There were maybe twenty idle cultists in the temple of the Greenwich Oracle. They stood up one at a time or in pairs and started towards Porter and Osman.
“A wounded dodger?” the Baron asked Maurice. “Were there any violent operations this morning?”
Maurice frowned. “The outstanding tasks are all safe. Excuse me.” A shout to Porter, “I’m on my way!”
“Do you want any help?” the Baron asked.
“Ah—yeah, actually, I’d appreciate it.” Maurice adjusted his suspender straps. “There are too many rooms to search.” He started off towards Porter, and the Baron and the Zombie jogged after him.
“What’s the news?” Maurice asked when Porter was in earshot.
Porter threw a thumb over at Osman. “He took the call.”
Osman spoke without confidence. “It was from the East River Docks. They said someone, um, dodged a gunshot wound, um, twenty minutes ago?”
“Dodged with a gunshot wound,” Porter said. “With!”
“But he’s in the temple, right?” Osman asked.
Porter moaned.
The Zombie walked around behind Osman. “Who made you a cultist?”
Osman swept about. “What?”
“Was it your father? The General? Did you turn twenty-one recently?”
Osman must’ve learned a bit about the Zombie in the last few minutes. He watched the Zombie’s bare hands like they were decorated with daggers.
The Zombie wriggled his fingers and reached out for Osman’s right shoulder. The neophyte quivered slightly, torn between the urge to retreat and the prey’s instinct which told him that if he ran, the predator would spring.
The Zombie whispered sweetly, “A boy made of glass, asking stupid questions…”
“Please, don’t haze the neophyte,” Maurice said.
The Zombie laughed at Osman and the Oracle. “What’s the rush? This is the closest temple to the docks, isn’t it? If the dodger is here, why isn’t he calling out for help?”
“I don’t know yet,” Maurice replied.
Several of the other cultists arrived. Most were dressed low-class—tank tops, jeans, and brightly colored daddy-o’s. One of them was like a beatnik who’d cribbed his look off a movie rather than from an actual beat poet. They listened attentively, trying to figure out the fuss and exchanging brief comments.
“Maybe it’s because he’s a corpse,” the Zombie offered.
The Baron decided to curb the Zombie’s enthusiasm. “We’ll still need to look. It’s the decent thing to do.”
The Zombie snorted. “When did I ever care about decency?”
The last stragglers of New York cultists bunched up beside Maurice. The man dressed like a beatnik said, “What’s happening, man?”
“There’s a wounded dodger,” Maurice told them.
The beatnik slapped a greaser in a blue daddy-o on the shoulder. “Told you.”
The Baron made a subtle gesture at the Zombie, tapping himself twice on the chest with two fingers. It meant “follow my example,” and it was only used when it was actually important that the Zombie fall in line. This dodge could give them insight into local factions, their conflicts, the outstanding blood feuds—everything and anything about local politics would be useful at this stage. They needed to fill in the fine details or they’d never find any suspects for Nagy’s killer.
The Zombie didn’t hide his disappointment, but Maurice seemed to read his exasperation as boredom more than anything. “Fine. I’ll help,” the Zombie said.
“Thank you, both of you,” Maurice said. “Porter, split up the crowd. Check the west apartments.” The Oracle looked up at the steep stairwells crawling along the walls. “We need all hands on the third floor. I’ll work the east side, and we’ll meet up in the middle.”
“Young Osman, come with me,” the Baron suggested. This boy was the son of the General of the New York cult, and it’d be smart to butter him up for the future.
“What?” the neophyte asked the Baron. “Why?”
“The Zombie is going to sprint, and we’re going to stay out of his way.”
Osman was immediately relieved. He’d puffed up like a rooster when he’d recognized the Baron down in the bookstore, but a blasphemous atheist was infinitely preferable to the company of a monster. “Where are we going?” the young man asked.
“We’ll take the apartments near the Oracle’s desk, east side. The Zombie can run down and start at the other end. Just like Maurice said, we’ll all meet in the middle.”
“I’ll hurry this up,” the Zombie said. Without much windup, he took off, sprinting in dress shoes for the far corner of the chamber at the very end of the row.
“I’ll start here and work towards the Zombie,” Maurice suggested.
“Sounds good,” the Baron said. “Osman, let’s go.”
d’Holbach and Osman marched quickly towards the stairwell to the left of the Oracle’s desk. It was at the southeast end of the rowhouse; since it was very close to the dodge point at the docks, there was a strong chance the dodger would end up there.
Once they were well out of earshot, the Baron said to Osman, “Do you know why I wanted you to come with me?”
“No, sir,” Osman said.
“My title is Baron. I’m not a knight.” They reached the foot of the stairswell. Each one was a repurposed fire escape—no ladders and high railings—which hit three apartment doors on the way up the brick wall. “I planned on giving you some friendly advice. Would you like that, Osman?
“Yes, Baron,” Osman said.
“Good.” They started clambering up the black-painted metal; shoes clanged on the steep mesh steps. “This is the right time to learn. You’re young. You’ll say stupid things to dangerous people, and they’ll forgive you because you’re too ignorant to know better.” The Baron half-pulled himself upwards with the railing.
“If you’re talking about my greeting in the bookstore, I’m sorry, Baron,” Osman said.
The Baron paused, looking down. “That’s kind of you, but first piece of advice—don’t apologize until someone demands it. Not unless it’s tradition. Being a cultist is a lot like being a criminal, Osman. Did you know that?” He started climbing again.
“No, Baron. My dad said it was like being a Freemason.”
“It is for your father. It might not be for you.” They passed the second story door. Up and up. “Once they have you finishing tasks, you’ll understand. Second piece of advice—just learn from your mistakes the first time. Someday they won’t accept ignorance as an excuse.”
“I understand.”
“Oh, and third piece—don’t tell powerful men where they are and aren’t welcome. You might as well learn that one now. On a bad day, the Zombie might’ve hurt you.”
“I’m sorry, really. I’d seen a picture of you in Tammany, and I’d heard about Salem.”
The Baron paused and looked down at Osman. “Were you at the fire?” The question was rhetorical. Salem had nearly burned to the ground in 1914, and the neophyte couldn’t be older than twenty-five at most.
“No, sir,” he said. “I mean, Baron.”
“Then it’s nothing you need to worry about.” The Baron started upwards one final time. To the side, in the open air, the hanging tapestries seemed to close the space up. Three stories over the floor, lines of sight were obscured, not opened. The great weaves were almost in reach. They reminded the Baron of the low hanging boughs in a dark grove. One could hide between them.
They reached the third story door. Osman was breathing a little heavier, but the Baron was no worse for wear. He put his hand on the door. “Before we go in, I have a question. Have you ever seen a dead body?”
Osman’s eyes opened wide. “You think the man is dead?”
The Baron sighed. “So you haven’t?”
“No, Baron. I’ve never seen a corpse.”
The Baron rubbed his forehead. “So you’re a gatekeeper because they don’t know what to do with you.”
Osman winced and opened his mouth to object, but a second thought brought his ambitions down, and he sagged. “Yes, Baron. I’m afraid so.”
At least the young Osman seemed to know how poor his position fared in the occult space around them. “Did anybody even tell you about the sanctuaries?”
“A little.”
“Do you know how someone dodges then?”
“They make a wish, and then they end up in the temple?”
The Baron squinted at Osman. It was a sad state of affairs in New York City, but he supposed it was their proximity to Tammany Hall itself that created the problem. Osman was part of the New York cult nobility. They didn’t go out into the field for years, sometimes never did, and they were paid for easy temple jobs with prestige tithed from other people. Osman was a child of vast nepotism, a useless cultist who showed up and expected that someday he’d have enough prestige to ensure a place in the hereafter. The worst part was, he would.
“Do you often work with your father?” the Baron asked. “General Osman?”
“He lives in Tammany Hall,” Osman said. “I don’t see him much.”
“He hasn’t paid anybody to teach you in his place?”
“No, Baron. He said I shouldn’t have to work much.”
“I see. Well, I hope your father forgives me, because I’m going to teach you something today.” The Baron opened the door. Behind the brick wall was a fairly large New York apartment lit by windows with the curtains drawn. Hardwood floors creaked underneath the Baron’s feet, and the air carried a hint of old lemon cleaner. Nobody had been staying here for a while. There was a staleness to everything, as if it’d all settled years ago and needed to air out. “So let’s start at the beginning. Have you ever made a wish, neophyte Osman?”
“No, Baron,” Osman said. “Porter tells me I’m supposed to save my prestige.”
“For the wish to go to the gods? For the afterlife.”
“Yes.” Osman followed the Baron into the apartment.
There’d be a few rooms that’d form the sanctuaries. Probably the bedrooms. There was little furniture in the main room, just a long couch and a table with two chairs. Folded blankets and sheets were laid out on the table, in case someone needed to sleep in the apartment. In a little kitchen alcove, a spotless oven waited to be used for the first time.
“If you make a wish, it costs you prestige,” the Baron said. “The bigger the wish, the more it takes to make it come true. Are you with me so far?”
“I know this much, yeah.”
“Good. What happens when you make a wish that you can’t afford?” The Baron opened up a bedroom door. The room was pitch black and chilly, but there was nobody inside. There wasn’t even a bed. There was just a heavy throw rug in the middle of the floor.
“The wish doesn’t come true?” Osman ventured.
“No. If you have prestige, any at all, your wishes are never denied. Not if you want them.” The Baron let go of the handle and the door very slowly shut itself. It was best not to force anything when it came to a sanctuary. There was no confirmed case of a magic door severing a hand from a man’s arm, but the urban legends were plausible enough to make even Baron d’Holbach careful. “Did you see that room?”
“Yes. That’s a sanctuary, right?”
“That’s right. They’re abnormal, anomalous. The cultists say they’re holy, but I think they’re just spatially strange. It’s like the door opens on disconnected spaces.”
“Which means?” Osman asked.
“I’m saying that one door opens onto several copies of the same room.”
“Ah, okay.” That was something Osman could vaguely understand.
The Baron went to another door. There were four off the main room, excluding the bathroom which was already open. “Listen, the so-called gods value two things. The first is the prestige they grant, and the second is human life.” He opened another door onto an empty, cold room.
“Life?” Osman asked. “Like human sacrifice?”
“With some limitations. They’re not interested in killing you. They just want to exact a toll equal to the favor of granting your wish. Have you ever heard the others talk about prestige in units of time?”
“I have.”
“So prestige and time are interchangeable. If you can’t pay with prestige, they’ll take some of your time.”
“So they make you older?” Osman peered into the open, chilly room. “And I guess they put you in one of these weird rooms to do it?”
“That’s close, but not quite right.” The room shut itself behind the Baron. “I’m not going to argue metaphysics with you, but here’s the official story. The gods claim there is free will. Do you know what this means for your future?”
“No, Baron.”
“It means that history isn’t predetermined. It also means that you have no set lifespan. The gods can’t subtract years from a future that doesn’t exist yet.” The Baron went to a third bedroom. “Not that I believe this is the truth, mind you, but I’m the Atheist, right?”
“Maurice calls you the Philosopher,” Osman said quietly.
“A much better title, I agree, but it’s still meant with disdain. Or at least it was when it was coined.” The Baron opened a third door onto an empty room. “The gods are clever. They want to grant your wish at the moment you make it, but they also want some of your life, and there’s nothing they can take from the future. So what could they do? How could they exact their pound of flesh?”
“I don’t know, Baron.”
The Baron approached the fourth bedroom door, and the last room in the apartment that could be a sanctuary. “The gods need you to wait, Osman. That’s the only way you can pay the time they’re owed.” He hesitated before opening up the sanctuary. Osman might not be ready for a corpse, and this was the most likely spot to find one, though it wasn’t guaranteed.
“So you go into a sanctuary and wait until your debt is paid?” Osman asked.
“Yes. Days, weeks, even years. You wait.”
“Huh. Do the gods feed you?”
For once, the young man was using his brain. The Baron smiled. “Thankfully, no. You don’t have to eat, drink, or use the restroom. You don’t even have to worry about going crazy. The gods start you out in a torpor. You can wait half-asleep while you grow old. But you’re still not quite getting it. I don’t think anyone ever does until they’re told.”
“Get what?” Osman asked. “This doesn’t seem that hard to understand.”
“The gods want to grant you the wish the moment you make it, but you have to wait before it is granted. You can’t wait afterwards, so what do they do with you? How do they make it work out?”
“They… can’t?” Osman asked uncertainly.
“They can because they cheat. These sanctuaries are more than hidden away. They’re nowhere in this world until it’s time for the door to open, and nobody can be found in a room until their wait is finished. Do you understand now?”
“No, Baron.”
“Then I’ll spell it out plainly. When you go into debt, the gods place you in a sanctuary in the past, and you’re trapped there, aging until you catch up to the present when your wish was made.”
“So it’s time travel?” Osman was skeptical. “Like the H. G. Wells book?”
“Like the book, but simpler. People in sanctuaries can’t see the past. That’s what the sanctuaries are for, you see? The gods abhor a paradox. They’re just looking to make you age a little, and storing you in the past is the easiest way.”
“Why don’t they just change your age? Why mess with time?”
The Baron frowned. Osman was clearly thinking of time travel as an incredibly complex thing. He was imagining men shaking hands with themselves and destroying the universe. He was raised on stories of arbitrary travel with arbitrary rules. He didn’t have the advantage of a philosophical mind. The Baron had learned about the sanctuaries from a position of profound ignorance with few assumptions, and all he’d discovered was that the gods were excellent at keeping their mysteries. There was no time travel model to speak of because nothing about their time travel could be modeled. It underdetermined many sets of possible rules.
Compared with that, the task of making someone artificially old was vastly more complex. Every cell in the human body would have to be changed immediately, ravaged in perfect mimicry of time and entropy. It wasn’t worth the effort when the debtor could be moved back and allowed to age naturally in a controlled environment.
“Just trust me,” the Baron said, “the gods are lazy, and it’s simpler this way. It may not sound like it, but this is reliable and fair. Making you older wouldn’t be as clean.”
“Huh. Can you die in a sanctuary then?” Osman asked. “Of old age, I mean?”
“Of old age, disease, and injury, yes. They feed you, but they don’t rebuild you—not while you owe them. Before I open this door, I want to tell you something though. When someone deliberately wishes for more than they can afford in order to escape to a temple, that’s called dodging. They’re ripped away because they deliberately accrued debt. Unfortunately, the smallest unit of debt allowed is equivalent to twelve hours of life.”
“Twelve hours… oh.” Osman looked down at his shoes. “Oh shit.”
“It’s a disaster when someone dodges while wounded. It’s a foolish thing, or at least something very desperate. There’s a very real chance that someone bled out behind this door hours ago. Are you okay with seeing that?”
“I don’t know, Baron.”
“Then look away while I open the door.”
Osman turned his head. Baron d’Holbach opened the door.
“You can look,” the Baron said. “It’s empty.”
Osman shuddered. “Thank God.”
The Baron rubbed his clean-shaven scalp. “Maybe,” he said.
“What’s that?”
“Nevermind.” Nobody had quite figured out the pattern for finding people in sanctuaries. It was almost probabilistic, which had implications for the physics of sanctuaries. He wasn’t about to break that notion down with Osman however. “Let’s get out of here.”
He opened the front door onto the fire escape landing.
“Baron?” called up Porter.
“I’m up here!” the Baron shouted down. “Nothing inside these.”
“The Zombie says he found the dead man!”
“Fantastic,” the Baron said, and meant it. The Zombie’s presence would discourage anyone from moving or removing the body before d’Holbach had a chance to look it over.
He and Osman clambered down the stairwell, shoes ringing out, then jogged silently along the aisle towards the corner at the other end of the building. The Zombie came out of the far apartment and leaned dangerously far over the railing, waving with both arms.
“Don’t fall!” the Baron shouted at him. “You could break through the floor!”
The Zombie stepped back and laughed loud enough to be heard echoing off the far wall despite the reams of hanging decorations.
The Oracle met them along the way. “The Zombie’s got it.”
“We heard. Is the man dead?” the Baron asked him.
“Apparently. You know as much as I do.”
They reached the base of the stairwell below the Zombie, where a few of the New York cultists were already gathered. “Any orders boss?” asked the beatnik look-a-like.
Maurice snapped his fingers and pointed. “You and you, get down to Tammany Hall. We’ve got a body to dispose of.”
The cultists started off immediately.
“Dispose?” Osman asked. “What if he had a wife?”
“She’ll learn later,” Maurice said curtly. “Get downstairs and greet anybody from Tammany that shows up. Do your job.”
“Yes, sir!” Osman ran off after the others.
Maurice started his way up the stairwell and d’Holbach followed immediately.
“Osman’s father wants him to be dead weight?” the Baron asked the Oracle.
“That’s right,” Maurice said, audibly unhappy with the idea. “The General can afford to pamper the kid, and I can afford to take care of him.”
“That’s miserable.”
“No, that’s royalty.”
They reached the third story, where the Zombie ushered them indoors with a tip of his bowler. “My friends, I present to you, one dead asshole.”
Just beyond the vestibule to the apartment, the nearest sanctuary door was propped open with a chair, and the Zombie had drawn back the curtains to let in more light. They could see a prostrate figure, lying at the entrance in a pool of black, dried blood. He’d been clawing at the wooden door panels while he bled out.
“Damn,” Maurice said. “Messy.”
The Baron skirted around the Oracle, approaching the dead man. “Small-time Mafia?” Baron d’Holbach asked, stopping beside the Zombie to inspect the corpse.
“Absolutely,” the Zombie said. “He’s got a shitty revolver in his jeans, left pocket.”
The Baron knelt close to the head of the corpse, looking him over. He was dressed like a dock worker in spring; his rolled up sleeves revealed thick, sunburned arms coated in old Navy Reserve tattoos. His newsie cap was stuck in the blood by his head; his right cheek was mashed into the hardwood floor. His short, black hair and thick mustache were in the style worn by Italian immigrants, but whether or not he was Sicilian was hard to tell. He was heavily tanned.
Maurice was waiting several steps back. “Looks like he came up out of the torpor.”
“A man in mortal pain doesn’t sleep.” The Zombie pointed to the middle of the dead man’s back. “The bullet didn’t pass through either. Frangible. An autopsy would dig up nothing but fragments. Very professional. Useless as ID.”
“Do you have any idea what wish he used to dodge?” Maurice asked.
“Penny wish, I think.” The Zombie grinned broadly, pulling out a small, grimy penny out of his pants pocket. “Found it with his blood on it, which means he thought it through. He was already shot, and still chose to run with a wish.” The Zombie kneeled beside the Baron “But you can’t make good decisions when you’ve been hit center of mass, can you? You panic and overthink it, and you die. Or you choose to die. Either way, there’s no escape.”
The Baron grunted. The penny wish was an ancient trick. A cultist was given a minimal amount of prestige to carry around with him—a unit sometimes called the half-day. If he had zero prestige, he couldn’t make any wishes until he received more.
The cultist then put a penny in his left pocket. When it became necessary to escape—to dodge to the temple—the cultist wished that the penny was in his right pocket instead. While teleportation was generally perceived as incredibly expensive, it was reasonable to imagine that the penny had always been in the other pocket or was moved by sleight of hand, so this wish was valued at a deep discount of a single day.
The wish cost twenty four hours, and the cultist had spent half upfront. The remaining debt was only twelve hours—the shortest possible time to wait in a sanctuary. It was still too long for someone like the dock worker with a bullet in his chest.
“Maybe he recognized the assassins,” Maurice said thoughtfully. “He might’ve had a good reason to try his luck with a dodge.”
The Baron frowned. “I don’t know. This corpse doesn’t tell us much about anything.”
The Zombie shrugged. “No wallet, only a billfold. Yes, I checked.”
“Do you know where he worked?” the Baron asked Maurice.
“This guy? No idea. I’m not even sure if he was working his real job on a Saturday. He was at the East River Docks though. Why do you ask?”
“Mostly curious.”
Maurice frowned at the dead man. “Are you thinking of looking for the killer? New York might put up a bounty.”
“I don’t know,” the Baron lied. “If I figure anything out, I’ll tell Tammany Hall.”
“Good,” Maurice said. “They’re going to be pissed.”
The Baron stood up and turned to face the Oracle. “If you’re looking for our help, you could do us a favor,” he added.
“What’s that?”
“If you get a name or cult attached to this corpse, you could leave me a message at the Biltmore. My room is under the name Ray Dufraine. I don’t know if the man here is important, but it might help everyone out if we keep trading info.”
“You’d owe me a favor back,” Maurice said.
“Of course.”
“Then it’s a deal,” Maurice said, offering to shake on it.
The Baron gripped the Oracle’s hand—heavy, an ex-laborer’s meaty paw—and he gave it two brief shakes before releasing it. “Thanks for your help, and I’m sorry about your loss. If we stumble across anything, we’ll be in touch.”
“You’re welcome.” He pinched the bridge of his nose just below his glasses. “It smells like blood in here. Are you good to go?.”
“Yes, Oracle,” the Baron replied.
Maurice turned towards the door, and the Baron and Zombie followed him out of the apartment and down the metal mesh stairs. Footsteps echoed off the far brick walls. When they reached the floor of the chamber, he turned to them. “Oh, I almost forgot to ask you.”
They walked down the aisle to the open temple door. “What is it?”
“We were talking about Schuler and Jackson Davis, and I was wondering, why don’t Diviners wish away the gift? If their sensitivity makes them crazy or gives them seizures, why stick with it? Why don’t they go back, if they can cure their madness?”
The Baron paused in the doorway. “You want to know their motivation?”
“I suppose I do.”
“It’s the same reason that flagellants whip themselves, Maurice. Suffering makes them holy. It makes them special. I think they stick with it because the struggle gives them meaning. Without it, there’s no purpose to their lives.”
“That’s grim,” Maurice said.
“It’s existentialism,” the Baron said. The Zombie darted around him and started down the steps, dress shoes tapping rapidly on the wood. “We’ll be heading out now. I hope you don’t have any trouble disposing of the corpse.”
“We won’t.” Maurice took a deep breath. “I’ve missed a task while talking with you already. If you’ll excuse me, I’ve got to get back to work.”
The Baron nodded, thinking the same thing. It was time to go from here to the docks—to see if this death could bear any relevant info for their case.
They exchanged their goodbyes, and the Baron followed the Zombie down and out through a bookstore filled with people browsing magazines and paperbacks. These readers were looking for a moment’s entertainment, while a murdered man laid over them, quiet and still. What a strange world it could be, containing both trifles and graves.
The young Osman was standing at the front window. He waved miserably at the passing Baron, and d’Holbach waved back with a heart full of pity for the living and the dead.
Author’s Note:
Trifles and graves, equally fleeting.
As always, thank you to the beta readers for helping with this chapter!
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