Forecast for today is light clouds; might see a bit of rain this afternoon. Finally getting a break in the weather, folks!
Fun fact of the day: meteorology was an Inventor program. Pretty sure that guy survived. I wonder what he’s up to. Probably retired somewhere warmer, am I right?
Anyways, gotta run the ninth bell prayers. Not like I want to, but it’s the law!
Spring 6
An expansive loft, a library full of heresy, and a new wardrobe managed to hold Valkyrie’s attention for a little while. The Mishkan loft’s state-of-the-art refrigerator stuffed full of her favorite snacks helped too.
“Nobles get all the best food!” she informed the empty loft, savoring out of season peaches.
On her second day in the loft, she tore through her new closet. Lots of dresses, mostly variations on pink or peach or lavender to match the current fashion for girls. Other than those, she found a variety of day clothing for children and adults, all within tolerance for her size. In back, she sifted through school uniforms, complete with socks and loafers, suitable for any of the borough schools of any age. In a separate pile, she found a bag of school emblems and a sewing kit.
Playing around, Valkyrie determined that she fit in the A-line jumper of Firstborough Elementary – if a bit tight – but the Fifthborough High Preparatory Academy sagged around her like a tent.
Typical result for someone five foot tall on a good day.
Still, so many outfits and so many schools…was this how all noble closets worked? Just filled to the gills with every possibility?
What other explanation could there be?
It wasn’t like they knew I was coming!
Moving to the vanity, she discovered a delightful assortment of trinkets. Necklaces, bracelets, charms, and earrings, each set worth a pretty penny to the right person.
Valkyrie tucked a few away in a purse, hung by the door. Just in case.
Nobles wouldn’t miss one or two.
Soon enough, she tired of her assigned quarters and peeked elsewhere. One room, covered wall to wall in calligraphy that squirmed against her eyes, creeped her right out. The second led into a vast library, tempting her with stories ancient and forgotten. She spent a full day browsing the selection, flipping through books ranging from history and politics to witchcraft and conspiracies. Many were written in that squiggly language and impenetrable to her squinting. For now.
Towards the back, she found an old diary. Flipping through, she skimmed anecdotes from the departed Lord Mishkan; she even laughed at a few!
Must have been nice for a noble.
Bored again, she dropped the diary on the table and turned her attention to one last door.
But the study door only rattled at her touch, firmly locked.
“Hmph,” she muttered. She was a guest here; she could respect the Lady’s privacy.
She tried the handle twice more before dinner though. Just in case.
By the evening of Spring 5, she had exhausted her little world. She went to bed early, playing with the hem of her pillows until sleep finally came.
The next morning, she awoke with the dawn, sunk into the depths of her bed. Fuzzy-headed, she automatically calculated the distance between Sixborough and her Fourthborough classes for the day. The outer boroughs were thinner than the fat inner boroughs; she could probably sleep another hour…
A laugh came from the foot of her bed. “With so many options, are we so eager to wear that dullard uniform again, my dear?”
A woman in silken crimson, cinched tight across her belly and cut up her thigh, smiled like a tiger at her prey.
Shrieking, Valkyrie threw the nearest stuffed animal at her. It sailed straight through the woman.
“I am but your humble shadow. Think of me as your own private guardian angel.”
What the hells is an angel?
The demon clicked her tongue. “Now now. Don’t fight my gift, dear. Let’s skip all that tedious vocabulary.”
A little bubble popped between Valkyrie’s eyes.
Angel. Aspect. Demon. Dominion.
Chorus. Foundation. Echoes. Spheres.
Lynne, Verdandi, Hylas. Their Covenant.
Gabriel, Sebastian, Alisandra. Shining angels on their hill.
Malkuth and Yesod and all those other silly names.
Mirielle Visage. Your proud succubus.
“Only our beginning,” assured the shadow. “As was promised.”
For a brief moment, we shall soar together
Wish for me and I for you
Our desires knit together to become our road
“Or maybe I’ve gone nutters!” Valkyrie retorted.
“All the better! A touch of madness eases the way.”
Scowling, the girl tugged up her comforter over her shift.
“Come now, dear, destiny beckons. Unless you want to go back to sucking your thumb and dreaming of school.”
Valkyrie surreptitiously wiped her thumb on her thigh.
“How fares your first visit to this blessed sphere?” the shade hummed, her sarcasm thick.
Well, cherub-bright soul, does Malkuth meet expectations?
The words picked at Valkyrie’s flesh. For a moment, she felt her body as a suit of lead confining her spirit like a caged bird…
Alas, this prison has no mercy
Iron Rules for iron gods
Heartless for the fledgling eager to spread her wings
Valkyrie shook her head sharply. “Oi! You’re ringing my ears! I didn’t order a haunting, you know!”
“Have no fear. I’ll wait on the other side of any bathroom doors,” the demon smirked.
My half-dreamed deal with the devil is a sassy stalker. Valkyrie snorted. “You need a name.”
You aren’t Mirielle, not exactly. Just… What was the new word? An echo. Like a charcoal imprint of a slab. Mini-Mirielle. Valkyrie and Mini-Mirielle.
The demon nodded along. “Precisely! I am glad you understand. I am but a copy, minted to match your needs. Harlot, harlequin, minx, strumpet – all are available.” Leaning forward, she played with the hem of her dress. “Your preferences?”
Valkyrie glanced away! Better to focus on the issue at hand.
Valkyrie. Mirielle. The point where the two meet.
She laughed. “You shall be Rie!”
“Then I am Rie.” The demon shimmered and shrank, abandoning the Lady Visage’s provocative figure for slender youth. Her sheer dressed pleated itself into schoolgirl fashion – Firstborough Preparatory, of course! – and she offered a perfect curtsy for her new friend. “Rie, your partner in crime.”
“Great!” Rolling out of bed, Valkyrie turned her attention to the next most important item. “Food first!”
Rie followed, passing through the wall like an apparition. However, halfway down the hall, she thumped into a solid barrier with a surprised laugh.
“Oh, my, what do we have here?”
Unable to see the shade, Valkyrie turned. “What?”
Rie rapped her fingers against an unseen wood panel; it rang like a bell.
“Lady Mishkan’s study?” the girl wondered.
A new bit of vocabulary floated up: ward. Diagrams floated into view for the girl: the flow of a circle, strength of a square, the arc of lines in chalk or paint that resonated like the fibers of a spider’s web with higher energies…
“All that from a few lines?” Her mind flashed back to the room full of calligraphy in alarm.
“Mere lines until the Will breathes,” Rie hummed, drifting into view. She floated to the floor and knelt before the lock to prod with a ghostly finger.
Not even the tiniest sliver of her nail could enter the lock itself, no matter how she scratched.
What is so special about Mishkan’s study?
What was Lady Mishkan hiding?
Valkyrie felt the itch of a mystery blossom!
“Alas, where would an enterprising lass find a sturdy set of lockpicks in Mel at this hour?” Rie wondered loudly. “Especially while under house arrest…”
“It is not house arrest!” Valkyrie countered. She finished her walk into the kitchen and started raiding the cupboards. Aloud, she reasoned, “I am wanted, you know. I need to be careful. If the mayor hadn’t helped out, I’d probably be sleeping in a ditch!”
The canned fruits smelled like last year, and she had already devoured all the cookies. Shrugging, she settled on oatmeal and chocolate milk. She dragged the stepstool over so she could reach the top shelf, and soon she had the pot warming over a burner.
Her demon slipped onto a stool at the countertop and rested her chin in her palms. “How well-behaved.”
Even your parents wouldn’t buy an act this obvious
Valkyrie blinked, caught off-guard. Parents? Her mother, yes, but her father…
She’d never met the guy.
Just another casualty of Lumia.
Rie’s just an echo, the girl reminded herself. Don’t forget that.
Clearing her throat, Valkyrie answered, “Mayor Oshton’s talking with some lawyers. Lady Mishkan is paying for it. I can have as many of the cookies as I want.”
When the butler arrived with the next grocery haul, at least.
Rie laughed. “And then what?”
“Everything will shake out in a few weeks.”
The demon snorted. “Shake out? Val, you know why they put you here, right?”
“To lay low.”
“To settle,” the echo contradicted. “Your soul brushed against an angel. They want to know if you saw anything. They want to know if you’re going to go mad and summon a monster. Once they’re satisfied, they’re going to plunk you down in Waves. Trust me. Echo or not, I know how the angels think!”
Wrap everything up all neat and nice with a bow on top
“Just the way Mom likes it.”
At least she was off the hook on graduation.
Like Hewes would ever give me a passing grade, she admitted to herself, and Rie smirked.
“Public school is adolescent daycare,” Valkyrie griped. “Only reason I went was to keep Mom happy!”
“The adults won’t care as long as it wraps up,” Rie sang. “Northern grades mean nothing in Waves. Belle will just plunk you down in remedial temple with all the babies. You can do the Rainy Day Shuffle and the Buttercup Spin!”
The demon mimed those beginner steps, smirking.
The Wavespeaker’s daughter
Dancer forty-five out of five hundred, performing twice a year for the Maiden
They’ll never let you be you
“Once you’ve settled.”
Like time-out in the corner after a tantrum.
Watching the pot inch towards its boil, the delinquent drummed her fingers on the counter. She could already see herself lined up with the children, freshly decked in Azure tutus, while the instructor encouraged them to work hard so they could perform in the Harvest recital as a pumpkin.
“At least up here you shock the schoolmarms when you wiggle your hips,” Rie teased. She conjured a ghostly cookie for a dainty nibble. “Or would you rather be Little Pumpkin Valkyrie?”
Valkyrie huffed. “I want something…something different! I want to see magic.”
“An elemental serpent all your own?”
“I said magic!” she snapped. The elemental serpents had books written on them! What grand mystery waited in the beasts that shuffled the ferries around on the Dragon?!
The ignored pot boiled over into the burner, and a gout of steam burst forth. Swearing, Valkyrie quickly dumped half into her waiting oatmeal; the other half slopped over the counter and barely missed her toes.
Rie grinned. “There’s no magic to be found in doing what you’re told, Val.”
“You must be one of those ‘bad influences’ Hewes mentioned,” the girl muttered. She dropped a hand towel on the spill and ferried her food to the table.
“Damn straight! Finish your food and find your shoes.”
Valkyrie wavered. “I’ve got a warrant out…”
“Only one?” dared the demon. “Amateur.”
You’ll never reach your sky playing the good little girl
Valkyrie finished her breakfast and went to turn some of those clothes in that noble closet into a disguise.
***
Hair tucked into a pageboy cap, silhouette rumpled by oversized overalls, just another truant, Valkyrie wandered west through back borough streets. She swiftly left Sixborough behind, and her anxiety grew as she entered the relatively straight and clean streets of Fifthborough.
Mothers sweeping their porches followed her movements, lips set in disapproval, and she made sure to take a weaving path just in case someone summoned the constables.
Her ghostly guide was little help here. Rie’s memories were a photograph from the old Mel. In Visage’s day, this was all farmland!
“Do the Houses still own the land?” Rie wondered as they searched for old landmarks.
“I guess so.”
“Then the Houses collect the taxes? Plus the usual extortions, of course.”
“What? The Lady Visage too good to play the landlord?”
Rie clicked her lips. “Damn straight. Even demons have standards.”
Valkyrie loitered a moment at an intersection, tugging down her hat as three sleek, black cars approached. Truthfully, she found little interest in the House bickering. The Houses changed; the signs changed; the factories rumbled all the same.
A case of content theft: this narrative is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.
You could axe the whole lot of them and nobody would even notice.
Rie inspected the cars as they passed. Then she sniffed in disdain. “What are those models?!”
“That’s what cars always look like.” Not that many could afford the pleasure.
“Exactly!” the demon huffed. “Fifteen years and they’re still selling the same model! Have they forgotten the very spirit of the Inventors?!”
“Every batch sells out instantly.”
Rie sighed. “Such fickle inspiration…”
Valkyrie let her stew. Her scalp prickled under the Spring sun, and she found herself glancing every way down the open streets.
The day bites different when you’re wanted.
“Then we’ll bite back,” Rie assured. “We’re close now.”
This turned out to be a wild exaggeration. Even once they found a landmark in the creek between Second- and Thirdborough, they spent another full hour before they could confirm Valkyrie’s fear. Mirielle’s echo knew a barn, but here stood a chemical factory. Its choked, rusted pipes disgorged a soapy discharge directly into the creek, and everything stank too clean.
The demon sucked on a hair, chewing on this development.
“Were you fond of that place?”
“Thea had a workshop in the basement…” the echo mused, concerned.
“Not anymore.”
Her ghost stared.
“Uh, Rie?”
Her ghost twitched, resetting. “Ah, this is a familiar dance. Setbacks will happen. More than one Inventor was born by a thief’s hands!”
“What was in the lab?”
The echo stared again.
Unnerved, Valkyrie cleared her throat. “Right. Lockpicks?”
“We will have to see who among the old crews kept up the trade,” Rie continued.
“That’s going to take forever!” Valkyrie’s stomach rumbled in habitual offense; this would be the lunch hour at school.
Most days, her quartet of miscreants would duck off the grounds and grab a bite at Katherine’s aunt’s eatery down the way from Fourthborough Main…
Thinking of her friends, an unpleasant jolt ricocheted down her spine. Katherine and Lyla! Hells, they’ve got to be worried sick!
“Yes, let’s meet your comrades,” Rie agreed, “and be away from these plaster-painted fences before I gag.”
Retracing their steps east, they returned to Fourthborough just as the end of lunch rang from the church bell. Folk filled the streets, tarrying at the end of their own meals, and she neatly blended into the crowd. Here her age proved no issue: many families pulled their young sons from classes in preparation for planting, and seniors from a dozen schools flouted the rules to flood the eateries.
Several cafés openly advertised discounts for good grades.
Never qualified for those.
Though she had learned how to fake her teachers’ handwriting…
Worried she would miss her friends, she cut across the expansive back lawn to the Fourthborough church. A manicured lawn with a dozen useless holes hosted a gaggle of priests and one deacon, all punting little balls around, and she ignored the altar boy that shouted after her.
“Golf?” Rie hummed. “A noble game. It was briefly a fad in the early days of the Regency, you know. Have the deacons stooped to the Conclave’s leftovers?”
“I heard they cheat like crazy.”
“Of course! A holy man must make par, after all.”
“And the congregation pays for it!” Valkyrie agreed, jogging off the edge of the course and back into the streets.
Finding the right intersection, Valkyrie followed the vestigial lunch line. She rose on tiptoes, peering left and right, and got a good view of a sea of backs for her trouble. Sighing, she ducked and squirmed between the crowd until she could peek over the register and call into the kitchen, “Is Katherine here?!”
Katherine’s aunt, elbow deep in dirty plates, shouted back without looking up. “Back porch!”
“Thanks!”
Valkyrie dodged her way through the restaurant and onto the back porch. Students clustered around five tables under worn umbrellas, their view a loading dock into a small factory, and languished against the return to class.
Well-familiar with the cliques, Valkyrie plunked down at the farthest table between her friends.
“Hey there, strangers!”
Katherine shrieked, and Lyla coughed on her sandwich.
“Miss me?”
“Hells, where have you been?!” Katherine gasped.
“Oh, you know. Breakfast in Mel, lunch in Highbranch, a hotel in Waves,” the girl grinned. Free like the Tempest herself.
Ignored and invisible, Rie cocked her head to hear a girl’s dreams.
Free as the eagle, fast as the sun
Race ahead and skim my fingers through the clouds
I will soar
Lyla leaned in. “You should have heard Hewes! She went off about how you’re a felon! Wanted by the constables! Rearing to get strung up!”
“She might as well write for the Daily Gospel,” teased Valkyrie.
Rie snorted. “That old rag?”
Blind to the ghost, Katherine tapped her lips in mock innocence. “I don’t know, Val. That radio description did sound an awful lot like you…”
“If they knew for sure, they’d put your name out,” Rie whispered into her ear.
“If they knew for sure, they’d put my name on it,” Valkyrie countered, smirking with her own wit.
Lyla gasped. “So you did break into the Conclave!”
“Prove it,” mocked Valkyrie.
The duo wiggled closer, pinning the girl between their pleats, and shared a communal grin.
“What’d you do?” Katherine whispered.
“Tagged back the deacons, that’s all!” Valkyrie tapped her mostly healed eye. “Hewes beaned me with a fruit mid-dance at the festival, and the constables didn’t do a damned thing. You can’t expect me to take it sitting down!”
“And you got caught?”
“Not quite.” Yet Valkyrie hesitated at the surreal truth.
“Dangerous,” Rie agreed, eying Katherine.
I know her type
Words passed in confidence and shared to the winds by tea time
“Do we make the risky play?” the demon asked, leaving the decision to her host.
“Don’t leave us in suspense!” Lyla teased. “I have to know the truth if I’m to play you in the stage production!”
They all laughed, and Valkyrie relaxed a little. These were her friends!
“Do you know anything about black-robed priests?”
Briefly, she related the highlights of her adventure beneath the Conclave, leaving out the Stormmother’s part. By the time she finished, the last of the lunch rush ebbed, and the trio were the only occupants of the back porch.
The clouds overhead turned grey, heavy with the unsure threat of chill rain.
Lyla drank the entire tale with glee. “Oh, Val, you could be a star! Pursued by the powers that be for your justice!”
Katherine smirked. “She’s gonna get busted for stealing from the Conclave. Knew you had it in you!”
“Focus!” Valkyrie snapped. “Black robes?”
Katherine sighed. “Fiiiine. So my aunt?” She jerked a thumb towards the kitchen. “She catered for the church for a while. You should see how deacons eat!”
“Pork and wine!” Lyla agreed.
“And when they’re good and drunk they start calling for ‘the girls’,” Katherine continued, lowering her voice. “That’s why she would never let me help on those jobs.”
Lost out on so many tips!
Smile and a wiggle and the cash goes straight in!
Oh, but Valkyrie wouldn’t know about that…
Catching that echo, Valkyrie sucked in an angry breath.
Rie provided an outlet. “Probably for the best. Deacons are used to getting what was promised.”
Toss it out lightly, my dear
You’re not insinuating she’s a whore
Just waving in that general direction
“Probably for the best. Deacons are used to getting what was promised.”
Katherine blinked, taken off-guard. Swiftly recovering, she flicked her hair back and continued. “Anyways. Last year, a bunch of new faces attended, and they brought dietary requirements. No meat, no wine, no leaven bread. Wouldn’t even use a plate that had touched any of the stuff!”
“The cataclysm of Lumia must be answered,” Rie added. “By indulgence, by indolence, by ascetism.”
“Long story short – the black-robed jerks sent back half the food as ‘impure’ and didn’t pay. My aunt lost two years profit on the whole deal! That’s why we didn’t sign up to cater anything this year.”
“Too holy for the bill,” Valkyrie agreed. “Sounds like them.”
Lyla wiggled her fingers ominously. “Black is the color of criminals in Waves, isn’t it?”
“Good thing I’m a freedom fighter,” Valkyrie shot back.
They snickered together.
“So where are you really staying?” Katherine asked, smiling under her lashes.
“Around,” the girl evaded.
“Come on, you can tell us! You’re couch surfing, right?”
Valkyrie squirmed. “Probably better if I don’t tell you.”
Wounded, Lyla bumped her. “We’d never sell you out, Val!”
“You’ll be in danger if you know,” Rie provided.
Valkyrie repeated Rie's words, adding, “I’m staying well out of the way.”
“Outer boroughs?” Katherine probed innocently.
Valkyrie’s cheeks started to flush in obvious guilt, but Rie placed a finger on the girl’s nape. A wave of collected calm burst through the girl.
“She has been sharpening that tongue of hers on your stone for a while, it seems,” the demon noted. “We must learn to be above concern. An idle thought; a trifle. Never ruffled; everything in jest. Hurl your own daggers with the careless flick of your finger, and never look to see if they land.”
Together, Rie and Valkyrie smiled. “If I told you, I’d have to kill you.”
Katherine rolled her eyes. “I suppose we are late to class.”
Observe: wary of this sudden resistance, she yields the field
She has good instincts…
Hey! You’re my demon here!
Rie patted her host on the head like a puppy.
Gathering her skirts, Lyla rose. “Do you think you’ll make graduation, Val?”
Valkyrie shook her head. “Waiting on the lawyers. Not looking good. You know Hewes.”
“Oh, yes, she’s so unbearable now!”
“Lawyers aren’t cheap,” Katherine added, interested. “Plus they charge extra for Azurites.”
Lyla clapped her hands. “A thought! Do you remember my uncle? Sometimes he helps with…discrete issues.”
The junkmonger? “Even heretics like me?”
“You’re my friend, Val!”
“Sorry,” Valkyrie said. “I wouldn’t mind talking to him.”
Lyla offered his address and a quick hug. Then both girls brushed the dust from their skirts and hurried back to school.
Left alone at the table, Valkyrie scowled in dissatisfaction. Lyla always left with a hug and Katherine with a little wave; why did that bother her today?
“To them, an adventure over lunch. Now back to class to nap and file their nails,” Rie surmised.
“So I’m left alone with the bounty on my head.” She huffed. “Well, I…I didn’t want to drag them into the problem!”
“If you were to fall, would they mourn you?” the demon pondered. “Or would they find another heretic to round out the group dynamic?”
“Shut up!” Valkyrie hissed.
Like a doll ordered still, Rie instantly fell silent.
“Let’s go see this stupid uncle.”
She grabbed a sandwich from Katherine’s aunt – free for a cute smile, of course – and went to talk to the fence.
Rie followed, silent.
***
Lyla’s uncle, Hubert, ran salvage out of a sprawling lot along the northern edge of Fourthborough.
His yard abutted the barbed, fearsome fence of Briarwood. The army base blocked the northern expansion of the boroughs, and few wanted to live next to a facility that growled and clanged late into the night. That made for cheap land to rent, and Hubert filled every inch of several acres with old furniture, broken cars, scrap metal, and sundry other leftovers.
A trio of sleek guard dogs appeared as soon as Valkyrie reached the edge of the fence and padded along, silent and alert, as she left the paved road for the dirt approach to Hubert’s shop.
“Mean dogs for mean men,” Rie judged.
The fence narrowed to single file on the final approach to the large shack with the open sign in the window, and Valkyrie tucked her elbows in.
The dogs followed, breathing on her calves through the chain links.
Inside, the shop was brightly lit and spotless clean, a stark contrast to the junk outside. Three long rows of tables displayed premium merchandise in locked glass cases. A dizzying array of tools hung on the walls, each tied and locked to its stud.
Behind the counter, a heavyset Jungle man with Lyla’s chestnut hair eyed Valkyrie with open suspicion.
“Lyla sent me,” the girl called across the room.
He picked up a rag and wiped grease from his fingers. “So?”
“Note the precision in each movement,” Rie advised. “Hands betray what the face hides. Those are the hands of a man trained in exacting craftsmanship. His fortunes may waver, but his hands remember.”
Valkyrie drew a breath and pressed forward. “I’m looking to make some extra cash.”
“Then put your hips to use,” he advised.
Rie snickered. “Your hips tell the same of you.”
“Rude!” Valkyrie mumbled under her breath. Louder, she made a bet on associations. “Is this how you treated Tura?”
His eyebrows twitched at the mention of the Inventor, but he answered evenly. “Tura has worked a day in his life.”
Thankfully, a young man in the yard shouted for Hubert before Valkyrie’s cheeks could reach full tomato red.
“I don’t have any work for children, and all payments up front,” he said, rising from his stool. Then he turned and shouted out the window to the customers in the yard.
“What a jerk,” the girl huffed under her breath. “Lyla likes him; I thought he’d be smooth.”
“Unfortunately, he seems to have pegged you as a penniless mooch more likely to incite the constables than finish an errand,” Rie consoled. “Annoying when they’re right, isn’t it?”
“Kiss my butt.”
“Not included in this particular deal,” Rie hummed. Floating back and forth, the ghost hummed to herself. “Junk. Junk. Junk…”
Valkyrie trailed after, balking at eye-watering prices. Plyer 3piece – Novian – half gold – no barter.
“Junk…junk…”
The next cases held a full set of eastern glazed dishware, cream white with dotted flowers crawling up the sides. Then Inventor memorabilia, including seal of authenticity.
“Alva’s time piece?” Valkyrie scoffed to herself.
“Conveniently autographed!” Rie laughed. She rounded the bench and stopped at the display case near the counter. “Ah. Something useful.”
The demon fixed her eyes on the shopkeep and flicked a finger.
Hubert swore beneath his breath, turned to his guest, and warned, “Buy something or get out!”
Then he marched out back to continue his argument.
“Now then. Over here, Valkyrie.”
Valkyrie joined Rie before a flat glass display. Under the pane, black silken pouches lay in a neat row, contents unnamed. The note at the bottom only said: By request.
“This…” Rie tapped above one of the pouches, though her finger slid right through the glass, “is a set of Novian lockpicks. And this…”
She tapped the railing of the case.
“…is Ulyssian junk metal.”
The demon directed, and Valkyrie obediently pressed her elbow hard into the right corner of the case. Rising onto tiptoe, she applied her full weight, and the case groaned. The opposite corner’s seam parted, granting just enough room for someone with small hands to jam two fingers in. Wincing at the rough grained wood, she fumbled her fingertips across the inner latch.
The case popped open.
“Grab and run?” she whispered, heart hammering.
“Patience, my dear. Only prey runs.” Rie grinned. “Take the picks and leave the bag. He won’t know they’re gone until he tries to sell them.”
Hells, I’m turning into a proper criminal! thought the girl fresh off her Conclave raid.
But this was different.
Never worry, my dear
We’ll find our justifications later
And there was no denying the electric thrill up her spine as she plucked at the bag’s careful knot. With every tug at the strands she imagined Hubert at her back; the roar of his voice; the barking of his hounds…
The knot released; she dumped the picks into a pocket; her fingers shook as she tried to repair the knot.
“Patience,” Rie soothed, laying a hand on her back. Cool shivers ran from her fingertips, and the girl’s grip steadied.
There! The knot obeyed, and Valkyrie stuffed the bag back into its spot. She closed the case with a painfully loud click and released a shaky breath.
“Hands out of your pockets,” Rie tsked. “Amble to another spot.”
As she reached the corner of the aisle, Hubert returned. “…and I have zero interest in your empty promises, boy!”
Behind him, Conner Orland in workman’s slacks and two tall boys in slick suits entered.
“I can have you six by next week!” Conner protested.
“Conner!” Valkyrie squeaked.
He drew up short, staring at Valkyrie.
Wheels clicking in his head.
“Val!” He spared a glance at his friends. “Just the girl I’ve been looking to see!”
“Me?” she protested. “If it’s about that homework you were going to copy, I’ve got bad news…”
Hubert kept all four in sight as he walked the store. He swept up and down all three aisles in a handful of strides.
Valkyrie’s heart rattled in its cage as he passed the Ulyssian display.
Rie watched Conner’s friends, a finger on her cheek.
“Good,” the man assured himself at last. “Right. All of you – either cough up money to buy something or get out!”
All four of the youths cleared out. On the way out, single file, the dogs growled at them, and the tallest of the suited boys spat on the nearest one.
Once on the wider dirt path, Valkyrie adjusted her pageboy hat and glanced up at Conner. “Who’re your friends?”
“Business associates,” the one hummed, flashing her a grin. “Conner, going to introduce you to your lovely darling here?”
“Let’s walk and talk,” Conner suggested.
“Sure!” she agreed, eager to be away.
Conner fell into step behind her; the other two trailed, one to either side. Rie floated in their midst, between Valkyrie and the suits. Together, they meandered back onto paved roads and south towards Main.
“Soon as I heard the radio I knew it was you,” he began with a smile. “You kicked the hornet’s nest this time!”
“I know for a fact you’ve stolen worse!” she countered.
“Not from the church.”
She outlined a person of interest report from early Winter bearing a shocking resemblance to her baseball-loving companion, wanted for looting the jeweled prayer box from the Firstborough chapel.
He winced. “Fair point.”
Behind them, the suits laughed. “Poor Conner couldn’t even fence it, either!”
“Too hot, too hot by far!” his companion agreed.
Rie noted the fact that the suited boys knew what Conner could and couldn’t fence with a click of her tongue.
“Lay off!” the baseball star grumbled. “I’m having a conversation here.”
Grinning, they retreated a few more paces.
Some friends, Valkyrie wondered.
“I know the heat,” Conner assured, sliding closer. “Feels like the whole world’s on your tail. Got you on the back foot like the fifth inning.”
She rolled her eyes.
“But the coneheads are dumb as they look, you know. They’re like dogs, chasing whatever’s dangled. You and I? We’re the fox.”
“Ha!” barked Rie. “Not familiar with noble hobbies, are we?”
“You have something in mind?” Valkyrie asked warily. Disguised or not, Main Street hosted too much constable traffic.
“I’ll pay better than Hubert,” he assured, dropping his arm over her shoulder.
Alarm bells rang in her head, and she shoved him a step back. “Spill it.”
The suits closed, pacing just behind.
“Simple. See, the constables offer a reward for information on fugitives. We set you up at the corner café, I drop a sighting, and my buds here help you make a quick escape. Each confirmed hit is twenty silver, and it takes hours for the reports to trickle over. We can hit every conehead between Mel and Fifth in a couple hours!”
“Are you serious?!” she snarled.
“Its easy money, Val!”
“For you!”
And a roll of the dice for me!
“It’s a good gig,” the gangster on her back right hummed. “Run it lots of times. Made five gold in a day once!”
The other smirked at Conner. “Five gold could go a long way.”
Swallowing, Conner stepped in front of Valkyrie and grabbed her by the shoulders.
The boys ringing her like a fence, herding her towards the quiet side of the road for their chat. Just another errand boy to shake down for his paper money in a side alley.
Hauling her, fingers digging, Conner muttered, “Look, Val, we all need cash. That’s how the world works. I’m trying to work with you here. Even split, easy money, we all walk away happy.”
The other two laughed low in their throats, stepping ahead like the chaperones to the alley.
“There’s other easy work if you don’t like running,” one said.
“And a finder’s fee,” noted the other to Conner.
The baseball star grimaced, his fingers suddenly shaking. “Chill, boys. Valkyrie’s a reasonable girl.”
Fingers shaking, yes, but not releasing their iron grip on her shoulders.
“You wouldn’t!” she hissed. “Conner, we’ve sat together all year. We’re friends!”
But there was a desperate fire in his eyes.
His path was set.
“He would,” Rie sighed. “Well, that’s enough of this.”
You laugh easily at others
Allow me to share in the fun
One of the two leering suits snickered suddenly.
The other burst out laughing.
“What gives?” the first asked…and started to laugh as well.
Their laughter grew into a manic cackle. They curled forward, clutching their stomachs. Their lips peeled back as they laughed harder. Their eyes widened, knees shook, and cheeks bulged. Then they collapsed backwards, seizing in paroxysms of hilarity as their fingers grasped desperately at the stones.
“What in the icy hells?!” Conner whispered, his grip slacking.
Still they laughed harder, tearing at their faces like men driven mad.
Their backs arching from the street as Rie’s merciless command drew the hysterics from their lips like a fish hook.
“Valkyrie, away!” the demon snapped.
Shuddering, the girl tore her eyes free of the suits, shoved hard into Conner, and twisted full circle on her heel. His slack grip tore, and she ducked under his hands. Then she bolted straight for Main.
The suits behind her howled like monkeys, begging for help between their gasps.
Icy hells, Rie! Are they gonna die?!
“No need to shout,” the ghost responded, keeping pace. “I am already inside you.”
Behind them, Conner glanced between the gangsters on the ground and the escaping girl. He chose to chase Valkyrie.
“But what did you do?!” she gasped, skidding around a corner. Ahead, Main Street bustled with trucks and wagons full of the day’s labor.
“To be technical, my dear, you did it,” Rie smirked.
What?
A sour sense of guilt rolled up from the pit of her stomach.
I-I did not! That was all you, Rie!
Valkyrie was just the host here! She was innocent!
The sour taste intensified, threatening to break her stride.
“Poor boys. Can’t handle a taste of the good stuff,” the demon hummed. “By the way, Conner is gaining on us.”
He’s a star athlete! Valkyrie thought, panting.
“Break line of sight,” the demon advised calmly, gesturing across the intersection.
There, between two stores, a shallow culvert, presumably dry this early in Spring.
How is that going to help?!
“Just obey!” Rie snapped tartly. “Honestly…”
Trucks rumbled in both directions ahead.
Swearing, Valkyrie poured her last effort into the sprint and shouted, “Out of my way!”
With a prayer to the seas, she bolted into traffic.
Brakes squealed like monsters all around, and the hot exhaust of an engine washed over her.
The last impact of her short life never came.
Reaching the far sidewalk, she vaulted the bridge railing and dropped hard onto her ankles in an inch of chilly water.
“Back,” the demon instructed, gesturing Valkyrie into the dark pipe. Then she assumed guard at the edge of the culvert, hands cupped together over her belly.
Angry shouts rang from the intersection, directed at Valkyrie and Conner in equal measure.
The baseball star slammed into the creek. Barely winded, he turned to peer into the culvert…
Straight at Valkyrie.
“Peace,” the demon murmured.
That sour taste rose to her gorge, and Valkyrie pressed hands into her cheeks lest she puke.
“Where the hells did she go?!” he muttered, searching frantically for his lost friend.
No, for his lost meal ticket, she corrected herself. Dammit, Conner! You wouldn’t have pulled this with Katherine!
He slumped, running his hands through his greased hair. “Hells…hells…”
How much of the panic in his eyes was for her?
“Valkyrie!” he added, calling into the culvert. “Look, I wasn’t going to…there’s no way I’d let things get out of hand! It was just a way to make some cash, you know! Just a job…”
And how much was for the debt he owed to the cackling suits?
His first question on the imp was ‘how much’. His first question on everything was always ‘how much’. We’d laugh about it…
“Did our little baseball star lose any big games recently?” Rie asked.
Last year’s championship. He was out sick.
“And doubtless bet quite large on himself,” the demon guessed.
An angry driver shouted from the bridge. “Boy! What the hells are you doing chasing some kid into traffic like that?!”
The baseball star offered a sailor’s salute. “Why don’t you jump down and find out?”
The driver cracked his neck and rolled up his sleeves, revealing biceps the size of Valkyrie’s head. “Well, the boy’s nowhere to be found! Clear off before I drag your sorry arse to the constables!”
“Whatever you say, old man,” Conner muttered, but he turned away.
Watching him walk away, Valkyrie saw his popped collar and low swagger from a new light.
From behind, just another borough thug.
“I thought…I thought we were friends…” Valkyrie mourned.
Rie offered a rueful smile. “All men must choose their allegiance. Not all choose well.”
Hurry now. The constables may come after all.
The driver leaned over the bridge and shouted into the culvert. “Hey, kid! That lout’s gone!”
Afraid to answer, she remained silent.
Offering one last curse to the foolishness of youth, the driver departed. A moment later, the culvert rumbled as traffic started again.
“Can’t you hide me?” she asked, peering out into the bright Spring day.
In response, the demon waggled fingers that foamed at the edges. “This vessel is only as strong as our bond.”
Hesitantly, Valkyrie scuttled out of the culvert. She struck east by the back ways, considering this new problem.
You’re my guide. You can’t fade on me that fast!
“Only you can control this,” the demon answered. “The knowledge is buried in your mind; this shadow’s role is merely to facilitate its blooming.”
Reaching another corner, Valkyrie spied a constable wagon heading for the bridge in Fourthborough.
“Looks like we’re taking the long way home,” the girl sighed.