March of the Third Autotomic Brigade #5
“The Chancellor will expect it. He’ll be disappointed if I make this all too easy for him.
” She eyes her work once more, then pulls it from the easel.
“I’ve no value as a tamed socialite if I do all the taming myself.
” She tosses the painting into the unlit hearth.
“Aster, do you have any perfume on you?”
“Purse,” she mutters. Elspeth grabs it and makes her way to the bathroom, leaving Aster and Mallory alone with the scattered portraits, the unraveled threads, the oddments and paint stains and scraps.
She watches him pull a pair of bellhop’s pants from the closet and swallows a sigh.
“I did a poor job of interrogating you last night,” she says.
“Well, next time, use the paddle.”
She laughs, taking his wrist and pulling him toward her. She lifts his hand to her face, touching her lips against the dozens of tiny scars on his knuckles. “Aufhocker,” she says. “Why Aufhocker? What is he to you?”
“Everything and more, vralen.”
“God, Mal. Every time I think you’ve run out of bullshit, you open your mouth.”
“I need perfume,” Elspeth says, gliding back through the doorway.
“Real perfume. All the ones you have are practically toxic weaponry.” She stops at the old vanity, glances over the dusty bottles of Fauniche scents, then seems to think better of it.
“Oh, fuck it. I’ll go as myself. I don’t want to be recognized anyway. ”
News climbs up from below, the hours painting a picture of an evacuation evolved into a protracted siege.
Joyous Healing is a stew of bullets and phlogiston, vitriol of Lun and BSPAF, Sreckt-brand darts and Metaldrip spearheads and the sweet, unmistakable scent of teratopod toxin.
A defensive squad of two dozen congeals from the chaos, mostly ex-brawlers and convicts and exiles.
A young Ostlerfell veteran is reported to stand at its head, chosen either by vote or by divine will.
He dies early on, says one messenger from the lift, shot twice in the chest—while the next announces his latest stratagem.
Frequent, contradictory reports suspend the corporal in a state of both victory and defeat, and Guy doesn’t have the courage to ride the elevator down to confirm either way.
He clings to uncertainty. He already knows he’s lost Three. He’d rather not know about Dawn.
Mercifully, Bertram puts him to good use.
While the exterminators in the root make heroes of themselves, Guy regresses to boyhood, shrinking back into an usher’s skin.
He buzzes around the presidential office with sleeves rolled up, fetching drinks and notes and messages.
He hums to drown out the cacophony in his ear, the whistle of fumigants carried up the elevator shaft, the percussion of gunfire, reeds of peeling wood, Tyro’s soft sobbing, Bertram’s muttering as Guy brings him his seventh coffee.
“Of all contractors,” he murmurs, hunched over his desk, pomade crusted, Ostlerfell tie undone.
“Metaldrip. Worse friends than enemies. Oh, thank you—” He sets the cup on a stack of papers already stamped with coffee rings.
The man has not left his desk all night, shouting into the telephone, pen scratching messages and missives and polemics.
In the corner of his office, Tyro sleeps under his silk overcoat.
“Look at this mess,” he sighs. “I need lawyers. Lawyers, Guylag. Soldiers. Lawyers with guns and soldiers with law degrees.”
“Sorry,” Guy answers. “I’m just the bug-killer.”
Bertram stands, stretches, and moves to the window, where a haze of gray sunrise threatens to light the horizon. “God, it’s dull out there. When was the last time you ate?”
“I don’t know,” Guy admits.
“Let’s fix that. Take a rest.” Bertram lifts the telephone, and a minute later, an errander appears in the doorway.
“Bring us something warm, will you? Wine, too. Something dark, that goes well with rain and bad luck.” The kid nods and disappears.
“Let’s hope Boris the Twelfth had something good stashed away.
Well, go on. Sit. A soldier lives or dies by his last drink, after all. Who said that? Chancellor Marseea?”
“General Bianco,” Guy answers.
“Of course, of course. Larbella—God, that was an opera. Drovick was in jail for that one, wasn’t he?”
“And for Poet-King.”
“That one, too?” Bertram downs his coffee. “Why is everything good written from prison, Guylag?”
“Nothing else to do, I guess.”
Bertram swivels in his chair and offers a sad smile. “You know, your captain told me you’ve got the whole Tiliarder canon in that head of yours.”
Guy’s heart clenches.
“She told me you like to put flowers in your pocket and sing the classics to your sister. And that you’re good.” Heat creeps into Guy’s face, and that only broadens Bertram’s smile. “You’re a fop at heart, Moulène. And there’s nothing wrong with that. I thought I told you to sit.”
He sinks into the chair opposite Bertram, wiping an eye.
“Ah, kid. Take a napkin.”
“I’m fine.”
“I know you’re fine. But you also need a napkin. Here.” Guy accepts. “I know what it’s like. I’ve lost more than my fair share of friends, you know. Sanitation is dirty business.”
Guy offers nothing but a sniff.
“You know how I got roped into this shit?” Bertram asks.
“Through Crypsis?”
“Who told you I was in Crypsis? I used to run a perfumery. Wasn’t much for the art—Reames did the chemistry—but I managed everything else, from transport to sales.
We grew our own herbs, tended our own bilge goats.
It was a lovely business—even supplied Fauniche for a while, before she retired.
And as it turned out, Sanitation is always looking for the kind of man who knows how to hide a stench. Oh, thank you.”
The errander returns with a bottle and two glasses. The label is antique, the cork grimy.
“Oh, this is a gloomy one.” Bertram nods. “Boris, you old poet.” He wipes off the dust and accepts the corkscrew. With a solemn squeak, he opens the bottle. The aroma is rich and bittersweet.
Guy fingers the stem of his glass as Bertram pours, laying one hand on his heart, waiting for his boss to initiate the traditional toast.
His proprietor only stares at him. “You drink a lot of this, Moulène?”
“Only sips,” Guy answers. “Here and there.”
“You’re full of surprises, aren’t you? Did you taste for someone?”
“When I was an usher. A few paranoids in the boxes.”
“Well, tonight, we’ll take that risk together. To the brave men and women of Borisch-Gorslung.”
Guy mirrors the toast and drinks. The wine settles, warm and sad, inside him.
“A bit cloying, isn’t it?” Bertram says.
“A little.” Guy takes another sip. “Gently crushed, though.”
They both stare out the window, where day feebly asserts itself. A rumble rattles up the elevator, sending a tiny shudder through headquarters.
“Eir Bertram,” Guy starts.
“Yes, Eir Moulène?”
“What happened at Sreckt—”
“Was the brothers’ fault. It was necessary. Justice—in the classic Vaughnian sense. If they’re going to enable this infestation by making our job difficult, they’re a part of it. It’s just how Species Management works.”
“And the teratopods…”
“Well, let me say this. An adequate gardener kills a weed. An excellent gardener makes a crop of it.”
A shiver runs up Guy’s neck. “How did you extract the toxin?”
“That, I couldn’t tell you. That’s my nephew’s department.
He’s the only bioalchemist who can distill an ounce of sense out of this.
I love that man but can’t for the life of me figure him out.
You know how family can be.” He glances to Tyro.
“I was the only one who invested in him. Believed in him. I put him through school, funded his projects. Rented him lab space, an apartment. Got him out of trouble here and there. Now I’m the patron of a latter-day Vernhardt. ”
“‘With alchemy as my brush,’” Guy sings quietly, “‘matter is my canvas.’”
“Yes, Guylag. Exactly.” Bertram pours himself another. “Ecdytoxin is a gift. So many volatile compounds can destroy. Very few can create. It just needs the right hands to direct it.”
The door creaks open and the errander appears, carrying some sort of stew, likely thrown together from whatever was left in the office. A note is delivered with the napkin. As Bertram opens it, Guy glances over to Tyro. She stirs at the scent of food, but does not wake.
“That bunkmate of yours is holding things down,” Bertram says. “I still find it hard to believe I hired Corporal Flint. The Flint. I thought I recognized him—from that Lunar Herald photo, you know the one. With the hospital ship. I was sure the Marshal had him killed.”
“He meant to,” Guy says. “Lost him in the undercity.”
“Just as well. Always thought it was despicable, what they did to him. Nullifying his contract—and for what? Being lucky? Being too damn good at his job?” Bertram scoops a forkful into his mouth. “How long have you known him?”
“Since we were kids.” Guy fiddles with his food. “We ran the errand trails together for a few years. Until he was old enough for conscription. Or—at least, someone wrote down somewhere that he was. Neither of us really knew.”
“Ah. ‘Reality cowers before paperwork.’ You know that one?”
“Vrenecker, Platitudes, number thirty-four.”
“Perfect.” Bertram sets down his fork and looks Guy over. The glance drags on into a stare, and Guy reddens.
“Did I get it wrong, Eir Bertram?” he asks.
“No, no. I’m only curious.” He refills Guy’s glass. “Do you know how Ostlerfell Blue is made?”
“No.”
“Well, deep in those canyons, where the cliffs are the steepest, there grows a scraggly little type of woad. They’ve cultivated it for a few hundred years.
Makes a decent blue. Then, about a decade before the War, a pest hits the crop.
A beetle that parasitizes the roots, and it’s cliff woad, so there aren’t many roots to go around. The plant starts to die off.
“At first they try to kill this bug. They try every poison under the sun, bring up some exterminators from Tiliard, even. But during this project, someone finds out the beetle metabolizes the indican—that’s the blue stuff—which it concentrates in its shell.
A flash of color it uses to deter predators, when it’s injured or stressed.
And so, of course, they stress them. Injure them.
Harvest them. That’s our Blue. The desperate attempt of a tortured little parasite to keep death at bay. ”
“That’s … sad,” Guy says.
“Sad, sure. But not the point. The point is, the beetle still kills the woad. It’s still a threat to the canyon’s ecosystem. So is it a pest or a pleasure?”
Guy shrugs. “I don’t know.”
“Don’t be a coward. Don’t waffle.”
“Pleasure, I guess.”
“Exactly. Species Management clings to their little philosophies about toxins and structural damage and how to classify all these things. But it’s so simple. A pest is only a creature that hasn’t found its purpose.” He leans forward. “And you, Eir Moulène, haven’t found your purpose.”
Guy bites his tongue, unsure if he has just received a compliment or a threat.
“If you’d trained early and had a patron, I might be throwing you a rose right now.
” Bertram shakes his head. “But that’s what we do in this city.
Let things rot before they can ripen. You know—when all this shit is over—I’ve got an alchemist friend who could take those marks off your arms better than any tattooist. You can go back to the Opera. ”
“I’m too old for ushering.”
“Hah! I meant as a patron. Why should you not be the one ushered, for once? You’re the only reason there aren’t cockroaches crawling out of the orchestra pit.”
Guy forgoes answering in favor of another sip.
“Shit, you’d make a better impresario than—don’t laugh—I’m serious.
You’ve clearly got more knowledge of the art than half the swine I share those boxes with.
You’d be able to bring new life to the place.
I’m tired of them putting on the same shows each season, these Neo-Repressionists.
The Only Good Man, again and again and again. ”
“I have heard it’s been stale lately,” Guy admits.
“Stale? It’s been dead.” He tops them both off, emptying the bottle. “Yours would make a great underdog story, don’t you think? Perfectly feasible. Empress Larbella began her career as a prostitute. Albrecht Vaughn was born on Broken Teeth.”
“Is that really true?”
“Who cares? My point stands. You’re not made for this business. You belong upstairs. And that one”—he gestures with his fork at Tyro, lowering his voice—“belongs in Crypsis. Been awake for the past hour. Absorbing every word.”
Guy glances over his shoulder. He half expects Tyro to stiffen at the accusation, to lift her head and deny the charges, but she sleeps on—or pretends to.
“She’s restless,” Bertram says. “I’ll make her a contract. Keep her busy. Short-term. We’ll start her off on something easy. Chem prep, or paperwork.”
Guy gulps. “She can’t read.”
“She’ll learn, then.”
He hesitates over his next bite. He shivers with something akin to shame. Jealousy, maybe—while he had to teach himself with lettered seating and playbills and blocking notes, she will learn deliberately, with instruction.
“I won’t pressure you,” Bertram says. “That’s the last thing I want to do. But Reames is right. We could use some small hands down there.”