Flora's Fury: How a Girl of Spirit and a Red Dog Confound Their Friends, Astound Their Enemies, and Learn the Impo (30 page)

“Did they ever find it?”

“Well, eventually they found it. It was empty”

“Not entirely” Cutaway said, smiling.

“No, not entirely empty,” Tharyn agreed. “After that, the Pacifica refused to ship humans, and also made a rule that express packages had to be accompanied by an agent at all times.”

“But you are human. How come it’s not dangerous for you?”

“He’s a skinwalker,” Cutaway said. “He’s only part human. Skinwalkers—those born that way that is—are all praterhuman-human hybrids. Didn’t you know that?”

I had not known that. And now that I did, I wasn’t sure how I felt about this knowledge. But I didn’t have time to think about it.

“I told you it was not without risk, Nini,” Tharyn said. “And I said I didn’t care. I’ll take the chance. I doubt that Madama Hargity ever lost a package.”

“I have not, actually” Cutaway said. “But if I do this, I jeopardize my contract with the Pacifica. It’s a lucrative contract, not just Elsewhere, but in the Waking World as well. So it’s going to cost you.”

“It’s fine. I’ll pay Whatever you want, I’ll pay.”

“Well, then, let us waste no more time. Thank you, Sieur Wraathmyr. I shall take it from here.”

“But I’m the agent,” Tharyn protested.

“I can’t take you both,” Cutaway said. “It’s too much. Don’t you trust me with your package?”

I looked at Tharyn in dismay I had expected that he would go with me, and the thought had lent me a lot of courage. Now to find out I would have to go alone—this made my tum twist with fear.
Suck it up,
said Nini Mo,
before it sucks up you.

I said, “I’ll be fine, Tharyn. Madama Hargity said herself that she didn’t wish to jeopardize her contract with the Pacifica. She’ll take good care of me.”

“Oh, yes, I shall. And I will tell you what. Since I’m obviously in a generous mood today, or I wouldn’t even consider doing something so silly, you can bring the dog. I won’t even charge you extra, just because he is so very sweet.”

“Done.” I turned to say goodbye to Tharyn.

But he was already gone. And so was the road, and the flat buildings, the blue sky Flynn and I were following Cutaway down a short flight of marble steps, across a wide sidewalk slick with recent rain. All around us, buildings, gleaming silver and wet, rose like mountains above us, so tall they seemed to scrape the sky Flashbulbs popped all around, voices shouting,
This way, Cutaway!
And
Where’s Jaredo, Cutaway?
And
Cute dog!

Cutaway ignored the catcalls. She had changed clothes; now she wore a black evening gown. The silk clung to her like shiny wet paint and trailed along behind her in a wispy train. But the scissors still dangled at her waist.

Ahead, a man in a black uniform and a peaked cap was holding open the door of a long, squat carriage. Cutaway ducked inside, and as I followed her, I saw that the carriage had no horses in front. Inside, two low seats faced each other. I sat down across from Cutaway.

Faces pressed against the windows, mouths open, but I couldn’t hear what they were saying through the glass. Flynn jumped up next to Cutaway and peered out the window, drooling with excitement.

“Where to, madama?” the driver asked.

“Give me your address label,” Cutaway commanded.

I handed it to her, and she glanced down at it. “Fort Sandy, Arivaipa, eh? That’s a long way from here. And there’s no Pacifica office in Fort Sandy. I’ll have to take you all the way there myself. It’s very inconvenient.”

She said something to the driver in Gramatica, Words that I did not know. Here in Elsewhere, the Words had no spark. I sat my dispatch case at my feet and settled back for the ride.

With a hiss, a panel of glass glided up behind me, cutting us off from the driver. The coach began to move, so smoothly and silently that it took me a moment to realize that we were moving.

“What kind of a carriage is this?” I asked.

“It’s a stretch Phaeton,” Cutaway said. “Nice, isn’t it? Such wonderful suspension. Rides like a dream. I can’t understand why it never sold well.”

“Where are we?”

Cutaway was fiddling under her seat; she produced a cut-glass bottle and two glasses, and sat them on the small table she folded down from the door. “On our way, Lieutenant Fyrdraaca, on our way. But before we get much further, let’s discuss the matter of the price.” She poured herself a drink and then offered a glass to me, but I shook my head.

“I told you I would pay whatever you asked.”

“So you did. You are aware that this means I could ask for anything—your left ring finger, your favorite teddy bear, your life?”

“I’m not an idiot,” I said. “I know what I agreed to. You can have any of those things, but you have to get me to Arivaipa first.”

“No, I suppose you are not an idiot. Tempestuous and harebrained, but not an idiot. Lucky for you, I have no need for any extra fingers, I never cared much for teddy bears—”

“I don’t have a favorite teddy bear, anyway.”

“And I don’t see what good your life would do me, it being so undeveloped and green, hardly ripe. And somewhat bitter. But you know who does want your life? Your Birdie friend. He seems to want it pretty badly, and to him, I’ll bet it’s worth a whole lot.”

Here came the setup. The whole thing had been a trap. Cutaway was going to sell me out to the Birdies. No wonder she had refused to bring Tharyn with us. But I knew Cutaway wanted me to be afraid, that she was hoping I would be afraid and would show it. I was determined not to favor her. I said nonchalantly, “If you sell me out to Espejo, then you’ll be breaking your contract with the Pacifica. Can Espejo pay you enough to make up for that?

“Oh, I’ll just tell the Pacifica that the package was lost in transit. It does happen. And I dare say that your friend Sieur Wraathmyr will not want to admit what was in the package, for fear of his own position. They’ll fire him if they realize what he’s done.”

“You are wrong.” I wasn’t sure if she was or not.

“Or perhaps I have already had my minions take ahold of Sieur Wraathmyr and am planning on selling him, too. Double my profit.”

“Before, in your office, you said you’d let Tharyn go.”

“I never said that. I only said I’d send the bill to Espejo and I wanted you off Barbacoa. But let’s cut to the chase, Lieutenant Fyrdraaca. I’m a businessdæmon. I’ve got expenses to cover and employees to pay, and at the end of the year, I want to see lots of beautiful black numbers in my account books. I do not like red ink. Your petty human fighting has cost me a great deal and jeopardized my bottom line. I do not like to be in the red. Espejo can pay enough to balance my books again, at least get rid of the red ink, if not actually move back into a profit.”

She continued, “However, lucky for you, I do realize that there is more to life than the bottom line. I’ve been Governor of Barbacoa for a long, long time. It’s a rough place, and I’ve seen a lot of things. Now I find I’m bored. Barbacoa is wide-awake, but after a while, you’ve seen it all. Money can’t buy everything.”

“Then why were you threatening to sell me to Espejo if you don’t care about the money?”

“I wasn’t threatening,” Cutaway said. “I was reminding you that I could. No, the money would be nice, but you have something else that would be nicer, I think.”

Already I had learned that when someone smiles in just that way, whatever came next would involve something painful for me or happy for someone else. It was the same smile the head prefect at the Barracks used when she was telling someone to report to the Commandant for a flogging.

I said, resigned, “What do you want, Madama Hargity?”

“I want your love for Udo.”

T
HE
P
HAETON GLIDED ON
through the night. I caught glimpses of rain-soaked streets and soggy figures, some huddling under big black umbrellas, as round and black as beetle carapaces. Once, the carriage crossed a long bridge, its lamp-lit struts arcing high above us; underneath was water, black as coffee, traced with the lights of ships. Off in the distance, city lights twinkled. After the bridge, there were no streets, no people, nothing but the road slipping by under our wheels, impossibly fast and impossibly smooth.

“I can’t give you Udo,” I said eventually. “He’s not mine to give.”

“Of course he’s not. I want your love for Udo, Flora. Udo I can get for myself—should I decide I want him.” “Then why do you want it?”

“Because I see your love for him inside of you and it’s shiny bright. I like shiny bright things.”

“How can I give you my love for him?”

“Don’t you worry about that. Do we have a deal? You give me your love for Udo and I’ll get you to Arivaipa. As I said before, the dog rides for free. And I will not sell you out to the Birdies.”

“And Tharyn?”

“May go his furry way unmolested by me. It’s a generous offer, Flora. And after all, am I not asking for something you don’t even really want? I heard you and Udo fighting in the bar. You said you didn’t care if you never saw him again. Of course, that wasn’t true at all, as the fit you threw in my office showed. But I can make it true.”

Of course I had said hot things during our fight. I always said hot things. And Udo did, too, but we always regretted those things later and made up. Didn’t we?

Cutaway continued, “And he doesn’t love you, anyway I saw him with the other one, the Zu-Zu. He’s obviously crazy for her. Why waste your love on someone who doesn’t want it? Give it to me, and you’ll be free to find someone who will love you back.”

“You mistake me, madama. I mean, I love Udo, but I don’t
love
him.”

“Don’t you?” Cutaway said. “Well, then, all the easier for you. If you don’t
love
him, then your love is easy to give up. You’ll hardly miss it. And if Udo gets himself killed, you won’t care a bit. How nice that will be, eh? How lucky for you that the price I ask hardly costs you a thing. If you want to love someone, there’s always the bear. He’s half in love with you already, and oh, what a chest he has. And I think you are not fully immune to his charms.”

If I was honest, I had to admit that she was right. I was not fully immune to Tharyn’s charms. He was solid where Udo was flighty, and sensible where Udo was flippery. He didn’t chastise me or treat me like a child. He understood me in a way that Udo, brought up in a happy family could not. We had a lot in common. When I was with him, I felt safe and secure. I liked him an awful lot. But I didn’t love him.

Udo. As far back as I can remember, Udo has been constant. When dusty dirty Crackpot Hall, with Poppy screaming in the Eyrie, had been too much and I had gone on the bum, Udo had cheered me. And even when I couldn’t be cheered up, he’d made me come stay with him at Case Tigger with his giant family of happily squabbling siblings and his three stable, loving parents. He had brought me back to life, even after I had drowned, so that I could save the Loliga. He had tried to rescue me from Espejo. He had lent me fifty divas when I ruined the teakettle making green hair dye (even though Buck had told me specifically not to make green hair dye in the teakettle), so I could replace it without Buck finding out. He had let me copy his maths homework when crazy Poppy had used mine as kindling. When he was captured by the pirates and I’d thought I would never see him again, my heart had felt pierced by a fiery needle. When I thought he might die of his injuries at Barbacoa, a part of me had felt that life without Udo was not worth living.

I did
love
him. I had just been too stupid and stuck-up and blind to see it. Oh, Flora, you fiking snapperhead!

But Tiny Doom. She had given me life, given me up, tried to protect me, and I had led Death directly to her. She was my mother. I had to save her. No matter what the cost.

Cutaway said, “Look, I’ll even sweeten the deal, Flora. Not only shall I take your love for Udo, but I’ll take away your memory of your love for Udo. You’ll never even know you’ve lost something. Come, come—decide. We are wasting time here, and you told me before that you had no time to waste.”

“You have to promise me you won’t do anything to Udo.”

“Of course I will not do anything to Udo. This is between you and me. Do we have a deal?”

I had no choice. I had to get to Fort Sandy and this was the only way to do it. And anyway, the sacrifice was all on my side. Anyone who almost gets you killed is someone you are better off without. Udo had the Zu-Zu. He had his sparkly red Jack Boots and his newly minted heroic stature and his pirate ship. He did not need me. He did not love me.

“Ayah, madama. We have a deal.”

“Excellent.”

At Cutaway’s order, I pulled open my jacket, unbuttoned my bodice, and unsnapped the front of my stays. “Is this going to hurt?”

“Depends on your definition of hurt.” Cutaway unsheathed her scissors. The blades were very long and looked very sharp. I didn’t see how it wasn’t going to hurt, but, well,
Grin and bear it,
Nini Mo said. I tried to grin, hoping that this would help me bear it.

“Hold still!” she ordered, and plunged the scissors through my chemise, into the middle of my chest. I shrieked, flailing, and she pushed me back onto the seat with one hand, saying, “Hold still!”

But there was no pain, just a strange tingly sensation. I quit thrashing, and looked down. Although Cutaway had sliced a large incision in my chest, there was no blood or guts. She stuck one hand into the gash and began to fiddle around ticklishly.

I giggled. “That feels really funny”

“Lucky you. Let’s see, your love for Udo, where is it? I see your love for chocolate ... Here’s your love for dogs ... Love for your little brother ... It’s got to be here somewhere. Ah, here it is, but it’s very tangled.”

“Tangled with what?”

She had pulled a thick skein of sparkling threads out of me, like a wad of tangled knitting. Now she picked through the threads, trying to unknot them. Some glittered redly, others were a sticky oily black. Some were gossamer and blue, others clear like ice.

“Oh, fear and desperation, desire and anger—you know, the usual things knotted up with love. What a mess! Hold still. This is going to be tricky” Now it wasn’t so ticklish; I was beginning to feel a weird painful stretching, like my muscles were being overextended. “It’s no use; I’m going to have to take it all. It’s too bound up together.”