The Madness Project (The Madness Method) (52 page)

Coins smirked.  “Well, not my problem if you’ve got a burnt
out cinder-bin for a skull, right?”

Scorch’s face paled.  But before he could retort, I grabbed
Coins by the arm and dragged him back.

“C’mon, Coins.  There’s more interesting folks to talk to
here,” I said.

Coins gave Scorch a mock salute and swung away, taking me by
the arm and strolling along like we were proper nobility.

“You suppose your fancy-pants Prince is going to make an
appearance?” he asked, shooting me a wicked grin.  “That who you had in mind?”

“Shush!” I said.  “He’s still traveling, right?  Haven’t
heard a pip about him being back.  Anyway, I dan’ much care to see
him
. 
Too high and tidy for his own good.”

“I think it’s high and mighty.”

“Nah, not him.  Just tidy,” I said, but I laughed, because I
had gotten it wrong and he knew it.  A minute and I sobered up a bit, giving
Coins’s arm a little squeeze.  “Coins, those mages scare the soot out of me.”

“Rivano’s pets?”  He shrugged.  “A bit high and flighty, I
guess.”

I shoved him.  “That’s me, you dundering idiot.”

“Whoops,” he said.  “Sorry.”

“I dan’ want to join the Clan if it means I have to deal
with them,” I said, turning my head aside.  “They’ll just mock me like he did.”

“So?  Go crow on ‘em and peck their eyes out.  They won’t
know what hit ‘em.”

I laughed and tipped my head back to the sky.  The night
couldn’t have been finer.  Some patchy stars glimmered behind the wisps of
cloud, and even the wind had died to a whisper.  I drew a deep breath, letting
the cold air sting my lungs with a smell of fire and sweets and roasting meat. 
In the center of the plaza folks were swirling in a country dance, wild and
raucous and full of stomping and clapping.  I watched the dancers a while,
feeling a bit wistful.  All on a sudden I caught myself wondering if Shade ever
danced.  I tried to picture it, but I just got an image of him scowling at me
like a devil, and I almost laughed aloud.

“You want to dance, Hayli?” Coins asked, shaking my arm.

I jumped and stared at him.  “What, why?”

“‘Cause you’ve been goggling at those folks for five minutes
now.  Reckon you’d want a chance at it?”

I blushed to the roots of my hair.  “Nah,” I said.  “Really,
I’m good.  Just…just admiring those fine dresses, that’s all.”

“Mmhmm,” he said.  “S’pose if Shade asked you, you might
reconsider?”

“What, is he here?” I asked, my head snapping up.

He just laughed.  “Sorry, Hayli, he’s not.”

“Oh.” 

I scanned the crowds anyway, wistful, but Coins was right. 
Shade wasn’t anywhere to be seen.  But my gaze snagged on a familiar figure,
and I froze.  Kantian.  Kantian, at a Kalethelia festival?  Mostly I thought
the adults believed the festivities were for the skitters and the fancy folks
who couldn’t garner an invitation to the palace.  I scowled a bit and watched
him.  He was talking to someone, but I couldn’t quite see who.  Just a shine of
spectacles, maybe, but loads of people wore spectacles.  That didn’t tell me
aught.  Still, it didn’t seem like either of them were here for the party. 
They had a kind of angry air about them.

I rubbed my hands over my arms, cold suddenly. 

“Look, Coins, I think I’m ganna head back.”

“Everything jake?  I didn’t scare you off, did I?  Didn’t
mean nothing by it, Hayli, honest…”

“I know,” I said.  “Just…not in the celebrating mood right
now, I guess.”

He nodded.  “Sure.  Want me to walk back with you?”

“Nah,” I said.  “Gan and have fun.  Think that girl over
there’s been goggling you…maybe you should say hullo.”

His head jerked up, and I laughed at how red his cheeks
turned.  Before he could say another word, I slipped away and into the crowd. 
Maybe, just maybe, I’d find Shade back at the Hole.  My stomach squirmed a
bit.  Maybe he was there…hoping I’d come back early.  Maybe we’d kick the ball
around the enclosure and talk and forget how strange things had got between
us. 

I hoped.

But he wasn’t there.  No one was there.  All the kids had
gone, and Kantian…oh stars, why was it that that spectacled man made me think
of Dr. Kippler?  But that wasn’t possible.  Kantian wouldn’t have aught to do
with those palace boffins.  He hated the whole lot of them.

But Kantian was a slippery devil, and I knew how he liked to
have a hand on the all the levers.  I decided I’d keep an eye on him.  Just in
case.

Since I was all alone at the Hole, I steeled myself to the
cold and went to the trough to get a good wash.  Usually it was so hard to
steal a moment when none of the other skitters were around, and I didn’t see
the point of getting up as early as Gemmie and Kite did.  All the other girls
were too young, and hardly ever remembered they needed a washing to start with.

I unbuttoned my shirt and tossed it beside the trough,
shivering as the wind cut through the threadbare cloth of my undershirt.  It
was a sleeveless thing that one of the younger lads had abandoned, but even so,
it barely fit me.  Or, it barely fit me decently.  When I’d first got to the
Hole, I wouldn’t have cared so much, but the last few years I’d changed and
gotten self-conscious like I’d sworn I never would.  The shirt fit just snug
enough over my stomach, but my shoulders were too thin and narrow to hold the
neck up proper.  Even though Gem had taught me how to wrap a bandeau around my
chest—the one kind thing she’d ever done for me—I still felt horribly exposed. 
At least I was alone, and could enjoy my wash in peace without worrying about
the lads cracking on me.

I turned on the spigot and shoved my whole head under the
gush of water, gasping with the icy shock.  Dancing to warm up and not much
caring how I looked, I splashed water quick as I could over my neck and arms,
scrubbing my hands over my skin as much to keep the blood moving as to scour
away the dirt and filth.

“Great muttering hog monkeys,” I chattered under my breath,
thinking of every not-quite cuss word I could use to keep my teeth from
clacking. 

“Cold, Hayli?”

“Oy!” I squeaked, my arms flying up to cover my chest, while
icy rivers streamed down my back.  I spun around and found Anuk staring at me
like I’d gone bird.  “Anuk!  I’m trying to have a wash!  Gan away!”

“Hayli,” he said, drawing his brows into a frown.  “Turn
around.”

I scowled.  “I’m not letting you dunk me.”

“Just…turn around.”

I stared at him a good long minute, then turned slowly to
face the trough.  I felt his fingers in my dripping hair and shivered, confused
as could be.  But he just touched the nape of my neck, like he was touching
something in particular.

“Where did you get this?”

“Get what?  What’re you on about, Anuk?”

“This mark.  Where’d it come from?”

I scowled and swiped my shirt from the ground, slipping it
on over my wet arms and back.  My fingers were too numb for buttons, so I left
it to hang open.  “I dan’ na what you’re talking about.  I dan’ have a mark.”

He dropped his hands on my shoulders.  “Yeah.  You do.”

I twisted my head, but of course I couldn’t see whatever
he’d seen.  “What’s it look like?”

“I’ll show you,” he said, and led me down into the Hole. 

I followed him to one of the old factory storerooms, where
they’d left some of their steel products after the fire.  Some of the girls
liked to go in there because the steel plates made a decent sort of mirror, if
you brought in enough torch-wielding friends for reinforcements.  I just had
Anuk and his torch, but when he turned my back to face the steel and held the
light just right, I saw what he’d seen.

All the blood drained from my face.

I shrugged my over-shirt clear of my shoulders to get a
better goggle, but there was no mistaking it.  At the nape of my neck, my back
was etched with clockwork—three brass and copper gears locked together.  In the
torch’s feeble light, I even got the strange notion the gears were shifting.

“Oh God,” I whispered, ice like terror shooting through my
veins.  “Anuk, get it off!  Get it off!  What is it?”

He turned me back around, so I could see my fear-white and
wide-eyed face staring at me from the steel, and his somber look as he touched
the mark again.

“It’s…I think it’s permanent,” he said.

I was shaking all over, and after a minute of frowning down
at me, Anuk put his arms around me and pulled me against his broad chest. 

“It’s all right,” he said, his voice rumbling against his
ribs.  “You’re jake, Hayli.  Don’t worry.”

“I’ve got a mark,” I whispered.  “I’ve got a mark and I dan’
na how I got it.  And a mark like
that!
  All…gears and machines and
metal…”  I shivered and buried my head against his chest.  “I wanted a real
mark, someday.  Bird wings on my shoulders, maybe.  I wanted to choose it,
though!”

And it seemed like such a dafty thing to latch onto, but it
was less terrifying than wondering how I’d got gears on my backbone.

“Dan’ tell anyone,” I whispered suddenly.  “Please, Anuk. 
What’d Rivano say if he saw me all marked up with
clockwork?
”

“I won’t,” he said.  “Not anyone.”

I peeked over my shoulder and my breath snagged.  Oh stars,
I wouldn’t cry.  I’d sworn I’d never cry.  Crying was weak.  I wouldn’t be
weak…

Anuk’s arms tightened around me, strong, secure.  But all I
really wanted was for Shade to hold me…but Shade would never even touch me,
like he already knew I was a tainted thing.  Oh stars, maybe that was it. 
Maybe he knew.  I was marked with gears and metal, and who would ever want me
now?

They did this to me. 

I knew it all on a sudden, with a terrible certainty and an
anger that burned away my fear and all my anguish.  It was the only
explanation, the only thing that made sense.  Those horrid scientists…they had
marked me. 

But why?

*  *  *  *

Shade didn’t come back in the morning, and by the time
dinner came and he was still missing, the skitters were all in a wild fit of
worry, even the ones who didn’t have much notion about what the others had
planned.  I could tell his group of lads were getting a bit fitsy too,
especially Jig, who kept insisting they go out hunting for him.  We all set
about the tables in the mess, poking at our food, not talking much, and
everyone jumped any time anybody walked in.  I’d given up on staring at the
door, and stared at my plate of beets instead.  Pika sat on her hands beside
me, swinging her legs under the bench and scowling at the world in general.

“What’s bothering, Hayli?” she whispered.  “You’re so sad. 
All day, you been so sad.”

“I’m not sad,” I said, lifting my chin to prove it.  “Dan’
be silly.”

“But it’s etched on you,” she said, her eyes huge in the dim
light.  I jumped and stared at her.  “The sadness, etched all over you.”

I let out a breath.  “I’m worried just about Shade.”

“He’s sad too.  He dan’ understand.”  Her eyes widened. 
“Just wants to forget.”

I frowned as I studied her.  She knew so much, that wee
thing, things she shouldn’t be able to know.  If only she could talk about them
in a way that was sensible-like.

“Hayli,” she said suddenly.  “He’s here.”

Everyone fell dead silent at that, and we all just stared at
Shade standing in the doorway.  If I were him, I’d likely have turned and flown
away fast as I could, but Shade just scanned the room until he spotted his
lads.  He held out a hand, beckoning them.

“Time to go,” he said.

His gaze drifted over the mess.  I held my breath as it
shifted my way.  He wasn’t going to look at me.  I knew he wouldn’t. 

Then his dark eyes met mine, and he didn’t look anywhere
else.  He didn’t smile, and he didn’t say a word.  But his gaze held mine, for
just one breathless moment, then he turned and strode away.

I let out all my breath in one shattered sigh, feeling
strangely queasy.  That look…it had felt like an apology.  It had almost felt
like a goodbye.

Chapter 8 — Tarik

Branigan had agreed to meet us, but only at night, and only
on the street.  Neither fact made me very happy, but I couldn’t let on to the
other lads that I was uneasy.  They were antsy enough, because some of the kids
at the Hole had run into Branigan’s crew before, and apparently before I’d
returned they’d busied themselves filling everyone’s ears with horror stories
of what Branigan had done.

So now Jig and Coins couldn’t stop jumping at noises, and
Anuk hadn’t let go of his knife since we’d left the Hole.  We reached the
street we’d agreed on, a wide and dreary scrap of the city between an old
clothing factory and a rundown flour mill.  Branigan and his crew were already
there, waiting for us, smoking stale cigars under a tattered red awning that
dripped rain like grease in the gaslight.  Unlike Joren, Branigan had a couple
of toughs that actually looked the part.  They wore leather armor under their
jackets, the bracers on their arms glinting with brass clasps and buckles in
the light of the street lamp.