by Kester Grant
Then he turns his gaze to Ettie. “This night, the Girl Who Walks by Day will die, and you will be born anew among the Dead. This night, you join the Wretched, giving yourself as a child to the Court of Miracles, as a daughter to the Ghosts.” Orso turns Ettie to face him and asks, “Are you ready, my child?”
Ettie looks at me in confusion. She doesn’t know what’s coming. I should have warned her, but I didn’t want to scare her. Fear so often makes the pain worse.
I nod for her to agree.
“Y-yes.”
“Good girl.” He pushes her gray cloak from her shoulder and tilts her head, baring the tender flesh below her ear. Loup steps forward; he’s carrying a long metal rod that is glowing red with heat.
“It will hurt,” Orso warns.
Ettie looks at me, eyes wide with fear. I take her hand.
The burning rod comes down on her skin. She screams and sways, and I feel a bitter tug of guilt as I catch her. I want to whisper, I’m sorry. But the Court is no place for sympathy. Loup takes the metal from her skin, and she collapses onto me. I hold her tight as her body shakes with dry retches. I pin her arms to her sides as the tears pour down her face and she tries to claw at her neck, which must feel like it’s on fire. She sobs in my arms.
The song starts, in whispers at first, till it grows and swells, soaring about us.
“We were born in the darkness, thou and I, my brother,
All forgotten, all in the grave,
All tooth, and club, and steel, and claw,
Side by side and unafraid.”
As voices join the chorus, they echo and ring around the hall, a thousand voices melding into one.
“We are of one blood, thou and I, my sister,
Bound by pack and Law the same.
When hunger or sickness or war shall take you,
I will sing the death song in your name.”
Ettie’s sobs have quieted. From time to time she trembles with pain.
“Cry no more, my sweet,” Orso says. “I know it hurts, but this is not a time for tears. There’s great joy after the pain.” He nods at me.
I lead Ettie off the stage, refusing to meet Thénardier’s eye. Orso perches on the steps of the stage. The Ghosts crowd around him like shadows. They make space for me, and I settle in among them as they coo over Ettie’s mark. Ettie lays her head in my lap and I stroke her blond curls. She’s shaking. Or maybe it’s me. I can’t tell anymore.
The Tiger’s face is pale and taut. After the song fades, there’s only silence in the Court. Every eye is on Orso. He smiles widely and raises his hands. “Well now, this is a somber affair. I thought we were celebrating my return.”
The music starts up. A crowd of singing Ghosts, Gamblers, and Thieves is accompanied by a piano.
Loup appears at Orso’s side with a goblet of wine. Everyone starts to laugh and chatter. The Hyènes come down from their perches and grab reluctant partners, swinging them around in their violent dances.
Ettie looks at up me. She’s stopped trembling. “I’m safe now, aren’t I?”
“Yes,” I say. “They can’t hurt you now.”
Which technically is true—the Law protects her. But the Tiger is watching Ettie with hungry, determined eyes. He has never been one for obeying the Law.
Tomasis catches my eye. I know from the slight raise of his head that he wants to speak. I slip away from Ettie and sidle up to him, my head bowed reverentially. He cocks his head to one side, studying my face with searching eyes. His necklaces sparkle, catching the dancing light of the candles.
When he speaks, his voice is low enough for my ears alone to hear what he has to say.
“Justice is a fire that rages through your bones. The Law hangs upon your heart like a burden.” He reaches out with a leathery hand and runs a finger down the side of my face, tracing the line of my cheek and neck, pausing at the Guild tattoo behind my ear. “You’ll make a good Thief Lord in your time.”
I flinch, recoiling at his words.
I don’t want to be a Lord. Tomasis is my Guild Lord, my Father in the Miracle Court. To consider anything else would be blasphemy.
“I won’t always be around, little kitten,” he says, as if reading my mind. His eyes dance with amusement as he watches my expression.
I can’t bear to think about what his words mean. A world without Tomasis would be unthinkable. How could I ever watch him be cut down by age or infirmity? How could I watch other hands lift the jewels from around his neck and wear them against their own skin as Lord of the Guild of Thieves? I myself could never do it.
“A Guild Lord does whatever he must to protect his children,” Tomasis says gently. “But a Guild Lord also chooses his enemies wisely.” He glances over at the Tiger, who’s still sitting rigid at the Lords’ table, watching Orso and Ettie. “There are things even I can’t protect you from.”
He holds out his hand, and I take it in my own and kiss his large knuckles. I whip out the tin cup I “rescued” from the Châtelet and offer it to him. He frowns, taking the battered piece of tin and raising an eyebrow at me as he turns the cup over, inspecting it. Then he sees the words stamped into its underside—
LE GRAND CHTELET
—and he laughs.
We watch the dancing late into the night. The musicians play our best-loved songs, and all the Guilds join in singing while I staunchly refuse to explain the lyrics to Ettie. I try to still the nervous thrum inside me. Try not to think about what will happen tomorrow. Here I am surrounded by my brethren. Let tomorrow take care of itself.
Throughout the night, various acquaintances nod at me in acknowledgment of what I’ve accomplished. Gentleman George doffs his hat and offers to teach me some of dances of the noblesse. I try to control the fluttering of my heart: one of the Merveilles of the Miracle Court has just condescended to talk to me. Femi demands to know how I did it, while all around us the hall buzzes that the youngest Cat of the Thieves Guild broke the Dead Lord out of the Châtelet. I pretend I can’t hear them and attempt not to preen too much. But I’m tipsy with pride. Renown is meat and honey to the Wretched. I squash a desire to glance into the long shadows, where a certain Master of Knives might be lurking. I try my best not to care about what he might be thinking.
Wine is passed around; a goblet reaches us from Loup. We raise it, toasting with the drinking words of the Court: “Come, brothers and sisters, let us forget.” The wine is so strong it hits me like a wave, dizziness and warmth going from my head to my toes. Ettie has a sip and coughs.
“You’ll get used to it,” I chuckle.
Ettie is safe now. As safe as she can be. But Thénardier’s face was a promise of rage. And when he drinks, his temper is ugly and unreasonable; his fists itch to batter something. I drink deeply to give myself courage, to steel myself.
A few hours before dawn, the music winds down and the singers turn to ballads and tragic love songs. The hall is drunk with the laughing and cavorting of the Wretched. Orso rises from his perch, and the Ghosts rise with him. I get up and help Ettie to her feet.
“Time to go, little one,” Orso says.
We leave the theater together, passing back through the old houses. I stop, and Ettie continues ahead of me before she notices I’m no longer next to her. She turns, confused.
“Let’s go,” Ettie says.
“I can’t,” I say as gently as I can.
“What do you mean?” She sees the determined expression on my face and her lips tremble. “You can’t leave me, Nina.” Ettie’s voice is small and terrified. She glances at the Ghosts. “You can’t leave me with them.”
I’ve no choice; she’s safer with them.
“Nina.”
I take her hand. “It’s only for a while.”
“Nina, don’t go….Stay with me, stay with us.”
<
br /> “I’m a Thief,” I say. “Not a Ghost.”
“You said w-we look after each other now.” Her words are sharp, like a slap across my face.
“Ettie—” I try, but she shakes my hand off and steps away from me.
“You’re a liar.” The tears run down her face. “You’re like Maman. She said she would come back, and she didn’t. She left me here, with you.” All of Ettie’s fear and anger spills from her. “And now you’re leaving me.”
“I’ll be back, I swear.” It’s a promise I can’t keep.
Ettie won’t take my hand. She won’t even look at me. She steps back among the gray shadows of the Ghosts, but I can see her expression. Right now, she hates me.
Hatred is all right. It means she’s still alive.
I walk alone down the cold street, away from the Ghosts, who watch me go; away from Ettie, who doesn’t.
I go to face what’s waiting for me.
You have to be brave, Azelma said.
I square my shoulders and pretend I’m not afraid.
* * *
Minutes later, shadows blur before me.
“What do you want?” I ask, trying to calm my voice.
Montparnasse cocks his head, and I suppress the desire to shiver.
It’s strange to think that a few days ago I’d have been afraid of him. I now feel nothing but a dull-edged anticipation. It’s easier to face what’s coming if you don’t think about it. I’ve had a lifetime of not thinking about it.
“You’ve done a service to the Dealers of Death tonight. Lady Corday is”—he fishes for the right word—“happy.”
It sounds foreign on his tongue. I have problems imagining Corday expressing any emotion, especially happiness.
“I thought you might need this.” He offers me the handle of a dagger—his dagger. The one he’s always playing with in a suggestively threatening manner. One of the ivory-handled daggers that Assassins carry with them until their deaths. I’ve never heard of an Assassin offering his dagger to another.
I’m amazed, recognizing the honor of this gift.
“I have several more, and you, it seems, have enemies.”
I take the dagger. It’s light. The blade is keen and wicked-looking. The ivory handle is wrought with skulls and filigree.
But it won’t protect me, not from this.
He looks at me; his eyes search my face for some sign. For a wild moment I consider asking him to stay with me. Does he know what’s about to happen?
He knows, or he’d not have given me the dagger.
But he can’t get involved; he’s an Assassin and I’m a Thief, and he’s not allowed to interfere. So he’s giving me a weapon to defend myself.
“Thank you,” I say.
Because I don’t know what else to do, I keep walking. Leaving him behind.
I think of the dagger inlaid in ivory. I think of Ettie.
The sun is rising ahead of me. The first light is breaking. We the Wretched are creatures of the night. And this night is ending. I raise my head and whistle the Morning Song.
Another voice joins mine.
“Making new friends?” Femi appears beside me. “As if your current ones weren’t problematic enough.”
I smile. “You don’t have to go with me,” I say.
Femi nods but keeps ambling along by my side. He’s remembering a promise he made to someone long ago. A promise to look after me. I’m glad he’s here.
They’re waiting for us down a side street. Thénardier’s face is an ugly mask of violence. He’s drunk and accompanied by four of the Flesh Guild.
“Nina,” Femi says, “we can run.”
I remember him saying those same words a long time ago, when I was a child. It didn’t work then either.
“He’s my blood kin. He’s the Master of my Guild. How long can I hide from him?”
Femi looks at me as if he’s looking at Azelma. He knows all the words I’m not saying. If Thénardier takes his anger out on me, he might not hurt Ettie. Hurting Ettie is forbidden, but from the way Thénardier is swaying, I’d say he’s in no state to care about rules.
“Well, well. If isn’t my little chienne of a daughter.”
Thénardier reaches out and grabs me, slamming me back against a wall. I feel my ribs crack as the breath gets sucked out of me, leaving me reeling.
“Do you know how much money you lost me?” he asks.
I smell his sour, wine-soaked breath, and a thousand memories tear through my mind. Blurred words, burning rage, a hundred bruises, a dozen broken bones. Azelma begging him to stop.
“Beating me won’t get her back. She’s under Orso’s protection now,” I say through gritted teeth.
“You’re right. It won’t get her back, but it will give me great satisfaction.”
He throws me and I fall, hitting my head on the cold stone.
“Thénardier!” Femi yells. “Tomasis won’t be happy if you hurt his best Cat.” He leaps in front of Thénardier, who drunkenly bats him away.
“Tomasis can go to Ysengrim,” he slurs.
Insulting Tomasis in front of Femi is a mistake, but Thénardier seems too drunk to care.
“She brings in ten times more than you ever have, Thénardier. Think about it. If you injure her legs or her hands and she can’t bring Tomasis her cut, what do you think he’ll say?”
Thénardier smiles. “Ah, but I won’t be the one injuring her,” he says.
He snaps his fingers and the Fleshers close in.
If someone is going to kill me, I’d like to get a few blows in first. I’d like to go down fighting. But if I fight here, if I land one punch, Thénardier will take his temper out on Ettie. He’ll wait patiently till he can waylay her and give her a taste of his rage. That’s the kind of man he is.
“Thénardier!” Femi says, his voice raised in warning.
“It’s not me who sent them.” Thénardier steps back to observe with a gleam in his eye. “Think of me as the messenger,” he says, laughing at Femi’s barely concealed rage.
“Are you the Tiger’s jackal now, Thénardier? This will end badly for you.”
Thénardier looks long and hard at me through the hulking forms of the Fleshers. “Ah, Elanion, I would love to intervene, but you know me.” His face splits in a vicious gold-toothed grin. “I always back the winning side.”
I hold on to the wall and haul myself to my feet as the Fleshers circle me like jackals.
When the first blow comes, I fall without even raising my hands to defend myself.
I taste metal. My fingers scratch at the cold, wet ground as the pain sings in my ears. It’s easiest not to think. It’s easiest to close down.
I feel the heartbeat of my mother the City beneath my palms, and I murmur the words of my childhood, words I used to say like a prayer into sticky, wine-stained floors.
It’s all right; it’s only pain. It’ll be over soon.
“For Rennart’s sake, she’s your daughter!” Femi pleads.
Rage screams through me, fueled by my pain. I might as well get it over with quickly. I raise my head.
I shouldn’t say it, but I do.
“I will never be his daughter. I’m a child of the Thieves Guild. Tomasis is my Father.”
Thénardier laughs.
A boot comes down on my face, and the world turns to darkness.
I fall into muddled dreams of Ettie shrieking in some distant place and Femi arguing with someone. Then the sensation of being lifted into the air, a voice like a whisper of cold wind against my ear.
“Don’t die, little Cat.”
* * *
Time is a blur, long stretches of silence and darkness. Days, hours, or weeks, I can no longer tell its passing.
Sometimes Ettie is beside me, her voice coming out in little
choked sobs. Other times I have the impression that Gavroche is watching me carefully with his expressionless dark eyes.
Sometimes there are moments of startling clarity, pain lacing my body as every detail comes sharply into brilliant focus.
Sometimes there’s movement as the Ghosts whirl into action, fetching foul-smelling ointments, burning things, boiling water in large steaming vats, changing bandages, offering blankets.
Sometimes there’s a whisper of almost-black linen, the glint of a silver blade, the suggestion of coldness and death.
Much later, when I’m awake, a box is delivered. It’s black, with a ribbon tied around it. It has written on it Pour la Chatte Noire.
“Tomasis sent it,” the Master of Knives tells me in an icy voice. “With his regards.”
It’ll be better than the vile medicine Montparnasse usually brings. Brewed by the Poison People, a gift from Col-Blanche that is meant to heal but burns my throat. I assume since I’m not yet dead that the Master of Poisons isn’t trying to kill me.
Ettie undoes the ribbon, lifts the lid of the box, and almost drops it.
Inside is a hand. Bones protrude from the wrist, blood is coagulated at the stump. The knuckles are hairy, decorated with rings I recognize instantly because they’ve marked my face many times.
Thénardier.
It is a statement from Tomasis to the Miracle Court. He has proclaimed with flesh, blood, and bone that I am a child of the Thieves Guild. That he is my Father now, and that I am under his protection; that anyone who harms me is striking at him and will be punished. Even if that person is his Master of Beasts.
Deep within the thick waves of my pain-fogged stupor, I smile.
* * *
Sometimes Orso’s rumbling voice echoes through the giant cavern and into my small cave as he tells his children stories of mice in a kingdom of cats, enchanted birds, and violent snakes. If I open my eyes, I can just make out a sliver of the main cavern, the Halls of the Dead. Gray mountains of sleeping Ghosts lie piled on top of one another: the Dead, sleeping in their bone-laced tomb deep beneath the city streets. The caverns hum with a low medley of snores and whispers, a broken lullaby that settles over my heavy heart.
