Twig

by wildbow

  Leah and the other twelve or so people that were actively fleeing had a clear path down the street.

  Better to trust Pierre than to run.

  He could follow them, see where they gathered, and we would do this again. Hit them at home, at an unexpected moment, with overwhelming force.

  I just hated that it meant casting Frederick aside, punishing him, and losing the extra time.

  No. There.

  Frederick emerged from the place I was assuming he was supposed to have departed a minute ago, his men jogging as they left the alley.

  If Leah had had more sense of the fight, of the battlefield, and what she was getting into, then she could have bolted. She could have kept the same course, getting past Frederick’s group before they could cut her off.

  But she panicked. She and the others balked. They turned to run away from the men with nail-studded sticks, and they saw me, with Otis following a bit behind.

  I kept advancing, walking.

  Leah and many of the others changed direction for the second time in a matter of seconds, retreating reluctantly and uncertainly toward Frederick’s group. The threat of them largely forgotten.

  I moved at a diagonal, and she moved in kind.

  It was clear that she was retreating from me.

  I could see Frederick eyeing me. Trying to figure out how that worked. He wanted to wrap his head around what had just happened in that building that might have her so spooked of me.

  Part of that was the clear realization that I was at the heart of this. The pre-established relationship.

  The glimpse of me, just before all hell had broken loose and everything had gone dark.

  “Let’s have another conversation, Leah,” I said.

  She nodded.

  “Bring her,” I said.

  Frederick obeyed.

  Good.

  We returned to the lab, and the various hired hands corralled the laborers and various students that had found shelter beneath tables or tried to exit the windows.

  Jessie was absent. I waited patiently as people were organized. The group was made to kneel on the floor.

  The lab smelled like chemicals, of gas flames and wood stoves. It made me think of home.

  “Impeccable,” I greeted Jessie, as she came in the front door for the second time.

  She gave me a little curtsy.

  Shirley was right behind her. Shirley had our people.

  I was mindful of the theatrics as I brought the four nervous people Shirley had recruited into the lab.

  Each one was positioned so they stood at a specific point, facing a specific individual.

  A stocky, muscular adolescent boy, swarthy, opposite someone who wasn’t so muscular, but was much the same general shape and complexion.

  A tall young man with black hair slicked back and parted, opposite a near-mirror in a lab coat.

  A red-haired boy with freckles, nearly a match for his friend in height, also wearing a lab coat. The noses were different, as were the ears, but that mattered little.

  Leah stood opposite the girl. I forgot the name, but it started with an R.

  Both of matching height. Both with blonde hair.

  “Chief members of the Rank?” I asked. “Meet your replacements. If I’m not positive you’re going to cooperate with Jessie and me on everything that follows, you’re going to disappear, and these are the people who will step into your shoes.”

  And keep Fray none the wiser.

  Previous Next

  Bitter Pill—15.3

  “Please escort each of the students to different rooms,” I said.

  “Not enough rooms,” Jessie said.

  “Her,” I pointed to Leah. I then pointed to the students we had doubles for. “Him, him, him…”

  “Two more rooms.”

  “Him,” I pointed to another student that looked particularly nervous. “And… her.”

  My finger directed attention to a young woman who wasn’t in Academy clothes.

  “Someone from the lower tier?” Jessie asked.

  “No,” I said. I eyed ink stains on her hands, and the freshness of her change of clothes. “That girl is a student.”

  I gestured. Otis’ men herded the people we’d pointed out into various rooms. I followed them, and watched through open doors, giving direction on where to put them, making sure they were bound.

  Trapping someone in place with physical bonds was an interesting thing, when it came to psychology. It made their world small. Once the escape routes and the connections to allies were taken away and pressure was applied, the sum total of existence became the room they were in. Their experience and ability to plan extended no further than the interaction between captor and captive.

  I could see it in Leah’s eyes as she was bound to a chair: the gravity of her situation.

  “Sylvester,” she said.

  I approached the chair, as Otis’ man stepped away.

  “Sylvester,” she said, again. “Jessie. I know this looks bad, but it doesn’t change what you and I talked about. I’m not your enemy or anything. This is a small side project. Money and resources.”

  I checked the bonds. The knot at her wrists was laughable. I undid and retied it, careful to leave her circulation intact.

  “It’s why I didn’t care that much about the money you were offering. I wasn’t being dishonest. It’s the way things work around here.”

  I held out my hand, then took another length of rope. I bound her so her back was flush against the back of the chair. This rope I made tight enough to cut into skin.

  “If there’s anything you want to know, I’ll tell you,” she said, insistent. “I’m on your side.”

  I put a loop of rope around her neck, and saw how she reacted, stiffening.

  I was careful in how I tied it, leaving plenty of room, making the knot overly elaborate.

  “Jessie,” she said, turning her attention from me to Jessie, who stood in the doorway.

  Jessie was as silent as I was.

  Knot done, I grabbed the back of her chair and dragged her toward the wall. She was petite, but the combined weight of her and the heavy wood chair made for a mingling of scrapes and screeches as the chair moved. Wood against wood.

  I took a moment, tying a knot into the middle of that same rope, and then, carefully, I tied it to the back of the chair, sure to leave a lot of slack.

  The rope around her neck didn’t really connect to anything. Not a noose, not a real binding.

  But she didn’t know that. Her head turned this way and that, eyes moving to the far right and left as she tried to see everything that was going on behind her.

  “Talk to me!” she said, raising her voice.

  Otis’ man had crossed the room to stand at the point furthest from her. I approached him, walking away from Leah.

  “You can’t do this!” Leah shouted.

  Even to her, I suspected, the words rang false.

  I stopped in front of Otis’ man. The guy was thirty or so, and had mottled marks on his cheeks and hands that suggested chemicals. He chewed on his tongue or inner cheek for a few long moments, eyes fixed not on me, but on Leah.

  She was still shouting.

  “Thank you for bringing her in here,” I told the man.

  Even when directly addressed, it took him a moment too long to turn his eyes to me.

  “That’ll be all,” I told him.

  Nothing passed over his expression. No hints or tells. But I suspected he was unhappy.

  He turned and left the room, moving aggressively enough that Jessie had to step back out of the way

  Jessie gestured. Warn man.

  Late fire emotion, I gestured back. Resentment. He wouldn’t be happy. Worth keeping an eye out for. Alternate eyes.

  Jessie nodded.

  “Why are you moving your hands like that?” Leah asked. “Hey!”

  I stepped out into the hallway. I looked down at the crowd, and assessed the people within. I pointed at someone
younger. A narrow-faced boy with a curly mop of hair that was short on the sides. He had grown into his frame, and that frame was such that until he put on some muscle and grew a beard, he would perpetually look the gawky teenager. I beckoned for him to come.

  He had to check with his boss, Frederick, before he came. But the fact that he did, and that he looked uncertain, it was a good sign.

  “Are you okay with standing guard?” I asked, as he got close enough.

  He gave me a fairly noncommittal half-shrug, glancing over his shoulder at his boss. “Sure.”

  “Perfect,” I said. I stepped closer, and murmured, “Stand by the door. Make sure she stays put. Whatever you do, don’t speak a word to her. Don’t approach her. If something comes up… can you whistle?”

  He nodded.

  “Whistle. Loud. That’s if she gets particularly fussy, or if someone that isn’t me or Jessie here wants into the room. Don’t wait, don’t discuss if they refuse your initial refusal, just whistle.”

  He nodded again.

  “Any questions?”

  He shook his head, very quickly. His eyes and eyebrows were such that he looked perpetually afraid or concerned, and they were very large. That deceptive nervousness translated to his movements.

  “Good,” I said. I studied him. “You’re with Frederick?”

  He nodded again, with emphasis.

  “I’ll talk to Frederick if he takes issue with you doing this. I’ll pay you and him, if necessary.”

  “I don’t think he’ll take issue,” the awkward fellow said.

  Don’t tell people they don’t have to give you money.

  “It’s a question of respect,” I said. I indicated Frederick, sun-worn as he stood in the gloom. “He won’t miss you?”

  The fellow shook his head.

  “What do you do for him?”

  “Uh, stuff. Carry packages and things. Stand watch. Sometimes he has me burn people.”

  I glanced at Jessie. I knew that behind my back, Leah was listening to this dialogue.

  “Dead people or live people?” I asked.

  “Live people,” the awkward fellow said. “I can cut ’em too, but I prefer burning. Mr. Rees picked me out of the group, about a year ago, handed me a hot poker and told me to get creative. Now he says I got talent for it. I’m sure, if you wanted, I could do it with these captives here. He wouldn’t complain if I got the practice.”

  Jessie glanced in Leah’s direction. She’d likely reacted to that.

  “For now, I want her intact,” I said.

  The fellow nodded.

  “In the meanwhile, watch her, and think about what you might do if I gave you the chance to practice,” I instructed.

  “I will,” he said, with grave seriousness, looking down at me with eyes that looked like they were meant only meant for getting and giving sympathy.

  Leah stared at me, the whites of her eyes visible, as I closed the door firmly behind me.

  “He’ll be okay?” Jessie asked.

  “That kid?” I asked, glossing over the fact that the ‘kid’ was older than I was. “Not a problem.”

  We checked on each of the others, making sure the bonds were tight, the accommodations secure, the guards competent.

  I shut the last of the doors behind me. When we were done, Jessie and I walked into the middle of the hallway.

  One of our prisoners was screaming nonstop. Not for any reason. Only that he was a wimp.

  “We need to know when Fray shows up,” I said, quiet, to Jessie.

  Jessie nodded.

  “If Fray knows them, how they do business. Get a read on how willing they’d be to cooperate, and if they could bluff Fray.”

  Jessie considered that for a moment. “I’d rather not try.”

  “I know. But we do what we need to do in order to make this happen. How good are you on their business as usual?”

  “Watched these guys from a nearby rooftop with some binoculars in hand for a few hours. I’m good,” she said.

  “Good. I go clockwise, you go counterclockwise? We’ll each visit each of them. Make Leah one of the last ones we check on. I want her to stew.”

  “I was going to say that your response back there was particularly…”

  “Over the top?”

  “…Motivated. You paid particular attention to Leah there. I’m trying to figure it out.”

  “We’re interrogating,” I said. “Putting on pressure is key. I know Leah better, I had a better sense of how to put on pressure.”

  “I have a gut feeling there’s more to it than that,” Jessie said.

  I reached out, and tapped the bit of her glasses between the two lenses, so they slid further down her nose. She swatted at my hand and pushed her glasses back up her nose.

  “Let me know when you figure it out,” I said.

  “I’m halfway convinced I just did,” she said.

  I leaned forward, so my face was close to hers, stopping short of our noses touching, only to turn my face at the last second, so I could speak in her ear. “Do tell.”

  Any of the girls I’d interacted with to date might have reacted. I could picture Mary matching aggression with aggression, forward lean with forward lean, forcing a game of chicken. Lillian would have backed off, likely blushed. Shirley would have redirected, deflected, or otherwise shied off. Lacey would have been traumatized, though I hesitated to call Lacey a girl. Helen would have eaten me alive.

  Jessie, though, didn’t flinch at all.

  “I’ll mull it over,” she said. She smiled a little. “Let you stew.”

  “That just isn’t right,” I said. “Psychological torture, that.”

  “Mm hmm,” she said. She glanced back in the direction of the lab. “Don’t forget our lieutenants.”

  As I turned to look, Jessie ducked away, heading for the first room.

  I sighed.

  I approached the room, where everyone was waiting.

  “That’ll be all. I borrowed a few people to guard the rooms, I’ll need a few hands to manage this crowd, too, but I don’t expect any problems,” I said. “Pierre will deliver your money within the hour. Pierre?”

  “Can do,” the rabbit-headed man said.

  “Good. Questions? Concerns?”

  “Not sure what exactly you’re wanting with all this,” Frederick said. “A lab? Decoys?”

  “Doesn’t matter,” I said. “You’ll see soon enough. And if you give me patience, I’ll pay you back with interest by showing you results. Wait, see, and it should be spectacular.”

  “I’m starting to see how you do things,” Frederick said. There was a note of derision in there. A bit of accusation.

  “Uh huh,” I said, not showing that I’d recognized it. “If you hadn’t dawdled earlier while moving to where we told you to go, you could have seen what the others did.”

  “Your girl’s timing was wrong.”

  “My girl’s timing is never wrong,” I said. “If it was, she or I would have died a dozen times over in the last year alone.”

  Frederick was challenging me. He wore an expression like he couldn’t quite believe me.

  He still felt threatened by me, yet not threatened enough to be cowed.

  “If you don’t want the money I’m offering, Frederick, then say so. If you don’t think I can do the job, then say so. If pride, greed, envy or fear happen to rule you, then say so.”

  “Envy?” he asked, arching an eyebrow.

  How very generous of him to tell me what his issue was. He didn’t respect me.

  “Decide if you want to see what happens next unfold from within my organization or from the outside. If you’re envious, then—”

  “That was a question I asked, not a statement,” he said. “I think you’re a little full of yourself, here.”

  I nodded. “I am. More than a little. But it’s deserved, I think.”

  I gave Frederick my best ‘dead eyes’ look.

  “Frederick,” Shirley chimed in.

&nbs
p; I immediately made a negation gesture, hand moving side to side.

  “No, no,” Frederick said. He smiled. “I want to hear what she has to say, that you don’t want us to hear.”

  She reacted to the sheer number of eyes on her, shifting her weight. Then I saw her using one of the little tricks I’d taught her, in how to use her eyes. One of the first tricks, too, in how she positioned her body.

  She met my eyes, and I gave her a fractional nod.

  “I’ve been with him for seven months now,” she said. “In that span of time, he’s had Crown, Academy, Rebellion, and criminal organizations come for his head, some of those very motivated, and often two or three of those groups at the same time. He has literally had his heart ripped out of his chest, yet he’s still here. He’s better off than he was, and he’ll be better off in another seven months.”

  “A week,” I said, interrupting her. “Maybe half that. Maybe tonight, though I doubt it. But before the week is over, my side will be ten times as strong as it is.”

  I saw Frederick, Archie, Otis, and Clay glance at each other.

  “Between all of us, counting the people we left behind… we add up to what, sixty people?” Frederick asked.

  I wished I had Jessie to give an exact number. “Something in that neighborhood.”

  “And in a matter of a week, you’ll have six hundred?” he asked. Again, that hint of derision.

  “As a low estimate,” I said.

  Shirley jumped in again, “If he says he’ll accomplish something, I believe him. It’s why I threw my lot in with his. I think it’s why some of the others here got on board. They don’t have the same experience I do, but I think they sense it.”

  Clay couldn’t sense the dick in his pants, probably. Otis probably hadn’t wrapped his head around the idea of a group six hundred strong in decades. Even in a crowd, I got the impression his focus was narrow, on allies and enemies, and getting the things he wanted.

  Archie got it, I was pretty sure. I couldn’t read him so easily, though.

  “What happens when you fail?” Frederick asked.

  Not if, but when.

  “If you want a win-win, you’re not going to get it here. If I win and you’re on my side, you win too. Strength, reputation, money, leverage, and the ability to effect change. If I lose, you’re no worse off than you were. All you’ll have lost is a week’s time, and you’ll have a story to tell others over drinks, about the kid who thought he could raise an army. If I fail.”