by Scott Mebus
“Kieft never arrived in Amsterdam to stand trial for his crimes. His ship was caught in a gale off the coast of Wales, and all aboard sank to the bottom of the ocean. And so he wasn’t heard from again, until he walked into City Hall to run for Mayor a hundred and fifty years later.”
“Now hold on a minute!”
The illusions flew away, leaving Bridget sitting next to her brother on top of the Chrysler Building, the city once again laid out below them. Rory was rolling his eyes.
“Okay, maybe I can buy this whole Munsee story,” he said. “But two-hundred-year-old guys running for Mayor? That’s a little much.”
Hex shook his head.
“No, no. It is here that we leave the story of Manhattan and move into the story of Mannahatta. Kieft had ascended to godhood; after all, nowhere is it written that a god must be nice. He ran for the post of Mayor of the Council of Twelve. Anyway, he didn’t win. That dolt Alexander Hamilton ran away with it, he who’d only been a god less than a decade.”
“Hamilton? The guy on the ten-dollar bill?” Rory asked.
“Yes, the guy on the ten-dollar bill.” Hex made a face. “If ever a man didn’t deserve immortality, it was Alexander Hamilton. But he got elected, and he’s been Mayor ever since. Kieft did eventually wheel and deal his way into being appointed First Adviser to Mayor Hamilton, and the Mayor began following Kieft’s lead in pretty much everything, especially with the Munsees.”
“I thought you said they were gone,” Bridget said.
“Their mortals were gone, but in the spirit world, in Mannahatta, the Munsee gods remained. Keep in mind, it had been their realm long before the European colonists had shown up; they had named it Mannahatta, in fact. Their connection with the island, with the land, was so strong that it remembered them long after their people had left. Unfortunately their relationship with the colonists’ immortal gods was no better than the one their mortal counterparts had had with the colonists: neither trusted the other. Small skirmishes began to break out between the two peoples, gradually spreading throughout Mannahatta as they fought over control of the spirit world. These fights would affect the mortal world time and time again, the worst of them causing the Draft Riots during the Civil War that almost burned the city to the ground.
“At last, the Munsees were weary of the conflict, as were we all, and so when the Mayor went to them with a compromise—Kieft’s compromise, though the Munsees didn’t know it—they took it. Their great sachem, Penhawitz, foolishly believed that the Mayor had always dealt with them fairly, though some others had not. But they knew nothing, because in truth no one hated the Munsees more than Mayor Hamilton, and he proved it when he sprung Kieft’s great Trap.”
“What was the Trap? Something in the park?” Bridget asked.
Hex turned to gaze north at the soft blue glow in the distance.
“Central Park is the Trap. The Mayor claimed he had it built as a peace offering to the Munsees. That was his supposed compromise. He gave it to them to live in a place where no god or man would bother them. But the minute the Munsees set foot within Central Park’s borders, that blue barrier you see now leaped up and trapped them inside.”
Bridget could see it in her head, the poor Munsees thinking they’d finally found their sanctuary, only to watch in horror as blue light shot up over their heads. They would have run up to the barrier, trying desperately to escape, but they could only beat hopelessly upon the walls of their new prison.
“That’s horrible,” she said, tears welling up in her eyes.
“The park was made by mortal hands, so the Munsees cannot feel the island anymore,” Hex said. “They are cut off completely, trapped forever, which is ten times worse than being killed. The land searches for them and it cannot find them. And the consequences have been far worse than anyone suspected. I’ve come to believe that removing the Munsees has thrown the balance between our worlds completely out of whack. For the past hundred and thirty years it’s been getting worse and worse. Haven’t you noticed the weather changing? The long summers and short winters? The temperature shifting drastically from day to day? Worse, the people are getting restless. Many feel dissatisfied and lost without knowing why. This has led to riots and disorder in the past; it will again, and soon. I believe this will only get worse while the Munsees are imprisoned and the needs of the land are ignored. That is why you are so important, Rory.”
“I don’t understand.”
“The Munsees need to be freed. I made it my life’s purpose to do so, no matter what it may ask of me.”
“What does this have to do with me?” Rory asked.
“The Trap was designed to be unlocked only one way, using four items together. All four items need to be used in conjunction for the Trap to open up. Only once in the last hundred and thirty years have these four parts even come close to one another, and that ended in tragedy. But I have tracked them down and I’m so close to finally bringing them together and tearing down the barriers. Then the Munsees can escape in peace and go where they will. We can finally put right the horrible events that began more than three centuries ago.”
“What are the items?” Bridget asked, caught up in the grand adventure.
“The lock and the key, the belt and the power. I know where all four are. I can do this—with your help, Rory.”
“What am I supposed to do, exactly?” Rory asked.
“You are the one with the power,” Hex answered. “Only a Light can turn that key.”
“That’s why that Stranger thing was looking for me?”
“I believe so. And that’s why you are in so much danger. Just as I want to free the Munsees, others want to make sure they never escape. Their power has grown since the Munsees were locked away and they are afraid of losing it again. So to my mind, you have two choices. Try to avoid capture for the rest of your life, always wondering when they will catch up to you, while the city of your birth heads toward certain catastrophe. Or break the barriers down for good and beat them before they can beat you.
“What do you say?”
6
THE SUBWAY SINGER
At the end of a small road called Stone Street, deep in the Financial District, stood a restaurant called The Old Winery. A small building dwarfed by all the huge skyscrapers around it, The Old Winery was actually not so old, having been built two years earlier on the site of another restaurant called The Old Vineyard. This fine establishment had also been liberal with the word old, being only five years in existence when it went under. Before that it had been The Old Grape, and The Old Bottle, and Ye Olde Sippe, and on and on, dozens of restaurants, none of which ever lasted longer than a few years before giving up.
This unbroken line of eateries went back much farther than any of their owners knew, since few records survived of the first tavern in the chain, built in the middle of the seventeenth century by a young Dutch soldier named Oloff Stevense van Cortlandt, who grew grapes in the back and made his own beer. In those days Stone Street was aptly named Brouwer—or Brewer—Street, and the short lane was lined with taverns. One stood above them all, however, roundly praised and fondly remembered as the finest tavern in the young colony, and so Oloff’s Old Brewery remained, even after a fire burned it to the ground in 1698. No matter what business occupied that spot on Stone Street, if one were to wander through its back halls in just the right way, one might stumble into the main common room of the Old Brewery, which looked the same as it had three and a half centuries earlier. Only now the customers ran more to the fantastical: the nineteenth-century street-gang thugs and ghostly sailors on leave before their next voyage into the mist beyond the harbor. Sometimes their otherworldly voices leaked out into the present-day restaurant, giving the eateries a reputation for ghosts that drove them out of business sooner rather than later, but that wasn’t Oloff’s problem. He still tended his place as he had for hundreds of years. He didn’t care what happened beyond the door. He had enough worries keeping his customers in wine and beer.
“I heard about Adriaen,” he said, giving a gruff but kind nod to Alexa. “I’m sorry for your loss.”
“Thank you,” she said softly. She’d barely spoken since the Portrait Room. Nicholas couldn’t tell if she was angry or sad. Probably a lot of both.
“You hear who they nominated to take his council seat?” Oloff continued, turning to the rest of them. They shook their heads. “John Randel Jr.”
“What!” Nicholas exclaimed. “Johnny Jr.? He’s a nobody! I can never even remember what he’s a god of!”
“Street Construction,” Albert said. “He’s a nervous little guy. I think it’s all the machines; they make him jumpy. I once gave him a piece of exploding gum, you know, just to be nice, and I swear he didn’t stop running until he hit the Hudson.”
Oloff laughed, a booming, joyous laugh that brought smiles to their sad faces.
“I wish I could have seen that!” he said, slapping his thigh. “Why doesn’t your father come forward, Nicholas? He’s a much greater god than this Johnny Jr.”
“Father won’t even leave his farm anymore,” Nicholas said derisively. “He’s too busy living in the past. The old coot has turned his back completely on his city. He could be doing some real good, but he’s too busy moping around, blaming everyone but himself for losing the Mayor’s job two hundred years ago.”
“Well, that’s too bad,” Oloff said. “Johnny Jr. will sure have a hard time living up to Adriaen’s legacy.”
“He can’t,” Alexa said. “Dad was a god of justice.”
“They just want someone they can push around,” Lincoln said, balling up his fist. “I’ll give ’em someone to push around.”
“You do that,” Simon said, rolling his eyes as he took a sip from his mug. “I’ll keep your drink ready for when you get out of the Tombs in twenty years.” His hand slipped and he spilled some liquid on himself, adding another mark to his already well-stained shirt.
“You’re such a slob,” Lincoln told him. “Do you ever wash your clothes?”
“One person’s dirty shirt is another’s work of art!” Simon answered him, licking his fingers clean. “This is my tavern shirt. With every new stain, I blend in better, like camouflage.”
“Why would anyone take us seriously with you two bumblers around?” Albert asked drily.
“Who cares, anyway?” Simon said. “It’s not like there’s a Rattle Watch anymore.”
This caught them all by surprise. Simon shrugged at their startled faces.
“Don’t look so shocked,” he said. “Adriaen’s gone. Without him, we’re just a bunch of arrested adolescents, some of us none too bright.” He pointed to Lincoln and then ducked to avoid the punch.
“You watch your mouth!” Lincoln shouted when he regained his balance. “We’re not giving up now. We know who did this, even if everyone on the council is too thick-headed to see it.”
Nicholas exchanged glances with Albert, who appeared to be giving the matter some serious thought.
“Simon’s kind of right,” Albert said to him. “It was fun while it lasted, but without Adriaen, we’re nobodies. What can we do against someone like Kieft?”
Is that true? Nicholas thought. Are we really powerless without Adriaen?
“So what are you saying?” he asked. “That Kieft just gets away with murdering the only one who ever believed in us?”
“We’re not gods, Nicholas,” Albert answered. “It’s that simple. I wish we were, but we’re not. They won’t even listen to us. They think we’re a bunch of loudmouthed kids.”
Nicholas turned to Alexa to see what she thought, but she wasn’t even looking at them.
“Mind if I say something?” Oloff said. They all turned their attention to the barrel-chested innkeeper. “I remember the original Rattle Watch, from when I was mortal. They weren’t much of a police force, just a bunch of volunteers, really. Regular folk, like us. And folks didn’t always appreciate them running around New Amsterdam, rattling up a storm, warning of danger. Turned out to be some poor Indian out for a stroll more often then not. Most people just wanted to sleep the night. But sometimes…sometimes there’d be a big fire or a drunk crazy shooting up the place with his gun, and then we’d all be thankful the Rattle Watch was there to warn us. If not for them, this whole city might never have lived through its first few years. Anyway, I’m truly sorry about Adriaen. He was a good friend. I’ll leave you to your beverages.”
He gave them a little wave and headed back to his bar.
Nicholas didn’t know what to do. Did he dare put up his little band of tricksters against the black-eyed man himself? A small voice cut in from the area around his boot, breaking his train of thought.
“Nicholas! Kids! Hello!”
He looked down. A cockroach was standing next to his shoe, holding his rat’s reins in his insect hands.
“Fritz!” Nicholas exclaimed. “What are you doing here?”
“Can somebody give me a lift?” Fritz said sheepishly. “I hate talking to ankles.”
Albert reached down, and Fritz hopped onto his hand. A quick ride later and the battle roach stood in the center of the table.
“I heard about Adriaen, so I came to find you,” he said. “Rory is awake!”
This really shocked them. They’d all heard about the hidden Light, though they’d been sworn to secrecy.
“He’s supposed to be blind to Mannahatta!” Nicholas exclaimed.
“He looked right at me,” Fritz said. “Somehow, he’s awake. And we’ve got to do something!”
They all looked to Nicholas. What should we do? And it suddenly never seemed clearer.
“This all means something,” he said, thinking as he spoke. “The murder coming right when the only Light left wakes up? Something is going on here and we need to find out what it is. We knew when we signed on that this wouldn’t be all fun and games. We just hadn’t hit the hard part yet. Well, now it’s hard. But we’ve got to grow up sometime. Might as well be today.”
“Amen,” Lincoln said, his face shining.
“Well spoken,” Fritz added, nodding with approval. The others were nodding as well, their eyes lighting up as their leader inspired them. “So what do you think we should do about Rory?” Fritz asked.
“I have no clue,” Nicholas answered him. “Maybe nothing, yet. Between the Light and the murder, I don’t know what we should do.”
“The Fortune Teller,” Alexa said, abruptly coming back from wherever she’d been. “Father would ask her for advice. Maybe we should, too.”
Albert rolled his eyes.
“Not this again. No one has found the Fortune Teller in decades, Alexa,” he said. “Adriaen was a great man, but that is one story I just don’t believe.”
Nicholas did not scoff.
“Do you think you can find her, Alexa?” he asked.
“Father did, and I know I can uncover how he managed it from his writings,” she answered.
“Then let’s do it,” Nicholas said firmly. “Fritz, go back and keep an eye on Rory. Make sure nothing happens to him. We can reveal ourselves once we know what we’re doing. Albert, Simon, Lincoln, I want you to spread out. Ask questions and try to see if you can discover anything about the murder that we haven’t heard yet. But stay out of the council’s way! We don’t want to tip off Kieft. Alexa, you and I are going to see this Fortune Teller of yours.”
“I can’t believe you’re chasing after a fairy tale,” Albert said.
“Hey, we’re desperate, right?” Nicholas answered. “We might as well act like it.”
The subway car raced north through the tunnels, bearing the Hennessy children homeward. Rory fingered the purple-beaded bracelet he now wore around his wrist, thinking about how
he was so tired of hard choices. Bridget sat next to him, pouting, still mad that they’d walked away without promising to do anything. She poked him for the three hundred and fifty-sixth time (he kept count).
“I don’t understand, Rory! The Munsees need us!”
“We don’t know that. All I know for sure is that Hex wants us to break into a bank.”
“That’s where they’re keeping the belt, he said. It’s not like we’re stealing money or anything. It’s the good kind of bank robbery. The kind they make movies about.”
“It’s dangerous,” Rory said. “And we don’t know if it’ll work. The bank is run by a god, for Pete’s sake. And this Tobias doesn’t sound like a happy, fun god, either.”
“Hex is a magician, and you’re a superhero. What could go wrong?”
A businessman sitting across from them glanced up, chuckling to himself at their conversation.
“I haven’t decided yet,” Rory replied. “I need to be sure.”
“They’re looking for you, he said. They’ll find you.”
“I’ve got this now.” Rory held up his wrist, the bracelet dangling prominently. Bridget reached out to brush her fingers on the cool, purple beads.
“What did he call these again?” she asked.
“Wampum.”
“It will protect you from the Strangers,” Hex had told him seriously, handing over the bright jewelry. “But it won’t last forever. Nor is it all-powerful. It will keep you as safe as possible while you make up your mind.”
“What if something else finds you? Something worse? You could be killed.”
“I just want to think about it,” Rory said. “Now leave me alone.”
Bridget looked ready to retort, but before she could, the door between the cars slid open and three tall black men entered. One had a salty beard and three teeth at most. The second stood shorter than the other two, with a large nose and bushy eyebrows. The third had a finely groomed pencil-thin mustache and the biggest smile in the world. He opened his mouth wide, flashing his perfect white teeth.
“Hello, ladies and gentlemen! We are the Troubadours, here to sing you the songs a’ yesteryear! If you like what-cha hear, don’t be shy ’bout showing your appreciation. And remember, we like the clink-clink-clink of coins, but our singing sounds sweeter with the flit-flit-flit of the paper money. So here we go!”
