Chapter Three, Part One — Garrick

CHAPTER THREE

PART ONE

Garrick

It always started with blood. 

The silver dagger was still buried in Father’s chest.

I reached for him, screams tearing soundlessly from my throat.

Too late.

I jolt out of sleep with a gasp so abrupt that it jerks me awake instantly, causing me to hit my head against the slats of the top bunk bed. 

Pain sears through my head, and I hold back from swearing.

For a while, all I can do is stare at the darkness surrounding me.

In the next bed, Alaric snores like a collapsing wall, with one arm over the edge of the bed. He cannot be missed, sleeping or awake, being as wide as a doorway, twice as loud, and having blond hair that constantly falls across his face because he is certain he looks like the sun.

Nevertheless, in some miraculous way, he will manage to pass the inspection.

Dorian is no better than Alaric, only prettier about it – which includes his physical appearance only. He sleeps with an open mouth, his black hair plastered to his forehead in clumps while one hand of his is stretched out on his belly as if he collapsed, dramatic as ever. But even like that, with his saliva covering his shirt, he looks like someone from the upper levels of Helion Heights. Uncalloused hands, charming face. His father clearly pulled some strings.

Details help draw my mind away from other matters.

I reach blindly for my jacket, its soft fabric beneath my fingertips, linen and tailored to be close-fitting on me, to keep from overheating. The silver clasps serve no real purpose; they glisten to capture the unwavering rays of the Solian sun. I fasten them despite that.

One by one, until my jacket reaches my chest, and then the symbol of the sunburst over my heart. It is supposed to make us appear respectable. Unapproachable. Like the law itself.

I tighten my sword belt until the leather digs into my skin.

There is ringing at the end of the hallway, so loud that it wakes Alaric from his nap. He shoots up and bangs himself on his head just like I had done before. Dorian sighs and buries himself in his blanket to drown out the sound.

“Morning already?” He asks, groggily.

I direct my eyes to the window, where the same merciless light bathes the wooden walls of our room. There is some sort of mechanism for opening the curtains in response to the bell. There is no morning in Solis. Literally.

No rest between the morning and no sunrise. Just constant – endless – light, shining in the skies above the Republic.

However, the Solian Watch calls it morning.

Bell. Inspection. Patrol. It’s always morning.

Alaric sits up, rubbing one eye with his palm. His eyes meet mine – already dressed – giving him the excuse to flash me a lazy grin.

“Saints, Garrick. Do you always sleep in formation?”

“Only when your snoring allows it,” I retort.

The chuckle from Dorian, still under his blanket, makes Alaric’s grin wane ever so slightly, but enough to make the remark worthwhile.

I walk past both before I find myself back in a locker and head towards the door. The hall is bustling with activity: guards fastening belts, straightening collars, showing past one another toward the yard. The air is thick with heat and the bitter scent of familiar beef jerky. 

By the time we arrive at the assignment board, the compound is crowded. The patrols shift every week, with their respective positions written out on parchment and pinned under a piece of faded canvas.

Alaric pushes his way to the front. “Upper Market.”

Dorian steps around him and pulls his own off the board. “Assembly Road.” He steps back, wide awake now. “Finally, a decent station.”

Alaric sniffs. “Maybe you’ll encounter a High Assembly member.”

I wait for both of them to move aside before I pull my piece off the board. It’s pinned at the bottom, barely visible beneath another soldier’s posting.

GILDED EXCHANGE – WEST GATE.

I just gape at it for a long minute. The Gilded Exchange. Auction house for people from the Upper Market who toss around suns and rubies (crimson glass valued at one hundred) with ease. It is located at the clean edge of the Market District, near enough for the poor to observe but far enough for them never to step inside.

Usually, this is one of the most desirable postings – indoors, clean-smelling, and effortless. But apparently, there have been rumors of a particularly strict senior guard “taking care” of the rookies.

Alaric whistles behind me. “Bad luck.”

Dorian grins. “Be careful. They may just buff you by accident.”

I peel the parchment away and tuck it into my hand. “They only use good polish on things worth showing off.”

His gaze sharpens, but I’ve already started walking away.

Outside the barracks gates, the heat waves rising off the stone streets blur the lines of the city, making the buildings shimmer before me. The Market District awakens around me: the shouts of street vendors calling out prices, the creaks of wheels on roads roughed up by time, children dodging through the streets with the instinct of a creature always on the run.

But the higher up I go, the cleaner things become. The stones of the streets grow smooth. The shouts of the market become quiet conversation. Sweat and frying oils give way to scents of perfume and lemon water and heated marble. Ahead of me, I can see the Gilded Exchange. The sun touches every district equally. The Republic does not.

It’s beautiful in the most cruel way. White columns. Doors edged in gold color. Banners made of silk with the sunburst seal of the Republic. Everything glimmers like a building that has never seen dust or hunger or disgrace.

Outside the west gate, there is Senior Guard Brom waiting for me.

He leans on the stone pillar with all his weight hanging off his good leg, while the other one ends up with a dark wooden stump that gets bleached by the sun at the bottom. The beard on his face is long and untidy, and it gets entangled with some gray hairs that curl like wires. He is somewhat fat – the jacket he wears pulls a little at the clasps – but his eyes are so sharp that even the slightest hint of a carefree assumption about him becomes threatening.

There are three silver rings in his left eyebrow. He looks partially destroyed.

And yet, he misses nothing.

“You’re late,” Brom says.

“I was posted here only a moment ago.”

“That better not have been denial, boy.” He gives me a look.

“No. Sir.”

His eyes scan me thoroughly, from the gleaming clasps of my jacket to the sword that hangs from my belt. They rest on my face.

For a moment, I fear if nightmares leave their marks.

Brom huffs and faces the gate; his wooden leg knocks against the marble every step. “Name?”

I blink. “Sir?”

“Your name, boy. Or do you intend to make me bellow out ‘boy’ all shift?”

“Garrick.”

He stops for a second. “Garrick who?”

My jaw clenches. “Just Garrick, sir.”

In Solis, a surname is much more than a name; it is a sentence. Corven, Dresk, Halcyon—families bred to protect the Republic. One could choose to bear either their mother’s or father’s surname, yet the surname chosen would determine their path. Their purpose. And there could be only one of each surname. A Garrick Corven and a Garrick Dresk could exist, but there cannot be two Garrick Halcyons. Not anywhere in the Records.

“We both know you ain't tellin' the truth, Just Garrick.”

The silence drags on, then I breathe out softly. “Corven.” For the first time since I’ve met him (which, technically, isn’t a very lengthy amount of time), Brom does not seem bored; his face suddenly turns serious, the humor long gone.

He adjusts his grip around the pillar slightly. “Danny’s boy.”

All the warmth drains out of me at his words; I have not heard my father’s name used in years. “You knew him?” I cannot keep the question from slipping past my lips.

Brom looks away, into the marvelous gates of the Gilded Exchange. “Aye,” he replies, “I knew Danny Corven.”

Before I can say more to him, Brom abruptly turns his back to me and moves towards the gates. “Not the time for ghosts. Patrol first.”

The words sting like scalding water.

Light glows through the grand glass ceiling above our heads. Brom waves towards the corridor. “You patrol here. Up and down. Don’t get distracted. Don’t gaze at the nobles. Don’t touch anything of value.”

“How would I know what is valuable?”

“In a place like this?” Brom huffs. “Assume everything.”

He limps away round the corner, leaving me here in the shadow of the painted faces of former Assemblymen.

For a minute or two, I patrol exactly as instructed.

Back. Foward. Back. Foward.

My boots make hardly any noise on the marble.

Then I hear it.

A scrape, or maybe a footfall.

Quiet. Fast. And certainly wrong.

I stop.

The corridor in front of me is deserted, but near the bottom of one of the columns, there is a blotch of something on that spotless marble floor.

Dirt.

A smear of it, dragged along the marble surface, leading to a tall white pillar.

My hand goes to my sword.

“The hell you doin', Garrick?”

I whirl round.

Brom is standing at the other end of the hallway; his eyebrow rings add to the scary look.

“N-nothing, sir. Just t-thought I heard something.”

He narrows his eyes. “You always stutter when you’re doing nothing?”

“I must have been distracted.”

“It certainly appears that way.”

I look back towards the dirty mark on the floor. “There’s dirt on the floor.”

Brom looks at me. “A tragedy.”

“In the Gilded Exchange?”

“Marble gets dirty, Garrick. That’s what servants are for.”

“Not like this, though. And it even smells different.”

He shifts his weight. “Always that curious with stains, are you?”

I feel my cheeks burning. “I’m on patrol, and it could be relevant.”

“And it could be dirt.”

I open my mouth only to shut it again.

Brom grunts, clearly satisfied in winning the dispute. “We move.”

“But–”

“We move, Garrick.”

I want to contest but give up. Instead, I trail after him.

The next hour crawls by so slowly that I start realizing the reason behind Dorian’s smugness with his post. To guard in the Gilded Exchange is no different from standing in long lines with the sun beating down on your face.

Brom keeps me (partly) busy wandering through one hallway after another, fixing my posture and scolding me for looking at things for too long to pass the time. By the time we arrive back at the west wing, the boredom covers me like a thick layer of dust on a century-old book. Finally, he leaves me alone with the usual grunt. The dirty patch of marble is completely wiped out, and the marble gleams with all its glory.

Even now, my eyes are fixed on the shine when a servant turns the corner far too quickly and almost runs me over. She’s tiny and likely about a year or two younger than me. She has rolled up her sleeves to her elbows and is pink-cheeked from the run.

“Guard,” she pants.

“What is it?”

“Someone went backstage.”

I stop with my hand close to the hilt of my sword. “Who?”

“I don’t know,” she breathes. “But they shouldn’t be there.”