Thresholder

Perry didn’t go straight back to Teaguewater. Instead, he headed out to sea, following the clouds to give him cover, hoping that if Cosme was in pursuit, they would diverge from each other. More likely they were both going to lick their wounds and find each other again later. The manor, if Perry returned to it, would be empty, the base of operations moved. That would be what Perry would do. He would go back, in the middle of the night, to see whether Cosme was stupid enough to stay there, but he wasn't holding out hope.

He had three bullets left. That wasn’t much. Hopefully Flora would be able to guide him to a machine shop, and hopefully they would be able to make something workable. Guns needed cleaning though, he knew, and the powder in rounds made here would be nothing like the highly-refined stuff that was in the remaining three rounds he had left over.

When twenty minutes had passed, Perry found a place to set down by a pasture and had Marchand run some diagnostics. There were tiny cameras with poor resolution in many places on the armor, and Perry moved his hand around to see where the damage was. He breathed a sigh of relief once March gave the full report: there was significant cosmetic damage, two of the cameras were non-functional, and a few of the microphones no longer picked up sound, but the core of the suit — the microfusion reactor, the battery, the distributed computing substrate, the armor itself — was all still relatively sound. There was a gash in the breastplate from where his sword had been knocked into it, but it hadn’t gone deep. Marchand suggested repairs in a polite voice, but obviously that wasn’t going to happen.

“Play the fight back,” said Perry. “Do an all-angles reconstruction.”

The video enlarged itself across Perry’s field of view, which momentarily felt claustrophobic, but March was on the lookout, and would warn him if anything came at them while the simulation was going.

The suit stored enormous amounts of video, though at a lower resolution than it had been at when shown to Perry as it happened. Marchand was able to use those recordings from multiple angles to generate a full scene, showing Perry things that weren’t directly on any camera, only guessed at by the many angles that were available.

The first moment that Perry wanted to look at was when he’d been struck in the back of the head. The staff had shot out from the house at speed, visible from one of the cameras that was facing backward, and Marchand had clocked it just in time, locking the suit. It hadn’t been a hard strike by the accounting of the armor, not hard enough to leave a dent, but if Perry hadn’t been in the power armor, it would have been a killing blow. Even if he’d been in merely normal armor, it would probably have snapped his neck. March had seen it coming though, and made the suit rigid.

He could see it on Cosme’s face, which he hadn’t been looking at then. The satisfaction of the hit, the readiness to fight, and the mild surprise that Perry hadn’t taken that to be the opening shot. He could also see, from the video’s enhancements, that the sleeve covering the golden bracer was faintly glowing even then. Charging? Had it all just been a stalling tactic?

Perry looked at other pieces of the video, the large wind up, the way the staff was held like a club, and tried to draw conclusions or make plans about how their next fight would go. There would be a next fight. He was certain of that.

The thing that upset him the most, that made him angry just to think about, was that he really should have just skipped over the conversation altogether. He should have shot them both from above, when they hadn’t been aware of him, or dropped down and swung his sword while they were still coming to terms with his presence. At the start of it, Cosme hadn’t had his staff, only the bracer, and depending on what it actually did, it might not have been able to save him.

Perry stewed in the anger, then tried to wash it away. It was hard work though, and he could feel it at the back of his mind, like it would come back if he allowed it.

He watched on the video when Cosme had been shot, a grazing wound, and wondered whether that was worth trying again. They had guns in this world, and it was possible that Perry could get his hands on one. Wearing power armor and shooting someone with a Victorian-era pistol seemed stupid in a way that he couldn’t quite put his finger on, but the staff moved so fast that its movement was only a frame or two on video.

Perry also watched the part of their fight when he’d been flying away, and focused on Cosme’s staff blocking another bullet. Cosme had dropped, and Perry wondered whether that was a tactic that could be reused. Cosme flew faster, but it left him without a defense unless he was willing to drop.

The final thing that Perry focused on was Wesley, the man that Cosme had been with, who hadn’t run when the fighting started, instead regarding it with laser focus. From the conversation, he was a scientist of some sort. Did Adversaries have Allies? Perry wished that he’d gotten more from Cosme, though of course Cosme couldn’t be trusted even a hair. At least some of the simpering he’d done had been an act.

Eventually Perry picked himself up from the ground and gripped his sword, letting it carry him up into the air, back to Teaguewater. When he was close enough that the earpiece he’d given Flora reconnected, he spoke to her.

“I’m back,” said Perry. “Found the Adversary, sparred with him a bit, and might need some help.”

“It’s been two hours,” said Flora after a moment. Her voice was low, and he imagined her in a place with too many people around. “How much was seen?”

“Nothing,” said Perry. “One outsider who the Adversary had already told everything to.” He wasn’t entirely sure that was true, but they had been working from a book on the history of radio. No one had seen him flying through the sky, and his hope was that the glamour had made them think that he was just an awkward looking bird.

“I have a place for you to stay, along with some clothes,” said Flora. “You’re not bringing the fight here?”

“No,” said Perry. He hoped that was true.

“I can give you instructions on how to find me,” said Flora. “You’ll have to descend down through the smoke from a smokestack, but it’ll keep you from being seen.”

“I already know where you are,” said Perry. “I’m coming to you now.”

Flora was in a more industrial part of Teaguewater, a place with a number of factories, their smokestacks spewing up some of the extreme pollution that coated the city. It was worse during the day, perhaps because the sun illuminated more of the problem, or because the factories were running, or maybe just because the weather had shifted.

Flora was inside one of those factories, on the rooftop, near one of the smokestacks. Perry watched from a distance, unseen, worried that this was a trap she’d set for him while he was gone, but she was alone, standing next to a small room on top of the roof, something like a storage shed. There didn’t seem to be a way to get up there, but she had wings, and he had his sword.

He landed silently, and she regarded him for a moment. She hadn’t seen him in his armor, except for briefly when he’d left the house. The armor was imposing, cobalt blue with highlights of gold, especially around the faceplate. He felt her cool gaze go over him, and wondered what she thought. She seemed to think that thresholders were beings of incredible power, more than he felt he possessed.

“This is a place for you to stay,” she said, gesturing at the door to the shed. “There was a metal staircase leading up here, but it broke away a month ago and hasn’t been replaced, so there’s no way for anyone to get to you unless they can climb or fly. There’s a bedpan that you’ll have to empty somewhere and a water barrel. No heat, but there is a bed. I can show you.”

Perry nodded, and followed her into the room.

It was small, but surprisingly well-furnished. The bed had a quilt on it rather than just a thin sheet, and there were a few plants by the windows, ferns. Two paintings hung on the walls, fine oil paintings by the looks of them, both portraits of women in gowns. The size left something to be desired, but it was much better than he’d ever have expected for a shed on top of a factory roof.

“Who used to live here?” he asked.

“Someone who didn’t follow the Custom,” said Flora. Her face was set. “It’ll do for you, for a few days. We need to meet with the Jade Council though, to see what they have to say.” She turned to him. “You have my word that I’ll protect you.”

“So long as I don’t start destroying the city,” said Perry.

“If there’s a fight between people like you in the midst of the city, it might be the end of the Custom,” said Flora. “That would be worse than destroying the city. At best, it might mean that the Jade Council kills the king and installs themselves in his place. At worst, a brief civil war that leads to extermination.”

“Yet you’re pledged to this king,” said Perry. “Edmund. And the Jade Council might kill him.”

“Kill or be killed,” said Flora. She looked at the quilt. “You’ve come at a very bad time.”

Perry waited for a moment, thinking that she would continue. When she didn’t, he changed tracks. “You were prepared for a thresholder.”

“We’ve been overdue,” said Flora. “Once every three hundred years seems usual. I was told the characteristics, and what to do when you arrived, if it happened. It's part of my duty to respond, not just to you, but to anything we know about. Fair folk, werewolves, yetis, anything like that. There are scattered few beyond our clans.”

Perry frowned, which she wouldn’t have been able to see beneath the armor. “You still seem calm about it. More calm than I would be.” It might have been her paleness, but she had a way of looking like she'd been carved from marble.

“Things need to get done,” said Flora. “We need at least one thresholder as an ally. Thresholders fight, that’s what they do, we can only help end it swiftly and direct the battle away from the people. You’re sure that no one saw you?”

“I was wearing the glamour,” said Perry. “And I was miles outside the city, at a manor, on farmland.”

“A manor?” asked Flora, growing more alert. “Nobility?”

“I don’t know,” said Perry. “I could show you on a map where it happened, but from the clothes and where they were, yes, nobility.”

Flora swore. “Someone who could report to the king and his people,” she said. She clenched her fists, and Perry saw a hint of claw there, digging into her palms but not drawing blood. “You should have led with that.”

“You want to keep this contained,” said Perry. “I do too. I don’t want anyone to die that doesn’t have to.” It was questionable whether Cosme had to die, or whether it was enough to beat him to within an inch of his life. That was what had happened with Mordant, and apparently Cosme had lost a number of times before, if a single word the man said could be trusted.

“That’s good,” said Flora. She let out a breath. “Are you staying in that suit?”

“No,” said Perry. “I’ve been in for two hours, which feels like eight.”

“Then I have clothes for you,” she said. She gestured to a bag that was sitting by the foot of the bed. “And food as well.”

“Is the water safe to drink?” asked Perry, who was looking at the water barrel.

“No,” said Flora. “But there’s no stove to boil it with, and no alcohol to cut in.”

“Mmm,” said Perry. He wondered whether he could somehow get Marchand to purify the water for him. The suit had gills, of a sort, and could filter air. He really did prefer not to get violently ill from whatever parasites and poisons were in the water table here. He'd somehow avoided food poisoning in Seraphinus, even though he'd seen how long and how casually they left meat sitting out.

“The factory is on half-time,” said Flora. “You should be able to come and go without being spotted, so long as you take care. In the bag is a piece of fabric you can wrap around your sword, to carry it with you and not draw attention. The glamour will do the rest.”

“Thank you,” said Perry. He felt supremely grateful to her. She was thinking things through and supplying him with solutions to problems that he hadn't even considered yet.

“Don’t thank me yet,” said Flora. “You still need to face the Council.”

“And they might order me put to death?” asked Perry.

“No,” said Flora. “I don’t think they would. But they might have things to ask of you, conditions for your continued presence here.”

Perry’s lips went tight. “More than just following the Custom?”

Flora nodded. She pursed her lips. She was either wearing lipstick, or her lips were exceptionally red. “The Jade Council is the primary power within our circles, but it’s not the only one. I don’t know that they would expect you to hold yourself to a pledge, but they might have you make one. Or it might be something more. It depends on which way they think the wind is blowing.”

Perry let out a breath. “And you’re all … vampires?”

Flora looked at him as though she was trying to see the expression beneath his faceplate. “It’s only now you ask?”

Perry had spent time, in the last two worlds, getting to know everything he could. He’d had maps of Seraphinus and detailed the entire alternate history of Richter’s world (which was just called Earth). In Seraphinus, the king’s wizard Romuald had given him lessons on how magic was performed, and how alchemical solutions were created, and even on the ways in which artifacts like the sword were forged. Perry had let it all wash over him, and nothing particularly stuck, not when there was a war to be fought. He'd always considered knowledge to be a good thing, every fact added to his mental file a tiny boon, but it demonstrably hadn't helped him. Everything that he'd theorized with Richter had needed to be thrown out, the whiteboard they'd filled up together entirely wrong on every point. There was magic in some of these worlds.

"The Adversary comes first," said Perry. "He has to. He's a threat, one way or another, and if I bury myself in a book, people are liable to die." That had happened, in Seraphinus. He'd let the wizard Romauld hold him back from one of the engagements with the enemy, and a hundred of their soldiers had died. Perry might not have been able to turn it into a victory, but he was certain that he'd have been able to save at least some of those men. "I do want to know everything there is to know about your kind, and about the others under the Custom, and especially the previous thresholders. It's just ... secondary. It's enough to know that you're allies until I have my footing." That might be easier if he didn’t have to know how many people they were killing to sustain themselves.

“You said you were a scholar before you became a thresholder,” said Flora.

“I was,” said Perry. “Though … not because I loved to learn, or because I was curious. More because I didn’t know what else to do. I liked knowing things, but — are there things you need to tell me, that I need to know, right now?”

His education in the last world had left a sour taste in his mouth. He'd enjoyed Romauld lessons, but the old wizard had particular thoughts on cosmology, and a long-windedness that bordered on tedium. It had occurred to Perry when he'd defeated Pulver, when it seemed as though another portal might come, that he'd learned too little to carry into the next world. The extent of his magical ability was that he could call forth brief blue sparks with the snap of his fingers, and that only with a half hour of concentration leading up to it. The thought of entire new systems of magic was daunting, and if there was going to be another world after this, and another after that, he needed to not be pounding his head against complicated concepts that wouldn't apply in another month. There were vampires, but they weren't the root of the thing, not more important than the magic of the previous world. And more importantly, they weren't his immediate concern.

“My genus — most of the Jade Council, the Jade Scholars — are of the strix,” she said. “There are five such groups in Teaguewater, more beyond the city and on the Eastern Shore. ‘Vampire’ is a word of myth.” She hesitated. “Appropriate, largely.”

“Explain what you mean by it,” said Perry. It was a miracle that they were speaking the same language at all, and the nuances of particular words could easily have been lost. When he had some time to himself, he would use Marchand to see what Richter’s world thought about vampires using the stored version of Wikipedia, Gratbook. “You drink blood?”

“We eat organs,” said Flora. “Kidneys, livers, sometimes the lungs. The varcoli feast on blood, the terrine on flesh.” She was watching him, though he was certain that the armor gave nothing of his expression away. It was gross, but also more or less what he expected.

“Human organs?” he asked. “Human flesh?”

Flora nodded slowly. Her stance had shifted slightly, not as though she was expecting to be punched in the face, but as though she wanted to be ready in case he did actually fight her.

“I see,” said Perry. “But … there are ways to do that which wouldn’t be, ah, awful.”

“You see no awfulness in the consumption of people?” she asked. "Nor in the marking of the soul?"

“I see it,” said Perry. He had no idea what she meant by soul, but he'd seen the religious iconography, including that which was on her badge, a chevron within a circle. “But the body, after a person dies — you could take bodies from hospitals, moments after death, or from prisoners who were executed, or — there are ways that you could do it that I would find understandable. Unless … the person needs to be alive.”

“No,” said Flora. “There are preservatives. A kidney can be fermented and still sustain us.” Some of the tension was slipping out of her. “It’s as you said. People die. If we have the body soon enough, before it can spoil, it can be parceled out. Blood, bones, flesh, organs, brains, those are the five genuses of Teaguewater, a single body providing for many. We don’t kill lightly, or unless we have to. It’s against the Custom.”

Vultures, Perry thought. He kept the thought to himself. “And you have wings. Claws.” He paused. “Glamours.”

“Those are of the cerebol, the brain eaters,” said Flora. “Artificiers.”

Perry thought about this for a moment. “And normal people … become these things?”

Flora watched him. “You’re thinking that the same could be done to you.”

“I was just wondering,” said Perry.

‘There’s power somewhere in this world, there always is.’ That had been what Cosme said. It didn’t seem like it was a lie.

“You would feast on blood or kidneys?” she asked. “You would decide that, within moments of knowing that it would grant you — you don’t even know what it would grant you.”

“Claws,” said Perry. “Wings. Probably something else.” The thought of such a 'feast' was disgusting, but he'd eaten disgusting things before. He also thought they were more durable, faster maybe, but that was on the basis that she'd been ready to match her claws against his sword. That appealed. He was too vulnerable without his armor on. For her part, she seemed stricken. “You were granted the power, or suggested as much.”

“There was deliberation, vetting, and understanding on both sides,” said Flora. “I knew the Custom by heart.” She frowned at him. “These are among the things you should not say to the Jade Council. They’ll see a lust for power in your heart. It doesn’t endear us.”

He didn’t think that was quite fair. He had only been asking — though he was asking because he was interested, yes. He’d given Cosme a wound, but he thought it was fair to say that he’d lost that fight, or at least managed to leave it as a bare draw. If there was power in the world, he was in no position to refuse it. And when he fought Cosme again, he was determined to go in with an edge, something that would turn the tables, especially if Cosme knew nothing about the secrets hiding behind the Custom.

“I’ll leave you to change,” said Flora. “We’ll speak more later. I’ll help you to prepare for the Council.”

Perry felt like this would be a good place for an apology, but he wasn’t sure what he would even be apologizing for. He didn’t understand enough about Flora, her genus, or the Custom to know why it was such a bad thing for him to have suggested he would become one of them.

Maybe when he was speaking to the Council, he would find out.