I draw a fat line in grease pencil through the latest failure in my logbook. My brother offers Alexander Wests’s coat to me, on loan from Tiberian to help us track his son. The dress coat is red velvet with gold and silk embroidery. Probably costs more than most soldiers are paid in a month. But what makes this coat in particular special is not its expensive pattern but how that pattern is polluted by a crimson stain of the West boy’s blood.
“I really thought we’d find something here,” Abraham muses, and then scans the crowd of the prisoner processing station, like it will divulge the answer. We need to find our quarry. We watch as the soldiers continue dividing the newly arrived conscripts of war into two different lines, one with men, the other with women and young children. The invasion of Ceneca is going well, if the twice-daily shipments of conscripts and workers are any indication.
An elderly man in tears has his forehead pressed against that of his daughter, a woman my age. They don’t want to leave each other, and the sound she makes is all too familiar in these times of war. I look away as our soldiers rip them apart from one another. They’ll probably never see each other again. He’ll be sent to the front lines, and she’ll work the factories until the war is won. Both will probably die before that happens.
When the war with Ceneca first started, I thought nothing of Kalykan conquest. We are chosen by Atlee’s grace to civilize and bring the light of reason and learning to the wayward savages of the world. It’s natural for people to fight back, and I don’t begrudge them this war. But I do look forward to a generation when Ceneca is a prosperous province of the republic, and we are one step closer to re-forming Atlee’s empire.
After all, the paragon’s sole duty is to serve Atlee’s will. So why should the reality of that will jar me? I shake the feeling, block out the cries of woe, and go back to my logbook.
“We could always try Leviticus Station again,” I suggest. “We weren’t as thorough with that one as we were with the others.”
“No, that one doesn’t feel right,” Abraham says disinterestedly.
“Abraham, I’m tired of hearing about what feels right to you. It’s been three weeks and Tiberian West will have our heads if we don’t have progress to show, and soon.”
He looks at me, and I can see that he’s trying to make me understand something that I’ll never be able to. Nevertheless, he tries.
“That”—he points to the coat Tiberian gave us—“doesn’t feel right at Leviticus. It feels right here. The blood has been here before, we just need—”
“Enough,” I say loudly, catching him off guard. “We’ve been going around in circles. No more following your gut. Just admit that you don’t know what you’re doing anymore.”
“You’re wrong, Cass. This is the best I’ve felt in years.”
“What are you talking about? Last night I watched you stare at a painting for three hours, just trying to make sense of it. Maybe it’s time to admit that you aren’t the man you once were.”
The words cut into him, and it’s like I pry open an already festering wound. The pain on his face is enough to make me almost regret I uttered them, almost. He’s not used to being questioned by me. Our entire lives I have followed in his shadow, content to exist within the boundaries he defines for us. But now that he’s losing himself, I doubt him for the first time. The sickness that all paragon’s eventually face has come for my brother, and I don’t know that he or I are strong enough to fight it.
We lock eyes. When he sees I’m not backing down, he relents.
“All right, Cass. We can do it your way. Let’s go to Leviticus Station again, but can I ask for one favor before we go?” I say nothing, simply waiting for him to finish his thought. “I’d like to try looking through Gerald Station first. I have a good feeling about it.”
I close my eyes and take a moment to clear my thoughts before I speak, making sure not to let even a hint of frustration creep into the tone of my voice. “This is Gerald Station, Abe. We’ve spent all day here and have nothing to show for it.”
He’s getting worse. Ever since he sprang the trap in the prison, he’s been more prone to the shakes, to hearing the voices, to the hunger. I thought after a week or so it would dissipate, but the more he searches for the scent, the worse he gets.
“I think we need to tell Tiberian that we can’t do this job, that he needs to find someone else.” I can’t stop the words as they tumble out of my mouth.
“No,” Abraham argues. “We need this, Cass. You know we do. With that much money, we can go anywhere. We can stop, be free of all this ugliness”—he waves his hand around, gesturing toward everything in sight—“just like we talked about. It’s the only way we can be truly free.”
How is it he can remember Tiberian’s offer but he can’t remember the events of the damn day? It’s precisely why I’m so frightened of him taking this job. If we get separated, if one thing goes wrong, he’s one bad day away from being gone forever.
I think he inherently knows, deep within that part of himself he keeps shielded from even me. But his pride is such that he’s been able to live off the fumes of his reputation. The Butcher should be capable of capturing some runaway princeling. It would be easy for that modern myth, but Abe’s no longer that man.
Perhaps more worrying is how competent our opponent is. The West boy concocted the perfect escape: branding himself and hiding among the conscripts to slip out of Westchester unnoticed. It would be the last place his father would look. But to brand yourself with the gammadon? Alexander West would know more than anyone what the brand means within the republic. No citizenship, no public office, no inheritance of title or ownership of land. It’s essentially a death sentence both physically and reputationally.To be so willing to cast oneself out just to escape …
Someone willing to go to those lengths must have a good reason. One that Tiberian isn’t divulging. Abraham searches my eyes for something, some glimmer of hope I can give him, but I can’t. I love him too much.
“He’s using us, you know that, right?” As I say the words, he’s staring across the crowd toward the vacant train tracks that sit parallel to where we stand.
“Who?” he responds, half listening. Before I can answer, he says, “Oh, Tiberian.” But he’s in motion, cutting across the streams of frightened people delivered here from the heart of Cenecan territory. It’s like watching a large boulder roll across the middle of a small brook, the water naturally parting for it.
“Where are you going?” I attempt to shout over the crowd, but it’s too loud and he’s too determined. He finds his way through a blockade of wooden spikes used to keep the Cenecans from escaping once they disembark from their train. The gravel I trek through to catch up to him makes an unnatural sound against the spurs of my boots as I squeeze through the barricade.
He comes to a halt at the edge of the train yard, his whole body shaking. “You see it?” He doesn’t need to point. A boy, maybe nine or ten, struggles to remove a railroad spike on the vacant track approximately twenty fathoms away.
Abraham slowly draws his Callahan revolver. What the hell is he doing? As he raises it, he says, “We need to kill it. I didn’t think they could cross over, but I was wrong. We need to kill it, Cass.”
What does he see instead of that street urchin? A monster? A demon? Crossing over from where?
I ground myself to the meridian, and the atmosphere suddenly turns crimson. My senses flare, and every detail becomes crystalline. Though I know better, it feels like time has slowed to a standstill. Abraham’s thumb cocks back the hammer, and I know my movement cannot be wasteful if I’m to save the boy’s life.
I knock his Callahan slightly off course just as the shot is fired.
When the sound of his shot rings into the sky, I make the mistake of taking a fraction of a moment to see if he missed his mark. He did, but my lapse in judgement gives Abraham a lead on me. The boy, after narrowly escaping death, turns to run, no doubt thinking he’s been caught stealing. He has no idea that the most dangerous predator in the world is at his heels and the only thing that will keep him alive is me.
With his saber drawn, Abraham’s form blinks from existence and reappears in front of the boy. To use the crimson step … On a boy, no less. He pins the child on his back and raises the saber for a killing stroke. Just as the boy lets out a primal cry of fear, I use my own step and put all my energy into tackling Abraham to the ground. But before my shoulder makes contact, he anticipates me and twists his forearm in such a way that he seamlessly transitions the killing blow meant for the boy into a deflection meant for me.
Is he going to kill me too?I use the momentum of my forward motion to twist out of the way of the blade, but this leaves me vulnerable. Abraham swings his forearm like a club into my temple, and a heartbeat later, I hit the ground. The air escapes my lungs in a groan.
His attention now fully back on the boy, Abraham readies for his next strike. This one will be successful. In one motion, I draw my baskom knife and toss it upward. To an outsider, it would look like an unnecessary flourish, but the truth is I can’t afford to flip the knife around to the right position in my hand. Instead, I catch it at a point in midair and whip it toward Abraham’s head, praying to Atlee that I judged the distance correctly. The spinning knife glints fiercely as it twists and finds its mark in the back of my brother’s head, handle-first.
His eyes roll back, and his consciousness seems to drain from his face. He slumps, and his saber clatters on the gravel.
The boy screams underneath the unconscious body of my brother. He’s too weak to unpin himself.
As I roll my brother off him, something happens that I’m not expecting: I get that feeling my brother was talking about, that feeling of wrongness. Something about the child is … off. Everyone has a certain cadence embedded into the way they live that’s unique to them, but this boy’s signature has been … disrupted. I’m not sure that is the best way to describe it. Rather, it’s like he’s encountered something that leaves an unnatural residue behind. A stain. Something harkens back to prison with Abe and Tiberian West.
As my brother begins to stir, the boy panics and runs. One look at the darkening sky tells me that the sun will leave us soon. I don’t want to abandon my brother here. He could harm someone. Kill someone, even.
But the boy, he might be the break we’ve been looking for …
“Abraham, I’m sorry I had to do that, but you gave me no choice. Stay here. I’ll be back.” I’m already feeling the wind rush by my face before I hear his confused voice call after me. He’ll understand, right?
The boy knifes his way through dark alleys and vacant passages into the industrial sector that abuts the ramparts of Westchester. It’s a problem. A straight footrace would be no contest, but his knowledge creates an inequality in the chase.
I watch as he leaps over a pair of barrels at the end of the alley and disappears around the corner. In a few strides, I follow suit and burst from the alley like I’ve kicked in a door. He’s gone. How?
I find myself the focus of contrasting stares from some urchins in the lane.
“Hurry along now.” A ragged mother rushes her children as they gawk. She won’t even make eye contact with me. Am I really that frightening? Only one man refuses to glance away: a beggar.
“You lookin’ for the kid?” he asks from across the street.
I make my way over to him, and he shakes his cup, loose change clanging against the sides. The insinuation is clear. I remove a coin from my pocket and show it to him, rubbing it between my two fingers. He salivates at the sight.
“Information first,” I say.
“Ah, that ain’t how it works down here, my lady,” he says with just the barest hint of male condescension slithering into his tone. Imagine being an urchin and looking down on a paragon because she is a woman. I shrug and take one step away, and he changes his tune.
“There.” He points to a building behind me, directly next to the alley I emerged from. “He went in there.” I give the beggar one quick nod of thanks and throw the coin at his feet.
The building is a large foundry. A smokestack sprouts from the roof, but no smoke belches forth at present. Everyone must have gone home for the day. But it isn’t the size of the building that catches my eye. Instead, it’s the subtle steps leading to a basement and a window that’s propped open just enough for a small child to fit through.
I break it and draw a few concerned looks from passersby as the glass rains onto the ground. When I enter, it’s mostly dark; the only source of light other than the area I came from comes from another window at the far end of the room, maybe a hundred fathoms away. For now, all I can see are the dark, jagged shapes of the different types of scrap metal that sit on shelves in the basement of the foundry. Each tells its own story, but something here triggers me, gives me a feeling reminiscent of watching my brother trigger the traps set by Alexander West in that confined prison.
“I know you’re hiding here, kid. Believe it or not, I mean you no harm. I just want to talk to you,” I call out into the darkness. I close my eyes, bringing all my focus to my hearing, listening desperately for a sound in the blackness, but I can’t concentrate. My body simply sings to me that I’m close to something more important: the residue. It’s here.
I get the same bitter taste in the back of my mouth as when I first held the quarry’s bloody jacket. I just can’t see anything. I must feel it, must go with my intuition. For all the grief I’ve been giving Abraham about following his instincts, he may have been onto something. It reminds me of the games he and I used to play when we were kids in the orphanage. One of us would hide a toy or something important under the vacant beds when we were alone and give the other hints when we’d get close.
Fire, I would scream when he’d get closer to it. No, ice.
Except this is more primal. Like the closer I get, the more my blood boils and my skin crawls. The only way to make it stop is to find what I’m looking for.
I snap my fingers and listen for the echoes it creates in the room. If I can’t use my sight to full effect, maybe I can visualize the room with sound. There’s a wall maybe twenty-five fathoms to the right and fifteen fathoms to the left. I need something louder, so I clap my hands. The echo it produces is not only louder but reverberates longer. The reverberations rattle shelves to either side of me, and the little metal items they hold chatter as they vibrate in kind. What I seek is among the scrap on the shelves. But where?
A cold clamminess creeps up my spine as I scan the third shelf’s middle rack.
There.
My hand shakes with anticipation as it reaches through the darkness and encircles what feels like a metal pole. As I feel its outline, a familiar shape reveals itself to me. I quickly remove the glove on my right hand and tuck it into my jacket’s breast pocket. As my index finger touches cold metal in the shape of a gammadon, an infinite bundle of life threads reveals itself to me.
This is a branding iron. Not just a branding iron, but the branding iron Alexander West and his companion used to disguise themselves as conscripts and sneak out of Westchester.
Examining the threads, I find moments of pain, hatred, and death emanating from the object, and they threaten to make me lose my way. Our teachers taught us to read the blood history of objects, but they always told us to avoid searching items with this many focus points. There are a myriad on the iron, like the roots of a great tree reaching down into the depths of pain and loss and burning rage. Follow the wrong branch and you can lose yourself in the flow of memories that are revealed.
But I’m looking for something specific. A moment I’ve already seen through the eyes of another. That alone helps me to sort through the endless brandings of countless unfortunates, and when I find it, I’m overcome with an immense grief mixed with an uncontrollable rage. I’m no longer Cassandra Ward, not entirely. A new memory sears itself into my brain:
I hate him. I hate him for killing them, for forcing me to do something like this.
On the fringes of my vision, the guard that Josiah killed upon entering the cell stares up at me, surprised. His hands are permanently fixed at his belly, showing how he tried to keep the blood from pouring out of him.
Josiah is stooped, holding the business end of the brand over the dead guard’s torch.
Already it reeks like death and mold in here, but now the smell of blood and the guards who soiled themselves upon death make the place repugnant. The body in the jail cell closest to me barely clings to life and makes a disgusting gulping sound. I’ll have to remember to alter his blood too.
“Where do I brand you?” Josiah asks worriedly. I offer my right hand, but I can sense hesitation in Josiah from the way he pulls the glowing gammadon back.
“Do it, before we run out of time,” I order. Josiah obeys, as always. My vision flashes white from the pain.
There’s a certain poetry to the agony of the branding iron. As my flesh cooks, it’s not lost on me that by doing this I’m giving up everything: my name, my title, my birthright. A prisoner or conscript forfeits all. And in return, I irrevocably mark myself for a life of suffering and likely death on the front.
Then again, William Atlee himself started as a slave before he became the first paragon and forged his empire. Perhaps it was during his time among the low that he learned to master his grace. This thought comforts me as my flesh bubbles and spits beneath the white-hot iron. It takes everything I have to keep my wrist still until Josiah finally removes the brand and the worst of the pain abates.
I look down at the charred flesh still leaking smoke into the prison air, and I smile …
The memory ends, and I am back in the darkness of the factory. Seeing that was like getting a small glimpse into Alexander West’s life. It’s obvious he is angry at Tiberian for killing someone, but whom? A lover of Alexander’s? A sister? At least we know the name of his coconspirator; perhaps this Josiah is the key to bringing the princeling back.
The patter of feet behind me pulls me from the memories and back into the now. The boy has come out of hiding and makes a run for a staircase on the far end of the room leading from the basement to the first floor of the building. Good, he’s heading toward the light.
The red specks—common aftereffects of reliving someone else’s memories—temporarily blur my vision as I stride toward the child. He grunts when I grab him and pin him to the ground.
“Where did you find this? I know you touched it,” I demand, wielding the gammadon brand in my ungloved hand.
Now that we are nearer to the staircase, a ray of fading sunlight from one of the only windows in the basement illuminates the boy’s face. His face is covered with soot, and his green eyes appear to be frozen in shock. Black curly hair spills out from underneath a cap.
I’m about to yell again when the door at the top of the staircase screeches open, and a deep voice calls out.
“Denny, is that you making all that noise down there?”
I pick the boy up like a barn cat would her kittens, by grabbing the back of his coat and hoisting him off the ground. He kicks his legs and gasps for air, but makes no sound. I step into the dying ray of light the window provides. It’s only then that the man realizes the danger he is in.
“We don’t want any trouble,” he pleads. “He’s just a boy, my boy.”
“I don’t care who he is to you. I need information. This.” I raise the branding iron up to the man looking down from the top of the staircase. “I need to find out where he found this.”
“I’m sorry, my lady, my eyes aren’t what they used to be. Could you come into the light up here?”
I let out an audible groan of annoyance, shift my grip on the boy to his arm, and begin to climb the stairs.
“Da, she won’t let me go. She tried to kill me,” the little whelp screams up to his father. If he only knew the truth.
“Shut it, boy. You’ve already gotten us in enough trouble,” the father retorts. Upon reaching the top and seeing my paragon livery, the portly man visibly shrinks, as if seeing me in the flesh makes the ridiculousness of the situation real.
Once he sees the branding iron, he looks to his son. “Did you find this, Denny? For scrapping?” he says, quizzing his son. The boy simply nods aggressively.
“I do apologize, my lady, but there must be some misunderstanding. My boy and I are scrappers. It’s not a noble profession, such as yours, but without it, we would starve. That piece there would feed us for a few days. Surely a”—he squints, trying to see what I hold in my hand—“brand … is of no importance to someone as cultured as yourself?”
He waves his plump little hands around in circles as if trying to put out a fire.
“Answer the question. Where did he find it?” Please don’t make me take out my gun.
“Tell her, boy,” he encourages his son. I become aware of the fact that I still haven’t let the boy go. Realizing how scared he must be, I decide to lower him to the floor. When he feels me releasing the pressure from his coat, he rips it away defiantly.
“I found it where I found all the others, near the train. I always go around sunset. That’s when the guards stop paying attention,” he says proudly.
“Gerald Station?” I ask in return, but the boy looks at me as though I’ve asked him to describe the color blue.
“Yes, at the station where your friend tried to kill me.”
Abraham was right. Him and his damn gut! That means Tiberian’s son must have embedded himself among the conscripts there. But why be so sloppy as to leave the brand behind? Is it a false trail? Nevertheless, it’s the only lead we have. I need to circle back, pick up Abraham, and find the train records for the day of the princeling’s escape. The manifest will tell us in which direction those conscripts were sent.
“Very well,” I say to the boy and his father. “You are free to go. I’m sorry my brother attacked you.”
As I turn to leave the basement, I stop to offer some parting words for the pair. “If you want to steal scrap for your foundry, you’re better off going to Leviticus Station. It’s farther from the barracks. There are less guards.