Volume 1: A Serviceable Boy
Chapter 19
Transparent
Frigid wind whipped Gersha’s cheeks as he bent over the parapet, vomiting into the ground-level courtyard. Each painful heave of his guts pumped more acid into his raw throat, but the cold felt cleansing. Like a hard slap.One of Bror’s strong arms had snaked around his waist, keeping him from tumbling into the rubbish bins caked with dirty snow. Gersha was grateful; if the kettle boy hadn’t happened by, he might not have managed to get himself up the stairs from the basement. He’d still be on the pub’s doorstep, a spectacle for the hard-drinking factory workers.
Maybe I deserve that.
“You ready to go back inside, Fir? Don’t want you to get frost-bite.”Gersha swallowed down bile, but his stomach felt empty at last. “Thanks. You can go along—I’m okay now.”“Nah, not leaving you like this.” Bror swung him around, hooking a shoulder under his armpit, and half-nudged, half-carried him back through the seal onto the cinderblock tram platform. “Is your car somewhere, or did you take the tram to this dump, Fir?”“Tram.” Gersha let Bror deposit him gently on a bench. His legs were still shaky, his cheeks burning from the cold.“You need to call Bosh, Fir. Have him pick you up.”“No.” Gersha couldn’t face Bosh’s silent censure tonight. He fumbled in the coat for his handheld, trying to remember why he’d been reaching for it earlier. “I’ll be fine on the tram.”“Give me that, and I’ll message Kehlo—István’s driver. He won’t ask questions.”Gersha clutched tight to the metal casing. “You can’t use this.”“You really think I’ve never used a handheld before, Fir?” Bror’s blunt face wasn’t terribly expressive, but now he got considerable mileage out of rolling his eyes.It’s off-limits. Personal data devices are for R8 and above. But Gersha wasn’t sure he could make his eyes focus on the screen, so he typed in his password and handed the device over. “If you try to siphon my data, I’ll know.”That earned him another eye-roll as Bror began typing, far too expertly. “I’m no hacker, believe me. Flunked out of programming. Where’s Rishka, Fir? You sure I shouldn’t call him?”Gersha’s stomach knotted again, and he sagged against the wall, feeling the world go liquid. “No.”“Yeah?” Bror handed the device back, his eyes narrowed. “Where is he?”“I don’t know. Library, maybe.” The lie tasted bitter.“Did you have a fight, Fir? You and Tilrey?”If only. Gersha closed his eyes and focused on breathing. He needed news from Ranek. He needed control.
I thought it was my duty. It is my duty.
Bror fetched them water, which Gersha drank gratefully, and in less than a quarter-hour, Councillor István’s mag-car slid up to the platform. When Gersha rose, everything wobbled; he was grateful for the big kettle boy’s guiding hand on his elbow.Once settled in the backseat with a thermal throw over his legs, he leaned his head back and closed his eyes. Normally he would have been unsettled by Bror’s muscle-clad bulk so close to him, but now it was almost reassuring. If he closed his eyes, he could pretend it was—no, don’t. You don’t deserve to think about him.The car rose straight up with a raucous hissing of jets, then leveled out and went silent, gliding in the grip of the top mag-grid. Gersha half-opened his eyes and watched monumental factories drift by in the dark, the snow lending their rugged concrete contours a ghostly illumination that made them almost beautiful.“Why were you in that mess, Fir? Doesn’t seem like your kind of place.”Gersha said nothing, hoping Bror would interpret this as Keep to your own Drudge business.But Bror wasn’t done with him. “Are you sure you don’t want me to call Tilrey?”“No. I mean, yes, I’m sure, lad. Don’t call him.”“Whatever he’s pissed about, he’ll forgive you when he sees you this sick. Hell, I’d even forgive you, Fir.”The boy spoke in a magnanimous tone that gave Gersha an absurd urge to laugh. “How generous of you. You’ve made it plain you don’t like me.”“Don’t dislike you, Fir. Just worry about my friend sometimes. He needs somebody on his side.”For a moment, Gersha was tempted to spill the truth. Confessing, even lowering himself to beg for forgiveness, might relieve the awful pressure in his head. If only Bror were a near-equal, someone like Ranek . . .But no, an equal would be even worse. An equal would scorn him. And this whole matter was classified. He drew himself up. “Your concern is touching, but the affairs of my house are just that.”Bror was undeterred. “Is Rishka out with somebody else, Fir? A girl, maybe?”“I don’t know, and I don’t care,” Gersha said, then regretted his sharpness. “Bror, could you tell me something?” He pondered how to phrase it, his head throbbing. “Have you ever . . . well, are you content with your posting?”If Tilrey had truly crossed over into the shadow realm of Dissidence, then Gersha needed to gain a better sense of why. Without that, he would never be able to help the boy.His boy.Bror’s massive knee nudged his. “You mean, do I like being a piece, Fir? Sure. I got decent scores in everything but prog, could’ve had a Sector job, but it sounded so fucking boring. Fact is, I don’t like getting up every morning and staring at a screen. I thought about enlisting in the army, but I wanted to see how the other half lives.”“So you . . . you chose this?”Bror chuckled, and Gersha realized belatedly that he must have sounded horrified. “Yeah. Went in with my eyes open. It’s got its ups and downs, but nobody’s forcing me to do anything. You’re not asking about me, though, are you, Fir?”Was he that transparent? Gersha pressed his hands over his eyes. “I don’t expect you to—”The car bumped to a stop, and he looked up to see the familiar parapets of his own building. Back in the land of Strutters. Safe.Bror slid out first, then steadied Gersha as he planted feet on the concrete.“I can’t tell you Tilrey’s story, Fir,” Bror said, his words half eaten by the wind as they moved together toward the seal. “Wouldn’t be much of a friend if I went blabbing his business. But I can tell you one thing—it’s not like my story. Not even close.”Gersha’s breath caught. “He didn’t choose to be a kettle boy. That’s what you mean, isn’t it?”Hadn’t he already known that on some level? If not, shouldn’t he have? Wasn’t it clear from the way Tilrey’s face went slack whenever Verán entered the room, or the way he lowered his eyes in any Upstart’s presence, like a long-term prisoner facing his jailor?He’d known, but he hadn’t wanted to think about it, because that made him a jailor, too.Bror shrugged. “If you want to know why he’s how he is, Fir, why not just ask him?”*Hours later, or perhaps only minutes, the “food and tea” that Celinda had promised arrived. A lantern-jawed boy with a face full of freckles, who looked barely out of his teens, elbowed the door open, closed it, and deposited a tray just within Tilrey’s reach. “Eat,” he said, crossing his arms.Tilrey sampled the mug. The tea was lukewarm, unusable as a weapon. If he stood up quickly enough, gaining the advantage of surprise, could he brain the boy with the plastic tray? But he wouldn’t get far unless the boy happened to have the key to the shackle in his pocket.The longer he stayed with these shirkers, the more he’d look like one of them when—or if—he finally got out. Perhaps promising to murder Verán was his only salvation, but would Celinda believe him now?Back when she was on top of him, he could have caught her in a chokehold and gotten the key off her. All those hours of swimming and lifting, and he had no notion of how to use his strength in a practical context. Submitting to force was almost a reflex at this point.He could use his tongue, though, in several ways. Perhaps to find out where he was and how many Dissident foot-soldiers he had to worry about.He grabbed a handful of dry biscuits—stale tasting—and washed them down with the tea. “So, what’s your rank in the shirker army?”“We’re not ‘shirkers,’ and we don’t have ranks,” the boy said sourly, leaning against the door.“Yeah? That doesn’t sound very organized. What did they promise you when you signed up? A trip to Harbour? Your very own handheld? All the sap you can drink?”“What do you care?”“I’m curious.”The boy’s eyes leveled with his, contemptuous. “They promised me freedom.”Tilrey gulped down the rest of the rank tea; he needed his strength. “That sounds good. I can see the appeal. I mean, to someone like you who probably resents his posting. Factory, right? I wouldn’t like that, either. But how much freedom will you have when you end up in a cell? Or dumped in the Wastes to die?”The boy hocked up loudly and spat on the floor between them. “Better that than be like you, going on my knees for them.”“You have self-respect. Good for you. But do you really think any of this will—”He stopped, going still, as a staccato crack sounded in the distance. “What the—”A second crack, and Tilrey’s heart thudded against his ribcage. He’d only heard such sounds out on the edge of the city where Linnett used to take him to watch the sunset; the army had a rifle range there.“Are your friends having target practice?” If these Dissidents had managed to get or make themselves firearms, they were more dangerous than he’d thought.But a glance at the boy showed Tilrey the shots weren’t routine. “Shut it,” the kid said, his own movements jerky and nervous as he yanked the door open and stuck his head out. “Jansha?”A third crack echoed through the passage. “Jansha?” the boy called, louder, his voice going shrill with panic.Somewhere in the distance an alarm began to whoop, making the hairs on Tilrey’s neck stand on end. “Are we under attack?”But the boy was already gone—out the door and racing down the passageway, his boots pounding away from the gunshots.Blood roaring in his ears, Tilrey hauled himself to his feet and glared at the now-open door. That damn key. If the constables had picked up Celinda’s trail and come for him, then he should be sitting put and waiting to be freed. But if the shots came from someone else—He had no more time to think before Celinda dashed into the room, her eyes wild and her braid half-undone.“Rishka!” She fell to her knees and seized his tethered ankle, her other hand fumbling desperately in her pocket. “I think we’re blown.”“Oh?” Tilrey snatched the key from her shaking fingers before she could drop it. “What happened?”She didn’t try to stop him, only whipped around to rifle through a crate. “Gotta go, now. We’ve got a few men holding them off, and there’s a skimmer outside.”She straightened with a length of pipe clutched in one hand. The shots had stopped, but the alarm continued to whoop, jangling Tilrey’s nerves and making him curse viciously as he forced the balky key to turn. If nothing else, he wasn’t going to be chained up here while they burned the place to the ground.There. He kicked the shackle aside and stood straight at last, flexing his knee and hamstrings. “That’s not going to help much,” he yelled through the alarm, nodding at Celinda’s pipe.She darted to him and dug her nails into his arm. “We need to get out before they seal the building.”He didn’t move. “No.”“Are you crazy?” She wrenched at him, shrieking through the mechanical whooping, “You can’t stay here—you’re with us now. They’ll try you for treason, Rishka!”The word sent a cold bolt shooting down Tilrey’s spine. But there was an odd flatness in Celinda’s eyes, something that didn’t match her tone or her increasingly frantic efforts to budge him. Something held in reserve.He wasn’t sure what to make of it, but he had inner reserves, too, didn’t he? “No,” he said, firmer now. “You go, but I belong here.”“They’ll kill you, Tilrey! They’ll drop you in the Wastes!” Her eyes were wet, her whole body shuddering, but something was still off. Something was missing, almost as if she were performing her terror.“Maybe,” he said, emboldened. “I think I’ll try my chances.”All at once the alarm broke off, leaving a gaping, palpable silence. Tilrey could hear his ears ring.Celinda brandished the pipe, her face too calm for the implied threat. “I’ll drag you if I have to.”Seriously? But the word died in Tilrey’s throat as heavy footsteps thudded in the corridor. Soldiers’ steel-toed boots—those had never meant anything good for him. Despite his resolve to stay put, adrenaline shot through him, narrowing his vision to the open door.Three red-uniformed men burst into the room, rifles drawn, taking in the scene with professional acuity. Tilrey raised his hands automatically, but he had no time to speak before two of them grabbed him and slammed him against the cinderblock wall, knocking the breath from his lungs.A knee lodged in the small of his back, then withdrew as he was allowed to stand. Broad fingers collared and cuffed him, and Tilrey could feel the full length of the nearest captor’s body, smell his sweat. Goddamn soldiers. Peering sideways through a haze of disgust, he could see the third soldier cuffing Celinda, who didn’t seem to be struggling at all.And then everything went weirdly still.The soldier’s grip loosened. He stepped back, allowing Tilrey to turn cautiously.Beside Celinda stood a newcomer, a slight, dark Upstart with narrow, febrile eyes. No longer cuffed, Celinda was straightening her hair and clothes, her mouth set but not frightened.Tilrey lurched toward her, but the soldier yanked him back. “What—”Then he got a better look at the Upstart.“The show’s over,” the man said, rubbing his palms. “That was a lovely performance, Rishka. I expected you to crack any minute, but you stood firm.”Ranek Egil. The face had taken a second to place, but he would never forget the voice.“I know who you are now.” It came out in a gasp, as the soldier whipped him back around and pressed his cheek to the rough cinderblock. Again came the sharp prick in his neck.“I should hope so,” said Egil.They were the ones putting on a “show,” not me. All of them. Dizziness overwhelmed Tilrey, his head roaring and his knees giving way, and though he knew there was no point in fighting, he rasped out, “Does Gersha know?”Egil’s reply seemed to come from a great distance: “Of course. Sleep now. We’ll have plenty of time to catch up.”
Frigid wind whipped Gersha’s cheeks as he bent over the parapet, vomiting into the ground-level courtyard. Each painful heave of his guts pumped more acid into his raw throat, but the cold felt cleansing. Like a hard slap.
One of Bror’s strong arms had snaked around his waist, keeping him from tumbling into the rubbish bins caked with dirty snow. Gersha was grateful; if the kettle boy hadn’t happened by, he might not have managed to get himself up the stairs from the basement. He’d still be on the pub’s doorstep, a spectacle for the hard-drinking factory workers.
Maybe I deserve that.
“You ready to go back inside, Fir? Don’t want you to get frost-bite.”
Gersha swallowed down bile, but his stomach felt empty at last. “Thanks. You can go along—I’m okay now.”
“Nah, not leaving you like this.” Bror swung him around, hooking a shoulder under his armpit, and half-nudged, half-carried him back through the seal onto the cinderblock tram platform. “Is your car somewhere, or did you take the tram to this dump, Fir?”
“Tram.” Gersha let Bror deposit him gently on a bench. His legs were still shaky, his cheeks burning from the cold.
“You need to call Bosh, Fir. Have him pick you up.”
“No.” Gersha couldn’t face Bosh’s silent censure tonight. He fumbled in the coat for his handheld, trying to remember why he’d been reaching for it earlier. “I’ll be fine on the tram.”
“Give me that, and I’ll message Kehlo—István’s driver. He won’t ask questions.”
Gersha clutched tight to the metal casing. “You can’t use this.”
“You really think I’ve never used a handheld before, Fir?” Bror’s blunt face wasn’t terribly expressive, but now he got considerable mileage out of rolling his eyes.
It’s off-limits. Personal data devices are for R8 and above. But Gersha wasn’t sure he could make his eyes focus on the screen, so he typed in his password and handed the device over. “If you try to siphon my data, I’ll know.”
That earned him another eye-roll as Bror began typing, far too expertly. “I’m no hacker, believe me. Flunked out of programming. Where’s Rishka, Fir? You sure I shouldn’t call him?”
Gersha’s stomach knotted again, and he sagged against the wall, feeling the world go liquid. “No.”
“Yeah?” Bror handed the device back, his eyes narrowed. “Where is he?”
“I don’t know. Library, maybe.” The lie tasted bitter.
“Did you have a fight, Fir? You and Tilrey?”
If only. Gersha closed his eyes and focused on breathing. He needed news from Ranek. He needed control.
I thought it was my duty. It is my duty.
Bror fetched them water, which Gersha drank gratefully, and in less than a quarter-hour, Councillor István’s mag-car slid up to the platform. When Gersha rose, everything wobbled; he was grateful for the big kettle boy’s guiding hand on his elbow.
Once settled in the backseat with a thermal throw over his legs, he leaned his head back and closed his eyes. Normally he would have been unsettled by Bror’s muscle-clad bulk so close to him, but now it was almost reassuring. If he closed his eyes, he could pretend it was—no, don’t. You don’t deserve to think about him.
The car rose straight up with a raucous hissing of jets, then leveled out and went silent, gliding in the grip of the top mag-grid. Gersha half-opened his eyes and watched monumental factories drift by in the dark, the snow lending their rugged concrete contours a ghostly illumination that made them almost beautiful.
“Why were you in that mess, Fir? Doesn’t seem like your kind of place.”
Gersha said nothing, hoping Bror would interpret this as Keep to your own Drudge business.
But Bror wasn’t done with him. “Are you sure you don’t want me to call Tilrey?”
“No. I mean, yes, I’m sure, lad. Don’t call him.”
“Whatever he’s pissed about, he’ll forgive you when he sees you this sick. Hell, I’d even forgive you, Fir.”
The boy spoke in a magnanimous tone that gave Gersha an absurd urge to laugh. “How generous of you. You’ve made it plain you don’t like me.”
“Don’t dislike you, Fir. Just worry about my friend sometimes. He needs somebody on his side.”
For a moment, Gersha was tempted to spill the truth. Confessing, even lowering himself to beg for forgiveness, might relieve the awful pressure in his head. If only Bror were a near-equal, someone like Ranek . . .
But no, an equal would be even worse. An equal would scorn him. And this whole matter was classified. He drew himself up. “Your concern is touching, but the affairs of my house are just that.”
Bror was undeterred. “Is Rishka out with somebody else, Fir? A girl, maybe?”
“I don’t know, and I don’t care,” Gersha said, then regretted his sharpness. “Bror, could you tell me something?” He pondered how to phrase it, his head throbbing. “Have you ever . . . well, are you content with your posting?”
If Tilrey had truly crossed over into the shadow realm of Dissidence, then Gersha needed to gain a better sense of why. Without that, he would never be able to help the boy.
His boy.
Bror’s massive knee nudged his. “You mean, do I like being a piece, Fir? Sure. I got decent scores in everything but prog, could’ve had a Sector job, but it sounded so fucking boring. Fact is, I don’t like getting up every morning and staring at a screen. I thought about enlisting in the army, but I wanted to see how the other half lives.”
“So you . . . you chose this?”
Bror chuckled, and Gersha realized belatedly that he must have sounded horrified. “Yeah. Went in with my eyes open. It’s got its ups and downs, but nobody’s forcing me to do anything. You’re not asking about me, though, are you, Fir?”
Was he that transparent? Gersha pressed his hands over his eyes. “I don’t expect you to—”
The car bumped to a stop, and he looked up to see the familiar parapets of his own building. Back in the land of Strutters. Safe.
Bror slid out first, then steadied Gersha as he planted feet on the concrete.
“I can’t tell you Tilrey’s story, Fir,” Bror said, his words half eaten by the wind as they moved together toward the seal. “Wouldn’t be much of a friend if I went blabbing his business. But I can tell you one thing—it’s not like my story. Not even close.”
Gersha’s breath caught. “He didn’t choose to be a kettle boy. That’s what you mean, isn’t it?”
Hadn’t he already known that on some level? If not, shouldn’t he have? Wasn’t it clear from the way Tilrey’s face went slack whenever Verán entered the room, or the way he lowered his eyes in any Upstart’s presence, like a long-term prisoner facing his jailor?
He’d known, but he hadn’t wanted to think about it, because that made him a jailor, too.
Bror shrugged. “If you want to know why he’s how he is, Fir, why not just ask him?”
Hours later, or perhaps only minutes, the “food and tea” that Celinda had promised arrived. A lantern-jawed boy with a face full of freckles, who looked barely out of his teens, elbowed the door open, closed it, and deposited a tray just within Tilrey’s reach. “Eat,” he said, crossing his arms.
Tilrey sampled the mug. The tea was lukewarm, unusable as a weapon. If he stood up quickly enough, gaining the advantage of surprise, could he brain the boy with the plastic tray? But he wouldn’t get far unless the boy happened to have the key to the shackle in his pocket.
The longer he stayed with these shirkers, the more he’d look like one of them when—or if—he finally got out. Perhaps promising to murder Verán was his only salvation, but would Celinda believe him now?
Back when she was on top of him, he could have caught her in a chokehold and gotten the key off her. All those hours of swimming and lifting, and he had no notion of how to use his strength in a practical context. Submitting to force was almost a reflex at this point.
He could use his tongue, though, in several ways. Perhaps to find out where he was and how many Dissident foot-soldiers he had to worry about.
He grabbed a handful of dry biscuits—stale tasting—and washed them down with the tea. “So, what’s your rank in the shirker army?”
“We’re not ‘shirkers,’ and we don’t have ranks,” the boy said sourly, leaning against the door.
“Yeah? That doesn’t sound very organized. What did they promise you when you signed up? A trip to Harbour? Your very own handheld? All the sap you can drink?”
“What do you care?”
“I’m curious.”
The boy’s eyes leveled with his, contemptuous. “They promised me freedom.”
Tilrey gulped down the rest of the rank tea; he needed his strength. “That sounds good. I can see the appeal. I mean, to someone like you who probably resents his posting. Factory, right? I wouldn’t like that, either. But how much freedom will you have when you end up in a cell? Or dumped in the Wastes to die?”
The boy hocked up loudly and spat on the floor between them. “Better that than be like you, going on my knees for them.”
“You have self-respect. Good for you. But do you really think any of this will—”
He stopped, going still, as a staccato crack sounded in the distance. “What the—”
A second crack, and Tilrey’s heart thudded against his ribcage. He’d only heard such sounds out on the edge of the city where Linnett used to take him to watch the sunset; the army had a rifle range there.
“Are your friends having target practice?” If these Dissidents had managed to get or make themselves firearms, they were more dangerous than he’d thought.
But a glance at the boy showed Tilrey the shots weren’t routine. “Shut it,” the kid said, his own movements jerky and nervous as he yanked the door open and stuck his head out. “Jansha?”
A third crack echoed through the passage. “Jansha?” the boy called, louder, his voice going shrill with panic.
Somewhere in the distance an alarm began to whoop, making the hairs on Tilrey’s neck stand on end. “Are we under attack?”
But the boy was already gone—out the door and racing down the passageway, his boots pounding away from the gunshots.
Blood roaring in his ears, Tilrey hauled himself to his feet and glared at the now-open door. That damn key. If the constables had picked up Celinda’s trail and come for him, then he should be sitting put and waiting to be freed. But if the shots came from someone else—
He had no more time to think before Celinda dashed into the room, her eyes wild and her braid half-undone.
“Rishka!” She fell to her knees and seized his tethered ankle, her other hand fumbling desperately in her pocket. “I think we’re blown.”
“Oh?” Tilrey snatched the key from her shaking fingers before she could drop it. “What happened?”
She didn’t try to stop him, only whipped around to rifle through a crate. “Gotta go, now. We’ve got a few men holding them off, and there’s a skimmer outside.”
She straightened with a length of pipe clutched in one hand. The shots had stopped, but the alarm continued to whoop, jangling Tilrey’s nerves and making him curse viciously as he forced the balky key to turn. If nothing else, he wasn’t going to be chained up here while they burned the place to the ground.
There. He kicked the shackle aside and stood straight at last, flexing his knee and hamstrings. “That’s not going to help much,” he yelled through the alarm, nodding at Celinda’s pipe.
She darted to him and dug her nails into his arm. “We need to get out before they seal the building.”
He didn’t move. “No.”
“Are you crazy?” She wrenched at him, shrieking through the mechanical whooping, “You can’t stay here—you’re with us now. They’ll try you for treason, Rishka!”
The word sent a cold bolt shooting down Tilrey’s spine. But there was an odd flatness in Celinda’s eyes, something that didn’t match her tone or her increasingly frantic efforts to budge him. Something held in reserve.
He wasn’t sure what to make of it, but he had inner reserves, too, didn’t he? “No,” he said, firmer now. “You go, but I belong here.”
“They’ll kill you, Tilrey! They’ll drop you in the Wastes!” Her eyes were wet, her whole body shuddering, but something was still off. Something was missing, almost as if she were performing her terror.
“Maybe,” he said, emboldened. “I think I’ll try my chances.”
All at once the alarm broke off, leaving a gaping, palpable silence. Tilrey could hear his ears ring.
Celinda brandished the pipe, her face too calm for the implied threat. “I’ll drag you if I have to.”
Seriously? But the word died in Tilrey’s throat as heavy footsteps thudded in the corridor. Soldiers’ steel-toed boots—those had never meant anything good for him. Despite his resolve to stay put, adrenaline shot through him, narrowing his vision to the open door.
Three red-uniformed men burst into the room, rifles drawn, taking in the scene with professional acuity. Tilrey raised his hands automatically, but he had no time to speak before two of them grabbed him and slammed him against the cinderblock wall, knocking the breath from his lungs.
A knee lodged in the small of his back, then withdrew as he was allowed to stand. Broad fingers collared and cuffed him, and Tilrey could feel the full length of the nearest captor’s body, smell his sweat. Goddamn soldiers. Peering sideways through a haze of disgust, he could see the third soldier cuffing Celinda, who didn’t seem to be struggling at all.
And then everything went weirdly still.
The soldier’s grip loosened. He stepped back, allowing Tilrey to turn cautiously.
Beside Celinda stood a newcomer, a slight, dark Upstart with narrow, febrile eyes. No longer cuffed, Celinda was straightening her hair and clothes, her mouth set but not frightened.
Tilrey lurched toward her, but the soldier yanked him back. “What—”
Then he got a better look at the Upstart.
“The show’s over,” the man said, rubbing his palms. “That was a lovely performance, Rishka. I expected you to crack any minute, but you stood firm.”
Ranek Egil. The face had taken a second to place, but he would never forget the voice.
“I know who you are now.” It came out in a gasp, as the soldier whipped him back around and pressed his cheek to the rough cinderblock. Again came the sharp prick in his neck.
“I should hope so,” said Egil.
They were the ones putting on a “show,” not me. All of them. Dizziness overwhelmed Tilrey, his head roaring and his knees giving way, and though he knew there was no point in fighting, he rasped out, “Does Gersha know?”
Egil’s reply seemed to come from a great distance: “Of course. Sleep now. We’ll have plenty of time to catch up.”