The Bone Season

  I caught Kathryn’s eye across the table. A massive bruise wept down one side of her face. 16 and 17 didn’t even glance at me. Good. If they looked at me I might not be able to stop myself chucking a dinner knife at them. Liss was still outside, dying, all because of them.

  “22”—Nashira turned to look at the grubber on her right—“how is 11? I understand he is still at Oriel.”

  The young man cleared his throat. “He’s a little better, blood-sovereign. No sign of infection.”

  “His bravery has not gone unnoticed.”

  “He’ll be honored to hear it, blood-sovereign.”

  Yes, blood-sovereign. No, blood-sovereign. Rephs did love a good ego-stroke.

  Nashira clapped her hands again. Four amaurotics came through a small door, each carrying a platter and the overpowering smell of herbs. Michael was among them, but he didn’t meet my eye. Working quickly, they laid a magnificent spread on the table, all around the bell jar. One poured chilled white wine into our glasses. A lump blocked my throat. The platters were laden with food. Beautifully cut chicken, tender and succulent, with crispy golden skin; stuffing with sage and onion; thick, sweet-smelling gravy; cranberry sauce; steamed vegetables and roast potatoes and plump sausages wrapped in bacon—a feast fit for the Inquisitor. When Nashira nodded, the bone-grubbers tucked straight in. They ate quickly, but without the feral urgency of starvation.

  My gut ached. I wanted to eat. But then I thought of the harlies, living on grease and hard bread in their hovels. So much food in here, and so little out there. Nashira noticed my reservation.

  “Eat.”

  It was an order. I put a few slices of chicken and some vegetables on my plate. Carl gulped down his wine like it was water. “Watch it, 1,” said one of the girls. “You don’t want to be sick again.”

  The rest of them laughed. Carl grinned. “Come on, that was just once. I was still a pink.”

  “Yeah, come on, leave off 1. He deserves the wine.” 22 gave him a friendly punch on the arm. “He’s still a rookie. Besides, we all had a tough time with our first Buzzer.”

  There were murmurs of assent. “I passed out,” the same girl admitted. A selfless display of solidarity. “The first time I saw one, I mean.”

  Carl smiled. “But you’re great with spirits, 6.”

  “Thanks.”

  I watched their camaraderie in silence. It was nauseating, but they weren’t acting. Carl didn’t just like being a red-jacket; it was more than that—he belonged in this strange new world. I could empathize, in a way. It was how I’d felt when I first started working for Jaxon. Maybe Carl had never found a place in the syndicate.

  Nashira watched them. She must take pleasure in this weekly charade. Stupid, indoctrinated humans, laughing about the trials she’d put them through—all under her thumb, eating her food. How powerful she must feel. How self-satisfied.

  “You’re still a pink.” A high-pitched voice came to my attention. “Have you fought a Buzzer?”

  I glanced up. They were all looking at me.

  “Yesterday night,” I said.

  “I haven’t seen you before.” 22 raised his dense eyebrows. “Whose battalion do you fight in?”

  “I’m not part of a battalion.” I was enjoying this.

  “You must be,” another boy said. “You’re a pink. Which other humans are in your residence? Who’s your keeper?”

  “My keeper only has one human.” I gave 22 a quick smile. “You might have seen him around. He’s the blood-consort.”

  The silence stretched on for what seemed like hours. I took a sip of wine. The unfamiliar alcohol felt sharp on my tongue.

  “It is well that the blood-consort has chosen such a worthy human tenant as 40,” Nashira said, with a faint laugh. Her laugh was disconcerting, like hearing a bell that had struck the wrong note. “She was able to fight the Buzzer alone, without her keeper.”

  More silence. I guessed none of them had ever been into the woods without a Reph escort, let alone tried to fight a Buzzer single-handed. 30 took the opportunity to voice exactly what I was thinking: “You mean he doesn’t fight the Emim, blood-sovereign?”

  “The blood-consort is forbidden from engaging with the Emim. As my future mate, it would be inappropriate for him to do the work of red-jackets.”

  “Of course, blood-sovereign.”

  Nashira was looking at me. I could sense it. I carried on eating my potatoes.

  Warden did fight the Emim. I’d cleaned his wounds myself. He’d gone against Nashira, and she had no idea, or if she did, it was just suspicion.

  For several minutes, only the clink of cutlery disturbed the silence. I ate my vegetables and gravy, still thinking of Warden’s secret dealings with the Emim. He’d never had to risk his life, yet he’d chosen to go out and fight them. There must be a reason.

  The red-jackets talked in low voices. They asked each other about their residences, marveling at the beauty of the old buildings. Sometimes they slighted the harlies (“Cowards, really, even the nice ones”). Kathryn toyed with her food, flinching if the Rookery was mentioned. 30 was still pink-faced, while Carl chewed with excessive force, alternating mouthfuls with his second glass of wine. Only when all the plates were clean did the amaurotics return to clear the table, leaving us with three dessert platters. Nashira waited for the red-jackets to serve themselves before she spoke again.

  “Now you are fed and watered, my friends, let us have a little entertainment.”

  Carl wiped the treacle from his mouth with his serviette. A troupe of harlies filed into the room. Among them was a whisperer. When Nashira nodded, he raised his violin to his shoulder and played a soft, lively tune. The others began to perform graceful acrobatics.

  “To business, then,” Nashira said. She didn’t even look at the performance. “If any of you have ever conversed with the Overseer, you may know what he does to earn his keep. He is my procurer for the Bone Seasons. For the last few decades, I have been attempting to procure valuable clairvoyants from the crime syndicate of Scion London. No doubt many of you are aware of it; some of you may even have been part of it.”

  30 and 18 both shifted in their seats. I didn’t recognize either of them from the syndicate, but my work had been limited to I-4 and occasionally, I-1 and I-5. There were thirty-three other sections they could have come from. Carl was open-mouthed.

  Nobody looked at the performers. They had their art honed to perfection, and not one person cared.

  “Sheol I seeks quality, not merely quantity.” Nashira ignored the lowered gazes of half her audience. “For the last few decades I have noticed a steady drop in diversity among the clairvoyants we capture. All of your skills are respected and valued by the Rephaim, but there are many talents we still require to enrich this colony. We must all learn from each other. It would not do to simply take in card-readers and palmists.

  “XX-59-40 is the kind of clairvoyant we now seek. She is our very first dreamwalker. We also require sibyls and berserkers, binders and summoners, and one or two more oracles—any breeds of clairvoyant that might bring fresh insight to our ranks.”

  Kathryn looked at me with her bruised eyes. Now she knew for certain that I wasn’t a fury.

  “I think we could all learn a lot from 40,” David said, raising his glass. “I’m willing.”

  “An excellent attitude, 12. And we do intend to learn a great deal from 40,” Nashira said, turning her gaze on me. “Which is why I will be sending her on an external assignment tomorrow.”

  The veterans exchanged glances. Carl turned red as the strawberry charlotte. “I will also be sending XX-59-1. And you, 12,” Nashira continued. Now Carl looked elated. David smiled into his glass. “You will go with one of your seniors from Bone Season XIX, who will keep an eye on your performance. 30, I presume I can count on you to do this.”

  30 nodded. “I’d be honored, blood-sovereign.”

  “Good.”

  Carl was on the edge of his seat. “What will the assignme
nt involve, blood-sovereign?”

  “We have a delicate situation to resolve. As 1 and 12 are aware, I have been asking most of the white-jackets to scry for the whereabouts of a group called the Seven Seals. They are part of the clairvoyant crime syndicate.”

  I didn’t dare look up.

  “The Seven Seals are known to be in possession of several rare clairvoyant types, including an oracle and a binder. In fact, the so-called White Binder is the key player of the group. From recent scrying attempts, we have deduced that they will be meeting in London the day after tomorrow. The place is called Trafalgar Square, within I Cohort, and the meeting will be at one o’clock in the morning.”

  The detail they’d accumulated was incredible. But with that many voyants being used to scry at once, focusing all their energies on one section of the æther, I shouldn’t have been surprised. It would produce a similar effect to a séance.

  “Do any of you know anything about the Seven Seals?” When no one replied, Nashira looked at me. “40. You must have been involved in the syndicate. If you were not, you would not have remained hidden in London for as long as you did.” Her eyes played no games. “Tell me what you know.”

  I cleared my throat.

  “The gangs are very secretive,” I said. “There’s gossip, but—”

  “Gossip,” she repeated.

  “Rumors,” I clarified. “Hearsay.”

  “Elaborate.”

  “We all know their false names.”

  “And what might those be?”

  “The White Binder, the Red Vision, the Black Diamond, the Pale Dreamer, the Martyred Muse, the Chained Fury, and the Silent Bell.”

  “I knew most of those names. Not the Pale Dreamer.” Great. “That suggests to me that there is another dreamwalker. Isn’t that a coincidence?” Her fingers tapped the table. “Do you know where they are based?”

  I couldn’t deny it. She’d seen my id card.

  “Yes,” I said. “In I-4. I work there.”

  “Is it not unusual for two dreamwalkers to live so close to one another? Surely they would have employed you, too.”

  “They didn’t know. I kept my head down,” I said. “The Dreamer is the mollisher of I-4, the Binder’s protégée. She would have had me killed if she thought she had a rival. The dominant gangs don’t like competition.”

  She was toying with me, I was sure of it. Nashira wasn’t stupid. She must have put it all together: the pamphlet, the Pale Dreamer, the Seven Seals working in I-4. She knew exactly who I was.

  “If the Pale Dreamer is a dreamwalker, then the White Binder may well be hiding some of the most coveted clairvoyants in the citadel,” she said. “It is rare that we have an opportunity to add such precious jewels to our crown. Your competence on this mission is vital, 40. If anyone is going to recognize the dreamwalker from the Seven Seals, it is another dreamwalker.”

  “Yes, blood-sovereign,” I said, my throat tight, “but—why are the Seven Seals meeting at that time?”

  “As I said, 40, this is a delicate situation. It seems that a handful of clairvoyants in Ireland are attempting to make contact with the London syndicate. An Irish fugitive named Antoinette Carter is their leader. The Seven Seals will be meeting her.”

  So Jax had pulled it out of the bag. I wondered how Antoinette had wormed her way into the citadel. It was nigh-on impossible to cross the Irish Sea. Voyants had tried to leave the country before, mostly heading for America, but few made it. You couldn’t cross the ocean in a dinghy. Even if anyone had succeeded, Scion would never have let us hear of it.

  “It is imperative that an analogous crime syndicate does not form in Dublin. Consequently, this meeting must be stopped. Your aim is to capture Antoinette Carter. I believe she, too, may be a rare type of clairvoyant, and I intend to find out exactly what power she hides. The second aim is to apprehend the Seven Seals. The White Binder is a critical target.”

  Jaxon. My mime-lord.

  “You will be supervised by the blood-consort and his cousin. I expect results. I will hold you all responsible if Carter is allowed to return to Ireland.” Nashira looked at each of us: 30, David, Carl, and I. “Is that understood?”

  “Yes, blood-sovereign,” 30 and Carl said. David swilled his wine around the glass.

  I said nothing.

  “Your life here is about to change, 40. You will be able to use your gift, and to use it well, on this assignment. I expect you to show gratitude for the long hours Arcturus has poured into your training.” Nashira looked away from the fire, into my eyes. “You have great potential. If you do not attempt to reach that potential, I shall see to it that you never walk the sheltered halls of Magdalen again. You can rot outside with the rest of the fools.”

  There was no emotion in her gaze, but there was hunger. Nashira Sargas was losing her patience.

  20

  A Little World

  The fifth and six members of our group were found in early 2057, the year after I joined.

  It was during a particularly vicious heat wave that they arrived. One of Jaxon’s couriers reported two new clairvoyants in I-4. The pair had arrived as part of a tourist party for the annual summer conference at the University, which was always a great success. Eager young tourists were brought in by the hundreds from non-Scion countries, ready to be sent back as advocates for anti-clairvoyant policies. Such programs had already found support in some parts of America, where opinions over Scion had been divided for decades. The well-meaning courier had spied two auras and run straight to his mime-lord, only to find out that the newcomers weren’t permanent residents of I-4. They had no idea that the syndicate existed. They might not even know they were voyant.

  The courier had reported that one of the two tourists—a young woman—was almost certainly a whisperer. Jax was unimpressed. Whisperers, he told me, were a kind of sensor—privy to the workings of the æther, the smells and sounds and rhythms of spirits. They could hear their voices and vibrations, even use them to play instruments. “A pretty gift,” he said, “but by no means groundbreaking.” Sensors were rarer than mediums, but not by much. The fourth order of clairvoyance. Still, there weren’t many of them in the citadel, and Jaxon did like oddities.

  It was the other half of the pair that interested him. The courier had reported an unusual aura, caught between orange and red. The aura of a fury.

  Jax had been scouring the streets for a fury for years, but this was his first hopeful case. He couldn’t believe his luck. He had a vision, a project. Jaxon Hall didn’t just want a gang—oh, no. He wanted a box of jewels, the crème de la crème of voyant society. He wanted the Unnatural Assembly to envy him above all other mime-lords.

  “I’ll convince them to stay,” he’d said, pointing his cane at me. “Just you wait, my mollisher.”

  “They have lives in their country, Jax. Families.” I wasn’t convinced. “Don’t you think they’ll need time to consider it?”

  “No time for that, my dear. Once they leave, I’ll never get them back again. They must stay.”

  “In your dreams.”

  “I don’t dream. But shall we have a wager?” He extended a hand. “If you lose, you do two assignments with no pay. And polish my antique mirror.”

  “And if I win?”

  “I’ll pay you double for the same assignments. And you won’t have to polish my antique mirror.”

  I shook his hand.

  Jaxon had the gift of the gab. I knew exactly what my father would have said about him: “Now there’s a man who’s kissed the Blarney Stone.” There was something about Jaxon that made you want to please him, to see that wild gleam leap to his eye. He knew he’d get the pair to stay. Having located their hotel and paid a busker to get their names, he sent them an invitation to a “special event” at a fashionable coffeehouse in Covent Garden. I delivered it to the concierge myself, in an envelope addressed to Miss Nadine L. Arnett and Mr. Ezekiel Sáenz.

  They sent their details back to us. Half-siblings. Both res
idents of Boston, the gleaming capital of Massachusetts. On the day of the interview, Jaxon kept us updated by e-mail.

  Fabulous. Oh, this is fabulous.

  She is most definitely a hisser. Very eloquent. Fantastically rude, too.

  The brother intrigues me. Can’t put a finger on his aura. Annoying.

  Nick, Eliza, and I waited for another hour before the golden words came in.

  They’re staying. Paige, the mirror requires elbow grease.

  That was the last time I bet against Jaxon Hall.

  Two days passed. While Eliza made room in the den for the newcomers, I walked with Nick to Gower Street to collect them. The idea was that they would just disappear off the radar, as if they’d been abducted and killed. We would leave clues: some bloodied clothes, a hair or two. Scion would love it. They could use it to advertise more unnatural crimes—but most important, they wouldn’t come after the missing siblings.

  “You really think Jax convinced them to stay?” I said as we walked.

  “You know what he’s like. Jax could convince you to jump off a cliff if you listened to him long enough.”

  “But they must have families. And Nadine is a student.”

  “They might not have done well over there, sötnos. At least voyants can learn what they are in Scion. Over there, they must just think they’re crazy.” He put on his sunglasses. “In that way, Scion is a blessing.”

  He was right, in a sense. There was no official policy on clairvoyants outside Scion; they had no legal recognition, no minority status—they only appeared in fiction. Still, that had to be better than being systematically hunted and killed, like we were. I couldn’t work out why they’d stay.

  They were waiting outside the University. Nick raised a hand to the nearest of the two.

  “Hi. Zeke?” The stranger nodded. “I’m Nick.”

  “Paige,” I said.

  Zeke’s eyes were like black tea, set in a thin, restive face. He must have been in his twenties, slim for his height, with brittle wrists and skin used to the sun.