Bill Fawcett

by Nebula Awards Showcase 2010 (v5)

  At the edge, I hesitated. The gap was large and my legs are short. But the heat behind me was hot, and Udo was shouting, and Nina Mo once leaped fifteen feet over a chasm sixty feet deep—without a running start. But surely her legs were longer than mine, and stronger, too. And she wasn’t wearing pinchy stays that kept her from sucking in a good deep breath.

  “Come on, Flora!” Udeo shouted. The Chickie was tugging on his arm impatiently. That gesture steeled my resolve; I was not going to let her leave me behind.

  Dare, win, or disappear, I thought grimly. For luck. I clutched at Poppy’s ranger badge hanging from my neck, and as a whiff of smoke wafted over me, I ran forward and hurtled myself across the gap, gasping like a teakettle. There was a dizzy roar in my ears, swooping blackness, and then I was in Udo’s arms, and Udo was staggering backward, moaning theatrically.

  “You weigh a ton, Flora.”

  “Come on,” said the Chickie impatiently. “I’m getting smoke in my hair.”

  I jerked away from Udo, annoyed. We tore across the roof, weaving past chimney pots, around piles of broken beer bottles and soiled mattresses, and then slid down the fire ladder onto Kautz Street, which was thick with people. Some of these people, like us, were trying to scarper. Others were running toward the ruckus, confusing those of us trying to advance in the opposite direction, as Nini Mo once defined retreat. Cries of “Azota and Cierra Califa!” mixed with the sound of sirens, the rhythmic rat-a-tat of the gas gun, the howls of pain. Something very fast whizzed by my head, so close that I could almost feel it parting my hair.

  We pelted around the corner onto Geary where, up ahead, the welcoming lights of the J horsecar were gliding out of the darkness toward us. Waving our arms frantically, we got to the stop just as the car pulled up.

  Udo, the Chickie, and I flashed our car passes at the driver and headed for the back. We plopped down in the last row; I peered out of the window. The sirens were getting louder and the streams of people thicker; in a minute the J horsecar was going to be stuck in the crowd. But the car didn’t leave the stop.

  “Come on!” Udo shouted. “Get going!”

  The driver was yelling at a man who was standing in the car doorway. “You gotta pay the fare!”

  The man didn’t answer, just tried to move past the driver, who threw out a barricading arm.

  “Fare!” the driver said again. He had closed the door, but through the glass, I could see several angry-looking people with large guns converging on the trolley. The stranger did not answer. “I ain’t going anywhere without your fare, bud.”

  “Pig face!” Udo was searching his pockets. “I don’t have any change. Do you have some change, Zu?”

  The Chickie ignored the request. I dug in my pocket, rushed back down the aisle, and threw a lisby in the fare basket. The driver, satisfied, dropped his arm, and the man went past me without a word of gratitude. The car clanged forward, just as large sweaty hands pounded against the door.

  “Thanks, Flora!” Udo said when I lurched back to my seat. He and the Chickie were now snuggling. Most of Udo’s lip rouge had transferred to the Chickie’s lips, which now gleamed blackly blue. The stranger plopped himself down in the second to last seat, next to me.

  I peered out the back window to see if we were still being pursued. We had already passed the last streetlight at Fluery and the Slot, and the darkness behind appeared empty of angry running guns. I breathed as much a sigh of relief as my pinchy stays would allow.

  “What the hell happened back there?” Udo asked. “The Zu-Zu and I went outside for a few minutes and the next thing we knew we were in the middle of mayhem. We had to take cover in that trash bin.” It was a testament to his bedazzlement that he didn’t complain about crawling into a trash bin; normally, Udo would rather be shot than get dirty. He gave the Zu-Zu—what a stupid name—a moony look.

  Udo was hardly even breathing hard. Neither was the Zu-Zu; other than the smeared lip rouge, she looked as composed as though she had just been for a stroll in the park. She snapped open a black beaded purse, removed a small black compact, and began to repair. I, on the other hand, thanks to my too tight stays, was wheezing like a hurdy-gurdy, and a bright spike of pain was trying to cleave my brain in two.

  I glared at Udo. “If you’d been in the club, where I was looking for you, you’d have known what happened. You missed the big rally,” I said, when I could do so without too much wheeze.

  Udo grinned at me, and I felt like smacking him. “I was busy.”

  “Well, then, I guess you didn’t miss much.”

  Weatherhead’s drummer exploded,” the Zu-Zu said. I’ll bet she had spent hours practicing her husky voice, so perfectly bored-yet-cool. “It’s the fourth drummer they’ve lost this year. They shouldn’t use percussive dæmons. They are too unstable.”

  “The Zu-Zu is in a band,” he said admiringly.

  “Huzzah,” I answered. “Anyway, that’s not what happened. Firemonkey got up onstage and incited the crowd into a mob.” I decided to wait until Udo and I were alone before telling him I had seen Idden; Fyrdraaca family business was none of the Zu-Zu’s affair. Nor was the tentacle attack, which I recalled with a shiver.

  The Zu-Zu pursed her blackened lips in a pout at my correction, then tossed back a lank black lock of hair from her paper-white forehead. Udo gave me a dirty look.

  “What time is it?” I asked him.

  He hauled his watch out of his pocket. “Eleven forty-two.” “Pigface, I’m going to get canned if I’m not back by midnight.”

  “Flora,” Udo told the Zu-Zu, “has a curfew.”

  “Pity.” The Zu-Zu looked unsympathetically at me. She smiled slightly. I had the sudden urge to smack her.

  Instead I said maliciously, ’“You have a curfew too, Udo.”

  “Oh no—I just have to make sure Flora gets home safely, and then I’m free.” Udo smiled at the Zu-Zu. “I haven’t had a curfew since I was a sprout.”

  Now, this was a big fat lie. Udo’s always had a curfew, even back in the days when I did not. The Daddies are pretty strict—with the six kids, they have to be. Otherwise the nuts would take over the nuthouse.

  Before I could point this out to him, something hit the back window, not hard enough to break it, but hard enough to make me jump. I looked back.

  “There are people with guns chasing the horsecar, Udo,” I said. “And I don’t think they are militia.”

  Udo and the Zu-Zu turned around and peered out the back window.

  “I was afraid this might happen,” Udo said. “Though I was hoping we could lose them in the mob scene.”

  “Lose who? What are you talking about?” I asked. “Why would men be chasing us?”

  “Oh, probably because of him.” Udo pointed toward the man whose fare I had paid. He had been sitting so quietly that I had forgotten all about him. The man was staring straight ahead, his hands neatly folded on his lap, his face slack and stupid. He looked asleep, almost, but his eyes were open. A thin string of drool dangled from his lips.

  Udo chortled, and my stomach twisted up. He was grinning too much like a fool not to actually have done something incredibly foolish. “Don’t you recognize him, Flora?”

  “It’s too late to play games, Udo. Just tell me.”

  Udo scrunched his face in disappointment. “It’s Springheel Jack, of course! Pigface, Flora, he’s just been all over the CPG for the last two weeks and you don’t even recognize him?”

  Springheel Jack! The cutthroat bunco artist and cat burglar! The leader of the infamous Red Heels gang, which practically controlled the South of the Slot. Only last week the CPG’s front page had trumpeted Springheel Jack’s latest exploit: He’d gotten into a bar fight with the equally infamous Gallus-Meg and gnawed off her ear. Later, when sober, he had returned it to her in a silver locket, accompanied by a gallant note saying that it was not normally his habit to gnaw upon ladies and she must blame his ill manners on too many Pisco Punches. The press had swooned over his gentil
ity, but it didn’t seem to me that a note of apology was much return for having your ear chewed off.

  At the moment, however, Springheel Jack didn’t look particularly aggressive. In fact, he was dribbling like a fountain.

  “Why is he following us?” I asked. “And why is he drooling?”

  “It’s a pretty story; see, the Zu-Zu and I had nipped outside to get some air, you know,” Udo said, “and who should we see but Springheel Jack pissing against the wall. Even though it was dark, I recognized him by his boots instantly.”

  I peered at the floor. Springheel Jack’s footwear was indeed somewhat noticeable—great big sparkly red boots with five-inch heels. Little snake heads spouted from the toes, but they, too, were droopy and half asleep. In the thin light of the horsecar, the boots glittered like rubies.

  Udo continued. “I played it cool. I just sidled up to him and asked him for a light, and when he leaned over to light my cigarette, aqui!” He brandished the red enamel compact. My heart sunk so low that I swear it fell through the bottom of the car and right onto the road below.

  “You snapperhead!” I added a few choice adjectives to the noun. “What were you thinking?”

  Udo glared at me, puffing. “I was thinking about the bounty on his head, fifty thousand divas, that’s what I was thinking.”

  “Udo told me his plan,” the Zu-Zu interjected. “I thought it an excellent idea and it showed a lot of initiative.”

  I ignored her, because obviously she was a snapperhead, too, and, anyway, who cared what she thought? I said to Udo, “Plan? There was no plan! We discussed the bounty hunting and decided it was a stupid idea—”

  “No, you decided it was a stupid idea,” Udo said hotly. “I thought it was a brilliant idea. And I was right! Look at him, fifty thousand divas on his head, and as easy as pie. If we hadn’t had to run, we wouldn’t even have broken a sweat!”

  “I think it was a brilliant idea, Udo,” the Zu-Zu said. “Never mind her.”

  “With his gang after us, trying to kill us, or worse!” I said, still ignoring her. “What are we going to do now, Sieur Brilliant Plan?”

  Behind Udo, through the glass, I saw the dim shadow of a man, waving something that was much too long and shiny to be his hand. Good rangers know when to act on instinct. I rolled to the floor, flailing at Udo to do the same, just as the window next to me exploded into a slivery halo of glass.

  EIGHT

  ANGRY OUTLAWS. AN OMINOUS APPEARANCE. UDO MAKES A CHOICE.

  I crouched on the floor and felt the glass pelt down upon me like little nuggets of razor-sharp rain. The window on the other side of the car cracked, thus leading me to the brilliant conclusion that we were flanked on both sides. That was bad, superbad, but surely it couldn’t get any worse—until I realized that the pop-pop-pop coming from above my head was Udo firing back with the little revolver that he had gotten for his Catorcena, and which I hadn’t realized he was carrying. It can always be worse, said Nini Mo, and usually will be if you wait long enough.

  “Udo!” I yelled, crawling under the seat and grabbing at his twitching feet. The floor of the horsecar was disgusting, sticky with spilled liquids and awash in torn paper. Why couldn’t people take their trash with them?

  “I got one! I think I got one!” Udo dropped back down and broke open the frame of the revolver, spraying empty shells in the air. “Zu—reach in my left breast pocket and hand me some more cartridges.”

  The Zu-Zu had dropped down onto the seat when the shooting started, thus keeping her pristine self above the trash. Now she rolled onto her side, fumbling in the pocket of Udo’s greatcoat, as unperturbed as though she got caught in a firefight every day.

  “What the hell are you doing, Udo?” I hissed.

  “What the hell does it look like? Defending our lives!” He dropped the last cartridge into the cylinder and snapped it closed. Before I could stop him, he bobbed back to his feet, firing wildly. Udo’s desire to impress the Zu-Zu was going to get us killed.

  The horsecar, which somehow had kept moving during all the implosions and explosions, suddenly jolted to a halt. The driver’s yelling was punctuated with another shot, then ominous silence.

  I gingerly poked my head up next to Udo’s, expecting any minute to feel the horrible bite of a bullet blowing my head off, but the firing didn’t start up again. Two men in long white trench coats were hauling something thumpy down the front steps: the poor driver. The windshield was liberally sprayed with blood.

  It was time, yet again, to advance in the opposite direction. In other words, to retreat. I looked wildly around to see how to accomplish that action and noticed the emergency door. Reaching up, I twisted the door handle, trying very quietly to jiggle it open. Someone from the front of the car hollered: “Hey! You, in the back! Let Jack go and no one will get hurt.”

  Udo fired again, but this time my whacking arm ruined his aim and the shot disappeared through the roof.

  “FLORA!” Udo shouted, pushing me away and dropping back down. I fell against the emergency door, adding a bruising pain on my side. The Zu-Zu smiled at me. I did not smile back.

  “Come on, kiddies, the game is up!” the outlaw yelled.

  “My game has just started!” Udo shouted back, the snapperhead. I gave up being stealthy and pushed the emergency door hard. It popped open, and the Zu-Zu peered around outside, then nodded encouragingly to me. I motioned with my chin, and she rolled off the seat and slid down into the darkness.

  “Come on, Udo! Hurry!” I hissed.

  Udo gestured toward Springheel Jack, who sat stock-still, oblivious to the ruckus. “I’m not going without him.”

  Something had to be done to give us enough cover to grab Springheel Jack and run. We needed a diversion. Maybe if I could lob a ball of coldfire at the outlaws, that would distract them enough to let us escape. A coldfire ball is easy—I’ve done it many times and never gotten it wrong.

  I whispered, holding out my palm. A bead of coldfire bloomed above my open hand, smaller than I would have liked.

  The coldfire light increased in size until it was about the size of a grapefruit. Cradling it in my hands, I popped up and threw the ball as hard as I could toward the outlaw—who neatly caught it and said, with an evil laugh, “I’ll return this to you, missy.” And then he suggested something that didn’t sound very pleasant.

  Clearly I needed something bigger. Much bigger. But I didn’t know any bigger sigils—well, I knew some bigger sigils in principle, but not in action. What would Nini Mo do? She’d dazzle them with a Scintilla Sigil, or confuse them with an Ambiguity Sigil, or turn them into goats with a Transubstantiation Sigil. But while I knew of these sigils, I did not know their Gramatica.

  The outlaw was advancing down the aisle. My mind had gone blank with terror—surely not a problem Nini Mo ever faced—and a funny taste was growing in the back of my throat, a rotten meaty taste. I swallowed hard, but that just made me gag, and when I opened my mouth to spit, a low ominous noise came out instead, a noise that vibrated my teeth and made the hair on the back of my neck tingle. A pale sickly glow began to seep through the car, the kind of light that makes the living look dead and the dead look decomposed. With detached horror, I realized that the glow was coming from me. I stood up and stepped out into the aisle, coldfire writhing like galvanic green ribbons from my outstretched fingertips. The outlaw dropped his gun and screeched.

  “Flora—what are you doing?” Udo asked from somewhere behind me, his voice breaking.

  The Word exploded from my mouth, its glittering coldfire letters whirling in a haze of furious fuliginous blackness, its edges as sharp and black as a Birdie obsidian sacrificial knife. The Word flung down the aisle, making whomp-whomp noises, and caught the outlaw square in the kisser. He screamed, a horrible sound that plunged into my brain like an ice pick in the ear. For a moment his head was separated from his body by a thick line of blackness, and then his head flew upward, buoyant on a spray of blood. He was still screaming, or maybe
that was air howling as it escaped from his neck. Whatever the noise, it was horrific.

  A sharp poke pushed me out of my daze. Udo was shoving me toward the emergency door. I crawled over to the door and rolled out, catching myself just before I hit the pavement, where the Zu-Zu waited. Udo prodded at Jack, who staggered out after me. We broke into a tearing run, eager to leave the howling shrieks and screams and the pallid glow of the horsecar as far behind as possible. No one followed.

  Somehow, somewhere, we stopped running. Or rather, Udo and the Zu-Zu stopped, and then I couldn’t run anymore and had to stop, too. In fact, not just stop, but sit down, not just sit down, but collapse, which I did. The curb was dirty and wet, but I didn’t care. I had to get new stays; I was squeezed so tightly into the old ones that my lungs were sucking against each other, and all the blood was bouncing around inside my skull, so that I felt as though I was going to upchuck.

  Udo leaned over, folding his arms around his stomach, gasping. “What . . . hell . . . Flora . . . hell? Your hair . . . on fire . . .” His braids flopped over his bright red face.

  “An Ominous Apparition, followed by an Active Protective Sigil,” the Zu-Zu said. She was barely winded, but her hair, I noticed happily, had become even more disarranged. “Where did you learn all that, Flora?”

  “I didn’t,” I gurgled. “I dunno—”

  “Whatever. I want a coffee,” the Zu-Zu said. “Let’s go to el Mono Real, Udo, and you can get me a coffee.”

  I straightened up and tried to look refreshed and relaxed, as though I invoked Ominous Apparitions, flung forth Active Protective Sigils, and ran pell-mell from killers all the time, no big. What I really wanted to do was expel the contents of my tum and then collapse on the ground in a little pile of goo. “What about Springheel Jack?”