Into this emptiness came the contraptions of the Theater. Moved along the tracks or across the pulley-lines, the actors of the BlackIron told the story of little Camilla, following her from childhood, portraying the struggles of her family, the conditions of their poverty at the hands of an uncaring king, a distant court. I had seen the play a hundred times. It was an old favorite of the city, a familiar tale repeated until it was ritual. Much like The Summer Girl , come to think of it. I shuddered, only half watching the production.
They told the story well, precisely, hitting every cue, reciting every line. But of course, their perfection was the conceit, for these were not the actors of just any theater. This was the BlackIron, renowned and remembered, the pride of Veridon. These actors were artwork, engines of cogwork and performance, assembled especially for each show, half-made and remade every night.
As I stood in the dim hall, Camilla herself was taking the stage. The preamble was over, and the ascension was beginning. I had seen it dozens of times, but it always held my attention. The director here was a clever man, personally rebuilding the performanceengines each night, bringing out some new reaction from the cogwork, so that every show was slightly different, slightly more… perfect.
Camilla appeared from the central trapdoor, high up on the stage’s palette. She unfolded, unbound by the rules of biology, shuffling open to her full size, exaggerated to aid the viewing of the audience. No bad seats at the BlackIron. The girl’s voice was gentle, quiet, but utterly clear. She sang about her family, gone over the falls, swept away by flood. Her voice wavered as she went on, describing her sickness, the rot of her lungs, the weakness of her heart. My heart is falling, winding down. My heart is empty, falling down. I whispered along.
Another voice, offstage, joined her. The churchman, the Wright. His brown robes and oil-grimed hands whirred into view along a track. Their voices joined, the song continued on, rising until the hall shook with her sickness, with his solution. The complicated trick that was the center of the spectacle began, her arms first folding out, unbecoming, the Wright adding, replacing, creating. Making her something more, something complicated.
I lowered my eyes. It was a metaphor, for the city. Whatever we were, whatever power we held, the Church was behind it. Their god was the secret machine, and their worship was the cogwork that ran the rest of the city. They didn’t let us forget, not the Families, not the people. The Church was the engine, and we were the gear.
I looked up and saw my man. He was at a booth by himself, off to one side of the upper rows. Available yet discreet. I went up and sat at his booth. He looked startled, both before and after he recognized me. He was an older man, his hair perfectly coifed and his face deep with powder and age. His skin looked like old parchment.
“Mr. Burn,” Matthew said. “Not someone I expected to see out and about.”
“Why’s that, Mr. Four?”
“Things I’ve heard, conversations that have been going around.”
“Conversations?”
He nodded, then slowly brought his hands up from under the table and lay them flat on the linen.
“You’re the subject of a lot of conversations.”
“Are you going to tell me what kind of conversations, Matthew?”
He shrugged. I rolled a coin across the table. He snatched it up, gave me a disapproving look for being so overt, then settled his attention on the stage. I waited, my eyes going between Matthew and the performance.
“How long have I known you, Jacob?” he asked, eventually.
“I don’t know. A while.” On stage the ascension was continuing. Camilla had extended into something ridiculous, her ribs a broad and white cage that held the machinery of ascension. The Wright was below her, carefully snipping off her legs with garden shears.
“A while.” Matthew nodded. “Quite a while. The better part of your life, I suspect. And in those years, I have seen some things.”
He drank from the nearly empty glass of wine by his hand. The play had gotten very loud, the Ascension Song crashing down from the stage. Camilla’s heart levered onto the stage, shattering into cogs and wheels that magically arranged themselves into patterns. The ruins of the girl grew.
“Some of these things, I never expected to see.” Matthew said, almost too quietly to be heard above the music. I leaned close to him.
“Tell me, Four. Did you ever expect to see this?” I took out the paper, lay it out flat and slid it in front of him. He squinted down at it.
“If I go for my glasses, are you going to shoot me, Mr. Burn?”
“I’ll save you the tension. That’s a list of names, Matthew. People who are supposed to be dead, people hired by the Council to do a job.” I took the paper back. “Your name is on this list.”
“Hardly shocking, Jacob.” He settled back into the plush leather of his seat and looked at me. “We both know the services I provide to the Families, as well as the Council.”
“This specific list is causing me a lot of trouble. I’d like to talk to these people, but like I said, most of them are dead.”
“Are you saying I’m about to be dead?” he asked, smirking.
“That’s not my call. I have no beef with you, if that’s what you mean. I just want to know what these folks were hired to do. And you seem to be the man to have hired them.”
“Well, in matters such as these, Jacob, the confidentiality of the client is of utmost importance. I couldn’t possibly-”
“You know a guy named Sloane? Malcolm Sloane? He’s on this list.”
“Ah. Oh, well. In that case, I’m positive I shouldn’t discuss this matter. Please, Jacob, don’t make me tell you no.”
“I guess I’m not asking, Four. These people… Marcus Pitts, Wellons, Sloane… they did something, went to find something, and they’ve kicked up a whole world of trouble. The kind of trouble you wouldn’t believe. It’s not just my own skin we’re talking about here. Lotta people could die, this doesn’t get settled.”
He looked at me coolly, his hands still flat against the table, his face emotionless.
“And now I know you’re threatening me, Jacob. But because we’re old friends, because we go way back, I’ll tell you this. I’ve never met Mr. Sloane. But I know the deal you’re talking about.”
“Couple years ago?” I asked. He nodded.
“Angela Tomb enlisted my services. She needed a group of people who wouldn’t be missed, men who could handle themselves in a fight. Preferably men with some out of doors experience.”
“Did she say why?”
“I’m smart enough to not ask. But that Sloane fellow, he was the one I was supposed to send them to. I was to keep the Tomb name out of it.”
I chewed my lip and looked around the theater. No one was paying us any mind.
“You’re causing me a lot of trouble, being here,” Four said. He hadn’t taken his eyes off me, hadn’t moved his hands.
“Why? People tell you not to talk to me or something?”
He nodded slowly. “Valentine, for one. I suspect you know why. I’m risking my standing with the old clockwork, talking to you like this. People are talking about you, Jacob Burn.”
“What are they saying?”
“That you killed a bunch of people up on the Heights. A bunch more at the Manor Tomb, the other day. The Council is cutting itself up, trying to get to you.”
“Yeah, well. I’m the kind of guy people want to talk to. You should feel privileged.” I slid my hand under the table, loosened the pistol in my holster, then tried to look real casual. “Anything else? Any idea, for example, why Angela Tomb would want to kill me?”
“Kill you? Gods, no. If anything, she wants to keep you alive.”
“She has a funny way of expressing that. And how do you know what she wants, anyway?”
He swallowed, glanced around. “Because I’m an old friend of the Families, you understand. When she asked me to hire those people, she made a point of saying that you weren’t to be involved. And I should avoid hiring people you might know.”
“Well,” I said. “Well. That’s funny. I don’t like it. But I’ve got reason to think she’s changed her mind about keeping me safe. Reason and a bullet they had to dig out of my chest.”