“Don’t get any ideas,” she said. “I’m coming with you into the Ministry. That’s final.”
“No. It’s not.”
Ruby glanced at the street far below. “I’m getting a strange urge to give you a hard push, if you get my meaning.”
“Listen, Ruby, how useful do you think a bow is going to be once we’re inside? Face it, you’re better suited to staying out.”
“Don’t give me that shit. Don’t pretend you aren’t leaving me behind to keep me safe. Because in case you’re too thick to realize it: trying to distract a whole army isn’t exactly safe either.”
Roman understood that all too well. “Caleb will stay with you. Candle and I will sneak in by ourselves.”
Ruby folded her arms. “Because two against half a hundred is far better odds, right?”
“It’ll still be safer than following us inside. Out here, you have the entire city to escape into. But once we get inside and head down to the machine, there’s only one way out. I’m not going to risk—”
“So it’s okay to risk your life, but not mine?”
Roman shrugged. “Yeah. That’s pretty much it.”
“Well, that’s bullshit.”
“We need a distraction. It’s the best plan.” Roman knew he had her. But, of course, she would be defiant to the end.
There was a long silence, after which Ruby pointed to a tower adjacent the Ministry of Agriculture. “That’s where I’ll set up. It’ll be a good vantage point. From there, I can get their attention and draw them away.”
Roman nodded. “They’ll swarm the building.”
“I’ll need a rope. Once they’re inside, Caleb and I will hold them off as long as we can. Then we’ll climb out the back of the building.”
“And you’ll get the hell away from here.”
Ruby didn’t answer.
“Promise me you won’t try anything stupid.”
Ruby sighed. “Fine. I promise.”
“Ruby, if you—”
Candle grabbed Roman by the shoulder and pulled him back towards the stairs. “She promised, so it’s settled. Now let’s go. I’ve waited a long time for this chance. Far too long.”
Frowning, Roman followed him back inside and downstairs. He glanced back at Ruby. She didn’t meet his eyes. Whatever sense of calm he had felt on the way here was now so long gone he barely believed he had felt it.
It doesn’t matter how pissed off she is at me, Roman thought glumly. As long as she lives, it’s worth it.
Back downstairs, the cobbler glared at Roman, still muttering to himself. Caleb was finishing a smoke; he snuffed out the cigarette on his palm and tossed it to the floor. “How was the view?”
“Wasn’t pretty.”
“Few are.”
The others stepped outside first. Roman was halfway through the doorway when the cobbler raised his voice enough to be heard. “Bunch of muties, the lot of you. I hope your—”
Roman stepped back inside. The cobbler’s expression quickly switched from irritation to panic. Roman was tempted to grab the miniature hammer out of his hands and see how effective it would be on a skull rather than a shoe. Instead, he strolled over to the nearest table and, after a brief search, selected a pair of boots that looked roughly the right size for him.
“I’m taking these,” he announced.
It was petty, he knew that. But the look of indignation on the cobbler’s face was worth it.
An hour later, when Ruby headed back towards Reformation Square, she had her bow strung over one shoulder and a length of rope coiled around the other. A quiver of arrows was strapped to her back, as well as her usual quiver on her hip. Beside her, Caleb had his pistol in his coat, a machete hanging from his belt, and a half dozen knives hidden amongst the rest of him. Ruby wasn’t sure that they were ready for what they were about to do, but at least they were armed for it.
They approached the tower she had marked; a back entrance allowed them entry without being seen from the militia guarding the square. The bottom floor was an upper-class pub, almost entirely devoid of customers. Behind a well-polished bar, a dark-skinned man took one look at them and scowled. His hand reached beneath the bar.
“We’re not here for trouble, love.” Ruby held out her hands in a non-threatening gesture. “The Captain’s hired us. We’re meant to keep a lookout from upstairs.”
The barman paused, eyes narrowed, then he shrugged and withdrew his hand. “The first six floors are rented space, the rest are empty and I wouldn’t trust them if I were you,” he said, motioning to a set of stairs behind the bar. “If you ruin anything, you can explain to the Captain that she’s fucking paying for it.”
“I’ll pass the message on.”
Ruby led the way to the fifth floor. “This’ll be high enough,” she said.
Caleb stepped past her and drew his machete. The main space of the floor was taken up by a large room, bare except for a couple desks, an overturned steel cabinet, and a pile of broken glass swept into one corner. Along two walls were a dozen windows, where the morning light streamed in. The other two had a handful of closed doors. Caleb kicked the first door open. “Get the fuck outta here. The Captain’s orders.”
“I wasn’t told anything about—”
“I’m telling you now. Fuck off.”
A man with a thin goatee, clutching a stack of papers, stormed from the room. If he had any further comments, he thought better of them when Caleb raised his machete meaningfully. He quickly disappeared down the stairs. While Caleb cleared the rest of the rooms, Ruby moved to the window and looked down at Reformation Square.
It was as good a vantage point as she could have hoped for, all things considered. The Ministry of Agriculture blocked half the square from her view, but there were still plenty of targets to choose from. Ruby’s hand twitched towards her quiver. Now that she was here, she was eager to get started.
Caleb moved upstairs, clearing out that level as well. Ruby spared a thought for the militia down in the square. More than a few would have her arrows through their necks soon enough. How many of them knew what Juliette was doing beneath the Ministry — what they would be dying to defend? Probably only a handful. Ruby had been a militia just like them. Would she have deserved to die for serving Juliette?
Probably not. But Tan didn’t deserve what he got, and Candle didn’t deserve to be locked down there, tortured just so the Captain can keep the lights on. We don’t get what we deserve. We get what we get. Simple as that.
Caleb returned with the last of the inhabitants of the building, who cursed loudly as they left. No doubt more than a few would go to the militia and complain. That would raise suspicions. But Ruby planned to announce her presence first — and shooting someone would raise a hell of a lot more than just suspicions.
Caleb moved to one end of the steel cabinet. “Give me a hand?”
Together they pushed the cabinet until it blocked the bottom half of the door to the stairs. Ruby winced as the effort hurt her injured hand.
“You reckon you can still aim straight?” Caleb asked.
“I don’t miss, remember?”
As Caleb began moving the two broken desks to their makeshift barricade, Ruby stepped inside the room closest to the stairs. It was bare except for a desk covered in papers, and a chair. She briefly glanced down from the rooms single window. It was a long way to the ground, but the rope would be long enough. Hopefully.
Caleb stepped into the room, cigarette in his lips, as Ruby was finishing knotting one end of the rope around a desk leg. “Once we get down, I’m heading straight to the Ministry,” he said. “I don’t like the idea of being left out of the action.”