dEaDINBURGH (3 page)

Chapter 3

Joey

Clattering his disassembled bow and the quiver into their hiding place, Joey retrieved his Communion robe, a black woollen poncho, from his dresser and took off at a sprint towards the main chamber where the ceremony was seconds from beginning. Brother Andrew, his guardian, wouldn’t be amused at his tardiness but it was too late to worry about that now.

Time had slipped away from him, as it always did, while he’d smoothly loaded and released arrow after arrow from his bow up on the Castle Esplanade. Standing perfectly still in the cold Edinburgh wind, he’d focused on the centre of his makeshift targets and released a series of perfect shots, one after the other. With each arrow lipping smoothly from his bow, Joey felt more relaxed, more alive. During his practice session he’d become aware that someone watched him. Assuming that Padre Jock was tailing him again, he ignored the presence. He raised his left arm and primed the bow for another shot when a flash of movement from the Gardens below caught his attention. Lowering the bow, Joey narrowed his eyes and focused on the black-haired figure standing alone, face up to the rainy sky. It was
her.

Joey didn’t like her. They’d only met a handful of times over the years, but each time they had the girl had stared daggers at him. She seemed truly furious whenever they met. Joey wondered how someone who lived out in the open, under the sky and in such beautiful surroundings, someone so free, someone so… beautiful, could be so miserable.

Watching her march back towards the community’s main tent, Joey sighed, raised his bow and refocused on his shot. As he pulled the string back to his nose, pulling tension into the string of his takedown recurve bow, he said a silent thank you to whoever had left the bow for him in his chamber on the morning of his tenth birthday. At times his bow was the only thing that gave him any joy.

In the five years he’d owned it, Joey had stopped wondering who had left it there for him; it was pointless. No one in The Brotherhood owned anything. Aside from some ragged clothes, each of them had discarded any personal items when they’d taken their vows. That left only Padre Jock, and there was simply no way that the creepy minister had given him such a gift.

Brother Andrew knew he had the bow and, naturally, disapproved, but had allowed him to keep it and to practice with it on the surface, on two conditions: that he didn’t allow any of the other young Brothers to use it and that he handed it over for disposal upon taking his vows. That wasn’t going to happen.

Five years spent perfecting his technique had made the bow part of his arm. Joey figured that he’d cross that particular bridge when he came to it.

Approaching the main chamber, Joey halted his sprint, smoothed down his robe and painted on a convincing look of serenity. He pretended not to notice Brother Andrew scowling angrily at him as he took his place on a bench towards the rear of the chamber. As he sat, a loud creak of protest from the wooden bench echoed around the chamber. Father Grayson, The Brotherhood’s patriarch, stopped mid-sentence and glowered at him for a moment. Joey picked a spot on the concrete floor and stared at it until the chamber filled once again with Father Grayson’s commanding voice.

“We,” he boomed, “Elisha’s chosen, have performed our sacred duties through four decades. It has fallen to us to walk with and care for the Children of Elisha who have inherited the world, by God’s will.”

“BY GOD’S WILL,” a hundred strained throats cried back, sore and unused for three months. The Brotherhood winced collectively as they broke the silence. Some held their ears.

Grayson continued. “Today, we give the daily offering of our blood so that the Children of Elisha may continue in their sacred existence. “

“BLESSINGS BE UPON THE CHILDREN,” the Brothers croaked.

Grayson spread out his arms in a crucifixion pose, a gesture made to include everyone in the chamber. His long black robes billowed slightly.

“Today we receive our Communion directly with Elisha and his Children.”

“BLESSINGS UPON THE HOLY ELISHA.” A ripple of excitement and of anticipation moved through the chamber as Grayson reached for the simple wooden bowls containing the Carrionite.

“Step forward, Brothers, and commune with our blessed Saint and his Children,” Grayson commanded.

Joey still had his head bowed but glanced up occasionally to watch the procession of Brothers in single file take Communion one at a time. As Brother Andrew approached the altar, Grayson scooped out a portion of the powdered Carrionite from the bowl with a silver teaspoon, tipped the powder onto the altar, drew a line around ten centimetres long and watched with approval as Brother Andrew filled his nose, inhaling every speck of the Communion powder.

“Blessed are we,” said Grayson

“Blessed we are,” Andrew replied, drawing the ceremonial blade in his right hand across the palm of his left. He clenched his fist over a large goblet, allowing a stream of his blood to flow into it. Finally he wrapped a clean cotton cloth around the wound and made way for the next Brother.

As Andrew walked slowly back to his bench, Joey noted the familiar glaze had already slid over Brother Andrew’s eyes. His facial muscles had relaxed and he was effectively dragging his dulled limbs back to sit in his allotted position on bench two. The Carrionite kicked in fully as he sat, making his gaze and countenance look so much like that of the Children of Elisha that Joey might have considered running from the chamber, if he hadn’t seen the effect on the face of his Brothers dozens of times before. As he continued to observe Andrew, he saw him slip into the comatose state, characteristic of the Carrionite.

“Joseph MacLeod, come forward,” Grayson boomed.

 
Joey shot up to a standing position, in shock at having been called by name. Kids Joey’s age didn’t take communion; only fully initiated Brothers did so. He must’ve screwed something up when preparing the Carrionite. Public humiliation followed by atonement was very much a favoured technique in Father Grayson’s repertoire.

Joey ignored the murmurs of those who hadn’t taken Communion yet and pushed past the catatonic bodies and floppy limbs of those who had until he reached the altar. Looking up at Grayson, he asked, “How may I serve you, Father?”

Grayson didn’t answer, but lifted his spoon into the Carrionite and spread out an offering for Joey.

He shook his head at the patriarch.

 
“Father, I’m not of age.”

Grayson didn’t reply, but used an open-palm gesture to indicate that Joey should take Communion.
Was it a test? Was he being punished? Would he be wrong to take the Carrionite, or wrong to refuse?

Hearing someone enter the quiet chamber, Joey glanced quickly over his shoulder towards the door to see Padre Jock strut in. It wasn’t unusual to see the old man at these events. He never took part but rather seemed to find some amusement in the ritual and pomp of Communion. Jock looked straight at Joey, then at the Carrionite in front of him, and finally threw Joey a look of pure contempt before leaving.

The look cut Joey to the bone.
Who the hell is he to judge me?
 

Father Grayson reached down and placed a hand gently on Joey’s shoulder. “Take it,” he whispered.

“Why?” Joey asked.

Grayson’s eyebrows rose in surprise but he held his anger and spoke softly.

“Some Brothers, for their own safety and for that of his Brothers, must be initiated early. Take it.”

Releasing the boy’s shoulder, Grayson rose to his full height, spread his arms wide and yelled, “Today Brother Joseph leaves his old life, his childhood behind. Even one such as he,” Grayson pointed a long finger at Joey, “even this boy, despite his rebellious nature, despite the nature of his arrival into our midst, even he is welcomed into our sacred Brotherhood.”

Joey’s ears pricked up at this. He’d almost never heard anyone refer to the fact that he wasn’t born into The Brotherhood, almost never heard any of the Brothers refer to how he came to Mary King’s Close as a baby. Exasperated at the futility, he’d stopped asking Brother Andrew years ago. That Grayson was mentioning his arrival in a public forum like this was astonishing.
Was he about to tell him who his parents were?

“Full members of The Brotherhood are privy to all of our secrets, young Joseph.”

Grayson indicated again for him to take the Carrionite. Looking out at the assembled Brothers, Joey searched their faces for help. Bobby, Andrew, former friends all either turned their gaze away from his desperate eyes or were too high on Carrionite to notice. Joey found himself wishing that Padre Jock would come back to scowl at him, to inject some will into him with the anger he projected towards everyone in his line of sight. But Jock was gone, as disgusted with his participation in Communion as the Brothers would be with his non-participation.

Grayson had trapped him. He’d made no secret that he felt Joey didn’t belong in Mary King’s Close. He didn’t like outsiders, people
not born to the service
. Joey had no idea why The Brotherhood had ever taken him in as a baby. It damn sure wasn’t out of compassion as The Brotherhood would dutifully leave any living person to be ‘blessed’, to be fed on by the Children of Elisha. If he refused the Carrionite, Grayson would make him leave. If he partook, he’d be just like
them
.

“Do it, “Grayson screeched at him, losing his composure in his eagerness.

Looking around the chamber, filled with the passive faces and bodies of the only people he’d ever known, Joey made his decision.

“No,” he said simply and left for his chambers.

Sprinting at full-speed along the tunnels of The Close, Joey reached his chamber within seconds and began pulling together all of his belongings. He had maybe twenty minutes before The Brotherhood began to rouse from their Communion and came for him. Grayson wouldn’t tolerate a non-believer in the underground town and would more than likely make him an offering to the Children of Elisha.

Pulling his clothes and possessions into the middle of the cold, damp chamber he’d called home for fifteen years, Joey packed what spare clothes he had into a rough canvas rucksack along with some other items, including a pouch of Carrionite. He dressed quickly in black denims, thermal long-sleeved T and sturdy hiking boots, all scavenged from a mountaineering shop.

Assembling his bow, Joey slipped his quiver full of arrows over his shoulder and onto his back and darted through the chamber archway, running straight into Padre Jock’s rock-hard chest. Thrown onto his ass, he launched himself back up onto his feet.

“Get the hell out of my way,” he ordered the old minister.

Silently, Jock stood aside and offered his palm out towards the door allowing Joey to dart through.

“Good for you, son.” Jock smiled to himself as he listened to Joey’s footsteps race through the tunnel.

Performing a quick check on his knives and other equipment, Padre Jock strolled off towards the main chamber at a leisurely pace.

Chapter 4

Alys

“Go to sleep, Stephanie,” Alys whispered to her younger cousin who was sitting up in bed.

“I can’t. Can I come with you, Alys?”

She was a sweet kid. Ten years old and at that age when she was just beginning to become a competent fighter, under the tuition of the council, but was still young enough to consider her combat training fun.

Alys smiled down at her in her bed and pulled on her leather jacket. Tucking her three Sai into their places – one on each thigh, one on her belt – she told Steph once again, “No, maybe next time, but not tonight.”

Alys tucked the girl back into bed and slipped out through the gap in her canvas tent. Once outside she looked up at the crescent moon, pulled her collar up against the breeze and took off at a slow run towards the gates of The Brotherhood.

Unable to get the boy with the bow out of her thoughts, Alys had decided earlier in the evening to visit the Castle Esplanade and spend some time training there, where
he
trained. She deserved the freedom; she’d earned it. Unfortunately her mother disagreed and still demanded that she did not leave the safety of their fenced community until
she
deemed her ready. Alys was supremely confident in her abilities to defend herself and dispatch any threat, of either the living or the dead variety. Besides, the Esplanade was Brotherhood territory and they rarely ventured outside of their underground town, certainly never after dark. Aside from the boy with the bow. Something shifted in her gut once more at the thought of him and the freedom he had but didn’t deserve.
I deserve it
, she told herself.

 
In order to reach the Esplanade, Alys would have to go through The Brotherhood gates and walk along through the Royal Mile, up Castlehill and onto the Castle grounds. She didn’t know that part of the city, but from the layout she was able to see from The Gardens below, it looked like a straight shot from the gates to the Castle. If the streets up on the Royal Mile were similar to those where her community lay, there’d be plenty of dark alleys, closes, doorways and crevices in which to hide in the darkness if needed.

As she reached the gates Alys slipped her pair of blunted Sai from their sheaths on the sides of her thighs. Rotating them she held her Sai handles out with her grip on the cross bar and the main shaft running tight along her inside forearms. In this grip, the Sai were excellent for defence and attack. She left the third of her Sai in her belt. The sharpened edges and point made it her most lethal and least-used option. The Ringed and living people alike could easily be silenced or stunned with her more traditionally blunt Sai.

After checking along the fence-line where Bank Street met High Street, the boundary between The Brotherhood’s territory and her own people’s and the place she’d first met the boy with the bow, Alys picked the gate’s lock and slipped through. A gust of wind shot along the length of High Street as she stepped through the gate, taking her breath away and causing her to retract through the gate in response.

Get a grip.
She stepped back out onto the cobbles of The Royal Mile. Locking the gate behind her, Alys moved quickly and quietly along the sides of buildings, pupils wide, taking in every speck of available light and every detail of the unfamiliar street and buildings. Looking to her left, towards The Brotherhood’s home at Mary King’s Close, Alys’ eyes were drawn to the gothic St Giles Cathedral. She made herself a silent promise to come back another time and investigate the beautiful building and its surrounding courtyards. Turning her attention to her right, she made her way up the cobbled Lawnmarket towards the Castle Esplanade.

As she forked right up to Castlehill, Alys noticed one of The Ringed stuck behind the railings of the fence around The Hub, another gothic-looking building. Trapped between the railings, arm broken and twisted around the fence, it was no threat to her. Trained to calculate risk, she decided not to waste energy silencing it and continued up Castlehill.

As she passed the railing, the former woman in a tattered red waitress uniform, craned its neck and snapped its jaws reflexively at her. A pitiful, dry groan escaped its throat. Alys looked at it for a second, taking in its appearance. In the advanced stages of decomposition – as advanced as these creatures got at any rate – the creature looked dry and broken. It creaked when it moved and carried dust, probably desiccated flesh, all over its person. The eyes were long gone having passed the putrefaction stage many years past, but it sensed her by some other means and turned its empty eye sockets towards her, repeating its weak, hungry groan.

Alys sighed, walked around the fence and quickly silenced the trapped ex-person, before moving up the slippery cobbled road once again towards the Castle.

Upon reaching the top of Castlehill the narrow, gothic street suddenly widened into a broad esplanade at the top of which stood Edinburgh Castle. Despite the freezing rain and the wind, and her own stoic disposition, Alys smiled to herself and began to walk out into the open space.

As she made her way across the square, she heard someone’s boots running up Castlehill behind her. After vaulting over the railings on her right, Alys took position behind a large stone Celtic cross and sat silently watching as the boy with the bow appeared. Obviously in a state of panic, he carried his bow out in front, arrow in position, and a rucksack on his back.
 
Scanning the Esplanade, he made his way carefully towards a massive arched door at the Castle. From where she sat Alys could see him retrieve a small object from behind one of the walls by the Castle, slip it in his bag and move back around the Esplanade towards Castlehill.

He stationed himself tucked in behind a wall, alert and watching, down the cobbled road that led to Mary King’s Close. Clearly he expected someone. Alys slid silently around the perimeter of the fence she’d taken cover behind, her eyes never once leaving him until she could see part way down Castlehill in the direction he was facing.

An hour passed, during which time he kept his arrow loaded and his bow-string taut. There was no sign of movement in his muscles despite the tension in the bow for the whole of the hour he stood watch. It was a striking feat of stamina and strength. Alice was reluctantly impressed. Eventually, he decided that whoever he thought was coming after him was gone or had never come. Unhooking his arrow he sat on the wet cobbles, rucksack pressed up against the wall, visibly relieved and obviously defeated.

Part of Alys enjoyed seeing the carefree boy so visibly distraught, but most of her was crushed that the illusions she’d crafted for herself of his perfect, free life were just that, illusions. Unwilling to break the silence or his moment of reflection, she sat as still as the stone cross behind her watching his shoulders move in time with his sobs. Shame rose in her; she wanted to leave, to give the boy his privacy, but she stayed where she was.

The sound of breaking wood brought her instantly to full alert. She sprang to her feet, giving her position away to the boy who’d already risen and was turning his body side-on to her and taking aim. She froze. Not out of fear for herself – she’d looked this boy in the eye as a ten-year-old and knew that, despite the anger, she felt towards him, the jealousy of a life she imagined that he had – this was a good person. He wouldn’t fire at her.

She’d frozen in place because she’d spotted the source of the noise which had startled them both out of their hiding places. Six Ringed had crashed through the boarded-up shop front immediately next to where the boy had been resting his back against the stone walls. With his attention on Alys, the boy was unaware of the dead hands reaching out to him or the teeth snapping in anticipation of a meal at last.

Her mother would look after herself and walk away. That’s what Alys been taught to do and it was what she wanted to do. She pushed her mother’s voice away and shouted at him.

“RINGED. BEHIND YOU.”

 
Alys began running in his direction as she drew her Sai. Never taking her eyes from him, she saw realisation dawn in his green eyes and watched him swing around, turning his bow arm to bring it horizontal and smashing into the side of the nearest creature’s temple. As she covered the ground between them, she saw him take a single step forward and kick another of The Ringed across its knee, causing the weak ligaments to snap and the creature to tumble forward.

He was quick and inventive but he’d obviously never fought a crowd before and was trying to fight them one at a time, as if they’d form an orderly queue and politely wait their turn. Inexperience was going to get him killed, or worse, get him bitten.

Alys threw herself into a high somersault, clearing his head as the downed creature dragged the boy to the ground with it. As she passed over the boy, she saw The Ringed using its arms to crawl up the prone boy, forcing him to jam his bow riser into its rotting mouth. She heard teeth crunch and a scream as she cleared the pair and flashed out a kick to a female creature’s chest, knocking her over.

Silencing her with a Sai point to the temple, Alys rotated both Sai and launched both hands forward delivering the flat Sai handles into the foreheads of the two Ringed currently reaching for her. Yanking the handles free she whipped around once more, using the length of her Sai to break the arm then leg then neck of the last one, before pushing a Sai edge through its ocular cavity, bringing it to a final silence. Leaving her Sai poking from its eye socket, she smoothly pulled her third Sai from her belt and launched herself at the boy.

He’d pushed The Ringed off him after catching the creature’s mouth around his bow, but was pulling at a blood-stained glove. It had bitten him. He saw her move towards him and held his injured hand up to halt her.

“Wait…”

He didn’t get to complete his sentence; she’d already delivered her blow.

“What the hell?” He’d been complaining at her for a while now as they walked downhill together towards the gates on Bank Street.

“It looked like you’d been bitten.” She shrugged. “Amputation’s the only way of stopping the infection spreading.”

He scowled at her and looked back to the tip of his middle finger on his left hand, or at least at the empty space where the top half of the finger formerly resided.

“It was just a pressure wound to the nail.”

Alys shrugged again.

The boy with the bow and the missing finger stared a little more at the cauterised wound on his shortened finger, before shifting his eyes to her face and offering her a wide grin.

“Well, a ‘thank you’ is in order I suppose.” He jabbed what remained of his mid-digit into the air in an attempt at a rude gesture.

Despite herself and the situation, Alys laughed out loud. It felt good to laugh with him. She couldn’t recall the last time something had made her smile.

“I’m Alys.” She offered him her hand.

The boy with the bow smiled broadly at her and took her hand in his.

“Thank you, Alys, I’m Joey.”

They stood for a few long seconds not letting go of each other’s hand, until it became awkwardly obvious that they’d both held onto each other a little too long. Fortunately Joey had the perfect opportunity to break the connection as he noticed a cloaked, masked man making his way towards them from the direction of Mary King’s Close.

Alys grabbed her Sai, noticing Joey bring his bow up into the ready position, despite the obvious pain in his hand. Her mother had told her often of how men were weak, and unreliable in that weakness, but Joey was anything but weak.

She let him step slightly ahead of her. It wasn’t a defensive gesture, he wasn’t being gallant; she might’ve taken another finger from him for that. Instead he’d taken the initiative, simply because his weapon had the longest range.

They instinctively parted from each other, sidestepping in either direction to flank the cobbled street. She liked this kid more and more; he thought like she did.
Give the enemy two targets to worry about instead of one.
Masking a smile that threatened to pop up on her face with a scowl, she shouted towards the advancing man.