The Unmourned
The vampires who emerged with the closing of the Fold don’t trouble the Geldstraat. Ketterdam’s rich live securely, with powerful wards against the supernatural built into the fabric of their houses and private security to walk their streets after dark. The rest of the city does what they can to keep safe, but the last line of defense for the poor, the helpless, and the unlucky are the Flames. Chosen by the University of Ketterdam’s Night Science Institute and sponsored by the city in the interests of preserving their labor force, Flames hunt vampires through the streets, accompanied by University-trained Wardens who strengthen and protect them.
Ever since Inej’s parents were killed, she’s devoted herself to a single ambition: becoming a Flame. But on the streets of Ketterdam, the future she dreamed of may not look much like the future she gets.
Chapter 1: The Wet and the Dry
She expects him to try for something inspiring, some drum-roll of rhetoric for the hundred people gathered here to compete for the privilege of risking their necks to save people. After all, anyone who’s here could be going out for private security, and maybe some will, if they don’t make it. The government subsidizes the NSI and its Flames, but it’s not like it doesn’t pay more, to walk the wards around the Geldstraat and the Zelverstraat and play bodyguard to rich kids when they slum it. Nobody tries to become a Flame unless they’ve got some ideals.
But all the Warden says is, “Welcome to the first day of the Night Science Institute’s trials. Candidates number one through twenty-five will go to the north hall for the written. Twenty-six through fifty, west hall for small science. Fifty-one through seventy-five, east hall for mental. Seventy-six through one hundred, please proceed to the south hall for the athletic.”
