Drowning (Kaz Brekker)

iv - Black Veil

"Hopefully?" Jesper repeated.

Asra shook her head. "It doesn't matter now. I'm finishing this job before anything else." She faced Kuwei. "What did the Shu want with Fabrikators?"

"Our leaders want to conduct more experiments, but they don't know how many Grisha they can find -"

"Maybe if they hadn't killed so many?" Nina put in.

"Yes," Kuwei nodded, either missing or ignoring the sarcasm. "They have few Grisha, and using parem shortens a Grisha's life. So they bring doctors to work with the Fabrikators already sick from parem. They plan to make a new kind of soldier, the Kherguud. I don't know if they succeed."

"I think I can answer that question with a big fat yes." Jesper said.

Asra nodded. "Body alterations, mechanical innards, altered brain chemistry. It all makes them stronger and deadlier. More obedient. Perfect."

"What did your mother want with them?" Kuwei asked.

"I think she wanted to make her own brand, use the process on us." Asra said. She remembered her mother ranting about them now, the adoration in her voice. The Kherguud had been little more than whispers then. Asra had been just toying with the idea of leaving.

"How many men does your mother have?" Kaz asked.

Asra shrugged. "A couple hundred, I'd guess. We come and go. I was isolated usually, as her daughter."

He nodded. Asra saw a scheming face coming on. She didn't want to know what he was planning.

"Fabrikators deal in solids," Jesper said. "Metal, glass, textiles. This seems more like Corporalki work."

"Tailors blur the line between Fabrikator and Corporalnik." Nina said. "I had a teacher in Ravka, Genya Safin. She could have been Heartrender or Fabrikator if she'd wanted to, instead she became a great Tailor. The work your describing is really just an advanced kind of Tailoring."

Asra suppressed a shudder at the advanved Tailoring she'd seen back at the House. "Were the wings organic or metal?"

"Mechanical." Nina said. "Some kind of metal frame, and canvas maybe. But it's more sophisticated than just slapping a pair of wings between someone's shoulder blades. You'd have to link the musculature, hollow out the bones to decrease body weight, then somehow compensate for the loss of bone marrow, maybe replace the skeleton entirely. The level of complexity -"

"Parem." Matthias said, brows furrowed. "A Fabrikator using parem could manage that kind of Tailoring."

Nina turned to Kaz, pushing away from the table. "Won't the Merchant Council do anything about the Shu attack? Are they just allowed to waltz into Kerch and start blowing things up and kidnapping people?"

"I doubt the Council will act. Unless the Shu who attacked you were in uniforms, the Shu Han government will probably deny any knowledge of the attack." Kaz said.

"So they just get away with it?" Nina said.

"Maybe not." Kaz said. "I spent a little time gathering intelligence at the harbours today. Those two Shu warships? The Council of Tides dry-docked them."

Jesper's feet slid from the table, hitting the floor with a dull thud. "What?"

"They pulled back the tide, all of it, used the sea to carve a new island with both of those warships beached on it. You can see them lying on their sides, sails dragging in the mud, right there in the harbour."

"A show of force." Matthias said.

"On behalf of Grisha or the city?" Jesper asked.

Kaz shrugged. "Who knows? But it might make the Shu a little more careful about hunting on the Ketterdam streets."