Moira’s luck turns, but not the way she expected. The working title for this chapter was “Moira Puts Her Foot In It”, which seemed accurate at the time.

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The Toymaker’s Opera is an alternative-world steampunk adventure. It is a story about a poor fortuneteller, a living automaton, a mad Baron, and a city that dreams. It is a story about the price of friendship and happiness, about legacy and talent, blood and luck. But most of all, it is a story about the things that have no price.

The Toymaker’s Opera

Vanity’s Errand

Moira

Steam rose heady and thick from the water. Moira took a deep breath and plunged under. For a long, glorious moment she was encased in sweet, sweet warmth. She rose with a gasp and shook her hair out. Slick droplets cascaded down her skin. It felt so good to be clean, really clean, at last.

“I just don’t understand,” Moira said, finishing the story she’d started earlier. “If my…fortune has really turned–and getting paid by the nob from Wrightsward certainly felt like it–then why did everything go so wrong in the Shade?” She turned in the bathtub–an enormous, claw-footed thing–toward the whore she’d hired, listening for a response.

Despite the obscene price Gray was now demanding of her Moira couldn’t let herself withdraw her appointment in Philandry. She wouldn’t give back any of the food or supplies she’d bought, and she refused to let Gray’s intimidation barr her from the nice things she’d told herself she was going to get. If one didn’t live a little now and then, what was the point? There was no sense being poor and miserable.

Philandry was the companions’ district. There were no guilds allowed in the Sheer; nothing that would give leeway for bargaining power against the Reach, but the prostitutes and lovers-for-hire were a force to be reckoned with. Philandry was twice as large as Medtown, taking up more space than even Wrightsward and Copperlight, and had all the importance due to such a district.

The whores who chose that line of work came in every shape and size. There were fat Yuan men who served cups of steaming tea, lithe young boys ushered to and from their patrons under the watchful eye of a master as stern and protective as a mother goose, and voluptuous Ombolan women who made an elaborate ceremony of consuming a small banquet before taking off so much as a stitch of clothing. Thin, awkward girls learned the art of shyness, well-muscled Toulene warriors and laughing Verandi women made dance and art and sex into one and the same, old soldiers missing limbs and pieces of their hearts told tall tales long into the night, and a precious few who studied and smiled and turned clients into friends left their draped boudoirs nightly for the gilded estates above the Teeth. Even a few Rimseans made their home and their work in Philandry, performing long, secret rituals with others of their race that no outsider was allowed to see.

Regardless of their gender or ethnicity or age, any worker in Philandry had the right to refuse any patron at any time for any reason. The customer who did not listen to the request to leave, or was not of a mind to, soon found himself being flung face-down on the grating just beyond the district’s border and barred from re-entry. Unlike Medtown, in which each seer had to fend for herself, the citizens of Philandry pooled for tithe and bouncers together, paying both at least a month in advance. It was no paradise; plenty of the men and women went hungry when they couldn’t entice in enough business, gossip and disease ran rampant–though neither worse than the other, and not every madam or pimp could be said to be kind; but thankfully it was a better place than most, at least there were more broken hearts than broken arms, and that was something to be happy for.

Many folk visited Philandry. Some went for sex, some for pleasure. More than a handful came to breed; usually Verandi women who could not have children with their otherwise infertile partners. A few went to observe the rites and trappings necessary to pass into adulthood or to honor the culture of their homeland. Some visited friends, sharing drinks and stories over dinner, some to make them. Others asked for advice and conversation, like Moira was doing now.

The whore who rose and swept across the room was a Sulisine lad, tall and lissome, with a long waterfall of hair that felt like ink when Moira touched it. His skin had a strange texture, both rough and smooth, as though he had fish scales running up and down his limbs just under the surface. They were a sea people by nature, long interbred with the locals on whatever coast they inhabited. Gentle, webbed fingers caressed Moira’s skull, easing out the lingering tension there and working shampoo into her hair.

He was quiet for a long time, as his people were wont to be. Moira had chosen him more for a need to be bathed than anything else and to have somebody to talk to; since she refused to admit outright to anybody in Medtown that she had gone to see Sophia in the first place.

“Have you considered, perhaps, that it is because you have not yet paid your Keeper?” the lad said, the suggestion cutting deep.

Moira winced inwardly and spent the rest of her visit chewing this over. She paid and tipped, as was proper, and went out into the street again feeling fresh but worried. It wasn’t that she was avoiding Sophia, but that her Keeper had not yet requested a price for her services. What Sophia would want, however, was beyond Moira’s power to guess. There was little she could offer a blood witch.

“I won’t have her doing me any favors,” Moira griped, “if she thinks she’s being helpful by waiting.” That had to be it. Sophia must be holding off on charging her, conscious of Moira’s money troubles. Moira resolved to have none of it. After all, the debt to her Keeper must now come first, and Gray be damned. Perhaps then the spell would take hold and the wheel would turn and she would be able to pay faster than the rate of interest, even if it did take years.

In this mind Moira made her way down the back alleys and twisting staircases to the Pride at the bottom of the city. She toiled over Gray’s parting words, on one level muttering curses on him and all his kin, while on another she resolved to pay him fairly. “As if he’s worth so much money,” she scoffed, setting off another circle of inner debate.

Undecided still, Moira stepped down from the broad stones of the Harvest Stair and onto the wide, cobbled street that led directly to the Pride. If she were to turn right and walk the length of a tower and a half she would soon find herself at Mercy’s Hall. North along the outskirts of the cliff would take her to Skyman’s Wharf where the airships and flotillas came in, their captains sending goods along the boulevard by cart and wagon, past the gilded bathhouse of Troi Matabla, south to the Pride.

The market of the Pride sat on the lowest level of the Sheer. Instead of clinging directly to the side of the cliff face it sat inside the tower itself, the middle tower of the outer three. Two great archways at either end ushered shoppers into the plaza, leaving the market itself open to the air. Once inside the ceiling stretched up into darkness, the sweeping sides of the walls coming to a fine keystone point. It was far from dark, however, as several rows of stained glass windows high along the eastern wall let in more than enough light. On the western facade an enterprising engineer had at some point affixed several beaten sheets of polished tin angled towards the ground. These caught the refracted corals, golds, cobalt blues and deep sea greens from the stained glass and threw them down upon the market in long stretches of color. The cloth tapestries hanging from cables flapped gently in the breeze, not advertising Guilds as they might do in any other city, but businesses.

Both sides of the plaza, western and eastern, boasted fine shops; tailors, wig sellers, cobblers, and jewelers. Wrightsward was where things were made but the Pride was where they were sold. Many districts had their own shops, usually grocers and those folk who specialized in whatever items locals usually bought; like Tabitha, who always had a hefty spread of smudges for the discerning seer. Plenty of folk who created their goods farther up the city chose to advertise or keep a booth in the Pride, which generally saw more foot traffic.

Down the middle of the market plaza stood rows upon rows of tented stalls, rickety wooden booths and permanent ones, food stands from which emanated the crackling of frying oil and the piquant smell of exotic spices; young apprentices darted between the crowd, drumming up business. The market was never quiet, and the noise once inside the tower was nothing less than a dull roar.

Moira generally did not visit the Pride, except when absolutely necessary. The grocer’s market in Patchwork was usually sufficient for her needs and anything else she might be lacking could easily be sourced from nearby. Not only that but the press of people made it far easier for thieves to do their work. Moira smiled a little, secure in the knowledge that her last few coins for the day were hidden too deep to be stolen.

A new stone, perhaps another quartz, was on her shopping list today. She needed something that would counteract the denseness of the malachite that she already had, anything to give her more difficult readings a boost. Another amplifying stones wasn’t necessary of course, she could read just fine without it. Soon, too, she would have to make a decision about Gray’s offer; whether to bow her head and take it or try to fight for something more reasonable. Either way the days ahead looked lean even though the weather was warmer. The least she could do was treat herself now, while she still had the funds to be able to do so, thereby making the long slog towards freedom that much more bearable.

Thus satisfied, Moria ducked into stall after stall, searching for the perfect stone. She didn’t press herself against the cases or ask many questions of the staff. In each gem shop she drifted the length of the tent, hands out and open, her second sight watching for the curl of–not magic, but a ‘rightness’ that would tell her she’d found the perfect stone. It was like trying to complete a puzzle without the rest of the pieces.

More than once she slapped away the brushing fingers of a thief, not bothering to turn and confront them. “Oh, off with you!” she sighed as yet another child made the attempt toward her side pocket.

“Wasn’t doin’ nuthin’, miss,” mumbled a boy so young his voice still had the clear timbre of a soprano.

She ignored him and ducked inside the last stall along the eastern edge. Moira reeled back at once, pushed to the side by the hard, gloved hand of a nutcracker. Just in time she caught her footing and managed to stay upright.

“Oh, I do beg your pardon,” the man behind the nutcracker drawled, not sounding sorry at all. His voice, sharp and as cutting as the crack of a whip, equally matched the icy spears of scarlet that came showering down in her second sight when he moved closer. “I should think that even the scum of the Warren would have greater manners–along with greater sense–than to go blundering about into their betters.”

Any shock at the sudden push disappeared in an instant. Moira squared her shoulders and shook her finger at the stranger. All the rage and teeth-gnashing Gray’s ridiculous scheme induced came pouring out of her before she could stop it. “Listen here you pompous, imbecilic, chord-fretting, overgrown, overpowdered narcissist: I have had it up to here with men like you! Ha, betters indeed! What right have you got to go shoving folk around? Surely a woman of my station has more right to the Pride than an officious ninny-dandy like you! And I wouldn’t have run into you anyhow,” she added, so full of venom she could spit. “So you may take your stupid errands back above the Teeth, where you belong, if you so hate to mingle with us lower folk. What?” she continued, only marginally away of a growing silence around her, “afraid to sully the gloves mama bought you–”

The slap hit the side of her face with all the force of a cane. Moira crumpled underneath it, her cry cut off. She sank to the stone, surprised to find that the earth was not also spinning beneath her. Numb cold lasted only a second before hot pain blossomed. She brought her hand away, unable to tell through the trembling if she had bit her lip and drawn blood. Regardless, that cheek would bruise, a more-than-lovely sight for her next customer.

Dimly, overhead, she heard the lordling say, “May that teach you a lesson in humility. Count yourself lucky I am in fair spirits today, or we would soon see how silent you could be, if you had buttons for eyes and wood for teeth. Men, get this detritus out of my sight.” With that Baron d’Bardi strode past her, allowing his nutcrackers to seize her and throw her aside.

Moira fell hard. Her clean hands scraped over rough edges on the rock, nails digging into the grime and dirt between the ridges of stone. Gradually the hubbub of the crowd’s normal activity returned, people moving swiftly around her without stopping. Wincing at a new pain in her side and holding her stinging arms gingerly, Moira staggered to her feet and tried to wipe the muck from her dress.

Hot tears spilled down her face, making tracks through the soot. The whole left side of her head ached, and a terrible throbbing had begun. Dazed and exhausted she trudged through the market, now and again wiping away the tears that leaked out. Moira bit her lip and refused to keen, trying to hold it in until she could lock her front door on the world.

“Sa Moira!” a familiar voice greeted her at the next stall. “I haven’t seen you in–oh my.”

“Oh my is right, Hector.” Moira felt her way forward under the hanging curtains and rested gratefully on the offered stool. The last few shops had laughed her right out, one had even told her that she could incur the wrath of the Baron elsewhere and sent her away. So much for getting herself a gift. Moira doubted now whether a new stone would even make enough of a difference to matter. Tentatively she touched her left ear again. It was still burning hot. “Maybe I should just go home.”

Hector, an Ombolan merchant with a bass as robust as his body, patted her shoulder with surprising gentleness. “Nonsense, Moira!” he boomed. Hector was always booming; his enormous belly jiggling from some joke or calling customers in from six stalls away. He had a smile to match, Moira remembered from her childhood, perfect white teeth on an ink-black canvas.

“What you need is a good cheering up, my girl. No more of this dreary face, no more!” Hector cried, clapping his huge hands together. “Any more of that and I shall have to find a cure to sadness itself and then–huzzah!–I would be the richest man in the Sheer and then where would you be?”

Unlike the men and women who worked in Philandry Moira had no friends with which to share stories over coffee or tea. She had only her customers, who were much too busy telling her their stories, and the people who owned the shops she frequented. The lack of companionship had never bothered her before–she was a solitary creature by nature, if a stubborn one at that–but now she wished more than anything for a sympathetic ear. Tabitha was too wrapped up in the laws of Medtown to be an impartial judge, Mrs. Marshall was better suited to the homey farm life she and her husband had left behind in Elleswhar than a tough one in the Sheer, and Sophia was as likely to tell Moira she had brought it on herself as she was to smother her former apprentice with motherly attention.

Nonetheless, Hector’s roaring good humor continued unabated and after a while Moira found herself smiling. “Aha!” he laughed, having brought her behind the counter while his attendants served the other customers. “So you do have a lick of cheer left: I thought so!”

“Only you,” Moira replied dryly, but he seemed not to notice. As far as she could tell there was no stopping the man. Hector was a force unto himself. “You’d sell your own apprentice to himself if you thought you could get away with it.”

He snorted. “And I’d turn a damn fine profit off it, too. What can I get you? If I know my Moira she doesn’t come to the Pride for just anything.”

Years of loyal patronage proved him right and Moira explained the type of stone she’d been searching for. “Something to see, to help amplify my readings and…make clear the path. Sorry,” she said, pinching the bridge of her nose. A headache was coming on. “I know it doesn’t make much sense.”

Hector rumbled in understanding, like the purr of some giant cat or the far-off roll of thunder. “I’m more than used to you Medtown folk, coming down here all bug-eyed in the daylight and crooning on about whether the stars are aligned well enough to actually buy anything.” Drawers and cupboards slammed as he rummaged through them. Packing paper rustled.

Moira turned her head to catch a soft breeze that billowed through the tent. Sitting there, in the middle of the market, it was hard to hear anything beyond her immediate vicinity. Next door someone complained loudly about the recent losses in ivory stock, the thriftiness of the Verandi flotillas, the exorbitant cost of shipping anything by sea. It almost, but not quite, drowned out a strange droning noise that shifted in and out of hearing, so that Moira wasn’t sure she was hearing it at all.

“What you need–what you really need,” Hector half-muttered as he banged through drawers and cursed his assistants, “is this!”

She paused just long enough and then tapped the right side of her face, twisting her mouth into an aching grin. “Blind, remember?” The joke felt flat but he laughed anyway.

“Ha! You know your way around the city better than any blind person I’ve ever met. But very well.” Hector cleared his throat and resumed a theatrical air. “What I have for you today, young lady, is an item so rare, so beautiful, and so obscenely rich in its design that any sane man would ransom off a flotilla and a soprano just to be able to afford it. But for you, my Moira, for my dearest customer I shall offer this lovely, perfect blue stone for just the simple price of–”

“Hector.” Moira stood, shaking her hands out. The stinging of raw skin had passed, leaving only a dull ache. “Let me hold it a moment before you go naming prices.”

“–one srir and twenty sams,” he finished. Then, with the exquisite care known only by the largest of men, Hector leaned forward and placed the stone in her palm.

In the split second it took the stone to fall from his fingers to hers, Moira saw a stain of glowing blue where the gem should be; a phosphorescent star of raw magic. She tried to jerk her hand back but too late. The stone hit her palm, heavier than its size. Moira waited, frozen.

Though large for a gem–at least an inch across–the stone nestled neatly in the hollow of her hand. It was uncut and had not been polished; unusual for anything that was normally sold in the Pride. Instead of the shock of magic that she had been expecting or the the fading warmth from Hector’s hand on it, the stone gave off a frosty cold that burned. It was not harming her–though it was hard to tell with anything sorcerous in nature–and the bright cerulean was steadily leeching out of the thing and running all over her hand and down her arm.

“What…is it?” she asked, and then shook her head to clear it. That sound–the droning–was louder now.

Hector chuckled, but not quite as heartily as before. “Oh, the Verandi used to mine them on the southern peninsula. That was before your time and mine, before the War of the Flotilla Fortuna. The gems used to be all over the Sheer, still find them in some of the old Baron’s machines, too. But the Reach won’t buy them anymore and when I can’t rightly call it sapphire, nobody wants much of anything to do with them.”

Moira felt queer; numb, as if she had been walking for hours against a northern wind. Her hand closed around the stone, though she was not conscious of the motion.

“Well?” Hector asked after a long minute of silence. “Is it what you need?”

“I’m not certain…” In truth Moira wanted nothing more than to give the stone back to him, to shove it into his hands and walk as fast as she dared for home. Something about it seemed off, a minor note in an otherwise major concerto.

But the stone did not want to be given back, for all Moira could tell. She could not make her fingers release it.

“I’ll take it,” she said, holding it as far away from her body as possible.

Hector did not immediately reply, distracted no doubt by something he could see and she could not.

Moira’s second sight consumed her entire attention. The blue stain, which had begun by running over her hand and down her arm like water, now raced up her bicep and shoulder at an alarming rate. A frigid wave, far colder than the sea in her dream, came frothing on the heels of that cerulean light. It spread from her fingertips to her neck, a burning like ice. Moira gasped as the feeling invaded her skull, flowing over her aching cheek and settling behind her eyes.

She swayed, everything suddenly blue and bright and tinged with frost. Second sight gone–completely overtaken–her one free hand felt very far away as it cast around for support. Whatever balance she had had vanished and Moira blundered to the side, turning over a rack of shawls that fell around her like soft rain.

“–speak, Moira, whatever is the matter–” she heard Hector saying.

Her mouth would not answer. Words refused to come. “Just…just let me pay you,” Moira managed through gritted teeth. If she could only get back to Medtown. The last thing Moira wanted to do was throw Hector’s stone to the ground, incurring further bad luck and insulting him in the same turn.

“My dear, you are not well. Rest here a while.” His gentle hands touched her and she reared away, the gesture more unexpected than unwelcome.

Every inch of her body was on fire, searing layer upon layer of stinging ice. Meanwhile, as Moira struggled to extricate the two srir out of her bodice with hands leadened by cold, the blue grew brighter and brighter in her vision. Any minute now it would burst.

“Take it,” she said, thrusting the coins in front of her.

“Moira–”

“Just take it!” she cried. Unable to tell his direction Moira made her guess and fumbled. She missed Hector’s hand by a hair and the coins went spilling down.

One of Hector’s apprentices burst through the flap of the sales tent from the plaza outside. “Master! Master, we’ve got to go!”

The coins and the blue and the Phage hit all at once. A solarflare wreathed in frost exploded inside Moira’s mind. It consumed all senses, sending her careening into the cloth wall of the tent. The sound of silver on stone and the wrenching wail of iron cried out in the same breath.

Rough, thin hands grabbed Moira’s shoulders and flung her out of the tent and into frenzied foot traffic. The droning had finally reached its familiar fever pitch, jumping up the register too quick.

People rushed by, shoving Moira aside. She fought for balance; no sooner having found it than to lose it again. Men and women ran, scattering before the Phage. They pounded up the steps to nearby shops along the wall, screaming when they couldn’t get in. The mob began to seethe, pulling in different directions, hauling Moira along with it.

A scarf, still clinging to her shoulder, slipped and fell on the ground. Moira scooped it up and held the thick fabric to her face. Nothing, she could see nothing, except a roiling, all-consuming indigo light, with dark shapes moving within it.

Moira closed her eyes and began to run, one hand holding the stone and scarf to her mouth and the other held out in front, finding the way. A man stumbled into her, already thick with Phage and dying of it. He crashed into her elbow and fell, each breath rattling in his throat. Moira rushed on and did not turn back.

Balance returned. Long, quick strides carried her across the plaza, toward the southwestern edge. Moira tried not to gasp, not to fill her lungs with poison. She panted, despite all her efforts, and tasted the queer copper bite of the Phage.

Moira prayed as she ran, ducking under a small half door along the western wall of the Pride and setting her foot on the bottom step of the Crimson Stair. She prayed for minutes, knowing she had only seconds.

The Crimson Stair was an ancient thing, one of the first of its kind. Like the old bridges between the districts it connected the Pride with the next level, Evenrhyme. That district had been destroyed in the War, however, and now the Crimson Stair went up and up, cutting through all that empty space. Eventually, after switchbacking through a score of lesser quarters and bypassing the Tammy completely, the Crimson Stair poured out into Wrightsward. From there it was only half a block left, up the shorter and more sedate Brigid’s Stair, and half a block right to her own front door.

Moira wheezed as the high steps and the incline began to take their toll. She coughed, trying to catch her breath, any moment expecting to feel a thickness in her lungs. Pure fear replaced the numbness that had come before. It didn’t take long to die of the Phage.

The close tunnel she had been following stopped abruptly as the stair kept going, protruding out of the back of the tower and continuing over open air. Down below and up above Moira could hear the hissing of the killing fog as it issued out of every grating and vent in the city. The sound echoed, trailing itself in a never-ending susurration. Like a giant serpent, ready to spring.

Moira felt the curve of the stair just in time, narrowly avoiding a tumble over the open sides. There was no railing to protect her. Sweat already soaked the scarf through. Wind assailed her from either direction, teasing and pulling her towards the edge.

Her mouth thinned to a grim line and she wheeled to the side, flying around the turn and up, up towards Medtown.

First Gray, then tithe, Sophia, the Baron, and now this damned stone. Moira put her head down and ran flat out with all her might. If none of those things had killed her, if she had any fire left in her breast, she would live, dammit.

No sooner had Moira crested the last step of the final stair and crossed into Medtown than the second wave of burning cold crashed down upon her. She faltered, tripping over her own two feet; feet that she could barely feel.

Instead of making for her own apartment Moira turned left, toward the closer haven of Sophia’s. She stumbled into the side of the middle tower and jogged along it, hardly able to breathe through the stitch in her side.

“Soph–Sophia!” she called, gasping. Her own voice sounded distorted and strange in the fog.

Moira felt her way along the wall, slowing without meaning to. An ache she could not get rid of clutched at her chest, drawing each breath out painfully. She heaved and heaved, panic seizing tired limbs.

Just a little farther. Only a few more steps.

Hands caught her before she fell. Not the wooden, gloved hands of nutcracker men but the broad, callused hands of Verandi sailors.

“Is okay,” Rashka purred in his thick baritone, “you safe now.”

Moira let herself be carried inside. She only needed one touch–Sophia’s scarred fingers brushing against her brow–to know that she was safe.

“I ran…all the way…” Moira tried to say. “The Phage–”

Sophia covered her lips. “Not now, mon nyara. Coleed, Boris; get her to bed. Rashka, lock the door,” she barked, and a moment later the wood slammed home, locking out the Phage.

Moira felt herself slipping away. Horror gripped her: someone had to know. She made another attempt, reaching up to claw feebly at the men carrying her. “The stone, please, take–” Her voice broke into winded coughing and she could manage no more.

One of the men patted the back of her hand. “Is right here,” he assured her, “no worry now, yah?”

“B-But…”

“Quiet,” rumbled Boris, the larger of the two. “Sophia say.” Moira didn’t have the strength to argue.

They laid her on her old bed and drew the covers over her. One by one they left, Coleed last. He brushed her sweat-soaked hair out of her eyes and murmured reassurances that Sophia would be up in a moment, ready to heal whatever ills her lungs had sustained from the Phage. Moira reached to catch his arm as he left, but with no success.

When he was gone Moira opened her streaming, aching eyes to a whirl of color. There, clutched in her palm, dulled now but still beautiful, sat the stone.

~~~

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In which Moira tries to settle her debt with Gray.

If you like this you can support me on Patreon.

The Toymaker’s Opera is an alternative-world steampunk adventure. It is a story about a poor fortuneteller, a living automaton, a mad Baron, and a city that dreams. It is a story about the price of friendship and happiness, about legacy and talent, blood and luck. But most of all, it is a story about the things that have no price.

The Toymaker’s Opera

Sisters of Sun and Shadow

Moira

Frigid salt water crested the railing and crashed over Moira. The solidness of the wave broke upon her back, a moment of near-drowning, and then the rivulets were running down her arms and face, plastering her hair against unseeing eyes. Wind drove at her from every angle, sending stinging raindrops like musketfire against her skin. She splayed her feet for as much purchase as she could get on the slick wooden deck and hauled hard on the oar between her hands.

Though numbed through with cold and sea spray Moira could still feel the blooming ache between her shoulderblades and along her arms with each sweep of the oar. How many hours had gone by since the storm began she had no way to know. It might have been an afternoon gale or a full-scale typhoon; there was no way to measure time except the distant beating of the ship’s drum.

She couldn’t see the men on either side of her, either, could barely feel them at all. The only indication Moira had that she was not alone was the constant heavy jaw of the iron shackles on her bleeding wrists, snapping taut as she rowed.

Lightning crashed overhead, so bright and close that another slave cried out, though he should have saved his breath. Thunder followed almost at once, so loud it was as if a cannon had gone off right in her ear. Moira winced, for a moment able to hear nothing but a dull ringing. Then the sea and the sound of it came rushing back, and another wave smashed against the deck, this one hitting her full in the face. She staggered, footing swept out from under her.

The Rimsean slave master cracked his whip overhead, a threat readily heeded. Moira pushed and pulled in time with her fellows, desperate not to call attention to herself. Under her hands, now rough calloused and strong, the solid wood of the oar moved in great sweeping strokes, propelling the tiny galley up one giant swell and down the steep slope of another.

Despite the howl of the storm and the heartbeat of the drum, another sound cut through the booming roar of the sea. It started as a low hum, in her teeth, working its way steadily higher. Moira shook her head to clear the noise, suddenly unable to focus. The deck of the ship and the world all around her felt numb and far away. Heart pounding in her throat, she gripped the oar and hauled with all her might against the ocean’s fury.

Moira broke out of sleep screaming. She clawed the sweat-soaked blankets off and scrambled to her feet before the calm darkness of her own apartment was fully realized. Nevertheless she stood naked in the doorway to her kitchen for a long time, until the rocking of the sea and the last threads of her nightmare finally faded away.

The iron pipes that ran through the corner of her bedroom vibrated high and clear, spilling the Phage into the street outside. Mechanically Moira checked the windows and her front door, to be sure there were no cracks. There were none and she made tea, standing while the kettle heated.

“Not another one,” she murmured, leaning her clammy forehead on the cool stone of the kitchen wall. “Not another dream.”

Moira tried to remind herself that she was no oneiromancer, who could take the fabric of their clients’ dreams and use that to divine the future. She was a fortuneteller, a card reader. If her magic had something to tell her it wouldn’t use a dream, at least she thought it wouldn’t. But the sea and the slave galley had seemed all too real, and so had the nightmare about being laid out as an Ophelia, cold and unable to move, the day before, and the one of Gray delicately carving her a new face the day before that. Moira had bitten her lip, woken to the taste of blood, and nearly resolved to flee the city then and there, debt collectors be damned.

But she hadn’t. Her debt, even though it was her mother’s debt in truth, had to be settled. After her last encounter with Gray, where he had clearly meant to capture her for some further nefarious purpose, she didn’t know what to expect of the man. If she was ever to be free from her mother’s shadow, however, Moira knew she didn’t have a choice. She would have to visit Gray and soon, or risk worse retribution, whatever that might be.

In the darkness at the base the final southern tower, along the wall of the cliff, crouched the disreputable district of the Shade. Sheltered from above by the brick-paved roads of the Sundered Carnival and on either side of the tower’s corners by two enormous iron doors, the Shade was forever shrouded in impenetrable night. The cloak of blackness was only broken by the thousand dim red eyes of apartment windows along the cliff wall and the prowling forms of firecats who had wandered away from their posts.

No one knew when the Rimseans had moved in, bodily evicting the previous residents and invoking a bloody civil war with the Warren. An uneasy peace had been reached, though it had been bought with many lives, and even now both dens of thieves nipped away at each other’s heels, giving the districts in between no end of grief. They dressed their parlors in eiderdown pillows and geometrically-patterned rugs, smoking fragrant hookah and drinking strong tea like wine whenever they conducted business. A Rimsean man was as likely to be hospitable as hostile, depending on his mood; they made up for their immobile faces by changing allies, promises, and contracts whenever it suited them. In fact, if it hadn’t been for the strength of their coin and deep pockets, they might never have been allowed to stay in the first place. But despite the uncertain date of their arrival, since each section of the Sheer preferred to ignore the others until inconvenience arose, there could be no doubt the Rimseans held the district now, and held it well.

Rimsea; a jeweled city-state where men wore masks instead of faces, where the sun and the sea beat down upon the land like a master to his slave, where a noble woman might find herself with as much wealth as a soprano and a gypsy would find his life just as mean, a city with secret places and a law as unforgiving as those that the nutcrackers enforced. A city of cruelty and beauty who was only oustripped in ruthlessness by the Sheer herself, a city who might be called the Sheer’s southern sister, if it were not for the fact that neither would admit to any similarities between them at all.

Moira scoffed as she carefully counted out her coins several days later, after the Phage had ended. Surely the Rimseans were more lazy than the men and women who worked in the Sheer; she could hardly remember noticing any of them doing any sort of manual labor. And if their lackadaisical attitude wasn’t enough, the time they did spend working was all towards smuggling, drug running, and slave trading. They were a nasty business, every one of them, even if a few of their race did prefer to start shops instead like civilized folk.

“There, six srir and eighteen cassum pennies.” Moira slid the coins out of her hand and into the nutcracker’s collection box.

A silver rattle followed and then a click as it slowly closed the lid. The single nutcracker, who had attempted to undercharge her again, lingered on the stoop.

Moira made a gentle shooing motion. “Go on,” she said, not unkindly. As much as she would have liked to pay less, and as much as she had the suspicion that the automaton was trying to give her a discount  out of charity, she couldn’t let that happen. “The others will come, do you understand?” she continued, when it seemed the nutcracker would not move. “Your fellows will know and I will have to pay it all later, at once. Thank you, though, for doing it the first time.”

The nutcracker could not bow, at least not very well, but it made a valiant attempt with a sound like a creaking hinge. It then turned and marched stiffly down the steps and away, the tramping of boots fading into the hubbub coming up from Wrightsward below.

Attempting to quell her rising panic, Moira stepped out onto the landing and locked the door behind her. She secured the key and her funds and then stood in place, trying to unknot the tangle of lead that was her stomach. Finally, after several deeps breaths had done nothing to ease the tightening pang of worry in her chest, she made up her mind and set off, heading for the Lane of Lifts.

“Damn Margarette,” Moira muttered, cursing her mother’s name. “Damn her.”

It was no longer a matter of choice, for the consequences would soon fall at her doorstep if she abstained; she had to see Gray.

Once divided up between necessities such as new candles, food, firewood, soap, fabric, salt, and tithe, and saving forward for the few luxuries she would allow herself–a proper bath, tea, a second-hand blouse, and a new stone to further augment her readings–only half of what she owed Gray remained. She hoped that Gray would consider an even half better than nothing, and let her go, but there was no way to be certain.

If only her mother hadn’t been such an empty-headed fool! Moira bit her lip as she stepped inside the lift and winced as the door slid closed with a rattling screech of iron. There was nothing to grab onto, except the automaton at the back of the box.

The lifts traveled the tall length of the Sheer, going from Sunsgate to the Junkyard, cutting through every level. Each box was fenced on all sides by metal grating, much like a cage, so that the riders would not tumble out and be broken upon the bottom of the shaft. Yet despite this precaution the lifts were anything but comfortable and many folk avoided them out of habit; as they did not always go where one told them to.

Moira edged toward the denseness at the end of the box and slipped a few spare coins into the change slot. “Mercy’s Hall, please.”

Like a calliope the mechanism slowly shuddered to life, the vibration rising until the automaton’s arms began to turn the crank that would take them down. Moira grabbed onto the change reservoir with a cry as the lift sank like a stone, too fast. If she reached for any of the box’s bars she ran the risk of her fingers being shorn clean off by the support beams passing them by. She held on, swaying when each level jolted the car.

“Oh muses,” Moira moaned softly, the wind of their fall blowing her hair into her face and tossing her skirts all about. Beside her the automaton cranked still faster: a thin tune, worn down by centuries of service, playing quintuple time all the while.

When they landed at last Moira staggered out, determined to walk back to Medtown, even if it took her all day. There had been no way she was going to traipse all the way down to the Shade with so much money on her and taking the lift, however terrifying, was the quickest route. On the journey home, however–if there was a journey home–money wouldn’t matter.

Moira adjusted her clothes, patted her pockets, and set out. She was on the very lowest level of the Sheer, where it was as cold as a night in autumn. No sunlight filtered here, or if it did, she could not feel it.

The avenues at the base of the towers were spacious and deserted. If she were to travel directly east, toward the cliffside, eventually she would meet up with the market district of the Pride, the bank where she had exchanged her musean gold piece for a pile of srir coins instead, and the glittering bathhouse of the Troi Matabla. The far-off cacophony of a thousand voices at market could not penetrate the dark towers, and the air around Mercy’s Hall was silent and still.

Moira shivered, feeling the openness of the broad avenue on either side of her, sensing not even a firecat, much less any person. She walked, conscious of the dull clipping sound that her boots made on the stone, echoing back larger and louder, as if she was a regiment marching and not one woman alone.

The street took her west to another intersection and farther, past the open doors of mercenary halls where bawdy men and women called to her in appreciative and cajoling voices. South for the length of a tower and a half, crossing the lamplight of skymen’s taverns and the leaping firelight of ringing forges. Moira kept on until her feet ached, trying not to think of what–who–she was about to face. She nodded to passing strangers and kept her chin up and only once had to slap away the ghosting fingers of a pickpocket, who did not try again. She walked and walked and ignored the false flattery that poured out of tavern windows until at last she came to the great iron door that was the entrance to the Shade.

The door itself, she knew, was to keep the nutcrackers out; the Rimseans preferred to keep their own culture and their own laws separate from the rest of the Sheer when at all possible. Why the nutcrackers had not interfered with the doors’ making was a mystery, since any other ghetto that tried the same was quickly put to rout. Even now, as she leaned in to speak to the gatekeeper, she could sense a swirl of denseness off by the massive hinges; where the nutcrackers gathered with tools to try to take the door apart. They did not work very fast and occasionally shuddered and gave a queer wooden cry as rifle shots were fired at them from secret places along the wall. But despite all the trouble the Rimseans threw at them the nutcrackers did not stop, and if their tools were destroyed or stolen, they only went away and returned later with more.

It was a hopeless endeavor, one the Rimseans could not mean to win. Yet they had held off the Baron’s soldiers for more than a century, a feat no other district could lay claim to. The laws of the Sheer were as rigid and unyielding as the stone of the towers themselves, save for those rare few, it seemed, who were clever enough to avoid them.

Moira bit down on her prejudices as she was hastily admitted into the Shade, the smaller door of the gate inside the larger one that spanned the street clanging shut behind her. The boulevard she had left behind had been nearly deserted but here, inside the Shade, the road was teeming with life.

The spicey scent of sizzling meat wafted through the open market, mingling with the smell of chalky dyes and heady perfumes. Voices called out on either side of her, merchants crying the value of their wares in the sing-song language of their native tongue. Moira threaded her way between the thick knots of crowd, trying not to let her hands jump to her pockets and show off where she was keeping her money.

A blue-hot pinpoint of light, five times the height of a man, appeared at the very edge of her second sight. Moira pushed through the throng and flattened herself against the cold stone of the cliff, as far out of the way as she could manage. Slowly and sedately, as if it had all the time in the world, the light came on. A soft clicking accompanied it, the sound of delicately-hoofed feet navigating the uneven street.

Just as the Sheer had her firecats, machinations of the first Baron, so did Rimsea and the Shade have the stiltwalkers. But whereas the firecats had been created through a mix of sorcery and mechanical artificing, the stiltwalkers were creatures of nature, though not native to this side of the sea. Moira remembered them, vaguely, from childhood: deer-like beings with glossy coats of silver-blue, eyes glowing white and phosphorous, thin legs covered in a horn like glass, and fine, branching racks of antlers, upon which hung hundreds of lanterns. They served the same purpose as the firecats; streetlamps.

Moira stayed away from them all the same, though they were well-known for their even tempers and were not vicious in the least. The market around her was for locals, not outsiders, and there were few Rimseans who would not try to pick a fight with a faceless stranger. She bowed her head and hurried away from the lamplight that the stiltwalker brought, desperate not to be accosted before she reached her destination.

A journey that should have wound her in a maze of hours was instead made short by memory. Ordinarily trying to find any one door on the wall of a cliff that was populated by thousands of doors and jutting roofs and interconnected staircases was almost impossible but Margarette–damn her–had led Moira too often to Gray’s parlor to beg for Hex, and so now the fortuneteller found her way without error, though that fact made her anything but happy.

Moira stopped short on a broad patio, breathing hard from the climb. She pressed her hands together to stop their shaking, jumping them away at once as her fingers touched the memory of rough callouses. Before her stood the looming doorway to the Ocient, Gray’s hideaway, four guards lounging at their leisure beside it. Now that she was here and they had seen her, there was no leaving, however desperately that she might wish to.

The guards laughed to one another, jeers directed at Moira, near as she could tell. One of them rose and came forward, his lilting, accented voice full of false courtesy. Clearly they remembered her. “Sweet shade to you,” the man said, bowing too low. “However may we be of assistance to such a fine lady?”

Moira bristled, the dream-taste of salt water rising on her worry and disappearing in her anger. She had come to pay Gray but not to be mocked. “I have business with Gray,” she snapped, “bring me to him at once.”

“Of course.” The man purred his words until they sounded less given to exaggeration and more like the hissing of a snake. He snapped a command to the others and they sprang up at once, rising from their table of dice and going to open the door to the Ocient. “If you will come this way.”

It was not a question and Moira walked forward, conscious of their gazes. She could not run now. To go pell mell down the side of the cliff would be asking for a broken neck, if she was not caught first.

The air inside the cave house was cooler than the air in the Shade, if that was possible. Moira was paraded down a narrow tunnel, only able to tell its size from the scuffling of her footsteps echoing back to her. The tunnel turned and twisted, curving back on itself. She remembered being blindfolded as a child, clutching tightly to her mother’s sweating palm, as they were led together. There was no telling how many other openings they passed or whether she was being taken in circles for the humor of it. Whatever bristling she had felt died away, settling down to a heavy dread that made her breakfast feel like an uncertain stone in the pit of her stomach.

Gray’s men brought her to a low couch in a wider room and bid her to sit and enjoy herself while they fetched their master. The first man who had spoken to her went away and came back presently with a tea tray. He set it before her on the rug and made a show of explaining the sweets he had brought to accompany the beverage.

“Candied lemon birds,” he said, pressing the dessert into her hands before she could protest. Delicately folded, the dried strip of lemon preserves had been formed into the shape of a hummingbird, wings outspread, and dusted with fine sugar.

Moira balked, quickly closing her fists, but too late. The man had managed to put a sweet in one palm and a cup of strong tea in the other. “I can’t, no, thank you,” she blundered, realization dawning.

This was one of the ways Gray had ensnared her mother, offering Margarette material comforts and rich food and a bed in which to sleep undisturbed; something Moira realized now that her mother, too hungry and gone with Hex, could not have refused. Margarette might have declined, though, once she understood what was happening or she might have decided not to return to the Ocient, but she had not, preferring to throw herself at Gray’s hospitality if only it would mean more Hex. And it was that constant return that compounded her debt, Gray running up Margarette’s tab for every single scrap of luxury, every cup of tea, every morsel of food, every pillow on her lended bed.

The high, sweet smell of lemon and the light tang of molasses from the sugar was almost too much to bear. He’d already handed it to her, after all. Despite her nerves Moira’s appetite snarled in protest.

Trembling a little she set the lemon bird and the tea cup back on the tray at her feet and then clasped her hands before Gray’s man could put anything else into them. “No, thank you,” she said when he tried to press her further. “I am quite full.”

“I am not a dream-seer,” she murmured once he’d gone away, disgruntled but no less courteous. The words felt flat in her mouth, empty reassurances. Perhaps the nightmares were only in warning, a caution to keep her head.

As the minutes ticked by Moira lost all track of time. The men had left her quite alone in the large room and here there were no pipes or voices outside or even a breath of wind to mark the hours. Everything seemed to funnel to a single point–her eventual conversation with Gray. Beyond that discussion Moira could only envision darkness, could foresee no plans of reading that night or what groceries she needed to purchase next. The outcome of her visit to the Shade could only be one thing; but whether she would need to run or fight or beg was not yet clear.

Moira swallowed her anxieties, or tried to. She forced herself to mentally retrace the steps that would take her out of the Shade and back to Medtown. A hundred routes presented themselves, several handy ones crossed out because they led through the Warren and Moira had no desire to go looking for further trouble. The possibility of a quick escape route would take her down the last lift into the Junkyard, or up to the Ream, where she might lose Gray’s men among the factories there. She could make for the safety of the Crossroads Clock–surely they would not be so stupid as to follow her then–but that would mean running for the better part of the day out along the cliff’s edge itself, a prospect that did not endear itself to anyone. Moira chewed her lip. Her best bet was to get out of the Ocient if she could and throw herself at the mercy of someone else’s front door, and hope it did not also belong to Gray.

“–I told you, Corto, that is no way to treat a guest. Honestly, treating Sa Mim as though she were just any visitor! You ought to be ashamed,” Gray said, sweeping into the room, entourage in tow. He strode up to Moira and bowed low before her. “My deepest apologies for my associate’s behavior–trying to press you; absolutely unthinkable, what a wretch–it won’t happen again.”

“Canus–” Corto, the guard who had tried to give Moira the sweets, began.

Gray made a gesture Moira could only hear by the rasp of linen, a quick cut of his arm. The guard closed his mouth on whatever else he had been going to say. Gray took the opportunity of silence to have stool drawn over. He sat upon it, leaning in to wring Moira’s hand in enthusiastic greeting. “It is so delightful to have you with us again, my dear. What an age it has been since we last spoke–but you are not here for pleasantries, of course–how rude I am–you told Little you wanted to talk business so here we are. Trust me, my dear, you have my full attention.”

“Gray,” Corto–or Little–hissed. His aggravation was not disguised by the resonance induced by his mask. “But she tried to–”

Moira, aware that her open-mouthed staring must make her look like a gaping fish, pressed her lips into a thin frown instead. Anger, malice, patronizing, elitism, cold disdain; she had expected all of these emotions. The one thing she had not expected was kindness, if Gray was to be taken at face value. She was much more inclined to trust Corto, who clearly did not like her or the fact that she had threatened to remove Gray’s mask several months ago. At least he, she felt, was acting as he ought, and not playing games.

“Yes, what about that, Gray?” Moira cocked her head in his direction and tried to keep an even tone. If he wanted to dance then she could oblige him. “You did bring your men afterwards–”

“A simple overreaction on my part. Moira, dearest,” he murmured, rising from his stool to sit by her side. Gray picked up her hands and patted them gently. “I put you in a delicate position–the equivalent of trying to take your face away would be robbing you of your cards, I expect–and you retaliated in kind. I completely understand. I only regret,” he added, truly sounding morose, “that I had not the coolest of tempers. It was wrong of me to come after you so, very bad. I shall never do it again. You must understand, however, that a debt so long gone unpaid can only be a hardship to me. I have associates to provide for, tribute to pay, Saints to honor, and guests to please. Surely you can appreciate my position. How would you feel if a customer of yours did not pay you after you had gone to all the trouble of helping them?”

Inwardly, Moira recoiled. Gray was right and he was apologizing, even if she wished that he would not sit quite so close. She could not quite forgive what he had done, however. He was a man grown, more than used to the perils of living in a foreign city, and not an apprentice first setting foot in the Sheer. No, Moira could not doubt that Gray’s attack outside her door had been as deliberate and as calculated as the honey he was plying her with now.

“I’ve come with half your payment,” she said, continuing the dance. As long as he was going to be polite then she would step in time, if it meant leaving the Ocient with her freedom and her life.

“Splendid!” Gray nearly knocked the couch over as he sprang to his feet. Real delight echoed in his voice. He called for the collections box and his tally sheet. Once these were brought he held it steady while Moira carefully and slowly counted out each srir coin.

Moira took out her pocket once she had emptied all her secret places. The little bag had traveled safe and unmolested all the way down to the Shade. She stood across from Gray, placing each coin onto the velvet lining one at a time. With every clink of silver she felt a bit lighter; closer to leaving the Ocient and closer to leaving the bad taste of her mother’s memory behind for good.

She had almost finished, the last handful of coins clutched loosely in her hand, when Gray said, “By my reckoning that should leave you with three musean left. Now, I realize you are a very busy woman and can’t always make your payments on time. I propose a reasonable schedule, due two weeks after tithe each month, of six srir at an interest rate of twenty-nine percent–”

“What.” Moira’s hand froze over the box. Her entire body staggered, as though she’d been slapped. She shook her head, not sure she had heard him correctly. “Did you say…three musean?”

“But of course, my dear,” Gray answered, sounding perplexed that she should think otherwise. “Interest for the time I wasn’t being paid, aggravation, damages, lost business, etcetera. Now, if you’ll just sign this repayment agreement, we can–”

“And what if I refuse?” she demanded. Everything she had just given him amounted to more than she would normally make in three years. And at that rate of interest and schedule, repayment would be impossible. Moira’s fist clenched, the pointed sides of the srirs digging into her palm.

He chuckled, a low, self-satisfied sound. “Oh Moira, all the charges are quite valid. You may have a lawyer look over the contract. If you can afford one, that is.”

Never in her whole life had she so much wanted to strangle someone. The rage slammed into her faster and harder and with more force than a wave at sea. It was so unfair! “How DARE you?” she cried.

Instead of striking him she threw the rest of the coins at his feet, the soft thumping of silver hitting carpet and the singing when they rolled out over bare stone. Moira turned on her heel and stormed out the way she had come, too angry to speak.

Gray’s booming laugh followed her all the way out.

~~~

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