Finch by Jeff VanderMeer (31 page)

"Stop," Finch said.

"A year later, the war broke out again and the park was gone. The
people couldn't come out onto the streets. It was too dangerous. My
mother had gotten better, but my father had lost his arm to a fungal
bullet. He couldn't work for a long time he was so depressed. He'd been
a journalist. I knew about my native heritage, but it wasn't until then
that I learned more, because my father returned to his roots. It was a
way of making himself whole again, I think."

"Stop," he said again. Each detail making her more distant.

"What about you, John?" she asked. "What do you want to tell me?
Is there anything you want to tell me?" Tone between bitterness and
sympathy. Maybe even affection.

"No."

"Does it make it better or worse if I tell you these things?"

Daring him to look at her. But he wouldn't.

"Worse," he admitted. Defeated.

"Because you can't tell me anything back," she said. "Because you
don't trust me. Shouldn't trust anyone."

Because then you're not who I need you to be.

Hugged him then. Whispered in his ear, "Do you understand now?
We're alone, John, even when we're together." Kissed his cheek.

Didn't want it, but took it.

"Let's just find the party." Needed a drink. Bad.

Down a stairwell. Through a hallway picked clean of detail. The
deeper they went, the more light. From gas lamps. From naked bulbs.
From flurries of candles unwinding along their path.

People began to appear out of the half-light. Couples kissing.
Sidewalk barbers, driven inside. A man leaning against the wall,
offering cigars. More vendors. Wine. Drugs. Food. Candy. Pots and
pans. Watches. Fabric. The smell of something spicy.

Finch bought a bottle of wine with three packets of gray cap food.
The man popped the cork for them. Finch handed the bottle to Sintra.
She took a manly swig, laughed, pulled him close as if in apology.
Kissed him, her tongue in his mouth. Connected to every nerve in his
body. She pulled away to hand him the bottle, whispered, "Isn't that
better than words, John?" He drank long and deep. Sweet, full-bodied.
Exploding against his taste buds. Coursing into his body. Followed by a
bitter aftertaste. But he didn't care. He really didn't care.

Down more stairs. The sounds of the party now muted, now blaring.
As if they were getting closer, then further away. They came to a
doorway with a black sheet draped across it. A small man with a
slurred, gritty voice and dirty black hair took their payment: three
food pods and the pocketknife Sintra had brought. Let them through,
into light.

A raised platform, looking down at a huge room that must have
been used for storage once. Hundreds of people occupied that space
now, the sound of their voices muffled yet deafening. Gray archways
surrounded the room. No way to defend the space. From anything.
Oil lamps hung from each archway, made a buttery light that created
shadow even as it swept away the darkness. A strong smell of sweat.

A band played in the far left corner. Cello. A drum made from trash
can lids. An old accordion. People were exchanging pieces of paper
nearby. Probably stories, poetry, artwork. The gray caps didn't care, but the Partials did. Noticed a few silent, large men at the fringes.
Probably bouncers hired by the vendors.

Finch took another swig of wine. The last time he'd seen so many
people in such a small space he'd been fourteen and his father had taken
him to a reception thrown by the Frankwrithe viceroy three months
after an armistice with House Hoegbotton. Stiff and cramped in a suit.
His father had introduced him to each dignitary, and afterward, while
they were distracted, Finch had snuck into the viceroy's rooms and
taken the papers his father needed.

Recklessly, he crushed Sintra to him, put his arm around her neck,
let his hand touch her breast. She turned into him. Shouted in his ear,
"Should we go down there?"

He nodded, and they descended into the chaos. Relaxed into it.
Despite seeing the tawdry cheapness of it. Too good at playing a role
not to know when another role was being played out in front of his
eyes.

The frantic, almost hysterical dancing of the women. The faces
rising toward them mask-like in that half-light. The hesitant rhythm
of the band. As if the Partials would break in at any second. How
much alcohol everyone was drinking. Quickly, just in case.

More wine. Another kiss from Sintra. Thought he saw on her face
a look close to desperation. Or was it resignation?

They made their way to the far end. Next to the band. Joined the
dancers. A man and woman, both shirtless, careened into them.
Disappeared again in a whirl of arms. Another couple up close to each
other, slow as the music was fast. The pungent tang of some drug. A
smell like incense. The bodies around them became like one body.
Only to fall apart, like the limbs in the rebel safe house. Heads. Legs.
Arms. Wyte charging out to meet the Partials.

Finch needed more wine, then. For both of them. Smiles from
people around them. A shared secret. Life could be good. If you could
only get far enough out of yourself. Abandoning. Forgetting.

A song ended. As it had ended before, and before that, too. But
this time Sintra said, "Follow me." Led him by the hand into the
darkness of a doorway where a lamp had failed. The sudden touch of
cold stone. On the other side, a catacomb of rooms. The light from the party already receding. Snuffed out. Men and women had paired
off here. Moans, murmurs, a sudden heat.

They found a section of wall around a corner. Drank the last
of the wine. Let the bottle fall, and, broken, roll to the side. She
was unbuttoning her white blouse, a wild light in her eyes. He was
helping her, suddenly frantic in his need. His mouth was on her
breasts. Tongue on her delicate brown nipple. Coming back up to
her mouth with his. She gasped. Unbuttoned his pants. His cock
throbbing as she took it in her hand. He let out a long sigh. His
fingers curled through her hair.

He pushed her up against the wall. Pulled her pants down. Got his
arms under her, ignoring the pain in his shoulder. Slid into her tight
wetness. Groaned. Her hand against the back of his head. Her arm
around his back. Nails digging into him ecstatically. Thrust hard up
into her like an animal, muttering obscenities into her ear. While
she encouraged him. His tongue into her mouth. Finding her tongue.
Pulling back to look at her sweat-tinged face in the dark. A shadow. A
wraith. Those eyes. She leaned into him, both arms around him, and
sucked on his ear in a way that drove him mad. Everything receded
to just that point at which he was entering her. Then expanded until
he was everywhere at once. Suddenly she came, biting his shoulder
and he, snarling, telling her to bite harder. The feel of her teeth on
his skin made him cry out, come deep into her. Held there by her long
after he was spent. She was spent.

With reluctance, Finch let her slide back to her feet. Pulled up his
pants as she pulled up hers. Buttoned her blouse. Kissed again. Salty
and deep. Shocked him.

They walked until they stood in the archway, staring into the main
room. With its loudness. Its light. Its movement.

"Stay here," she whispered. "I'll get more wine and be back."

"Now?"

"Now. I need another drink." She threw her arms around him.
Clung to him like a child. Whispered in his ear, "Be careful, John."

When she pulled away she looked so vulnerable Finch almost told
her everything he thought he knew. She looked like she was receding
from him at a great speed. And he was suddenly frightened.

Then she was gone. Beyond his grasp. Out into the crowd. Lost.
And he was standing there. Alone.

He started after her. Didn't know why. She was just going to get
more wine. Not leaving for good. But a familiar face stopped him.

Bosun. Entering from the raised stage opposite. Five tough-looking
men in trench coats stood behind him. Bosun was scanning the crowd.
For him?

Looked again for Sintra but couldn't find her. Decided to step back
into the archway. Out of sight.

A hint of movement behind him. A hand over his mouth. A sharp
pain in his arm before he could react. Falling as the lamps shuffled
through his vision, became the scrap of paper pulled from Shriek's
hand, bursting into flame. Became the candles on a cake from his
eleventh birthday. Began to blow out the candles. And with each,
another clue snuffed out. Shriek going dark. Stark's transcript
extinguished. His father's face, hovering just beyond the candles.
Mysterious. Shadowed. Smiling.

omeone slapped his face.

"Wake up. Wake up."

Finch opened his eyes. Night. Lying on his back. In the grass. Staring
up at a field of green stars. He shivered. It looked nothing like the sky
over Ambergris.

A woman's face blocked out the stars. For a second, in the gloom,
he thought it was the woman from the rebel safe house. She had a
gun. Didn't recognize the make.

"You ..." he said, still woozy.

"Don't make me hurt you," she said, then stepped out of view.

Hands roughly pulled him up. They shoved his arms behind him.
Handcuffs slid into place. Cut into his wrists. Felt almost as bad as he
had after following Bliss through the door.

"Where am l?" Finch asked.

"Shut up," the woman said.

Wyte, saying to him once, "You know what they say about the rebels?
A rebel is just a Hoegbotton who made the mistake of marrying a
Frankwrithe."

They stood on the side of a grassy hill. Below them, a crushed tangle
of tanks and other military equipment. Glistening darkly. The wind
through the hundred metal husks made a distant, warped, singing
sound. Beyond, he could see the black silhouette, jagged and wrong,
of a ruined city. In the middle: a dome of dull orange light.

"Is that Ambergris?" Incredulous.

"Shut up," she said.

Two men appeared to either side of him. They wore dark pants
tucked into boots. Camouflage shirts. Ammo belts. Rifles slung over
their shoulders. Military helmets.

"Or are we inside the HFZ somehow?" Finch asked. His gun was
missing from its holster. His mouth was dry. His arms already ached.

"No one is in the HFZ, John Finch," the woman said.

"Why am I here?" Tried hard to bite down on a rising fear. I'm here
because I work for the gray caps ...

"Walk," said one of the men. Shoved him in the back.

"We're going to the top of the hill," the woman said, from in front of
Finch. "Don't move too fast, or we'll shoot you. Understand?"

"Yes," he said. "I understand." Understood, too, that Sintra had
betrayed him. Realized he'd been expecting that ache for a long
time.

Some of the stars in the sky were moving. Slowly moving back and
forth. The wind was very cold. The grass whispered around his boots.

They reached the top of the hill. In the shelter provided by the
ruined wall of an ancient fortress, a tent served as a windbreak for
two chairs. A table with a pitcher on it. Two glasses. A couple of dim
lamps, placed so they couldn't be seen from downhill.

A figure beside the chairs. In a long, dark robe. Graying hair lifted
slightly by the wind.

The Lady in Blue.

Unmistakable. Finch just stared at her. Disbelieving. Forgot his
captors shoving him from behind. Forgot the danger he was in. He
had never seen her before, and now he was seeing her by starlight.
On a hill under a strange night sky. Surrounded by some kind of
dead city.

In the Hoegbotton Irregulars, the promise of meeting her had
been held out like a guarantee of better times. As they lay in
the trenches. As they went from house to house, rooting out
insurgents. As they ate hard, stale bread and molding fruit. Made
soup from glue, water, and salt. That whole past life overtaking
Finch as they marched him up in front of her.

She was shorter than Finch. Maybe five-six. Late fifties or early
sixties. Thin and in good shape. Wrinkles at the corners of her eyes,
across her forehead. Accentuated by the lamplight: a near perpetual
wry smile, a sad amusement to the eyes. A look that seemed to say
she was here, in the moment, but also a dozen other places as well.