“Why?” I say. “So he can bleed out tonight, or die a week from now when his bowels fester?”
“Isoka!”
“You know it’s true. Look at him. Unless you have a tame Ghul adept you haven’t told me about, he’s done.”
Hagan bites his lip. His hands are shaking. “You’re saying we should just leave him here?”
“No, I’m saying we should slit his throat and be done with it. It’s a mercy.”
He winces as though I’ve hit him. “I … I can’t—”
“You were quick enough to finish the woman with the crossbow.” I frown. Hagan is usually more reliable.
“It’s not the same! He was—is my friend. I can’t just—”
“Then get out of the way.”
Hagan looks at me for a moment, then stands. I kneel beside Shiro. His eyes are closed, and I don’t think he’s conscious. Thank the Blessed One for small favors, I suppose. My blade slides into his side, and he shudders and goes still. I stand up and let my power fade away, the Melos energy dispersing into shimmers of green lightning. It feels like stepping from a stifling room into a cool breeze, heat streaming off my skin.
“Let’s go,” I tell Hagan.
“There’s probably money here,” Hagan says, looking away from Shiro’s corpse. “You don’t want to look for it?”
“To the Rot with the money. We’re here to send a message.” I wave one blood-spattered hand at the bodies. “This is the message.”
Hagan gives a jerky nod. I watch him surreptitiously as we leave through the busted door and slip back onto the Sixteenth Ward’s busy streets. My other eye is on the crowd, but if anyone pays us special attention, they take care not to stray too close. In the upper wards, if a body was discovered, the Ward Guard would come out and pursue the murderer. Down here, the guards barely bestir themselves to clean up the corpses, and not until after they’re picked clean.
Still, it’s a good idea to get off the streets. There’s another hideout ready, halfway up a decaying block of shabby tenements. I’ll lay low there until morning. Quite a few of the Sixteenth Ward’s vagrant children are on my payroll, and they’ll watch to see who finds the bodies and who those people tell about it. It’s possible that the people in that room were the whole of Firello’s organization, but it’s equally possible he had another partner or two who might come over all revenge minded. If so, I’d like to know about it. I didn’t go from street rat to ward boss by taking unnecessary chances, and even Melos armor is no protection from a knife in the throat while you’re sleeping.
The bolt-hole is another empty, grubby room, with a rag-curtain window looking into a central courtyard the residents use as a garbage dump. There’s a sack with fresh clothes, a clay jug of weak wine, another of water, and paper-wrapped parcels of food. Hagan stops in the doorway, one hand clutching the wound on his arm, breathing hard.
“Well.” I look down at myself, the bloodstains already drying to dirty brown. “That could have gone better.”
Hagan snorts and mutters something. I turn to look at him.
“Are you okay?”
He looks up, face hardening. “Fine, boss.”
“I’m sorry about Shiro.” I’m not, but the lie won’t hurt. “But he got emotional and paid the price. You know I warned him about that.”
“So did I,” Hagan said.
I frowned. “Was he your brother or something?” It’s not like we hadn’t lost men before. It happens. When you’re in the business of hurting people, sometimes they hit back.
“I haven’t got a brother,” Hagan said. “He was just … a friend.”
I shrugged. Who rotting knows what goes on in people’s heads? Friendship wasn’t a luxury I’d ever been able to afford. Life had taught me that lesson early on: there was Tori, there was me, and then there was everyone else.
“How’s your arm?” I ask. “You look pretty bloody.”
“Nothing serious.” He pokes at the wound and winces. “I’ll be all right.”
“Go get cleaned up. I’ll see you in the morning, once we know we’re clear.”
Hagan forces a smile. “Yes, boss.”
* * *
I strip, wadding up my shirt and trousers, and do what I can to scrub the blood from my skin. It’s something, but I won’t feel really clean until I can get to a bathhouse for a proper soak. Once I’m in fresh clothes, I demolish the supper in the sack—rice balls, a roast chicken, sweet preserved cherries—and start in on the wine. It’s all simple stuff, but with my body coming down from the combat high everything tastes good.
The dim light from the window turns redder as the sun slides down the sky. Jug in hand, I wander over and stare. From here I can see the harbor up close, pier after pier jammed with vessels, their bare masts like a strange, dead forest. I’ve heard that Kahnzoka is one of the greatest ports in the world, rivaled only by the Jyashtani capital of Horimae. Farther out are ships under sail, from single-masted junks to enormous square-rigged traders. The sleek triangular sails of an Imperial Navy galley, black trimmed with gold, cut through the riot of color like a shark through a school of fish.
I feel keyed up, jittery, unable to relax, like I’ve missed something and I can’t quite put my finger on it. I’m like this, after a fight. It helps if I have someone to fall into bed with, a quick rut to burn off the extra energy. I thought about asking Hagan to stay—I’ve tumbled him a time or two—but he didn’t seem like he was in the mood.
Wine’s not as good, but I’ll take what I can get. I bring the jug to my lips and swallow, as the last of the sun slips below the horizon and the light begins to fade from orange to black.
* * *
I dream of the people I’ve killed.
I don’t know why. I don’t feel bad about killing them. But their faces appear behind my eyelids when I sleep, standing around me. They’re not threatening, not come to take vengeance from beyond the grave. Just … waiting, as though I should have something to tell them.
Firello is there, and his girl, and his guards. Shiro’s there, too. He looks at me, silently, expectantly.
“Get lost,” I tell them. “I don’t know what you want from me, but you’re not going to get it.”
They just stare. No expressions, no sadness or pain. Just … expectation.
“This is a dream,” I tell them. “You’re all dead.”
They don’t react.
I struggle to wake up, to open my eyes. And it seems like it works, for a moment. Only it doesn’t, because I’m still dreaming.
I’m lying on the thin, lumpy sleeping mat, empty wine jug near my hand. A slight breeze through the rag curtain raises goose bumps.
Above me there’s a faint light. Tiny glowing pinpricks hover and dance, like dust caught in a sunbeam, leaving trails of luminous gray in their wake. They writhe like a bucket of eels. I raise my hand, and the gray trails shift, as though pulled toward my fingers.
Dreams. I close my eyes again, hoping for a more pleasant one.
2
Everyone has their addictions.
Mine isn’t drink, or dice, or sex. That’s not to say I never have a jug or three, or that I’m immune to the rush of clinking coin and clattering bone, or that I’ve never spent the evening in the company of a pretty boy from Keyfa’s brothel. But these are things I could do without, if I had to.
My addiction is Tori. I can no more stay away from her than a plant can turn away from the sun.
Hagan picks me up after breakfast, at a suitably discreet spot far from our usual haunts. He’s driving a battered old cab, with proper livery and permits. Nothing fake—I have an arrangement with the owner, and he keeps Hagan’s name on the books as a licensed driver. Hagan dresses the part, too, in a cabdriver’s shabby linen and slouching felt cap. The elderly mare in the traces gives a snort at the sight of me, and her ears flick while I climb aboard.
Then it’s up to the Second Ward, up the great hill, climbing away from the sea and out of the miasma of smoke and poverty. It’s like ascending the celestial mountain where the Blessed One dwells with the heavenly court. Except at the top of our mountain sit the nobles and the Emperor’s favorites—more like rotspawn, in other words, than choirs of angels. We drive through the main gate under the suspicious eye of the Ward Guard, but our passes are in order, and a few coins encourage him not to ask unnecessary questions.
Hagan knows the routine, and he drives in silence. I’m back in my kizen, ridiculous, tight-bound thing, trying to look like the respectable lady I’m not. I don’t know why I bother. It never works.
* * *