The ghost disappears over the edge. Mookie feels his heart fall with the specter – the sound that comes out of him is a strangled, grief-struck bleat.

But then:

Nora’s body shudders. Gasps. A great heaving intake of breath. A seizure overtakes her. She judders like a truck on rough road. A scream bubbles up and flies free–

Her eyes focus on Mookie.

“What have you done?” she shrieks.

And then she falls limp once more.

At her neck is a pulse. At her mouth, breath.

She’s alive. He holds her close. Kisses her temple.She’s alive.

Chapter 28

28

This is the Ravenous Expanse. This is the Maw-Womb. A great abyss carved out of the rotten heart of the world. A deep nothing burning with distant fire. Toward the heart of the flame: the Deep Shadows, the Hungry Ones, Those Who Eat. I feel their hatred toward me even as they call me closer. They hate all us for what we have. It bleeds off of them, that jealousy. They have no fealty toward us or this place or to anything. Their loyalty is only toward themselves and their own cruelty. This is the knowledge I take with me to my death. I hobble to the edge, but I refuse to fall. I crawl back from the brink and nestle up against the wall, the infection in my side now like tree roots wrapped around pipes and breaking sidewalk. I slumber into death now – surrounded by the tiny violet eyes watching me from the outcroppings of rock above me and around me.

– from the Journals of John Atticus Oakes, Cartographer of the Great Below

Morning. Impossible to tell but for the brightening of dark to gray.

Skelly checks the address. It’s an old grocery store warehouse down by the harbor docks. They had a fire here years ago. Everything’s still closed up, scorched with the tongue-kiss of an old flame. She shows up in a black slicker and a Yankees baseball cap, her rockabilly persona drowned like a rabbit in a mud-hole – but she’s not here to show her colors.

Even though that’s what she’s supposed to do.

After leaving Werth with whatever it was he had to do, she and Burnsy parted ways. He gave her a pager number, to which she said, “People still use pagers?” His answer: it’s a dead technology. Then she checked on her girls. After scattering to the four corners of the city they’d meet back at another safehouse in the Meatpacking District.

And then yesterday night she got the call.

She let it go to voicemail.

Glad she did. It was him. The Boss. Calling a convocation of all the gangs in the city still loyal to him. Said he has “big plans”. Offered “new opportunities for leadership”. Didn’t mention the death of his grandson, which by now half the city had to have heard about.

A tantalizing call to those in the dark.