The church was hot.

Her cast was spongy with sweat and made her skin crawl. Must sit still. Her aunts were watching her from three rows back. Must sit with a straight back and solemn sorrow on her face, and do nothing unusual, like jumping on the pews and laughing hysterically. Not that.

James looked reassuringly bored. His gaze was fixed on the open casket. Nothing interesting there. Just a corpse in a box. ‘Remind me why I am here,’ he sulked for the tenth time.

‘You said you wanted to see what a funeral looked like,’ said Sam. Having a Maestro at a funeral was rather like…like cooking for a chef when you didn’t know how to cook. No that’s not right. Like…a lawyer being arrested for breaking the law. Hmm. Like –

She pinched her leg. Stop. Stop it. Any further down that line of thought and she might start giggling again, which would not perform well in front of her aunts.

‘Why are you pinching yourself?’ James asked.

‘I thought I might laugh.’

‘A natural reaction. A necromancer should possess an elevated perception of death. For others it is a finality, for us –’

‘A commodity.’

James looked at her for a long while. ‘Once upon a time, necromancers were considered practitioners of the occult, perverted by evil, and to redeem their souls they must be burned at the stake. Apparently, amblers were too…law-breaking. But then we started making them plow fields and pull wagons, and the people’s love for free labor overcame their misgivings. Laws were changed, and we Maestros became the elites of society. Ah, wait, this was before the rebranding. We were still called necros back then.’

‘Are we? Elites of Society?’

‘Oh no, not you and I. We work too hard. But the occupation as a whole? Very much so. Maestros control labor, and therefore control every means of production. If not for those nasty steam engines we’d run practically everything. Those machines are expensive though. One could have a single engine or rent two hundred amblers for a year. Most clients know which one’s the better deal.’      

A hand touched Sam’s shoulder. Charlie; she had put on makeup for the occasion, and exchanged her smith’s apron for a grey suit.

‘Hi Sam. I’m sorry for your loss.’

‘I’m sorry we haven’t paid you yet.’

Charlie gave her head a gentle knock. ‘Maestro Cowen. Fancy seeing you at a funeral.’

James waved his hands in dramatic displeasure. ‘An archaic tradition, expensive to observe and wasteful in execution. If one wants to mourn a portrait would suffice. If one wants to, what do you call it, say a few words, I can simply raise it and you may say whatever you want to your father’s face.’

A chill came down her spine. Sam thought she was used to this kind of talk, but no, no she wasn’t, not even close. ‘Don’t do that.’

‘You misunderstand. Anatomic Resurrection, chapter six. Cognitive remnants can persist up to three cycles after what is commonly known as death. If the cadaver is raised during this time it may exhibit a statistically significant density of cognitive remnants, meaning memories, personalities, and behaviours unique to the deceased individual may be reproduced in the arisen for up to thirty cycles. It is a highly exploitable property. A recently deceased pianist, for example –’

Charlie was frowning. ‘I don’t think that was the misunderstanding.’

James raised an eyebrow. ‘And what say you to Charlie’s interruption, apprentice?’

Sam opened her mouth to say that, yes, she felt quite sick in the stomach, please stop talking about raising my dad at his funeral, and while you are at it, please stop my hand from itching…but no. Other words came out. Emptier words.

‘The Maestro teaches important lessons,’ she said.

‘I know what the Maestro doesn’t do,’ said Charlie. ‘Pay his bills.’

The Maestro leaped to his feet. ‘I think I’ve had quite enough of this farce,’ he declared, loud enough for the whole church to hear. ‘I shall see you back at the House, apprentice. I won’t clock you for the morning, but you are expected at your desk by one. Agreed?’

‘Yes Maestro.’

‘Good day, Ms Smith.’ And with that James strode down the center aisle. ‘Lucia? Lucia! We go!’

Sam watched him carve a path through the pews as her aunts tried their best to ignore him. They were almost buzzing. If there was one thing they knew about their estranged niece, it was that she worked for a great Maestro on the Floor of Seventeen, a number nigh unreachably high. And that was enough. They weren’t interested in anything else, and neither was she.

Sam the apprentice, an elite of society.

Charlie took James’ seat. ‘He ran away.’ she said wistfully. ‘Why do you still work for that asshole?’

‘He pays well.’ Sam lied.

‘No he doesn’t.’

She got her there. The concern in Charlie’s voice had a curious effect. Sam felt a warm heave in her chest and [JQ2] suddenly words were coming out of her mouth. ‘Charlie, I think I’m going crazy,’ and she said it all. The Floor of Nine burning. The people huddled together as the army of amblers, spears and muskets and all, herded them into the mines. The bellowing flamethrowers as they vomited fire onto the houses, the fields, the school…

What was she saying? Sam had thought for sure that James would not come, and she didn’t want to be alone with her aunts, so she had invited Charlie. Was she a friend? Business acquaintance, more like, but James’, not hers – if not for him, this mercenary woman would never have bothered to come. Yet Charlie was listening.

‘Then they…they sealed the mines…even the kids were…’

Speaking was difficult. Sam felt drained, as if each syllable sapped a chunk of her life. Her hand was a hive, but she sat with her back straight and her head lowered at an appropriate angle, to convey polite sadness, to declare to the audience that, yes, her burden was heavy, but it was nothing she couldn’t handle.

 ‘…and my dad, we never really talked –’

Charlie threw up a hand. She was smiling, but not really. ‘I’m sorry Sam, I try, really I do, but I’m not here for your life’s story, yeah? I don’t have time for your baggage. I came to catch the Maestro so I can get my money. He’s been avoiding me for weeks, no thanks to you. Next time I ask you how you doing, how are you, just stick with the usual I’m fine like you always do. Lords Below, but I never knew you can talk so much!’

Then she laughed, as if that was hilarious.

Sam had to smile, for she suddenly remembered the pyro named Jack, that despicable, handsome lunatic. Your job is to enjoy yourself.

‘James wants me to audition,’ Sam declared, a little louder than conversational.

Charlie gave her a blank look, as she well should. ‘Audition? For…theatre?’

Sam smiled a little wider. ‘To become a Maestro.’

‘But…what does that mean?’

‘It means after I pass, I’ll be able to use the Green.’

‘The Green…’ Charlie’s eyes sparkled. ‘Does that mean…if you pass this audition, you can raise the dead? Is that how you become a necromancer?’ Sam nodded. ‘But…but you can’t do it now, right? Even if you tried.’ Sam shook her head. ‘But…doesn’t that mean anyone can raise the dead after they pass the audition?’

‘That’s how it works Charlie.’

‘But then I can be a Maestro!’ She exclaimed. ‘So if I apprentice for a Maestro they’ll let me audition?’

‘Um…if you are sponsored…’

‘Sign me up! You must know a whole lot of them by now – you have to introduce me. Aren’t they always hiring? Lords Below, I never knew this! I thought you had to be born with the…the talent, the quirk, or something. If it was just like…like getting your license at a guild – if I’d known I’d never have gone to the foundry!’

‘It’s not exactly –’

‘Sam, we’re friends. Help me get into a House, Floor Fifteen or above. I can work hard, study hard, do whatever they ask me to do. I know you have contacts.’

‘No…well…they test you first.’

‘Of course they do! What kind of test?’

‘I…I was…’ Crammed into a blackened lift with other frightened kids. The cabin flooding with bodies, scrambling to get out. Intestines, everywhere. The bloodstain up to Lucia’s elbows, bits of brain under her fingernails.

Sam shrugged. Her shoulders were heavier than mountains, but she shrugged all the same. ‘You kill people,’ she said. ‘If you help them kill people, they hire you, and after you pass the audition, you kill more people and then you raise the corpses for money.’

Charlie’s face came down a bit, as if she just heard her voice for the first time. ‘Is…is that what happens? They kill people, and turn them into amblers?’

Sam was annoyed. Where did she think they all came from?

Next Chapter: Chattel (8)