17
	Jess drowsed in the chair, lulled by the heat of the fire, and she was almost asleep when Sarah came in.  The girl closed the door so quietly that Jess didn’t hear the click of the latch, but a breeze from outside carried the smell of Sarah's perfume ahead of her to tickle Jess's nose.  Jess opened her eyes, but she didn’t sit up until Sarah’s hands touched the arm of the chair.
	“I thought you hated us,” Sarah said.
	“I hated everyone,” Jess said.
	“But now you’ve seen the light?  I don’t believe it, nobody changes that fast.  So what is this?” Sarah said.
	“Pure selfishness, nothing more.  You get me what I want, and I help you get what you want,” Jess said.
	She couldn’t say why she was so sure that Catherine would know where Elizabeth was, but right now it was the only thing she was sure of.  Catherine was so much like her, in some ways, that she felt certain that Elizabeth wouldn’t have been able to resist confiding in her.
	“Why do I need you?” Sarah said.
	“You don’t. You have all the friends, and all the influence.  I need you, and I don't think you're the sort of girl who can sit by and watch anyone suffer,” Jess said.
	She stood up and stretched, feeling her right knee pop because she’d been sitting too long.  Her whole body was sore, and the scratch down her hip itched and stung every time she moved.  Sarah drew back from her, hissing between her teeth.
	“Mr. Coburn said you looked like you’d been chewed on,” she said.
	“This is what comes of standing up for yourself,” Jess said.
	“Giving up would be even worse,” Sarah said.
	“So then we fight back harder.  That's why we have to hurt them first,” Jess said.
	Sarah put a hand to her own neck and rubbed it with her fingers.  Her breathing was shallow and quick and, maybe it was the firelight, but her claws were more noticeable that Jess remembered.  They were blunt and heavy, relics from the time when skunks had to dig their homes out of the ground, but with Sarah’s weight and strength behind them Jess knew the girl could still do a lot of damage.
	“Why are you doing this?” Sarah said.
	“I've already told you.  You can give me what I want.  And maybe you two thought you were trying to help me when you took me out of the House.  Maybe I owe you a favor or two,” Jess said.
	Every other time she had seen her, Sarah had been wearing ordinary clothes.  Now the skunk was dressed in soft, dark grey clothes that draped loosely over her to hide her shape.  The pants tied around the waist and there were no belts or buckles to catch the light.  The only thing that was out of place was the pack on her back, which she shrugged off and dropped on the floor between them.
	“Robert said you might need some new clothes.  I can’t afford any pretty dresses, but I thought that these might be more comfortable than what you’ve got on,” Sarah said.
	The clothes in the bag were a match for what Sarah was wearing.  Like hers, they had a rough, homemade look,  but the cloth was a good cotton fabric that had to have cost more than anything Jess ever owned.  She wondered how Sarah had been able to get it, and decided it didn’t matter.  Elizabeth had taught her that stealing was wrong and she’d believed it, even though she could see that was how the city worked.  If Sarah had taken the cloth it was probably the least that any of them were owed.
	She put on her new clothes over what she was already wearing.  The shirt was a little tight across her chest, and the pants were a bit too big for her, but they were warm and soft.  There were a pair of boots in the sack, too.  Jess had never worn anything on her feet before, except sandals, and the boots felt heavy and clumsy.  While she worked on getting them laced, Sarah tied up the belt on the waist of her pants.
	“Catherine’s a sweet girl.  She doesn’t know a lot of things, and she has spent all of her life sheltered behind these walls.  But she tries.  And she never thinks of herself,” Sarah said.
	“You love her,” Jess said.
	“I do.  But I didn’t come here just because of her.  I came because she isn’t the only person I know who gives a damn,” Sarah said.
	Jess snorted, and tugged her shirt down, trying to cover the little gap of bare fur that was left between the hem and the top of her pants.
	“Somebody has to love the unlovable,” Jess said.
	Back out on the street, Sarah took time to lock the front door with a key she wore on a string around her neck.  Jess couldn’t help but feel that it was foolish to give a girl like Sarah the key to any house.  Still, she was at least more honest than anyone else Jess had met outside of the House and maybe that counted for something.  Sarah put out the lanterns on either side of the door, because the moon was bright enough that they didn’t need the fire to see with.
	“Do you have a weapon?” Sarah said.
	“What do you think?” Jess said.
	A little scrap of moonlight glinted off of Sarah’s teeth in what was possibly a grin.
	“I think anyone who gives a girl like you a weapon would deserve to get gutted for their foolishness.  It’s just as well, because I never use them,” Sarah said.
	Sarah jumped down off the steps and headed down the road towards the heart of the city.  She walked fast with her arms folded around herself, like all she wanted was to get in out of the cold before she froze.  Except that the girl went the wrong way.  Now that she’d had some rest, and a chance to collect herself, Jess thought she had her bearings.  The street they were on led up the hill to one end of Hope Street, just past the cathedral.  She ran after Sarah to drag her back, but when she grabbed the girl’s arm, Sarah just put a hand on top of hers and kept walking.
	“It’s a kind of short cut,” she said, before Jess could open her mouth.
	“To the prison?  There isn’t one,” Jess said.
	“Not the way most people think, but you can climb over a wall, can’t you?” Sarah said.
	The road ran up the shallow side of the hill so carts and wagons could get up it, and it curled around the outside edge, to give the cathedral at the top of the hill plenty of space.  Jess had always thought it was an ugly building.  It even had gargoyles on the top, and clustered around the door, all carved to look like they were clawing their way out of the stone.  Every time she walked past the church it gave her nightmares.
	They followed the street to where it ended in a dead-end alley behind the Bishop’s house.  It ended in blank brick walls on two sides, which were the backs of two more houses on the adjoining street, going around a curve.  The third one was the side of a storehouse, probably the Bishop’s larder.  It was a little taller than Jess was, but if she stood up on her toes it was just possible to see the top of it.
	“Don’t stop, and don’t think about it.  It’s always better that way,” Sarah said.
	“That’s easy for you.  You don't have to try it when it feels like your whole body is filled with crushed glass,” Jess said.
	Her privates no longer felt like they were on fire, though, and that was some improvement.  As long as she didn’t let herself dwell on what had happened she could hold on until they found Elizabeth.  It worried her that she didn’t know how long she had before Elizabeth’s pills couldn’t help her anymore.  The idea of being a mother had always frightened her.
	Jess jumped up and grabbed the top of the wall to pull herself up.  A brick shifted alarmingly under her right hand and she couldn’t get any traction on the face of the walls, or pull herself up.  House girls were discouraged from taking too much exercise because most males didn’t want to be with someone who was as strong as they were.  So while Jess had always kept herself fit, she'd only ever done the bare minimum needed to keep her healthy.  The brick slipped again and she felt herself sliding down, until Sarah planted both hands on her backside.  The girl pushed up, and Jess was able to hook her body over the edge of the wall and swing a leg around.
	“Ask for help if you need it,” said Sarah.
	“I was doing fine,” Jess said, and she let a little snarl creep into her tone, to hide her fear “A touch like that is worth a half a dollar.  You get that one for free, but watch it in future.”
	“Do you always think of yourself like that?  What’s the good of our stealing you, if you’re going to act like you’re still in that House?” Sarah said.
	“I haven’t seen any difference yet.” Jess said.
	The roof of the storehouse was comfortingly solid under Jess's feet, and she moved away from the edge to let Sarah climb up.  The girl took two steps back and ran at the wall. She jumped straight up just at the point when Jess thought she ought to have hit the wall, caught the top with both hands and kicked up to hook her leg over the top.  When she had made it up, she flashed another one of her strange, toothy smiles.  Skunks, Jess thought, were every bit as mad as weasels.
	“Now for the fun part.  Walk close behind me and don’t stray.  We can go slow, until you’re used to it, but I’d like to get there tonight,” Sarah said.
	Sarah walked to the other side of the roof and stood with her back to the city.  In front of her, the top of the storehouse was even with the sloping roof of the house opposite it.  The roof was old copper and it looked slick with all of the snow on it.
	“Remember.  Don’t think about it.  Just go,” Sarah said.
	Eyes still closed, Sarah stepped up onto the roof.  Her boots kicked up little drifts of snow and Jess could hear ice snap under the skunk's weight, but she didn’t slide off.  Sarah took two more steps and Jess followed her, moving just as fast as Sarah did so she wouldn’t lose her nerve.
	“You and your girl are so keen on getting me away from here.  Why don’t you leave the city?” she said.
	“Why should I?  This is my home,” Sarah said.
	“There are other cities,” Jess said.
	“You mean Shelby's Ford?  That’s not a city.  They wouldn’t be anything without their mine, and I'd be bored,” Sarah said.
	They reached the peak of the roof, and started down the other side.  There was less snow here, since it was partly sheltered by the next building, and there was no ice underneath.  On the wall above them, just within reach, was a ladder.
	“If you mean I should leave because I steal, well what of it?  I’m not afraid of anyone,” Sarah said.
	“But you know what this city is like.  You know what they'd do to you if they catch you.  I don’t understand why anyone stays if they don’t have to,” Jess said.
	“Some are scared to leave, like you.  Others are just too stubborn,” Sarah said.
	“Like you,” Jess said.
	“Yes.  And some really care, like Catherine does.  She really thinks that this used to be a good place, back when Deirdre was alive,” Sarah said.
	The top of the next building led onto a narrow metal walkway.  It was rusty, and it shook under their footsteps.  There were guardrails on either side and a raised tread that gave their boots something to grip, but all Jess could see under it was darkness.  She held her breath until they were across it and on solid brick again.  The knot in her stomach loosened a bit and she hurried to catch up with Sarah.
	“I don’t believe all those old stories.  What kind of vixen could she have been if this is the way her city turned out?” said Jess.
	“She was just an ordinary person.  That’s the part nobody wants to remember.  She isn’t responsible for the way people have twisted her ideas,” Sarah said.
	“Someone has to be,” Jess said.
	Sarah half turned towards her, and she could see a glint of moonlight again.
	“I used to say the same thing.  I never dreamed that silly wolf of mine would take it this seriously,” she said.
	They were moving at a fast walk when Jess slipped on the patch of ice.  If she hadn’t already been lifting her other leg to take the next step she would have been okay.  Her foot slipped off the top of the wall, which was narrower than she’d thought, and she felt herself fall all the way down to the ground, some unseen distance away.  So it didn’t immediately register that Sarah had caught her and pulled her back to safety instead.
	“This is why I normally do this by myself.  I can’t think right when I have to walk people through this all the time,” Sarah said.
	Jess pried Sarah’s hands off of her chest, but didn’t dare move more than a tiny way away from her, which irritated her more than the grope.
	“That’s a dollar and a half, all told,” she said.
	“Oh yes, very nice.  You’ll let me know when I’ve got to the full amount, won’t you?  How much is it for a kiss?” Sarah said.
	Jess’s stomach cramped, a quick, sharp pain that was gone before she noticed it, and she hoped that Sarah hadn’t noticed the flash of her fangs.  She could still feel Marcus’s mouth on hers.
	“Five hundred dollars,” Jess said.
	The path they were on led to another slightly wider metal walkway.  This one had a metal bar across the front of it which, she supposed, was meant to be locked.  Any lock it had once had was gone now, though, and Sarah pushed it up out of their way as if it was no concern.  Beyond that was a short flight of stairs leading down to a broad slate roof with a high rim all around it.  The width of it was a tremendous relief after the wall, and she ran down the steps, heedless of the ice and the noise, just to have it under her feet.
	“But where are we?  You said it was a shortcut, but we’re just going around in circles.  I don’t recognize any of this,” she said.
	“That’s because everything looks different from up here.  Look to your left,” Sarah said.
	On that side of the roof there was a little shack with a wooden door, which looked like a way to get inside.  Rising above that, not nearly far enough away, was the dome of the courthouse roof.  Jess could only see the bottom of the topmost spire, and she couldn’t see the old gibbets hanging from every corner just below the dome, but she didn’t need to.  She turned and would have bolted for the stairs if Sarah hadn’t been in her way.
	“Welcome back to jail,” the girl said.
	This door was locked, and it looked both new and well made.  Sarah frowned at it for a moment, then knelt in front of it and took a roll of cloth out of her pocket.  She spread it out in front of her and removed a few pieces of crooked metal that Jess didn’t recognize.  The girl studied them for another minute, then bent over to shield the lock from view with her body, and the door swung open.  Instead of another set of stairs, there was only a smooth floor sloping sharply down into the end of a hallways.
	“Now you really do need to stick close.  If something goes wrong, you aren’t to wait for me.  I certainly won’t wait for you,” Sarah said.
	“That’s exactly the sort of stupid thing I expected you to say,” Jess said.
	Still crouched low, Sarah pushed herself onto the ramp and slid down to the bottom.  She landed on her feet and was up and moving as soon as she hit the floor.
	The stink of cinnamon was strong enough that it reached Jess where she was, and it nearly turned her back in spite of her worry for Sarah.  She could feel the heat rising between her legs again, and the scratches on her leg burned witih fresh pain.  It would be easy to run away.  Sarah knew what she was doing and skunks had certain advantages when they got into trouble.  But Jess knew that Elizabeth would keep going, if she was here instead.  The old vixen never ran away from anything, and had raised her to stand her ground, too.  Knowing that didn’t make it any easier to force herself to slide down the ramp, but she did it anyway.
	The hallway at the bottom was only a few feet long and completely bare.  There wasn’t even any plaster on the walls to hide the bare boards, and there was an empty doorway at the end.  Sarah crouched down just inside the door, and the little thief just held a finger up to her muzzle and held out her other hand.  Jess hesitated, then took it.  They needed each other, no matter what Sarah had said.
	As soon as they stepped into the next hallway, Jess had to clamp her free hand over her muzzle to keep from gagging.  The air was so thick with the smell of cinnamon that she could taste it on her tongue and it made her eyes sting and water.  This hall was thickly carpeted and panelled with dark red cherry wood.  There were six doors on this end, three to a side, all with big brass locks.  Five of them were smoothly polished, and looked brand new.  The one in the middle on the left wall was scored with clawmarks, and splintered around the frame.
	“Cath kind of loses control when she gets angry,” Sarah said.
	“Good for her,” Jess said.
	Sarah bent to look at the lock on this door, but when she touched the knob it swung open.  Sarah tensed, and Jess became aware of a sudden, slight change in the air that suggested that a noise that had been just on the edge of hearing had stopped.  Her first thought was of Marcus and what he might be doing on the other side of the door.  Her second thought was that Catherine was a big girl and could take care of herself, but by then her shoulder had already hit the door and sent it banging into the wall behind it.
	The room on the other side could have been the same one that Jess remembered.  There was a bed and the same kind of table with a pitcher of water on it.  Since it was night, the room was lit with a small lamp that had been hung on the wall next to the window.  The lamp filled the corners with deep shadows, but it still gave enough light for her to see Catherine, sitting on the edge of the bed with her hands behind her back.  There were scratches across her face and Jess thought she had been crying.
	A fat raccoon stood next to Catherine and he had his claws hooked in the collar of her shirt.  He turned as Jess charged across the room, but wasn’t fast enough to get out of the way.  She hit him as hard as she could in the mouth, and sent him stumbling back to slump against the wall.
	“Not a word.  Don’t even breathe.  If you’ve hurt her—“ Jess said.
	The raccoon recovered from his shock and hit her in the same place that Marcus had earlier.  His claws dug new scratches in her already tender skin and the pain of it made her yelp and flinch.   He hit her again, and there was a small, metallic click next to her ear.  It wasn’t a loud sound, but it made the fur on the back of her neck prickle.  Jess swiped at her eyes with her hands, clawing the wetness out of the fur on her cheeks.
	When her vision cleared, Sarah stood next to her with a revolver pointed at the raccoon’s chest.  The barrel weaved around in small circles, but she was too close to miss him.  He held his hand up over his chest, as if there was any chance that they would protect him and Jess could see the fear in his eyes.  It was an old fashioned pistol, the sort with a revolving barrel, one for each shot.  They had been popular twenty years ago, but now they only ever showed up in antique shops.
	“Do you know, I’ve never used one of these before?  I hate guns.  But I think I could get the hang of it,” Sarah said.
	“A little bit of restraint might be nice.  Unless you want to invite all of his friends to join us,” Catherine said.
	“I’ve got six shots,” said Sarah.
	“And if there are seven of them?  Put it down, please.  We’re in enough trouble already,” Jess said.
	“You most certainly are.  All I have to do is shout.  Don’t think that anyone would miss you, either.  Girls like you are worth nothing,” the raccoon said.
	“That just makes it easier to pull the trigger,” Sarah said.
	“I don’t think you’ve got the nerve,” the raccoon said.  But he cringed and shut his eyes when Sarah put the barrel of her gun under his chin.
	There was a ring of keys on the table.  Jess grabbed them and retreated to the other side of the room to unlock Catherine's chains.  The wolf leapt to her feet as soon as she was free and she took the cuffs out of Jess's hands.  She held them up in front of the raccoon’s face and shook them.  The little smile that spread across her muzzle left no doubt what she intended to do with them.
	“It’s only fair.  And it beats the alternative, don’t you think?” Catherine said.
	“Why can’t people just stay in their proper places?  Everything would be so much easier then,” the raccoon said.
	“And that is why you don’t deserve any mercy.  Lucky for you, I’m a civilized girl.  Most of the time,” Catherine said.
	The wolf grabbed his arms and twisted them up behind his back until he groaned with pain.  He leaned backwards to try to ease the strain in his arms and Catherine pulled him close to the wall.  She snapped the cuffs around his wrists and pulled up on his arms again, until he was standing on his toes.  Without taking her eyes off of him, she lifted the lantern off the wall and hooked the chain of the cuffs over its hanger instead.  This left him in an awkward position that meant he hand to stand up on his toes and lean forward to keep from pulling his arms out of their sockets.
	Jess saw that he was going to slip when Catherine let go of him, but there wasn’t any way she could catch him herself.  When he did, she heard his arms pop, even over his howl of pain.  She felt a twinge of pity for him, but she wanted to hear him yell louder at the same time.
	She grabbed Sarah and Catherine by the scruffs of their necks and pushed them towards the door.  The raccoon yelled again as they tumbled out into the hall and they could hear footsteps on the stairs leading up to the second floor.
	“Not the brightest thing you’ve ever done,” Sarah said.
	“I liked it,” Jess said.
	She turned up the hall to go back the way they had come, but Sarah and Catherine ran the other way.  Sarah aimed her pistol at the head of the stairs and fired.  She only hit the ceiling, but that was enough.  The coyote coming up the stairs ducked with his hands over his head and ran back down, barking wordlessly in his fright.  They went down after him, with Sarah in front and Jess noticed that the girl wasn't trembling anymore.
	They were met at the bottom of the steps by the coyote and a big grey wolf with a limp and one eye.  He had a pistol in a holster on his hip that looked like a small cannon.  The wolf caught Jess’s glance at it, and nodded.
	“It can put a hole through two of you together, and the wall behind you.  You’re brave girls, but not very smart,” he said.
	“I’ve been sensible all of my life and this is where I wound up.  I’m tired of the game,” Jess said.
	“Her bond was only set at a hundred dollars.  A clever girl could have raised that in no time,” he said.
	“And see her become the same as me? Not if my life depended on it,” Jess said.
	The wolf raised his hand, palm hovering just above the butt of his pistol.  He stopped when Sarah shook her gun at him, but his fingers twitched.
	“No,” he said “I don’t think you could.”
	The gun drooped in Sarah’s hands, and the wolf’s fingers closed over his gun.  Before he could draw it from its sheath, Jess snatched the pistol away from Sarah and fired it into the ceiling.  The coyote ducked again, whimpering and covering his head with his arms.  That, she thought, proved he had more brains than the wolf, who grinned at her like she had just done a clever trick.
	“Four left, Miss Bryar, if you want to try again.  Captain Thomas told us you’d be coming back.  I suppose I owe him two dollars,” he said.
	“Thomas did?” Catherine said.
	“You knew he was one of ours, didn’t you?  He did tell you who he was?” the wolf said.
	“He never did like answering questions.  I told you we should keep an eye on him,” Sarah said.
	The coyote looked up at them, snarled, and lunged across the room.  Jess thought he wanted the door and she fired again, splintering the wood above the lock, to scare him off.  He veered away, too smoothly for it not to be planned.  There was a rack of rifles on the wall behind a heavy wooden desk, and before she could adjust her aim he’d grabbed one and ducked behind the desk.
	“The three of you are under arrest.  Put down the gun, or I will shoot you all,” he said.
	“You know, after the evening I’ve had, I don’t think I’d mind,” Jess said.
	“I would.  I promised Elizabeth that I’d keep you safe, and she can be frightening when she’s angry,” Catherine said.
	“You ought to be more worried about President Keppler.  He was supposed to be dropping by later to talk to our little guest himself,” the wolf said.
	Anger and fear blurred Jess’s vision for a second time, and when it cleared she had the collar of the wolf’s shirt in one hand and the muzzle of her pistol shoved into the soft flesh under his jaw.  Just the thought of seeing Marcus again frightened her more than the rifle did.
	“I told you not to move,” the coyote said.
	He leaned across the desk now, squinting at her across the barrel of his gun.
	“Pups today, huh?” said the wolf.
	She knew that he would hit her as soon as she turned to face the coyote.  She did it anyway, because she knew, too, that if the puppy didn’t shoot her, he might shoot Sarah, or Catherine instead.  It was strange, she thought, that she felt so pleased with herself when she saw him raise his hand as she pointed her gun at the coyote.  The weapon went off, nearly of its own accord, while he still had his arm over his head.
	Jess didn't intened to actually shoot the coyote pup.  She thought she’d gotten control of herself again, after she'd finished with the cat in the alley.  It was much better to imagine that the gun had twisted in her hand when she pulled the trigger.  It was old, and unreliable, after all, and it was a wonder it fired at all.
	Even so, she didn’t think she’d ever forget the noise he made when the bullet hit him in the throat; a sort of high, strangled whine, like a disappointed child.  He collapsed over the desk at the same time the wolf brought his fist down.
	His blow never landed, because suddenly he had Sarah’s teeth buried in his wrist.  He barked with pain and raised his other hand to hit her, but Jess kicked him between the legs.  That felt so good she kicked him again for good luck, and he fell, retching, to the floor.
	“I’m going to have to have a talk with Captain Thomas the next time I see him,” Catherine said.
	“To hell with him.  Thomas can go swing for all I care.  I'm not in this to help your revolution,” Jess said.
	She slid the gun into her pocket, and then they ran out the door.  Clouds had moved across the moon while they had been inside and the darkness was both a shock and a relief.  They could still be tracked by scent, of course, but, for now, Jess wasn't  worried about that.