The Bridge

by Jane Higgins

  ‘I don’t do politics. Can I have those back?’

  ‘Everyone does politics. There’s nothing here but politics.’

  ‘I could be one of these Remnant people, for all you know, so shouldn’t you give me back those papers now and leave?’

  Her black eyes studied me, her long fingers destroyed the staple holding the papers together. ‘You’re not. I’d know.’

  ‘You’d know. How would you know?’

  ‘Jeitan says you’re a heathen. And you wouldn’t have fixed my arm. And you’d have reported me by now. And Coly wouldn’t hate you so much.’

  That got my attention. ‘How much?’

  ‘Enough. You should watch your back.’

  I stared at her. How had something as simple as food and a bandage turned into a full-blown freakin’ circus?

  The door to the main room closed.

  Levkova. She stood in the doorway of my cupboard and glared. ‘Don’t let anyone in. Did I say that?’ Lanya stood up and I scrambled to my feet. They bowed that short bow to each other, and Levkova said, ‘My dear, you are surely in enough—’

  ‘Yes. In enough trouble already. I know. I’m leaving now.’ She headed for the door.

  But Levkova put up a hand. ‘Wait. Someone’s in the corridor. Put out the light.’ She closed the door on us and we heard the key turn in the lock. I pulled the string and killed the light. Darkness, but for a thin line under the door. And Lanya breathing an arm’s length away. The door in the main room opened and closed, then Levkova’s voice said, ‘Councillor Terten, what brings you here?’

  ‘Sub-commander Levkova.’ A man’s voice. ‘Working late?’

  ‘As you see.’

  Boots clicked on the floor as someone paced and stopped outside our door, blocking the thin line of light. Lanya drew in a breath. The steps moved on. She let out a ragged sigh and the beads in her hair made tiny clacking sounds in the dark.

  The voice outside said, ‘How long have you worked here, Sub-commander?’

  ‘Since before the last uprising, Councillor.’

  ‘Many years of active service, then. You have a well-earned retirement awaiting you.’

  ‘I have no intention of retiring.’

  ‘Times change, dear lady, times change. But I forget myself. There is nothing dear or ladylike about you, is there?’

  ‘I hope not, Councillor. Did you want anything in particular?’

  ‘I came, Sub-commander, because I expect to remove you from here, very soon. With God’s grace, by week’s end. I came to ask that you go quietly and with dignity. CFM has lost its way and we intend to make that clear to the people.’ More pacing.

  Levkova said, ‘You lay great store in the hearing.’

  ‘I lay great store, Sub-commander, in common decency, which your continued presence here offends. You appear but rarely at prayer, you scorn the modesty of widows, you assume control of affairs that should concern no woman. It’s time for you to return to what is properly yours.’

  ‘Speak plainly, Councillor. I can take it.’

  ‘You take this lightly.’

  ‘On the contrary.’

  ‘If that were so, Sub-commander, you would understand that as long as you and your like, as long as your beloved CFM, offend against God in this way, we will never be granted victory over the city.’

  ‘The city is in disarray, Councillor. If we could present a united front, we could force it to the negotiating table.’

  ‘There will be no negotiation when we take the city. There will be no peace but ours.’

  ‘Then we have nothing more to say to each other.’

  A pause. ‘Until the hearing, then.’

  ‘Good night, Councillor.’

  We stood listening to silence for some time, then the lock turned and light came flooding back. Levkova limped to the table and sat down. ‘Councillor Terten.’ She looked from Lanya to me. ‘The hearing is set for Thursday morning. You are both summoned. You will be asked to explain how you came to be together on Saturday night.’

  ‘We weren’t together,’ I said.

  ‘No. We thought not. Commander Vega and I were of the opinion that what Coly saw was a stranger, possibly you, harassing a Pathmaker and detaining her from her duties during a Crossing.’

  I opened my mouth to protest but she held up a hand and looked at Lanya. ‘But now you come visiting. Late at night and alone, breaking all the rules. One of you will please explain.’

  We looked at each other. Lanya sat down in my chair; I sat on the floor and listened. She left out the knife fight, but said how they were arguing, her and Coly, about the food he had brought and wanted her to eat, and how she refused because it would break some kind of sacred fast she was on and that would stop her dancing at the Crossing, so she gave it to me instead.

  Levkova was silent for quite a while after that. ‘Who hit you? That bruise, and the cut on your lip – these came how?’

  ‘Coly.’

  ‘Not just a simple disagreement then.’ Levkova looked at me like I was a puzzle and a pain. ‘So much easier if it had been you.’ She rubbed her forehead. ‘I see. I do. But will the Council?’

  ‘Why wouldn’t they?’ I said.

  ‘Because Coly will swear otherwise, and he claims to have evidence to prove what he saw. They’ve been hunting a Maker’s scalp for a long time now; they’ll not let this one go. You fall so neatly into their hands. A scavenger from Gilgate. A stranger with no family, no friends and no allies.’

  ‘What evidence?’ I said.

  ‘A digi-graph. I haven’t seen it. Remnant will argue involvement and consent on both your parts, the Makers will argue harassment, and probably assault—’

  ‘What?’

  ‘That’s why I am surprised you came here, child,’ she said to Lanya. ‘I’m sure you have instructions – and accusing Nik must be the first of them?’

  Lanya looked at me. ‘You have a name.’

  I put my head in my hands. ‘This is insane. Are those your instructions?’

  She nodded.

  Levkova sighed with something like real regret. ‘And you won’t accuse him. I see that. Otherwise, what are we but the liars and cowards our enemies believe us to be? This will go hard against us though.’ She struggled to her feet, sent Lanya on her way and summoned Jeitan. ‘Which are your quarters?’ she asked me.

  ‘Shed 12.’ A drafty bunkroom in one of the prefabs; it housed auxiliary staff – from kitchens, comms, printery and so on – in narrow bunks with thin mattresses, thinner blankets, and a concrete floor.

  ‘Not this week, I’m afraid. We need you under lock and key when you’re not here – for your own safety, until after the hearing. Jeitan will take you to a safe room. You can go by Shed 12 and collect your belongings on the way.’

  ‘No, but…’ I needed to find Sol, and I had a lead at last, and if I was locked up Fyffe was likely to go and do something terrible like turn herself in. Then Sol would be lost for good.

  But Levkova was saying, ‘I’m sorry, Nik. That’s an order.’

  CHAPTER 19

  So there was good news and bad news. The good news was that I had memorized a list of known and suspected traffickers and their associates, which I wrote down and pressed into Fy’s hand at breakfast next morning. The bad news was that I now had a shadow: Jeitan wasn’t going to let me out of his sight until the hearing, except when he locked me into a cell-like room in Shed 3 at night ‘for my own safety,’ whatever that meant.

  I told all this to Fy as we sat at the end of a long table in the dining room, dipping chunks of bread into bowls of thin, chocolaty milk. We spoke low and put our heads together; the rest of the room was loud with talk and laughter and people ignored us, the strangers from Gilgate.

  ‘A hearing?’ said Fy. Her Breken was slow and stammering but getting better fast. ‘That’s not good.’

  ‘Yeah. I know. It’s going to be hard to get out of here until it’s over. But there’s more I can do on the computers. I
want to plug in those names and look for addresses to go with them.’

  ‘What happens if they find you guilty? Nik, they flog people here. Can’t we just get out? Go down into the town and search there?’

  I looked up the table at Jeitan. ‘Maybe. But what with? We’ve got nothing to go on except that list. How are you getting on in the infirmary?’

  ‘They think I’m slow – it’s my Breken, and I keep forgetting to answer to Sina. But they don’t seem to mind too much. They’ve made me a supplies assistant. That means I get to go down to the township with a supplies officer and collect things from the main hospital. We’re going tomorrow. I might be able to do something there: listen for the names on your list, I don’t know. I don’t know. We’re not getting anywhere!’

  ‘Give it one more day. If we’ve got nothing more by tomorrow night, we’ll get out of here. Or try to. Okay?’

  She nodded. ‘I’m still wondering if we should just tell them who we are and ask for help. I mean, if trafficking is illegal, it’d be reporting a crime, wouldn’t it? But then, what chance would you have at that hearing, if they knew?’

  Vega rapped on a table and stood up to give the breakfast briefing.

  ‘City forces are regrouping in Sentinel… their attempts to retake Watch Hill have been unsuccessful, but these are sustained attempts.… Overnight rocket attacks from city forces have been indescriminate. They’ve destroyed homes in Ohlerton, a church in Blackbyre and a clinic in Gilgate… civilian casualities are significant…’

  ‘The city fights back,’ murmured Fy. ‘I guess we should be cheering them on.’

  ‘You don’t look like you’re cheering,’ I said.

  ‘The people in the infirmary aren’t. It’s so overcrowded no one can move, and they’ve got almost nothing to treat people with. No wonder they hate us.’

  That afternoon I sat at my desk wishing Levkova would find sudden, urgent business elsewhere. Jeitan was arguing with her about Remnant. He was impatient to go looking for some dirt on them to pre-empt their takeover of the Council after the hearing. He paced in front of her desk until she told him he made her dizzy and would he please sit down. I listened with half an ear to his complaints about how corrupt Remnant was, and then he said, ‘Look, if the rumors are true and they’ve got a big windfall coming, then chances are they’re planning something major against us.’

  I stopped work and paid attention.

  ‘Rumors,’ said Levkova. ‘We need evidence. How big a windfall?’

  ‘Big. That’s all I heard.’

  ‘From what?’

  ‘No idea. Spoils of war. Their hangers-on have been over in the city. Who knows what they’ve grabbed.’

  ‘And for what? What are they planning?’

  Silence. I could just about hear Jeitan shrug. ‘But it’s not looking good, is it?’ he said. ‘They take Council and they’re flush with funds: that gives them plenty of scope to undermine us. Can’t you raise something about this windfall at the hearing? You’ll have the Council together and—’

  ‘Not without evidence, no.’

  ‘With respect, ma’am, you and the Commander play this far too straight. We need a strategy against them.’

  ‘What we need,’ said Levkova, ‘is to stabilize the situation over the river. That has to be our top priority. And I think the independents will see that and stay with us.’

  I stopped listening. Remnant had Sol. I was sure of it. What else could a big windfall be but a small city boy worth millions? I wasn’t entirely sure who Remnant were, though. All I knew about them were headlines from textbooks that I’d paid too little attention to, and one or two Stapleton sermons about them. According to Stapleton, they were dedicated to building a Holy City on both sides of the river, and they were even stricter in their Rule than we were, Cityside, when it came to sex and food and ritual. That being so, I wasn’t surprised to hear that they liked to play dirty in secret.

  That evening I waited for Fyffe in the dining hall, but she didn’t show. The rain was bucketing down so I asked Jeitan if we could pack up some dinner and take it over to people in the infirmary to save them getting soaked coming over. He said that was a pretty transparent ploy on my part to see my girlfriend, but not a bad idea. So that’s what we did.

  The infirmary was an ugly gray modular building sprawling behind the main building. It looked like a kids’ block game gone wrong: a wonky E shape with rooms from different model sets stuck on over the years so that one good temper tantrum might break the whole thing apart and scatter it across the hillside.

  Inside, people sat crammed shoulder to shoulder in the waiting room, and staff in white coats zoomed about. Notices cluttered the walls with warnings in no-nonsense black-and-white, reminding everyone of ‘The Three Minute Rule’ (how long to boil water for), ‘The 30-Second Rule’ (how long to wash hands for), to NEVER buy meat or fish from unlicensed sellers, and to PLEASE be patient, staff were BUSY, your number would be called in due course.

  The staff were pleased with the food we’d brought over, and it got me a white coat’s attention, which I would have struggled for otherwise. ‘Sina,’ he said. ‘Yes, she’s here. She’s with someone.’

  The someone she was with was dead. One of the Moldam squad, they said. He’d been caught in sniper fire over the river a few days before and had died two hours ago. I knocked on the door and Fy let me in. There was enough space for a bed and two chairs. The room had green walls, a skylight that the rain thudded on, a small leafy tree in a pot in one corner and a lamp stuck on the wall above it. The place felt like a prayer room and the steady glow of the light on Fy’s face and hair and white coat made her look like a thin, thoughtful angel. There was a body on the bed – a young guy, maybe twenty years old. He was dark and his eyes were closed. He was covered up to his chin by a white sheet. Fy was supposed to be praying for him, and I bet she was.

  ‘He was sitting up and talking this morning,’ she said. ‘And his family were here and everyone thought he would get better. But he got an infection that ran hot through him. Now they’ve sent for the family again, and someone must sit with him and wait for them.’

  I sat down beside her. ‘You all right?’

  She nodded.

  ‘Do you want some food? There’s some in the staff room.’

  ‘No, thank you.’ She looked at me, frowning. ‘Nik? You know that thing you wear round your neck, from your mother – oh, you’re not wearing it.’

  ‘I lost it – that night at school.’

  ‘Oh, no. I’m so sorry.’

  I shrugged. It seemed wrong to feel gutted at losing a talisman when she had lost her brother, maybe both her brothers.

  ‘This man,’ she nodded towards the body, ‘I think you should look; he’s wearing one the same.’ She gave me a little push. ‘Have a look.’

  I got up and peered at the body. He looked peaceful and young. I tweaked the sheet under his chin and there, round his neck, was my talisman. Not mine exactly – this one was copper or bronze rather than silver, and it was smaller. But it was the same shape as the one I’d worn my whole life until a few days ago – an elongated S with a long narrow hole in the middle of it.

  ‘So?’ I turned back to Fy. ‘It’ll be a trinket they make here and ship over to the city. My mother must have bought one at a market. There’s probably thousands of them around.’

  Fy said, ‘Maybe. But when we washed the body I tried to take it off him and they wouldn’t let me. They were shocked that I would do that. They said only his mother or his father or his wife can do that.’

  I looked down at him. My mind was blank.

  ‘I don’t know why they said that,’ Fy was saying. ‘I was afraid to ask, in case,’ she hesitated, ‘in case it’s something I should know. In case it’s something everyone here knows.’ She chewed her lip and watched me.

  I looked away, back at the body, and tidied up the sheet corner that I’d moved. My heart beat hard. ‘It doesn’t mean anything,’ I said. ‘We’re h
ere to look for Sol, aren’t we? This is a distraction. It’s not important. Sol is important. We’ve got a list of traffickers. Plus I have some news about Remnant. We need a plan, a strategy, we need to—’

  ‘Slow down, slow down. I can’t follow.’ Fyffe stood up and turned me round to face her. She spoke softly in Anglo. ‘I might be wrong, but if your talisman is the same as his, then it means something here. I don’t care what – as far as I’m concerned, you’re Nik and I trust you with my life, but if you want, I’ll help you find out what it means. If you want. And that might help us, you never know.’ Her eyes were blue and earnest and I couldn’t look at them. I couldn’t go where that thought was taking her.

  ‘I gotta get back,’ I said. ‘Don’t worry about this, okay? Don’t put yourself in danger over a trinket.’

  ‘But—’

  ‘I’ll see you at breakfast. Keep safe.’ I headed out the door.

  I worked late that night, hoping that Levkova would be called away and I’d be able to get onto the computers. Also, let’s face it, cowardice. I didn’t want to be locked up in my cell in Shed 3 thinking about that talisman. I didn’t want Fy’s questions in my head, and I certainly didn’t want to see her, every time I closed my eyes, reading me in that watchful, worried way of hers.

  I was sure the wires would be buzzing with Sol’s disappearance. The top brass at ISIS had to know about it by now and they’d be working on a strategy to get him back. I could help them, if I could just crack the code and work out what they were planning. So I buried myself in Levkova’s piles of paper.

  As the night ticked by, letters blurred in front of me. I put my head on the desk and closed my eyes. When the ground began to shake I sat up thinking I’d dreamed it – most nights I saw the school go up in flames. But no, this was real: thumping concussions deep in the earth. I went out to the main room. Levkova was still there, but Jeitan had gone. I stood at the window looking out towards the Mol. I couldn’t see anything over that way but far to the west, towards St Clare, the sky glowed; the city was burning. St Clare was burning. I saw it in my mind’s eye: flames and choking smoke; people staring at the blood on their hands and clothes, wondering if it’s theirs or someone else’s; people stumbling through the rubble, calling out, falling over the dead, wailing. That sound. It’s strange what you remember: that noise people make when the sky falls in and they can’t work it out, what they’ve lost.