Of Metal and Wishes

  “The red Noor did a terrible thing,” he says quietly.

  My heart sinks. “Did you see him do it?” I demand. “How do you know?”

  He is quiet for several seconds. “Ebian thinks he did it. So do all his men.”

  “That’s not enough proof for me,” I cry.

  An exasperated huff flows through the vent. “They found the murder weapon.”

  “He’s smart. If he’s actually guilty, why would he hide it under his sleeping pallet?”

  “How do you know Mugo was the only one he wanted to kill? The red Noor certainly had the motive, and who’s to say he didn’t want to take out Jipu or Ebian, too? What about those boys he beat up? Maybe he was just getting started.”

  I pause, remembering how Melik knew where Mugo and Jipu lived, like he’d looked into it. What if he was going after the bosses?

  Bo sighs. “He’s aligned with a group of men who want to unionize, which Mugo would never allow. They are naive if they think they will end up anywhere but on a train headed for the camps.”

  “You know an awful lot about this.”

  “You’re upset with me,” he says.

  I scrub my hand over my face. This is no way to talk to someone I want to help me. “No. I’m sorry. I just . . . I can’t believe Melik would do something like this. He seems so much . . . better than this.”

  Bo laughs, all derision. “He’s a Noor! They’re little better than barbarians!”

  “He’s a good man,” I snap. But deep inside of me there is a seed of doubt. Melik is good, yes. But he is also a warrior. He keeps it hidden, but I have seen what happens when his mask falls away.

  “You deserve better.” Bo grinds out every word. Then he draws a breath and cools the heat in his voice. “You’ve had such a long day and a horrible night, Wen. Please get some rest.”

  “Good night,” I whisper, because I know I have ruined any chance of getting help for Melik from Bo, if there was ever any chance to begin with.

  Once again I’m alone in the darkness. I lie still as my father trudges up the stairs and stands over my bed. I lie still as he brushes his teeth and washes his face. I lie still as he creeps into his alcove and pulls the curtain shut, and I don’t move until his quiet snores reach me.

  But then I’m up. I can’t stand to be still anymore. I slip on my woolen shoes and my dressing gown, and I tread down the stairs so lightly that they don’t even creak. I don’t turn on the light in the clinic; I don’t need to. I know where everything is, and I prepare my supplies and fill the pockets of my dressing gown with the things I might need.

  When I’m done, I put my ear to the door and listen.

  The guards are outside, and they are breathing heavily. They expect no trouble from us, and it is the deepest hours of the morning. Silently I twist the knob and pull the door open, just a crack. One of the guards is sitting against the wall, his head hanging back, his mouth wide open.

  He will be my first victim.

  I crouch low and pull a soporific sponge from my pocket, careful to keep it far from my own nose, and slide my arm out the door. The guard twitches a bit as I lower it over his face, but it takes no more than a few seconds for his breathing to deepen even further, for the drool to drip from his gaping mouth. He will not be waking up anytime soon.

  I pull the door open a little farther and see the other guard sitting across the hall. His thick arms are crossed over his middle, and his head hangs forward. I am tempted to leave him there, but if he wakes up before I’m back, he might raise the alarm. I emerge into the hallway and close the door behind me, careful to hold the knob and release it slowly, but the click echoes down the hall like cannon fire.

  The thick-armed guard raises his head, blinking and confused.

  I am caught.

  “What are you doing out here?” he asks stupidly.

  “I was hungry,” I say, as if that should be obvious. And even though I want to run, I walk straight toward him like one of Bo’s spiders. I am activated and will follow this sequence of movements, this plan I’ve already set in motion.

  The guard doesn’t expect this. He expects me to be scared of him, to shrink back against the door like I’ve done something wrong. I don’t. I advance on him without hesitation, and he doesn’t know what to do with me.

  “I might have a bun if you’re really starving,” he mumbles, because he reads something on my face that tells him I am serious, that I am not leaving until I get what I want.

  “That might do,” I say, and now I am only steps from him. My hand dips into my pocket.

  And when he reaches for his satchel, I pull out the syringe and stab it into his upper arm. He jerks, but I’m ready, and I move with him as he tries to evade me, managing to depress the plunger and fill him with opium before he knocks me away. I hit the wall and bounce off, but find my balance quickly and watch him. He will not be coming after me, even though he’s trying to do exactly that.

  He lifts his arm and it falls back into his lap. “Whatcha,” he says. “Whatcha munding . . . bicklind . . . purpsy . . .” He falls off his chair and lands on his side.

  I put his satchel under his head so he’s not resting on cold concrete.

  I’m not entirely heartless.

  My guards will be sleeping until someone comes to relieve them, probably at the day shift whistle. I have until then to get what I need.

  My footsteps are completely silent as I jog down the hallway. I climb through a shattered window into Mugo’s office. It’s pitch black in here, and I won’t be able to find my way through the maze of piled debris. I pull a candle from my pocket and light it, because it is easily covered and not as noticeable as the bright electric lights. The suite of rooms is in disarray, but I weave around the ceiling tiles and piles of rubble to the inner office. Mugo kept his master key in the locked bottom drawer of his desk. As my candle’s faint light sweeps over the desk, the sight of Melik’s name draws me up short. I hold the candle over the crumpled note.

  MELIK,

  I NEED TO DISCUSS YOUR BROTHER’S ILLEGALLY OBTAINED WORK PASS AND THE NECESSARY PENALTIES. THIS IS A MATTER OF THE UTMOST URGENCY.

  UNDERBOSS MUGO

  This is exactly the kind of note Mugo liked to write, the kind that struck fear into the heart of every worker in the compound. And when Melik got this, I’m certain it made his stomach drop to his shoes. Sinan is the most important person in the world to him, and if Melik believed he was under threat, he would do anything to protect him. Mugo would have loved that, to bring Melik low.

  The thing is, this note is not in Mugo’s handwriting.

  Usually he made me type his notes, but when he needed to dash one off, he wrote it himself, and his handwriting was tiny and perfect and neat. This note is written in block letters, and there’s a certain flare to them, a boldness, that Mugo’s writing did not have. The S at the end of “PENALTIES” is like a lightning strike, stabbed into the page. It is vaguely familiar to me, but I can’t pull the why or where to the front of my mind right now.

  I tuck the note into my pocket and pull my father’s scalpel out. It’s a fiercely sharp little blade, and a few years ago, thanks to my intense curiosity about my father’s tiny study in the cottage on the Hill, I learned it is also excellent at picking simple locks. It takes me no time to spring the lock on Mugo’s drawer. I swipe the master key and climb back through the window. I press myself against the wall for a moment, catching my breath and listening hard. The administrative hallway is silent, but people are awake at the front of the factory, near the cafeteria. I hear the low, angry buzz of voices. Probably men waiting for the regional police to arrive or recovering in the aftermath of the brawl with the Noor. They are, no doubt, in dangerous moods. But that’s all right. That’s not where I’m going.

  I slide my feet along the floor, sheltering my guttering candle with my hand, and peek thro
ugh the filmy window to the killing floor. With careful, slow movements I use Mugo’s key to unlock the door. Even in the yawning darkness of the enormous chamber I can see that Mugo’s body is gone. I inch the door open and slip inside, where the dark letters still mar the floor. I raise my candle to read them again, trying to picture Melik writing them in blood.

  But as I stand over them, I see “BOSSES”—each S is shaped like a lightning strike. I pull the forged note out of my pocket and hold it up, comparing the two.

  I think back to this afternoon, how Melik walked in at the exact wrong time. How it happened when a group of men was cleaning up the mess out in the corridor. So many people saw Melik exchanging words with Mugo, saw Mugo screaming at him. Someone lured Melik here for this confrontation. The same person who wrote these words on the killing floor. Maybe the same person—or people—who knew he had a bone-handled knife in his possession.

  Melik has been framed.

  I’m not sure which emotion is bigger, the rage or the relief, but they’ve both sunk their teeth into me. If I’m good—very, very good—this will be the key to freeing Melik. This will be the—

  “I knew I heard something!”

  I jam the note into my pocket and reach for another syringe, my heart nearly bursting from my chest. I turn around slowly as Lati walks forward, a smug smile on his face. Iyzu is right behind him. “Did you come to try to free your boyfriend?” Lati asks.

  Yes. “No,” I say, taking a few steps back. “But he is innocent.”

  Lati laughs. “Innocent.” He says it like a curse. “Wait until I tell the police how he attacked me. How he threatened me and Iyzu with the very knife he used to cut Mugo open.”

  “I’m going back to the clinic now,” I say. But Iyzu and Lati don’t move away from the door.

  Iyzu shakes his head. “I don’t think so. Did you help your Noor lover, Wen?” He looks me up and down. “Are you just a stupid whore, or are you a murderer?”

  “Are you?” I snap.

  “Why would we want to kill Mugo?” Iyzu asks with a chilly smile. He walks toward me with a strange, vicious look on his face. I swear, he wants me to pay for the humiliation he suffered at Melik’s hands. I can already tell the price will be very high.

  My fingers tighten over my second opium syringe, but I know it’s hopeless, because there are two of them, and both are twice as strong as I am. If I try to use the syringe or the scalpel, it’s more likely they’ll turn one or the other against me. So I reach for the only thing I have left. “Have you ever made a wish to the Ghost?”

  Lati and Iyzu stare at me.

  “I know you have,” I say. “Has he ever granted one?”

  They look at me like I’m crazy, but Lati tries to recover control of the conversation. “Why, did you wish to satisfy both of us at once in exchange for your freedom?”

  I am choking on my fear. Part of me is tempted to jam this opium syringe into my own thigh, because at least I won’t be awake while they hurt me. But until I’m sure I’ve been abandoned, until I’m certain I’m completely alone, I won’t give up. “I wish . . .” I look around, and then I blow out my candle. “It’s a little too dark in here. I wish for some light,” I say.

  Iyzu strides forward. “You are the dumbest girl on the—”

  We all blink as the killing floor lights up as bright as day, every single bulb in the place snapping on at once.

  BO HAS NOT abandoned me. I start to step around them, hoping they’ll let me return to the clinic, but that is too much to ask for. Lati snatches me by the arm.

  “I don’t know how you did that, but I’m not impressed.” He grinds his fingers against my arm bones and grabs a handful of my hair, but as he twists my head back, Iyzu stops him.

  “Lati, I think we should hold off,” he says, glancing up nervously at the glaring lights. He may not have been scared of Mugo, but he is smart enough to fear the Ghost.

  “What are we supposed to do with her?” Lati whines. His fingers are inching up my ribs, and I feel like I’m going to be sick.

  Iyzu’s smile is hideous. “Let her keep the Noor warm. They deserve each other.”

  Lati doesn’t seem to like that idea. Judging by his suspicious frown and questing fingers, I think he’d rather keep me for himself, but Iyzu is the leader between them, so he drags me across the killing floor to the refrigerated chamber way in the back. I look around, hoping Bo will appear and rescue me, but when Iyzu orders Lati to go fetch a group of men to post outside the door on this side and the one that opens to the cafeteria kitchen, I suspect there are few things my Ghost can do for me now.

  Iyzu pulls a set of keys from his pocket and unlocks the chamber, then shoves me inside. “Try not to freeze to death,” he says brightly, and then he slams the door.

  I am familiar with darkness, but this one is complete. Black and cold. “Melik?”

  From across the room comes a low moan, but it is the best sound I have ever heard. I take a step and run into something hard and pointy.

  That’s when I remember I still have a candle clutched in my fist. I light my only remaining match on the concrete floor, and when my tiny flame gutters to life, I hold it up.

  This is a terrible place.

  It’s as cold as the winter frost. Piles of meat, ribs, hindquarters, and ground chuck are all around me in huge bins. Dead cow and metal and my own fogged breath. But over in the corner is what I’m looking for, and I weave through beef and bins and boxes to get to him. He is curled on his side, his knees pulled to his chest, and he is shaking, shivering, losing his battle against the cold. I drop to the floor and lean over him.

  “Melik,” I whisper against the side of his face, stroking my hand down his arm.

  “Wen always has medicine,” he mutters thickly, and then chuckles, like what he’s said is incredibly funny.

  I think he has hypothermia.

  I lift my candle so I can see him better. There’s a blackened mark on his shoulder where the cattle prod burned through his shirt and cauterized his pale flesh. His face is deeply bruised, and blood trickles from his nose. They’ve beaten him. Tried to put him in his place. It fills me with an anger so deep it boils from my skin, enough to keep us both warm.

  I get up again and use one of the enormous scoops to dig a heaping lump of ground chuck from a nearby bin. I plop it to the floor and sculpt it into a mound in front of Melik’s knees, and then I stick the base of my candle in it to secure it. I sit down next to the candle, strip off my dressing gown, and slide it over us like a tent. My mother made me this gown for cool winter nights, and it will hold the heat of the candle in and keep us alive. Of course, that leaves me in only my thin cotton nightgown, but this isn’t really the time to worry about modesty. I’m more worried about freezing.

  While I wait for the space to warm up, I rub Melik’s frozen hands and talk to him, telling him stupid stories from my childhood, singing him songs my mother used to sing, telling him all the things I wish for, even my dream that I will go to medical school and be a doctor like my father. I don’t think it matters too much what I say, but I hope Melik will find his way back to my voice, that he will wake and know he is with me, that we are together. I wish I could tell him he is safe, but that is far from true.

  “I know you didn’t do it,” I say when I finally run out of mundane things to talk about. “I have proof.”

  “Iyzu and Lati have proof too,” he replies, his voice barely above a whisper.

  He’s awake, and I have no idea how long he’s been listening to me prattle on about myself. I scoot closer, nudging up against his knees, and he raises his head and wipes the blood from his nose with the back of his sleeve. But he doesn’t smile at me. In fact, he looks extremely unhappy. “Why are you in here with me? What did you do?”

  I shrug. “I’d rather be in here than out there. Lati and Iyzu caught me on the killing floor. They
probably don’t want me to be able to tell anyone that they framed you.”

  He squints at me in the dim light of the candle. “You shouldn’t be here. This is the last place you should be.”

  I know that. But I can’t regret it. “You shouldn’t be here either.”

  “Do you know if my brother got away?” His voice is so full of fear that it hurts me.

  I inch forward on my knees, careful not to set my nightgown on fire. “He did. The local police are looking for your friends, but the last I heard, they had all escaped into the Ring.”

  I touch his face, a brush of his cheek. Because while I am here, I may as well pretend that I am a Noor woman and I can touch whomever I please. He closes his eyes and winces as my fingers slide down his face. “That hurts.” I pull my hand away, but he catches hold of my palm and tugs me back. “I didn’t say I wanted you to stop.”

  After a few minutes like that, just the simplest of touches, he opens his eyes, and they are full of want and wish and sorrow. “When they open that door,” he says, “they will take me away, and that will be the last you see of me.”

  “That’s not true.”

  He cups my face with his palm. “You know it is. There’s no way I’ll have a fair trial. I’ll be lucky if I have a trial.”

  “The regional police are coming to investigate. I have evidence that you were set up.”

  His laugh is as bitter as lye. “I’m a Noor, Wen. Most people in this country hardly think we’re worth something as expensive as an investigation.”

  His words slip into my heart and crush it from the inside.

  I will try; I will wave the forged note and scream of his innocence, but no one else will stand up for him, and I have no power of my own. Iyzu and Lati are good Itanyai boys. No one will believe Melik over them. The tears sting my eyes. I am going to lose him. This boy is going to die, and there isn’t anything I can do about it. “Then, what shall we do with this time?” I ask in a strangled voice.