Coldmaker(24)

The High Nobleman’s eyes again went to the door of Solomon Weavers, and he was quick to produce a bag of Cold and a Noble token, which he hurried to hand over.

‘Fast and quick, you little piece of dung,’ the High Nobleman said, shooing me off my corner just as his wife appeared in the background.

Half out of the door, her hand waved frantically. ‘Come quick, Ulyssipher, my love. You simply must see this sun-dress. On sale for a Shiver and three Drafts!’

In the time it took for the words to reach our ears, the High Nobleman’s face had softened immensely. He looked as passive and innocent as a child, his expression full of wonder as he hoisted his large Cold-purse back over his shoulder, hustling down the street. ‘Coming right now, my sweet mulberry!’

I darted to the nearest alleyway to scrape the sand from my tongue. After a few gritty passes with my fingernails, I realized something else had sneaked into my mouth during my desperate breath; something soft, now pressing against my upper gums. Trying not to think of the agonizing pain in my cheek, I fished up and found a tiny flower petal, one from the Roses of Gilead.

The Domestics must have missed it after the Procession.

The petal would have sat near my corner, bright red, yet undetected. Small and fragile, certainly the runt of the basket, it had been flung towards me by a burst of Cold that never should have happened.

I knew the Crier didn’t get involved with my kind, so the petal couldn’t have been any kind of sign, but looking at it sent my mind to the Upright Girl’s crazy posture, and then to my Cold Wrap, gears turning in my head. If the girl hadn’t been caught after wasting that much Cold, why was I so scared of my three little Wisps?

By the time I’d reached Mama Jana’s, the burn on my cheek had taken shape.

I ran my fingers over the tender spot, feeling the raised skin, but it wasn’t until I sneaked a look at my reflection in her shop window that I realized I’d been branded. The Closed Eye had been inscribed in the metal on the bottom of Thoth’s shoe, and it was now imprinted on my cheek.

The burn was superficial, and I knew it would clear with some rest and salve, but I felt violated. I ran a hand over the spot and felt tears welling in my eyes, desperately missing Jadanmaster Geb.

What had become of him? Kindness towards Jadans seemed less and less welcome in the World Cried, and I worried that Mama Jana might be next to fall. A part of me was scared to grab the handle to the shop door because I might find it locked, its owner having been dragged off to the dark pit the Vicaress reserved for her enemies.

I was just about to open it when something caught my eye on one of the alley’s walls.

I looked around, checking there weren’t any taskmasters nearby, and then ducked into the shadows. I had to blink a few times to adjust my eyes, but even after things became clearer, I still couldn’t understand what I was seeing.

Someone had crafted a symbol on the wall in green paint. I stepped close enough to smell the brick, and traced the air above it with my fingertips, careful not to smudge the design.

An ‘Opened Eye’.

It looked like the raised skin on my cheek, but in the centre, instead of a shut lid, the eye was wide open.

I stepped forward and examined the smears of green, my heart in my throat. The discovery filled me with a dark terror, and not just because graffiti was illegal in Paphos. Without knowing exactly what an Opened Eye meant, I had a feeling it was probably worse than waving two knuckles to the sky.

I decided it was best not to linger.

I skittered back to the front of the shop and pulled open the door, to be greeted by a puff of air so Cold it made the pain in my cheek disappear.

Mama Jana waved me in, as she finished stowing her new Cold. I sometimes wished the levers and teeth of her lockbox would break so she might ask me to fix it, but as it was, she spun the dials, and the latches pulled together with a satisfied click.

Mama Jana breathed the air deeply with a bright smile. ‘Thanks to you, dear boy,’ she said, tapping her fingernails on the glass, ‘my home is once again breathable.’

‘Don’t mention it,’ I said, trying to match her smile.

Mama Jana pointed to the Cold Bellows, displayed proudly on a nearby table. ‘I swear that thing is now giving me twice the Cold at half the twists. Whatever changes you made, I wish you could do it to the world itself.’

‘Mama Jana,’ I said, as politely as I could, even though the question was burning a hole through my pocket, ‘may I ask you something?’

She gave a roll of her wizened eyes. ‘Some Noblewoman short you again? What do you need and how much you got in that purse? I swear, my kin are getting more miserly by the week.’

‘I need something shaped like a heart,’ I said. ‘And I was given six Drafts. But that’s not what I meant.’

Mama Jana was out from behind her counter almost before I could finish my sentence, sweeping past her impressive display of parasols. ‘Heart-shaped, eh? What kind of item?’

I remembered the Nobleman’s backhand against my face as I said, ‘Any item, please.’

She moved towards her stack of jewellery boxes, but looked at me with a double-take. ‘What’s that on your cheek, Spout?’

I covered the burn with my hand. ‘Nothing. Nothing but the Sun. I’m fine.’

‘I know I’m not outside much, but I didn’t think the Sun had that much bite.’