I shake my head, eyes unblinking. “Just the one.”
He tilts his gaze, cracking his neck. “You sure?”
“I’d know if I had more, wouldn’t I?” I’m surprised at my tone, the unflinching quality of my voice, as if I’ve dealt with men like him before.
He straightens back up, an eyebrow still raised, then movesdown the counter, retrieving something from beneath it. When he returns, he sets a whole bottle of dark liquor on the bar in front of me, then pockets the pill I gave him.
Apparently, a single aspirin buys me a whole bottle of alcohol. I wonder if Pa knows this, knows how much a whole pill is worth?
The two men seated down the bar glance over at me, at the full bottle, sizing me up, probably trying to guess what I paid the man to get me the bottle, and if I might have more. If I’m worth robbing.
“I’m looking for someone,” I say to the barman before he walks away.
He gives me a curious look, like he’s still trying to figure out who I am and where I came from. And why the hell I’m in here. “Who’s that?”
I touch the bottle, tapping a finger against the glass, then lift my eyes. “A man—” My voice breaks off, unsure if this is a good idea, but if anyone knows the men who come and go into this saloon, who hears the far-off stories from traders who have traveled to the ends of this land and come back to the market to tell their tales, it’s this barman. I have to risk it. I have to ask. “An Architect,” I continue. “Have you heard of him?”
The barman tips forward and spits into a foul-smelling metal canister resting on the bar top. His eyes narrow to that of a bird’s, dark and intent. It makes me uneasy, but I meet his gaze dead-on, refusing to look away.
“Never heard of anyone by that name,” he says, squinting, rolling his tongue against the inside of his cheek. But I can’t tell if he’s lying, if this is a game, and he’s waiting to see what I’ll say next.
“You’re sure?”
His chin lowers, watching me, like he might reach across thebar and take me by the throat for even saying the word aloud in his saloon, for daring to speak such a name, but then he swallows and says simply, “Yep.”
We stare at each other a moment more, both of us untrusting, before he turns away and walks back up to the far end of the bar, where he refills the empty glasses in front of the two men who had been eyeing me. Then begins talking to them out of earshot.
Shit,I think.
I need to get out of here.
Whether he knows the Architect or not, lying or not, now he knowsIwas asking about him. A girl he’s never seen before, trading a whole white pill for a bottle of booze, is now poking around about the Architect.
And I can feel the eyes of others in the saloon watching me now. A curiosity in their stares, in the words they mumble, nodding at me. I have to get out of this smoke-heavy room.
But if I go now, I’m certain I’ll be followed. Pursued out into the dark street, into the quiet, where my screams will be swallowed up by the night. Maybe it’s better if I stay put, act like I have nothing to hide. Wait for them all to have a few more glasses of alcohol, let their interest in me wane, and then I’ll slip out unnoticed.
I let my eyes skip to my left, to the man still playing his banjo, before sliding my gaze back to the bottle in front of me. The barman didn’t give me a glass, so I tip the full bottle to my lips—trying to calm the nerves coiling along my veins—and let a small amount slide into my mouth, along my tongue, then spill down my throat. Instantly I regret it, and a cough rises up from the bottom of my chest. It tastes terrible, and I nearly retch onto the bar, but manage to hold it down.
Now I feel even more eyes on me.
Shit. Shit.
I swallow, wrapping my hands around the bottle to steady myself, feeling a buzzing warmth in my chest, in my head. If I stood right now, I’m not sure I’d be able to keep from tipping to the floor.
A door swings open at the back of the bar, banging against the wall with a loud thud, and several people turn to look. The door must lead out to a back alley, the place where the boy took the boots from a dead body, and I lift my watering eyes to see a girl step into the saloon. She doesn’t look much older than me.
However, she’s a girl who looks like sheactuallybelongs here.
Half her head is shaved, revealing her dark scalp, while her black hair is grown long and knotted down the other side, where I can just make out a line of silver studs along one earlobe. Her pants are rolled up above her boots, and her oversize, pale green coat looks as scuffed and dirt-stained as the men seated around me. The thud of her boots echoes across the floor, and my eyes catch on the knife strapped at her waist, where everyone can see. She doesn’t care that every half-drunk man in the saloon is watching her; in fact, I think she prefers it—she wants everyone to know that she’s not worth messing with. Try to steal from her, and she’ll gut you clean through.
She walks to the far end of the bar, eyes roving the dimly lit room, then perches herself on a stool. She’s been here before—she knows the landscape of faces, and she angles herself so her back is to the wall, so there’s no chance anyone will be sneaking up behind her. So she’ll always have the upper hand.
I watch her, fascinated, as she slides a silver coin across the counter to the barman, which gets her a short glass of dark alcohol.With the glass in her hand, she lifts her gaze, noticing me at the far end of the bar, staring back at her. I want to look away, but my eyes are caught on the striking color of her eyes, a semi-green against her olive skin. She raises her glass in my direction and nods at the bottle in front of me, her eyebrow tugging upward. I lift the bottle and we both drink. But I wince as the sharp liquor slithers down my throat, and when I lower the bottle, she looks like she’s holding back a smile.
I turn away, touching the mark on my neck, shifting my hair over it—keeping it out of sight. Maybe I can make my way down the bar, sidle up onto a stool next to her, and ask—quietly, secretly—if she’s heard of the Architect. Maybe she’s not someone I can trust, but at least she might be someone willing to talk. Unafraid of names like theArchitect, unafraid of anything.
I brace a hand against the edge of the bar, starting to push myself up, when the front door of the saloon bangs open, and a wind coils in from outside, bringing with it a gust of cold air. And something else—fear. The voices in the saloon abruptly fall silent, all eyes turned toward the doorway, where the heavy sounds of boots clomp across the wood floor toward the bar.
