Chapter 7: A New Refuge

“It’s alright,” Jared insisted, his voice a stubborn, optimistic anchor in the swirling chaos of my thoughts. “Just the two of us, we’ll find a way. I’ll make sure you live. I swear it.”

I had no reply. It was strange how a boy, likely younger than my former self, could project such an aura of unwavering reassurance. And I truly did need him. Without his help, I’d have likely perished in that alley tonight, another frozen corpse for the dawn to find. At least with this blanket, held in his arms, the gnawing cold had receded. A warmth spread through me, though I still couldn’t quite reconcile the fact that I, a man in soul, was being carried like a damsel. But it was too late for such reservations. He couldn’t go back now. MacDuff would have discovered the theft and his flight. Returning would mean a beating that might leave him crippled, or worse. This desperate, moonless flight was now our only path.

I fell silent, trying to observe our surroundings as he hurried on. But my night blindness was a cruel curse. Beyond a few feet, the world dissolved into a blurry, shifting mosaic of light and shadow. At ten paces, I couldn’t tell a man from a wraith. Wait… Just as the thought crossed my mind, I saw something flicker at the edge of my vision. In the deep, inky shadows of a street corner, a bloody head, slick with gore, seemed to float for a bare second, its eyes wide and vacant. I blinked, a jolt of pure ice shooting through me, and it was gone. A trick of the fever? A phantom born of my failing eyes? I stared again into the oppressive darkness of the corner, but there was only emptiness. Jared, oblivious, sped past the spot, leaving it and its potential horrors far behind.

I’d had no idea how large this city was, having spent all my time in that one small, wretched rookery. But as Jared carried me, his pace swift and sure, I realized it was vast, a true metropolis. He’d been running for the better part of half an hour, his breath coming in ragged pants, and still there was no end in sight. Far in the distance, I couldn’t make out the shapes of buildings, but I could see the pinpricks of light from their windows, rising high into the fog on all sides.

We had clearly left the slum behind. The narrow, mud-choked tracks with their open sewers and foul, suffocating stench had given way to wide, paved streets of smooth, dark flagstones. Ornate lamps stood at regular intervals, casting a strange, ethereal glow. The light here was different from the sputtering, yellow flames of the gas lamps back in MacDuff’s territory. This was a silvery-blue luminescence, soft and cool like captive moonlight, pulsing gently. I had no idea what arcane science or strange alchemy produced such a light. The buildings here were grand, two or three stories high, with some even reaching four or five. They were elegant and well-kept, many boasting small, wrought-iron fences enclosing manicured gardens. And, thank the non-existent heavens, the suffocating smell of the slum was gone. To be free of that inescapable stench was a relief so profound it almost brought tears to my eyes. For someone from my old life—a life of clean air and modern sanitation—that filthy, stinking rookery had been a unique and intimate circle of hell.

With the tenements no longer pressing in, the sky opened up above us. Though the ever-present fog still obscured the stars, the light of the moons shone through, pale and strange. And it was then that I knew, with an absolute, world-tilting certainty, that I was truly on another world. There were three moons hanging in the sky. One was a crimson orb, huge as a washbasin, casting a faint, bloody pallor on the clouds below. Another, the size of a dinner plate, was a sickly, verdant green. The last was a tiny, pale blue sphere, no bigger than a child’s playing ball, sharp and cold as a chip of ice. Each was in a different phase. The blue moon was a perfect, unwavering disc; the green one was gibbous and waning; and the great red moon was a crescent, a curved, crimson claw hanging in the sky just like the moon of my old world, a cruel mockery of home. My world did not have three moons. My world did not have a sky that bled. I was on an alien planet, trapped in a different reality.

The city was larger still than I had imagined. Jared carried me on, across three more districts. We passed through what looked like a commercial or factory area, its darkened warehouses looming like sleeping giants, then a vast, dark park, and finally over a wide, stone bridge arching over a black, sluggish river that seemed to absorb the light. Once across the river, that faint, familiar stench of poverty and coal smoke began to creep back into the air. We were nearing the place Jared had spoken of—another slum, a new refuge far from MacDuff’s reach where we could try to eke out a living. The sheer size of the city was, at least, a small comfort. It was teeming with people, even at this late hour. Whatever new dangers lurked here, the chance of MacDuff finding two insignificant children in this sprawling, gaslit metropolis was next to none. We were a needle in a vast, grimy haystack.

“Can’t we… can’t we just stay here?” I ventured, my voice a weak rasp against his shoulder. “Find a corner on one of these cleaner streets?” I truly dreaded the thought of plunging back into that kind of suffocating filth. In my old world, I’d seen plenty of homeless people make do with a blanket on a city street. “No. It’s too dangerous out in the open,” Jared replied instantly. His tone was so stern, so filled with a fear I didn't understand, that it startled me. I wanted to ask what dangers he meant, what could be worse than the slow death of the slums. But he seemed unwilling to elaborate, his jaw set grimly. He clutched me tighter and pressed on, finally arriving at a new slum. It was just as the last: a claustrophobic maze of dilapidated hovels and narrow, oppressive alleyways. The difference here was the factories. Several massive, dark structures loomed over the slum, blotting out the three moons, their walls a web of giant pipes and arcane-looking conduits, some of which ran directly through the residential warren below. I knew they were factories not by sight, but by sound. A constant, deafening mechanical roar echoed from them, a ceaseless, grinding thunder that vibrated through the very ground, a mechanical heartbeat for this part of the city.

“This is where the factory workers live,” Jared explained, his voice barely audible over the din. “Folk from out of town, or ones who can’t make a living any other way, they end up taking work in the factories. The bosses put ‘em up here.” It seemed some things were universal, no matter the world: soul-crushing labour and endless shifts. I looked at the residents of this new slum. Most wore simple work clothes, their faces sallow and gaunt, their expressions listless or utterly numb as they trudged through the muck, too tired to even register our presence. Well, at least they were honest workers, I supposed, a cut above the thieves and liars of MacDuff’s crew. But this place had a new drawback to endure: the incessant, maddening noise that felt like it was shaking my bones apart.

I was wondering where among these hovels Jared planned for us to stay when he turned and headed towards a small, dark canal that cut through the district. He led me down a set of steep, slick stone steps, and when we reached the bottom, a new wave of despair washed over me. On either side of the canal, which was more of an open sewer, ran stone platforms several hundred metres long. And huddled all along these platforms, against the cold stone walls, were more vagrants and beggars. Above them, huge, thick pipes jutted out from the foundations of the factories, continuously discharging streams of foul-smelling, discoloured effluent into the waterway below. I understood. This was the factory’s drainage system. A sewer. This was the “safe place” Jared had brought me to. This was our new home.