like dragonfly wings.
"Of course we are not trapped within our bodies like ghouls, dear Nyana,” Georgiana Segunda said, with a pointed glance at Hardhands. "At least most of us are not. I intended that the energies of this family should always nurture both this House and Paimon, who has deigned to be our servant. So it was agreed that when a Haðraaða dies, his or her Anima joins the others, and together we are a well of strength that Paimon may draw from. This is how he survived all those years with no established living Head of the House. We nourished him in the interim while we waited for you.”
"And you certainly did take your time!” Hardhands interjected. Georgiana Segunda whacked his arm with her fan—the fan Paimon had given me and with which I had fought off the Loliga’s tentacle in the pisser of the Poodle Dog. Hardhands gave Georgiana a loving gaze, and did not look a bit abashed.
"Welcome to the family, Nyana,” Georgiana Segunda said kindly "You may kiss me.”
She proffered a powdered cheek, and not knowing what else to do (and with the memory of Tiny Doom not so long ago—or, really, long ago—kissing that cheek, then filmed with mold), I kissed her. Her skin was smooth and soft and smelled like roses.
Georgiana Segunda said, “I am sorry that you had to deal with the Loliga, Nyana. Certainly, I never meant for things to work out the way they did. Tiny Doom should never have left you in the lurch that way—it was her responsibility to attend to the Loliga, and her responsibility to make sure that her daughter and heir knew her duties. But you acquitted yourself well, dear girl. You remind me of my dear mamma at that age; she also ascended at an early age, and was oft misjudged. Sweet as a bon-bon on the outside, but bite down and inside is an iron filling.”
“Hell on your teeth,” Hardhands remarked, and again was whacked with the fan.
Georgiana continued, “I think you shall do well, my dear. Come, now—we haven’t much time and I don’t feel like wasting it blathering. Let us dance! You, Udo, dear sweet boyish morsel, dance with me.”
Udo gallantly offered his arm to Georgiana Segunda and she swept him out to where the floor had suddenly cleared. Music burst out, and the rest of the Haðraaðas flung themselves into partnerships and began to hop about, extremely energetically for a horde of reanimated corpses and disembodied spirits.
"Shall we dance, little bon-bon?” Hardhands asked. He swung his arm low in a courtesy, but I shook my head. I still had the feeling that even though he wasn’t a ghoul, he might snap at me if he had the chance. Hardhands took my refusal with an incredulous lift of one long black eyebrow and stalked away, the tails of his sangyn kilts swishing behind him with a reptilian hiss.
The dance floor was a crush of the Haðraaða dead. Those with bodies were so animated and forceful that you would hardly know, unless you squinted, they were dead. Those without bodies were ethereal and transparent, yet they, too, maintained their personalities. They knew who they were. Their Anima remained strong.
All the Haðraaðas were here.
All, I realized, but one.
Tiny Doom.
Her catafalque in the Cloakroom of the Abyss was empty; thanks to the Birdies there had been no body to bring home. But the Birdies couldn’t touch her Anima; they could kill her body but they couldn’t extinguish her soul. She had to be here somewhere. Everywhere I looked there were Haðraaðas, dancing, laughing, eating, talking. Standing in line at the buffet; laughing at each other’s jokes; feeding the dogs nibbles; dancing the mazurka; threatening each other with umbrellas; toasting each other with punch glasses. Paimon had vanished; perhaps he was refilling the canapés, or retrieving Springheel Jack’s boots. And I didn’t see Tiny Doom anywhere.
“Where is she, Pig?” I asked. He didn’t answer.
Then, I heard her voice in my head, as clear as if she were standing beside me. So clear, in fact, that I turned and looked, but there was no one there.
The Ultimate fiking Ranger Dare, baby.
And with a sick excitement, I realized that there was only one reason that Tiny Doom would not be here, celebrating my ascension with the rest of the Haðraaða family.
She wasn’t dead.
Statement of Intent Magical Working No. 9
by
Nyana Georgiana Brakespeare Haðraaða
or Fyrdraaca
Written in Sub-Rosa Ranger
Scriptive Code
Dear Mamma Butcher Brakespeare Azota Tiny Doom:
Everyone thinks the Birdies killed you, sacrificed you to one of their gods, whose priests ate your body while he ate your soul. Everyone thinks you are more than just dead, that you’ve been erased from the Waking World and Elsewhere, without a trace of your Anima surviving to cross the Abyss. Even Paimon thinks this. I am the denizen of Bilskinir House, he told me. No member of the Haðraaða family can be unknown to me; if she escaped the Birdies and survived, I would know it. But she didn’t, he said. Tezcatlipoca took her and she’s Gone.
I don’t care what Paimon says, or what he thinks he knows. He might be Bilskinir House’s Butler, but I am the Head of the Family and I know you are still alive. I am your daughter, and I know.
I know it. In my heart and my head and my very gut.
And I’m really fiking furious about it.
Never leave a comrade behind, the great ranger Nini Mo said. Well, you not only left me behind, Mamma, but you left me in the lurch.
I’m sure you’d say that you were trying to protect me by getting Buck Fyrdraaca to pass me off as her own child, by getting Buck to lie to me all those years about being my mother. (And by the way—was it really fair to hide this knowledge from Poppy, too? He’s my father. Didn’t he deserve to know who my real mother is? He knows now, but finding out was a terrible shock. And believe me, after all the horrible things Poppy’s been through, he did not need another terrible shock.) I know you were only trying to save me from the Birdies, who would kill me for no other reason than I was your daughter. But did you ever think about what this meant for me?
My entire life—my family, my name, even my birthday—is a lie.
I used to be so sure of myself. I used to know who I was: the youngest child of General Juliet “Buck” Fyrdraaca and her crazy husband, Hotspur. I used to have a home: Crackpot Hall, old and moldering and with a banished Butler, but a home nonetheless.
I used to
have dreams: I’d be a ranger, like Nini Mo, stealthy and secret. I’d speak Gramatica, the Language of magick. I’d cross from the Waking World to Elsewhere as easily as crossing the street. I’d be clever, cunning, and shrewd, true to my own Will.
I used to have sand and grit, hope and a future. And now I have nothing. Now I have to skulk around in the shadows, trying to be small and unobtrusive, so our Birdie overlords won’t notice me, won’t discover who I really am.
I can’t even use my real name. You named me Nyana, after the great ranger Nini Mo, but Buck changed my name to Flora, after her daughter who was lost to the Birdies when she was small and perfect. As far as everyone is concerned, I am just Flora Segunda, a pale shadow of the original.
Unless the Birdies catch me. Then I’ll be Nyana Brakespeare ov Haðraaða. (As far as they are concerned, my Fyrdraaca half doesn’t count.) Then the Birdies will take me to Anahautl City. They’ll march me to the top of one of their black obsidian pyramids and rip out my heart with a slick black obsidian knife. Then they’ll eat my heart and feed my Anima to Tezca-whatsit, the Lord of the Smoked Mirror. That will be punto final for me, the absolute end. I’ll be done before I even got started.
Needless to say, I’m not so keen on that.
So, to avoid exactly that, I’ve spent the last eight months being anonymous. I’ve pretended to be a good little Fyrdraaca and have done everything a good little Fyrdraaca is expected to do. Like a good little Fyrdraaca, I went to Benica Barracks Military Academy There, I was a good little cadet. I shined my shoes and dug latrines, calculated trajectories and marched eight miles with a fully loaded pack and an empty canteen. When, thanks to the Infanta Sylvanna, I was detached from the Barracks and sent to work in Buck’s office as her junior aide-de-camp, I went with a smile, happy to settle in to a prison of paperwork. Now I spend all day copying reports and going to meetings and reviews and inspections and briefings, and baby-sitting Pow. If the Birdies don’t get me, this will be the rest of my life.
And I can’t spend the rest of my life this way. I just can’t. Can’t spend the rest of my life hiding, afraid and alone. Ignored and overlooked. Trapped in a lie. I’d almost rather the Birdies catch me and put me out of my misery.
No, that’s not true. I want to live. As my true self.
Also, Mamma dear, I’d like to point out, it’s not just me that you left in the lurch, but the entire Republic of Califa. Thanks to you, the war was lost. Thanks to you, the Birdies own us now. We are their lap dogs. The Infanta Sylvanna has lived with the Birdies most of her life. Basically, she is a Birdie. The Warlord is old and on his last legs. Once the Infanta is in charge, Califa will become a Birdie State. There’ll be no chance for me to be free, and no chance for anyone else, either.
If Nini Mo were alive today she would not stand by idly as Califa is sucked ever deeper into lap-doggery as we bow our heads ever lower to the Birdie yoke. Free the oppressed! Is that not the Ranger Motto? Nini Mo would never live as a slave, subject to another. She would be working tirelessly to overthrow Califa’s Birdie overlords; she would do everything she could to undermine them.
Well, I can’t start a revolution, Tiny Doom, but you could.
I know you weren’t very popular when you were alive—hence the Butcher nickname—but now that everyone thinks you are dead, they love you. Azota, they call you now, the Whip, and they mean it as a compliment. They scrawl cierra azota! on public buildings and sing heroic ballads about you—“Lo’ She Wields Her Mighty Goad” is particularly popular right now—and wear shocking-pink ribbands in your honor. They make offerings to you and name their children after you. Somehow, I don’t know exactly how or why, you have become a symbol of freedom.
But if you came back, you’d be more than a symbol; you’d be a leader. The people would flock to you, would rise up and kick the Birdies square in the teeth, right out of Califa. Califa would be free. I would be free. You owe us this freedom. It’s your fault the war was lost to begin with. It’s time for you to come back and make amends.
So where the fike are you?
The Waking World is a vast place. There are many places to hide: The Kulani Islands, Bexar, Espada, Ketchikan, Varanger, Porkopolis. How do you track someone whose tracks are fifteen years old? Who left those tracks a thousand miles away? Who hundreds of people saw die— thought they saw die. Who is able to hide from the denizen of her own house?
Not even Nini Mo could cut that sign.
Oh, I know that wherever you are, you think you are well hidden. No one has found you so far, so no one ever will.
We’ll see about that.
How does one cut sign if there isn’t any sign to cut? I’ve been puzzling over this for a long time. Then, on my dinner break a couple of days ago, I noticed one of the other clerks reading Nini Mo, Coyote Queen vs. the Crab King of Krake Island. In case you don’t remember, it’s the one where Nini Mo and the Macaroni Kid are trapped in the belly of the Crab King, and Nini Mo charges a drop of her own blood into an Erucate Sigil, which she then uses to blast them both out to freedom. Suddenly the answer was obvious.
I may not be a ranger and I may not be an adept, but I have an edge no one else can claim. I have a connection to you, the strongest connection two people can have.
Blood.
Blood calls to blood, Nini Mo said. It’s the one bond that can never be erased. You can hide from the Birdies, Poppy; the Warlord, anyone. But you can’t hide from me.
All I need is a simple Locative Sigil and a few drops of blood, my blood, which is your blood, too. Blood, and the Will to do the Working. Of course, I have to be super careful not to do anything that might reveal me to the Birdies. Magick being number one on that list. But here’s the clever part. Tomorrow night is Pirates’ Parade, amateur magick night, when the Current is full of snapperheads playing at conjuring, sigils, and fortunetelling. The perfect camouflage. With all the other magickal hijinks going on, no one is going to notice me.
I know a Blood Working won’t be easy. I may be in hiding, and my magickal studies may have been cut short, but I’m not some tyro. I stood up to Lord Axacaya, the City’s greatest adept, when he tried to kill me. I’ve been to the very threshold of the Abyss and back. I helped birth a baby etheric egregore of the ninth order. I’ve parlayed with Springheel Jack and fought a Quetzal. I may not be a real ranger, but I’ve pulled off the Ultimate Ranger Dare. I am confident I can manage it. I have to. It may be my only chance.
I am going to track you down and make you come back to Califa. Not because I’m desperate for maternal affection or looking for some melodramatic reunion. But for Califa’s sake. For my sake, too, but mostly for Califa.
SO THIS, THEN, is my Statement of Intent, the what, how, and why of the Working.
What: Calling upon the Sanguinary Link between One Member of a Family to Another, and by Following this Link thus Determining Her Whereabouts.
How: A map, a razor, the Current, the adept’s own Will.
Why: Because it is my Will.
This is a paltry Statement, I know, but it’s all I have time to write. It’s already almost two in the morning and I still have to polish my buttons, shine my shoes, wash my gloves, and finish packing my gear before I can go to bed, and I have to be at the office by seven.
And, of course, I’m never actually going to show this to Tiny Doom. I’ll burn it during the Working, and anyway, it’s just a way to screw up my nerve. I know she doesn’t care about me. If she did, she would have come back long ago. Well, she doesn’t have to care. She just has to come back. I’m sure of that. The only thing I’m not sure of is how I will get to her once I locate her. But I’ll worry about that later. I have to find her first.
And I will.
ONE
Paperwork. Pow. Duty.
WHEN I GOT TO the Commanding General’s Office at seven thirty-five, my desk was already piled high with papers. Either Buck had been working late or Lieutenant Sabre had been in early. Both, probably. I made coffee, and, as the other c
lerks trickled in, began to sort. At eight thirty, Poppy rushed in, hung Pow’s cradleboard on the coat rack, and rushed out, saying he’d be back by lunchtime. I’d just finished stamping the incoming mail and begun to log it in the Correspondence Received Register when Pow woke up and began to howl. Even Private Hargrave’s bunny imitation, normally a baby side-splitter, failed to distract him; you can’t tell a five-month-old baby to wait for his chow. So I hefted the cradleboard over my shoulder and went in search of Buck.
I found her down at the cavalry stables, worrying over Sadie, who still hadn’t foaled. While Buck sat on a hay bale and fed Pow, continuing her conversation with Dr. Mars, I ran over to the post bakery and got two dozen donuts and three cups of coffee. I returned to the stables and found that Buck and Pow had already gone.
So back to the office I went, balancing the coffee and donuts carefully so I wouldn’t get anything messy on my uniform. The rain, which had been pouring down for the past week, was finally letting up a bit, but everything was soggy The parade ground was too wet for drills and the roads were ankle-deep in mud. At Building 56, a sign had been hung by the main door reminding everyone to scrape their boots before coming inside, but the front porch and hallway were streaked with mud. A sorry-looking private with a wet mop was trying to keep the mess down, without much success.
Buck took a coffee and donut and put a finger to her lips: Pow was asleep again, so I was dismissed back to my correspondence. I finished logging and had begun on my endorsements when Buck realized she was late for a meeting with the Warlord and had left the Command Baton at the O Club.
I rushed to the Club, found the Baton in one of the lavs, and raced back to the CGO. There I discovered that Sergeant Carheña had gone to the quartermaster storehouse to get more paper and pen nibs, leaving Private Hargrave in charge, and Private Hargrave, who is what’s commonly known in the Army as a coffee cooler, had disappeared into the sinks with the Califa Police Gazette. Flynn and Pow were alone in the office—Buck had left without the Baton—and while Pow was still sleeping peacefully in his pen, Flynn had eaten an entire box of donuts, fourteen in all.
Flora's Dare: How a Girl of Spirit Gambles All to Expand Her Vocabulary, Confront a Bouncing Boy Terror, and Try to Save Califa from a Shaky Doom (Despite Being Confined to Her Room) Page 35
