Havoc (17 page)

‘Temper, temper.'

I tried to push him off me. I had no chance.

Somewhere behind us Dash said, ‘Enough already. Get off him, Jono.'

Jono pressed harder on my throat till I was choking, and then he climbed off me.
I sat up, my breath rasping, and watched him walk out the door. He was limping, but
not much.

Dash said, ‘Well that was wasted effort. Stupid, both of you. Come with me. You can't
go out of here looking like that.'

I followed her to a sick bay where she gave me a towel and I splashed cold water
on my face, washed off the blood.

‘You betrayed us,' I said.

She handed me a bottle of antiseptic and didn't answer.

‘So you owe us.'

I pressed on a cut lip and a grazed cheek and held a cold flannel to my left eye
which was starting to swell. I glared at her with my working eye.

‘It wasn't me that brought your friend in,' she said. ‘You were both spotted yesterday
on Sentinel Parade, so she was on a watch list.' She paused. ‘We know she's more
to you than a friend.'

How the hell could they know that? ‘You're wrong,' I said. ‘A friend is exactly what
she is to me.'

‘Well, I can't help her.'

I looked at the damage in the mirror. Not as bad as it could have been. Other damage
was starting to make itself felt in my stomach and back, but there wasn't anything
to do but wear it. I leaned on the bench feeling sick.

‘Do you really not know that Frieda has plans for Moldam?'

‘No. It's propaganda, Nik. Let it go.'

‘It's not propaganda. Operation Havoc—go and look. Find out what it is.'

She sighed. ‘I can drive you into town, if you want.'

‘Yeah.'

‘Why do you have to be like this?'

‘Because.' I threw the towel on the floor.

We drove without exchanging a word and she let me off near St John's Square. She
said, ‘I'd say be careful, but you'd laugh.'

I said, ‘You owe me. I won't forget.' I slammed the door.

CHAPTER 22

I went to Clouden Street. Its houses basked in the golden glow of the late afternoon
sun, smug, beautiful and bristling with security cameras, bars and barbed wire. Inside,
there'd be no sign of any of that heavy fortressing: chandeliers would be bright
above marble floors and staircases, tall windows and wide glass doors would be opening
onto river views to catch the breeze, and kitchens would be busy with prep for dinners
that would last late into the night because these people would all have curfew exemptions.

I walked up the middle of the street. I got yelled at by drivers of sleek black cars
that slid past me and disappeared into underground garages, and I got frowned at,
then pointedly ignored, by pedestrians hurrying past on their way home from work.
The only time they stopped was to punch secret codes into wrought-iron gates and
multi-lock front doors that opened silently to let them in and closed silently behind
them. It was like walking through a virtual game where people vanish as soon as you
lay eyes on them and every door shuts just as you reach it. A few times I saw people
peering from windows, watching me, and one person took a photo. I stopped and bowed
at him and he stepped back into the shadows.

I reached Number 11 without being arrested, climbed the steps and punched the doorbell.
I was past caring who answered. The guard, Alan, as it turned out. He barked, ‘Yes?'
into the intercom.

I'd thought about summoning up bright and cheery and a story about being an old school
friend of Fyffe's but my battered face in the security camera would give the lie
to that so I simply said, ‘Can I see Fyffe, please?'

He said, ‘Get lost,' and flicked off the intercom.

I pounded on the door until he came and wrenched it open.

‘I said, get lost!' he demanded.

I stuck a hand on the door before he could close it. ‘Please!' I said. ‘It's important.'

Fyffe's voice came from the stairs behind him. ‘Alan? Who is it?' Then her face peered
around his bulk, and she said, ‘Oh! Come in, come in!' and almost dragged me through
the doorway.

The bodyguard wasn't happy. He frisked me, hit on a few Jono-inflicted bruises, then
followed us to the doors
of the pool room and planted himself there while we went
inside. The room was stifling; Fyffe pushed open the riverside doors and we left
the guard behind and went out onto the wide balcony. We leaned on the glass barrier,
trying to catch some breeze but the air was still and heavy with the day's heat and
the salt smell of decaying seaweed. To our right Fyffe's neighbours were having a
small elegant party on their balcony; half a dozen people were dressed for dinner,
each with a glass in hand, chatting and laughing to the clink of bottles in buckets
of ice. One of the women waved at Fyffe and she waved back, but moved away to the
far corner of the balcony. I followed.

She said, ‘Lanya and I got to the posting but never got to talk to anyone because
the army arrived. They rounded everyone up, even Mr Corman! Then they realised who
I was and dropped me like I was poison, but they wouldn't let Lanya go. I tried to
stop them, I really tried. I threatened all kinds of things but they piled everyone
into their trucks and left me standing on the roadside. I've spent all afternoon
trying to find out where Lanya is. I went out to the Marsh, but I couldn't get hold
of Dash, so I left a message for her to call me.' She studied my face. ‘She hasn't
yet. You look terrible. Tell me everything.'

I did, and she swore with un-Fyffe-like explicitness. ‘But Dash—'

‘Yeah, Dash. Tell me about it.'

Fyffe shook her head in disbelief. ‘She promised. She
promised
me
! They can't do
this!'

‘Yes, they can. They can do whatever the hell they want.'

‘We'll see about that. What are you going to do?'

‘I have no idea. None.'

‘I mean—are you going to look for the One City people? You could try Sentian again,
but the place is kind of a ghost town, except for the army.'

‘Suppose I find them,' I said. ‘What then? What am I supposed to do with that? I
turn them in and they go to the Marsh. I don't turn them in and Lanya—' I stopped.
Started again. ‘Everywhere I go takes me to a deadend where somebody's hurt or killed.'

Glasses clinked next door and someone laughed long and high. Fyffe watched them for
a moment and then said, ‘I'll go and see Dash tomorrow and I'll ask to see Lanya.
I'll demand to see her. I'll wear Dash down and make her help.' She looked at my
bruises and said, ‘You should stay here tonight.'

Tonight seemed a long way away, with a lot of thinking to do before I got there.
‘Yeah, I don't know.'

‘Please stay. And we'll…we'll…' She was casting about but, like me, coming up with
nothing.

‘We'll what?' I asked.

She screwed up her face. ‘I want to say we'll work something out and it will be all
right.'

I managed half a smile. ‘Go on, then.'

She smiled ruefully back. She was dressed in something long and pale and floaty;
the setting sun turned it a faint red-gold.

She said, ‘I used to think there was always an answer, you know? Just do the right
thing and the answer will pop up and be there for you. Her eyes brightened with tears.
‘But we did the right thing for Sol, didn't we. Every step along the way we did the
best thing we could think of.'

‘Do you think so?'

She looked surprised and blinked her tears away. ‘Yes,' she said. ‘I do. You did.
I did. You don't doubt that?' She peered at me. ‘You do. Look at you. Well please
don't. It wasn't your fault and it wasn't mine either. We did the best we could,
and we almost managed it.' She dabbed at her eyes. ‘Not that that helps us now. We
know the worst can happen, whatever we do. But, you know, maybe there are people
along the way who can help and…and chances…there might be chances for us to take.
We have to hope for that. Go forward a step at a time and watch for those people
and those chances?' She grimaced. ‘Best I can do. Sorry. It's not much help. I wish
you'd stay, you need food and sleep.'

Being kind may seem small compared to being brave but it's not, and Fyffe was both
of those.

I said, ‘You are a huge help. Always.'

‘Feeling pretty helpless right now. Still—' she glanced at her watch ‘—the people
from the Dry are coming for
dinner tonight. Should I tell them about Nomu being safe?
They're expecting a memorial for her and it seems wrong to keep them in the dark.
I don't think they'll go running to Frieda.'

‘It won't matter if they do. Frieda knows.'

Fyffe's eyebrows shot up. ‘Oh no. How? Did Sandor—'

‘No. Nothing to do with Sandor.' I stared out over the river. ‘I told her. Fy, I
told her without a second thought. Our one chance to bargain for Moldam and I gave
it away.'

All that time I'd spent thinking Sandor was a lowlife and here I was giving away
our one great secret at the first hint of pressure.

‘You thought it would save Lanya?'

I nodded. ‘And you know what? Frieda barely noticed. “Irrelevant,” she said.'

Fyffe thought about that and shook her head. ‘That's curious,' she said. ‘It's been
huge, here, Nomu's disappearance. It's been top of the news for days. Look at this.'

She went back into the pool room and turned on a wall screen. She found a news channel
and sped through its archive until it showed a picture of Nomu. ‘Look.'

She played though the footage: there was Nomu getting off the boat from the Dry,
smiling shyly at the cameras and being hurried into one of those long black cars.
She and her group were dressed in the loose, cream-coloured clothes of the Dry, but
the next shots showed
them arriving at some official function or other and this time
her hair was curled and piled high, and she wore a bright flower-patterned dress
and some very high-heeled red shoes that made her awkward on her feet. She waved
nervously at the crowds as the group was ushered up some steps and inside someone's
fancy house.

‘We got invited to lots of these functions,' said Fyffe. ‘Someone did a makeover
on Nomu and her brother so she looks like one of us now, which is kind of a pity.'

Next came the distressed Dry-dwellers pleading for anyone who'd seen her to get in
touch, and, finally, shots of plastic flowers and soft toys piled on the steps of
an apartment building.

‘Frieda's got to be interested in this, even if she pretends she's not,' Fyffe said.
‘She'll be Ms Popularity if she finds Nomu and brings her back. We should pre-empt
that if we can. Nomu's own people should be the ones to find her.'

I said, ‘Feel free to be the bearer of good news. It's not as though we can use her
to bargain with anymore.'

She turned to me, ‘I think you should tell them.'

‘No.' I shook my head. ‘I need to go away and think about what to do next.'

Suddenly, all along the riverbank speakers wailed the first curfew siren: it began
as a moan and climbed quickly into a shriek specifically designed to freeze your
blood and send you scurrying inside.

Fyffe was watching me doubtfully. ‘But you can't go now, can you.'

I watched the people next door pick up their glasses and wander off their balcony,
still chatting and laughing.

Fyffe said, ‘What are you thinking? That you're going to stay, yes?'

The front door buzzed.

‘Oh!' she said. ‘That's them.' She stood straighter and took a deep breath. ‘Listen
to me. If you go out into the curfew and get picked up you could lose a whole day
in the cells and that's a day you could spend getting Lanya back. I'm going to take
the guests upstairs. I'll tell everyone that you're here and that you've got important
news.' She nodded and tried to look encouraging. ‘It'll be okay.'

She hurried away.

Terrific, I thought. An ambush. That's what it would feel like to Thomas and Sarah
Hendry. Plus, I was still wearing the dust and grime of the Marsh's basement floor,
and I could feel my eye quietly swelling shut. Perfect for a reconciliation with
the people who thought I had betrayed their friendship and was at least partly responsible
for the death of their youngest son.

I watched the shadows creep across Southside and thought about Lanya. I had no good
plan for getting her out. I knew that she wouldn't sink peacefully into drug-induced
oblivion. Part of her training as a Pathmaker was meditation and exercises for mental
discipline. She
was tough. Maybe that would help her resist the effect of the drugs.
And maybe peace would come and everyone would live happily ever after. The adrenaline
rush from the fight with Jono had long worn off. I felt like I'd run into a wall
at speed.

I decided to leave, hole up in a corner somewhere and think things through. I didn't
want to meet the Hendrys, and I was certain they wouldn't want to meet me.

Fyffe reappeared beside me. ‘It's all settled. They're waiting for you. Come on.'

I shook my head. ‘You tell them. I'm gonna go.'

She hooked her arm through mine. ‘I'm not arguing. They know you're here, and they
want to see you. I promise.'

She marched me towards the stairs.

CHAPTER 23

I stood in the doorway to the dining room and looked at a memory: the long table
set for dinner, candles in tall shining holders, crystal glasses and the family silver,
the starched white tablecloth, bowls and platters of roasted meats and vegetables.
But in the shadows beyond the candlelight the packing cases were piled high, the
kitchen was dark and there were no waiting staff. Fyffe's mother, Sarah, had cooked
this meal and now she sat at the table with her guests and the remains of her family
in a tiny oasis of candlelight, like an echo of family dinners that used to be.