City of Ghosts

“It’s nothing.” She tried to pull it back.

“Ain’t nothing, baby. Know them marks when I see em, aye. Been Bound, you have.” He dropped her hand; his deep smoke voice lowered. “Bet you lookin for them Lamaru again, aye?”

“How—” Ouch. Shit. “You know—you’ve heard—damn it!”

Edsel nodded. “Been hearin them rumors, if you dig. Know some people, them know people. Say big trouble on the way down, them gearin up right.”

“Why didn’t you tell me?”

“Ain’t seen you much, aye? And you ain’t look like you up for it, baby. Lookin tired. Lookin mighty down. Guessing maybe got aught doing with why Terrible been rippin it up like him dog dead. Aye?”

Fuck. She did not want to discuss that. Not with him. Not with anyone. Edsel may have been the closest thing she had to a friend—at least, he used to be, and she guessed he was again—but some things were just…private. Most things were private.

Of course, she couldn’t deny being a little interested in that last line anyway. So Terrible looked upset, did he?

Then again, why wouldn’t he?

“Who do you know? I mean, you said you knew people who knew people. Do any of them have any information?”

He hesitated. “I ain’t got names, you dig. Need to make some calls.”

“No problem. Just, anything you could find out would be a help. Really. Bump’s got his fingers in it too, so it’s not just me you’re helping, you know?”

Edsel looked down, dug his cell phone out of his pocket. The sun glowed off his pigmentless hair. “Gotta hang me a couple days on this one, baby. They folk ain’t the kind always answer them phones.”

“Sure. Thanks, really. Oh, and here—” She dug her notebook and pen out of her bag, leaned forward to scribble a list. “This is a long shot, I know, but if anybody buys any of this stuff—anybody you don’t know—could you let me know? Try to find out who they are, if you can.”

Her list wasn’t long; the Lamaru would have their own suppliers anyway. But things like corpse water or tormentil were pretty strictly regulated by the Church, and had a big enough customer base outside of it that they might chance buying it off someone. So why not Edsel?

He took the torn-off sheet of paper, nodded. “Hold out, now. Lemme try, while you here.”

He punched a couple of buttons on the phone, took a step back into the shadows at the back of the booth. He usually lurked there, out of the sun, looking more like a wax statue or a corpse than a man. Caught a lot of thieves that way, too.

She took a discreet step away, distracting herself by gathering up a few things to buy. Thirty K in her bank account felt really fucking good, and she could use some things, right?

In the center of the counter she made a little pile: one of the bags Galena made, a couple of hare bones, a little vial of goat’s blood. That might come in handy if she was dealing with black witches. Oh, and some protective items, too, she’d need those.

In a wicker basket fairly vibrating with power, plasticwrapped snake segments rested in among lodestones and black cat paws. She grabbed a paw and two bags of snake to add to the pile, too, and tossed a chunk of black mirror on top. She could make a hell of a hex with those, and she might need it later.

What else…mandrake might be useful, grab a piece of that…She opened her mouth to ask how much spiderweb he had, when he held up a hand.

“Got me a message left. Ain’t no guarantees, baby, you know, but we see what we got. You keep touchin me, aye? An I touch back iffen I hear, or sell that list somebody I ain’t know.”

“Thanks.”

“Aye, well. Bump getting involved this one, maybe he willin to kick in some lashers, aye? Babies got needs, you dig.”

“Yeah, I’ll ask him, okay? I…”

He definitely looked paler, she thought, seeing Terrible push through the crowd. Last night she hadn’t noticed it, not even at Bump’s place; all that red gave everything a low-key sort of glow. But in the sunshine she saw it. He looked a little tired, a little pale. She wondered if his wounds still hurt. She wished she could turn her greedy eyes away.

“Might wanta get yon mouth closed, baby,” Edsel murmured.

Chess did, snapping her teeth together so hard it hurt and wishing desperately she’d paid better attention to casting glamours in training. She could have wiped the stupid blush off her face.

Instead she focused on the grinning skulls dancing down the wide stripes on the front of his bowling shirt. It was easy to do so, considering he stood about a foot taller than her own five feet six.

“Edsel,” he said. “You right?”

“Right up. Been telling Chessie here, maybe I got some knowledge be useful. You thinkin Bump might kick in, be the case?”

“Aye, he lash you back. No problem.”

“Cool. Chessie gonna keep touchin me, I keep her up, aye? She pass it on.”

Terrible’s gaze fell on her. His chin jerked; it could have been a nod, she guessed.

“Hey.” She fumbled in her bag for some money and thrust it at Edsel. “Do you have the file—”

“Aye.”

“Where is it? I really need it back, you shouldn’t have just—”

“Car.”

Deep breath. “Um, I wanted to grab something to eat first, okay?”

Shrug.

Okay, this was bullshit.

The food booths were at the far end; Edsel had set up in the middle, where he usually tried to find a spot. The center was the best, away from the hot smoke of the firecans and the meats cooked over them, far from the clucking chickens and the occasional goat, where the sawdust spread over the cement wasn’t soaked with blood.

But she wanted food, anything she could find, despite knowing it would deaden her high. Like he wasn’t doing a fine job of that all on his own.

She took her purchases from Edsel and shoved them into her bag, her scuffed boots shuffling on the cement as she headed for the food. The noodle lady was there, but she didn’t…yes. One of the vendors had a set of bamboo skewers turning over a fire; on the skewers were chunks of what appeared to be chicken. That’s what she was going to assume, anyway. They looked good and they smelled good, and if the meat was something unnamable she didn’t want to know about it.

Terrible loomed behind her while she made her purchase, barely concealing his impatience, until finally she swung around on him with her stick in hand.

“Look. You want to be mad at me, that’s fine. You want to not give me a chance to explain, I can’t do anything about that either. But we have to work together. So the least you can do is not treat me like I’m carrying some kind of fucking communicable disease, okay? Be pissed at me on your own time, because I can’t work like this.”

“Depends the kinda work you doin, aye?”

Oh, man, that hurt. Not showing it, though? Now that was easy. She’d had a lifetime of practice at pretending not to be hurt.

So she pegged him with her eyes, folded her arms across her chest. “Fuck. You.”

“Ain’t thinkin I got the price.”