Never Knew Another (21 page)

Jona looked around, wondering if he could find something incriminating to justify this whole idiotic night. If he was really lucky, the owner would come in with some thugs and he could fight them and then everything would be sensible and right with the world, beating down the rough men and bouncers that brothels always drag in off the street.

Jona smiled at that thought, and snatched a heavy glass perfume bottle off a cabinet. He pulled the pillow out of its case, and turned the perfume bottle and the pillowcase into a makeshift blackjack. He slipped beside the doorway to surprise anyone who came in from looking for a fight.

He heard footsteps in the hall.

When the door opened, he raised his improvised blackjack, ready to shatter a heady stink all over whoever came through the door. He expected trouble.

A maid pushed a mop bucket into the room, dressed like a Senta.

Jona frowned. “That’s it, then.” He lowered his weapon.

The Senta startled and jumped away from him, tripping over herself and the mop bucket and the mop, falling over. She landed hard on her elbows.

Jona winced. “I was expecting someone else.” He bent over her to help her up. “Sorry.”

The Senta snarled at him. She snapped her fingers and fire singed Jona’s face. It caught easily on his clothes and the sweat stain in the fabric started to singe and burn. Jona startled. He beat at his collar and rushed over to the water basin in the room. He threw filthy water on it.

“Bloody Senta,” he said, dabbing at his uniform, “Look, it was an accident! You shouldn’t burn a king’s man. It’s the same as burning the king himself!”

She stood up and adjusted her thick clothes. “The king should be burned for letting you thugs run around!”

Jona balled up his fist, but hesitated. “People don’t say that to our faces,” he said, instead of hitting. If he struck her, she’d probably set his clothes on fire, and the sweat stains would burn through the cloth before he could douse it all.

“People should!” said the Senta. Jona walked over, still thinking about striking her, and if he could hit her hard enough in one shot to knock her out while she was busy standing up.

She punched first. She got Jona hard, right on his nose. “Don’t come near me!”

Blood. Blood all over her hand.

Jona held his breath. He clutched at his nose, and pinched it. “You shouldn’t have done that.” He leaned back and felt the blood seeping into his sinus cavity and into the back of his throat. He coughed.

The blood caught the edge of her long sleeves. It started to singe the cloth.

Jona smiled even through all the pain and fear, and had to try not to laugh. She’d see that. She’d see that, and he’d be done with everything. As soon as she saw that, his life was over. Even killing her wouldn’t save him. Calipari would hang him for that. She wasn’t some brain dead pinker, or a thug on the street. She was decent people, working hard at something.

She looked down at her sleeve, how it cooked. She beat at it.

“Don’t.” Jona’s life flashed before his eyes. He had been lucky last time, with Calipari, that the sergeant had washed his hands before he saw how the blood had gotten on his sleeve, and anyway it all could be blamed on Aggie’s broken nose.

“What is this?”

“Nothing,” Jona said. “Wash your hand. Come on. Get that blood off it.”

“Is this…?”

“Listen, I’m sorry I scared you. I was just bored. I thought Elitrean’d send someone tough, and I’d bust a perfume bottle on ’em for a laugh. I meant nothing by it. I swear I didn’t mean to scare you, or do any real harm to anybody. Please…”

Jona should have felt more fear than this. Always, hanging over his head, running through the streets and the night, the threat of it: a bleeding wound. Now he was begging for his life.

“I don’t care what you’re doing here,” said the Senta. “You should get something for your nose.”

“It got broke a bit ago,” he said. “It’s not important. Please…” He pinched his nose shut, trying to stop the bleeding.

She frowned. She pulled some wet rags from her pocket and wiped at the blood on her hands and sleeves. Her hand was shaking. She offered the rags to Jona. “Soapy washcloth?” she said, “Slightly used, but still covered in soap. Might keep it from burning your shirt off.”

Jona shrugged. “Why not?” He took the washcloth from her fingers.

“You…” said the woman.

“What?” he said. His eyebrows creased.

“Your blood is eating my sleeve. It’s like an acid.”

“I’m not,” he said, forcefully. “Don’t be crazy. Elishta’s been sealed a thousand years.”

“Right, I know. You know I’m Senta. I could find these things out.”

“So go find these things out, and find out I’m not.”

“Some demons’ children are exceptionally long-lived.”

“If you’re such a Senta, why you cleaning up after whores?”

“I do what I must. Would you prefer I joined the city guard?”

“Of course not,” Jona sighed. “It’s just weird. Aren’t you supposed to be on a corner with dice or cards or something?” He thought his voice sounded crazy with all that blood in his throat. It was hard to try and talk out of this problem when there was so much blood.

“Not every Senta finds the koans of dreamcasting in her heart.” She snapped her fingers again, and a splash of fire sparked in mid-air.

“What’s your name?”

“What’s it to you what my name is, king’s man?”

“Nothing, I guess,” he said. “You like it here? You know, cleaning up brothels.”

She nodded. “I like it fine.”

“Well, if you need anything, you look me up, and we don’t tell anybody about the blood, okay? It’s not what you think it is, and a rumor can kill me over nothing when it’s about my blood. My name’s Sergeant Calipari,” he said. “Sergeant Nicola Calipari.”

“Nicola,” she repeated, her expression grave. “I will.”

“I have to go take care of this.”

“Okay.”

***

Jona left Rachel there, in the messy room alone. He rushed back to his own home to clean the blood off his uniform and out of his fingers, and make sure his nose wasn’t going to open up again. If Jona’s blood touched grass, the grass would die too fast to be inconspicuous.

He ran through the dark. He pushed through all the shadows in the street to run home to the light of his mother’s kitchen. He ran, feeling his way around through darkness, pushing up to the basin where the old pipes still carried water from the river. He pumped water into the sink. He held one hand under the surface, then another. He washed at himself with old rags he’d have to burn.

He heard his mother’s soft feet coming down the creaky stairs. He heard her bare feet padding across the room. He felt her hand on his arm.

“Jona,” she said, “Are you all right?”

Jona nodded. “I’m fine, Ma.”

He was lying. His stomach burned.

She rubbed his arm. She wrapped an arm around him.

“I said I’m fine,” he said. “You need to stay back.”

She held him. He didn’t push her away. “You have to work in the morning,” he said.

“Are you going to be all right?”

“I don’t know,” he said. “I don’t know.”

“Do you want to talk about it?”

“My nose opened up again. I got scared, that’s all,” said Jona. “I just got really scared that someone might find out about me.”

“Did someone find out?”

“No,” Jona said, “I just got scared.”

“Don’t be,” she said. “How’s your nose now, Jona?” She reached for his face.

He flinched away from her. “It’s better. Don’t touch it, ma.”

“I never wanted you to be a king’s man. It’s dangerous. More so for you than anyone. Clean up your mess before you go to bed,” she said. “I’d do it for you if I could. Good night, Jona.”

“Ma, what do I do if someone finds out about me?”

She walked back to the stairs, quietly.

“What do I do if someone finds out?”

Her steps up were so slow, like each one was a sunset coming down all heavy in a valley. Her steps were so slow. Jona listened to them, and to how quiet it was between her steps.

Silence was a word, right then.

***

We hide all the time. I hide all the time.

Rachel sniffed the blood again. She definitely smelled the touch of Elishta on it. It smelled just like hers. Djoss taught Rachel her whole life to keep her blood hidden and burned. Her mother taught her that, before her brother did. When the women’s dilemma arrived, she had to use rags and burn them to ash in private. If she cut a finger she had to cover it with candle wax and cloth to keep it completely sealed. People got sick around her blood.

Rachel rushed the blood-spattered sponge and rags into an abandoned strip of grass behind the brothel. She found a few blades of green grass. She sprinkled the blood on the grass. The blades withered like they were in a drought. She held her breath and tried the little experiment again with a larger plant. That plant died, too. Already, the acid had eaten through the rags, pooled in her palms in ruined ash, blown away in the wind like sand.

She had never met another like herself before in her whole life.

CHAPTER XIV

W
e moved here. It’s better in this place. Cleaner.
“You work on the other side of the Pens, right?” Djoss was standing at the door, his arms folded. “You’re by that one river—the bigger one.”

Rachel sat up in her cot and stretched. “If I see you in the brothel where I’m changing those disgusting sheets all night long, I’ll burn your bare behind,” she said. “Don’t worry about where I work.”

“I’m not—look, I found a room over by there. This butcher has a whole building in the place next to his shop. He owns the block. You’ll be closer.”

“What about yours?”

“A few extra blocks won’t kill me.”

“Won’t kill me either.”

“It’s nicer than this.”

“Who needs nice? We need to stay hidden, Djoss. We need to stay out of trouble, pinch every coin, be ready to run.”

Djoss sighed. He told the truth of it. “Turco needs this room,” he said. “We need a nice hidden place. You and me can go be inconspicuous somewhere else.”

Rachel fell back into her cot. “Baker know about that?”

“Baker won’t mind, the money we’ll bring in.”

“Those crates wearing down?”

“Something like that,” said Djoss. “Tired of working for other people. We’re going to do our own thing.”

“You ever smoke any of that stuff?”

“A little bit,” he said. “Need to when you pick it up. Make sure it’s good. If it ain’t, I bust heads. I’ve had to bust heads a couple times already. Folks skim off the top, sell on the side. Lots of bad stuff out there.”

“Djoss…”

“Better than bouncing. Safer then that. No drunks. Turco did you a favor, too, didn’t he? Got you a job.”

“Yeah, he did.”

“So let’s move,” said Djoss. “Nice place. A window we can open when it’s hot. No oven over our heads. Not so sweaty, so we don’t need so many hammocks and cots. Come on, let’s go. It’ll be better.”

“I’m wearing everything I own,” she said. “I’m ready to go. I’m always ready to go, Djoss. Don’t get too deep into anything. Don’t make good friends. We can’t stay here forever. We can’t stay anywhere.” Rachel stood up and adjusted her clothes. She was laced up tight. “They’re waiting outside, aren’t they?”

Djoss opened the door. Turco came in first. His red clothes were worn through in the seams. His skin was ashen. He bowed to Rachel, like a gentleman.

“Found you a new place,” he said.

“Thanks, I guess.”

“Could be more grateful than that,” said Turco. “I try to do right, and nobody ever’s grateful. Not polite.”

Dog came in behind him. He walked into a corner. He touched the warm brick where the baker’s ovens poured heat down into the ground, leaning into it and closing his eyes. He turned around to look at Rachel, leaning back into the warm stones.

Turco placed a hand on Djoss’ shoulder. “This’ll do fine. Gonna start our own thing here. No more other people’s weed. Make the real money.”

Rachel wanted to do more, to say more. There was nothing she could do. As horrible as Turco seemed to be, he had found her a job. In that old alley, he made room for people that didn’t have anywhere else to go. He had found her brother a job, too. As much as she hated it, he was her brother’s friend. He was finding her a new place instead of just throwing her out. It was hard to think of it that way, but it was true. This man, and his mute friend, were actually being as nice as they could manage.

“Turco, I’m grateful. I’m also kind of terrified that you’re going to get my brother killed. Are you going to get my brother killed?”

Turco smiled. His teeth were as red as his clothes, and more ragged. “You worry too much,” he said. “Plenty good stuff for everybody.”

She took a deep breath. She went to Dog, and pulled him off the bricks before he burned himself. He was deep in the weed. His eyes couldn’t focus. She sat him down in a different corner where he could still feel the heat, but wouldn’t burn.

“He’s a bit… Well, Djoss’ll be watching the door. Dog’s getting a little too pink for that.”

Turco could have abandoned Dog, too, but he didn’t. Dog was hanging on, always hanging on. She was, too, in her way.

“Who’s going to be carrying the meat?” Rachel asked.

“Ragpickers, mostly,” said Turco. “Little mudskippers be dividing it up, sneaking it in. Plenty coming in off the ships. Plenty for everybody, I think. Djoss’ll be working here, watching for trouble, carrying meat if it’s too heavy for the ragpickers.”

Rachel nodded. This man was her brother’s friend, and he was trying to help them. “You said this new place has a window?”

“Won’t be so hot there, either, with the window,” said Turco. “This is better for us. Demon weed cools you down a lot. Thins the blood.” He looked over at Dog and laughed. “He’s going to be mean when he comes down. Anything you need help moving?”

Rachel touched Dog’s naked skull. She looked into his glassy eyes. She wanted to shout and run away from Dogsland that night. She wondered what it was like for the man she had met, in the brothel, whose nose she had punched and who had a life here, too. She’d never know anything about the man with burning blood if she ran. She smiled. “I’m ready to go,” she said, sadly. “We can leave the furniture if you need it.”