Ana suppressed a sigh. Morale was low at the Sanctuary. It hung in the air almost like a physical thing, weighing down people who were already weighed down at the best of times.

“Come in, come in!” Damia said, waving people in through the door. Bless her heart, she always tried to wear a smile for their subjects, but she had no skill for making it look genuine when it wasn’t.

The kitchen volunteers were hurrying to finish preparing bowls as the evening’s crowd shuffled in. There was a considerable number of stooped backs, bad legs, or simply a general weakness brought on by sickness. Then of course there were the low spirits.

“I heard about the new place, Ana,” said one of the regular men. “The Bomber, wasn’t it?”

“It was,” she told him.

“How bad is it?” he asked.

“Bad,” she admitted. “We won’t be able to use that loft for a while. Not until the roof can be repaired. And the furniture was damaged.”

“That was a whole lot of wasted effort,” another one commented from behind him.

“We will carry on,” Ana stated confidently. “We managed one place, and we will manage another. Now please, take your seats and don’t block traffic.”

Damia started helping with tonight’s soup, while Ana moved over to the door and did her part by simply being the first thing people saw as they entered. Stability and familiarity was a salve in itself, and it seemed that every destitute in Black Bend had come to know her. And more than perhaps anything else, human beings needed their spirit maintained.

“Good to see you. How is the cough? Hello. Yes, we’re carrying on. Oh, hello, welcome back.”

She went through the familiar ritual, but made sure to look each person in the eyes and give each one a personal greeting. A considerable crowd had built up; the matter with the loft had delayed things, but in time the flow died down and everyone had found a seat on one of the mismatched benches.

Normally it was soup and bread, but there had been an issue with the flour delivery, so tonight it was just soup. The unemployed, the homeless, the disturbed, the disabled and the sick, all contented themselves with a meal of water, vegetables, and however much salt Ana and the cooks dared spare for the week.

This place was, when Ana remembered to think about it, a small miracle. A large, open space on a ground floor, made dirt cheap by the location and yet it had a small kitchen and functioning plumbing. And yet it was so little.

She could see Damia coming, desperate cheer plastered onto her face as she delicately wove between benches and tables. Ana retreated to the resting area, which was just a section of the open floor hidden from view by a set of drapes. Damia followed.

“Well?” Ana asked.

“Really, what are we going to do?” the younger woman whispered. “With the loft gone? It took people’s generosity to gather the furniture, the money, the glass panes, the pressure on the authorities... we can’t just go out and do the exact thing all over again. People only have so much generosity. Especially now.”

With her arms around herself and out of sight of the street people, Ana allowed herself to feel a bit of despair and close her eyes. Just how long had it been since she’d stood before the most feared man in the city, and then seen it all come down? As so often before, Damia’s worries slid through her armour and infected her, and as usual the woman reached out and touched her shoulder comfortingly.

“Oh, I’m sorry,” Damia said. “I don’t mean to make you feel worse. But... you’re the planner here.”

“Here is what we do for now, Damia,” Ana said as she steadied herself. “We carry on, as usual. We give these people a stable castle to turn to, and we remind them that they are worth something and that things aren’t hopeless. And we do this through caring and strength, and maintaining a community.”

Damia hung her head. Ana knew perfectly well that the woman had caring. She’d proven that time and again. But her strength often threatened to fail. Ana pulled her in for a hug, which had the pleasant side effect of getting her one in turn.

This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road. If you spot it on Amazon, please report it.

“Onwards,” Damia said, steeling herself as they separated.

“Yes. Onwards.”

Ana retrieved her violin from a locked cupboard, sat down in her usual corner and began playing. Damia helped with refills, while making small talk with the people at every opportunity. Some of the guests turned her way as they ate, silently giving their approval. Ana continued playing as the refills slowed down, and continued still as the others helped gather the bowls. No one had ever complained.

After a couple of songs more she had everyone’s undivided attention and took it as her signal to switch to words. She packed up the simple violin and then stood up on her chair for maximum visibility.

“I know you’ve all heard by now,” she said in a strong, clear voice. “Yes, the loft has been damaged. Yes, the Green Bomber did it and yes I was there myself. This is a setback, but that’s no reason to despair. I remind you all that we are no worse off than we were yesterday. I and my team will continue to work towards an additional shelter, whether that means getting the loft repaired or finding another spot. And Sanctuary will continue to be here for you, as always. I know it’s later than usual, but you all come here for certain services and we will give them to you.”

She wasn’t sure how much reassurance she’d actually achieved, or indeed how much reassurance there was to be had in the first place, but all she could do was her best.

She and her team broke up into their usual separate duties. Ana went over to another portion of the house, this one behind an actual door. There she took out her medical bag as the expected line of people formed outside the room. Meanwhile Damia and a couple of the others engaged in talks about job prospects, mental well-being, and just whatever each person wanted to get off their chest. Not everyone had anything to say, and some simply shuffled back out the door while others lay down in the rest area.

The medical issues weren’t numerous tonight, much to Ana’s relief. She cleaned a rather infected-looking cut on a teenager’s thigh, set and bound a broken finger, and then massaged Old Alma’s arthritic hands.

“You’ve got magic in those fingers, child,” the woman said as Ana worked to relieve her pains. “There is no other explanation for it.”

“Skill,” Ana said with a weak smile.

“Pah.”

“Have you seen Kylis?” Ana asked her. “I was expecting to see him tonight.”

Old Alma shook her head sadly.

“His head’s taken another funny turn. Talking about things only he remembers and only he sees.”

Ana grimaced on the inside. She really thought he’d been getting better. She supposed it had just been a lucky streak.

“Is he sermonising or wandering?” she asked.

“Started with the first but now he’s doing the latter, looks like.”

That was the worse option, and Ana’s heart sank a little. Kylis couldn’t be trusted with himself while having one of his episodes.

“So he’s just wandering the Jungle?” she asked.

“A couple of people were watching him,” Alma said. “But he’s oddly slippery when he has a mind to.”

“I know,” Ana said. “I think-”

“Hey!” said a voice out in the main space, and she heard awkward footsteps and the sound of something being dragged. It proved to be a man who could only intermittently get his feet active beneath him. He was helped along by two other equally poorly dressed men, both of whom were smeared with his blood.

“It’s not as... I don’t think it... it’s not as bad as it looks, I think...” the man said weakly, gasping with each poorly coordinated movement.

“What happened?” Ana asked and rose.

“We found him,” one of the other men said. “He said something about having been attacked.”

“The streets just keep getting worse,” Old Alma muttered.

“Put him on the table,” Ana said and readied her pouch of more serious medical supplies.

“It’s his back,” the other man said and they laid him down face-first.

The victim’s back was indeed covered with blood and it didn’t take a close look to tell that much of it was sticking the torn jacket to the injured flesh. Ana brought out her scissors and put them to the material.

“I need the jacket,” the man protested weakly as she began cutting.

“We’ll get you another one,” she assured him gently. “We have a supply of donations.”

“I like it,” he insisted with a hint of delirium.

“Let’s just get you healthy,” she whispered soothingly.

She skilfully cut through and at her direction one of the men readied gauze and alcohol. It looked like the wounds weren’t actually all that deep, just broad and torn and awful, and the blood loss had clearly stopped. She removed the jacket and the shirt beneath it as gently as she could, and then began cleaning the blood away with water.

“Where... where did you find him?” she asked, taken aback.

“In the Jungle.”

There were three sets of wounds running across the man’s back, each at a different angle. And each one was a set of four symmetrical cuts. Try as she might, Ana could only think of one explanation: These were claw marks.