Fear Her Wrath II: Crucible of Glass

Chapter 57

The next day, the newspapers carried the story that James Greenwald had died peacefully in his sleep during the night. In keeping with his wishes, Councilman Greenwald would be cremated and his ashes scattered over the Marbrose River. He was survived by his two children and five grandchildren, including his grandson, who would be cutting short his honeymoon in Santo Domingo to attend the funeral. A special election would be held to choose a new councilman to complete Greenwald's term. Blah. Blah. Blah.

I don't know if you've noticed, but I'm easily distracted. Every time something new pops up, I lose focus on what I'm doing and throw myself into whatever stole my attention. That's part of why working with Corrigan was so good for me—she didn't lose focus. But, more on her in a second.

So, as you can probably guess, watching Eugene Rothko's machine in action for the first time drove Nika Artemesia and Glassface and everything other than shutting down the New Imperium out of my mind. And, for the next few weeks, that was exactly what I did. With Gabriel at my side, I broke into just about every Imperium stronghold in the Fen, trying to find a way back through that steel door beneath the Dreyfuss—which Gabriel, much to my annoyance, had thoughtlessly closed behind us when we left.

He claimed that it was better if nobody knew we'd snuck in that way and that even leaving it cracked would have given us away. I would have preferred to take my chances.

Summer, meanwhile, had finally started, and I'd somehow scraped my way out of 9th grade with straight Cs, which meant I didn't have to waste half my day in school. Instead, I wasted it with Gabriel at the Argosy. Despite all his talk about it being a home for recluses and loners, I also started getting to know some of the other residents—at least the ones on Gabriel's floor. Harold Kling, the giant I'd seen on my first night, turned out to be a soft-spoken playwright who always greeted me as "Miss Hunt" and spent all day hunched over his typewriter. Tobit Stone, who I'd seen meditating the hallway, was a busker and an old-school bluesman who practiced his repetoire of lonesome ballads and world-weary hollers long into the night. Rumor had it he'd picked up most of them decades ago in an actual chain gang down south. I also met Teddy the Bum, a perennially unlucky gambler who claimed to be the most eligible bachelor in Marbrose under 4' 6", and Klara Katz, the old woman at the end of the hall who played pop songs from World War I on her piano and gave the strongest handshake I'd ever experienced in anyone over 40.

Oh, and Declan Lovejoy—my reporter friend—moved into the Argosy towards the end of June. Apparently the horses were conspiring against him, because he spent most of his time getting bad racing tips from Teddy the Bum and frowning at the newspaper Dorian brought him each morning. Every once in a while, I'd slip an interesting document I'd found under his door, but even writing juicy exposés on the city government or the mafia didn't do much to help his (presumably self-inflicted) financial woes.

Okay, back to Corrigan. She was busy organizing her new department—rebranded as the Special Victims and Perpetrators unit, or SVP, since she would be handling both underaged assault victims and costumed freaks. We saw each other occasionally, and even managed to set aside our differences (well, my differences) whenever a lunatic in a costume threatened to make summer in the Fen a little too exciting. These were mostly small-time threats—like the 17-year-old who celebrated the first day of July by freezing the street outside the Fenley Trust Company and trying to rob it while wearing ice skates. She beat the Evening Examiner to the punch by christening herself "Skate Punk," and I beat her to the punch by breaking her nose with my fist before she could escape with her loot.

I'm skimming over these weeks because in a lot of ways, I was stuck. Sure, I was gathering lots of information about the New Imperium, and that felt like progress, but I wasn't actually getting any closer to the machine. After the first few nights, it became more about the thrill of just being with Gabriel. It was fun to break through locked doors and beat up mobsters with him. We were a really good team. And, when the night's work was over... well, use your imagination.