The deal with Lav goes south. Of course it does. Rivin doesn’t expect any different, yet somehow they leave with all of their fingers and their toes — except for Slink, but you can’t blame the Spine for that. Well, not this time.

  It’s a week before he can walk without limping. A few more days for the stitches to dissolve, for the bandages to come off. Then he’s mostly himself again, minus some weight around the middle where his ribs jut out against the skin.

  He’d been to see what was left of Mouse’s pyre — all dust and ash now, remains scattered by the Basin where the glowmoss flares brightest. She’d always loved the aquifer, even though the Drowner’s scarcely allowed visitors past their gates.

  Fresh water was a resource the most ancient of the low did not take lightly and thus it was only a small trickle that welled into the trenches of Spine ruin; a reservoir that had filled over centuries and from which stood a partially submerged cathedral; the dilapidated skeleton of a decaying dome ceiling peaking out from within clean water.

  It was known that the Drowner’s kept the flow and the Spine kept the water; the only piece of a forgotten world all were in agreement of protecting.

  What’s left of Mouse rests by the algae bloom where fernery has not yet had the chance to overgrow her seat. Rivin stays for too long, waiting for her to appear. He hasn’t heard her gurgle in his ear since he made it home — but she dies in his dreams every night, just as surely as he hears Chip crying through the walls.

  He misses her. They all do. Even Rivin who Slink swears has never missed anything. He’s just better at hiding it.

  When he returns home, he’s cold to the bone. They’re substantially richer but gold is bitter when you’re barred from trade. Blacklisted for surviving.

  “Where’s the rest of it?” Lav had growled, eyes gleaming with suspicion. They’d only brought the visor, hidden the rest for leverage.

  ‘I’ve grown since we last met..’ Rivin hadn’t flinched when they trained their guns to him, a nozzle kissing the center of his forehead. He wasn’t afraid of death. So he only blinked slowly once then twice. ‘I’ll tell you when the deal is done. ’

  Lav, a lanky thin man more synthetic than flesh had paused before grinning wide, exposing the set of silver veneers that had long ago replaced his teeth. He lowered the weapon, tapped the nozzle against the steel of his bolted thigh, and mused ’smart kid.’

  Not really. He’d taken Roach’s advice. He hadn’t skinned the cat. He’d let it live it’s feral little life in the pockets of the damned and stood taller. Held the power nestled in rare gear and come home richer — richer than they’d ever dreamed.

  But what use did money have when you were barred from trade? when even the most accessible vendors within the Spine turned away their business?

  No one smiled that day. Nobody won, least of all the starving children.

  It wouldn’t be such a low blow had they held ties to the Swill, the only other faction with enough power to have functioning trade. No. They’d barely earned the reputation to take jobs at all. Now it was all gone. Nothing had changed. Nothing bar one empty cot and a misery that felt suffocating.

  The queen of trash has not returned. In fact he hasn’t seen her since she pulled him — half-conscious and fading — through the gates of The Hole.

  Despite that, her absence proves just as stubborn as her attendance, for she sticks to his thoughts like mold he can’t kill.

  The more he distracts himself, the more he sees her.

  He’s half-ashamed that it’s her ghost that haunts him now, and not the dead. He wonders if she saved him from that too.

  He’s at first a little shocked to hear that Ricket already appears to have a strong relationship with the Queen of Nothing, and when he asks the boy, he flushes a deep and rosy red — right to the tips of his ears — and glances away nervously, though his lips are curling into a tentative smile.

  It hurts Rivin’s heart.

  He looks like Chip.

  He can still picture him handing Mouse the amulet. The doomed necklace. It’s the one thing they’d kept. Chip had refused it, cried for hours after.

  It still sat heavy in Rivin’s pocket. He hadn’t even cleaned the blood from it. Hers or his. He didn’t know. Wouldn’t risk it. He’s not sure why he kept it. Why he’s begun to worry his thumb over the edge. It’s never lit up again and it’s always cold.

  It won’t bring her back.

  He knows that’s not how life works.

  “You said Roach gave you that map?” Rivin isn’t very good at being sly. He’s always been more direct. The kind of boy that didn’t see the point in dancing around a topic. It felt like wasting time.

  Ricket is polishing his favourite weapon; a club wrapped in wire and stubbed with nails. The club is sleek metal and covered in graffiti, an alligator with stark white, scratchy teeth on one side and a glittering Spine Snake on the other.

  Ricket notices Rivin looking and holds his prize a little higher, smiling wide. “Yeah! She’s my best informant. Don’t tell Slink.” He narrows his gaze to glare over his shoulder at the silhouette of their older companion, hunched over tech in the furthest corner.

  Slink hasn’t moved since he shaved his hair and dyed the remnants green; it might be a mohawk had he styled it.

  “Your best informant..” Rivin chews on his lower lip. “How long have you known her?”

  Ricket furrows his brow. “You never let me borrow the watch…”

  “You’ll break it again.”

  The boy sighs and pouts. “Then I don’t know.”

  “I can trace it back a few months.”

  Ricket sits straighter, as though he’s mistaken the observation for praise. “Aha! So you do listen!”

  Rivin shrugs. “When it matters.” He won’t admit he missed it at first. That he’s been scanning backward through time ever since. That the journey opened something old in him. Something ugly and slow to heal.

  When he tilts his head, the boy blushes once more, flitting his hazel gaze towards the floor. “I met her in the Spine ’round the time we took that water job. She was looting a dead guy and spotted me a coin—”

  Rivin interjects to sigh heavily, pinching the bridge of his nose. “Of course she was.”

  Later, he asks Chip, whose reaction is most the same.

  “Ah, Roach?” the blonde had muttered. The bags under his brown eyes have deepened and he looked far, far older than his thirteen years. Loss, like moths, had eaten away at the light in his eyes. He was polishing an old bullet shell with Mouse’s name carved into the steel.

  Rivin remembered that story. From the time Mouse decided that the only thing that would get to kill her was her very own bullet — it helped that she preferred knives she’d said.

  Rivin turned his eyes to the ground when the ache in his chest spread too deep into his soul.

  “She’s always causing chaos in the Spine.” Chip explained, using a drill to funnel a thin hole into the casing before threading a chain through it. Rivin helped him fasten it and the bullet sat lonely between collarbone. “Nasty barterer..”

  It was naturally Slink that seemed to have known her for the longest, although he doesn’t even look up. He hasn’t for hours. The soft flicker of solder burns blue against his skin, reflected in the shadows beneath his eyes. He eats only when fed. Sleeps only when shut down. Grieves like a machine breaking itself apart from the inside.

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

  “Her royal self,” he laughs bitterly.

  Rivin rolls his eyes. He can almost see the curl of her hand. The stupid grin as she gestures towards a rat like some loyal servant.

  “She’s bad news. Like most things that don’t die.”

  “You talk like she’s some kind of myth.” Rivin furrows his brow, he’s teasing and yet it feel wrong — for he still remembers her in the dissonance of time. The sharp skip of someone confident in the cracks of reality, and he wonders why he should believe any different.

  “She’s a trouble magnet is all.” Slink finally pauses. He looks to be searching for the right words. He can’t seem to find them.

  “I heard stories—”

  “Don’t listen to the stories!” He scolds sharply, flicking a screw that hits Rivin square between the eyes. “You’ll only hear what she wants you to hear.”

  When he pushes him further, Slink only grunts over sparks and wire until Rivin loses his patience. He won’t elaborate and something about the refusal makes Rivin grit his teeth until his gums throb.

  She’s just a kid. Just a human.

  He doesn’t know why it matters so much — that she be nothing more than flesh.

  But it does.

  It’s officially been two weeks since he came home. It feels like a lifetime. Everything is greyer now. Nothing shines as bright without the sun. He finds himself dreaming of the No Option Drop often. Sometimes he falls, crashes down into sunbeams and rides them into battle.

  He leaps into ghosts — wields a mighty hammer or a spear only to hear it crack through skull or torso. The victims rotate.

  Mouse always smiles when he kills her.

  She’s never been a woman again since his first dream and so she dies her age each and every night. Sometimes silent, sometimes fogging up his skull with tears and breath.

  He needs to escape the hollowing out of home. The darkness the clings to the walls. He’s sick of pacing the tin, dusting the shelves, labelling and relabeling their meager stock.

  He wishes he’d grabbed one of those guns from the observatory. It might have been enough to capture Swill attention. He feels like an idiot. A stubborn boy whose tried so hard to be anything but.

  And so despite Slink’s advice, Rivin falls down the rabbit hole of underground gossip.

  He dons a scrappy black cloak, threaded by careful fingers but worn with age. The fabric smells like him but he remembered when it didn’t.

  He searches for signs of her in the Spine first.

  Lav’s boys are still on high alert since their deal, so Rivin is careful to avoid them. Thankfully, the smell of oil, rust and the sound of metal clanking from their enhancements is a clear give-away and Rivin’s always been good at being a shadow.

  An hour in and he spies her molting tag on the side of a brothel, greying with age but vibrant against the harsh stone and tin. His heart skips — he pretends it didn’t.

  ROACH WAZ ERE

  When he asks around inside, they know her well.

  “Oh, she’s so cute. Always selling us trinkets.”

  One exposes her breast, the nipple covered only by a bejeweled cog, thinned into a antique pasty. Fine blonde hairs sprout from the tip and he wonders if they come from a braid stuffed with pins.

  He feels his stomach lurch and the girl sours her face into a pout.

  “She braids my hair,” another giggles, pulling fingers through long crimson tresses, most of which were threaded with beads and gemstones.

  “Her mother died in a fire. Burned alive without making a sound.”

  “I heard she was abandoned at the steps and the soldiers kicked her down them.”

  “She’s some bastard to the King,” one whispers, too seriously. “She’s the result of an experiment gone wrong, when the Kings first wife became infertile.”

  Rivin drags a hand down his face. He’s getting nowhere. Each confession sounds curated. Planted. Roach-like.

  It’s the matron that appears to know her more deeply — although she’s secretive with all things; even Roach’s.

  Her eyes are ringed with smokey colour and her lips are bold violet. She’s wrapped in scraps of threaded velvet and satin that drape over a voluptuous figure, silk sitting only over merchandise. Everything else is shown proudly. Her prosthetic leg is pure titanium and sharpened at the heel, engraved with carvings that tell a story he’s not privy too.

  “Darling,” she greets and Rivin scowls, crossing his arms over his chest. Her beauty doesn’t fool him.

  Cold bitch.

  “You’ll hear one hundred things about that pup,” she laughs, and even her chuckle is a low purr. Seductive by nature. “Ninety nine of them are hers.”

  “The other one?”

  “Closer to the truth.”

  “And what do you know?”

  She’s leaning over paperwork now, skimming patron names and fees — clearly losing interest in him. “I’m not in the business of asking too many questions.”

  “Right,” he sounds annoyed but not surprised.

  Her eyes soften. She knows his mother used to work for her. Knows she died, starving and abandoned after she fell pregnant with a Seraph soldiers’ bastard.

  Him.

  It’s why she’s even bothering to speak with him. Why she cares enough to be patient. He never comes to purchase, only to grieve, fight or suffer.

  Her room is still locked. After all these years.

  He wonders if it still smells of flowers, even though it makes far more sense for it to smell of decay.

  “Everyone seems to know her but not..” he pauses, waits for the right word, “know her.”

  The matron smiles then. “She sounds smart.”

  Rivin doesn’t argue.

  He moves back into the fray of the vendor strip, although most sellers turn away when he approaches.

  Merri, a butcher nearest to the Drowner’s gates, is the first to greet him heartily, grinning as he hacks a glinting sharp blade into something Rivin can’t name — it’s scruffy and poorly skinned, like most of the haphazard beasts that line his stall. A barrel of something still kicking up against water reeks heavily of decay.

  “Ahh. Little bug queen.” He laughs. “A good apprentice! Has all ’er fingers, eh?” His accent is thick. Rivin doesn’t know where he’s from and when he asks, Merri only wiggles thick, caterpillar brows. “Somewhere warm.”

  When he tries Scooter’s Trinkets, the frail old man scowls and spits thick in the dirt before quickly throwing his arms over the scraps stacked atop his stall. His one eye is narrowed and weary. “Don’t take nothin’ — I’m watching yer.” He refuses to talk to Rivin after.

  Finally, and as exhaustion begins to creep in, he passes Matteo by the Heights — not far from the fiercely guarded tunnel leading to the Swill district. The hulking man is good-natured always, and throws up a two fingers salute with one bulky steel arm, the hydraulics spitting steam as he waves.

  He passes Rivin a mug of something bubbly and acidic, invites him to sit behind a bar masquerading as a stall — it only passes for the meager weapons the Swill are willing to part with.

  Rivin shakes his head. It’s the first time in a long time he has spoken to so many people and he’s quickly growing tired. Irritated too.

  Matteo takes no offence but also doesn’t take ‘no’ for an answer, coming to guide the much smaller male to sit, before returning to sharpening an antique Halidom blade; fastening a handle carved with an intricate design to the base.

  “She’s a good girl,” the hulking man sounds cotton soft. “A regular player at the Drip.”

  Rivin sips and recoils. The alcohol is strong. “The Swill bar?”

  “You’re tasting their best brew.”

  Rivin tries to smile politely. Whatever face he makes instead causes Matteo to shake with laughter. “So, you know her?”

  “As much as she allows. Pyrn knew her best.”

  Rivin hasn’t heard that name before. “Pyrn?”

  “The Burned Man.” Now that name rings a bell. Rivin squints as he tries to remember.

  He recalls the echo’s of a myth. A Seraph deserter muttering in the streets, face twisted with scars.

  The terrible explosions in the East End, near a decade ago and during the last great Halidom sweep.

  The tunnels had burned for months afterward. Most choked on the smoke.

  “And where is he?”

  He knows the answer already.

  “Long gone now.”

  “Unhelpful.” He takes another gulp of the grog. Scowls as it goes down wrong. Much like all he’s learned today which is naut.

  “I’m surprised you’re asking ’round. She pissed you off or something?” Matteo raises a brow.

  “No.” he pauses and starts slowly, “she..”

  The big man smiles wide. Like he already knows what the boy means to say. “Saved your hide, huh? Most have a story like that. She’s always exactly where she’s needed.”

  Rivin crosses his arms. He’d never admit it but it hurts to hear that he’s not special. Everyone appears to know Roach. In fact, it’s looking more and more likely that Rivin is the last person in the entire Lowrealm to have noticed her. He feels fooled and something ugly unfurls in his gut.

  “She just appeared,” he says, defeated. He looks around at the vendors, at the bottlecaps littering the streets, the string of flickering lights stuck stagnant in the air. A small paper boat following a murky stream through the cracks. “And now she’s everywhere.”

  Matteo is chuckling again. Thankfully, the more Rivin drinks, the less he finds it infuriating.

  “I’m sure she’d love to hear she’s had that effect on you.”

  Rivin snaps, grey eyes hot with hurt ego. “She didn’t have any effect on me.”

  The man only smiles knowingly, in that way adults always do when they underestimate or misunderstand him, and his scowl fades when he leans back, his face hidden beneath hood.

  “I think she’d like that reaction even more.”

  Rivin finishes the bitter tasting drink and slams it — too hard — onto the table, when suddenly, the Swillsman hands him a crude dagger from beneath the stall.

  Rivin blinks, accepting it tentatively, narrowing his eyes to study a figure carved into the handle. It’s the sun, he realizes. His heart tightens. “What’s… this?”

  Matteo only shrugs. “She told me to give it to you when you came.” Rivin looks at the muscled man slowly. He wonders if he looks as dumb as he feels. The man pauses, appearing uncertain for a beat as he raises a brow. “You’re… Rivin, right?”

  The boy nods. His throat feels raw. His chest tight. The moment of silence between them lingers like a pulsing aftershock.

  Rivin exhales and slumps. “You’re kidding.”

  Matteo only starts chortling again, raising his mug to the Earth. “Told you. Always right where you need her.”

  When Rivin returns to the Hole, it’s hours later.

  His feet hurt and his side is humming with the dull tone of exhaustion. His recovering ankle punishes him at the last few steps and he trips by the kiosk, barely staying upright.

  Ricket bounces towards him, already beaming and chattering away while offering a steaming mug of soup. He doesn’t ask where Rivin’s been. He doesn’t need to, and by the time the teen returns to his bunk, his hair is a mess from restless hands.

  He stares at the ceiling. Lies awake.

  In his hands, the blade, his fingers skirting the sun with their tips.

  He’s been scowling all day.

  All day.

  Yet, at the end of it all, the smile comes without permission.

  Unnoticed and unprompted, as she had.