The Guvnors control the Dome. Big old bubble by the river. Built for a festival long before the civil war. Big holes in it now. But it still gives enough shelter for the market. The market never sleeps. 24/7. Anything you can buy in Riverside, you can buy it here.

We ain’t allowed in, of course. Counts of our nicking. But here we are. Rats find a way.

I told the boys we’re on the rob. Looking for shoes to steal, or trade. Got a proper back pack to sell now, and a few other treasures. We need drinking water too. If we had real sterling, I’d buy drugs, painkillers or sleeping pills. Help with the sickness. Feeling it now.

It’s a riot in here. Noisy as hell. Busy busy busy. We split up. This is how we do. Pick a grown up. Follow them. Looks like you a little family. Don’t get spotted by the Guvnors and chuck out. Well that’ll happen sooner or later. Rather it later.

What I’m really here for, is the book shop.

On the edge of the market, Old Derek, built his palace of books. Like the walls themselves are piles of books. All lit up by little gas lamps. Could burn down if it didn’t get so damp. Smell of all that damp paper.

Derek scrapes a living here. Books is cheap, and tech is mostly broken. Those who can read, all come here. Old Derek ain’t rich, but he eats well. Chubby old reader. Curly white beard. Cracked glasses. Always smoking and drinking chai.

“Oi Oi Dez!”

“What are you doing here? I’ll bet a pony you can’t read. And you wouldn’t say hello if you were planning to rob me. You know I’m under the full protection of our local mob.”

I like the way Dez talks. Like he likes it. Putting all the words together.

Then the lights and the words in my eyes, they start to go hyper. There is actual text around Dez, like he is highlighted. Like it wants me to notice him.

He cocks his head a little. Must have noticed my face. It’s dizzy making when the lights kick off. Prolly shows.

“What’s your name?”

That’s a rare one. Shocked. Nobody asks a river rat their name.

“Skelly.”

“You know you won’t last out there, lad. There’s work for a hardworking boy here.”

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“Ain’t no slave.”

“Why did you come to me, Skelly?”

“You can read.”

“Sketch!”

He calls to the woman on the stall opposite, she nods, halfway through a heated negotiation over a tub of powder milk for babies. Ripped Guvnor muscle with a chrome fist looks on, keeping the peace.

“Keep half an eye on the books my love, got a meeting.”

He beckons me out back.

I’m scared. You learn not to follow grown ups to the back room when you’re street scum like me.

But I ain’t got much choice. My fingers fiddle with the corner you, blankie. And I follow him.

He’s got a little snug up a ladder on top of his stall. Cushions and books and incense and dirty old food trays he hasn’t cleaned up in weeks. Needs to get himself a Bleeder. Wonder what his last slave died of?

“What do you need reading Skelly?” He asks as he settles into a pile of cushions.

I start coughing. Takes a minute to calm down.

“Can I show you?”

This is it then, if he thinks I’m a witch, he can report me just by shouting. Guvnors don’t have a record of burning witches, but they’d probably sell me.

“I need something to draw with.”

He puts a book of yellowing blank paper in front of me and a biro.

I work really hard trying to write down some of the things I see. It’s not perfect but the symbols look pretty close. Then he gasps. I’m shocked cause I never knew you could read upside down.

Before I can move, he pulls down my scarf. I know what he sees. I’m whiter than white. Bone white cracker boy. So the yellow from the sickness, must be bloody neon on my fizzgog.

He grabs me by the arms, stronger than I thought for a fat man.

“Don’t panic. Breathe. I’m not going to raise the alarm on you.”

“Ain’t you scared of the fever?”

“Let’s just say I have reason to believe I can’t catch it.”

“Are my boys gonna die?”

His face crumples up.

“Survival rates are low.”

That’s a yes then.

“There’s drugs that can slow it down but they cost more than all the sterling in the dome. It’ll come and go in waves, but most don’t live longer than a month.”

I’m streaming tears. Can’t even hide it.

“But it won’t kill you.”

“What?”

“What you wrote here, look, it’s the Crone, the Siren and the Weaver.”

“I don’t know what that means Dez.”

“They are the Three. My gods, you don’t know anything do you.”

“Never had no school, Dez.”

“You have a... system growing inside you. There are people who can teach you how to use it. I can contact them for you...but you have to want that.”

A growing feeling of sickness deep in my belly. I know what the filthy old sod means by people. I know what he means by system. I jump up and stumble backwards, nearly fall down the ladder.

“You made a choice already. You chose clan Crone. If you don’t learn how to use the Rhizome, it’ll kill you eventually.”

I’m trying to get out, fall into a stack of books, avalanche.

“Stop thief!” Derek shouts.

The world turns upside down, pain in my ankle. I’w watching the filthy ground as I am dragged by my leg towards the exit. And I’m coughing and coughing as I go. Someone screams.

“Infected! The kid is infected!”

The gangster goon starts running through the crowd, all the upside bodies running away from me, and then I’m in the air for a moment, now I feel all the air leave my body as I hit the ground. Red light grows around the edge of my vision, and my heart beat is suddenly loud like a drum.

Then it fades.

The yellow sickness saved me from a kicking then.

A rat sniffs at my face. Wondering if I’m dead enough for eating.