Marjorie Liu - Within the Flames

The boy nodded. Eddie walked back inside the workers’ station for his backpack. All he needed was his wallet and cell phone.

“Come on,” he told Jimmy. “Let’s go find her.”

They walked fast across the uneven ground, flashlight beam swinging wildly across the shadows. Squeaks echoed off the walls, and the air smelled like rotting garbage, accompanied by the occasional whiff of feces.

Jimmy gave Eddie a sidelong look. “Are you Lyssa’s boyfriend?”

His heart squeezed. “I hope so.”

“You don’t know?”

“Do I have to go through you first?”

“Maybe. I like her.”

Eddie smiled to himself. “I’ll arm wrestle you for her heart.”

“You’re bigger. That’s cheating.”

“Can you blame me?” He heard voices ahead of them, and saw the reflected flicker of fire against the tunnel walls. “Wait.”

“It’s okay. I know them.” Jimmy began to lurch ahead, but Eddie grabbed the back of the boy’s sweatshirt.

“Wait,” he said again, firmly. “Give me the flashlight, and stay back.”

The boy’s scowl wasn’t quite lost in the beam’s glow, but he lingered in the shadows as Eddie strode across the rough gravel. He listened for Lyssa’s voice, but all he heard were men laughing coarsely, and the hum of a radio.

“Jimmy,” he said, over his shoulder. “What did that note say? The one you gave her?”

The boy hesitated. “No message. Just a piece of fur stapled to the paper.”

“Dammit,” Eddie muttered, and began running — right into a tent city that reminded him of some apocalyptic way station for humanity. When and if the end of the world came, this would be what it looked like: homes made of cardboard and trash, and broken furniture that held up nothing but air. Fires burned in barrels, and a few men were huddled around them.

They stared at Eddie with surprise and wariness as he approached, clutching that blanket around his waist.

“Lyssa,” he said sharply. “Did she pass through here?”

A tall black man blinked heavily at Eddie. “Like a bat out of hell. She mentioned a naked man might come this way. Left money for clothes, but there’s not much to give you.”

Eddie gritted his teeth. “I’d appreciate anything you can spare, sir. I can pay, as well.”

“Hmm,” he said, just as another old man saw Jimmy and bared his teeth in a brutal hiss that sounded like the death throes of a decrepit snake.

“Fucking little thieves,” he muttered, coughing on a snarl. “I’m ready for you and that dog.”

The boy sputtered. Eddie stepped in front of him. “You touch this kid, and I’ll break your arms off.”

“Hey, now,” said the black man, holding up his hands. “No need for bad feelings. Mack, maybe you should go sit down. Take a load off your bad back.”

The old man, whose skin was the color of snow and ash, made a wet grunting noise and gave them all a dirty look. He didn’t leave the circle of heat but looked down at the flames with a stubborn jut of his chin.

Two minutes later, Eddie was forty dollars poorer, and dressed in jeans that were loose in the ass and short in the leg. His red sweatshirt smelled like mildew and concrete and made his skin itch.

“Lyssa said to tell you not to follow,” said the black man, rubbing his knee with a wince. “But that she knew you would , and that she was sorry for trying to get a head start.”

“I bet,” Eddie replied.

“Women,” he added. “They’re killers.”

Handcuffs were cold, even on dragon skin.

Lyssa’s glove was still in place, but the soft portion covering her wrist had ridden down just enough for the metal to rub against her scales. She ignored the sensation, watching red taillights and the two police officers riding up front, who did not speak to her or talk with each other.

It was still night, which surprised her. Time never meant much underground, but this day had been one hammerblow after another.

Life hates the complacent, her mother had told her. Almost as much as the complacent hate living.

Are you talking about me? Lyssa’s father had asked, grabbing his wife around the waist. If I’d been complacent, I’d never have caught you, darlin’.

Her mother had a beautiful laugh. Sometimes it was hard to remember what it sounded like.

You knew this would happen, thought Lyssa, wishing her mother were here. You knew you weren’t the last of your kind.

You knew someone would come for you, one day.

And if not you, then me.

Lyssa wore Eddie’s jacket, and it felt like a suit of armor. His warm, smoky scent still clung to it — and her — and she breathed deep as she listened to the radio crackle, and the squeak of the vinyl beneath her, and the jangle of handcuffs.

Eddie, she thought. Eddie, don’t look for me. Jimmy, don’t tell him anything.

Stay away. Please, stay away.

The two police officers had done their best not to show her their faces. Only during that initial approach on the sidewalk had she gotten a good look at them. The driver was middle-aged, white, with a downturned mouth and milky blue eyes. His partner was Latino, young and handsome, and six inches shorter than Lyssa. He kept giving the other man nervous looks.

Both had been waiting outside the neighborhood Laundromat, a nondescript hole-in-the-wall between an Italian deli and a convenience store that sold more comic books and cigarettes than milk and bread.

The building that housed the laundry — and, to some degree, the deli and convenience store — had been built over the second entrance to the abandoned subway tunnel. Or rather, there was a door in the laundry’s basement, which descended into a mechanical room that held another door that opened into a corridor filled with pipes — leading to yet another hall that had a metal grille in the floor — which, when lifted, revealed a ladder that descended into a hand-dug corridor that spilled out into the subway tunnel.

One had to be very brave or very stupid — and sometimes lucky — to find certain secret places. It also helped that the owner of the Laundromat was sympathetic to folks who lived underground. Mostly because they washed all their clothes at his place.

Lyssa had not felt brave, stupid, or lucky when the cops pointed guns at her. She felt no surprise, either, not even when a tall, African-American woman in a red jacket glided from the shadows.

Nikola.

The men handcuffed Lyssa while she watched, and their scents washed over her in a wave of body odor and sweat, and nauseating fear.

No rights read. But why would they? Rights didn’t exist. Not here, not now.

All that mattered was power.

“Lyssa Andreanos,” said Nikola, and the police officers flinched at the sound of her voice.

“That’s me,” she said, staring the woman in the eyes. “Sorry about Betty.”

Nikola punched her in the stomach, then grabbed her hair, yanking back her head.

“You will be sorry,” she whispered, then frowned when Lyssa’s only response was a quiet laugh.

Nikola drove a red Corvette. During the ride over the Hudson, she pulled alongside the police sedan and looked into the backseat at Lyssa — who stared back, straight into her eyes, with a smile.

You can’t make me afraid of you, she thought. Not unless I choose to be afraid.

The witch’s frown deepened, and she gunned her Corvette ahead of them. Lyssa kept smiling but for a different reason.

Five minutes after crossing the bridge that spanned the Hudson, the police took an exit off the freeway and cruised down a series of twisting streets that carried them into a quiet riverside neighborhood filled with expensive homes nestled in expensive gardens, where a person could smell the money in the breeze, and the breeze smelled good.