But I knew a few. There was one about a knight and his princess. Rusclan and Ludmilla. On the day they were to marry Ludmilla was carried away by one of Rusclan's rivals. Through many trials Rusclan hunted and found his beloved. But that wasn't the point. The point was his supposedly faithful and Unbound friend, the only man Rusclan would trust with his powerful and pion-strengthened sword. The night after Rusclan had regained his bride his friend broke that trust, and killed the hero with his own weapon.
After which Rusclan was healed by a good binder and went on to save the princess again and probably the day. Something like that. But again, that wasn't the point. It was the Unbound that called to me, skulking from his place in the darkness. What could it have felt like to play shadow to a knight like Rusclan, to care for his pionpowerful sword when all it looked like to you was a hunk of steel? Would you feel used?
The man didn't have a name. He was just Unbound.
So, that's what I was. Untrustworthy, unnamed. Unbound.
I felt dark against the rays of the new sun. But as I disembarked from the Tear and made my way toward Darkwater I realised how wrong the fairy tales were. We did not skulk in the darkness because we belonged there. We stuck to the darkness because that was where we had been pushed. Because of the crowds and the offended looks.
And because that's where the debris was. If debris didn't like the shadows, the crevices, the cracks and the darkness, then we wouldn't have to walk in it.
Debris skulked, we merely followed.
Breakbell had not yet sounded as I reached the door to the sublevel, but it was unlocked – Kichlan had arrived before me. I glanced up before I stepped into the stairwell and caught sight of clouds rushing over the Keeper's Peak, whipped along by a wind as strong as the Tear's current had been. They shaded the promising morning sun.
Sure enough, Kichlan and Lad were alone in the sublevel, and both avidly poking at a young fire.
"Morning," I said, and shrugged off my heavy jacket. It was pleasant in the sublevel, warm and sleep-inducing, far nicer than the outside promised to be. "Clouds are coming." Hands thrust out, I warmed myself by the struggling flames.
"Tan!" Lad leapt to his feet, opened his arms, checked himself visibly and compromised by patting me on the shoulder. "Good morning, Tan."
"Good morning, Lad."
He beamed, and crouched down to the fire.
Kichlan and I shared a raised-eyebrow glance. "He's being good," Kichlan mouthed, before standing up, and passing me something wrapped in linen.
"What's this?" I flipped open the cloth and found a cool pastry, about the size of my hand.
"Eugeny and I have been talking," Kichlan said. "We decided you don't eat enough." He couldn't quite meet my eye.
"Did you now?" I hardened my expression and fixed him with my gaze. I didn't need handouts, least of all from Kichlan, Eugeny or Lad. They who had hardly anything to share.
"Didn't," Lad said, from his position by the fire, leaning so far into the fireplace I expected him to topple at any moment.
"Lad!" Kichlan snapped. "Get your head out of there."
His younger brother sat back, expression puzzled, verging on hurt. "But you didn't, bro. Geny said Tan was hungry and you said she wouldn't want to. You said she's too…" he screwed his face up. "Don't remember."
With a sigh, Kichlan patted his brother. "Ever the diplomat, Lad."
Lad grinned, and returned to his fire.
"Too what?" But I couldn't feel angry, not at the embarrassment colouring Kichlan from neck to forehead. "What am I, exactly?"
"Proud."
I thought of the ball, of sitting alone in the shadows. "Then you don't know me as well as you think you do." I bit into the pastry. Potato, pumpkin, and turnip were soft. I tasted pepper and the faint dripping of lard holding it all altogether. Before leaving I had drunk my usual tea, and scrounged leftovers from a meal Devich had made on Rest: the crusts of bread he hadn't wanted to eat, and browning apple peel.
I just had to hold on. Another night like the ball, more of Devich's important friends, and I would make someone listen. I would make someone understand. Or Tsana would wake up to her cowardly self and together, we would open a tribunal. We would tell the truth and the veche would find whoever was behind those pions burning fierce, and with the compensation – surely, I would be compensated – I would have enough kopacks to eat. To keep my home.
Just a little while longer.
"Thank the old man for me, won't you?" I sucked oil from the tips of my fingers.
"I'll tell him you said that with your fingers in your mouth." Kichlan grinned. "Trust me, that will be thanks enough."
As breakbell sounded above us, the rest of the team filtered in. Uzdal and Mizra were wrapped in extra scarves and knitted hats, their pale features nearly lost amidst the clothes. Sofia was so heavily layered she walked like a child dressed for the snow. A few strands of her dull hair escaped a large knitted hat, to stick against her cheek and nose. Natasha followed, brown hair tucked into a tight dark cap pulled down as far as her eyebrows.
"Lovely day outside," Uzdal muttered. Even in the sublevel warmth he kept his layers on.
"If we're really lucky it might snow on us again," Mizra added. "Wouldn't that be nice?"
Kichlan collected metallic jars and filled his brown leather bag. "Then the sooner we fill quota, the better."
"Other's oath," Uzdal muttered.
We left the Darkwater sublevel and entered an outside world growing rapidly dim and cold. I tucked my hands into the pockets of my jacket, tugged my leather-lined cap down to cover my ears. The wind that had whipped the clouds along started whipping us as soon as we stepped into the street. It was funnelled by the buildings and careened down Darkwater with a scared-dog howl. Above us, clouds settled in like hounds for the night, dark fur raised and shaggy.
It was hard to believe I had ridden the Tear in clear sunlight that morning.
"The snow will start any moment," Mizra said as we turned the first corner in what I was beginning to learn was our usual Mornday route. "And then, if Lad finds another sewerage vent, the day will be complete." He clasped his hands behind his back in a fair imitation of Kichlan. "Because if collecting doesn't make us as miserable, as cold, and as dirty as possible, then we're simply not doing it right."
I grinned at him and glanced at Kichlan. He was entertaining Lad that morning who, as usual, led us from the front. Together they were pointing at lampposts, rooftops, effluent vents. But at each one Lad just shook his head. Not a good sign, as far as the quota was concerned.
"What is it with this place and brothers?" I asked, keeping my voice low.
Mizra shrugged. "Don't know about those two, but twins always end up as collectors."
"Really?"
"Truly."
"Other's oath," Uzdal muttered again.
What had started Uzdal's sudden fascination with the phrase? I thought for a moment. "I haven't met many twins like yourselves." Had I met any at all? No binders that I could think of, not at any circle level.
Both made identical faces of disgust. "Sad truth about the world, Tanyana," Mizra said. "Twins aren't particularly, how shall I put it? Desired."
I did my best to appear perplexed, and assumed that it worked when Uzdal gave his head an exasperated shake.
"Most twins end up like us." Uzdal pointed to himself and his brother. "Debris collectors. Fallen. So, most mothers, if they find out they're expecting twins, well, they do something about it."
"They abort the children," Sofia, walking behind us, interrupted. "That's what these two are trying to say, although they obviously don't want to. Of course, if you'd just thought about it for a moment you might have worked that out for yourself."