Read Online Rojan Dizon 02 - Before the Fall by Francis Knight - Free Book Online Page B
Authors: Francis Knight
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that’s coincidence, do you? If that happens, this city is lost, whether you get the power back on or not.”
He didn’t say it—“please find whoever’s killing those boys”—but he didn’t have to. It was in the defeat in his voice, something I’d rarely heard in a brother who thought everything was an opportunity. He had his hands full of ambassadors to placate and disgruntled cardinals who didn’t want change, any sort of change, and especially the sort Perak would bring. Dench had already hinted that he didn’t have the time for this, not if he wanted to keep Perak safe, and his Specials and the guards were hard pressed enough with keeping a lid on the explosion.
Which left me.
I was going to say: “Goddess’s tits, Perak, I’m having enough trouble keeping my shit together just keeping the Glow at this level, never mind getting everything up and running in five days and, oh, finding a killer while I’m at it.”
Then I caught sight of Jake. The way she was looking at me, hoping.
Like I said, the reason I do most things is so the lady will think I’m good and noble. Not because I am good and noble, but it’s a hell of a way to get them interested. This was going to be a fuck of a lot of being good, too much for my liking, but it might have its advantages. Besides, it was Perak asking.
“All right, I’ll try. I can’t promise anything, though.”
“I knew I could rely on you. I’ll send Dench with what we’ve got on the murders, though it won’t be till tonight probably. It isn’t much, but maybe it will help. And thank you.”
It surprised me, then, that his smile was almost worth it all on its own, the way the worried creases smoothed away, how his shoulders stopped hunching somewhere up around his jaw. Helping my little brother. It felt kind of good, in fact. Until I started thinking about what it actually meant, and the work—and magic, pain—it involved.
Perak left and I sank into the chair, trying to ignore the contraption on the arm, the way it seemed to call to me. I had other things calling, and the reason was smiling at me in a way that made me feel quite odd.
She perched on Pasha’s chair opposite me. “You know I’ll help, we both will, however we can. There’s been more killings than they’ve let on, you know that?”
No, I hadn’t known that. “How many?”
She shrugged, and the ice cracked a little. Downsiders being murdered, people like her and Pasha. Little Whores, both of them, tainted by the mages, branded. Collaborators is what those brands and rumour said, even when they were anything but, had spent their lives fighting against what had gone on. They were walking targets, hated by everyone who knew their secret, knew the mark on their wrists, something I hadn’t really realised in my own quest to avoid getting lynched.
“I’m not sure exactly,” she said. “Maybe a dozen? Any Downsider could tell you that. Upsiders don’t care. Ministry don’t care, except Perak. He sees, but the rest—we’re only Downsiders. We don’t matter. If it was Upsiders getting murdered, or Ministry, they’d have the killer caught by now.” That last with a pained twitch of her lips. A devout follower of the Goddess, she was, with a faith that somehow shamed me. Made me wish I did believe. I would, if I could believe as hard as she did.
“I care,” I said, and the smile…good job I hadn’t finalised that deal with the Goddess, or I’d have to have started believing right then.
Pasha came back in at that point, shattered the moment when she turned her smile on him and racked it up a notch.
It only took a couple of minutes to tell him what Perak had said.
“All right. What first?”
And that was the question. I could spend my time trying to find one person in thousands upon thousands, and all the time we weren’t getting the power back on, helping people live, we were helping people die. A dozen Downsiders were dead, and that was bad, but not as bad as a
He didn’t say it—“please find whoever’s killing those boys”—but he didn’t have to. It was in the defeat in his voice, something I’d rarely heard in a brother who thought everything was an opportunity. He had his hands full of ambassadors to placate and disgruntled cardinals who didn’t want change, any sort of change, and especially the sort Perak would bring. Dench had already hinted that he didn’t have the time for this, not if he wanted to keep Perak safe, and his Specials and the guards were hard pressed enough with keeping a lid on the explosion.
Which left me.
I was going to say: “Goddess’s tits, Perak, I’m having enough trouble keeping my shit together just keeping the Glow at this level, never mind getting everything up and running in five days and, oh, finding a killer while I’m at it.”
Then I caught sight of Jake. The way she was looking at me, hoping.
Like I said, the reason I do most things is so the lady will think I’m good and noble. Not because I am good and noble, but it’s a hell of a way to get them interested. This was going to be a fuck of a lot of being good, too much for my liking, but it might have its advantages. Besides, it was Perak asking.
“All right, I’ll try. I can’t promise anything, though.”
“I knew I could rely on you. I’ll send Dench with what we’ve got on the murders, though it won’t be till tonight probably. It isn’t much, but maybe it will help. And thank you.”
It surprised me, then, that his smile was almost worth it all on its own, the way the worried creases smoothed away, how his shoulders stopped hunching somewhere up around his jaw. Helping my little brother. It felt kind of good, in fact. Until I started thinking about what it actually meant, and the work—and magic, pain—it involved.
Perak left and I sank into the chair, trying to ignore the contraption on the arm, the way it seemed to call to me. I had other things calling, and the reason was smiling at me in a way that made me feel quite odd.
She perched on Pasha’s chair opposite me. “You know I’ll help, we both will, however we can. There’s been more killings than they’ve let on, you know that?”
No, I hadn’t known that. “How many?”
She shrugged, and the ice cracked a little. Downsiders being murdered, people like her and Pasha. Little Whores, both of them, tainted by the mages, branded. Collaborators is what those brands and rumour said, even when they were anything but, had spent their lives fighting against what had gone on. They were walking targets, hated by everyone who knew their secret, knew the mark on their wrists, something I hadn’t really realised in my own quest to avoid getting lynched.
“I’m not sure exactly,” she said. “Maybe a dozen? Any Downsider could tell you that. Upsiders don’t care. Ministry don’t care, except Perak. He sees, but the rest—we’re only Downsiders. We don’t matter. If it was Upsiders getting murdered, or Ministry, they’d have the killer caught by now.” That last with a pained twitch of her lips. A devout follower of the Goddess, she was, with a faith that somehow shamed me. Made me wish I did believe. I would, if I could believe as hard as she did.
“I care,” I said, and the smile…good job I hadn’t finalised that deal with the Goddess, or I’d have to have started believing right then.
Pasha came back in at that point, shattered the moment when she turned her smile on him and racked it up a notch.
It only took a couple of minutes to tell him what Perak had said.
“All right. What first?”
And that was the question. I could spend my time trying to find one person in thousands upon thousands, and all the time we weren’t getting the power back on, helping people live, we were helping people die. A dozen Downsiders were dead, and that was bad, but not as bad as a
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