فصل 38

38

MATTHIAS

Matthias jogged along beside Kuwei’s lifeless body. Two of the stadwatch had hefted the boy onto a stretcher, and they were running toward the Beurscanal with him as the plague sirens wailed. The medik struggled to keep up, his university robes flapping.

When they reached the dock, the medik took Kuwei’s wrist in his hand. “This is pointless. He has no pulse. The bullet must have pierced his heart.”

Just don’t pull that shirt back, Matthias willed silently. Jesper had used a wax-and-rubber bullet that had shattered when it struck the bladder lodged behind Kuwei’s shirt button, bursting the bladder’s casing and spraying blood and bone matter everywhere. The gore had been collected from a butcher shop, but there was no way the medik could know that. To everyone in the church, it appeared that Kuwei Yul-Bo had been shot in the heart and died immediately.

“Damn it,” said the medik. “Where is the emergency boat? And where is the dock steward?”

Matthias suspected he could answer those questions easily enough. The steward had abandoned his post as soon as he’d heard that plague siren, and even from this narrow vantage point they could see the canal was clogged with watercraft, people shouting and jabbing at the sides of one another’s boats with their oars as they tried to evacuate the city before the canals were closed and they were trapped in a plague warren.

“Here, sir!” called a man in a fishing boat. “We can take you to the hospital.”

The medik looked wary. “Has anyone aboard shown signs of infection?”

The fisherman gestured to the very pregnant woman lying at the back of the boat, sheltered by an awning. “No, sir. It’s just the two of us and we’re both healthy, but my wife’s about to have a baby. We could use someone like you on board in case we don’t make it to the hospital in time.”

The medik looked a bit green. “I am not … I do not treat female problems. Besides, why aren’t you having your baby at home?” he asked suspiciously.

He could care less if Kuwei survives, thought Matthias grimly. He’s looking after his own hide.

“Don’t have a home,” said the man. “Just the boat.”

The medik looked over his shoulder at the panicked people spilling from the doors of the main cathedral. “All right, let’s go. Stay here,” he said to Matthias.

“I am his chosen protector,” said Matthias. “I go where he goes.”

“There isn’t room for all of you,” said the fisherman.

The stadwatch officers exchanged furious whispers, then one of them said, “We’ll put him on the boat, but then we have to report to our command station. It’s protocol.”

Kaz had said the officers wouldn’t want to be anywhere near a hospital during a plague outbreak, and he was right. Matthias could hardly blame them.

“But we may need protection,” protested the medik.

“For a dead guy?” said the stadwatch officer.

“For me! I am a medik traveling during plague time!”

The officer shrugged. “It’s protocol.”

They hefted the stretcher onto the boat and were gone.

“No sense of duty,” huffed the medik.

“He don’t look too good,” the fisherman said, glancing at Kuwei.

“He’s done for,” said the medik. “But we must still make the gesture. As our uniformed friends would say, ‘It’s protocol.’”

The pregnant woman let out a terrible moan and Matthias was pleased to see the medik skitter back against the boat’s railing, nearly upending a bucket of squid. Hopefully the squeamish coward would keep well away from Nina and her fake belly. It was a struggle for Matthias to keep his eyes from her when all he wanted was to reassure himself that she was safe. But one glance told him she was better than safe. Her face was aglow, her eyes luminous as emeralds. This was what came of her using her power—no matter what form it took. Unnatural, said the old, determined voice. Beautiful, said the voice that had spoken the night he’d helped Jesper and Kuwei escape Black Veil. It was newer, less certain, but louder than ever before.

Matthias nodded to the fisherman and Rotty winked back at him, giving a brief tug on the beard of his disguise. He poled the boat rapidly down the canal.

As they approached Zentsbridge, Matthias caught sight of the huge bottleboat parked beneath it. It was wide enough that the hulls scraped as Rotty tried to pass. The bottle man and Rotty broke into a heated argument, and Nina let loose another wail, long and loud enough that Matthias wondered if she was trying to compete with the plague siren.

“Perhaps some deep breathing?” the medik suggested from the railing.

Matthias gave Nina the barest warning glance. They could fake a pregnancy. They couldn’t fake an actual birth. At least he didn’t think they could. He wouldn’t put anything past Kaz at this point.

The medik yelled at Matthias to bring him his bag. Matthias pretended to fuss with it for a moment, extracted the stethoscope, and shoved it beneath a pile of netting—just in case the medik wanted to listen to Nina’s belly.

Matthias handed over the bag. “What are you looking for?” he asked, using his bulk to block the medik’s view of the bottleboat as Kuwei’s body was swapped for the corpse they’d stolen from the morgue the night before. As soon as Sturmhond had gotten Genya out of the church, she’d stopped beneath the bridge to tailor the corpse’s face and raise its body temperature. It was imperative that it not look like it had been dead for too long.

“A sedative,” said the medik.

“Is that safe for a pregnant woman?”

“For me.”

The bottle man shouted a few more coarse words at Rotty—Specht was clearly enjoying himself—and then the fishing boat was past Zentsbridge and sailing along, moving faster now that they’d left the most crowded part of the canal. Matthias could not resist a look back and saw shadows moving behind the stacked wine crates on the bottleboat. There was still more work to be done.

“Where are we going?” said the medik abruptly. “I thought we were headed to the university clinic.”

“Waterway was closed,” Rotty lied.

“Then take us to Ghezendaal hospital and be quick about it.”

That was the idea. The university clinic was closer, but Ghezendaal was smaller, less well staffed, and bound to be overwhelmed by the plague panic, a perfect place to bring a body you didn’t want looked at too closely.

They glided to a halt at the hospital’s dock and the staff assisted Rotty and Nina out of the boat, then helped lift the stretcher out as well. But as soon as they arrived at the hospital’s doors, the nurse on duty there looked at the body on the stretcher and said, “Why would you bring a corpse here?”

“It’s protocol!” said the medik. “I am trying to do my duty.”

“We’re locking down for a plague. We don’t have beds to give to dead men. Take him around the back to the wagon bay. The bodymen can come for him tonight.”

The staff members disappeared around the corner with the stretcher. By tomorrow a stranger’s body would be ashes and the real Kuwei would be free to live his life without constantly looking over his shoulder.

“Well, at least help this woman, she’s about to—” The medik looked around but Nina and Rotty had vanished.

“They already went inside,” said Matthias.

“But—”

The nurse snapped, “Are you going to stand here all day blocking my doorway or come inside and be of help?”

“I … am needed elsewhere,” the medik said, ignoring the nurse’s disbelieving look. “The rudeness of some people,” he sputtered, dusting off his robes as they left the hospital. “I am a scholar of the university.”

Matthias bowed deeply. “I thank you for your attempts to save my charge.”

“Ah, well, yes. Indeed. I was only doing as my oath demands.” The medik looked nervously at the houses and businesses that had already started locking their doors and sealing their shutters. “I really must get to … the clinic.”

“I’m sure all will be most grateful for your care,” Matthias said, certain the medik intended to rush home to his rooms and barricade himself against anyone who so much as sniffled.

“Yes, yes,” said the medik. “Good day and good health.” He hurried off down the narrow street.

Matthias found himself smiling as he jogged in the opposite direction. He would meet the others back at Zentsbridge, where hopefully Kuwei would soon be revived. He would be with Nina again and maybe, maybe they could begin thinking about a future.

“Matthias Helvar!” said a high, querulous voice.

Matthias turned. A boy stood in the middle of the deserted street. The young drüskelle with the ice-white hair who had glared at him so fiercely during the auction. He wore a gray uniform, not the black of a full drüskelle officer. Had he followed Matthias from the church? What had he seen?

The boy couldn’t have been more than fourteen. The hand he held his pistol in was shaking.

“I charge you with treason,” he said, voice breaking, “high treason against Fjerda and your drüskelle brothers.”

Matthias held up his hands. “I am unarmed.”

“You are a traitor to your land and your god.”

“We haven’t met before.”

“You killed my friends. In the raid on the Ice Court.”

“I killed no drüskelle.”

“Your companions did. You’re a murderer. You humiliated Commander Brum.”

“What’s your name?” Matthias asked gently. This boy did not want to hurt anyone.

“It doesn’t matter.”

“Are you new to the order?”

“Six months,” he said, lifting his chin.

“I joined when I was even younger than you. I know what it’s like there, the thoughts they put in your head. But you don’t have to do this.”

The boy shook even harder. “I charge you with treason,” he repeated.

“I am guilty,” said Matthias. “I’ve done terrible things. And if you wish it, I will walk back to the church with you right now. I will face your friends and commanding officers and we can see what justice may come.”

“You’re lying. You even let them kill that Shu boy you were supposed to protect. You’re a traitor and a coward.” Good, he believed Kuwei was dead.

“I will go with you. You have my word. And you have the gun. There’s nothing to fear from me.”

Matthias took a step forward.

“Stay where you are!”

“Do not be afraid. Fear is how they control you.” We’ll find a way to change their minds. The boy had only been with the order for six months. He could be reached. “There’s so much in the world you don’t have to be afraid of, if you would only open your eyes.”

“I told you to stay where you are.”

“You don’t want to hurt me. I know. I was like you once.”

“I’m nothing like you,” said the boy, his blue eyes blazing. Matthias saw the anger there, the rage. He knew it so well. But he was still surprised when he heard the shot.