Magpie's Song

by Allison Pang

  Magpie’s Song (The IronHeart Chronicles, Book One)

  Copyright © 2017 by Allison Pang

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without the written permission of the author, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law.

  If you are reading this in e-book, please remember that this e-book is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This e-book may not be resold or given away to other people without the express permission of the copyright holder. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each person. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

  To request permissions and for all other inquiries, contact: apang@heartofthedreaming.com

  Cover and book design by Mae I Design & Photography

  Editing by Danielle Poiesz and Double Vision Editorial

  ISBN (print): 978-0-9985343-1-2

  ISBN (e-book): 978-0-9985343-0-5

  First edition

  August 2017

  Visit the author’s website at www.heartofthedreaming.com.

  TABLE OF CONTENTS

  Also By Allison Pang

  Quote

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Acknowledgments

  Excerpt Magpie’s Fall

  About the Author

  ALSO BY ALLISON PANG

  The Abby Sinclair Series

  A Brush of Darkness (Book One)

  A Sliver of Shadow (Book Two)

  A Trace of Moonlight (Book Three)

  A Duet with Darkness (a prequel short story in the Carniepunk anthology)

  Standalones

  Respawn, Reboot (a short story in the Out of Tune, Book 2 anthology)

  The Wind in Her Hair (a comic in the Womanthology: Space anthology)

  Webcomics

  Fox & Willow

  To Lucy, Moon Child of my heart.

  ’Ware IronHeart’s breath and IronHeart’s claws

  For when IronHeart roars, Meridion falls.

  They calls me Raggy Maggy

  But I have no song to sing.

  I’ve a ghost for a shadow

  And a sparrow on the wing.

  CHAPTER 1

  “Well, it’s certainly not from here.” I smirk, eyeing the tiny dragon with a raised brow.

  Beside me, my clanmate Sparrow snorts and pushes a lock of pale hair from her face. “Obviously. You can tell because there’s no rust on it.”

  And there isn’t. The dragon is about the size of a robin and perches on a nearby barrel, its metallic body gleaming beneath the sodium light with the golden glitter of an oil-coated pearl. Tiny cogs whir and click in miniature perfection, nestled inside a shiny glass belly full of steam and smoke. A red-hot ember flares in a rhythmic pulse in the chambered center of its chest.

  In the entirety of my nineteen years, I’ve never seen anything like it. Its exquisite appearance is at odds with the severity of our surroundings, making the BrightStone junkyard seem even more haggard than it is. And that’s saying something.

  “So where do you think it came from? The Upper Tier . . . or the upper tier?” Sparrow points up to the sky with an exaggerated flourish and rolls her eyes. For all that she’s five years younger than I am, she has enough cynicism for the both of us. Living on the streets as we do, a sense of humor is a necessity. Sometimes it’s the only thing we have.

  I gaze upward to search through the hazy fog of the slag heaps, straining to see the emerald glass of the shining towers of Meridion in the distance. The floating city looms above BrightStone as it always does, its secrets dense and seemingly without end.

  It’s all bones here below, a graveyard of corrosion and twisted metal, the castoffs of Meridion sprawled in haphazard fashion like the burial grounds of elephants I once saw in a picture book. The junkyard sits outside the crumbling ruins of BrightStone’s lower quadrant, which is now nothing more than a maze of cobblestone streets and empty buildings. It probably had a name once, a proper one, but these days we just call it the Warrens.

  I move closer to where the dragon sits until I’m only a few feet away, and I glance back at Sparrow with a shrug. “Too finely made, even for the BrightStone jewelers in the Upper Tier. No, some spoiled Meridian brat probably lost her precious toy out the window of a wind balloon. Or down the garbage chute.”

  “Still pretty, though.” A hint of longing threads its way through Sparrow’s voice, her dark eyes suddenly pensive. She’s a tiny thing, but there’s a boldness that belies her small stature, a subtle cheeky disposition that’s part humor and part defense mechanism wrapped in BrightStone’s drab hand-me-down rags.

  “Aye,” I say softly, studying the delicate webbing of the dragon’s wings, the golden membranes overlapping like the mocking sweep of an exotic bird’s feathers.

  A Meridian would call it beautiful, no doubt. A wonder of engineering. But all I can see is night upon night of hot meals and the promise of a real bed with blankets, a roof, and maybe a bath in something that doesn’t resemble pig swill. Maybe even a shiny hammer and a new wool coat.

  Toy or not, this dragon could be sold. Melted down. Ripped apart.

  It turns toward me, catching my gaze with its jeweled eyes.

  I wonder for a moment if it will startle, but I shake away the absurd thought. After all, it’s merely a toy. And yet, there’s an odd sensation of recognition I don’t understand as it maintains eye contact. My heartbeat clatters in my chest, as though reminding me why I’m here.

  Sparrow and I have a certain weight of scrap we need to collect—anything that could be sold or traded. For those of us living in the Warrens it’s the only legal way of making enough jingle to survive. But whatever our individual supplementary means of subsistence might be, every member of the clan is required turn in their scrap at the end of each day or earn their keep in some other fashion.

  Sliding my hammer from my belt with a careful hand, I nod at Sparrow. “I’m short my quota. Halvsies and such?”

  “Aye.” Her coat flaps in the breeze, and she shifts. The dragon snakes toward her, its steaming breath hissing like an angry teakettle.

  I see my chance and close the distance with a scuff of boots. I carefully press down on the back of its neck until it touches the lid of the barrel. The dragon squirms, nearly sliding through my oiled fingers, and I turn my battered hammer so that the clawed fork traps its triangular head.

  “Oy, look at it wriggle,” Sparrow says, eyes wide.

  “Help me put it in the bag.” My knuckles strain as the dragon lets out a shriek. “Mine’s mostly empty.” Sparrow struggles with the drawstring, forcing me to adjust my stance to allow her better access. “Quit moving, beastie, or I’ll take the hammer to you,” I warn.

  A disdainful sniff puffs from its intricately carved nostrils, but I don’t hesitate to take a firmer grasp behind its head and thrust it into the bag once Sparrow has it opened. The dragon lets out an indignant rumble, but Sparro
w’s already tightly tying the bag shut.

  She hands it to me with a shrug. “So now what? Not exactly like we’re going to be able to fob it off at the scrap-trader’s.” She purses her mouth. “Be a shame to destroy it, though.”

  A sigh escapes me. I know she’s right. Not about destroying it so much as having it traced back to us or our clan. Something this fine . . . People would take note.

  “We’ll have to be careful about it,” I admit.

  “We could turn it over to Rory . . .”

  The thought makes my stomach twist. “No. Not that. We’d never see a penny.” Rory acts like a liaison between our clan and the rest of BrightStone. Our leader might be what he calls himself, but he’s nothing more than a bully with a slight edge over the rest of us.

  “That leaves us with smelting it, then,” she says.

  “Maybe. But I bet Archivist Chaunders could tell us how much it’s worth. Then we can take it to Molly Bell over at the Conundrum. She might not give us full price, but at least the profits would be ours.”

  It’s a risky venture at best. Molly Bell deals in black market goods and information and has an extensive clientele of BrightStone elites and underworld lackeys alike. Approaching her is a bit like swimming with a shark: sooner or later, she always takes her pound of flesh.

  Sparrow cocks her head at me. “Oh, aye. That’s brilliant. You really think Rory will let it slide if we start dealing with Molly Bell behind his back?” She scoffs. “I don’t trust her any farther than I can see her. And not even then, Mags.”

  “Well it’s not like we can just walk into Spriggan territory to try to sell it ourselves, now can we? Besides, what Rory doesn’t know won’t kill him.”

  The words sound hollow even in my own ears. As excuses go, it’s paper-thin. But what of it? I’ve never found anything of real value before. Rory won’t hesitate to dole out punishment for coming up short, but the temptation is so strong I can taste it.

  “Might kill us, though,” Sparrow mutters.

  A shadow passes overhead, the darkening pall of an Inquestor air patrol, its sails spread wide on either side of its narrow hull. It’s one of their scout ships, drifting upon invisible currents of fog and steam. From below it looks like a silver hummingbird, darting in and out between the buildings.

  I throw the bag over my shoulder and slide my hammer into my belt. The ship’s sudden appearance only serves to make me uneasy. Inquestors tend to stay out of the Warrens, abandoned as they are. A patrol out at this time of day would be looking for somewhat.

  Or someone.

  I don’t want to be either.

  Sparrow and I have been on the receiving end of their searches before. Last time I’d been stopped, they took nearly a full day’s worth of scrap for no reason except that they could. Rory had beaten me senseless when he found out, the arrogant bastard.

  Still . . .

  Short my quota or no, the dragon in my sack troubles me. The longer we hold on to it, the more likely we’ll be discovered. And the more likely we’ll give up any chance of a profit. I shift the strap of my bag so it’s sitting more securely on my shoulder. “Let’s just head toward the Conundrum now. The sooner we dump this, the better off we’ll be. Maybe I can make up for my missing scrap tomorrow.”

  Sparrow lets out a disbelieving grunt. “Come on, then. I’ll split my takings with you, and we’ll say the patrols chased us out of the junkyard. Wouldn’t be the first time.”

  I cast a wary eye at the shadow, but the air patrol is heading toward the lights of BrightStone’s Upper Tier and away from us.

  “And good riddance.” Sparrow sighs with relief.

  We slink our way to the borders of the junkyard, pausing when we discover the remains of an ancient carburetor, its innards slowly leaking out in inky streaks. I pick off the bolts, but they jangle miserably in Sparrow’s sack with every step she takes.

  At the outskirts of the Warrens the fog thickens around us in a cloak woven of soot and ancient rust. The coverage is deceptive, making it seem as though the lower bowels of the city are cleaner than their wont. But like a diseased whore, all it takes is a stiff breeze from the fetid bay to remove the illusion, its skirts lifted to reveal the rotting core beneath.

  Oily puddles stinking of fish guts and damp shit cover the cobblestones in layers of filth that make it hard to walk. You get used to the smell the way you get used to never being warm or having a belly that never stops biting.

  In the distance, the dull clang of the Mother Clock thumps out the hour, the sound burrowing its way through the crevices of shutters and chimney tops, crumbling brick and slick-packed cement. Something crunches beneath my foot, and I wave away the fog, blinking in surprise when I see a metallic hue.

  More scrap?

  I kneel, my fingers digging through the muck without hesitation.

  “Mags?” Sparrow’s voice is a whisper from the gloaming.

  “Hush. There’s somewhat here.” I feel hard metal. Oil, slick . . . and warm? I pull a lightstick from the inner pocket of my coat and tap it softly. It blazes to life, illuminating the alleyway in a putrid piss color. Enough to get a better idea of what I’d stumbled over, at least.

  Sparrow mumbles a swear above me.

  “Hells.” The metal glints beneath my foot, and I realize it’s another dragon, just like the one in my sack, but its wings are a shattered mess of coils and springs and no ember beats within its broken glass chest. An uneasy feeling churns in my gut.

  But really, it isn’t the metal so much as the blood pooling in a large depression in the cobblestones. And it’s not from the dragon.

  I trace the sluggish crimson rivulets to the source—a body sprawled in a haphazardly ungraceful position. Death being the great equalizer, it clearly has no time to stop for dignity.

  The man’s head is cracked; something spongy leaks from his ears, and his jaw hangs open like a door knocked off its hinges. Death isn’t a new thing for us by any stretch, but that’s not what makes me pause. I glance at Sparrow, nestled deep in her coat, and she swallows.

  “His face . . .” she says, barely a whisper.

  “I know.” I carefully prod his cheek. Even beneath the yellow luminescence of my lightstick, his skin seems to shimmer.

  He’s a Meridian. A real, gods-be-damned Meridian.

  I’ve never seen one before, and as far as I know, neither has Sparrow. These days they keep to themselves in their floating city, using the specialized techniques of their red-robed Inquestor squads to keep the rest of us in line—BrightStone citizens and half-breed Moon Children alike.

  Moon Children like me and Sparrow.

  “I always thought the glowing-skin thing was bullshit.” Sparrow tugs at a lock of her hair. “Too bad we don’t glow. It’d be a lot handier in the dark.”

  “Or make us easy targets,” I retort. “At least now we know what that air patrol was looking for.” I touch his face again, marveling at the way it glitters, almost like a hint of frost upon a windowpane.

  “We should get out of here,” she says. “This is bad news.”

  “In a minute.” I look up at the Meridian towers. Had he jumped or been pushed?

  I shuffle forward, patting down the ruins of his fine wool coat until I discover a credit chit. I nearly toss it. The chits are Meridian currency, but they find their way to BrightStone from time to time. The shops here only take credit chits from Inquestors and BrightStone citizens of the Upper Tier—noble gentry who wouldn’t deign to rub shoulders with gutter rats like us if their lives depended upon it.

  Still, the thought of leaving money behind rankles. I pocket the chit on the off chance I can trade it for something later.

  “Mags,” Sparrow hisses at me again. I frown at her. Scavenging is first come, first serve. If I don’t do it, then someone else will five minutes from now.

  “Nearly done.” I snag a few loose odds and ends that can be melted down if I can’t sell them, and oh . . . a parcel of dried tobacco worth more than every
thing I have on me put together.

  Sparrow leaves me to clamber up the brickwork of the nearest building, her fingers expertly digging into the rotting cement. “There’s a ground patrol coming. I think they’re looking for him.” She melts into the shadows of the rooftops only to reappear a moment later. “Half a block. They’re being quieter than usual.”

  “They’re a tad late, don’t you think?”

  Something about the raggedness of his coat nags at me, and I run my hands along the lapel as I lower my lightstick. I feel the wound before I see it. Holes upon holes and shattered bones and cooling viscera. “He didn’t just fall,” I say. “Poor bastard’s been gutted right under the ribs.”

  She exhales slowly. “Come on. They’re nearly at the corner.”

  Now that she’s pointed it out, I can hear the telltale thudding of heavy boots from somewhere behind us. “Time to go.”

  I pocket whatever is left of the second dragon’s body and narrowly avoid the less than pleasant bodily fluids leaking from the soft parts of the man’s flesh. No sense in leaving a trail.

  I reach the far end of the alley, Sparrow silently flanking me up above. She whistles sharply twice, and I freeze.

  Not one patrol but two.

  And I’ve run smack into one of them.

  It’s a contingent of at least ten by the quick count I make, all dark-crimson trench coats and oiled mustaches, white gloves and brass buttons. Definitely not the normal caliber of the BrightStone watch.

  No, these are Inquestors.

  Shit.

  It’s said that Inquestors were Meridians once, before they came to BrightStone, but I don’t know if it’s true. They certainly don’t shimmer from what I’ve seen. The leader of this particular patrol glares at me in disgusted recognition. Inquestor Caskers is a beanpole of a man wrapped in sallow skin and bristling black hair, his squared jaw set like that of a bulldog. The brass star on his breast indicates his rank of lieutenant, and his mustache is freshly waxed.