Point of Hopes

“She’s out back, in the yard.” Ranazy would clearly have loved to ask more, but Rathe ignored his curiosity, and pushed open the back door of the station.

The space behind the points stations was, more properly, open ground intended as defensible space, but forty years of civil peace had turned it into a back garden, lightly fenced, and sporting a few haphazardly tended garden plots. Monteia was sitting on a bench under a straggling fruit tree in the reddened light of the first sunset, the winter‑sun’s shadows pale on the ground around her. She held a lit pipe negligently between her first two fingers, and the air was redolent of the mixed herbs. She looked up as the back door closed.

“Dare I ask what the sur wanted?”

“You won’t like it. It seems Judge‑Advocate Foucquet has lost one of her clerk’s apprentices. It’s the same as the others. No sign that the boy ran. He just–disappeared, yesterday afternoon. His mother is assize clerk in Point of Hearts.” He took a breath. “And the judge‑advocate and the surintendant both want me to take the case on my book.”

“Oh, that’s just marvelous, Rathe. As if you haven’t enough to do…” Monteia broke off. “And how am I supposed to justify your poaching to Hearts?”

“It was the sur’s direct order,” Rathe answered. “And aside from that, I do feel as though I owe this to maseigne.” He had kept his tone as respectful as possible, but from the look she gave him, Monteia was not appeased.

“For a southriver rat, you certainly have a lot of friends in high places.” She picked up a sheaf of papers that had been lying at her feet, weighted with a slate against the nonexistent breeze. “Well, then, since you’re taking on extra work, you can look into these. The whole city’s getting a rash of these unlicensed sheets, and they’re not helping things. About half of them are blatantly political–hells, they’ve backed every possible candidate for the succession, including a couple I’ve never heard of–and the rest of them are passing hints about the children, but they’re none of them operating under a bond license. You can add these to your daybook.”

Rathe took the papers mechanically. If Monteia’s assessment was correct–and it would be, he had no doubt of that–then Caiazzo could well be co

Along with the papers, he took a batch of nativities Salineis had collected for him out through the station onto the front steps, unwilling to intrude on Monteia’s quiet work in the yard, even more unwilling to remain in the still, hot air of the station–made hotter, if not stiller, he thought, by the presence of Ranazy. He sat down on the broad front step of the station, stretching his legs out with a sigh of relief, and started leafing through the nativities, settling the broadsheets under his hip. A knot of the station’s ru

He read through the nativities, poring over them for any similarities, anything at all that he might have missed the times he had read through his and the other points’ notes, knowing it was fruitless, knowing he didn’t make that kind of mistake and even if he did, it was unlikely that every other pointswoman and man in the city would overlook anything that was there. He looked at two he held in his hands– in his left, the nativity of an eight‑year‑old, in his right, that of a twelve‑year‑old.

He realized, with a sick knot in his stomach, that the station’s ru

“Sorry, no job at the moment, I just want to talk to you. Come on over here,” he invited, and the ru

“Right, Nico,” the boy said, cheerfully enough, and dropped to the ground with a solid thud. He sat down next to Asheri. “What’s up?”

These were streetwise children, for the most part, probably a lot wiser in the ways of the streets than many adults, certainly more so than most of the children who had been stolen. But like most children, they had a sense of invulnerability, despite the fact that their lives had been a great deal harder than that of most of the missing children. “All right,” he said. “You lot know what’s been going on, these disappearances. We’re doing everything we can to find out what’s happened to these kids, and, just as important, find those children who have already disappeared.” He looked at them, their faces grave, but not frightened, not even worried. They were street urchins, southriver rats who faced this kind of threat most days of their lives. “And you’ve probably all heard all the rumors going about, maybe even some we haven’t yet.”

“Like the ones who say the points are doing it, Nico?” Laci chimed in, and Rathe gave him a sour look that fooled neither one of them.

“I had heard that one already, yes, thank you, Laci.” He paused, not quite certain how to proceed, wanting to find the words that would reach them, and not simply send them squirming into paroxysms of impatience. “The thing is, the thing you may not have realized, is that all the missing children are between the ages of eight and twelve.” He stopped, and looked at each of them in turn. They understood, he could see that, but still, he had to say it, make it explicit. “So you lot are in the exact age range of the children who have disappeared.” He shrugged. “All I’m saying is, be careful. You know the city better than a lot of people, you see things other people would miss, or would dismiss as unimportant. If you see anything, no matter what you think I might think of it, let me know, or anyone else here.”

“ ’Cept Ranazy,” Jacme muttered.

“Yes, well, just do it, all right?”

There were mumbles of assent, and looks were exchanged that made Rathe frown. “And if you’ve already noticed anything, now might be a good time to tell me.”