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“Oh, Wylan,” said Nina, peering through the half-open door of her room at the Sweet Shop. “Again?”
“It’s not as if I do it on purpose,” Wylan muttered through his swelling lip, as she opened the door fully and hauled him inside. He took his coat off and hung it up on the back of the door, resolving not to get mud and blood all over Nina’s furniture. It was a cheap bit of Barrel flash, a horrible pink and green paisley number. He couldn’t imagine someone who would actually want to wear it, or indeed like it, but it had been affordable. “Can you put teeth back in?”
Nina sighed, propelling him to sit on a shiny green couch. “Yes. Sit there.”
“I found the broken bit of it,” said Wylan, proffering a scrap of bloodied white. Nina rolled her eyes and took it from him. She was still wearing her kefta; she must have just come off shift. Wylan knew she hated it, and he didn’t blame her. He’d seen real Ravkan Second Army keftas, once. They were nothing like this cheap copy.
“What happened this time?” she said, crouching to forge his front tooth back together. Wylan waited until her hand had retreated from his throbbing mouth, then said:
“I got jumped on the way out of the Club Cumulus job. It all went off without a hitch, apart from that— but a few Liddies grunts were out on the patrol. One had brass knuckles.”
Nina hissed.
“Surprised you don’t look worse.”
Wylan shrugged, wiping his bloodied nose on the back of his hand. Nina’s hands came to pinch the bridge of his nose, then went to his jaw.
“I was still packing a few flash bombs,” he said. “Turns out detonating one at close quarters has some… interesting effects.”
“Will they ever see again?” snorted Nina.
“Doubtful.”
“At least you’ll live to build demo another day.” said Nina, seeing to his cracked rib and bruised temple.
“Leave a few bruises on me, at least,” said Wylan, watching her work.
“I’m sure I don’t understand why you want to look like a thug.”
Because then I don’t look like Wylan Van Eck, Wylan thought. But Nina looked tired, too; she’d probably been at this all day. He said:
“Bit of a waste of your power. They’ll heal on their own.”
Nina smiled ruefully and chucked him under the chin, semi-ironically.
“Using the power is what Rollins employs me for, Wylan.”
She rose and planted her hands on her impressive hips to survey her work. Her roots were starting to show, again; she'd have to re-tailor her hair soon, to keep the red that the Sweet Shop demanded.
“Oh, you’ll be fine. And you have two front teeth again.”
“A standard I aspire to,” said Wylan wearily. She grinned and wandered off to the gaudy gold drinks cabinet that all the rooms in the Sweet Shop hosted.
“Gin? Rum?”
“Anything,” said Wylan. Nina shrugged and poured him a generous measure of spiced rum.
“Did you get the raise?” said Wylan, accepting it gratefully. Nina worked at the Sweet Shop as a Tailor and Heartrender exclusively— meddling with moods, altering appearances, lowering pulses and blood pressure. As such, she was in unbelievably high demand; Wylan had been sent diving around the corner several times, to avoid the eye of one of his father’s old merch friends. They tended to scuttle up the private dock at the back, dressed in the Komedie Brute costumes— loath to be recognised going into a Barrel brothel, but Wylan knew most of their voices. They came for treatments for stress, for grief, for illness, insecurity, perceived weakness— anything to avoid profits plummeting. Wylan could only imagine how much kruge Rollins must have been making from Nina’s work.
“Rollins hasn’t decided yet, apparently,” said Nina thinly, sitting down with her own glass and shucking off her cheap kefta, to reveal just a corset and a slip under it. Once, Wylan might have been embarrassed. Now, he just shook his head.
“After you removed that growth from Radmakker’s stomach? You saved his life.”
“It was nasty. Some of the worst fates are the ones you grow yourself, in my experience.”
“You should have gotten a King’s ransom, for stabilising the Merchant Council.”
“I’m sure someone got a King’s ransom,” grumbled Nina. “But I haven’t seen a single corner of it. Not that I really care for the money.”
“Do you not?”
“...well,” said Nina. “If I didn’t have the contract, I wouldn’t.”
A brief pause. Then Wylan said:
"You have to know he can't get him out, Nina."
"He can," said Nina darkly.
"Yes, but he won't," Wylan said.
"But he can. He's the only man in Ketterdam who can. I just need to find a way to convince him."
Wylan sat back on the squeaky, sweaty leather couch. He liked Nina. He really did. She was perhaps the only person in this place he'd consider a friend, though plenty would have thought they were his friends.
“It would have to work for him,” he said. “Benefit him in some way. You know how this city works. You need to find a reason for him to spring Matthias.”
“And what could I tell him? That a Fjerdan drüskelle will make a perfect bouncer for his clubs?”
“Well, he might. If he was a soldier—”
“Matthias would never do something like that,” said Nina sadly. “He’d think it was immoral. He’d refuse. He’ll want nothing to do with the gangs.”
“Nina, I’m trying to find some kind of angle.”
“Unless Rollins starts negotiations with Fjerdans, or gets a head injury that makes him stunningly benevolent, I doubt he’s ever going to find worth in setting Matthias free,” murmured Nina. “I don’t know why I ever believed him.”
Wylan did. Because of the Hellshow; because Rollins had dangled his unique influence at Hellgate in front of Nina, and Nina had taken the bait. Why wouldn’t she? How could she have known the gamble wouldn’t pay off? A Ravkan Second Army deserter, alone in a strange city, with no other offers and the constant threat of slavers or forced indentures. Of course she’d taken protection and a chance at getting Matthias out, however slim, over risking her own neck on the streets.
She sat back tiredly. “And even if I could get him out, what could I do? My contract here is not exactly going to be up soon.”
“I thought you said you’ve been getting tips from the merchers.”
“I have, but Rollins only lets me have them because I need them to maintain my tailoring kit. They’re not going towards my contract. That’s why I asked for the raise.”
“Then that’s exactly why he won’t give it to you,” said Wylan.
“I could stop seeing clients,” said Nina uncertainly. “Strike until he gives it to me…”
“Is that safe?” said Wylan sceptically. “Or will Doughty and Eamon burst through the door and beat you until you say you want to work again?”
“Nothing’s safe, here,” muttered Nina. “Or in any of the brothels, at that. But I’m better built to defend myself than some of the poor things who are beaten or strangled by clients or enforcers. Or who simply waste away. Didn’t you hear that there've been three deaths on West Stave in the last six months? One at the White Rose, one at the Anvil, and one at the Menagerie. I went and lit candles at the church for all of them. Felt like the least I could do.”
Wylan rubbed his newly-healed face. More deaths. More suffering. The Barrel glutted itself on it. The whole of Ketterdam did.He had never been truly religious; his father had long considered him a curse from Ghezen, and so Wylan had inevitably shrunk away from Ghezen, from the whole operation. But now he sent up a quick prayer for them anyway. Nina was right— there was no safe, not in the Barrel. There were those alive, and there were those dead. That was it.
Someone hammered on the door, and Nina got up to investigate, slipping on a horrid emerald robe as she did so. It clashed with the artificial red of her hair dreadfully.
“Doughty,” she said, cracking the door open on the chain. “What business?”
“You got Hendriks in there?”
“Just finishing up,” said Nina, opening the door a bit further and gesturing to Wylan, who stared, unimpressed, at Rollins’ bouncer.
“We’ve got a new job for you, boy,” said Doughty. He glanced at Nina. “You too, Heartrender.”
Nina couldn’t really negotiate— she was Dime Lions, and she did what Pekka said. But Wylan said, not bothering to get up:
“What is it?”
“Bank job. Need a Heartrender to take the guards out, and we need you to get through the metal vault.”
Didn’t Rollins have enough money? What did he need to rob a bank for? It had to be a warning shot. Or a punishment.
"Then I want my cut now," Wylan said. “In cash.”
“Can you do it?”
“Of course I can do it,” said Wylan pertly. “And you know that too, or else you wouldn’t have come to find me. Payment. Upfront.”
"You'll get a cheque in a few days," said Doughty, unimpressed. Wylan leant forward, his elbows on his knees so both of his forearms were visible. Both of his bare forearms.
"In cash; now."
The Dime Lions had been full-on courting him for weeks, at this point. Rollins knew, as everyone knew, that Wylan was the best demo man working. But half the gangs in the Barrel wanted him, and Wylan hadn’t really decided if he was interested or not. He’d run with the Dime Lions on and off for the past few months, and frequently came to see Nina for the resulting injuries, or met her for drinks in various dreadful alehouses. Perhaps Rollins assumed he would join up soon. Or perhaps not.
“That's not how this works, lad. You ain’t Dime Lions yet.”
"Do you think I'm running a charity?" said Wylan. "Do you think all those chemicals come free? If you want to do that job without me— that's fine. But if you withold that money, Rollins will have to use it anyway; to bail you out of jail when the stadwatch grunts catch you with a fucking circular saw at the vault."
“We can get someone else.”
“No, you can’t,” said Wylan. “The city’s running low on the required acid for the job at the moment. There’s production problems. But as luck would have it, I have a lot of the remaining stock.”
“How’s that?” said Doughty. “Divine foresight? Insider trading?”
“I put a firebomb through the distillery’s window,” said Wylan calmly. “Just to make sure I stayed exclusive. They won’t be producing any more for a while.”
There was a brief pause. Doughty was eyeing him with the look Wylan liked to call You? Really?, in which classic Barrel cynicisms went to war. Anyone could do anything in this wretched warren of streets… but really? Ruddy-cheeked Wylan Hendriks? They were used to Barrel thugs with a bit more… heft.
“I heard about a fire down that way,” volunteered Eamon.
After a moment, the men turned to each other in mumbled consultation. While they were distracted, Nina shot Wylan a dubious look. Wylan ignored it for the moment.
Eventually, Doughty turned back, scowling. There was some fumbling, and a wedge of kruge was produced. Wylan took it and counted it briskly, not breaking eye contact, feeling for the little ridges on the end which indicated the number.
“Pleasure doing business with you, gentlemen,” he said. “Where and when?”
As Wylan trudged home with his kruge tucked securely into his inside pocket, he did the calculation mentally. Three more big jobs, and he’d be on the first browboat to Zierfoort or Belendt or Lij that he could find. He didn’t have much love for playing Barrel thug, but it was necessary. That was all this was; a means to an end. He didn’t truly need a gang, and he didn’t want one. Once he’d done a few more jobs for assorted bosses, he could vanish, exactly like his father had always wanted him to.
Wylan slipped down side alleys and canals, trying to keep his footing on the damp, mildewed cobbles. As usual, the Barrel roared; the eternally hungry monster, trying to glut itself on anything that its denizens could give it. It rattled like a percussionist; bags of kruge, sprays of fireworks, the occasional gunfire, screams, cheers, loud music. The eternal carnival, trying to spirit away the horrors that lurked underneath it like a cheap stave magician sweeping handkerchiefs over rabbits or doves.
It wasn’t a good magician. Tonight, its brutality was barely concealed at all— it was a commotion in an alley next to the Gold Strike, stadwatch cordons and clumps of dithering pedestrians blocking the road. When Wylan passed, there were a few bodies covered in sheets being loaded into the back of a wagon, and the floor boss was arguing with a stadwatch officer on the steps. Blood ran in little rivulets down the cobbles, and bullet casings clinked under people's feet. A debtor’s brawl gone too far, if Wylan was any judge. At least the poor bastard, or bastards, hadn’t gone down without a fight.
It wasn’t at all uncommon in the Barrel, but Wylan touched the brim of his hat in respect for the dead anyway. He didn’t know why he bothered, sometimes— he spent half his life doing it. But he felt it was wrong to act as if it was normal. They’d all been people, with families, or with hopes, or just wanting to live.
Just like he wanted to. He’d had a hundred run-ins with thugs and thieves in the Barrel— dunked in canals, mugged for what pennies he had, beaten and left bleeding in alleys for no reason at all. And he’d always gotten back up, dusted himself off, and bounced back. He wasn’t even sure what for; he was just certain that life owed him something a little more than perpetual misery. He’d get out. He’d preserve what dignity and decency he had left. And he’d start fresh.
Soon, he told himself. Soon.
He avoided Zovercanal, so he’d not have to pass the burnt shell of the distillery. He had made sure there was no one in there before he’d put the glass through the window; it had been done carefully, which wasn’t something he could say about all his demo jobs, but he had only meddled with the distillery equipment. He needed first dibs on big jobs like those; they paid the money that would get him out of the Barrel. No one at the distillery would die, and everyone could keep their jobs in a few weeks, once it was back up and running. It was a weak justification, but at least he’d tried to be somewhat fair about it. Wylan’s long-term security, for a short inconvenience and some money lost…
Or so he told himself, anyway.
He went down a filthy side alley, whistling a half-formed idea of a tune to himself. He wouldn’t get jumped tonight; not dressed in singed and ripped Barrel flash and whistling an aria. He’d look mad, and bruisers didn’t like to get too close to madness. Perhaps he was mad. Perhaps his brain was doing him a favour, and shielding him from the constant paranoia and anxiety with the beautiful veil of insanity. Maybe he’d be happier if that was the case.
He came out next to one of the major canals and shunted through the back door of the house he rented the attic room of, barging it with his hip to stop it sticking. There was no one in, which wasn’t surprising. Everyone would be out— either working, or sampling the Barrel’s entertainments. The landlord turned up every month at midday to collect rent, and didn't leave until he had everyone’s.
Wylan trudged up the creaky stairs and went into his tiny attic room, locking the door firmly behind him. He knelt down and pried up the loose floorboard under which he kept his strongbox, and counted the kruge into it. All he had to do was hold on a little longer.
Wylan sighed and sat back on his haunches for a minute— then got up to rifle through his food stores. He’d get a proper breakfast at the Emerald Palace before he went on the job tomorrow, but for now he’d subsist on stale crackers and dried fruit.
He sat down on his sagging bed and listened to the clamour next door as he chewed— arguing and hasty walking and random errands being run, all from the safehouse of some minor penny gang. Their boss was a grizzled middle-aged man with the distinct air of the lazy and complacent about him. They’d need a shake-up to survive, but it certainly wouldn’t come from him. They’d never bothered Wylan; he didn’t even know what they were called. Perhaps it was because they were so busy trying to make ends meet— or because they knew he was Dime Lions affiliated, and no one wanted to be seen trying to poach from Pekka Rollins.
The arguing turned into full-blown shouting, and there was the crash of something being overturned. Wylan winced. It wasn’t usually so loud, up here. The sound only came from the lower floors; if they had an attic, it was uninhabited. Probably storage, or fallen through.
Wylan unlaced his boots and lay back on the mattress, trying to think through the rest of the aria. Maybe some drums…
The crows that lived on all the rooftops were calling, their talons clicking on the roof slates. Wylan didn’t mind the noise too much. They were just birds, and they were just as entitled to filthy, miserable Ketterdam as anything else. Truth be told, he didn’t mind the company.
The bank job went as well as any bank job could— which was to say, they got out late, and ran for ten streets before they could be sure they hadn’t been followed.
They staggered back to the Emerald Palace once darkness fell, and they could creep out of the safehouse near the Exchange they’d holed up in. Nina was in decent spirits, pleased to have been sent out of the Sweet Shop on a real job for once, and they’d been paired with a few other low-level Dime Lions who were nowhere near as irritating as Doughty or Eamon.
“You never know,” Nina said as they went up the steps to the towering green facade. “Maybe if I keep being needed for jobs like this, my shifts at the Sweet Shop will drop off…”
“I guess it depends where Rollins can make more money,” sighed Wylan, as they peeled off from the others and went up the stairs to deliver the report— and the money— to whoever was around for it.
“Isn’t that always the way?” said Nina glumly.
As it happened, Rollins himself was around when they reached the top floor; just coming out of his office, shaking hands with a masked man who had an air of merchant about him. Wylan paused, half-concealed around the corner, wondering if he needed to escape a familiar face. Nina waited behind him, twiddling her thumbs—
Wylan caught sight of the eye through the mask, and froze.
He knew it immediately— because it was identical to his. More creased around the corners, admittedly— but still, the same eyes. Identical to his…
Because this was the man that had handed them down to him.
It was Jan Van Eck.
Wylan ducked behind the corner, head pounding. Rollins was dealing with his father. Rollins was linked to Van Eck, and Wylan was running with Rollins’ gang. Either Wylan fled, or he severed Pekka’s influence over him.
“Wylan?” said Nina, but he was already brushing past her and staggering down the hall. “What’s the matter?”
She bundled him into a supply closet when he appeared completely incapable of speech, and got father— here— out of him before she had to drop his heart rate for him. Wylan pitched forward, head in his hands.
“My father,” he said hoarsely, once he could force his clenched jaw open. “That was my father.”
Nina was the only person who he’d told about his real identity. It was a laughable turn of phrase— as if he was some vigilante, or else a prince in hiding— but what else was he meant to say? He’d been pretending to be a Belendt runaway for months. At first, she’d laughed incredulously, and he didn’t blame her— but then he’d told her about Miggson and Prior, and she’d gone quiet. He trusted her not to spread it; she’d trusted him with the truth about Matthias, so he’d thought it was only fair. Two miserable runaways, struggling to escape the Barrel. It was nice to have someone to commiserate with, on occasion, but sometimes he was sure Nina was far braver than he had ever been. She said repeatedly she’d take the perjury charges, if only it would get her out of her contract and Matthias freed. All Wylan had done was jump into the canal, and he had scrabbled about to survive ever since.
“Van Eck? What the hell is he doing here?”
“I don’t know— I don’t know—”
“Hey, look—” Nina gripped his hands tightly. “It’s fine. We’ll work something out, maybe it’s not connected to you—”
“Is that any better?” said Wylan desperately. Nina hesitated.
“Well— fine, it’s shitty all the way down. But you might not be in… active danger.”
That was true, at least. But it was terrible luck. Awful luck. But there was no luck, not here; only the manufactured gambling hall sort, and even then, no one was giving that to Wylan.
Wylan took a huge gulp of breath, then sat back, pressing his hands to his eyes.
“Okay,” he said. “Okay. Alright. Fine. My father. Why not! Hell!”
“That’s the spirit,” said Nina. “Cavalier acceptance of a terrible fate. Wylan, we’ll make a Barrel boy of you yet…”
“We still have to take the report to Rollins. And the money.” said Wylan, digging his knuckles into his knees. “We might be able to guess what he was there for— or Rollins might even say. We’ll pretend like nothing’s wrong.”
“I can take it,” said Nina.
“No,” said Wylan. “No, I want to go...”
At any rate, it was pointless; within two minutes of them emerging to find Rollins, Doughty had come up to them.
“Boss wants you, Hendriks.” He spied Nina hovering. “ Just Hendriks.”
Nina shot him a panicked glance, but what could they do? Wylan hefted the cash they’d lifted in clammy hands.
“Sure,” he said, projecting a certainty he’d never felt less of, and followed Doughty up the stairs to Rollin’s plush green office. It was an ugly room, flash and gaudy in a way that screamed Barrel. It had an air about it that made Wylan uncomfortable, as well— a sort of oppressive ostentatiousness. Lions roared from every carving and painting and piece of embroidery. It looked like being stalked by big cats in a forest— which might have been funny, if it hadn’t been so accurate to the feeling of being in Rollins’ presence.
“Sit down, my lad.” said Rollins, the second he came in. Wylan sat uncomfortably down in a green leather chair and stared at the polished floor. “Ah, is that the bank job stash?”
“Yes, sir.” Wylan handed the bags over. Rollins immediately handed it to Eamon to count, rifling through papers on his desk.
“Looks about right,” he said, despite having barely glanced at it. “Good work from your team...”
A whole bank robbery, and he barely blinked. He must have been unbelievably rich.
“Couldn't have done it without Nina taking out the guards, sir,” said Wylan, staring straight ahead.
“Miss Zenik certainly is a good asset,” said Rollins distractedly. “Now, do you—” he looked up and spied Wylan’s clammy face. “Ah. Grapevine works that fast, does it?”
“What did he want?” said Wylan, tense-jawed.
Rollins sighed, shuffling papers. He was a good actor, Wylan had always thought. He was good at adapting, being exactly what you wanted to see at that current moment. You didn’t get this high up in the Barrel by being a stupid brute. Rollins was clever, and it made him powerful.
But how clever? Wylan thought distantly. Everyone had a weakness. A bit of shame, a bit of fear. What was Rollins’s?
“I don’t think you want to know, if I’m honest,” said Pekka, face solemn.
“Tell me,” said Wylan, and quickly modulated his tone when it came out too harsh: “I promise I can handle it.”
Rollins sighed.
“Well, a variety of things— but chief amongst them, was the fact that he knows we’re trying to get you on side. He was… concerned, to think that his son was being recruited into the gang that runs the Barrel.”
“What should he care?” said Wylan tightly. “He was happy enough to see me disappear before.”
“Ah, yes,” said Rollins. “Well, as I’m sure you know, men like your father take a… dim view of the Barrel. They think they’re so much better than us… so much more moral. They’re not, of course— else he never would have come to a Barrel gambling palace to try and strike a deal with a mobster in the first place. But I suppose he thinks death or suffering are better options than the Barrel. Hah! But men like you and me… we know how important it is to live. To have a future. To profit from our struggle.”
Wylan said nothing. Pekka went on:
“Honestly, lad, I think he was trying to intimidate me. He expressed his
concern
in lots of different ways. Money. Veiled threats. Offers of influence. But I sure as hell won’t ever be cowed by some mercher from up the Geldcanal who’s never learned how to slum it.”
When had Pekka last slummed it, Wylan wondered? Sitting in these plush apartments over the Emerald Palace, never going on jobs, never taking a punch? Was it
his
struggle, he was profiting from?
Rollins leant forward and set a heavily beringed hand on Wylan’s shoulder.
“Listen to me, Wylan. I’m on your side, my lad. I know that he tried to have you killed— I even know which men he hired to do it. What sort of father would kill off his own son, eh? I like to think I have some standards, and he’s stooped lower than them all. A bad business— very bad. But if you join up— I can give you protection, lad. I could make Miggson and Prior disappear forever, believe me. You know I can.”
Wylan stared at him, brain ticking over so fast that he felt almost dizzy. It would be so easy to believe him. It wasn’t just the fatherly act, or the knowledge that Pekka certainly could afford him protection, get rid of Miggson and Prior; it was certainly the sort of thing that Jan Van Eck would do. Clutch his pearls over his son dirtying his hands in the Barrel, when the idea of leaving him at the bottom of the canal had barely been a stain on his cloth. And Rollins’ offer of protection… yes, it was tempting. Incredibly so.
But a little part of him, a tiny part, said: it wasn’t about me.
The meeting had not been about him. He knew it hadn’t been. Whatever Van Eck and Pekka Rollins had discussed, Wylan had been at best, an aside. The Barrel was the perfect place for Wylan to disappear. It was only a step above death. If he became Wylan Hendriks, Dime Lions demo man, then Wylan Van Eck, merch son, would disappear forever.
As long as it takes for people to forget I had a son. Why would Van Eck remind anyone? Especially Pekka Rollins? Wylan was doing a perfectly good job of vanishing on his own.
Wylan looked up into Rollins’ kindly stare, and knew he was being lied to. What did Rollins really want him for? Was it the demo? Or was it to use him as a bargaining chip against Van Eck? He wouldn’t get far, if that was the case. Or did he want intel about mercher operations—
“Oh— and I do know about your… affliction.”
Wylan recoiled. Rollins smiled sympathetically, patting him hard on the arm.
“Never mind, eh, lad? I have plenty of illiterate penny-poor boys working my halls. I’m sure with time, we can get it fixed. Or even if we can’t, I’ll keep quiet— I promise you that. I won’t shame you, not when you can be useful in lots of other ways. Someone can read out the labels on your bottles. That is, if you choose to join up, eh?”
He chuckled. Wylan smiled queasily, but he felt sick and rattled. I won’t shame you. Was he meant to be grateful? Was he meant to thank the tyrant King of the Barrel for that lowest of courtesies?
Not for the first time, Wylan wanted honesty. He wanted real, cruel honesty, not wicked half-truths and lies told through a smiling mask. The Barrel was brutal, but it draped its brutality in expensive tablecloths and garish flash, as if bright colours and loud cheers fixed everything. Wylan would have respected Rollins far more if he’d been upfront. Why couldn’t people just be honest?
He said:
“Sir— I think I’d like a day to think about it. Just one, please. And then I’ll give you my answer tomorrow.”
Rollins smiled.
“Never lose those merch boy manners, Mister… Hendriks. They do you credit. Tomorrow, then. I hope you choose wisely.”
He winked, and Doughty and Eamon saw Wylan out.
Wylan sat in the pub which dominated the second floor of the Emerald Palace, and stared at the wall— considering, weighing up. One glance around the room, and you knew the mood was grim; people muttered in twos and threes over pints, and frequently threw dubious looks at the guarded door that led to Pekka’s apartments. No one was meant to know that Pekka had been taking meetings with merchants, which of course meant that everyone knew. And no one liked it, either. It felt like a betrayal. It was a betrayal.
A gaggle of Dime Lions came stomping up the stairs, clearly back from shifts or jobs. Bente saw him and came over to him, looking weary and sporting a nice black eye. She was a bruiser, and a good one too; no one suspected the girl with the uneven plaits of landing a wicked punch until it was far too late. She tied one plait with a red ribbon and the other with string— possibly to play into the messy Barrel flash fashions. Wylan liked her; she was a terrible cynic, but she was nice to him, and had defended him in a bar fight a few months ago.
“That looks nasty,” he said, as she slid into the booth.
“Not so bad as it looks,” said Bente. “Still here? Decided, yet?”
“Giving Rollins my answer tomorrow.”
Bente nodded slowly, then turned to order a pint as the barmaid came over. Her eyes were narrowed a bit— she looked to Wylan as if she had something to say.
“I wouldn’t mind your advice,” Wylan said, once the barmaid had gone. People talked to Wylan. That was his real power. People drunk, people guilty, people miserable. He had a sweet face, a face that invited people to spill their guts; usually figuratively, though occasionally literally, with the drunks. He didn’t trust anyone enough to consider them his friends, except maybe Nina, but people liked him. It had proven useful a few times, when drunken confessions had come back to bite people, and Wylan had remembered exactly what they’d said, and when they’d said it. He liked to think it could continue to be useful...
Bente waited for her pint to come, before she said anything. Then she said:
“Do you ever feel guilty, Wylan? For the jobs?”
Yes, thought Wylan.
"Sometimes,” he said. He suspected whatever he said, Bente would keep talking. And she did:
"Back when I was a kid, new to the Dime Lions... I did a con with Pekka and Susanna. And Bram."
"Oh?" Wylan vaguely knew the names— Susanna was a middle-aged woman who’d been in the gang for years, usually working as a card dealer on the tables. Bram ran monte games and small-scale swindles out front, or near Kelstraat.
"We were running game on a couple different people at once. Fake identities, the whole shebang… but my job was mostly to remember my fake name and look cute.” She shook her head, tugging on her pigtail, the one without the ribbon. “Typical investment scam,” she said. “But we wrung money out of some real vulnerable people, Wylan. Desperate old widows. Orphan kids too young to know any better. And yes, I was too young to know any better… but I still did it. We scammed people out of house and home. Every bit of money we could. And at the end of the week, Rollins divvied up our pay, laughed, said we’d had a good week, and that was it. It didn’t hit me until I was older, quite what we’d done. But when it did…”
She trailed off. Wylan sat back, picking distractedly at the dirt under his nails. He had known, vaguely, that Rollins pulled scams of that sort— but he’d thought, probably naively, that they were on businessmen. Not on the elderly. Not on kids.
But was he surprised? He couldn’t be. Not really. Rollins played at being a benevolent paterfamilias to a big crime family, but he threatened kids, kept couples apart, preyed on the vulnerable. And he wasn’t even honest about it. There was no subtlety to demo; Wylan just blew a door, or a house, or cracked a safe. But Rollins would tell any lie and do any piece of underhand dealing, if it meant profit. He’d throw kids to the wolves if it got him a quick stack of kruge, f it secured his empire. He wasn’t scraping to survive; he was profiting, and he was enjoying it. Rollins was, Wylan realised, exactly like Jan Van Eck. Which was no doubt why they were working together.
Later, Wylan would never be entirely sure of what had spurred him on that night. What had given him the creeping certainty? What had given him the nerve? He would probably never know. But at the time, all he'd thought was:
He has to go down.
Repeatedly, the thought came; he needs to go down. He has to.
He didn’t know what Pekka Rollins and Jan Van Eck were planning. Maybe they would come to no agreement at all. But any kind of relationship between the two could be of no benefit to Wylan. How could it? There was no scenario in which Wylan survived intact.
“Are you trying to tell me not to join up?” he said, slowly.
“Wylan, do whatever the hell you want,” said Bente heavily. “But I just know the people we scammed are dead. I just know it. It was barely two weeks before the Queen's Lady hit."
"Some might have survived," said Wylan, but he knew there was hardly a chance. No one who had been on the streets would have survived. He’d seen the packed bodyboats before he’d been hustled off to the country.
"If they had, I'd know." Bente leant forward on the tabletop. "So now I only do clean fights and brawls. Nothing underhand. I can’t shirk on my contract, and I wouldn’t want to. I’ve got food, a bed, and a roof over my head at night. But I still think about the house on the Zelverstraat, and the way Rollins acted like scamming kids out of pennies was some kind of big triumph."
In his first days in the Barrel, Wylan had wished for some kind of hero; someone to protect him, to do what he couldn’t, to sweep him out of the screaming streets of the pleasure districts and deliver him somewhere safer, kinder. He knew now he had no hero. He had to make his own choices. No one was going to shield him from the truly ugly work.
And if Rollins was willing to scam kids, then he was certainly willing to work with merchers like Van Eck. He wouldn’t care if his gang thought it was betrayal; he knew they’d shut up and sing, when the payment came in. He had preached to Wylan about his standards, but Wylan was certain he had none— or if he did, they were very mangled indeed.
“What’d I miss?” Nina came mincing over to them with a huge gin and tonic, and installed herself next to Bente. “Hiya, gorgeous.”
Bente smiled, but it was half-hearted. “Wylan’s deciding tomorrow,” she said.
Nina shot him a sharp glance, mirth fading. “Is that so?”
“It is,” said Wylan.
“What did he say?” said Nina.
“Nothing much,” said Wylan. “Pleased with the bank job. Offered me… protection, and said he was on my side.”
“Bet he did,” muttered Nina, stirring her straw about in her glass.
“So he really wants you to join?” said Bente. Wylan shot Nina a quick glance.
“Seems that way.”
“Hmm,” said Nina, mouth pressed tight. She was obviously coming to the same conclusions as Wylan. “And what are you going to—”
Before she could finish, Doughty and Eamon appeared at the door at the far end, heavily armed… and escorting a kid.
Wylan blinked. Doughty was holding the hand of a little red-headed boy, tottering along without a care in the world, chattering incessantly to Eamon. He had a stuffed lion tucked under his arm. It was almost comedic, seeing two of Pekka’s top grunts entertaining a child.
“Well, well,” said Nina softly.
“What’s that meant to mean?” whispered Wylan— then got his answer, when, at the door to Pekka’s apartments, they handed him over to Pekka. Rollins swept the kid up and chucked him under the chin, and went up the stairs with him, his bouncers following.
Wylan waited until the door had shut, then said:
“That’s not…”
“Oh yes, it is,” said Nina wryly. “Heard about it at the Sweet Shop. He’s the son of one of the girls there, one that Pekka took a fancy to. He promised her she’d be the King of the Barrel’s mistress, then tossed her aside the second he was bored of her, and now she’s back to work as usual. Very salacious. Very amoral. I’d expect nothing better. But the kid… well. Heard of the new gambling hall opening on the Lid? The Kaelish Prince? The King of the Barrel’s got his heir to the throne.”
Exactly like Jan Van Eck, Wylan realised. He wondered vaguely if Alys had had her baby yet. It had to be soon, if she hadn’t.
As long as it takes people to forget I had a son.
“And he’s just parading him around like that?” said Bente, who had clearly never seen the kid before either. Nina shrugged.
“In front of Dime Lions? No one here’s going to do a thing to put him in danger. Not if they like life. Mutiny in the Dime Lions is… practically unheard of.”
Her fists had clenched under the table, and Wylan looked questioningly at her.
“Ensuring we can’t be overheard,” she said lightly. “The people around us are having a little bout of tinnitus… or they’re about to have something else to worry about.”
Wylan heard the sounds of someone throwing up behind him.
“Ah.”
Nina winked.
“Practically unheard of?” said Bente thinly. Wylan wasn’t entirely sure if he could trust her, but she’d come to him with this unprompted, even knowing that either of them could snitch to Rollins. There was backbone, and there was decency. You didn’t come across a lot of either, in these parts. Now, Bente was looking at Wylan, eyes flinty and strange.
"Reckon the way things are run around here could do with a change,” she said.
“I think you could be right,” said Wylan.
“Reckon it’s one rule for Rollins and another for the rest of us… reckon it’s alright when it’s other people’s kids…”
Wylan looked thoughtfully over at the closed door.
“He needs to go,” said Nina darkly. “I’ll never get to Matthias while he’s still the boss. We’ll never get out of our contracts.”
"Fathers and sons..." Wylan said vaguely. "Hah."
An idea was prodding at him. Half an idea. A scrap. Not a plan. And yet—
He tilted his head to the side, trying to visualise it. He let his eyes slide out of focus.
In his peripheral vision, Nina folded her arms.
"This better be good, Wylan."
"I think it can be," said Wylan, eyes still glued to some unknowable point. "I really think it can be."
“Matthias out of Hellgate good?”
“Well, it’s always nice to aim high,” said Wylan. “And I think we could do with some ex-millitary muscle.”
Nina laughed, but it had a hell of an edge. Bente cracked her knuckles on the table.
The next day, in Pekka Rollins’ office, he took the Dime Lions tattoo, and the oath.
It was like Nina said; some of the worst deaths were from the things that grew inside you.
All he needed was time.