Chapter 45 Chapter 45: A Plan is Born
The bar reeked of whiskey and yesterday’s puke. The usual crowd of green-clad drunks roared over fiddle music, but their laughter choked off when I stepped inside. Eyes, hard and suspicious, followed my every move as I crossed the sticky floor to the bar.
Seamus stood polishing a glass, pretending not to see me. That was his first tell.
I slid onto a stool, the wood groaning under my weight. “Sláinte, boss.”
He didn’t look up. That alone set my nerves on edge, until he burst out laughing, a great booming sound that cut through the bar’s noise and shoved a full glass of amber liquid at me. “Either you’re the bravest bitch in New Eden, or you’ve got a death wish. Which is it today?”
“Both.” I knocked back the whiskey, the cheap burn a familiar comfort. “I need a favour.”
He drained his own glass in one go, then moved faster than a man his size and age should, hauling me off the stool and into a crushing bear hug that smelled of tobacco and stout. “Christ, girl, I love you like me own, but you’re not askin’ for a favour.” He dropped me back on my feet, his voice dropping to a gravelly whisper only I could hear. “You’re askin’ for a fuckin’ miracle.”
Cold metal pressed into my ribs from behind. Lacy’s voice grated in my ear: “Bringin’ the devil right to our door? I had respect for you once, Tilly.”
Seamus waved a meaty hand at her. “Away with that shite, Lacy. She’s family, blood or not.” His eyes never left mine as he jerked his chin toward the back. “Bring a bottle. The good stuff. Not the paint thinner we serve this lot.”
The back room was a stark contrast to the rowdy pub, thick with silence and the scent of old wood and dust. Lacy slammed the bottle of whiskey down on the scarred table hard enough to make the glasses jump. “Askin’ the Irish to declare war on the whole damn world. And you just waltz in here.”
Seamus laughed, a raw, jagged sound that held no real humour. “Aye. Times are changin’. And we owe her. Or have you forgotten that she saved my life, more than once” He poured three generous measures, the liquid glinting in the low light.
Lacy’s jaw twitched. But she took her glass. We drank in the muffled quiet, the weight of what I’d asked hanging in the air between us like a noose. Then, abruptly, she yanked me into a rough, brief embrace, her whisper fierce against my ear: “You better know what the hell you’re doin’, girl.” Hard words. But her eyes, when she pulled back, burned with something that looked an awful lot like pride.
“So. What’cha need, girl?” Seamus asked earnestly, refilling the glasses as Lacy finally let me go.
“Like Lacy said, I want a war.” I met his gaze, letting him see the cold resolve in mine. “I need you, our crew, plus John, and the Brits to tear the Sectors apart. Riots, distractions, the works. Keep the guards busy and looking the other way. Then, I need someone convincing to tip off the Church that I’m in town. That’ll keep ’em scrambling, looking for me in all the wrong places.”
Lacy’s hand cracked across my face so fast I barely saw it move. The sting was sharp and immediate. “You’re a damn fool! They’ll find you! They’ll burn you alive!” Her voice wavered, raw with a fear that sounded too much like care. “You could just… leave. Disappear. No one would blame you.”
I brushed my cheek, offering her a forced, bloody grin. “And miss all the fun?” Turning back to Seamus, I laid out the rest. “I’ll also need three of our best, ones we can trust to keep their mouths shut and their knives sharp. And four Ajax guard uniforms.” I reached into my pocket and slapped the stack of a thousand Chids down on the table. The sound was flat and final in the small room.
Seamus looked from the stack to my face, a slow, grim smile spreading beneath his beard. He uncorked the bottle again. “Lacy, go fetch the lads. We’ve got a revolution to plan.”
Seamus, Lacy, and I drank the sun up, plotting, running through the plan a hundred times, tearing it apart, finding every flaw, and stitching it back together with whiskey and grim determination.
An hour had bled away since we’d fled the chaos of the Spil. The air in the lower sectors was a thick, acrid soup, reeking of scorched oil, melted plastic, and something darker, the sweet, coppery tang of blood. The stench was a gift from the Molotov cocktails that had rained down like hellfire during two relentless hours of fighting. Screams and furious shouts clawed from every street corner, a dissonant chorus swallowed only by the hungry, crackling roar of flames devouring wood and cloth. In the flickering firelight, the silhouettes of the crowds twisted like damned spectres against the walls. Those with sense had long since barricaded themselves behind locked doors, leaving only the desperate, the enraged, and the damned to haunt the streets.
In the deep shadow of a narrow backstreet overlooking the gothic spire of the Church of the Machine, I fumbled with the cheap lighter, my knuckles scraped raw. I pressed the naked flame to the oil-soaked rag stuffed into the bottle’s neck. For a heart-stopping moment, it refused to catch, then, a teasing blue flicker sprang to life, greedily lapping at the fuel. I gave it half a second to spread before hurling it in a high arc. It struck true, shattering the towering stained-glass window in a cataclysm of flame and glittering shards that rained down like fallen stars. I ducked back into the welcoming darkness, pressing myself against the cold brick wall, watching eagerly as my handiwork unfolded.
Not ten minutes earlier, we’d watched from a nearby roof as Lord Sparks and his fanatical cultists had stormed out, lured away by a false tip that I’d be hiding amidst the forges of the Hammer Cogs. Now, the fire took hold inside their sanctum, and only a lone, panicked figure scrambled with a bucket to contain it, just as I’d hoped. In their blind frenzy to hunt me down, they’d left their heart nearly empty.