Chapters 23-25

(In which the trainees get to stretch their legs a bit, attack a boat, and Elizabeth gets to act the part she was born to play)

Twenty-third

      Graves was as good as his word; though she remained the least competent of the trainees in almost every way, and light-years away from Graves himself, Elizabeth was no longer the hopeless bumbler she had been when she first stepped off that dumbwaiter.
      She learned to swing a sword, executing the delicate movements he taught her, relying more on balance and momentum than brute force. "It's almost a guarantee that your opponent will be bigger'n ye, Totem. Ye canna' win a contest of strength. The trick is to make your opponent acutely aware of this, so much so that he forgets that relying too much on strength is in itself a weakness."
      Graves showed her how to get a swordsman to overcommit with their movements, how to feign weakness and slowness, then to strike. "Ye have an advantage over almost anyone ye'll face, since they're not likely to see ye as a threat. Our side may be fooled into thinkin' ye're the second comin' of The Knife-Fingered, but The Guard'll just think ye're a girl with an obsession. They'll see ye as a lamb, and themselves as the wolves." He turned to the rest of the group. "That goes for all of ye. If they be the wolves, then what are ye?"

      Shrike, a boy of maybe two years older than Elizabeth, answered with a question. "What hunts wolves?"
      None of the trainees responded. Graves took a moment, then spoke. "The answer will always be the same. Ye'll be the last ones standing. Ye'll be those who hunt the hunters. What stalks the wolf? Death, disease, famine. Ye'll be the inevitable. Ye'll be the trap hidden in the snow, the unseen bit of glass that gets swallowed, the poison concealed in the meat. Ye're the thing they canna see comin'." He looked at their confused, serious faces. "Your biggest advantage now is that ye're far more deadly than ye look. Use that while it lasts. It will na' be long before they know what ye're capable of. Especially you, Totem."
      Elizabeth blushed at this bit of praise, a warm feeling that Graves snatched away as quickly as he had bestowed it. "Not because ye're all that good, but because ye're the most recognizable. Once ye kill your first guard, word'll spread, and they'll be more cautious. The rest of ye, it'll take a bit more time. Of course, the fewer survivors ye leave to tell the tale..."
      They had spent the morning dueling with practice swords. They were supposed to be nonlethal, but that didn't mean the weapons couldn't scratch, or bruise, poke an eye or loosen a tooth. The trainees had access to padding, but Graves was set against them using it. "Once ye get used to thinkin' there's somethin' protectin' ye, it's hard to go back. Better to let pain be your teacher, remind ye where the weak spots are, so ye learn all the better to protect 'em."
      Well, if pain was a teacher, then Elizabeth felt as though she had been taking extra credit. She had never thought of herself as unathletic, but for the first few weeks of training, she may as well have been an invalid, compared to the other trainees. Last in the morning runs, able to complete the fewest push-ups or sit-ups or pull-ups. Hopeless in sparring, either with weapons or unarmed.
      The other pupils were nice enough, understanding that she had come into training later than they had. At one point, Graves dressed down Ever, a tall boy with a pock-marked face, for what he perceived as his going easy on her. "Dinna ye see how ye're cheating her? Do ye think the Guard will back off, just because she lost the last ten battles? Ye've got to go hard on each other every. Single. Time. And if I see ye holdin' back again, Ever, then it will be the last time I hold back. Understand?"
      They all hailed from Aldergate, but had come to the revolution in different ways. Shrike's older sister had been killed by The Guard during the riot that Adri and Walton had described. Quill was an urchin that Graves had rescued from police pursuit, a chance encounter she described as the luckiest thing that had ever happened to her. Hachi's home had been repossessed under somewhat shady circumstances, and his father's inquiries revealed that one of Silas's high-ranking officials had forced the bank to sell it to him for a song. Ever had grown up on a farm just outside the city and sought out the rebellion on his own, hating The Guard passionately but refusing to explain why.
      Elizabeth found herself trying to guess why Silas’s Guards passed them over. Quill's reason was obvious: she had grown up on the streets, avoiding school and other ties. Shrike's hotheadedness seemed to be his disqualifier, and Ever's almost pathologic silence his. Hachi's was harder to detect until one day he revealed he’d been born with a game leg that left him unable to walk unaided until it healed a few years previous by methods he was disinclined to detail.
      The four had already been a tight-knit group when Elizabeth was thrust into their midst, functioning like a family, squabbling like siblings. They had been strangers before entering training. She had to ascribe the credit for the group's cohesion to Graves, at least partially; he had an uncanny ability to play them off of each other, of getting them to push each other without playing favorites or causing rifts. There were fights, of course...not just sparring but real brawls. But each one ended with a handshake, no hard feelings, and an hour later it seemed to have never happened.
      She was shocked by the first scuffle she witnessed. The five of them were eating dinner in the cavern that served as their mess hall, connected to the dormitory by a narrow tunnel. Ever made one of his rare jokes, a crack about Shrike's affluent upbringing, some sort of spoiled-rich-kid comment that on the surface seemed so harmless that Elizabeth couldn't even remember its exact details. But before the words even had time to register, a leaping Shrike inadvertently elbowed the fork from her grip as he flew across the table, head-butting Ever in the nose. The larger boy gave an indignant squawk as blood streamed over his lips, then Ever grabbed Shrike and wrestled him to the ground. The two became entangled as they fell to the floor, arms and legs in blurred movement as they traded blows.
      Elizabeth leaped up, meaning to put a stop to the melee, but Hachi stopped her, his brown eyes serious under the black mop of hair that fell across his forehead. "Against the rules. They have to solve this themselves. No one will get killed." Quill nodded confirmation, then went back to her meal, eating as though there wasn't a pair of boys rolling around on the floor a few feet away.
      Hachi was right. They wore each other out, fighting to an apparent standstill. Technically it was Ever who was the victor, she supposed, as the fight ended with him holding Shrike in a headlock. But the tall boy was exhausted, bleeding, and had an impressive bruise stamped across his cheek. Neither boy apologized, and they would go about the rest of the day acting like always, save for each being quieter than usual. Graves surely noted the injuries; the bruises and Shrike's limp were not hard to detect. But the trainer did not mention them, nor did he alter the planned activities for the rest of that day.
      The tactical training was the one subject in which Elizabeth caught up at a greater speed. Whether it was years of video games, her careful reading of Sun Tzu's The Art of War a few summers ago, or some inborn talent, the primers that Graves, Adri and Walton gave just seemed to make sense. Before long, she was readily out-thinking the other trainees. The classes consisted of lectures, followed by a series of games in which the trainees teamed up against one another or against their teachers, moving figurines meant to represent armies, soldiers,  cannons, or supply lines. They played on boards meant to represent the city and the surrounding areas to teach them how to use the local geography to their advantage.
      Elizabeth’s teammates began to defer to her with regularity. She found a talent for misdirection, for the tactical feint that led her opponent to commit troops and resources to meaningless objectives while she honed in on the true goal. When her fellow trainees repeatedly failed to identify her subterfuge, she became even more willing to take risks.
      Graves would watch her matches with particular intensity, and, in what she would later come to regard as his first meaningful compliment, he stepped into a match between herself and Quill, taking over the manipulation of Quill's armies to launch an attack on Elizabeth's smaller strikeforce.  Graves won that game, but he did not win the next one, nor the one after that. Once she had faced him several times, she found an almost preternatural ability to predict his moves two or three rounds ahead, taking special joy in making him think she had fallen into his traps, only to make it all come crashing down.
      Adri and the other teachers began pushing her harder than they did the others, and once, after she had squeaked out a victory against Walton in an epic battle that lasted twice as long as the usual encounters, she caught Adri giving Graves a look clearly meant for the two of them alone, a private message of I-told-you-so. Graves raised his eyebrows in acquiescence.
      Though physical pain and exhaustion enshrouded her days spent underground, Elizabeth experienced a pure joy she had not known for a long time. From the moment she set foot in Edge, there had been an undercurrent of terror swirling within her heart, the certainty that something was going to kill her. In this damp, chill underground, she was finally part of a family again, a cog in a group that had her back, and she theirs. It was becoming less important that she was not as emotionally bound up in the revolution; if Quill and Ever and Hachi and Shrike were committed to it, then she would be, too. Because that was what you did for family, be it blood or chosen: you made their battles into your battles.
      Though her definition of what a family was did experience some growing pains. One afternoon she returned to the dormitory from a private sparring session with Graves, perhaps an hour earlier than planned, as the trainer had been called away to the surface on some urgent, private business. Hachi and Shrike were on an errand overground, taken with Walton to survey some of the details of a block of buildings in which some government offices were located, though Elizabeth was not sure if this was practical or purely educational.
      Ever and Quill had been given the afternoon off, purportedly to study, practice or rest, so when Elizabeth returned to find the dormitory darkened, she assumed they had gone off on a run, or were napping. Both of them slept like the dead, and she felt confident the wan light would not wake them, if they were still inside. But when she turned the light on, she reflexively flicked it off immediately, even before the cries of protest and surprise reached her ears. Only one of the beds was inhabited, though the number of legs she saw in the brief moment of light clearly indicated a double occupancy. She backed out of the darkened room, her face hot and flushed, embarrassed and feeling inexplicably betrayed.
      That night at dinner, she ate wordlessly, unable to look any of the others, even Shrike or Hachi, in the eye. She stared at her plate, chewing quickly and efficiently, answering questions with as few words as she could get away with. Her silence was contagious, and soon the only sounds at the table were the noises of eating. She could feel the others communicating without words, conversing solely with facial expressions; knowing that they were discussing the afternoon's episode made the flush crawl back into her cheeks. She excused herself with the most minimal of grunts, her meal half-eaten, and left the mess hall to wander the tunnels. She had at least an hour before the evening run...maybe a walk would clear her head.
      She had not gone far before she was overtaken by Graves. "Hold up there, Totem. I'd like to join ye, if ye dinna' mind." Elizabeth shrugged, moving over to allow space to walk beside her. "Not in the mood for talkin', eh? I can respect that. But maybe ye could grant me a few minutes of listenin'." She shrugged again. "I know about what happened this afternoon."
      "You do?" She was surprised...she assumed such activities were forbidden, that they would interfere with the cohesiveness of the group, that they were...unsanitary.
      "Aye. As far as I'm concerned, ye're all adults. After all, we're askin' ye to do adult things. As long as ye all treat each other with respect, I'm willin' to not be your babysitter." He paused, waiting for a response that was not forthcoming. "Are ye int'rested in Ever, then?"
      "No!" She responded like a grade-schooler, teased on the bus for having a crush.
      "Quill?"
      "No!" Why was Graves needling her like this?
      "Has Quill told ye how we met?" His tone was serious, the playfulness drained out as though a plug had been pulled.
      "She said you rescued her from the Guard." She thought back...had Quill given any further details? No, that was it. "She didn't say anything else."
      "That's true. It's actually a funny story, I managed to spook a vendor's horse, drivin' it between her and the pursuin' Guard, and gettin' meself all tangled up with him in the process. Bought her enough time to get away. He didn't see which way she went, but I did...he was too busy yelling at me, slammin' me against a wall, gettin' a few punches in, threatenin' to bring me to jail for interferin' with his bringin' a fugitive to justice."
      "You didn't fight back?"
      "No. I could've beaten him, for sure. The man was an amateur. Ye could've taken him." She let the insult slide. "But I got what I wanted. I bought her time, and I knew where she was hiding. Y'see, there was something about the way she ran...the litheness, the way she dodged around pedestrians and carts alike. She showed promise, and I didna' know if I would find her again. So I made a split-second decision, to do what I could to save her, and see if she could be recruited.
      "I tracked her to her hidey-hole, gained her trust, slowly, and got her story. I'm sure she wouldna' mind me tellin' ye, but she had a bit of a rough go of it, on the streets of Aldergate. Not every girl is fortunate enough to find work at an inn on her first try. Some have to resort to...other jobs."
      His implication struck Elizabeth like a lightning bolt. "Quill...?!?"
      "Aye. It's the one profession where any girl can make money, though obviously it has its...disadvantages."
      "Like being arrested."
      "Oh, she wasna' in danger of being arrested. The Guard wanted his money back. She had stolen his wallet mid-act, and he realized it sooner'n she could get outta sight. She was in more danger of a beatin' than him bringin' her to any sort of justice. And if he was the wrong sort of man, he could've killed her."
      "Why are you telling me this?"
      "Because ye need to understand. That what ye walked in on, it's...well, it's Quill reclaimin' part of herself that was taken, against her will."
      "Her dating Ever is reclaiming part of herself?"
      Graves snorted. "I dinna' think they're exclusive, not that it's any of my business. But doin' what they did, at a time and place of her choosin', is her claimin' dominion over something she should'a had her whole life."
      "I don't know if I understand."
      "Well, let me put it a different way, and tell ye a bit about myself. I stand before you the runt of the litter, the youngest of six Graves men, each one a hulking brute, each one more familiar with the drink than he was with the gods. My father would beat all of us, whenever the whim took 'im. But when my eldest brother received the beatin', he would turn and beat the rest of us, givin' as good as he got. When the second eldest felt my da's belt, he would distribute the violence on all of us except the eldest. And so on. Me bein' the youngest, and besides that a weaklin' compared to even boys my own age, I was an easy target, barely goin' a day without bein' on the receivin' end of some form of torture or savagery. I taught m'self to fight, sure. But more importantly, I learned the ways the swift of thought can defeat those with naught but muscle 'twixt their ears. Learned manipulation, how to set them 'gainst each other, 'til there weren't nothin' left. I watched one of my brothers kill another in a drunken rage, all because of a deception that I had set into motion.
      "I'd like to say I feel sorry about that, but I'm not, not even the tiniest bit. They were monsters, all of 'em. I still carry a multitude of scars my brothers gave me. See this one?" He pulled his sleeve up his forearm, pointed to a salmon-pink swath that ran across it. "This came from a poker, fresh out of the fire. One of 'em held me down, while t'other made me beg for mercy...and then burnt me anyway."
      Elizabeth felt nauseated. She pictured a younger version of Graves, a serious, slim boy, screaming for a reprieve that would never come.
      "I've done things I'm not proud of. I killed my father and two of my brothers by my own hand, though I maintain that those particular acts were ones of self-defense. But years ago, I made to m'self was that I would never let another person touch me in violence, without payin' them back tenfold. "I have had to break that vow more times than I could count."
      Elizabeth was taken aback. "Break it? When?"
      "With the Guard that was chasin' Quill, for starters. And what about in trainin'? If we were to spar, and the gods smiled upon ye, and ye landed a hard blow on my head, would it be sportin' of me to respond by beatin' one of my star pupils to a pulp?"
      "I suppose not."
      "'Suppose not.' See? Ye're not even afraid of me."
      She smiled. She had assumed someone as good with a sword as Graves was would have no trouble killing someone when the situation arose, but she had to admit, she had never felt personally threatened by him.
      "My point, and I do have one, is that when ye're hurt, and angry, ye sometimes make vows that, righteous and powerful though they are, are not the most realistic or self-serving. If I went around killin' everyone who looked at me cross-eyed, I might be feared, but I wouldna' have a very satisfyin' life."
      "And if Quill...?"
      "I'm willin' to bet that, at some point, Quill swore she would kill any man who touched her. Because she saw the worst of men on the street and may have come to believe that the small sample she had experienced was a true representation. It's hard to live your life thinkin' half the population isn't worth your time. So she needs to learn, in a safe place, among friends and family, that such things are possible.
      "I could put a stop to what's happenin' between her and whoever...after all, she's still just a child, really, no more'n fifteen or sixteen, I could get all paternal and step in and start meddlin'. But I dinna think that would help with her healin'."
      There had been times in Elizabeth’s life when she felt her mother or father, or a teacher, or someone else in a position of power was making the wrong choice. Sometime she spoke up, with varying degrees of success, and sometimes she kept quiet to see how everything would play out. This particular situation was one that wasn't sitting well with her, but she couldn't put her finger on why. Was it just a vague sense that someone who had been hurt shouldn't keep probing the same wound? Was it some repressed attraction for her friends?
      Graves interrupted her train of thought. "But there's another, more selfish reason that I'm lettin' it go. She's goin' to need it as a part of her trainin'."
      "Part of her training?" she echoed.
      "Aye. It's no secret most of the high-rankin' officials in Silas' Guard are men. A girl who knows what she's doin' can insinuate herself into situations that a male spy couldna'."
      Elizabeth felt anger swell like a rising tide. "You're planning on using her?!?"
      "No more so than I'm plannin' on usin' any of ye. Is what I'm proposin' really much worse than puttin' your lives at risk? Maybe I havna' made it clear what would happen if Silas gets his hands on ye. He's not known to be particularly forgivin' to prophecy-chasers, Totem. Legend has it he's got a collection of false-Eliza hands, somewhere in that castle of his. If The Guard ever was to catch ye, a quick death would be the best thing to hope for." He sighed. "We're playin' a deadly game here, Elsie. Your friends know what they've signed on for. They may have to give their lives, as well as take the lives of others. What I'm askin'...what the revolution might be askin' of Quill, is it really all that worse than what we're askin' the rest of ye?"
      She supposed not. But, at the same time, it was. She just couldn't explain why.
      Elizabeth glanced sidelong at her trainer. His serious expression had shifted subtly, had become softly reticent. "Graves?"
      "Aye."
      "Did you and Quill-?"
      His eyes flashed, the blue piercing her like an arctic wind. "No."
      "Sorry, I just...well, if it's part of the training, I just..."
      "No." His emphasis ended this line of discussion, as firm as any order: she was not to probe any further. Still, the force of his denial was unexpected. Had Quill come onto him? Elizabeth could see it happening...a young girl developing a crush on her rescuer. It would almost be odd if it didn't happen. But her curiosity would have to go unsatisfied; she certainly wasn't going to keep prodding Graves about it, and she couldn't see herself asking Quill about it, either.
      A terrible thought struck her.  If they were preparing Quill to infiltrate the Guard, would they ask her to do the same? "With me, are you going to..." she trailed off, unable to complete her question.
      It didn't matter. Graves understood. "I wouldna' ask any of ye to do anything I didna' think ye were capable of. In your situation, I think your hand would make ye exempt. Any of the Guard who tried to...dally with ye, would be answerin' to Silas personally. Besides, your gifts seem to lie in the tactical realm, so we'll focus our efforts there."
      She felt relief, then shame quick on its heels, knowing the responsibility would fall to Quill alone. Still, she supposed, it would be the girl's own choice...at least, she hoped, if the situation presented itself, Quill would be free to decide for herself.
      Elizabeth and Graves walked back to the dormitory, the lights strung through the tunnels swaying in some subterranean breeze. The others were gathered there, readying themselves for the post-dinner training; Graves had promised to take them to a larger cavern for training with distance weapons, and Hachi in particular had been eager to start using a longbow.
      Quill did not avoid Elizabeth’s gaze, nor did she meet it. Elizabeth sidled next to her while they walked and gave her a playful shove with a shoulder; the wan girl looked surprised, then a sly smile crossed her face, and she nudged Elizabeth back. No words were exchanged. None were needed.

Twenty-fourth

      Elizabeth's heart was singing drumbeats, a rhythm that resonated through the pulse rushing in her ears. The thrill of danger successfully navigated, of victory, of enemies successfully dispatched and made to run off scampering into the darkness like deer running from a hunter's gunshot...it felt marvelous--better than anything she could have imagined.
      It took all their will to maintain silent restraint, but she and the other trainees made it to the dormitory before exploding with cries of joy. Elizabeth felt Ever's hands lift and spin her around, the vibration of his yelling tickling the skin of her neck. Quill had grabbed Shrike and Hachi's hands and pulled them into a sort of kicking-circle of a dance. They laughed and shouted, all talking at once so that only scraps of sentences bubbled through the cacophony.
      "...see when Hachi disarmed that..."
      "...know! That guy was like twice your size, Quill! He went down like a..."
      "...almost punched you in the face! I thought you were that wiry guard! The one in the..."
      It was their first outing, the first time they had been allowed to take action for the revolution. Graves had gone with them, and they had been told after the fact that there was a cadre of other members of the rebellion, hidden out of sight, waiting to be called in if things went sour. But a cavalry had not been necessary. It had gone off without a hitch.
      Their target had been an official vessel of the government:  a large ship, broad and business-like, with the tall grey and blue markings on the sails and the crest of The Pretender--a crow in mid-flight, a flaming sword within its talons, stalks of wheat in concentric circles comprising the background.
      The boat regularly made the journey between Aldergate and Silas's city of Pendulum, running the circuit and stopping at a few of the larger seaside cities and towns. It moved troops and supplies, news and weapons.
      It was this last that interested the revolution. "Though we'd prefer the Guard leave The Gate without us havin' to resort to violence, we know it's not likely to happen," Graves explained, the afternoon before their expedition. "Surreptitious acts of sabotage and vandalism will only get ye so far. The more weapons we have access to, the better off we'll be. And if those weapons come from their storehouses, so much the better. Zero sum game."
      They arrived at the docks in late afternoon. Quill and Hachi were outfitted as young gentry, perusing the stalls of the seaside merchants who sold wares straight off the boat. Ever had dressed as a dock worker and managed to secure afternoon work on a late-arriving ship, not far from where their target intended to dock. Shrike and Elizabeth were disguised as urchins, moving shiftily from pier to pier, nodding to or eyeing other street children suspiciously depending on their perceived place in the pecking order of the feral. Elizabeth caught a single glance of Graves as she and Shrike moved through the streets.
      Their target berthed just after sunset, too late to start unloading its hold. A handful of black-clad Guard met it, with some remaining on shore to guard the gangplank, while bookish-looking types went on board to take inventory.
      Elizabeth and Shrike stumbled toward the ship, the watchmen eyeing their shabby clothes and dirt-smudged faces. One turned to another and made what was surely an off-color joke; his partner brayed laughter that rang through the gull's cries. Ever approached from the other direction with the slow, sauntering walk of a man whose bulk allows him to fear no cutpurse. Quill and Hachi waited until their three compatriots were about to cross paths, just in front of the group of the Guard, then extinguished the lights, shattering the glass of the gas lamps with expertly aimed arrows.
      The unprepared Guard had no chance to react. Ever picked up two of them and hurled them into the salty water before the light could have faded from their retinas. Elizabeth yanked her left hand from her pocket, and sunk its teeth into the hamstring of a Guard while she plucked the shortsword from his belt with her right. She struck him across the skull with the sword's hilt, and he crumpled to the ground, still breathing but unconscious.
      She whirled to parry a remaining watchmen, her eyes adjusting to the wane moonlight, the purloined shortsword meeting his blade with a sharp clang. She allowed him to force her blade aside, then spun as though his strength had caused it, coming full circle to bite the edge of the blade into his wrist. He dropped the weapon with a scream, and she kicked him full in the chest. He fell off the dock, slipping between the wooden planks and the side of the ship.
      Elizabeth heard footsteps from behind and turned to see a Guard advancing on her. But in her rotation, she caught sight of the figurehead on the bow of the ship. Even in the dimness, she recognized the profile of the woman carved into the prow: a perfect likeness of a younger version of her mother, reimagined as a mermaid. The sight unsettled her, and though she used her blade to block the Guard, on the following thrust, the point of his sword managed to clip her shirt. She shook off her shock and engaged his sword with her own, slowing it down while she swept her leg across his to yank him off balance and bring the shortsword around to disarm him. She struck him with her closed left fist, the metal knuckles bloodying his nose without cutting his skin. He fell, and Ever clubbed him across the head.
      Two guards lay in a pile at Shrike’s feet, disarmed and unconscious. Hachi emerged from the darkness and moved to stand next to Shrike. Both had their bows out, arrows notched and ready to fly. "Make a noise," Shrike hissed to the Guards in the water, "and you will be eating feathers, soon as your breath is drawn." The three waterlogged soldiers struggled to tread water, but they remained quiet.
      Elizabeth looked up to see Quill artfully sprinting up the gangplank; it quivered across its angle as she ran. The girl had shed her disguise, leaving her in an entirely black outfit. The rest took turns shucking off their clothes to reveal similar ensembles.
      Ever and Elizabeth kept their position until a flare glowed faintly from the stern of the boat: Quill's signal that the alarm-bell had been disabled. Shrike sheathed his bow and he, Ever, and Elizabeth crept up the walkway to the ship. Hachi remained below to guard. Elizabeth saw no sign of Graves.
      On deck, Quill had begun to incapacitate the enemy, amassing an impressive collection of prone opponents at the stern. She signaled to them that no alarm had been raised, and no one had escaped below deck. Ever stayed at the top of the ladder to listen for any warning from Hachi, and to catch any sailors who managed to escape.
      He was not needed; the ship was running a skeleton crew, with only a dozen or so to be taken out, not including the two who had come on board to catalog the contents. The trainees took control of the ship without a single casualty, though a few would likely need canes for the rest of their lives. They bound the prisoners' wrists and legs with strong cables they had brought with them.
      Shrike cornered the captain, identified by the intricate pattern on his uniform, and forced him to lead them to the hold and describe how to work the pulley mechanism to lift the crates to the deck. They could hear Ever grunt as the supplies reached his level; he would carry them to the bow of the ship and toss them over to land in the shallows, where a retrieval team would take them from the water to a safe house in the city.
      There was one last crate marked as containing weapons, but this one was different: reinforced and marked with a red flame. "Wait," Elizabeth cautioned Quill. She used one finger to slice through the straps that held it closed, sliding the lid off.
      Dynamite. That hadn't been on their list of what to expect. Good thing they hadn't tried to toss this one over the side. If it got wet, it would be useless. She wasn't sure it would be safe to transport, either.
Shrike glanced inside. His eyes grew wide, and he smiled. "Get this to the surface. Don't let Ever get his mitts on it, though." Quill and Elizabeth gave him quizzical looks, but slid the crate over to the lift and called up Shrike's instructions.
      They escorted the captain back to his quarters, and Shrike tied his wrists, but loosely. He looked the man in the face. "You've got, at most, five minutes to evacuate this ship and save as many of your men as you can. That's a far sweeter deal than your compatriots gave my brother." He shoved the captain to the ground and left the room, jogging down the hallway. Elizabeth was confused; this was not part of the original plan. Had Graves given Shrike different orders?
      Elizabeth and Quill followed Shrike onto the deck. Ever stood at the stern next to the crate full of dynamite. He eyed it warily, them asked, "What are you doing?" He addressed this to all three, but they remained silent: Elizabeth and Quill because they didn't know how to answer, Shrike because his face was screwed up in concentrated thought.
      Finally Shrike seemed to come to a decision and directed them to leave the ship. Elizabeth felt foreboding grow within her as she darted down the gangplank.
      Hachi stood smiling at the bottom, then looked confused as they ran past him. "Give me your spark," Shrike demanded.
      "Why?"
      "Just do it."
      Hachi reached into his coat and produced an ancient-looking Zippo, the one he called his a good-luck charm. Elizabeth had never seen him light it.
      Shrike flicked it once and a small flame erupted. He tore a strip of fabric from his sleeve and wrapped it around an arrowhead. Then he gutted the lighter to reach the small amount of fluid inside, ignoring Hachi's cries of protest as he poured the accelerant over the cloth. He closed the lighter, flicked it once more, and touched the flame to the fabric, which ignited into a miniature sun.
      "Oh, Gods, yes." Ever was grinning maniacally, eyes wide. "Do it, Shrike. Light that barge right up."
      Quill nodded agreement. "Send the Pretender a message from Aldergate. A message from us."
      Shrike needed no further encouragement. He took aim, but waited until the crew of the ship had started to amass on the deck. The Captain looked from the flaming arrow pointed to the stern of the ship, then to the crate in its line of fire and began to bark orders at his sailors, adamant words unintelligible on shore, but clearly effective. The crew sprinted for the rails and leapt over them, cutting through the surface of the water like projectiles.
      The arrow flew from the Shrike's bow, tracing a glowing arc, tearing through the darkness and dropping into the crate. Elizabeth felt the explosion before she heard it, a thrumming that spanned the distance to the dock and rattled its planks like chattering teeth.
      Chunks of flaming wreckage rained into the water. She had a brief thought of the men in the water, then of Graves' men who had been recovering the weapons from the shallows where they had been hurled.
The five trainees sprinted off the dock, pausing only to gather up the clothes they had left piled by the gangplank, then hustled out of the seaside. They split up when they hit the first street…the only thing more conspicuous than someone running down a darkened alley was five such people doing so. Elizabeth and Shrike put their shabby clothes back on, hiding their weapons beneath their cloaks, and walked as nonchalantly as they could manage to the closest entrance to the underground.
      Back below, Graves allowed them to tire themselves out with their self-congratulations. He waited until they calmed, until he had their full attention, before he spoke.
      "As far as your objective goes, ye did a crackin' good job. Secured the supply of weapons, none of our own wounded, or incapacitated, or captured, or killed. What hand-to-hand I saw looked commensurate with your level of trainin'." That didn't sound complimentary to Elizabeth. "Ye made the same mistakes I've seen in here. Ye perform the way ye practice, as the bards say. But 'twas good enough for today's job.
"Ever, stop tryin' to use your strength to overpower everythin' in your path. It worked well enough today, but if ye're in a protracted battle, ye'll tire too quickly. And ye never know how long a skirmish'll wind up takin'. Conserve your energy and ye won't run out.
      "Shrike, dinna assume your opponent is out without checkin'. Twice, twice I saw ye knock a guard to the ground and then move right on to the next one. Ye'll get a sword in the back if ye're not careful.
      "Hachi, watch your footwork. Ye know what I'm talkin' about, boyo, and so does everyone else.
      "Quill, ye move as quietly as a herd of elephants, I swear. Ye even breathe loudly. The Gods granted ye a body built for stealth and yet ye make more noise with it than a ten-piece orchestra. Focus, and ease each step onto the ground. It's a wonder ye didna' have the whole of the ship collapsin' on ye from the moment ye set foot on it.
      "Totem, ye seemed rattled from the moment ye started. Each time ye fought, ye used too much movement. I'll chalk this one up to first-time jitters, but ye're better than ye showed out there tonight. Ye disarmed guards, to be sure, but ye did it in seven moves, when it shouldna' have taken more than five. Efficiency. Economy of movement. Work on that.
      "So, that's everyone," Graves said in a concluding tone. "And it leads us to the one problem that Adri and myself have with your performance this evenin'."
      Adri stepped forward. The woman was dressed all in black, and Elizabeth realized she had probably been among the support staff in the shadows. She was visibly shaking, and when Elizabeth saw her clenched jaw, she realized it wasn't with excitement.
      "I'm sure you're all very proud of yourselves. Really, I'm surprised that you've stopped congratulating and complimenting each other. That was at most two minutes of celebration. I'm a little disappointed.
      "But what disappoints me most is not the brevity of your display. No, it was more the way you SET THE BOAT ON FIRE."
      Her yell jarred the group to attention, snapping their spines as straight as arrows. The volume seemed to come out of a different person; no body as slender as Adri's could possibly contain lungs that could expel that loud of a noise.
      "We have been fortunate thus far in that we have been able to garner some support among the people of The Gate, play on their sympathies and our shared hatred of oppression and the foul acts of the Guard. And we have done this without bringing the full force of Silas down on the city.
      "How long do you think we will last when Pendulum discovers that we have committed what will be considered an ACT OF WAR? Because that is what you five took it upon yourselves to do this evening. An attack on The Pretender's navy...not a theft, which is what we asked of you, a theft with no casualties on either side, if possible. But you five, representing the revolution, have sent a giant message to Silas, one he will be unable to ignore."
      She lowered her face into her hands for a moment, feigning composure. "We had a plan. A long-range plan. Build support, and when we gained strength, and only when we gained strength, would we prod The Pretender into an act to decide our sovereignty.
      "Go topside and look out at the horizon, over the sea. Get a good look at that unbroken line, because by this time next week it will be full of warships. Do you understand that? You have brought a storm down upon The Gate, and we barely have a roof constructed."
      She had started shaking her head, slowly, back and forth. "We may have to flee the city to survive. Do you understand that? Can that penetrate your skulls? We cannot defeat the force that will surely be on its way. We captured as many of the shipmen and the Guard as we could, but a few got away. There are probably a dozen rock doves headed for Pendulum this night, each one carrying the news of your little adventure. Do you know how many would have been sent if you'd just kept to the plan? None. Because theft happens all the time, and the last thing the Captain or the Guard want is for Pendulum to think they're incompetent. But this? This has to be reported. Because if it isn't now, it sure as hell will be when the ship doesn't arrive down the shore as planned."
      Graves touched Adri’s shoulder, but she shook it off. "We were training you to be the leaders of this revolution. This was to be your city when this was all over. Everyone would look to you for direction, to make this new sovereign city, the first of its kind in centuries, into a beacon other cities could look to as a blueprint for independence. Gods, I'm just..." She hung her head in a gesture of defeat, then turned and walked out of the dormitory.
      No one dared to speak until Graves broke the silence. "Best get to bed. Silas's armada won't be on our shores by tomorrow." Then he left, and they were alone.
      Shrike looked at each in turn. "I'm sorry, everyone," he exhaled.
      "No, Shrike," Quill said. "We could have stopped you if we'd wanted. I encouraged you. So did Ever."
      "I could have taken my spark back, once I knew what you were going to do with it," Hachi added. "You would have given it back if I'd asked."
      Elizabeth cleared her throat. "We stand together, Shrike. In victory and defeat. And...in whatever this is. Both, I guess."
      They collapsed into their bunks, exhaustion overwhelming their apprehension. Elizabeth dreamed fitful dreams, ones of fire, of explosions, and of foes who had been a step quicker than in reality, wielding swords stronger and sharper than what they had faced that evening. But behind these scenes, her slumber was haunted by a single image: the carved wooden face of a woman she had left behind in Central, sinking slowly into the black water of a foreign sea.


Twenty-fifth

      Adri's prediction did not take long to prove itself true. Within two days she had received a missive via a source in Pendulum: Silas' armies were preparing to move, his fleet of ships already being stocked with tools of war.
      Walton predicted they would have at least one week, and no more than two, before the troops could be fully mobilized. "They know the old section of The Gate was built to withstand a siege. Even though they've got a garrison here, it's still not enough to secure the whole of the wall should the citizens rise up. They'll need engines to scale the walls, or knock them down. Because the city stands between the seashore and the woods, they won't be able to get the supplies they'll need to build such structures once they get here. They'll have to bring them along, which means extra time packing and traveling. Maybe extra time procuring the materials, if they don't have them at hand.
      "In times of old, the city keepers were able to raise the seawall in the middle of the bay, blocking it from foreign ships. That particular magic is lost to us, but I've sent out some messages--in an easily broken code, for the semblance of authenticity--claiming we've re-discovered the key to the seawall. If they think they'll be trapped between the two walls, they'll need to bring even more supplies, food enough to feed the troops until they can break through."
      "But you haven't actually found the key to the seawall?" Hachi asked.
      "Gods, no. No such reprieve for us. I'm not even sure that ever really happened."
      Ever spoke up. "How many men do we have?"
      "Armed and trained? Maybe five hundred. Another one thousand who may be sympathetic to our cause once the city starts burning, but it will be tough to muster and organize them once the fighting starts. If the whole of the city rallied behind us, maybe we could total two or three thousand. But many of those would be untrained."
      They ranged around their map of the city, a grand picture painted on the cavern's floor, used for tactical training. It had been enjoyable, then; a game. Knowing that real soldiers would be moving and dying on their orders took the fun out of their deliberations.
      Elizabeth noticed the silence, and looked up to find all eyes on her, waiting for her to speak. She squinted at the map. "Okay," she began, "our advantages are knowledge of terrain, and the geography of the city. The woods and the mountains make an overland attack impossible, so they'll come by sea." She looked to Walton for confirmation; he nodded. "So as long as we keep that front intact, we can hold them off.
      "We don't have to knock any walls down, we just have to prevent them from doing so. Many of the old fortifications are intact. We know where the weak spots are, and we can shore those up with very little warning. And we can station archers on the wall, or drop rocks on anyone who gets close enough to try to break or sneak through.
      "We know the tunnels, and they don't. We can send small groups of saboteurs underground to disrupt their troops from behind once they mass at the wall. All of the tunnels to the old city can be triggered to collapse, so as long as we're vigilant about watching them, we won't have to fear them being used against us.
      "We have the farms at the city's outskirts, and it's harvest time; if they're trying to starve us out, they'll have a long time waiting. And we have plenty of fresh water in the wells. They'll have only what they've brought with them, and what they can draw from the wells of the outer ring. We can poison those wells if we have to. They may not think to guard them until it's too late.
      "And, if worse comes to worst, we can evacuate into the woods." She saw the startled looks on their faces. "It's not ideal, I know. But I survived there for the summer before I came to Aldergate. If Silas's troops think it's haunted, then they may not pursue us. If they do, well...the trees will at least provide some cover.
      "First thing: we need to extricate the Guard from the old city. It won't do us much good if they're in here with us. They'll be able to hold the doors to the inner wall open, and the invaders will ride roughshod all over us. We'll need to start getting citizens who live in the outer ring inside as well, either in the city or to the farms." She turned to Adri and Walton. "Can we set up refugees' camps for the old and the young? We'll want them out of harm's way."
      "We'll send carpenters and masons out to start work on temporary settlements. We've got contacts in their guilds."
      "Good then. Do you anticipate any trouble with the people we'll displace?"
      "Not much," Adri answered. "Those that want to stay can stay...there are plenty of expensive homes on the cliffs near the sea, a lot of the old blood of the city settled out there, and they won’t be happy that their houses are being forfeited. Might make us some enemies. But we won't force anyone out. If they want to greet Silas as a liberator, let them. His troops may not differentiate between Gate-born supporters and rebels, though."
      "Okay. What about the Guard?"
      Walton looked at Graves. "In the outer ring, we've got them cornered in their garrisons. Archers are already hidden in the surrounding buildings, picking off any who try to leave. Stragglers are being engaged as we find them. We'll be keeping alive those we can, to use for trades later."
      Elizabeth stepped back. "That's all I can think of."
      Graves looked at her, satisfied. "Good enough. We've got preparations to make. And it might not hurt if ye did the job we hired ye for."
      She squinted at him, confused. Then it hit her. "You want me to make a speech?"
      "It'd do a world o' good, Totem. Word spread about the stunt ye all pulled on that ship, including the Guard whose leg ye sliced. People who didna' believe in ye before are startin' to come around. May be that a rousing oration could sway some of our thus-far-unconvinced citizens."
      Between the mental and physical toll of her training and the excitement of the attack on the ship, she had completely forgotten about the role she had been recruited for. "I...I don't have anything prepared."
      Adri looked amused. "Oh, you thought we'd just put you up on a box in the center of town and let you improvise?" She drew a paper from within her dress. "We've had this written for weeks. Though recent events," she glared at all of them, "Have necessitated some re-writing."
      "How long until I have to give it?"
      "Once all of the Black Guard have been corralled, we will need to speak to those who live in the outer ring. They'll be the most inconvenienced, and it will help to have their sacrifice recognized by the legendary Eliza. Then we'll have you do the circuit in the old city, then speak to the farmers."
      That sounded like a lot. "I feel like a politician."
      Walton chuckled without humor. "You'd better be a damned good one. Some of these people are going to be a hard sell. Love of city is easy when there's nothing to lose. But there're going to some homes that will be lost. Lives that will be lost. If you give them something to fight for, maybe they won't quit at the first sign of hardship."
      She indicated her friends. "Can they come with me?"
      "Ever will be with you; we'll need him on your entourage as a bodyguard." She hadn't even thought of that. No telling if anyone in the crowd would be taking aim at her. Ever did not look pleased to have drawn this detail. "The others will be needed elsewhere. You've been trained to work independently. If we have you all in one place, it's too great a risk that we lose you all at once. We'll need your brains and your swords throughout this campaign."
      It occurred to Elizabeth that, for all of their support and encouragement, Adri and Walton, and even Graves, saw her as just one more commodity, one more weapon to be deployed in the most effective way. Her death would be inconvenient, but not an insurmountable loss.
      They fit her into a suit of armor, a gleaming antique attached over her regular clothes. An insignia of a handprint, the fingers tapering to sharp points and interwoven with a vine of ivy, was etched on the breastplate. A cream-colored cape sprouted from the shoulders. The helmet was an elaborate, heavy one with metal wings extruding from the temples, and an eye-and-nose-piece jutting down over her face.
      “You have got to be kidding me,” she said to Adri. “I can’t fight in this. I can barely see. And this cape is going to get caught on something. This is a horrible idea.”
      “You’re not going out to fight right now,” the woman answered. “You’re a symbol, and this is part of that. Without this armor, you’re a girl with a novelty for a hand. With it, you’re legend come to life.”
      “Ye’re both right,” Graves interjected. “It’s na’ ideal, in terms o’ function, but it’ll have t’do. But be sure to get rid of it if fightin’ starts.”
      “Fine,” Elizabeth answered, “but I’m not putting the helmet on until we get to our destination. I prefer to see what’s going on in all directions, not just straight ahead of me.”
      They approached the outer ring through an unfamiliar serpentine tunnel, the only illumination coming from Walton’s lantern. He walked in front of her, Ever behind. The tunnel passed close to the surface several times without breaking through; Elizabeth heard rumbles of carts’ wheels and snatches of conversation.
      They emerged in a dugout crawlspace whose only other exit led to an alley. Walton showed them through the narrow streets until they reached the backside of a squat building, all dark stones set together like puzzle-pieces. A nondescript door, bordered by latticed windows, opened as they approached.
      As they were ushered inside, Elizabeth heard the noise of a large gathering somewhere within the confines of the building: impatient, eager voices mashed together into a wall of sound. A short man, wide and dark-skinned as though he were the human embodiment of the building they had entered, beckoned them down a hallway, where a door waited at the end. The man gestured toward it, and Walton opened it and stepped through, followed by Ever. Elizabeth paused to pull on the helmet, then crossed the door’s threshold.
      Silence greeted her entrance, a hushed awe. Then, the entire crowd seemed to inhale at once, exploding in one tumultuous wave of clapping hands and stomping feet. Grown men in the front row wept openly as they shouted her name. Some pointed at her hand, then raised their own fists and shook them in the air. Elizabeth glanced at Walton, who suppressed a smile. Ever, however, directed his gaze at the crowd.
      A podium waited mid-stage. She approached it, removing the paper from her sleeve, unfolding and smoothing it across the podium's flat surface. She hoped her voice would last without a microphone; given the gathered mass’s vehemence, she might have to yell the entire speech. But the crowd silenced as she opened her mouth.
      "Citizens of Aldergate," she began. "I have returned."
      The throng's response shivered the building's foundation. "I am Eliza the Knife-Fingered, Eliza of the Wheatsea, she who came from Central. She who it was prophesized would return to shake the yoke of The Pretender from this fair land."
      Again, the thunderous tumult. This is easy, she thought. I could say anything and they would applaud. She had a brief, insane notion that her next sentence would be completely nonsensical or out of context. Is there anyone here from Binghamton? or Be sure to tip your bartender!
      "I was not born here, but I have lived here, lived in disguise among you for the past year. Testing you, learning about you. And I have found that this city boasts the most courageous, strongest men and women in all of Edge!
      "From here we will peel the grip of Silas loose, so that we may determine our own destiny! I am the flesh-made-weapon!" She thrust her left hand into the air, following the stage direction Adri had scrawled in the margins of the paper; its metal gleamed cruelly in the light. "And I will cut down any who stand between this city and its independence!
      "But I am just one, our enemies many! They gather as we speak. Though I am thankful for your applause,"--apparently, Adri had been confident in the crowd's reaction when she was penning this speech--"Let me assure you, the Guard in Pendulum are not spending their hours applauding. They are sharpening their swords. They are readying their ships. They are preparing to make war on your city, the city of your fathers and your grandfathers, the city you would leave to your children! They would take this great city of Aldergate and bend it to their will, make us an example to stifle other cities that yearn for freedom!"
      The crowd booed lustily. "Well, I say, if it's an example they crave, let us GIVE THEM ONE!"
She had scanned the rest of the speech, not enough to memorize it, but she the gist and felt comfortable going off script. She walked away from the podium, using broad movements of her arms to accent her words. "Let us give them an example of what happens when they try to enslave free men! When they try to invade our homes! When they try to turn us against each other! Let us give them the same welcome that our forefathers gave those who would invade from the sea! Let us show them how marauders wash against our walls, and how we repel them like sea foam!"
      The metaphor sounded better in her head, but the crowd seemed not to care. "What will we say when the Guard tells us this is Silas's city? Will we lie down and let them lay claim to Aldergate?"
      "NO!" The sound washed over the stage.
      "Whose city is this?"
      "OUR CITY!"
      "Whose?"
      "OUR CITY!"
      "Will we abandon our city, though Silas takes our homes?"
      "NO!"
      "Will we abandon our city, though Silas takes our lives?"
      "NO!"
      "Some among us may lose our lives. Some may lose our homes. But we have too long yielded to tyranny. That ends here, and now. Let the poets of the years to come sing of this day! The day when the free men and women of Edge rise up to claim what is their birthright! For Aldergate!"
      "ALDERGATE!"
      The crowd took up the chant, continuing long after she stepped back from the stage front. Walton opened the door to the hallway for her, Ever remaining behind, still eyeing the room's inhabitants. Walton turned back to Ever, speaking in urgent whispers. He nodded several times, then pulled back and closed the door. The squat man who had led them to the door had returned; it was to this man that Walton now spoke.
      "Vickram, three need to be culled from the crowd: a large-bellied brown man with grey hair and sideburns in a checked woodsman's shirt and suspenders; a tall mustachioed man, sallow complexion, wearing a green jacket and a black watchmen's cap; and a red-haired woman with rouged cheeks, hair in two braids, dressed all in blue."
      "The second man works for us." Vickram had a voice like a whip cutting through the air. He sounded sinister, though his facial expression was amiable and concerned.
      "I don't care. He needs to be questioned. Have those three separated and sequestered."
      "Ever singled out those three?" Elizabeth asked.
      Walton nodded. "I marked the woman and the first man. Neither seemed pleased at the idea of losing their homes. May be natural, but that kind of reticence can easily change into displeasure. If they're not with us when our rallying cry is its strongest, before the bad times start, then they'll surely be against us once their homes are decimated and their neighbors start getting killed."
      "What will happen to them?"
      "We'll question them. If we don't like their answers, we'll detain them until we can make sure they're not a danger to our cause. If we cannot guarantee that, then we'll have to hold them until the fighting stops."
      "That could take months, if this becomes a siege. Is this even legal?"
      "Legal?" Walton scoffed. "Elsie, you're a traitor against The Pretender's government. You've killed a Guard, destroyed a ship, and incited a riot. You haven't done anything legal for months."
      "Fine, granted. But is it moral?"
      "We'll sort that out later. If they're dangerous, they could report your location to the Guard, describe your companions, get Silas one step closer to capturing you. You're going to be one of their main targets. And, unfortunately, you'd be just as useful to their side in turning public opinion as you have been to ours."
      "So," she said slyly, "I did good up there?"
      "You had a good scriptwriter and a willing audience. Don't get too confident."
      The door opened and Ever stepped through it. "It's done. Vickram's men have the three in custody."
      "Very good. Let's get you two back to the tunnels. Next stop is the old city. Can you give this speech again?"
      "I think so.”
      They exited the building through the back door, scrambling to the alley that led to the underground. Elizabeth was still elated from the response of the crowd...they had loved her. They had hung on her words, had been fired up and ready to fight for their city. Fight for her.
      They just might win this. They might beat Silas.
      She might get to go home.
      She took no notice of the path they followed through the darkness, blindly following the rhythm of Walton’s footsteps. When he stopped walking, she ran into his back.
      "Oof!" Her face took the brunt of the impact, abraded against the rough fabric of his overcoat. "Are we there?"
      "Shhhh." The tunnel was shadowy, lit only by scant light that fell from an overhead trapdoor, the brightness squeezing around the borders of the square opening. Shouts and running boots could be heard through it, distantly. "It sounds..."
      "It sounds like battle," Ever finished for him.
      "They must be in conflict with a group of Guard. Let's go."
      Elizabeth asked, "Should we find another way up?"
      "It'll be safe," Walton reassured. "Only stragglers remain in the old city. The Guard are outnumbered and reinforcements are a week away. The citizens need to see you in the thick of it, not just on stages, trotted out to perform. Let's make an appearance."
      The trapdoor was located straight above them six or seven feet, in a tunnel that ran perpendicular from the ceiling of the one where they stood. Ever reached up and easily hauled a movable ladder down to their level, then ascended. When he reached the top, he leaned back and wedged his torso against the passage’s wall, freeing his hands. He pushed upward to dislodge the trapdoor, grunting with the effort.
      He poked his head through the opening and then looked back down at them. "Someone put a chair over one side of the door. I tipped it over."
      Elizabeth followed up the ladder, then Walton. The basement contained well-maintained and expensive-looking furniture, so different from the one in the outer ring. "Nice place," Ever observed.
      "We have some successful supporters. They keep the revolution well-financed."
      "Well, I hope they get a good return on their investment."
      "What's that supposed to mean?"
      "Nothing." Ever turned away from Walton, finding the stairs leading upward and out of the basement. "Let's go make an appearance."
      Elizabeth caught him by the arm. "What's wrong with you?"
      He spoke quietly. "I don't think we should expose you to a skirmish like this. Not just yet."
      "I got the same training you did, Ever! I can handle a couple of the Guard. I did just as well as you on that ship!"
      "I just don't think it's necessary--"
      Walton interrupted. "Let's get a move on, then." He had already started for the staircase.
      Elizabeth looked at Ever and shrugged, then followed Walton. Like its counterpart in the outer ring, the door at the top of the stairs opened into an alley. Now, from around the corner, they could hear shouts and the clang of steel on steel.
      Walton beamed as he walked down the alley. "Sounds like we've got a big gathering. Better get there before they decide to string the Guard--" He halted jerkily as he rounded the corner, his legs spread wide, his arms out. He called back to them without turning, his voice free of mirth. "Go back, Elsie. Ever, go with her."
      Ever backed up and put his hand on the doorknob; he rattled it quietly, then in loud frustration. "It won’t open. It must’ve locked behind us."
      "Well, break the damn thing down!" Walton remained at the mouth of the alley, arms akimbo, as though trying to block them from seeing out. Or something else from seeing in. "Get her out of here!" They could hear the fear tremble his voice.
      Ever sprung into the door, shoulder first. He repeated this motion again, then a third time. "Gods-damned posh apartments! Have to be so damned secure!" Elizabeth scanned the alley: no ground-floor windows on this side of the building, and those on the second floor were too high to reach.
      Her attention was drawn back to Walton as the man yelled, then spun as though shoved by an invisible hand. As he whirled to face them, they could see the shaft of an arrow that had lodged in the right side of his chest and the blood blooming on his white shirt. He fell face down, snapping the arrow as he landed.
      Elizabeth and Ever ran to him. He was still alive, but breathing in desperate gasps. A regiment of the black-clad soldiers were sweeping through the street in groups of twos and threes, probing alleys and kicking down doors, dragging citizens out into the light of day. The dead bodies of resistors littered the cobbles. She heard the pounding of footsteps and looked up to see a Guard bearing down on them, fully armed and armored.
      Ever strode forward to engage the charging soldier, bringing his blade from its sheath to the man's throat in one fluid motion. In seconds, the black armor turned crimson with rivulets of blood. Ever grabbed the man by his torso, holding his body before him as a shield. He backed into the alley, motioning to Elizabeth. "Get back to the door! Pick or cut the lock, or scratch through, or do something with that gods-damned hand of yours--just GET OUT OF HERE!" he roared. Two arrows split the air, one glancing off the dead man's helm, the other thunking into the corpse's thigh.
She ran past Walton's prone body, still gasping for air; she thought about dragging him deeper into the alley, but decided to open the door first. The wood was thick, but she could scratch through it, and worked on prying the tip of her fingers around the metal of the doorplate. It started to give, and she yanked on the knob with her right hand, one foot flat against the wooden surface, using her whole body to haul the plate from its socket.
      She heard Ever cry out and turned to see that he had dropped the corpse and now grappled with a pair of soldiers who had entered the alley. He disarmed one, but his blade caught on the bricks of the adjacent building, slowing the arc of his sword just enough to give the second Guard an opening.
The blade flashed as it moved through the air, and cut into his unarmed flesh as though it was made of warm wax. The Guard redirected the point of the sword, stabbing into Ever's chest and sliding up to the hilt, giving it a twist and emitting a satisfied victorious grunt when it would go no further. He let Ever's lifeless body slither to the ground.
      The guards advanced on her. The periphery of her vision had gone black with anger and fear. Elizabeth drew her blade and centered on the one who had killed Ever, pointing her sword at his throat.
      The lead Guard stopped suddenly, pointed at her hand, and said something unintelligible to his partner, who backed turned and sprinted out of sight. The remaining Guard spoke in a low, calm voice. "I'm not going to kill you, girl. You know why. Put the sword down and slide it over this way."
She spat and then lunged at him, her sword meeting his before she backpedalled quickly. He stumbled forward but regained his balance. He swung his sword at hers, once, then twice, with the skill of a fencer, not a brawler. He need not defeat her; all he had to do was to keep her occupied until his compatriots arrived.
      Elizabeth lost her footing, her back foot sliding on the mud that slimed the cobblestones. The Guard took advantage, striking hard at the base of her blade, wringing it from her. She dove forward, striking with her left hand. It sliced through his armor, but only superficially.
      He brought his gauntleted hand down on top of her head with a blow that made her vision swim and slide into doublets, then blurriness, and finally the blackness of unconsciousness.