Hope and Red (2 page)

The cloaked man took a notebook from his pocket as soldiers brought out a small table and chair and placed them before him. He sat at the table and a soldier handed him a quill and ink. The man immediately began to write, pausing frequently to peer through the netting into the tent.

Screams began to come from inside the tent. She realized then that all the villagers were inside. She didn't know why they screamed, but it terrified her so much that she dropped back into the mud and held her hands over her ears to block out the sound. The screams lasted only a few minutes, but it was a long time before she could bring herself to look again.

It was completely dark now except for one lantern at the tent entrance. The soldiers had gone and only the cloaked man remained, still scribbling away in his notebook. Occasionally, he would glance into the tent, look at his pocket watch, and frown. She wondered where the soldiers were, but then noticed that the strange boxy ship tied at the dock was lit up, and when she strained her hearing, she could make out the sound of rowdy male voices.

The girl snuck through the tall grass toward the side of the tent that was the farthest from the man. Not that he would have seen her. He seemed so intent on his writing that she probably could have walked right past him, and he wouldn't have noticed. Even so, her heart raced as she crept across the small stretch of open ground between the tall grass and the tent wall. When she finally reached the tent, she found that the bottom had been staked down so tightly that she had to pull out several of them before she could slip under.

It was even darker inside, the air thick and hot. The villagers all lay on the ground, eyes closed, chained to each other and to the thick tent poles. In the center sat the wooden box, the lid off. Scattered on the ground were dead wasps as big as birds.

Far over in the corner, she saw her mother and father, motionless like all the rest. She moved quickly to them, a sick fear shooting through her stomach.

But then her father moved weakly, and relief flooded through her. Maybe she could still rescue them. She gently shook her mother, but she didn't respond. She shook her father, but he only groaned, his eyes fluttering a moment but not opening.

She searched around, looking to see if she could unfasten their chains. There was a loud buzzing close to her ear. She turned and saw a giant wasp hovering over her shoulder. Before it could sting her, a hand shot past her face and slapped it aside. The wasp spun wildly around, one wing broken, then dropped to the ground. She turned and saw her father, his face screwed up in pain.

He grabbed her wrist. “Go!” he grunted. “Away.” Then he shoved her so hard, she fell backward onto her rear.

She stared at him, terrified, but wanting to do something that would take the awful look of pain away from his face. Around her, others were stirring, their own faces etched in the same agony as her father.

Then she saw her father's sea glass necklace give an odd little jump. She looked closer. It happened again. Her father arched his back. His eyes and mouth opened wide, as if screaming, but only a wet gurgle came out. A white worm as thick as a finger burst from his neck. Blood streamed from him as other worms burrowed out of his chest and gut.

Her mother woke with a gasp, her eyes staring around wildly. Her skin was already shifting. She reached out and called her daughter's name.

All around her, the other villagers thrashed against their chains as the worms ripped free. Before long, the ground was covered in a writhing mass of white.

She wanted to run. Instead, she held her mother's hand and watched her writhe and jerk as the worms ate her from the inside. She did not move, did not look away until her mother grew still. Only then did she stumble to her feet, slip under the tent wall, and run back into the tall grass.

She watched from afar as the soldiers returned at dawn with large burlap sacks. The cloaked man went inside the tent for a while, then came back out and wrote more in his notebook. He did this two more times, then said something to one of the soldiers. The soldier nodded, gave a signal, and the group with sacks filed into the tent. When they came back out, their sacks were filled with writhing bulges that she guessed were the worms. They carried them to the ship while the remaining soldiers struck the tent, exposing the bodies that had been inside.

The cloaked man watched as the soldiers unfastened the chains from the pile of corpses. As he stood there, the little girl fixed his face in her memory. Brown hair, weak chin, pointed ratlike face marked with a burn scar on his left cheek.

At last they sailed off in their big boxy ship, leaving a strange sign driven into the dock. When they were no longer in sight, she crept back down into the village. It took her many days. Perhaps weeks. But she buried them all.

Captain Sin Toa stared down at the girl. During her tale, her expression had remained fixed in a look of wide-eyed horror. But now it settled back into the cold emptiness he'd seen when he first coaxed her out of the hold.

“How long ago was that?” he asked.

“Don't know,” she said.

“How did you get aboard?” he asked. “We never docked.”

“I swam.”

“Quite a distance.”

“Yes.”

“And what should I do with you now?”

She shrugged.

“A ship is no place for a little girl.”

“I have to stay alive,” she said. “So I can find that man.”

“Do you know who that was? What that sign meant?”

She shook her head.

“That was the crest of the emperor's biomancers. You haven't got a prayer of ever getting close to that man.”

“I will,” she said quietly. “Someday. If it takes my whole life. I'll find him. And kill him.”

Captain Sin Toa knew he couldn't keep her aboard. It was said maidens, even eight-year-old ones, could draw the attention of the sea serpents in these waters as sure as a bucketful of blood. The crew might very well mutiny at the idea of keeping a girl on board. But he wasn't about to throw her overboard or dump her on some empty piece of rock either. When they landed the next day at Galemoor, he approached the head of the Vinchen order, a wizened old monk named Hurlo.

“Girl's seen things nobody should have to see,” he said. The two of them stood in the stone courtyard of the monastery, the tall, black stone temple looming over them. “She's a broken thing. Could be a monastic life is the only option left to her.”

Hurlo slipped his hands into the sleeves of his black robe. “I sympathize, Captain. Truly, I do. But the Vinchen order is for men only.”

“But surely you could use a servant around,” said Toa. “She's a peasant, accustomed to hard work.”

Hurlo nodded. “We could. But what happens when she comes of age and begins to blossom? She will become too great a distraction for my brothers, particularly the younger ones.”

“So keep her till then. At least you'll have sheltered her a few years. Kept her alive long enough for her to make her own way.”

Hurlo closed his eyes. “It will not be an easy life for her here.”

“Don't think she'd know what to do with an easy life if you gave her one anyway.”

Hurlo looked at Toa. And to Toa's surprise, he suddenly smiled, his old eyes sparkling. “We will take in this broken child you have found. A bit of chaos in the order brings change. Perhaps for the better.”

Toa shrugged. He'd never fully understood Hurlo or the Vinchen order. “If you say so, Grandteacher.”

“What is the child's name?” asked Hurlo.

“She won't say for some reason. I half think she doesn't remember.”

“What shall we call her, then, this child born of nightmare? As her unlikely guardians, I suppose it is now up to us to name her.”

Captain Sin Toa thought about it a moment, tugging at his beard. “Maybe after the village she survived. Keep something of it in memory, at least. Call her Bleak Hope.”

2

S
adie was drunk that night. Far too drunk to make it back to her bed. But she couldn't stay where she was either.

“Closing down the bar, Sadie,” said Bracers Madge.

Sadie looked up at Madge, struggling to keep the double vision at bay. Bracers Madge was the bouncer and order-keeper of the Drowned Rat Tavern. She was over six feet tall and got the nickname Bracers because she was so large, she had to wear suspenders to keep her skirts up. Madge was one of the most feared and respected persons in the slums of New Laven. It was known throughout Paradise Circle, Silverback, and Hammer Point that she kept order in her tavern. Anyone foolish or reckless enough to cause trouble would have their ear torn off and would be barred from the tavern and marked with shame for the rest of their life. Madge kept her collection of ears in little pickling jars behind the bar.

“Sadie,” said Madge. “Time to go.”

Sadie nodded and lurched to her feet.

“You got a place to stay?” asked Madge.

Sadie waved her hand as she dragged her feet across the sawdust floor. “I can take care of myself.”

Madge shrugged and started putting chairs up on tables.

Sadie stumbled out of the Drowned Rat. She scanned the block for anyone she knew who might put her up for the night, squinting in the dim light of the flickering street lamps. But the street was practically empty, which meant the police had either just come through or were just about to.

“Piss'ell,” she cursed, scratching at her dirty, matted hair.

She shuffled down the street a ways until she caught sight of the plain wooden sign for an inn called the Sailor's Mother. It was a notorious crimp house. But she was Sadie the Goat, known in Paradise Circle, Silverback, and Hammer Point as one of the most accomplished thieves, mercenaries, and artists of mayhem currently breathing. She had a rep. Nobody was stupid enough to southend her.

She wove her way unsteadily into the inn, where she ordered a room for the night. The innkeeper, a thin, pouchy gaf named Backus, eyed her speculatively.

“And no funny business,” she said, poking her finger on his forehead hard enough to leave a mark.

“Naturally not.” Backus smiled a thin, pouchy smile. “I'll take care of you myself. Wouldn't want no…misunderstandings, right?”

“Sunny,” said Sadie. “Lead on, then, innkeeper.”

Backus took her up broken wooden stairs and down a dingy hallway that echoed with laughter, sobs, and some bastard playing his fiddle at this ungodly hour. Backus unlocked the last door on the left, and Sadie shoved past him toward the filthy mattress that lay on the ground.

“Want I should get you a nightcap?” asked Backus.

“That'd be real sunny, Backus,” said Sadie. “Maybe I had you figured wrong.”

“I'm willing to bet you did,” said Backus, giving the smile again.

Sadie dropped to the mattress, not bothering to take off skirts, boots, or knives. She watched the cracked ceiling spin unpleasantly for a few minutes until Backus returned with a cold mug of something nice.

Had she not been so drunk, she would have smelled the traces of black rose before she'd even had a sip. But as it was, she downed the whole thing in one go, and a few minutes later everything went dark.

When Sadie woke up, she wasn't on a mattress in a flophouse anymore. She was lying facedown on a wooden deck. It took her a second to realize that the deck was rocking back and forth. A small shaft of sunlight came in through a round portal that brightened things up just enough for her to see that she was in a ship's cargo hold.

“Piss'ell.” She struggled to stand, but her hands and feet were tied with grimy rope, so the best she could manage was to sit up. She tried to untie her wrists, but it was hard to get a grip at that angle and it was some sailor knot so bewilderingly complex, she didn't even know where to start.

She leaned back against something that gave a light grunt. She turned and saw a young boy next to her, also tied up. He was ragged and filthy, probably some street urchin that had been picked up same as her.

“Eh, boy.” She poked him hard in the ribs with her boney elbow. “Wake up.”

“Get off, Filler,” the boy muttered. “I ain't got nothing for you.”

“Stupid,” she said and jabbed him again. “We've been pissing southended!”

“What?” The boy's eyes opened. They were bright red, like rubies. It was the sign of a kid who'd been born to a mother addicted to coral spice. Nasty drug, very hooky and slowly ate the brain right out of your head. Most kids who were born coral-hooked didn't last past the first month. Sadie figured there must be some hidden mettle in this kid for him to have survived. Hidden, because she sure as piss couldn't see it now. The boy was blubbering and whining like a whipped puppy, tears falling from red eyes beneath a ragged curtain of brown hair as he cried, “W-w-w-where am I? W-w-w-what happened?”

“I just told you, didn't I?” said Sadie. “We've been southended.”

“W-w-w-what's that mean?”

“Are you a complete cunt-dropping?” said Sadie. “Never heard of southending? How'd you live on the streets and not know such a thing?”

The boy's lip quivered like he was starting a fresh bout of the weeps. But he surprised her by drawing in a shaky breath and saying, “I only just landed on the street about a month ago. I don't know much. So please, lady. Please tell me what's going on.”

She looked at him and he looked back at her and maybe it was the first sign of soft old age setting in, but rather than laugh or spit, she just sighed. “What's your name, kid?”

“Rixidenteron.”

“Piss'ell, that's a mouthful.”

“My mom was a painter. She named me after the great lyrical romantic painter Rixidenteron the Third.”

“She dead then, your mom?”

“Yeah.”

They were quiet for a minute, with only the occasional sniffle from the boy, the wooden creak of the ship, and the gentle hiss as the prow broke the water. They must be sailing at a pretty good clip.

Finally, she said, “So this is the length of it. We've been taken aboard a ship bound for the Southern Isles. Press-ganged into service. They'll let us sit down here awhile and stew, then they'll come down, maybe bloody us up a bit to let us know they mean business. Then they'll give us the choice: Join the crew or be declared a stowaway and thrown overboard.”

The boy's eyes had grown wider and wider until they looked like big red-and-white dinner plates.

“But…” His lip quivered again. “But I can't swim.”

“That's the general idea. And even if you could swim, we'd be so far from shore, there'd be no way you could make it that far, even if you managed to escape the sharks and seals.”

“I-I-I don't want to go to the Southern Isles,” he whimpered. “They say it's full of monsters and there's no food and no light and nobody ever comes back, that you
can't
come back, that once—you go—you're trapped there—
forever
!” His voice was coming out in spasms now as the sobs overwhelmed him.

Sadie had heard just about enough of it. She thought about giving him a nice kick to the head. That would shut him up. And she doubted he'd be much help when she made her escape anyway. He wasn't even a proper neighborhood wag. He was some artist's kid, probably suckled at the teat till he was five. How he'd even managed to survive a month on the streets was beyond her.

But he
had
survived. And didn't seem to be starving either. So there had to be something going for him. She wondered what it was.

The boy's sobs had quieted back to sniffles. As much to stop him making that annoying sound as anything else, she said, “So tell me, Rixi-whatever your name is. What was your mom like? What happened to her?”

He gave one last sniffle and wiped his teary red eyes with his shoulder. “You really want to know?”

“Course I do,” she said, nestling her back into a burlap sack of potatoes and making herself as comfortable as she could with her wrists and ankles tied up. It could be hours yet before anyone came down to the cargo hold and she'd be able to make her move. A dreary story of an artist's son was better than no entertainment at all.

“Okay.” His expression was earnest. “But you got to promise you won't tell anyone.”

“I swear on my father's purple prick,” said Sadie.

Rixidenteron's mother, Gulia Pastinas, came from one of the well-to-do families that lived in the north end of New Laven, far away from the grime and violence of Paradise Circle, Silverback, and Hammer Point. She was the second daughter, and pretty enough, but so headstrong and fiercely independent that her father despaired of ever getting her married off. It was frowned upon in the wealthy families to let the women work, which meant he would have to support her.

He was thrilled when she told him that she was joining an artist group down in Silverback. It was fashionable at the time for the children of wealthy families to dabble in bohemian culture. That was all he thought it would be. A nice break from his troublesome baby girl.

But it turned out that she was an immensely talented artist, and that she would not be coming back within a year with her tail between her legs. That, in fact, she would not be coming back at all. First, because she was far too busy being the toast of the downtown New Laven arts community. Later, because she was far too sick to return to him. Not that she would have returned even if she could.

Rixidenteron's father was a whore, descended from a long line of whores, male and female. It never occurred to him that there was a problem with his profession until he was at a party and met a beautiful, dark-eyed artist who, after talking to him for ten minutes, declared she would rescue him from his life of misery. She was flush from the sale of a new batch of paintings, and bold from a recently acquired coral spice addiction. She took him home that night and insisted that he give up his life in the sex trade. He smiled his soft, warm smile and nodded agreeably, so smitten with her poised charm and fiery passion that he would have done just about anything she'd asked.

So she would paint and he would cook and clean, and for a while, they were happy. Then Rixidenteron was born and everything changed, as it always does when people become parents. Their son was born with the telltale red eyes of a coral addict's child, and friends told them he wouldn't last more than a week. But perhaps he did have some hidden strength. Or perhaps it was because his parents spent every waking moment caring for him, doing everything they could think of to keep him alive. They went without food so that they could afford the medicine her sister brought down from the uptown apothecary. It got so bad that Rixidenteron's father offered to go back to work. But she refused and instead painted so much and so fiercely that her hands were perpetually stained with color. Years later, art critics would call this her finest period.

And Rixidenteron did survive against all odds. When they celebrated his first birthday, they figured the worst was behind them.

Except his mother's paints contained a jellyfish toxin, harmless in small doses, but it had been seeping into her skin for years now and was beginning to attack her nerves. Between that and the coral addiction, it was increasingly difficult for her to paint. By the time Rixidenteron was two, she could no longer hold a brush steady. Again his father offered to go back to work. Again she refused. Instead, she taught Rixidenteron to paint for her. She had him wear a pair of leather gloves so he wouldn't suffer the same fate. Then she put him to work. By the time he was four, he could create any image described to him with breathtaking precision. Rixidenteron flicked away at the canvas for hours a day while his mother lay on the battered blue couch in their apartment, trembling hands covering her eyes as she whispered the images in her head. And he would make them real.

He cherished this time they spent together and was proud that he could help his mother, the great painter, with her art. But as time went on, it got harder. Rather than steering her away from the coral spice, Rixidenteron's illness and her subsequent infirmity pushed her deeper into addiction. By the time he was six, her descriptions were nonsensical, and he was making up most of the images himself. But while he had her dexterity, he did not yet have her vision. And the paintings made that evident. People said she was through.

This time, his father did not ask. He just went back to work. He was older, and life had taken its toll on him. But he was still reasonably handsome and able to make enough money to anonymously buy his love's paintings. So she continued to think she was supporting her family. Rixidenteron knew the truth, but by the time he'd worked up the courage to tell her, she was too far gone to understand what he was saying. Or so it seemed. He always wondered. Because the night that he told her, she overdosed on coral spice and died.