Chapter 6
Ridge is swaying again. Fourth time in an hour, and his face has gone from pale to gray-green.
"That's it." I start packing up my paintings. Only managed to sell one today—the landscape with the wonky trees. Someone's aunt called it "art with personality."
Ridge straightens when he sees me closing early. Tries to look alert. Fails. He's sweating in weather cold enough to see your breath.
"You don't have to—" he starts, then grabs the wall.
"Come here." I abandon my half-packed canvases and march over. His forehead is burning. Actually burning. "You have a fever. A bad one."
"M'fine."
"You're not fine. You're basically a walking infection." I grab his arm. He tries to pull away but he's weak. "We're going to Crow's for medicine, then you're going to bed."
"Can't leave post."
"Your post will survive without you for one night." I'm already steering him down the street. He weighs nothing. When did these people last eat properly? "Unless someone's planning to attack me in the next hour, in which case they can wait until you're not dying of pneumonia."
He makes a sound that might be a laugh. Or his lungs protesting. Hard to tell.
Matthias takes one look at Ridge and starts pulling bottles off shelves. "Fever reducer, something for the cough, and—" He pauses. "This one's for the infection that's clearly setting into his chest. Two drops every four hours, no more."
"How much?"
"For you? Half price." He wraps everything carefully. "Boy needs rest and proper food. Soup. Nothing heavy."
"Soup I can do." I count out coins, then turn to find Ridge listing dangerously to the left. "Where do you live?"
"Can't—"
"Can't tell me, yes, I know. Super secret criminal hideout." I get my shoulder under his arm. He smells like fever sweat and leather. "Point which direction at least. I'm not letting you collapse in an alley."
He points vaguely northeast. We start walking. Well, I walk. He mostly stumbles and occasionally mumbles what might be directions or possibly fever hallucinations. We end up in a part of the city I've never seen before. The buildings get older, darker, pressed together.
"Through here," he manages, gesturing at what looks like a solid wall.
"Through the—oh." There's a gap, barely wide enough for one person. "Of course you live somewhere that requires squeezing through walls."
The passage opens into a courtyard that's seen better decades. The cobblestones are cracked, weeds pushing through. Windows everywhere, all dark. And the smell—mold and damp and too many people in too small a space.
"This is where you live?" The words come out before I can stop them.
Ridge nods, then immediately regrets the motion. I catch him before he falls.
"Right. Bed first, horrified questions later."
The inside is worse. Corridors that drip with condensation. Stairs that creak ominously. And cold—the bone-deep kind. No wonder everyone's sick.
We pass two guild members who freeze at the sight of me. One reaches for a weapon.
"He's sick," I say firmly. "Either help or get out of the way."
They get out of the way.
Ridge's room is a generous term for what's essentially a closet with a cot. The blanket is thin enough to read through. There's mold in the corner. Actual, black mold just... there.
"Absolutely not." I prop Ridge against the wall and start stripping the cot. "Where are the clean blankets?"
"The what?"
"Clean. Blankets." I speak slowly, like maybe they just don't know the words. "Sheets? Anything that doesn't look diseased?"
The two guild members exchange glances. "There's... storage. Maybe."
"Show me."
Storage turns out to be a room full of weapons, gold, and what might charitably be called linens if you squint. I find two blankets that don't smell like death and what could pass for clean sheets after a good shake.
"Help me get him into bed," I order. They do, probably because I'm using my stern voice. The one that makes even Mrs. Harwicke pay eventually.
Ridge is burning through his shirt. I get the medicine into him—two drops, no more—and pile both blankets on top. He's shivering anyway.
"Where's your kitchen?"
More confused looks.
"Kitchen. Where you cook food. Make tea. Have soup."
"There's a room. With a fireplace. Sometimes people heat things."
"Show me this 'room.'"
It's not a kitchen. It's a crime scene that happens to have a hearth. Empty shelves. A pot that might have been used to boil water sometime during the last king's reign. No food. No supplies. Nothing but dust and old smoke smell.
"How do you eat?" I'm genuinely baffled. "What do you eat?"
"Tavern food. Sometimes. When there's time."
"When there's—" I stop. Breathe. Count to five. "Right. You." I point at the taller one. He actually backs up a step. "What's your name?"
"Um. Finn?"
"Finn. Good. Finn, do you know where food comes from?"
"...shops?"
"Excellent start. Do you have money?"
He nods cautiously.
"Wonderful. You're going shopping." I start making a list on a scrap of paper from my pocket. "Vegetables—carrots, onions, celery. Chicken, a whole one if you can find it. Garlic. Parsley. Salt. Bread. Butter. Can you read?"
"Yes?"
"Don't sound so uncertain. Either you can or you can't." I shove the list at him. "Go. Now. Take..." I look at the other one. "What's your name?"
"Davis."
"Take Davis. He can help carry things."
They stand there.
"Is there a problem?"
"It's just... we don't usually..."
"Shop? Cook? Eat proper food? Yes, I've noticed." I'm already looking for firewood. There isn't any. Of course there isn't. "Wood too. For the fire. Unless you prefer eating cold raw chicken, which I don't recommend."
They flee. Good. I have work to do.
By the time they return—laden with bags and looking bewildered—I've got water boiling and the hearth actually producing heat. Other guild members have been drawn by the unusual sight of their kitchen being used for its intended purpose. They hover in doorways.
"Excellent." I start unpacking. Real vegetables. Fresh bread. The chicken looks properly plucked. "Who knows how to cut vegetables?"
Silence.
"Anyone? Basic knife skills? You're all professionally stabby people."
"S'not the same," someone mutters from the back.
"It's exactly the same. Just different target. Here." I hand a knife to a woman with intricate braids. "Dice these onions. Small pieces. Precise."
She takes the knife like it might explode. Starts cutting. Badly, but she's trying.
"Smaller," I correct. "And watch your fingers. I can't heal everyone if you all start bleeding."
"You can heal?" This from Gray Streak, who's appeared with perfect timing.
"Not the point. Carrots next. You." I point at a younger man with terrible posture. "Peel these."
"A what?"
"The thing in that bag that peels vegetables."
And somehow, I end up with eight hardened criminals in various stages of food preparation. Someone's actually taking notes. The woman with braids—Syl, she signs—has moved on to celery and is doing much better. Gray Streak is attempting to tear bread into chunks.
"The chicken needs cleaning," I announce. Everyone steps back. "Oh for—it's dead. It can't hurt you."
"It's slimy," Finn protests.
"Many things in life are slimy. We persevere." I demonstrate proper chicken cleaning. "See? Now it's ready for soup."
The kitchen fills with steam and the smell of actual food. I add the vegetables to the pot, then the chicken. Bay leaves from Matthias's shop. Salt. A lot of salt.
"How long?" Davis asks. He's been stirring religiously for twenty minutes.
"Another hour at least. Soup takes time." I taste the broth. Needs more salt. "Has anyone checked on Ridge?"
"I did." A girl who can't be older than sixteen raises her hand. "Fever's down. He's sleeping."
"Good. When he wakes, he gets broth first. Just broth. His stomach won't handle more yet."
The hour passes with me teaching basic cooking skills to people who could probably kill me dozens of ways but can't figure out how to tell when onions are properly sautéed. Someone takes detailed notes about browning meat. Another asks why we add vegetables in a specific order.
When the soup's ready, we have a problem. No bowls. Or rather, not enough bowls. They have eight bowls for what's clearly forty-plus people.
"We share," Gray Streak says, like this is normal.
"Absolutely not. Everyone needs their own bowl. Don't you have a treasury? Gold? Ill-gotten gains?"
"Yes?"
"Then tomorrow someone's buying dishes. Bowls, plates, cups that don't leak."
They eat in shifts, sharing the eight bowls with careful precision. Everyone gets exactly the same amount. I make sure Ridge gets his broth, spooning it into him when his hands shake too much. His color's better. The medicine's working.
"This is." Someone stops, swallows. "This is really good."
"It's basic chicken soup." But I'm pleased. "Anyone could make this."
"Teach us?" The request comes from multiple voices.
"Tomorrow. After someone buys proper dishes and we get real supplies in here." I look around the room—guild members sprawled on various surfaces, actually talking to each other instead of brooding in corners. "And vegetables. You're all eating vegetables whether you like it or not."
No one argues. They're too busy having seconds.
Gray Streak helps me clean up. Well, he tries. Washing dishes is apparently not a skill set they've developed either.
"The boss won't like this," he says quietly.
"Won't like what? His people being fed? Housed properly? Not dying of preventable diseases?"
"Won't like civilians in the compound."
"Then he should have thought of that before letting his people live like this." I scrub the pot harder. "There's mold in the bedrooms. That's not dangerous mystique, that's respiratory infections waiting to happen."
He almost smiles. "You're not what I expected."
"What did you expect?"
"Someone who'd run. Smart people run from us."
"Smart people also eat vegetables and maintain proper living conditions." I dry my hands on my skirt. "I should go. But I'll be back tomorrow. Someone needs to check on Ridge, and you all need to learn how to dice an onion properly."
"I'll walk you out."
"I can find my way."
"The boss really won't like that."
Fair point. I let him escort me through the maze of corridors. In the courtyard, I turn back to look at the building. Still grim. Still actively unhealthy. But there's light in the kitchen window now. Warm light.
"Get firewood," I tell Gray Streak. "Lots of it. And fix that broken window on the second floor—draft's getting in. Winter's coming and you're all already half-dead from poor nutrition."
"Anything else?" He's definitely almost smiling now.
"Clean blankets. For everyone. Burn the old ones if you have to." I pause. "Actually, definitely burn them. They're beyond saving."
I leave him standing in the courtyard, probably wondering how his life reached the point where a civilian orders him around about laundry. But he'll do it. They all will. Because somewhere under all that practiced intimidation, they want someone to care if they're eating properly.
Tomorrow: vegetables, dishes, and maybe I'll start on the mold situation.
These people need more than soup. They need someone to mother them into basic self-care.
Lucky for them, I've got nothing but time and an aggressive need to fix things.
Even if those things are technically criminals who could murder me.
Details.