City of Burning Shadows (Apocrypha: The Dying World) Page 4

  “Salvation from what?”

  Copper pointed up. “Salvation from everything, Mr. Drake. If my sister has the time and the resources, she’ll be able to save the city.”

  Copper’s bright green eyes held mine. “She’ll be able to make it rain.”

  CHAPTER FOUR

  Shadows and Lies

  Fyea was the goddess of creativity, of inspiration, of genius. As such, she was one of the few of the Thirteen who had a sizable following outside her own church. Even I’d prayed for her help a time or two, on projects where I’d hit an unsurpassable wall and I needed some jolt of insight to point me in the right direction. Did she help me? Hard to say. But I always found my way through the problems eventually.

  Her best help, her real power, she saved for her own children. The things Fyeans could do with circuits and wires and chips were better than magic. So when Copper said her sister had found a way to make it rain, I believed her.

  Trouble was, I couldn’t see any way to help her. Even if P&B offered a wider range of services than I’d realized, the idea of trying to outmaneuver the Jansynians lay somewhere in between stupidity and suicide. I spent the whole train ride back worrying at the problem, but no matter how I twisted and turned the problem in my head, I couldn’t see a way past the simple truth that with the Jansynians involved, we were completely over our heads.

  Back at the office, I found Amelia in the library, balanced halfway up a ladder with three open books in her hands. The only person in, until I noticed the ginger tabby-cat that could only be Iris sprawled on a chair. They both looked up as I came through the door.

  “So?” Amelia asked.

  “So.” I snagged an empty chair and resisted the urge to scratch Iris behind her fuzzy ears. “It’s complicated.”

  “I’m not a fan of complicated.” Pressing the books against her with one hand, she climbed down the ladder. “Tell me.”

  “Micah’s boss is a Fyean, Copper, who wants to hire us to protect her sister, Spark.” I stopped there, watching for Amelia’s reaction.

  Which was a simple nod. “Go on.”

  So that was something we did. But it certainly wasn’t announced on the door. How did Copper and Micah know? And what other unadvertised services did we provide?

  I pushed that thought to the back of my mind and went on with the information Copper had given me. “Copper’s got a kid who runs errands. And spies for her. He’d been keeping an eye on the city council. He’s seen Vivian there, and traced her back to us. Copper believes we share a common problem, and that problem comes out of the Corporate Crescent.”

  Iris shifted back to her human-looking self, talking before her body had fully formed. “Jansynians, Amelia! That would explain—”

  Amelia lifted her hand, shushing Iris. “What else?” she asked me.

  “Spark has a technology she’s developed. Something the Jansynians are after. She tried to take it to the city council. It was after that—” I leaned forward. “Amelia, has Price & Breckenridge been investigating the death of the personal aide of one of the city councilors?”

  “Copper knew about that?” Iris asked.

  “Yeah. Copper thinks it was a threat from the Jansynians. She says after that, the councilor she’d been working with wouldn’t talk to her any more about city support for Spark’s work.”

  Amelia nodded. “We suspected it was a threat from someone. Iris had been following leads among Miroc’s Children.”

  I knew about that group. Everyone in the city did. They were the most vocal groups of protesters demanding the city council release more of Miroc’s stored water. They’d grown exponentially in the last few months, and I wasn’t the only one who expected them to turn violent at any moment.

  “What are they after?” Iris asked. “What’s Spark got that they want?”

  “She thinks she can make it rain.”

  Silence from both women. Amelia stood, thoughtful, and the moment stretched out. I could practically see the gears turning in her head.

  So could Iris. “You can’t be considering this.”

  “What are your thoughts, Ash?”

  I’d told Micah I was done with crusades. But I guess that was just another lie. Kaifail would have been proud of me. “The logistics alone would be a nightmare. We couldn’t do anything over the net. No computers. No conversations over wireless. Nothing. We’d have to be on constant alert for spy devices, and there’s no guarantee that what Seana taught me seven years ago is still valid enough to catch everything. If they find us, they’ll kill us. There won’t be any room for error.”

  Iris was nodding along, but she wasn’t going to like the rest of what I had to say. “On the other hand, it isn’t like the Jansynians are a unified body. If we can figure out which corporation is hunting Spark, we might be able to reach out to their competition and level the playing field. They’re smart, but they’re predictable. Even inflexible. If we’re quick on our feet, we might be able to stay ahead of them. So…we could do this. Maybe.”

  “Oh, well, if Ash says maybe, that’s enough for me.”

  “Shush,” Amelia said absently. She set the books she’d still been holding on a table and rested a hand on top of them, tapping her fingers as she thought. “If it were anyone but Fyeans claiming they could make it rain…”

  “Oh come on.” Iris’s entire body flushed red, from skin to hair to clothes. An angry color, but I suspected that anger was driven by fear. Kaifail knew I couldn’t deny the uneasiness in my own stomach. “Jansynians, Amelia.”

  Amelia went to her, took her hand. “If you want out of this one, I’ll understand. But if there’s even a chance we can get the water back, I can’t ignore that.”

  Iris jerked her hand away and stormed from the room. “Iris—” I started, but Amelia cut me off.

  “She’ll be fine. She just needs time to get used to this.” Amelia returned to her books, settling in for what looked like some serious research. History books, of all things. “Our first order of business is to get Spark someplace hidden. You’ll work with Iris on the safehouse. We have a few that we use, scouted by field agents, in locations known only to the agents who work with them. I’ll want you to do an initial inspection and then keep in close touch to make sure the house stays clean. Which means both you and Iris will know where it is, but you’ll be the only two.”

  I nodded, swallowing against my nerves.

  “You’re going to be central to the security on this job. You up for it?”

  I hoped so. I nodded again.

  “I want Spark safe in our custody tonight. Once that’s accomplished, we can figure out what to do about the people hunting her.”

  Amelia took her books and left me there, alone with my worries. I headed back towards my office.

  There was one thing I could do while I waited for Iris to calm down and figure out the plan for tonight—one avenue of investigation I could start down without digging any deeper into Spark’s past. One person I could contact who might be able to shed some light on this situation.

  Someone I hadn’t spoken to in seven years. Who had walked out of my life without a single look back. After all this time, you’d think I’d be over it. But in a lot of ways, it hurt worse now than it had seven years ago.

  Seven years ago, the rest of my life had still been around to keep me distracted.

  I pulled out my NetPad and tapped out the message to Seana. I went through several drafts before I had something I was comfortable with. I was asking a big favor. I was presuming on a relationship that didn’t exist anymore. And sentimentalism wasn’t a weakness that had ever been ascribed to Jansynians.

  I settled on simple and honest.

  Seana,

  We need to talk. Can we meet? A friend is in danger and you may be able to help.

  Ash

  Turned out, I needn’t have bothered. As soon as I sent the message, I got an error. Seana Arisia has no address in this system. Please try again.

  I did try again. Just
to be sure. And got the same response.

  Which gave me a whole new nest of worries. Where was she? What had happened? Had she left Miroc before everything collapsed? Had she—gods forbid—gotten caught in the riots somehow? Was she dead?

  It was just one more loss on top of the rest. One more person I’d never see again. Factored on top of everything else, it was nothing.

  I couldn’t let myself get distracted. Not now. Not with what was undoubtedly a long night ahead of me.

  All the same, it was a long time before I could move past this new shock and concentrate on the immediate problems at hand.

  #

  One nice thing about Iris—she never stayed grumpy for long. She never stayed anything for long. By the time we were ready to head out, she was back to her bouncy, colorful self.

  Miroc woke up at sundown. Even before the Abandon, no one with any sense tried to do business under the sweltering afternoon sun. Twilight conjured the living city.

  Such as it still was.

  Green wasn’t the only color my city had lost. Our man-made oasis in the middle of the desert had grown up around the intersection of three intercontinental tube lines and two overland trade roads. Despite our dangerous reputation—or perhaps, because of it—the streets of Miroc had thrived.

  The transient traders had set the stage—giants in their rainbow finery; bird-folk and their vibrant displays; even the desert-trolls covered in rich, flowing earth-tones—each tent and stall flashier than the next, vying for the attention of the tourists.

  And oh, the tourists. Gods bless them all. From the herds of the well-bred wealthy, clinging to the idea of safety in numbers, to the smaller packs of youths looking for danger and excitement. Be they human, Jansynian, or any other child of the Thirteen, downtown Miroc always brought the same look of awe to their faces.

  Not that we had tourists anymore. After the disaster in Tala, tubes all over the world had shut down. Sure, people could fight their way through the desert on the overland routes, but why would they? Trade had dried up with the rains. Like everything else in this city, our world-renowned markets had crumbled in the heat and blown back into the desert.

  This wasn’t to say the streets were empty, just that the color and life had drained away. Desperate men and women, driven from their homes and storefronts by skyrocketing utility costs, hawked overpriced and dwindling goods to people who could no longer afford them. They called after Iris and me—our clothes were clean and neither of us looked water-starved—but even if that put us among the most privileged in the city, it didn’t mean we had any money.

  It was all such crap. “This is what the gods left us. These people, this city. What are any of them supposed to do?”

  Iris didn’t even blink at my comment out of nowhere. It was another nice thing about her. “This city is angry. The whole world is angry. It’s just in some places, they have the hope of survival to distract them. Here, the only choices they have are ones that will just make them die faster.”

  And that was the problem, wasn’t it? “Everyone sitting around and waiting for…what? For the gods to reappear as suddenly as they went away? For them to swoop back in and save us?”

  “Any day now, I’m sure.” Iris’s voice was as rough with anger as my own. “Might as well wait for the desert sand to turn to water.”

  “We tried that, you know?”

  Iris’s eyebrows shot up and speckles of red and orange rippled over her skin. She still had some work to do before she could flawlessly pass as human. “You tried to turn the desert to water?”

  “Before the worst of the riots. Before so many priests died. We thought—maybe if we all worked together….”

  Iris was a creature for whom magic was as natural as breathing, and even she was shocked by the idea. “Can you really—obviously you didn’t—but could you have?”

  “The scale was too enormous. The amount of water we would have needed to make a difference—the magnitude of the transformation. The definitions, the limitations—even if we could have worked out the math, created the right ritual, it would have taken far too many trained gifted to pull it off. By the time we had even an inkling of what we needed, well, it wasn’t an option anymore. The temple leaders were dead and the rest of us were hiding.”

  “Humans,” Iris grumbled. “You’re all crazy. You, Amelia, all of you.”

  So she was still a little upset about the Jansynian business. “What choice do we have? We’re stuck here. It’s not like the rest of us can turn into birds and just fly away.”

  Iris sighed and her thick magenta hair paled and drooped. “And so I’m stuck here too. I can’t leave her, Ash. Especially not to this.”

  Shifters weren’t known for their long-term involvements. They weren’t known for their long-term anything. And maybe if they’d met before the world collapsed, Iris’s relationship with Amelia would have been an intense fling, burning bright for a time, then fading. But none of us were the people we used to be.

  Unfortunately, I couldn’t think of anything to say that would cheer Iris up. Nothing that wouldn’t be a lie.

  As night fell in earnest, the downtown streets became even more haggard looking. Shadows intruded in the gaps between buildings, in vacant windows and doorways. What had once been a prismatic sea of light was, like everything else, fractured and dying.

  As we reached a corner that had managed to retain its working streetlights, Iris put a hand on my arm. “Wait here. One of Amelia’s contacts lives right down that alley, but if he sees you with me, he’ll spook.”

  I obediently planted myself next to a wall, under the light, and waited.

  I didn’t notice the man standing next to me until he spoke. “Tell me what brings a priest of Kaifail to this part of downtown.”

  That got my attention. I reached for my collar, but it was closed and in place. He couldn’t have seen my tattoo. “Not a priest anymore, friend.”

  He wasn’t a Jansynian. Human, but with skin that fair, he wasn’t from around here. He was dressed all in black, expensively tailored, but death in the afternoon sun. “You avoid my question.”

  “Not sure that it’s any of your business.”

  He smiled. Not charming, exactly, but something in it was trustworthy. “I am your friend, Joshua Drake. And I need to know.”

  Of course he was my friend. “We’re scoping out a safehouse for a client. Jansynians are hunting her.”

  “Are they?” He leaned in closer. I couldn’t look away from his deep blue eyes. “Have you seen these Jansynians? The ones who attacked your client?”

  “No,” I whispered, overwhelmed with disappointment I couldn’t help this man. I wanted so badly to be of use.

  “Ash!” Iris’s voice.

  I blinked and looked around. Iris was next to me, frowning. I’d been…how long had I been waiting? “What did you find out?” The question came out brusquer than I meant as I tried to cover the fact I’d drifted off.

  “Who was that?” she asked, irritable again.

  “Who was what?” I looked around.

  She took me by the shoulders, pointed me towards the other side of the street. “Him!”

  I still didn’t know what she was talking about. “Iris, you’re going to have to—”

  She pointed, and only then did I pick out the man staring back at us. Human, but dressed all in black and pale—he wasn’t from around here. Weird that I hadn’t noticed him before; it wasn’t like he blended with the crowd. “Who’s that?” she asked again.

  “How should I know?” Now I was getting irritated.

  “It looked like you were talking to him,” Iris said. “But, whatever. Let’s go. The faster we get this night over with, the better.”

  #

  As we headed out of the crowded downtown and into darker, less-travelled parts of the city, Iris shifted once more—this time, to an imposing, unkempt giantess. I envied the ease with which she did it, wishing I could learn the same trick.

  If you want to b
e technical about it, magic is magic—whether it’s Iris changing her shape or me doing what I do. The thing is, for Iris’s people, it’s something they’re born with—part of who they are. Drinion wasn’t just the god of magic—Drinion was magic. The very essence of change. And Iris’s people are Drinion’s children—or were, before it became dangerous to speak the names of the gods.

  Kaifail stole the secrets of magic and passed them on to his children—us—but it’s not in our blood the way it is for the shifters. If I were to try to do what Iris does….

  Matter destroyed still wants to become energy, and if you don’t surround that act with the right controls and modifiers, you’re going to get one ugly mother of a bang.

  That’s most of what those of us who have the aptitude for it learn in school. That’s where the rituals help—codified limitations you don’t have to hold in your mind. I couldn’t wrap my head around the complexities of what Iris did every time she made herself different; I couldn’t imagine what it must be like to be able to do that purely by instinct.

  On the other hand, Iris couldn’t do my kind of magic either. She simply didn’t understand it. So it all balanced out. I guess. Except that her skills seemed a thousand times more practical and useful than mine.

  Iris led us into one of the rougher parts of downtown. My heartbeat pounded and it got harder to breathe. Streetworn toughs, human and otherwise, lurked in the shadows and watched us as we passed. Either they weren’t hungry for prey or Iris looked like more than they could handle. They left us alone. I kept a hand bundled in the fabric of my robe right at the neck, holding it closed. If Iris noticed, she didn’t say anything.

  Our luck held until we reached a particularly seedy looking apartment complex and Iris stopped. There was just enough ambient light for me to make out the splashes of graffiti on the walls of the building and the muzzle of a gun poking out through a gap in one of the boarded windows. Iris rippled and shrunk back down to my size, but with a different face than she’d worn when we left our building. Her whole body was lean, harder-looking than I was used to from Iris.