Chapter Text
They say the city was warmer once.
Before he came, before she went.
And who knows, maybe they’re right. But nobody left in this city can remember a spring or fall, as far back as they can remember. If you can find any of the older ones, they’ll tell you for train fare, how the sunlight would burn skin. How the autumn leaves sounded under feet. They don't even have whole pieces. But they have a sip of blue sky. They have a half-dose of the moonlight. And to someone like you or me? Brother, that’s plenty.
But that was before the walls.
Look out your window, now.
You’ll see a man standing there, on the sidewalk. You didn’t see him walk up, you didn’t see any car. But who knows if you did?
“It's a sad one,” he says softly, hands in the pockets of a coat too thin for February. “It always is.” He smiles, just a little, and reaches out a hand. He’s rehearsed this part, so you’d better go along.
Up on top, you haven’t got much. So what’s left to lose, if you follow him? Who knows where you’ll go? Well, he knows. The end of time, the end of the world, my dear.
The dragon of time stirs, under the cracking pavement. It unfurls its wings, sweeping forward the great masses on the riverbank. It opens its mouth in a never-ending scream, the blank faces of the lucky ones looking forward. It’s surrounded by foundries, powergrids.
Most people don’t ask who built them.
“Weather isn’t quite what it used to be,” Remus continues, glancing toward the iron grates set into the cobblestones. “Wonder when spring will come again, hm?” He smiles faintly.
“But that’s getting ahead of the story.”
Look past the man, towards the bar across the street. You need to.
You see a boy.
He stands beneath a broken awning as sleet needles through the night, collar turned up, hands bare despite the cold. He does not shiver. Shivering is weakness. Weakness is visible. And visible things get found.
He reaches towards the door, and there’s a flash of– there, look, can you see it?
There’s a tattoo, wound around his wrists.
And wait- you’ve seen that face before. This man sleeps in abandoned corridors of the Underground where the tiles sweat and the air tastes metallic. The city above has walls. The city below has more.
He tells himself he does not care. He tells himself he does not remember. But that dragon still sings, in the back of his mind. It loops. It returns. There are things he did. Things ordered softly. Things he carried out with steady hands.
If he runs far enough, he thinks, maybe the music will stop. If he is cold enough, maybe he won’t feel it.
Look through the door, into the bar, and the dark room beyond. Across that threshold, there’s a man. A flash of hands on strings. He has ink on his fingers and light in his hair, from where you just can’t tell. It’s hard times, in this world of gods and men.
His fingernail snags on a thin string. He frowns. Starts again. It isn’t right yet.
If you look as close as you can, you’ll see him singing.
He doesn’t know about the boy under the broken awning yet.
But he will.
Look down, now. Through that sewer grate. Six-feet-under-the-ground, below.
There, can you see it? There’s another city there. There’s no sun, for the starving muses and boxcar children.
A king walks down its streets. A long, black coat. Mouths hush in sync, but he doesn’t care. He’s got clients to call, and orders to fill. There are no riots anymore.
Way down, that’s where everything has a place.
Workers in dark uniforms move in rhythm — lift, stack, seal. Lift, stack, seal. The wall rises brick by brick, even though no one remembers what it is keeping out.
The king pauses before the newest section. He presses his palm to the stone.
His wife may call him a tyrant, but who needs their name, when they have work? Names are inefficient. Names can be mourned.
Numbers do not mourn.
A shift behind him- a flask.
Her pale, spidery fingers darting back into the pocket of her dress.
Look a little closer, and- there. There’s a crack in the wall.
His queen laughs like breaking glass. He turns away from the wall, just for a moment. Her head swims, lost in a fog of the fruit of the vine.
“Oh, don’t brood, Tom.” she calls lazily as he stalks towards her. “You’ve made sure I’ll be back.”
“Don’t leave yet,” Tom replies.
“Well, they need me up there.” she sighs, picking up her bags, and pushing her flask back into her pocket to toss a black curl over her shoulder. “Endlessly.”
Her heels click as she walks, crossing to him, fingers trailing over the lapel of his coat. Once, long ago, he would have caught her wrist and kissed her pulse. Now, he grabs it in a vice grip. The air is cold.
“The artists will survive another season without you, hm? After all, their world is permanent.”
“Nothing is permanent, Tom.” She snatches her thin wrist from his hand. He stands, stone-faced, as she walks away. His hand comes up to his pocket, to find it empty. As he watches her go, he sees his red flower in her hair.
Behind him, the wall continues to rise.