The Bloodline She Burned novel · Chapter 3 of 24

Chapter 3: Low Ladder

Rosalind beats a loud regular at a ranked machine in a bootcamp cafe with an opening that is not in any guide, and the owner asks where she got it.

The bus dropped Roz at the old tram yard because it was the last stop, and she did not have the money to ride past it.

Snow had started.

Her hand throbbed inside the napkin, and her coat was too thin for the wind.

Across the yard a sign glowed blue in a second-floor window: LOW LADDER. RANKED ALL NIGHT. HEATED.

She read the last word twice.

She climbed the stairs and pushed through the door into a long room of warm air and humming computers.

Twenty screens glowed in rows.

Half the seats were taken by people in hoodies, headsets over their ears, hunched toward their maps.

At the counter, a young woman with red curls pinned up by a pencil looked at Roz's coat and her bloody napkin.

"Four dollars an hour," she said. "First aid kit is under the register. Sit anywhere."

"Thanks."

"I'm Nina. If you cry on a keyboard, you pay for the keyboard."

Roz gave her a four dollar bill and took the first aid kit to the machine at the end of the row.

The game was already open on the screen.

BREAKLINE.

She knew that logo better than her own face.

For five years of her last life, every night, she had sat in a public library with a borrowed login and played this game until her eyes would not stay open.

It had been the only place nobody could tell her what she was worth.

She taped the gauze over her hand and logged in as a guest.

"New face," said a voice over her shoulder.

A big man in a blue and gold jersey leaned on the back of her chair.

On the sleeve was the Crown logo.

"Guests can only play unranked," he said. "Want a real game? Duel mode. First to five. Twenty bucks."

Roz looked at him.

She had sixty-three dollars, minus four for the hour.

"Forty," she said.

Two of the regulars turned around in their seats.

"Forty," the man agreed, grinning. "Easy money."

Nina had come out from behind the counter with her arms folded.

At the back of the room, a tall man in a faded team hoodie lowered his laptop lid and watched.

Roz did not look at him.

The map loaded.

It was Cinder Yard, the one with the rusted freight cars, and she had played it a thousand times.

The man took the high rail.

Everyone did.

It was the standard opening, and this year it was the only one anybody used.

Roz went down the east vent instead.

It was a tight, ugly route that cost her half her health before she reached the end of it, and the regulars laughed.

Then she came out under the rail, three steps behind him.

One shot.

"Lucky," the man said.

Round two, she did it again.

Round three, he tried to guard the vent.

She went over the freight car roof, which the game's own tutorial said was not possible, and put him down from above.

The laughing stopped.

Round four, he panicked and ran the old route, and she was waiting at the door.

By round five his headset was off his ears and the whole row had gathered behind her chair.

The final shot landed.

SCORE: 5 TO 0.

The man stared at the screen.

"The roof," he said. "How did you get on the roof?"

"There's a ledge by the second car," Roz said. "You have to crouch twice and jump on the third frame."

"That isn't in the game."

"It will be in the next patch notes."

That was true, and nobody in the room knew it.

The man dropped two twenties on the desk and walked out without his coat.

Nina picked up the money and handed it to Roz.

"I like you," she said. "Remind me to teach you how to take a bet properly."

The tall man from the back had crossed the room.

He stood beside her chair with his hands in his hoodie pocket.

He was around thirty, with a nose that had once been broken and a face that had not slept.

"Gabriel Rook," he said. "I own the place."

"Rosalind."

"Rosalind, that vent opening is not in any guide, and no streamer plays the roof."

He looked at her bandaged hand, then back at her face.

"I coached pro teams for six years," he said. "I'd have seen it."

Roz said nothing.

Gabriel leaned down until his eyes were level with hers.

"So where did you get it?"

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