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bedlamsbardTossing some more Revelations stuff out there into the ether, because this is what I'm working on when I'm not otherwise procrastinating on my schoolwork. Look, y'all, I'm not even going to pretend I'm not writing this thing, because I clearly am. Well, I mean, I should probably go back and start from the top again and at some point I may actually have to learn things about 1950 England, but I guess at least I'm in the right place to do that.
As usual, reminders that these are scenes set in a post-Dust story and as a result may have spoilers and/or hints at future events in Dust in them, though probably not anything really spectacular. Character reminders here. (Quietly casting the remainder of the other named characters. Will probably do another post then. This is useful for me, yes? I have no idea why I feel like I need to justify my creative decisions.) All the Cair Paravel neighborhood names are from Dust; I keep freakishly detailed notes for Dust.
As an aside, this is probably the first thing I've ever written where I keep staring at it going, "Do I need more male characters?" So that's interesting. I don't know if that says more about me, society, the story, or again, society.
They pulled up half a block down from the ten-year-old mint-colored Zebra that Ironstone and her friends had switched over to in the Black Pearl after having spent almost an hour driving seemingly aimlessly around central Cair Paravel. They’d spent another half hour taking the most circuitous routes possible before finally crossing the river to the North Bank; Idís had never been so glad for the nondescript IS-issue Traveler she and Khoury were in, indistinguishable from the many others on the narrow, choked streets of the old city. They’d almost lost Ironstone a few times, but CCTV had picked them up and Rilian House had relayed the location each time – no more than a few blocks from where she and Khoury had gotten hung up, thankfully.
Khoury reached down and turned the key as the Zebra’s doors opened, letting out Ironstone and her friends. The sudden silence in the car as the engine rattled off felt electrifying somehow; Idís felt her fingers twitch slightly, as if preparing for battle – not that they would have been able to do much about it; IS officers didn’t normally carry sidearms. She leaned back in her seat, watching Ironstone and the other two dwarves enter the pub whose battered sign was indistinguishable in the evening gloom, though the neon Rako logo was flickering in the window.
They waited in silence for a few minutes, both of them shooting thoughtful glances towards the mint-colored car. They’d bugged the gray Zebra that had taken Ironstone away from the courthouse, but no one had expected her to have a second car. The only question was how long she’d stay in the pub.
Khoury chewed on his lip. Idís pulled the end of her braid over her shoulder and began playing with it, her fingers restless, creating further small braids in the loose tail. Dwarves weren’t meant to sit still, her mother had once told her. They were never meant to have empty hands; it was half a gift and half a curse. They always had to be making something.
Another trio of dwarves came around the corner, headed towards the pub. Idís pulled the camera out and started taking shots of them – snap snap snap – as they went into the pub. Light spilled briefly into the street as the woman in the lead pulled the door open, then was quickly shuttered as it swung shut behind the small group.
“Someone’s got to get in there,” Idís said. “For all we know Ironstone could be going out the back – or meeting with her entire crew.”
Khoury looked over at her. “You volunteering?”
“It’s a dwarf pub,” Idís said, raising the camera again as another car – a Goza Basil, the down-market knock-off of the Zebra – pulled up the curb, disgorging two more dwarf women. Even from here, Idís could recognize the distinctive hat of the shorter one – Odeth Stonehelm, one of Aerin Ironstone’s charmers. That meant that the woman with her was probably her cousin Sighi. They’d be able to tell for sure once they uploaded the photos to a computer and got a hi-res look. “You might make it past the door, but you couldn’t stay for long.”
“How can you tell?” Khoury asked, frowning a little.
“You think a lot of human pubs – or anyone else,” she allowed, “– have names like the Broken Shield?” The glare of Stonehelm’s headlights had illuminated the battered sign that hung over the door. “It’s named after an Anvil pub that burned down in the Great Fire. Famous place – it’s where Athan Ironstone and his people decided to start fighting the Calormenes during the Occupation, back in the day.”
“That’s a bit old news,” Khoury said lightly.
“Well, that’s dwarves for you,” Idís said. “Never forgive, never forget. Minds like stone,” she grinned, tapping her own temple.
“You people need to be more like fauns,” Khoury said, twisting around to dig in the back of the car. “Take each day as it comes – don’t live in the past. Oh, here we go.” He passed her an earwig, which Idís pressed in, then pulled her hair loose of its braid and fluffed it out a bit with her hands so that it would hide the earwig better. Khoury fit his own earpiece over his ear, fiddling with it until it stayed in – his ears weren’t as big as a pure faun’s would have been, but they were awkward enough, and the equipment hadn’t really been made for fauns.
Idís handed him the camera and picked up her purse, which was lodged in the wide space between her feet and the front of the car. She glanced quickly at the contents – taser, thank the Queen of Spring, paperback novel, wallet, lipstick, two kinds of lip gloss, mobile; nothing that would get her made if she dropped it, except maybe the taser. She flipped quickly through her wallet to make sure that everything inside had the same name on it – not her name, of course, but one of the cover IDs.
Khoury touched his earpiece. “Testing,” he said, and his voice rang in his ear clearly, an odd double echo. She gave him a thumbs-up. “Be careful,” he said.
She grinned at him, hooking her purse straps over her shoulder as she opened the car door. “I’m just going to get a pint, how bad can it get?”
She shut the door on his grin and walked quickly up the pavement, rubbing her hands together against the evening chill. She hesitated a moment before she reached for the door, looking up at the battered sign, which to her eye seemed a little charred around the edges and old enough that it might, in fact, have dated back to the Occupation – but that was impossible, even for dwarf-work. Idís pushed the door open and went in, reaching for the zipper on her leather jacket.
It was warm inside, and there was a pleasant buzz of sound from the television over the bar, which was showing a Jubilee Court rerun. There was a thin crowd, but it was a weeknight, and there were enough loners or small groups that Idís didn’t feel like she stood out. She had been right, though – it was a dwarf pub, through and through, from the height of the counter to the size of the tables and chairs. Even the layout of the room was slightly different, though she couldn’t put her finger on how. Idís felt her shoulders loosening a little as she wandered carefully up to the bar, glancing around just to get a feel for the room.
“I’m in,” she murmured. “Our girl’s here.”
Ironstone was tucked away at a big round table off in a side room, along with more than half a dozen other dwarf women – holding court, Idís thought automatically, because they were all oriented towards here, even as one of the barmen brought over a tray of drinks. She took the seat at the bar that gave her the best view, smiling a wan smile at the barman as he came over to her. It was, Idís realized with some surprise, the first time since uni that she’d gone to a pub and not had to climb on a stepstool to get the bartender’s attention. She was so used to it by now that she barely even noticed it at her local – Counter-Terrorism had gone to the mat with the Behavioral Analysis Unit in a vicious football match over who got the Lost Prince and who got the Round Table, and Counter-Terrorism had come out on top, mostly because they played dirty.
“What can I get you?” said the barman. He was a young dwarf with a curling moustache and a short bear, split in two and braided at the ends, with his dark hair pulled back from his face in a ponytail.
“I’ll have a pint of whatever’s on tap,” Idís said. She pulled her mobile out of her purse as the bartender poured it for her, then paid in cash, unfolding a pale red five-lion note to hand across to him and taking the coins she got in change.
“Can I get you anything else?” He indicated the chalkboard behind him. “We make a mean treacle tart.”
Idís tipped her glass at him. “I’ll take it under advisement,” she said. “Cheers, mate.”
She flicked her finger across the screen of her phone and pulled up the camera, leaning on the bar as she took several discreet photos of Ironstone’s table and sent them back to Rilian House. Khoury was quiet in her ear, no doubt restless and impatient in the car, but she had been right – he would have stood out like a sore thumb in the pub. Besides Ironstone and the two Farquarry women, she recognized the Stonehelms and a woman that she thought might have been Gyda Bullroarer. All the others were strangers to her, a few half-remembered from blurry surveillance footage that they hadn’t been able to match names to. Rilian House didn’t know anything about the Daughters of Stone, not really.
“Three IC-3 males inbound,” Khoury murmured in her earwig, Beruna vowels clipped, and sure enough, a moment later the door swung open to admit a group of laughing twentysomething dwarves. Idís tipped her head to watch them approach the bar, but they didn’t even glance at Ironstone’s table, just collected their drinks and a couple of menus and took themselves off to an empty booth, throwing elbows as they jostled for space.
Idís put her phone down flat on the counter and leaned over it, watching Ironstone’s table in the mirror behind the bar. She was grinning, leaning into the arm Louca Farquarry had flung around her shoulders, and with the ill-fitting blazer she’d worn at the courthouse gone and her hair loose around her face, some of the lines and care had gone out of her face. Her gaze kept flickering towards the door; Idís couldn’t tell if she was just making sure she had an escape route or if she was waiting for someone else.
The barman came back towards Idís, replacing a half-empty bottle of Glasswater whisky in the rack behind the counter. He grinned comfortably at her. “I haven’t seen you in here before,” he said. “You from out of town?”
“Cair Paravel,” Idís said. “I’m just in town for business.”
“What do you do?”
“I’m a graphic designer,” Idís said. “You don’t happen to need your logo redone, do you? That sign looks like it might actually date back to the Occupation.”
He shook his head, grinning behind his moustaches. “The owner’s attached, I’m afraid.”
“Too bad,” Idís said. “It’s a nice statement piece, though. If anyone could see it.”
“I’ll pass it on to Thyri,” he said. “You have a card?”
Idís did, actually. She dug into her purse, glancing quickly at the stack of cards before she peeled one off and handed it over. A few years ago she’d passed off a card from a different cover than the one she’d actually been using at the time, which had ended with her in hospital with a concussion and two Galman thugs dead on a warehouse floor where Specialist Operations had had to come in shooting. Not a mistake she planned on making again anytime soon.
The barman took the business card and looked at it. “Ygritte Stoneworthy,” he read off, and leaned over the counter, offering his hand. “Nice to meet you, Ygritte. I’m Gardi.”
She took his hand, smiling back at him. “Nice to meet you too, Gardi.”
“Are you here for long?”
“I haven’t really decided,” Idís said. She heard Khoury laugh softly in her ear; the mic she was wearing was good enough to pick up the conversation.
“Stop flirting, Idís,” he said.
“I’m just being polite,” Idís murmured back a minute later, when Gardi had to leave to take an order. It came from one of the dwarf women at Ironstone’s table, younger than the others and with purple streaks in her black hair. Idís tipped her phone up, pretending to frown at it as she snapped a picture of the woman’s – girl’s, really, she didn’t look much older than university age – reflection in the mirror.
Khoury was still laughing to himself, but she heard his tone change abruptly. “I’ve got two IC –” He hesitated, and Idís had to force herself not to react. Police identity codes were supposed to be for quick identification of individuals, but she knew from sour experience that it could sometimes go very wrong.
“I’ve got two IC-1 females inbound,” Khoury finished finally, but he sounded doubtful about the identification. “They could be IC-3s,” he added after another beat.
IC-1 was human, IC-3 was dwarf. The fact that Khoury couldn’t tell for sure hinted at the likelihood that the women inbound were probably mixed-species. Idís herself was a half-dwarf, but she took after her mum enough that she could usually pass for a full dwarf unless someone only looked at her face and not her height and build, which had in the past led to some extremely awkward conversations.
She picked her mobile up, camera aimed at the mirror and rested her elbows on the counter as the door behind her opened. A roar of greeting went up from Ironstone’s table, and Idís judged that provocation significant enough to turn around in her seat and get a look for herself.
The two girls who had just come in were much younger than she had expected, barely old enough to be in university – the younger one looked like she ought still to be in school. Idís could see immediately where Khoury’s confusion had come from. The average height for a dwarf these days was about 4 foot 8, and even the shorter of the two was above average, but the taller girl was almost five foot – enough to pass for human without closer inspection, though both of them carried themselves like dwarves. The younger girl was shorter, with a tumble of dark hair beneath the hood of the sweatshirt she was wearing beneath her denim jacket. The other girl, the one who might have been human, had pulled off her stocking cap as they came inside, stuffing it into her pocket as she ran a hand through the multitude of golden braids in her hair. She was wearing heavy make-up, which wouldn’t have raised an eyebrow from Idís if she wasn’t all too familiar, from personal experience, what make-up looked like when put on to conceal bruises.
The younger girl whooped in excitement when she saw Ironstone, who had emerged from behind the big round table in the other room. She caught both girls up in an embrace, pulling them close as Louca and Pella Farquarry followed her into the main room. The back of the fair girl’s battered leather jacket rose up at the motion, and Idís stiffened as she saw the butt of a gun tucked into the back of her jeans. It was gone a moment later, her shirt falling back down to cover it as Ironstone released her. She raised a hand to touch the girl’s cheek, her eyes fixed on the bruises, and the girl turned her face aside, shaking her head.
Idís let the corner of her mouth quirk up in a good-natured grin, then turned back to her own drink, raising the mobile she was still holding to take snapshot after snapshot as they returned to the other room. She could see some jostling take place until Ironstone was settled back in her former seat, the younger girl leaning her head on one shoulder, the older one on her other side, sandwiched between Ironstone and Louca Farquarry. She had picked up a menu to look at it, but she put it down again when Ironstone said something to her, turning her head to smile at the dwarf woman. Idís took another picture – and found herself catching Farquarry’s eye in the mirror, the woman’s expression gone suddenly dark.
Idís forced herself not to react, switching her phone to her other hand as she picked up her pint glass and drained it. She ducked her head so that her hair swung down as she whispered, “I might have been made,” reaching for her purse.
“Do you need an exit?” Khoury said immediately.
“I don’t think so,” Idís said. She slid her phone into her purse and climbed down off the barstool, hooking her purse straps over her shoulder as she reached to zip her jacket back up. She deliberately didn’t look at the mirror or over her shoulder at the other room, just made her leisurely way towards the door.
“IC-3 female coming in,” Khoury said, just as the door opened in front of her.
Idís had to step back to avoid the dark-skinned dwarf woman who came in, but they still danced around each other for a moment in the small entranceway before they got out of each other’s ways and Idís was able to escape out into the chill dark of the street. Her heels clicked on the cracked pavement as she strode back towards the nondescript IS-issue Traveler. She didn’t look over her shoulder until she’d pulled the passenger-side door open and slid into the seat, locking the door behind her.
Khoury was already turning the key. He pulled away from the curb even before she’d gotten properly seated, the car gliding through darkened streets on their winding way back to Rilian House. “Hamel’s a block down to take over,” he said. “You all right?”
“Yeah.” Idís settled her purse on her lap and reached inside, meaning to get a better look at the photos she’d taken – but instead of her mobile, her fingers only met empty air and the soft sides of her battered paperback, the hard outline of her taser. “Son of a bitch!” she exclaimed, upending her purse on her lap. No mobile, no wallet.
Khoury almost took out a postbox, but straightened the car out quickly. “What’s wrong?”
“The woman who came in just before I left,” Idís said. “She must have lifted my mobile and my wallet. Tell me you got her picture.”
“I got it,” Khoury said, lifting one hand to pat the camera that rested on the cupholder between them. “You think she’s one of Ironstone’s?”
“Louca Farquarry must have signaled her somehow,” Idís said, shoveling everything back into her purse and dropping it on the floor between her feet. She reached up and pulled the earwig out of her ear, tucking it into one of her purse pockets. “I think she saw me taking pictures. Gods, she’s slick. I hope Kes can get an ID off these when we get back to Rilian House. I sent them all back, but they’re on the phone, if Ironstone can get past the password.”
“Everything’s backstopped, though, right?” Khoury said.
“Yeah.” Idís tipped her head against the window, the glass cool against her forehead, and watched the terrace houses that lined the street roll by. They drove on in silence for a few more minutes, then Khoury leaned over to fiddle with the wireless until he found a jazz station. Idís shut her eyes, letting the music wash over her.
It was another forty minutes before they made it back into central Cair Paravel, where they were forced to navigate the still crowded streets before pulling into the Rilian House car park.
The bullpen was mostly deserted when they made it up to Counter-Terrorism. The task force had moved to another floor, taking most of the unit with it, so they had more or less had the bullpen to themselves for the past day or so. Kesztheley was waiting for them, sitting on the edge of her desk and holding a paper cup of break room tea, looking at it in unconcealed dismay. She’d taken out her contacts and was in a pair of red-framed glasses, perched crookedly on her nose.
“Hey,” she said tiredly when she saw them, putting the cup aside. “So I ran those photos you sent me. Most of them are still being checked, but I’ve a few hits on the ones that were in the system.”
Idís knew better than to ask if it could wait till morning. It probably could, but none of them were the type of people who would have joined IS if they were capable of waiting for just that minute more, for being more comfortable. “All right,” she agreed, stifling a yawn with her hand and chucking her purse into her desk chair. “What do we have?”
Kes got off her desk and turned one of her computer monitors towards them. “Odeth Stonehelm, of Glasswater. She used to run with Aerin Ironstone and Louca Farquarry back when they were with the Smoke Lane Slashers fifteen years ago. She’s got a sealed juvie record, cleaned up and fell off the radar for a while, but then popped back up again a few years ago after the Highwater estates shootings along with her cousin, Sighi Stonehelm.” She tapped the keyboard. Sighi Stonehelm might have been pretty, except for the long, ugly scar that cut across half her face, leaving behind the empty socket where her left eye had once been.
“Sighi Stonehelm,” Kes said. “She was caught in the crossfire between Glasswater Specialist Operations and the Highwater shooters during the shootout in ’93. She survived, but after she was released from the hospital she vanished until she and Odeth were sighted with the Dwarf Liberation Army in ’97, along with Aerin Ironstone and Louca Farquarry. We think they went with Ironstone and Farquarry when the Daughters of Stone were founded.”
She tapped the keyboard again. “Gyda Bullroarer. Car thief. Knocked around with dwarf gangs in Glasswater and Cair Paravel – including the Smoke Lane Slashers with Ironstone when they were kids – for a few years before she started going steady with the Daughters of Stone. We think that she might have been the getaway driver for the Long Dusk bombings, but all the surveillance footage from Beaversdam Station is still locked up from the system update.”
“Well, we knew those three,” Khoury said, leaning forward with the elbows on the back of Kes’s chair. “Anything new?”
“Oh, ye of little faith,” Kes sighed. She tapped the keyboard again. “Two more. This is Thyri Stonehelm, part-owner of the pub. She’s in one of the group shots that you sent over.” She nodded at Idís.
“Stonehelm?” Idís said. “Like –”
“Exactly like. She’s Odeth Stonehelm’s sister, so she’s in the system even though she doesn’t have a criminal record. She owns the Broken Shield along with her partner, Sarre Bullroarer – who does have a record, by the way, along with her sister, Gyda. She used to be a surgeon at Royal Court Hospital, but she lost her license for reasons redacted; she bought the pub with part of the settlement money. And she’s in one of the group shots too.”
Khoury let out a low whistle. “It’s a family business. We didn’t realize this before. That’s – thirteen, if we count the woman who stole Idís’s mobile and the two teenagers. No IDs on the others yet?”
Kes shook her head. “They’re in there somewhere, but the computer probably won’t turn up anything until morning.” She ran her hands through her hair, yawning.
“Go home,” Khoury said firmly. “We don’t have any evidence yet that Ironstone’s a clear and present danger, so there’s no point in all of us being exhausted because of it.”
“Yeah,” Kes said. She picked up the paper cup and looked at its contents, sighing.
“Hey,” Idís said, “before we shove off for the night, do me a favor? Can you look up the phone number for the Broken Shield, then do that thing where you make it look like the call is coming from somewhere else?”
“Sure,” Kes said, leaning over her keyboard. “Where do you want it to come from?”
“Oldcommon,” Idís said, reaching for the phone on her desk at her indication. She dialed the number Kes showed her, listening to it ring.
“Broken Shield, Gardi speaking.”
“Hi, I was wondering if you’d found a mobile and a wallet? I think I might have left them behind.”
“Oh, is this Ygritte?” he asked, and she murmured an acknowledgment. “Let me check.”
She heard a burst of meaningless conversation in the background, mostly covered by the sound of the television, and tapped her fingers absently on the back of the phone. Kes and Khoury were both watching curiously.
“Hi, Ygritte, you still there?” Gardi said.
“Nowhere to go,” Idís said. “At least I didn’t leave my keys behind, yeah?”
“Small mercies. Anyway, I’ve got them here. Can you come by tomorrow morning before we open to pick them up? Say, ten o’clock?”
“That works for me,” Idís said. “Will I be seeing you there or someone else?”
Kes swallowed her laugh with her fist.
“Probably someone else,” Gardi said, sounding regretful. “I work nights.”
“Oh, too bad,” Idís said. “Ta, though.”
After she hung up, Khoury leaned his hip against Kes’s desk and said, “You know there’s a good chance Aerin Ironstone or Louca Farquarry is going to be there waiting for you when you show up.”
“One can only hope to be so lucky,” Idís said. “This might give us something new. Or it might give us nothing. We’ll find out.”
“All right,” Khoury said. “But I’m going with you. These women blew up a train station. They’re not going to hesitate at taking an IS officer out of the picture.”
“I’ll pick you up at nine,” Idís said, and pointed at him, finger and thumb like a gun. “But I’m driving.”
*
Ros fell asleep in the back of the Zebra on the way to Louca’s garage, head tipped over onto Aerin’s shoulder, loose hair falling into her face. Aerin put an arm around her shoulders, feeling the breadth and strength there – more than the last time she’d seen her nieces, two years ago before she’d gone to prison. She and Louca had decided that it wasn’t wise for the girls to come anywhere near her, not where there were sign-in sheets and security cameras and fingerprints that were all too likely to send the girls back to Denes Underhill. Pella had brought pictures, but pictures didn’t really capture them – the sound of Ros’s laugh, the scents of gunpowder and oil that clung to Tamsin, the pulse of their heartbeats. Two years was a long time, at that age. At any age.
Tamsin was sitting on her other side, leaning her shoulder comfortably against Aerin’s. She had been doing something on her mobile, but she let it fall to her lap and tipped her head back, smiling sleepily at Aerin.
Aerin ran a hand over her braided hair, comforting, but she didn’t smile. “Give me the gun,” she said.
Tamsin’s eyes fluttered shut, then she squirmed away, reaching behind her to pull the pistol out of her jeans. She handed it butt-first to Aerin, gaze flicking away again.
Aerin checked to see if the safety was on – it was – and whether or not it was loaded, which it was. She saw Louca glance at the rearview mirror, frowning a little. “And the other one.”
Tamsin didn’t reply, but she leaned down and pulled out a compact ST-1N5 – commonly called a sting – from an ankle holster, handing it over. Aerin checked that one too, and gave her niece the courtesy of not asking for the knives she could tell that Tamsin was carrying. “Do you want to tell me about it?”
Tamsin shook her head, her mouth thinning into a straight line. Aerin glanced up at the rearview mirror, meeting Louca’s eyes, saw the familiar flicker that meant, we’ll talk about it later.
“Okay,” Aerin said. “Are you all right?”
Tamsin shrugged, her gaze cutting across Aerin to rest on Ros’s dark head. Whatever it was, Tamsin didn’t want to talk about it with Ros anywhere near, even asleep.
“Okay,” Aerin said again, leaning over to press a kiss to Tamsin’s forehead. “Later, then.”
Tamsin nodded and shut her eyes, leaning against her. Within a few minutes she was asleep too, her fingers twitching anxiously in her lap. Aerin looked down at the guns she was still holding and sighed, slipping the sting into one of the inside pockets of her jacket. The OR-100 pistol she kept hold of, stroking her thumb absently over the battered grip.
“I’ll get her a real holster for that later,” Louca said softly from the front seat.
“I’d feel safer about her carrying it then,” Aerin said. Tamsin wasn’t as hot-headed as her sister, though she was no slouch when it came to her temper, either. If she’d started carrying a gun – two of them – along with her knives, then something had scared her, and badly enough for her to take the risk.
They pulled into the back alley behind Louca’s garage a little while later. Tamsin and Ros were roused with a little prompting and went sleepily and obediently up the stairs to the flat over the garage while Aerin and Louca lingered behind to pull the groceries out of the boot. They were both quiet as they carried the paper bags up the narrow stairs. It was ordinary, domestic – nothing like St. Leocadia’s Prison for Women, and for that Aerin was profoundly grateful.
Tamsin had put the kettle on and was waiting by the kitchen counter, nibbling on a half a biscuit. She came over to help Aerin and Louca unpack, her eyes downcast. Elsewhere in the flat, Aerin heard the toilet flush, then Ros darted out to help too, snatching up one of the biscuits from the open package Tamsin had left on the counter.
They got the groceries put away, and then Ros flattened down the bags and stuffed them into the old shoebox Louca kept for just that purpose in the laundry room while Tamsin busied herself making tea, her bruised face turned carefully away from Aerin. Ros went to bed soon afterwards, kissing first Aerin and then Louca good night before retreating into the bedroom she shared with her sister, while Tamsin ducked into the bathroom, locking the door behind her.
Aerin looked at Louca. They were sitting at the counter, sharing the plate of biscuits Tamsin had laid out and drinking the remainder of the tea. “Tell me,” she said.
Louca ran a hand through her short blonde hair. “I’d rather wait until Ros is asleep,” she said, her voice lowered.
Aerin reached behind her and pulled the OR-100 out of the back of her jeans, setting it down on the counter with a click. The little ST-1N5 followed a moment later. “It’s bad, isn’t it?”
“Well, it’s not good,” Louca said. “I knew about the sting, I don’t know where she got the OR.”
“Ros doesn’t know?”
“Well, she knows something’s wrong; Tamsin’s good at lying but she’s not that good. And it’s not like Ros hasn’t noticed that her big sister is beat to hell. Gods.” She hopped down off the stool and ducked around the counter, leaning down out of sight as she rummaged in a cupboard. “This calls for something stronger than tea.”
“Louca,” Aerin said, “don’t lie to me. Not about this.”
“Aunt Aerin?”
She turned around to see Tamsin standing in the tiny sitting room. Her face was wet, makeup scrubbed off to reveal numerous fading bruises. Aerin had guessed at them already, but it was one thing to guess and another to see, and it was worse than she’d thought.
“I’m fine,” Tamsin said quickly, seeing the expression on her face. “It’s not as bad as it looks.”
“Booze,” Louca said, straightening up from behind the counter with a bottle of vodka in one hand.
Tamsin looked over her shoulder at the closed bedroom door. Aerin knew her niece well enough to be certain that Ros was most likely standing behind it, listening to every word. It was, in her experience, fairly pointless for one of the sisters to try and hide something from the other, but both of them kept trying from time to time. Ros had to have figured out that something had happened to Tamsin – the bruises on her face were evidence enough of that – but Tamsin was trying to hide the details from her.
“It’s nothing, Aunt,” Tamsin said, her voice pleading. “It’s not important. You just got out of jail, that’s important, not me.”
“Come here,” Aerin said, and Tamsin did, her bare feet silent on the floor as she moved from the carpeted sitting room to the scratched linoleum in the kitchen. Perched on one of Louca’s mismatched stools she and Tamsin were finally the same height, the way they hadn’t been since Tamsin was fourteen and hitting her first tearful growth spurt. Ros had gotten her fine features from their human father; Tamsin had gotten his height. Some of it, at least.
Aerin put her arms out, letting Tamsin step into them and drop her head down against Aerin’s shoulder, breathing hard. Aerin pressed a kiss to her the base of hairline. “Jail’s over,” she said. “You’re what’s important to me, you and your sister. You always have been. You’re the most important people in the world.”
Tamsin was silent, breathing hard. There was a soft click as Louca found the shot glasses and started splashing vodka into them.
“Tell me,” Aerin said, feeling Tamsin’s breath stutter. “You’re scaring me. You don’t want to keep it inside, do you?”
Tamsin swallowed. “There were some people,” she said eventually, her voice pitched low. “Dwarves. The LOR.”
Aerin knew that name. The Legends of Rustwater were one of the junior gangs in the neighborhood, a bunch of young punks that, as far as she was aware, spent most of their time getting drunk, getting high, and getting into trouble.
“It was right after the bombings in Beruna,” Tamsin went on. “Ros and I were staying with Gyda. I went down to the corner shop to get milk and some crisps, and when I came out a bunch of the LOR were hanging around, you know, doing that thing they do. Watching. And then they started following me, saying things – calling me names. Chim slag. Human bitch.” Her hands tightened on Aerin’s arms. “Human,” she said again, softly, like that was the worst insult.
Aerin tightened her grip. You’re not, she wanted to say. You’re not human. You’re mine. But she held her tongue.
“Some of them got in front of me,” Tamsin said after a moment. “So I threw a punch. I got some of them good,” she added, her voice gone proud for an instant, “but there were too many of them. They got me on the pavement. Got most of my knives off me – the ones they could find, and the ones I could get at. A couple of them had guns. They said they were going to make an example out of me – to show why humans oughtn’t to come over to this side of the river. To get them back for the bombings.” She swallowed. Aerin was holding her so hard that it had to hurt, but she didn’t want to loosen her grip – didn’t want Tamsin to think that she’d let her go for any reason.
“I could feel the barrel of the gun against my cheek,” Tamsin said. “She was going to do it – I could see it in her eyes. Because she thought I was human. Because I was worthless to her. Because I looked – because I look human. She was going to kill me. And I thought, well, she’s going to feel really fucking stupid when the Daughters of Stone come after her.” She choked out a laugh. “They were all standing around, watching. I looked over and I realized that the girl standing next to me had a knife sticking out of her boot. So I grabbed it. I got her across the face, the one with the gun, and I got out of there somehow. I just remember running, and somehow I ended up here. I got in, and I locked the door behind me, and I got one of Louca’s guns and I waited for them to come after me.” Her voice trailed off. She pressed her face harder against Aerin’s shoulder, her breath coming out in stuttering gasps. “They didn’t come,” she finished eventually. “Louca got back first.”
Aerin wrapped her arms around her, as tightly as she could manage, and held Tamsin close. Her niece was shaking, her fingers digging into Aerin’s back as she leaned into the embrace.
“My brave girl,” Aerin whispered, kissing her forehead. “My smart, brave, wonderful girl.”
Louca came over, silently, and put her arms around them both. Tamsin was crying, her tears soaking through the thin fabric of Aerin’s blouse. Louca stroked her back, and Aerin kissed her and held her close, until at last Tamsin hiccupped and pulled away from both of them, scrubbing a hand over her reddened eyes.
“Booze,” Louca repeated, leaning over Aerin to pick up the trio of shot glasses she’d filled from the counter. Aerin took one from her, the glass cool against her hands, and Tamsin took another. She summoned up the ghost of a smile when Aerin looked at her.
“I know,” she said. “I’m over the drinking age now. You missed my eighteenth.”
“I’m sorry,” Aerin said.
“It’s okay,” Tamsin said. “Nat and Odeth got me so drunk that I don’t remember any of it anyway.”
Aerin gave Louca a meaningful look. Louca just shrugged. “What? You weren’t there and we can’t all be moderating influences.”
Tamsin giggled a little. There was an edge of hysteria in it, but her hand was steady on the shot glass as she tossed the vodka back. “Uff da,” she said after she’d swallowed, shaking herself like a dog. “Did you make that in a bathtub, Aunt Louca?”
“I did not,” Louca said, clinking her glass against Aerin’s. They drank in unison, the alcohol burning its way down Aerin’s throat. “I’ll have you know I haven’t made bathtub gin in six months.”
“Because it exploded the last time,” Tamsin confided to Aerin. She sat down on one of the empty stools and leaned her head against Aerin’s shoulder, her eyes slanting closed as if that last shot of vodka had leeched all the energy out of her. Aerin put an arm around her, stroking her hair.
“I put the word out,” Louca said quietly, leaning back against the half-wall connected to the counter.
Aerin looked up at her. Tamsin appeared to have fallen asleep already, because she didn’t stir. “What word?”
“That the LOR had gone after one of the Daughters of Stone. I didn’t name names, but it’s out there.” Her face was solemn.
Aerin stroked a finger down one of Tamsin’s golden braids. “Do the others know?”
“Gyda and Sarre do. I had to call Gyda to let her know that Tamsin wasn’t coming back, and I brought Sarre in to look Tamsin over. Some of the others probably worked it out.”
“But Ros doesn’t know?” Aerin said softly.
“Ros knows something happened, but not what.”
Tamsin jerked up at the sound of her sister’s name, flailing for a moment and nearly falling off the stool before Aerin steadied her. “You can’t tell Ros,” she said, pleading. “You can’t, Aunt Aerin, please don’t tell her.”
“I won’t,” Aerin said.
Tamsin gripped her arm and looked down at her, with the intensity that only the very drunk could manage. “Promise me.”
“I promise I won’t tell your sister,” Aerin said.
Tamsin nodded, the brief sharpness in her green eyes going blurry again. “I don’t want her to know, Aunt.”
“I won’t tell her,” Aerin said again. “Come on, Tamsin. Time for bed.”
Tamsin straightened up obediently at her light touch, running a hand through her braids. She looked like a dwarf, Aerin thought, except for her height and her too-long legs. She moved like a dwarf, rooted to the ground, and she had the same knack for making things that all dwarves were born with, gift or curse. If it wasn’t for her height, no one would look twice at her. No one except a human.
Damn them, Aerin thought with familiar weariness, but even after two years in prison she couldn’t summon up the energy to get properly angry about it. The vodka left it all pleasantly numb.
Tamsin was clinging sleepily to her arm, slouching a little to tip her cheek against Aerin’s head. She’d gained an inch or two since the last time Aerin had seen her, when she’d kissed Tamsin and Ros goodbye at the breakfast table and been arrested two hours later at a petrol station just outside Beaversdam. She’d been barely more than a child then – only seventeen. She didn’t look much older now.
Louca began quietly gathering up the dirtied cups and glasses as Aerin walked Tamsin to her bedroom door. When she pushed it open, she saw Ros curled up on one side of the double bed they shared, stripped down to a battered t-shirt – seemingly asleep, though Aerin knew her niece well enough to guess that that might not be the case. Tamsin stood stock still as Aerin released her, swaying a little. She looked down at her bare feet in apparent fascination, at her scuffed scarab blue toenails. Aerin pushed her carefully towards the bed, sitting her down on the empty side before managing to coax her down. She pulled the duvet up over Tamsin’s shoulders, leaning down to kiss her good night as Tamsin blinked at her.
“I love you, Aunt Aerin,” she murmured sleepily.
Aerin stroked a hand over Tamsin’s hair. “I love you too, Tamsin,” she said. She leaned over and pressed a kiss to Ros’s black hair, pulled into a messy braid for sleep. Ros stirred slightly, rolling over to smile up at her. It was a little too deliberate and Aerin thought, grimly, that there was no way that Ros hadn’t been listening at the door and dashed back to bed when she’d heard Tamsin and Aerin coming.
She leaned up and kissed Aerin’s cheek quickly. “I’ll take care of her, Aunt,” she said, and for a moment her eyes were too old for her age. “I always do.”
“I know you do,” Aerin said. She tugged the duvet up over both of them – Tamsin was already asleep, curved towards her sister like a comma, and Ros wrapped her arms around her, their black and gold hair mixing on the pillow.
Aerin left them there, closing the bedroom door carefully behind her. She found Louca curled up on the sofa, field-stripping the OR-100 Aerin had taken from Tamsin. Aerin sat down next to her, dropping her head to Tamsin’s shoulder.
“Not how I expected my first day back to go,” she said.
“It could be worse,” Louca said, leaning forward to put the OR-100’s component parts down on the coffee table. She frowned at them, and Aerin let her head fall back against the sofa cushions. “IS could have figured out that you’d be coming here and bugged the place.”
Aerin sat up abruptly. “Are you sure they didn’t?”
“The girls wouldn’t be here anymore if they had. Don’t worry, there’s always tomorrow. They’re sitting outside anyway waiting for us to leave.”
Aerin stood up and went over to the window, cracking the blinds open to see the dark form of the beat-up Majesty parked across the street. “Well, the Eyes can have a cold night of it, for all I care,” she said. “Pella will sort out that woman from the pub?”
“One way or another,” Louca said, starting to fit the pistol back together. “Where the hell did Tamsin even get this thing, anyway?”
Aerin dropped back down onto the sofa, running a hand through her hair to pull out the tie. She tossed it onto the coffee table and pulled her legs up onto the sofa. “Was it as bad as it sounds?”
“Worse.” Louca put the gun down and leaned forward, elbows resting on her knees as she threaded her fingers through her hair. “Tamsin almost shot my head off when I came in. I’ve never seen her so scared – she’s an Ironstone, after all, and she grew up with us.” She ran her hands over her face. “I’m still finding bloodstains in odd places.”
Aerin sat up abruptly.
“Sorry,” Louca said, glancing over her shoulder at her. “I shouldn’t have said that. Gods, if I ever get my hands on the dwarves who did this, the King of Summer himself won’t save them.”
Aerin shut her eyes tightly. “If I’d been here –”
“She went out to get milk, for Spring’s sake,” Louca said, spreading her hands helplessly. “It was last week! It’s Rustwater, she should have been safe. She’s a dwarf –”
Aerin ran a hand over her face. Tamsin was a dwarf, in every way that counted, except for her human father’s height, and for some that was all that mattered. “Who do the LOR feed into? They’re a feeder gang, aren’t they? They have a mother?”
“Hammerhand’s lot,” Louca said. “I can’t remember what they’re calling themselves this week; I feel like every time I turn around it’s something new. That bitch can’t make up her mind about anything except that the only thing she hates more than humans is chims.”
“Set up a meet,” Aerin said. “She might run a corner of Rustwater, but I’m still the biggest bitch in Narnia, and it’ll please her to remember it. And if she thinks her cubs can go after my girls, she’s got another think coming to her.”
“She probably doesn’t know,” Louca said. “I’ll have Morwen sort it out.”
“Since when is Morwen on terms with Daragh Hammerhand?”
“It’s a really long story,” Louca said. “And mostly involves Nat’s terrible lack of self-control and self-preservation instincts.”
“So same old, then,” Aerin said.
“Pretty much.” Louca sat back. She pressed her hands together, touched her fingertips to her nose, rested her thumbs against her mouth. “She was so fucking scared, Aerin. I don’t know what it was like in St. Leo’s, but on the streets it’s been a nightmare since the bombings. Humans are blaming us for the maglev attacks, nonhumans are blaming them for Beruna – everyone’s jumping at shadows.” She was silent for a moment. “Shooting at shadows,” she said finally. “I heard the LOR chased a cop car out of Rustwater the other day. When even the coppers are running scared –”
Aerin glanced over at the window, thinking about the no-doubt IS-issue Majesty parked outside. Louca followed her gaze and added, “We should be so lucky. Even the LOR knows that this is my patch. And if they showed up I’d probably just shoot them, Eyes or not.”
“And I probably wouldn’t stop you,” Aerin said. She put her arm out, pulling Louca close. Louca came easily, dropping her head against Aerin’s shoulder. Aerin shut her eyes, pretending they were eighteen again, young and wild and free in the streets of Glasswater, before Guiry had gone to prison, before Kyrene had died, before everything had gone to hell and she’d taken the girls and run because they were family and she was a dwarf, and if there was one thing that mattered to a dwarf, beyond Narnia and their crafts and gold, it was family. And even if she and Louca had only been nineteen, they’d known that.
She opened her eyes again to find Louca looking up at her. She smiled, a little, and leaned up to press a closed-mouth kiss against Aerin’s lips. “I’m glad you’re back,” she said softly. “I missed you.”
Aerin smiled against her mouth and pulled back slightly to say, “I missed not living in a cell with a triple-murderer faun.”
Louca laughed and stood up, grasping Aerin’s hands and pulling her to her feet. “You always knew how to ruin a moment,” she said. “They put you in with a triple-murderer?”
“She told some interesting stories,” Aerin said, and let Louca lead her out of the sitting room and into the familiar space of Louca’s bedroom – of what had been their shared bedroom since they’d bought the garage. She stopped to turn the sitting room light off, then shut the door behind her.
As usual, reminders that these are scenes set in a post-Dust story and as a result may have spoilers and/or hints at future events in Dust in them, though probably not anything really spectacular. Character reminders here. (Quietly casting the remainder of the other named characters. Will probably do another post then. This is useful for me, yes? I have no idea why I feel like I need to justify my creative decisions.) All the Cair Paravel neighborhood names are from Dust; I keep freakishly detailed notes for Dust.
As an aside, this is probably the first thing I've ever written where I keep staring at it going, "Do I need more male characters?" So that's interesting. I don't know if that says more about me, society, the story, or again, society.
They pulled up half a block down from the ten-year-old mint-colored Zebra that Ironstone and her friends had switched over to in the Black Pearl after having spent almost an hour driving seemingly aimlessly around central Cair Paravel. They’d spent another half hour taking the most circuitous routes possible before finally crossing the river to the North Bank; Idís had never been so glad for the nondescript IS-issue Traveler she and Khoury were in, indistinguishable from the many others on the narrow, choked streets of the old city. They’d almost lost Ironstone a few times, but CCTV had picked them up and Rilian House had relayed the location each time – no more than a few blocks from where she and Khoury had gotten hung up, thankfully.
Khoury reached down and turned the key as the Zebra’s doors opened, letting out Ironstone and her friends. The sudden silence in the car as the engine rattled off felt electrifying somehow; Idís felt her fingers twitch slightly, as if preparing for battle – not that they would have been able to do much about it; IS officers didn’t normally carry sidearms. She leaned back in her seat, watching Ironstone and the other two dwarves enter the pub whose battered sign was indistinguishable in the evening gloom, though the neon Rako logo was flickering in the window.
They waited in silence for a few minutes, both of them shooting thoughtful glances towards the mint-colored car. They’d bugged the gray Zebra that had taken Ironstone away from the courthouse, but no one had expected her to have a second car. The only question was how long she’d stay in the pub.
Khoury chewed on his lip. Idís pulled the end of her braid over her shoulder and began playing with it, her fingers restless, creating further small braids in the loose tail. Dwarves weren’t meant to sit still, her mother had once told her. They were never meant to have empty hands; it was half a gift and half a curse. They always had to be making something.
Another trio of dwarves came around the corner, headed towards the pub. Idís pulled the camera out and started taking shots of them – snap snap snap – as they went into the pub. Light spilled briefly into the street as the woman in the lead pulled the door open, then was quickly shuttered as it swung shut behind the small group.
“Someone’s got to get in there,” Idís said. “For all we know Ironstone could be going out the back – or meeting with her entire crew.”
Khoury looked over at her. “You volunteering?”
“It’s a dwarf pub,” Idís said, raising the camera again as another car – a Goza Basil, the down-market knock-off of the Zebra – pulled up the curb, disgorging two more dwarf women. Even from here, Idís could recognize the distinctive hat of the shorter one – Odeth Stonehelm, one of Aerin Ironstone’s charmers. That meant that the woman with her was probably her cousin Sighi. They’d be able to tell for sure once they uploaded the photos to a computer and got a hi-res look. “You might make it past the door, but you couldn’t stay for long.”
“How can you tell?” Khoury asked, frowning a little.
“You think a lot of human pubs – or anyone else,” she allowed, “– have names like the Broken Shield?” The glare of Stonehelm’s headlights had illuminated the battered sign that hung over the door. “It’s named after an Anvil pub that burned down in the Great Fire. Famous place – it’s where Athan Ironstone and his people decided to start fighting the Calormenes during the Occupation, back in the day.”
“That’s a bit old news,” Khoury said lightly.
“Well, that’s dwarves for you,” Idís said. “Never forgive, never forget. Minds like stone,” she grinned, tapping her own temple.
“You people need to be more like fauns,” Khoury said, twisting around to dig in the back of the car. “Take each day as it comes – don’t live in the past. Oh, here we go.” He passed her an earwig, which Idís pressed in, then pulled her hair loose of its braid and fluffed it out a bit with her hands so that it would hide the earwig better. Khoury fit his own earpiece over his ear, fiddling with it until it stayed in – his ears weren’t as big as a pure faun’s would have been, but they were awkward enough, and the equipment hadn’t really been made for fauns.
Idís handed him the camera and picked up her purse, which was lodged in the wide space between her feet and the front of the car. She glanced quickly at the contents – taser, thank the Queen of Spring, paperback novel, wallet, lipstick, two kinds of lip gloss, mobile; nothing that would get her made if she dropped it, except maybe the taser. She flipped quickly through her wallet to make sure that everything inside had the same name on it – not her name, of course, but one of the cover IDs.
Khoury touched his earpiece. “Testing,” he said, and his voice rang in his ear clearly, an odd double echo. She gave him a thumbs-up. “Be careful,” he said.
She grinned at him, hooking her purse straps over her shoulder as she opened the car door. “I’m just going to get a pint, how bad can it get?”
She shut the door on his grin and walked quickly up the pavement, rubbing her hands together against the evening chill. She hesitated a moment before she reached for the door, looking up at the battered sign, which to her eye seemed a little charred around the edges and old enough that it might, in fact, have dated back to the Occupation – but that was impossible, even for dwarf-work. Idís pushed the door open and went in, reaching for the zipper on her leather jacket.
It was warm inside, and there was a pleasant buzz of sound from the television over the bar, which was showing a Jubilee Court rerun. There was a thin crowd, but it was a weeknight, and there were enough loners or small groups that Idís didn’t feel like she stood out. She had been right, though – it was a dwarf pub, through and through, from the height of the counter to the size of the tables and chairs. Even the layout of the room was slightly different, though she couldn’t put her finger on how. Idís felt her shoulders loosening a little as she wandered carefully up to the bar, glancing around just to get a feel for the room.
“I’m in,” she murmured. “Our girl’s here.”
Ironstone was tucked away at a big round table off in a side room, along with more than half a dozen other dwarf women – holding court, Idís thought automatically, because they were all oriented towards here, even as one of the barmen brought over a tray of drinks. She took the seat at the bar that gave her the best view, smiling a wan smile at the barman as he came over to her. It was, Idís realized with some surprise, the first time since uni that she’d gone to a pub and not had to climb on a stepstool to get the bartender’s attention. She was so used to it by now that she barely even noticed it at her local – Counter-Terrorism had gone to the mat with the Behavioral Analysis Unit in a vicious football match over who got the Lost Prince and who got the Round Table, and Counter-Terrorism had come out on top, mostly because they played dirty.
“What can I get you?” said the barman. He was a young dwarf with a curling moustache and a short bear, split in two and braided at the ends, with his dark hair pulled back from his face in a ponytail.
“I’ll have a pint of whatever’s on tap,” Idís said. She pulled her mobile out of her purse as the bartender poured it for her, then paid in cash, unfolding a pale red five-lion note to hand across to him and taking the coins she got in change.
“Can I get you anything else?” He indicated the chalkboard behind him. “We make a mean treacle tart.”
Idís tipped her glass at him. “I’ll take it under advisement,” she said. “Cheers, mate.”
She flicked her finger across the screen of her phone and pulled up the camera, leaning on the bar as she took several discreet photos of Ironstone’s table and sent them back to Rilian House. Khoury was quiet in her ear, no doubt restless and impatient in the car, but she had been right – he would have stood out like a sore thumb in the pub. Besides Ironstone and the two Farquarry women, she recognized the Stonehelms and a woman that she thought might have been Gyda Bullroarer. All the others were strangers to her, a few half-remembered from blurry surveillance footage that they hadn’t been able to match names to. Rilian House didn’t know anything about the Daughters of Stone, not really.
“Three IC-3 males inbound,” Khoury murmured in her earwig, Beruna vowels clipped, and sure enough, a moment later the door swung open to admit a group of laughing twentysomething dwarves. Idís tipped her head to watch them approach the bar, but they didn’t even glance at Ironstone’s table, just collected their drinks and a couple of menus and took themselves off to an empty booth, throwing elbows as they jostled for space.
Idís put her phone down flat on the counter and leaned over it, watching Ironstone’s table in the mirror behind the bar. She was grinning, leaning into the arm Louca Farquarry had flung around her shoulders, and with the ill-fitting blazer she’d worn at the courthouse gone and her hair loose around her face, some of the lines and care had gone out of her face. Her gaze kept flickering towards the door; Idís couldn’t tell if she was just making sure she had an escape route or if she was waiting for someone else.
The barman came back towards Idís, replacing a half-empty bottle of Glasswater whisky in the rack behind the counter. He grinned comfortably at her. “I haven’t seen you in here before,” he said. “You from out of town?”
“Cair Paravel,” Idís said. “I’m just in town for business.”
“What do you do?”
“I’m a graphic designer,” Idís said. “You don’t happen to need your logo redone, do you? That sign looks like it might actually date back to the Occupation.”
He shook his head, grinning behind his moustaches. “The owner’s attached, I’m afraid.”
“Too bad,” Idís said. “It’s a nice statement piece, though. If anyone could see it.”
“I’ll pass it on to Thyri,” he said. “You have a card?”
Idís did, actually. She dug into her purse, glancing quickly at the stack of cards before she peeled one off and handed it over. A few years ago she’d passed off a card from a different cover than the one she’d actually been using at the time, which had ended with her in hospital with a concussion and two Galman thugs dead on a warehouse floor where Specialist Operations had had to come in shooting. Not a mistake she planned on making again anytime soon.
The barman took the business card and looked at it. “Ygritte Stoneworthy,” he read off, and leaned over the counter, offering his hand. “Nice to meet you, Ygritte. I’m Gardi.”
She took his hand, smiling back at him. “Nice to meet you too, Gardi.”
“Are you here for long?”
“I haven’t really decided,” Idís said. She heard Khoury laugh softly in her ear; the mic she was wearing was good enough to pick up the conversation.
“Stop flirting, Idís,” he said.
“I’m just being polite,” Idís murmured back a minute later, when Gardi had to leave to take an order. It came from one of the dwarf women at Ironstone’s table, younger than the others and with purple streaks in her black hair. Idís tipped her phone up, pretending to frown at it as she snapped a picture of the woman’s – girl’s, really, she didn’t look much older than university age – reflection in the mirror.
Khoury was still laughing to himself, but she heard his tone change abruptly. “I’ve got two IC –” He hesitated, and Idís had to force herself not to react. Police identity codes were supposed to be for quick identification of individuals, but she knew from sour experience that it could sometimes go very wrong.
“I’ve got two IC-1 females inbound,” Khoury finished finally, but he sounded doubtful about the identification. “They could be IC-3s,” he added after another beat.
IC-1 was human, IC-3 was dwarf. The fact that Khoury couldn’t tell for sure hinted at the likelihood that the women inbound were probably mixed-species. Idís herself was a half-dwarf, but she took after her mum enough that she could usually pass for a full dwarf unless someone only looked at her face and not her height and build, which had in the past led to some extremely awkward conversations.
She picked her mobile up, camera aimed at the mirror and rested her elbows on the counter as the door behind her opened. A roar of greeting went up from Ironstone’s table, and Idís judged that provocation significant enough to turn around in her seat and get a look for herself.
The two girls who had just come in were much younger than she had expected, barely old enough to be in university – the younger one looked like she ought still to be in school. Idís could see immediately where Khoury’s confusion had come from. The average height for a dwarf these days was about 4 foot 8, and even the shorter of the two was above average, but the taller girl was almost five foot – enough to pass for human without closer inspection, though both of them carried themselves like dwarves. The younger girl was shorter, with a tumble of dark hair beneath the hood of the sweatshirt she was wearing beneath her denim jacket. The other girl, the one who might have been human, had pulled off her stocking cap as they came inside, stuffing it into her pocket as she ran a hand through the multitude of golden braids in her hair. She was wearing heavy make-up, which wouldn’t have raised an eyebrow from Idís if she wasn’t all too familiar, from personal experience, what make-up looked like when put on to conceal bruises.
The younger girl whooped in excitement when she saw Ironstone, who had emerged from behind the big round table in the other room. She caught both girls up in an embrace, pulling them close as Louca and Pella Farquarry followed her into the main room. The back of the fair girl’s battered leather jacket rose up at the motion, and Idís stiffened as she saw the butt of a gun tucked into the back of her jeans. It was gone a moment later, her shirt falling back down to cover it as Ironstone released her. She raised a hand to touch the girl’s cheek, her eyes fixed on the bruises, and the girl turned her face aside, shaking her head.
Idís let the corner of her mouth quirk up in a good-natured grin, then turned back to her own drink, raising the mobile she was still holding to take snapshot after snapshot as they returned to the other room. She could see some jostling take place until Ironstone was settled back in her former seat, the younger girl leaning her head on one shoulder, the older one on her other side, sandwiched between Ironstone and Louca Farquarry. She had picked up a menu to look at it, but she put it down again when Ironstone said something to her, turning her head to smile at the dwarf woman. Idís took another picture – and found herself catching Farquarry’s eye in the mirror, the woman’s expression gone suddenly dark.
Idís forced herself not to react, switching her phone to her other hand as she picked up her pint glass and drained it. She ducked her head so that her hair swung down as she whispered, “I might have been made,” reaching for her purse.
“Do you need an exit?” Khoury said immediately.
“I don’t think so,” Idís said. She slid her phone into her purse and climbed down off the barstool, hooking her purse straps over her shoulder as she reached to zip her jacket back up. She deliberately didn’t look at the mirror or over her shoulder at the other room, just made her leisurely way towards the door.
“IC-3 female coming in,” Khoury said, just as the door opened in front of her.
Idís had to step back to avoid the dark-skinned dwarf woman who came in, but they still danced around each other for a moment in the small entranceway before they got out of each other’s ways and Idís was able to escape out into the chill dark of the street. Her heels clicked on the cracked pavement as she strode back towards the nondescript IS-issue Traveler. She didn’t look over her shoulder until she’d pulled the passenger-side door open and slid into the seat, locking the door behind her.
Khoury was already turning the key. He pulled away from the curb even before she’d gotten properly seated, the car gliding through darkened streets on their winding way back to Rilian House. “Hamel’s a block down to take over,” he said. “You all right?”
“Yeah.” Idís settled her purse on her lap and reached inside, meaning to get a better look at the photos she’d taken – but instead of her mobile, her fingers only met empty air and the soft sides of her battered paperback, the hard outline of her taser. “Son of a bitch!” she exclaimed, upending her purse on her lap. No mobile, no wallet.
Khoury almost took out a postbox, but straightened the car out quickly. “What’s wrong?”
“The woman who came in just before I left,” Idís said. “She must have lifted my mobile and my wallet. Tell me you got her picture.”
“I got it,” Khoury said, lifting one hand to pat the camera that rested on the cupholder between them. “You think she’s one of Ironstone’s?”
“Louca Farquarry must have signaled her somehow,” Idís said, shoveling everything back into her purse and dropping it on the floor between her feet. She reached up and pulled the earwig out of her ear, tucking it into one of her purse pockets. “I think she saw me taking pictures. Gods, she’s slick. I hope Kes can get an ID off these when we get back to Rilian House. I sent them all back, but they’re on the phone, if Ironstone can get past the password.”
“Everything’s backstopped, though, right?” Khoury said.
“Yeah.” Idís tipped her head against the window, the glass cool against her forehead, and watched the terrace houses that lined the street roll by. They drove on in silence for a few more minutes, then Khoury leaned over to fiddle with the wireless until he found a jazz station. Idís shut her eyes, letting the music wash over her.
It was another forty minutes before they made it back into central Cair Paravel, where they were forced to navigate the still crowded streets before pulling into the Rilian House car park.
The bullpen was mostly deserted when they made it up to Counter-Terrorism. The task force had moved to another floor, taking most of the unit with it, so they had more or less had the bullpen to themselves for the past day or so. Kesztheley was waiting for them, sitting on the edge of her desk and holding a paper cup of break room tea, looking at it in unconcealed dismay. She’d taken out her contacts and was in a pair of red-framed glasses, perched crookedly on her nose.
“Hey,” she said tiredly when she saw them, putting the cup aside. “So I ran those photos you sent me. Most of them are still being checked, but I’ve a few hits on the ones that were in the system.”
Idís knew better than to ask if it could wait till morning. It probably could, but none of them were the type of people who would have joined IS if they were capable of waiting for just that minute more, for being more comfortable. “All right,” she agreed, stifling a yawn with her hand and chucking her purse into her desk chair. “What do we have?”
Kes got off her desk and turned one of her computer monitors towards them. “Odeth Stonehelm, of Glasswater. She used to run with Aerin Ironstone and Louca Farquarry back when they were with the Smoke Lane Slashers fifteen years ago. She’s got a sealed juvie record, cleaned up and fell off the radar for a while, but then popped back up again a few years ago after the Highwater estates shootings along with her cousin, Sighi Stonehelm.” She tapped the keyboard. Sighi Stonehelm might have been pretty, except for the long, ugly scar that cut across half her face, leaving behind the empty socket where her left eye had once been.
“Sighi Stonehelm,” Kes said. “She was caught in the crossfire between Glasswater Specialist Operations and the Highwater shooters during the shootout in ’93. She survived, but after she was released from the hospital she vanished until she and Odeth were sighted with the Dwarf Liberation Army in ’97, along with Aerin Ironstone and Louca Farquarry. We think they went with Ironstone and Farquarry when the Daughters of Stone were founded.”
She tapped the keyboard again. “Gyda Bullroarer. Car thief. Knocked around with dwarf gangs in Glasswater and Cair Paravel – including the Smoke Lane Slashers with Ironstone when they were kids – for a few years before she started going steady with the Daughters of Stone. We think that she might have been the getaway driver for the Long Dusk bombings, but all the surveillance footage from Beaversdam Station is still locked up from the system update.”
“Well, we knew those three,” Khoury said, leaning forward with the elbows on the back of Kes’s chair. “Anything new?”
“Oh, ye of little faith,” Kes sighed. She tapped the keyboard again. “Two more. This is Thyri Stonehelm, part-owner of the pub. She’s in one of the group shots that you sent over.” She nodded at Idís.
“Stonehelm?” Idís said. “Like –”
“Exactly like. She’s Odeth Stonehelm’s sister, so she’s in the system even though she doesn’t have a criminal record. She owns the Broken Shield along with her partner, Sarre Bullroarer – who does have a record, by the way, along with her sister, Gyda. She used to be a surgeon at Royal Court Hospital, but she lost her license for reasons redacted; she bought the pub with part of the settlement money. And she’s in one of the group shots too.”
Khoury let out a low whistle. “It’s a family business. We didn’t realize this before. That’s – thirteen, if we count the woman who stole Idís’s mobile and the two teenagers. No IDs on the others yet?”
Kes shook her head. “They’re in there somewhere, but the computer probably won’t turn up anything until morning.” She ran her hands through her hair, yawning.
“Go home,” Khoury said firmly. “We don’t have any evidence yet that Ironstone’s a clear and present danger, so there’s no point in all of us being exhausted because of it.”
“Yeah,” Kes said. She picked up the paper cup and looked at its contents, sighing.
“Hey,” Idís said, “before we shove off for the night, do me a favor? Can you look up the phone number for the Broken Shield, then do that thing where you make it look like the call is coming from somewhere else?”
“Sure,” Kes said, leaning over her keyboard. “Where do you want it to come from?”
“Oldcommon,” Idís said, reaching for the phone on her desk at her indication. She dialed the number Kes showed her, listening to it ring.
“Broken Shield, Gardi speaking.”
“Hi, I was wondering if you’d found a mobile and a wallet? I think I might have left them behind.”
“Oh, is this Ygritte?” he asked, and she murmured an acknowledgment. “Let me check.”
She heard a burst of meaningless conversation in the background, mostly covered by the sound of the television, and tapped her fingers absently on the back of the phone. Kes and Khoury were both watching curiously.
“Hi, Ygritte, you still there?” Gardi said.
“Nowhere to go,” Idís said. “At least I didn’t leave my keys behind, yeah?”
“Small mercies. Anyway, I’ve got them here. Can you come by tomorrow morning before we open to pick them up? Say, ten o’clock?”
“That works for me,” Idís said. “Will I be seeing you there or someone else?”
Kes swallowed her laugh with her fist.
“Probably someone else,” Gardi said, sounding regretful. “I work nights.”
“Oh, too bad,” Idís said. “Ta, though.”
After she hung up, Khoury leaned his hip against Kes’s desk and said, “You know there’s a good chance Aerin Ironstone or Louca Farquarry is going to be there waiting for you when you show up.”
“One can only hope to be so lucky,” Idís said. “This might give us something new. Or it might give us nothing. We’ll find out.”
“All right,” Khoury said. “But I’m going with you. These women blew up a train station. They’re not going to hesitate at taking an IS officer out of the picture.”
“I’ll pick you up at nine,” Idís said, and pointed at him, finger and thumb like a gun. “But I’m driving.”
*
Ros fell asleep in the back of the Zebra on the way to Louca’s garage, head tipped over onto Aerin’s shoulder, loose hair falling into her face. Aerin put an arm around her shoulders, feeling the breadth and strength there – more than the last time she’d seen her nieces, two years ago before she’d gone to prison. She and Louca had decided that it wasn’t wise for the girls to come anywhere near her, not where there were sign-in sheets and security cameras and fingerprints that were all too likely to send the girls back to Denes Underhill. Pella had brought pictures, but pictures didn’t really capture them – the sound of Ros’s laugh, the scents of gunpowder and oil that clung to Tamsin, the pulse of their heartbeats. Two years was a long time, at that age. At any age.
Tamsin was sitting on her other side, leaning her shoulder comfortably against Aerin’s. She had been doing something on her mobile, but she let it fall to her lap and tipped her head back, smiling sleepily at Aerin.
Aerin ran a hand over her braided hair, comforting, but she didn’t smile. “Give me the gun,” she said.
Tamsin’s eyes fluttered shut, then she squirmed away, reaching behind her to pull the pistol out of her jeans. She handed it butt-first to Aerin, gaze flicking away again.
Aerin checked to see if the safety was on – it was – and whether or not it was loaded, which it was. She saw Louca glance at the rearview mirror, frowning a little. “And the other one.”
Tamsin didn’t reply, but she leaned down and pulled out a compact ST-1N5 – commonly called a sting – from an ankle holster, handing it over. Aerin checked that one too, and gave her niece the courtesy of not asking for the knives she could tell that Tamsin was carrying. “Do you want to tell me about it?”
Tamsin shook her head, her mouth thinning into a straight line. Aerin glanced up at the rearview mirror, meeting Louca’s eyes, saw the familiar flicker that meant, we’ll talk about it later.
“Okay,” Aerin said. “Are you all right?”
Tamsin shrugged, her gaze cutting across Aerin to rest on Ros’s dark head. Whatever it was, Tamsin didn’t want to talk about it with Ros anywhere near, even asleep.
“Okay,” Aerin said again, leaning over to press a kiss to Tamsin’s forehead. “Later, then.”
Tamsin nodded and shut her eyes, leaning against her. Within a few minutes she was asleep too, her fingers twitching anxiously in her lap. Aerin looked down at the guns she was still holding and sighed, slipping the sting into one of the inside pockets of her jacket. The OR-100 pistol she kept hold of, stroking her thumb absently over the battered grip.
“I’ll get her a real holster for that later,” Louca said softly from the front seat.
“I’d feel safer about her carrying it then,” Aerin said. Tamsin wasn’t as hot-headed as her sister, though she was no slouch when it came to her temper, either. If she’d started carrying a gun – two of them – along with her knives, then something had scared her, and badly enough for her to take the risk.
They pulled into the back alley behind Louca’s garage a little while later. Tamsin and Ros were roused with a little prompting and went sleepily and obediently up the stairs to the flat over the garage while Aerin and Louca lingered behind to pull the groceries out of the boot. They were both quiet as they carried the paper bags up the narrow stairs. It was ordinary, domestic – nothing like St. Leocadia’s Prison for Women, and for that Aerin was profoundly grateful.
Tamsin had put the kettle on and was waiting by the kitchen counter, nibbling on a half a biscuit. She came over to help Aerin and Louca unpack, her eyes downcast. Elsewhere in the flat, Aerin heard the toilet flush, then Ros darted out to help too, snatching up one of the biscuits from the open package Tamsin had left on the counter.
They got the groceries put away, and then Ros flattened down the bags and stuffed them into the old shoebox Louca kept for just that purpose in the laundry room while Tamsin busied herself making tea, her bruised face turned carefully away from Aerin. Ros went to bed soon afterwards, kissing first Aerin and then Louca good night before retreating into the bedroom she shared with her sister, while Tamsin ducked into the bathroom, locking the door behind her.
Aerin looked at Louca. They were sitting at the counter, sharing the plate of biscuits Tamsin had laid out and drinking the remainder of the tea. “Tell me,” she said.
Louca ran a hand through her short blonde hair. “I’d rather wait until Ros is asleep,” she said, her voice lowered.
Aerin reached behind her and pulled the OR-100 out of the back of her jeans, setting it down on the counter with a click. The little ST-1N5 followed a moment later. “It’s bad, isn’t it?”
“Well, it’s not good,” Louca said. “I knew about the sting, I don’t know where she got the OR.”
“Ros doesn’t know?”
“Well, she knows something’s wrong; Tamsin’s good at lying but she’s not that good. And it’s not like Ros hasn’t noticed that her big sister is beat to hell. Gods.” She hopped down off the stool and ducked around the counter, leaning down out of sight as she rummaged in a cupboard. “This calls for something stronger than tea.”
“Louca,” Aerin said, “don’t lie to me. Not about this.”
“Aunt Aerin?”
She turned around to see Tamsin standing in the tiny sitting room. Her face was wet, makeup scrubbed off to reveal numerous fading bruises. Aerin had guessed at them already, but it was one thing to guess and another to see, and it was worse than she’d thought.
“I’m fine,” Tamsin said quickly, seeing the expression on her face. “It’s not as bad as it looks.”
“Booze,” Louca said, straightening up from behind the counter with a bottle of vodka in one hand.
Tamsin looked over her shoulder at the closed bedroom door. Aerin knew her niece well enough to be certain that Ros was most likely standing behind it, listening to every word. It was, in her experience, fairly pointless for one of the sisters to try and hide something from the other, but both of them kept trying from time to time. Ros had to have figured out that something had happened to Tamsin – the bruises on her face were evidence enough of that – but Tamsin was trying to hide the details from her.
“It’s nothing, Aunt,” Tamsin said, her voice pleading. “It’s not important. You just got out of jail, that’s important, not me.”
“Come here,” Aerin said, and Tamsin did, her bare feet silent on the floor as she moved from the carpeted sitting room to the scratched linoleum in the kitchen. Perched on one of Louca’s mismatched stools she and Tamsin were finally the same height, the way they hadn’t been since Tamsin was fourteen and hitting her first tearful growth spurt. Ros had gotten her fine features from their human father; Tamsin had gotten his height. Some of it, at least.
Aerin put her arms out, letting Tamsin step into them and drop her head down against Aerin’s shoulder, breathing hard. Aerin pressed a kiss to her the base of hairline. “Jail’s over,” she said. “You’re what’s important to me, you and your sister. You always have been. You’re the most important people in the world.”
Tamsin was silent, breathing hard. There was a soft click as Louca found the shot glasses and started splashing vodka into them.
“Tell me,” Aerin said, feeling Tamsin’s breath stutter. “You’re scaring me. You don’t want to keep it inside, do you?”
Tamsin swallowed. “There were some people,” she said eventually, her voice pitched low. “Dwarves. The LOR.”
Aerin knew that name. The Legends of Rustwater were one of the junior gangs in the neighborhood, a bunch of young punks that, as far as she was aware, spent most of their time getting drunk, getting high, and getting into trouble.
“It was right after the bombings in Beruna,” Tamsin went on. “Ros and I were staying with Gyda. I went down to the corner shop to get milk and some crisps, and when I came out a bunch of the LOR were hanging around, you know, doing that thing they do. Watching. And then they started following me, saying things – calling me names. Chim slag. Human bitch.” Her hands tightened on Aerin’s arms. “Human,” she said again, softly, like that was the worst insult.
Aerin tightened her grip. You’re not, she wanted to say. You’re not human. You’re mine. But she held her tongue.
“Some of them got in front of me,” Tamsin said after a moment. “So I threw a punch. I got some of them good,” she added, her voice gone proud for an instant, “but there were too many of them. They got me on the pavement. Got most of my knives off me – the ones they could find, and the ones I could get at. A couple of them had guns. They said they were going to make an example out of me – to show why humans oughtn’t to come over to this side of the river. To get them back for the bombings.” She swallowed. Aerin was holding her so hard that it had to hurt, but she didn’t want to loosen her grip – didn’t want Tamsin to think that she’d let her go for any reason.
“I could feel the barrel of the gun against my cheek,” Tamsin said. “She was going to do it – I could see it in her eyes. Because she thought I was human. Because I was worthless to her. Because I looked – because I look human. She was going to kill me. And I thought, well, she’s going to feel really fucking stupid when the Daughters of Stone come after her.” She choked out a laugh. “They were all standing around, watching. I looked over and I realized that the girl standing next to me had a knife sticking out of her boot. So I grabbed it. I got her across the face, the one with the gun, and I got out of there somehow. I just remember running, and somehow I ended up here. I got in, and I locked the door behind me, and I got one of Louca’s guns and I waited for them to come after me.” Her voice trailed off. She pressed her face harder against Aerin’s shoulder, her breath coming out in stuttering gasps. “They didn’t come,” she finished eventually. “Louca got back first.”
Aerin wrapped her arms around her, as tightly as she could manage, and held Tamsin close. Her niece was shaking, her fingers digging into Aerin’s back as she leaned into the embrace.
“My brave girl,” Aerin whispered, kissing her forehead. “My smart, brave, wonderful girl.”
Louca came over, silently, and put her arms around them both. Tamsin was crying, her tears soaking through the thin fabric of Aerin’s blouse. Louca stroked her back, and Aerin kissed her and held her close, until at last Tamsin hiccupped and pulled away from both of them, scrubbing a hand over her reddened eyes.
“Booze,” Louca repeated, leaning over Aerin to pick up the trio of shot glasses she’d filled from the counter. Aerin took one from her, the glass cool against her hands, and Tamsin took another. She summoned up the ghost of a smile when Aerin looked at her.
“I know,” she said. “I’m over the drinking age now. You missed my eighteenth.”
“I’m sorry,” Aerin said.
“It’s okay,” Tamsin said. “Nat and Odeth got me so drunk that I don’t remember any of it anyway.”
Aerin gave Louca a meaningful look. Louca just shrugged. “What? You weren’t there and we can’t all be moderating influences.”
Tamsin giggled a little. There was an edge of hysteria in it, but her hand was steady on the shot glass as she tossed the vodka back. “Uff da,” she said after she’d swallowed, shaking herself like a dog. “Did you make that in a bathtub, Aunt Louca?”
“I did not,” Louca said, clinking her glass against Aerin’s. They drank in unison, the alcohol burning its way down Aerin’s throat. “I’ll have you know I haven’t made bathtub gin in six months.”
“Because it exploded the last time,” Tamsin confided to Aerin. She sat down on one of the empty stools and leaned her head against Aerin’s shoulder, her eyes slanting closed as if that last shot of vodka had leeched all the energy out of her. Aerin put an arm around her, stroking her hair.
“I put the word out,” Louca said quietly, leaning back against the half-wall connected to the counter.
Aerin looked up at her. Tamsin appeared to have fallen asleep already, because she didn’t stir. “What word?”
“That the LOR had gone after one of the Daughters of Stone. I didn’t name names, but it’s out there.” Her face was solemn.
Aerin stroked a finger down one of Tamsin’s golden braids. “Do the others know?”
“Gyda and Sarre do. I had to call Gyda to let her know that Tamsin wasn’t coming back, and I brought Sarre in to look Tamsin over. Some of the others probably worked it out.”
“But Ros doesn’t know?” Aerin said softly.
“Ros knows something happened, but not what.”
Tamsin jerked up at the sound of her sister’s name, flailing for a moment and nearly falling off the stool before Aerin steadied her. “You can’t tell Ros,” she said, pleading. “You can’t, Aunt Aerin, please don’t tell her.”
“I won’t,” Aerin said.
Tamsin gripped her arm and looked down at her, with the intensity that only the very drunk could manage. “Promise me.”
“I promise I won’t tell your sister,” Aerin said.
Tamsin nodded, the brief sharpness in her green eyes going blurry again. “I don’t want her to know, Aunt.”
“I won’t tell her,” Aerin said again. “Come on, Tamsin. Time for bed.”
Tamsin straightened up obediently at her light touch, running a hand through her braids. She looked like a dwarf, Aerin thought, except for her height and her too-long legs. She moved like a dwarf, rooted to the ground, and she had the same knack for making things that all dwarves were born with, gift or curse. If it wasn’t for her height, no one would look twice at her. No one except a human.
Damn them, Aerin thought with familiar weariness, but even after two years in prison she couldn’t summon up the energy to get properly angry about it. The vodka left it all pleasantly numb.
Tamsin was clinging sleepily to her arm, slouching a little to tip her cheek against Aerin’s head. She’d gained an inch or two since the last time Aerin had seen her, when she’d kissed Tamsin and Ros goodbye at the breakfast table and been arrested two hours later at a petrol station just outside Beaversdam. She’d been barely more than a child then – only seventeen. She didn’t look much older now.
Louca began quietly gathering up the dirtied cups and glasses as Aerin walked Tamsin to her bedroom door. When she pushed it open, she saw Ros curled up on one side of the double bed they shared, stripped down to a battered t-shirt – seemingly asleep, though Aerin knew her niece well enough to guess that that might not be the case. Tamsin stood stock still as Aerin released her, swaying a little. She looked down at her bare feet in apparent fascination, at her scuffed scarab blue toenails. Aerin pushed her carefully towards the bed, sitting her down on the empty side before managing to coax her down. She pulled the duvet up over Tamsin’s shoulders, leaning down to kiss her good night as Tamsin blinked at her.
“I love you, Aunt Aerin,” she murmured sleepily.
Aerin stroked a hand over Tamsin’s hair. “I love you too, Tamsin,” she said. She leaned over and pressed a kiss to Ros’s black hair, pulled into a messy braid for sleep. Ros stirred slightly, rolling over to smile up at her. It was a little too deliberate and Aerin thought, grimly, that there was no way that Ros hadn’t been listening at the door and dashed back to bed when she’d heard Tamsin and Aerin coming.
She leaned up and kissed Aerin’s cheek quickly. “I’ll take care of her, Aunt,” she said, and for a moment her eyes were too old for her age. “I always do.”
“I know you do,” Aerin said. She tugged the duvet up over both of them – Tamsin was already asleep, curved towards her sister like a comma, and Ros wrapped her arms around her, their black and gold hair mixing on the pillow.
Aerin left them there, closing the bedroom door carefully behind her. She found Louca curled up on the sofa, field-stripping the OR-100 Aerin had taken from Tamsin. Aerin sat down next to her, dropping her head to Tamsin’s shoulder.
“Not how I expected my first day back to go,” she said.
“It could be worse,” Louca said, leaning forward to put the OR-100’s component parts down on the coffee table. She frowned at them, and Aerin let her head fall back against the sofa cushions. “IS could have figured out that you’d be coming here and bugged the place.”
Aerin sat up abruptly. “Are you sure they didn’t?”
“The girls wouldn’t be here anymore if they had. Don’t worry, there’s always tomorrow. They’re sitting outside anyway waiting for us to leave.”
Aerin stood up and went over to the window, cracking the blinds open to see the dark form of the beat-up Majesty parked across the street. “Well, the Eyes can have a cold night of it, for all I care,” she said. “Pella will sort out that woman from the pub?”
“One way or another,” Louca said, starting to fit the pistol back together. “Where the hell did Tamsin even get this thing, anyway?”
Aerin dropped back down onto the sofa, running a hand through her hair to pull out the tie. She tossed it onto the coffee table and pulled her legs up onto the sofa. “Was it as bad as it sounds?”
“Worse.” Louca put the gun down and leaned forward, elbows resting on her knees as she threaded her fingers through her hair. “Tamsin almost shot my head off when I came in. I’ve never seen her so scared – she’s an Ironstone, after all, and she grew up with us.” She ran her hands over her face. “I’m still finding bloodstains in odd places.”
Aerin sat up abruptly.
“Sorry,” Louca said, glancing over her shoulder at her. “I shouldn’t have said that. Gods, if I ever get my hands on the dwarves who did this, the King of Summer himself won’t save them.”
Aerin shut her eyes tightly. “If I’d been here –”
“She went out to get milk, for Spring’s sake,” Louca said, spreading her hands helplessly. “It was last week! It’s Rustwater, she should have been safe. She’s a dwarf –”
Aerin ran a hand over her face. Tamsin was a dwarf, in every way that counted, except for her human father’s height, and for some that was all that mattered. “Who do the LOR feed into? They’re a feeder gang, aren’t they? They have a mother?”
“Hammerhand’s lot,” Louca said. “I can’t remember what they’re calling themselves this week; I feel like every time I turn around it’s something new. That bitch can’t make up her mind about anything except that the only thing she hates more than humans is chims.”
“Set up a meet,” Aerin said. “She might run a corner of Rustwater, but I’m still the biggest bitch in Narnia, and it’ll please her to remember it. And if she thinks her cubs can go after my girls, she’s got another think coming to her.”
“She probably doesn’t know,” Louca said. “I’ll have Morwen sort it out.”
“Since when is Morwen on terms with Daragh Hammerhand?”
“It’s a really long story,” Louca said. “And mostly involves Nat’s terrible lack of self-control and self-preservation instincts.”
“So same old, then,” Aerin said.
“Pretty much.” Louca sat back. She pressed her hands together, touched her fingertips to her nose, rested her thumbs against her mouth. “She was so fucking scared, Aerin. I don’t know what it was like in St. Leo’s, but on the streets it’s been a nightmare since the bombings. Humans are blaming us for the maglev attacks, nonhumans are blaming them for Beruna – everyone’s jumping at shadows.” She was silent for a moment. “Shooting at shadows,” she said finally. “I heard the LOR chased a cop car out of Rustwater the other day. When even the coppers are running scared –”
Aerin glanced over at the window, thinking about the no-doubt IS-issue Majesty parked outside. Louca followed her gaze and added, “We should be so lucky. Even the LOR knows that this is my patch. And if they showed up I’d probably just shoot them, Eyes or not.”
“And I probably wouldn’t stop you,” Aerin said. She put her arm out, pulling Louca close. Louca came easily, dropping her head against Aerin’s shoulder. Aerin shut her eyes, pretending they were eighteen again, young and wild and free in the streets of Glasswater, before Guiry had gone to prison, before Kyrene had died, before everything had gone to hell and she’d taken the girls and run because they were family and she was a dwarf, and if there was one thing that mattered to a dwarf, beyond Narnia and their crafts and gold, it was family. And even if she and Louca had only been nineteen, they’d known that.
She opened her eyes again to find Louca looking up at her. She smiled, a little, and leaned up to press a closed-mouth kiss against Aerin’s lips. “I’m glad you’re back,” she said softly. “I missed you.”
Aerin smiled against her mouth and pulled back slightly to say, “I missed not living in a cell with a triple-murderer faun.”
Louca laughed and stood up, grasping Aerin’s hands and pulling her to her feet. “You always knew how to ruin a moment,” she said. “They put you in with a triple-murderer?”
“She told some interesting stories,” Aerin said, and let Louca lead her out of the sitting room and into the familiar space of Louca’s bedroom – of what had been their shared bedroom since they’d bought the garage. She stopped to turn the sitting room light off, then shut the door behind her.
(no subject)
Date: 2013-05-11 09:22 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2013-05-13 01:26 pm (UTC)