I do not own DGM.
Bookman had no idea where the bullet had come from or whose rifle it belonged to but he had a very strong feeling that that soldier would meet his end in utter misery. He dragged his apprentice a few meters away into an alcove in a rock, certain that he could save her because it was only a ricochet; a ricochet from that sort of distance couldn't be deadly if it tried.
Not that bullets often killed people these days. It was just politics and God.
Bookman did his best but the infection set in sooner than any hospital appeared on the horizon. Truth be told, he had little hope of even finding a living soul that wasn't too busy killing another to care about the dying.
Victoria breathed her last spilling a secret and hope. They'd found an abandoned village a couple of miles away and Bookman raided the doctor's modest house finding nothing. Not even any bandages, which were dangerously close to running out.
"Panda," she said when he emptied another chest of drawers desperately seeking anything that could be considered antiseptic. "Panda," she repeated. She hadn't been talkative lately, being half-dead and all, but it wasn't a welcome change.
"What is it?" Bookman asked, forgetting to call her on the annoying nickname. He saw her note it, but she already knew. Bookman was good at ignoring his feelings and even better at hiding them, but it wasn't enough when someone like her was around.
"I'm going to die soon," she told him, because Victoria loved to state the obvious like that, "and I need you to know something."
He didn't even need to call her Victoria anymore. Dead apprentices had the privelege of claiming back their names at the end, to signify their failure. Bookman took a seat next to the bed and absent-mindedly reached for his pipe, deciding not to light it at the last minute.
"Those two years... that I was gone?"
Bookman nodded, having expected as much. He had been waiting eight years for this tale and the patience seemed to have paid off. Victoria closed her eyes and smiled.
"You figured it out, didn't you? That I was in love?" She paused for a while, gathering strength. Her voice lacked the usual brightness and enthusiasm and Bookman realized that it wasn't something he would ever hear again. "I never meant to leave forever… it's why you waited, right? You never found a new apprentice in that time and I knew you wouldn't. I was going to come back after I had the child but… I just… peace is so nice, Panda."
Bookman noted the present tense, and suddenly it seemed like Victoria's death was not tragic at all compared to her life. She indicated to her backpack, and he handed it over after helping her sit up on the pillows. Not long now, he thought as she rummaged through it weakly.
"I wasn't planning on ever seeing the both of them again, but then I got this… four months back."
She handed him a letter composed in a black apologetic scrawl. It was semi-formal in describing the events which led to her lover's death, and completely distant with it's offers of sympathy. A death notice from a town with broken typewriters.
"You have to find my son, Bookman." And then a shadow of her former grin appeared on her face as she said, "He's going to be perfect; he's so much like me. You'll see…"
What kind of a mother wishes this life on her child? Bookman asked himself, not entirely certain that he understood humanity after all.
"I'm going to make you promise me something too," she said, losing the smile and finally meeting Bookman's eyes, "it's going to be my dying wish – you can't refuse, your conscience won't let you forget."
"You might be overestimating my conscience, Cara." Bookman said, realizing that maybe he should be asking more questions. He would have wanted to know the reason why Cara assumed her kid would be accepted by the Clan but it seemed to be too late for that now. His apprentice smiled again, knowing full-well what he was thinking but choosing to ignore it.
"His name is Seanán." She closed her eyes so that Bookman wouldn't have to when she passed. "And he is a human being… just remember; nothing more and nothing less."
The Bookman Clan was aware of sorcery like the Order was aware of ethics. They scowled on it in disregard but there were times when it was a necessary tool for survival.
One of the few spells that the Bookmen used was the recording of data into biological matter; the object could be anything but it was traditionally an eye, idiotic as that may sound.
Bookman set to work soon after his first apprentice was dead. Cara's right eye reduced to a tiny glowing sphere of magically encoded data, he set it gently in a wooden box along with her journal and the stack of letters he found among her belongings. The rest he burned to ashes and threw over the coffin that he had constructed for her to be buried in.
Her name was given back to her as promised, etched into the gravestone. Cara Westerfeld.
The tiny Welsh town showed so many signs of a recent revolution that Bookman was uncertain about his safety when walking down the street in broad daylight. Paint and blood marked angry graffiti on the walls, windows had been boarded up to shield from bullets, stray orphans sat in huddles of misery in the corners of alleys.
Bookman found the house first and glanced at the windows with some trepidation. Through the gaps in the makeshift shutters he could see a few lights, flickering with shadowy figures. He knocked, knowing already that Seanán wouldn't be there. Orphans of traitors didn't have many rights and the advancing army never failed to create a housing problem.
Someone very tall answered the door, cracking it open about three inches and making it clear that he had a rifle in his hand.
"The hell d'ya want, old man?"
Bookman didn't hate these kinds of people only because a Bookman wasn't allowed to hate. The smell of alchohol wafted in from the house and this time Bookman started hoping that the kid wasn't in there.
"I'm looking for the previous occupants, it seems," he said, trying hard not to sound condescending. The soldier laughed dryly and slammed a fist into a wall.
"He's dead, and damned deserved it too." The man grimaced.
"And his son?"
"Heh, that brat? Police station's that way."
He waved a hand towards the west and looked like he was about to say something, so Bookman rewarded him with a glare and took a step back to indicate he didn't want to hear it.
"Thank you for your time," he muttered, already turning away. The door slammed into the frame behind him.
Wondering why the orphan would end up at a police station, Bookman made his way to the centre of town through more war-stricken streets. Few people were out, even though it was about noon, but this was very familiar. Bookman used to feel more at home in war-zones than he did in peacful places, before he found out how dangerous a stray bullet could be.
The station itself was almost a ruin. One of the outside walls had collapsed and someone built a shaky-looking scaffolding to keep the rest of the bulding standing, but the most striking thing about the area was the white wall.
Except it wasn't white, it was a mud-streaked grey splattered with dark red stains that a haunted officer was attempting to wash off. Rain hadn't graced the town with it's presence for a week, the weather forcing citizens to look again and again at the crime.
Bookman turned away and hid a couple of banknotes up his sleeve before entering the dingy police department. No-one looked up when he came in. There were no coffee cups on the table, no chatter or even a companionable quiet. Just officers in all stages of dissarray, scratching hastily on cheap paper.
He cleared his throat, standing by the front desk. He stood level with the receptionist, even though the latter was sitting, but he had learned long ago how to command the atmosphere to make himself look like the tallest person in the room.
"How… how can I help you?" The receptionist asked uncertainly. He was young and not yet used to being in the position of power that is the front desk of beaurocracy. Bookman slid the death notice onto his desk.
"I'm looking for Seanan Westerfeld?"
"Wester-? Oh! Of course. Are you a relative?" The officer brightened suddenly, dropping what he was doing. He stood up and motioned to one of the other men, who threw a set of keys in their general direction. "We weren't sure anyone was going to show up..."
"Seanán is my grandson," Bookman lied without hesistation. It would be easier this way. "His mother asked me to take care of him."
"Thank God," the officer smiled with relief, then knocked on an open door. A person who seemed to be his superior lifted his head. "Sir, it's Westerfeld's grandfather."
The superior hmmmmed in a very Bookman fashion and stood, taking the keys from the receptionst and dismissing him. Bookman was led to another door, this one locked.
"I'd ask you who exactly you were, but the kid's been here for two days and this isn't a bloody nursery." He sighed heavily and added, "it's the war, is what, no-one blames him."
"Blames him for what?" Bookman had his suspicions. He'd had suspicions ever since he heard the words 'police station' and associated them with Cara's declaration that her son was a lot like her.
"For being insane. And y'know, shooting that guy,"
Seanán sat in the corner of a cell bench, flicking lazily through a book. More volumes of battered dictionaries were discarded on the floor; English, English/Gaelic and, inexplicably, Gaelic/Lithuanian. Probably the only books the station owned. When Bookman walked into the room and the kid's curious eyes followed him, he instantly recognised the same intense searching gaze that Cara wore on a daily basis.
"I'm just gonna fetch the paperwork, and you two can have a talk," the police officer unlocked and opened the door then excused himself. Other prisoners turned to watch.
Seanán hopped off the bench once the policeman was gone and walked right up to the bars to face Bookman. He pulled the gate closed again and holding on tightly to it he said, quietly,
"Bookman… are you going to tell me why?"
Bookman smiled slightly, though he wasn't surprised to hear his title. This kid was so much like Cara it was almost a miracle.
"Every answer you get will only lead to more questions." It was Cara's weakness and strength, always asking why and he had noticed too late. "Thus, no-one can tell you why."
"I know." Unfazed by the philosophy, the boy smiled Cara's perfect, unsettling smile and added, "if anyone could, Matthiew Ramsgate would have told me."
Ah, Bookman thought, so this is what happened. He prompted for a further explanation, "Matthiew Ramsgate?"
"He was a soldier. Or so they say, but soldiers are supposed to fight, right? He didn't; he just pointed and shot, which isn't hard at all."
Seanan's eyes slid to the left for a second in an uncertain show of guilt.
"Where's my mother?" He asked suddenly, throwing Bookman entirely off balance. He straightened his expression while the kid continued asking, "father said that if anything happened that I should wait for her, or a little old guy who looked like a panda. It's you, right, panda-man?"
Bookman sighed. He hated this. He hated Cara for falling in love, he hated humanity for being weak and emotional and existing at all, and most importantly he hated himself right then for not being able to save a person when it did matter.
"You mother died, on November 6th this year." He was hopeful that the boy would see his silent apology. "My condolences."
Seanán stilled like a lake that could swallow stars. He only blinked once, and the tears fell uninvited down his face. His fingers were white from gripping the bars and staying upright under the weight of being left utterly alone in a world that has no answers.
"But can't you just tell me why?"