Chapter Three

Chapter Three

Huster seemed to enjoy trap-snatching. In her injured state, Dilly was in no condition to skulk around the Shades on her own, so she genuinely needed his help. However, it was perfect preparation for what Dilly planned to come next. He had no Taint or Glamour, but he was stronger than Dilly now and she knew his quick wits would keep him safe.

Of course, Huster had jumped at the chance to join Dilly. He was far too old to play with the younger boys and Argentine was no company now that they had the babe. For the first few days they focussed on scraping the fung in the south Shades. Huster didn’t notice Dilly pocketing handfuls of the stuff as he worked, but he did once ask her how she used to get the fruits. She had made some clumsy excuse about them being out of season. Huster was too clever for that though, he would figure out soon enough that she had been stealing the fruit from Company Wagons. She certainly wasn’t going to be the one to tell him though. Instead, she kept his lessons to the safer, although less profitable, work of mush-scraping, trap-raiding or the occasional shift of muck-labour. It was grim, but working for the muckers meant they could earn a ha’piece. Huster learned quickly and got on well with the muck rangers. With no contract in place, he laboured in Dillys’ stead. Dilly wasn’t sure if it was Husters’ charm that prompted Ol Hye to pay him a whole piece for his day or the sight of Dilly’s arm and black eye on that first day that resulted in her paying the going rate for once. Huster had handled the inevitable confrontations well too. Arguements, and the occasional fight, were not uncommon for the better fungholes, but Huster had negotiated all of the disputes expertly. He was able to climb to areas most couldn’t, so he didn’t even need to squabble over the lower areas.

Dilly hated being idle. As the weeks passed, she would consider, and reconsider,  Bedlam’s offer to help her. Dilly wondered if Bedlam could read, could he tell her what the letter said? Dilly didn’t think she would be able to trust him. And, even if he could help her, his price would be too steep. She could find someone to trust at the university, once she was strong enough to go.

Dilly toked on the butt of her cigarette and focussed on her breath. She was used to the glowing green eyes escaping her dreams and haunting her waking thoughts. She forced the image of the eyes from out of her head and instead turned to Huster as he elegantly hopped over the damp rubble in the oldcave back towards her. Dilly flicked the spent butt into the cavern.

Huster brandished four large rats and a massive grin. After three weeks he was nearly as competent at trap raiding as Dilly. He was already better than her at fung farming; his long limbs meant he could reach further into the wall crevices and retrieve more than she could. He could even reach some of the lichen. Dilly added the four rats to the three in the halfsack she was carrying.  Her left arm was wrapped in Argentines’ shawl, she was nearly fully healed  now but didn’t want to force it until she had to. Huster was now a competent trapper and could nearly earn a quart a day with the amount of fung he was able to gather. Dilly had felt a weight slowly lift from her shoulders over the past few weeks. She could now share the responsibility of finding food for them all with Huster.

Dilly teased Huster as they walked back home, the sun hung casually over the walls and warmed them as they walked. Even after all these years, Dilly could still smell Offal street whenever she returned, even having spent just a few hours away. It would take her half again to get accustomed to the smell. As they turned into their street, Dilly could see the door to Argentines’ house was open. Outside was parked an ornate carriage flanked by two carriage men, standing alert, with white cloths pressed to the underside of their noses. Her heart sank, she recognised the style of the carriage and the sombre garb of the carriage men. The Papalcy had come for their tithe.

The Bishop turned to look at them as they entered the small kitchen. Smoke and incense billowed from the metallic bauble suspended from the chains he held. He was probably a slight-framed man under all of the fat and ruddy skin that seemed to melt from his frame. Dilly was almost glad of her humble diet if the Company food would make her look like him. The white robes of his sect hung from him in an ill-fitting manner. He was flanked to his right by the shining, armoured form of a Steel-Sister. Her face was fully obscured by her helmet and Dilly wondered how she even managed to squeeze the bulk of her armour through Argentines’ door. Black flecks suspended in the wafting incense twinkled and glittered as they reflected light off the Sister’s armour.

“Come children. Welcome” mouthed the bishop, his head flopping to one side in an affected manner of pity or perhaps what he thought compassion might look like. He waved them both into the middle of the room. It was all Dilly could do not to stare at the clagging gunge in the corner of his mouth as he spoke. Huster didn’t move though, he stood transfixed. Dilly followed her brothers’ gaze.

She could barely see them through the perfumed smoke, but genuflecting on the floor were two young boys she hardly recognised, their taints had receded. Barklys fur had all but vanished and Sam’s eyes were, for once, visible. The porcine flaps that usually masked his face were almost entirely gone. He beamed up at her, his eyes a boyish blue. He would have been handsome.

Dilly had seen this before, the effect of the Bishops blessings, but it always took her breath away. She couldn’t help but feel sad for her younger brothers, sad for who they might have been. Argentine knelt next to the boys, her head bowed.

“Ah, the other two. Come children ” The Bishop said “You can still receive a blessing”

Dilly did as she was bade and took a kneeling position next to Argentine,  Huster followed her. The Bishop proceeded to utter an incantation in the old language that the Papalcy still spoke. Dilly didn’t understand the words but could make out the frequent ‘Stain’s and Glamours’  that seemed to feature heavily in whatever blessing he was administering.   The cloying smoke made Dilly feel dizzy. She had witnessed the ceremony before; a Bishop would arrive, provide some sort of blessing, all while demonstrating their power over the Stained by dimming their taints. They would then demand an offering, or tithe, as both a thanks for their blessing and tribute to the Papalcy. Argentine had explained to Dilly that, in principle, the tithe was payment to permit them to live outside of a Company house. As if it were a choice. In reality, the papalcy’s Steel Sisters would pay a visit to any Stained house that couldn’t pay and take them away. No one knew where the Sisters took those that couldn’t pay, only that they never came back.

The bishops arcane words washed over Dilly as she ignored them. She knelt in quiet contemplation and wondered if her taint had diminished, if her crimson hair and eyes had returned to a natural brown or maybe blue. ….Or green….

Dilly felt Argentine stiffen next to her, the sensation wrenched Dilly from her mindspace. Had Argentine noticed her distraction? Only now did Dilly realise that the Bishop had stopped speaking. Then she heard it, a quiet wail coming from upstairs. The babe.

“It seems we have yet another child in need of Aurlord’s blessing”

Argentine sat bolt upright with a sudden speed that Dilly had never seen in the old woman. Her eyes were wide open.

         “He’s just a babe.” Said Argentine. “ Please, your holiness, grant him mercy this year.”

         “Aurlord has only mercy for his subjects, and in his grace,  tolerance for those that bear the mark of Methusalem.” The Bishop mewed, his bauble now stationary, the sickly smoke billowing straight upward and coalescing in the ceiling .

         “No your holiness” Argentine begged, “We took him in as a mercy. Does Aurlord not teach that mercy, above all, is what will save us? He was abandoned by an indentured family and..”

         “Are you suggesting that a good, honest, Holy, Company family would abandon their child? I’m disgusted by the very accusation” The Bishop barked with exaggerated emotion. A pantomime. “Disgusted,” he repeated. “Come, Sister, let us investigate”. The Bishop turned on his heel and strode off up the stairs. The steel sister followed him, the timber treads heaved and creaked under her massive weight. Dilly turned to look at Argentine, her aged face was ashen. Dilly took her hand as the old woman looked up at her.

         “Oh colours of hell, Rosie.  He’s just a babe.”

Dilly didn’t understand, was the baby in trouble? A Bishop wouldn’t hurt a child, surely? Dilly snatched her hand from Argentines weak grasp and raced up the stairs, two-at-a-time,  after the Bishop and his Sister, following the trail of sweet, heady smoke.

         The priest held the naked babe in his right hand and by the poor things’ left leg. The terrified boy was squalling and screaming. His arms, fists clenched, waved back-and-forth in front of his face. Dilly could see the spines that ran along his back receding as the smoke eddied around him. The black flecks suspended in the smoke seemed to glimmer and flicker. The priest turned to Dilly as she burst into the baby’s room, his neck wattle wobbled as it caught up with the rapid movement of his head.

         “Watch as the grace of Aurlord washes away the mark of Methusalem that blights this sinner. This residence is consecrated for only three such stains.” The Bishop spat the last word. “For Aurlord to tolerate such a blight on this blessed City a greater Tithe must be paid. Three-hundred additional marks, at least, else our Holy Sister will have no choice but to save him from his sins, which must have been many for Methusalem to have marked him so.”

         Dilly could barely hear the Bishop over the terrified squalling of her brother. He was even redder than the Bishop now and tears were pouring from his eyes. Dilly’s mind raced, she brushed her right hand through her hair as she wracked her mind for ideas. The tithe he demanded was too high, three hundred marks was more than Huster and her would make in six months.

         “Sister, take this poor wretch” The fat man held the naked baby at arms length, much like Huster had held his first rat. The timber floor groaned under the weight of the armoured woman as she made to grab the babe.

         “Wait” Dilly shouted “Give us more time, we can get the marks to you in a few months, paid in full”

         “My child” dribbled the Bishop as he paused “Aurlord cannot tolerate this sacrilege for even a second more. Do you not understand this Stains’ very presence here is an insult to the majesty of Aurlord?”

         Dilly felt the blood rush from her face. Her stomach pitted.

         “Well..” Dilly choked, she blinked to clear her eyes. Her lip was shaking “Well, he will need his blankets, he’s cold. And his milk! We even bought Bovvy milk for him and …”

         “ My child” mewed the Bishop as he passed the baby into the steel gauntlet of the Sister”. The baby squealed as her steel fingers clasped his plump leg. “The babe needs nothing more than Aurlord’s grace now.”

With her free hand, the sister deftly unravelled a coarse hemp sack that had been tied to her grieves. She made to put the baby in the bag.

A grim realization dawned over Dilly. Her legs turned to jelly and she fell to her knees. An involuntary moan escaped from her mouth. The baby’s terrified howls echoed in her ears. They were going to kill him, they were going to kill her baby brother. 

Dilly flared her glamour.

She sprung from her kneeling position. She poured all of her glamour into her palms and threw herself at the small man. She lunged as hard and as hot as she could, she needed to be quick. She could hear the air fizz and crackle as she rushed through the incense enveloping the room.

The Sister was so quick. Impossibly quick. Dilly didn’t see her move, she simply felt, then saw, the Sister’s iron gauntlet clasp around her right arm. She was so much stronger than Dilly, immovable. Dilly’s assault was arrested immediately, she was glad to see that her brother, bawling, still hung from the Sisters other hand.

Dilly’s mind scrambled for her next move. She focussed her glamour into her right arm, where the sister grabbed her, it was a risk, but Dilly was desperate. Dilly reasoned the steel should conduct her heat well and hopefully the Sister would release her grip on both her and the babe. Dilly could then grab him with her cooled left hand. And then…What? No time to think that far ahead now, she had to focus.

Dilly fired all of her Glamour, she pledged the warmth of the tiny room and pushed all of her raging energy into her forearm, pouring her boiling heat into the steel gauntlet of the Sister.

And, nothing happened. The Steel Sister’s gauntlet simply gripped Dilly’s arm even tighter. In fact, Dilly could now feel the cold steel stinging her. The priest laughed. Only now did Dilly notice the black flecks in the smoky room sparking and fizzling. Was the smoke sapping her Glamour? Was it the smoke that was washing away the boys taints? 

“It’s a venial sin to assault a holy Bishop,” The Steel Sister boomed, her voice reverberated around her metal helmet. “You shall repent!”.

Dilly turned to face the steel juggernaut. The Sister’s face was completely obscured by her gleaming steel visor, Dilly could only see her own crimson eyes staring back at her. She hated how scared she looked. The baby’s howls had reached an ear-splitting bellow, he must be so scared, Dilly prayed the Steel Sister wasn’t grasping her brother as hard as she was clenching her arm.

The steel sisters knee met Dillys stomach with a clang. The Sister’s grieves concatenated against Dilly’s soft flesh and every whisper of breath rushed from her lungs. Dilly gasped as she hit the floor. Her mind raced.

“Wait” squeaked Dilly, her voice a pitiful wheeze. “take me instead, leave the babe”

         “Nonsense” The Steel Sister bellowed, raising her leg once again to stomp down onDilly.

         “Stop,” Argentine screamed. Dilly hadn’t noticed her appear in the doorway. “Your holiness, please grant mercy”

         “Mercy?” he spat, before turning to look down at Dilly, as if for the first time. “Yes! Yes, Aurlord is merciful.  She’s slight. And still young, hardly a beauty but there’s a vitality to her that is not …. unattractive. She would clean up nicely, I think, Sister.” The Bishop turned to face the iron woman as she lowered her boot. “Aurlord will accept the girl in the babes stead. She may make a nice Sacrament for our Holy Brothers” the Bishop spoke, wetly. He took a step forward to leer down at Dilly.

         The Steel Sister strode over to the cot in the middle of the room and placed the babe back in it with a surprising delicacy, Dilly could see her wrapping her brother in his rags. He still bellowed, but Dilly was baffled by the sudden care the Steel monster was now exhibiting; an uncanny mirror of the cruelty she had shown mere seconds before. A cruelty Dilly was sure she could soon expect to see plenty more of.

         “No!” wailed Argentine “Your holiness that’s not what I meant, that’s not what I meant. We need her!”

         Dilly wobbled to her feet and extinguished her Glamour. Quashed as it was, by the incense, it was useless to her now and would only exhaust her. And, she was going to need her strength. She ignored the priest as he paced around her.

         “Rosie!” Argentine cried, “ Rosie you mustn’t go, you mustn’t leave us!.”

         Dilly turned to look at her mother, even through the swirling smoke she could see the tears rolling down Arjentines’ cheek.

“Dont worry Arj,” Dilly said, doing her best to hide the wobble in her voice. “I’ve got a helper.”

Dilly could hear Huster sobbing. She was going to miss them sorely, of course, but her hand had been forced. The two younger boys watched wide-eyed, they didn’t understand what they were seeing. Their taints were slowly returning to them as the smoke diffused into the street.

The rope around Dillys’ wrists chafed as the Steel Sister pulled her to the back of the wagon. The Sister tied the other end of the rope to the back of the carriage.

Dilly watched the Bishop hand his incense bauble to the first carriage man who, with great solemnity, attached it to an ornate holder on the outside of the carriage. The second carriage man helped the fat Bishop into the timber carriage. The two carriagemen then strapped themselves into the leather harness at the front of the wagon and, on the Bishops instruction, began to pull.

As the slack in the rope diminished, Dilly turned back to her family.

“Huster,” Dilly bellowed “take them all inside”. He looked up at her with bloodshot eyes and met her gaze, he nodded. If nothing else, the recent weeks she had spent with him in the Shades meant he knew when Dilly was warning of a serious risk. And what she was about to do was certainly risky.

“Quiet, you dog” The Steel Sister hit Dilly over the head with the back of her gauntlet with a clang. Dilly steeled herself. The tight rope dragged her forward, the incense seemed to cling to the air as she was dragged through the smoke. The Steel Sister strode by her right hand side, ready to extol a gauntlet of discipline should Dilly try to resist.

As they rumbled up Offal Alley, the vent pipes from the factory loomed  ahead on their left. Dilly estimated the paces. Ten, Eight, Six, Four, Two. She took a deep breath as the foul, billowing air from the factory washed over them. The warm, pungent air caused the carriage men to balk and even the stoic sister raised a steel hand to her visor. Dilly watched carefully as the exhaust gas, pumped by whatever arcane technology was in the factory, engulfed the party in in its fetid embrace.

 Dilly walked in silence behind the wagon, the smell of the incense once again overpowered the vent gasses.  Dilly grabbed the rope to lessen the strain on her wrists, this little act of autonomy did not elicit a response from the Sisters’ gauntlet. 

The cart rolled through the streets, bystanders stopped and stared at her. Vendors, city guards, urchins and workmen all stared at her as she walked past before catching themselves and returning to whatever task they had been attending to.  Dilly caught the eye of a mush vendor that was closing up for the day that she half recognised.

The wagon continued to roll through the Shades as the evening drew in. The bustling crowds parted to make way for the carriage as it rolled through. Onlookers would continue to glance at Dilly and then avoid her gaze, it was as if by looking at her they risked taking her place. 

The wagon weaved in and out of alleys until finally the drivers pulled the wagon through an abandoned street that would link the Shades with the Lower City. As the throng of citizens thinned toward the Lower, out of the corner of her eye,  Dilly was certain she saw him again. The one-legged man.  When she turned her head to look for him, he was gone. Perhaps he had never even been there. The wagon rolled into an unoccupied, narrow alley and Dilly seized her moment.

Dilly  released  her grip from the rope and tugged. With a quiet crack, the weakened rope around her wrists snapped and fell to the ground.

Dilly turned on her heel, and ran, not even pausing to glance behind her. She was sure the Sister couldn’t leave the priest, it was her duty to guard him. But, Dilly wasn’t going to waste even a second turning to look. 

The sisters armour was loud and the visor restricted her view, she might even take a few seconds to notice that Dilly had fled. She certainly hadn’t noticed the vent gas from the offal factory dilute the incense. As the sister had gagged on the offal gas, she had not noticed Dilly flare her Glamour the second the hot gas had washed over them.

Dilly had timed it perfectly. Her Glamour had sputtered and fired into life under the smokescreen of the offal gas. The incense had still dampened her ability, but she had been able to focus heat into her wrists. Dilly had pledged the rotten warmth of the vented air and poured the energy into her wrists. Any taste of iron that might have given her actions away had been overshadowed by the taste of the offal in the foul air. The rope around Dilly’s wrists had fizzed and crackled and she had watched the threads fray and unravel as the tension from the wagon pulled the smoldering rope away. Dilly had quenched her Glamour before burning through the rope entirely and then gripped further up the rope to relieve the tension on what remained of the rope around her wrists. 

Dilly ran south, away from Argentine’s house, and towards the Fleet Oldgate. Towards Beldam. She hoped he would remember her, remember his offer. He was her only hope now. She could not run back to Arjentine, they would kill them all if they found her there. Her only hope of protection in the Shades was under Beldam’s wing. The university would have to wait.