CHAPTER THIRTY THREE

11:20. Almost time.

Beside him loomed his masterpiece – the hydro-mechanical vindication engine he"d dreamed up in grief"s darkest pits. A monstrosity of gears, cogs, pipes, all spinning, churning, gulping down the seconds like a temporal black hole. At the bottom the dam operator – Frank Hollister – gasped and flailed, churning the inky water to froth.

Not long now. The clock knew. It measured poor Frank's life in drips and drops. Seth closed his eyes and let the sound wash over him. The rattle-clank of the gears, the suck-slurp of the water, the operator"s panicked glugs echoing up the basin. A symphony to make Beethoven weep.

This was it, the culmination. The last spluttering gasp in a year-long opus of vengeance. He"d started at the top, the kings and kingmakers – that smug prick Toledo, poster boy for the New Liberty. Ayers, egghead extraordinaire, with his specs and his clipboards and his fucking flow calculations. Then the builders, the drones. Clancy, foreman to the damned, barking orders and brown-nosing his way to the top.

And now, the cherry on this sundae. Mr. Dam Operator himself, the man with his hand on the spigot. Probably spent his days whistling jaunty, turning dials and yanking levers like some kind of cartoon. Merrily flushing Seth"s home down the cosmic drain.

Well, he wasn"t whistling now. No, those choked-out whimpers had a distinctly un-merry timbre. Seth cocked his head, savoring each watery bleat. He"d replay them later, in the dead hours before dawn. Splice them into his dreams until the only lullaby he knew was the sound of a man drowning.

11:22.

He was good with his hands, always had been. A mason, a maker. He"d built so much over the years – homes, hospitals, even that cute little sculpture ticking away in the town square. But they were empty gestures. This was his true calling, his pièce de résistance. A monument to retribution, a machine of judgement. Justice, at long last.

And Jessie would finally rest easy.

When he found her in the creek, it wasn"t suicide splayed out in the silt – it was murder. They"d killed her sure as if they"d held her head under themselves. The politicians, the planners, the toadies and enablers. They"d buried her in paperwork and cowardice, damned her with cooked books and cocked-up studies. So much blood on so many soft, uncallused hands.

Well, Seth was an old hand at wet work. And he"d built them a gallows to swing from. All it took was stone, steel, and a drop of madness.

Seth stepped forward and peered over the basin"s rim. There was the operator, suspended like an insect in amber. His eyes stared up, unseeing. Dead moons in dead sockets. Seth filed away the image for his mental scrapbook. Another ghost to hang on the family tree. Four down. A matching set to lay at Jessie"s worm-gnawed feet.

He turned to his tool table, picked up the hammer and tested its heft. These tools were for insurance mostly, in case one of the Big Four lucked their way out of his contraption. But this time, maybe he'd put the hammer or the hacksaw to use. He could take a souvenir – something to remember Mr. Dam Operator by. A finger, an ear. Something to slip under the pillow and dream dark dreams upon.

Because once Frank Hollister gurgled his last, there"d be no one left. No more cogs in the machine that ground his world to dust. The main players, the shot-callers who"d signed Liberty"s death warrant, they"d all be rotting at the bottom of Seth"s masterpiece. Toledo, Ayers, Clancy – a triumvirate of bastards laid low by their own hubris. And now Hollister, the late-shift lackey who"d kept their doomsday clock ticking. His numberless hours at the switch, his countless tugs at the levers. Each one draining a little more life from the land like a vampire sucking marrow from bone.

Well, who had their hand on the valve now?

Seth closed his eyes, let the sweet anticipation wash over him. It"d been a long road, a hard road. Paved with blood and madness and the screams of drowning men. But he"d walked it gladly.

For Jessie. Only ever for Jessie.

His baby sister, his shining star. The one pure thing in a filthy world. He"d cradled her when she was a squalling babe, watched in awe as she took her first wobbling steps. Braided her cornsilk hair and wiped her snotty nose and scared off the monsters under her bed.

And when she"d needed him most, he"d failed her.

Oh, he"d told himself he was helping. Working round the clock, scrambling for jobs that paid more than peanuts. Anything to keep them afloat as the river of red ink rose higher and higher. Jessie would handle the farm, keep their parents" legacy limping along. She had the green thumb, the magic touch with soil and seed. She"d coax life from dust and ashes, keep them solvent for one more season. One more turn of the wheel.

But you can"t sow crops with dust, can"t irrigate with sweat and prayers. And while Seth broke his back building other people"s dreams, his own crumbled around him.

Sometimes, in the darkest hours of the night, he swore he could hear her. Whispering secrets, singing lullabies. A little girl"s lilting giggle. It was a sweeter kind of madness. The only scrap of humanity he had left.

He wondered what she"d think of him now. This blood-soaked wraith, this avenging golem built of grief and stone. Would she recoil in horror, flee from the monster wearing her brother"s skin? Or would she smile that secret smile and tell him he'd done the right thing?

Seth liked to think she"d understand. She'd see the beauty in this design. All the things he'd built to honor her and sanctify her memory.

Because that"s what this was, in the end. A memorial, a tribute. A love letter written in water and blood.

In the basin, Frank Hollister let out a reedy wail. Seth smiled and drank the sound in like fine wine. Yes, plead. Beg. Pray to your uncaring makers, little cog. See what good it does you when the water swallows you down.

11.25.

Already, Hollister"s thrashing was weaker. The drowning rattle, the aquatic swan song. Soon, he"d be still and silent. Pinned like a butterfly in Seth"s collection.

And then it would be over. The scales balanced. The blood debt paid. The ghosts of Liberty laid to rest in watery graves.