Chapter 72
The wind was not a tattle tale. It could keep secrets.
It had kept secrets for eons. There were secrets locked so deeply in the wind’s vault that they hadn’t been aired out for centuries.
If the wind unlocked the vault, opened the creaking door, and let light inside, the secrets would crumble to dust at the first spray of sun.
There were secrets so old their brittle bones would disintegrate at the first breath of air.
How dare the Merchant insinuate a great, wondrous being like the wind was a tattler? The wind had kept the Merchant’s secrets, hadn’t it?
If huffed northward, following the taxi the Merchant had flagged. The yellow van darted along the river, bobbing like a fishing lure in a swiftly running stream. Every now and then, the wind caught the driver’s muffled voice, entertaining the Merchant with a human joke.
“. . . only remember twenty-five letters in the alphabet. I don’t know why. Get it? Y? No? Huh. Did you hear the one . . .”
At the tunnel that dove beneath the river, the wind thought about veering east. It could fume in the exhaust, shout louder than the shaking delivery trucks, and shoot through the damp tunnel, emerging far away from the Merchant and closer to the boy.
But no. If it went to the boy, it would whisper about the Merchant, and the wind wasn’t a tattler. If anything was a tattler, it was fire. It crackled and popped and roared and mesmerized and told anyone who would listen every story that had ever been uttered around its bright flame.
Even worse than fire was water. It was a gurgling gossip who babbled constantly. There was a reason humans said water murmured, gurgled, whispered, and roared. Where did they think the phrase “the mouth of the river” came from? Of course water had a mouth. It spilled all its secrets.
The wind slowed, swirling in the condensation plopping from a window air-conditioning unit. It hovered in the drip then dove toward the sidewalk, laughing as the water drop exploded on the concrete. It bounced on the drop and caught the taxi’s opening door.
They were at the Merchant’s tower. As his chair was lifted from the van, he glanced at the heavy gray clouds pressing against the city spires.
“Hope it’ll rain,” the driver said, the van’s metal arms hissing as they lowered the chair. “It’ll break the heat.”
“Did you hear the joke about rain in hell?” the Merchant asked.
“Nope.”
“That’s because there is no rain in hell.”
The driver stared. The Merchant stared back. Then, finally, the driver laughed.
The wind huffed and wandered to a woman selling red carnations.
The flower heads stuck out of large white buckets, their tight petals already curling in the heat.
There was an entire row of buckets—a whole garden’s worth of carnations.
The wind had always loved their smell. It was delicate and quiet, a midnight scent, with dark spice and floral promise.
It rolled in the perfume, coating itself in the heady carnation feel, then it dipped down to splash about in the warm bucket of water.
The water gurgled. Then it gossiped. It babbled and burbled and told the wind a secret.
The wind laughed and shot from the bucket. Carnation petals flew in the air like red raindrops. The flower-seller shouted in surprise as the wind rushed through the Merchant’s front door.
“What’s the hurry?” the Merchant called, his fox leaping into his lap.
The wind didn’t stop to rub itself along the fox’s plush coat or twine itself around its firelight tail. No. It sped along the dark, hidden hallway, and then—
There!
It was the pixie-like woman who carried grief and sorrow in her executioner-tree voice.
The wall shifted. It spun. It slanted and grasped. The pixie-like woman tilted her head as if she were listening to the mournful gasps of 107 dying men. Then she slowly turned toward the shifting, spinning, slanting wall.
The wind shrieked and darted forward, grabbing the black cuff of her shirtsleeve.
The wall recoiled at the pixie-like woman’s smile. Then it lashed out, and the viscous heart of the wall gobbled them whole, sucking them into its Den of Depravity.
* * *
They landed with a jarring, bone-rattling force. The pixie-like woman somersaulted, her limbs flailing, her teeth snapping. The wind smacked into the earth, splattering dirt and coughing in the tumult. The woman knocked the wind to the side, and it catapulted over spraying gravel.
Finally, the woman skidded to a stop. The wind panted next to her.
It was dizzy and out of sorts. The pixie-like woman wasn’t much better.
Her shirt was ripped, and it flapped freely in the wind, baring her stomach.
Her face was streaked with dirt, and gravel had torn her skin.
She pressed a hand to her temple and winced.
“Oi! New one! Get o’er here!”
The wind shrieked at the croaking, querulous shout. It shook itself off, spraying more dirt, and then nudged the pixie-like woman. She lifted her gaze in the direction of the shouting creature.
It was a strange place. A strange den. The wind had never visited a Den of Depravity before, but it had heard the stories. It was supposed to be a place that enchanted and enticed until it swallowed you whole. It was a place that dazzled and lured, like a moth devoured by a flame.
This place was not beautiful. It didn’t dazzle.
The wind sniffed. The air was thick with the perfume of star jasmine, as if the wind had just sped down the anther of its flower and rolled in its sweet pollen scent. The odor was dizzying. It was a cotton-candy, spinning-teacup smell.
Black, ropelike clouds churned overhead, blocking everything but the thinnest stream of light.
The wind had once traveled through a fetid, decaying swamp, where thick vines had choked every bit of life and light until the trees were bones, the leaves were husks, and every living thing that remained shied away from the ghostly light.
The black-rope clouds reminded the wind of those deadly vines.
The ground, of course, was dry—lifeless dirt and gravel. Usually, the wind could hear insects scrambling, worms tunneling, seeds unfurling, and roots seeking water. But the soil here was as lifeless and silent as a closed, airtight coffin.
This was a dangerous place. A place that had never seen the wind. It didn’t want to stay longer than necessary.
It nudged the pixie-like woman.
“I said get o’er here! Line up. Do you want to die?”
The wind huffed at the shouting creature. There was no need to be impolite. The pixie-like woman had twisted her ankle when she fell. It was obvious in the purple and blue bruises mottling her skin. Her ankle throbbed with heat and was already swelling. The wind sent a cooling breeze over it.
“Are you talking to me?” the pixie-like woman asked.
She was surprised. The wind was surprised too. Since the moment she’d stepped out of her lightning-split tree, no man had ever spoken to her so impolitely.
The creature barred his teeth and marched across the barren ground. He grabbed the woman by her arm and yanked her upright, shaking her so hard her teeth rattled.
She winced and hopped on one foot as he dragged her across the gravel to a long line of miserable-looking beings.
The pixie-like woman was a small being. If she was mistaken for a human, people assumed she was a short human.
Her cheeks were round. Her face was heart-shaped.
Her black hair was closely cropped. She had smooth, glowing skin and wide, luminous eyes.
She was pretty like a porcelain doll was pretty.
However, no one had ever mistaken the pixie-like woman for something as harmless as a doll.
She stumbled against the grandmotherly woman in front of her, and the grandmother knocked into a young man.
“Watch it,” he snapped.
“Are you all right, dear?” the grandmother asked.
The pixie-like woman gingerly set her right foot on the ground and then covered a wince as she stood on both feet. “Fine, thank you,” she said. Then, before the shouting man could leave: “Excuse me, I’m looking for someone.”
“Don’t care.”
The pixie-like woman raised her eyebrows. “His name is Justice Marr. He’s about six inches taller than you.” She held her hand in the air to show his height. “Russet hair.”
“What’s russet?”
“Like the coat of a deer,” the grandmother said. “Very pretty.”
“Where are we?” the young man asked. “What’s that city?”
“Shut up,” the shouting man said, kicking dirt at the line of people. “You.” He thrust a scab-covered finger at the pixie-like woman. “Stay in line.”
“It’s really beautiful,” the young man said. He moved toward the city, walking as if entranced. The shouting man struck him across the face and pushed him back.
“You’ll go when I tell you.”
The young man shook his head, and the wind sniffed at the shouting one. Rotting teeth. Decaying flesh. Dirt under his fingernails. Dried blood on his hands.
The pixie-like woman frowned at the tall stone walls. They thrust from the ground like black monoliths placed by giants. Firelight flickered around the city, and smoke curled at its edges.
The woman took a hobbling step forward.
“Where are you going, dear?” the grandmother asked the pixie-like one.
“Hey!” The shouting man swung around, his fist raised.
The pixie-like woman stared at the man. The wind moaned at the black abyss filling her gaze. It quivered at the rattling of branches in a cold November wind.
“Yes?”
The shouting man lowered his fist. He shivered and then glared at the woman. “You stay in line. It’s the rules. All new ones line up. Then you go and meet the Maker.”
“The Maker?”
The wind perked up. Who was the Maker?
The shouting man sneered, and the stench of his rotting teeth swirled on his laugh.
The wind knew this type of being. He loved having power over others.
He was the petty, tyrant type. These beings flocked to places where a thousand petty rules could be used as canes to beat and belittle others.
They didn’t need a lot of power—they only needed a lot of rules.
A little power was enough for any little tyrant.
The wind had seen enough of them through the centuries to know their special sneer.
“He’ll make you, or he’ll break you. It’s him what chooses. You get heaven, or you get hell. The Maker is he what made this place.” The shouting man thrust his thumb at himself. “I’m the one what takes you to him.”
He said the final “him” with an anticipatory, awe-filled voice.
The pixie-like woman’s expression turned thoughtful. Then she smiled at the shouting man. “All right, I’ll meet your Maker.”
The shouting man snorted. “You act like you have a choice. It’s the rules. Everyone meets the Maker.”
The wind pushed a sharp gust of air, blowing the man’s stench across the plain.
“I love it here,” the grandmother said, her rheumy eyes happily vacant. She patted the young man’s arm. “Don’t you?”
He nodded, and then the shouting man shoved the long line of beings forward.
The pixie-like one hobbled after them. The wind sent a questioning breeze—was she okay?—but instead of answering, the woman only smiled.