Pt. 4
Yes! He knew how she would love. He had not loved her without gaining
that instinctive knowledge of what capabilities were in her. Her soul would
walk in glorious sunlight if any man was worthy, by his power of loving, to
win back her love.
—Elizabeth Gaskell, North and South

When she'd turned sixteen, her father had decided that they were moving from Massachusetts to New Amsterdam. It hadn't been the first move they'd embarked on since her mother had left them, or even before that—it had, after all, been the move to Jamestown, her father's job as economic advisor in the factory there, that had resulted in her parents' marriage cracking, like lightning-forged glass, glossy and brittle. But it had been the one she'd enjoyed the most. New Amsterdam had smelled, and the poverty there had broken her heart, but it had been alive. The whole city had whispered to her, curling through her blood. The libraries had sung to her soul.

She'd met Justin in the library two years after they'd moved to New Amsterdam. He stopped her to ask the way to the antiquities section, and she'd offered to show him. She'd wondered later if he'd orchestrated it; he'd never shown any interest in ancient antiquities after that point, but his questions had been enough to get her talking, even if she'd been downright irritable about it. (Libraries, after all, weren't made for talking in.)

She'd never once been attracted to him, no matter what her father had thought. Maka very rarely became attracted to anyone, at least not in the way that her father seemed enchanted by any woman who looked his way. She wasn't sure if it was a matter of mind or biology, but where her father was excess, she was temperance. There had been only three people in her life she would have ever described herself as being attracted to, and Justin Law hadn't been one of them.

The most recent of them she had only just come around to admitting to, even to herself. She was attracted to Soul Evans, and that riled her.

Her reason for spending time with Justin had been simple. He read. He read good books, and he was a good at conversation, whether the subject turned to history or ethics or new styles of technology or anything in between. Nor was he as arrogant as other young men she had known—at least, he hadn't been at first. When he'd proposed marriage to her, on her nineteenth birthday, in front of half of high society, she had been utterly shocked. She hadn't even been able to speak. To her utmost horror, and everlasting shame, the only word she had been able to think—the only thing she'd been able to say—was "Why?"

She could remember the way his face had purpled then, the way he'd seized her by the arm and wrenched her out onto the balcony to lecture her, in ever increasing volume, as to how much he'd done for her in society, how often he had had issue with her temperament and her attitude, how much of a tease she was for not anticipating something like this to happen after spending such a long time in such close quarters with a man, and that this was only evidence that her father's blood ran true in her after all.

At that, she'd punched him. She hadn't slapped him, the way a lady would have, or burst into tears and run, as a girl would have. She had balled up her fist and punched him in the solar plexus as hard as she could. He'd crumpled. She'd left Society early, and that same night had walked in on her father with one of his whores. The screaming match had lasted until three in the morning.

The whole experience had left her feeling hollow. Maybe she was a tease, she'd thought, curled into her bed that night. Maybe she did have some of her father in her. But she had never once said to Justin that she liked him, that she was in love with him. She would never have been a good curate's wife. She wasn't godly enough; she was an atheist, for goodness' sake. She'd told him so, multiple times. What part of her behavior towards him had ever made him think that she would want his attentions in that way? What part of her father had he seen in her?

That feeling she'd had then wasn't what she was feeling now. Justin proposing to her had been embarrassing. Later, after the argument, it had been hurtful, insulting, demeaning, frustrating, enraging. It had never made her heart ache. It had never been bittersweet.

This was. Her chest was aching with the force of all that she was feeling, and for once she couldn't even put a name to it. It simply was, as if her heart had swollen up to half again its regular size, and was pressing against her lungs, catching her breath and stealing it for its own. Because Soul Evans was not Justin Law, and she knew it. Lord, how she knew it. Soul Evans was infuriating and transfixing to her in a way no other person on the planet had ever been, a subject impossible to define, even to herself. A working man and a reader. Crass and well-spoken. A master who cared for his men. A weaponsmith who tried to preserve life. He was a paradox, and Maka Albarn hated paradoxes.

What was hurting her the most, in a strange, backwards way, was that he hadn't even said anything that should have made her feel like this. The idea that such a proud, independent person—the sort of man she'd always tried to avoid—had gone out of his way to consider her opinion, to give thought to something she had said, and amended his own way of thinking to mesh with hers because he had thought it was right was crippling. It was dazzling. She ought to be seeing spots. Soul Evans might be the most dangerous person she had ever come across simply because he made her feel like she—not just Maka Albarn the society lady, but Maka, thoughts, opinions, attitude and all—mattered to him, and that scared her. She was hanging over a crevasse, and someone was sawing through her ropes.

She didn't sleep that night. At dawn, she rose, dressed in her warmest clothes (it was still freezing outside) and went out. She didn't know where she was going; she just had to walk somewhere, and that somewhere couldn't have anything to do with Hale's. She wanted to talk to Tsubaki, but the thought of telling her what Mr. Evans had said made her insides feel sticky. So instead of turning left at the fork, she went right, towards the mines, the fort, and Asura's.

She'd only been this way once, the one and only time that her father had brought her to the fort to show her how his reorganization of military funds was getting along. It was a barren sort of place, no excess in architecture or armament anywhere, and she wasn't allowed within a hundred feet of it. So instead she mounted the hill—or, rather, the small mound of dirt that had been pulled out of basements during the construction of the new barracks—and sat at the top to watch the horses blow plumes of hot breath into the frosty air. The sun was breaking over the ridges of the mountain now, and in the fort, men were being put through their paces. They marched in small phalanxes, and the bayonets on their rifles gleamed like tongues of fire. She thought of the sharpener-girls, Liz and Patti, and of the spray of sparks as they worked their stone wheels to grind the blades to razor edges. A trio of soldiers made their way out to the pastures, and at a whistle, a gelding trotted up to meet them.

"Miss Albarn?"

Maka jumped, and lifted her chin from her hands. It was Corporal Kidman. His helmet was off, his hair messy, his eyes wide as he blinked at her from the bottom of the hill. He'd clearly been on his way into town for some reason, judging by the rucksack and the absence of bristling weaponry. He glanced back into the fort, and then mounted the hill to stand next to her. There was a funny white streak in his hair that she'd never noticed before; he always kept it combed perfectly back and under his uniform cap. "What are you doing here so early in the morning?"

"I…" She looked back at the horses. "I don't know. I needed someplace to think, I suppose."

Corporal Kidman tilted his head just so to one side, and then to the other, as if he couldn't bear to do anything halfway. After a moment, he shucked his bag at the bottom of the hillock and clambered up to sit next to her, the still-frozen grass crunching under his heavy boots. He kept a careful distance from her, a foot between them at least, and suddenly she was overwhelmed with how much she liked him for it. If a man—any man, even her father—had tried to invade her space right now, she would have ripped his guts up through his nostrils. For a few minutes, he simply watched the horses with her, resting with his gloved hands against his knees. Then he cleared his throat. "Did Evans ever tell you why he named the factory Hale's?"

Maka laughed. "Hearing about Soul Evans is the last thing that I want to do right now, Corporal."

"Ah." Corporal Kidman nodded, as if this was precisely what he'd expected. "Still, I think you ought to. It's not a story that's commonly known. Evans doesn't like talking about it. The only reason I know is that I met him before he came out here, while I was stationed even further west. He grew up there, you know. He and his family didn't part on good terms, you see, and part of the reason he's out here in New Bly is simply to get away from them."

In spite of herself, Maka lifted her head.

"Evans is a pianist, or was." Corporal Kidman leaned back, looking not at her, but at the sun rising over the fort. "He was very good at it, apparently. His whole family were quite good at it. His father had been heir to a company that makes very good violins, and his brother took to strings like he did to mother's milk. Even his mother was quite an accomplished harpist. Evans grew up with a piano in his bedroom, and he loved it. He was—remains—very talented. But as he grew older he found it hard to reconcile that talent with the expectations his parents had of him. They wanted him to go to a premiere music school back East, had paid for it since before he was even born, the same way his brother had. It was called Hale's."

Maka had an inkling of where this story was going. Still, she said nothing. She propped her head in one hand and closed her eyes. If she tried, she could imagine it. She wasn't unfamiliar with Soul Evans being stubborn about something, after all.

"Evans didn't want to go," said the corporal simply. "They argued about it for years. His mother especially was insistent. Finally, he relented, said he would head east to Hale's when he turned eighteen. They were elated. The day he came of age he took a bag, packed all his clothes, and left the house without another word. When he made enough money to purchase the factory, he named it Hale's, just to say that he'd never broken a promise. They haven't spoken since, though he sends letters home once a month, just to let them know what he's doing."

Corporal Kidman fell silent, clasping his hands against his shins. Maka frowned. "Is that story supposed to make me feel bad for Mr. Evans, Corporal? Or to respect him? Because it puts me in the sort of mind to put a flea in his ear."

"Neither," said the corporal. "I simply thought it was a good illustration of his character. I've known him for years, and I've never seen him to be anything less than independent, impulsive, irritatingly combative, oddly sentimental, and as hard-headed as an old mule that's been whacked in the head too many times to see straight."

For some reason, Maka felt insulted.

"But," he said, before she could speak, "he's also one of the best men I know, and if he's done something to put you out in this cold at dawn on a Sunday, then it must have been something very stupid indeed." He stood, and brushed frost off his backside before holding his hand down to her. "If you'd like to tell me, then my office is open, Miss Albarn. My errands can be put off for an hour or two, and I can promise some half-decent coffee inside. Your father swears by it."

"Anything my father swears by is not necessarily to my taste, sir," she said, but she took his hand anyway. It was devilish hard to get up from the ground when she was tangled in so many skirts. "But even half-decent coffee sounds wonderful to me right now."

She didn't end up telling him what had happened. That was private, and even if it had meant nothing, she preferred to keep it that way. Still, she was feeling indescribably better by the time she finally left Mortimer's office. ("My school friends called me Mort," he said, and frowned, as if the thought was personally offensive. "My actual friends call me Mortimer.") She wasn't sure if it had been because of the coffee or because of the stories he told—not a single one about Evans, after the first, and nothing that made her think he was telling her for any other reason than just the joy of sharing—but she felt…comfortable. Not assuaged. But comfortable.

She was still riled, but that, at least, could be put aside.

If Soul Evans had been as shaken up by what he'd said that night as she had been, he didn't show it. He was over to dinner with her father two days after she'd talked to Mortimer, and he hadn't even looked at her. His shoulders had been funny and stiff all evening, and she wished him a sore back for it. He came less often after that. She didn't tell Tsubaki about it, as much as she wanted to; the aftermath of the strike was still too fresh in her friend's mind for Maka to feel all right about adding anything else to the mire, especially considering it involved Soul Evans so intimately. Maka wasn't even sure it was worth confiding about. So what, she thought to herself, changing into her ruined sprigged dress and tramping down to the slums to repaint one of the houses. So what that Mr. Evans had said that to her. He hadn't said anything else. What was a woman supposed to do when men were so damn wishy-washy?

She refused to consider that she was running away from the problem, and painted houses until she couldn't lift her arms for three days.

Winter faded slowly, with frosts that clung on for weeks at a time. Something about New Bly was unsettling her. Maka wasn't sure how to describe it until one morning in February (two months until her birthday, two months until she could run, only two months away now) she went out to find a message painted in red on the side of the Hampton Street tavern. Masters of our fates. Tsubaki's lovely eyes had gone dark, the way they'd been on the street in front of Medusa's, and she rarely ever saw Black Star anymore. One afternoon she knocked on Tsubaki's door to find Masamune alone, reading to some of those who had been orphaned by the riot.

"Tsu doesn't want to talk about it," he said, as soon as the kids had been settled in the corner. The youngest, who could be no more than a year old, was sleeping in its sister's lap. "You heard about how Evans made concessions? All the legal things he did?"

"The pay raise?"

Masamune nodded, his mouth thin around the edges. "He went to the other masters, tried to get them to sign, but they wouldn't. Asura was furious. He and Medusa have been working their people harder, lately, just to show that they can, I think. It's not as if there are many big orders during the winter, anyway. There's too much snow for gunfights, and the nitro freezes in its vials. But three weeks ago a mine went off somehow, on the factory floor. It set off a chain of three. Nearly thirty people died, and a dozen more were injured, and she didn't even apologize." Almost without thinking about it, Masamune reached forward, and rubbed the stump of one leg. He looked so tired, his cheekbones standing out in his cheeks, but something in his eyes was hot and furious and flaming. It almost frightened her. "Some of the families came to Black Star for help, and since then him and Mifune have been working on a petition. Not that it's going to work. Medusa's a cold-hearted witch, and the only thing that makes her change her mind is money."

Maka collected a blanket from the table, and handed it to the girl in the corner. She was shivering. "Can't people just quit?"

He gave her a disgusted look. "Not if they want to eat, they can't. Medusa's hard, and her pay is next to nothing, but even next to nothing is better than nothing at all. I would have thought you knew that by now."

Maka winced, and stared at the floor. "I'm sorry. That was thoughtless of me."

Masamune shrugged. He didn't seem to have heard her. "She's never going to change. I wish Tsu and Black Star could see that. She's too greedy. Both of them are, Asura and Medusa alike. They don't care what happens to the people who work for them, not so long as they get their shipments in on time." His mouth twisted. "I'd be out there with them if it weren't for my damn legs."

She didn't know what to say. Maka bit her lip. Before she could work something out, the girl in the corner cleared her throat, and the moment was broken. She turned. "What is it, sweetheart?"

"Baby needs something," said the girl, and sure enough, the baby was waking up. Whether it was cleaning or feeding, it'd be crying soon no matter what. Maka sent Masamune an apologetic look before collecting the infant (she hated infants on a normal day, but there was nothing to do about it right now) and its sister and taking them both to the kitchen to get them something to chew on. She'd only just finished when Tsubaki returned, and the conversation was turned to other things.

Maybe it was fate, or some awful twist of happenstance, but the next week was the spring party for the masters, and she and her father had been invited. Maka almost claimed a headache, but when she heard that Mortimer would be coming, she changed her mind. At least there would be one sane person to speak to, even if she hated every moment of it. Besides, she was determined to show Soul Evans—if he even cared—that she wasn't a coward. So she put on a blue gown that she hated, crammed her feet into shoes that pinched, and made her way downstairs to hasten her father out the door.

Spirit Albarn was standing in front of his mirror, fiddling with his bow-tie and staring off into the distance. His hair was pulled back into an absent-minded ponytail, and when Maka stopped in the doorway to watch him, she caught the tail end of a sigh she hadn't heard in a long time. Not since before her mother had left, at least. Snarling to himself, he ripped the tie off and tossed it on top of the cabinet before he finally caught sight of her. That stupid smile—the one that made her feel happy and furious and guilty, all at once—spread across his face. "Maka. You look wonderful."

She considered her reflection in the mirror. Her dress was two years out of date, but that wouldn't matter out here. It was sleeveless, baring her shoulders and collarbone, with inlays of black lace into the bodice. The heavy bell skirt was deliberately slashed in places to let black silk peep through. Her gloves were pale cream, her hair was down (for the most part; Blair had curled some of it) and there were sapphires in her ears. "I don't know," she said after a moment. "I feel gaudy. But I feel," she said, in a rare moment of humor, "that if you wanted, you could sell me up the river and make a decent profit."

He sucked in a horrified breath. "Don't even say things like that, Maka! I may have my problems, but I would never—"

"Papa." She gave him a flat look. "I was joking. Don't panic about a joke." Before he could respond, she crossed her arms over her belly, and said, "So are we walking to Hale's, or is Mortimer collecting us?"

Spirit's whole face went sour. "I don't like how you're calling everyone and his mother by their first name nowadays," he said, turning back to the mirror to fiddle with the bow tie. "It was all right when it was just that friend of yours, the secretary at the factory, but now all I hear about are Black Star and Masamune and Mifune and Mortimer—don't you have any lady friends? Ones that I don't have to buy a shotgun for?"

She refused to think of Soul Evans, that day last summer, with his sleeves rolled up to his elbows and a shotgun in his bare hands. "You don't need a shotgun at all, Papa," she said, and came around to fix his tie. "If you buy one, I'll use it on you. I'd be the only one in the house who'd know how to load it anyway. Besides," she said, before he could splutter, "you have nothing to fear from any of them. Masamune's too sad, Black Star has Tsubaki, and my eyebrows are too uneven for Mortimer to even think of it."

Spirit caught her wrists in his hands. "Maka," he said, and his voice was so serious that she looked up, blinking, in surprise. "I've been wanting to talk to you about something for a few weeks now, but I was never quite sure…" he hesitated. "Are you—are you sure that that not a single person in town…cares about you? In that way?"

She went absolutely stiff. Spirit, sensing danger, let her go before she could explode. Maka closed her eyes, and took a deep breath, letting it out slowly. By the time it was gone, she felt like half a human being. "If there was," she said after a moment, "then probably not anymore."

His face fell, just slightly. "No one—no one you cared for in return?"

She redid the button on her glove. "I don't ever intend to get married, Papa. You know that."

His hands flickered, like he wanted to reach out for her, but he'd stopped himself. Spirit cleared his throat. "Maka," he said, and Maka turned to collect her evening bag. "I know that—I know that what happened with your mother and I was…difficult."

"No." Her voice, as she said it, was flat. Dead. "You don't get to say this. Not tonight. Not ever. Do you hear me? Not when I've lived with you for years. Not when I've seen off your women the next morning. You don't," she spat the word, "get to pretend that you know a single thing about love, or tenderness, or anything." She snapped the clasp of her bag shut so she didn't have to look at his face. "Even if someone had cared for me, it doesn't matter. I leave in two months. That's all there is to be said."

Her father looked ready to cry. "Maka," he said, but she'd already turned her back on him.

"I'm going to wait outside for the carriage. I'll knock on the door when it arrives so you know when to come out."

She cried a little out there, standing with her shawl wrapped tight around her shoulders. She told herself it was because of the wind.

If Medusa's was ice and fire, and Hale's was sparks and engines, then Asura's would have to be made up of darkness. It was a hulking thing of black wood and painted metal, its wings spiraling off in odd directions, almost like a torn spiderweb. The house smelled of dust and mothballs, and felt abandoned. Maka couldn't suppress a shiver as she stepped down out of the carriage onto the stoop, and behind her, Mortimer frowned.

"You don't have to stay," he said in a low voice. "Not if you don't want to."

"I am determined, sir," she said, and held her head up high. "If anything, I can tell Black Star the best possible window to throw a brick through. If the night ends with only that much of an achievement, I will be content."

Mortimer snorted, and took her arm as they went into the foyer. "If he does end up using the window, I'll join him."

Maka sputtered with laughter.

There was a draft in Asura's house that kept blowing out the oil lamps at random intervals. Maka had the distinct feeling that she would spill something on her gown and not even notice as they marched their way through the four courses, and the man on her left, a very large gentleman she didn't recognize, kept knocking her elbow with his. On her other side, her father ate very quietly, his eyes flickering around the table, his eyebrows drawn together. There were many flaws she could (and would) credit her father with, but his instincts were not one of them. He didn't like these people any more than she did, and she hadn't told him any of the things she'd heard about Asura's. Despite her lingering fury, she felt a little more kindly towards him after that.

Soul Evans was seated towards the other end of the table, away from Asura and Medusa. Kilik, his designer, was seated beside him. Neither of them looked up from their plates. In spite of herself, she couldn't help sending little glances down the table at him. The candlelight was casting interesting shadows in his pale hair, and he looked horrendously awkward and out of place in a tie and proper suit jacket. At one point, Kilik caught her, but by the time Mr. Evans had looked up, Maka was staring very hard at her grapes.

Two months, she told herself, and for the first time, it stung. She thought of Tsubaki and Black Star, of the Thompson sisters and Masamune, Mifune and Angela. Was she really prepared to leave all of them, when for the first time in years, she felt like she was actually wanted? But no. She'd decided. Two months.

Madame Medusa, the head of this and every other party she attended, tapped her glass. "Gentlemen and ladies," she said, with an exquisite curve of her mouth. "To another year of charm and profit. May the strikes never return."

Maka felt her hackles raise. "You," she said in a soft voice, as everyone around her lifted their glasses. "You—"

A hand clenched around her knee. She hissed, and turned to snarl at her father, but the look on his face shut her up. She bit her cheek. Maka raised her wineglass, and met Madame Medusa's eyes over the rim. She had the distinct feeling Medusa knew exactly what she had nearly said, and that it had done nothing but amuse her. She tossed the whole glass of wine back. "Excuse me," she said, and pushed back from the table. "I need some air."

"Shall we dance, then, gentlemen?" said Medusa, and there was a caroling of bright voices from the men around the table. Maka paused at the door and looked back to find Soul Evans watching her.

She darted out onto the balcony, and attempted to remember how to breathe.

Factories at night were eerie. Whatever else Soul Evans had said to her, that bit about factories being living things made sense to her. To be standing in a factory that was still was like standing inside a graveyard where all the bones were bared to the elements. Too still, too quiet, like something out of a nightmare. She rubbed her bare arms, and then went to the railing. Asura's only balcony was through his study, and it had frightened her to slink through there even if the man himself had not been present. He had no books there, only papers from the factory, and his only globe had a tremendous crack running through the middle of Columbia. Outside, though, some of the cobwebs cleared from her mind. Maka rested her elbows against cold metal, and clapped some color back into her cheeks. She'd already found five or six windows she could tell Black Star about—not that he would do anything, but it would make him laugh, and he needed that more now that the mines had gone off—and with luck, she would be able to excuse herself within two hours.

She heard the study door open. Maka turned, slowly. The curtains had been drawn over the French doors that led out to her balcony, and even when she'd passed through them, they'd barely budged an inch. If she was lucky, Asura wouldn't notice she was out here. She didn't want to be alone with that man, even if he had never said anything to her in her life. But the voice that came through the crack in the door wasn't Asura's. It wasn't even a servant's.

It was Medusa's.

"Do you have it?" she said, and Maka couldn't help herself. She crept a little closer to the door, and peeped through the gap in the curtains. Medusa, all slinky satin and cigarette smoke, was leaning with her hips against Asura's desk. In front of her was a stubby little man in a top hat with a long, sharp nose. M. Squito, general foreman of Hale's. She bit her tongue rather than cry out.

"He keeps the black man's designs locked up in two separate safes, madam," said Squito, his eyes fixed somewhere under Medusa's left breast. "I have only been able to crack one code, not the other. I need more time."

Medusa drew a breath from her cigarette. "You don't have much time left, Moss," she said, her voice a sweet croon. "I told you last Friday you would have until the end of this week. You've had a full three days beyond that. Either you provide, or I will drop a line to Evans about him having a mole in his organization. All good business and everything. You know how things go, Moss."

"Madam," said Squito, his hand to his heart. "I never said I came empty-handed." He looked both ways—Maka ducked back from the crack in the curtains—before drawing a folded piece of blue paper from inside his jacket pocket, and presenting it to Medusa with a luxurious bow. "It was on his desk," he said, as Medusa opened it and held it to the light. It looked, Maka thought, squinting, like a trigger mechanism for a shotgun. "I copied it while he was out in the shooting barn yesterday. I told you he would grow sloppy."

"Well done," Medusa said. "Well done, Moss." She tucked the paper into her little bag. "You will take as much time as you need with the safes, as long as you keep providing like this. You'll need to be careful—"

"Madam Medusa." Squito swept his hat off his head as he bowed again. "I know my trade. Please don't worry about me." He glanced at the door again. "You ought to leave first, madam. If I return before you do, then some might be suspicious."

Medusa stubbed her cigarette out on Asura's desk, leaving the butt on his papers, before sweeping out the door. Moss Squito took a few minutes more, picking through some of the paperwork, and pocketed two quarters and a nickel before departing. Maka waited until she heard the click of a lock before she finally opened the balcony doors, and stepped inside again. There were goosebumps all up and down her arms.

Espionage, she thought, staring at the smoking butt. Corporate espionage. Maka crossed to the study door, and opened it, sneaking out into the hallway again as quietly as she could. Neither Medusa nor Moss Squito were anywhere to be seen. If Mr. Squito was a plant inside Hale's, she thought, then there might be any number of spies in Tsubaki's factory. If this had any links to the mines that had gone off—

Someone grabbed her wrist, wrenched her around, and clapped a hand over her mouth before she could scream. Maka bit down as hard as she could, and the man behind her cursed, long and sharp and soft. "Damn it, Albarn," Evans said, and she yanked out of his now loosened grip to slam her back against the wall of the alcove she'd been dragged into. "You didn't have to bite that hard. You made me bleed."

"You," she said stupidly. "Are you following me?"

"No." He sucked at his hand, and stared at it. His eyebrows were at a distinctly peevish tilt. "I'm not."

"Then what are you doing here?"

"None of your business," he said, but there was a flicker that made her pause. Maka hesitated.

"I—I don't know if you want to hear this from me," she said, drawing it out as best she could. "But I was in the study just now, and I saw—well. I saw something odd, with your foreman."

"Moss?" Evans peered at his hand again. "Did you see him with Medusa?"

She goggled. "You know?"

"Of course I know," hissed Soul Evans. "I've known that little bastard was a spy since before I even hired him." Maka went to step back, and he grabbed her wrist again, yanking her back into the alcove. "They're still at the end of the hall, don't stand there like a ninny—"

"Let go of me," she snarled back, and to her very great surprise, he did. They stood there staring at each other for a second or two, Maka panting, Soul Evans remarkably still. Then she licked her lips. "You knew?"

"Squito's been working for me for four years now. It's easier to keep him sniffing after bait he can't get at and giving him dummy plans than actually tossing him out. It lets me know that Medusa's interested in what I'm doing." He ran his good hand through his hair. "Miss Albarn, you have to promise me, don't go to the police with this. Not yet. Squito's a snake, but he's a snake in my garden. I'll deal with it."

"As long as you promise me you won't shoot him—"

"I'll graze him," said Evans, and he bared his sharp teeth in a mockery of a smile. "At most. He's in no deadly danger from me, Miss Albarn."

She studied his face. She was standing very close to him, close enough that she could see the pores on his nose, that every strand of hair in his brows was white. "Fair enough," she said, and looked away. After a moment, Evans cleared his throat, and leaned out to peer at the end of the hallway.

"It'll be clear soon," he said, once he'd slunk back into the alcove. "Kilik's going to signal me as soon as it is. We're stuck until then, I'm afraid."

"Kilik?"

"My designer." Evans blinked at her, deliberately clueless. "Did you ever meet him?"

"No," she said. "I didn't." He scuffed one foot along the floor, and she had to bite her tongue to keep herself from telling him not to ruin good shoes. The silence stretched on unbearably long, maybe five heartbeats, maybe six, before her fine wire of patience finally snapped.

"Why did you say what you did?" Maka demanded, her palms sweaty inside her gloves. "Why did you say any of it?"

He glared at her. "This is not the time."

"Is there going to be any other time?" Her heart skipped double-time inside her throat. "You've been avoiding me, Mr. Evans—"

"You've been avoiding me," he snapped back, but she ignored him.

"I just want to know the answer." She drew a sharp breath. "Why did you say that I—that I had something to do with the legalities you enacted? Why did you say you did it for me?"

Evans bit his lip, and stared at the floor. Maka clenched her hands in her skirts. No, she thought. This was definitely much different than anything she had felt while talking with Justin. She felt as though she might be sick all over her shoes, and her heart was beating like a hummingbirds's.

"Because I thought—" Evans cleared his throat, and looked away. "Clearly I was mistaken. The last few months have told me that much."

"Thought what?"

"It doesn't matter."

"It does matter."

"Why?" His composure was gone. His accent, a far-western twang, was in full throttle. "Why does it matter when all you do is run away? Miss Albarn. I didn't say a thing because I knew you wouldn't like it, and that's the truth. Never thought you'd come runnin' after me trying to get answers you never wanted in the first place—"

"Don't you dismiss me like that!" She wanted to punch him. Maka settled for poking him once, hard, in the sternum. It made her finger ache. Evans stared at her as though she'd just set off a firework under his nose. "What you said—I thought it meant that what—what I thought mattered to you—"

"It did!" He lifted one hand, and then lowered it again. "It does!"

"Why?" She was nearly screaming. "You don't care for me at all. You hate me."

"Hate you?" said Evans, with the air of someone who had just whacked his head on a stalactite. "Hate you?"

"Yes, hate me." Damn it, she did not need to cry. She refused to cry. Maka took a tremendous breath, and soldiered on. "And I don't like being confused about anything and what you said confused me because it wasn't something someone should say to someone they did not like, and it kept bothering me long after it should and I don't know why it did because you are absolutely insufferable—"

"I don't hate you," said Evans. She didn't really hear him.

"—but someone who was absolutely insufferable would never have gone to Black Star as you did and talked to him as you did; you don't make sense, Soul Evans, and you never have, and if you don't explain yourself right now I swear I'm going to—"

"God," he said, explosively, and then his hands had gone up to her face and his mouth covered hers, and Maka's brain switched off.

It wasn't a very good kiss. Not at first. It had been too fast, and Maka didn't know how to kiss anyway, so she nearly panicked and drew back. Then his mouth softened, his fingers loosened, he went to pull away, and she couldn't help it. Maka hooked her hands into the front of his suit and pulled him back. She kissed him, this time, as best she knew how, and even though it didn't amount to more than simple pressure, she felt him groan low in his throat and he hooked an arm around her waist to pull her closer. Her hands crept up into his hair, the hair that had fascinated her since the first moment she'd seen it; it was soft and coarse simultaneously, somehow, and twined perfectly into her fingers.

She hadn't even known she'd wanted to kiss Soul Evans until she'd done it. Now all she wanted to know was why on earth she hadn't done it sooner.

She had to breathe, though. Maka broke away, but didn't step back from him, her fingers still wound all through his hair. Soul Evans was panting as hard as she was, his pupils blown wide, and he stared at her with a mixture of awe and uncertainty. She licked her lips, and his eyes dropped to her mouth. She wondered why she'd never noticed him watching her mouth before; it looked too practiced for this to be the first time. Then he sighed, and closed his eyes.

"Sorry," he said, and his voice was hoarse. "I was—I was going to ask you, before I did that. I wanted—I wanted to ask."

She shifted, and his grip automatically loosened. She didn't step away, though. "You were?"

"I don't just go kissing people," he said. "Not without asking."

"Oh." She listened to her heart pounding for a moment or two, still shaking inside. "I don't know what I would have said," she murmured, "if you had asked."

He hummed, and she felt it vibrate through her ribcage.

"Mr. Evans," she said, "I—"

"Soul," he growled, and then he kissed her again. And again. He pulled away first, and Maka nearly stumbled. Her legs were suddenly very wobbly. "You said it before. Don't take it back now."

"Soul," she said, a bit breathlessly. She ought to be frightened, she reasoned. All of the things she'd thought to herself in the dead of night about men and her father and Soul Evans had all made so much sense anywhere else but here. "I don't—"

"Yes," he said. "I said it because I care for you. Yes," he repeated, and pressed his mouth to the corner -of her lips. "I've cared for you since I first met you."

She met his eyes. He studied her for a long moment, and then added, "And if you tell me so, I will walk away, and you'll never see me again."

Something clutched at her heart. "What?"

"I know you, Maka." She swallowed hard at the way he said her name: like a promise, like a sigh. "And I know your father. I know you have no reason to trust me. So the only thing I can do is tell you that if you ask, I'll stop. I'll give you my word, now—" and with this he let her go, stepped back, out of the alcove, hands in his pockets, and Maka stood there, flushed and hurting and cold "—that I'll never touch you, or come near you, if you don't want me to. I swear it."

She didn't know what to say. Maka swallowed hard. "Soul," she began, and then there was a burst of flame, a fracturing beneath her feet, and something struck her in the head and she knew nothing more.

She heard the story in bits and pieces later, from Tsubaki, from Black Star, from her father. Masamune had met up with some of the resistance, somehow, and together, they had managed to get their hands on a bag of Medusa's mines. They'd snuck into Asura's mansion, and Masamune had volunteered to roll the whole bag into the ballroom, and set himself alight. There was nothing left to bury.

Her father had gone to look for her when she hadn't come back immediately, and had been trapped in the library for three hours before someone finally found him. Maka woke up in the fort sickbay eighteen hours after that, with a broken arm, a sprained ankle, and a bandaged skull, to find her father with tears pouring down his cheeks.

The funeral was two days later. Only a few came. The group that had roped Masamune into destroying Asura's mansion—and Asura—was nowhere to be seen. Mortimer (who had been outside, talking to one of the few guards on duty at the time) was on the warpath. Maka went with Tsubaki and Black Star, Blair hovering behind her. It rained. Maka cried. Tsubaki stared at the gravestone, and said nothing.

The list of the dead came in fits and starts. Moss Squito's body was found two days into clearing the wreckage. Medusa was alive, and holed up in her own factory, with guards on all the doors. Kilik, who had been looking for Soul (who hadn't responded to his signal) was also alive, though he was badly bruised from being knocked about by hardwood planks.

Her ankle healed slowly. Her head healed even slower. She couldn't lie on her side like she normally did to sleep, and so instead she lay flat on her back staring at her ceiling and thinking deep into the night.

Soul Evans didn't come to visit. She didn't expect him to. She felt as though she'd slipped free of her skin. Had that been her, kissing, letting herself be kissed? Had that really been her life? Or had she dreamed it?

Tsubaki came to visit her one afternoon when she was feeling particularly itchy under the bandages. There were deep rings under her eyes. "Evans convinced Medusa," she said with no preamble, dropping her bag onto Maka's floor and settling at the end of the bed. "Said the only way to prevent it from happening again was to sign a contract. So she did. She hated it, she'll turn her back on it the first chance she gets, but for now—" she shrugged. "We're safe for now. Now that he's dead."

Maka reached forward and took Tsubaki's hand. Tsubaki closed her eyes for a moment. "Why?" she said, simply. "I should have seen it. I knew him better than anyone. I should have known he was planning something. I should have known."

"No one could have known."

"Couldn't they have? I knew something was wrong. Everyone knew something was wrong. But we didn't—" She gulped. "We didn't ask. We should have asked. Maka, my brother's dead and he didn't even say goodbye."

Tsubaki burst into tears. Maka shifted over, carefully, and drew her forward onto the bed, and stroked Tsubaki's hair while she sobbed. For as long as Tsubaki's eyes were closed, she cursed Masamune, she cursed the guards, she cursed the men who had enlisted him, and she cursed herself, because she, as much as any of them, had been blind.

The next morning, the first sunny day in March, her foot had improved enough for her to limp on crutches. Maka waited until she heard the slamming door that meant her father had gone off to the fort before extracting herself from the bed, changing her clothes, and turning towards Hale's.

She would not forgive her father. She couldn't. She knew that the same way she knew the marrow in her bones, the way she knew every word of Gulliver's Travels. She was as unable to forgive her father as she was unable to forgive herself for being his daughter, and there was nothing she could do to change that. She was too old, too set in her ways, for it to change now. But a lack of forgiveness didn't mean a lack of care, just as terror didn't erase hope. It was hope that was dragging her through the dusty streets with a throbbing ankle and a broken head, because she was too damn stubborn to let it lie any longer.

It took much longer to get to Hale's than it would if she'd had two working feet. She had to stop every few blocks to rest her underarms, because she wasn't used to the crutches. Thankfully, the streets were mostly empty, so there was no one to see her humiliation. The foreman's room was empty as she crossed into factory property, and this time she wasn't imagining it—she knew she saw Liz and Patti Thompson in the sharpening room, and she knew that they saw her, because they stopped dead to watch her pass. She gave them a little wave, and kept moving. She had a feeling she knew exactly where he would be.

The man with dreadlocks was standing outside the testing cabin when she approached. She thought she saw a corner of his mouth quirk up, but all he said was, "I have paperwork" before sticking his hands in his pockets and wandering off. Inside, a shotgun went off with a plume of smoke, and a string of curses emerged through the partly opened door. "Kilik, you son of a bitch, I thought you said this thing worked—give me the rifle, you jackass, let's see if you've broken that too."

"Which rifle?" Maka said, because there were three leaned up against the outside of the cabin. For a long moment, he said nothing. Then, slowly, the door opened, and he leaned against the jamb, wiping his hands free of grease and gunpowder on a grimy handkerchief she thought she recognized.

"Maka," he said, and then corrected himself. "Miss Albarn. What brings you out here?"

She let go of her crutches, and wobbled. But only a little. "I," she said, her voice a bit wobbly too, "have a business proposition for you."

His eyes sharpened. Slowly, he put his handkerchief back in his pocket. Despite the weather, his sleeves were rolled up to his elbows, and his shirt was unbuttoned indecently low. "Do you," he said, and Maka nodded. Her heart had jumped up into her throat.

"I," she said, "come of age in six weeks. When that happens, I will be coming into a great deal of money. Originally, I intended to take this money and use it to move back to New Amsterdam, but certain elements of society here have convinced me that this would be a very unwise investment."

She thought she saw one corner of his mouth lift, just a little bit. Then it vanished. "New Amsterdam is going through a low economic point right now," he agreed solemnly, and crossed his arms over his chest.

Maka swallowed hard. She had to stare at the door jamb, rather than focus on his face. "According to Corporal Kidman, the factories around here are always looking for sponsors." She licked her lips. "I propose that I invest my inheritance in Hale's Weapons Manufacturing, at a percentage of interest to be determined at a later date, in return for a position on the board of directors and an office on the premises."

"An office," he repeated, and she nodded.

"An office. I would be unsatisfied with the arrangement if I was not able to observe the premises at—"

He reached out, and touched her cheek lightly with his fingertips.

"—at close quarters," she finished. Her voice had gone husky.

"Wouldn't that be a conflict of interest?" He stepped closer, and she could smell him, grease and dust and Soul. "For a member of the board to be that entwined into the life of the factory."

"I'll be protecting the interests of the workers, not the company." He touched the bandages around her head, his mouth twisting, and then he twined two fingers into a lock of hair that had fallen forward over her shoulder. "It would be natural—" his free hand dropped to her good one, sliding his thumb against hers, and she turned her palm over so he could twine their fingers together. "—for me to be close enough to hear their—their concerns."

"Lady of the people, huh," he said, and this time she wasn't imagining it. He was smiling.

"I would also require—"

"For God's sake, woman." He slid his hand around to the back of her neck, twisting his fingers into her hair. "How many contract clauses do you have?"

"Enough." His thumb slotted perfectly into the hollow just under her ear. "I would also require that—that Black Star be made your foreman, since you now seem to be requiring one."

"I was already planning on offering," he said.

Maka turned her face up to his. She couldn't quite smile. "I will never," she said, "be good at this."

"At what?"

She lifted their tangled hands. "This."

Soul lifted her fingers to his lips. "I want you to be you," he said. "I wouldn't want you here for any other reason."

She thought she might actually cry. Maka blinked furiously for a second or two, and then took a deep breath. "Well," she said. "Do you accept the proposal?"

"I do." He held tight to her hand. "And are you—"

"Yes," she said quickly, and Soul grinned. It was a smile she had only ever seen before when he was teasing her, and it made her want to punch and kiss him, all at once. She did neither, and blushed like an idiot instead, staring at her shoes. "I like that you were going to ask."

"Well, then." He leaned forward, just enough to make her breathing catch. "Maka Albarn, may I kiss you?"

"You may," she said. "You always, always may."

A/N:

KidMaka brotp is my crack lemme alone

Also I have a private joke here that only I will probably find funny; my beta asked why I named Kid 'Mortimer', and I guess it's because the most common nickname for Mortimer is 'Mort,' which, in French, means "Death." (Shinigami-sama is named Mortimer too, and he does go by Mort, unlike Kid. So Kid had a looooot of jokes being lobbed at him while he was in school. OTZ)

Finally finished. Please forgive me, Ivali. It took so freaking long.