Page 22 of The Quarterlands (Dark Water #4)

“They are welcome to, if we have space, but they must work. There are usually jobs to be had here, caring for the sick, elderly, and the children. There are also maintenance, cooking, cleaning, and other jobs to be done around the Quarter. That’s how we are able to keep it in such good condition.”

“Has Gideon returned here recently?” Josiah asked.

She looked genuinely startled. “No. Why would he?”

“If he was dying? If he wanted to return to his childhood home for the last few weeks of his life, would he be welcome?”

She hesitated, then gave a tight smile. “If he renounced his sinful ways, then yes. We’d never turn away a member of the Fellowship if truly penitent.”

Josiah leaned back in his chair and gazed at her coolly. “And what sinful ways would those be?”

“Gideon was a good child, bright and hard-working. He was never wilful, mean-spirited, rude, or aggressive.”

“But?” Josiah had already guessed where this was headed.

She sighed. “As a teenager, he developed sinful lusts. We had many conversations with him about it and how his nature was not compatible with Fellowship teachings. He swore he’d try to defeat his demons, but I don’t believe he was successful.”

“Are you saying that Gideon was homosexual?”

She gave a regretful smile. “Yes. ”

Josiah wasn’t surprised. Society as a whole couldn’t care less who anyone slept with these days, but the whole ethos of the Floodites was that God had sent another flood because of humanity’s wickedness and corruption.

They believed that only absolute purity would save them from another Rising.

Homosexuality was only one of the many things they disapproved of.

“When did you last see Gideon?” he asked.

“He visited us about ten years ago, when his spiritual adviser here, Brother Ezekiel, died. It was good to see him again. He said he still struggled with his sinful inclinations but he found his servitude useful in avoiding temptation.”

“And you haven’t seen him since?”

“No. Forgive me. Is he in trouble? I’m wondering why an agent from Inquisitus is asking after him.”

“I’m afraid I can’t answer that.” He smiled at her. “One more question, although I think I know the answer: did Gideon have a sibling or… a nephew?”

“No. He had no relatives. He was completely alone in the world. That’s why the Fellowship agreed to care for him.”

“I see. Well, you’ve been most helpful. Thank you for your time.”

He left the Arkian Quarter feeling unsettled.

This Quarter was a sanctuary of sorts. Gideon had been fed, clothed, and educated here.

He’d been cared for. Yet he hadn’t been accepted.

Josiah’s own childhood in a different Quarter had been far rougher and more precarious, but also more accepting and less rigid.

Nobody had cared that he was gay, and there had been no pressure to become an IS.

In fact, his father had always made it quite clear that he was never, under any circumstances, to sell himself.

At least he’d established that there was no nephew. He had no doubt that the person who’d arranged for Gideon’s belongings to be cleared out was Gideon himself. He climbed back into his duck and read Gideon’s note again.

It’s been a glorious summer, but the raine will come soon, and by then, I’ll have gone home.

Where might Gideon call home? And why was he leaving a note for Josiah, because that was definitely an “e” on the end of “rain”. It was deliberately cryptic, designed to be misunderstood, yet Gideon clearly expected Josiah to be able to decipher it.

Home.

Josiah stared out the window. Why would a man he’d never met leave him such a bizarre note? Alex had said Gideon found him “dead sexy”. Had he harboured a strange crush on him?

Home.

Oh, shit.

Josiah put the duck into gear and high-tailed it away from the Arkian Quarter, leaving a small tsunami in his wake.

It was just a hunch… unlikely, improbable, and yet, somehow also the only thing that made sense.

He had no other clues, so it was worth a try.

He drove for two hours across several lost zones, and as he drew close, he felt a sense of impending dread.

He’d avoided this place for years, on purpose, and he’d never had any intention of returning.

Home.

Not Gideon’s childhood home – his.

Ahead of him, five tower blocks loomed from out of the sludge-brown water.

Greenfields – he could only assume the name was ironic, but maybe it had once been true – was a 1970s-era housing estate, full of high-rises, column upon column of reinforced concrete towers, brutalist monoliths that squatted on the skyline like a row of crumbling tombstones.

He parked his duck next to the middle tower block and climbed out.

A pack of kids was on him immediately. They weren’t as feral as the kids of the Canary Quarter, but they were wild and rough all the same.

He threw them cash cards, waved his badge around, and made it clear that if there was so much as a scratch on his duck when he returned, he’d arrest them all.

He could tell by their wide eyes that they believed him: these kids had a healthy fear of Thorities.

He’d left here as a teenager to join the army, but he still remembered every mouldering concrete walkway.

Greenfields was rough, but it wasn’t as brutal a Quarter as Canary or Shard; it still appealed to families with kids, and the gangs that’d run it when Josiah was a boy still kept it under control.

It wasn’t a refuge for drug addicts and violent crime, although there was always a criminal element.

It still stank of sewage and damp – that smell never went away – but the place was lit, if dimly, and it wasn’t too overcrowded.

In fact, there were fewer people here now than when Josiah was a kid.

Perhaps because the ceaseless government campaigns to encourage families out of the Quarterlands and into service or work camps had been effective.

The world was returning to what it had once been, and the detritus left over from the Rising was slowly being cleaned up.

The new floating cities offering cheap accommodation and much better living conditions were also making inroads into old Quarters like this.

There was no welcoming committee at Greenfields like there had been at the Arkian Quarter – this place wasn’t anywhere near as well managed – but Josiah knew his presence had been noticed from the moment he’d arrived.

Still, he wasn’t challenged as he made his way to the central office hub from where gang business had always been conducted.

He walked confidently, remembering the way as if it were yesterday.

People moved aside to let him pass. Was that because they could see he was Thorities?

Or was it because they recognised him as one of their own?

Just a man returning home, nothing to see here.

Very little had changed. The office was still there: a small room with a couple of chairs and a battered old desk with a few old magazines and an old-fashioned walkie-talkie on it.

There had always been one gang member on duty at any one time, and that hadn’t changed.

An obese, middle-aged man sitting behind the desk looked up at him, then burst out laughing.

“What’s so funny?” Josiah asked, resting his hand on his stun gun, just in case.

“You are! Heard you were on your way. What’s it been, twenty-odd years? And you just saunter back in like it was yesterday, you old fucker. How’s life treating ya, Joe? Last time I saw you, you swore you’d never come back, but here you are.”

Josiah peered at the man in the poorly lit room and then he burst out laughing, too. “Seamus? Is that you?”

“Yeah. A few years older and a couple of hundred pounds heavier.” Seamus heaved himself to his feet and ambled over to envelop him in a clumsy bear hug.

“And nearly bald.” Josiah rubbed the few bristles on Seamus’s head affectionately.

“Look at you, striding in here with your fancy clothes, posh accent, and full head of hair.” Seamus grinned.

“I always said you’d get yourself killed in the army, but nah.

No such luck, eh?” He took a step back to admire Josiah’s well-cut jeans, maroon polo shirt, and smart linen jacket; even when he was technically off duty, he never let his standards slip.

“How are you doing, Seamus?” he asked softly, taking a seat on a rickety plastic chair and watching as Seamus poured him a typical Quarterlands brew: black tea with a generous dash of whisky, no milk.

“I’m okay, thanks, Joe.” Seamus beamed at him.

“Took a few years, but I finally managed to take charge of this place. Of course, most of the old guard are dead, as is this shit-heap nowadays. Its glory days are long gone, Joe, but still, I run Greenfields now, and I bet nobody would have put money on that when we were kids.” He sat back in his chair, looking pleased with himself.

“If you’d hung around here, you could have taken over.

You had the brains and the muscle for it. ”

“I didn’t want it. I had to get out, Seamus.” Josiah took a gulp of the tea, and then another. He didn’t usually drink, but this tasted of home. “Dad never wanted me to stay here. He dreamed of bigger things for me, a better life than he’d had. He didn’t want me to become an IS.”

“Yeah. He always said that to me an’ all.” Seamus smiled at the memory. “Your dad was good people, Joe. I fucking loved him, and your mum, too. She taught me how to read.”

“Me too.” Josiah felt a rush of warmth. Maybe it was the whisky in the tea, or maybe it was talking about his parents with people who’d known them.

“She was a drybaby before she came here. She went to a proper school on dry land. Then her parents died when she was sixteen and she was turfed out of her home. She had nowhere else to go, so she ended up here. Dad was born here. He knew his way around and he always looked out for her. She said she fell for him because he had kind eyes. ”