The City We Became (Great Cities #1) - N. K. Jemisin Page 0,71

at Padmini’s apartment building. It’s an ordinary-looking wooden frame house, four stories high. She’s told them she lives on the top floor with Aishwarya and Aishwarya’s husband, and their new baby. “That building,” Manny says. “It’s glowing, isn’t it? We all see that?”

Brooklyn turns to look, and Padmini gasps. Glowing isn’t exactly the word for what they’re seeing, Manny suspects, but it’s close enough. The sun has slanted toward sunset, backlighting the building in a way that would be eerie if this were Amityville instead of Jackson Heights. That’s not what Manny wants them to notice. What he hopes they see, and what all of them except Aishwarya clearly do, is that Padmini’s building is different from Mrs. Yu’s, and from every building around it. Brighter, somehow. More defined? Almost as if the building has been Photoshopped for greater sharpness while the rest of the block retains a fuzzier contrast. Somehow, that building is right in a way that the Checker cab had been, now that Manny thinks about it—and his own apartment building, once he’d stepped off the elevator. He noticed the change at the time, but hadn’t understood it.

“I don’t think the Enemy can get into that building,” Manny says. “Something has made it more Queens, so to speak, than the rest of Queens.”

“You’re saying I did that?” Padmini shakes her head. “I didn’t do anything. Until you two showed up, I had no idea why any of this was happening. Why would I be able to—” She gestures at her building in frustration.

“I don’t know. But I wish you could tell us how you did it. This thing is targeting us one by one, and I don’t think it’s going to stop. There doesn’t seem to be an instruction manual or a wise old mentor anywhere to help us figure out the rules, but if we keep playing catch-up, it’s going to win, eventually.”

Manny sighs and rubs a hand over his face, suddenly very tired. It’s been a long day. Between them is a little plate of baozhi that Mrs. Yu put out for them, and he bends to take one, suddenly ravenous. It’s delicious. He takes another.

Brooklyn sighs as well. “Look, I’m worn out, and I missed lunch riding up to Inwood to save this one from the feather monster.” She jabs a thumb at Manny. “I think we need to rethink trying to do this all at once. Not going to do anybody any good if we drop where we stand.”

“Shouldn’t we go to the Bronx?” Manny frowns. “Since we know who she is. And, uh, what’s the fifth borough, again? I forgot, sorry.”

“Staten Island,” Brooklyn says. “I have no idea how to find her, though.”

“‘Her’?” asks Padmini.

Brooklyn blinks. “Huh. I don’t know where that came from. It feels right, though. Doesn’t it?” She looks at each of them. Padmini frowns and nods slowly. Manny does, too.

“Well, okay, then.” Brooklyn shakes her head, plainly uneasy about the strange knowledge dropping into her head. “My point was that the, uh, that woman, has probably already gone after the Bronx and Staten Island, same as she did all of us. And the fact that those boroughs haven’t exploded or something means that the people who represent them have figured out enough to survive so far. They’re probably confused as hell, but they may not need our help any more than she did.” Brooklyn nods toward Padmini.

“I am certainly confused,” Aishwarya Aunty mutters. Padmini pulls her to sit down on the step beside her, and they start having a hastily muttered conversation in some other language. Tamil, Manny knows. He knows so many things that he should not.

“There’s another of us,” he blurts. When they all look at him, Aishwarya with narrowed eyes, he explains. “Not five, but six. The Woman in White, she kept going on about another. Someone who’d fought her—beaten her—but not completely. That’s why she’s still able to attack us.”

“Six?” Brooklyn frowns. She’s been staring at the baozhi, and now finally gives in to temptation, taking the last one. Almost immediately the door behind them cracks open, and Mrs. Yu puts out another plate of three. Manny nods to her awkwardly, but she doesn’t bother looking at them before closing the door again. Meanwhile, Brooklyn continues, “Ain’t but five boroughs, Manny.”

“Five shapes that fit together make one whole,” Padmini says, shrugging. Manny blinks in confusion, but Brooklyn inhales.

“You mean the city as a whole,” she says, her eyes widening. “Not a borough at all,