STV-010
St. Valentine's Ledger
Patron: The Usuals
Date: Aug 10th, 1923 – Gold Coast District
Location: St. Valentine's (Balcony Booth, Above the Stage)
Proprietor: Mags
I watched them from the balcony. Three strange stars orbiting a darker sun.
Rocca, she moves like she already knows how this will all shake out. She’s resigned to it, you know? She won’t step in the way of what’s to come. Doesn’t want to put her neck out for Costigan, because all that will do is have two heads chopped instead of one. I respect that about her. She doesn’t trust me, not fully. That’s fine. Trust is for after the curtain falls.
The priest, Voss. He carries a certain stillness with him. Speaks like a bell toll. Listens like he’s memorizing your sins before you even get a chance to speak ‘em. That man’s touched the divine and didn’t come back clean. I can see the ash on him. Still glowing at the edges. He found God, then found another, and another, and he’s trying to play them all for fools, but I fear he doesn’t know what he’s truly messing with.
And then… there’s the Canary.
Costigan.
I know a bird in a cage when I see one. Paces like he’s looking for a crack in the bars, but the bars are made of a song and he’s the one who sang ‘em. He’s got the kind of voice you hear in a dream and wake up crying for reasons you don’t remember. I don’t know who he made his deal with, but it left a mark deeper than blood.
They snipe. They snap. They circle each other like hounds and ghosts.
But together? Man, they hum.
There’s a rhythm between them, even if they don’t hear it yet. Like the Universe put them in the same room just to see what chord might ring out.
I’ll stay a little longer. Dance my steps. Do what I came to do. I don’t really have anywhere else to go, do I?
And besides I want to hear that pretty Canary sing. I want to know whether it’s a lullaby or a warning that the mine’s coming to close.