Welcome to Bordertown

by Holly Black

  As I walked up to number 44, the leaves rustled and whooshed in the trees, but I felt no breeze. Under the bushes, trash rattled. The skin on my back crawled, but I shook the feeling off. Animals, I told myself, but I glanced around before I ducked into my overgrown yard and crept toward the house with caution. Halfway down the path, I froze. The nightlife had stopped chirping.

  A commotion broke out in the undergrowth on my left—scuffling, scrabbling, squeaking. I snarled and whirled, my fists clenched, ready to face my enemy. Then something crashed away toward the next house.

  I waited for I didn’t know what, but the normal night sounds started up once more and my shoulders slumped in relief.

  Two of Flora’s cats fighting, I thought. Flora is my nearest neighbor—out back and over two. She runs some kind of sanctuary for crossbred elfin cats people have tired of—oriental-looking creatures with bright green points or pink stripes. Flora called her cats in when I walked by. Her distrust hurt me. I never bother cats. I like cats.

  A bird sang a lonely song, and the sky slowly turned pewter. I’d better go inside, I thought. I moved the shaggy coat of ivy to reveal my front door and whispered the key. A dandy from the Dragon Fire gang had swapped me a protection spell for a watercolor of his chopper. He didn’t want a picture of a girl or his family; he wanted a picture of a machine. He might be worse off than me.

  Inside smelled of home—moldy, dusty, safe. Even though the ceiling had collapsed into the front parlor, there were two good back rooms in the house and a kitchen tacked on that might have been called a scullery in times gone by. Water still ran from the faucet; I didn’t know why. Maybe the water came from a well. At least I could wash. I had lived in worse places.

  I stashed my supplies in a corner and checked the curtains on the back windows; then I changed into an extra-large World of Warcraft T-shirt. I curled up in a pile of blankets to sleep as the sun rose, my arms around a stuffed toy tiger I had found in the fallen plaster upstairs. I mean, who could throw that away? It would be heartless.

  * * *

  Sometimes I wondered if Bordertown rearranged itself every so often. I had found streets that I was sure hadn’t been there the day before, and occasionally streets I thought I knew spat me up in unexpected places. That could worry a person who wanted to reach home before sunrise. It took me a while to find Green Lady Lane, even after I asked three people. None of them had ever heard of Sluggo’s. Where was this club? I walked up and down the lane three times and was just about to give up when a stout oak door burst open and a blond kid with zits wrestled an ungainly wooden sandwich board out onto the sidewalk and set it up. “Sluggo’s” was emblazoned on the sign in red and gold.

  “Don’t do anyone any favors,” I griped.

  The blond kid poked his tongue out at me, then went inside to leave me staring at old, bowed, multipaned windows glazed with thick, ancient glass—rippled, uneven, and greenish. The place looked like a refugee from a Dickens novel.

  “You’re early,” Moss said with delight in his scratchy voice when I found him in front of the stage. Tonight he wore a perfectly fitted black dress tailcoat over a white T-shirt and washed-out jeans. I couldn’t decide if that looked impossibly cool or totally dorky. He had another book under his arm.

  The band was busy setting up and tuning and testing mics, but when the bass player saw me, he tossed his mod shag and snapped at Moss in Elvish. Perhaps he didn’t approve of interracial hookups.

  Moss replied calmly, also in Elvish, and the bass player thumped his strings with the palm of his hand in discordant ire.

  “It’s no biggie. I’m not dating him,” I protested. I mean, I hadn’t dressed up, had I? I’d changed my shirt, that’s all. “WTF” it said.

  The bass player turned on me. “I am sworn to protect him,” he spat.

  “Huh?”

  The plunking and banging onstage quieted, and the band gathered around.

  “Hadaway, divvent scare the lass,” the singer said. “She’s only a bairn.”

  The other human punched him gently on the arm as if to say, Keep out of it.

  “She’s a street hustler,” said the bass player.

  That pissed me off. “I’m not a con artist,” I said. There it was again, that thing elves had against me because of my looks.

  The drummer poked the bass player with one of his sticks. “Quiet,” he said. “We don’t know who she is.”

  That was better. Some respect at last.

  “Lizzie is my guest,” said Moss. “Please be gracious.” I liked the forcefulness that gathered in his voice. It was totally at odds with his meek appearance.

  Sky looked sympathetic. I waited for him to say something nice to me, but instead he addressed Moss. “Don’t think that you’re infallible because nothing has gone wrong since you’ve been here. Don’t go courting mischief.”

  Courting! I thought. You’ve got it wrong. I’m not with him. I’m available, but all I could stammer out was, “I’m not mischief.”

  The bass player put his hand on Moss’s shoulder. “You are your kindred’s hope,” he said.

  “I’m their tool,” said Moss, removing the bass player’s hand firmly.

  I was impressed. He was so composed.

  “It’s what you get for having a perfect record,” said the drummer, and laughed like he was trying to lighten things up.

  “I hope I’m not perfect,” said Moss. “If I’m not, my parents won’t have so many plans for me.”

  “I don’t think you’re perfect,” Sky said to Moss. “I’ve been here longer than our parents. Things don’t work the way people expect in Bordertown, no matter what they believe.” He finally turned to me. “Be gentle in your dealings with Moss. He has many who love him.”

  Was it my imagination or was there a threat in those words? I opened my mouth to protest again but decided to curb my tongue and wait. If they let me hang around, Sky would soon see I was a decent person. We’d laugh about this one day.

  I followed Moss to a table, and he beckoned to a bartender clad in a sari and combat boots.

  “Wow, overprotective much?” I said after she took our order. I tried to wriggle the tension out of my shoulders.

  “They only want what’s best for me,” he answered, as if it amused him.

  My stomach gurgled. I hoped he didn’t hear. I might have to leave early to eat, I thought. I was always hungry lately, even after the blood, as if my body yearned for something. Elf blood maybe? “What’s the book this time?” I asked to distract myself.

  He showed me a copy of The Bride Wore Black by Cornell Woolrich. “A femme fatale on a quest for revenge,” read the blurb on the back cover. The book looked absurdly noir for elf reading.

  “So you like mysteries,” I said as Sari Girl set two beers in front of us.

  He nodded enthusiastically. “And adventures.”

  “Yeah, you said.” I flipped through the pages. No illustrations despite the promising cover.

  “Sometimes I think I’d like to write a book,” he admitted, and then he blushed.

  I stifled a giggle. No one comes to Soho to become a plumber, though I suspect that there are many who move uptown eventually and find a trade.

  “But I don’t know those places to write about them,” he continued.

  It’s funny, I’m usually tongue-tied with people, but he was such a nerd that I had no problem talking to him. “Who says they have to be set in the World?” I told him. “Mysteries happen here, don’t they?”

  He laughed hard. “Drink your beer,” he said.

  I’d given up trying to eat and drink real food ages ago, but because he watched, I took a tiny sip. I was surprised that the beer went down smoothly. I didn’t push my luck, though.

  “I don’t have any notebooks,” Moss said. “I’d need a notebook to be a writer, right?”

  “I know where you can find some notebooks.” If there were art supplies at South Street School, I was sure there was a closet with notebooks somewhere.
Maybe he’d pay for them.

  Before I could ask him that, two humans came up to the table. The bald guy wore a T-shirt that said “TCP” and the girl’s said “IP.” They were a couple, I guessed. I wondered a little jealously where they bought the Ts. “Hi. I like your pictures,” the girl told me.

  I could barely stutter out a surprised thank-you, and I wasn’t sure what else to say. She gave me a hesitant wave as they went back to a table full of kids talking loudly about heliographs and pigeons. “Guess what?” she screeched at them. “They found a dead wharf rat under Riverside Bridge this morning.”

  “You’d make people feel more welcome if you didn’t glower so much,” Moss said.

  “I don’t!” I protested, but all I could think about was that dead wharf rat. Did I do that? Would I get caught?

  I looked around nervously and discovered that the little bar had filled up. One gorgeous, willowy elf girl wearing long, long braids streaked silver and rose and a skintight New Blood Review T-shirt over leggings leaned close to talk to Sky as he tuned his guitar. I hated her right away. As I wondered how to interrupt them, the front door crashed open and a human boy, dressed in a motley quartered tabard that featured peace signs and kanji symbols, ran in and banged a beribboned staff on the ground. Everyone fell quiet.

  “Territory change,” he announced. “Truebloods back one block. Pack advances.” Then he dashed out, the bells tied around his calves jingling.

  People mumbled and several elves left. Soon after that, some Packers swaggered in all black leather and black jeans. Someone said something to someone else, and I had to duck an ashtray that suddenly flew past my ear.

  The place became chaos. Some people screamed, and quite a few made for the exits. There were always those who were game for a fight, though, and they stayed.

  “The instruments!” Moss cried, and leaped up.

  A Packer sporting a hammer tattoo on her forehead took that as an invitation to swing at him. I yanked the table aside as I came to my feet under the girl’s arm and jabbed her in the gut with a left hook. As she doubled over, I finished her with a right.

  Moss gave me a shocked glance, but he tugged my arm and we ran for the stage, where the band rushed to move their instruments out of harm’s way. We jumped onto the low platform and defended it from invaders. I kicked and Moss swung the mic stand. His moves were more agile than I expected. I was enjoying myself. The singer belted out a rollicking drinking song as he grabbed the last drum, and the others hustled the amps out back. Sky picked up the impossibly beautiful elf girl, tossed her over his shoulder, and ran for the back door, both of them laughing. A hollow formed in the pit of my stomach. I have no chance with him. No chance at all, I thought, and I didn’t have the time to wait for a beautiful elf to fall in love with me. I’d take the one I had.

  I pushed Moss in the shoulder. “Come on, let’s go.” I dragged him through the middle of the brawl and away from my cruel disappointment. He followed willingly, whooping with excitement as we ducked and weaved.

  We ran out the front door hand in hand.

  Rain had fallen while we were inside, and the air smelled fizzy and full of life. I expected the street to be deserted, but people like a train wreck. Gawkers strained their necks to see through the windows and “oohed” and “aahed” at each crash. I felt sorry for the owner, who would have to clean the mess.

  “Sluggo’s is the wrong name to give that place,” Moss said.

  I must have looked blank.

  “Sympathetic magic,” he elaborated. He must have seen my eyes glaze over because he changed the subject. “Those notebooks,” he said. “Can we fetch them now?”

  I hesitated a moment. Normally I would have insisted on going for them alone to protect the location of my stash, but South Street School was quiet and deserted. And what I had to do might be noisy.

  “Okay,” I said.

  “Great!” He rubbed one of my hands between his own. “You’re cold.”

  He was warm and friendly, not aloof like his brother, and I was planning nasty things. I removed my hand from his. “Yeah, I’m cold.”

  “Wait a minute,” he ordered, and left me at the curb while he dashed off around the corner. He came back pushing a bright orange Vespa scooter. If I had friends, I wasn’t sure I’d want them to see me on that.

  He waved his hand over the spellbox, and the engine burst into life. I’d seen other people struggle and fiddle for minutes to start their bikes. “You’re good.”

  “I have a knack,” he said quietly. He seemed pleased that I’d noticed. When he smiled, he actually looked kind of cute, and to my surprise, I felt a fluttering response.

  I climbed on behind him and he revved the engine. “No one is impressed,” I snapped, because that flutter had thrown me off-kilter. I told him how to get to the school; then I wrapped my arms around him as we left the curb. This close, he smelled even better than his brother did. “Don’t stop if you see the Pack,” I yelled.

  He might be a friend, I thought. A real friend. I should let him go.

  I wanted to scream. I couldn’t wait for him to like me enough to forgive what I was and maybe, just maybe, help. I was out of control. I had to stop myself now. And whether his blood cured me or not, I would have to go back to the World. I liked Soho; I didn’t want to ruin it with me.

  The night air whipped through my hair and tangled it, and the sleeves of my jacket flapped. The tears in my eyes were from the wind, I told myself.

  No one was hanging around the school, so Moss secured his scooter to a pillar and we went through the front door. He brought a bag.

  “Notebooks aren’t heavy,” I informed him.

  He shrugged and pulled a flashlight from the bag. He intoned “abracadabra,” and the light turned on.

  “Joker,” I said. Damn him for making me smile.

  As we climbed the main steps, our feet crunched dried leaves and rat shit. Water dripped musical notes from a hole in the decaying roof to a puddle somewhere above us, and an object clattered on the third floor landing—maybe a twig from a nest?

  We were inside. Alone. I could do it anywhere here, but I led Moss down the corridor to the art room anyway. Most of the doors were off their hinges or were missing entirely. Skitters erupted in one of the classrooms as we passed, and I heard the occasional squeak. Moss inspected the ceilings and the walls and peered into the rooms. He’d probably never seen a human school before.

  Moss helped me move the file cabinet away from the supply cupboard and waited respectfully for me to find him what he wanted. I hated to leave that lovely loot behind, but I just grabbed two small spiral-bound sketchpads and three blue exam books and walked out of the storeroom.

  “Will these do?” I asked.

  He balanced the flashlight on top of the file cabinet and reached for them.

  It has to be now, I thought.

  As he bowed his head to put the books in his bag, I slid behind him and placed my hands on his shoulders. He chuckled. He probably thought I was coming on to him. If only that were true.

  If only? When had I started to feel that way?

  Ignore it, I told myself. Be prepared to grab him tight. Grip him until paralysis sets in. My throat ached and my eyes stung with tears, but I could think of no other way to get elf blood.

  I lowered my teeth carefully so I wouldn’t rip him like I had the kid the night before. I’m so sorry. His skin was fragrant and smooth, and the sight of that funny kinked ear tugged at my heart for a moment. I tightened my lips.

  But no fangs grew.

  What the …?

  I grimaced and willed my fangs to emerge.

  Nothing happened.

  Was he immune? I choked back a howl.

  He raised a hand and laid it over mine. “You know that Truebloods live for a very long time, don’t you?

  “What?” I gasped. I can cut him, I thought. I can still have his blood.

  “But still, there are those who lust for more,” he continued, obliv
ious to my panic as I realized I had nothing sharp.

  “They use blood magic,” he said.

  All thoughts of cutting him fled and my panic condensed into pinpoint attention. “What did you say?”

  “We have descendants in the World who have only a drop of the Trueblood, but want to use it to live forever. They use blood magic for power over death, but it changes them. And it changes those they use in their rites. What they don’t tell you is that you can change back. Trueblood magic favors life.”

  “What are you talking about?” My voice was shrill.

  “Away from the attentions of your maker, you are coming alive,” he answered, and twisted into my arms.

  I stepped back to break his embrace. I was icy sober. “You … you know what I am?”

  “Yes. You are a drinker of blood, trapped between life and death, the victim of a Lankin. But you are mending.”

  Fury possessed my tongue. “And you knew I couldn’t bite you, you fucking tease?”

  He blinked. “No, I didn’t know that,” he admitted, “but I was curious.”

  “Are you crazy?” I shrieked. “I’m evil. I killed someone last night.”

  “No, you didn’t.” Moss tried to take my hand again, but I snatched it away. “You pulled him out of a puddle so he wouldn’t drown, and you propped him against a wall. You tied a bandanna around his neck to stop the flow of blood.”

  “Yeah, but it obviously didn’t work—they found him dead.…” My mouth fell open as I realized what he had just said. “Wait a minute—you weren’t there.”

  He looked embarrassed. “I followed you. You were my adventure—my mystery. Everyone said rotten magic surrounded you, and I wanted to find out the cause.”

  Rotten magic? That’s why elves didn’t like me? “But the dead wharf rat this morning …”

  “Some other fool who fell off the bridge … Shhh!” He raised a finger, then cocked his head.