The Fire Eye Refugee Read online

  Kay grunted, lost in thought. Everything she’d built here was being threatened. How many of her friends would turn if the Dynasty came out against the Farrow? Against her? After watching the fighters make their final preparations for a few moments, she leaned forward. “Thanks. You see a contingent of western Farrow here? Someone I could use to get word? Get this Alban to stop asking around.”

  Calum made a gesture with his neck towards a group of Farrow near the front, now truly distracted as the fighters joined. The soldier won in the fourth minute. The easterner had to be carried out of the ring when it was over. Calum had been right. He’d looked skilled, but the soldier had a grim efficiency that eventually led to an opening. And then he attacked savagely. If there had been a referee, the fight would have stopped long before the soldier let the camp fighter crumple to the mat.

  After the fight, Kay wandered over to the cheering group of westerners. With some careful digging, she was able to arrange a message to Alban that she’d meet him early tomorrow. She laughed off the advances of the Farrow but let them give her a couple drinks. Mixed-blood women were popular outside the gates. More exotic and less beatdown than the Farrow camp women. More accessible and familiar than the Gol women, who generally avoided the refugees, being regularly lectured by fathers and brothers about the savages beyond the gates.

  She watched one more fight, the highly anticipated Gol-Farrow bout with the Bosun taking on the camp fighter Amos Farr. Again, Calum had it right, and the Bosun dropped Amos in the third minute. When he hit the dirt floor, Kay skirted past all the Farrow, dropped a smile to Calum, and left the fights to reenter the gates.

  Chapter 3. The Fire Creep

  Kay’s walk home took her back past the plaza near where she’d met Ban Terrel earlier. Celest was generally a safe city and much of the crowd lingered, seated in quiet circles on the stones passing wineskins. Children were up despite the late hour, catching the stray paper lanterns that drifted near them and collecting the candle stubs. Kay spared a thought for the soldier Reagan, considering whether to check if he was still in the spot she’d left him.

  Instead, she chose her path home to take her past as many of the lingering celebrants as she could. To absorb as much of the goodwill that accompanied the Opening as possible, before she went home to have her private communal with the Fire Eye. She was quickly rewarded for her choice. As she rounded the corner and brought the central plaza into view, she saw the Fire Creep was out.

  The Fire Creep — that was the name Abi had given him and it stuck in Kay’s head — was a street performer. But that didn’t do him justice. Maybe the greatest street performer of all time? Maybe Kay’s personal idol? He juggled fire. At least it started as juggling. Looking solemn, ominous in white robes with red fringes, he’d announce his presence to the crowd with a giant fireball rising to the sky. In a flash it was gone and all the tourists and children would gather around. He’d start juggling flaming pins. Right about when the crowd seemed to get restless, started to see him as ordinary, magical things would start happening. The fire would start staying in place long after the pins fell back into his hands. Soon he would be juggling pure fire, sending it dancing among the crowd. He would make shapes, loops, colors. He never spoke and rarely moved anything but his hands. He never put out a hat, but coins gathered in front of him anyway.

  Kay loved the show and it was always at its best the nights of the Opening and the Closing. She’d caught him near the middle of his act, already producing an impressive bouquet of fiery flowers in the air above him. Kay had always had the sense the Fire Creep knew when she was watching. Knew he had a spark in the crowd. A raiser. A light. A girl who had once trembled with a confused lust at the sight of fire, had dreamed of it as an escape. A woman who still did in her weaker moments.

  His show would get bolder and brighter. Flames would lick closer to the crowd, hotter than before. To say Kay knew fire well was an understatement. But she had no idea how the Fire Creep did what he did. It was impossible. Magical, like the Fire Eye itself. When she told Abi her suspicions, Abi had laughed and offered to sell her magic beans.

  As she watched, she thought of Alban’s arrival in Celest. She should have been better prepared. The news from the west was that every inch of Farrow lands was in the hands of the Winden now. What remained of the retreating Farrow forces were spread out in a spearpoint, and its tip was Celest. She should have known Alban would be here, would manage to slime his way into the local Farrow leadership.

  She was distracted and left before the end of the Fire Creep’s act, something she’d never done before. She felt an odd flash of heat as she left the plaza, almost as though the Creep had noticed and sent her a small reprimand.

  When she reached her building, Kay climbed the stairs to the roof. In addition to her small apartment, the building housed two families. One of them was out of town for the holiday. They would usually rent out their apartment to visitors, but the uncertainty over the refugees prevented them from doing so this year. So that apartment was vacant. The other family, also friendly to Kay, would already be asleep. That left her the roof to herself. She’d set out a sleeping pallet and a few candles. A bottle of argosy gin hidden under the pallet. A few stray paper lanterns littered the roof, wishes that had failed to pass through the Fire Eye, as all of them did.

  Kay sat and looked up. As with every year since her first in Celest, ten years ago, she felt a peace spread within her. She’d given herself to the fire in the sky and emerged healed, the damaged parts of her burned clean. The Fire Eye was the reason she could be Kay, a finder of lost children, a fetch, a person she could be proud of. She toasted the skies and began drinking from the bottle, enjoying the burn in her throat. She leaned back and settled in.

  Despite the warmth of the season and the gin, the mild chill to the night air never quite let loose of her. There was an unease buried deep within her. In her place of greatest comfort, she should feel invincible. But this year had brought too much uncertainty back into her world. There were forces outside the walls that may want to see her back in a helpless and desperate state. And inside the walls too, now that she thought of it. It may have been the chill that led Kay to sleep poorly. Interrupted by dreams in which she was trapped in a shed, crying and digging until her fingers were bloody. She awoke with her hands cradled under her, the light of the Fire Eye blunted by the rising sun.

  Chapter 4. A Private Matter

  It was early morning when Kay left Celest for the main refugee camp. The gate guards looked at her curiously. Most who left for the camps were in groups and in uniform. Not many Gol women, even mixed-bloods, went to the camps at all. Kay had her papers to get back in, but she’d need to keep them close. Alban could cause her serious trouble if he was able to take them from her.

  It was about a quarter mile beyond the walls that the camp proper started, spreading off from the major thoroughfare to cover the fields. The wooden and brick buildings sprawling out from the walls gave way to orderly rows of tents marching off towards the horizon. A dry, flat terrain with a few pockets of woods in the distance. Kay couldn’t help herself from visualizing how quickly a fire would claim the camp, spreading from tent to tent with abandon. Finish what the Winden had started.

  When she reached the first tents, she looked back to see Celest rising in the distance. The city’s compulsive need for height was emphasized by the flat vantage point. The hills and crests within the city were the most densely packed with tall buildings, straining towards the skies. None came close to the Dynasty Palace, which dominated the skyline. The Fire Eye was faint in the daylight.

  Kay entered the main camp and had an uneventful walk to the camp center on the southern end. The camp was bustling, men about a variety of chores. Several looked twice at her golden skin but no one spoke to her.

  The camp center was one of the few semi-permanent structures, wooden walls forming rough rooms. As she entered, she was told she’d been expected and that Alban would be there shortly. Luc
ky her. After a few moments, she saw Alban approaching down the hall. When she’d last seen him, she was fourteen. All adults had looked somehow both old and ageless to her. He looked the same, an angry and pointy man. A bully not quite big enough to dominate with his size alone. His lank grey hair made points at the side of his head, his nose was sharp and downturned, and he bore a permanent sneer. She felt the old fear she’d had of him bubbling up through her. He was walking with two other men and the last words she heard were the bug before the men split off. Today would be bad.

  Alban wasted no time greeting her, instead grabbing her by the arm and yanking her towards a room behind the reception desk. The largest and presumably most secure room in the structure. It was packed with Farrow men. A single chair in the middle. Alban pushed her towards it and went to stand among the crowd of men, staring at her like a jury. There were two guards behind her. One of them was the camp fighter from last night, the one named Amos Farr. His lean face was bruised along the right side, left eyebrow sported a gash. He had several days scruff and looked bone weary but his eyes were alert.

  Across the room, clustered around Alban, there were eight more Farrow. Most had short-cropped military haircuts. A range of ages. A few wore partial uniforms, patches here or there. No others she recognized from last night. Her grasp of Farrow institutions was pretty undeveloped as she’d left at fourteen. She’d known to fear the police forces, Farrow Guard and Home Guard. She saw one or two with the narrow style of beard favored by those institutions. She guessed the other men represented a variety of interests. Loosely grouped, no sense of rank. A motley collection Alban had assembled to humiliate her in front of.

  Alban was looking her up and down. He sauntered into the middle of the room. He seemed to be enjoying the spotlight. After a dramatic pause, he began. “Keara the Bug. How many in this room have heard of Keara the Firebug?” The other men didn’t seem to care for the guessing game. The question was ignored. “Let me tell you a little bit about Keara the Bug.

  “About ten years ago, back when I was with the Farrow Guard, we started getting reports of fires in the River West neighborhood of Ferris. When it kept getting worse all summer, we knew we had a firebug on our hands. No reason to the fires. Not for profit, not for insurance. Random structures. At first lots of old houses, mostly abandoned. Carts on the street. Garbage piles. But they kept getting larger and larger. Soon our little arsonist was targeting occupied buildings. Killed more than a few people. She’d work after dark, sometimes setting fires up until dawn.”

  Alban leered at Kay. He wasn’t interested in giving her a chance to speak. To break up the flow of his little speech. Ten years and he thought she hadn’t changed. He obviously hadn’t.

  “I eventually tracked her down. Caught her running from a fire like a cockroach. A fourteen-year-old mixed-blood orphan girl, filthy from the streets. Carrying matches and nothing else. We learned she’d been kicked out of the orphanage for setting the beds on fire. When I leaned on her, she told me about twenty-five other fires she’d started. And those were just the ones she remembered. Fires that left good Farrow dead.”

  No mention of his former partner, the one who’d really caught Kay. Ewan Silas was the one who’d found her, arrested her. But also the one who helped her through the frightening experience, patiently working with her, talking to her about each step in the confusing days that followed. Eventually she’d revealed the locations of every fire she’d started that she could remember. Both Alban and Ewan had been with her for two long days in which she’d traveled around with them in an enclosed coach from site to site. When she’d shown them her sparks. But only Ewan had intervened when the word had leaked that the firebug who’d terrorized the neighborhoods west of the river had been caught and the neighbors showed up with rocks and nooses. They hadn’t cared it was a small, confused girl. They wanted old justice. If it had just been Alban minding her, they would have had it.

  “We should have given her the hangman’s noose. But we took compassion on her given her age. We gave her the option to go to Celest. She obviously had Gol blood dirtying up her veins. We said the little half-haught could stay free, so long as she sent us reports, once a month, on what was happening there. Here. I’ve been getting those reports for ten years. I promised her, the one month you miss a report, that’s the month I send my own report to Celest. Tell them exactly what they’ve got on their hands.”

  Alban made no reference to exactly why they had made that decision, but it hadn’t been a mystery even to a frightened young girl. What better way to undermine the Gol than to send a tireless firebug to their largest city and force her to remain there? She could be snuck in fairly easily. Mixed-bloods were not so rare. Celest gets a little burned, gets a difficult problem to occupy their time and resources. Ferris’ problem is solved. If she even survived the lynch mobs or the arresting officers when she inevitably got itchy for another spark and gave in to her fire lust, no one would believe her stories of government-ordered exile. No one would care.

  Kay had been dropped in the middle of Celest with no money or friends. She spent two panicked nights on the streets dodging the efficient Gol police, eating garbage. The stress made it hard to breathe. She knew she needed a spark and then the pain and fear would all be over. At least she would get a few seconds of blessed relief when the flames began to rise. But then, her third night in Celest, things had changed. The Fire Eye found her. She’d looked up, confused by the loud parties and the lanterns streaking across the skies, thinking she was losing her mind, only to see the sky ablaze. Her own little spark quieted in the presence of the great fire in the sky. Her life changed. She found a sort of peace, learned to live with her bug. For the first time, she wanted to be alive and free, if only to serve as one more audience to the Fire Eye as long as possible. She still ached in the presence of flames, but gained a measure of control she’d never possessed in Farrow.

  “The Bug held up her end, surprisingly, and left me sifting through ten years of useless reports, trying to find the tiniest bit of value. But now that we’re here, face-to-face, maybe we can motivate her to be a little more helpful. Remind her that she still has an unpaid debt to the Farrow.”

  Alban was glaring at her. Kay was fighting not to mirror it. She needed to sell herself as calm. Reasonable. Above all, valuable. And not just to the men in this room. She needed to remember that in her heart. Keara the Bug was dead, even if Alban was ten years late figuring that out.

  Alban sauntered closer. “Now we get word that the Gol are planning a special council to address the refugee issue. Have you heard about it?” He smirked when Kay shook her head. “Such a helpful little murderer. Bad start. Do you know who will be on it?” Again, Kay shook her head. “And did you know they are planning to release a recommendation within a week?” Kay didn’t even bother this time.

  Alban made a noise of disgust. He walked towards the back of the room and picked up a canvas bag. Heavy, from the way he gave a small grunt as he lifted it. He brought it close and threw it at her feet. “Look in there.”

  Kay slowly leaned over and opened the flap. There were two gold bars bearing the Farrow crest. A small fortune. Her mind began working rapidly even as Alban continued speaking. “Get back in Celest and bribe whoever you have to. We want to know about the council.”

  So much gold. They were desperate. And blind. They had no idea how the Gol were going to respond to this latest wave of refugees, the remnants of the army, mostly westerners. The Gol had been more comfortable with the first few waves, heavy with women and children. This wave wasn’t prepared to bend their necks to the Gol. And the Gol had shown signs of disapproval. They’d tightened restrictions on the gates. They were reigning in the growth of the camps. They could land hard on all the Farrow now that more had come begging. Sweep them off their lands. Turn them back to die at Winden hands.

  The men in this room needed her. Alban had a big show to make her think she was in their hands. It might be the other way around. Kay loo
ked up. “How can I trust you to keep your end of the bargain?” The first thing she’d said at the meeting.

  Alban was furious. “Trust me?” He walked right over to her. “I don’t know who you think you are, Bug, but…”

  Alban was close, making his point. Without needing to put much force into it, she gave a sharp kick to his shin. He leaned forward over her, drawing in his breath in surprise. With his chin floating above her, it was easy to grasp his jaw in one hand and, rising quickly to her feet, push his head back and up. He overbalanced and toppled over, falling back among the men with an angry grunt. Kay sat back down before anyone else could react.

  “You bitch!” Alban said, rising to his feet, face red.

  “Are you really in charge of this room, Alban?” Kay asked. “I wouldn’t trust you to be in charge of my laundry.” The men around Alban were half holding him back as he looked ready to attack. With her sitting calmly, the guards behind her hadn’t made a move to grab her. It looked like she’d have a few seconds to make her point. “Who calls for a meeting with one of their informants and invites the entire camp? You guys haven’t had any problems with leaks? Is there an eastern rep here? If you wanted to keep me quiet from them, I’m sure it’s too late. But more importantly,” Alban was starting to argue but Kay talked over him, “how am I supposed to gather any real information about the Gol if they know that’s what I’m doing? You don’t think they’re watching the camp? You think they’re children? Blind? Not going to be curious about what mid-morning meeting drew half the fucking Farrow leadership to a single room? ‘Hey, who’s that mixed-blood woman from inside the walls who’s with them?’ You think they won’t be curious?”