Petra K and the Blackhearts (7 page)

“Welcome to the League of the Maiden and Minor Pup,” said Abel, who had materialized behind me. “Not sanctioned, highly illegal, but you can make a lot of money here. Come on, let’s watch the races!”

“But Luma,” I began.

“He is safe here,” said Abel.

I followed Abel deeper into the room. Nobody took any notice of us as we pushed our way to the front of the crowd. The audience was composed of all stripe of Pavain. There were black-clad, bearded Zsida sharing a bottle of red wine, arms around each other and loudly cheering on their favored dragonka; there were Half Not gangs issuing bets. Some in the audience had come in formal dress, and there was more than one anonymous, masked observer. I could see the other Blackhearts too: Isobel and Jasper, as well as a few members of the Big Thumb Devils and Stink Clovers, pitting their dragonka against one another.

“I don’t have to tell you that this is a secret,” said Abel.

“I’m good with secrets,” I replied.

“I know,” said Abel. “That’s why I let you follow me.”

“What is this?”

“Different things to different people, I guess,” he said. “Dragonka breeding is just in our blood here. You can’t post some stupid sign and expect people not to show off what they’ve got. Then there are the Half Nots. If you gave them good enough odds, they would bet the sun wouldn’t come up in the morning. So there is money in it. Some of these people are foreign scouts who want to take our stock while the price is cheap. Plus, it’s good for the dragonka. They need the attention. Without a chance to be seen and fawned over, they either mope about or start raiding the markets for food.”

“And what is it to you?” I asked, though I really wanted to ask what it was to
me
.

“It’s a laugh,” he said. “Something to do. We are laying off on the potions for a bit while Deklyn works his new plan out, so it gets kind of boring around town.”

“But aren’t you afraid of the Boot?”

“Naw, they’d never come into Jozseftown at night. Too dangerous. Plus, we’re careful.”

“Yeah,” I said, though I had stopped listening. I was keeping my eye out for Luma, whom I still couldn’t spot. “I shouldn’t be here, should I?” I said, suddenly apprehensive.

“No. It is totally unacceptable. But no need to worry. If anybody asks, just say you’re with me, Abel Blackheart,” he said, throwing open his shirt, revealing the black heart tattoo.

“Do you guys always have to go off showing your silly tattoos to everybody?”

“Silly?” Abel said. “Deklyn inked this into me with his own hand. This has the ancient charm of pure Pavaian River clay mixed into it. That’s how I knew you were following me through Jozseftown. I can tell trouble from a mile away.”

“I am trouble?” I asked, half-offended, half-proud.

“The worst sort,” said Abel. “But I don’t mind.”

I needed to find Luma, but before I could search further, I was interrupted by a commotion on the floor. The two
racing dragonka had gotten into a fight after the winner nipped the loser’s tail with too much enthusiasm. Soon they were a tumbling ball, whirling around the room, a blur of fangs and scales into which nobody dared intervene. This caused another sudden wave of betting, this time on the results of the fight. I watched the brawling dragonka spill into the spectators and the crowd surge back. To distract the audience a Half Not band started up, playing on spoons and blowing jugs. A troop of Sibernian soldiers began dancing a high step, and some celebrants took the opportunity to settle old scores—I saw a pocket picked, a cup of mead poured over a woman’s head, and more than one fistfight break out; and for a few minutes the room was pure chaos, like a wedding party that had been overrun by a riot.

Suddenly, the audience regrouped, as another competition had begun, and the issue of betting needed to get underway. I was pushed into the midst of the crowd, and was beginning to panic because there was no sign of Luma anywhere. But the ferocity of the spectators’ cheering retrained my attentions to the pit and the two dragonka racing around it. It took me a moment to believe what I was seeing: Luma was one of the racing dragonka. And from the looks of it, he was winning.

I
SHOVED MY WAY TO THE FIRST ROW
, all the way up to the perimeter of the pit. Luma was moving quickly as a ferret around the ring, chasing the tail of a dragonka pup that looked like a squat lizard, its tongue hanging from the side of its mouth in fatigue. It was not long before Luma inflicted his bite on the other beast, which let out a high-pitched whimper before scampering from the pit. There was a collective groan from the crowd, as it seemed Luma had been heavily bet against. I noticed only a few cheers, the loudest being from one of the Blackhearts. There I saw Deklyn collecting a purse of kuna from the Half Not bookmaker.

I pushed my way over to him. As I did, a Half Not attendant delivered my panting dragonka to Deklyn’s arms. The Blackheart held Luma, stroking him behind his ears. I immediately felt an anger rise in me. When Luma sensed me there, he immediately fluttered from Deklyn back into my arms.

“What are you trying to do?” I yelled over the noise.

“What do you mean?” he replied casually, tossing his bag of coins from hand to hand.

“With my drangonka? With Luma!”

“Luma,” said Deklyn, trying the name out on his tongue. “I like the name, maybe we will even keep it.”

“
You
will keep it?” I was so angry that my words sputtered like a misfiring engine.

“This creature never belonged to you. I don’t know where you got it from, but it’s not yours. I asked around after we saw you,” he said, reaching into his pouch. “Have a few kuna for your trouble.” But I knocked the brass kuna from his hand.

“He
belongs
to me,” I shot back.

“You? You can’t even take care of yourself. And see how lean Luma is? That is not right. Even a racing dragonka needs a little fat to fire his breath with. You haven’t even trained the beast to do
anything
.”

Deklyn was right. And though I could barely feed the both of us, I would find a way. But I wasn’t going to admit that. Not to him. We both fumed at each other for a few silent, unhappy moments before the Half Not girl spoke.

“Stop it!” Isobel commanded, stepping between us. “It is obvious that we need each other. Listen,” she said, turning to me, “we need a beast of trainable age. There just aren’t many left, with all the quarantines and confiscations. And you, well, you need to survive. Deklyn is right. We know all about you, and your mother, and we have seen you hitting the bins at night. You might survive, but the dragonka can’t. Not on picked-over corncobs and stale poppy buns. Luma obviously belongs to you. That much anybody
can see. Nothing will change that. But we can be partners in his training and share his winnings.” She turned to Deklyn. “That means cooperating.”

Deklyn grunted something I could only take as grudging acknowledgement. “She is Luma’s master, but we all have to take care of him,
if
,” she said, grabbing the pouch of money from Deklyn’s hands, “if this is going to continue.” One thing I noticed right then was that when Isobel spoke, Deklyn listened. “Plus,” she continued, “the Boot has been looking for our lair for weeks now. It is only a matter of time before they find it. The beast will be well-hidden in Petra K’s.”

“OK, OK already,” Deklyn said. “But she has no idea how to train a dragonka. That is where we will start.”

“You can talk to me,” I said. “I’m right here.”

He turned toward me as though I was some sort of night-sprouting fungi that had popped up without warning. “You have no idea how to train a dragonka, and
you have no idea what you are getting yourself into
.”

All eyes were on me. I realized then that I had at least
some
power over them. And, I have to admit, despite my distaste for Deklyn and his gang, what Isobel was proposing excited me. More than anything I wanted to escape my mother’s oppressive silence. And that we might actually make some money, despite the danger, made it an irresistible offer. “I don’t care,” I said to Isobel, just to spite him. “Tell him I agree. Luma and I are in.”

“Fine,” Deklyn sputtered. He obviously did not like being ignored either. “Eighty-twenty split with the winnings.”

“Eighty-twenty?” I spat out.

“There are more of us,” he said. Jasper, Isobel, and Abel were all standing behind him now.

“Seventy-thirty, plus you bring me pomegranate seeds for Luma,” I countered.

After a moment, Deklyn nodded his assent. He signaled to his gang, and they began to depart.

“Hey,” I shouted at him. “Thirty!” I held out my hand. Deklyn shrugged, counted a percentage of Luma’s winnings and handed it over to me. It was more money than I had seen at once in my entire life. I grinned, rubbed Luma on the back of the ears, and left the Dragonka Exchange.

T
he next day I went shopping. I bought a shiny brass cage for Luma, with a feather pillow to sleep on, and a portable nest that fit in my coat pocket. I loaded myself down with poppy-honey buns by the stack, porridge and molasses to sweeten it, sticks of dried bison meat and jars of jam in every flavor imaginable. I visited the tea merchant and picked up tins of jasmine, and smoky oolong tea for my mother. I had been neglecting her. At home, I made her a small feast and carried it in to her room. She must have known I had been sneaking out, but she never let a word slip. But I could see worry crease the sides of her eyes. Those lines had grown like unspoken sentences over the weeks. If she voiced them, would they disappear, like words in the air?

I put the tray down in front of her but she would not look at me. She just poured a little cream into her tea and watched it cloud up, then stirred it briskly with her teaspoon.

I began to leave, but my mother called me back when I reached the door.

“Petra K, come here.” I did as I was told. “It is time you knew. I have protected you for too long.”

“Know what?”

“Look under the bed, Petra K,” she said. I did. It was dark and musty but for a wooden box, which I pulled out.

“Put it on the bed and open it, Petrushka.”

I did: inside I found—a
doll
? No, it was more like a small, intricately designed automaton. I took it from the box. It was a man with a foxlike face and sly eyes, dressed in a black silk cape.

“Do you have a coin?” Mother asked.

“A what?”

“A coin,” she restated. From my pocket I drew a brass kuna.

“Hold it toward him,” she instructed. I offered the coin slowly to the automaton. But before it got close, the money flew from my hand. It landed in the open palm of the doll, which activated a gear, and the coin was passed into the sack. The doll had stolen my coin! I laughed with glee.

“That is what I was worried about,” said my mother. The trick did not please her, nor did my reaction.

“What is it?” I asked.

“That, Petra K, is Jozsef K. That is your father.” I looked at her, stunned. The
doll
was my father? “He wasn’t a tea trader. That was a fib I told you. Oh, he liked tea. He could steal bushels of it out from under the best-guarded Indyn caravan. He could steal the wheels of a cart while it was still moving. That is what your father was. That is why you never spent a day in the Jozseftown school, because he was so notorious that even the teachers knew of him. Amongst thieves he was legendary. The Thievery Guild had this made in his honor once he disappeared. I wanted to keep all that from you, in the hopes that you would be different.”

“He disappeared?”

“See what I mean? You only hear what you want to hear.” She sighed, took a sip of her tea, then set it down on the bedside table.

“But you just said he disappeared, so how do you know he is dead?” I asked.

My mother grabbed me. I did not know if it was out of love or anger—then I realized, by the intensity with which she was holding me, that it was both. Though it was suffocating in its firmness, I savored her touch. I could feel hot tears from her cheeks burst against my neck. Then she whispered in my ear, “I know he is dead, because I have seen his spirit.”

On the topic she would say no more.

F
OR THE FIRST DAY OF TRAINING
, Isobel met me on Newt Island, which sat in the Pava River in between the large and small sides of the city. By decree of an ancient treaty, Newt Island was a place free of Imperial authority, and was safe from the Boot Guard, at least for now.

“Where are the others?” I asked.

“We don’t need them. We will be training Luma in the Half Not way. It is subtle, and demands great gentleness and concentration. Deklyn and the boys would just get in the way.”

Isobel’s
fazek
—her Half Not costume—had been redone in a bright, striking design, like that of an ornate Persian carpet. It was legend that rare Half Not girls were born with wings, which were a source of great embarrassment for the parents. These girls were forced to wear the woven fazeks that hobbled the wings beneath the yarn, making them deformed and unusable, for a Half Not girl who could fly away would never be found again—such was their wanderlust.

“Are those really wings under that yarn?” I asked impetuously.

“Don’t concern yourself with things that aren’t your business,” said Isobel, giving me another sharp look. “Let’s begin,” she said.

“Begin how?” I asked. This question only proved my ignorance of Half Not ways. They rarely responded to such direct questions. Isobel only stared at me blankly, leaving me stung by
how unfair it was to forbid me from asking questions. It was as if she was training me, not Luma.

“The trick to real dragonka husbandry is not to make the dragonka conform to your behavior but to find a way to make their own nature flourish. You have to find the individual characteristics within the dragonka and bring them out into the open for the entire world to see: this is the artistry. This is a Half Not talent.” Isobel demonstrated what she meant by whispering Luma’s name on the breeze. Soon enough the beast perked its head up, then trotted over to us.