Bone Season 01: The Bone Season: A Novel (27 page)

“The sixth card. Your hopes and fears.” She picked it up, ran her thumb over it. “Eight of Swords.”

The card showed a woman, bound in a circle of upturned swords. She wore a blindfold. Liss’s skin glowed with sweat. “I can see you. You’re afraid.” Her voice trembled. “I can see your face. You can’t move in any direction. You can stay in one place, trapped, or feel the pain of the swords.”

This had to be the most negative spread of cards she’d ever seen. I couldn’t stand to see the last card.

“And the final outcome.” Liss reached for the last card in the spread. “The conclusion of the others.”

I closed my eyes. The æther trembled.

I never saw the card. Three people burst into the shack, startling Liss. The bone-grubbers had found me.

“Well, well, well! Looks like we’ve sniffed out the fugitive. And her abetter.” One of them seized Liss by the wrist, yanking her to her feet. “Card-reading for your guest?”

“I was just—”

“You were
just
using the æther. Privately.” This voice was female, spiteful. “You only read for your keeper, 1.”

I stood. “I think I’m the one you want.”

All three of them turned to look at me. The girl looked a little older than me, with long, ragged hair and a prominent brow. The two young men looked so similar they could only be brothers.

“True. You
are
the one we want.” The taller of the boys pushed Liss away. “You going to come quietly, 40?”

“Depends where you want to take me,” I said.

“Magdalen, you bleached mort. It’s past dawn.”

“I’ll walk.”

“We’re escorting you. It’s orders.” The girl gave me a really foul look. “You’ve broken the rules.”

“Are you going to stop me?”

Liss shook her head, but I ignored her. I stared the girl out. Her teeth clenched together.

“Do the honors, 16.”

16 was the shorter of the two men, but he was burly. He reached out and grabbed my wrist. Quick as a flash, I twisted my arm to the right. His fingers and thumb slipped apart. I jabbed my fist into the hollow of his throat, pushing him into his brother.

“I said I’ll walk.”

16 clutched his throat. The other man lunged at me. I ducked his arm, swung my leg up, kicked his exposed stomach. My boot sank into soft fat, winding him. The girl took me by surprise: she grabbed a handful of my hair and pulled. My head crashed into the metal wall. 16 wheezed with laughter as his brother pinned me to the ground.

“I think you need to learn some respect,” he said. He clapped a hand over my mouth, panting. “Your keeper won’t mind if I give you a quick lesson. It’s not like he’s ever around.”

His free hand groped my chest. He was counting on easy prey, a helpless girl. Not on a mollisher. I cracked my forehead straight into his nose. He cursed. The girl grabbed my arms. I bit her wrist, and she shrieked. “You little haybag!”

“Get off her, Kathryn!” Liss grabbed her by the tunic, hauling her off me. “What
happened
to you? Has Kraz made you that cruel?”

“I grew up. I don’t want to be like you, living in my own filth.” Kathryn spat at her. “You’re pathetic. Pathetic harlie scum.”

My assailant was sporting an impressive nosebleed, but he wasn’t giving up. His blood dripped onto my face. He yanked my tunic, bursting a seam. I shoved at his chest, my spirit close to the bursting point. I fought the urge to attack, I fought so hard my eyes watered.

Then Julian was there. His eye was bloodshot, his cheek freshly cut. They must have reefed him just to reach the shack. His arm wrapped around the boy’s neck. “That how you grubbers get your kicks?” It was the first time I’d ever seen him angry. “You only like ’em when they struggle?”

“You’re bones, 26,” my assailant choked out. “Wait until your keeper hears about this.”

“Tell her. I dare you.”

I pulled down my tunic, hands shaking. The red raised his arms to protect himself. Julian socked him in the jaw with a single, brutal uppercut. Blood spattered the boy’s tunic, staining it a shade darker. A chip of tooth slipped from his mouth.

Kathryn lashed out. The back of her hand caught Liss’s cheek, jolting a cry from her lips. The cry startled me. It was Seb’s cry, all over again—but this time, it wasn’t too late. I pushed myself off the floor, intending to tackle Kathryn, but 16 took me down at the waist. He was a medium, but he wasn’t using spirits. He wanted blood.

“Suhail,” he roared.

The commotion had attracted a group of harlies. A white-jacket stood among them. I recognized him: the boy with cornrows, the julker. “Get Suhail, you little tooler,” Kathryn burst out. She had Liss by the hair. “Get him,
no
w
!”

The boy stood still. He had large, dark eyes with long lashes. Neither of them were infected now. I shook my head at him.

“No,” he said.

16 let out a bellow. “Traitor!”

Some of the performers fled from the word. As I shoved at 16, my skin ran with sweat under my tunic. There was a glow on the edge of my vision.

The stove. I stared at the flames creeping along the boards.

Liss struggled free from Kathryn’s grasp. She pushed at 16. Julian dragged him away from us.

A thin haze of smoke filled the shack. Liss started to gather her cards, her fingers scraping the deck back together. Kathryn pushed her head down, keeping her still. A muffled scream escaped her.

“Hey, look.” Kathryn held out a card to me. “I think this one’s for you, XX-40.”

The image showed a man lying on his front, staked by ten swords. Liss tried to take it back. “No! That
wasn’t
the—”

“Shut your trap!” Kathryn pinned her down. I struggled against 16, but he had me in a headlock. “Useless shitsayer bitch. You think you’ve got a hard life? You think it’s so
hard
to dance for them while we’re out there getting eaten alive by the Buzzers?”

“You didn’t have to go back, Kathy—”

“Shut up!” Kathryn slammed her head into the floor. She was too angry to care about the fire. “Every night I’m out in the woods watching people get their arms torn off, all to stop the Emim getting in here and ripping your worthless throat out. All so you can sit on your nancy and play with cards and ribbons. I’ll never be like you again, you hear me? The Rephs saw
MORE
in me!”

Julian hauled 16 outside. I made a grab for the cards, but Kathryn got there first. “Good idea, 40,” she said, almost hysterical with anger. “Let’s teach this yellow-jacket scum a lesson.”

She threw the whole deck onto the fire.

The outcome was instant. Liss let out an awful, gut-wrenching scream. I’d never heard a human being make such a sound. My hair stood on end. The cards burned up like dry leaves. She tried to grab one but I caught her wrist. “It’s too late, Liss!”

But she wouldn’t listen. She plunged her fingers into the fire, choking “no, no,’’ over and over.

With little fuel but the spilled paraffin, the fire soon went out. Liss was left on her knees, with shiny red hands, staring at the scorched remains. Her face was tinged with gray, her lips with purple. She choked out brokenhearted sobs, rocking on her heels. I cradled her against me, staring numbly at the fire. Her small body heaved.

Without her cards, Liss could no longer connect with the æther. She would have to be strong to survive the shock.

Kathryn grabbed my shoulder. “That wouldn’t have happened if you’d come with us.” She wiped her bloody nose. “Get up.”

I looked at Kathryn and pushed the barest edge of my spirit against her mind. She cringed away from me.

“Stay back,” I said.

The smoke burned my eyes, but I didn’t look away. Kathryn tried to laugh, but her nose was starting to bleed. “You’re a freak. What are you, some sort of fury?”

“Furies can’t affect the æther.”

She stopped laughing.

A muffled scream came from outside. Suhail shoved his way into the shack, past the terrified performers. He took it all in: the smoke, the disarray. Kathryn dropped to one knee and bowed her head.

I stood very still. Suhail reached out a hand, grabbed me by the hair, and wrenched my face against his. “You,” he said, “are going to die today.”

His eyes turned red.

That’s when I knew he meant it.

15

Fall of a Wall

The day porter stared as Suhail passed, dragging me by the wrist. My throat was raw, my cheeks streaked with blood. He pulled me up the stairs and banged on Warden’s door.

“Arcturus!”

A muffled ringing came to my attention. Liss had said Warden would kill me for missing the dawn. What would he make of resisting arrest?

The door opened. Warden was there, a massive silhouette against the dim chamber. His eyes were two pinpricks of light. I was rooted to the spot. Having my aura sapped had brought on a kind of fit. I couldn’t feel the æther. Nothing. If he tried to kill me now, I couldn’t do a thing to stop him.

“We found her.” Suhail pulled me forward. “Hiding in the Rookery. The seditious runt tried to start a fire.”

Warden looked at each of us in turn. The evidence was clear as glass: Suhail’s eyes, my blood-streaked cheeks.

“You fed on her,” he said.

“It is my
right
to feed on humans.”

“Not on this one. You took far too much. The blood-sovereign will not be pleased with your lack of restraint.”

I couldn’t see Suhail’s face, but I imagined him sneering.

In the silence that followed, I coughed: a dry, hacking cough. I was shivering all over. Warden’s gaze moved to the rip in my tunic.

“Who did this?”

I was silent. Warden leaned down to my level. “Who did this?” His voice sent a cold chill through my chest. “A red-jacket?”

I nodded, just the barest movement of my head. Warden looked up at Suhail. “You allow the red-jackets to violate other humans at will, on your watch?”

“I care not for their methods.”

“We do not want them
breeding
, Suhail. We have neither the time nor the means to deal with a pregnancy.”

“The pills sterilize them. Besides, their fornication is for the Overseer to manage.”

“You will do as I command.”

“No doubt.” Suhail looked down at me with those chilling red eyes. “But back to business. Ask your master for forgiveness, 40.”

“No,” I said.

He cuffed me. I lurched to the side, caught the wall. A prisoner’s cinema staggered past my eyes. “Ask your master for
forgiveness
, XX-59-40.”

“You’ll have to hit me a lot harder than that.”

He raised his hand to oblige. Before he could strike, Warden blocked his arm. “I will deal with her in private,” he said. “It is not for you to punish her. Wake the Overseer and deal with the commotion. I will not have the sun-hours disturbed by this turn of events.”

They stared at each other. Suhail let out a soft snarl, turned, and was gone. Warden looked after him. After a moment, he took me by the shoulder and steered me into the chamber.

His home was the same as it always was: drapes drawn, fire in the hearth. Gramophone chirping out “Mr. Sandman.” The bed looked so warm. I wanted to lie down, but I wouldn’t show weakness in front of him. I had to stay on my feet. Warden locked the door and sat in his armchair. I waited, still unsteady from the blow.

“Come here.”

I had no choice. Warden looked up at me; only a short distance—even sitting, he was almost my height. His eyes were dim and clear, like chartreuse liqueur.

“Do you have a death wish, Paige?”

I didn’t answer.

“I do not care what you think of me, but there are certain rules you must obey in this city. One of them is the curfew.”

I still didn’t speak. He wouldn’t have the satisfaction of scaring me.

“The red-jacket,” he said. “What did he look like?”

“Dark-blond hair. In his twenties.” My voice was rough. “There was a boy that looked a bit like him—16. And a girl, Kathryn.”

A cold spasm racked my stomach as I spoke. Snitching to a Reph felt criminal. Then I pictured Liss’s face, her grief, and my resolve strengthened.

“I know them.” Warden looked into the fire. “The two men are brothers, both mediums. XIX-49-16 and 17. They have been here since they were considerably younger than you.” He clasped his hands. “I will ensure that they are never allowed to harm you again.”

I ought to have thanked him, but I didn’t.

“Sit down,” he said. “Your aura will renew itself.”

I sank into the opposite armchair. My ribs were beginning to ache, and my legs hurt. Warden watched me.

“Are you thirsty?”

“No,” I said.

“Hungry?”

“No.”

“You must be hungry. The gruel the performers make does far more harm than good.”