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It was as silly sounding as it was serious: The Bounce Hypothesis. It wasn’t so much a competing idea to the Big Bang Theory, but a cyclical interpretation of its better known cousin, which the universe contracted and expanded across infinite time. Rather than the Big Bang being the source of our universe, it was the result of the previous universe’s collapse.
To humans, this made little difference. To Cosmologists, it was an idea that was largely discredited in the latter half of the 20th century. However, long into the 21st century Professor Hardwick continued to spend at least a day every semester teaching this interpretation of the universe’s cycle.
The professor was often teased by friends, ridiculed by rivals, and questioned by the Dean about wasting his students time in teaching a defunct theory. He always replied that it was good to explore competing ideas, even old ones, to illustrate the flow of academic thought.
That was a lie, though. Hardwick taught the idea because he wanted to believe it. If the universe always began and ended in the same way, it would move on for eternity, in endless renditions. And if it went on for eternity, eventually there might be a version where he would get to see his Susie again.
Strong was stuffing the last of her clothing into a duffle bag when a knock at the door stopped her. No one knew she was here and, as far as she could tell, housekeeping at the Hotel Voyage didn’t existent.
The hotel did, as a sane precaution against outsiders and its own tenants, have peepholes in all of its doors. Even through the fish-eye of the lens, Strong couldn’t see who was on the other side, only a carefully coiffed head of dark hair that blocked out the trash of empty takeout and beer cans that lined the hotel’s hallways.
None of Wayne’s crew was that short, or had hair that black, so at least she knew it wasn’t them. That didn’t mean she wanted to speak to anyone. However, a small fist raised itself to the door and knocked again. The brightly lacquered nails flashed like a warning sign against the dingy hallway, telling her that whoever it was wasn’t going away.
“What do you want?” She yelled through the door.
“Nola Strong?” The voice with its question was hoarse, lower than the head that stood beyond the peephole, but Nola didn’t think it was a man. At least, she thought, there’s that. Nola repeated her question.
“My name is Aggie McPherson. I’d like to speak with you.”
“Go away.” The words formed themselves around an uncontrollable cough, allowing Nola to add, “I don’t feel well.” She immediately regretted it, like a child hiding in her room.
“Ms. Strong, there are men coming to speak to you and I don’t think they’ll accept that excuse. If you open the door and talk to me, maybe we can get you out of here in time.” Nola looked at the half-stuffed duffle bag and cursed being on the second floor. She had been traveling light, a prisoner to the necessity of moving fast at night in the dark streets of Slakterquay. She could have busted out the bathroom window and escaped to the back alley if it weren’t for the thirty foot drop. In this part of town, if she broke anything in the fall there was no way telling what the smell of blood and pain might bring out.
A heavier knock on the door caused Nola to jump. She gulped air and then took several calming breaths. With the chain on the door she cracked it open. Through the sliver into the florescent lit hallway she confirmed that the short person on the other side was a woman, with oddly colored eyes beneath dark hair. Her suit was nice enough that it would have attracted the attention of anyone who noticed her walk into the hotel.
“Ms. Strong, we don’t have a lot of time.”
“What do you want?”
The crack in the door seemed to widen as Aggie stared back at Nola. “I don’t think you want to discuss it standing in the hall.” Nola unchained the door to look up and down the hallway’s desolate length, verifying they were alone. With no one else in sight, she allowed the stranger in.
The other woman stepped in gingerly, floating around Nola while stepping around the worst stains on the hotel carpet. Her eyes flicked around the room before coming back to Nola as she finished securing the door. “I’m not the police,” she began, “and I want you to know that because I know that you’ve been involved in a number of robberies over the last 11 weeks. I don’t care about that.” Nola resisted the urge to grab something in the room as a makeshift weapon. It died entirely when the stranger continued, “You should care that, during those robberies, you’ve been exposed to hazardous chemicals. You should seek immediate medical attention.”
The last statement struck at every chest pain and headache Nola had been experiencing the last several days. Rather than let it become fear, she began to deny with, “I don’t know what you’re – “
Aggie held up a hand, palm forward. “Ms. Strong, can we just skip this part? Like I said, men are on their way here to find you.”
That was more concerning to Nola than the cops. “How do you know that?”
Aggie cocked an eyebrow. It wasn’t a dissimilar expression than one Nola used to get from her mother before she took off, but lacked the ridicule. There was only a dispassionate evaluation there. “I’ve tracked the device in your possession to several recent robberies. Banks, armored cars, underground vaults, seemingly impossible targets have been broken into using an unknown explosive. While you were doing this, the device melted industrial surfaces that put out some rather nasty pollutants. You weren’t warned about this so didn’t have proper protection.
“Now you’re dying. Any chance of that not happening is going to disappear when those men arrive.”
Nola felt her cheeks burn as her anger smoldered down to all of its old resentment. “Why do you care?”
There was an absence in the woman’s violet eyes (Violet eyes? Who has violet eyes?) that made Nola believe what she said next. “I don’t. However, I’ve arranged that, if you come with me, I can get you into the clinic at Port Gamble. It’s on the X’Komish reservation so the police won’t be able to touch you and neither will your erstwhile accomplices.”
Nola stared at the short stranger and thought about all of the lies she had been told and told in the last seasons. “Why would you do that?”
“Because you have information I need. It’s a straight exchange. I keep you alive, you give me answers.” Even at these words of an even deal, Nola hesitated. The other woman stepped forward, an odor like lilacs stored in a humidor wafting between them. “The man you were working for told you you were special. That the rod would only work for you. Because of your ancestry or blood or hair color. Whatever.” The accuracy of this statement bit into Nola. Her cheeks burned brighter as she felt all the more foolish at having this woman reveal what easy prey she’d been: Handsome stranger, beautiful lies, the greed of gold.
The other woman broke the spell of Nola’s self-recrimination by reaching out and taking her hands in her own. “He lied to you. He wanted you to be the one to you use it because he didn’t care if you were exposed to danger. He didn’t care if you died.” Aggie dropped her hands and reached for the duffel bag. “And somewhere along the line you figured out you were never going to get your cut, that he was sending it somewhere else. So you did the smart thing and grabbed the most valuable thing you could and ran.”
“You tried to sell the rod to a number of fences, one of whom has connections to the X’Komish nation. You may not have, but he knew the men you were working with are white supremacists, so he didn’t have any reservations about giving you up.
“And it’s good thing he did. Because now I can get you to a clinic and you can tell me who the ringleader is.”
Aggie’s eyes pointedly flicked towards the door. “Or I can figure out who he is by waiting for the men that are coming for you and ask them. But I’d prefer not to do that as it would require a level of violence that I don’t care for.”
Aggie held the duffel bag out to Nola. “What do you say?
Nola took the duffel bag.
Moments later Nola was impressed with the speed and strength this Aggie person was ushering her down the back stairs of the hotel. Out the rear exit, into a yellow and blue taxi driven by a man who was slunk so far down into the driver’s seat she could barely see cap on his head.
Inside, Nola saw the cabbie was dark-skinned with sharp nose and ears, barely old enough to drive. Aggie said quickly, “Nola, this is Rafi. Rafi, Nola.” Rafi nodded with a tip of his cap into the rearview mirror before Aggie asked him, “See anything?”
“Not yet.”
“Good. Let’s get out of here.”
As they pulled onto Olympia Street, Nola slid down, suppressing a cough as she noticed several men moving quickly into the Hotel Voyage lobby.
The Hill District was as far as you could get from the river and the ocean it flowed to and still be in Slakterquay. Which is the way Layla Rodriguez liked it. The closer you got to the river and, particularly the ocean, the richer and whiter the city got, and Layla had enough tourists wander through her shop. She could always tell newcomers because they pronounced Slakterquay wrong. Instead of Slauk-ter-key they almost always made it sound like Slaughter Quaye, which was probably more right than anyone cared to admit. The clay under the city, and all it contained, was proof of that.
The rolling streets that gave the district its name assured the ignorant arrived panting and out of breath, stepping into her front parlor a little more likely to believe whatever half-truths the credulous wanted. Fortunes told, dead relatives spoken to, the lost found, all of the usual things. Then there were clients like the spritely Aggie McPherson.
A small brass bell, an heirloom from her grandmother and only God knows how many mothers before her, hung above the shop’s entrance. It made the usual tinny sounds when a customer entered but, as her grandmother had told her, the volume of the bell always matched the trouble the person brought with them.
That morning, the bell sounded like a gong. Layla looked up from the book she was reading, a study on the etymology of Hebrew words, their numerical values, and how their place in the kabbalah could change other magicks. She caught herself in the mirror she had behind the counter, positioned so customers had to look themselves in the eye while making a purchase. She could read volumes in how a person examined themselves in the mirror and had, more than once, ceased a transaction or made an alternative suggestion based on what she saw there.
Whoever had brought trouble to her shop, though, wasn’t in the mirror yet and Layla wondered, not for the first time, what her grandmother would think of her now. She shared the same dark skin as all the women in her family, but her graying hair was put up in a scarf fit for a gypsy, sprouting from the multi-colored silk in the way of the mad and homeless. It contrasted strongly with the dark gown she wore, a brown ragged thing with bones knitted into it. They were a flair suggested by a colleague, their clatter able to punctuate important proclamations or frighten the annoying.
Out of boredom this morning, she had put a streak of purple down her right cheek to see what reaction it might elicit from any rubes that walked in. In her shop far from home, in her motley assemblage of carnival wear, she found it felt like the one thing that truly belonged to her. So she led with that side of her face, the eye above it squinting as she slowly turned to examine who had entered her shop.
It didn’t exactly frighten her to see Aggie already standing on the other side of the counter, but it almost caused her to start. For the inspector to move quickly and subtly wasn’t unusual in Layla’s experience, but to be accompanied by the bell was. To verify this was her long-time customer and not some phantasm, she said the other’s name as a question.
Aggie smirked in a way that, as far as Layla was able to tell, was her one indication of actual fondness. “Hi Layla. You’re surprised to see me.”
Layla Rodriguez, bruja of Slakterquay, descendant of women who had burned at the stake rather than be enslaved, found the pride of her ancestors and stood up tall. This allowed her to admit the truth. “Not you. But you usually don’t trip the bell.”
Aggie glanced over her shoulder, eyes arcing towards the ceiling as she looked from the entrance and back to Layla. The proprietor took some small pride in still being in control of her space when her friend and customer asked, “What bell?”
To cover this, Layla pursed her lips and shook her head, letting her dangling gold earrings dispel the question. “It doesn’t matter. It’s been too quiet today.”
Aggie’s smile broadened, which usually indicated that she was about to amuse herself, Aggie’s main occupation next to dressing in expensive suits and working to pay for them. “You know, it might help if you named this place and put a bigger sign up.”
Layla dismissed this notion with a pshaw and a waggling of her fingers as if scooting naughty schoolchildren away. “I get enough business from the rubes. Anymore would test my patience.”
“Well, I like the purple. It’s a nice touch. Should freak out the normies.” Layla smiled as Aggie reminded her of what she liked about the inspector. She tended to notice anything out of the ordinary as well as its source.
With that in mind, Layla leaned forward, putting elbows on the counter. “Would you like some tea?”
“That sounds delightful.” This elicited another smile from Layla. While Aggie might be a bit too concerned with the material world, at least she was always polite.
With a drawing back of the curtain behind the counter, the two of them moved into Layla’s parlor, its old wooden floorboards making it feel as if they were stepping into the belly of a ship. As Layla prepared the tea, Aggie asked, “No little street urchin to help you out today?”
“Luisa,” Layla corrected, “is old enough to start school and the sisters of the Parish have been kind enough to let her attend St. Veranus’s.”
“You’re gonna let those old crows get their claws into that little girl? After all you’ve taught her?”
“Hush now. The sisters mean well and they teach good. And Luisa needs to learn how to blend in.” Layla set down the silver tray at the table Aggie had arranged chairs at, the teapot and cups delicately placed as any Japanese ceremony. “Besides, Veranus banished a dragon. Tis a good omen.”
“As long as some priest doesn’t get her alone in the rectory.”
Layla held the pot gingerly, pouring the steaming liquid into the cups one at a time. “If anyone tries to have their way with that child they’ll burn in the fires of Hell. Priest or no, I’ll see to that.”
Aggie quirked an eyebrow at Layla. “I really do enjoy your accent. Where is it you’re from again?”
Reconsidering her opinion on Aggie’s politeness, Layla sat down across from her. Rather than touch her tea, she steepled her fingers below her chin and gazed at her guest. Dropping the thick edges of her accent, she asked, “What brings you around today?”
Aggie picked up her tea and blew on it, wisping the steam into the air. “I have a client that’s got a Revenant on his trail.”
“Then you need to let that client go,” Layla answered, grasping her cup in both hands. “If it gains enough force it’ll chew through anything to get at what it wants.”
“I just need to figure out why it’s after my client. Technically, I’m not working for him yet, but I’d like to get a jump on it.”
“Not like you to start work for a client before an arrangement has been made. Who is this person?”
“You know that’s confidential, Layla.”
“OK, then,” Layla took a deliberately long sip from her cup before saying, “Best of luck.”
Aggie leaned back in her chair, staring with a long appraisal that Layla ignored by pretending to be very selective about a sugar cube. The silence went on long enough that Layla was about to offer Aggie one when she finally responded. “Well, I’m not really working for him yet.”
“Technically,” Layla offered.
“Technically. In the future, if everything goes through, I’d be working for Haddo Skull.”
Layla stood so fast that the tray and pot rattled on the table, her earrings jangled and her bones rattled. “Get out.” She helpfully pointed to the door.
Aggie didn’t move. “So you know him?”
“I know he’s an evil sinvergĂĽenza.”
“I’m impressed. I had to do a lot of digging to even find his last name. Or, rather, the stupid alias that he’s going by. I suspect he’s had a number of names over the years.”
Layla lowered her pointed hand as Aggie’s calm salved her quick temper. She smoothed the idiot bones on her gown as she reseated herself, eyes on her guest in a steadying reevaluation. “And for good reason. Why would you get mixed up with that?”
“It’s a long story, but it involves the good reverend I introduced you too.”
At the mention of Reverend Taggart, Layla’s sympathy overrode her animosity. “Oof, is that puppy having more bad luck?”
“Probably. He seems the type, but I don’t think it involves this.”
“Then why? And be quick, or take my instructions and go.”
“Haddo has given me his word that if I find out about his Revenant he’ll leave Taggart and his congregation alone.”
Layla held her gaze on Aggie in the same way she might with a client who said they didn’t believe in Greenland. “If you stay out of it, it seems to me that the Revenant will solve that problem for you.”
Aggie shrugged, sipped her tea. “Maybe. Or the Silver Shields might take him being targeted by a powerful supernatural entity as proof their cause is righteous and do something stupid.” She set her tea down. “It wouldn’t surprise me if a couple of them are just waiting for a reason to go postal.”
“What?”
“It could give them a reason to start shooting. The Silver Shields have amassed quite the arsenal.”
Layla contemplated the kraken on her teapot. “Lots of targets for that in Slakterquay.”
“Yep. And the weapons are all legal so the cops can’t do anything about it until the shooting starts. Of course.”
“Of course.” Layla thought she might have spotted the odd figure hanging around her shop, but it hadn’t concerned her much until Aggie’s news. Now she tried to remember any detail she could, trying to make any connection. None surfaced, but she did remember the strange young woman who had come into the shop the other day.
“So you can see how keeping Haddo in play might keep the peace until a more permanent solution can be arrived at?” Layla picked up her cup again and tried not to grin, imagining what a permanent solution for Haddo Skull might look like.
“Fair point. But I couldn’t help you if I wanted. Revenants are necromancy and all of my arts in that sphere are just tricks and trades for the gullible.”
“You don’t have anything that might be protective?”
“Not for Haddo Skull I don’t. Silver Shields or no, I’m not helping that bastardo.”
“OK,” Aggie conceded. “But Haddo claims he doesn’t know who sicced it on him. Or murdered anyone. Lately,” she added after a pause. “You have any ideas on how I might track it down?”
Layla let out a laugh, strong enough that it caused her head to go back and it drew a chuckle from her visitor. When she leveled her eyes back to Aggie, her grin had taken on a feral cruelty that would have set Taggart back. “What are you going to do if you find it? Talk to it? Bargain with it?” As if it were the funniest idea of all, she added, “Beg?”
“No. But I’d have a place to start.”
Layla shook her head. “I can provide a gris-gris for you in case you’re unlucky enough to find it. Nothing more.” She returned to her tea, but when Aggie’s grin remained unchanged, Layla added, “But you knew that.”
“I thought that might be the case,” Aggie said, perhaps a bit too proudly for Layla’s liking. “But it couldn’t hurt to ask.”
“So what’s the real reason you came around then?”
“An old associate can’t drop by for cuppa tea?” Aggie put on a fake accent, sounding like a cereal box leprechaun. Layla only stared in return, immobile until Aggie continued in her normal voice. “I thought you might have noticed something out of ordinary lately. Clouds on the horizon, so to speak.”
Layla set down her cup, about to say that she hadn’t noticed anything that was strange for Slakterquay. This was her guarded side, though, the front she kept for the would-be hucksters and the naive. But this was Aggie. They had always dealt with her squarely and never dragged trouble to her door, even when they could have. So Layla took a longer consideration. Then, “Nothing on the horizon, but a woman came in the other day. Little more than a waif. She had something strange she wanted to sell.”
“What’s that?”
“A blasting rod.”
That inquisitive eyebrow of Aggie’s arced. She set down her cup and raised her hands, holding them about a foot apart. “Was it about this long?” Layla nodded, causing Aggie to quickly bring her hands closer so they were a thumb’s width from each other. “About this wide?”
Layla nodded. “Made of blackthorn with a brass tip mounted with a pointed ruby.”
Aggie leaned back in her chair, forgetting her tea. “She must have known what she had. Any normal thief would pry out the ruby and sell it.”
“True,” Layla agreed. “Nonetheless, I told her not to break the rod. If it was charmed, it could go badly for her.”
“You didn’t buy it?” Aggie asked, although to Layla it didn’t sound like a question.
“Gods, no.” Laylya shook her head minutely but with enough force a few of her bones rattled. “I don’t mess about with that goetic juju.”
“Goetic?” Aggie’s eyebrows did their dance of surprise again, even if Layla doubted much surprised her. “The blasting rod was created demonically?”
“Oh, yes. It’s straight out of the Grand Grimoire.” Layla sipped her tea while she observed an uncustomary consternation on her friend’s face. “You surprised?”
“I am,” Aggie admitted in a way that suggested she didn’t care for the experience. “I thought it would be a man.”
“You’re looking for a thief now?”
“No. I’m just looking for leverage.”
It was Layla’s turn to look perplexed. “I don’t understand.”
“It’s not important. Did you get a name?”
The woman who came in had been cagey, hadn’t introduced herself, which wasn’t unusual for first-timers into Layla’s shop. She had been tall, red-haired, and too thin for the cool, damp climate of Slakterquay. They parted ways when they couldn’t agree on price. The woman wanted too much, but Layla didn’t have much use for such a thing. Layla told Aggie all of this. At the end she added, “I don’t know where she was headed next, but there are only so many places she could sell such a thing.”
“Yeah,” Aggie nodded. “I was really hoping you bought it.”
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The light was lambent off the snow, every bird following the warmth of those rays coming from above and below. Snow on the beach wasn’t meant to happen, but here it was, and the flocks knew better than to question it. The old patterns didn’t hold anymore, but the migrations did.
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The shadow of the Tower extended across the land. In places where it was impossible to reach, by distance or shelter, it still laid its darkness. It defied boundaries, setting its stain on any who resisted the Tower, even as it told everyone there were no such things as magic, power, or good.
