“That once might have made you rich, Cody,” Tia said, “but you’d have some trouble selling it now.”
That was true. Jewelry was practically worthless these days. There were a couple Epics who could create gemstones.
“Maybe,” Cody said, “but gold remains a standard.” He scratched his head. “Not sure why, though. You can’t eat it, which is all most people are interested in.”
“It’s familiar,” Prof said. “It doesn’t rust, it’s easy to shape, and it’s hard to fake. There aren’t any Epics who can make it. Yet. People need to have a way to trade, particularly across kingdom or city boundaries.” He fingered a gold chain. “Cody’s actually right.”
“I am?” Cody looked surprised.
Prof nodded. “Whether or not we take on Steelheart, the gold we’ve recovered here can fund the Reckoners for a few years on its own.”
Tia set her notebook on the desk, tapping it absently with her pen. On the other mortgage cubicle desks we’d arranged what we’d found in the vault. About three-quarters of the boxes’ contents had been recoverable.
“Mostly we have a lot of wills,” Tia said, opening a can of cola, “stock certificates, passports, copies of driver’s licenses …”
“We could fill a whole city with fake people if we wanted,” Cody said. “Imagine the fun.”
“The second-largest grouping,” Tia continued, “is the aforementioned pile of jewelry, both valuable and worthless. If something in there affected Steelheart, then by pure volume this is the most likely group.”
“But it’s not,” I said.
Prof sighed. “David, I know what you—”
“What I mean,” I interrupted, “is that jewelry doesn’t make sense. Steelheart didn’t attack other banks, and he hasn’t done anything—either directly or indirectly—to forbid people from wearing jewelry in his presence. Jewelry is common enough among Epics that he’d have to take measures.”
“I agree,” Tia said, “though only in part. It’s possible we’ve missed something. Steelheart has proven subtle in the past; perhaps he has a secret embargo on a certain type of gemstone. I’ll look into it, but I think David’s right. If something did affect Steelheart, then it’s likely one of the oddities.”
“How many of those are there?” Prof asked.
“Over three hundred,” Tia said with a grimace. “Mostly mementos or keepsakes of no intrinsic value. Anything among them could be our culprit, theoretically. But then there’s a chance it was something one of the people in the room was carrying on them. Or it could be, as David seems to think, something about the situation.”
“It’s very rare for an Epic’s weakness to be influenced just by proximity to something mundane,” I said, shrugging. “Unless an object in the vault emitted a kind of radiation or a light or a sound—something that actually reached Steelheart—the chances are slim it was the culprit.”
“Look through the items anyway, Tia,” Prof said. “Maybe we can find a correlation to something Steelheart has done in the city.”
“What about the darkness?” Cody asked.
“Nightwielder’s darkness?”
“Sure,” Cody said. “I’ve always thought it was strange that he kept it so dark here.”
“That’s probably because of Nightwielder himself,” I said. “He doesn’t want sunlight shining on him and making him corporeal. I wouldn’t be surprised if that was part of the deal between them, one of the reasons Nightwielder serves beneath Steelheart. Steelheart’s government provides infrastructure—food, electricity, crime prevention—to compensate for it always being dark.”
“I suppose that makes sense,” Cody said. “Nightwielder needs darkness, but can’t have it unless he’s got a good city to work from. Kind of like a piper needs a good city to support him, so he can stand on the cliff tops and play.”
“A … piper?” I asked.
“Oh please, don’t get him started,” Tia said, raising a hand to her head.
“Bagpiper,” Cody said.
I looked at him blankly.
“You’ve never heard of bagpipes?” Cody asked, sounding aghast. “They’re as Scottish as kilts and red armpit hair!”
“Um … yuck?” I said.
“That’s it,” Cody said. “Steelheart has to fall so we can get back to educating children properly. This is an offense against the dignity of my motherland.”
“Great,” Prof said, “I’m glad we now have proper motivation.” He tapped the desk idly.
“You’re worried,” Tia said. She seemed to be able to read Prof pretty well.
“We’re getting closer and closer to a confrontation. If we continue on this course we’ll draw Steelheart out but will be unable to fight him.”
The people at the desk grew still. I looked up, gazing at the high ceiling; the sterile white lights around the room provided insufficient glow to reach the room’s farthest corners. It was cold in this room, and quiet. “When’s the last moment we could pull out?”
“Well,” Prof said, “we could draw him to a confrontation with Limelight, then not show.”
“That might be kind of fun on its own merits,” Cody noted. “I doubt Steelheart gets stood up very often.”
“He’d react poorly to the embarrassment,” Prof said. “Right now the Reckoners are a thorn—an annoyance. We’ve only done three hits in his city and have never killed anyone vital to his organization. If we run, what we’ve been doing will get out. Abraham and I set in place evidence that will prove we’re behind this—that is the only way to make sure our victory, if we obtain one, isn’t attributed to an Epic instead of ordinary men.”
“So if we run …,” Cody said.
“Steelheart will know that Limelight was a fake and that the Reckoners were working on a way to assassinate him,” Tia said.
“Well,” Cody said, “most Epics already want to kill the lot of us. So maybe nothing will change.”
“This will be worse,” I said, still looking up at the ceiling. “He killed the rescue workers, Cody. He’s paranoid. He’ll hunt us actively if he finds out what we’ve been up to. The thought that we tried to get to him … that we were researching his weakness … he won’t take that sitting down.”
The shadows flickered, and I looked down to see Abraham walking up to our cubicle. “Prof, you asked me to warn you when we reached the hour.”
Prof checked his mobile, then nodded. “We should be getting back to the hideout. Everyone grab a sack and fill it with the things we found. We’ll sort through them further in a more controlled environment.”
We got up from our seats, Cody patting the head of the dead—and steel-frozen—bank patron who slumped beside the wall of this particular cubicle. As they left, Abraham set something down on the desk. “For you.”
It was a handgun. “I’m no good with …” I trailed off. It looked familiar. The gun … the one my father picked up.
“I found it in the rubble beside your father,” Abraham said. “The transfersion turned the grip and frame to metal, but most of the parts were already good steel. I removed the magazine and cleared the chamber, and the slide and trigger still function as expected. I wouldn’t completely trust it until I give it a thorough once-over back at base, but there’s a good chance it will fire reliably.”
I picked up the gun. This was the weapon that had killed my father. Holding it felt wrong.
But it was also, so far as I knew, the only weapon ever to have wounded Steelheart.
“We can’t know if it was something about the gun that allowed Steelheart to be hurt,” Abraham said. “I felt it would be worth digging out. I’ll take it apart and clean it for you, check over the cartridges. They should still be good, though I might need to change the powder, if the casings didn’t insulate against the transfersion. If it all checks out, you can carry it. If the opportunity presents itself, you can try shooting him with it.”
I nodded in thanks, then ran to get a sack and haul out my part of what we’d found.
r /> “Piping is the most sublime sound y’all have ever heard,” Cody explained, gesturing widely as we walked down the corridor toward the hideout. “A sonorous mix of power, frailty, and wonder.”
“It sounds like dying cats being stuffed into a blender,” Tia said to me.
Cody looked wistful. “Aye, and a beauteous melody that is, lass.”
“So, wait,” I said, holding up a finger. “These bagpipes. To make them, you … what was it you said? ‘Y’all need to kill yourself a wee dragon, which are totally real and not at all mythological—they live in the Scottish Highlands to this day.’ ”
“Aye,” Cody said. “It’s important y’all pick a wee one. The big ones are too dangerous, you see, and their bladders don’t make good pipes. But you have to kill it yourself, you see. A piper needs to have slain his own dragon. It’s part of the code.”
“After that,” I said, “you need to cut out the bladder, and attach … what was it?”
“Carved unicorn horns to make the pipes,” Cody said. “I mean, you could use something less rare, like ivory. But if you’re going to be a purist, it has to be unicorn horns.”
“Delightful,” Tia said.
“A grand word to choose,” Cody said. “It, of course, is originally a Scottish term. Del coming from Dál Riata, the ancient and great Scottish kingdom of myth. Why, I think one of the great piping songs is from that era. ‘Abharsair e d’a chois e na Dùn Èideann.’ ”
“Ab … ha … what?” I asked.
“Abharsair e d’a chois e na Dùn Èideann,” Cody said. “It is a sweetly poetic name that doesn’t really translate to English—”
“It means ‘The Devil Went Down to Edinburgh’ in Scottish Gaelic,” Tia said, leaning in toward me but speaking loudly enough that Cody could hear.
Cody, for once, missed a step. “You speak Scottish Gaelic, lass?”
“No,” Tia said. “But I looked that up last time you told this story.”
“Er … you did, eh?”
“Yes. Though your translation is questionable.”
“Well, now. I always did say you were a smart one, lass. Yes indeed.” He coughed into his hand. “Ah, look. We’re at the base. I’ll continue the story later.” The others had arrived at the hideout just ahead and Cody scurried up to meet them, then followed Megan up the tunnel.
Tia shook her head, then walked with me to the tunnel. I went last, making sure the cords and cables that hid the entrance were in place. I turned on the hidden motion sensors that would alert us if someone came in, then crawled up myself.
“… just don’t know, Prof,” Abraham was saying in his soft voice. “I just don’t know.” The two of them had spent the trip back walking ahead, speaking softly. I’d tried to edge up to hear them, but Tia had pointedly placed a hand on my shoulder and drawn me back.
“So?” Megan asked, crossing her arms as we all gathered around the main table. “What’s going on?”
“Abraham doesn’t like the way the rumors are going,” Prof said.
“The general public does seem to accept our tale of Limelight,” Abraham said. “They are scared, and our hit on the power station has had an effect—there are rolling blackouts all over the city. However, I see no proof that Steelheart believes. Enforcement is sweeping the understreets. Nightwielder is scouring the city. Everything I hear from informants is that Steelheart is searching for a group of rebels, not a rival Epic.”
“So we hit back with a fury,” Cody said, crossing his arms and leaning back against the wall beside the tunnel. “Kill a few more Epics.”
“No,” I said, remembering my conversation with Prof. “We need to be more focused. We can’t just take out random Epics; we have to think like someone trying to capture the city.”
Prof nodded. “Each and every hit we make without having Limelight appear in the open will make Steelheart more suspicious.”
“We’re giving up?” Megan said, a hint of eagerness in her voice, though she obviously tried to cover it.
“Not by a mile,” Prof said. “Perhaps I will still decide we need to pull out—if we aren’t confident enough about Steelheart’s weakness, I might do just that. We aren’t there yet. We’re going to keep on with this plan, but we need to do something big, preferably with an appearance by Limelight. We need to squeeze Steelheart as hard as we can and drive that temper of his. Force him out.”
“And we do that how?” Tia asked.
“It’s time to kill Conflux,” Prof said. “And bring down Enforcement.”
27
CONFLUX.
In many ways he was the backbone of Steelheart’s rule. A mysterious figure, even when compared to the likes of Firefight and Nightwielder.
I had no good photos of Conflux. The few I’d paid dearly to get were blurry and unspecific. I couldn’t even know if he was real.
The van thumped as it moved through the dark streets of Newcago; it was stuffy inside. I sat in the passenger seat, with Megan driving. Cody and Abraham were in the back. Prof was running point in a different vehicle, and Tia was running support back at our base, watching the spy videos of the city streets. It was a frigid day and the heater in our van didn’t work—Abraham hadn’t gotten around to fixing it.
Prof’s words ran through my mind. We’ve considered hitting Conflux before, but discarded the idea because we thought it would be too dangerous. We still have the plans we made. It’s no less dangerous now, but we’re in deep. No reason not to move forward.
Was Conflux real? My gut said he was. Much as the clues pointed to Firefight being a fabrication, the clues surrounding Conflux added up to something being there. A powerful but fragile Epic.
Steelheart moves Conflux around, Prof had said, never letting him stay long in the same place. But there’s a pattern to how he’s moved. He often uses an armored limo with six guards and a two-motorcycle escort. If we watch for that, wait until he uses that convoy to move, we can hit him on the streets in transit.
The clues. Even with power plants Steelheart didn’t have enough electricity to run the city, and yet he somehow produced those fuel cells. The mechanized armor units didn’t pack power sources, and neither did many of the copters. The fact that they were powered directly by high-ranking members of Enforcement wasn’t much of a secret. Everyone knew it.
He was out there. A gifter who could make energy in a form that could power vehicles, fill fuel cells, even light a large chunk of the city. That level of power was awesome, but no more so than what Nightwielder or Steelheart held. The most powerful Epics set their own scale of strength.
The van bumped, and I gripped my rifle—held low, safety on, barrel pointed down and toward the door. Out of sight, but handy. Just in case.
Tia had spotted the right kind of limo convoy today, and we’d scrambled. Megan drove us toward a point where our road would intersect with Conflux’s limo. Her eyes were characteristically intense, though there was a particular edge to her today. Not fear. Just … worry, maybe?
“You don’t think we should be doing this, do you?” I asked.
“I think I made that clear,” Megan said, her voice even, eyes ahead. “Steelheart doesn’t need to fall.”
“I’m talking about Conflux specifically,” I said. “You’re nervous. You’re normally not nervous.”
“I just don’t think we know enough about him,” she said. “We shouldn’t be hitting an Epic we don’t even have photographs of.”
“But you are nervous.”
She drove, eyes forward and hands tight on the wheel.
“It’s okay,” I said. “I feel like a brick made of porridge.”
She looked at me, brow scrunching up. The van’s cab fell silent. Then Megan started to laugh.
“No, no,” I said. “It makes sense! Listen. A brick is supposed to be strong, right? But if one were secretly made of porridge, and all of the other bricks didn’t know, he’d sit around worrying that he’d be weak when the rest of them were strong. He’d get smooshed when he wa
s placed in the wall, you see, maybe get some of his porridge mixed with that stuff they stick between bricks.”
Megan was laughing even harder now, so hard she was actually gasping for breath. I tried to keep explaining but found myself smiling. I don’t think I’d ever heard her laugh, really laugh. Not chuckle, not part her lips in wry mockery, but truly laugh. She was almost in tears by the time she got control of herself. I think we were fortunate she didn’t crash into a post or something.
“David,” she said between gasps, “I think that is the most ridiculous thing I’ve ever heard anyone say. The most outlandishly, audaciously ridiculous.”
“Um …”
“Sparks,” she said, exhaling. “I needed that.”
“You did?”
She nodded.
“Can we … pretend that’s why I said it, then?”
She looked at me, smiling, eyes sparkling. The tension was still there, but it had retreated somewhat. “Sure,” she said. “I mean, bad puns are something of an art, right? So why not bad metaphors?”
“Exactly.”
“And if they’re an art, you are a master painter.”
“Well, actually,” I said, “that won’t work, you see, because the metaphor makes too much sense. I’d have to be, like, the ace pilot or something.” I cocked my head. “Actually, that makes a little bit of sense too.” Sparks, doing it badly intentionally was hard too. I found that decidedly unfair.
“Y’all okay up there?” Cody said in our ears. The back of the van was separated from the cab by a metal partition, like a service van. There was a little window in it, but Cody preferred to use the mobiles to communicate.
“We’re fine,” Megan said. “Just having an abstract conversation about linguistic parallelism.”
“You wouldn’t be interested,” I said. “It doesn’t involve Scotsmen.”
“Well, actually,” Cody said, “the original tongue of my motherland …”
Megan and I looked at each other, then both pointedly reached to our mobiles and muted him.
“Let me know when he’s done, Abraham,” I said into mine.
Abraham sighed on the other end of the line. “Want to trade places? I’d sure like to be able to mute Cody myself right about now. It is regrettably difficult when he’s sitting beside you.”