Tim Lebbon - Echo city

"And after I left?"

"The purge," Malia said, and in her voice Peer heard a sense of relief. Perhaps this was something she needed to talk about to keep her memories, and her fury, fresh. "The Scarlet Blades were sent out by the Marcellans-and their Hanharan-fucking priests-to stamp out the Watchers' organization once and for all. They'd already destroyed our political side, with you and the others being killed or…"

"Tortured," Peer said lightly.

"Yes, that. So they went after the rest of the organization. Announced it as a banned group, dangerous to the well-being of the city. Bad times. They swept through Course, killing and arresting as they went. Some of us escaped, some hid, a few fought. But fighting wasn't the thing back then, and it likely never will be. We're the sensible minority in a city of unreason."

"How did you escape?"

"Bren and I went down into the Echoes around the water refineries. We thought we'd be safe, because it's endless down there. And he hoped that after long enough we'd be forgotten and could return topside and live again. But there were Blades waiting down there. Maybe it was luck on their part, or more likely they'd already tortured favored hiding places out of Watchers they'd caught. They took Bren, but I slipped away-"

"From Scarlet Blades?" Peer winced instantly, ashamed at the doubt her voice betrayed. But Malia saw Peer's regret and looked down at her feet as they passed from unsurfaced paths onto a road of condensed gravel.

"Bren fought them," she said. "Gave me a moment to flee and hide. Just enough time, the edge I needed, and I ran and ran. I heard him shouting from behind me, a long time after I'd started. Heard them following, like rats scampering through the Echoes. And something…" She trailed off.

"Something?"

"Something saved me."

They stopped walking and Malia sat on a low wall beside the road. "There's a safe house not far from here," she said. "Devin and Bethy will hopefully be there. We need to start spreading the word about Rufus."

"Yes," Peer said, "but what saved you?"

"Phantoms."

Peer frowned. Shook her head. "They're echoes of Echoes."

"Some say they're unsettled wraiths of people killed by Blades in the distant past and that they hate them still." Malia shrugged. "But something covered me down there, smothered me from view, kept me still. I saw three Blades pass within stabbing distance of me, and if I'd been able to move I'd have gone for them. Might've taken two of the bastards with me, at least. But it kept me from moving."

Peer looked across a field of blooming fruit trees at the reservoir and let the brief silence grow.

"They sacrificed Bren on the wall," Malia said at last.

"I know. I'm sorry." Peer saw the glitter of tears in Malia's eyes. An uncharitable thought came-So she does feel-and Peer glanced away in shame.

"As far as I know, the thing with Gorham and Nadielle was all her," the Watcher woman said, wiping angrily at her eyes. "And I suppose he was feeling… vulnerable. Don't know what she sees in him, frankly."

Peer glanced at her, frowning, but then she saw Malia's expression soften somewhat, the creases around her eyes and mouth defined in the morning sun as she almost smiled.

"Yeah," Peer said. "Lousy in bed too."

Malia chuckled. Peer laughed. And then Malia stood quickly as something flitted overhead, flying low and fast toward a spread of buildings to the south.

"What is it?" Peer asked.

"Messenger bat. We use them, but only in emergencies. Too easy to trace. Come on."

Malia led them toward the safe house, and Peer hoped it would remain safe for a little while longer.

It took a while to reach the house, buried as it was far up one of the sloping streets leading toward the walls of Marcellan Canton. Malia jogged steadily, but soon Peer found herself out of breath and sweating, her old hip wound aching. All those long days harvesting stoneshrooms must have detracted from the fitness she'd once enjoyed.

The streets were busy already with people on their way to and from their places of work, and Peer and Malia attracted more than a few curious glances. We should slow down, Peer wanted to say, but something had Malia unsettled. So Peer stayed quiet, concentrating on the pounding heels of the woman ahead of her, and hoped that chance favored her this morning. Hers was not an especially recognizable face, but since breaking out of Skulk she was more than aware that a death sentence hung over her.

"Not far," Malia said over her shoulder, and Peer knew that the Watcher must have heard her panting.

They reached a small, sloping square where a group of musicians had set up their instruments on a leveled timber area. The musicians stood and sat with their backs to the Marcellan wall, their gentle strains serenading people rushing here, there, or somewhere else. Few stopped to watch, but the musicians seemed unconcerned. Peer had seen their like many times before, and from her time with the Watchers she knew more about them than did most Echo City inhabitants. Their music was designed to lull, written by songsmiths embedded deep within Order of Hanharan circles. Listen to enough of that crap, she remembered Malia's husband, Bren, saying across a table of empty wine bottles and spilled ale, and you'll be paying homage to Hanharan's asshole by morning. They'd laughed at the blasphemy and glared at any tavern patrons daring to throw a disapproving glance their way.

Past the square, along a tree-lined avenue of three-story buildings, and then Malia paused at a doorway and glanced back at Peer.

"Still with me?" she asked, smiling. Her breathing displayed hardly any sign of exertion, and Peer's respect for this Watcher woman grew some more.

Malia knocked at the door. A small viewing panel slid open and she exchanged words with someone inside. As bolts and chains were withdrawn beyond the door, she turned back to Peer, face grim.

"We should hurry," she said. "The bat's here and the reading's about to start."

Bats. Readings. Peer knew nothing of this. And as she followed Malia into the small, shady house, she wondered just how much the Watchers had ever confided in her. Being a part of their political wing, she'd believed that she had their beliefs and concerns at heart every time she'd confronted Marcellan politicians or the more fanatical Hanharan priests. The Marcellans had been entrenched, though, and although they were completely driven by their Hanharan faith, they had ironically viewed the Watchers' political face-the representation of a faithless belief-as fundamentalist.

But perhaps the Watchers had felt it safer keeping their true, deeper secrets to themselves. Having been banished and returned, she was now a part of something deeper and more covert. Being used even back then, she thought, but now was not the time for upset or recriminations. The past was past. The future had yet to be formed. And the higher the sun rose today, the more unsettled she feared their immediate future might be.

The woman was huge. Peer didn't think she'd ever seen anyone this size in her life-a bulbous mass of sickly gray and yellow flesh, with rolls of fat spilling from between swaths of damp leather. Atop this gently shifting mass was the woman's head, chinless and swollen, with a small tight mouth and eyes all but hidden in pits in her skull. Her arms and hands seemed unnaturally small compared to the rest of her body, and her legs were somewhere out of sight. The smells were rank and rich, and as the woman shifted to watch them enter, Peer heard wet and fluid sounds. It was disgusting, and it made her want to retch-but then she saw the woman's eyes for the first time.

"Hello, child," the woman said, staring directly at Peer. Her voice was high and light, lilting with harmonies that would have put a silk snake to shame. "Close the door behind you. It's cold."