The Broken Lands (36 page)

She leaned back against the windowsill and scratched her head. “All right. Let me think through how this will need to go. We take the letter frames to the bridge and mount the lances on the spikes. We string the letters across.” She turned to Sam. “How does that work?”

Sam turned to Constantine. “Con?”

The blond boy stretched in his chair. “I can get us up to the tower; that's no problem. Then the quickest way to hang the message will be just to go out and attach it to the cable. The men working on the cables use a thing called a buggy that hangs from—”

“Just a minute,” Sam interrupted. “I was thinking we could find some way to start up the spinning engines to drag the message across, rather than sending someone out onto the cable. Wouldn't that be safer?”

“Sure, it would be safer, but it's Sunday. There might be people there finishing projects, but there won't be anybody working the engines, and these aren't the sort of machines you can start up just by pulling a lever.”

“What's this buggy you mentioned?” Jin asked. “Why can't we do it that way?”

“I think Sam's concerned for your safety,” Constantine said.

Jin rolled her eyes. “Really? We have time to worry about that?” She looked to Susannah. “Tell them we don't have time to worry about that.”

Susannah shook her head. “We don't. Obviously.”

Sam threw his hands into the air, stalked to the corner of the room, and leaned against the wall.

“Thank you,” Susannah said. “Carry on, Jin.”

She nodded. “I took enough rockets to send up a thirty-second fanfare to get the attention of as many people as we can. Once I set the letters in place, we light the fuses from both towers. The way they're wired, the fuses will illuminate the letters more or less simultaneously, right around the time the fanfare ends.” She chewed on her thumbnail. “So that's the message portion of the plan, which I think seems under control.”

She looked to Susannah, but the fifth steward's eyes were on Constantine. “Before we move on, are you sure they're going to just let us up onto the towers?” Susannah asked. “Folks aren't that trusting, in my experience.”

“Well, people are allowed out on the footpath,” Constantine said. “And I know the workmen. I can talk my way to getting it done, I'm sure. I'll tell them some big bugs in the government are setting off fireworks for some kind of celebration.”

“I can imagine you talking your way past your old friends, and I can believe that nobody would bother telling the workers about something like fireworks,” Susannah agreed. “But if anybody's up there working on his day off, don't you think it's likely to be somebody in a higher position? Engineers, overseers?”

Constantine scowled. “I'm sure you're not questioning my ability to talk fast and in a convincing fashion.”

“I'm not, it's just—am I wrong?” She gestured around the room. “Furthermore, look at us. Honestly, Constantine,
look
.”

“She's right.” Mike spoke up. “Anybody in charge is going to laugh us out of town if we try to tell him we know something he doesn't, and it involves setting explosive charges anywhere near that bridge.”

Jin felt herself wilt. It was true, of course. Three girls, one white, one black, one Chinese—certainly no one could look more out of place. The boys were the only ones who might remotely seem like they belonged up there. But only
remotely,
and only because they were boys, and white.

Then she had an idea. “We need someone who can look upstanding and in charge, and who we can trust. We need an adult who can pass himself off as someone official.”

Sam scratched his head. “Mr. Burns, maybe? Tom Guyot and Walter Mapp don't look much more reputable than we do.”

Jin shook her head. “I don't want Mr. Burns up there. He's bad luck around fireworks. No offense,” she added quickly.

“None taken,” Mr. Burns replied.

“But I have a thought,” Jin continued. “Sam, do you have time to track someone down?”

“I suppose that depends on you. What do you need for the cinefaction?” Sam asked.

“A little more time to make sure I've got the formula right. Then I'll go back to Uncle Liao's laboratory.” Where, unless she was much mistaken, one—or maybe both—of Jack's henchmen would be waiting. “A few hours?”

He nodded. “I'll track your man down.”

“I have a question,” Mr. Burns interjected. “Jin, why are you still worrying about the message? If you perform the cinefaction, you won't need to keep them from being able to find Miss Asher. Our work will be done.”

Jin looked down at her hands. “In case the cinefaction doesn't work,” she said softly. “I'm afraid to give up the message. What if something goes wrong? What if . . .”

What if I'm reading this book wrong? What if Sam loses his bet? What if I'm not a conflagrationeer? What if . . . what if . . . what if . . .

“What if I can't do what you think I can do?” she said at last. “The message will be our backup plan.” She was very careful not to look at either Mr. Burns or Susannah.

Sam sighed. “I guess I'd better start figuring out how to pull off my part of this.”

“Which is what?” Constantine asked.

Sam's grin looked forced. “Nothing but cards, Con.”

“There's something else we need to do first.” Every head turned to Susannah. “It's time to replace the missing stewards,” she said. “Do you mind giving us the room?” she asked Mr. Burns.

“Not at all,” he said. “I'll go see about a cup of tea.”

“You need us to go get some folks for you?” Mike asked when he had gone.

Susannah shook her head. “We have everyone we need right here.”

A confused quiet fell over the room. “You don't mean
us?
” Sam protested.

“I do. Well,” she corrected herself, “except for Jin. I don't think it's important to have been born here, but even if we're only talking about temporary stewardships, it doesn't make sense to offer one to someone who doesn't
live
here.” Susannah glanced at Jin. “You understand, right?”

“Goodness, yes,” Jin said immediately. It would never have occurred to her that she could be a steward of the cities of New York and Brooklyn, and not living there was the least of the reasons why not.

They all had to be thinking it, but Ilana said it first. “But . . . but we're kids,” she said hesitantly.

“I know. But I've considered this carefully.” Susannah's face hardened. “After what Overcaste did . . . and what Sawyer did . . .” She swallowed. “They should've known better! They should have been stronger! And even Hawks and Van Ossinick, thinking that keeping one of us hidden away would make us all safer, when all it meant was that one of us was left unprepared . . . no,” she said, voice strong, “being an adult is not important now. Being the right person is. And I'm not going to offer this responsibility to someone I don't believe is right just because these are desperate times. We're going to find out now if I'm correct about you four. Are you willing to be considered?”

A stunned hush fell across the room as Susannah looked at each of them: Sam, Constantine, Ilana, and Mike. Jin held her breath. Then, one by one, each nodded silently.

“All right.” Susannah's words came with an exhale; she'd been holding her breath, too. “I need something from each of you, something that you love. It must be an object you're carrying with you right now.”

“What if they aren't carrying anything like that at this moment?” Jin whispered as the others began rifling through their pockets.

“If they are able to speak for the city,” Susannah replied quietly, “they will have something suitable.”

Ilana came forward first. In her hand she held a ring with two keys on it. She selected a tarnished one that had a tiny tag tied to its loop, and handed it to Susannah. “It's—”

“Don't tell me what it is,” Susannah interrupted. “Not yet. I need to see for myself.” She sank onto the sofa, gripped the armrest with one hand, and stared at the key in her other. When she spoke again, her voice was uneven. “You unlock a door at the top of a flight of stairs. I smell dust, old paper, the stuffing of sprung chairs, mice. You have put this key in the pocket of your apron. It stays there for many weeks while you prepare the room for your brothers.”

Jin looked at Ilana. The girl's eyes were wide. She nodded.

“It reminds you every day of doors that do not need to be locked,” the keeper of lore continued. She looked up at the dark-haired girl and searched her face. “It reminds you of home, and what it means.”

Ilana nodded again, her eyes shiny. Susannah handed the key back and squeezed her hand.

“You had brothers?” Sam stared at Ilana. “I'm so sorry, Illy. How did they . . . when did you lose them?” Behind him, Constantine wore an identical expression of concern.

Ilana turned to stare at him with such a look of disgust that Jin actually had to suppress a chuckle. “I didn't
lose
them,” the girl retorted.

Constantine frowned. “Well, you don't have any that you told
us
about.”

“The key,” Ilana said deliberately, “is from the
attic
. We were cleaning it out for
you
.”

“For your brothers,” Constantine repeated, surprised.

Ilana put the key back in her pocket and folded her arms. “I kept the key. I thought it was pretty. And then after a while—well, Susannah already said it. Of course I have brothers. Idiot.”

Constantine shook his head, put his arms around her, and squeezed her tight. She reached out for Sam and pulled him in, too.

Jin watched, a little sigh in her heart. Unlikely family, but family nonetheless. Just like hers.

“All right, all right,” Mike grumbled. He pushed himself away from the wall he'd been leaning against and crossed to where Susannah sat. “Tell me my fortune next.”

There was a small box in his hand, hinged on one side and fastened closed on the other. Susannah thumbed the latch and let the box fall open in her palm. Inside were a small coil of lamp wick, a flint and firesteel, a little glass vial of oil, and a folding knife.

“You are walking along a dark street,” she began after a moment. “It is narrow and crooked and the stones are irregular. The smells here are strong, sickening—there is a gutter full of rotting things. A small girl runs past you. She is barefoot, and she stubs a toe on the uneven cobblestones.”

Susannah shuddered. “When she falls, there is a horrible sound as her head hits the ground. You run to her. You have a clean pocket square—it is brand-new, just-bought yellow silk, and it reddens as you hold it to the cut on the crying girl's forehead. The man you have been walking with picks her up and tells you he will take her home. As he tucks her against his shoulder, he takes this box from his vest pocket and hands it to you. He points at a dark streetlamp that might have illuminated this place, broken for who knows how long, and tells you to fix it.”

She closed the box and latched it tight again. “That man was James Hawks, and since then you have carried this, taught yourself to repair broken lamps, and kept your eyes open for them.”

Mike's eyes were fierce. Jin recognized the expression immediately; it was one she resorted to when she wanted to look like she absolutely, positively was not about to cry. He nodded curtly, tucked the little kit back into his vest, and returned to the wall with arms crossed tightly across his chest.

“Constantine?”

He came forward and tipped the contents of his cupped hand into Susannah's palm: three fragments of twisted steel, linked into a short, rough chain.

Susannah ran her fingers over it. “You are in a roomful of machinery,” she began. “There are engines there, and great coils of wire, and vats for oiling it. The engines send the wire out across the river, over a great stone tower, and then another, to the far shore and then back. You are weaving a bridge.”

The bridge. Everything seemed to come back to that bridge, Jin thought.

“And then, one day, very early on, the wire snaps.” Susannah held up the linked bits, turned them in the light. “Several men die. You survive, but not undamaged. Your blood is in the wires of the bridge. You keep these pieces now, as a reminder of that. Two of them are good steel, which would not have broken. The third is bad, brittle, a piece of the wire that killed the men in front of you.” She held them out to Constantine. “I cannot tell the difference, but you can.”

Constantine swallowed hard and took the steel links back with a shaking hand.

Only one person remained. Sam handed over a deck of cards.

Susannah turned the deck over and sifted through them. “You are younger, a small boy in a crowded room. Sweat smells, old food smells, the odors of unwashed clothes and bodies . . . but you have a small piece of candy bought from a Chinese man on the corner, and you smile as you ask the man who sits before you if he has a two of cups. He says,
Go and fish
. Happiness is that two of cups—sometimes hidden among swords and coins and staves, but you turn over card after card, knowing it is always there to be found. And all the despair around you is not enough to dampen your happiness.”

His father. Jin looked sideways at Sam. His face was wooden as he watched Susannah neaten the cards back into a stack. She handed them back to him and took a deep breath.

“All right. We five will speak for the city if you accept the posts I am about to offer.” She rose from the couch and stepped up to Ilana. “In every city, there must be a keeper of sanctuary. This I offer to you. Will you accept?”

Ilana nodded solemnly. “Yes, I accept.”

Susannah kissed her forehead. “You are brave, and you are loyal, and you love deeply, and to share your home brings you pride and happiness. Never forget how important those things are. I am overjoyed to build this new family with you.”