Tim Akers - Heart of Veridon

“I don’t suppose any of us are, anymore. Whatever’s going on, Em, it’s big. And it’s dragging us along with it.”

She grimaced, and then the two of us crossed to the next roof. Wilson was waiting. We spent an hour hiding, running, looking for someplace in the city where we’d be safe from whatever forces pursued us. We didn’t talk much. It was grim work.

We found a hole and planted. Veridon is full of holes, burrows in the steep slopes or nooks under the built up terraces of the modern city. This one was a warehouse that had lost its floor to a cistern that had collapsed, one of the ancient rivers that ran under the city shaking off its domestic borders and cutting into the architecture.

We set up on the ledges around the lake. Stairs led down into the water, and under the old first floor there was a cave of brick and mud, just a sliver of space that couldn’t be seen from the street. It was cool down there. The bricks were mossy and slick, and the air smelled like dead fish.

I lay my coat out on the brick and tried to relax. Wilson was setting up in the corner, and Emily was crouched at the water’s edge, staring down into the cold.

“Don’t get too comfortable, Wilson,” I said. He was hanging his tool belt on the wall, holding it there with some kind of viscous gunk. “We’re not sticking around.”

“Was that some crude swipe at humor?” he asked.

“I don’t know. Was it funny?”

“Not particularly.” He kept his back to me. His shoulders were twitching.

“Well then. I guess not.”

“We’re going to need food,” Emily said. “And we can’t be hiding in empty buildings forever.” She craned her neck to look at us over her shoulder. “We need a plan.”

“We need to know what we’re dealing with, first,” I said, struggling up. “There’s a lot more going on than is apparent.”

“Every Badgeman in Veridon is hunting us, Valentine has banned you from the organization… there’s more than that?”

“Yes,” I said. “The gods are trying to kill us or something?” Emily asked.

“Something like that.”

Wilson snorted, but he didn’t say anything. I folded my coat open and fished out the list I had gotten from Calvin.

“The guy you talked to, after I left. A little shorter than me, neatly dressed. Could have been military at some point. Bald. Leather gloves?”

“Yes,” she said. “It’s the gloves I remember the most. And his hands were hard. Very strong.”

“That’s Mr. Malcolm Sloane.” I took the paper and spread it out on the ground, smoothing it down. “Right here at the top.”

Wilson and Emily gathered close, stooping to look at the list.

“What is this?” Emily asked. “Angela Tomb is on this list. Where did you get this?”

“A friend. It’s a list of deceased, all from a single military unit. Their date and cause of death was censured, by order of the Council. Angela’s name is here because she authorized it. Sloane was Coordinating Officer.”

“Then he’s not the guy who came by Emily’s place, is he?” Wilson looked at me. “I mean, if he’s been declared dead.”

“Two things,” I said. “Coordinating Officer is not a field rank. It’s administrative. These other names could be the deployed unit. Sloane was the guy they’d report to when they got back to the city. Secondly, recognize anyone else on the list?”

“Marcus?” Emily said. “I didn’t know he was military.”

“Neither did I. A man of surprises, our Marcus.”

“This guy, too,” Wilson said. “Gerrus. I know he wasn’t military. A very clever thief, but never military.”

“So maybe this isn’t a military list after all?” Emily asked. “Maybe it’s something else. A list of criminals?”

“I’ve seen the original. This is military, trust me.” I took the ID card out of my coat and set it next to the list, by Wellons’s name.

“You collect military records now, Jacob?” Emily asked.

“This I got off a body, up on the Heights. It was in the quarters of the Artificers, surrounded by dead Guildsmen.”

“A marine. You’re saying a marine killed a bunch of Artificers? Or someone killed them, and this guy tried to defend them, got himself popped?” Wilson grimaced. “Seems unlikely.”

“No. Our friend Wellons was long dead. At least a couple weeks.”

Emily and Wilson stared at me dully for a few breaths. Finally Emily nodded as though she understood.

“Huh,” she said.

“So.” Wilson murmured. He sat back on his heels. “So, we’ve got a list of people, with deceased dates two years old. Only we know two of them didn’t die two years ago. But both of those people are dead now. This is good.” He smiled. “This is meaty.”

“There’s more.” They both turned to look at me. “I think I know who Marcus was running from.”

“When he crashed the Glory?” Emily asked.

“Yeah. The guy I told you about, the one who jumped. I saw him again, up on the Heights.”

Emily got dead still. “You could have mentioned that.”

“Been busy getting shot. At least I think it was him. And he changed, he became some kind of… an angel.”

“Angel,” Emily said.

“Yeah. Wings of steel and cog, talons like knives. Angel.”

Wilson was staring at me. They both were. Didn’t blame them. Angels were part of the mythology of Veridon. The Church of the Algorithm claimed that the wreckage they strained from the river Reine was sent to them by angels of steel and wire. They claimed to have been visited by one specific angel, a girl named Camilla. She was sick, and they were able to help her. In exchange, she gifted them with the secrets of the river. No one believed it, not even me, and I had seen an angel. I had killed an angel.

“This is… unusual,” Wilson finally said. He was fiddling with his tool belt, worrying it between his thin fingers like a prayer chain. “What did he want?”

“The Cog. Everyone wants the Cog. I saw him with the Artificers, and again later after I did the deal with Prescott. Later that night, I thought to go talk to him, went to see the Artificers. There was Wellons’s body, dead Guildsmen, the Summer Girl missing. He killed Prescott, probably thought I’d given the Cog to him, then came after me. Nearly killed me.”

“You’re a hard man to kill,” Wilson said.

“We’ve covered that. And you’re right, I am. I put him down. Her, it turned out.”

“Her?”

“There was a performance that night. The Summer Girl. It was her, the angel was her. When she died, the bugs fell away, the angel dissolved. There was just her.”

“That’s awful,” Emily said. “Gods, you killed that girl?”

“No. I killed that monster,” I hunched over the list, gathered up my coat. “I didn’t know.”

“What is this Cog?” Wilson asked. I sat up and looked at him.

“Not sure. I picked it up off a dead friend. Marcus here,” I said, pointing to the list. “Things have been weird ever since.”

“I have that problem sometimes,” Wilson said. “Dead friends leave strange gifts. This friend of yours, he brought you this Cog?”

“It ended up in my hands.” I stood up. The ruined ceiling was close. “I gave it to Emily to look after. See if she could find anything out about it.”

Wilson looked to Emily. “You could have brought it to me.”

“Things got strange,” she said, not turning around. “I had to ditch it fast. Some people showed up at my place, then Jacob got shot. It got complicated.”

“So.” Wilson said. “Angels and Councilmen. This must be one hell of a Cog.” He turned to Emily. “Where is it?”

“Tomb has it. I gave it to the Family Tomb.”

I nodded and loosened the revolver in my holster. The hammer was smooth and warm under my thumb.