Breath of Earth (7 page)

“Maybe they'll find others alive in the rubble,” she said softly.

“Surely they will,” he whispered.

The door cracked open again and Lee leaned into the room. “Ing? The soup's ready.”

“Thanks, Lee. I'll be back soon,” she said to Mr. Sakaguchi as she backed away. “I'll ring you.”

He nodded and said nothing. Grief flowed over her in a wave. Most everyone they knew, dead.

Ingrid failed to hold back tears as she walked away. The simple melody of the shamisen returned to her mind as the
gun, in perfect rhythm, bumped against her thigh with each stride.

Mr. Calhoun resided in a flat near Russian Hill. Ingrid's breath huffed as she crested a rise. The two pots of soup steamed in the nippy air, handles heavy in her grasp.

It had been a chilly winter, and so far April hadn't shed its cloak of gray. Ingrid loved it, and she loved San Francisco. She loved the flowing hills crowned by jeweled mansions, the varied chimes of cable cars, and how everyone here came from everywhere else. The French patisserie owner set up his clapboard sign advertising prices for day-old croissants, while a quick-tongued Italian woman berated her children as she clipped laundry to a clothesline draped above an alley. Two Chinese men toted handcarts, yellow patches vivid on their black suits, and walked with the wariness of prey in a meadow.

For everyone else, the day was utterly normal, and there was comfort in that.

Airships buzzed overhead, out of sight above the clouds. She breathed in brisk air, not minding the underlying taint of exhaust and sewage and whatever strange brew wafted from the factory upwind.

Up ahead, braced between a leaning telephone pole and a gas streetlamp, stood a familiar figure. The woman wore a dress of similar fashion to Ingrid's, a Western modification of a kimono. The fabric was so dark it almost obscured the floral pattern. The high belt revealed a figure still curvaceous enough to make most men look twice, but Ingrid's focus was on the camera. The black box rested atop a tripod with telescoping legs adjusted for the street's slope.

“Miss Rossi!” Ingrid called, eagerness quickening her steps.

The woman remained stooped as she peered through the camera lens.

Ingrid hadn't seen Victoria Rossi in months, ever since the portrait salon beside the auxiliary shut down. Miss Rossi had done photographs in studio and also sold commercial images of fantastics—pegasi, selkies in midchange, grotesque ghuls, soaring thunderbirds, that sort of thing. Ingrid still had some postcards of unicorns tucked away in a bureau drawer.

Miss Rossi had something of an obsession with wild fantastics. Sometimes she'd close shop for days as she gallivanted off to the beach or hills to attempt a sighting through her lens.

“Hello, Miss Rossi!” Ingrid panted from the climb. Soup sloshed in the kettles as she came to a stop.

“You. The girl from the auxiliary.” Miss Rossi didn't lift her head. She wore a crown of soft ostrich feathers dyed to match her navy dress.

“Yes.” Ingrid preened at the recognition. “I don't believe I've seen you do street photography before. Have you set up a new studio?”

Miss Rossi straightened as though the camera scalded her. “New studio? Ha!” The laugh was practically spat. “You think they let me own another studio here, in this city?”

Ingrid stepped back, shocked at her vehemence. Miss Rossi had always been a bit clipped in her mannerisms, but this rage was something new. “I'm sorry. I thought—the business seemed to do well. It was a good location—”

“Oh, location. Yes, location fine, too fine. Mayor Butterfield, he has business fees and permits, you see?” Miss Rossi rubbed
her thumb and fingers together. “Fees for location, fees for sewer, though sewer always backs up, fees for my safety as a woman, fees to keep his people from telling lies. No fee paid—things vanish. Chemicals no delivered. Windows broken.”

Ingrid wasn't surprised. The wardens paid their own fees to Mayor Butterfield. However, no one used graft like the Chinese. It was rumored that the late emperor's treasures were used to bribe the city and state to keep Chinatown intact. It was yet another reason why his memory was venerated by his people.

“I'm sorry,” Ingrid said.

“Sorry does not get my business back. It gets nothing back.” Miss Rossi's eyes narrowed. “You not in building today?”

“You heard about that, then.” Ingrid's throat tightened. “Yes. Yes, I was. Me and Mr. Sakaguchi. We . . . survived. We might be the only ones. It was . . . a miracle, I suppose.”

“A miracle. Mary, Mother of God! Maybe so.” Miss Rossi snorted. “Well, enjoy life as it is now, eh? I have work to do.” With that, she bent over to look through the camera again.

Ingrid couldn't help but glance downhill to follow the angle of the lens. The shot would show quintessential San Francisco: wagons and autocars parked and driving; seagulls plucking at gutter trash; a gang of dark-haired boys in knickerbockers chasing a blown-up bladder ball across the street. Fog softened the horizon. If the image could capture scent, it needed the stale reek of beer from the German rathskeller across the way.

“It may not mean much, but I am sorry.” Ingrid stalked on past. Miss Rossi offered no reply.

With her mood subdued again, the next few blocks passed in a blur of physical exertion. Nearby magic tickled her skin, and she spied fairy lights glinting in the bushes; Ingrid didn't pause to look closely, but guessed them to be invasive European pixies, the equivalent of flying, pretty weeds. She had always had a keen awareness of magical creatures around her, sensing their power like prickles of heat. It was similar to the feel of the earth's hot energy, but distinct, like the difference in ambience, smell, and sound between a wood fire and wax candle.

The ability had nothing to do with geomancy either. Ingrid learned when she was quite young that Mama and Mr. Sakaguchi had no explanation for it, and that she needed to keep her awareness secret.

Ingrid released a frustrated huff. So many blasted secrets.

Russian Hill was a hard slog even when she felt well, but with her back healing and soup in hand, she felt like an A&A recruit after a full day of boot camp—exhausted to the bone. At least the pain was gone.

The steps to Mr. Calhoun's apartment building creaked beneath her weight. She managed the front door lever with her elbow. Electricity lighted the hallway. Any geomancer skilled enough to make warden earned adequate money for electricity and most other modern comforts.

Up one more flight of stairs, and she reached his flat. Setting down her kettles, Ingrid wrung out her hands, wincing, and quirked her neck from side to side. Reiki or not, she was bound to ache tomorrow. She knocked on the door. Mr. Calhoun usually answered rather quickly; he seemed to spend
his evenings in his armchair, listening to music on his new Marconi.

“Mr. Calhoun?” she called. “It's Ingrid Carmichael from the auxiliary. Mr. Sakaguchi sent me. May I come in?”

She waited a few minutes, rocking in her shoes, before she knocked again. Was he unable to rise from bed? Should she fetch a doctor? Frowning, she tested the doorknob, and was surprised when it turned.

“Eh eh! What're you doin', young lady?” The barked-out brogue stopped Ingrid cold. She turned to see the landlady halfway up the steps. Her brilliant red hair was highlighted by thick streaks of white, as though a giant had dipped his hand in paint and then trailed his fingers up from her forehead.

“Hello, ma'am. I work for the wardens. I came to check on Mr. Calhoun, and no one's answering—”

“I seen you before. What, you people don't speak amongst each other? The city's been and gone! Someone shoulda gone to that auxiliary o' yours.”

“The city's been here? What message did we miss?”

The landlady stopped at the top of the stairs. Despite being shorter than Ingrid, the stout woman seemed to look down on her.

“Why, tha' Mr. Calhoun's dead, o' course.”

To Ingrid, it seemed that the world became very, very still. “Dead? How can he be dead?”

“God called him home, simple as that. Considering the ugliness of how he went, was a right mercy, the poor man!”

“Ugly? How? I know he was ill yesterday—”

“Ill! Pah! I'll tell you, his rent for this month'll be spent cleaning the place up, that's for sure.” The landlady stepped closer and tapped her pointer finger to her lips. “He lost everything in 'is guts, every which way. I never seen anyone 'ave it so bad. His skin turned yellow, too, jaundiced like a newborn babe. Most peculiar thing!”

The information spun around in Ingrid's mind. What could have caused jaundice like that? He hadn't even seemed that sick! “How long ago did he die?”

“Don't rightly know. I checked on him at lunch, brought him some broth. That's when I found him.”

Ingrid looked down at the soup kettles on the floor. This soup clearly wasn't needed here. She sucked in a sharp breath. Mr. Thornton! If he had the same illness, he might only have hours left. There was time yet to fetch doctors and keep him alive.

One more warden might make all the difference in safeguarding San Francisco in these next few days until help arrived.

“I have to go!” Ingrid said, hoisting up the kettles. She pushed past the landlady and practically flew down the stairs. The first apartment door was open, and through it she could hear the wavering notes of an orchestra playing over a Marconi.

At the sidewalk she paused for a moment, panting, as she glanced at the slope ahead and whimpered. Two blocks more. Not far as the crow flew, but damned crows had wings.

Her calves screamed for mercy as she trudged uphill. Broth splashed from beneath the lids and warmed her fingers. Sunlight
began to fade and colored the clouds in murky pink, like weak watercolors muddled with pencil.

“Almost there, almost there,” she muttered.

“Look out!” cried a small voice behind her.

Ingrid turned to see a brown ball flying directly at her. Heat flared to her skin. For an instant it was as though she could feel the very presence of the baseball in the air—an instant that brought the ball alarmingly close. She yelped and stumbled sideways. The kettles clattered as she dropped them with just enough time to catch herself. Her knees banged on the hard ground.

“Damn—darn it!” She propped herself up and immediately set a leaking kettle upright. Branches snapped as the ball smacked into the bushes behind her.

The tingle of heat lapped against her as a blue cloud arose from the ground. She froze. Another quake, already? So many in a cluster today, especially when she was hurting at the Reiki shop. None since then, either. She rubbed her knees through cloth.

“Gomen-nasai! Sorry!” A little white boy dashed up, panting. He wore a battered baseball player's cap. Several other boys trailed close behind.

“I think it landed over there,” she said, jerking her head as she picked up the soup. “Be more careful.”

“Hai. Sorry again!” He offered her a gap-toothed smile then hurried in pursuit of the ball.

She walked on, new warmth within her skin. She almost collapsed in happy relief at the sight of Mr. Thornton's narrow town house. Her calves felt the strain as she worked her way
up the stairs to the porch, but her knees no longer hurt.

“Mr. Thornton! Mr. Thornton, are you there?” She stepped back to study the windows for any movement. Nothing, not so much as the sway of a curtain. She set down the kettles and knocked on the door as loudly as she could. “Mr. Thornton! If you can hear me, make a noise! This is Ingrid Carmichael!”

Still nothing. She grabbed the doorknob and rushed inside the dark home.

Ingrid had braced herself for the reek of illness, and was stunned at the normality of the air. She recalled the switch box was near the door, and fumbled to open the panel and flip the lever. Yellow light revealed a floor heaped with papers, books, and other debris. The china press had notable gaps where pieces once sat on display.

“Mr. Thornton?” Her voice was softer now, wary. She dried off her soupy hand and let the fingers rest near her pocket. The bedroom would be the most likely place to find a sick man, but with what she knew of Mr. Thornton, she thought to check the study first.

A file cabinet drawer dangled like a slack jaw, its contents vomited onto the floor. The bookshelves reminded her of a pugilist's mouth with many missing teeth. Even a safe behind the desk gaped open.

A large empty space on the wall denoted where a full-color map of India had been pinned. Mr. Thornton had overlaid vellum and colored it in layers to show the progress of the imperial conquest of the subcontinent. It had been the showpiece of the room and visible evidence of his obsession. He had daily marked the shifts in dominion.

Bookshelves had been emptied in a way that made it impossible to know what may have been taken. Ingrid nudged a haphazard stack on the floor. The books were about China, the Qing Dynasty, and Japan's agrarian colonization of mainland Asia. The nineteenth century had brought repeated devastation to China as part of the majority Han populace rebelled against the Manchu Dynasty that had ruled them for centuries, even as Britain, Russia, and the Unified Pacific manipulated the people and economy through opium and forced trade. The last Chinese emperor, Qixiang, almost died of an illness, and emerged as a changed man. He broke with his predecessors in a major way and declared that the Manchu and Han would be treated the same beneath the Qing Code, uniting the people as never before. His Restoration came woefully late to avert China's decline. By then, Japan had already taken Manchuria, dubbed it Manchukuo, and partnered with America with an eye to even greater prizes.

Ingrid and Lee knew more than most people about the history of China and other places—a different angle of history than what was printed in these books from publishers in Tokyo and New York City. Mr. Sakaguchi recounted tales of India, tales that told of how the original incarnation of the Thuggee cult had likely been a threat greatly exaggerated by the British, an excuse to demonize and massacre settlers in the interior subcontinent; he also told tales about how Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation had not truly eliminated slavery, and that thralldom continued through unlivable wages for freedmen, Chinese, and American natives; and so many other things that people never discussed in public, if at all.