“Not my problem,” Bahram says, with a puff of his cigar.
I have no money and no options, except for the faint promise that tomorrow I’ll be able to take a boat that will get me out of here. But for now, I need to find a roof over my head and a way out of the streets. I find myself on the road to a familiar place. The only one I can think of to find shelter.
Dim yellow light radiates from oil lamps set in all the windows. There’s a cacophony of voices and instruments inside. Someone shuts an upstairs window, and the light in the room goes out. A high-pitched squeal escapes the thin wood-paneled walls. Old, cracked flowerpots are scattered around the front porch, filled with half-dead, neglected plants. The white paint is chipped and peeling, and a piece of the rail is missing. Almost unfathomable that I once believed this a luxurious place. Yet here I am, back again, begging. A rush of shame spreads through me.
I knock quickly, before I can give in to my fear and leave. Footsteps approach. The door flies open. “Welcome to Madame Vero—oh!”
“Charlie, it’s me,” I say.
“Gin!” Charlie says, pulling me in for a hug. Charlie was one of my friends at the brothel. Ten years older than me, with a sardonic sense of humor and a practical way about her. She’s wearing a huge curly wig with a large white bow, and very little else, aside from the white satin robe hanging off her shoulders to the ground. That’s one of the perks of the job—clean clothes. Though by Lady Ariadne’s standards, the robe is filthy. There are tiny snags in the fabric, and the bottom, though washed, is slightly stained from being swept across the dusty floor all day long. Everything, even the most coveted items in the Sleeve, is always subpar.
“What are you doing here?” she asks. “The girls said last time they saw you, you were getting into a fancy carriage heading up to the hills. Word around here is that you scored a big fish.”
I shrug. “He let me off the hook.”
Charlie gives me a rueful smile. “Don’t they all? Hope it was worth it for a while?”
I don’t answer, it’s too painful. “I just need a place to stay for tonight,” I say. “Please. I can sleep in the kitchen like last time. Just one night.”
Charlie looks behind her, then sticks her head out while closing the door a little bit. “I’m sorry, Gin, but we’re not supposed to talk to you,” she whispers. “Madame said if we ever see you around, we should let her know where you are, so she can send Ham after you.”
Ham is Madame’s head thug. “But today’s Sunnanday, isn’t it? Madame is out in the country, she doesn’t have to know.” I just need a safe place to lay my head tonight.
Charlie doesn’t say anything, she just looks back over her shoulder again.
“I have nowhere else to go,” I add. “I’ll be gone by dawn. Please, Charlie.”
“Oh, Gin,” Charlie says. “I wish I could, I really do, but things have been different around here.”
It’s then that I notice the bruises on Charlie’s upper arms and, when she turns and her robe slips, the welt of scars on her back.
“That’s not because of me, is it?” I ask, horrified. Charlie was the one who came to my aid when a patron tried to have his way with me after finding me alone in the kitchen. She knocked him on the head with a candlestick while I scrambled away.
She doesn’t need to answer because I already know I’m right and I’m flooded with guilt and shame. I shouldn’t be here, I can’t get my friend into more trouble because of me. “I’m sorry I asked—I’ll go, be safe.”
Charlie reaches her hand through the open doorway and grabs mine. “You too, Gin. I’m sorry, too.” Then the door shuts and the locks click into place, one by one.
My heart heavy, I turn and step slowly down the wide porch steps.
I suppose I could survive a night on the streets of the Sleeve by myself—find a dry corner, and hope no one notices me, and stay awake all night. But I know myself, I’ll nod off—and once you let your guard down around here, you wake up to a nightmare.
There’s one last place I could be safe.
At least for the night. Better than sleeping out in the open, among predators and animals. Going back to Aris is the last thing I want to do. Yet that’s exactly what I must do.
I head toward the grimy eastern quarter. None of the streetlamps in the Sleeve are lit. Most are broken, some are missing. Few of the houses have any lights on, and save for a bonfire here and there, it’s almost as dark as the woods at night. A handful of men gathered around a small fire call out to me; one of them whistles. I neither acknowledge nor run from them. Running would show fear and I don’t want them to give chase. Luckily for me, they don’t.
Just yesterday I was living in a dream world with Rollo, and now, somehow, I’m alone in the Sleeve in the middle of the night, with nowhere to go, and not a single coin to my name. Maybe I should have kept a few for myself before handing it all to Bahram. It’s all surreal. I should have prepared for this, I knew it wouldn’t last, but after so many years on the run, I’d just wanted to rest. Although if I give in to my deepest, darkest feelings, I don’t care what happens to me anymore. Yet I continue, one foot in front of the other, knowing the way simply by muscle memory. After all that time at Madame Verona’s, meeting Rollo, and living another life, I’m right back where I began. I’d worked so hard to get out, to try to have something better. All for nothing.
Perhaps it would have been more merciful for Rollo to let me hang.
The old shack lies back from the road, behind a copse of large trees. Smoke billows out from the chimney. Dim light flickers in the single, four-paned window. It would almost look cozy, if I didn’t know better. I drag myself up to the front door. There’s a hand-painted sign on a scrap of old wood.KNACKER: WILL DISPOSE OF ANIMAL CARCASSES. He’s still using the same old front, then.
I hold my fist up to knock, hesitate, then tap on the wobbly door. If no one answers, I’ll leave, and at least be satisfied that I tried. “Hello?” I call. No one answers. But the door is unlocked and I let myself inside.
The place is a wreck. Aris was never the best housekeeper, but it was never quitethisbad. There are rusty buckets scattered around the ground, collecting drips from the leaky roof. A fire is lit, which is welcome after being out in the wet and clammy air for hours, and there are walls, technically speaking, but they’re so thin, they may as well be made of paper. As soon as I step away from the fireplace, the room is chilly.
I clear my throat and tap on the doorframe at the entrance to the back room.
