? ? ?
Lizanne spent the next few hours sketching in her room. She had traded a quarter of her soap with one of the second-floor ladies for a pencil stub and parchment. The pencil was too thick for this kind of work and the parchment rough, but she had little alternative. Scorazin was not well-supplied with stationery and she didn’t want to arouse the Electress’s attention by seeking out better tools. One of the traits she had inherited from her father was a facility for drawing, a skill honed by Exceptional Initiatives, who set great value in the ability to render detail from memory. Even so, she knew her sketch lacked the precision or the artistry of the original and had to trust it retained enough detail to serve as a recognisable facsimile. Once satisfied she rolled the parchment into a tight scroll and concealed it within a pocket she had sewn into the armpit of her overalls.
Nightfall in Scorazin brought a depth of darkness rarely seen in other cities. The lack of street-lights and the constant, moon-obscuring pall of smoke made for a depth of shadow she would normally have welcomed, had she any Green to enhance her vision. So it was with a considerable degree of care that she crawled from her window and out onto the roof-top, body flattened to the tiles and ears straining for unseen hazards. She lay still for a long time, hearing only the rumble of snoring whores and the faint regular grunts of Anatol and Melina’s shared intimacy. Satisfied, she crept to the edge of the roof above the inn’s north-facing wall and began her descent. She had chosen this wall for its sparsity of plaster, the bare brickwork affording a wealth of handholds, though finding them in the dark was a protracted business.
On reaching the street below she crouched and waited once more. The night-time streets of Scorazin had a legendary reputation for danger and even the most capable and well-armed folk tended to stay indoors. At night the streets belonged to the Creepers, the lowest rung on the prison city’s ladder. These were the mad or deformed souls the Emperor had seen fit to send here, those denied a place in the gangs due to their appearance or erratic behaviour. Melina said even the mud-slingers and midden-pickers shunned them. There’s many a place to hide in here, she said. Those that don’t starve find ways of getting by, come out at night to scavenge what they can, and they aren’t picky about where their meat comes from.
Lizanne made her way towards the sulphur pit, keeping to the darkest shadows and moving in a low crouch. She had her knife strapped to her ankle in case of emergencies but found it a scant comfort. Tonight she felt the absence of product more keenly than ever. In the event she only saw one Creeper during the journey. She had been about to vault a low wall at the corner of Breakers’ Avenue when a soft, scraping sound made her freeze. She sank as low as she could as the sound grew louder, one hand resting on the hilt of her knife as she concentrated on keeping her breathing as shallow as possible. Instinct in times of danger was to hold one’s breath but that had been trained out of her long ago. Lack of air caused the heart to race and sapped muscles of strength that might be needed in the event of discovery.
The scraping sound stopped on the other side of the wall, replaced by a series of harsh inhalations as someone sniffed the air. Lizanne was grateful she had resisted the temptation to indulge in a thorough wash with her precious scented soap for the sniffing soon faded and the scraping sound resumed. A few seconds later she saw a tall, stooped shadow emerge from the corner of the wall, moving away along Cable Lane. The silhouette was rendered indistinct by a cloak or other covering, but Lizanne could tell it was dragging something behind it. She waited a full minute after the shadow had merged with the surrounding gloom before vaulting the wall and continuing her progress to the pit.
The gloom faded as she neared the pit. The hot spring gave off a luminescence that added a yellow tinge to the billowing steam, the light reflected back onto the pit by the smoke banks above. There were some Furies about, cudgel-bearing guards set to ward off any intrusion or seizure by a rival gang. Lizanne was grateful to find them a lazy and amateurish lot, wandering the edge of the pit in groups of three or four with large gaps in their patrol pattern. It took less than an hour for Lizanne to establish their routine and slipping through the cordon proved almost laughably easy. Navigating the scaffolding with all its creaking infirmity was more precarious, she was obliged to hang from the edge of a platform when the squeal of a protesting joint drew a curious shout from one of the shafts. Luckily, the disturbed miner was either too tired or addled by mercury dust to investigate further and the rest of her journey to Tinkerer’s refuge was free of interruptions.
He appeared as she crouched before the grate, knowing the combination lock was beyond her and pondering the best way to attract his attention. He stared down at her through the bars in silence for several seconds before asking in a faint, uninflected whisper, “Are you here to kill me?”
She shook her head, finding her professional curiosity too piqued to resist a question of her own. “Did you hear me?”
“I sleep only two hours per night and have very keen hearing. I believe it to be a necessary survival trait in this environment.”
Lizanne nodded and rose from her crouch, raising and opening both hands before slowly reaching into her overalls and extracting the scroll. “I believe this will be familiar to you.”
Tinkerer took the sketch and unfurled it, his gaze taking in the bulbous, propeller-driven contraption in a single, expressionless glance. He replied without hesitation, but for the first time Lizanne detected some colour to the tone, a slight quaver that told her the skills of this very special man did not extend to lying. “You are wrong. I have never seen this before.”
Lizanne moved closer to the grate, managing to keep the smile of satisfaction from her lips. “Do you want to get out of here?”
He met her gaze, face blank but eyes suddenly very bright. “I have explored all possibilities. There is no means of escaping this city.”
“Oh but there is, for me and any I choose to take with me. And I’ll happily find a place for you”—she reached through the bars and tapped a finger to the sketch—“and him.”
CHAPTER 21
Clay