He let her, at first, trying to run her out of steel. They bounced through the city, two currents in the mist, leaping over roadways clogged with angry rioters, past middle-class neighborhoods full of closed shutters and extinguished lights, over the grounds of the rich—whose security forces stood tensely by gates, waiting for this hellish night to end.
Wax confirmed to himself as they flew that Bleeder had not been the Marksman. She’d worn one of his masks earlier—and seemed to be doing so again, from the quick glance he got as she passed a burning building in the night—but she did so to consternate and confuse him. Marks had sought the insides of rooms as he ran, trying to set up an ambush. She kept to the open spaces, as if frightened of the indoors. No running toward skyscrapers, no seeking the cramped confines of the slums. Instead, she headed directly east from the governor’s mansion, toward the freedom of the outer city.
There wouldn’t be nearly so much metal out there, making it difficult for her to flee—but also removing some of his advantage. He couldn’t let that happen.
As they chased past a late train, Wax redoubled his efforts. He anticipated her turn as she cut away from the train toward an industrial quarter, and he cut sideways, earning a few seconds. As she leaped over a squat, burning building—passing protesters who threw rocks at her from below—Wax skimmed between it and the building beside it, coming around the other side in a precise turn. He passed through boiling smoke and emerged, gun out, as she came down from a more graceful arc.
That earned a curse from her as she saw him. She flung herself down a street, using each passing light as another source to Push off, increasing her speed. It was done with deftness, but Wax had an advantage. He decreased his weight, filling his metalmind. As always, though the change was sometimes subtle, this increased his velocity. If he decreased his weight while in motion, he got a little burst of speed. He didn’t know why.
In a chase such as this, shoving off each light that passed, little advantages like that added up. Each cut corner, each careful judge of an arc, each use of the speed boost in flight after landing for a moment, sent him closer to her. To the point that as they neared the edge of the city, she glanced backward and found him about to grab her heels.
She cried out, a feminine exclamation of surprise. She shoved herself to the side, passing out over the river, and managed to land on the roadway portion of the Eastbridge, holding on to one of the support wires.
Wax landed gracefully before her, gun out. “You can’t run from me, Bleeder. Let me remove your spike and take you prisoner. Perhaps the others can find a way, someday, to heal your madness.”
“And become a slave again,” she whispered behind the red and white mask. “Would you clasp the manacles willingly on your own hands?”
“If I had done the horrible things that you have, then yes. I would demand to be taken in.”
“And what of the god you serve? When will Harmony accept his punishments? The people he lets die. The people he makes die.”
Wax raised his gun, but Bleeder launched herself upward.
Wax trailed her with his weapon, but she bounced back and forth between massive bridge support beams, and he did not fire. Instead he lifted himself with a Push, soaring up—coat flapping—until he reached the top of one of the bridge’s suspension towers. Bleeder waited here, atop the pinnacle, dressed in her red shirt and trousers, a loose cape blowing around her.
Wax landed and leveled the gun.
Bleeder dropped the mask.
She wore Lessie’s face.
*
Marasi didn’t tell the other constables, even Aradel, the truth about Innate. What would she have said? “Sorry, but the man we’ve been protecting was actually the killer”? “Oh, and the city has been run by an insane kandra for who knows how long”? She’d make a report soon, once she knew how to explain it, but for now she didn’t have time. She needed to save the city.
She still felt a stab of guilt as she stood near the flimsy stage at the front of the steps, where she watched Captain Aradel pass her. The lord high constable looked visibly sick as he paced. The predicament she’d placed him in, with regards to thinking the governor was a crook, troubled him deeply.
Nearby, MeLaan stepped up onto the stage to address the crowd. Though she critiqued her own shortcomings, in Marasi’s estimation her imitation of the governor was excellent.
The crowd grew quiet. Marasi frowned. Had Aradel’s men prompted that somehow? No … the constables stood in a tight line between the crowd and the mansion, but weren’t doing anything to quell the crowd.
How odd. Though there were a few jeers, for the most part everyone fell silent—watching through the mists, which seemed thinner than they had before, now that lights had been set up all around the square in front of the mansion. The former rioters genuinely wanted to hear what the governor had to say. Well, why shouldn’t they?
Marasi felt their mood, one of hostile curiosity. She felt a calmness too. MeLaan’s speech would work. Everything was fine. Why had she been so worried earlier? It …