CHAPTER FOUR

Adelaide looked down. Blood wept from her wound, dripping down her cheeks like tears, slipping away as quickly as her short-lived happiness. She tried to reach for it, hands scraping against cold air. Then, as she pulled her trembling hands back towards her face, she felt the icy drip of liquid. It coated her hands. Even in the darkening light, it was a stark red.

The pain in her head and cheek was hot and seething. Adelaide staggered to her feet. Faintly, she could hear the sound of police whistles and the echoes of footsteps growing quieter.

Leaning against the wall, her face was pulled into a harsh grimace. With her hands feeling so clammy, it pained her to think if it was blood or sweat coating her fingers. How long had she been lying there? Mere seconds, likely. The sound of racing feet had disappeared not long ago and as she looked out across the street, it appeared empty. But she couldn't trust her vision. It was slowed, blurry, readily deceiving her. So too her memories were fogged, covered by the throbbing pain in her head.

Using her left hand, the other tucked to her chest like a sling, Adelaide pushed against the wall, forcing herself to use her balance. Yet she toppled, dizzy, and continued to use the wall for support. Her arms ached, but no matter how she stood, they tired in seconds.

Adelaide sighed and her breath caught in her throat like a sob.

Where am I? The name of her surroundings was clear. She could envisage the wide front doors; a walking stick, hanging alone; and the large glass windows that had lined the corridors. She pushed passed it, swimming through a blank space, until she was stopped shortly- by a blank, white wall. Tommy. Tommy.

"Tommy." Her voice came out as a moan, pained and hoarse.

Adelaide stumbled past the doors of the hospital, dropping to the steps. The pale moonlight, although soft, cast a ghostly tinge on her dull surroundings. The streets that forked from both ends of the alleyway were identical: surrounded by thin houses and broken cobble. But from the left, the sound of heavy boots against pavement rose louder once again.

Run. Run. Run! Something in her mind screamed out. It sounded vaguely of a man's voice. She shifted her weight onto her hands and pushed, and then she was limping down the steps, to the road, to the light of the streetlamps, away from the footsteps. As loud as the screams in her head, her body yelled in pain, yelled for her to stop.

Arms wrapped around her shoulders, holding her back. 

"Adelaide."

Marco. Marco...

"Marco!"

Tears streamed down her face. She melted into his chest, letting him stroke her hair until she finally pulled away. Her blood stained his shirt.

"Where's my brother?"

Marco didn't need to answer.

"Adelaide!" She felt long arms twist around her waist, and as a head buried into her neck, they toppled to their knees on the floor. Her brother pulled back. Her shoulder was wet.

"We were so worried."

"I'm sorry I scared you."

Harry took her by the face again, shaking his head so hard that it must have hurt. "No, no. This is not your fault, Adelaide. Not your fault," he said, but his eyes roamed the lower half of her head, lingering on the space that throbbed and burned. "What happened?"

Adelaide closed her eyes. She had no fight left in her, no clever words to hide the fact that she was hurt. Harry looked at her as if she was fragile, as if she would break should his touch be too hard. It was that, more than anything, that she hated. Always, she had been the leader, the stronger, older sibling. But now it was Harry holding her together like the pieces of a broken vase, never to be whole again. 

"I'm sorry. It was a stupid idea. I should never have come here," Adelaide said. 

There was a part of her that couldn't believe her own words. She had told Tommy as such. Adelaide could never regret coming back to him, just as she had not regretted leaving. 

"No, Addy, please, no," Harry said. Marco lingered behind him, shaking his head. "This is not your fault."

"Harry." 

Adelaide was crying. How she hated that she was crying! But the tears would not stop. She seethed through the pain in her face, teeth gritting together like an animal. 

"Those fucking bastards," he hissed. 

Adelaide gripped her fingers around his wrist. "I want to see it."

For a moment, he didn't move. Then he leaned back from her, reaching his hand back so Marco could place a pocket watch firmly in his palm. It was small and greasy, but Adelaide flipped it over and stared at herself in a dirty, golden reflection, blinking away pooled tears. Though the image was warped, the large cut that was carved into her face, crusted in blood, was as clear as day. 

S.

"For Sabini," she said aloud, staring at the jarring shape. 

The looks of horror made sense now. Sabini had maimed her in his name and claimed her in his doing. 

"Let us help you, Addy," Marco said, taking her other arm as Harry lifted her to her feet. 

She let them guide her along the street, and only as they'd turned a corner, did she question it. "Where are we going?"

"To the girls," Harry said in a gentle voice. "To rest."

Adelaide placed her head against his shoulder, eyes closing so he could guide her blindly. "I'm tired."

"Almost there," he said so softly she almost couldn't hear him. "Almost there."

The room Marcon had found for them was dingy and cheap, sitting on the upper floor of a dodgy pub somewhere. Adelaide hadn't paid much attention. Her eyes fought to stay open as her brother guided her.

Two double beds were pushed at either side of the room, a window in between them with a candle that had no wick. By the time they finally pushed through the doors, the sun was on its way to the horizon, casting the walls in an eerie glow. 

They couldn't stay for long. Marco had suggested moving after a single night. Especially since the five had settled into their rooms, after cleaning away the blood and sweat, and caught a glimpse of loitering men around the front door, from the window.

"Sabini's men," Adelaide muttered, eyes trailing over the familiar faces that seemed to plague her everywhere they went.

"Where will we go?" Robinson asked. She was the only one who hadn't joined Adelaide in gathering at the window, staring down at the oblivious Italians.

"There's nowhere to go," Marco said, collapsing upon a bed, hand covering his face. "We can't go to London. Not now, not ever. Not with things going the way they are."

For a moment, they were all silent, the raw truth of the statement settling in. 

"Could we go north?" Robinson asked.

"No," was all that Adelaide could croak out for a minute. 

Harry agreed with a shake of his head. "We won't have our sister mixed in like that." 

"Well, what else can we do?" Marco protested, losing the light from his match when he struck too hard out of anger. 

"No. We can't just run away from our problems."

"Marti's right," Harry said, taking himself from the window and leaving his sister to stare out of it alone. "Going north will do nothing for us. Not when our people haven't a clue about what's going on." 

"I haven't a clue what's going on!" Robinson snapped suddenly, shaking her head, eyebrows darkening her stare. "One minute I'm sitting down for business and the next I'm running for my life from a former employer like it's a high-risk game of hide and seek."

"Didn't you expect it? Playtime's been coming for a long, long time."

Avery Robinson closed her eyes and breathed out. The smoke from her cigarette couldn't seem to calm her like usual.

"So what do we do? We can't choose to stay locked in our rooms." 

"But we can't go north either, not when Sabini's on our backs. Just look at Adelaide's face. What else would that mean apart from 'you're fucking doing what I say'? And our sister... she's not like us."

"We don't have to go to Newcastle! We could go anywhere. What about Manchester?" Robinson carried on loudly, arms animated and cigarette swinging between fingers.

"That's still running away, losing our territory," Harry insisted. They'd worked too hard to lose what they'd built. The moment Sabini gained the upper hand, he would light it all on fire. 

"And Sabini would have already placed his people at every train station within miles of Birmingham. To make sure we're not getting out," Marco added. Adelaide watched as they argued.

"I don't understand, though. Why go through all this trouble?" Robinson asked, after a few short moments of silence filled only by heavy breathing.

"Because he's scared," Harry said.

"Of what? Us? Because I find that hard to believe."

"He's scared of what we can start," Adelaide said, turning her gaze from the window, as she continued quietly. "It only takes one single match to start a real fire."

"If we find a way to get to Solomons and the Peaky Blinders, he knows he's done for," Harry explained. "That's why he's trying everything he can to stop us from getting there."

"We could go to Polly's," Adelaide spoke up.

"Who's Polly?" 

"Polly Gray, she's Tommy Shelby's aunt," Adelaide said.

"She'd have your head!" Harry exclaimed, letting himself find the humour in it. Adelaide finally smiled, wincing slightly as the skin around the cut stretched too far. 

"Maybe so, but the safest place we can be is in the heart of Tommy's territory. They'd never get to us there. 

"We'd never make it."

"If we can't make it there, then we can't make it anywhere," Adelaide said. Marco stayed quiet, but she could tell from the look on his face that he didn't believe her. 

Adelaide turned to look out of the window again. The Italians lingered tiredly by the gates at the side of the pub, watching beneath wide-brimmed fedoras. The front entrance was easily in sight, but the back... It seemed too easy. But all the same, something was brewing in her thoughts- a plan.