Page 51 of The Only Way Out Is Up

“You didn’t tell me about this,” Ky says, instantly on guard.

“I figured it’d be better to let them lay it out for you!” Weslai says, raising his hands defensively. “If you don’t like it, tell them to get lost.”

A bell rings as the front door opens again. There’s some inventive swearing, and then a familiar raised voice.

“Wes?” Venci shouts. “Where in the Heap are you?”

“Back here, lovely!” Weslai shouts back.

The pitmaster arrives a few moments later, looking almost subdued without her glittering impresario’s coat. Behind her, to my surprise, is Lorrimer. The woman looks sullen, though it’s hard to make out any expression through her fringe of hair. As best I can tell she’s staring right at me.

“You can’t live in an apartment like a normal fucking person?” Venci complains.

“I need the space,” Weslai says smoothly. “Besides, I find the solitude and… discretion conducive to my work.”

“It certainly makes you less likely to get visitors,” Venci says. Her eyes flick to me and Ky. “I’ve met Taj, but I don’t think we were properly introduced.”

“Kycilea,” Ky says. “Call me Ky.”

“Wonderful. Did Wes tell you why I wanted to talk?”

“Not exactly,” Ky says. “But I think I can guess.”

“You two have really kicked over the anthill, you know? I’ve been asking around, and I know you’ve been hitting pits all over the city. Knocked off a dozen champs so far. That about right?”

“Fourteen, by my count,” I put in.

“Fourteen. Right.” She thumbs another one of those seeds into her mouth and bites down with a crunch. “But you’re running out of pits, aren’t you? Nobody else has a champ with more than three or four wins. Pretty measly pot, that.”

“That’s possible,” Ky allows. “Weslai and I were just discussing what it would take to get some big street matches.”

“Street matches are rigged, everyone knows that. Best you can hope for is a cut in exchange for taking a fall at the right time. And anybody can do that, so there’s no money in it.”

“You have another proposal?”

Venci smiles. “Obviously. Be a champion.”

“It’s the next logical step,” Weslai volunteers. “Let the fights come to us.”

“I can see why you didn’t want to start that way,” Venci says. “It’s more lucrative to take all the big pots, that makes sense. But now that you’ve built up a reputation, you’ll get more challengers than you know what to do with. That’ll build up your pot real quick.”

“And you’d like us to use your pit, I take it,” Ky says.

“Why not? It’s the best in the city, and I’ll get you more challengers than anybody else.”

“And I trust her not to fuck us over,” Weslai says. “Venci’s an honest woman.”

“Don’t let that get around,” she says dryly, crunching another seed. “You’ll ruin my reputation.”

“Ky,” I say, “can we talk for a minute?”

“I don’t like it,” I say when we’re sequestered behind a stack of crates.

“I’m not sure I do, either,” she says. “But we may not have another choice. She’s right about running out of rich pots.”

“How much have we got so far?”

“Almost eighty stripes. Nearly enough for the entry fee, but that’d leave nothing extra for upgrades for Star. And he’ll need to be stronger if we’re going to have a chance in the Ascent.”