As Above

Chapter Four: My Father Promised Me

A fog had settled over Dunwall's skyline as night began to creep in, casting the entire city in soft grey as though someone had taken watered down paint, and had brushed it over everything. Moisture clung to the windows of Dunwall Tower, the glass cold to the touch. It was the perfect night to disappear. As the clock tower chimed the hours of the early morning, Emily crept out of her chambers the way she had the night Delilah had locked her there. Her signet ring slid into Sokolov's lock with ease, the door sliding open without so much as a whisper.

The instant Emily's boots collided with the rooftop, her entire body relaxed. This was her city, and this was where she belonged. The surface beneath her feet was slick with water from the fog but she was better now. Gone were the mistakes of miscalculating jumps the way she had when she'd escaped Dunwall Tower on the seventh day of the Month of Rain. Gone was her uncertainty that had led to being too cautious. Emily Kaldwin had been shaped by time, and by the tides of the Void until she knew exactly what it was that she had to do.

She hoped that her journey would allow her to be back before her father was any the wiser, but every second she spent worrying about getting caught was another second she lost. The silk scarf pulled taught around the lower half of her face was a reassuring feeling that she had missed ever since she'd returned from Serkonos, but what she missed more, was the feelings of pins and needles that danced across the back of her left hand as she raised it before her. The Void's song grew to encompass everything else as she pulled herself across the space, leaping from the roof of Dunwall Tower to the streets below. The bonecharm sewn into the arm of her outfit granted her temporary invisibility until she landed with a rush of wind on a nearby roof.

The electricity of the Void in her bones crackled as she gave herself a split second to admire what she had just done. Both times before this, she'd not had the Outsider's gifts aiding her, and by the Void, was it far more exhilarating this time. Moisture began to gather on her raven hair with every passing moment, and trying not to dawdle, she began to run. She disappeared from one spot, and reappeared in another, conserving her momentum to use it to pull herself to another spot altogether. She granted herself fewer than three seconds between each instance of her power, simultaneously trying to be efficient while conserve her energy but she had to know.

To anyone else, travelling from Dunwall Tower to Slaughterhouse Row would have taken several hours. Emily Kaldwin, fuelled by curiosity, desperation, and the Outsider's mark, managed to do it in just over one. She almost wished she hadn't. She almost wished that she'd taken longer, given herself more time to think about if she truly wanted to see this scene for herself.

But it was too late now.

Slaughterhouse Row had grown over the years, expanding from the single street it had been so long ago, to a sprawling district in its own right where the streets ran red with the blood of whales, tainted silver by their oil. The stench of rotting flesh was heavy in the air and noxious fumes was almost stifling but Emily had bigger concerns.

Such as to why the slaughterhouses were completely empty.

Not just of workers—though that was to be expected, given the hour—but of the whales they were meant to be harvesting oil from. For every five slaughterhouses, there was perhaps one whale between them, and the whale was half the size of what she was expecting to see. While the gangs had largely been reigned in with Corvo's assistance, there were still several groups scattered around large fires, boasting about their day with a bottle of Old Dunwall in their hand. Calling upon the Void, Emily pulled herself down behind a group of two muttering to themselves. She darted behind a box before anyone could notice her, straining her ear to overhear their words.