“Everything is weighted with… consequence, Mr Tomlinson.”
“To scramble the mind so, it is-”
“Exactly what modern medicine does, and this is a very specific form of medicine. Now, the drug is easy to produce?”
“Yes, and to produce cheaply. We can have it in the… facilities within a month.”
Facility was a polite way of saying prison, those groaning, fetid pits where the damned would cling to a drug like this. Stade chewed on his cigar. It would start with the prisons and spread out from there. He said, “Good. The, um, recipe
— I want it distributed as widely as possible.”
“Isn’t that dangerous?” Tomlinson rose to his full height, almost as tall as Stade. “This drug will reduce the will of a city.”
“Mr Tomlinson, I am not putting it in the water. “ Stade loomed over the chemist, tapped a little ash onto the ground. “Believe me, there are far more dangerous things than this drug you have invented. Far more dangerous things.”
Tope cleared his throat. And Tomlinson’s eyes grew pleasingly wide.
Stade said, “Of course you have nothing to fear. This is a legal contract.”
Tomlinson took a deep breath. He walked to his desk, watched closely by Tope and Sheff. He pulled a file from the teetering pile of notes. “Everything you need is here.”
Stade walked from the building; the boy was back on the corner, but the moment he saw Stade and his Vergers, he ran. Tope gave him a look, and Stade shook his head, in a few weeks he would be selling Stade’s new drug. Though perhaps not on this corner, there would be too many bad memories here.
The production of drugs was such a dangerous activity, all those chemicals. Fires got out of hand all too quickly. It would be a terrible tragedy of course, and as a mayor who had risen on the back of small business he would speak at the funeral. One did such things for important constituents: it was a sign of respect.
He couldn’t risk anyone in Parliament finding this out. Not even Warwick, he wouldn’t understand. His friend wouldn’t understand a lot of things that Stade had put into action. A week after the Grand Defeat, and still no one seemed to understand that the world was ending.
Rain clouds had gathered. Stade pulled Tomlinson’s file under his jacket, and scowled. He hadn’t thought to bring an umbrella.
Part Two
Drift
I should have taken David with me, not left him with the monster Cadell. Though in truth where I had ended up was just as dangerous. The worst thing was all the time I had: to doubt, to regret, to grow fearful. I'd been left alone, my companions murdered, my city squandered for something that was already lost to it, an Underground that had been overrun by Mayor Stade's enemies.
We were all haunted by the past, by the ghosts that drift and challenge. In a kingdom of the dead with night drawing close, what else could you expect? I don't think anyone slept easily in those last few weeks. We were waiting, every single one of us, for something to come. Roil or not, we knew it would be bad.
And it was.
Whispers in the Dark, Medicine Paul
CHAPTER 18
There was no city quite like her. When I close my eyes, sometimes all I see are those walls, ice-slicked, and I half fancy that the earth moves to the beat of the Four Cannon. Tate haunts me still.
THE CITY OF TATE WITHIN THE ROIL BUT NOT OF THE ROIL
Margaret increased the night sight of her field glasses and swept the horizon, tracking the thin pale line of Mechanism Highway. No matter how she adjusted her field glasses, the convoy did not appear.
In the south-eastern quarter, Sentinels fired at a drift of floaters blown in too close to the walls. The Sentinels' bullets punctured the creatures' gas sacks with a wet slap. Margaret turned towards the sound and watched the last floater, its jaws snapping uselessly, crash to the ground like a burst balloon.
Another threat efficiently dealt with, as all threats were here. Footsteps crunched on the ground behind her.
“Go home,” Lieutenant Sara Varn said, her breath escaping in plumes from cracked lips as she spoke. “You're not meant to be here until tomorrow and I will not have a weary sentry on my wall. Get some rest.”
Wrapped in the standard black cloak of Tate's Sentinels, Sara’s single concession to Halloween was a tiny silver skull pinned to her collar. She wore heavy spiked boots. Strapped to her back were two ice rifles, while a rime blade and ice pistols were holstered around her waist. Ice weaponry proved effective against the creatures of the Roil, but was inefficient. It took considerable time to charge up and reload each gun, so Sentinels bristled with weapons, swapping and changing from pistol to rifle and (if severely pressed) to blade.
The city itself remained the best weapon.
Ice sheathed the Jut; refrigeration units lipped each merlon, pumping a chill into the air that transformed the cloying warmth of the Roil's winds into frigid gusts.
Sara clapped her gloved hands together and, despite the futility of the gesture, blew on them.
“Of course. While you're here…” Sara pointed east. “A nest of Sappers, staying an inch or so out of range of the main guns.”
Flares went up.
Margaret stared at the spot with her glasses. Six of the beasts disturbed the ruined earth. Their huge dark eyes met the light fearlessly. Then Roil spores, drawn by the heat, smothered the flares — and darkness drowned the Sappers again.
“Quite a large nest,” Margaret said.
Sara's eyes lit with a grim humour, she clapped her hands together again. “Already under control. We're sending drones out soon. Heavy endothermic bombing, ground breakers. You know, the standard stuff. Odd though, we haven't seen Sappers this close to the city in years, they nearly destroyed the north wall. We got them then and we will this time, too.”
Margaret kept her gaze squarely on the Sappers, they did not move. Just stared at the city walls, like they were waiting for something. “When are the drones being launched?”
Sara laughed. “Soon. Just go home and rest. Tate can look after herself without you.”
“All right, I'm going,” Margaret said finally, and lowered her field glasses, slipping them into a case hung from her hip. Still she hovered there a moment longer.
“I'll send a message the moment they arrive,” Sara said.
“The bells are set, so ring me. Three for the moment they drive through the gates.”
“Three it is. It's always three, we've done this before many times. Now go.”
Margaret climbed to the top of the Wire-tower — the stairs creaking with her every movement — and opened a cabinet in which hung a half-dozen leather harnesses. She pulled out hers and hooked the harness around her chest and waist, making sure the tugs and collars fit snugly; then linked herself to the wire.
She flicked a switch by the side of the tower, smiling despite herself as gears clicked into place. Beam engines hummed, counterweights fell, and the tower rose another couple of yards, making it the highest point of this section of the wireway, lifting her into a zone of hot winds. The whole structure shook slightly, then the wire tightened, lifting her even higher as it did so. Margaret made a final check of her harness; the hooks and wheels were in line, free of tangles and no cracks in evidence. Satisfied, she nodded to herself, then let go. She hovered there for the briefest of moments, a final hesitation perhaps, but it was too late, gravity had its way and she flew, suspended by the humming wire.
“Whatever you do, do not look down,” someone had warned her once.
Such advice was absurd! Where else could you look? There were no stars above, just the netting doming the city, and the dark blur of the Roil. Down below, Tate’s lights shimmered, distant and comforting, beautiful in their constancy.