A Song of Shadows and Starlight

Prologue- Tess

PROLOGUE- TESS

This city turns innocent men into monsters. Those were the first words Ander Bridger had told me, and they were words repeated throughout the city of Surcon, in the pleasure houses and distillery districts, in the blood-soaked and plague-infested streets of the Narrows. It was even whispered in the Gem Districts, throughout the Ruby and Opal and Emerald Districts, although quietly, in case they were worried about someone overhearing them from their ivory towers. They were words that had always rang true, especially in the Narrows, but none more so than the man crouched beside me. Ander Bridger had certainly turned into a monster, although whether he was ever an innocent man to begin with was hard to imagine. I should say honest boy. Sitting next to me inside the White Serpent, one of the most notorious pleasure houses in the city, he barely looked a day over well... seventeen. I was the same age, and it was indicative of the Narrows that neither of us had been spared a glance as we walked in. Plenty of down-trodden young men and women much younger than us passed through the doors of the Pleasure Houses in search of distraction from their sorry lives. Not that I could blame them.
The White Serpent was the worst of all the various Pleasure Houses down by the Dockyard District. Worse than the Golden Cat, the Bronze Lync, the Blue Fish, worse than all of them. The bosses were crueler, the drinks cheaper, the girls even more desperate. The Pleasure Houses were all in a row, one after the other, the bright colours and tacky trinkets getting progressively worse. Everything matched a theme. The girls outside in the rain, smiling and chatting with every man who walks by blissfully unaware, trying to coax them inside to spend their hard-earned coin in their pleasure houses, their taverns, their clubs. The Narrows had been divvied up by the gangs of Surcon after the plague had hit. Bloodpox. That's what everyone calls the Council Lady's plague. Named because of a councilman's mistress that'd brought back the plague-ridden rats from a pleasure-vessel somewhere outside the Isles, it had quickly began travelling through Surcon, infecting and decimating and destroying, just like it had done when it first arrived almost six years earlier. The City had managed to contain it, but only after it had almost decimated us. The areas worst affected had been left to rebuild themselves, and eventually became known as the Narrows. Now, the plague was back, and it seemed to be even worse than before.
In the Narrows, everyone loved to stand out. Bright, gaudy, garish colours and opulent, glittering jewellery. Their girls were the same, sweating in the oppressive heat in fake diamonds and cheap silk, brightly-coloured to match the decorations. As such, I was dressed in powder-white silks just like every other girl here. That was all anyone cared about in the Narrows, coin and territory and appearances. All except the boy I was with tonight, he didn't care about appearances. He was the epitome of restraint sitting beside me. Black tunic, black boots, black hair tucked neatly back into a bun.
Ander and I weren't here for pleasure. We were here for something else, something worth a lot more than a pitiful romp with a poor girl who was unlikely to be there under their own free will. Rather they were likely to be indentured, enslaved to the brutal owners who would sooner cut out their own eyes than set you free.
Ander nudges me as a young man who can't be much older than us walks into the grotty house. He's fair-haired and fresh-faced, with eager green eyes. The dull blue of his uniform and the blue cap he has pulled low over his face marks him out as a member of the city watch.. If his mentor hadn't told us otherwise, I wouldn't have given him a second glance. He looks no different than the hundreds of young men from the watch who come through the doors every single day. The steady tap of Ander's staff on the wood counter was distracting me. He carried that damn thing everywhere.
"That's the one." Ander murmurs to me. "You know what to do."
I nod and slide out of my seat. I'm dressed in a sheer silk dress, and a fluffy white mask covers my eyes. My dark hair is tied into a messy bun behind me, he messier the better if I was to convince anyone I was one of the whores who inhabited the White Serpent. My face is obscured by a mask of white powder so that I almost resemble a ghost. Ander watches me with a cool disinterest, his ice-blue eyes sparkling with amusement as I sidle up beside the man. He looks even younger up close, barely older than Ander.
"You looking for something honey?" I whisper in his ear, and I feel the goosebumps on his arm as my painted-white nails graze his bicep.
"I might be." the man responds cooly. "What do you think I might be looking for?"
I grin. "I could show you if you like."
His eyes light up as his eyes travel up and down my body, drinking in the sheerness of the silk I wear. I fight the urge to gouge his eyes out as he leers at me. He slams his drink on the table and slides a pouch out from his tunic. He keeps one eye on me as he begins to steadily tap out a bundle of silver and cold coins onto the wood. He raises an eyebrow as I stay silent.
"You must be very confident in yourself, girl." The man laughs as I finally place my hand on his, and he slides the coins over to me. The neat stack I pocket is probably most of his weeks wages from the Delegation, but Ander had always told me to get my money's worth and judging from the lustful gleam in the officer's eyes, he certainly wasn't thinking with his brain.
"In myself and no one else."