Page 27 of Vilest Things
“A hiccup that caused half your numbers to be jailed?”
“Says you, deserter—” Woya coughs, cutting himself off. Clearly he’s called because he needs something, so it isn’t smart to go offending Matiyu. “Iheard you work in palace surveillance now. I need you to check on something very, very small for me.”
“I’d rather not,” Matiyu replies. “I’m not trying to get into trouble.”
“How many times did I watch your back in the temple, hmm? I only need a yes or no from you—yesterday, sometime in the morning, did San-Er receive an entrant through the wall?”
Matiyu frowns and tuts, even as he types in a search for the footage Woya is describing. “There are no entrants into San-Er while the wall is undergoing construction.”
“Just check the footage.”
When Matiyu pulls up the camera pointed on San’s wall, he realizes it won’t catch any entrant, because the gate is on manual operation. After a quick calculation, he finds another camera, farther away but at a higher angle, pointed at a side path. He rewinds. Fast-forwards.
“Doesn’t look like it. I’m only seeing guards.”
The line stays quiet. Matiyu pulls the receiver away from his ear, checking the sound quality. If Woya hung up on him…
“Oh.” Woya’s voice returns, breaking the silence. “Hmm.”
Matiyu presses the receiver back to his ear. He taps his keyboard, cycling through the other cameras nearby for the sake of it. “You know the surveillance room has technology that issues alerts when there’s irregular movement by the wall, right? If it were that easy to sneak into the capital, there would be chaos.”
“People do sneak in,” Woya says, sounding defensive.
“Sure.” Matiyu rolls his eyes. He resets his feeds, letting it return to live time. “As I said, there’s no—oh. Oh, wait.”
The line rustles. On the other side, Woya either sat up really quickly or dropped something. “What? What is it?”
“What the fuck?” Matiyu says.
The shoe is what catches his attention. The live footage on Gold Stone Streetcaptures only a small part of the trash heap in the corner—there are cameras installed on just about every alley and street in the city, but they’re not all actively playing on the surveillance room’s screens, or else the people working this room would be overwhelmed by far too much useless footage. Camera three tends to remain active in the surveillance circuit for a broad view into the street. But that shoe is sticking directly up, and it can’t really reach that angle without afootin it, so if Matiyu activates camera four for a lower angle on the trash pile…
“Oh,fuck.”
Swallowed within the trash, a dead man lies on his side, wearing the uniform of a palace guard. He couldn’t have been left there long, given the color that remains in his face, his expression frozen in surprise.
The most bizarre part, though, is the yellow umbrella stabbed through his middle, both his hands curled around its handle as if he was attempting to tug out the weapon shortly before death.
“I have to go.”
Woya splutters. “Wait, what did you—”
Matiyu hangs up the phone.
“Guards!”
CHAPTER 9
Calla hauls Leida all the way to her rooms and slams the door closed before any of the panic in the hallways can catch up to them. Her cat greets her upon entrance, but when he sniffs Leida too, he flees into the bathroom.
“I don’t know what you think you’re achieving by yanking me around like this,” Leida remarks. She tries to extricate herself the moment Calla grabs her arm, but Calla is stronger. Leida grunts, throwing her body weight into her. They’re in close quarters—it isn’t easy to put up a good defense. Instead of finding a way to hit back, Calla only grits her teeth, putting her whole focus into the grip she has on Leida’s left arm. If she lets go, Leida will flee in an instant, and this will be for naught.
“Letgo.” Leida’s shoulder clips her across the chin. The moment Calla flinches, Leida seems to realize that Calla’s other hand has been working on freeing something behind her: the heavy curtain, and the cord in the middle that keeps the fabric bundled. Leida tugs her arm hard, but it is too late. The curtain bursts loose, its cord secured in Calla’s hand. As a last resort, Leida kicks out to take Calla’s knee from underneath her, but Calla has already braced low. In this body, Leida is shorter than she’s used to, and she doesn’t put as much swingbehind the attack. Calla pushes the cord around a pipe running up the wall, a thin tube stemming from the anchored radiator. Before Leida can throw herself free, Calla has her left wrist tied with the cord, then her right.
“Heavens,” Calla grumbles, finally lurching back to catch her breath.
When Leida tries to move now, her arms stay welded to the pipe. Her blue eyes are bright, almost feverish.
“Were the prisons not enough of an indignity?” Leida demands. “Did you have to trap me to a”—she looks back—“acoldradiator?”
