Alexandra Duncan - Salvage

“I have to say, I’ve never heard of a crewe abandoning a girl before,” Howe says.

I look out on the garden, where a row of pear trees is beginning to fruit. “It happens.”

“I’ve worked here seven years and I’ve never seen a crewe girl. Vina will want to hear all about you.”

We stop at a set of steps leading up to a green door with an old-fashioned knob, like the one in Soraya’s house.

Howe pulls out his crow again. “Hena?”

“Vina’s there. She says to go in whenever you’re ready.”

“Thanks, Hena.”

She snorts. “It’s your funeral.”

The green door opens on a kitchen. Shelves run along every wall and above the counters, every surface crammed with seed packets, clothespins, books, and cheery jars of jam, chutney, and pickles. Sacks of potatoes and pears slump against the bottommost shelves. A stack of plates dries by the sink.

“Vina?” Howe calls.

“In here,” a woman answers from the next room.

We follow the sound of her voice into a small office. She sits at an enormous desk. Wires, used mugs, and scraps of paper litter her workspace, along with a crook-necked lamp, a tablet, and a scanning machine. Behind her, yellowing log books climb the shelves all the way to the ceiling. I crane my neck to read the print on one of the spines. PSYCH EVALS A-B.

Vina doesn’t look up from the tablet she’s been scribbling on. “This had better be good, Howe.”

“Vina, this is Parastrata Ava,” Howe says. “She’s here about some records.”

Vina looks up and narrows her eyes at me.

“My grandfather was from groundways,” I explain again. “That’s why . . .” I wave a hand at my appearance.

Vina nods and steeples her fingers beneath her chin, but still doesn’t say anything.

“I’m looking for someone from another crewe. A boy named ther Luck.”

“I thought you’d want to talk to her,” Howe says. “Seeing as—”

“Thank you, Howe.” Vina nods. “I can take it from here.”

Howe breathes a sigh of relief, and then he’s gone and I’m alone with Vina.

“Well.” Vina leans back in her chair and raises her eyebrows at me. “Would you like to have a seat?” She waves at a tatty blue chair in the corner.

“Thank you, so missus.” I sit, nervous. My eyes flit over the books behind her. GRAIN INTAKE MAY-DECEMBER. WORK SPONSOR RELEASE FORMS. RESIDENT INDEX.

Vina clears her throat. “So you’re looking for someone?”

“Right so.” I shift in my chair. “ ther Luck.”

“How old?” She stares at me, not moving.

“Now?” I try to stop fidgeting and make myself sit up straight. “Um, nineteen or twenty turns—years—I think.”

“That old?” Vina frowns. “And when would he have come here?”

I count back in my head. “Some time in the last eight deci—I mean, months.”

Vina grimaces and clicks her tongue. “I don’t remember anyone that old in the last year. Most of the boys we get are much younger. Thirteen, fifteen. But I’ll check my records.” She spins her chair around and reaches for the log labeled RESIDENT INDEX. “You know, you could have submitted an information request through the feeds. You didn’t need to come all the way out here.”

My body goes hot, and then cold. Why didn’t I think of that? I could have known all this time. I could have found Luck months ago.

“I . . . I didn’t know that.”

“Here we are.” Vina drops the thick log book on her desk. She pages through. “ ther, ther. Yes, okay.”

My heart lifts.

She continues. “ ther Talent, ther Mercy, ther Far.” She flips the page. “ ther Till. ther Keep.”

She looks up at me. Her mouth twists in professional sympathy. “I’m sorry, those are all the boys we’ve found from the ther crewe over the last year.”

I sit stunned for a moment. “Can . . . can I see that book, please?”

“Certainly.” Vina hands it over.

I flip through the pages, reading the same names she recited, each with his own page of data. Intake date. Height. Weight. Approximate age.

“But . . .” My mind skitters, trying to find a way for her words not to be true. “Are there other places—homes, like this one—where he could be?”

“Not really.” Vina lifts the book from my hands. “We get all the boys left in-country and on Bhutto station, but most states don’t want to spend money on rehabilitating a bunch of vagrant boys.”

I open my mouth to protest.

“That’s how they see them,” Vina says quickly. “In most of the backwaters out there they end up stealing to eat, getting in fights, begging. A lot of them wind up in detention facilities. It’s the fortunate ones who are picked up and sent here. And we’re only open because we’re nearly self-sufficient, really. We don’t take much government funding.”

“I see.” I stare blankly at the stack of papers on her desk.

Vina closes the log and replaces it on the shelf. “I’m sorry. I hate to be blunt, but if he didn’t come through here, your chances of finding him are slim to none.” She swivels back to me. “Are you absolutely sure his crewe left him behind?”

I bite my lip. Luck’s face bleeding from his father’s ring. The metal look in ther Fortune’s eyes. “No,” I say. The word tastes like copper.

“That’s good, then.” Vina smiles, but it looks forced. “That’s the best we can hope for, really, that his crewe didn’t abandon him after all.”

“Right so,” I say quietly. But she doesn’t understand. If Luck’s crewe didn’t leave him, that can only mean he’s dead.

“Now, I’ve answered your questions. I hope you’ll be so good as to answer mine.” Vina reaches over to her tablet and taps.

“Recording started,” a mechanical voice says.

Vina leans forward at her desk and laces her fingers together. “We’ve never had a girl from one of the crewes turn up here before. You’re quite the find.”

“Thank you, so missus, but I have to walk back and catch the train. I have people waiting for me.”

She frowns. “You’ve clearly adapted much better than most of our boys. Your experience could be invaluable in improving our socialization techniques.”

I bite my tongue. She sounds like Dr. Lata, trying to overrun me with words. Why should she expect me to tell her things I’ve never even told Rushil or Soraya?

“Thank you, so missus,” I repeat, sharper this time. “No.”

“Well, at least let me offer you some tea before you go.” Vina forces a smile and pushes back her chair. “It’s a long way back to town.”

“Thank you,” I say dully.

Vina bustles around the kitchen, running water into a kettle and crinkling open a wax paper pouch of loose tea. “You know, we have so much to learn from each other,” she calls over the running water. “You could give us such insight into the crewe system. And we can always use a pretty face to help convince parliament to increase our funding.”

A spark of anger flares in my chest. She’s asking me for help? Me? She’s just told me in so many words that Luck is dead, and now she’s grasping at me.

Vina returns with a tea tray, all smiles. “Think about it, Ava. Imagine all the good we could do together.”