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Clifton met Eddie and me at the edge of the Greyzone. With my reputation, I probably wouldn’t have been accosted, but officially, I didn’t belong there anymore. What a fucking joke, that so-called perfect test.
‘Eddie!’ said Clifton. ‘Welcome to your stag night.’
Stag night. Only Clifton. In our hearts, we were at a funeral. A funeral for two people who probably weren’t actually dead yet, but would be by morning, and also for the future that deMauve and the Colourman had conspired to snatch away from us. Yateveos would be too good for them, even feet first.
But I couldn’t dwell on that. Later, in the uncomfortable isolation of my new home outside the Zone, I could make vengeful wishes upon stars, which might even resolve themselves into contingency plans, should Gloss or deMauve or Violet or Sally Gamboge or any one of the bloody motherfucking lot of them blunder into our path the way Courtland had done. Right now, though, I had to make introductions. It was time Eddie met some people, and time they met him.
Once we were safely inside the house, the home that wasn’t mine anymore, I pulled Eddie aside. ‘Follow my lead,’ I warned him. ‘These people don’t know everything that we know. Don’t say anything about High Saffron or the mural.’
Eddie nodded, and we started up the stairs to the tiny attic, Clifton trailing behind us. Our three guests, clustered together in the gable, looked up as we came in. I cleared my throat and began introductions.
‘Eddie Russett,’ I said. It was still his name, if not for long, and it was all I could do not to throw up in my mouth at the thought of calling him Mr deMauve. ‘I’d like you to meet Catherine G14, Charles G38, and Jean G29. When it comes to the many illicit and very, very necessary activities that go on in the Greyzone, they’re the ringleaders—the ones who know where all the bodies aren’t buried.’
Eddie bowed his head in deference—over the top, as usual, but painfully sincere. I’d looked forward to years of taking the piss out of that. Fuck. ‘It’s an honour to meet you,’ he said, and my friends’ eyes went wide as they took in the fact that the Red Prefect had said this to them, and that he’d meant it.
Jean spoke first. ‘He Who Runs With Scissors,’ she said, inclining her head slightly—just enough to return the gesture, but not fully lowering her eyes. She was sizing him up, as she should do.
‘If he doesn’t stab himself with them,’ said Clifton, startling me, ‘after ten minutes of marriage to Violet.’
There was a round of muted chuckles. Eddie and I forced out laughs that almost didn’t sound like strangled sobs.
‘I handle accommodations,’ Jean said, ‘while Charles here coordinates efforts to keep everyone fed. Catherine calls herself a tutor, but we call her a spymaster. It’s her job to make sure that as many people as possible learn certain things that aren’t taught in school.’
‘Like humility?’ said Eddie, his voice laced with bitterness. He fingered his ‘Needs Humility’ badge. Now that he was a Prefect, he could remove it without comment. He’d worn it on purpose tonight, and fuck, I loved him for that. Oh, please do something stupid and force me to kill you, Your Colourfulness. In my mind, I imagined several ways; in reality, Catherine gave a solemn nod.
‘What’s in your lesson plans?’ Eddie asked her. ‘Does every Grey know about the supernumeraries?’
‘Most,’ said Catherine, ‘but not all.’ She had a voice like gentle, rhythmic summer rain, effortlessly putting people at their ease and commanding their respect all at once. I was valuable because I had a temper; Catherine was valuable because she didn’t.
But that didn’t mean she was soft. ‘Even the Greyzone has a handful of liabilities,’ she continued. ‘If you’re bad at keeping secrets, have Chromatic ambitions, or are just too thick to be safely trusted, or if you’re an unfortunate ex-Chromatic who simply isn’t ready and possibly never will be, then you’ll live and die in ignorance, if not necessarily bliss. For everyone else, though, civics lessons are priority one, and stealth is priority two.’
‘Your students must learn more in a day than anyone in Jade-under-Lime does in a year,’ said Eddie, in a tone that would have blighted crops.
‘Not that it helps with true knowledge,’ said Charles, speaking for the first time. His eyebrow quirked upwards to one side. ‘I hear you’ve done a loganberry deal, Eddie?’
‘I hope to do more,’ said Eddie. ‘It’s the only thing about marrying Violet that isn’t horrifying. The deMauves’ cellar is chock full of it.’
‘Good,’ said Charles, ‘use that, and report what you find out. Fortunately for me, simple cooperation is the much more manageable price of five bacon strips.’
‘Come to my Question Club,’ Eddie said. ‘We can use it to exchange information. We might have to work out a code, though, if Violet’s determination to play-act a happy marriage leads to her joining.’
‘You’ll just have to be so annoying the rest of the time that she doesn’t want to,’ I said, with more of an edge than I’d intended. ‘You can do it. I have faith in you.’
‘I’ll make it my life’s work,’ said Eddie, with tenderness he couldn’t quite suppress. Fuck you, Matthew Gloss.
‘What we’re really interested in,’ Jean said curtly, giving both of us a stern look, ‘is your father, Eddie. Jane said you thought he’d be sympathetic, like Robin Ochre. When can we meet him?’
‘Soon,’ said Eddie. ‘I haven’t managed to tell him everything I know yet, and I don’t know that he’s quite the rebel that Ochre was. But I do know he doesn’t—’ He broke off, looking at me. I nodded.
‘He doesn’t use the Rot,’ Eddie finished, staring sullenly down at his feet. I wished I could push a wheelbarrow into his train of thought, chugging rapidly from his mother’s grave to the graves that Dorian and Imogen would never get. I wished I could push one into mine.
‘Good,’ said Charles. ‘In the next couple of days, I’ll injure myself on purpose at the linoleum factory, just to build a rapport. But you’re the one who’ll have to convince him.’
‘I’ll do my best,’ said Eddie. Then, for once, he asked the right question. ‘How many of you are there?’ As one, my friends smiled.
‘Enough,’ said Catherine, ‘but we’re the ones you need to know. We each run our own independent networks. Before Jane introduced us, we were just separately protecting the Extras we personally knew. Now that we know about each other, we’ve got a far more efficient system going.’
‘That’s my sister,’ said Clifton, ‘always snooping where she shouldn’t be.’
‘Hey,’ I said, punching his arm. ‘You’re the gossip in this family, and the entire Zone will back me up on that.’
But for once, I was grateful for the teasing. I cherished the split-second of amusement that graced Eddie’s face, which just days ago I would have punched him for, too. Clifton couldn’t know it, but he was tethering us to reality in a way we desperately needed. Every second of silence was one in which we remembered why we were here.
Innocents will die, and die at your hands. Rusty Hill had numbed me to it. Even Zane and Robin hadn’t been prepared for that. We had accidentally brought about the slaughter of an entire village, and we couldn’t even regret it because what we were doing absolutely, unquestionably needed to be done. But even knowing it needed to be done, even having seen the thousands of absorbed Rebootees at High Saffron crying out for it to be done, we had never guessed the price.
My friends continued to brief Eddie over the next hour, and by the time they had finished, nightfall was well underway.
‘Right,’ said Catherine. ‘We’ll leave you to it for now. But we’ll be in touch.’
‘Thank you for meeting me,’ said Eddie. ‘I look forward to working with you. With all of you.’
‘Don’t disappoint us,’ said Jean, and they filed out into the dusk.
Eddie gestured out the window. ‘I’m not going to make it back. We’re too far.’
‘I’ll guide you,’ I said, ‘and you can use it as practice, since you’re also going to have to learn to see at night. Just hold tight to my arm, and if I tell you to shut up, assume both our lives depend on it. Because they probably do.’
‘OK,’ said Eddie. ‘You don’t need to worry, though. I’m not afraid.’
‘Then you’re an idiot,’ I said, shaking my head.
‘We’ve established that,’ said Eddie. ‘But we’ve also established that you’re not trying to kill me anymore, remember?’
‘Give it a few months,’ I said, ‘and you might wish I were.’ I held out my hand, and he took it, and my heart leapt and sank at once.
‘Why don’t they know the rest of it?’ Eddie asked, as we set out into the magnificently beautiful night.
‘Because we need them alive,’ I whispered. ‘The work they do is too important. If any of them were targeted by Head Office, the Extras they care for would be screwed, and so would probably half the Greys who “could not have reasonably failed to know”. We’re not telling them unless and until they’re up for Reboot themselves, and part of your job as Red Prefect will be making sure that never happens.’
‘I see,’ said Eddie slowly, as if turning this over in his mind.
‘And what’s more,’ I added, ‘your father will likely be in the same category. I’m not sure I want to ask him to pick up where Robin left off even if he’d be receptive to that, especially if you’re able to get into National Colour.’
‘What’s that got to do with it?’ Eddie asked, reverting a lifetime of Chromatic unthinking. I groaned.
‘A much more reliable source of paint,’ I said, rolling my eyes at him, not that he could tell. ‘If you’re our in to complete the mural, all we need your father to be is a compassionate Swatchman who’ll keep the supernumeraries alive.’
Eddie nodded, his eyes widening as he grasped the full picture. ‘Running with scissors,’ he murmured, as if to himself.
‘That’s right,’ I said, squeezing his hand, and he squeezed mine in turn. We had reached his house, where I could see his upstairs neighbour standing at the window.
‘I think I’m starting to see stars,’ he whispered. ‘Or maybe it’s just you.’
I shook my head. ‘Don’t make this harder than it has to be.’
‘Sorry,’ he said, hanging his head in despair, and my temper flared. Not at him, but everything around us. I cupped his face and tilted it back upwards.
‘Not half as sorry as they’re going to be.’