The Ancient Wound: The Wound Saga, #1 6p2m6r

The Ancient Wound

The Wound Saga, Volume 1

Hope C. Dixon

Published by Hope C. Dixon, 2021.

Table of Contents

Title Page

Dedication

PART ONE - DEPARTURE | Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Discussion I - K and M

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Interlude I - Ghii

PART TWO - ARRIVAL | Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Discussion II - K and S

Chapter 17

Chapter 18

Chapter 19

Chapter 20

Chapter 21

PART THREE - TRUST | Interlude II - Dorus

Chapter 22

Discussion III - K and I

Chapter 23

Chapter 24

Chapter 25

Chapter 26

Chapter 27

Chapter 28

Chapter 29

Chapter 30

PART FOUR - DECEIT | Interlude III - Dorus

Chapter 31

Chapter 32

Chapter 33

Chapter 34

Chapter 35

Chapter 36

Chapter 37

Chapter 38

Chapter 39

Chapter 40

Chapter 41

Chapter 42

Chapter 43

Epilogue:

About the Author

To D'Artagnan; my love, my best friend, and my greatest er.

PART ONE - DEPARTURE

Chapter 1

The serene face of the iron effigy seemed dishonest to Alrik. Elder Shayid had been much more confused and afraid when he'd died. Alrik climbed atop the roots of a jacaranda tree and gazed at the crowd. Around him perhaps a thousand people, young and old, were assembled around the effigy of the Elder. The iron statue lay, arms crossed, beside the stream that led to the Anmon Cascade. Alrik watched as three strong attendants lifted the effigy and laid it in a canoe tied at the mouth of the Cascade, then kneeled. The Elder Mullamar spoke, his voice crackling with magically enhanced volume. Ears perked up at that. Heavy restrictions on magic in the city meant any display of it turned heads. “Brothers, sisters, aunts, uncles, cousins, and most of us here; friends. We come here today to commemorate a good man.” Elder Mullamar was the oldest elder in the city and looked it, dark skin hanging off his bones. He held himself high, despite his age, his blue ceremonial cloak glowing in the waning light. Alrik took a purple jacaranda flower and split it with his fingernails. Moisture oozed out. He did it again, flinching as wet dirt gathered on his hands. He cleaned it out fast, as well as he could. He felt self-conscious, but kept his eyes focused on the bleeding purple flower and breathed deeply. He was there for a reason. You must find him, he thought. “I hope this spring eve has found you all well,” continued the elder. “We are here, of course, because we have lost one of our own. One of our Elderate. Shayid.” He cleared his throat. “The council of Elders is a remnant of our

history. While we defer to the parliament in Adrest and the Crown in Canalas City, our great friends,” he said, with a thin smile, “our Elderate is an heirloom of one of the many far-off cultures that led to our beautiful city’s creation. It’s an old and strange institution, but ah –” he smiled. “Sometimes things that are old and strange can be lovely. That’s to the point, really. Elder Shayid was many things, and among those, he was indeed old, and definitely not usual.” A gentle laugh rippled through the crowd. The service was pleasant, Alrik thought. Kind. That made it worse for him. “Sometimes all we can hope is to die after a good, long life, in a gentle way. A slide into whatever lies beyond with no struggle, no fear. Friends, I feel peace in my heart telling you that Elder Shayid ed in this way, in his garden, playing his favourite hand drum.” Alrik bit his teeth and looked at the ground as Mullamar went into Shayid’s life, from his revamping of the Cinuravese Elementary School program to his interest in painting. Alrik was one of only two people in the city who knew how Shayid had died. The other was a man, a year older than him at nearly twenty-one, named Baalgali em-Fuahim: The person Alrik was at the funeral to find. Alrik looked up and brought himself up to his full height. He was still unsure about whether to share what he knew. If he did, who with – the Elderate? The police? Not them. Baalgali was the son of a powerful ambassador, and rich men like that were obsessed with their image. Alrik cursed and slipped away into the sea of blue houses that made Cinura. Baalgali wasn’t at the funeral. Down an adobe street, around a corner to a lane where the buildings had been washed the colour of the morning sky by sunlight, Alrik stopped briefly and breathed in the air. It was pure, here, in the mountain city. The cool, clean air floating off the Ollossal Sea to the south diluted the smells of faeces and coal smoke and alcohol that came off the city itself.

The street he stood on sloped down such that, as he reached the top, he could see the ocean itself, ink black between two mountains. He continued on, thinking. His feet took him a place his mind knew it’d work best – the office and study of Doctor Melalhir, a little, dusty room at the top of the old Lagtower, to the south. Alrik didn’t have too far to go. He ed a smattering of urchins playing in the entrance of an ivy-covered alleyway, smiled at them, and turned left, feeling the upward incline in his thin legs. He continued up the curve and reached the mossy base steps of Lagtower, sitting down for a moment to catch his breath. He opened the door, old white pine with creaky hinges, and trotted bandy-legged up the narrow staircase, surrounded by old rough-cut stone. He knew the tower would be empty – he’d seen Doctor Melalhir in attendance at the funeral. That was good. He needed some quiet. Alrik slid his key into the lock at the top of the stairs and turned it. The old wooden door pushed open smoothly. Immediately ahead there was a wide window left ajar to circulate the air, fading sunlight bathing the room in egg-yolk orange. Alrik lit some candles in two candelabras around the room with some of Melalhir’s matches and closed the window with a whoosh, pulling the curtains closed. In the flickering light, the contents of the room both became clearer and more distorted. Along each wall were shelves, stacked high with books and old scrolls and pens, and where there were no books or scrolls, there were jars. In one, the pickled foetus of a magically mutated lizard, with no eyes and stone-flecked skin. In another, the skeleton of a little red frogbird from Canalas City. Crowded between these were an old desk and a rickety chair. The desk was covered in scattered books and papers. Many of them, at a glance from Alrik, were addressed to someone referred to only as ‘K.’ Alrik felt guilty for seeing that much, and didn’t pry further. In shrouded cases around the edges of the room sat things Alrik couldn’t see – things no one aside from the Doctor may have ever seen. He could only wonder about what they contained. Sitting down on the chair, he talked to himself.

“Yes, hello, good evening, mister em-Fuahim,” he said, bowing slightly as he spoke, acting out the scene. “I am afraid – I am terribly sorry to tell you that – I really ought to preface this by saying... well, no, that isn’t right.” He slumped down and covered his face with his hands. He tried again, no longer bothering to act out the motions. “Mister Em-Fuahim, I am of the knowledge that your son was the triggering factor for the death of the late Elder Shayid. I know this is difficult to hear, and...” He trailed off. He walked to the window and gazed out, opening the curtains a crack. He could see most of the city from his vantage point. Cinura was built into a cirque, with its southern end sloping off downwards to the sea. This meant the southern districts of the city were colder, and the richer Cinures tended to be, the further north they tended to live. In the far north district of Murkurkil, posh, shiny men like the parliamentarians and the Elderate lived luxuriously in vast villas with vaulted ceilings and servant-tended gardens. Unlike the rest of the city, their houses were not blue, but a cold grey, all ornate and laden with silver and gold. Alrik could see them from his vantage, their grey encircling the blue city like stones around a pond. Ta ta-ta-ta, ta-ta-ta-ta ta. Musical knocking came from the door. Despite himself, Alrik smiled. It was Doctor Melalhir. “Oh, hello Alrik!” said the doctor, hobbling into the room. Ibo Melalhir was a short, hunched man who buzzed with energy. His skin was the colour of burnt umber, and his eyes were sparkling and dark. His clothes were black in mourning, but his shoes shone with red velvet, and he had an unusually thick head of snow-white hair. As soon as he entered the room, he got to work, momentarily ignoring Alrik. He adjusted some objects on a shelf, dusting as he went. He reached into his satchel, carefully placing three small succulents on various shelves around the room. He quickly, almost anxiously, folded the many notes and letters he’d had on his desk into drawers and folders, out of sight. He did this all in silence. Alrik felt the urge to talk bubbling up in his chest like a nasty cough. He took a deep breath and closed his eyes. The doctor was adjusting a telescope. Alrik

spoke, but couldn’t address the elephant in the room immediately. “You attended the elder’s funeral. I saw. Shame about him, hmm?” he said. The doctor nodded, frowning, turning a dial on his telescope. “Yes. Shayid was a good man. Kinder than most.” Alrik nodded. He looked away, then stared back at the doctor. “I saw Elder Shayid die. It wasn’t natural and I know who killed him,” he blurted. All the air escaped the doctor’s body in a puff, and he slumped. After a pause, he sat at his desk and motioned to the other chair in the room. In the candle-lit darkness, the stern-faced doctor might have been made of gold and rusty iron. “Sit, child. Explain.” Alrik didn’t want to , but he forced himself to, struggling to form the right words. “I was out in the night three days ago walking in Murkurkil, up near the Can’las houses. I’d walked far that night; my mind was wandering. I was troubled, and hoped my walk would help me think. The path I walked went from dirt to paving and then the outermost Can’las house came into view; I didn’t know, but it was Shayid’s.” Alrik stuttered. The doctor waited, rigid. “I stopped on a low brick wall and lit a reed of worrywort; the Cinro pharmacist says it should help my nerves. A while after I started smoking, I saw Baalgali em-Fuahim. At first, I thought he was drunk, stumbling down the path. But as he approached, I felt a change in the air. All the hairs on my skin stood like needles. He was buzzing with electricity, and looked like he lacked control. I’m no magical expert, but I believe he was under the influence of something powerful.” “Seems so,” said the doctor. “Continue.” “Alright. So, I saw Baalgali, saw his state, and I was frightened and decided to leave. I snuffed out my reed and stood. However, once I did, I noticed Mr Shayid walking out into the garden of the nearby house. In his garden, the Elder sat and began making music. I couldn’t see him clearly through the bushes, but I heard him drumming. Something about the drumming must have attracted Baalgali. “I panicked. I thought I could either stay where I was or try to talk to Baalgali. Try and get him to snap out of it before he got anyone hurt. I know him, a little –

I’ve done deliveries to his house. So, I went towards him, but the magic was –” Alrik shook his head and blew from his cheeks “His magic was terrible. I was knocked back like an angry juksha had hit me. My blood felt red-hot. Baalgali continued to the elder, and I think the shock was too much for him, and he dropped. A stopped heart, maybe. I don’t know.” The doctor was silent and pale. They both sat in silence for a moment, and Alrik bit his thumbnail. The doctor’s eyes looked at nothing. They cleared, and he looked at Alrik. “Give me time to think. This changes some things, though I don’t know exactly what. Thank you, Alrik, for letting me know, but you must go from here now. If anyone finds this out, they might be worse than angry. You or I could be less than safe.” Alrik’s stomach twisted. “Unsafe? Here, in the tower? Or where? The city?” Melalhir shook his head, stood, and ushered Alrik to the door, hands clasped together. “Doesn’t matter. Go home. Don’t tell anyone, don’t do anything out of the ordinary. Keep a low profile.” He closed the door on Alrik, leaving him blinking in the darkness of the stairway. Alrik shook his head and walked down the stairs, stomach abuzz, cringing at shadows. Alrik was neither poor enough to live in the far south nor rich enough to live anywhere near the north, and so, like most Cinures, he lived somewhere in the middle. For him, it was the district of Coelhar, an area of middling reputation, middling temperature, and government-mandated middlingly sized trees. His flat was also, vitally, on the border of the district of Cinro, the lower-income trading district. At night there was some distant ruckus, animals kicking up dust, a few torches and arcane lights, but during the day it was a termite mound of activity; the bluish houses framed dozens upon dozens of stalls filled with mountain river fish and jellied eels and boxes of bananas and blueberries and sweets and cheap cloth. Merchants called out to ers-by and shouted monkeys away from their produce, and small colcol cats stretched out on rooftops to soak up the milky sun. Alrik’s mother and father, respectively a smithy and a tailor, journeyed to the

Cinro Marketplace daily to sell their wares. He inhaled deeply, trudging on, approaching his flat. In arcane light, he saw a shape upon the doormat. A colcol cat, lounging in some of the heat seeping under the door from inside. “Come here, colcola,” said Alrik, picking up the feline, which went limp in his hands. He walked a distance and placed the cat down, brushing its side with his hand. “Go have a bath, little one.” Alrik walked back to and opened the door and the warmth from inside made him flush. He smiled and took off his shoes and heard his father complain from the other end of the room. “What is wrong with this naca bloody calefactor?” Alrik’s eyes adjusted to the firelight from the hearth, and he saw his mother and father standing before a dingy old arcane machine. The heating element stood in the centre of the contraption, drooping. Alrik’s mother stood beside her husband in a deep blue nightgown – always one for comfortable clothes, like her son – and regarded the calefactor with disdain. Alrik’s mother tottered over, not so fast as she used to be after her sickness five years past, but still frighteningly fast, and as Alrik ed when she wrapped her arms around him, remarkably strong, too. He felt the air go out of him like a squeezed pair of bellows. She patted him on the back. “Gods, Alrik, I swear you grow taller and skinnier by the day. You should have taken my offer to work at the Cinro bread stand – some Canalas loaf from the bread bins might fatten you up a little.” She paused, glancing at her husband. Alrik’s father was leaning down and tinkering with the moribund heater, the on its backside unscrewed and open. “Arvid, say hello to your son.” Alrik’s father grunted and then turned around, his face softening. He walked to his son and took him into his burly arms, and Alrik was once again gratefully

crushed. The pressure made him feel secure. His father let go and took another look at the calefactor. His father truly was a man, broad-shouldered and muscled, with only a little softening in the middle from age. Alrik was told that he took much more after his uncle Foskir, his mother’s brother. A tall and thin man. Another beanpole. Alrik’s father turned and regarded his son with his dark eyes narrowed and his lips pursed. “Tell me, son. What do you know about calefactors? About, er, other such machines? You have some general knowledge in many areas.” Alrik hesitated. His mind was so full already. Alrik’s mother glanced at them both, exhaling gently, and waddled to the kitchen. “Upa, I think you’ve gotten me wrong,” said Alrik. “My free time comprises wandering the outskirts and in-skirts of the city writing about interesting plants and animals. My favourite part of yesterday was when I found a perfectly preserved egg laying on the ground. I know about as much about calefactors as a juksha knows about mathematics.” “In any case,” said Alrik’s father. “You’re smaller than me, and your hands are smaller than mine. Root around in there for me, will you? Any mez you find in there are yours. Gods know, some have probably ended up in there.” This turned out to be lucrative. Three double-mez coins had somehow accumulated within the turns of the calefactor; Gods knew why. Alrik pocketed them and then reached into the back of the machine and pulled out a vial of gelatinous liquid. It was green in a way that suggested former vibrance, but now held a closer resemblance to sputum. Alrik grimaced and handed it to his father, who held it limply, unsure what to do with it. “There’s your problem,” said Alrik, his chest swelling with the authority of his limited knowledge of the subject, as he rose to his feet and dusted off his hands. “The toxaument vial that provides the heater’s power has expired.” His father scowled at the small glass tube. “Expired? I bought the nacas thing last week. A bloody robbery, that’s what it is. I’ll be sure to speak to Mr emKaddin on Sufur street, I swear. What’s the point of spending so much if we have to use the smoky old fireplace, anyway?” He closed the inner with a

huff. The heating element wobbled and then fell off. Alrik’s mother called out from the kitchen. “Will you be having dinner with us tonight, Alrik?” He looked at his mother in confusion. She never asked him that. She would just tell him. His mother stood there, frumpy in her nightclothes, clutching a spatula and a dish filled with potatoes covered in city spices. Her expression was genuine. Nothing seemed out of the ordinary. But then why did she ask? “No, thank you, uma. I’m quite tired and would like to retire to my room. Please keep some food cool for me if there’s any left after you’re done.” Alrik’s mother looked at him and nodded. She put the pan down and motioned to him. He walked to her, and she embraced him again. It was still strong, this time, but not so hard. It was deeper, almost, like she was trying to keep him there with the force of her arms alone. The hug broke, and it looked like she might cry, though Alrik didn’t know why. “Goodnight, my son,” she said. His father clapped him on the shoulder and said the same. Alrik walked down the short hall to the door of his room. He looked back for a moment, then opened the door and collapsed onto his bed. He pulled a linen and alpaca wool quilt over himself and curled into a foetal pose. The doctor’s words played in his head and carried cold fear with them. A low profile. If only he could keep that with a clear conscience. I must tell someone, he thought. I need to tell Baalgali himself.

Chapter 2

“L umi! Lumi, wake up . You’re slipping.” Lumi opened her eyes. She felt ill and dissociative from the hours of touching the Layer beyond. The tang of the toxaument pine needles was still strong on her teeth, but their effect was fading. “Gimme a bit more to chew, will you?” she asked Aurin, cracking her neck. He ed her a handful and she grabbed it, grinding it up between her teeth. It tasted like cut grass. She closed her eyes. Time to focus. Time to cross back over, and to not slip again. The toxaument mixed with the spit in her mouth, and the warm night air before her dilated like the pupil of an eye. The world she saw before her was altered. Tilted. From this new angle, she could feel further. The next layer, the Quodrine, floated beneath the seen world like water under oil. It was exciting and sickening, and it made her stomach lurch. She raised her hands and looked out, seeing the contractions of air from Elder Mullamar’s mouth, and willing them stronger, louder. The other sonoranteer, a boy named Taksin, thanked her silently from the other side of the Anmon Courtyard. Hopefully, the volume hadn’t dipped too much when she went under. Time felt different through the Quodrine. Sitting there in her corner, fingers outstretched, what could have been hours or minutes slipped by and she felt her magic fade. Mullamar’s speech stopped, and Elder Shayid’s family and friends, his many grandchildren, and their terribly off-tune musical performance finally left. Six mouthfuls of tox were more than enough for the night, and the sky was brightening. Lumi lowered her shaking hands, sat back, and closed her eyes. She severed her connection to the Quodrine with a big hacking spit onto the ground next to her, and her stomach dropped. Aurin was by her side, one strong arm around her shoulders. “Welcome back to the world, Lume,” he said. His voice was low and playful. “You did good, sis,

eh? Most of the mourners have stumbled home by now. You can rest.” He sighed. “So that’s fifteen half-mezzevos. That’s good.” “Is it enough for the piss test they’re going to make me take in a week to ensure I didn’t sneak any home?” she asked. He laughed. “Two weeks of good bread and butter for a little discomfort on your part? That’s definitely something I’m ready to deal with.” Lumi poked her brother hard in the ribs.

“N ow, I know you do well with sound. I saw some of your work last night; it was good. For someone of your experience, your skills as a sonoranteer are above average.” Lumi smiled, but her smile had a sour tinge. For whatever reason, her mentor had opted to leave the funeral early last night, absent for most of the time she was casting. She wanted to know why; Gods knew Doctor Melalhir was the only person in the city, perhaps the entire country, who knew enough about magic to teach it to her. But she kept her mouth shut. If now was the time she had to learn, she would learn. “Thank you, Doctor.” The doctor laughed. He sat heavily on his desk chair, reaching underneath it. Lumi sat across from him on a stool, the cramped space of his Lagtower office around them. “I know you do well with sound,” he restated. “And that is commendable. Manipulating sound requires a certain alacrity and quickness of wit. However, sound carries no physical weight. As a magicworker, the bulk –” he chuckled at that, “– Of your work is dealing with tactile things. Hence, the boiled water test.” He took the item from under the desk. It was a glass kettle with an iron bottom. “You want me to boil water with magic? Is putting the kettle over a fire too cheap and easy?” said Lumi flatly. Melalhir looked at her evenly, his face stern. “I want you to boil the water in this kettle. It’s room temperature right now. Take your tox.” Lumi shrugged and did so, reaching into the pocket of her rough tros and procuring a vial. Inside was a dark green liquid flecked with purple and white. She pulled the cork out with a ‘careful!’ from the doctor and downed it. She blinked and snorted as it entered her body, was absorbed into her throat and from there her veins and muscles and brain. Her heart sped up, but her breathing slowed and deepened. Melalhir appeared before her, as she opened her eyes, like a shifting oil painting. That was better than last time; either it was a more pleasant mix, or she was getting used to it.

“Maintain your grip on the usual world,” cautioned the Doctor. His words came at Lumi as if through a long tunnel. Images arrived in her mind a half second after she saw them. She closed her eyes, outstretching an arm, and exhaled, focusing. When she opened her eyes once more, the blur had receded to the edges of her vision. She could see each individual hair, mole, and follicle on the Doctor’s face in exquisite and uncomfortable detail. The glass of the kettle no longer looked smooth and uniform, but was now a cracked, bumpy landscape, like a great sheet of scarred ice. The iron at its bottom looked like a mountain face, flecked with rust and impurities that now looked enormous. The water looked largely the same as it had; whatever smaller parts it was made of were harder to see individually. Still, she focused on it, tracing its movements by the tiny particulates of iron and dust floating within. They looked as big as stones. With a psychosomatic shaking of her right hand, she made the patch of water boil. She took what made up the water and made it shake. “Interesting tack,” said the Doctor, the words bouncing around the tunnel before reaching her. Lumi stopped and watched as the agitated water boiled and then, mixing with the cool water in the rest of the kettle, mellowed out. She puzzled over that. How best should she heat the water, if it was impossible to heat the whole kettle’s worth by working on the water directly? She snapped her fingers. “I’ve got it,” she said. “I just have to –” “Lumi!” came a shout from the door. “Come quick!” “Fuck!” Lumi’s connection to the Quodrine shook, and she vomited in her mouth, turned around and fell off her chair. The shouter was Girrin Halver, a thin girl with eyes like wide bowls, hair like embers, and an affinity for puffy beige skirts. The one she was wearing now billowed as she ran towards Lumi, thrown up with the wind from outside. Slender fingers gripped Lumi’s broad back, and she felt them through the Quodrine’s film. Doctor Melalhir handed her something – the kettle – and she knelt, shaking, and pushed two fingers down her throat. She gagged and vomited again, losing her breakfast and the magic.

The toxaument floated in the kettle’s torpid water like a foul tea. The Quodrine faded to the periphery of Lumi’s mind, and she slumped again, Girrin’s bony arms ing her. She let the small girl help her up. The doctor stood still, observant and concerned. He looked to Girrin. “I trust you have an excellent reason for interrupting Miss Hellemar’s studies.” Girrin looked at him with disgust and began to lead her friend away. When she stopped to speak, Lumi heard everything as if through rushing water. “I don’t know how you convinced Lumi to be your little magic experiment, right, because she’s usually smart. If you touch her, I swear to Mond, I’ll throw you out of this tower.” The doctor went white, and Girrin spat at the ground. “Aye, don’t think no one knows about that because people do. You touch my friend and I’ll fucking cut you. I don’t care how magical you are, you old limpet,” she said. Lumi quietly protested, but Girrin shushed her as she led her out. It was about seven thirty in the morning, and the air was clear and crisp. Girrin held Lumi’s hand and waved down a bright red carriage, driven by a broad man with a tall hat, a moustache, smoking a fat cigar. His clothes had the cut and style of Murkurkil, but they were wool instead of cotton. A wannabe rich man. Girrin reached into her pockets and pulled out a fat handful of mez. The coins glittered upon her hand in the morning light. “We want to get to Ollol, please, sir. Far as you’ll take us. Got a little brother in the south side.” The driver eyed the money. Girrin handed it to him, and he bagged it in a satchel by his side. “Very well. Won’t stay long so my juksha don’t freeze. Hop in, girls.” Girrin helped Lumi inside, and Lumi rested her head on Girrin’s lap. The inside of the carriage was lined with yellow mildewy velvet. From the ceiling hung a small arcane light, currently unlit.

The driver commanded a forward trot and set the two powerful gracile juksha into a light trot. The wheels of the carriage creaked and turned. Lumi stirred. “Girrin, you can’t spend that much money just to get us across the city.” Girrin shushed her, stroking her head. “My ma and pa give me more than I need, Lume, you know that. Plus, we need to get, ah, there,” she said, lowering her voice. “We’re bloody late. Lots of things to talk about.” “Like the expedition.” Lumi sat up, most of the green gone from her face. Girrin sighed and stopped stroking Lumi’s hair. “Yes, including the expedition. Tell me, Lumi, why can’t you just stay here and fight it with us? What is it about that frozen fucking wasteland that has you so enamoured?” Lumi was silent for a moment. She opened the curtain. People had begun their daily activities, setting up their stalls and hugging their loved ones goodbye as they headed off to work. Everywhere were sunwaaks, musket over their shoulders. A noodle cart was being shouted off their place by one of them and moved to somewhere it’d be less in the way of pedestrians – and not sell as well. “The snow, Gir.” Girrin blinked. “You can get fucking snow at home, Lumi.” “You know that’s not what I mean. Down there is the biggest magical leak in the Eine. People are afraid to go. We take back a decent metre of snow, boil that down, access the magic in it...” Girrin begrudgingly nodded. “It’d be useful. It’d give us an edge.” “A huge one.” “If, and only if, we were able to use it. There’s a chance it wouldn’t work. We couldn’t access it, or it’d be too bloody strong. We’d burn our arms off or some shit.” “I’m willing to risk a lot for that chance,” said Lumi. She spoke softly, her arm hanging limply out the window. They turned onto a street where the dark sea

could be seen more clearly, the landmass of the frozen island Upollos paper-thin against the horizon. Lumi daydreamed and hoped she would be there soon, on her way to the bottom of the world.

Chapter 3

Alrik awoke, cold and contorted, with mist licking the outside of his room’s little window. His room was spare, just his bed and his shelf and five books on various kinds of natural history. He moved, groaning. He felt cold and not only because of the chill in the air. He felt drained of life, tired though he had just awoken. He climbed up on the bed and looked out the window. He could barely see a thing for the mist. He suddenly felt terrifically lonely. In that room, with that mist, he might as well have been the last person in the Eine. He could have called for his parents for comfort, but he didn’t want to bother them. Melancholia was no cause for being a nuisance. He did not fall asleep quickly, but sat for an hour beforehand in painful silence. The sun rose over the blue city and burned the mist away. In the night there had been thunder, but the sky was clear now. Alrik awoke with a finality that meant he wouldn’t see sleep again. He thought of all the other people waking up – the children in their homes. The Elderate. Baalgali. He clicked his tongue thrice – a nervous tic – and got dressed. Undershirt is sweaty again, discard it. Underclothes. Shirt. Breeches. He ran his fingers through his close-cropped black hair and washed his face with water left in a bucket in the house’s main room. It was mundane. He tapped himself on the head with the heels of his hands, as if that would unplug some reservoir of clear thought in his foggy mind. It didn’t. He went to give his hair another look in the mirror and then turned away, shaking his head. He stepped out onto the street and was met with a wall of smell and sound. Spices, sweat, and meats wafted from busy nearby Cinro, with the sounds of squabbling humans, grumbling juksha and chattering monkeys. Quieter among

them were the colcol cats. Where was Alrik walking to? He was not entirely sure. He knew what he was walking towards, at least. Baalgali. He needed to talk to him. He hadn’t looked self-aware when he’d killed Shayid. He had to know what he’d done if he didn’t already know. Alrik had to tell him. It’s not reasonable, the logical part of Alrik’s mind told him. It changes nothing whether he knows or not. Let it go. But he couldn’t. He had to do the right thing. It was Ochtdi, the first day of the weekend, so the streets were busy – even Sarrayup street, far from Cinro, was buzzing. There was some chance he’d see Baalgali on the street; that would make the ‘finding Baalgali’ part of his problem relatively easy. However, the ‘telling Baalgali he was guilty of manslaughter’ part, Alrik thought, was likely to be harder. The chance was slim, anyway. Baalgali was a rich boy and lived up in Can’las Town. Alrik took a step to the side of the road, ing the worrywort and papers in his coat pocket. He fumbled around with sweaty hands. Taking a small piece of paper and a tube of dried wort, he rested against the speckled blue of a low house and began assembling a cigarette. He looked dead ahead, trying to ignore the people walking by. He licked the edge of the paper and rolled the herb in, striking the match against the wall of the house. It lit, and he burned the cigarette and closed his eyes. The drum beat in his chest settled a little, and the knife of self-consciousness lost a little of its edge. He looked up at the sky. It was mostly clear. A rare sight. Alrik heard men shouting and looked back down to the street. As he watched, a huge white juksha bucked its rider off its saddle and bolted, trailing a length of thick, frayed rope. People scattered as the creature charged past, barrel-chested and puffing and stomping the ground with chunky footpads. Its eyes and nostrils were wide with fright, and it flicked its ears nervously, tail whipping.

“Sorry! Sorry!” said Alrik, pushing past someone as he made chase. The creature bellowed as it crashed headfirst into a cart filled with lychees and plumbs, wooden splinters bouncing harmlessly off its leathery hide, then backed out, kicking dust into a thick cloud. Policemen – the sunset walkers, or ‘sunwaaks’ after their bright orange uniforms – pointed their muskets at the animal, but Alrik waved his hands, trying to stop or at least distract them, as the creature continued its rampage. His heart was beating so hard it hurt his chest. “Hey, hey, hey! It’s okay! We’re handling this!” he shouted to the sunwaaks. He could not let the creature be shot. The juksha took a sharp turn through an alley and Alrik followed, stumbling after it onto Cinura’s main street, where everything was somehow brighter, louder, and smellier. He turned, running into another alleyway, where decrepit people were consuming odd-smelling substances just out of the hubbub of the main drag, and then turned into a smaller, less populated road. The alleys were mazelike, but he knew the way. Alrik took a running jump and grabbed onto the lip of an alley wall and pulled himself up, looking over. This alley was higher than the main street, and he could see the juksha continuing its trail of destruction north, approaching the outskirts of Murkurkil. Alrik grimaced – Murkurkil was filled with the kind of people who’d gladly kill an animal to maintain the integrity of their front lawns. Catch it, and hide it away somewhere until people calm down, he thought, dropping from the wall. Protect it. Alrik ran through the alleys, acid building in his muscles, making his body pulse with pain, to reach the creature without drawing the attention of the crowds in the main street. He wasn’t sure what he’d do when or if he caught up with the creature. But if it’s going Murkurkil-ways anyway, he thought to himself, why not? He thought of a few reasons, but chose not to acknowledge them.

At last, the beast was directly beside him, the two of them separated by only a thin alley wall. He could hear it panting and grumbling. So, seeing the fence ending, he breathed deeply and leapt around the corner, ready to stop the beast; to help it, hopefully. In doing so, he collided with someone. “Moons!” the woman shrieked, tumbling over and spilling her colourful skirts. Alrik stumbled and yelped as he hit the cobbled stone. He scrambled to his feet and ran towards the woman. The juksha, bellowing, thundered past. “Ay-oor, I am so sorry,” Alrik said, grasping the woman’s arm and helping her up. She glared at him with watery blue eyes, dusting off her dress. “You’re lucky the road this way is cobble and not dirt, boy,” she said. “Otherwise, my dress would be ruined. I’m on my way to a wedding, for Mond’s sake.” Alrik looked at the dust still hanging in the air. He’d never catch the juksha now. Alrik had heard accents like hers before, but he couldn’t place hers – was she from Canalas City? Her paper-white skin would have suggested as much, though skin colour varied wildly in Cinura. She warned him to be more careful and turned to leave. A thought struck him. “Hello! Excuse me, I’m sorry but –” “What is it, donnai?” she interrupted. She held herself like one of the penguins Alrik had seen once caged by a street vendor – high, proud, and unintentionally silly. “What wedding is it – is the one you are attending?” Alrik stammered. The woman narrowed her eyes and looked him up and down. He wasn’t wearing rags, but he wasn’t dressed like a citizen of Murkurkil.

“The wedding of Darrus Brindle and Maria. The nephew of the bloody king.” She left, trotting north. His pride wounded a little, Alrik watched as a sweaty-looking farmer type, puffing hard, streaked past where the juksha had gone. Alrik laughed under his breath. Maybe it won’t get caught. It could reach the edge of the city and run free, he thought. The idea was unrealistic but comforting. He began to walk north, too. The nephew of the king of Canalas himself, ruler of half the continent, here in Cinura? That sounded like a honeypot for men with too much money. Men with too much money and, Alrik hoped, their sons. Some said Cinura was first coloured blue because of the peace its founders wanted it to represent. Others said it was an offering to a Kandrii god. Some said it was chosen because the colour somehow repelled mosquitoes. In any case, the city was not a uniform colour; with differing sun damage throughout, minutely different shades of paint, and the many minds and cultures that had formed the city, no two houses were the same shade of blue. A humble cyan jutted against a deep pelagic storehouse, and many smaller buildings for various uses: coloured pale and bright, purplish, and greenish, but always blue. Alrik used these differences to mark his journey; the houses became paler and their paint scabbier towards the outskirts of town before the colonial houses began. He ran his hand across a rough wall, brick covered in hard clay and painted over in lapis. He ed a great steaming building with an ornate silver door and noises inside. A small sign in Nuarec by the door said, ‘remove shoes before entering,’ in faded and flaking gold filigree. From the outside it looked like a brothel, but it smelled like fetid skins and bleach. Alrik wrinkled his nose. ing the dye-house, Alrik felt the incline in his legs, and turned to see a lengthy procession of wedding goers, flocking like geese up a switchback. Their dresses were in the colours of Dubcloch; thundercloud grey, gold, white and noon-sky blue. The king’s colours. Some of them hoisted little flags. Even in Can’las town, they stuck out. The procession flowed through Can’las Town like a loud, gaudy river.

As the houses became more grandiose, the roads became more gently inclined, switchback upon switchback, for the benefit of richer men’s feet. The party turned a corner, and the great mountains beyond the city stood faded and monstrous in the distance, and before them on the side of the road was a mansion the likes of which Alrik had never seen up close, richer than any place he’d dared to stroll. It looked like a scale model of the Canalian palaces he’d seen paintings of. It stood, milky white and ash grey stone with vaulted ceilings and delicate patterning of Mondine figures around its windows. It dwarfed the tumultuous crowd bustling around it. At its front were two moongates, like great open eyes. Alrik could see the corner of what looked like a courtyard on its eastern edge. A tall, wickedly sharp black metal fence surrounded the entire property. Dubclochian flags hung from all over. Alrik took a deep breath and moved through the crowd, slipping into the maw of the leftmost gate. If he had thought the crowd was thick on the road, that had been water to what was now wet clay. He couldn’t stop without being violently pushed and couldn’t move without receiving angry cries and glares. Finally, with a great struggle, he emerged from a heavy clump of wedding goers and saw a clearing in the form of the smoking area, clearly designated with a sign written in Nuarec propped up on the green grass. In the middle of the area was an austere stone statue of the god Mond himself, one moon in each hand, jaguar face stern. Around it was some light scaffolding, probably for repairs. If only Alrik could have climbed up without making himself too conspicuous, he might have been able to get a bird’s-eye view of the area and seek out Baalgali once and for all. He approached the smoking zone. About five people sat or stood around some benches, holding cigars and cigarettes. “Oh, hello Alrik. I didn’t know you were invited.” Alrik turned his head towards the voice. A young man had emerged from behind the statue at an angle Alrik could not

have seen behind the scaffolding. Baalgali grasped Alrik’s hand with the kind of pressure a python applies a small animal and shook it vigorously. Alrik, thin as he was, trembled like a leaf in the wind and attempted to return the shake. Baalgali looked at Alrik for a moment and then motioned for him to come sit down on a bench. He fished around in his pockets for a cigarette and matchbox. He offered it to Alrik. “Thank you, but I don’t smoke,” he said. Baalgali narrowed his eyes. “This is the smoking area.” Alrik blinked. “Yes. What I intended to say, rather, was that I don’t smoke tobacco. I smoke other things.” Baalgali raised his eyebrows. “Alrik, this is not the place for – for tox. Why –” “Pharmaceuticals.” “Ah.” “Ah.” Baalgali struck a match and held it to his cigarette. The fire lit his face in orange and Alrik stared for a moment. He was handsome, in a Skandrian way; strong, pointed nose, and deep-set eyes. Curly hair, well-maintained, but he was a spoiled rich boy and a murderer. Even if he’d been inebriated at the time. “On a note related to that, there is something I must talk to you about,” said Alrik, taking a worrywort stick from his bag. Baalgali lent him a match, striking it on his own box. The smoke filled Alrik’s mouth with a taste of acorns and tar. Baalgali looked at him side-on. Their relationship was friendly, but shallow – Alrik had delivered him Skandrian spices from the Cinro markets a few times.

The chasm of wealth and prestige between them was immense. “Baalgali, I know about Elder Shayid. I know what you did and if you don’t do something I – I will.” Baalgali’s face darkened. He stomped on his cigarette and grabbed Alrik’s arm. “Come with me.” Frightened, Alrik resisted and pulled away. Baalgali glared at him. “Myute damn you, boy,” said Baalgali –‘boy,’ though he was barely older than Alrik, if at all. “I need to speak to you somewhere more private. Surely you understand what is at stake.” Alrik stared at him for a moment, and then followed him behind the statue, to a nest of scaffolding shrouded into a makeshift hiding spot with a tarpaulin. Baalgali beckoned him into the darkness in between the sheets. He could barely see him beyond an impression of a sharp nose and dark eyes. They were so close that Alrik could feel Baalgali’s breath. Then Alrik felt a hand pressing him hard into the statue’s base. Baalgali was looking him directly in the eyes. “Listen,” he said, through gritted teeth. “I don’t know what you saw. I know little of what I did, ‘til I came sober and saw the man slumped. I was... there was something unusual about what I took. I didn’t mean to kill him. I am not a murderer. I am a lord. A lord’s son.” Baalgali looked down as he spoke, and his grip loosened on Alrik. Alrik wriggled away and grunted, rubbing his chest. “I am not a murderer,” said Baalgali, indignant. “Telling people I am one would be unwise.” “Who said I wanted to tell anyone else?” mumbled Alrik. He took a deep breath. His mind was floundering with stress, and his chest ached. He stumbled halfway out of the scaffold shelter, and the overcast skies began to rain. The raindrops on his skin were invigorating. “You can do what you want with it based on whatever ‘right’ means to you, but I go by what ‘right’ means to normal people. The elder had children and grandchildren, and they – they walk these streets, and they don’t know what happened to him. Who are you, and who am I, to deny them that truth? We are no one. We have no right.”

Baalgali looked at him, expression cloudy as the sky above. He didn’t just look angry now – he looked sad. And scared. “Don’t tell anyone, boy,” he said, his quivering voice still full of condescension. “It won’t go well.” I didn’t need to tell anyone but you was what Alrik was going to say, before Baalgali pushed past him and left, merging into the wedding crowd. Alrik was left standing, half in shadow and out, half wet and half dry, half exhilarated and half terrified. The rest of Ochtdi ed quietly, then Ottodi and Tinden, and the weekend was over. Alrik woke up, pushed a book he’d fallen asleep reading off his chest, and rubbed his eyes. The warbling call of an ever-suff’ring-bird sounded bright outside his window as he pulled on his clothes and brushed his teeth with a frayed reed. He blinked sleep out of his eyes, took his house key, his pack, and a sandwich, and walked out. His parents had woken hours ago – delivery work required less hours than handcrafts. It was a quiet morning. That was normal – Cinura wouldn’t change its nature to match the boldness or stupidity of what Alrik had done, as much as it felt like it should. Alrik walked to the dusty red postbox on the corner of Katr Lane and Felup Close and took a keycoin from his pocket. He slid the coin into a rust-lined slot on the machine, and all the postbox’s little doors opened. Alrik methodically checked through them. One caught his eye: divorce papers for a Mrs. A. Pleigh in Murkurkil. Don’t want to go up that way again soon if I can help it, he thought, and placed it back, pushing its cubby closed and making sure it clicked. It was easy to lose letters if you didn’t make sure they clicked. Alrik could walk a decent way in a day, but he chose carefully anyway. If too many of the letters placed in the postbox remained undelivered at the end of the day, Alrik could lose his job. It was better to be strategic. So, he chose letters for Cinro, Anmon, Arama, and the city centre, and started off at a trot. If he were fast enough, he’d be able to take notes on his surroundings

and deliver all the mail with time to spare. Cinuravese postmen like Alrik delivered directly to the door. In part, this was because the city liked to portray them as personable and friendly. Mostly it was because only the richest Cinures could afford front lawns to put letterboxes on. The first three people Alrik delivered to took the letters without a word. He recognised some of the letters he gave them from their colours and textures: notices of debt, government request denials, and calls to pay for war bonds. Alrik didn’t know where the war was, but apparently it was close enough to pester people in his city. The fourth letter was addressed to the Belfry Police Station in the Central Business District – to a Lieutenant E. R. Tafthi. Alrik didn’t recognise the letter from its design. It’s like a hive of sunwaaks, minus all the things that make real insect hives interesting, he thought, trotting towards Belfry. He felt more and more uncomfortable as he approached the long, low building, but he pushed on. It was the logical choice. It was the perfect choice to fit his quota for the day, even if the building itself was crawling with waaks. He arrived at the door fifteen minutes before first dayrest. Hopefully, it’d only be a few guards on duty, and not the full force. He knocked, skinny fingers making the hard door boom. A thin man in sunwaak attire opened the door, blinking when his eyes focused on Alrik like a thought had struck him. He nodded at Alrik and motioned him inside. Alrik hesitated, confused, and thrust the letter out before him. The sunwaak smiled without his eyes, took the letter from Alrik’s hands, and then leant over him and shoved him into the foyer. Alrik stumbled and blinked in the relative dimness. Five sunwaaks in full uniform stood before him. In the distance, some could be seen in their pyjamas, getting ready for first dayrest – though some looked on in interest to what was happening in the foyer.

A sunwaak stepped forward, and presented a pair of manacles to Alrik. “You can go quietly, or we can subdue you. We won’t let you hurt anyone else again.” Alrik started to laugh. He felt small and frightened, but he was mostly confused. “What?”

Chapter 4

Baalgali took a flute of chilli wine, ignored the server by the moon-shaped doorway, and strode into the foyer in a huff. He ed of the gentry who looked at him and whispered as he ed. That was allowed. They could do that if they liked. He sipped the wine, and the alcohol and spice burned his mouth and throat. It almost had the kick of something from back in Skander-Sareen. None of the nuance or finesse, though. He stopped, briefly examining the foyer; it was a warm day, and arcane windblowers were placed at intervals around the room, where pink-skinned pastel-dressed gentlemen and ladies stood trying to relieve themselves from the heat of their puffy skirts and heavy jackets. The table was covered with porcelain plates adorned with the sugary, shiny finger foods the Canalian gentry loved; salted and spiced macadamia nuts, santaline peaches, muntaberries, kuzhira fruit pickled with soy sauce, candied insects, and finger limes. Baalgali grabbed a handful of nuts with carelessness that made a few of the pampered poodle people glance up at him in surprise. Not all Canalian food was bad, he thought. Just most. Their customs, though, were a chore to memorise. His father’s tenure in Cinura was for three years, with all their time spent in the Crown Quarter. Alrik had said people further downhill called it ‘Canalas Town.’ It was a little Canalas away from the great smoggy city itself, a microcosm of all the niceties and idiosyncrasies of the old and dusty Crown’s tradition, warped into a caricature by distance. To appease his father, Baalgali had done his best to learn the mores and formalities of the Canalian gentry. He had done well, he thought, and yet every

party he attended felt like acupuncture by a practitioner whose needles were just a little too thick. He took the stairs leading up from the lower dining hall two at a time. All that, and now the boy. The boy and the dream. Baalgali scratched his nose as he reached the top of the stairwell. Alrik had said that Baalgali had committed a murder of a government official. That was quite a statement. Elder Shayid had died of a cardiac arrest; he was well into his sixtieth moon-turn. And yet, something was pressing into Baalgali’s mind that he couldn’t place. He needed a moment. Even the corners of the walls in this building were decorated with flowing patterns, harkening to the rivers on the moon Middagh or the namesake canals of Canalas City. Baalgali ducked into one of these ornate alcoves, sending a quick prayer to Yerek, the Skandrian ghoul god of the dark, to keep him hidden from any pesky gentlefolk. He ducked down to the floor, took a pose of meditation he’d seen the monks of the Zhayry assume, and explored his reasons for not attending the funeral of Elder Shayid. Logically, there was nothing; he was the son of Fuahim em-Lehr, and was expected, no, required at such events. Even just to stand among the common folk for a few moments and listen to the officiator drone. That was the reasoning for his attendance at every event in the last three years. It was the reason he was at the wedding he was trying so hard to slip away from. So, he explored beyond the logical parts of his mind, offering a prayer to Myute, the holy cobra, for greater mental clarity. It may have been Myute, or it may have simply been concentration, but Baalgali then noticed a presence in his mind he had overlooked. It was amorphous and impossible to touch on, like a memory held once in a moment and then

forgotten, or a sneeze building but never released. Baalgali pushed into the presence, bringing his shoulders back and deepening his breath, just as he’d seen the monks do. With a sinking feeling in his gut, he became aware of an unawareness. The amorphous shape in his mind was a hole in his memory that had been so missing as to not even an absence. He poked at it and prodded at it, but all it gave him were vague images and feelings. A buzz in his chest like too much liquor but dancing within him. His bare soles on the street at night. Then, a woman’s face. A girl’s. Large eyes and a small mouth, a little crooked nose. It was dark, but she looked Cinuravese; allcoloured. Baalgali’s stomach sank further. Something had happened to him, and it was connected to the death of the elder. His blood ran cold, and he prayed to Myute again and Achay, the goddess of life, for good measure. Cool your blood, he thought to himself. You may have been drugged. Toxxed. You’ll have to address the security concern. No worry. Still, he needed more time to breathe. The stupid Cinuravese boy. The girl, whoever she was. It was frustrating, and concerning, but it wasn’t enough to cause great alarm. He just needed to breathe. “Hello, sir! Are you lost? I’d be happy to point out directions, though I’m a little new to this place myself.” She was a servant girl with four moles beside her mouth and the figure of a chamber pot, despite her youth; some people just didn’t have Davacht’s blessing. Baalgali sneered through a smile. “I’m quite alright, thank you,” he said, standing up straight and brushing himself off. The stumpy servant girl smiled, nodded, adjusting her tray of chilli coffee and candied insects, and clomped away.

Baalgali waited until the heavy footsteps faded to the general hubbub around the corner, took the breath he’d been holding for all this time, and walked out. One thing that interested Baalgali about the parties of the Canalian gentry was how they segregated themselves, even at what seemed like the highest level. The head of a textile empire and a Narrahan Province oil baron might address each other like they viewed each other as equals, but both men were silently counting every mezzevo the other man had, and only one of them would come out on top. This spiderweb hierarchy of wealth went from the fish vendor in Cinro all the way up to King Ebon in Canalas City. Much of the time, the slightly more-rich had their own spaces in parties. The first time Baalgali had seen one was by mistake, and he’d quickly been stared down and out, his tail between his legs like a jackal frightened by gunfire. He’d discovered the next time that with his head held high enough, his shoulders held back enough and his face carrying enough distaste, he could as someone above the standing his father afforded him. The distaste was easy; it wasn’t an act. Baalgali entered the second dining hall and nodded to a portly man with a wiry moustache who held a thin, yellow-haired woman by his side. The atmosphere in this room was more austere and contained; rather than live musicians, automatons provided the music, playing precise notes and singing in ethereal, wordless voices through pipes in their ‘faces.’ The automaton was a Skandrian invention and had unnerved Baalgali since he was a child. They’d followed him here, and he didn’t like it. Someone tapped him on the shoulder, and Baalgali bit on his tongue as not to flinch. The man attached to the finger was the same portly man he’d seen on entry. That nod had not been an invitation. Baalgali swallowed his annoyance. “Good day,” he said to the man, licking his lips. “Of whom do I have the pleasure?” The man grinned. His cheeks were ruddy. He took Baalgali’s hand and shook it aggressively. “Farrer Aulwynn, here all the way from the Land of a Thousand Lakes. Lots of good oil there – not just up in Oilen Province! Ha-ha!”

Baalgali retracted his hand slowly, nodding and smiling like he cared. “And you, your reputation precedes you,” continued Mister Aulwynn, not losing any steam. “Baalgali em-Fuahim, Ambassador-Son to Fuahim em-Lehr! I’ve heard so much about your father’s lobbying. Really bringing Canalas and all its subsidiaries into the eleventh century with Skander and the rest of us. Mond above, they’re so behind, aren’t they? Whores in your city can be paid by paltwire, but down here there’s barely the infrastructure for basic communication between cities.” Baalgali nodded, pretending to be thoughtful and taking a flute of chocolate liqueur from a ing waitress. He felt sure this man was manoeuvring him into something, positioning him somewhere that he could slip and make things uncomfortable for his father by comparing Canalas negatively to SkanderSareen. So, he played a different role; one he genuinely held some belief in. “Oh, yes. Progress is important, but we must also for safety. How many more houses burn down in Skander-Sareen, where there are paltwires between every house? Where everyone has access to toxauments to use at their will? Isn’t it frightening to have people walking around with that sort of power unchecked?” Baalgali felt genuine fear creeping into his voice as he spoke, ing that unknown woman’s face, and he breathed in deeply through his nose. Mister Aulwynn looked confused. Of course, he didn’t know the context. “Surely you don’t oppose this progression. Setting aside steam technology, advancements in making magic cheaper and more efficient are what will transform our world into a more connected, educated place.” Baalgali nodded and raised his cup to the man. He’d reached his limit again. Maybe the thought at the back of his head, the memory, was getting to him more badly than he’d thought. “You make good points, Mister Aulwynn, but I’m afraid I must use the restroom. Please don’t feel a need to direct me – I know the way.” Baalgali bowed shallow, placed his half-empty flute, entirely against etiquette, on the corner of a table, and left the level again. He went up. He wasn’t sure what would be there, but there’d be fewer people, and that was enough. The stairs squeaked – wood instead of stone – and the air was dustier. The hall itself, though, was as squeaky and polished and preened as any other corner of

this Myute-forsaken building. He took his breath back and let it out in a few whispered prayers to any of the gods that might be listening. He gathered himself in a long few seconds, and thought to go back, to apologise and greet those at the upper-level party as if he had just gone to perform his ablutions, and then he heard a crashing of broken glass from the level he was on. Baalgali froze, waiting for the commotion that’d come from the sound. None came. The floor beneath his feet echoed with the sounds of the automated music and voices raised in enthusiastic conversation. No one had heard the glass break, and no one else from the party was on this level. This wasn’t something as trivial as a dropped cup. He carefully took his shoes off. It was impolite in Canalian society, but he knew it would make his walking quieter. His father had taken him hunting as a child back home, into the scrubby savannah north of the city, with a gun longer than he was tall. He hadn’t shot anything. They had gone barefoot, and the sand burned his feet until they were red and blistered. His father had told him it was part of the experience. No hunter, just as no predator, does their hunting with anything but slow, soft steps, until the strike. He heard the crunch of boots on glass coming from a room further up the hall. He quickened his pace, leaning into each step to minimise the sound of foot meeting floor, and then heard the crunch again. He was outside the door now, and he realised he wasn’t sure what to do. Confront the intruder? Who could it be, anyway? Surely there were guards positioned at every point of the building’s perimeter. Some drunk fool had somehow scaled the building, perhaps using a tree, and crashed through the window. Baalgali reached up to the door’s handle, but his grip faltered. Why should he be the one to apprehend the intruder? It’d help my standing, he thought, and turned the doorknob. He stood to his full height to face the intruder, and his mouth fell open.

The woman who stood before the broken window was someone he had seen before. The face in his memories. His stomach turned. She looked equally surprised, her hands fidgeting to something behind her. She was not drunk or belligerent, but sober and kitted out with what looked almost like soldier’s attire. “You toxxed me,” Baalgali said. “You toxxed me. How did you do that? Why did you do that?” The girl looked at him with wide rabbit eyes, and then scrunched her mouth up and replied in a small, Cinuravese-accented voice. “I’m trying to do things. Fix things. Please forgive me,” she said. Then, she took a rusty wooden pistol from behind her back, raised it, and fired. The ball hit Baalgali in the chest, bringing with it a flash of terrifying, white-hot pain. There was a crunch and a pop and Baalgali felt a horrible emptiness as a lung collapsed, and something that might have been a rib snapped and projected in a bloody shard through his overshirt. Before he ed his descent, he’d fallen to the floor. The gunshot had caused a commotion; the gunwoman didn’t have another gun, and now didn’t have the precious minutes needed to reload her first one. Baalgali could hear footsteps rushing up the stairs. Guards, only now deciding to do their jobs properly. The girl ran out of the room, was accosted by guardsmen, and then dragged screaming away. Other guards and servants swarmed through the hallway, until one stumbled upon Baalgali, his world turning grey. “We need a nearworker, and quickly. The ambassador’s boy has been shot!” said a voice, close to Baalgali’s body but far from his mind.

Chapter 5

The carriage driver left them about five hundred metres into Ollol District. The air was bitterly cold. They walked south, staying in the shadows of houses and trees. The streets were sparse, then abandoned as they crossed into Joyrey District; there was no need for sunwaaks in a place with no people. Girrin produced a single coat from her pack. “Might I ask if you’ve got any of that tox left in you?” she asked through chattering teeth once they’d left the carriage driver far behind. No one else was in sight. Lumi laughed. Her lips were turning blue. “Oh, so magic is awful until it can warm your skinny behind, hey?” “Shut your arse and warm us up!” snapped Girrin. Lumi smiled. Her body had just enough tox in it; enough to keep her warm and calm without any nausea or paranoia. She held out her hands, concentrating. She focused on some dust particles floating in the air before her and made them shake. There was a burst of warmth, which quickly dissipated. “We’re going to have to rush through the warm pockets as we go. Nothing’s solid enough for anything better. Race you to the church?” “Catch me if you can, short-arse.” Girrin grinned and leapt forward, closely pursued by Lumi, bursting the air in little flashes of heat. Lumi thought the old church must have been stuffy before rioters tore it open ninety years before. Maybe she only imagined churches in far-off lands to be bigger, but something about this one seemed like it had been stifling. She helped Girrin through their usual hole in the wall and went after her, scraping her knees on the old bricks slick with frost. After all this time, the front doors were still locked, and the locks had rusted shut. Years ago, the church floors might have been carpeted, because now they were

covered in thick moss that released water like a squeezed sponge underfoot. The church was warmer than outside – the heat from the weak sunlight trapped by the remains of the roof, beams bare like a ribcage. Through the coloured window depicting the jaguar-god Mond holding the moons in his hands, the church’s little overgrown nave was lit by a wavering, rainbow light. “This room always unsettles me,” whispered Lumi, wiping sleet off her knees. The overgrown nave was quiet, sound muffled by moss and bushes. Down the nave’s other end, they could hear talking through an old door; the vestry where the Mondinist priests used to change. The pair continued forward, tiptoeing over and around roots and undergrowth. The voices through the door became more distinct as they approached. Girrin reached the door and knocked. Her knuckles stood out red on white hands. “What’s the ?” came a gravelly voice. Henrik. “Eat shit and open the door,” said Girrin. Henrik laughed, and the door swung open. Warm light and warm air spilled from inside. Girrin and Lumi dashed in, closing the door behind them. The vestry was buzzing and warm, nearly fifty bodies crowded within. Down the end of the room, past wardrobes of rotting moon-patterned cloaks, was Irinus. He crouched before a great easel and paper, pen in hand, drawing. Every few seconds he dipped the pen into a pot of ink right by his foot. “Morning, Girrin. Lumi,” he said without turning around. “You’re late.” “Lumi was off with weird old Doctor Melalhir,” said Girrin. Lumi gave her a sour look. Irinus turned and looked at them. His skin was deep brown, so dark it was near

purple. He stared at them for a moment imively. “That’s fine. Some magic could be useful,” he said at length. He stood up. Behind him was a map of the south-east part of the continent. Cinura was marked by a dot at the very southern tip of the country Roït. That was as far south as the map went. “So,” said Irinus, rolling the pen in his hand. The room was abuzz with talk and activity. Irinus pulled over a chair, dusted it off, and stood on it. Tall enough already, he dominated the room from atop the chair. “So!” he repeated. The room quieted. Only a tall, broad blonde man continued. Irinus stopped him with a glare. “We need to keep our plans moving. Tommund, can you confirm that you have a man on the inside? In the Elderate?” The blonde man nodded. He spoke with confidence in a Canalian accent. “That’s right, sir. Feeding me information. If we’re going to put the government on the back foot, the Elderate is the best place to start. The laws are softer around their rituals. It’s a weakness.” “But what can we do with that?” asked a heavily pregnant woman named Akçal. She was clearly Cinuravese. “What leverage do we have, beyond a handful of people and maybe half that in muskets?” “Simple. We storm the Elderate Building and kill or capture the elders. We establish a base and use the survivors as hostages. That’s our leverage.” Lumi raised her eyebrows. This Tommund had a hard-line stance. She didn’t like it much. “That’s all well and good until Canalas comes south and blasts us into the void. That plan wouldn’t give us leverage. It’d give us a pretence of leverage to hide behind before we were killed.” Tommund looked at her, smiling. He didn’t look angry. It was unsettling. “Miss Hellemar makes a point,” said Irinus, nodding at the two of them. “In fact, I believe she has a plan concerning this exact thing. The leverage you vouch for is magical, yes, Lumi? The so-called Ollossos Expedition.”

Tommund rolled his eyes. Lumi ignored him and nodded. “I believe it’s the only way to show that we won’t bow anymore, sir. A powerful, non-lethal magical event to scare the heads of government into conceding power, and then the resources to dissuade any larger forces from coming close while we establish ourselves. I believe we can only achieve that by going to Ollossos.” Irinus carried the easel and map to the room’s centre. People crowded around to look. Lumi shuffled towards him. Up close, the map’s detail was rich, every detail of the coast delicately marked. There were thousands of fjords and valleys, nooks and crannies for pirates and poachers to hide. Lumi, stiff-necked, looked to Irinus. “Now, Lumi,” said Irinus. “Tell us the basics.” “Yes,” she said, pointing towards the southern tip of the Roïtian Peninsula, to Cinura. “Here we are. Across the Daring Strait lies the biggest of the Falaric Islands, Upollos. Blucvisdoc port is where we’ll stop for supplies on our way south.” At the word ‘south,’ an unsettled murmur swept through the attendees. Malbry, a keen-eyed lean youth of nineteen, spoke up. “How do you know you’ve planned this well? What knowledge do you have of Ollossos?” “All of the knowledge currently available,” said Lumi, her neck stiff. “The plan’s thoroughly thought-out.” “But is it really?” asked Malbry. “What basis do you have for your assumption that there’s power there to be gained? Only the most desperate hunters and fur traders go to Ollossos and even then, only the very northernmost tip. You want to go inland. No-one goes there.” “I am a magicworker in training, Malbry,” said Lumi. “I’ve spent hours gazing into the Quodrine. Take a tox, climb a hill and look far south. Magic gushes from the Quodrine, there. More the further south you go. And look at us!” she said, motioning around. “How many of us are there? Forty? Thirty-five? Thirty-five untrained, poorly armed and unprotected against the entire Canalian Empire. If you think we can make real change without help, then you’re a fucking idiot.”

“Because you just love to be so fucking contrary,” said Lumi, despite herself. “Watch your dirty mouth.” “My dirty mouth? Moons, but your breath could kill a pig!” Lumi launched herself at Malbry, and Girrin had to hold her back. Lumi struggled for a moment and then stilled, seething, eyes wild like a spooked animal. “Enough!” boomed Irinus. “We will not have infighting. We have even less of a chance of achieving anything if we divide our small number. Cinura is not a normal city. We do not subscribe to the ideas of the government beyond this church. We’re for all Cinures. Even the poor ones. And the ones with terrible breath.” He looked from Malbry to Lumi and back again. Lumi’s heart was beating hard. Malbry almost spoke again, but Yuon, a tall, bespectacled youth who Lumi knew had signed up for the Ollossos Expedition, placed one of his large hands on Malbry’s shoulder. Malbry gave him a dirty look, but didn’t otherwise react. Friends, then. “Right,” said Irinus. “Unless anyone has any other polite criticisms, we need to clarify details. First, how? Then, who? Lastly, when?” The crowd was oddly quiet. Lumi stood rigid, cheeks burning. Rude as he was, Malbry had made a point. She took a deep breath in. “Malbry made a point, as bad as his mouth smelled when he said it,” she said, trying to smile. “Ollossos is dangerous, and our information is outdated. We need to equip ourselves as well as we can.” “Do any of you own a ship?” Irinus asked, his tone sceptical. Henrik raised his hand. “I do,” he said. “A proper fishing dinghy. Perfect for catching cod down by the black coast.” The crowd muttered laughter. Irinus frowned with half of his mouth. “That’s thoughtful of you, Henrik.

However, we need something bigger than a dinghy. Approaching the Ollossos, the weather becomes wild, the sea full of floating ice. A dinghy would be dashed to bits. Also,” he said, motioning to Lumi, “I assume we would need more than a dinghy to carry the material we’re seeking. On that note,” he said, “What exactly is this material, Miss Hellemar? Will you bring snow back with you, spread magical water on the street?” “The magic will be imbued in the dirt, snow and air,” said Lumi. “And yes, we need space to carry things like sleds and food and the warmest clothes we can get.” “But what of a ship? None of us have one,” said Malbry. “I can get us a good ship,” came a small voice that was unused to being small. “Girrin?” said Lumi, incredulous. The skinny girl was holding herself high, but she breathed fast. “I can get us a good ship,” she repeated. “My parents live in Murkurkil and make too much money from Canalian stocks. I’ll tell them I want to go on a holiday up east to see the floating towns, and I need money for a good villa and transport to and from. They’ll give me more mezzevos than we’ll need for a cheap ship.” The room was dead quiet. Irinus’s eyebrows were raised. Well, I suppose that’s sorted, then. Where would we get this ship? And who would crew it?” “Easy,” said Lumi, audibly excited. “I’ve worked it all out. We need four people – that’s enough to crew a small ship and carry enough material but still be mobile enough to move fast. We’ll take Henrik’s dinghy to Blucvisdoc. They make good ships there. With the kind of mez Girrin mentioned, we’ll get a second-hand vessel from them easily enough; it might stink of guts, but it’ll do. Blucvisdoc has markets. We’ll stock ourselves there with what we can’t carry on the dinghy.” Lumi had a thought and turned to Girrin. “You’re buying the ship. Does that mean you’re coming? I thought you were against this idea.” Irinus turned his back on them and marked out several points on the map. Girrin smiled, took Lumi’s arm, pulled her close, and whispered. “I knew you were going to do it anyway, so I thought I’d make it as safe as I could. And, you know, really... I’ve grown sick of this place. I wake up every morning and I look

down the street and see the sunwaaks harassing people, and it just makes me so angry.” Lumi smiled back at her. Girrin took her hand. “Lovely! So, I have a list here of people who have expressed interest in this expedition. I’d like to hear updates to establish the final number,” said Irinus. “Here,” said Yuon, quietly, then louder. “Here! I know the area – my father was Falarese. I visited Upollos annually as a child for the solstice festival.” Lumi smiled at him, and he smiled back. He had a prominent voice-box and crooked rabbit teeth, but a certain handsomeness. His hair fell in yellow curls and his skin was like dark cedar. Irinus nodded, patting Yuon, who towered over him, on the back. “Anyone else?” he asked, drawing a sea monster in the bottom corner of the map. “We need one more.” “I’ll come. I have strong arms, and you’ll need someone to row when the girls get tired.” Malbry. Lumi turned to him and gawked. “Malbry. Of course, we could do with more hands on this, but only minutes ago you expressed scepticism. Why the sudden change of heart?” said Irinus. Malbry placed his hand on his chest in real or mock solemnity. He was shorter than Yuon, but broader and stronger. “I swear by Mond, the Zhayry, and all the other gods we may not publicly worship, that I mean only to further the cause of this expedition.” Girrin raised her eyebrows. Lumi was breathing deeply to calm herself down. She grabbed Girrin’s hand again, and she squeezed it back. She noticed Irinus was looking at her for approval. “If you really aren’t going to be disruptive, we’d be happy to have you along. If you are, though, I may well just throw you into the freezing sea myself,” said Lumi.

Quiet laughs bounced from the assembly. Malbry smiled, and it almost looked genuine. “Anymore?” asked Irinus, but was met with silence. “Right,” he said, swallowing. “We know how and who. When?” “As soon as possible,” said Yuon. Lumi looked at him. He’d spoken quickly. “Why is that?” asked Irinus. “Surely some time to prepare, perhaps send word to Blucvisdoc, would be better.” “If we are to do this before next year,” continued Yuon, “we ought to leave as soon as possible. Spring’s nearly over. Considering the time it’ll take to get there, hire a ship and a crew, and buy what we need – and for Girrin to get the money in the first place – even less. Ollossos is deathly cold at the best of times, but if we are there when the winter starts, when the sun doesn’t rise for half a year, we’ll have no chance.” The crowd grew thoughtful. Even Malbry. Lumi was unnerved by her own oversight. For all the planning she had done, she’d assumed she could have taken more time without having to take the long polar night into . “Right,” said Irinus, punctuating the silence. Most of the congregation had thinned as the topic no longer concerned them. “Girrin, you organise your plan with your parents, and prepare. Yuon and Malbry, prepare. Lumi, prepare also – and get some rest. You look exhausted.” Lumi blushed and looked at the floor. “This meeting is over.” Lumi walked out, followed by Girrin. Excitement and dread sat together in her heart like mismatched lovers. The shadow and rustle of the jungled nave no longer made a mark on Lumi’s mind. Closing her eyes, all she could see was the black of the sea and the

blinding white of great shelves of ice. Immeasurable tons of water, already splitting and melting and cracking. It made the cold of Joyrey more bearable. Lumi said goodbye to Girrin, thanked her for the ride there, and strode away. Girrin looked at her, eyes narrowed, but did not follow. It was raining. Lumi used the dregs of magic in her blood to stop herself from freezing as they trudged home. She let the rain soak into her clothes as she trudged up the icy, cobbled road north. The city’s blue buildings looked grey under the overcast sky, and she ed an abandoned vegetable cart as she entered the district of Ollol. The people she walked by, huddling around their markets in Cinro with umbrellas and thick coats, were bogged deeper in their lives than they knew. Robed sunwaaks abandoned their water-clogged guns near Anmon Square and took up spears. Any merchants or market goers who stepped out of line in some small way earned a shout or even a rap between the shoulders with the wood of a spear. Lumi travelled east from Cinro to the district of Ayek, where the buildings were shorter, squatter, and whiter, and the streets narrower. The buildings here were new; one could tell their age from the white tinge of their paint; they couldn’t make them as blue as they once had. From there, she entered the Tall Quarter – a failed development plan of multi-levelled concrete buildings, now mouldering in disrepair. She walked into a ruined building between two towering blocks, with a floor covered in rubble and dust of grey, blue, and white. After wiping her feet off on a bunch of straw, she lifted it, revealing a heavy basement door it had hidden. She opened it and climbed down the ladder beneath and closed it after her, careful to replace the straw. “Afternoon, sister. Moons, you’re soaked!” Aurin squatted before their makeshift hearth, cooking something meaty in a pot. The two of them lived in a single room, with dim light streaming in from a tiny skylight-chimney Aurin had engineered from a sewerage pipe.

Lumi didn’t respond to Aurin, and went behind the sheet draped over the far corner of the room and took off her wet clothes. Her fingertips had pruned, and her boots made a sucking sound as she removed them. Another worry: she needed those for tomorrow. “Are you going to mope forever or are you eventually going to talk to me?” asked her brother. Lumi was still struggling out of her clothes and didn’t respond. She had become frigid, naked behind the curtain. She ran her hands up and down her body and frowned. She looked down at herself, feeling bulbous, until a fleece dropped upon her head. She dried herself, shivering. “You’re welcome,” said Aurin. “Thanks, Rin.” Lumi dried herself as well as she could and slipped out, reaching for a soft shift on her ‘bed’ – a low bundle of fabrics and downs she’d collected over the years. Her brother slept rougher, on a hard bamboo mat bought for cheap from a kind old trader from Inivan. She ran up behind Aurin and hugged him briefly, placing her wet clothes beside the fire before retreating to her bed and sitting down. Beside her bed was her ‘bedside table’ – a stump, logging refuse that had a flat enough top and bottom to stack the four books Lumi owned. The one at the top and by far the most worn and dog-eared was Cassandia; Collected Works of the Lady Lefan. She opened the book and pored over the familiar words. On one page they were in Nuarec, and in the other the ancient language of Old Lefaneie. Some ink had spread from how many times she’d traced her fingers over the words. Lumi, a small child when she first came across the book left behind by a black-market vendor, was enraptured. There was such a disconnect between what she read and what she could understand, even in Nuarec – Cassandia had been rich, she had been beautiful, and she had lived somewhere where the summers were long and hot and the winters short and warm, attended to by beautiful servants at all hours. Lumi, twenty years old, now sat on her makeshift bed poring over the high-class woman of antiquity, acknowledged the divide, and managed a small smile.

Her brother had just added garlic to the stew he was cooking – she loved garlic. She turned to look at her brother. I might never see you again, she thought. But I can’t tell you where I’m going. That’s cruel, and I’m sorry. Aurin finished cooking and served the food in little ceramic bowls. It was gristly and had perhaps a touch too much pepper, but the meat was soft and flavourful from some mint and spices he had no doubt nicked from a garden up in Canalas Town. “Lumi,” he began, spitting out a small piece of cartilage. “Are you well? You came in drenched and have barely spoken a word since.” Lumi looked at him and then looked away. “I’m fine, Rin. I spent some time with friends, but I got caught in the rain. I’m probably just going to read for the rest of the day.” Aurin nodded, but looked displeased. “You’ve been reading a lot lately, Lume. You know we should really both be looking for work – a man in Cinro offered me a job to deliver newspapers to the northern suburbs, and I’m going to take it. It’s only a few mez, but it’s something. We need the money.” Lumi felt a pang of guilt. She could hardly her brother out on the expedition. But if she didn’t go, what would she do? She had committed to doing anything to give her brother a better life a long time ago. Maybe even back when their parents were still around. “We do,” she said, moving to him. He wrapped his arms around her, and she put her food down. “I’ll start my newspaper job tomorrow, if I can buy a bicycle,” said Aurin gently.

Chapter 6

Alrik let the sunwaaks manacle him without any trouble – of course, what trouble could he possibly cause? – and lead him away. “Where am I going?” he asked, wriggling his hands against the manacle bar. Even as frightened and worried as he was, the texture of the metal on his hands made him squeamish. “Processing,” said the policeman. Alrik pictured a piece of pork being shoved into a grinder and cranked into mush. Instead, the room the man took him to was small, pale, and pedestrian. The four walls were all made from mud brick. Ageing chairs, one of them occupied, sat up against two of the walls. Beneath a large painting, there was a pinewood desk, where a bored-looking paltwire clerk tapped out slow notes on a typewriter. This was all illuminated by a dangling arcane lightbulb. It was a waiting room. Alrik was manacled to one of the chairs and sat blinking in the light. His body wanted sleep – he never missed dayrest. He thought of his parents then, likely off to one of the sleeping shelters, and his heart ached at not being able to them. He fought down some more hysterical laughter. He wasn’t insane, and didn’t want to look it. “Name?” said the paltwire clerk. The sunwaak nudged Alrik, and Alrik nodded. “Er, Alrik Ifani-Smith.” “Crime?” The clerk said this in the exact same tone. Alrik didn’t know how to respond. “Er...” “Terrorism and crimes against the state,” filled in the policeman. The other person being processed, a Cinuravese girl maybe a little younger than him across the room, perked up.

“Wow. Hard to confess to that, huh?” asked the clerk. Alrik smiled like a frightened monkey. The processing began. Alrik’s birth certificate was scoured for his name, the ethnicities of his parents and grandparents, his current address and his parents’ past addresses, and a dozen other things Alrik thought less than important. These were sent off throughout the city and beyond by paltwire for reference. He gathered all this only from the clerk’s muttering – in the room with the clerk, him, the sunwaak on guard and the other processee. Nobody spoke aloud for a while. “Hey,” said the girl from across the room. She was manacled, too. It looked like unnecessary restraint for such a small, pointy person. Alrik glanced at the sunwaak guard. His hand was on the handle of his truncheon, but he didn’t react to their talking. “Hello,” said Alrik. His words felt awfully loud in the quiet room. “I think there’s been a mix-up. I haven’t done anything. I was just delivering some letters.” The paltwire clerk snorted but didn’t look up. The manacled girl, however, nodded. “You don’t look like the type. It’s first dayrest and you’re nodding off. No real criminal has a standard sleeping schedule.” Alrik chuckled at that, despite everything, and the girl smiled. “So, what did you get in here for?” asked Alrik. The girl’s countenance was disarming. “Oh, I shot someone. Some Skandrian lordling at a wedding. Blasted his chest wide open. Not the most subtle, I know, but we all make mistakes.” She said this casually, like an anecdote about a wild night out with friends, but her movements were fast and twitchy. She wasn’t well. Alrik blinked, the blood leaving his face. “Oh, I see. Is that all?”

She laughed and shook her head. “No, actually. I drugged him first.” Alrik stopped talking to the girl. The hours wore on, and first dayrest ended. The room became far busier, with office workers and fully-kitted policemen walking in and out on their way to other places. Alrik, fighting the anxiety that knotted up in his chest, fixated on the painting above the desk. It depicted a swirling orange-yellow orb in a black void. In amongst the orb’s swirls, little white things could be seen, like coral towers. A little label beneath the piece read A Dream of Tearing Wind by Soslanes Tukexi Kauanei. Eventually, Alrik fell asleep, manacled to his seat. The girl, the real genuine murderer, was taken away while he drifted. Finally, Alrik himself was processed. “Alrik Ifani-Smith,” said a broad-shouldered sunwaak looming over Alrik. Alrik tried to wipe the sleep from his eyes, but the manacles tied to the chair wouldn’t let him. It was nearly second dayrest. “I hereby charge you guilty in acts of terrorism and violence against the state of Roït and the governments of Cinura and Canalas City,” said the man. Alrik felt his gut twist even further. He needed to piss. He wanted to cry. The sunwaak’s confidence seemed to flicker for a moment, but then his look became steely. “Come on,” he said, picking a whimpering Alrik up by the crook of his elbow and taking him to Mond knew where.

Alrik was in a holding cell. He was no longer allowed anything as comfortable as a waiting room. Third dayrest had come and gone, and the sun was setting. He slumped against the wall and then jumped back. Damp. The jail wing was an old building, and rain from earlier in the day had inundated the ceiling of his cell. His head pulsed. He closed his eyes and cried. Each time a tear fell, he twitched, trying to avoid the water from his own eyes. His socks were wet now. He squeezed his eyes closed harder and tried to ignore the chill air and his damp clothes. He stood like that, shaking, until his tired legs gave out, and he crumpled. Water immediately soaked into his tros, and he bit his tongue. He forced his eyes shut, controlling what stimulus he could, but then let them slip open. His cell was bare save for a chamber pot, lacking even a bed. In the corner, something tiny moved. Alrik crawled over, wiping his hands off on his shirt and grimacing at the feeling, and looked down at it. A shiny black millipede, barely longer than his fingernail, strode along the space where the floor met the wall. Alrik, sleeves and legs soaked, hunkered down and watched intently on his elbows and knees, trying to push everything else from his mind. It didn’t entirely work, but it helped. Alrik awoke later to a sound like choking from down the hall. He’d fallen asleep with his head on the wet floor, and he shivered in disgust and wiped at his chin as he stood. The light spilling into the jail compound from the rest of the police station had dimmed, but there was still activity. Alrik held onto the bars of his cell and imagined himself as a newspaper cartoon’s depiction of a criminal. That’s what he probably looked like, claiming complete innocence as he did. All the bank robbers and swindlers and gunmen in newspaper cartoons claimed complete innocence until they were hanged. He rested his head against the bars, letting the metal cool his scalp, and deliberated. Every Cinuravese child learnt from a young age to avoid sunwaaks. Walk the other way, keep your head down, do what they say and then leave as fast as you can.

Is this why they say that? Alrik thought. Because one day they might throw you in chains and pin you like a butterfly for a fabricated crime? The door to the compound opened, and someone walked inside. Short, Cinuravese, ageing, and not wearing a sunwaak uniform. Alrik frowned. He frowned even deeper when the man, who he now recognised as Doctor Melalhir, walked up to Alrik’s cell, slipped a key into the door and unlocked it. It slid open with a scrape that was far too loud. “I –” began Alrik. “Quiet,” hissed the Doctor. “I don’t have time for your rambling, boy. Keep your head down and stay quiet. We’re getting out of here.” Alrik swallowed and nodded. He stepped out, barefoot with socks that squelched with each step, into the hallway. The other cells were dead quiet, save for a few more noises like choking. Alrik’s stomach twisted up. “Where are we going?” he whispered, huddling behind the Doctor even as he towered over the man, scuttling away to avoid a red satchel he held over his shoulder. The doctor tutted, but didn’t otherwise respond. They took a back way, past bunks of sleeping guards and dusty awards on walls. Through one dim doorway to the next room, Alrik saw a woman sitting at a desk, and seized – but her glasses were hanging off her nose, drool streaming from her mouth. She breathed and made the choking noise he’d been hearing for several minutes now. Alrik looked at the Doctor. The Doctor grunted softly once they’d ed that room. “They’re fine. Don’t worry about them.” Two minutes later and they were out of Belfry. Alrik breathed in the chill spring night air and held his arms around his chest. The Doctor tutted and removed a cloth from the satchel he carried – a cloak, at closer inspection – and threw it to him. “That’ll shroud you. Come on, boy. Come on. Scant hours of night left, and I have somewhere to be. You, too – I’ve

arranged your parents to meet you where you’re going.” Alrik gasped. “My parents! How did you –” “Shut up, boy!” growled Melalhir, raising his right hand as if to strike, and Alrik shied away like a hurt dog. Alrik feared the Doctor, then. This was all far too much – he’d been so proud of himself for talking to Baalgali, only to be arrested for crimes he’d never committed three days later. Now, a man he knew and usually felt comfortable around had freed him from imprisonment and was growing violent. The rules of Alrik’s life were breaking down. That didn’t look like it was going to change any time soon. The doctor whistled and clicked his fingers as they neared the edge of the central business district medina, and out of an alley came a carriage. Alrik had never ridden in a carriage except as a child for a demonstration at his elementary school – a tired driver and an even tireder juksha had trotted in a circle in a courtyard to show how the things worked in action. Alrik had never had the money to pay for a carriage going any sort of distance. This carriage was clearly not for school activities. It was painted dark blue, blending into the benthic alleyway wall, and four gracile juksha stood eerily still at its front. Every part of it seemed oiled and tightened and sanded to make as little sound as possible. “In,” said the Doctor, prodding Alrik in the back. Alrik nodded hard and jumped into the carriage. It was higher-up than it looked. The Doctor took a seat diagonally to Alrik and facing him, and then tapped the wood near where the nondescript driver sat. “Vildhan outskirts, as soon as possible. Good pay from the man I have there. Here’s my seal,” he said, handing the man a piece of green paper through the window. No other words were exchanged, and the driver cracked his reins, and the carriage set off in its oddly silent way.

The carriage travelled east, leaving the centre and then the outskirts of the city behind. The green-white glow of the moons was ed by the ever-growing light of the sun. That light brought exposure, and with it, fear. Clusters of blue buildings and green grass gave way to jagged, bare cliffs with tiny ramshackle farmhouses perched between them. Alpacas, pigs, goats and juksha huddled together against the chill wind. At twilight, the carriage approached a hill, and upon cresting it, Alrik could see the sea, a morose black-blue. Before them was a muddled little town of simple brick and wooden buildings, bungalows, and docks. A single jetty with several battered sailboats jutted out from the black sand beach. To the east some way away from the town was a farmhouse, painted white and flaking. The Doctor knocked behind the driver again and the carriage came to a halt. Alrik stumbled out into the half-light and Melalhir followed, wobbling on his bad leg. The driver didn’t move his carriage, but instead moved from his place at the driver’s seat and draped cloths over his vehicle – red and yellow. Traditional taxi colours to obfuscate whatever business it was he did in Cinura’s long nights. “Now you must –” began Melalhir, but then he stopped, and pulled Alrik behind the newly changed cart by his arm. “Wandering sunwaaks. Fine for me, not fine for you. Get gone, boy. Take this,” he said, ing Alrik the red satchel he’d been carrying all this time. “The seaward side of this hill is a cliff, with some steps carved into it. When I say, I’ll walk out and address them. You then step confidently out behind me, like there’s nothing strange happening at all, and reach the cliff. You got me? You got me, boy? You’re just a traveller. Don’t let them see your face.” Alrik nodded so hard his eyes rattled. “Yes. Yes, I’ve got it.” Melalhir smiled, and his eyes crinkled up at the edges. The smile looked real, but Alrik wasn’t sure anymore. “Good,” said the Doctor. “Your parents will be by the docks. Wish them well. Now, be quiet.”

They waited ten seconds, and then Melalhir moved out from behind the carriage as if he’d been organising luggage, and Alrik heard him greet the sunwaaks like they were friends. Like the man hadn’t just used a shady carriage to transport a criminal, guilty or not, to another town. Alrik took a deep breath and stumbled, swearing under his breath. After that, he strode. He knew how to walk. He was good at it, in fact. He walked out from behind the carriage, paying no mind to the sunwaaks or the Doctor. They paid no mind to him. He reached the edge of the cliff and looked over. Sure enough, a body’s length away were rough-hewn steps. Alrik began down them, watching his feet. The smells of beer, fish, and sewerage wafted from the town as his socks touched the sand. Smoke poured out of chimneys. Alrik walked to the edge of the town, his hands in his pockets for warmth. Without the bowl of mountains that hugged Cinura, southern Roït was cold and windy. It couldn’t have been later than four in the morning, and much of the town was asleep. Those awake in Vildhan now, the bakers and fishers and early risers, regarded Alrik with suspicion or indifference. He was a stranger for the first time in his life. Though the town was small, it was still difficult to navigate in the ambiguous light. Alrik stumbled past a dark alley and several low houses before finally coming to the beachside. A thick mist rolled upon the open sea, and the black sand glittered. Alrik blinked in the sea wind. “Uma? Upa?” Alrik’s voice seemed strange, alien, wrong. How can you be so lost, so close to home? You’ve lived your entire life within spitting distance of this place, he thought. He answered his own question when he approached the dock and saw his parents peeking out from behind a windbreak of gnarled pines. His mother saw him, covered her mouth, and ran to him. “Ay-oor, boy, ay-oor,” she said, wrapping him in her arms and ignoring the biting wind. His father came up behind them and held them both in his big arms, before

leading them back behind the windbreak. There, Alrik saw, his parents had placed down a rugged blanket and several small bags and bottles of food and water. His mother motioned that he sit down, and he did, his long legs dangling off the blanket. He placed the satchel the doctor had given him by his side. His father let go of him as he sat, but his mother did not. She knelt and sat next to him, her knees popping. She was panting from her run, burying her head in his shoulder. There was silence between them, for a moment, with no sound but wind, the tide, distant seabirds, and his mother’s breath. “That doctor told us what happened, son,” said his father. His voice was weaker than usual, more fragile. Alrik nodded, and frowned. How did Melalhir know? He’d been so caught up in running away that he hadn’t given himself the time to think about it. “I was doing my rounds just yesterday, as usual,” said Alrik, voice shaking. “When I took one to Belfry, just before first dayrest, and they – well, they arrested me. Claimed I was a terrorist. I haven’t hurt anyone, uma,” he said, turning to his mother. “Moons.” “I know you didn’t, my sweet thing,” said his mother. “There was a mix-up. A terrible, terrible mix-up.” “Or something more sinister,” said his father. Alrik blinked away tears and nodded. “Maybe,” he said. “But that matters little now, I think. They have it in their minds. In their gun hands. I’m guilty to them.” Alrik’s father nodded with eyes overcast. His mother was shivering. “And that is why you must go,” said his father. Go. The word cut. Alrik began to sob. His mother ed him, stopping to cough, and then continuing, and his father held them both, face still as a marble statue. They stayed like this for nearly an hour until bright sunlight glinted off the sea

behind the windbreak. Alrik’s father was a strong man, not only in body but in heart, and was the first one to suggest Alrik leave. “I saw sunwaaks as I got here,” said Alrik, “So I suppose I should.” Alrik’s father stood, helped up his wife and son, and dusted Alrik off. Then he held his head in both hands and kissed him on the forehead. Alrik’s mother slipped beneath and held Alrik. She shakily gave him the rest of the food and water she’d brought, stuffing them into the red satchel Melalhir had given him. They walked past the windbreak and the ocean wind hit them with force. Alrik could hardly hear over the whipping of air past his ears. A lump of fear rose in his throat at the thought of not hearing his mother’s voice in – how long? Forever? He was tempted to run back to the windbreak and make his parents follow, but the sun was almost all the way up in the sky and he knew he was in danger if he stayed. His mother took his wiry hand in her small and rough one and led him to the dock. It was rickety and old and light in colour. There was a small boat by the dock, something like a dinghy, old but wellmaintained, with a layer of green paint on the outside and two solid wooden oars locked into the sides. Alrik walked down the jetty, nauseated. The thought of falling into the water made his body lock up with fright. “Listen, son,” said Alrik’s mother. His father had formed a wind block with his broad body, and though the wind roared, Alrik could hear her well. “We talked to the Doctor, and we hired this boat ourselves. Don’t feel guilty, my son, they’re cheap here. And, of course, we would do anything for you.” Alrik’s father wrapped his arms around him again, his mother between them, and spoke into Alrik’s ear. “Take this boat up the coast for about three hours,” he said, the struggle to maintain his composure clear in the lines around his eyes. “Go far enough from the beach that the waves do not break, but always keep the shore in sight. Go north – we gave you a com. Soon you’ll see the Amber Cliffs. Continue north when another three hours have ed, and you’ll come to the port town of Tine. Tine’s a proper town, with big ships. There’s money in your bag, enough to rough it in a trade ship to a big city. Go to Canalas City.”

Alrik’s mind reeled to keep in all the information. “And what will I do in Canalas City?” he asked. Canalas City was a metropolis. A great place to get lost in, with all the negatives and positives that entailed. “Someone there owes me a favour,” said Alrik’s mother. “An old lover, unfortunately. And that someone owns several properties in the town. I’m not saying it’ll be easy, my son, but you’ll find a warm place to sleep and hopefully earn some money. The man you’re looking for is Torren Threeb. He works in the government. You’ll find his address in with the papers in your bag.” Her voice broke and tears flowed as she spoke. “I know you had different plans. Different aspirations. I’m sorry, my son,” she said, and buried herself in his chest. He wrapped his arms around her for a moment that was both long and far too short. Then, he gritted his teeth and walked to the edge of the dock. He kissed his parents goodbye, one on his mother’s soft cheek and one on his father’s stubbled one, and stepped into the boat. It wasn’t his first time in one, but it might as well have been. The wobbles spooked him, and he had to stop from yelping as he steadied. He managed to sit, placed the red bag by his feet, and got a feel for the oars. His parents wished him off, his mother wrapping herself in her husband as he pushed away. Alrik didn’t know what to say or even think. Pushing the water with the oars strained his arms. “When will I see you again?” he called out. His parents were too far away to hear him. His desire to turn the dinghy around, to just go back home and face injustice, nearly overwhelmed him. If he could just spend a few more minutes with his parents, perhaps it was worth it to face everything. He pushed the feeling down and rowed away until he lost sight of them for the waves. He could smell the dinner from last night wrapped up in his bag. He wished he’d had it the night before with them, and not now alone.

Chapter 7

Lumi awoke and sighed in relief. Her dreams, waking and sleeping, had been haunted by icy water. The waking world felt so warm in comparison it was like being wrapped in a woollen blanket. As she gained consciousness, her dread grew, and she clung to the warmth. She sat up. Her skin prickled in the morning cool – cool, not cold. Aurin was asleep, splayed out on his bamboo mat. Lumi stepped out of bed, tiptoeing barefooted around her brother and changing out of her sleeping linens, shoving them into her bag. She crouched, naked, sorting through her things and packing and stashing others aside. She took with her: several shifts, her thickest coat (a thing of beauty and horror, woven of alpaca’s wool and almost falling apart), several pairs of tros, undergarments, a bright green apple, her diary, a pen, and a knife. She shivered and slipped into the one shift she hadn’t packed and shimmied into her favourite pair of boots. Finally, a shirt. She was glad she didn’t have a mirror in this room – she was sure she looked frumpy. She sighed and glanced at Aurin. He was still deep asleep. She looked past him, thinking. She ripped a page from her least favourite book, the condescendingly written A Guide to the Inivanese Language for Complete and Utter Fools, and scrawled a rough note on it, placing it under her pillow. Not so obvious that he’d see it immediately, but obvious enough to be found. The ten-second journey to the ladder by the wall felt like it lasted an hour. She looked at her brother for likely the last time. The muscles of her face strained, hard like stone, every emotion forced out. She wanted to hug him, to kiss his cheek, to the point it caused her physical pain. But that would have woken him, and she’d have lost her chance to leave. If she were successful – and the unlikelihood of that stung – she would see him again. That thought let her put her hands on the ladder. “Goodbye for now, brother,” she whispered, barely louder than a breath.

Most cultures in the Eine Lumi knew of – and that was roughly five – viewed death as something below. It was what was unseen, unknowable: the opaque dirt rather than the open sky. This hung in Lumi’s mind as she climbed the ladder, feeling as if she was ascending into hell. She walked south at great speed. Her group had agreed to meet at six. Lumi had never managed to steal a working watch, but the tall clock in the bustling central business district medina was enough. She stood in its shadow and looked up, letting the crowds move around her. She was making good time – it was only five. Still, she was agitated. Something touched her leg, and she jumped. She looked down, and the ‘something’ turned out to be a beggar, old and withered and sitting in a pile of putrid rags. His appearance was difficult to ascertain through layers of muck. “Please, could you spare?–” “Fuck off and leave me alone,” she said, kicking her leg and continuing south, faster. The city was quieter past the medina, and she was alone with her guilt and her fear. Amongst the buildings of the main square, painters had begun to mix their brushes, gardeners to fill their pots. Down-and-outs like the one who had just grabbed her stirred in hope of making it through the day. She entered Laggen District, and it sprung up like something organic, overlooked by Lagtower, with houses haphazardly stacked upon one another, most blue but some green, red, and yellow. Murals adorned the walls: far-off lands, great dead kings, exotic flying beasts, and beautiful women. Another place she’d never see again. She tried distracting herself. She focused on the latticework of ice on the buildings as she left Laggen, went down through the southern Cinro market and finally to the second-coldest district, Ollol. Little cottages of the sparsely populated district gathered like penguins huddling in the cold, smoke tumbling from their chimneys. Her breath floated around her like a ghost and then dissipated, illuminated by the morning sun. She arrived at the church and walked through the jungled nave, opening the door without bothering to knock. Those assembled there – Yuon, Malbry, Girrin, Irinus and Henrik – looked at her, anticipation in their eyes.

“Sorry for barging in,” she said. “I’m all in my head at the moment.” Yuon laughed. He carried a heavy pack on his shoulders and had excited eyes. “You and me both, sister,” he said, shimmying his shoulders and making his bag rattle. Irinus was instructing them, giving sacks of dried meat and fruits and hugs. He talked to Girrin, who looked concerned. She nodded, and he left her. He handed Lumi a package, hesitated, and then pulled her into an embrace. She hugged him back tightly. “You’re a clever and driven young woman, Lumi,” he said. “I have all the faith in the Eine in you.” She smiled, and he smiled back; Lumi could have sworn, though, that there was a glint of finality in his gaze. A look of preparing for detachment. Henrik had said ‘let my rotten lungs be damned’ and overruled Irinus, deciding to lead the party down to the Southern Coast and his dinghy. The man huffed and puffed as they worked their way down past Joyrey to the Southern Slip, where the earth tilted from the Cinuravese cirque to the smaller hills by the coast and finally the sea itself. The only way out to the south was through Wry Neck, a long, thin split in the earth, the downhill drippings of a long-melted glacier. Lumi held Girrin’s hand as they carefully made their way down the slopes. “Are you sure you’ll be well to come back on your own, Henrik?” asked Malbry. Malbry had stayed near silent for their walk up until this point, though his smirk never disappeared completely. “Aye, don’t worry about that,” said Henrik, wheezing. “I’ve a mountbock in a warm little hut down by the coast. On him, these slopes will be like taking a stroll on a sunny day.” “My ma and pa own a farm for those a little north of the city,” said Girrin, puffing and using Lumi for . “People ask for them as far off as Oskalind and Lilnya, past the Great Divorcing Range. High demand. Highly sought after.” Malbry rolled his eyes. Yuon opened his mouth to say something, visibly excited, but then slipped and

fell onto his back with a yell. Girrin gasped, and Lumi tried to let go of her hand to help, but Girrin’s muscles had clamped shut in her fear. Before anyone else could act, Malbry leapt forward, dug his feet into the slippery ice, and ran behind Yuon. He widened his legs and pushed up against the gangly youth, stopping him from sliding. He managed to bring them both to a full stop as the incline decreased. They were both panting and soaking wet. “The biscuits my mother made me are probably broken,” mumbled Yuon. “Perhaps consider eating fewer biscuits going forward,” said Malbry, pushing Yuon off him and patting his belly. The Southern Slip had mellowed into a gentle downward curve, and only a few yards before them lay the entrance to Wry Neck, imposing in jagged black stone. “Would any of you like to hear a story about this place?” said Yuon, voice nearly swallowed by the wind whistling around them. Lumi shuddered to think of the power behind the water that had carved the age out; it looked as if it’d been cleaved with an enormous knife. “Not particularly,” said Malbry. “Rude, Mal,” said Girrin, punching him in the arm and giggling. Lumi looked at her accusingly before she was aware she had. Girrin blushed and looked away. There was silence for a moment. Yuon looked embarrassed, like he’d missed the joke. “I’d like to hear it,” said Lumi. “I’m interested in this place,” she elaborated. “It looks like it’s been carved up like a butcher’s pig.” Yuon was bright again. The Neck was now at an arm’s length. “Just two astride at most here,” croaked Henrik. Henrik, knowing the way, went first. Yuon entered second as the tallest and thinnest. Then went waifish Girrin,

followed closely by Lumi and the broad-shouldered young Malbry. Lumi felt self-conscious being on the tail end, cognisant of the fact it was because she was broader. That won’t be a problem if I come back half-starved from this, she thought, or half-eaten. Yuon told his story, a sort of campfire tale about a duchess from the east who’d come to Cinura soon after it had been founded. Almost her entire entourage had lost their lives on the way to jagged rocks and the freezing sea, and ultimately only the duchess and her personal guard were left. In that time, ferocious frogbirds roosted up on the roof of the age, and the duchess’s guard, in his devotion, spent such a time craning his neck up to watch for them that his muscles stayed frozen there, an eternal wry neck, until he died days later after safely taking his duchess to the town. It was a sad, strange, unrealistic story. As much as part of Lumi found it hard to hear, another was glad some warmth might be following them on their journey in the form of Yuon. She smiled. “That’s a good story, Yuon. I hope you have plenty more. It’s going to be a lengthy journey.” She breathed in and she could taste the sea. The sound of waves, before a subliminal rumble, grew louder. Henrik whooped in relief as the Neck finally spit them out onto a grainy, dark beach. Before them lay the Ollossal Sea, shining greyish blue in the morning light. The water’s surface shuddered and broke in the cold wind, and the shapes of jagged rocks could be seen just below it like beastly claws. A shack was just east, up a small hill and surrounded by big rocks to shelter it from the wind and chill. Henrik motioned the party to him, and to the shack. “Penguins!” shrieked Girrin, clamping her hands over her mouth. And, indeed, penguins huddled in a multitude of small pools and gaps between rocks further down the beach. They were quiet, huddling to stave off the cold. Some scurried away at Girrin’s cry. Rough-looking birds – skuas, Henrik said – shrieked overhead.

“In you go, in you go,” said Henrik, his voice little more than a wheeze. Lumi entered the shack and sighed in relief at the warmth. Along with warmth came the less-than-pleasant smells of a stable, but Lumi was willing to put up with one for the other. Girrin slumped into a corner, shivering and holding herself. Lumi knelt and took her into an embrace. Henrik looked at them and sat on a stool against the far wall. “You can spend as much time here as you like, though I’d suggest not waiting ‘til it gets dark. Cold’s biting enough in daylight. Your boat is out back under seal hide. On the note of transport, meet Oska,” he said, knocking gently on a pen in the corner. There was a grunt, and a dirty-white lump rose to reveal a goat nearly the height of a grown man. Yuon’s eyes widened, and he moved towards the creature. “May I – may I pet him? I’ve never seen a mountbock before.” Henrik smiled and nodded. Yuon stroked Oska’s snout gently, in the way one might dust a priceless work of art. The creature sniffed, gazing out with sideways-slanted eyes, and nuzzled into his hand. “Savour the smell of goat shit and straw, everyone,” said Malbry. “I don’t much know what great big ice flats smell like, but I don’t imagine it’s much.” Girrin smiled at him, and he grinned back. Lumi looked at them both, and then away. Henrik introduced them to their boat, the ostentatiously named Cinuravese Splendour, back out in the freezing air. He wished them off, hugging them each in turn, albeit some more stiffly than others, and strapped into his mountbock. Turning to leave, his breath caught in memory. “Ah, Lumi,” he said, towering above her on the lofty goat. He rifled around in a package, one of the many he’d strapped to the beast’s side. He found a red satchel, full of things that tinkled and clunked as they moved, and handed it to her. “From the doctor. Said it was important, though I nearly forgot. Farewell, you all.” The mountbock and man set off. They stood and watched him go with great fascination, and some

procrastination. Rider strapped in firmly, the long-shanked beast scaled the jagged, slippery wall of the Neck with ease. Henrik and his pet disappeared behind greater stones. Even Malbry was impressed. After spending a good half hour back in the shack and searching through their supplies for what they needed first, the group finally set off. Girrin had on a sealskin coat, which she told Lumi would keep her warm and dry. Lumi struggled to believe this, and as soon as Girrin stepped outside, she began to shiver like a leaf in a gale. Yuon gave her a pitying look and handed her some furs he had in his bag, mumbling ‘too small for me.’ The Cinuravese Splendour was not splendid, but it was beautiful in the sturdiness and utility of its design. It was big for a dinghy, Lumi thought, fit for at least six, and made of pinewood polished shiny. Lumi ran her hand across its side. “It’s like you’ve never seen a decent dinghy before,” said Malbry. His voice lacked much of the contempt she expected. Lumi was taken off guard. “I – well, that’s because I haven’t,” she said, eyes fluttering. “I’ve never even been to the seaside before. Only ever seen the sea from Laggen.” Malbry smiled. “I’ve only been once, to the west coast of the peninsula by the Bight. It was shit,” he said. Lumi laughed guardedly. Then, Malbry turned away from her as if the conversation had never occurred. The group loaded the belongings they weren’t carrying in their pockets into the boat. “Alright, bamboo boy, let’s get this in the water,” Malbry said to Yuon, who rolled his eyes and walked to the side of the Splendour and gripped it. Girrin went to help him. Malbry took the other side of the boat in his strong hands and Lumi took it up with him. The four of them hefted the boat just a little up from the wooden planks it sat upon and slid it out onto the beach. The sand there was a mixture of

the white of the west and the black of the east. “Nice multicoloured sand for our lovely multicoloured city,” said Yuon, with more than a hint of sarcasm, straining under the weight of the boat. “If Cinura’s so lovely, then why are we trekking to the bottom of the world?” growled Malbry. “If you’re not so into the idea, you can leave!” joked Girrin back. “We would do perfectly fine without you!” “Oh, really? Is that so? So, if I let go of this boat, you can drag it yourselves? Fine,” he said, and dropped the Splendour. Of course, it fell. He smirked, satisfied, and took a hold of it again. “Once we get to Upollos, I’m sure we can find three big strong Falarese boys that’ll render you useless, however handsome and strong you so obviously are,” muttered Girrin. Was she mocking him or flirting with him? Malbry just raised his eyebrows and said nothing. Whether or not three big strong Falarese boys could have done it better, the group successfully moved the Splendour to the sea with Malbry’s help. Yuon tiptoed as the water reached his feet in a futile attempt to avoid the cold. “Got a problem with the water?” teased Girrin. “I thought you said your parents were Falaric.” “Well,” said Yuon, helping Girrin into the boat where she wobbled, then steadied. “I grew up in Immunen, on the far side of Upollos – biggest town there, maybe four thousand people, right in the mouth of the bay – and something that was clear to me from childhood was, er, not to go in the water because you’ll freeze and die and then your grandmother will cry over your frozen corpse.” “I’ll concede on that,” said Malbry, lifting the gangly boy onto the boat. Then he turned and took Lumi’s waist. Without a thought, she slapped away his hand. He looked at her in confusion, and she sighed, moving her hand away. “My apologies.” He lifted her up onto the boat, and his ease consoled her. Then, he pulled himself into the boat in a terrifically wobbly fashion that made Girrin

scream in terror. Lumi, she was happy to think, had done a good deal of research. She knew the prevailing current against the Roïtian peninsula pushed east, crashing against the westernmost beaches and cliffs. The peninsula itself shielded them now as they travelled southeast from the little shack on the beach to Upollos. “It won’t shield us when we’re going due south,” she said to herself. Girrin, pale green and wedged between bags of supplies in the middle of the boat, perked up. “What did you say?” “Nothing, Gir,” said Lumi, agitated. She softened. “Sorry. I’m just worrying. About everything.” She stared over the side of the boat and into the sea. With the wind in her face, the sun in her eyes and the salty sea in her nose, it was impossible to come to with what lay before her. Before her temporally, at least. Before her physically was Malbry’s back and arms, sparkling with sweat as he worked the oars. An hour had ed, and the air was still biting with cold, but Malbry wore no coat. He doesn’t look too bad from behind, and when he’s not speaking, Lumi thought. Yuon was staring up into the sky, shielding his eyes and commenting on the birds. “That’s a southern green-eyed gull, I think. Unfortunately, I know a lot more about mythological bestiaries than real animals.” “What a crying shame,” grunted Malbry, stopping to stretch his arms. He rolled his shoulders, and the boat bobbed in the waves. Lumi sat up carefully and looked beyond him. Upollos rose, grey-white, now far above the line of the horizon. One of Lumi’s main concerns approaching Blucvisdoc was maritime traffic. Trading ships came almost daily from the east, from Inivan and Dubcloch and all the lands of the continent of Akkand. There were few boats of leisure or cruise here – the cold was biting, and the Torrid Sea was not smooth enough for recreational sailing. What she had failed to for was underwater traffic. Upollos had grown to a solid white block of snowy rock ahead, the tops of the

cliffs speckled with nesting birds and dripping with their faeces. “Those cliffs – the Loens – smell absolutely awful, and they’re deadly hard to climb,” said Yuon, “But there’s white gold up there. Some of the richest men in the Falarics earned their way by scraping bird shit off the Loen Cliffs. When they get rich enough, they pay other people to do it for them. It’s maybe the best fertiliser in the Eine.” “If I was going to get rich, I’d rather use a standard method like tax evasion or thievery,” said Lumi. “And you call yourself a revolutionary,” joked Girrin, and then something bumped the bottom of their boat. Girrin’s sensitive stomach turned and her face greened over. “What in Mond was that?” said Yuon. The bump came again, and with it, a sliding, scraping sound, like a huge finger being dragged across the bottom of the boat. “Lumi, have you led us over rocks?” Lumi shook her head. Then a shape broke the surface. It was an animal, as big as a carriage and dark and shining like an opal, spitting air and water out of a hole in what Lumi assumed was its head. “What is that?” said Lumi, mystified, as the creature twisted its body like an enormous eel and beat at the water with its tail fin. “It’s something like a huge newt,” said Yuon. “Called a great yawning eft. That one’s not as big as they get, but they couldn’t hurt you if they tried. No teeth. They’re slow and dim-witted, but people in the Falarics believe they bring good luck.” One of the eft’s flippers, gummy and shiny, briefly broke the surface, before the creature descended one last time into the cold, dark water. Noon ed, and Lumi felt a sunburn growing on her cheeks. At least the cold is a salve, she thought, looking up. The Loen Cliffs looked huge now, and the constant cawing of seabirds echoed across them like violins in the world’s most badly tuned orchestra. Blucvisdoc huddled next to the cliffs, hiding in their shadow. It consisted of

many sturdy little houses with dramatically sloped rooves. The village, like Cinura in that the fancier houses were further uphill, seemed quaint to Lumi. As cold as it could get in Cinura, the cirque’s embrace let little snow fall there outside of winter. It’s cute, thought Lumi. Like cake icing. A great trading ship with bundled-up sails and an owl figurehead was docked at the town’s main port, flying the wine-red and leaf-green flag of Inivan in the cold wind. Beside it were many other smaller ships, and even further away still a small jetty for littler vessels where Lumi and her party trussed the Splendour. Lumi stepped, wobbly, onto the jetty. She walked until her feet felt the solid ground. Not Cinura anymore. Not even the peninsula. She couldn’t see it for the Loen Cliffs and distance, but she could feel the Tongue of Amenofriak, the northern tip of Ollossos, so much closer than it had been. Her blood raced.

Chapter 8

Alrik dozed, his muscles aching, and dreamed of the floods. Before his seventeenth birthday, Cinura lacked any sort of flood drains or reservoirs, and instead, when the clouds gathered in the cirque and brought heavy rain and fast water, people crowded into towers. Like everything else in Cinura, there were some of good quality for the rich, and some of worse quality for the poor. The cheap ones were stilt-legged wooden death traps. Alrik’s eyes blinked open, his hands still gripping the oars. The sun had risen higher in the sky, and every so often a dark shape ed beneath the boat and surfaced to soak up some warmth. A great eft surfaced, spraying sea, and made a call Alrik felt in his bones, like an enormous crying child. He reached out to touch it, but it dove again. Disappointed, Alrik decided to note the incident. He looked up and let the oars drop into their sockets. The sheer mountainous edge of the peninsula rose by him, with no beach nearby. Alrik reached into his bag and gasped. “Shit!” The bottom of the bag had slipped through his legs to the wet bottom of the boat and was soaked through. Cursing, he sorted through his things. He threw the meal his mother gave him, soggy and falling apart, into the waves. His journal for natural observations, too, was inundated with water. He turned the pages, and they tore like wet tissues. He wept as he sorted through what had survived. A few dried pieces of meat in greased paper. Some rye bread. He dug deeper. A little bag of vials that tinkled together. Alrik pulled its drawstring open. “What?” he said aloud. They were toxauments; the little illegal capsules looked inviting and terrifying; back home, they were more illegal than cocaine and uned weapons. He read their little labels and little warning signs. How did the doctor get a hold of these? What was he really doing to be able to get them in the first place? Why did he give them to me? His mind was a flurry. “Witch’s Knee, for the manipulation of electricity,” one of them read. “Not for

pregnant women or those with pulmonary conditions. Produced in the city of Skander-Sareen, Kandrii.” The magical liquid was an opaque white and looked noxious. The two books the doctor had gifted him were unharmed. He opened them one after the other: The Eine: A Compendium, and On the Learning and Performance of Magic. The second had something that caught his eye: beyond the pages about biwids and long-dead sorcerers, the book was empty, with lined pages left blank. At the bottom of every page was simply written, ‘for notes.’ Alrik grinned and marked the date in the corner of the first free page – the third of the month of Moutz. He scrawled his name, and through the lines sketched the eft he had seen. He wrote a short description of the creature and of its behaviour, identifying its species and possible sex. The whole activity filled him with a kind of still excitement as the sun beat down upon him and the dinghy bobbed in the calm water. After writing the entry, he stashed the book again, squeezing it between his legs to keep it dry, and took up the oars once more. Tine came into view from behind a cluster of pines on a reddish slope. It was small and a little cold, but cleaner than Vildhan had been, with boxy, sturdy dark brick houses and the sounds of talking and laughter. Alrik felt even more misplaced here than in Vildhan – like he was walking in on a conversation he wasn’t allowed to listen to. He didn’t know how to dock a boat, so instead he pulled it onto shore. This far up the coast and beyond the Amber Cliffs, the sand was golden tan instead of black. There were bars and pubs in the town where men and women milled around freely, with no sunwaaks in sight, and some ornately decorated corners flanked by decorated women he thought were the entrances to brothels and bordellos. And he realised with a shock that there were churches. Functioning, wellmaintained churches, built from brick and wood and stone, publicly giving praise to Mond without restriction. The street lacked cats. Alrik wasn’t a day’s journey from Cinura, but Tine already felt like a different world.

“You lost, boy?” asked a whiskered old man that ed Alrik on his approach to the town. Alrik shook his head. “No, sir.” The man frowned and turned away. Alrik walked through the noisy streets, taking them in, and suddenly felt a warmth from his bag, like an animal was inside it. He stopped under the shade of a butcher shop’s patio and reached into his bag to find no creature, and the heat coming from a book. On the Learning and Performance of Magic was making its own heat like a living thing. What kind of magic is this? He handled the book carefully, but it wasn’t hot enough to burn him. There were no tiny toxaument vials or magical circuits on it that he could see. Alrik thumbed through the pages until he arrived at the start. ON THE LEARNING and PERFORMANCE of MAGIC By DR. IBO MELALHIR He read a little more, but his eyes slipped over the words, and he closed it. I’ll hold it to me if I get cold on my journey, he thought, stashing it in his satchel. He followed his nose to where the smell of fish was strongest and arrived at what looked to be the town’s main dock. He’d seen two more docks on the way in, but this one carried a good several dozen ships, and was bustling with people. Alrik noted some of them – a tall, thin Huzunite privateer in yellow doublet and cutlass; a portly Inivanese gentleman in wine-red suit clothes, and a tall Skandrian woman in a sheer yellow and gold dress, shining with diamonds and silver chains and a wide-brimmed black hat. She was guarded by a broad hooknosed man holding a musket. Alrik could see the freckles on her shoulders beneath her dress. She must be cold, he thought.

Alrik walked down wooden steps to a loading area, and a draft brought with it the smells of rotten fish and walrus oil. Alrik wrinkled his nose. Approaching a tall, broad, Canalian-looking man from behind, he took a deep breath. He wore what Alrik thought was a sailor’s hat. Alrik didn’t know much about sailors. “Excuse me, sir. I would like to take age to Canalas on a ship. I can pay.” The man turned around and raised his eyebrows, looking Alrik up and down. The man was both taller and broader than him, with a large red moustache. “What’s your name, boy?” he asked. “Al –” Alrik paused. “Alin,” he said, looking away. “Alin Smith.” “From?” “Cinura.” The big red-haired man tutted, shaking his head. Alrik wandered the docks, paying a half-mez for a cup of warm tea from a stall on his way. He considered buying some fried fish to fill his belly, but he still shook with anxiety, and he doubted he could have kept it down. “Hey, you. Cinure.” The voice came from right behind him. Alrik spun around and wobbled, and the person laughed. He was of indeterminate age, and just shorter than Alrik, with white skin marked tan and freckled by the sun. Stray grey and white hairs poked through his oily black hair and beard, and his eyes were grey and twitchy. The man extended an arm. He was entirely clad in black material of a kind Alrik had never seen before. “I’m Lucan. Pleased to meet you.” Alrik extended his hand slowly, and they shook. The man’s hand was rough and warm. Alrik’s was soft and dainty as a rose in comparison. “It’s your lucky day, Cinure,” said Lucan, wrapping his arm around Alrik’s

shoulders. Alrik flinched and nearly pushed him off but didn’t. They began to walk. Alrik’s heart began a harder, rougher beat. “I’ve got a ship – a good Canalas-made cutter – that’s just begging for one last member of crew to help before she sets off, and, lucky you again; she’s heading straight for Canalas’s main port. Heard you talking to that bloke,” said Lucan, jabbing a finger towards the moustachioed man. Alrik breathed in deeply and his lungs filled, excited but reproachful. “You’re free to come with us – assuring you have the coin, of course,” said Lucan. Alrik nodded. “Yes, of course.” “What’s your name, again?” Alrik took another breath. Sea air. Something he ought to get used to for a while. “My name is Alin Smith.” From the main dock, Alrik followed Lucan through a series of dockside alleys filled with squabblers and drunkards and drug takers. He pulled in on himself like a zipper being drawn up. Lucan didn’t seem bothered by the characters. The reason why hung at his belt – a proper sabre in a dark red sheath. Either that, thought Alrik, or he’s like them. The docks became seedier, and Alrik’s bile rose. His heart quickened, and he nearly turned and ran. Would Lucan threaten him? He wasn’t sure. He gulped and kept walking. Finally, Lucan led him to a last tiny dock. In the water bobbed a ship of middling size, looking both sleek and cobbled together. It flew the black and white flag of international merchantry. A dozen sailors climbed over and through the ship like insects on a carcass. They’re not all Canalian, Alrik thought. Most were – but one of them was a tall man, black as a moonless night, who hailed them as they approached. His voice

was rich and deep and carried far, with an accent that made his words sound rounded, and his sailor’s clothes were dotted with small jewels and trinkets. Some people on this ship had wealth. “Hail, Lucan. Who’s this fella?” called the man. “Hail, Mawari. He’s a Cinuravese lad. Name’s Alin.” The man’s eyes widened. He was dressed warmer than most of the others milling around. Probably colder than he’s used to, Alrik thought. He noticed that Mawari, too, carried a sabre. Alrik’s waist felt naked. “Hail, Alin!” said Mawari, and Alrik felt a confusing warmth at being welcomed by his fake name. “Welcome to the Mulliver.” “Who’s this you’ve brought now? I hope this one isn’t strung out on tox like the last,” said a voice. “Ah, captain,” said Lucan, motioning for Alrik to come on board. Alrik did so, and felt the deck shift beneath him, and threw his arms out to steady himself. The captain stood before him. He was a short man, Dubclochian in skin tone and face but with a strong nose and densely curled hair. He wore a coat covered in medals, only a few of which Alrik recognised. War? Trade? Kindness? Alrik didn’t know. The captain enthusiastically extended a hand, and Alrik took it limply. “Hello! My name is Gannet, and I am your captain, if you choose to stay on the Mulliver. That is what you want, isn’t it? I’d hate for Lucan to have just plucked a poor lost Cinuravese boy off the street.” “Oh, no. I want to travel with you, especially if you’re going to Canalas City.” Gannet regarded him with a keen, bright eye. “Very soft hands,” remarked the captain. “Can you work the ropes? Help maintain the rudder?”

Alrik flushed. “Uh, no. Not really.” “Can you use a mop?” “Yes, I can definitely do that.” Lucan glared at him, and Alrik blanched. “That’s when you call him by his title, boy,” he muttered. “Sir!” shouted Alrik, blushing. The captain cackled, and Lucan slapped Alrik’s shoulder. “He has a decent load of mez on him too,” he said. Alrik smiled sheepishly and nodded. Gannet raised his eyebrows. “Well, alright then. Welcome aboard. Your living quarters may not be spacious, and the food may not be of royal quality, but it should do. Talk to Jeang or Mawari if you need advice – they’re foreign too. Talk to Lucan if you wish to speak to me and I’m not on deck. I do not appreciate my subordinates entering my cabin without my permission.” He slapped Alrik on the shoulder; that shoulder was starting to hurt. “We leave in three hours, at three past two.” The captain glanced at a fob watch. “Three past the hour is the best time to leave for any journey. Mond willing, we should arrive at Canalas in just under two weeks.” “Magnificent,” said someone else. The voice had a delicate, sharp accent. Alrik turned, and a man was standing before him. His eyes were angular, and his skin a soft tan colour, laced with freckles. The man extended a hand. Alrik took it, and it was warm. “I’m Jeang Son-Arre. Allow me to show you to your quarters.” “Thank you.” Alrik followed the man below decks, and he was met with the smells of sweat and beer and mead. The sound of the sea hitting the sides and bottom of the boat echoed through its insides like the rumbles of a churning stomach. There were bunk beds ordered neatly, maybe two dozen, yet there couldn’t have been more than ten men below decks. Beyond the bunk beds were a few hammocks of

hemp, and beyond them a closed door and a great black tarpaulin covering supplies. Jeang led Alrik to the hammocks. “Here you are, mosoko,” he said gently. Alrik’s quarters were a single hammock swinging from a rack built into the inside wall of the ship, along with a small, broken chest beneath. I suppose the actual beds are for the actual crew, Alrik thought. “What’s that mean? Mosoko?” Jeang smiled. “It’s a word of respect in Inivanese. Something like the Nuarec sir or mister. It took a lot of bravery to get from Cinura to Tine. Did you cross the mountains or go around past the Amber Cliffs?” “The cliffs,” said Alrik. “You know the routes?” “I know some people from Cinura,” said Jeang. There was a moment of silence between them that Alrik spent trying not to be overwhelmed by the background roar of the ship and its crew. “Not many crew for such a big ship,” said Alrik. Jeang’s eyes drifted, and he shook his head. “Good today, Alin,” he said, standing up. “I expect to see you on deck when we set off.” Assuming misplaced sunwaaks, it dawned on Alrik that he was finally out of the flood. Out of danger. Safe, as much as he could be in a place like this. He held the red satchel to his chest, and the magic book inside warmed him. He laid in his hammock, dozing, and finally fell asleep to the sounds of busy men discussing rough things in low tones. He awoke to someone tapping his shoulder. Several hours of sleep weighed down his bones. “Up, mosoko. It’s a custom that all the crew see the ship off as it leaves. Gannet doesn’t like the people who don’t respect the customs.” Alrik nodded, bleary, and stood. He’d taken his shoes off before going to sleep and now hesitated to put them back on. His socks were soaked through.

Jeang looked at them. “Captain gives no shits about shoes. Leave them. Barefoot is the best way to get sea legs, anyway.” Despite worrying about nails and broken glass, Alrik agreed, and followed Jeang out onto the deck where the rest of the crew had assembled. He felt a little awkward, standing alone as he was, with the wide expanse of deck occupied with no more than twenty men. The captain stood before the wheel, shouting orders. The barnacle-crusted anchor was pulled from the sea and the ship’s sails were released, billowing like great white blankets. Men at the dock guided the ship out with shorelines, and then they were upon open water. The sails caught the wind with a woosh, and the ship pulled away from port. Alrik looked over the side, at the green-blue sea, and felt a new feeling rising within him, mixing with all the others that tumbled within him. Excitement.

Chapter 9

25 .9.1042 Today I spotted a Great Yawning Eft in the Shadow of the Amber Cliffs. It was mottled red-brown, sleek and smooth like polished stone. I was unable to determine its sex, as from my knowledge of the wildlife in this area, there is little sexual dimorphism in the species except a male cloacal swelling during mating season. The creature in question didn’t decide to show me its cloaca. The Sea is dark and deep, and the Cliffs are jagged. I must make a Note to read more of Studies whenever (if ever!) I can reach a decent Library again. I hope to write in this note Section again soon, though, truly, I know not what my Future holds. Yours (mine?) truly, A.I.S. Blucvisdoc was welcoming in a way Lumi hadn’t expected. The people were all short and stocky, built for the cold and the dark, and smiled at her as she approached. Where Cinura’s markets consisted of many little stalls scattered over areas like the medina and Cinro, the markets in Blucvisdoc were a series of long and low buildings of stone around great hearths and protected from the weight of the snows by gently curved rooves – like tunnels lifted above ground. Lumi, Girrin, Malbry and Yuon each split up with some of Girrin’s money, with the agreement of reconvening at the docks after four hours. Malbry was to oversee the buying of tools and boots, Girrin and Yuon to find medical supplies, menstrual products, fresh food, and the ship itself, and Lumi oversaw buying clothes and preserved food. “Thickest coats you can find,” had said Girrin, before kissing Lumi on the hand and walking briskly off. Lumi was left standing straight as a soldier, grinning and holding her hand to her

face before she began to feel the cold and moved on. The market was like a whole bustling town squeezed into a tube. It was hot; the great fires sent heat and smoke into the crowd, to be vented away by grates in the low ceilings. With the smell of smoke were those of spices and meat, sweat, and the maritime smells of cooked fish and rendered blubber. The air was thick and close. Lumi tried to savour that while she could. She stopped at several of the food stalls, picking through the produce with a keen eye she’d picked up from Aurin. Turn the item over, looking for any bruises or beauty marks. Shake it, if it’s an egg or a container, to make sure it’s not rotten. If it looks good, pretend to cough, or drop something, and pocket it. Now that she had money, Lumi consciously made herself pay for the food. That wasn’t one of Aurin’s steps. Lumi tried to buy food that would last. Dried juksha, seal, fish, and seabird. Raisins from Inivanese grapes. Dried rye bread from Reata. Two businesses that thrived in the market tunnel were refrigeration and mushrooms. The refrigerators looked like wooden crates with steel sides. They were ‘out-tox machines’, their callers d in broken Nuarec –their magic was in a circuit. Lumi smiled and shook her head, picking through some mushrooms. We won’t need to make anything colder where we’re going, she thought. By far the most expensive items Lumi purchased were their coats. After perusing a few other clothing stands and purchasing several pairs of gloves and woollen socks, she decided to look for more heavy protection. “Suits perfectly every size,” said the shopkeeper, a round and hairy man with glowing red cheeks. He stroked the jacket up on a tall pine hat rack, like one might stroke a child or a loved one. “Outer layer is sealskin, waterproof. Second layer is alpaca’s wool. Third is duck’s down, then sealed in with seal skin again. You could walk down to Ollossos in this.” The man’s wife, sitting next to him and knitting, laughed. “Ice licker talk, Ikiya,”

she said. Lumi smiled but did not respond to the statement. “May I buy seven?” Her coin was all but gone after she paid for the coats, loading them into an old fishing net they provided and slinging it over her shoulder. She thanked the couple, who thanked her back, looking at her with kind faces. She pulled on a coat and made it hers, partly to lighten her load and partly to test it, experimentally stepping out from the tunnel into the cold wind. Surprisingly, she didn’t shiver. The cold stung her face, and her legs felt cool, but her body was warm, almost hot. She grinned. With the weak sun beginning its slow descent, Lumi decided it was time to reconvene with the group. She strode, newly invigorated, back to the dock. Her mind wandered. She felt a little more excited now, like the warmth of the coat gave her hope she might survive. She turned a corner past a grim-looking stone building, and something caught her eye. A small store, separated by perhaps a quarter of a mile from the other markets, built into its own little alcove. A single hearth burned at its centre, and there were odd flashes of colour in the flame; blue, then green, then egg-yolk yellow. I’m sure the others aren’t done yet. Ships aren’t easy to come by. I can have a look, she thought, and walked towards the store. As she approached, she noticed new things. Normal herbs like garlic, ginger and chillies hung in great bunches on strings, and bundles of thyme and basil and lemongrass, but among them were biwids; the magical plants in toxauments in their purest form. Lumi could feel the Quodrine shivering gently in the presence of them all, and the air was filled with their astringent sweetness. She strode towards the shop. It was crewed by a single old woman. She didn’t look much different from the other people Lumi had seen that day – until she smiled, and a glint of something unfamiliar shimmered in her eyes. “Hello, girl,” she said. Her accent wasn’t Falarese, and Lumi didn’t recognise it. “Hello,” said Lumi, more meekly than she’d intended. With a nod from the

shopkeeper, she ran a finger over all the little leaf clippings, berries, and twigs. Lumi bought several biwids, poured into several little labelled pouches, using the remainder of her money. She thanked the shopkeeper, and the shopkeeper nodded. Lumi walked a few metres away with her prizes, playing with them in her hands. She turned back, and the little shop’s hearth was out. Its owner was nowhere to be seen. The docks were busier now, as the sailors came in for the night. Frigid seabirds sent their shrieking calls across the bustling space, and snow fell lazily. Lumi felt the red satchel over her shoulder. She hadn’t looked at its contents yet, but she had felt a couple of books. Once she was on the ship, if there was a ship, and they were set on their course, then she’d read. One of the books the Doctor had given her was strange – it leaked magic, like a sharp nail tearing the Quodrine wall wherever it went. What on earth has that doctor been up to? “Oi there, landlubber!” came a voice from high up. Girrin. Lumi turned and squinted through the gently falling snow. She stood at the edge of the docks, now, where the earth became wood held up over sea. “Up here!” said Girrin. Lumi’s eyes followed the sound, and her jaw dropped. A proper ship, a schooner, pristine and shiny, sat before her in the water. Girrin called her from near the captain’s wheel, waving and jumping up and down. Lumi waved back and looked around the ship, wide-eyed. The ship, carrying the sombre blue, black, grey, and white Provincial Falarese flag, was like a finely tuned musical instrument. Every board, every rope, every nail looked like it had been put into its optimal place in perfect alignment. Lumi walked up the docking ramp on the side of the ship and ran toward Girrin, taking her in her arms. She nearly knocked her over. “Gir! Moons above, how in the Eine did you manage to pay for this?” Lumi was overwhelmed. For all their journeying hitherto, it struck her that she’d never expected to make it this far.

Girrin shrugged. “I told you I had money. Money and generous parents.” She sounded almost sad, but Lumi brushed it aside. “Where is Malbry?” asked Lumi. “Has he hired some crew for us? Where is Yuon? Do we have food? I have seven amazing coats for us. Where should I put my things?” Girrin held up her hands, blotchy in the cold, and closed her eyes. Lumi slowed and then stopped. “Sorry, Gir,” she said. Girrin smiled, stood on her tiptoes, and kissed Lumi on the cheek. Lumi’s soft brown cheeks reddened, and she imagined them sparking like she was toxxed. “I understand, Lumi. Yuon’s gotten us a good deal of food, and he’s put it in the pantry area below deck. Not big enough to be a mess hall, but good for storage. That’s where you’ll put your things, too. We could only find one other crew member,” Girrin said, gritting her teeth. “We tried to recruit maybe fifteen people, girls and boys, men and women, and they were nearly all interested until we said where we were going.” She pointed to the far side of the ship where Malbry and another boy like Yuon with golden hair and skin were fastening the Splendour. Malbry caught Girrin’s eye and waved. She smiled. The new boy waved too, grinning widely. “Boy’s name is Ford Tate Ythanuen,” whispered Girrin. “No parents, no prospects. Was living in some guano slums with his uncle when we found him. He’s strong, though, and seems smart. He knows the south better than we do, too.” Lumi looked at the boy. With none of Yuon’s tropical blood, he was small, compact, and strong. Perfect for keeping in heat. “I hope we can trust him,” she whispered. The young man, Ford, caught Lumi’s eye again. Oh dear, she thought. He’s approaching me.

He was. Ford met Lumi at the bottom of the wooden steps by the captain’s wheel. He removed one of his gloves and vigorously shook Lumi’s hand. His hand was rough. He looked at her. His eyes were small and brown and bright, shielded from the cold by a strong, wide face. He grinned like an excited child. “Greetings, greetings, capitan,” he said. He was still shaking her hand. “Oh, er, I’m not the –” “Captain? Oh, ne, of course you are! Big strong Skandrian girl, ne?” Lumi’s eyes widened, and she looked around. Malbry had walked up beside Ford and was watching in confusion and amusement. Ford was also confused, for a different reason. “You are Skandrian, aren’t you, ne? Clever magic people. Make all the good clocks and heaters the rich folk around the Falars use.” “Not, er, quite,” said Lumi, gathering herself. Meeting someone new was not something she had prepared herself for today, as much as it was on the itinerary. Ford nodded slowly. He may have grown up in isolation, but he’s not stupid, thought Lumi. “Mixed blood, ne? Can’t say my skoggle would approve, but I it. Me? I’m full Falarese blood.” He beat a fist on his chest. “Descended from the Ahien people. Oldest people in Tokarey. I give this ship my blessing,” he said, forming his hands into fists, extending his index fingers, and moving his hands together until they touched and formed a triangle. He closed his eyes, muttering a prayer, dead serious in the cold wind. He opened them again, and the childish grin was back. “So, what are we going to name this ship, then?” he said. Yuon appeared suddenly as a disembodied head and arm rising from the bowels of the ship from a hatch. “Oh, please let me help name it!”

After nearly bowling poor Yuon over exclaiming lombrar, lombrar (‘brother, brother,’), Ford and the rest of the once-group-now-crew settled in the belly of the ship, standing by a small hearth. Nothing was organised yet, and it irked Lumi. Give it time, she told herself. “So, what should we name the ship, ne lombrar?” asked Ford. Though Lumi was the de facto captain, she noted that Yuon as a fellow brother of the Falarics seemed to have taken these honours. Lumi was miffed, but she tried not to show it. Girrin rubbed her arm; evidently, she had failed at not showing it. “Well,” said Yuon, hesitant. “I have been thinking about that story about Wry Neck while we’ve been travelling. It seems important, in a way. I’d be interested in naming the ship after the guard, but it’s such a personal name, and none of us are Inivanese.” “There is a sort of poetry to it, though,” said Girrin wistfully. “The whole idea of the duchess, in fine clothes, to be protected at all costs.” “The Duchess,” said Malbry. Malbry! Everyone in the room looked at him in turn. Lumi was the last person to it that he’d chosen the perfect name, but eventually she gave in. The tiny crew prepared to make the Duchess fly. Unlike the others, the two Falarese boys had some knowledge of how to use a ship, and Lumi took it upon herself to learn as many nautical and tricks from them as she could. “So, when you’re facing forward, left is port and right is starboard?” she asked. Ford nodded. “And the front is the bow, and the back is the stern.” Ford nodded again. “You’re a quick learner, lombsia. As the captain, it’s likely that’s all you got to know. You’ll be up at the helm, turning the wheel, unless you get someone else to. I can teach me lombrar and the other boys how to change tack with the wind, all those ropes and what. That smaller girl, the

orange-head one – I’m not sure what she can do. If she’s got the strength, she looks light enough to climb the riggings and cut ropes if need be.” Lumi frowned. “You don’t think I can handle the sails myself?” Ford raised his eyebrows. “You got something to prove, lombsia? You’re my captain. I chose to be standing here. I am not about to question what you choose to do, but I’m the only one here with any experience with proper ships. This crew is small and inexperienced, and the waters are dangerous. I respect your abilities, but to my know-how, a good leader knows when to listen as well as when to instruct.” Lumi grunted. “Alright,” she said. “I’m sick of bobbing in place. Let’s get her out of the port.” She looked up into the sky. They’d missed first and second dayrest, and were all drooping – at least, the Cinures were. Ford looked peppy. “Yuon! Malbry! Pull anchor. Girrin, can you climb?” called Lumi. Girrin nodded and grinned. “Lower the topsails, then, if you please.” Lumi enjoyed the sound of her voice carrying loud and clear across the ship. Girrin grinned and began to scale the rigging. She did it with the ease of a monkey, and Ford was visibly surprised. He leapt down from the helm as Yuon and Malbry worked to bring up the anchor and then shouted instructions up to Girrin on how to open the topsails. Girrin climbed down the mainmast with ease, and Lumi called out to her. “Where did you learn to climb like that?” “Strict parents breed creative children,” she said blithely. “I climbed whenever I wanted to escape to see fireworks or music. Or just to get out, really.” She stood on the horizontal yard of the middle sail now, grinning. Suddenly the wind picked up, and the yard swung. She shrieked with joy and surprise and gripped on tight. Ford vaulted back up to the helm. “Suggesting a sharp turn of the wheel to starboard, captain,” he said. He was calm, but his eyes shone with excitement.

Lumi tried to which way starboard was and then took the wheel and pulled it to the right. The ship turned slowly as little bursts of wind fluttered in and out of the sails. The Duchess turned finally around when a great breeze picked it up from behind and launched it forward. Sails went taut as drum skins and snowflakes blurred into white lines. Lumi checked by eye and then took a telescope from her pocket and scanned her surroundings for other ships. There were none within several hundred yards. She pulled her coat around her as the wind whipped by. I could learn to enjoy this, she thought. The wind was strong, and the Duchess sailed with ease as the hours drifted by. Lumi spent the first hour standing at the helm out of some sense of duty, but soon realised there was no logic in it and sat. The sea was so calm that it sat more like dark glass than the churning waves she was used to seeing at the beach, at the cliffs. Of course, that would change once they left the bay. Even in the gentle swell, the ship creaked and knocked like the breath of a living thing. Malbry, Yuon and Lumi all worked the anchor back off the side of the ship as the sun began to set hours later. They choose their anchorage in the shadow of one of the tall cliffs cupping the bay. Yuon looked up at it. Even now, the sounds of birds carried far into the night. “I really do hope I don’t get shat on,” he said. “Maybe don’t look up with your mouth wide open, then,” said Malbry. Yuon shut his mouth tight. “Anchor away!” The anchor chain tumbled over itself a dozen times, inciting a deeper creak in the ship. There was a muffled impact that juddered through the chain, spread throughout the ship, and disappeared. The anchor held, and they stopped. “Are ships really meant to creak this much?” asked Girrin. Malbry smiled and nodded.

A familiar but nameless feeling crept into Lumi’s gut. “Captain!” It was Ford, out of breath. “There is a man hiding in the mess room!” Ford went first, because he was the only one with a weapon, but Lumi was close behind, followed by Malbry, then Yuon, then Girrin. “How the fuck did he get on here?” growled Yuon. “Should we approach him at all? I mean, I left the weapons I bought us in the mess, which is where he is.” “Don’t worry. We are five. No harm shall come to us,” said Ford. He sounded confident, at least. Yuon tried to open the companionway quietly, but the door creaked hideously and all five of them cringed. They waited another moment, and then Ford slunk down the stairs. Lumi had a moment of fear. What if this man is with Ford and they’re going to team up and kill us? Oh, Moons, she thought. We’re going to die before we even reach the Tongue. There was a scuffle at the bottom of the stairs, and she heard Ford and another man grunting. She hurried down and blinked as her eyes adjusted to the dimness inside. Ford got the man in a headlock, and Lumi’s jaw dropped. “What should I do with him, ne, Captain? Throw him overboard?” “No,” said Lumi. “You can’t do that. That man is my brother.” Ford looked at Aurin and then dropped him. Aurin looked up at Lumi and gave her a wan smile. “Hey, Lume.”

Discussion I - K and M

“G ood tea. Anything in it I should be worried about?” asked Kenneman, swirling the drink in the mug. M looked across the little wooden table at him and laughed nervously. “Er, no, of course not.” Kenneman smiled, looking out the window of the cottage. It was a fine day in the hills, despite the overcast grey sky, and the sounds of wind were punctuated by the humming of alpacas and the grunts of pigs. He looked back to M. “I am being facetious, but you’re a funny man to tease, Doctor.” He sipped his tea. “The town boy is gone? Who saw Shayid and the ambassador’s son?” M nodded. Kenneman scowled. “That was sloppy.” “It was,” conceded M, shame clouding his eyes – and then he changed the subject. Kenneman decided not to push it. “Aside from the ambassador’s son, that rebel I toxxed – she’s been hanged. Sun walkers will be on edge now.” Kenneman nodded. “Good. And the others?” “Others?” asked M, blinking. Kenneman tapped the wooden table in frustration. Was it the years of tox abuse, or had the man always been so airheaded? “The ambassador’s boy himself and that Cinuravese girl you took in,” he said. M’s expression shifted to something Kenneman couldn’t read. “Indeed. The em-Fuahim boy’s going northeast – I sent him on a different route to the wanderer so they won’t bump into each other. As for the girl... she’s going

to her death. Ollossos. Remarkably stupid idea.” His eyes fogged over a little, and Kenneman raised his eyebrows. “I liked that girl,” said M. Kenneman’s stomach turned. “I’m sure you did,” he said, grimacing, standing up and leaving his tea half-empty. He made for the door. “Is that all you’re going to give me?” came the Doctor’s voice. He sounded strained. Kenneman turned back to M. “What in the Eine is that supposed to mean, M?” he said. The Doctor held his eyes, but the surface of his tea made little waves as the hand holding it shook. “You’ve shafted me,” said M. “Well and truly. You know I was doing well in Cinura. I’ve had to abandon all my patrons –” “The teenagers you’ve groomed to test your experiments on, you mean,” said K. “– And my experiments. Moons, my experiments! My books! Do you know what the books you had me throw were made of? What significance they held?” “Yes, you dullard,” said K, reaching into his coat pocket. “That’s why I had you throw them away.” The Doctor growled. “This is a pile of juksha-shit taller than Lagtower. I won’t continue to let you puppet me around, K. I won’t. You can’t hold my past over me anymore – everyone already knows! And I’m beyond that now! My desires are in check. If it weren’t for you and yours fucking me, I’d still have my role. I’d still have my house, and my tower and my – my people.” Kenneman nodded and scratched his nose, dropping a tiny flake of something into his mouth. It dissolved on his tongue. “And what do you expect me to do about that, pederast?” he asked. The Doctor was fuming. Kenneman stepped back.

“Capitulate,” seethed the Doctor. “But why?” “Because I’ll tell.” “You have nothing to tell because there’s nothing you’ve been told.” “Hardly,” said the Doctor, something wild in his eye. “I know. I was there in 1021. Yes, there. And I –” Kenneman, using the toxaument he’d ingested while the Doctor was distracted, took hold of M’s head and slammed it with terrible force into the table, onto the mug. The ceramic shattered, but several pieces held firm enough to force their way into the Doctor’s eyes and brain. The body slumped, and tea and blood began to spread over the tabletop. “That’s quite enough from you,” muttered Kenneman. He picked a bloody piece of ceramic from his lip and left.

Chapter 10

26 .9.1042 This is a Test. I was given this Book by its Author. I suspect he may be playing a Trick on me – perhaps there’s some sort of slow-reveal invisible Ink on these pages, but I cannot detect it. Can I Dr. Melalhir through this Book? I cannot for the Life of me think how. Nor can I justify this Writing, in Truth. I see this Book leaking magic like a Cauldron full of boiling Biwids, but this is beyond any Magic I have ever heard of. Alas, clueless, Lumi. There was new writing in the note section of On the Learning and Performance of Magic, and it was not in Alrik’s handwriting. Lumi – is that a name? An acronym? How did these words get there? Alrik glanced around him, as if the secret writer were still nearby. Could it have been Jeang? Unlikely – the writing featured none of the quirks Alrik had heard in his speech. Mawari? Perhaps, but Alrik didn’t know why the jovial, open man would have taken Alrik’s book and written in it under a pseudonym. Clicking his tongue, he wrote a note beneath the one written by ‘Lumi.’ This is also a Test. Are you someone on this Ship? If so, please speak to me directly. I doubt I look frightening. You are also taking up valuable Space I would use for taking Notes on Wildlife. Alrik took the pen from the page and then gasped. He scribbled down a few more words. I suppose you know my real Name, then, too. I’d ask you not to spread it. The ink sunk into the page and set dry. Alrik stared at the page and, after less than a minute, with a creeping feeling like ice on the back of his neck, saw words writing themselves onto the page below his own. No pen appeared, but

only the words. The book grew warmer in his hands. I am not on your Ship. Then, nothing. Alrik stared at the book, eyes wide, willing more writing to appear, but it did not. He bit his tongue and closed the book. The strange book brought his view of the goings-on of the ship down to something dull and mundane, like a failing light. It was magic, he thought; at least no other natural processes he could fathom could have been the cause. The message had appeared in the book, and then no more came. Days ed. Despite Alrik’s fixation and fascination on the occurrence, in other moments, he noticed more strangeness. With such a small crew, nearly everyone was on their feet at any given time. Alrik spent much time scrubbing and mopping and sweeping, and by the second day his once-soft hands were blistered red. Then, those blisters had popped, and new ones had come to take their place. It had been four days since the Mulliver had left Tine, and Captain Gannet had done, Alrik thought, an excellent job of keeping the busy crew in order. But why was the crew so small in the first place? By the sixth day there had been squabbles, often leading to shouting and occasionally grappling and punches, but no more blood had been drawn than a bloody nose. Alrik had stayed most by Jeang and Mawari. They stood out, and, therefore, he fit in with them. Alrik didn’t mind cleaning. He enjoyed the feeling of the soap on his hands and preferred being above deck to below. However, something he struggled with was the random times the Captain would order him to clean: after supper, at noon, in the dead of night. Though the captain and crew all had dayrests as Alrik did, the lack of work structure made Alrik anxious. After a great internal debate, he worked up the courage to speak to Lucan, and see the Captain. “Captain,” he had said with all the strength he could muster. “I am paying to be on this ship, and I am offering my work. However – consider it a cultural issue –

I cannot work at any time without notice. I will work, and I will work hard, but you must give me a time or times to work in, and to stay with that time consistently. Give me whichever hours. I’ll take your worst if I have to.” It wasn’t a cultural issue. Cinuravese workers could work at any time – he’d seen it on his walks – but it was a difference to him. Perhaps it was this white lie that led the Captain, after only a moment of thought, to agree. So, for the two nights since that moment, Alrik had taken the Witching Hour shift out above deck. He used the time, as he cleaned, to memorise port, stern, bow, starboard, and other things of interest, like the boards that creaked and ones that didn’t, and ropes that were frayed or thin. At the dawn of the seventh day, he stopped near the helm, and rested on the wooden decking. All was silent, and still – the only other person awake was Mawari, up in the crow’s nest, sending morning prayers to far-off gods. Alrik always stayed until the dawn. First, the sun peeked over the water, colouring the sky mellow blue, then lavender, then pink. He was shivering from a night out on the decks, so he accepted the sun’s heat gratefully. As they travelled, both the days and the nights had grown warmer. The crags of the Roïtian peninsula were gone, replaced by smoother, greener hills dotted with distant dark forests. They were still by the country of Roït, but Jeang said that within a week they would reach Dubcloch, the vast country to Roït’s north, and soon after that the bustling Canalas City, its capital. The period between his Witching Hour clean and the waking hour of his fellow crewmen was one of the only times that Alrik could write his observations. To his chagrin, his only book with references to birdlife had been destroyed on his paddle to Tine from Vildhan. So, instead, he’d had to turn to his memory, and his observations. He’d invented fanciful names for the birds, like ‘red-crested gulldove’ and ‘black-winged skyweasel.’ Sometimes, strange things revealed themselves to him, like what he theorised was a dead shark, decayed to a thousand tiny white strings and chewed at by blackfish. Once, he had seen something like a great greyish shed skin, nestled between two pieces of cargo on the main deck. After his shift, he’d gone to investigate, but it had disappeared. He theorised about what it might have been.

This is ittedly fanciful, he writes. But I do believe I am doing some good work. Surely the National Library at Dubcloch could benefit from some different perspectives. I am not an Expert by any means, but I am learning. He thumbed through the book. He had written only four entries, most brief. Since those three days gone, no further writing had spontaneously appeared from Lumi or anyone else.

Let me be read clearly , Alrik. I do not know how you are ing me, and I do not know if this is some sort of elaborate Trick Melalhir or someone else has set up for me, though my Curiosity grows by the Day and my Willingness to trust these Words grows with it. It appears this Book may be the Conduit of a type of Magic I’ve never seen nor read of before – as though, between your Copy and mine, the Words written imprint upon the Quodrine itself. It strikes me as absurd, almost, though I suppose any sufficient technological advancement seems absurd to the uninitiated. That places you, Alrik, in a unique Position. As far as I have observed, there is little Delay in Transmission between these two books. As such, you and I are in possession of perhaps the fastest Method of communication in the entire Eine. Who are you? Where are you? And why must you hide your real Name? We may be able to help each other. My name is Lumi. I am from Cinura, and I am on a Journey to change my City for the better. Please respond as soon as possible. Lumi. It was next morning, and Alrik’s skin prickled in excitement and fear. Lumi, whoever they were, had seen his notes, seen his sketches. Travelling where, and for what? He flicked back through the pages, squinting in the early morning light. Under several of his words were lines and tiny notes. Another explorer, he thought. Hello. he wrote. He thought and was about to write more, but a rough shoulder knocked him, and the book flew from his hands. He dropped to the floor and scrambled to pick it up. When he held it again, it was warm. “Sorry about that, mate,” said the man, who stopped and looked at Alrik for a moment. He was a short, broad Canalian fellow, with black bristly whiskers and old puncture holes from clack or something more mundane on his arms. He looked tense. The night scraped on, and the sounds of the crew faded off into sleep. Alrik sat up, steadying himself on his shaking hammock. He felt like everything he

touched or stood on was wobbling like jelly, and he longed for dry, solid land. He opened On the Learning and Performance of Magic, to Melalhir’s words he’d so far ignored, and then closed it again. He fell asleep slowly, and the voices, softer at night, helped carry him away. The boat creaked, and something made a sound Alrik’s fuzzy mind fancied as hard claws skittering on wood. The voices became garbled and unreal as his mind slipped away. Alrik didn’t open his eyes. If a monster had come to eat him, then so be it. He felt so far from those around him, from anyone or anything familiar, that he might as well have been on one of the distant moons.

Chapter 11

Hello. My name is Alrik . I am from Cinura, too. I am on a Ship travelling up Tokarey’s eastern Coast. Hopefully, I will cross into Dubcloch’s waters soon. I’m going to Canalas to escape a false Accusation. Murder. I understand that You received this Book from a Doctor Melalhir – I seem to have received an identical Copy. We should discuss this. Strange Night. Will write soon. On the Learning and Performance of Magic was splayed out on the rickety desk, pages covered in notes and tiny diagrams. Lumi had one corner of the mess, hidden among the group’s belongings, as her study, her laboratory. She opened the book and pored over it. If the bizarre and developing situation with this ‘Alrik’ had convinced her of anything, it was that she ought to read as much as she could. “Scot’s moss, dried. Grows on the southern steppes of Fossica. Promotes the manipulation of electricity through the altering of positive and negative charge. More lossy performance for other kinds of magic.” She held up a corked vial of dried moss that crackled gently in the candlelight and squinted at it. “Sounds like some boffin shit,” said Girrin. “Looks like burnt pondweed to me.” Lumi jumped and then turned, irritated. Girrin was trembling, wrapped up in her heavy clothes with a sheen of frost coating them. Lumi looked at her in frustration for a few moments, her face hard, before she softened. There was no reason to be angry. “How was the iceberg watch, love?” she asked, helping Girrin strip off her jacket and squeeze out half a gallon of icy water into a bucket. “Cold,” said Girrin. She stood in front of Lumi, now naked save for her shift,

which clung to her body with the sweat of all the layers since gone. The two looked at each other. Lumi did her best not to look anywhere but at Girrin’s face. “Should I... change my shift?” Girrin said. Her skinny body had warmed quickly before the hearth, and her cheeks were flushed. “I... yes. The one you’re wearing is soaked through. Yuon’s on washing duty next. Do you want me to help you? Get it off, I mean.” Lumi took a step towards Girrin. Girrin was not a short girl, but Lumi was a head taller, and much broader in shoulder and hip. Girrin spread her arms like the wings of a falar and grinned. “Undress me, Miss Hellemar.” Lumi giggled and helped work off Girrin’s wet shift. She led her friend into an alcove and then hung up the shift by the fire. Then she turned away to give Girrin some modesty, but Girrin spoke up. “Hey, Lumi. Turn around.” Lumi turned around and struggled to keep her eyes level with Girrin’s. Girrin posed, her hands on her hips. She was pale, nose and cheeks red from the cold, with knobbly knees and an assortment of moles, scars, acne scars and red spots. Covering half of her left breast was a port wine stain birthmark. Despite her boniness, she looked soft, like silk over a little down. “I... didn’t know you had a birthmark,” was all Lumi managed to say. Girrin’s face fell a little, and her modesty came back in the form of turned-in shoulders. “Don’t you like it?” “No!” said Lumi. “No, I like it very much. I like you very much. All of you. I...” Lumi stepped forward. Lumi’s heart felt like a drum. If she’d had any toxaument left in her system, she might have accidentally set something on fire. Clang!

The entire ship lurched forward, and Lumi slammed against the wall, grunting in pain. Girrin tumbled, landing in a pile of clothes. Lumi’s books and toxauments were scattered. She groaned, helping Girrin back up to her feet. The hearth had gone out. The companionway creaked open. “Sorry, ne! Yuon decided to lower the anchor in a strong headwind, so she yanked against the chain. Blame me lombrar.” “Sorry!” called the remorseful voice of Yuon further up on the deck. Girrin laughed, gathering herself some clothes. Lumi smiled at her, then frowned as she saw her desk. Girrin watched her put everything back into order as she pulled the clothes on in silence. The air between them buzzed with quiet promise and disappointment both. “What are you doing down here, Lume?” Girrin asked. Lumi was still rearranging and cleaning. “Making things. Learning to be better at harnessing magic. Everything was nicely organised until... you know.” Girrin stepped forward. She could see the tension in Lumi’s posture. “Hey,” she said gently, and rested her hand on Lumi’s shoulder. Lumi softened. A different, familiar kind of tension entered the room. “I thought with magic all you had to do was eat the plants or toxxes and then you could be a proper sorcerer.” She reconsidered. “Sorceress.” Lumi smiled. “Not quite, Gir. How’s your theory?” Girrin shook her head and shrugged. Lumi opened her book to a compendium of toxauments, a hundred thousand different plants from every corner of the Eine. Lumi ushered Girrin to her side

until they were hip to hip. “I peeked at this before we left Blucvisdoc. Magic is through biwids, for the most part, but the interesting thing is that you can combine them in different ways for different effects. Some biwids are ‘lossier’ than others with certain kinds of magic – like Scot’s moss. It’s best suited for work with electricity. You can do all kinds of magic with any biwid, really, but some are more suited to certain things. You can make lightning with this stuff if you know what you’re doing.” She motioned to her vials. “Do you? Know what you’re doing?” “Not really.” Lumi smiled, embarrassed. “That’s why I’m experimenting. I’m mixing Scot’s moss with some other biwids that help with the creation of light and heat. My idea’s external, not internal – like a basic machine instead of a pill. The idea is to make something so potent that say, if we’re in trouble when we’re down in Ollossos, I can make a huge bonfire, a ruckus that should attract nearby ships and whatnot.” Girrin cocked her head. “Won’t we be too far inland for ships? Folks give the Ollossos a wide berth.” “Maybe,” said Lumi, shrugging. She stared at a little vial she’d labelled ‘Alert.’ “Maybe not, though. Even the people here before the Shock, the ones who caused it – the Lefaneie – never went too far south. All the magic in the Eine, all the heat, couldn’t make the very bottom of the world safe to live in. If we find anything, it’ll be within a few days’ walk at most from the northern peninsula.” I hope, she thought. Fear creeped into the room like a ghost. “A few days still sounds like a few too many,” said Girrin. Lumi frowned and looked at her. She stared at the wooden ship wall for a moment and then clicked her tongue. The anger boiled up again, but she pushed it down. Why? Girrin hadn’t done anything except doubt a statement. She shifted her mind to somewhere else. “Listen,” she said, and Girrin turned and listened, interested in her tone. “Soon we won’t be able to sleep without being wrapped in our clothes. It’s my turn with the captain’s bed tonight, but it can... get lonely. And you’re awfully thin, so I don’t know if I want you sleeping in the crew’s quarters if you don’t have to. I think we could sleep in the captain’s bed together if you’d like. We may as well give our clothes a rest before we make landing at the Tongue, too.”

“That would bloody well please me,” said Girrin, with a wide-mouthed grin. Lumi ran to the captain’s cabin with Girrin’s hand in hers. On the deck, she saw Aurin standing, smoking. She whispered to Girrin to go to the cabin and walked towards her brother. “I didn’t know you smoked.” “I didn’t know you took life-endangering trips to frozen wastelands,” said Aurin. His voice was sharp. Lumi, taken aback, frowned deeply. “I didn’t ask you to come with me. In fact, as you know, I bloody well didn’t want you to.” Aurin had been helpful those past few days, but quiet. The unusual circumstances of their reunion stilted their interactions. “You didn’t do a great job of hiding your plans,” he said flatly. “You kept it written down at your bedside.” Lumi’s mouth twisted into a snarl, and she grabbed her brother by the shoulder, turning him around. She pointed up at him – he was easily two heads taller than her. “You read my diary? That was never your place! Who do you fucking think you are? What do you think you’re doing? We bought provisions for five people on this journey, and now you’ve made it six, and fucked it all up. I love you, Aurin. I really, really do. But I never asked you to come, for your sake, so don’t you dare be snarky with me. If you don’t like it, you can take the dinghy and paddle your own damn way back to Cinura.” Huffing like an angry bull, bright red in the cheeks, she stormed away. Aurin’s eyes were wide, his cigarette blown out. He sighed and threw it into the sea. “I brought my own supplies,” he mumbled. Lumi opened the cabin door to find Girrin half-asleep beneath the covers. Something in her that had faded was relit. It was cold, but with the lighting of a few sweet-smelling candles, it became less so. Girrin gazed up at Lumi through half-lidded eyes, her hair an orange mess around her head. Lumi stood with her back to her, staring out at a moon through the little glass window. Middagh. The glow coming off it was a gentle green from the reflected light of its lunar jungles.

She pulled the curtains closed. “Hey,” croaked Girrin. “Come here, then. I’m getting cold.” Lumi smiled, looked down at the ground and began to work off her coats. Her mind was in two places. It was within this room, with her beautiful friend naked in her bed, and outside, standing in the cold, staring off into the icy distance. Staring at her brother. “I don’t know if I want you to see what I look like,” said Lumi, and the words surprised her. Girrin grunted in confusion. “I mean, that doesn’t make an awful lot of sense considering what you implied earlier, but I’m not about to make you strip like some sort of alley woman.” “What do you know of alley women?” said Lumi, sitting at the edge of the bed and taking off her boots. She took a stealthy whiff of one and wrinkled up her nose. Girrin sat up and pulled the blanket up to cover herself before changing her mind and letting it drop. “You seem to forget that, unlike you, I’m a well-travelled girl,” said Girrin. “I’ve visited Canalas City. It’s hard to walk half a block without bumping into a gaggle of whores there.” “Whore seems like a harsh word,” said Lumi. She sat now in only thick stockings and her shift, and pulled the stockings down, rolling them up and placing them in her shoes. “They’re just women with a hard job, you know. I’m sure people from Skander-Sareen to Canalas City would have words for whatever we are that would be just as dismissive.” “For what we are?” said Girrin. Lumi nodded. She felt ice in her blood, and it wasn’t from the outside. She was just in her shift now. Her body was oddly proportioned, she thought, with skinny ankles, bulbous hips, and far-apart breasts. She shivered. “I can see your nipples through your shirt,” said Girrin, giggling. Lumi looked down. “That is true.” She started to giggle as well, and crawled into

the bed, pulling off her shift as she went, ensuring her body was never fully exposed. She settled into the bed, and felt Girrin by her side, warm. Girrin reached out and touched Lumi’s hip. Lumi found breathing a little harder. “You’re very soft,” whispered Girrin. Before she was aware of it, Lumi began to cry. Girrin moved away a little, but Lumi pulled her back, and they wrapped themselves up in each other. All Lumi could see was candlelight and the fiery red hair atop Girrin’s head. All warm colours. For a moment she thought Girrin might be asleep, but then her thin hand reached, took Lumi’s own, and placed it between her legs. Lumi inhaled sharply, and then Girrin began to kiss her. She was on top of Lumi now, and her hand found its way between Lumi’s legs. It was a soft touch, but it made her whole body shake. For a few minutes, the exact time she could never know for sure, Lumi lost herself in Girrin. She made a muffled cry after a time and collapsed. She felt so many things. Elated but melancholy. So tiny she could be crushed in a single hand, and so large she filled the entire room. She began to cry again. “I don’t want to die, Gir. I don’t.” Girrin kissed her forehead, her cheeks, and then her lips. Then the kissing stopped. Lumi opened her eyes and saw Girrin asleep, mouth hanging open and drooling. Lumi stifled a laugh and stroked Girrin’s hair, wiping her own eyes. Beyond that warm room, the Duchess creaked. The sea churned around it. The ocean shivered with the thunder of an ice shelf as big as a castle falling into the sea.

Chapter 12

Hello Alrik. It’s fascinating to converse with You in such a Manner. I know not of your Face, though we share a common Origin and have likely walked the same Streets. What do You know about Me? If this is a Ploy or a Deception by those who would oppose Me, It is far more advanced than any Other I have seen. Write to Me when You can, Alrik. Stay safe. That is, unless You are lying, and you are involved with Canalas or the Cinuravese Government. Then it would inconvenience me less for You to die. The ship was ing near a settlement that looked like an enormous wooden spider web. Jetties were stacked haphazardly upon one another, hung with ropes and flags and pulleys and wagons. The ocean, not confined by a beach, had been dug deep into the land, pulsing into and between wooden houses. Nearly the whole settlement was built on the water, held together by deep foundational poles and floating lines. “What’s this place?” asked Alrik. “That is Shorlik,” said Mawari, standing by his side. “Could I – could I borrow your telescope?” asked Alrik. Mawari was slightly shorter than him, but Alrik felt smaller. Mawari punched him in the shoulder, making him wince, and took his telescope from a bag slung around his shoulder. Alrik received it, feeling grooves around it. He peered closer, and the grooves revealed themselves as carvings and inscriptions. An elephant, a leopard, between them a jagged script he didn’t know. T’fonkese, perhaps. “I’m not much of an authority on telescopes, but this one is lovely,” said Alrik, carefully extending it and holding it to his eye. Blinking away a fascinating view

of his eyelashes, he focused on the settlement in the distance. Some things became apparent; little gnarled mangrove trees bearing misshapen white fruit grew from cracks in buildings, and there were no roads. Between all the little boxy houses were, instead, little ageways of water, ebbing and flowing with the sea. The water went into fields of what looked like rice and other vegetables, and people at work rode wide, heavy-set creatures invisible below the waves. The people, too, interested him. “They look a little like me,” said Alrik. Mawari smiled and shook his head. “They look it, but not quite. Omolu knows you might have some Filleadeen blood in you, but they’re unique. They can hold their breaths for a remarkable time, and keep alive in frigid water.” Alrik nodded, still gazing through the telescope. He saw what looked like houses carved into the foothills and mountains behind the drenched town. At the top of a promontory, he could see an imposing mountain-stone building, led up to by a set of winding and perilous stairs. Moons wonder how anyone could climb those. “These people have lived here longer than anybody, but were driven out of most places. They manage to eke out an existence here,” said Mawari. “And all for seagold.” He leaned up against the railing of the ship and pointed. “It grows all along this coast, but most of it is too rocky to be safe to dive at. Shorlik and its little country, Fillead, is the only place to get it.” “Gold grows?” “It’s not really gold. It’s a plant, like seaweed. Rich women from T’fonk to Lhong pay fortunes for it.” Alrik looked at the building that towered over the city, and the scattered, rotting houses below. “And who benefits from that wealth?” he asked. Mawari smiled. “I think you know.”

Bang! Alrik sat bolt upright, awake. Thunder? No. It had sounded like it, but the sea was calm. He could feel it lapping gently against the cabin side wall. Bang! There it went again. Were they firing cannons? There was a commotion, too. Alrik braced himself for return fire, sinking down as far as he could onto the floor, clutching his red satchel to his chest. “What’s-your-name! Alin! Up!” shouted a man. Tall. White. Face bristled like a pinecone. Alrik vaguely ed that his name was Pauly. Alrik stood, shook. The man put a shiny black pistol in his hand, and Alrik held it like it was poisonous. A series of smaller bangs erupted from above deck, and it finally sunk in that they were coming from guns. Big, proper muskets. Why? Alrik thought. Why today, and why guns? “Above deck, you wastrel,” grunted Pauly. “The transfer’s gone wrong, and we need all working hands up above.” Alrik’s heart, thumping, fell. Pauly was gleaming with sweat, carrying a musket with what looked like seven separate barrels, all arranged in a circle at its front. Alrik wondered if the gun was loaded; no wonder the explosions were so bloody loud. “Above deck! Come on!” Pauly shoved open the door to the upper deck and immediately fired his gun, several barrels at once. There was a sound like thunder, and Alrik clutched at his

deafened ears. The air was filled with brief flame and a choking chalk-white smoke. He heard a terrible crunch as the force of the shot dislocated Pauly’s shoulder, and the man dropped his gun, screaming. Alrik ran to cover behind some tied-down luggage and held his breath, catching a glimpse of another ship with a purple flag pulled to the Mulliver with hooks. He watched Pauly, dazed and sweaty, sanding for a moment, peering through the smoke. Then, his chest caved in from a volley of gunfire like a rotten fruit being stepped on. His insides became a fine mist that swirled in the air as his body slumped to the ground, nearly cut in two. Alrik covered his mouth with both hands to keep from crying out. He crouched, frozen, behind the luggage. His knees began to ache, and he heard changes; the gunfire became sparser. He wanted to peer out behind the crate – he had an idea it contained rum – but as the ship rocked gently back and forth, what was left of Pauly’s torso moved with it. For a moment, he imagined that was him. Who’d publish his observations if he died here? Who’d write all the books he wanted to write? If he moved, he might be mowed down, but if he stayed where he was, he might die without making any progress. Who were the people on the other ship? I’ve really gotten myself into some juksha shit, Alrik thought. He made his choice and began to crawl towards Pauly’s gun. The companionway hatch had closed on the wooden stock of it, so the barrel was pointing towards him, and he could gaze down the barrels. He extended his hand, so his fingers were three hair’s breadths from the barrel. He examined the deck before him. Pauly’s blood, black powder dust, wood shavings. He retracted his fingers, and, despite himself, laughed at the thought, How much do I really need this hand? He extended it again, and someone in a boot stepped on it. Alrik cried out. “Hello, sandgroper,” said a voice Alrik didn’t recognise. All he could see was that the man had black boots and faded red socks. He’d decided then that he did like his hand, but he couldn’t do anything about it. He struggled, and Red Socks twisted his boot, making Alrik cry out once more. Alrik’s vision was blurring out at the edges. He tried to stand up but was kicked

down. He scowled and began to cry. Red Socks nonchalantly reached for the seven-barrelled musket stuck in the hatch and yanked it out, testing its grip. He moved his foot from Alrik’s hand to his back, holding him there with his weight, and began to load the musket at a leisurely pace. For all seven barrels, the process took a considerable amount of time. The gunfire had mostly stopped above deck, though Alrik felt its echoes below. He lay thinking, devising, and praying. I refuse to lie here and be executed, he thought. Then he acted. “Fuck you!” he cried, pressing down on all fours, and pushing up, knocking Red Socks off balance, and struggling to his feet. The man, Dubclochian and thin with an unfamiliar face, scowled and aimed the seven-barrelled gun at Alrik. “Come on! Shoot me!” Alrik urged. The man’s moment of confusion let Alrik drop down to the deck on his knees and elbows, scraping up every t, before the man pulled the trigger. Bang! There was an odd gunshot. It came with the sound of splitting metal and the smell of burning wood. “Agh!” cried Red Socks. Alrik jumped to his knees and stumbled behind a cargo box, peering over it. Red Socks was now Red Eyes, Red Face, and Red Chest, curled up in pain; just as Alrik had observed, two of the barrels had not gone off when Pauly fired the gun. The overloaded musket barrels had exploded. Alrik didn’t like the sight, or the smell, or anything about what was happening – the constant loud sounds were making him shiver like a tox addict three days without a fix – but he felt a rush of adrenaline. He now needed to think of what exactly to do next. He peered over the side of the ship and into the distance. Beyond their boarders, they were maybe a kilometre from shore. Over the sea, he could see hills, greener and lighter than any he’d ever seen, lit and shaded in patches by clouds and rays of light. It was beautiful, but far, far away. He

couldn’t swim it. “Hail, Cinura-lad! You still live?” came a familiar voice, round and full. Mawari. He knelt across the midship, covered in sweat and blood, behind a barrel of hardtack. “I really don’t know,” shouted Alrik. He felt silly and exposed, standing on the smoke-filled deck, thin and shaking. Mawari shook his head. Little explosions could still be heard from the lower decks. “No use in standing here and stuttering like a Cagaxian. Come with me to the captain’s quarters,” he said, motioning up to the helm. “But the captain-?” started Alrik. “Why are they down there and not up here?” Mawari silenced him with a wave of the hand. They approached the quarters in silence, walking quickly. A great boom echoed through the ship, and Alrik saw a piece of the deck burst up from below. Upon the sea, other ships bearing Dubcloch’s flag started to shift their courses, keeping an eye on them like curious cats staring at a pond of fish, or hungry sharks drawn to the smell of blood. The steps up to the helm had been hacked by axes and riddled with bullets. The door to the cabin, too, had been attacked, but was sealed closed. Alrik peered down the length of the ship. “Why have they been here and left?” he said, motioning to the damaged green door. Mawari knocked with a big hand. All the beautiful golden jewellery was gone from his arm, torn off. “They couldn’t open the door,” said Mawari, his expression pained. “So, they’re trying to get to the armoury to get something that can. Nakasi Dubcloch folk. They found out about this somehow.” Alrik looked at him, his mouth a little open. “Who is it?” came a voice from the other side of the door. “Who do you think, Jeang?” growled Mawari. “It’s not safe out here.”

“Two?” “Aye. I have the skinny Cinuravese lad with me.” There was a moment of silence. No further response. Mawari kicked the door in frustration. “There’s also some big odd fucking creature out here in the rigging. Let us in, you damned fool.” There was sound of maybe seven locks clicking out of place. The door swung open and Jeang hid behind it, beckoning them in. Alrik stared up and out at the rigging. Something crawled there, up on the ropes. It was hard to see through the smoke and moving rapidly. “Like a millipede or a centipede only – only the size of a man, I think. It’s far away. I’ve never seen anything like it,” said Mawari, shaking his head. Alrik did his best to hide his excitement and fascination. That wasn’t appropriate. It wasn’t the time to jot down notes. Jeang herded the two of them into the captain’s cabin. He poked his head out the door and looked, and his face flashed pale. “Fucking terrifying,” he said, slamming the door shut and locking every bolt as tight as he could. “Joyrey’s Men hijack the transfer, and now hell’s own creature on the ropes. Saddagh’s angry with us.” Alrik collapsed onto the floor, massaging his stomped hand. Sweat had pooled and dried and made his skin crack. He hugged his red satchel to his chest with his free hand, exhausted. Jeang was still pale-faced. Captain Gannet was slumped, shirtless, in the corner of the room. He burned with magic, a living field of electricity. Doctor Melalhir’s book grew hot in Alrik’s satchel. Jeang looked at the captain, and then to Mawari, who was cleaning his gun, and finally to Alrik.

“Step away from the door,” whispered Jeang. “I saw them moving a cannon this way just this minute when I looked to outside.” Mawari dropped his gun and stepped up to Jeang, pressed his face up to his, furious. “How did Joyrey’s Men find out about the transfer? What did he – and you know who I mean – tell you that he didn’t tell me? Where is Lucan?” “I don’t want to have to kill you, Mawari. You’re a good man. So, shut up!” The captain began to stir.

Chapter 13

“I ce as far as the eye can see, captain. Well, as far as my eyes can see. There’s a good deal of fog.” “You do know you don’t need to call me captain. It’s been a week and a half. I’ve told you every day.” Ford cracked a wide grin. “A captain is a captain is a captain, ne?” If the coat Lumi had bought in Blucvisdoc was a person, she would have married it. She was up on the decks, with the ship crawling through pockets and patches of sleety ice. At the bow of the boat sat Aurin and Malbry, perched at the edge and gazing over. Lumi’s stomach dropped when she thought of what would happen if they fell in. Death within minutes, if not seconds. The ship moved painfully slowly, and the cold air was thick with tension. Despite this, Lumi felt a sort of strength in the group that’d been built up over their journey up to that point. Every so often, when she wasn’t thinking about it, Lumi realised she’d built another wall against the cold. Not any kind of magic – just her body’s way of adapting. Soon, though, her body, and the bodies of her crew, would reach their limits. The Lip of Amenofriak approached – a frozen, rapid current that marked the barrier between cold and even colder seas. Lumi felt the anger she’d so far pushed down bubble up within her. How would she keep it at bay as the days and weeks wore on? “Starboard turn coming,” shouted Ford. He stood at the helm, next to Lumi, in charge of the wheel. “Starboard turn! Hold close!” relayed Girrin, clinging to the centre mast. Lumi half-smiled. The ship made a slow creaking turn to starboard, carving a swathe in the thin ice.

The tip of an iceberg floated off to port like the snout of a sea monster. The immensity of ice underneath the water, of what it could do to the Duchess if they were to make a navigational mistake, made Lumi shiver almost as much as the cold did. “Maintain course! Keep sails low!” called Lumi. Girrin echoed the order, and the ship maintained its course. Lumi watched as Malbry jumped down from the railing and approached the helm, followed by Aurin. The boy and her brother were caked in frost and shivering violently. Aurin’s lips were blue. “Moons above, boys, come here,” said Lumi. She took a small vial from her pocket and tipped its contents into her mouth, then closed her eyes and concentrated. It’s like rubbing your hands together to make them hot, she thought. Little specks and motes of dust and ice began to quiver as she shook them and, within a few moments, the air warmed. It was hard to maintain, as the surrounding air was cold and moving quickly, but it helped the pair of young men defrost. After a few minutes, wherein they were ed by a shivering Girrin, Lumi lowered her shaking arms. The active connection to the magic was cut. “Wonder why you couldn’t just use that to get rid of the ice in front of us instead of having us dangling into the freezing spray poking sticks, Lume,” said Aurin. He was irritated, and Lumi understood. She was also annoyed, however; he should have been grateful for what she could do. “You only wonder that because you know nothing about magic,” said Lumi, contemptuously. “I can only alter so much mass with so much energy. The big icebergs are a million gallons of frozen water. I’d sooner melt my own brain trying.” “What’s the use of this magic shit if it can’t do anything anyone actually needs?” grumbled Aurin. “It heated my home pretty well back in Blucvisdoc when we ran out of wood, ne!” called out Ford, grinning.

Lumi looked away and smiled outwardly, but felt the anger boiling up in her again. “I could use it to weaken thin points in big blocks if we needed to,” she said at length. “If we found a good place, I mean.” “Why not just row a little dinghy out there and stand on it? Jump up and down a couple times if you need to. I’m sure you’re heavy enough to crack it,” said Malbry, spitting on the deck. “My face is still bloody cold.” Lumi blinked. The biwid was still in her blood, in her saliva. Her mind went through a logical set of parameters: Can you make fire? Yes. Do you want to? Yes. Is there someone you want to make fire on? Yes. “Moons! Moons above!” yelped Malbry, clutching and batting at his pate as the top of his hair burst into flames. He violently shook his head until the flames went out, and then knelt on the deck, gasping, balder than he had been. Lumi enjoyed seeing him so flustered. Girrin was doubled over laughing, but her eyes were wide in concern. “How bad is it?!” Malbry asked Aurin, who was suppressing a laugh. “Not... bad,” said Aurin, sounding unsure. Malbry’s head was mostly unharmed, but about a third of his long, glossy hair was missing. After kneeling on the deck for a few moments, he sat. “I may have had that coming to me after insulting the Great Witch of the Duchess,” he said, as the mockery turned to spite. “You definitely did,” laughed Girrin. As she did, though, she moved over to Malbry to comfort him. Ford and Girrin stayed above decks with the singed Malbry sitting begrudgingly by the companionway with his ice poker. He leaned on the staircase and watched Lumi walk down. His clothes were still caked in frost, and he was shivering. The hearth was out. She looked him in the eyes, and then looked at the hearth, tensing her muscles. There was a small shimmer, a tiny ember, and then the old wood crackled to life with a white flame. The room flooded with warmth, and, despite his tension, Malbry sighed in relief.

Lumi looked up at him, long and hard. Her face was taut, her cheekbones high. Her nose was long and hooked. She looked at him until he looked away, and then she left. “Oh, hello Lumi. Thank you for, uh... turning on the heat,” said Yuon as Lumi entered the study. He was wrapped up in a haphazard mess of sealskins, blankets, and cushions, with only his dirty-gold hair and hands poking out, embracing a book. Lumi absentmindedly ruffled his hair. She looked at a candelabra on the desk and squeezed her eyes shut. She could see the light through her closed eyelids as the wicks set aflame. “It’s a cheap trick,” said Yuon. Lumi tilted her head. “Cheap? That’s a little short-sighted. Without it we’d freeze.” “That’s because we’re travelling to the bottom of the world, where the sun doesn’t shine for half of the year and the ice never melts. You’re not doing anything more than a decent heater we could have bought in the Falarics.” Lumi knew she was being goaded, and she turned away to avoid losing her temper. Closing her eyes, she breathed in. All she could hear was the rocking of the ship and the gentle scraping of ice against its sides, and the pumping of blood in her head, until Yuon spoke again. “Mond knows I’m not dismissing what you’ve done and what you’re doing, Lume, but I’ve been reading this,” he said, showing the book. Lumi’s eyes widened. “Doctor Melalhir. I know you knew him. I’m not a sorcerer – I just like stories about them – but I know this isn’t your average book. I’ve been skimming it these past few nights. It’s mostly too dense for me, but I’ve looked in at the end.” He opened the book, turning the pages to the note-taking section at the end. The page was filled with notes and small drawings. He turned the page again, and it was marked in the same way. Half of them were in a messy, scrawled writing, and the other was in something stricter and more academic. This continued for several pages, back and forth.

“Lumi, this is incredible. Why haven’t you told anyone?” “You don’t know that I haven’t,” said Lumi quickly. Yuon pursed his lips into a line, and his eyebrows crinkled. “Have you?” “No.” Yuon sighed and motioned to a chair, mumbling, “Sit down, you’re making me uncomfortable.” She sat stiffly. “Whoever Alrik is, you’re communicating with him in a way I have never heard of or read about, and I spend most of my time reading about fantastical things. It’s not logical. Where’s the toxaument? Where’s the conductor? Why does it get warm like a living thing? Is the heat from a reaction?” He narrowed his eyes. “And why haven’t you told anyone about it?” “I don’t want to give anyone the wrong idea,” said Lumi, at last. She sounded smaller than she was, and far smaller than she liked coming across. She looked past Yuon’s shoulder. They were alone with the sounds of the ice, wood, sea, and crackling hearth. “Magic is complicated, and with the laws back home, I couldn’t practice much. I can’t do much, Yuon. I don’t understand how this book works. I can’t harness it. I try to present myself to you and everyone else on the Duchess as some sort of powerful sorceress so you’ll respect me, but with what I know now, I really can’t do much more than make things hotter and colder, and Moons know nothing needs to be colder here, especially as we get further south.” Yuon regarded her evenly with his golden eyes. “That’s what I’m worried about, Lumi. We’ve all built up some resistance to the cold – even skinny little Girrin – but there’s a reason even the Falarese don’t go any further south than the tip of the Tongue. The sun doesn’t reach the bottom of the world. No one has been as far south as we plan to travel and lived, as far as we know, in a thousand years. And what you’re saying is that your magic has about the same use as, what, a candle?” Lumi pursed her lips together and motioned to her desk, nudging Yuon.

He shifted his blankets and stood, towering above her. She noticed their difference in height and didn’t like it. She sat. “I am working on something,” she mumbled, pushing away scattered books, and taking out a rack of small vials and placing them in front of her. Yuon looked on, his eyes brightening in interest. “What’s all this?” “I know I said I didn’t want to appear more powerful than I am,” she said, avoiding his question. The wind outside picked up into a low howl. “And I don’t. But magic is chemistry, really – weird, kind of spiritual, metaphysical chemistry – but chemistry, and so I’ve been experimenting.” She pulled two of the vials from their rack and showed them to Yuon. They’d been labelled in messy handwriting – Crushed hand of Rēa (and assorted other ingredients) and Powdered Silver. “Do you know how magic works?” asked Lumi, looking up at Yuon. He shrugged, clearly a little embarrassed at the gap in his knowledge. “Not really. All I know is that someone must consume something. A specific concoction or ingredient. And then they can draw some sort of power from some invisible other world. It’s an uncanny thing to me – I can only imagine some sort of terrible gods or demons in the other dimension ready to jump across the divide.” Lumi laughed, and shook her head, sprinkling a little of the silver powder and a little of the crushed herb onto the desk. “The first few times I went into the Quodrine, I thought there was something watching me, too, so I understand the fear. It’s the feeling of standing over an abyss you can’t see the bottom of. Doesn’t mean anything is there,” She mixed the substances with her fingers, and took another vial from the rack, popping its cork with her teeth. She gingerly fingered a small fleck of plant matter onto her tongue. “The origin of magic is unknown, but magicologists think it’s in the air or in the sunlight. Humans can’t absorb it on its own. We need to consume it through a biwid or a toxaument, so it’s concentrated enough. The magical energy that you can get, that I can get, exists in the Eine and the Quodrine all at once. And, like electricity, it can be conducted through metal. Particularly, silver. My plan is to make a toxaument that, once within the blood, reacts with itself. It should, in theory, arc from my blood to the silver, and back again, increasing its effect and

duration. To my knowledge, this has never been done before.” “You’re going to ingest silver? Moons, Lume, that could kill you.” “I am not ruling that out as a possibility, Yuon, believe me. But with the kind of power I’m experimenting with, it could also save all our lives. I might not need to ingest it, in any case.” She paused. “I’m going to try it on the table. Would you like to have a look?” “Do I have a choice?” “Not really,” said Lumi. “But you should cover your eyes.” Yuon covered his face with his hands, and Lumi concentrated, drawing a small arc of electricity between her finger and the tiny pile of magical substances upon the desk. Her hand buzzed like it had fallen asleep. Electricity was one of the more fun types of magic to cast, she thought. There was a crackle, then another spark, and then the substances began to jump, popping like fried corn, and a light spilled forth from them. Yuon fell back and Lumi hid under the desk, whooping in glee and surprise. The glow grew, spreading out from the desk and filling the entire room as the Quodrine attempted to close and was ripped further apart by the reaction between biwid and conductor. “What the bloody hell is going on?” shouted Malbry from the next room. Cries of surprise and astonishment came from the above decks. The light shone up and made every wall of Lumi’s ‘office’ glow like a giant hunk of amber, bright against the dark sky beyond. The light lingered for ten seconds more before fading. Lumi ran up the companionway to explain the events to Girrin, Ford, and Aurin. Girrin and Ford were fascinated and excited, but Aurin’s face was as cold as the surrounding sea. “Moons know you might have burnt our whole ship down.” Lumi tried to respond to him but gave up quickly, shaking her head. Why tempt fate? There was a sizable hole burnt into her desk – she’d have to work at

another part of the table – but his hard-line opposition to her magic frustrated her. “This could help us if something awful happens and someone’s around to see, Aurin,” she called out to him, as he began to walk away. He stopped walking. “Nobody is going to be around to see us, Lumi. You are walking us to our deaths.” Lumi faltered, excitement draining to the floor through her feet. She stood on the deck, Ford standing near at the helm. “We’ll have each other,” she said, but too quietly for Aurin to hear. He made her want to cry lately, though she didn’t know if it was out of frustration or sadness. Then she saw Ford’s attitude change as he ran to the other side of the ship. He called something out she couldn’t make out, and Girrin climbed up to the crow’s nest. Though she was sure-footed, frost clung to the wood, rope, and cloth like a slippery cobweb, and Lumi held her breath. Girrin shrieked something. Lumi ran to the foot of the mainmast, straining her ears to hear. “Land!” shouted Girrin. “Land! Ollossos! It’s the Tongue!”

Chapter 14

By the Moons, we’ve caught our first sight of Ollossos! The tip of the Tongue of Amenofriak. The pack Ice grows thicker by the Hour, and my First Mate cautions that our Ship may be caught at any time. Luckily enough, the Ice should be solid enough that we can cross to the Mainland without Issue. What great white Expanses! What tall Mountains! It is too much to process. You have not written in several Days. I hope your life is not endangered. Please respond as soon as you can. Best Wishes, Lumi. “By every set of gods, I have a roaring headache,” said Captain Gannet. He was drenched in sweat, pupils as wide as dinner plates, with a sliver of drool escaping from the side of his mouth. Alrik saw a tension appear in Jeang’s neck as the Captain awoke. The tension travelled down Jeang’s shoulder to his tattooed bicep, then to his hand. His hand went from resting on the hilt of his sword to gripping it tightly. “You’ve really gone overboard with this one, Gannet,” he said. Alrik blinked at the breach in respect. The Captain spat on the ground. His saliva looked like oil. “I couldn’t have stopped this, and you know it, you mopey lizard of a man. It went wrong, and I had two options. Suffer until I died, or do this,” he said, motioning wide as if to show how well things had gone. Jeang nodded and grimaced. He glanced at Alrik and then Mawari, stepping over to the big man and putting a finger to his chest. “Why’d you have to bring the boy? Mond knows what Gannet will say or do in this state,” he hissed. Alrik’s ears were ringing, his head throbbed, and his skin burned from the latent magic in the air. He could hear men swearing outside the door. They’d taken the cannon up the stairs, and now they were fumbling to light the wick.

Why? Why not just starve us out or take the time to hack down the door? “Better that than dying on the deck to a conflict he has no part in?” said Mawari. “I think not.” “It doesn’t matter what you think. What would our employer think, Mawari?” The two men stood nose to nose. Then Gannet stirred again. He was laughing. “Why all the secrecy, anyway, Jeang? Everyone will know soon. Our men and Joyrey’s play silly games to cash in on the misfortune that’ll befall all of us. And I, frankly, don’t care if we’re doing it for –” Jeang crossed the room, drew his sword, and slashed the captain’s throat. The neck poured crimson blood, and his head slumped forward. Alrik had no time to react. That same moment, there was another terrific bang, this one much, much closer. The door exploded, and a cannonball ripped through the room. Jeang, now in the ball’s path, was struck, his leg tearing like a doll’s. The cannonball continued forward in less than an eyeblink. The captain was obliterated, and the cabin collapsed down around them in a crash of wood dust. Alrik covered his eyes to the dust and blood and splinters that filled the air, coughing and pulling his satchel around his mouth. He took a deep breath through the material. “Mawari? Mawari?” he called into the ruined room. There was no reply. He grimaced and stood, stepping out onto the deck and directly into the path of the smoking cannon and the sights of seven angry sailors with guns and swords. Alrik raised his hands and closed his eyes. His legs trembled. “I’m not – I’m not with them.” “Is that so?” The men talked amongst themselves for a moment. It sounded mocking.

Alrik looked beyond them, to the sea. Two Dubclochian galleons were circling them, but kept their distance from the Mulliver and her boarder. Alrik wondered if there were others beneath decks preparing the cannons to fire on the galleons. He looked behind the men, then up at the rigging. He kept his eyes there, purposefully, and in a last-ditch attempt, gasped. Three of the men looked in that direction, and two others looked at those men in confusion. A tall and skinny one with a scrappy-looking musket grumbled at the others. “Just fucking shoot him, there’s nothing there.” He raised his gun. Then, opposite to the direction Alrik had looked, the creature he had seen in the rigging climbed into view. “Oh, fuck me!” yelped one of the sailors, scrabbling to grip on his musket and aim it at the creature. Alrik backed away against the ruined cabin. His assailants had forgotten about him for a moment. He tried to think, to formulate a plan, but thoughts escaped him. His ears still rang, and his skin and lungs ached. The creature ascended the staircase and climbed upon the cannon. Alrik was transfixed. It looked like an invertebrate, like a millipede, but grown immense, a good deal larger than a man. It stared at them with two shimmering purple-black compound eyes and skittered with dozens of legs, appearing both intelligent and nonchalant. The more Alrik looked, the more he saw – along the shining bronze armour of the creature’s back, little chinks in between showed small holes, closing and opening like little gasping mouths. At the creature’s front, that portion of its underside exposed in its erect position, were four arms folded against its body. By all gods, what a creature, thought Alrik. He was so excited that he struggled to be scared. That feeling lasted all of three seconds.

Bang! A musket fired, and the creature flinched and lunged. As it went, the armour on its back straightened and closed, forming a thick shield. The musket ball sunk into the chitin and stayed. “Oh, moons! Oh, daughter of Mond!” said the shooter, a burly man childlike with fear. The creature, a blur of coffee brown at speed, grabbed him around the waist with two of its largest legs, effortlessly climbed the taffrail at the edge of the ship, and threw him into the sea. The other men dropped their weapons and ran for the other end of the ship, tripping over each other and the bullet-riddled floor. Alrik realised, with a sinking feeling, that he was now alone with the creature. “Hello,” he said, his mind blank of anything more substantial. The creature looked at him (he thought – it was hard to tell with its compound eyes) and lifted its midsection again, baring its soft underbelly. Clutching his satchel to his chest, Alrik watched. What is this? His mind ran through the possibility of it being a display of well-meaning, as in ‘I am baring my belly to prove I am not a threat.’ The possibility also occurred to him that the creature was rearing for a killing blow. Alrik backed up. A loud sound came from one of their satellite ships – someone fumbling with magical amplification. “Unidentified locked vessels, immediately surrender your arms to the Dubclochian Naval Authority,” blared a voice across the sea between them. Alrik had to squint his eyes to see the ship through the movement of the sea and the sun’s glare. The centipede creature did not seem to take any notice of the ship – though, again, it was difficult to tell – but it paused. Then it scuttled towards Alrik. “Oh, fucking hell,” he said, and tried to run, but

the creature had him, and they were both off the side of the boat and falling into the sea.

Alrik was deposited on the beach drier and more alive than he’d expected. The swim had been brisk, though the creature didn’t seem to have known or cared that he had nearly drowned. He was face-up, arms spread, at the lip of a beach. The sea breathed in and out, sending frothy water around him. The sea salt worked into every little cut and scrape he’d developed over the past half day. There were many, and they stung, but he forced himself to stay, breathing slowly. He’d read about animals dipping their wounds into the sea when they were injured, so it was probably beneficial. There was a krrrr sound behind him. “Oh, fuck,” he said, stumbling to his scraped knees and getting a mouthful of salty water. Good thing my mother can’t hear me swearing like this, he thought. Too much time around sailors. In that moment, his mind dwelled on his mother, and his heart ached. He turned, and behind him, looking at him, was the creature. It ‘stood,’ imive, and rising to the height of Alrik’s clavicle. Alrik raised his arms as he had when held at gunpoint. That made him think. How am I still alive? “Why did you help me?” asked Alrik. The air stilled. The lapping of the sea was gentle, and the sand was softer than the beaches near Cinura, mustard yellow instead of black. Beyond the scrubby beach growth, he could see green hills, with little dashes of lavender and dandelion sprinkled throughout, shining in the sunset’s orange glow. The creature made a sound. It didn’t come from the creature’s mouth, a pair of small mandibles, or at least the front of its head – but instead from the multiple holes beside each t in its sides. The sound began as a wheeze, growing into a clicking growl, and then into something else. “Grrr. Captaintothebosunquartershelloyes.” Alrik balked. Each of the holes was saying a word – a Nuarec word –

simultaneously, in an inflected Dubclochian accent that altogether sounded like a group of pirates speaking in a cramped, metal room. The creature scuttled forward and tilted its head like a confused dog. “Captaincaptaincaptaincannonfirehello,” it said, the words once again all at once. Alrik’s mind reeled and, keeping an eye on the thing, he held up a finger and walked further inland. The creature followed him but did not make chase. Alrik sat on a tussock of grass, and the creature followed, relaxing into a horizontal state, like a great long pillbug. The thing was large as a middle-sized juksha. It stopped moving except for the occasional vibration or buzz of air from its spiracles. Breathing. Probably. “I suppose if you were to kill me you would have done it already,” said Alrik, unbuttoning his red satchel and sifting through its contents. He sighed – The Eine: A Compendium was half-ruined. Alrik tore off the destroyed half of the book and tossed it away in a wad. “Moons know things are strange enough as they are,” he said. The creature burbled but did not move. Alrik flicked through the surviving half of the book and propped it open with his com, waterlogged but functional. “Have you been to Canalas City? You know, I wonder if you understand anything I say, or if you’re like a parrot from Tariaad and can only copy what you hear. Perhaps I’ve gone mad from stress and I’m imagining you. Gods, how fascinating.” The creature did not move, but it ‘spoke’ again, creaking like a choir echoing through a forest. “Speak.” Alrik turned to look at it. His hands had begun playing with the grass, breaking it into little pieces and spreading the wet innards of the stalks around his folded legs. He’d have to wash that off soon. “Speak?” The creature did not nod, but made a wordless noise, or noises, that lined up in perfect harmony, like a consonant chord on a musical instrument. An affirmative.

Alrik sat bolt upright, wiping his hands. “You understand me, but you don’t communicate like me. Like a human. You communicate through... through relationships between sounds. Like an instrument. So, when you first tried to communicate with me, I couldn’t understand you because you were relaying information all at once.” The creature made another affirmative noise, playing several other notes above it in a pattern. The sound seemed agreeing, but with a hint of doubt or questioning. Alrik covered his mouth with his hands and began writing down notes at a great pace, giggling out loud. “By the moons. By the moons, by the moons, by the moons,” he said. His heart was beating out of his chest. What lineage was this creature from? Was it an arthropod? Its brown carapace had an almost metallic quality to it, and its eyes were strange. Alrik knew some arthropods grew large, like the tree-razer crabs in northern Tokarey, but this was different. The creature was like another version of an arthropod – a convergently similar but unrelated creature. He nearly asked the questions out loud, but then bit his lip. Would that be rude? He didn’t want to offend the creature and have it run away. “Can I ask why you saved me?” asked Alrik at length. The creature vibrated. “Insides-your,” it said, the words overlapping slightly but more separated now. “Other-your-insides-thrown,” it said, struggling to create the sounds. ‘Th,’ came out more like a sort of hacking sound. “Not you. No red. No insides. No cut, or... or fire?” Alrik marvelled. It was learning quickly. “So, you spared me because I didn’t make anyone... bleed?” The creature made another affirmative chord-noise. “Spread insides,” it said, its words echoing with dissonance and disgust. Then it climbed up the nearby hill and left.

Alrik tried to call out to the creature, but it didn’t heed him. Alrik stood at the top of the hill and watched the biological marvel go, blinking. “Gods above and below,” he muttered. The sun was setting, but it was still warm. “How do people live in Skander-Sareen? To be hot all the time...” He gathered up acacia sticks and dry beach grass and made himself a small fire in the shadow of the hill. He attempted an Ahienuric recipe he’d read in an old book once, crushing acacia seeds with water to make bread, but he ended up with an inedible grainy mush, and fell asleep hungry. He awoke the next morning and looked over his books. The latter half of A Compendium was faring well, and On the Learning and Performance of Magic was undamaged. Alrik shook his head and spent a few minutes looking over his notes about his encounter with the creature. He read Lumi’s latest entry and felt their odd connection wavering over the distance. Why had they, strangers separated by hundreds of miles, been connected in this way? What, by every clever god, was Melalhir doing that night, and why had he given them the books in the first place? Alrik felt he was embroiled in something, but he didn’t know what. He only knew the violence he’d seen. He crested the hill and looked off into the distance. The land spread out before him like a brilliant deep-green carpet lain across a bumpy gravel path. The sun, stronger and brighter here than he had ever seen it, illuminated the dew on the grass and made it shine like polished glass. Perhaps two miles away, nestled between three small hills, lay what looked like a town, with stone, wood and thatched rooves. Hopefully, beyond that, was Canalas City. Alrik gathered his things.

Interlude I - Ghii

Though they knew they should not have, Ghii resented their Khokhokho village. They’d spawned there, pupated there, and grown to maturity there. They’d taken a partner and performed all the appropriate rituals, but the village was confined. Ghii didn’t fear small spaces, but the fact that their people lived in a mountain and chose to spend their days in holes made Ghii’s blood spark with frustration. “Crossing under the mountain. Hunting,” Ghii said to Quxe, a weathered old Kho with a reddish carapace. The guard posted at the village exit. Quxe surveyed Ghii’s travelling supplies and intoned affirmation. Ghii gazed over what little of the settlement was exposed to the outside world; trees whittled by mandibles and bashed by hammers and clubs into platforms, little shaded areas where bards might rear up and perform their polytonal epics. The heart of their settlement was in the mountain. But what was exposed, Ghii thought, was more representative of the group. It was what they exposed to the world; even if that portion of the world was just a clearing in a cold forest in the south of the planet. Ghii tucked their bulbous-headed club up under their belly with two arms and low, dashing into one of the tunnels and chirping a farewell to Quxe. The old creak-shell didn’t respond. Ghii enjoyed running. It wasn’t like how they’d seen some other animals run; the puffthirns with their long, birdlike legs or the leapers who bounded through the bushes. It was a rapid, flowing movement. Insectile, though Ghii knew they could have never spoken such a comparison aloud. ‘We are above the insects. They do not look like us. We are of a different place,’ an elder had said. Ghii didn’t their name; only that they were truly old, soon to die and be taken to the wide tunnel and ritually consumed. Ghii had been young then, and had little memory of the event, the discordant weeping, the removal of the shell and the cutting of the flesh. Kho didn’t die often, and so the ritual was rare. Ghii had only witnessed and partaken in one.

Just as it was sacred to eat the flesh of the dead elderly, it was also sacrilegious to lie in the loose, cosmic belief system Ghii’s settlement of Kho followed. And yet, Ghii had done so. They were not planning to hunt, for they were full. Perhaps along the way. But no. They wanted to explore. They wanted to get out. What would they do if they saw me? thought Ghii. What would men do if they knew where my kind came from?

PART TWO - ARRIVAL

Chapter 15

(A t the side of the page is a drawing of something Lumi has never seen. It is drawn as if lit with torchlight and looks like a vision from a nightmare. Dozens of little notes are connected to the image with lines, speaking of musical notes and chords and valves and spiracles. Below is a longer note addressed to Lumi.) Dear Lumi, I hope this finds you well. I apologise for not ing you sooner; my Position on this ship became precarious until Yesterday, wherein there was a Mutiny and many of the Crew were killed. I’d say you’d see it in the Papers in a few days, but I suppose there aren’t any Papers near you. Your Excitement about your Journey warms my Heart. I’d consider it foolhardy in any other circumstances, but if you’re a Magicworker, I suppose you’re more equipped than most. I almost wish I could accompany you, just to see what Sights, what Creatures, live below the Lip. I have had the most fascinating run-in myself, as I’ve noted to the right. By the kinder Gods, I’ve made a Discovery that might change the scientific World. I am well and travelling North to the closest Town as we speak. I implore you to stay Safe. Alrik. The sea, far out, looked like a field of white poppies on strange, shining black earth. Up close, the patches of white revealed themselves as something far more substantial: icebergs. Some were wide, flat floes, dotted with penguins or bare and spliced with cracks. Others built up and were swept into strange peaks and troughs. Some showed hints of blue or green, but all were dazzling, lit up with the spring sun, and formed a beautiful, deadly mosaic ahead of and behind the Duchess. To the south, a lumpy white line on the horizon; the Tongue of Amenofriak. Land, shrouded in fog. Yuon and Malbry were hard at work breaking what ice they could at the bow

with their sticks, but the sound of ice scraping against the hull was a nearconstant whine. Aurin stood at the wheel, turning them away from the worst of the ice, while Ford looked through his spyglass and spotted for him. The wind was howling. “Capitan, please and thank you come here, ne?” called Ford. Lumi stepped up to the quarterdeck, pulling her coat further around her. This far south and past the Lip, it was a constant battle to stay warm enough to not freeze without sweating so much her coat got soaked. “What is it?” shouted Lumi, pulling a scarf over her mouth and seeing it get dusted with snow in her peripheral vision. Ford was frosted like a fancy biscuit, but didn’t seem to mind. Lumi had to get close to talk. Ford spoke with one eye still on the spyglass. “I think we should drop anchor and take the rest of the way in the Splendour, capitan,” he said. Lumi blinked snowflakes from her eyelashes. “Why would we do that? We’ll make much faster headway in a ship than a dinghy. It’s sturdier, too. You see that ice?” Ford shrugged. “Yes and no, capitan. I do see the ice, but in the dinghy, we’d be able to go around much of it, instead of having it scraping at our hull. You hole a dinghy, and you can put your fist in the hole if you need to. You hole a ship and it’s disaster, ne?” Lumi bit her chapped bottom lip. The wind picked up into a gale, and the boat rocked, jagged ice bobbing around them like huge floating teeth. She shook her head. “We’d lose too much time. Malbry and Aurin are strong rowers, but we’re still two kilometres away from the Tongue at least. We need to arrive before nightfall.” Ford blinked. He looked amused. “Lumi, the sun will not set here for another two months.” Lumi blushed and spat on the deck. “You know what I fucking meant, Ford,” she said, hiding her embarrassment behind anger.

Ford raised his eyebrows, snapped a salute, and then pointedly turned away. Lumi stood, huffed, and then walked to the helm. She tried dusting the snow from her coat, but it only stuck to her gloves. “Brother,” she said, slapping Aurin on the shoulder. Her brother wiggled his eyebrows, but didn’t speak, breath puffing out before him like smoke. “Hard work?” she asked. He nodded. “Would you like me to take a turn?” He shook his head. She nodded, coughed, and then sat on a snow-covered wooden bench behind him on the quarterdeck. She opened a book, balancing it on her knee, and chewed a biwid leaf. It tasted like ash and salt. She concentrated, holding a swath of the air in her mind’s eye, and let it become excited. Heat came slowly and stayed. She saw Aurin and Ford visibly relax, and smiled. Then, maintaining the magical heat, she opened the book and began to read. The magic flickered for a moment and then held steady. She smiled wider. She could do it. She could properly read, properly process the words, and cast magic at the same time. She could split her mind in two.

Eventually, her magic faded. She sweated or breathed the biwid out. That’s the way it always went. When the magic left, the cold came back, and though Ford stayed stoic, Aurin tensed again. Lumi tapped him. “Let me. Or let me get Ford or Malbry to do it. You’ve been up here for hours.” “You’re distracting me, Lume,” he said, his voice hoarse. “There are ice islands everywhere and someone needs to steer us away from them.” “And I’ve offered you some people to do that, Rin, so why don’t you just listen to me?” she said, her voice cracking. Her brother groaned. “Lumi, not everything has to be an argument! Get someone if you must, but stop pestering me while I’m trying to protect us.” She smacked his broad back insolently and trotted away from him, shoving her book into her satchel. “Stuck-up pig of a man,” she muttered under her breath. Girrin had been below for a while, but now held a broom and was sweeping icicles from the rigging. Ford was looking out into the foggy distance, transfixed. It had gotten much harder to see in the past hour or so. Lumi stepped down to the main deck, trying to look around herself. Ford was acting strangely, she thought. “Ford, are you –” she began. “Oh, Mond’s piss,” he said, lowering the glass. Lumi followed his line of sight and saw then a huge iceberg, as big as a hill and far more jagged, looming out of the fog. They were right on course to smash into it. Lumi dashed to her brother. “Rin! Rin!” she screamed over the wind. “Rin, do you see the iceberg?” “I’m not fucking blind, Lumi. I see the iceberg,” he shouted back. “I’m pulling

the wheel as hard as I can, but the water’s choked with ice.” “Lombrar! Malbry!” shouted Ford, running past the mainsail. “Get back from there, and help me lower the sails! All mainsails down!” Yuon and Malbry, frigid, dropped their sticks at the ship’s bow and ran over on shaking legs. Lumi did her best to follow Ford’s instructions, feeling as much like a subordinate as she ever had. She knew what ropes to tie and untie, at least, and went to do so at the mainsail. All three sails rose, sheets of frost falling off their crumpled forms, but the ship was still moving at speed. “Fuck!” she shouted. Her voice was hoarse now, too. The air was so dry, even with the sea spray and fog. The iceberg loomed impossibly close, and though she saw Aurin put all his might into the wheel, they collided with it with a crunch. The impact sent Lumi sprawling across the slippery deck. The others fell like cast sacrificial bones, and the air rang with a horrible, tearing crunch that lasted far too long. A portion of the hull ripped open like a wax seal. Immediately, they began to slow, and Lumi’s heart dropped as she could hear, beyond the wind and scraping ice, the sound of water rushing below her feet. “The mess!” she shouted. Her voice nearly gave out. “The mess, we need to save our things!” “And the dinghy, the Splendour!” shouted Ford. Lumi looked across at Ford from the mainmast, where he stood at the mizzen, and he looked back at her. It was only for a second, but in that moment, Lumi felt the full weight of guilt and embarrassment for her mistake. “Yuon, Girrin, with me!” yelled Lumi. “Belowdecks, get the carts and anything loose.” “Malbry, Aurin, with me, ne?” came Ford. He looked at Lumi once more, nodded, and then they both set off running. Lumi slipped on the frosty deck, but managed not to fall. She heaved open the

companionway door and scuttled inside, cringing as a wash of icy water came up to her ankles. The three sleds sat to one side of the room, already mostly packed at Yuon’s insistence – but there were many things, mostly daily necessities and wants, that lay strewn about, some ruined by the water already. “Carts first. They have food,” ordered Lumi, sloshing up to one of the carts, piled with clothes and food and wood, and took hold of its rope, pulling. It didn’t come easily, and she needed Yuon’s help to dislodge it from its place by the inner hull. Despite Lumi’s command, Girrin was skirting around, collecting small things that hadn’t been packed away: menstrual rags, toxaument vials, cutlery. Lumi went to her desk, still burned from the incident with the silver and fire, and gathered what toxauments and biwids she could, one hand still clutching the sled’s rope. The water had risen from her ankles to her shins. Soon it would be high enough to rise above her sealskin shoes and enter her socks. She doubted she could walk for long after that happened. She gripped the rope tightly with both hands and, putting her back into it the way Aurin had taught her, pulled the sled up the companionway steps, an awful bump as it ed over each one. Her arms and shoulders strained and burned, but with a shove to open the hatch, she managed to get the first sled out onto the main deck. There, she could see Malbry, Aurin and Ford working the ropes holding the Cinuravese Splendour to the side of the ship. She sprinted up to them and placed the sled at their feet. They nodded at her as she dashed back to the companionway hatch. “Moons above, I need to use the seat of ease,” said Girrin, walking out with a handful of cans. Behind her came Yuon, hauling another sled with surprising strength in his long arms. Lumi, unthinking, kissed him on the forehead. He blinked. “I’m going back in for the last sled,” said Lumi, scrabbling to get a grip on the deck with her shoes. The entire ship had started to cant to the port side. Aurin gripped the taffrail and held both sled ropes in a single hand against the tilt. Gods, he was pushing himself.

“Lume, the water is really – it’s really high in there, and –” began Yuon, but Lumi waved him off. She pulled up the companionway hatch, and it opened into dark, swirling water. It wasn’t up to her boots anymore. It was higher than her waist. She blinked, took a deep breath, and took a step downwards. Then, she was pushed out of the way by Malbry. “Don’t be an idiot,” he said. “I’ll get it. There’s something I need to save.” Malbry sidled past her and then, visibly breathing in, waded into the water. It came up to his belt. Lumi cringed. “You don’t be an idiot!” she shouted from the companionway door. “If you stop being able to feel your legs, call me and I’ll come down!” “So we can both freeze in here? Real clever plan, captain. Just hold that door open, alright?” Lumi could barely hear him over the rushing water. It was up to his stomach now. Gods, how was he walking? Lumi turned, still holding open the companionway. “How’s the Splendour?” “Good, capitan” called Ford. “We have two carts on, and we just need the third before we can drop.” He, too, held onto the taffrail to keep from falling over. It’d be an uphill climb for Lumi and Malbry to get to the dinghy. Thank the kinder gods that Girrin and Yuon had already scrambled there. “Your legs still working, Mal?” called Lumi down the hatch. Malbry grunted. The water was up to his chest, but he was walking back. Slowly. Painfully slowly. In one hand he carried the third and final sled’s rope, and under the other was something else. A curved shape, wrapped in tarpaulin. Some kind of instrument. “That’s what you went down for? A lute?” called Lumi, incredulous. “A guitar. My grandfather’s. You don’t think after this we’ll need a bit of levity? I can play us a tune.” He sounded strange, airy. Like he was losing his grip. “I feel almost warm now, Lume. It’s weird.” Lumi grimaced and extended her hand. “Give me the guitar, Mal. You focus on the sled.”

Malbry, the water up to his collarbones and the wrapped guitar held above him, narrowed his eyes in a moment of dislike or distrust. Then, he ed Lumi the guitar, and emerged from the companionway and onto the sloped deck, pulling the sled with stiff limbs. Yuon and Aurin rushed to help, pulling both the freezing Malbry and his soaked cargo to the Splendour. They sat him down at one end, opposite to Girrin, and then they began to crowd in themselves. Lumi sat next to Malbry as Aurin set the winch that would drop them to the sea below. Malbry smiled at Lumi with blue lips. Then, he fell asleep, or into something that looked like it. Lumi scrabbled for her satchel, leather flaking off it where it had been damaged by sun and cold. She pulled a biwid leaf out, knowing it was Scot’s moss from the taste, and chewed hard. Aurin released the dinghy, and it dropped. Lumi shuddered with the impact, some spray coming off onto her and her group – but with how low the ship had sunk, they hadn’t far to fall. They bobbed on the frigid water, even more exposed to the spray and the wind. Aurin took up the oars and began to row. They weren’t more than a kilometre from shore now, and if luck were on their side, they’d reach ice they could safely cross before then. That didn’t mean Lumi would forgive herself if any of them died – especially because of her. She raised her hands to Malbry’s chest and, thankfully, felt him breathing. She focused on his clothes, an easier target than loose air, and excited them. She had to be careful to heat them enough that he would be warm, but not enough that she might burn him. Steam began to rise from Malbry’s clothes, and Girrin, huddled in a pile of cloths, cried out in surprise. After a few tense minutes, Malbry’s lips faded from blue to their normal brown, and his sleeping looked less dangerous and more peaceful. Lumi touched his coat, and then pulled it up and touched his undershirt. Dry enough. Then she lay back, facing into the bright, clear sky, and split her mind in two, using one half to wash heat over her people, her friends, and the other to rest.

They made landfall some hours later, stepping onto permafrost with aching legs and tired eyes. Malbry was carried on one of the sleds, wrapped up like a piece of cargo. An hour after reaching ice, they reached solid land, covered in a thick layer of snow, and pitched tents. Lumi crawled into hers, lighting a small magical fire in the air with what moss she had left. They’d discussed contingencies on the way; without the Duchess, they still had a chance to get back. Sealers and shellers from the Falarics and southern Akkand had settlements in Ollossos’s northern extremities, and in some of the sub-Ollossal islands. They might have a ship they could use to get back. Might. Thinking too hard hurt Lumi’s head. So, she ate another biwid – she didn’t know or care which one – just for the feeling, for the high, and went to sleep.

Chapter 16

To my distant friend , Alrik. I am so weary. We made landfall today. The Chill here is to the Bones, to the Soul. My Hope... wavers. I wish you the Best. Lumi. Alrik was thirteen when the last sweet shop in Cinura closed its doors for good. It was a good half-hour trek from his house to the north-eastern district of Ayek, to the streets of Nakka and Onetree and the corner where they met and where the shining little store stood. Alrik waited until his birthday with calm but visible enthusiasm. He had never had sweets. His mother and father were both between jobs after the textile factories had closed, and had been waiting on permission from the Office of Civilian Affairs for a merchant’s grant for four months. Alrik didn’t have much, and he knew how much his thinness worried his parents. So, on his thirteenth birthday, Alrik walked by himself to Alistair’s Incredible Sweets with a spring in his step. He had five whole mezzevos, and in keeping with his father’s words, he held onto them in his pocket. When he arrived at the shop, it was closed and boarded up. Its door read: ‘Permanently closed for suspected unauthorised distribution, written in amendment 115A of the Blue Prohibition.’ Alrik looked upon the sign and the boards and tilted his head. He turned and noticed a flash of white, and then another. A flutter of white butterflies ed overhead, swirling like petals of white roses come alive. Alrik’s mind drifted from the building that had once been Alistair’s Incredible Sweets and set out after the fluttering insects. Alrik, now twenty, crouched at the banks of a little brook that led into the town

he’d seen from the hill. A smattering of dukefish burbled in the water and the mud, coffee-brown but for a lattice of gold on their backs, and their great tremulous black eyes. Alrik watched as one climbed the bank, a considerable feat for a creature the size of a child’s fist. It galumphed towards a little white mushroom, opening its big frog-like mouth, and took a large bite. Alrik took notes in a section near the back of the magic book, as to not interrupt his exchanges with Lumi. How does the creature survive upon land? Visual analysis suggests a mucus-like slime surrounding the creature to prevent loss of moisture, but how does it breathe? Can a fish have lungs? “Can a giant centipede speak Nuarec?” he muttered to himself and then wrote ‘lungs?’ underneath his notes. He considered taking a sample, maybe a dead dukefish, for study. However, all the dukefish he found were alive, and he didn’t have any good containers for storage. The dukefish were good company, in a one-sided way. Alrik had never had a friend that spoke back to him in his language. At least, not since Kalmir when he was young. Perhaps that’s why I was so open to the centipede, he thought, with only a hint of humour. “Why are you crouching in the mud looking at fish?” said a small voice in a Canalian accent. Alrik stumbled, clutching his book and pen to his chest, and landing on his arse in the wet dirt. He cringed at the feeling and stood immediately. Two children, a little boy, and a slightly older girl, had appeared by the edge of the brook and were eyeing him with what he guessed was suspicion and curiosity. They were well-dressed, in warm and well-maintained clothes. “I’m interested in the fish,” said Alrik. “Why? There are lots of them. They’re not special,” said the little boy. He seemed to like talking. Alrik grew stressed at the thought of being seen with these children. He didn’t

want to draw attention to himself. He climbed out of the little ravine. “I think they’re special,” said Alrik. “I’m a scientist. Or, at least, I want to be. I’m writing notes on them so the whole Eine can know more about them. They may be boring to you, but I’ve only ever seen drawings of them in books, so they’re stimulating to me.” He took some refuge in the lack of visible judgement from the children. Talking to adults terrified him, but children tended to be more forgiving. “Why are you brown?” “Albie!” scolded the girl, and the little boy, Albie, looked at her, puzzled. “Some people are just brown. It’s because of what their ma and pa looked like.” Alrik smiled, laughed, and nodded. “She’s right.” She grinned. Alrik smiled back, but unease was growing in his gut. If these children had never seen someone darker than a beech tree before, his being with them in the outskirts of their town would be especially strange. “You learnt that at school? Is that in town?” he asked, pointing down the brook to the buildings. “I’m thirsty and would like to get something to drink, maybe somewhere to rest my head. Would you be so kind as to direct me?” The little girl nodded excitedly and urged Alrik on with a wave. Alrik towered over her, but she showed no fear and extended her hand. “I’m Elira.” Alrik shook her hand. “Pleased to meet you, Elira. I’m Alrik. Please, lead the way.” The three began their journey north to the town. As they walked, Albie tapped Alrik on the leg. He whispered something in his high voice. “I saw you drinking water in the stream. Are you actually thirsty?” Alrik shook his head. “Not really. That was a lie. I know it’s not good to lie, but I get scared when I have to talk to people, and I lie sometimes when I get scared.”

Albie seemed to consider this. “Me too. But you don’t need to be scared. You’re big.” “Not compared to some people.” The town was called Jageurshire, and, as its welcome sign boldly proclaimed, it had been christened in the year 453 by the ‘revered King Oster-Leszt III.’ The sign was decorated with a steel-wire image of a jaguar which Alrik fought the urge to note down. Less than a quarter of an hour with these children had convinced him that opening his magical book would lead to endless prodding and questioning as to what was inside it, and that was something he could not afford. Instead, he asked, “Why is there a jaguar on the sign? And in the town name. Jaguars don’t live around here.” Elira rolled her eyes as if that were the most obvious question in the history of the Eine. “That’s Otto. Lady Cleat in school told us Otto’s the reason this town got made. He was stupid, and got very lost, wandering out from the jungles down... whatever way that is,” she said, waggling her hand to the east. “I’m good at listening, but I’m not good at directions yet.” “No, I’m intrigued. Your storytelling is excellent,” said Alrik. She blushed. They were nearing the centre of town now. Farmsteads with large fields and little houses became urban dwellings with small gardens. The houses closer to the town’s centre were nicer, with multiple stories and pillars and manicured gardens. Alrik frowned. Even here, he thought. “So, Otto got lost and came here, where there was an old farmer named Iver who owned sheep. Otto started eating Iver’s sheep, so Iver got a bow and arrow and tried to shoot Otto,” continued Elira. Alrik looked ahead, and saw that Albie had run before them, and was peering around the corner of a long building, all tasteful wood and stone, decorated with: ‘JAGEURSHIRE TOWN HALL’ in big cast iron letters on its front. Albie pulled his head back, and came running back over to Elira, his eyes wide with fear.

Then bells started ringing. Alrik hadn’t seen them, but he looked up and saw them then: tiny bells hanging from every eave, from the paltwires between the houses and the town hall, from the clotheslines and the eaves. Some force, magical or otherwise, made them all shake at once, and Alrik cried out in pain, clutching at his ears. “Play hide-and-seek, big man,” said Albie, his voice high. Alrik struggled to hear him over the din. “What is going on?” he shouted, his voice shaking with the bells. “I don’t know. I don’t know. Albie, let’s get back to mother,” said Elira, grabbing Albie’s wrist. She looked at Alrik and then ran away without another word, down another street, leaving Alrik alone. Play hide and seek, big man. The words stayed in Alrik’s frazzled mind and refused to move. The bells grew to a deafening crescendo and then faded slowly from a pounding migraine to a back-of-the-mind drone. He took the young boy’s words to heart and dashed to the veranda out in front of the town hall, pressing his body against the wall. Presently, voices came from around the corner. With them came a new kind of fear atop the stress of the bells, and Alrik dared not peek around to look. “What is the purpose of this violent call?” The voice was old, Canalian, male, and aggravated. It carried vocal inflections that Alrik thought of as posh. “The bells are for emergencies. Much of our elderly population will have been awoken by this exercise and I’m sure to receive complaints by palt before the day is through.” “The elderly of this village have the rest of their lives to relax. That’s why they’re here, mister mayor. My people and I are here on important business that must be attended to with haste, authorised by the King himself.” The second voice was rougher, in an accent Alrik didn’t recognise. Whoever it was evidently still worked from under the thumb of King Ebon, though. “And what business is that?” the mayor said.

The rough voice sighed. “Did you not receive any messages from Canalas City?” “No. Our wires to the city have been broken for three days. We sent a courier on the fastest juksha we had.” “Unfortunately, no such juksha was intercepted, so I’ll explain it to you now. We’re here to take a census. Illegal immigration is rampant, and the King and the Prime Minister are following the foreign incident three days ago off the south coast. So, gather your papers. My men and I will be surveying every member of this town to assess the validity of their citizenship.” The mayor stuttered. Alrik felt himself reach an ime – he could attempt to run away and possibly be seen and apprehended by the surveyor, or hide in the building until the census was over. Which was riskier? “I have lived here for fifty-four years,” the mayor was saying, his tone incredulous. “I attended university in Alcipree but promptly returned to Canalas City. That’s a Canalian accent you’re hearing. Do you really question my place here?” Alrik heard a humph and a rustle of papers. He tried the door to the town hall. It was unlocked. “Dubcloch is a big country, sir mayor,” said the surveyor. He was the one handling the paperwork, Alrik guessed, from his distracted tone. “I am from the Hetterfields, as you may have noticed from my face and my candour. Or my mount. I am as much a Dubclochian citizen as you. Many folks from SkanderSareen carry dual citizenship, and they are all darker than you or I. So, I ask you again, to present me with the appropriate documents for each citizen of this town. Do you have an appropriate site in which we could conduct business?” When the mayor spoke, he sounded defeated. “The town hall should suffice.” Alrik, his heart beating out of his ears, made a snap-fast judgement, and slipped through the town hall door. Strangely, the hall was also a church, a chapel probably used for services and town-running both. The first twenty years of Alrik’s life had been spent in a city

where the only church was frozen stone and rubble, and seeing buildings built to honour Mond outside of Cinura was still odd to him. The hall was lit by what Alrik had read of as the classic Mondine window. Glass pointed up in an angular dome at the ceiling’s centre, allegedly so that Saddagh and Middagh could be always seen from the assembly. Alrik didn’t look up for long enough to see if that was true. As terrified as he was – his papers wouldn’t look legitimate under scrutiny, and he’d be sure to have something bad happen to him if found out – the quiet of the hall allowed him to think just a little. Where would government officials go in a church? Where would they not go? Outside, something made a crashing sound. A cart or a wagon? There was a loud animal noise, then a rattle at the door. Alrik bolted down the hall, slipping into a small room to the right of the stage. He’d picked it because it looked more religious than judicial. In short, somewhere more likely frequented by priests than policemen. “Oh, thank the kinder gods,” he whispered. The room contained four wardrobes, one of them half-open, with priest’s robes showing through. Hiding places. The door to the town hall swung open, and the Hetterman surveyor’s whistling echoed. Alrik tried the wardrobe in the corner, but it was locked. He tried the next, pulling himself inside and sliding the door closed behind. He went as far into the wardrobe as he could and tripped on something. The air was close and hot with the robes around him, and claustrophobia fought with his fear of making noise. He made himself as small as possible and grasped his folded-up legs. In the space between one breath and the next, he felt something cold and metallic pressed against his forehead. The barrel of a gun. “It’s a little crowded in here,” said the owner of the gun. “Good hiding spot, hey?”

Discussion II - K and S

Kenneman shoved his pale hands into his coat and walked onto the abandoned Ollol District street. Just north of Joyrey, Cinura’s frozen arse district. It was frigid even in spring. He’d rather have started his workday in a cosy room with some Dubcloch tea and a blazing hearth, but the man he sought was paranoid. They needed to meet somewhere no one would reasonably see them, and then perhaps caper to somewhere warm. Kenneman had suggested first meeting in Joyrey itself, but the man had scoffed at that. There was only so much cold the desert-born man could handle. Kenneman walked in circles to stop himself from freezing and saw the man coming from farther up the road, out of the corner of his eye. He was giving himself away. Kenneman frowned. He’d hoped for some competence from someone as influential as this client. The man approached and extended his hand. The Canalian way. Kenneman took the hand and shook it. It felt cold even through his glove. “K,” said the man, his tongue far back in his mouth. Kenneman nodded to him. The man nodded back, his muscles tight and his spine coiled like a spring. He was nervous. Good. “So,” said Kenneman. S nodded, and waved him on, body tensed against the cold. The thin man led Kenneman through frigid windy alleyways where the only life was yellow-green lichens and little sturdy mushrooms. The sun, weak as it usually was, had a moment out from behind the clouds, and the mist it touched was lit up in bright, warm colours. The pair of them walked for ten minutes, separating by fifteen metres as they approached the occupied districts to avoid being seen together. Their journey eventuated in S walking down another small

alley, this one warmer with foot-stomped moss blanketing the dirt path, and into a squat apartment on the ground floor, and leaving the door to it ajar. Kenneman followed inside and was enveloped with a heat strong enough to be stifling. An expensive-looking arcane calefactor sat against the far wall, only a laying man’s length away from him, on a carpet of deep red. He breathed in and the hot air thawed the burning cold inside his nose. S was busying himself with papers at a great desk. “Would you like to remove your shoes before you take a seat, K?” asked the man. Kenneman looked at him and frowned. S’s shoes, he now saw, had been placed by the door. “No. I lack both the time and the patience to do such a thing,” he said. S looked at him, the muscles in his cheeks tensing, but didn’t push it further. Kenneman smiled and sat in front of the desk, legs set wide. “We both know what we’re here to talk about. Glass.” Kenneman smiled. “Glass,” repeated S, coolly. “I possess.” It was all code, of course; within the city, even in a closed room, they couldn’t be too careful. “Good. Glass from the northeast, I’d assume?” “Of course. And from the south...” “Black glass,” said Kenneman. “Got a bit mixed up in transit from the shit isle, but it made port safely. There’ll be enough to go around. A little south. A little north. A little further north.” S nodded. They looked at each other for a moment, their maintained distrust dampened by the joy of the game. Then, S turned to a compartment of his desk that Kenneman couldn’t see, opened it, and retrieved a box. It was made in an eastern Dubclochian style, which was good, but in a wood that was exceptionally rare on the continent. Kenneman would have to bring that up another time.

S slid it across the table to him, and he clasped it in his hands. He bit his lip as excitement bloomed in his chest, and he opened it. The box’s inside was soft velvet and filled with sheer pouches. Through them he could see specially designed screws like the tips of narwhal horns, little lenses labelled ‘1a’ through ‘7c’, oil, glue and bundles of cloth. Underneath it was a folded piece of paper, where, in Nuarec and a language Kenneman knew by sight but couldn’t read, were the instructions that would bend the Eine, or at least the continent of Tokarey, to his will. “I’ll you again when the work is done,” Kenneman said, leaning forward and taking S’s hand tenderly, noticing himself almost slip into his playful leader’s persona, though the man had seen him without it already. “We must have some time to practice.”

Chapter 17

Lumi’s breath was corporeal . It was so bloody cold. Even in the confines of their tent, lifting her shoulders out of her sleeping bag felt like being born into a world of numbness and pain. The deep cold had settled on the party, and they were each growing in it, like plants in hard soil. It was like learning to walk with a missing eye or a broken leg. Painful, but possible. “You don’t think there are any nice hot places with palm trees and handsome Huzunite boys that we could have gone instead?” said Girrin. Her voice was cottony. Lumi grunted and started to extract herself further from her sleeping bag. “Big toxaument spills. Maybe a factory explosion. But those aren’t worth much. The reason the site is valuable is that it –” she paused, and Girrin side-eyed her. “It’s theorised that it’ll be a clean hole into the Quodrine. I don’t know what that’ll look like, if we can even see it, but it should be, importantly, clean. Toxxes come with all sorts of side effects, but the stuff coming out of the rip should be...” She waved her hands. “... pure magical potential energy. We should be able to use it to defend Cinura against anything.” “A few too many ‘should’s for my liking,” said Girrin, but there was no fight in her voice. She knew what she’d gotten herself into, and it showed on her face. Lumi wasn’t sure if she liked that or not. She saw Girrin’s eyebrows knit together as a new worry ed into her mind. “Magic makes things change, doesn’t it? Fundamentally. You use magic to change the world around you. Who’s to say that getting too close to the site won’t make me burst into flames or grow an extra arm or something worse?” Lumi swallowed. Her throat was dry. “We needn’t get close enough for it to hurt us, if it even can.” Girrin laughed and shook her head. She wriggled out of her sleeping bag, squatting pale and gangly in the low tent, and quickly pulled on her clothes.

“I love you, Lume, but I’d hoped for more confidence from the person that brought us here in the first place.” Lumi frowned. ‘I love you’ after being so onished felt like a slap. “Being a bitch about it isn’t going to help, Gir. I’m doing the best I fucking can.” Girrin blinked at her, then widened her eyes, holding her hands up in mock surrender. “Excuse me for not noticing that you must have fallen on one of the ship’s masts and gotten it lodged up your arse,” she muttered, then left the tent. Lumi swallowed, and sat there fuming for a few minutes before getting dressed and following. “So, you crush the Calasi nogt, ne? That’s the plan? Never let them near your city again.” Ford was talking excitedly to Aurin, both sitting on a sled like a couch. A metal bowl of food steamed over a fire; Filleadeen salted rice and Carmintine beans in tomato sauce, Yuon had said. A Canalian military ration. The irony was not lost on Lumi. A strange cylindrical not-hill – Yuon guessed it may have once been a Lefan tower, now collapsed and encrusted with a millennium of ice – shielded them from most of the wind. Still, the fire struggled. Lumi seated herself on an unoccupied sled, gave her brother a nod in morning’s greeting, and listened. “As I understand it, the intention is not to ‘crush’, but rather to reduce the power imbalance. Cinura having a bigger stick to wave, metaphorically, could help make way for more diplomatic discussions. I mean, Canalas is never going to try to take Eawar because they have the largest stick in Einea. If we can get a strong enough advantage, we shouldn’t even have to use it. Is that what we’re going for, Lume?” said Aurin, looking at her. There was a note of challenge in his voice, but it wasn’t the childish challenges that they’d exchanged as youths. He was asking an important question. She paused and then nodded. “Yes. No reason to spill blood unless we must. Which we may,” she said, eyeing her brother. “Cinura has been under Canalas’ boot for far too long. Simply asking nicely may not be enough.” Ford reached for the bowl of rice and beans with a spoon. “Ay to that, lombsia.

Falarics and Cinura have been too long under Calasi heel both. Calasi nogt eckfet surwe, eckfet...” He trailed off, swearing to himself quietly in Falarese, bean spoon in hand, staring up at the sky. Lumi worried about his mental state sometimes. He wasn’t Cinuravese – why had he risked his life to come here in the first place? She hadn’t given enough time to talk to him about it. That was something she hoped not to regret. “What’s this about spilling blood?” said Malbry, appearing from behind the nothill and brandishing an axe and a bloody sack of fur and fat that had been once a seal. Since his incapacitation, Malbry seemed to be compensating by pushing himself even harder. Ford raised his eyebrows and stood, brandishing his beany spoon. “Ah, good thinking, lombrar!” Malbry smiled and saluted, dropping the seal a few metres away from the campfire. It was grotesque. The animal must have been charming in life, so chubby and with great, wide black eyes. Now, the eyes were glassy and blank, and the fat fell awkwardly around a limp frame. Yet, Lumi understood why the animal had been killed, and she was grateful. They needed all the extra food that they could get before they were further inland, and the ice was kilometres thick and solid as stone. Malbry took a multi-purpose knife from his satchel and began to prepare the carcass. Steaming innards spilled out onto the ice. “I can’t watch,” said Girrin, just returned from taking a piss. “The poor thing looks like the puppy I have at home.” She sat on the sled next to Aurin with a thump and leant into him. Lumi pursed her lips. She watched with tired interest as Ford helped Malbry prepare the seal, telling a melancholic about how the Canalian seal trade all but drove the native seals on the Falaric Isles to extinction. “But many fewer people come down here, ne lombrar?” Ford said with a grin, peeling the skin off the seal like it was a bloated red banana. The pair started hacking up the creature’s meat and fat.

Lumi looked away and cursed herself for it. She scrunched up her mouth and replaced the bowl over the fire with a cast-iron pot filled with coffee, sugar and water. Yuon had sat next to her, and begun waxing about navigation plans to anyone who would listen. Girrin was distracted, so that left Lumi. “We’re going to make cairns,” Yuon said, munching on the rice. It was terribly salty – Lumi questioned Filleadeen tastes. She raised her eyebrows and sipped her coffee. Yuon had declined the coffee, saying that he was buzzing already. “Cairns? Like for graves? That’s a little foreboding,” she said. “Cairns can mark graves, but they can also be general markers. We get some rocks, some hard ice, whatever, and we make a cairn about as high as a man. So Malbry, not Girrin.” Girrin, nearby, pouted and laughed. Lumi wondered if she was putting her cheeriness on. “The closer we get to the south pole, the more we’ll need to weigh our com needles down to compensate. We can’t accurately measure how far we’re going each day, but we can establish the cairns in a roughly straight line, on as high a point as we can each day, and we’ll adjust our course relative to them as we go south,” continued Yuon. Lumi felt a surge of affection for Yuon and ruffled his llama’s mop of hair. “You’re clever. I’m glad that you’re with us.” Yuon smiled back cheekily. “Not clever enough to not come at all, though, am I?” He laughed, and the ground split beneath them. The crack appeared just left of their campfire, sending embers into a frigid abyss below. “Oh, shit!” shrieked Girrin, leaping to her feet. The crack grew into a crevasse about the width of a hand – Malbry’s hand rather than Girrin’s – and then no more. Malbry and Lumi carefully moved their things to a distance, eyeing every footfall as they went. “What the bloody hell is that?” said Girrin. Her voice was high and tremulous.

Malbry placed a hand on her shoulder, and she sunk into the touch like a moth to a light. “My guess?” came Yuon. “The ice isn’t thick enough, and our weight is breaking it after maybe decades of its heaviest visitors being penguins. We should be safer if we move further inland.” “Also, colder,” said Ford. He sounded excited. It unnerved Lumi. She realised, without noticing when it had started, that they were all looking to her for guidance. She cleared her throat. “Further inland today it is, then. That is our goal, after all. Time to repack.” There was a soft murmur of agreement, barely loud enough to hear.

The summer sun never fully set this far south; it half-closed its eyes, as if daydreaming. The constant light made Lumi’s sleeping inconsistent, and over the course of the not-night she had wriggled repeatedly. Girrin had warmed to her over the course of their day’s trek, but there was still a wall between them, even as the red-headed girl slept soundly. The light didn’t help, but the main factor was the ground. It was hard to sleep thinking that the ice might swallow them up, camp and all. Leaving someone else to try to retake Cinura and fail. She stood, desperate for some space, and wandered out into the midnight haze. Yuon’s explanation for the crack didn’t satisfy her – they were on the Tongue, on solid land. Their ship had met huge ice out in the bay, so it was a cold summer. She sat out on one of the sleds, marinating in the chill. The sun hovered in place over the horizon, gilding the mountains and glaciers in soft gold. She took it in. Her chin burned from reflected sun. She wasn’t yet far south enough to be standing upon land that hadn’t been trodden on for centuries, but she was close. It was hard not to feel honoured, to feel self-important. A pretentious position for a girl soon to die unknown after losing her friends, she thought. She considered making coffee. Then, scanning the shimmering horizon, she saw light. Down a gentle slope at a short distance, atop another strange hill that might be a Lefan ruin, there was a glint, like a piece of a mirror in the sun. And there was movement towards it. A person. Ford. She stood, blowing air out of her lungs like a pair of bellows. By Mond... She looked around, pulled up her scarf, and pocketed an ice-pick in her coat. Then she began to run and immediately regretted it. Beyond their little alcove, the light dusting of snow that aided grip was replaced by a foot or so of clinging, wet powder. Lumi felt like she was dragging herself through molasses, and after less than five metres her legs burned. Momentarily, she worried if she should worry about waking up her group. Then she decided that this was more important. What the hell is he doing? “Ford! What are you doing?!” she called. The echo is incredible here, she thought, despite herself. A sonoranteer would

barely need to project at all. Ford didn’t hear her or didn’t listen. He was near the not-hill now, and the glint upon it had been lost in shadow. Lumi called out again. Ford turned around, looked at her, hesitated, then kept walking. Lumi cursed and powered forward. By the time she had almost caught up with him, the thick snow had thinned, filled with hidden ankle-breaking rocks. She clambered onto a larger stone protruding from the ground and glowered at Ford’s back. He was climbing the structure, some old building. At the top, the shape of a statue, a weathered human figure, could be seen, half-collapsed. Balanced in the statue’s right hand was the glinting thing: a spear. How long had that been there? “Ford, get down, now,” Lumi shouted. Ford hesitated, but then continued to climb. Lumi lost her temper. “I am your captain! All those weeks at sea, you’ve done what I have told you to without question, because I hired you. What’s changed? Where is your sense of loyalty now, Ford? Fucking come down and stop being a little shit!” He stopped and turned to her, settling into a dip that may have once been a window, surrounded by harshly cut symbols. “You are my captain. But I don’t see a ship, ne? I helped you, but I never came on this journey with the intention of returning.” Lumi lost whatever words she was about to say. Ford kept climbing. Lumi looked above him, at the statue. “What do you mean, Ford?” she said quietly. Suddenly, she vividly pictured Ford leaping from the top of the ruined tower, cracking his head open turning the white snow beneath crimson. “I didn’t have... what’s the Nuarec word? Prospects, back in Blucvisdoc,” he said, at length. He was almost at the statue. As fit as he was, he was puffing, and

his tone sounded confessional. “It’s not that I came here to die, lombsia-capitan. It’s more that I’m not bothered if I do. Now we’re off the ship, lombrar Yuon knows more about this place than I ever could. He’s a smart one. I am... relatively useless.” He climbed the last of the dishevelled tower and touched the statue with a gloved hand. “Amenofriag. Amenofriak, in your tongue. Goddess of the south. It’s her land we’re walking on now, lombsia-capitan.” “She’s beautiful,” said Lumi. And she was, or must have been when she was made; a soft robe carved in stone over a slender frame, with gently slanted eyes, a pointed face, and hair that fell in curls. All eroded and cracked with time. In the time Ford had been climbing, she had moved about two metres closer to the base of the tower. She wasn’t sure what she’d do when she reached its foot – try to talk him down, she supposed. She’d likely get herself killed trying to climb after him. “Ford, we do need you.” Lumi fumbled with her words. Her lips were cold. “You’re kind. You’re strong. And I... I don’t know how we’ll make it to the site without you. I’m not trying to guilt you. I’m being honest. My powers are weak, Ford. You’re one of the only people holding this group together and I’m weak, Ford. I’m weak.” Ford reached the spear in Amenofriak’s hand. It was not made of stone like the rest of the statue. He spoke, and his voice was muted, distracted. “I’m a gutter rat, Lume. A guano gull. Another mouth to feed, ne? Your moody brother, surprise guest, means I’m just draining your life. And really,” he said, his voice hardening, “I am unsure about this expedition succeeding. Amenofriag doesn’t want us here, capitan. She’s going to eat us. We’re all going to fall victim to whatever made that Mond-awful split in the earth or something else just as surweyny.” He stood shakily atop the tower, his face imive and unreadable. Then he shrugged. “Thought I might as well help you out, though, ne? You’re my lomi. All of you. Just a few weeks, I know. So, I saw this spear, ne, and my uncle taught me how to see magical things. This has sorcery all over it. Maybe we can use it to hunt,” he said, and smiled. “Just let me –” Ford screamed in terror as something grabbed his leg and wrenched it out from under him. He scrambled at the frosty top of the tower and managed to regain his grip, only to instead fall headfirst off the front of the tower.

Lumi gasped and held her breath. Before she could think, she flexed the muscles in her neck, arms and shoulders, and slipped a foot into the doorway of the Quodrine. Whatever residual toxaument she had in her system quickened in her blood, and with a woosh through her ears, she pushed Ford a metre forward, into the deeper snow. Lumi’s vision narrowed, and she dropped to her knees, nearly losing consciousness. Ford was an order of magnitude heavier than anything she’d ever fenworked, and she hadn’t had any time to prepare. She wanted to throw up. “I think something took a bite out of my leg, lombsia-capitan,” said Ford, huddled in the snow. He curled up in a foetal position, his voice pained. “I think you saved my life. Something bit me when I was up there. I don’t know what the fuck it was, but it had... big eckfet jaws.” Lumi heard him as if through a tunnel. “Scream, please,” she said, slurring at first. He looked at her, confused and in pain. They were a sorry pair. “I said scream,” she said, raising her voice. Bile tickled the back of her throat. “I just saved your fucking life, Ford, and whatever took a chunk out of you might come back. All I have is a gods-damned ice-pick. Back at camp, we have guns. My magic has royally fucked me up right now, so please just scream for help.” Ford looked at her and nodded. He began to scream, to yell, and it echoed around the frozen mountains and cliffs. Genuinely wonderful acoustics, Lumi thought again, through the fog. She let herself collapse against the stony ground for a moment, and the rocks tried to pierce her coat and into her back, so she shimmied to spread her weight evenly. She looked up, and the sky was a clear, icy blue. Icy, she thought. Hilarious. She turned her head to Ford, feeling some nausea dissipate. He was silent and still, looking at her – no, above her – in terror. She looked up and screamed. Above her was a pair of huge, scythe-like jaws and

an angry, gnashing mouth, on a head like an armoured cannonball. She put all the energy she had left into her arms and pushed the thing, even as it leant into her and pressed great, grisly legs on her body. The thing resisted and then gave in, scuttling back. Lumi jumped to her feet, and her stomach turned. She vomited there on the snow and stones. There were more of the slate-grey creatures around her; at least three, maybe as many as six or seven. It was hard to tell with her vision constantly falling out of focus. She took a deep breath, closed her eyes – her vomit seemed to have kept the creatures back for a moment – and reached a conclusion. “Oi there now!” she said, her Cinuravese accent coming out strongly. She waved her arms and backed towards the tower, away from Ford. The creatures had left him alone. She hoped to the gods, and anyone else, that his screaming had alerted the rest of the group. The creatures, which Lumi likened to pillbugs if pillbugs were the size of dogs and created by a tox-addicted artist who’d personally visited hell, followed her. They barely came up to her knees, but gods, their jaws were big. I’m probably just fresh meat to them, she mused. There can’t be much to eat out here. It wasn’t a comforting thought. “Ford, I’m going to throw you something,” Lumi said to him. He hadn’t moved – she wasn’t sure if he was able to. “Don’t speak. I think that’ll attract them.” As she spoke, the pillbugs gnashed their mandibles in what Lumi fancied was excitement. “Cover your sensitive parts.” She threw the ice pick at Ford, and it landed side-on on his thigh. He grasped it. The pillbugs looked at him quizzically, but Lumi clapped her hands and whooped, drawing them back to her. She was in a precarious position, and she knew it. Ford, crippled, was brandishing the ice-pick like an actual weapon, which it was not. The pillbugs were backing Lumi up to the tower. She grimaced, cursed, and then

cursed again, louder. The only good weapon nearby, to her dismay, was in the statue of Amenofriak’s hand. She tried to things that Girrin had said about climbing – she would have asked Ford for help, but she couldn’t. The pillbug beasts were nipping at her heels now, and their jaws looked big enough to bite her legs down to the bone. She didn’t plan on confirming or denying that hypothesis. Instead, she quickly scanned the nearby rocks for a steppingstone, and, on finding one, did her best to climb up. She was shaking, terrified. She gritted her teeth, looking for handholds. Indents, deep grooves, yes! The runes wouldn’t do, but centuries of melting snow had etched grooves into the stone in places, and many were deep enough to grasp. The lunge from the stone to the tower felt like limbo. She felt a full-body lurch, and then a deep tension as she locked into place with one hand. She found two footholds, too close to the ground for comfort, and then another handhold. She wanted to stop to breathe, but she lacked time. Her magic-tired muscles complained loudly to her mind, which struggled to find the handholds she so desperately needed. Halfway up the tower, a terrible thought dawned on her: Ford had been first attacked upon the tower. The creatures could climb. She felt a deep, throbbing pain as one of the beasts bit deep into her forearm. She screamed and kicked wildly, almost losing her grip. On a second kick, her foot connected, and the beast dropped a good two feet without losing its grip on the tower. Frenzied, her arm bleeding hot, Lumi made a mad dash up the collapsed tower. She nearly lost her grip and plummeted twice, but she made it. She reached the top and tore the spear out of the statue’s hand. Four of Amenofriak’s fingers came off with it, and she brushed them away. She stood, wiping the frost off the spear and breathing heavily. Her arm was cut deep but, thank the Moons, it wasn’t her dominant hand. The creature that she had kicked was bleeding from one of its antennae, and this had rallied the group. They were all climbing the tower now. Lumi had to balance and keep her eyes flickering from side to side to see if they were coming up behind. She was lucky in one way – they were slow, deliberate climbers. She tested the weight of the spear in her hand and made some experimental jabs at the topmost pillbugs. They shied away for a beat, but continued again almost

immediately. She fought back a sob. They’d get her, and then they’d get Ford. This was never going to go their way, unless – BANG! A musket ball hit one of the creatures right in its back and it dropped to the ground, stunned. The others scattered from their fallen comrade, milling around, confused. Malbry stood at the crest of a hill overlooking the tower with musket raised. Beside him, Aurin, with an axe in hand, and Yuon with Lumi’s satchel. Lumi thanked all that was good that Girrin had stayed back at the camp. To Lumi’s dismay, the pillbug that had taken the musket ball to the back was still alive. It rose, vibrating like someone shaking themselves out of sleep, and began the climb again. Hopelessness began once again lapping at the shores of Lumi’s mind, but she still formulated a last-ditch plan to survive. “Yuon!” she shouted. “Open the notebook!” She wasn’t sure if he could hear her or not at his distance, so she shouted louder. This got the beasts excited, and they began their driven climb up the tower once more. “What book?!” Yuon shouted back. He sounded bewildered. Lumi tried not to get frustrated. “On the Learning and Performance of Magic. Write in the note section. You know the part. Describe these things. Describe them and maybe we’ll figure out the best way to kill them!” Yuon looked at her for a moment, and then reached into the satchel, rummaged, and opened the book. He rifled through the back pages, taking a pencil and scrawling. He looked at the page blankly for a moment, and then thumped the book in frustration. That’s not going to do anything, she thought. But Yuon’s face changed. She couldn’t see if there was writing in the book or not, but she saw him write again. Alrik was talking to them. Alrik might save their lives. “Holes in their sides!” shouted Yuon, running closer. Malbry took a shot at the topmost creature, but the lead ball glanced off its chitin.

Lumi was almost backed off the other side of the tower, glancing behind every other second. “What the fuck do you mean?!” screamed Lumi, livid with fright. “Look at their sides. They breathe out of there. Their carapaces are too hard to damage, but attack their breathing tubes and they might leave us alone.” Lumi hated his overuse of the word ‘might,’ but she looked, and, sure enough, along the sides of each creature was a series of small holes, opening and closing. She gritted her teeth, aimed, and jabbed her spear at one of them. She missed, and the metal of the spear ting-ed against the thing’s armour. She had to step back to avoid its jaws, and then she tried again. It landed, one half in the hole and the other in between two chitin plates. She leant into it and twisted. The creature screeched two simultaneous discordant sounds and plummeted, bleeding greyish-white blood onto the snow. This sent the other bugs into a panic, and Lumi speared whichever came close. A bug near the ground wandered too close to Ford, and Malbry blasted it right in the breathing hole with a well-placed shot. It whimpered and died. With the fear rising in the beasts, Lumi felt something else rising in her. She didn’t know what it was, and as it grew, she wasn’t sure if she wanted to. It was almost like joy. The spear felt electric in her hand. She felt vigorous, for the first time in a good while. Finally, the creatures gave up. Maybe one of them released some sort of chemical signal. Maybe they found the group too much of a hassle to eat. Either way, they crawled down from the tower and away, burrowing into the ice. Lumi sat with a thump and watched, transfixed. As more and more of them filled the tunnel, and then a crack appeared where they had been. Just like the one that had appeared beneath their camp. She sighed and laughed. “Moons, we are fucked,” she slurred, and then fainted, falling face first from the collapsed tower.

Chapter 18

“I didn’t expect this wardrobe to be occupied. Sorry.” Alrik wasn’t sure what else to say. The fact that a gun was being levelled at him didn’t help. The words were awkward. “Why are you hiding? What’s your crime?” said the voice. The gun was still pointed at Alrik, but the grip seemed looser. Alrik thought hard. Should he lie? What would it benefit him? Maybe the stranger would take pity on him. “I – I was wrongly convicted.” “That makes you the thousandth wrongly convicted criminal I’ve met. Out of a thousand. Incredible consistency there. What was the crime?” Alrik exhaled. “Terrorism. Allegedly. See, it all started with the city elder –" “An elder? What kind of commune are you living in that you have elders in Dubcloch country? Did you piss on the ceremonial bonfire? Drink all the mushroom tea?” “I’m from Roït. Cinura. The Blue City.” There was a moment of loaded silence. Alrik could swear he heard the man grin. Then, a little flickering flame appeared above the man’s hand, illuminating him with reddish-orange light. Magic. He was, outwardly, a fairly normal-looking Canalian man, with ruddy skin, freckles, and mousy hair. Despite this, Alrik struggled to look at him. He moved like a man on heavy tox, or with little care for his surroundings, even nearly still as he was. He seemed dangerous. “I thought I recognised your accent,” said the man. He lowered his gun and extended his free hand.

Alrik shook it, and it was warm and rough. “Your name?” “Alin Smith,” said Alrik. “Samjal Mantic,” said the man. “And you, Alin, are going to be my hostage. I’ll walk out of here, gun on you, and that’ll give them enough pause to let me go.” Alrik’s head pulsed like he’d just hit it against something hard. He bit his lip, sweating from the magic flame, and then shook his head. He wasn’t going to take this. He wouldn’t give in so easily. “No,” he said. “I have a better plan.” “So, you’re a senior priest and I’m your Skandrian liege,” said Alrik. The robe itched, but he thought the blue suited him. Something about it felt sacrilegious, though Alrik, a child of Cinura, had no faith of his own. Faith in nature, maybe. Not much else. “Indeed,” said Samjal. He carried the same intensity in the bright arcane light of the changing room that he had in the dark. “Though you can’t speak. We can’t have any of them hearing your accent.” He stripped off his shirt, stretching muscled shoulders. His arms were covered in pockmarks, and when he turned, his back had a dozen small markings from shrapnel or shot. He wore a necklace of the double-moon symbol of Mondinism. He saw Alrik looking and seemed briefly less malevolent. His words were soft, but oozed with malice. Like a venomous slug, Alrik thought. “I’m doing you a favour, kid, but let’s be clear that I don’t need you. I don’t need my gun. I could brain you against the corner of the wardrobe and it wouldn’t mean a Mond-damned thing to me. I’m being kind. So, mind your own business, and when this is all done, we can both go on our way.” He pulled on his robe. Alrik flushed and turned away. He was scared, of course, he was also angry. He hadn’t chosen this path, all his running from police and government men. It had been forced upon him. He’d done one thing – the right thing, he thought, telling Baalgali what he’d done – and it had sent him into the way of progressively worse company, death, and fear. He was sick of it. He hardened his jaw, closed his eyes, and breathed in.

“Mr Mantic. Samjal,” he began. His voice shook more than he wanted it to, but it was stronger than before, judging by the expression on Samjal’s face. Alrik continued, emboldened. “I doubt that you were sitting in that wardrobe, on your arse, waiting for an assistant. I presented an opportunity to you. I’m not going to be your fucking hostage. I’m helping you as much as you’re helping me. And you could brain me? We’re in a church. If we’re donning these robes to pretend to be priests, I fail to see how you murdering me would help your plan, and –” Alrik felt his will draining, and he shook his head. His throat hurt, and his neck ached. Samjal looked surprised, bemused, and annoyed at once. “Alright then, sandgroper. Perhaps you’re right. Maybe I could use your help. You’ll still owe me after this is done. You understand?” Alrik did not respond for a long moment. He felt the weight of Samjal’s glare on him. “It’s rude to not speak when spoken to, boy.” Alrik’s reply was soft, trembling, and laced with derision. “I’m sorry, I’m practising being hard of hearing.” Crash! A minute later, Samjal threw open the door, Alrik just behind. Alrik wasn’t entirely sure how a deaf person acted, so he tried his best to look slightly less aware of his surroundings. It wasn’t hard when fear and trepidation made him feel as if he was drowning. “I’m so sorry, your governance!” said Samjal, bowing to the mayor who was standing near the podium. The hall was now teeming with citizens of all shapes and sizes, though Alrik was surprised by how old many of them there. He’d only ever seen so much white and grey in an overcast sky. “My liege, el-Inze, and I, Brother Telreed, were paying our tithes when the bells sounded. The poor boy is very hard of hearing, almost deaf. It was difficult for me to wrangle him to stop doing his godly duties. He’s such a pure soul.” Samjal placed a hand on Alrik’s shoulder.

Alrik’s eyes focused on the mayor, and he forced a smile. The mayor was old, wrinkled like a snowfield dappled by the wind, in an aging two-piece suit. He took a pocket watch from his suit coat. “You wrangled him for an entire half hour?” Samjal grinned, shrugging widely. There was no fear there. Alrik almost ired it. “Where’s that one from, anyway?” asked the mayor. “Skander-Sareen, where else? He’s one of those Joyreyian Mondinists they have over there. He has a visa, don’t worry about that! It’s in my quarters near the northeast chapel. We’d just have to go and fetch it, is all,” he said. Alrik felt the mayor scrutinising his features. His nose wasn’t very Skandrian. The prospect of being given away by a nose was painful. He was glad that he didn’t have much faith in Mond. If he had, he would have been furious with him. “That’s not entirely untoward, I suppose,” said the mayor, his face still scrunched. “You will need to be assisted by one of the Hetter officials, of course. Captain Dsjevme!” Alrik’s heart sank. The thick wooden doors at the front of the town hall opened and a tall, walnut-skinned man walked through. He carried himself with an air of self-importance, and when he spoke, his voice was thick and accented, and Alrik immediately recognised it. The immigration officer. “Mxaba and good day, mister mayor,” he said, waving broadly. His eyes, thin and dark and lined in black paint above and below, looked to Alrik. Alrik was too afraid to follow them, but he felt them on him like sunlight through a lens. “Who’s the swarthy priest and his manic-looking friend?” asked Dsjevme, walking towards them, the crowd parting like he exerted a physical force beyond

his person. His Nuarec was perfect. The mayor looked small and withdrawn compared to him, and stuttered as he spoke. “You’d do better speaking directly to this one, Dsjveme,” he said, motioning to Samjal. “The other is hard of hearing. Apparently,” he said, audibly doubtful, “These two were so late for the assembly because Brother Telreed struggled to convince his charge to stop counting the tithes.” Alrik did his best to act as if he couldn’t hear the conversation. Dsjevme frowned. He towered over them now; he must have been almost seven feet tall. Alrik’s view was of his chest, wrapped in military cuirass and strapped with pockets and pouches of gunpowder and shot. He smelled of fire and sweat; he’d travelled far to get there. “And, I assume, that means they’re on their way to retrieve their papers? A visa for the Skandrian one?” The mayor nodded. Alrik felt the burn of the Hetterman captain’s gaze on him once again. He wondered if all Hetterfolk were this tall. And this intense. He considered for a moment the most logical thing for a deaf person to do in his situation and looked up. The man was three heads taller than him, and he had to crane his neck. He could only hold eye for a second, then looked down. “Right, then. I suppose I should lead you two lost pigs to your pen, eh?” said the Hetterman. Alrik instinctively turned his head to the sound, then froze. “After you, captain,” said Samjal, scrambling to cover for Alrik. “You have quite the voice, if I may say so. It practically shakes the floor.” Alrik didn’t know what the hour was, but the sky was overcast. When had the last dayrest been? Did the elderly in Jageurshire just sleep whenever? His mind was frazzled. The days walking from the beach to Jageurshire had offered some respite from danger, at least, but it wasn’t enough. He wanted structure. Somewhere warm to sleep. The idea of little safe hovel in Canalas City owed by a friend appeared more and more fantastical by the day. “So, how’d a regional Dubclochian man such as yourself get penned with an

immigrant?” asked Captain Dsjevme. His tone was conversational, even jovial, but his words were provocative. Samjal raised his eyebrows at the captain and laughed amicably. Alrik trailed behind, adopting what he thought might be a ‘holy’ or ‘priestly’ stance. Stupid, he thought. Samjal led the trio through the grey light, though Alrik knew not where. He hoped the man had thought that far ahead. “You’d think me regional, eh, sir?” said Samjal. The captain nodded. He was just behind Alrik, and it made Alrik’s heart thump. He fought his urge to glare at Samjal. You better have a plan. “Regional’s just a descriptor, but aye, Brother Telreed. Your accent’s rougher around the edges than the more refined folk in the capital.” Samjal snorted, and Dsjevme laughed. Was that something a Mondine priest would do? Alrik bit his lip. Keep your head cool, he willed. Keep calm, Mantic. “I mean, it’s not like you’re not regional yourself, eh, captain? The Hetterfields are only part of Dubcloch on paper, you know,” said Samjal. Alrik tensed his jaw. The big Hetterman bristled. Alrik tasted bile. The houses they trundled past seemed smaller, further spread out. They were nearing the edge of the town. Alrik’s mind whirred with halfbaked ideas of escape in case Samjal bailed on him. “My people are just as much a part of Dubcloch country as any of you fairer folk,” said the large man, measuredly. “You’d do best to that.” He paused and stopped. Alrik nearly walked into his back. “You do live far from the main drag, don’t you?”

Samjal nodded and laughed. His voice carried an edge. Alrik didn’t know if it was anxiety or something else. Anticipation? “We really do, don’t we, el-Inze? What am I doing? He can’t hear me!” he laughed. It was a shrill, artificial sound. He paused. “You know, I do need a cigar. Permission to take a few puffs, officer? It’s a bad habit for a priest, I know, but a powerful one.” The Hetterman eyed him suspiciously and then sighed. “As long as it’s brief.” Samjal laughed, and Alrik hovered awkwardly. “I used to be worse before my priestly days, but now? Now my only vices are tobacco and reading. The second undoubtedly healthier than the first.” Samjal took a deep, emphatic breath in, retrieving what looked like tobacco and a wooden pipe from his robe’s pocket. “But you hear what’s happening in the cities now, don’t you? Politicians dropping like flies down in that blue city in Roït. Threats on the king. Ships fighting off the coast. Makes you feel just a little unsafe, like you need to calm down.” He stretched a shoulder, and almost imperceptibly dropped a few pieces of the ‘tobacco,’ into his mouth. He chewed feverishly. Alrik felt the charge in the air almost instantly, as his brain struggled with politicians dropping like flies in Roït. Like Elder Shayid? The captain felt the air change, too. “Now, what is –” Captain Dsjevme was thrown back by an invisible force. Samjal Mantic, jittering and sweating, held his hands out before him. The big man hit the ground hard, groaning in surprise and pain. Mantic frisked him for a moment, throwing away a knife and taking a gun. It was a good quality thing, glinting in the moonlight. He examined it for a moment, gently prodding its flint and pan, looking it over – and then put it back in the man’s holster. Alrik’s eyes widened like an owl’s. “What the hell are you doing?” he shouted, then immediately regretted it. Jageurshire wasn’t a big town. One loud shout might echo all the way to the town hall. “And what did you mean about politicians dying in Roït?”

“Run!” hissed Samjal between his teeth, ignoring Alrik’s question. The Hetterman’s moans turned from noises of pain to growls of anger. “He can’t hurt you now! Run!” Alrik ran. Across the bumpy tussock grass and pebbled ground, he ran. He felt like a rabbit chased by hunting dogs. He fought down bile, fought down lactic acid and the pain of his muscles. He ran, clutching the red satchel to his chest beneath his robe, puffing out hot air. Each green hill he approached offered a moment of relief and then more pain as he had to scale it. Moons above. The ground levelled out, and the town became small in his vision, and he stopped beneath a jacaranda tree. He heard the bang of a pistol, and then a cry of pain. He glanced towards town, and saw the tiny shape of Captain Dsjevme, defeated. There was blood. The crux of Samjal’s plan dawned on him, then. He looked inside the pistol to learn its inner workings. So he could work magic on it. He exhaled. Samjal may have been frightening, but he was clever. Now, Alrik thought, he needed to remain quiet and vigilant. Let the day into evening and then continue the road north. Then his satchel thumped against his chest. He tipped it out, afraid that a creature had somehow crawled inside and become trapped. Yet only one thing fell out, and it fell out with a thump: the book. On the Learning and Performance of Magic. Alrik was exhausted to the point of sobbing, and almost too tired to be curious, but not quite. He flipped the pages, past words he didn’t care much to understand to the note section. Lumi’s conversations greeted him like the voice of an old friend, but the newest words, and the thumping, weren’t hers. He felt a pang of worry. Alrik, please respond. This is Yuon. Something strange is happening. Creatures. Big. Look like bugs. Grey. Pillbugs. As big as big dogs. Going to bite Lumi. Please help.

Alrik scrambled to think. Giant pillbugs? He knew nothing of the sort. Why had his book moved? Had Yuon done that? I don’t – He scratched out his words, gulping them down as if they needed to be digested. Holes in the sides, maybe. He wrote, thinking about the creature that had saved his life. He hoped that he wasn’t hurting others like that one. He’d rather have written about the ‘pillbugs’ from a distance, but clearly this was beyond the question. That’s a very, very shaky maybe, he wrote. He squinted at the page in the overcast light, but no new words formed. All sounds from Jageurshire had faded. His missed dayrests catching up with him, he fell fast asleep against the tree. It was a deep and dreamless slumber.

Four days it had taken from Jageurshire to the outskirts of Canalas by foot. It had not been easy without a blanket, food, or water, but as the nucleus of the city drew nearer, the land became richer with life. Alrik drank from rivers and little tributary streams that flowed to the canals that gave the city its name. He picked fruits, nuts and berries from the edges of farmers’ fields. Thinking of home made him sick with worry and pining, but the idea of a little home in Canalas had been growing in him ever since he’d been forced to leave, carrying with it with fanciful ideas of stability and safety. Canalas City snuck up on him. Alrik hadn’t considered that possible. Canalas, in Alrik’s mind, was a primordial beast of a city, a force of nature created and ruled by forceful men; it wasn’t the kind of place that he’d imagined could in any way sneak. The city’s approach began as a trickle, with the endless fields and farmhouses becoming more houses with more modest fields. Then, past a large canal filled with huge ships Alrik thought only fit to sail seas, there was a wall. The outer limit of the city. Canalas. The wall was ancient grey stone and looked older than any in Cinura by centuries. Beyond it rose the spires and smoke puffs of industry. Toxaument production. Textiles. Metalworking. The smoke billowed down and thickened the air and made entering the city even more surreal. The contrast was powerful; The ancient and the modern. The immovable and the constantly in motion. The smoke leaving the toxaument factory was a swirling mass of colours and greys and browns as different magical chemicals burned and boiled with coal and oil. A juksha-drawn wagon strolled past a half-built stretch of railway. The factories themselves were a strange mosaic of bricks, bright sunset orange to deep amber with great ornate logos painted on their sides, like Canton Industries and Milver & Co. Beyond the factories, where Alrik couldn’t hear his footsteps for the crash of machinery, was the main drag. Businessmen, dapper in tailed coats and greased hair. Presentable ladies in great big frilly dresses and parasols. All beneath a crisscross of thin shadows, a multitude of lines suspended between buildings and lampposts – tram wires. One of the trams was coming towards the intersection now, covered in posters for operas and speeches and symphonies. As it

approached, little shapes moved from that wire and onto adjacent ones. They were small and black, and at first Alrik took them for bats, but at closer inspection he saw they were frogbirds. They darted amongst the wires, nesting in eaves and in the balcony gardens that seemed to spring forth from every second or third storey. The buildings, too, astounded him. Millions of tons of stone and wood and marble were placed up and around as if it were an easy thing, lacquered and coloured and covered in stucco in white and grey and green and yellow. The product of a thousand years of history and a thousand more of progress. Even free of the smoke, his head spun. He looked up at the tall building, shook his head, and collapsed against a wall. His mind was woozy with a kind of anxious euphoria. Imagine the universities here, he thought. The libraries! He shook his head. He was Alin Smith now. Alrik was gone. Truly gone, now. Cinura was changing. Heating up like potatoes in a pot. And he was changing, too. He felt an aching need for his parents, but he pushed it back and stood. Safety for me, first. Then I can make sure they’re safe, too.

Chapter 19

They had been wary for three days after the pillbug attacks, but soon became too tired to be afraid. Whatever terrain they had to cross, slick ice or waist-deep snow, Yuon insisted on the placement of the cairns in the straightest line they could manage. This more than once led them to leap across a ravine. Lumi had lost count of the number of times she’d thought she might die. She’d become numb to it. The spear she’d taken from Amenofriak’s hand had become her constant companion, more so than any of her human friends. Ford had been right about the weapon’s magical force; inlaid in its haft was a small diamond-shaped piece of silver that must have been connected to the spear’s steel head by an inner core. Lumi found that she could direct her magic with it like a conductor in a circuit. She tried to study Doctor Melalhir’s book to find out more, but the vocabulary was mostly too dense for her to parse. As well as this, sometimes she heard murmurs through the staff. She wondered at first if she was finally going mad, driven there by exertion or sun exposure, but no. The sounds were there. Squatting alone in her tent, the underside of her face flaking from sunburn, she touched her fingers to the silver of the staff and heard mumblings. They could have just been sounds, but they seemed organised. Whispers in a language she didn’t understand. And she was alone. After too many arguments, Girrin had moved into Malbry’s tent, and Aurin had taken her place in Lumi’s. The dynamic was different. Her brother wasn’t someone who she was comfortable sharing a sleeping bag with. Maybe, once, he would have been, but the circumstances of his arrival had driven a wedge between them. Most of the time, Aurin skulked around outside their tents, keeping watch. Lumi questioned that. She was worried that maybe he just wanted to disappear. To reach the end of it. It had been weeks south without stumbling upon any ‘magical shit,’ as Girrin said, and true night was coming. The sun would dip under the horizon, and the temperature would plummet. Lumi had nightmares of waking up to find her brother’s mummified corpse crumpled just outside their tent.

Sleep wasn’t much of a relief, either. After a dozen nights, her sleeping bag became slick with sweat, and the sweat froze. Each night the ice would thaw, and her body would be rocked back and forth between uncomfortable cool and squeamish warmth. It was frustrating, infuriating, and had driven her over the edge. Girrin had left their menstrual rags outside the tent, and they had frozen solid. She was bleeding, and in sharing a sleeping bag with Lumi had bled on her leg. Maybe, thought Lumi, alone in her tent days after, I could have maintained my composure. Maybe if we were somewhere better. Maybe. “Girrin! You moron! How am I to wash this? Do you see any kindly washerwomen here? Maybe there’s one behind a frozen hill, or a big iceberg somewhere. Maybe if we ask one of those giant fucking bugs nicely, they’ll do our laundry. Or, maybe, you’re just a fucking dullard. Get out of my tent.” Girrin had been taken aback. The cold had stripped the colour from her cheeks. She looked gaunt. Lumi’s guilt had been almost as strong as her anger. “I – Lumi, what?” “You heard me, you stupid bitch. Get out.” Girrin began to cry, stunned. She didn’t respond for a moment. Some adrenaline was already falling from Lumi then, but Girrin’s face had hardened. “Right then.” She stormed out, taking her sleeping bag and her clothes. Tears still streamed down her face. Lumi was about to speak, beginning to weep in earnest herself. Girrin held up her hand. Like a traffic attendant, thought Lumi. The comparison almost made her laugh. “You don’t get to apologise to me. I’m not just some whore you can use for warmth and treat with contempt. Not even here. Goodbye.” Girrin sniffled the words, but they were harsh. Whore, thought Lumi, as she left, the word sticking in her mind like a seed

between her teeth. The argument had been early in the morning, and they’d returned to their daily ritual of packing up and trudging south soon after. I swear that if I live to be an old woman, the details of how to stow and tie this tent will echo in my dreams when I’m seventy, thought Lumi. Repetitive work as it was, it was work, and it eased her mind a little. They’d come here for work, to achieve a goal, and strapping slowly shrinking sacks of food and frozen and soiled clothes to their sleds helped convince her for a few minutes a day that her goal was still achievable. Just a little more south. Just a little more clay weighing down the com pointer, so it stayed true. Just one more cairn to keep them on a straight line. Just one more step through waisthigh powder or sludge or grit, and they might finally come across the magical material, sitting open and available. The cognitive dissonance was jarring. Lumi liked to think of herself as a realist, but even as the likelihood of her goal being achieved shrank and shrank, she found herself needing to lean on the hope. Lean on the hope. Don’t take your shame out on anyone else. Don’t talk to anyone else unless you must. Just lean on the hope. It became a mantra. Even with her eyes set forward, she still worried about the past. The pillbugs. The terrible crack in the earth and ice. The bugs had not been sighted since they’d left the Tongue, and Yuon reasoned that they might have a food source in the soil beneath the ice there. Below them now was nothing but miles and miles of ancient, frozen water. This was both a comforting and discomforting thought. They made camp and set up a temporary cairn, carving ice ‘stones’ with an axe. There was always some fear that driving the tent pegs into the permafrost would open a crevasse that would swallow them whole or reveal some horrible creature that would eat them, but this time, like the countless other times, the tents were pitched without incident. “We’re at the ridge of some sort of valley. I can’t see the other side, or a way around,” said Yuon. He’d been suffering more and more the further they’d gone

south. He was too skinny for it, his Falarese blood not offering enough protection. His lips always looked a little blue, and he favoured his right hand. “Might be hard to see our cairns from down there.” Lumi nodded, trying to keep her leadership position as if business were occurring as normal. “Might be, indeed. That’s a risk we’ll have to take. Surviving texts say that Lefan sorcerers carved into the ice to make a wall around Jeluli. Maybe this is the remnants of that.” Yuon glanced at her sideways. “Perhaps,” he said. “I had considered that, but there’s a problem. If we’re going the right way, if there was anything left of Jeluli, it ought to have been five days’ walk north. They weren’t too far from the Tongue.” Lumi bit her lip. “If we’re going the right way? We’ve made the cairns, haven’t we? You could match those with a ruler. They’re near perfect.” Yuon nodded, chuffed despite himself. He, of course, had plotted them. “They are. So, either our perception is being warped, or...” he trailed off, and looked out into the dark ice field. It stretched away before them, as far as the eye could see. “Or magic has shifted the ice around us. I mean, magic changes the property of things, makes them shift from one state to another. Perhaps Jeluli has travelled in the thousand and forty-two odd years since the Lefaneie destroyed themselves.” Yuon ground his teeth. “If the magic that strong,” said Lumi, momentarily forgetting the cold, the ache in her ts, and anything related to Girrin and Malbry, “That means that we could be getting close. Close to the source. To the site of where the city is now.” Yuon regarded her coolly and nodded. There was a hint of excitement in his eyes, but it was amongst a mixture of other, less positive emotions. “Yes. And then we have to walk back.” It was the coldest night since they’d landed, so Lumi didn’t blame them. The fact that she didn’t blame them, and that she could understand why they were doing it didn’t make it hurt any less. Aurin snored softly at his side in the tent, but not loudly enough to cover up muted cries and the of flesh on flesh. Girrin. Malbry.

She wanted to be sick. She wanted to walk outside naked, douse herself in water, and freeze, but at the same time, she wanted some time to herself. She and Girrin had made love three times since that first night out on the sea in their cabin, but that was behind them now. Very far behind them if the continuous sounds from her neighbouring tent were of any indication. Her stomach turned again, and she hoped to whatever gods were listening that Malbry was wearing a sheepskin. It was like a little war in her mind. Her sexual desire and the object of her affections in conflict. Her want to be touched by the red-headed girl in the next tent over and the wall she herself had built between them. And the prick pricking her. Lumi pursed her lips. It wasn’t just emotions. It was a war. Just like the one they’d fight against Canalian occupation once they were back home. Her hand slipped beneath her thick tros, scraped across rough, unwashed pubic hair. Winning a battle is a kind of orgasm, she thought to herself. You lose a little of yourself during sex. You lose, too, in a battle. A righteous battle, like the one I’m fighting. For Girrin and Cinura. She rubbed herself until her fingers were slick, but the pleasure was fleeting. What a stupid metaphor, she thought. Malbry had finished, and the effort of pushing the mental image of his climax out of her mind forced away any trace of her own libido. She took her hand from her tros and wiped it on her sleeping bag, cursing. She tossed on her coat, not bothering to pull it tight, took a biwid cigarette from her red satchel and her spear and stepped out into frozen hell. This was becoming too common, and she knew it. She also knew that if it became more common, it’d stop entirely because she’d freeze to death. I wonder what they’d do if they found me dead when they woke up, she thought, tipping a thumbnail-sized biwid leaf into her mouth and chewing. The thought was dangerously seductive. With the tiny amount of magic from the leaf, she lit the rest of a biwid cigarette and took a deep drag. Probably wander around like headless chickens and then freeze or starve, she thought, and then frowned. That wasn’t true. Yuon and Aurin’s knowledge and Malbry’s strength had kept them alive as much as she had. They’d just freeze, then, she conceded, and took another drag.

It was getting hard for her to sleep without consuming toxaument beforehand. The terrible wetness of her sleeping bag didn’t help the habit, but tox also had a calming effect. People had been consuming magical and non-magical substances for pleasure for millennia in the Eine. I’m having an awful time, she thought. I feel that permits me to a tox habit. Tox. What an abrasive word. The tox helped with the cold, too. Even toxauments designed for lowering temperatures tend to warm the blood, and this concoction flushed Lumi’s cheeks and made the air around her shimmer with a gentle heat. Maybe I should share some of this heat with my brother, she thought. No. He doesn’t need it. She sat, cross-legged on the snow, and closed her eyes. She felt a wet sizzle as snow melted beneath her. Beneath that, miles upon miles of ice, straight down. The wind around her picked up, tossing around a million little snowflakes that melted to steam near her skin. She tried to meditate, closing her eyes and thinking of poems she’d heard. The austere Inivanese woman in the arts district back in Cinura, hair pinned back, warbling old Lefan tales. The timeless classic of how the third and last Lefan empire had blown itself up, something called the Sudden Shock, and left a magical wasteland behind in the snow. Lumi was in the resting place of the last Lefaneie, now, and the air was different. Somewhere ahead, somewhere south, the air would be rippling. The Sudden Shock had been like nothing the Eine had ever seen. She sat, and she hoped. Her hoping was like a meditation. The wind picked up, and the silver spear clutched in her hand began to murmur, softly and then louder. Then there were words in her mind. Clear as if spoken, but unaffected by the wind, echoing only in her mind itself. Atesse foi tü lün. Lumi pondered the words with deep interest. The message travelled from the spear, up her arm and into the places her brain stored knowledge. At first, the words meant nothing to her. Then her brain worked more, and she ed. She’d never heard the words, but she’d read them. Not in this order, but she knew them. Not pronounced in this way, but she knew. She almost wanted to wake up Yuon to ask him more, but instead she screwed up her eyes and

focused. “Atesse,” she mumbled. Her stomach dropped. Open. I don’t know where I’ve read it, but I have. ‘Open.’ Taking this knowledge as a structure, she squeezed her eyes shut again and focused, grasping the spear. A pillbug could have snuck up on her, but she didn’t care. She was at the edge of discovering something bizarre and far, far deeper than she’d intended to. “Atesse foi tü lün. Atesse is open, and tü lün sounds a little like ‘to you’ in Inivanese, but the pronunciation is bizarre,” she muttered to herself. “Foi could mean anything. Ears? Nose. Unlikely. That means...” she muttered, and then she stopped talking. Open your eyes. She opened her eyes, and something was hovering in the air half a metre from her face. She stifled a shriek and raised her spear at it before she could blink. It looked at her with sunken pale eyes that were fringed with rough ice-encrusted eyelashes. It was a human face, but on a head that was as big as she was, hanging in space before her. Her first rational thought was that she might have been hallucinating. Who knows how much crushed Rea is in my blood? And it was true that she was intoxicated. Her perceptions of time and space, heat and cold, were warping around her, spiralling. But she knew that the creature was there because it stayed. She closed her eyes, squeezed them shut tight, and opened them again. It hovered still, blending in and out of the ice with its speckled, semi-transparent skin. Lumi grunted, made up her mind, and shoved two fingers down her throat. The bile burned her throat and coated her teeth in a film. Her ears popped with the dimensional transition, and her ts creaked in protest at moving between states of existence. She closed her eyes, opened them again, and stood. Her eyes focused now, but her feet were unsteady. Her perception of time moved closer to reality, and she realised she had been locking eyes with the creature for less than a minute. Then the creature arched its neck and stood. It had been crouched on all fours, already bigger than her, and now it stood tall as a five-storey building. It was human, but only roughly – proportionately, some things were wrong. The head was too large, the fingers too long. It was a drunk’s impression of a giant. Her

spear was murmuring, humming with words she could, once again, not understand. She began to shiver, no longer toxxed up enough to keep herself warm. The creature was huge, and yet as it walked towards her its steps were soft, muted. “What do you want from me? How did you talk to me? What language are you speaking?” she called. She may as well have been shouting to someone in Skander-Sareen. The creature stopped, and she had to crane her neck to meet its gaze. Was it truly talking to her? Or was the crack in the Quodrine the Sudden Shock had left starting to mess with her mind? Then another message echoed through her, from her spear. It was the language that floated just on the edge of her knowledge once more. “Une oi tül ostan nerren.” The creature disappeared abruptly, as if it had never been there. There was no fanfare, no magical ‘pop,’ but it was gone, far faster than it could have walked. Another mystery. After that, Lumi sat abruptly. Her legs and head ached, and her throat burned. She picked her cigarette from the snow and dried and relit it with magic. It was a routine. Something normal, as much as anything could be in this hellish place. She smoked it to its ashy butt and dropped it in the snow. She buzzed, tiredly trying to piece together the message the spear had given her. Trying to parse what she’d seen. She had people she loved in her care, whether they loved her back or not. She needed to think, to care for them. To care for all of them. She dried off as best she could, changing into a shift with old, dried sweat instead of new sweat that might freeze. She wanted a bath. A nice warm bath, like the public ones Cinura was supposed to have had before the Prohibition. Or like Malbry said, his grandfather had so loved in Mellesta. Malbry. It was stupid, but the name still stung to . Even when there was a creature as big as a palace with strange magic lurking around their tent. If it wandered too close or had malicious intent, it could crush them all. But it hadn’t killed her when it had seen her. So, and this was a hope she clung to dearly, perhaps it didn’t plan to.

It wasn’t until she was back in her sopping sleeping bag that most of the toxaument cleared from her mind. The clarity was almost as enthralling as the high itself, though it came from fear and anxiety. Her newly clear brain made two important mental connections. One was that what she’d just seen might have been what roared when they first made landfall. The roar was heavy with magic and seemingly from a huge set of lungs, and the way that the behemoth had parted the snow made Lumi think that it had knowledge, somehow, of magic. The second connection that she made was less positive. She repeated the final message in her head dozens of times, sifting mentally through poems and stories she’d read in other languages. She took a deep breath and tried not to think of catastrophe. Her knowledge of anything but Nuarec was scant and muddied by exhaustion. “Une oi tül ostan nerren,” she whispered. Aurin didn’t stir. “Gods, what does it mean?” Of all the words, the only one she thought she knew was nerren. Death.

She slept soundly. Her tent wasn’t crushed beneath the pillar-like legs of an enormous beast while she rested, which was pleasant. In fact, she woke up feeling refreshed. Though the days had grown shorter since they’d first landed, this one was bright, and the sun’s touch felt gentle and loving. “Morning, Lume,” said Aurin, wrapping her up in his arms in a hug. Momentarily confused, she returned the embrace. The hug disengaged and Lumi stretched her aching shoulders, elbows, knees. The day ahead would mean more walking, and more walking would mean pain. Pain was something she could focus on, so she welcomed it. And focus on it she did, for much of the rest of the day. They packed up their tents, checked the com, and went south. She barely talked to anyone and didn’t mention her encounter the night before. At some point, though she wasn’t sure when, the group ed a threshold. Like leaving a sauna and walking into a cool night, a supernatural chill entered her bones, different to anything she’d felt before, and then turned hot. She stopped, startled, and looked to see her group responding in a similar way. She trotted over to Yuon. The buzz in the air was magic. She could feel it making her blood jump. It was exciting and terrifying and new. “A-are we nearing it?” She didn’t have to explain what it was. It. The zone. The site of the Sudden Shock. Yuon nodded, teeth chattering. The group instinctively drew together for warmth from the supernatural cold, and before she knew it, she was standing side-by-side with Girrin. Malbry was on the far side of the party. “I’m sorry –” Lumi began. “I simply –” began Girrin at the same time. They laughed together for the first time in many days. Lumi moved an arm to hold Girrin to her, gingerly, and Girrin accepted. The feeling was more euphoric than any toxaument Lumi had ever taken.

“This is it, isn’t it, Lume?” She spoke. Lume. A pet name. “This is the bottom of the world. The site. We’re in it. I didn’t expect the feeling to come on so fast.” “You and me both, Gir.”

Chapter 20

Canalas City was threateningly old. Through new layers of paint and polish Alrik saw stones older than the city he’d been born in and stones beneath them older still, layered one era upon another. There was no medina, but instead many streets, broad and narrow, knots of bridges and walkways across the Arphi Canal and her tributaries, all with a kind of green slickness. Water was plentiful here, but it didn’t look good to drink. Torren Threeb’s house was far. The streets were packed with commuters; so many people, Alrik felt he had to hold his breath. He stuck close to the edges of buildings. It was hotter here, and the heat of the sun and bodies and the noise left him exhausted after three hours of walking. He was out of water, and without any clean streams nearby he felt desiccated. He took stock of his surroundings and collapsed against the wall of a general store. He was in the merchant’s district now, he supposed, but it wasn’t what he was used to; few sturdy stalls, less ephemeral than back home, and then dozens and dozens of brick-and-mortar shops, all different sizes and colours and shapes. The crowds, despite their crush, always seemed to be travelling in the opposite direction to him. He’d come into Canalas City from behind. I suppose the rear end is where the gas comes out, he thought, and giggled. It was delirium. He dozed without realising it, looking like a homeless, lost boy. He awoke to the smell of cigarette smoke and a tap on the shoulder. “You still don’t smoke, do you?” The voice was accented; not Cinuravese, but oddly familiar. He’d heard people speaking it back home, but this one sounded more refined, like its speaker had grown up with just a bit too much money. Alrik, bleary, turned to the speaker and blinked twice. “Baalgali?” “Alrik,” said the boy, slapping him on the shoulder and sitting next to him on the dirty ground. He was thinner than the last time Alrik had seen him, more tanned, and he moved like a wounded man.

“I’d rather – I don’t really go by that name anymore,” said Alrik, shaking his head and rubbing his eyes. He was unsure of how long he’d been asleep, but the traffic on the main drag hadn’t slowed. “Ah, yes. I see. An understandable move.” Baalgali sucked on a cigarette and blew out a cloud of smoke that made Alrik grimace. The Skandrian boy seemed amused. The obvious question remained unanswered. Alrik’s head was still spinning. “What’s your name, then?” “Alin Smith,” said Alrik, and then frowned as Baalgali suppressed a chuckle. “Isn’t that a little close to –” “I know,” Alrik rebutted too quickly. He deflated a little. When he spoke, it was difficult. “In all due respect, you have no right to mock me. You got me arrested, didn’t you? I had to leave. I had to run away. I had to leave my parents in Cinura as it goes to hell.” He shook his head. “Now I’m here, I’ve never left home before in my life, and this is the biggest city I’ve ever seen, and I’m looking for one single man, and I’m absolutely fucking lost.” He deflated. Baalgali, to his credit, sat silently, smoking throughout Alrik’s entire rant. “I’ll do you one better, to one of those things at least,” he said, coughing and lifting his shirt, showing thick bandages wrapped around his chest. His forehead and the corners of his eyes crinkled with pain. “A frightened little girl shot me at the wedding party not half an hour after we talked. Lucky for me, all five nearworkers in that town were present at the ceremony, and I lived. They determined that it was dangerous for me to have the ball removed, so I carry it now as I heal. My father wasn’t as lucky when they got him. I had to flee, too.” His eyes went to the ground, and he dropped his cigarette, grinding it under the heel of an expensive, ageing shoe. “So, you didn’t tell the police, then.” Said Alrik, simply. Then, he blinked in realisation. “Your father was killed? By whom?” It was easier to sidestep tragedy with questions than face it head on. “I don’t know,” said Baalgali, sighing. “The police wouldn’t tell me. Someone, though. Someones are doing things in Cinura. Someone sent a girl to tox me and

I killed an innocent man for it. Then, she shot me. Maybe someone heard you knew and had you arrested for it. Maybe my father...” His gaze fixed on the middle distance and then lost focus. He was grieving. Then his eyes snapped back to Alrik. “You said you wanted someone found, yes? I know just the right people to ask.” The Docks were close to the docks, but they weren’t the docks. The docks were where ships stopped to unload their sailors and cargo. The Docks were where Canalian business happened. Baalgali said the distinction was important. In contrast to the main drag’s rows of cramped old stucco-roofed houses lay an arterial tributary of the Arphi Canal, churning green like a misplaced strip of ocean and dotted with ships and boats. Alrik followed Baalgali and looked at the flags of the vessels they ed; Mostly Dubclochian, some Skandrian or Inivanese, others the less-familiar flags of other nations. The Docks made the seediest parts of Cinura look like well-tended palace courtyards. The air stank of fish, booze, and a thousand other volatile things; Skandrian incense, burning biwids, bird droppings, urine. It rang with the sounds of talking, shouting, gulls crying out in the wind – and softer voices. Deliberately low, inviting voices. That’s what Baalgali was looking for. “Hello! I’m looking for someone,” he said, extending his arm. Alrik hovered behind him. The comfort girl looked at Baalgali in confusion that even Alrik could see. She was tired, brightened by belladonna on her lips and charcoal above her eyes. Her torso corset looked comfortably loose, at least at the top. “You do know I’m not a police officer, yeah?” she said. Her eyelids were low, and her voice was rough. “Missing persons cases aren’t my job.” “Oh, no, I understand that,” said Baalgali. “It’s just that I’m looking for a man. A middle-aged man. I don’t know of his marital status one way or the other, but I thought that maybe –” He waved his arms to fill in the rest of his statement.

The woman shook her head. “We don’t mess in the private affairs of our clients.” Baalgali’s hands made fists in frustration. The woman stepped back. “Please,” Baalgali said. He opened his hands. “I’m looking for Torren Threeb. My friend isn’t going to have anywhere to stay tonight if I don’t find him, and I don’t think he’s safe in this city. Threeb’s supposed to work in the government. Please.” Alrik side eyed Baalgali. The woman looked at him for a few moments. There might have been concern in her eyes beneath the exhaustion. Then a decision. She shook her head. “I’m sorry. But if we were to lead you to him, he could follow you back to us. Man could have a wife that doesn’t know.” Alrik swallowed his frustration and it mixed with his other feelings, and Baalgali nodded curtly, thanking the woman. He was kind. Why was he being kind, now? “I understand,” he said. They spent the next few hours trudging through the canal-side rime and crowds. The sun dipped from its highest point, and they stopped at a public bench to recuperate during second dayrest. Alrik’s mind had grown fuzzy. Even after his journey so far, over unfamiliar lands for hundreds of kilometres, being in crowds for long made him feel like he’d been hit in the head with a hammer. Canalas City wasn’t the worst place to be lost in, though. Not even somewhere as grimy as the Docks. Something caught Alrik’s eye during their respite. A distance away from the canal stood a stone basin wider than he was tall, with a carving of a great thirn, teeth bared and feathers extended, spouting water. Occasionally, someone would bring a vessel like a bottle or a flask and fill it with water from the thirn’s mouth, or even lean down and drink it straight. “That’s a drinking fountain,” said Baalgali, bemused. “You don’t have them where you’re from?” “No, we don’t,” said Alrik, stepping up to it and taking a handful of water, sipping it. It was warm, but pleasant. “We have communal wells and we’re allowed to collect some rainwater for ourselves. I’ve never seen it coming out of something like this. It’s bizarre.”

“Back home, with my dad –” Baalgali said, then furrowed his brow and paused before continuing. “Back then, there were three water fountains on our one estate. They were pressurised with pistons and magically hemalised to be icecold even on the hottest days. It was luxurious. Coming as far as I have, it seems almost obscene to me now.” Alrik shook his head, blowing out air and looking at Baalgali again. What was their relationship now? He was no longer the boy that brought Baalgali his bread and letters on occasion. They were both men, now, and due to their shared misfortunes, perhaps even equals. Is it up to me to decide that? He thought. “You know, sometimes you look at me like you’re going to pin me into a display case like an insect,” said Baalgali. Alrik realised that he’d been looking at him for a deal too long and blinked, turning away and shaking his head. “Sorry. Thinking.” The next pleasure house they went to was called the Freshett Inn, though it was clearly a bordello. It was as if the working girls they came across could communicate over distances at great speed, because by the time they arrived at the Freshett, everyone was closed off. A pimp in green livery politely but firmly asked them to leave. “Surprised he didn’t shoot salt into our arses with that blunderbuss of his,” said Baalgali, dusting himself off as they left. Alrik was beginning to lose hope. “That’s nearly all of them. Maybe they just won’t tell, you know. Maybe they have messengers, getting around and telling the girls to avoid us. I mean, we do look strange. Do we look trustworthy, Baalgali?” Baalgali blinked. “Well, you do, Al. You have a pleasant face. Wide and open. Me? I don’t know. They might think Kandriians are embezzlers and crooks around here.” Alrik flushed, blinking and looking away. Had Baalgali complimented him? He didn’t know why that caused such a bloom in his chest. “Well, you’re making a right racket about it, in your own way,” said a female voice, coming from behind them.

Alrik jumped, and Baalgali twitched in surprise. They turned, and a brownskinned woman in a working girl’s attire stood before them, looking unamused. “You’ve been asking up and down for Torren Threeb? The senator? What do you know of him?” she said. Her accent was familiar, like the other women they’d spoken to, though her voice was not so rough. Though she didn’t look it, she sounded as Canalian as anyone. Her skin was the colour of unbaked clay, and her black hair and squeezed chest were styled like the other hirelings around her. There was nothing Canalian about her nose, though; it was long, pointed, and hooked. She looked to Baalgali and then to Alrik as the boy deferred to him. “Not much,” itted Alrik, swallowing down his anxiety. “He owes my parents a favour. A place to live, I think. I don’t know much. I had to leave quickly.” The woman regarded him. She couldn’t have been much older than he was, and she might even have been younger, but the intensity of her stare burned him. Then the stare relaxed. “Alright,” she said. “I’m feeling generous today. I know where he is, and I’ll take you there as long as we use your mezzevos for the trip. I’ll probably have a nearby client. And no touching. This isn’t a pleasure visit.” Alrik, relieved, introduced himself. “I’m Alin.” He extended his arm. The woman took it and almost smiled. “Prudence.” She turned to Baalgali, hesitated, and then bowed instead of taking his hand. “Baalgali,” he said. “So, you can’t find your man?” asked Prudence. Alrik nodded. Talking was odd, but Alrik found with Prudence’s forwardness it was almost easy. “And your first thought was to go to The Docks, rather than his place of work?” Alrik shrugged. The carriage they rode in was bumpy and smelled of stale hay, but the arcane light above them shone brightly and the seats didn’t feel like they were going to collapse. Baalgali checked for dirt beneath his nails. He was nearly as well-groomed as Prudence. “I didn’t know where he worked. This is my first time in the city.”

Prudence nodded. “Thought so. Funny accent, yeah? What is that? You look like a dark Skandrian, I’d say, but your accent... Lilnya, maybe? Up near the Osk? You must have come a hell of a way.” Alrik smiled and shook his head, looking for a moment out of the dirty window and seeing the city moving by. It was approaching the late afternoon now, and the first of the lights were appearing on the streets and shop windows. Near the border of O’Dea and Meir, please, Prudence had said. It had been three whole mezzevos. Even the names of the boroughs sounded expensive. “Not either of those. I’m from... from down south,” he said softly. “Cinura.” Prudence raised her eyebrows. “Are you, now? Never met a Cinuran. People here think you spend all your time breaking your backs in mines with guards jabbing you with sticks.” Alrik laughed awkwardly. “Our mining industry shut down fifty years ago. Most people work in trades or farming, but, er, the ones with the most money work in the government or in business. We have a group of elders who lead ceremonial things, but that’s not a job many get.” Prudence looked away; her eyes curious, but her brow furrowed. “Saying ‘elders’ makes me think of simple tribal living, like the Unna or the untouched tribes far inland. Guess that’s not really Cinura, yeah? I’ve seen the papers. Town’s going to shit. King’s probably going to send a detachment to kick it down before anything big happens, though.” “The papers?” Alrik said. Prudence held up a finger and knocked on the back of the coach driver’s seat. She said something like ‘papers, mate’ in a sound more grunt than speech, and the driver produced a newspaper. The writing was crisp and freshly printed. “No Bread for the Blue City,” Alrik read aloud. “After a period of droughts and crop fires over the last month, the price of bread and other essentials in the southern Roïtian city of Cinura has increased. Roïtian, as well as Canalian, aid is being considered. Neighbouring Fillead has sent rations of rice and fish.” His heart beat faster. How would his parents fare? Thank the gods for Fillead, he thought, ing the lattice of waterlogged pathways and boats he’d seen

as he ed on his doomed journey on the Mulliver. “Wonder what the king will do about that,” said Prudence. She sounded dismissive. “You’re not a fan of the king?” asked Alrik. Prudence laughed harshly as the cart moved over a bump. “I’m not foolish enough to tell you the truth about that. I don’t know you yet.” Her tone made Alrik retreat into his seat. She saw and softened a little. “I’ll put it simply that Canalas has her own problems. A lot of fingers in a lot of important pies, and a lot of guns and sorcerers, but her walls are too tight for all those guns and sorcerers not to cause problems. There are half a million people within the walled part of the city alone. The second-biggest city in the Eine, I’m pretty sure. If things get further out of hand in Cinura, Canalas is going to try to extend itself out to squash it. That’ll leave us... open.” She quietened. “I say ‘us’, but I mean her,” she said, motioning outwards. “The city.” The road was smoother now. Alrik peered out of the window again. He breathed on it and smudged it with his hand. A church the size and scope of which he couldn’t grasp through the little window stood before him. Behind him, Prudence looked to Baalgali. “You’re not hard to place, Akandthatesh. You have ‘upper-hills Skander-Sareen rich boy’ written all over you.” Baalgali grinned so widely Alrik could see it out of the corner of his eye. “Guilty.” “The Most Holy Mondine Basilica at Park Meir is a marvel of late tenth century architecture. Note the vaulted ceilings and towering flying buttresses. Truly a more magnificent building doesn’t exist east of the Divorcing Range.” Their coach driver’s croaky, tired lines were almost drowned out by a huge choir gathered at one of the immense building’s side, each member dressed in bright green. There must have been more than two hundred people clumped together, all in bright green robes, like grasshoppers in the throes of breeding. The church rose like a great white millstone ready to crush them. Revellers gathered opposite, raising their arms in penance to Mond, though

others seemed to be studying it; in the centre of the crowd, a tall blonde woman in strange clothes and eyeglasses frantically took down notes. “What are they singing?” Alrik asked. The choral harmony was haunting and unusual, the words in an ecclesiastical language he didn’t understand. “Hymns,” said Prudence, shrugging. “About Mond and his acts and his Sinners. Church folks aren’t exactly wont to go around singing about fucking and eating biwids. We’re nearly at our stop.” Alrik laughed at that, and it was an honest laugh. Prudence held herself with a trained sort of confidence, Alrik thought. He wasn’t good at reading people, but he felt more confident around her because of her confidence. The carriage pulled to a stop, and one of the juksha burbled. “Out with you three, then,” said the carriage driver. He was lighting a fat cigar and not looking any of them in the eye. Baalgali climbed out first, wincing slightly as the motion pulled at his bullet wound. Almost before Prudence’s skirts touched the cobblestone, the driver cracked his reins, and the juksha snorted and set off. Prudence dusted herself off. “You’ll have to get used to not being respected, Alin,” she said to him, seeing his expression. “At least not at first. In part, the rift is because of the immigration fright, and we all look like sandgropers. We’re lucky he didn’t refuse us outright.” She started walking, long and sure strides in her high-heeled shoes. Alrik struggled to keep up, Baalgali slightly more so, touching his chest. “Even people like us?” asked Baalgali, his first words in nearly half an hour. “My father – This country and Kandrii have been partners for centuries. Friends, I would have thought.” “Maybe they used to be,” said Prudence. Next, they walked through the borough of O’dea.

“Rich fucks live here,” remarked Prudence. The words were said in the way someone might comment on the weather or foot traffic. It was stated to explain everything that Alrik was seeing. O’dea was immaculate in a way that even the most well-maintained house in Canalas Town couldn’t hope to achieve. The streets were smooth stone. Every plant, from tulips and bloodflowers in vases and patios to the neat line of birch trees rising in a row along the road, had not a leaf out of place. There were no insects buzzing nearby. No bats, frogbirds or true birds. It made Alrik uneasy. The only upside was that it wasn’t crawling with sunwaaks. “It’s awfully quiet here,” he said, as they approached a corner. “I don’t mean people because I suppose rich neighbourhoods are often quiet. But in other life. I can’t hear any insects or birds.” Prudence just nodded. Meir was the most living borough of the city that Alrik had yet seen. With the sun more than halfway down to the horizon, it looked quietly urban in a way that hinted at long history and obscene wealth. Past the immense Mondine Basilica, which a good hour of their journey had been spent circumnavigating, Park Meir stretched out before them, verdant manicured green grass dotted with plum, acacia and birch trees. Birds sang from the canopies and animals darted within the water of Lake Meir, Canalas City’s ancient central point. “You ever wonder about how much separation between church and state there is in Canalas?” asked Prudence. She pointed from the Basilica at the far end of the park and then across it, towards a structure that rose on a hill, far above the surrounding expensive residences. To call it two structures would have been more appropriate – one was a dark, aging behemoth of stone walls, with the crenelations of a castle cresting just above them, and the other a younger but still old attachment of rooms and hallways and pointy fences like a boarding school writ large. Coelhartzphin Citadel and Parliament House. “About two kilometres.” She grinned. “That’s where our dear old Torren Threeb will be, Myute willing. Best get there ‘fore the sun sets.” Prudence set off down the length of the park with her confident stride. Alrik had to skitter to keep up. He looked at Baalgali. How long does he plan on tagging along for? Alrik found the question difficult to ask, but Baalgali must have seen it in his eyes. Alrik

never understood how people did that. “I’m staying at the university,” Alrik said, slowing to match Alrik’s pace. “I’m not bereft of a home. I’ve enjoyed our trip, today, though. ittedly, I’m out of place at the university – so I may ask this Prudence if I can pop over. Stay for the evening, perhaps. It’s a long walk.” Alrik looked at the boy and cocked his head. In his chest and head swirled emotions he couldn’t place. “You aren’t planning to... are you? Not to her,” he asked. Baalgali furrowed his brow in confusion, and then shook his head, once, but hard. “No. No, I – really, and since you’re godless this might come across as strange, but I feel a connection to her. We share the same faith. There are some Temples to Myute in this city, but I haven’t had the heart to go to one yet.” Alrik felt some swirling in his chest lessen, but his cheeks had gone hot. He nodded and then accelerated towards Prudence. “We’re walking into parliament house. How?” Alrik asked Prudence. “Well, we’re not walking in,” said Prudence, like it was the most obvious thing. Alrik moved closer to her, striding long to match hers, as bustling crowds of well-to-do ladies and families – park-goers – trundled by them, buzzing around the picturesque lake like insects around a flame. “What, do you think they’d let three apparent sandgropers, one an illegitimate immigrant, one a half-caste whore and one a dead ambassador’s son into office? A world where that could happen would be a very different world. We’ll wait outside. I know a place where we can wait without the guards getting too irritable.” Alrik wrinkled his brow, and a shot of confusion slipped into his blood. One, how did she know that much about him. Two, how was she so familiar with Threeb’s movements? Alrik decided to address them one at a time. “Illegitimate immigrant? What gave you that idea?” Alrik felt the words shake as they left his mouth. Prudence laughed harshly. “I know my – I know Threeb. He

participates in less-than-wholesome acts, from time to time. Things that he ends up owing people for. I know you’re going to fulfil something he owes. I understand it, but I also understand that you wouldn’t be needing to do it if you came here the legal way.” Alrik frowned deeply, stepping to avoid a man with dark skin in a shining green tailcoat striding past. “My parents aren’t the kind of folk who do things like that,” he said. Baalgali, just behind, raised his eyebrows and looked away. Alrik had noticed him struggling, and without being conscious of it, had offered his hand. They walked now, hands clasped. It was pleasant. Prudence shrugged. “Sometimes our parents surprise us,” she said. Alrik breathed in and asked his second question. “How do you know so much about Threeb’s whereabouts?” Prudence’s mouth became a straight line. “I’ve grown up around here,” she said, her voice flat. They walked in silence the rest of the way. Compared to the terrific size of the Basilica across the park and the looming mass of Citadel Coel, Parliament House looked pedestrian; never mind that it would have barely fit inside Cinura’s entire central business district and probably made in a month what the central business district made in ten years. Prudence led Alrik to a little alcove beside a tall, nastily pointed fence that ran around one of Parliament’s exits. The brick of the building here was old, red, and worn. Guards stood at intervals across the property, holding rifles with bayonets and wearing stoic expressions. The place where the three of them stood, now, was in the corner of their watchful eyes. “The sun really is starting to fade now,” said Alrik. “Do you want me to pay you a fare to get back to The Docks?” Prudence looked at him, smiled, and shook her head. She looked at Baalgali and then back to him. “I don’t live there.” She didn’t elaborate, but she spoke quietly with Baalgali as they waited. Alrik felt separated suddenly, and it was disconcerting. Their voices were too low for him to hear; were they planning to leave him there? The city didn’t seem

like it’d be safe at night. He could slip and fall into a canal. Or worse. Government people began to mill out of the gate, and Alrik tried to look inconspicuous. He didn’t have much idea what Threeb looked like, in truth. Prudence stood tall and straight, like an illustration of a meerkat. He wondered what she was really doing – did Threeb owe her something, too? Were they in some sort of relationship? At least one question was quickly answered. A man in a stiff brown suit, bow backed and Canalas pale, emerged from the gate. He saw Prudence and balked. She strode over to him like a lion to a crippled gazelle. “Keys, Torren. Three pairs. I need them.” He looked at her, narrowed his eyes. Looked at her bulging breasts. Looked away. He scowled. “What about your own damn keys, girl? Haven’t you considered getting some more? It’s been a long time.” As he spoke, he shielded himself from the rest of the crowd. He bowed even lower than his hunch, and his eyes stayed down. “I lost them. I know you keep half a dozen pairs on you in case you lose one yourself.” “You’re a – you’re a ne’er-do-well, you, why don’t you just pick the lock?” He grumbled. Prudence pushed his chest with both hands. He barely swayed, surprisingly solid, and his eyes snapped up to hers. “If I’m a ne’er-do-well, I wonder why that would be, father,” she spat. She swung a finger at Alrik, and he felt like he was being sighted by a musket. “He says you owe his parents for something. So, give the skinny little man and your fucking daughter a key each, yeah? And some mezzevos. I know you keep some of those on you, too.” She clapped him on the shoulder. A vein pulsed in Threeb’s forehead. “Don’t speak of that,” he said, eyes shifting as keys jangled in his hand. “Not in relation to me. It’s unbecoming to my

position in proceedings.” “Fuck your proceedings,” said Prudence. She was seething. Alrik felt fear and shame radiating from the old man. “Everyone knows. We appreciate the keys. Goodbye, father.” Torren winced again, and Prudence took the keys. Then she strode away, her confident stride now subtly wounded, like the lion and the gazelle had swapped places. She looked at Baalgali and Alrik. “I’ll pay for the carriage,” she said.

Chapter 21

Are you well, Lumi ? You haven’t written in some Time. I wish You the best. The World is big, and I am small. Regards, Alrik. Geometric. That’s the word that Aurin used to describe the way the land was unfolding before them. It was geometric, like something plotted on a graph in a textbook. “How is land supposed to be geometric?” asked Lumi. The words didn’t come out easily. The magic haze, something Doctor Melalhir’s book called ‘magical background radiation,’ was an increasingly physical force the further south they went. It was like the tingling of a nerve-deadened foot across her whole body, and the heat of a furnace a foot away. And yet it was still cold. “I’m not the expert, Lume. You’re the one who uses toxxes.” Aurin didn’t sound happy about it. Not that the party had sounded happy about much of anything in the past day. “I’m the ‘expert’ on magic, but you’re the one with carpentry experience. Mathematics. What do you mean by ‘geometric?’ Are the patterns of the snowfall oddly even? Are there curves in the side of the dip I’m not seeing that fit some obscure mathematical concept?” Aurin squinted as he thought. “Your second thought is closer to the truth. At least, the theory. If you’ll try to see,” he said, emphasising ‘try’ as the pair shuffled forward through the slush. He pointed to the far ‘wall’ of the dip, about thirty metres away, visible as a lightening of the snow at a change of angle. Lumi squinted. She’d chosen not to tox, but felt blind for it. “You see the incline there?” Aurin asked. “I do.”

He nodded. “Well, look back about fifty metres or so. Take the telescope if you need.” Lumi shook her head and strained her eyes to see. The rest of the party was a little behind, so she didn’t feel too guilty about stopping. “Water snuck into its middle lenses and cracked them. It’s useless. I can use my eyes.” Aurin grunted. Lumi’s eyes, flake-flecked lashes blinking desperately, looked back. At about fifty metres, just like Aurin had said, there was something like a corner. An abrupt, clear. angular turn in the dip that looked more like architecture than nature. “How do we know that this isn’t just some part of Jeluli? Like a age into the city? The Shock is supposed to have happened just outside the city, after all, and it’s not as if we know much about how the Old Lefaneie made their cities.” Aurin shook his head, frustrated. His nostrils flared and let in a little snow that he had to snort out. “We do, though. We’ve talked about it, but you’ve been too toxxed up to . It was built like a branched tree, around hundreds of anfenieüle, sort of magical heating towers. They’re what stopped the whole city from freezing over. What we’re walking into is an angular spiral. This isn’t what Jeluli is supposed to be like at all.” Lumi nodded and bit her chapped upper lip. She thought for a moment and then sighed. “And I suppose the site of the Shock is going to be in the middle of the spiral, isn’t it?” she asked. “Magic is an excitant, but it’s more than that. I’ve been reading that book, the further we’ve gone south. Uncontrolled magic seeping out for this long can do bizarre things. Like pulling a city south and twisting it into a spiral. Or...” she stopped. “What?” asked Aurin, stopping alongside her. Lumi’s arm burned from carrying the sled, though it was lighter than it had been a week prior. The ice shifted, as it always did, but this time it sounded like the crawling of the pillbugs. Or the opening of a ravine. Her stomach tightened. “Why don’t we just stop here?” she said. She heard a murmur from behind as Yuon, Malbry and Girrin slowed. She waved a hand at them. She restated.

“Why don’t we just stop here? Collect some jars of snow. Porous rocks with particulates in them. They should carry enough magical energy to help our resistance. And if we go any further south, who knows what’ll happen to us? The magic here has bent ancient ice and stone into strange shapes. We’re just humans. We’re soft.” Aurin looked at her, cracking his jaw. He glanced to Girrin coming over slowly, her short legs shaking with tiredness. “We’ve come all this distance, Lume,” said Aurin. “Hundreds of miles on land and sea. The closer we get to the source, the more powerful our samples will be. The land around us has had a thousand years to warp into what it is. We only need a few hours to get what we need.” “Why did we stop?” asked Girrin. Both Aurin and Lumi turned towards her. She was shaking. “You know I can’t really stop moving unless we’re warm in our tents.” Lumi looked at her, and her heart sank. Girrin was gaunt. Almost emaciated. She’d spent the last few nights in Malbry’s tent, and even with her jealous heart, Lumi was thankful for the warmth he could give her. “You’re right, Gir,” she said, wrapping her arms around the smaller girl and holding her close. She felt like holding a sparrow. It made guilty bile well up in Lumi’s throat. Held in her arms now, Lumi felt that she could pick Girrin up and break her in half over her knee like a dry branch. She looked at Aurin. Stay here and maybe freeze. Keep going south and maybe be transmogrified and boiled by magic. Not pleasant choices. She shrugged. “Don’t worry, Gir. We’re not stopping.”

“T here’s something wrong with my eye.” It was Yuon. He’d stopped moving, which this far south was less an inconvenience and more of a moral sin. His voice sounded unnervingly flat. His voice was always either high with excitement or low with disappointment. Now it was neither. “You’ve probably just got some dust or ice in it. Blink a few times and it’ll go,” said Aurin, his tone dismissive. Yuon remained unmoving. Lumi turned back to him, squinting through the snow, and then let go of her sled and ran to him. He was shaking. At first, she thought he was shivering, but his jaw stayed still. Each individual part of his body was still, and yet his entire body shook. And, she noticed now, his left eye was cloudy. “Talk to me, Yuon. What’s going on? Can you hear me?” she asked. He paused, grimaced, and nodded. His arms canted at odd angles, like he was trying to balance on a thin rope he wasn’t sure would hold his weight. His eye had turned pale and was becoming something like grey. “What’s wrong with me?” He stammered, and Lumi frowned. She fished out a fleck of biwid – one of her last – and chewed it, drawing upon the Quodrine just enough to melt the snow on Yuon’s face and chest so that she could see him more clearly. As soon as she cast her magic, something happened. “Argh!” Yuon cried, clutching his head. There was a powerful burst of that same uncomfortable hot-cold background feeling they’d felt since entering the spiral, but it was a great deal more intense. It was something between destruction and growth. Between chaos and meticulous organisation. With the single burst, Lumi became aware of a change in her skin. Pores had switched places, and hairs had singed and changed colours and thickness. She grimaced, but didn’t have much time to dwell. Yuon was much worse off, laying prostrate on the ground, hands covering his face.

He didn’t cry out again, but he was whimpering. She turned him from his back to his side and looked at his face. One of his eyes was gone. Gone and replaced with something else, grey-black and glistening. In the dim light, she could see that it still retained some fine details of the eye – a bump for the iris, and a hole for the pupil – but it was solid now. Unseeing. “It’s stone. It’s stone, isn’t it? Gods, it doesn’t feel like it belongs to me anymore. I can’t see through it.” He was sober now, at least, and the magic didn’t seem to have gotten any further than his eye. The reason why clicked in Lumi’s mind even as she attended to him. “The eye is transparent. It’s hard for magic to penetrate through opaque surfaces like our skin and clothes, but there’s no difficulty accessing the eye,” she muttered, as if the words would be comforting to Yuon. “Well, I’m glad it’s scientifically sound!” barked Yuon, moving to get up and then crying out in pain. Ford, who had spent the last few days in a silence that he only now broke, was at his side, gingerly feeling at Yuon’s shoulder. “Something in lombrar’s shoulder broke. Might be a clean break, might not. Can you heal him?” Lumi looked down at Yuon and shook her head. “Can’t. I don’t have enough tox left for that kind of procedure. I have barely enough to keep us warm.” I couldn’t heal him anyway, she didn’t add. I don’t know how. “Can you walk? How much pain are you in?” asked Lumi, cradling Yuon’s head in her arms like a child. He shook his head, and then shivered at the pain it sent through his shoulder. No, he couldn’t walk. “Tie him to one of the sleds,” ordered Lumi. “Should keep him warm enough with what we have left. Check on him every fifteen minutes. We’ll set up camp when the sun goes down. We don’t have the resources to spend any more time here than we have to, and time is a resource in itself.” She turned to Girrin, who was nestling her head into Malbry’s chest. Lumi’s heart throbbed, but the pain was duller now, at least. “Hey, Gir,” she said. “Your main job is keeping warm and walking forward, yeah? But if you could try to keep Yuon talking, I’d appreciate it.” Girrin looked at her sideways, past Malbry’s coat, and smiled ruefully. “I’m

good at talking, Lume. Don’t you worry. I can do it so much it might even keep me warm.” The spiral was getting tighter. Yuon was asleep, or unconscious – they all made sure to check his pulse and his breathing as Lumi had agreed, so he was still alive. The day was growing darker and a few of them, Girrin and Ford included, had taken to draping thin pieces of fabric over their eyes to prevent what had happened to Yuon from happening to them. She doubted that it would work, but she let them play out their ideas, as long as they could still see. By the work of some momentarily benevolent god or a trick of nature, the snow fell more lightly. It was a small reprieve. A blanket of cloud had protected them from the worst of the bottom-of-the-world cold, and now it was stripped away the cold was bone-cutting. The magical radiance was stronger, too, the further inwards they went. Further into the spiral. Lumi felt as if she might boil on the inside and freeze on the out. “What is that?” she heard Girrin call. Her voice sounded tinny. Lumi blinked herself out of a daze and found that her nose had been bleeding. Gods, what was happening to her body? ‘What’s what?’ was what Lumi almost said until she saw. There, in the middle distance, was something that hadn’t been before them in the minute since she’d been conscious and looked. It looked like a pit of burning slag, liquid rock and metal, bubbling in flashes of red, white, and orange. “It looks like some sort of volcanic shaft,” said Aurin. His eyes weren’t covered by a sheet. Lumi thought he might be the smartest in their group after Yuon. So maybe the smartest in the group bar none, soon. “Yes, it does,” called Girrin, “But a minute ago it wasn’t there. Little pits of molten slag don’t just appear from nowhere. Not even here.”

“Would you bet money on that, Gir?” said Lumi, gingerly stepping towards the anomaly. It bubbled like a puddle filled with tadpoles. “The ground cracked open beneath our feet for no reason that we could ascertain. We were attacked by woodlice bigger than dogs. Yuon’s eye just turned into stone. The skin between dimensions has been broken here for a long time. I don’t think things like distance and place matter so much anymore.” Lumi blinked, and the lava pit was gone. “What –” Then, the lava pit was beneath Girrin’s feet. Lumi screamed and leapt towards her, but Aurin tackled her to the ground. Her teeth broke the skin of the inside of her mouth, and she let out an animal moan as she tasted her blood. Why here? Why Lumi? Why did it move? But then she looked up, and Girrin was still standing, petrified. She saw, then, the peculiar way in which the hole had reappeared. It was below Girrin, bubbling as it was, but it was accompanied, in a way that made Lumi’s head ache, with visible and frozen solid ground. She scrambled to her knees and tried not to throw up. It was confounding and terrifying. The ground that Girrin stood upon was simultaneously solid and not. Safe and not. She was simultaneously in grave danger and in no more danger than she had been the moment before. “What the fuck is happening to me?” Girrin shrieked, wobbling on her heels. “Don’t move!” shouted Lumi, spitting blood onto the snow. “Don’t move, Gir, I don’t know how, but the lava pit is superimposed onto where you are. It’s there, and it’s not. If you move, you might make it transition fully to our world and then you’ll –” “And then I’ll what?!” “I think you bloody know that! Malbry, give me my bag!” Malbry looked at her, confused, but then she glared at him and he ed her the worn, breaking red satchel. She rooted around in it, pulling out empty toxaument vials and tossing them into the snow. Wasteful. “What are you doing?” exclaimed Aurin, picking up the empty vials. “You need those. And why do you think magic is going to help? It only made Yuon worse before. You saw it.”

Lumi looked at the there-and-not-there lava pit and the sweat and fear on Girrin’s face and steeled herself. “I have an idea, Rin. You need to trust me.” “Sis, I don’t know. You’re so tired and you’ve been toxxing so much –” Lumi raised a hand, and Aurin ceased. Hands shaking, she opened two vials of toxaument and emptied them both into her mouth. She stood then, for a painful moment, feeling them settle into her, changing her. They bubbled and boiled in her. She tensed her fists and pumped her wrists to help the magic around her body. “Get to a safe distance,” she slurred to her brother. Then she released a gust of wind. In the woozy hyper-semi-awareness of the toxauments, tiny motes of magical fallout were clear in the surrounding air. They’d settled on them all and were the worst in the there-not-there lava and Yuon’s eye, like pus in infected wounds. Lumi extended her fingers, and in the distance let the pressure of the air drop. New air came in to fill the space, and wind picked up. Those particulates, little as they were, were swept along. The lava pool flickered in and out of existence like a dying candle and then disappeared. Lumi broke into an ecstatic grin, stood shakily to her feet, and then ran to Girrin. Girrin’s face was a mask of relief, soaked in a locationally confused sweat that flickered in and out of existence like the lava had. Before Lumi reached her, however, the ground split open again. It was sudden and violent, and Ford’s feet abandoned him, and he fell, gripping the edge of the chasm that opened beneath him with slippery gloved fingers. Next was Yuon in his cart, held on as tightly as he could be by Aurin, though in less than a second the sled was hanging vertically down a ravine, barely held up. The ground shuddered, and essential items, menstrual rags included, fell away into darkness. Malbry rushed to help Aurin pull up the sled, and Yuon, but the rope wasn’t made to carry such weight. Lumi, clutching Girrin to her chest, saw the rope beginning to fray. It was all too much, too fast. It was too dark to see and help. Too dark.

“What are you doing?” said Girrin, her eyes wider than Lumi had ever seen them. Lumi laughed to herself, albeit hysterically, thinking she wouldn’t have thought that possible. “We need light to see,” is all that she said. “You can’t use magic again, Lumi!” cried Girrin. “You saw what it did to Yuon. What it did to the ground. I won’t let you. Not as long as I’m here holding you.” Lumi looked at her and swallowed down pain. “Then step away from me. I’m going to help everyone. I promise.” She swallowed the Scot’s moss, and she swallowed the flecks of silver, and cast her magic. The world dissolved into electric crackling, with a great resonant bang, like a steel drum the size of a continent being struck.

PART THREE - TRUST

Interlude II - Dorus

Stretched as it is between the areas of south-eastern Tokarey called Reata and Deirfur, the Dorus feels a change. A million, million roots sending bursts of arcane electricity, a billion seeds aloft across the Eine like dandelion puffs. An uptick in nitrogen? No. Trace mineral changes? No. The Dorus likes trace minerals, as much as it can like anything, but no. The change is in the Quodrine. Some time ago, about a tenth of the Dorus’s lifespan, it felt a tear. The Dorus’s roots weren’t only in normal space, after all, but had for centuries extended into the Quodrine and beyond. The explosion was immense, in all worlds at once. The feeling of the tear was the closest the Dorus has ever experienced to fear. The entire planet shuddered. The Dorus felt the change, shuddered along with the ground beneath it, and closed its leaves as the ash fell. For weeks now there have been new queer shudders. Two little pieces of itself that have for so long been locked away had begun to travel, quickly and far. The Dorus, though it has no eyes to see, watches them. Curious. Angry, maybe, if that’s something that it can be. One travels up to the human infested Canalas City. One travels south, down to the bottom of the world. The one that instigated the change. To gather some insight, the Dorus sweeps the continent with its sensors, the tips of roots hundreds of kilometres far and wide, the nerve centre of the largest body on the planet. There is the smell of fire and smoke and the sound of shouting in the human city called Cinura.

In the nearby mountains, creatures with shells and dozens of legs crawl and hunt, but one of them is missing. The creature has followed the piece of the Dorus to Canalas City. There, more trouble for the humans is afoot. It’s quiet, for now, but the Dorus senses gunpowder, dismissal. A neglectful leader. The Dorus doesn’t care what they do if its stolen piece remains unharmed. And then there’s the bottom of the world. After weeks of magical shudders and pops and bursts between the worlds, there is, suddenly, silence. The thousand-year-old wound has closed – but it has not been a clean healing. Some things are tumbling, worming out of the scar. The Dorus, far too old to be bothered by things not of immediate concern, is perturbed, but makes no decisions. Across the country of Deirfur, its leaves shudder on a windless day.

Chapter 22

Hello, Alrik. I don’t know if I’m going to survive this Journey. My Resolve grows weaker with every ing Day, replaced with something like a furious Desperation. Perhaps this is something that every ‘Explorer’ experiences – though I don’t feel like an Explorer. I feel like a Fool. We’ve entered some sort of Magic-twisted Spiral, and I’m wary of it. I feel as if I am walking in Circles, inwards and to my Death. What you tell me about the situation back Home fills me with another kind of Dread. You are correct that I am in some way connected to what is happening. My group was Revolutionaries, or People who wished to be – Dissenters. But our Plan was never an all-out Conflict. It was to walk back into the City with enough Magic that we could make candles leave and stay gone. I don’t think that’s going to happen anymore. I don’t know what is. If I don’t ever write to You again, you can assume that I am Dead. Lumi. Alrik’s stomach twisted. The sun was still up outside the carriage, bright with no mountains to block it. “You alright, Alrik?” It was Prudence. “You look dubious.” After the encounter with Threeb, she had deflated, and was leaning against the murky glass of the carriage window. They were on their way to her flat – the place that Alrik, and Baalgali, if only for the night, would be staying. “Yeah, I’m well,” he said, lying. He didn’t know if she could tell or not. “I suppose there’s just some trepidation in doing something like this. I’ve never lived anywhere else but – but my old home,” he said. Prudence smiled warmly and nodded. “You needn’t worry. It’s not a shining Eawari palace, but it’s not a beetle hole either. There’s a room supposed to be for shop storage, but the shop’s never going to open again, so you can sleep there. You can sleep in the sitting room,” she said to Baalgali. He grunted.

“There’s just an empty shop sitting boarded up?” asked Alrik. They were trundling alongside the market district now, in a little lane set aside to let juksha and their loaded food carts deliver away from the main throng. The crowds were slowly dispersing as the sun set. “Yes. It’s odd,” said Prudence. “You’d think here, with everything so packed, people fighting for space, the local council would knock it down. Maybe my father’s put a word in. Let them know I’m there.” “You think he’d do that?” asked Baalgali. “A part of me doubts it,” said Prudence. “But it might be to get me off his case.” They rode in silence for a minute or so. “It’s not strange to see closed shops in Cinura,” said Alrik. His words came out quietly, because the carriage had stopped, and his new home stood before him. It might have been pretty and quaint twenty or thirty years ago when it was built. Now it was a monument to a failed business venture in cracked green paint and old, stained wood. Little holes that might have been from termites or bullets lined the rusty plaque above the storefront, now covered in obscene graffiti and aged to the point that only the word Ellis could be seen. “Ellis’s Bowzy Beericle,” said Prudence, answering Alrik’s question before he asked it. “Used to be a pub. Not a good one. I don’t even think beericle is a word.” Alrik imagined looking at the old building too hard and making it crumble into dust. Prudence thanked the carriage driver, and he was off again in a moment, rubbing his eyes. Prudence pulled her hair through her fingers like a makeshift comb. “Don’t worry. I’ve had it checked for termites within the last year.” She stepped forward, reaching into Alrik’s red satchel, which he’d let her hold without a thought, and produced the key. Alrik expected the sound of loud gears, but the lock was well-oiled, and opened with a bassy click that echoed pleasantly through the door.

Prudence smiled. “Here it is,” she said. She stepped inside and Alrik stepped after her and coughed. The room they entered had dozens of little wooden stools and upside-down tables draped in a week’s worth of dust and an entire city’s worth of spiders. Prudence tutted, taking Alrik’s hand and pulling him up a flight of creaky stairs to their right. Creaky though they were, they were much cleaner than the abandoned shop. He heard Baalgali taking the steps below him one at a time, cringing when they creaked. “So, what’s your name, then?” asked Prudence, taking the stairs almost gingerly, with her head cocked, as if listening out for something. Alrik felt a trickle of confusion. “Pardon? It’s Alin. I told you.” Prudence shook her head and laughed. “Yeah, you told me that. But I know your situation. What’s the truth?” Alrik balked and stopped walking. There were a fair few more stairs than he had anticipated. Baalgali nearly walked into him. “I’m not asking you to confess your crimes to me,” snapped Prudence. “As long as you’re not going to kill or rape me or damage my home, I care little what you’ve done. I just want to know your name.” Alrik inhaled deeply, leant against the wall, and nodded. “My name’s Alrik IfaniSmith. I’ve been going by Alin since I ran away from Cinura. I know Roït’s only a vassal state of Dubcloch, but I don’t know how common the name Alrik is here, and I don’t care to find out.” Prudence looked down at him, thought for a moment, and then nodded, satisfied. “Don’t you think Alin Smith is just a little too like Alrik-Ifani Smith? They were at the top of the stairs now, where a little shrine and statue stood. Alrik stared at it for a moment. The room around them was filled with the last of the sunset’s light, but the little alcove was in darkness. It was a small, fool’s-gold

statue of a cobra, etched in a script that he couldn’t read. Prudence saw him looking at it and softened. “That’s my attempt at a shrine to Myute. He’s the Skandrian god of patience and resilience. The shrine’s never supposed to be in direct sunlight.” Alrik nodded. Religion made him uncomfortable. He opted to ignore it and shook himself as if shaking off fleas. “Lovely. Can we please go fully up the stairs now?” asked Baalgali, nodding at the statue. “Yes,” Alrik said, following Prudence into the main room of her ‘home.’ “I suppose it is too similar. When I came up with it, I was surrounded by unsavoury men on a boat far from home, and I wasn’t as creative as I should have been.” Prudence raised her eyebrows, smiled. Alrik couldn’t tell if she was genuinely interested in what he had to say or if she was just humouring him. What if she robs me blind and kicks me out onto the street? He thought. Then, I don’t think I’d really blame her. “Well, you know,” said Prudence, and then she frowned. From the brief time that he’d known her, Alrik was surprised. She rarely seemed to lack words. He looked around them. The area was spare and cramped, but homely, with an empty hearth in one wall, a well-cleaned arcane light in the ceiling, a tiny desk with a stool, two armchairs and a sofa, and a dusty pianoforte in the corner. Alrik thought to press Prudence to continue, but didn’t. “Well, you know,” she eventually continued, “In the business I’m in, most choose to obscure their identities. I could help you with that if you wanted. I’m sure you’ve heard of the immigration crackdowns. I could help you get new papers.” Alrik looked at her and tilted his head. “Why would you do that for me?” he asked. “Well, it wouldn’t be free. The kind of people who can forge those things

properly never do anything for free. It’d be about six hundred mezzevos, give or take.” Alrik nodded slowly, feeling his heart sink a little. Six hundred mezzevos. That was nearly all he had, and that was supposed to be for food, bills, living... but, he reminded himself, Have I just travelled all these thousands of miles from home to go from one prison to another one? If I’m found to be illegal, that’s what’ll happen. He breathed deeply again and nodded once more. “If you can, and if it’s convincing, I’ll pay for it. But that doesn’t answer my question; why would you do that for me?” Prudence looked away for a moment in thought and then back at Alrik with something like a scowl and a smile at once. “I know what it’s like to be displaced. Not in the same way. I’ve had citizenship here since I was born, but there’s never been anywhere I could feel like was mine. You might be a criminal, but you seem as dangerous as a wet towel, so my working theory is that you cheated a taxman or something akin to that.” She paused. “Did you cheat a taxman?” “You just said that you didn’t care what I’d done,” said Alrik, grinning. “Curiosity is a fact of human nature,” Prudence said, smiling back. “Come, watching you stand is hurting my legs. Sit.” She motioned to an armchair. Alrik sat and melted into the cushioning. Baalgali had already collapsed onto the couch. Prudence looked at them both like a curious bird. “Thank you,” said Alrik. “Curiosity is not just a fact of human nature, you know. Nearly every animal has it. Even the...” he trailed off, as the weight of his exhaustion finally reached his shoulders. With it, the fear, the worry, the thoughts of his parents in his home city dissolving into turmoil. Even with that plague on his mind, he was so, so tired, that he fell asleep sitting up. “I suppose you don’t have to worry about unpacking,” remarked Prudence. It was the last thing Alrik ed hearing before he woke up. He couldn’t have been asleep for more than an hour, but his grogginess made it feel more like twenty. Prudence had given him a dusty little pillow, and he sneezed as he awoke.

“Hello?” he cried out and sat up. He’d wormed into a twisted foetal position in his sleep. Prudence, wearing a lavender nightgown significantly more modest than her daywear and Baalgali, still in his student’s clothes, jumped. “There he is,” said Prudence, laughing. Alrik rubbed his eyes. “I’ve had a few rough nights lately,” he mumbled. “Surely they can’t match up to the strenuous study Baal’s been doing this past week,” Prudence said. “I – really? Is university that hard?” said Alrik, sitting up straight in the chair. He felt oddly displaced; he was finally somewhere safe enough that he could sleep without fear, and that combined with how nothing was familiar to him – not the lighting, not the furniture, not the street sounds – was disquieting. Prudence looked at Alrik quizzically, but Baalgali smiled and shook his head. “I think that was a joke, Alrik. Prudence knows you’ve been through hell.” Prudence looked to Baalgali and then to Alrik again and smiled. “Not too fast on the jokes, Alrik?” Alrik blushed. “Not always.” “That’s alright,” Prudence said, waving her hand. “We all lose in some areas. I can’t even read more than my own name and a few basic words. Baalgali’s biology notes are complete nonsense to me.” Baalgali nodded, moving to the case he’d been carrying and unclasping it, sorting through his items. Alrik, however, was curious. “You can’t read?” he asked. “Not Nuarec neo-runes or anything?” Prudence shook her head and sat on the armchair next to his. Her legs were dotted with bruises and were shaven oddly smooth; he’d never seen that before. “It’s not that I need to with my occupation, but it is one of the many small tragedies I carry around in this life. I have ideas, you know, for little stories. Maybe ones about knights and monsters, and maybe just tales about love and friends. I know, it’s ridiculous; the prospect of a whore becoming an author. Especially one who can’t read. But it’s something I’ve held since I was young.”

“That’s one thing I was curious about, if we’re being open about our thoughts,” said Baalgali, walking over to the couch with a heavy tome called On the Origin of Magic dotted with little page markers. Prudence turned to him, eyebrow cocked. “Your name,” said Baalgali. “Prudence is Canalian, no doubt. el-Hadden Shalreeq, though? That’s Kandriian, but it’s not typical. That’s a descriptor, like what we might use for historical kings. Why’d you pick it? And how’d you know?” Prudence nodded, and her jaw worked. She glanced at the pianoforte by the wall. “I had a great-uncle when I was young. He was from the hills outside SkanderSareen, come to Canalas to try to help my mother. They were close.” She took a deep breath, then looked at the two of them. “If either of you use this information to be cunts to me later, I will personally throw you out of the study window and onto the street.” Alrik balked and nodded. Baalgali, unmoved, nodded too. “Right. Good. Well, by the time that he made his way here, he was too late. My mother was already gone, and it was just me. He looked after me for a while, but he grew old and frail. He had a venture sending money from back home, but it dried up, and I had no connections in the city to find work of my own. No one wanted to hire a foreign waif, even for needlework, which I’m decent at. I started working on the street at fourteen, and my great-uncle hated it, but we needed it to survive. He –” she paused, her voice catching. “He helped me pick my name. Baal, you’ll already know, but Alrik – ‘el’ means ‘daughter of.’ He knew, and I knew I didn’t want to carry the name of my father. And as much as my great uncle loved me, it wasn’t proper for me to carry his. So, I named myself after a good omen instead. ‘el-Hadden Shalreeq’ means ‘daughter of the cold sands.’ I’ve never actually been to Skander-Sareen,” she said, “but when I get there I am going to go into the desert in the dead of night and walk on that sand.” She smiled, eyes damp. Alrik felt like he was viewing something he shouldn’t. Had she been drinking? He didn’t think so. Not knowing how to respond, he just looked at her, forcing himself to maintain eye , and nodded. Baalgali, as always, radiated

assuredness, but now carried a look of sorrow. “He got me that pianoforte when money was still good. When he still worked. It hasn’t been tuned since then. I miss that old bugger. I never respected him enough,” said Prudence. “I understand,” said Alrik, the words escaping before he could rein them in. “I had a friend when I was young. Died in a flood. Kalmir, his name was. I was cruel to him one day, and the next day he died. I tried running to find him, but I couldn’t. I was too late. I still hate myself for that sometimes.” Alrik felt himself trying to balance as he spoke. What would be too much, what would make Prudence feel as if she had been spoken over, what would seem weak? He glanced at Baalgali. Gods, his father had so recently died. Been murdered, even. Alrik looked at him more pointedly. “We’ve all lost people,” he said. “We have,” said Baalgali. “My father was often a raging cunt, in his drinks and his women like they’d preserve him. They didn’t.” He paused and fidgeted with a golden ring around his left index finger. “I loved him though.” The three of them exchanged quiet ‘I’m sorry’s’ in their little triangle, and Alrik’s eyes dropped to the floor. He felt warm; it felt like a religious gathering without the guilt. The honesty of it made him want to cry. After perhaps three minutes, perhaps an hour, an idea struck him. “Prudence,” he said. She wiped her eyes. “I know how to read and write. Why don’t I show you?” She furrowed her brow. “How? Paper is hard to come by. I can’t afford a typewriter for the life of me, and I won’t get far writing by hand in most industries these days. Alrik already knew what he would say. “I’ll take out a loan,” he said. “Once my papers are done.”

Aweek later, Alin Goodrin was a legal citizen of Dubcloch and resident of Canalas City, with the identification papers to prove it. The fact that he did not exist was of no matter. Alrik Ifani-Smith, meanwhile, was still at large after being convicted of a brazen tox-induced murder in Cinura. The fact that he was waiting in line at one of Canalas City’s most frequented trade offices, likewise, didn’t alter the legal reality. “Next, please,” said the paltwire clerk, a severe-looking middle-aged woman with a sharp nose ing wire glasses. The office was quiet that early in the morning, and so the only sounds were the murmuring of sleepy customers and staff, the arcing of the paltwires sending off messages, and the tapping of the messengers on their typewriters as they converted wired messages from electricity to words. “Hello,” said Alrik. He never knew what to say to customer service personnel. His parents had done much of the talking back home. He felt a momentary pang of embarrassment along with the usual pining at the thought of them. “Hello,” said the clerk. “Name?” You bleeding idiot, Alrik. He smiled wanly. “Alr – Alin Goodrin,” he said, fumbling and producing his papers from his red satchel. The clerk regarded them with a disinterested eye, leafing through them. “Alin Smythe Goodrin. Born in Narasus Province, north-east Dubcloch. Huzunite father and Skandrian-Canalian mother.” She raised her eyebrows. Alrik shrugged and laughed uncomfortably. What was he supposed to do? Smile? Frown? He landed somewhere in the middle. “Love, er, finds a way. Sometimes.” The clerk looked at him for a moment and then nodded. “So, Mr. Goodrin. What brings you? An outstanding fee? A loan? We can send out a twenty-character paltwire message to any city in the network, for thirty-five mez, an extra five

every three provinces.” Alrik nodded and twisted his mouth to the side. “I’m opening an independent printing business near the market district. I’m looking to take out a small loan to buy a typewriter, paper, cartridges. The essentials, you know.” The clerk grunted. Alrik wondered how long she’d been working. “You can’t open your business until it’s been approved by the Typist’s Guild. That should take about a month. But, yes, you can take out a scribe’s loan before then. Let me re-evaluate the and conditions. Just to be sure.” Alrik smiled as kindly as he could. He was genuinely grateful. “Thank you, ma’am.” She looked at him and cracked a smile of her own for the first time. “And thank you for being polite, young man.” The loan took about fifteen minutes to complete. Alrik had to stop himself from writing his real details on the sheets. Lying aloud was one thing; sounds were transient. Lying on paper felt much more real. “I said, is that all?” asked the clerk. Her name was Evelte. Alrik didn’t know how or why, but she’d seemed to warm up to him, or at least he thought so. He snapped out of his daze. “Oh, er – Yes, but I had one request, actually.” The clerk raised an eyebrow. A silent question. “I was wondering if I could send a paltwire message. If you’ve got wires running there, I mean.” “We have wires running up to Narasus and under the sea, up to Skander-Sareen and beyond, young man. Unless you want to send something through the Divorcing Range, it’s unlikely to be out of our reach.” Alrik gulped and nodded. “I’d like to send a message to someone in Cinura.” Alrik could see the breath that the woman took in. Her eyes narrowed. “We are not sending messages to Cinura at this time.”

Alrik fumbled. “Oh. May I ask why?” “Because,” said the clerk, “Of fears of insubordination, treachery, and treason. You seem like a nice lad, and even though you’re a sandgroper, you don’t have the touch of a criminal. But I think it’s best that you leave.” Alrik nodded, tight-lipped, and walked from the building. “How did it go? Are we a-drowning in debt, now?” said Baalgali, singing the words. He was smoking a tobacco cigarette and leaning against the wall of the palt centre. Baalgali smoked like the tox towers downtown, but both Alrik and Prudence hated the smell of cigarettes and forced him to smoke outside when he was in the ‘house’ above the shop. He’s catching up on lost time, Alrik thought. “Not quite drowning, but not quite floating, either,” he said. Baalgali detached from the wall and finished his cigarette, stamping it out on the ground. “Speaking of floating,” said Alrik, before Baalgali could read his face. “I’d like to visit Park Meir today. I’ve written about the biodiversity in several of the boroughs around town and not yet in its greenest part. You don’t have to do anything except sit while I write.” Alrik forced a smile. Baalgali wasn’t the kind to fawn, but he wasn’t heartless, either, and being felt sorry for making Alrik uncomfortable, so he feigned happiness instead. “As you wish, your highness,” mocked Baalgali, bowing. “The Park is pretty, so I don’t mind just going and looking at it. You can watch for the toothed ducks and I can watch for the rich folks giving us stares because of our cheap clothes.” Alrik grunted. After walking, running and being chased over what had seemed like half of Dubcloch, long walks didn’t bother Alrik. It felt good to stretch his legs and make his blood pump. It felt right, reconnecting with his physical, animal self harmlessly. Park Meir was about forty minutes’ walk from the trade office, and when they arrived at the sparkling water and green grass, Alrik was invigorated

and Baalgali was struggling to catch his breath. “How did you become so fit?” he asked, sputtering. Alrik shrugged. “I’ve walked a lot.” Prudence’s off-handed joke about the separation of church and state at Park Meir had stuck with Alrik. The side they came from was swarming with churchgoers, priests, and monks, in green robes and jaguar masks. On the other side of the park, there was the humdrum of business, men and women in suits and extravagant dresses and powdered wigs. One side the mottled, slimy, colourful humdrum of terrestrial existence, and the other the austere, monolithic attachment to something loftier. Baalgali and Alrik found shade underneath a young maple tree, only a few metres from the water’s edge, and watched. The day was starting for much of the working and upper classes, and so the crowds were increasing in mass and noise. As was the heat. It got much hotter in Canalas than back home, but Alrik didn’t mind. Heat would draw more animals to the water. “So, what are we looking for today?” asked Baalgali. Alrik raised a finger to his lips in a silent shh. Baalgali had only accompanied him once before, and he seemed genuinely interested, if snarky. “Halzphy birds,” said Alrik, simply. Baalgali side-eyed him. “Pardon?” “Halzphy birds,” Alrik repeated, and peered out at the lake. “The ducks with teeth.” His eyes widened. By some shimmering reeds at the water’s edge, an animal had appeared. It appeared mostly like a bird, with a wiry little frame and off-white feathers. Alrik immediately began writing. It chirped, once, a high and piercing sound, and then came half a dozen higher copies of the same sound, so high as to be on the edge of hearing, in answer. Alrik was scribbling furiously. “What are they?” whispered Baalgali. Alrik shrugged absentmindedly. “We call them birds, and they look like them –

mostly,” he said, still scribbling. “But if you look up close, they’re a sort of ‘middle kind’ – part bird, part thirn, maybe.” “It does look mostly like a duck to me,” Baalgali said, at length. Alrik rubbed his temples. He spent the next few minutes buried in his book, flipping through and comparing notes. The first two thirds, the magic-focused parts, were untouched. “Alrik?” asked Baalgali. “This is the eighth day since you moved into the flat above the Beericle, where I’ve spent just as much time as not, and I’ve been meaning to ask – what’s your stance? On what’s happening in Cinura, I mean.” Alrik felt the discomfort like a weight around the sides of his head. “It’s not something I’d like to talk about, Baalgali,” attempting to sound pleasant. Baalgali pushed. “So, you don’t have a stance? If you don’t have a stance, you’re just leaving people room to twist you to their ends, good or bad. I got shot, my father was killed, your friend Lumi might freeze, because of what’s happening, and you don’t have a stance?” Alrik’s face pumped hot. “I don’t care about politics!” he shouted hoarsely, looking up from his book but not into Baalgali’s eyes. He stayed focused on the middle distance. “I just want to focus on my studies! I want my city to be well. All of it. But I don’t see how saying ‘I will follow the men in red’ or ‘I will follow the men in orange’ makes a lick of difference when they’re both tearing the city apart. I’d rather avoid it in general. Go with whatever causes the least harm.” Baalgali nodded, quietening. There was another moment of silence, and Alrik tried to write again but failed, dropping the pencil and watching the halzphy birds. “Why’d you do it?” asked Baalgali. Alrik looked up at him in confusion. He was still on edge, but it was tempered by the fact that he’d managed to decently capture the swoop of a halzphy bird’s back in his most recent sketch. He was leaning on Baalgali now, moulding to him in the heat. “Do what? Come here? You know that,” he said. His voice sounded flat to his own ears.

“No, I know that. We’re here for similar reasons. I mean, why did you get Prue the typewriter?” “So, I can teach her to read and write. What were you doing when we talked it through? Sleeping, sitting up with your eyes closed?” “Alrik,” said Baalgali. Alrik frowned. “A bit rude?” Baalgali nodded. Alrik apologised, voice soft. They’d developed this system over the days after Alrik had, to his great dismay, said something that had made Prudence cry. It wasn’t easy to make Prudence cry. Alrik had made them both promise to tell him when he was being rude, in case he wasn’t aware of it. “You know that’s not what I mean, Al,” said Baalgali. “I mean you came all the way here, ran from pirates, government men, police, to come here... and spend your mez teaching a girl you’ve only just met how to read? Why?” Alrik twisted his mouth to the side. “You want the truth? The truth is that I don’t know. It was a snap decision. I haven’t really been able to make snap decisions in my life so far, so I suppose I was... trying them out,” he said. He couldn’t hold Baalgali’s eyes. “I wanted to help her. I like her. She seemed like she was having a rough time of it, so I saw a way that I could help, and took it. I think that’s it.” Alrik snuck a look at Baalgali. He was almost smiling, though his face carried other things Alrik couldn’t parse. “That’s kind of you, Alrik.” Alrik blushed and hoped it just looked like heat flush. “Maybe.” Baalgali was still looking at him, and then he rested his head on Alrik’s shoulder. The hairs on the back of Alrik’s neck sprang up, and a cold shiver went through his skin. What was that? They spoke then with their words echoing through each other’s heads.

“Couldn’t have given her a Kandriian typewriter at least, though?” said Baalgali. He sounded amused. Alrik answered honestly. “Those exist?” “Sure, they exist,” replied Baalgali. “... Where?” “Oh, in Kandrii. Maybe Vydeshi to the south, too. Narrahan, if you’re lucky.” “Ah. You’re a prick.” “Thank you.” Half an hour later, the halzphy bird had gone to sleep in a nest of dry moss and reeds, her little babies huddled and chirping beneath her. Baalgali dozed off, and Alrik nearly told him that he was ready to return to the Beericle before he saw the half-covered carriage, stopped at the side of the road. “What’s that?” he said, perking up. “A juksha carriage?” Baalgali half-stated and half-questioned. “For transport.” “An awfully tall one,” said Alrik, closing the magical book with a snap and jumping to his feet. Something tall and white could be seen poking out of the canopy of the carriage. Alrik ran to it, bow-legged, clumsy, and intensely focused. The creature inside turned its head to him, and its red eye swivelled and focused. “Oh, gods,” breathed Alrik. “You’re beautiful.” The carriage canopy was three times taller than Alrik, perhaps five metres or so, and the head of the falar still extended a foot above that. Its eye looked small, but was probably as big as Alrik’s closed fist, and the head it was carried in was easily as long as his entire body and then some, off white and dandelion yellow with a beak like a canoe. It bristled as Alrik approached, and the little fibres on its head and neck shook. Alrik held out his hands and slowed in the near-universal animal sign of peace, and the creature quietened.

“Is that what I think it is?” came Baalgali’s voice from behind Alrik. Alrik couldn’t bring himself to turn around. Caged up as it was, the beast was still breathtaking, but he knew its spread wings could rival the sails of a ship. “If you think it’s a fully grown falar, then yes, I do believe it is what you think it is,” said Alrik. He wanted to reach out and touch the creature, but whoever was transporting it might object – and he’d probably need a ladder to do that, anyway. “What are you doing here?” whispered Alrik, stepping closer. “They took you from so far away from home for this? For you to languish in a cage?” The carriage’s driver, spent cigar in hand, poked his head around the side of the vehicle. Alrik bared his teeth like a confused monkey in an attempt at a smile. “Y’right?” asked the coach driver. His tone was confused and concerned, but gentle. “Yes, sir. Not interfering with the animal at all, just iring.” Alrik looked up at the creature again. “Where is it going, may I ask?” The carriage driver stepped off the seat, looked Alrik up and down, and shrugged. “King’s menagerie in the citadel. The man’s not one for subtle decorations, as you’ve probably heard.” Decorations. “Will it be able to fly?” asked Alrik. He sounded more desperate than he liked. The coach driver looked at him for a moment, and Alrik saw a hint of something that might have been sadness or pity. The driver shook his head. “One flap of the wings on that thing could clear the tables of Castle Coel’s largest banquet hall. It’ll be kept grounded. It should manage.” “Do you know its sex?” “Not yet, no. I’ve only had it today and haven’t sought out a step ladder to look between its legs. Not concerned enough to stick my head near the beast’s arse, anyhow. What’s your interest, anyway? You some sort of student?”

Alrik shook his head. “Not really. Just an enthusiast. Does it have a name?” “No.” A pause, and a sigh, like people often gave Alrik when he asked them a lot of questions. “Got any ideas?” Alrik’s heart fluttered. “Sarensa. It means ‘safety.’” The driver shrugged and laughed. “Alright. You have a nice day now.” Alrik and Baalgali echoed him as he drove the carriage, and Sarensa, away.

Discussion III - K and I

The man Kenneman met at Tine’s dock was tall, broad, and swarthier than a Cinure would have been, almost purple in the moonlit night. His chest, arms and face bore deep, fresh scars, and he spoke little, but when he did, his voice was deep, his accent rich and rounded. A Huzunite far from home. His eyes had shown disdain upon seeing the prisoner, but he had not commented. Clever of him. The Mulliver’s essential cargo had nearly been lost – their transfer ship had been hijacked by Joyrey’s fucking Men, and the captain had been too strung on tox to manage his crew. Jeang Son-Arre, an associate of Kenneman’s for several years now, had pulled things together. Good man. “May Mond heal him quickly,” he muttered under his breath. “Pardon?” asked the Huzunite sailor. Kenneman shook his head. “Just thinking,” he said, looking out at the Opki Shaa, a Skandrian light frigate that had managed to sail to the Mulliver under cover of darkness and bereave it of its contents. Good shipmen, those Kandrii. As he watched, they carefully – very carefully – carried their prize into open-backed freight carts. The cargo was then wrapped in tawny rope to secure it. The half that wasn’t staying here would be travelling a long way. This so-called ‘black glass’ was a new technology, and while it was supposed to be much more stable than the traditional, hackneyed method of draping a strip of cloth into a jar of oil and setting it alight, Kenneman didn’t want to take any chances. On the chance that they were accosted by some enterprising bandits looking to steal food or mezzevos or even some of Joyrey’s Men, they had a travel guard; that didn’t stop the cargo, whose primary purpose was to explode, from doing its job prematurely. Only caution could guard from that. They travelled through the night, each carriage lit by an arcane light on a long metal pole. Such an expense. Kenneman was glad it was coming out of coffers

deeper than his. He followed behind the convoy in the back of a carriage used for food and supplies for the journey, wrapped in rough blankets of mashed tree bark. His eyes grew heavy as the night wore on, and he slept soundly until the weak southern sun grew strong enough to draw him up from his well. Kenneman blinked up at an overcast sky and noticed that the creak of the carriage wheels and the thump of juksha footpads had ceased. Low, muffled sounds of tearing and chewing could be heard from his carriage, and the others around him. They were feeding the juksha. Nothing else was wrong. He sighed and lay back. “Kenneman,” called the big Huzunite man, and his voice startled like the bark of an angry dog. “Prisoner wants to talk.” So, something was wrong, then; they still gave their prisoners some rights. The man’s name was Irinus Mawegu. It made Kenneman a little uncomfortable, knowing a man’s full name. That’s not how his business normally worked. The sweat on his hands made it harder for him to keep the grip on his pistol. Irinus was tied to a sapling and wearing little more than a cloth. He had mostly Huzunite blood, dark skin and coiled hair, like the big man from the Mulliver, but he had none of the strength; he looked desiccated, like his few days in their company had drained all life from him. Maybe they had. “You’re not going to give me any more trouble are you, Mister Mawegu?” said Kenneman, and he swallowed hard, blocking the shake that was coming into his voice. He could do this. He’d killed before, and recently; the doctor was long gone. The girl. This man had no power over him. “Only as much as you let me,” gasped the man. Kenneman’s breath caught, and he swallowed it down. “You’ve been usurped. You’ve been overtaken. My people own the resistance in Cinura now, Irinus. You have lost everything. You will gain nothing, and I will gain everything. Do you understand me?” He felt himself overextending and knelt, bringing himself in, so he was face to face with the man, hands on his

knees. “I will ensure that this revolution fails. I will lead your people to their deaths. Are you processing that? Ninety years of planning, of organising, gone like that. Your best people are poisoned. Your main source of magic is dead. You are nothing, and you have achieved nothing. I will receive the glory in your place.” Irinus’s eyes had been closed as Kenneman spoke, and they slowly opened again. Then the man laughed. The laugh was pained, but it was honest and hearty. Kenneman’s stomach turned. After all this time spent showing the man, really showing that he couldn’t get what he wanted, he was laughing. “You’re a pathetic little man, and I wish I could have lived long enough to see you fail.” The barrel of the pistol was against Irinus’s head, and the trigger pulled. His head caved in like a melon dropped on a rock, and the air shook. Kenneman wiped the blood from his face and shook in the morning cold.

Chapter 23

The world and the ones beyond and adjacent to it snapped apart and then back together with a sickening crunch that Lumi felt in her bones, and a lurch that she felt in her stomach. A response came to her brain from her body, telling it to be sick, but her mind was slow. Everything was. Time was dilating like a tox addict’s eye, and the smallest actions seemed to take eons to complete. Even Lumi’s worry was slowed. Yuon, is he safe? Where is Girrin? Where are Ford and Malbry? Then the wound sealed itself. Lumi could feel it slamming shut like a door. Time raced back to a normal pace. Lumi vomited, collapsed, and fell unconscious. “Kat niümi lani?” called a voice, in a language Lumi didn’t understand. Something about it, though, stirred on the edge of her frazzled consciousness. “Łal eia, anne atese. Łal eia, anne atese!” The second voice was female and authoritative. “Üme.” “Üme.” More, difference voices now. “Ran, u üme.” The cries of ‘üme,’ whatever that meant, echoed around the space. Accompanying these words were groans and cries of pain and discomfort. Lumi was inside now, somehow, in a large room or hall, judging from the way the voices of the strangers echoed. This is all impossible, she thought. There’s no way that people could have survived here, and no way that we could have missed this building. I must be dreaming. I must finally have snapped. “Nieraün tül jaieti, üm foa koi. Relo ar rojojaie fos lani. Io?” “Io.”

“Io.” Again, voices echoed out among the room that shouldn’t have been there. Lumi tried to open her eyes. There was a layer of gunk there, like she hadn’t opened them for weeks. She forced them open, and her mind struggled to comprehend what she saw. By her side, Girrin’s body. Breathing. Thank the gods, thank the gods, thank the gods, she thought. She tried to look to the other side, exercising muscles that felt so unused that cobwebs might be growing around them, and she was noticed by one of the people that were speaking. “Jojeron,” a man barked. “Feiello nienerren ałe.” Lumi’s tired mind was shuddering with effort. Girrin was alive. That was incredible. But what of the others? And what did these people want? They looked human – properly human, not like the strange giant she’d seen. But who were they? Lumi tried to get a look as one came up to her, but she could barely move her neck to glance up. All that she caught was some clothing, military-looking and sky blue, with thick fur-lined leather boots on thick legs. An old-fashioned sword at the belt and something else over the back. A quiver of arrows? What? Lumi thought, then If I’m to die, make it swift. And if Girrin must die, make it swifter. She doesn’t deserve any suffering. Instead of being killed, Lumi received a short, sharp hit to the jaw, and promptly fell unconscious.

Like an old house expanding in the heat and settling back into place with the cool of the oncoming night, time relaxed once again for the next few days. The people, whoever they were, cared for Lumi and her group, jaw injury notwithstanding. The haze of magical entropy was still around, but it was gentler now. The magical wound was gone, sealed tight. Lumi spent most of her time sleeping, and when she awoke, she would be given fresh water and a bowl of hot green soup sharp with spices. She hadn’t realised how weak she’d become over time; she felt like a sponge that had all the liquid squeezed out that was slowly beginning to soak some back up. Girrin was safe. Lumi talked to her occasionally, though the newcomers didn’t seem to like that. Ford and Malbry were both safe, too, though kept separately from the women. Lumi hadn’t seen Yuon since the newcomers had arrived, and mourned him quietly. Though she was cared for and fed, the lack of , and that initial violence, made Lumi feel like a prisoner. It was as if the newcomers were nursing the group back to health to question them, but how? They didn’t speak the same language. She’d tried to speak with them, but their dialect was strange and heavily accented. It sounded almost like something she should know, but the exact reason as to why escaped her. Her mind made connections halfway and then became too frazzled, slowed by weeks of exhaustion and tox abuse. Lumi spent much of her time observing. The newcomers were in military garb, though not a kind that she recognised. Not Skander-Sareen or Canalas or Inivan or Eawar. Their clothes were tiered like the branches on a pine tree, in a way that Lumi thought might stop snow from collecting in the crevices. The people themselves weren’t an ethnicity that Lumi could easily categorise, either. Some of them were as pale as southern Dubclochians, while a few, including their leader, a tall, handsome woman that Lumi had inferred was named Jojeron Olifiela, was as dark-skinned and dense-haired as someone from the midlands of Huzun. Their weapons were strange and archaic, too. Instead of muskets and pistols and

rapiers, they carried short swords, spears, bows and arrows. A motley group with an affinity for old weapons? she wondered. Camping out in the ruins of the last Lefan city? It was ridiculous, but it was happening all around her all the same. The building she found herself in, too, was peculiar. Looking up, Lumi could see that they were in some sort of dome, perhaps a church or temple, but the stones themselves were warped as if someone had taken a clay model of a temple and wrung it in their hands like a towel. Inscriptions and religious iconography in stone and glass had run and refrozen like ink. This must have come out of the wound, somehow, she thought. Stored and warped since – well, since the Sudden Shock. She couldn’t think of another reason. Did that mean that the newcomers had come out of it too? That was harder to accept. The Quodrine was a nothing world. Perhaps something as simple as stone could be caught in it by a damage in the dimensional fabric as big as the Sudden Shock, but people? Five hundred of them, by Lumi’s count? That was much harder to accept. Just as hard to accept as the newcomers’ proposed origin and Yuon’s death was the fact that Lumi was sure she could understand some of their language. Lumi had finished her spiced soup and was squatting spread-legged on the smooth stone ground and stretching her legs. “Kat tükima al nerren łeie. Lom üm üio ano, ana.” One of the soldiers said. He sounded disgruntled. Another soldier, exchanging a smoking pipe with him, grunted and shook her head. Something clicked in Lumi’s mind. That language. She knew what it was. It was just in an obscure dialect, a strange form. Nerren meant death. Nerren meant death in Old Lefaneie. “No nerren!” she shouted. The two soldiers looked at her, shocked and confused, the man reaching for the wide-bladed sword at his hip. Lumi shook her head vigorously, crossing her arms ‘no.’ She reached back into

her memory for the words. Try to speak to them the way you’ve heard them talking, she thought. This might be your only chance to sway them. “Om anne Lefaneie!” she shouted. She sounded desperate to her own ears. Both soldiers stopped dead. The commotion had drawn others, a few of them with their weapons drawn. Through the crowd came Jojeron Olifiela. She was dark, darker even than Lumi herself, but tall and with a slim face and close cropped wiry black hair, regal despite a mild limp. She was beautiful, in a frightening way. She looked at Lumi, and then pointed at her square in the face. “Lüi. Ana om.” She jerked her head to a point further along the dome. The message was clear. Lumi walked with Olifiela and her entourage in silence. The walk was quick. Lumi had decided that the newcomers, the archaic Lefaneie speakers, must have found a way to go outside to gather snow for water, as that hadn’t run out. Where they got their food was unknown to her. Through a door that looked only a few years old – and perhaps it was, if it had been preserved from ageing by the Quodrine – Lumi found herself in what she thought must be a banquet hall. A banquet hall through the eyes of someone who was drunk, though, as the whole room, oblong and rectangular as it appeared to have once been, was now curved to the side like a banana or a warped piece of wood. Along its walls were thick glass windows, and a series of scrappy chandeliers following the room’s curve. The building material here was a mixture of shiny black and white smooth stones, all over the walls like a game board. One of Olifiela’s escorts offered Lumi a seat in front of a small table, and she nodded. The chair smelled a little of rust but looked and felt new. Just a few years old, again, give or take a millennium. Some other chairs hadn’t fared so well, transmuting into stone or plaster and something that might’ve been hair, piled up in the corner out of the way. Olifiela sat in front of Lumi. She was the only one to sit down, with the other three spreading out across the room, hands on their swords or bows. Again, Lumi’s mind wandered as to who these people might be; a cut-off Inivanese faction that had never advanced technologically and somehow

managed to survive in Ollossos? They didn’t speak Inivanese, though. They were speaking what Inivanese had been centuries before. That didn’t explain where they’d sheltered before the dome and the rest of the building had appeared, either. Olifiela coughed, a perfunctory sound, and kicked away a stone that had been twisted into the shape of a wrung sponge. “Feiele kat anne lüi?” she asked, tapping her lips and throat and then pointing at Lumi. Her voice was rough around the edges in a way that Lumi enjoyed, and she found herself sitting up straighter. She looked away to think. Speak. Anne. “Anne... Nuarec,” said Lumi, hesitantly. Olifiela nodded. She, too, thought to herself for a moment, then tapped the table and called out to one of her guards. “Kesbirex! Leme asun, fo.” “Io, Jojeron.” “Alos, Kesbiresh,” said Jojeron (a title Lumi had begun to equate to ‘general’) Olifiela, as Kesbiresh handed her a scroll of paper, a quill, and a pot of ink. A scent riding on the cold hall air reached Lumi’s nostrils, and she wondered if they made the spiced soup somewhere close by. “Lüi kat? Üm eie lün?” questioned the Jojeron. The woman ran slender, strong fingers through her hair. Lumi took a deep breath and tried to clear her mind, save for the words she needed. She’d read enough Lefan to know a little. The lives of her friends might rely on her knowledge. What was the word for ‘name?’ Fojo? “Omo... fojo Lumi,” said Lumi, and Olifiela nodded and handed her a piece of paper. Lumi wrote her name down as neatly as she could, and Olifiela took the paper and regarded it, licking her teeth. Then she nodded again. “Omo Jojeron Olifiela. Lüi pato une leme?” The question hung in the air for a moment, and Lumi gritted her teeth,

shrugging. Olifiela showed no signs of recognising the significance of the gesture. The woman sat in thought for a moment, and it was odd seeing her face, the face of a warrior, bright and concentrating like that of a child in school. She concluded, then took her rough-palmed hand and pointed it to Lumi. In a rudimentary motion, she walked the middle and index fingers of that hand across the paper. “Une?” she asked. “How did I... how did I get here?” said Lumi, and Olifiela spread her hands. Lumi motioned to the paper and Olifiela slid it to her, along with the quill and inkpot. This was a strange sort of dance. The atmosphere of learning and understanding was undermined by the three armed guards around the room. Lumi feared that at any moment she’d break some unspoken rule and become a pincushion for arrows. If their bows and arrows were real, anyway. Lumi took the paper and began to draw. The lines were quick and messy, a far cry from the neat line-work she’d seen from Alrik, but they were sufficient. She drew the vessel that she and her group had arrived in and labelled it ‘ship.’ Olifiela clearly recognised it. Good. Lumi scribbled out a rough coastline parallel to the ship. She pointed to herself, then the ship and the coastline, and made a walking motion with her fingers. Olifiela grinned and took the paper. The feeling of brokered understanding was exhilarating. Lumi grinned back. “... Ship,” said Olifiela, sounding a little like ‘sheep,’ and Lumi nodded, satisfied. Olifiela wrote underneath Lumi’s own label. Her handwriting was small and tight, but the alphabet was close enough to Lumi’s own for her to understand. “Falisia,” said Lumi. “Falisia, ship. Ship, falisia.”

The two of them worked for the next few hours, in their tentative way, to translate as many words as they could. Bolstered by knowledge of poetry a thousand years older than even the Sudden Shock, Lumi grew her understanding. Olifiela was a fast learner and a hard worker, and Lumi genuinely enjoyed her time there, talking to her in the echoing ballroom. There was a joy to it, but the ambiguous safety of her friends never left her mind. Only after some time did Lumi grow the courage to ask Olifiela the question that had been burning within her since the Lefaneie speakers had appeared. She asked similarly to how Olifiela had posed a question earlier; she pointed at Olifiela, walked her fingers across the table, and widened her hands. Olifiela smiled ruefully and motioned for the paper. Her drawing was delicate and tight like her writing, and Lumi had to lean in to get a good look. The shape, though, was easy enough to recognise. It was a spiral. In the centre, Olifiela drew a cross. She tapped it lightly. “Leme,” she said, and then in Nuarec. ‘Here.’ Lumi’s breath left her and Olifiela followed her eyes as she struggled. That couldn’t be right. This was some sort of elaborate trick, surely. “Aturufurti?” asked Lumi, breathlessly. ‘Of truth?’ Olifiela nodded and looked confused. There was no hint of a joke in her eyes. Lumi swallowed down fear and shock, and then pointed at the dark, imive woman. “Lui... you are...” “Jojeron Olifiela of Jeluli. Lefaneie. Surprise?” she said, her accent thick on the Nuarec words. Something like mixed terror and ecstasy dawned on Lumi. Living Lefaneie, somehow alive in the Quodrine for a thousand years, and alive now. It was hard to believe. “So you left during the war with – with Meir, yes? When they invaded,” Lumi said, half in Nuarec and half in Lefaneie, thinking back to histories she’d read. The final, tiny Lefan Empire, and its downfall by its own hand. An exposé on magical hubris and unbridled power. It was a classic tragedy. For this woman, if she was telling the truth, it was a recent memory. “Io, yes,” said Olifiela. “Do you know how much time has ed since the war?” Lumi asked, shakily.

The soldiers were looking at her curiously, noting her erratic behaviour. Olifiela shook her head, concerned. “The war is over?” Lumi bit her lip and turned over the paper, marking a corner past all the little etchings of definitions they’d written out. She wrote a number. “Can you read these numbers?” she asked. One of the soldiers began to walk towards her, but Olifiela waved him away. “Io. Numbers one-oh-four-two.” Lumi nodded, flecks of spit collecting at the corners of her mouth. “One thousand and forty-two. That’s how many years have ed since your war has ended, Jojeron. It ended in an event that killed every Lefan in Ollossos and sent the entire world into a seven-year winter.” Olifiela took the sheet and spent a moment organising the words that Lumi had said and translating the Nuarec. She turned grey. “Aturufurti?” she said, and then repeated herself in Nuarec, “Of truth?” Lumi nodded, then breathed in. “I ask, Jojeron,” she said, trying to calm her speech. “How did you survive the Quodrine? The mina, you say? To my knowledge, it is not a ‘place’ a person can live. Time doesn’t really exist there. It doesn’t have meaning. But how did you become something not physical – without trying – and then back again?” Olifiela flicked through her notes and then nodded. Frowned. “We could feel the Shock coming. Power that large in the mina echoed backwards in time. I took my best leiei, people, and we tried a new technology. There are more magic layers than Quodrine, you see” she said. Lumi nodded, pretending that every paper on magicology she’d read wasn’t made obsolete by this conversation. Like this wasn’t new and frightening and dangerous. She felt overloaded and a little numb. “So, we buried ourselves,” said Olifiela. “Me and five hundred magic kind, slipped between crack. I don’t after that. I slept without sleeping for unknown time. Not unknown anymore, seeming.” Something about the story, beyond all the incredible things she’d already heard,

piqued Lumi’s interest. “Five hundred mages? Do you mean to say that you are all not only Lefaneie, but Lefaneie mages?” Olifiela made the hand-shrug motion. “Io. Yes.” There was a pause. Olifiela sat with her back straight, and her hands clasped, staring into the distance. A loneliness that Lumi could feel almost physically radiated from her. Lumi almost wanted to go to her, to touch her. Moons. What had she lost? Her soldiers showed no reaction or impatience at her state. This continued for several minutes until Lumi chanced one thing more. “If I may, my lady, I had one final question.” “Yes?” “A friend of mine. A leie. He was injured before the closing of the wound and I haven’t seen him. I fear that he is dead or injured.” Olifiela nodded and stood. Two heads taller than Lumi. And strong. “There are many wounded, and many dead. Perhaps your leie is among the former. We can see. Come. You’ve shown useful to me. You will have proper clothes. And perhaps a sword once I can trust you.” “As you say, Jojeron,” said Lumi. A hint of a joke crept into her voice. “I must introduce you to the latest weapons technology.” She was plotting, she realised. Five hundred of some of the best mages that had ever lived had fallen onto her doorstep – or, more accurately, their doorstep had fallen onto her. If she could get the Lefaneie army to do what she wanted, she wouldn’t need diplomacy or magical snow. She could take Cinura back. “Intrigued,” said Olifiela, in her own language and then Lumi’s.

Chapter 24

The age of Canalas City, as intimidating as it had first been to Alrik, was fascinating. Like a great tree that leant with age, or one of the older cats in Cinura who walked slowly and grew dull coloured fur, Canalas City had, over time, begun to bend. Just as he had done back home in Cinura, Alrik spent much of his time walking. It was exciting; he missed his familiar nooks and crannies, but there were so many more places to explore; a hollow tree with a frogbird nest holding a tiny, fluffy infant creature; less-walked alleys where the moss was so thick that it leaked water when stepped on, and tiny green worms danced around his shoes. The great, dank tunnels that ed some of the islands that made up the boroughs of the city. And the Arterial Canal. As imposing as the great double hexagon of Coelhartzphin Citadel was, it was well into its fourth century, and, like everything else, it had shifted and changed with time. Though he often ed near it in his walks around Park Meir, at first Alrik stayed clear of it; any hubbub involving the Crown was the opposite of what he wanted. But, one day, right at the western edge of the park, out of the corner of his eye, Alrik saw that part of the wall had crumbled. Piled stone had become a jagged hill spilling into the Arterial Canal. The waters lapped at the walls, gentle but insistent. That first day, Alrik looked, but didn’t get close. The crumbled section of wall was unguarded, but long pikes, their spearheads rusted, formed a kind of fence around the area. Alrik drew a little sketch of the area and then left for the Beericle. The next day, he walked closer. His wrist smarted from knocking it on the doorframe walking out of his room that morning, and he massaged it as he crept towards the site of the collapse. The closer he got, the less intimidating it seemed, the more fascinated he became. What lay beyond this patch of ruin in this massive city? What plants might grow between the stones? He twisted his wrist, making the bones pop, and slipped past the pike fence. Muddy gravel crunched beneath his shoes as he climbed the little hill that was once a wall and looked beyond it.

Beyond the wall was a tiny, misplaced forest, maybe as big across as a Can’las Town mansion, hiding an ageing tower. The tower was taller and thinner than Lagtower back home, dark wood in a metal frame with a slight lean. Amongst the acacias and spruces and pines, it looked almost like a tree itself. The walls of the little glen all looked much newer than the outer walls of the Citadel, and were shorter, barely coming above the taller trees. Alrik’s curiosity was insatiable. He crept down the other side of the rubble mound, and the crunching of old stone beneath his feet sounded like crashing to his ears. The air in the glen was cool and wet and smelled like damp grass and weeds. As he ed under the canopy, he straightened. Underneath one of the trees was a musty bedroll and a circle of coals. He heard the chittering of frogbirds and the crowing of their feathered kin, but no talking. Nothing heavier than a handful of mezzevos walked through the undergrowth –except for him. Alrik took it in, quiet, thankful, and still on edge at his proximity to the castle. It seemed like this place had been closed off and forgotten about, but he was so close to danger that he couldn’t be sure. Finally, he arrived at the tower. It might have been a bell tower once, he thought, though the bell was nowhere to be seen. Its metal frame made it look modern, but it showed age in the way it leant and creaked with the wind. I’d have to be insane to climb that, he thought.

“I want you to climb it with me,” Alrik said. Baalgali blinked. It was the next day. “There’s a rickety tower technically in the walls of Castle Coelhartzphin that you want me to tres with you into and climb, because you think you might be able to see over it?” Baalgali’s voice was flat. It was the early morning, and Prudence, who’d taken the night off, was typing across the room. “Well, yes. We can test the strength of it as we go. Give each step a real good stomp before we go any further. The stairs might be iron, anyway –and that would mean they’re probably fine.” Baalgali looked at Alrik, then, after an expression that he couldn’t read, smiled. “Sure. Let’s do that.” Two mornings later – for Baalgali had needed to finish an assignment he’d left until the last minute – Alrik and Baalgali approached the pike-fenced gate and ed through. Alrik walked into the little alcove. He was less fearful than the last time, but he didn’t strut. Baalgali looked around, wide-eyed. “This is right up against the castle wall, Alrik.” “It’s actually a little past it.” Alrik grinned, but his voice was tight with anxiety. He could see Baalgali cringe with each step on the rubble. “This is sort of like an enclave.” “What’s to say there isn’t a contingent of Crown men waiting in the bushes to stick us with their bayonets?” said Baalgali. His words were damning, but, Alrik noticed, he didn’t slow down. “Well, I’ve looked at all the walls of the little forest. They’re newer bricks than the main ones around the Citadel, and they’re packed tight. No walls, no tunnels, no gaps into the citadel. There are also other people here who don’t seem to be scared.”

Baalgali stopped. “Who?” “People without homes. I saw one bedroll and a dead fireplace the first day I came here, and at my wall inspections on the second, I came across a mother nursing her newborn. I’ve seen oil barrels with the remains of fires in them, too. This is a sort of refuge.” “A refuge for tox-takers, cutthroats and whores, maybe,” Baalgali grumbled, starting forward again. Alrik laughed. “You practically live with a whore, Baal. You’d put her in the same category as murderers?” Baalgali was silent for a moment. The base of the tower was now visible between the trees. “I forget that she is one,” he said. “It’s a bit of an abstract concept to me, I suppose. I see whores – when I can, with the money I have – and I don’t rationalise them as women the way I do Prudence. She’s like... a sister? I don’t know.” He looked embarrassed. They were at the foot of the tower now, and Baalgali was looking up its length and frowning. “Perhaps your perceptions of her work and the reality of the thing need to be brought into line,” said Alrik. “Perhaps,” said Baalgali, then paused. “So, are we going in?” “Yes.” The door was locked. More accurately, it had been locked, but the bolt securing it in place had rusted away to the point that, with a nudge, Alrik could push it open. The air inside was dusty and dry and faintly illuminated from somewhere near the tower’s summit. The floor was rotten wood on cracked concrete, with dead plants peeking through. Alrik’s eyes wandered up to the staircase. It was rusty, but it was metal. He flicked it with his forefinger, and it rang like a badly tuned bell. He sucked his aching finger and nodded to Baalgali as he walked up to the first step. “What’s the light up the top, you think?” asked Baalgali. “A hole?”

“Maybe,” said Alrik. Each step onto a new stair made it groan – a little more with Baalgali than with him – but he was already far above the floor now, and he felt no wobbles. “This is awfully impulsive of you, Alrik,” said Baalgali. He was close behind, now; Alrik could almost feel his breath on the back of his neck. He was close. “It’s just curiosity, Baal,” said Alrik. “Any of these stairs have the slightest wobble or bend and we leave. I’ve looked at the height of this tower and I think – I think – if I get to the top, I might be able to see over.” “See over? Into the citadel? Alrik, forgive me for bastardising a metaphor, but I don’t think you can see the forest – that is, the obvious truth – for the trees. And the truth is the trees. Whenever this little place was built off, clearly nobody would have wanted anyone to see into the citadel from it. There are thickets all over. All you’d see is leaves and pine needles.” Alrik didn’t reply for a moment, stopping briefly to test a particularly creaky step. They were nearly up the tower. “I think I might be able to make glimpses. If the mental map I’ve made is right, and I have some luck, I might be able to see... something useful.” He felt Baalgali’s eyes on his back as he turned one more tight corner and came to the tower’s only proper floor. Baalgali walked in after him and Alrik saw his mouth widen with shock. Dominating the centre of the circular room was an enormous glass lightbulb, long since inert and dusty. The glass it was made of was incredibly thick, and the way it distorted light hurt Alrik’s eyes. Beyond the globe was the source of light from outside; the lighthouse’s windows were bound up with planks, where light only showed through gaps. Alrik stalked towards one of the windows, facing east, towards the citadel, and kneeled. Through the gap in the planks, and through the waving branches of a pine, he could see over the wall. Over the wall, and into the citadel. He turned his head and saw movement. Cages. Creatures. His heart nearly erupted from his chest. The Crown Menagerie was right there. He could see it. He stood and turned to Baalgali, grinning. Baalgali stepped gingerly towards him and smiled back, leaning down and

looking through the gap Alrik had found. He seemed nervous for some reason – and Alrik knew he was nervous because even he could tell. “Sharn burn me,” Baalgali muttered, shaking his head. “That’s quite a view.” He rose and looked at Alrik. Then he cocked his head, in the way Alrik often did, placed his hands on Alrik’s face, pulled him in and kissed him. Alrik’s already excited heart nearly gave out. He stumbled, and Baalgali laughed, keeping his feet. Alrik’s blood felt like pure toxaument, or maybe alcohol. Was this what it was like to be stung by a venomous animal? How it felt as it stopped your lungs and then your heart? They stood in silence for a moment, staring at each other. Then Baalgali, licking his lips, nodded. “Do you want to go back?” he asked. His face was unreadable, his words quick. Alrik blinked. “Not yet, thanks. I would – I’d like to keep looking. I’ll meet you... later.” Baalgali nodded, tipping his head. He smiled. “Later,” he said. Stay safe,” and then began to walk down the moaning stairs.

Alrik found Sarensa on his second day of peering through the peephole. She was fed at five in the morning each day and spent her time huddled up in a cage with barely enough room to turn. He took his telescope – a gift from Mawari – from his eye, and frowned, adjusting his position. He’d been eyeing Sarensa partly out of interest; she was unfamiliar and singular, unlike anything he’d ever seen – and partly because he was brewing a plan. An escape plan. It was sketchy, and if it worked, he’d never be able to come to Canalas City again. Alrik’s trips to the Coelhartzphin Citadel glen became almost commonplace over the following weeks. There was a routine to it, but there was also an element of danger, of distraction. He needed that. It had been seventeen days since Baalgali had kissed him in the lighthouse, and they hadn’t spoken of it since. The fear of being caught, the focus on self-preservation, were some of the only things keeping Alrik from losing himself in confusion and ‘what-ifs.’ He crept down from the lighthouse into muck and bracken and bushes and spinifex. Alrik thought the city was prettier when it was quiet in early mornings like this because that’s when its natural beauty was the loudest. Crimson frogbirds, the tiny, aggressive fiery-red relatives of huge beasts like Sarensa, roosted in the trees and then woke one by one, croaking and spreading their little leathery wings. The morning mists rolled over the hill Coelhartzphin Citadel sat upon and awoke the eyeflowers from windowsill gardens in the nearby houses, opening their petals and turning their spindly stalks towards the sun. Alrik didn’t dawdle. He strode past Lake Meir, only stopping once to gaze at the halzphy birds roosting, past the great ivory flying buttresses of the Great Mondine Basilica. Soon, he arrived home. It was home now, in a way that made Alrik both comfortable at finding a safe place, and uncomfortable at the thought that he might forget his real home. His parents. Silly, he thought. If he’d forgotten his parents, why was he making his plan? When he arrived, Prudence was asleep. Behind her dressing screen, she lay in a scrappy shift, her bruised legs and arms bare. Alrik averted his eyes and walked to his room. He had the study. He opened the door and had to cover his mouth to avoid screaming.

The centipede creature was next to his makeshift bed. It made a small chirping sound, facing him in a semi-upright position. “Hi,” blurted Alrik, closing the door as quickly and quietly as he could. It was back. By the Moons, it was back. Gods. Fuck. What? “I didn’t really expect to see you here. Or at all. Ever again,” said Alrik. The creature stared at him imively. Or ively. It was hard to tell. “Why?” it. It was an odd sound. With no lips, it couldn’t make a ‘w’ sound and instead approximated it with a croak – like a raven trained to say ‘hello’ by a street performer. Alrik sat on his bed, stunned. The creature didn’t turn from its original position or make another sound. “You didn’t?” It said. Am I witnessing non-human sapience? Alrik thought. It’s making full sentences now. And it followed me home? Gods. “Well, I’d never seen anything like you before,” he stammered. “And you never said you wanted to – to talk again. So, when you disappeared, I assumed you’d gone off for good.” The creature didn’t make a sound or noticeably react; Alrik sat, arms clasped. In a flash of self-awareness, Alrik pictured himself sitting there, clasping his hands nervously while the creature stared at him, and it made him burst into hysterical laughter. He was overexcited. “I did go. Around. Listened,” it said. Different words, Alrik noticed, were spoken with different accents and timbres. The creature had heard them from different people and copied them as it heard them. Did it genuinely understand speech, or was this just an elaborate raven show? The creature creaked for a moment, something like hesitation, then spoke again. “Ghii,” it said. “Ghii. Me. I am. Yes. Language...” it trailed off. Alrik thought he could hear the frustration in the creature’s voice, but he reminded himself not to anthropomorphise it. If it was truly as intelligent as a

human being, it wasn’t likely intelligent in all the same ways. “I go. I went. I listened and – yes, and – spoke. Talked. People... Ghii listen. Listened.” It tapped one of its legs, one of a pair slightly longer and thicker than the rest, against its belly. “You. Not me, you. Blood, no. Fish guts, no. In relation to me... difficult word to find. But good. To Khohkokho, good.” Alrik’s mind churned. “I didn’t bleed. And you thought that was good? That’s why you took me off the ship?” The creature, Ghii, made a soft, dissonant sound. Two notes out of key with one another. No. “Not you bleed. Others. Others, guns, bleed. You, no.” It said the word ‘no’ twice at once – again, a dissonant interval. A chord. Alrik wished he had focused more on music theory at school. “I didn’t make anyone bleed. I didn’t hurt anyone. And you like that. You –Khohkokho? You like that.” Ghii made an affirmative sound. They sat in silence for a few more minutes, but for the sounds of Alrik taking out On the Learning and Performance of Magic and sketching down some furious notes. Then, Ghii spoke up again. “I am here,” said Ghii, its diction shaking, but clear, “To tell you. Warn.” Alrik looked up from his sketchbook, brow furrowing. His joy clouded over. “A man. Person. Here soon. Today. Yellow head. Angry. Sa –” the creature croaked. “Sam –” but Alrik’s stomach dropped. “Samjal Mantic?” said Alrik, and the blood drained from his face. “We’ve met.” Knock-knock-knock-knock! came the door. Alrik closed his eyes, breathed in, and stood. “I here, at now,” said Ghii. “Thank you,” said Alrik. He went to stand up. What if Ghii ran off again while Alrik was downstairs? It’s not as if Prudence could answer the door. She was asleep. But to lose a biological marvel because he was overly polite? The idea

stung. If it really is sentient, it should be its own choice to leave, said Alrik. He swallowed the thought, acknowledged it, and turned back to Ghii. “If it is Samjal at the door, I have an idea that may scare him off. Would you be able to help me?” he whispered. “Yes. If can.” said Ghii. Alrik thanked him quietly and whispered the plan to him before walking downstairs to the front door. The little sharp-dressed man smiled thinly. His hair was oiled, his face neatly shaved, and he smelled of strong soap. He wasn’t Samjal Mantic. Alrik sighed in relief. “Good morning,” said the man. “I wanted to know if you’d be interested in learning about our prophet, Aurweyr. Our pursuit of him has led to many great achievements, from the telescope to the typewriter. If I may come inside, I have a brochure that I can show you. I assure you, Aurweyrianism is by far the most academically inclined Mond-following sect and any donations would be deeply appreciated.” Alrik inhaled and touched his hair. Did he look like an intellectual? That was flattering. Maybe he just looked Skandrian. A lot of people viewed them as one and the same. “You’re pursuing Aurweyr,” said Alrik. “I’d assume that’s some sort of spiritual pursuit, right? Why do you need donations for that?” The little man’s smile wavered. “It’s not a spiritual journey, but a physical one. Aurweyr is on Middagh. We’ve observed signs he lives up there. With funding, as well as magical and technological advances we’re pushing on, we plan to fly there in the ultimate pilgrimage. We will meet our prophet, and the Eine will benefit.” Alrik barked a short laugh. “No, I don’t think so,” he said, and closed the door.

Chapter 25

Alrik lounged on his favourite armchair, flicking through his notes. The eft he saw near the Amber Cliffs, the olms and oilbirds in the caves near Cinura that he’d recorded by memory. So meticulous, he thought, and they barely brushed the surface of what there was to find. It both excited him and made him feel useless, like he was playing some sort of impossible categorisation game. Mainstream biology was content to lump halzphy birds in with every other kind of avian, and it made Alrik unreasonably angry. Perhaps if he could develop a thesis, comparing the bones and phenotypes of halzphy birds with more usual birds and more usual terothirns, he could present the findings to a good university and see if the scientific consensus could be challenged. Even with all the resources I’d need for that and don’t have, I don’t know if there’s a point, thought Alrik, closing the book, when there are nutters asking for donations to go to a moon and find their prophet. He blinked and rubbed his eyes, glancing to his study door. Then again, I have seen some bizarre things, he thought. He tried to stay awake, cooking himself some bean paste with pepper over the cookfire and pouring black coffee into a tall cup, but the day wore on and there were no more knocks at the door. Ghii had told Alrik that it had to go eat something. Alrik, naturally, had asked what the creature ate. Ghii seemed reticent to answer, but assured Alrik it’d be back to enact their plan if Samjal showed up. Baalgali was at university, learning something Alrik didn’t care about, and Prudence wouldn’t be awake until late in the afternoon. So, despite his efforts, Alrik dozed, and his nap turned into a deep sleep. Prudence woke him with a tap on the shoulder. She wore a loose-fitting sunflower-yellow dress that caught the light like a festive lantern. The dress

looked comfortable, and that made Alrik happy. “Hey, dozy. I see you’re spending your Vattedi wisely.” Alrik grunted and pulled a cushion over his eyes. “Vattedi?” he grumbled. “Aye,” Prudence said. “Most of my clientele will be spending the day with their families, so I can give myself a break, too. Should still have enough money for bread and beer. Speaking of that, I have had a little to drink, but I could swear I heard you talking to someone in the study this morning, Al. Did I dream that? Or did you sneak someone in?” Alrik’s blood turned just a little cold, and he shook his head, forcing a smile. “I was probably talking to an insect on the windowsill,” he said. “In the study, anyway. There was a door knocker from the church of Aurweyr in earlier who said some nonsense. I declined. Politely, I hope. I’m bad at telling.” Prudence looked at him, smiled, and nodded, and then retreated to the side of the room to the cookfire. “Do you have any idea what decides when Vattedi is? Is it mathematical? Religious? Does someone in power flip a coin?” Alrik asked. He was tense and trying to lighten his mood. Prudence snorted. “You ask me, the girl who can barely read or write.” It wasn’t a question. “You’re learning quickly,” said Alrik. “Don’t dismiss that.” Prudence sneered and bowed, pulling the cork lid off a jar with a pop. “I appreciate your empty flattery. Being able to write my name still doesn’t make me an expert timekeeper though, Al. I suppose some clever men all huddle together and look at the sun and moons all focused-like and think ‘yes, we’ll put a 301st day here.” Alrik smiled. He didn’t feel a need to reply, so he lapsed into silence again. With the silence came the fear of what Ghii had said. Prudence was turned away, ripping up some stale bread and mixing it with earthy spices and black chickpeas in a bowl. Food from the ‘old – for cheap’

section of the street markets. The day dragged on just like the one before it. Alrik paced the main room and the study, running his hands through his hair until it puffed up like fried corn. Something was going to happen tonight. To Prudence, Baalgali and the rest of Canalas City, that was the Vattedi celebrations. To Alrik, and the giant arthropod loose in the city that seemed to like to visit him, that event was a possible visitation, or a possible attack. At two in the afternoon, Baalgali arrived, and within ten minutes was poring over chemistry papers – big, printed sheets covered in tiny writing about things like the composition of gunpowder and the exchange rates of different toxauments to and from the Quodrine. Prudence was cooking again, this time bean curd in a strong soup with lakeweed, a recipe she said was adapted from a country she hadn’t heard of, far east of Inivan. “You know that in Dalport, a city all the way over the other side of the continent, they have a sort of meaty bread concoction called bog-loaf? I really can’t imagine a less pleasant name for a food item.” “Shit-loaf?” offered Baalgali, not looking up from his notes. Prudence wrinkled up her nose. Alrik wondered if he should tell them about their potential visitor. He wasn’t doing much. He could go to his room, but it was rare that he could spend time with Prudence and Baalgali together, so he stayed. He stayed, and the slow burn of the day lingered with him. Baalgali used him as a receptacle for bouncing off his notes, and now Alrik learnt a few things he hadn’t known before. Alrik liked learning, but it was harder to things he had less interest in. It was as if his mind was only sticky for a specific thing or topic, and anything else would slide off like water on oil. While he was helping, Alrik experimented – scientifically, he thought – by shuffling closer to Baalgali as he talked. Baalgali didn’t react. So Alrik moved closer. Then again, until they touched. Baalgali looked from his notes and then up to Alrik, furrowing his brow and then

grinning. He touched Alrik on the centre of the back, and Alrik inhaled sharply. Alrik felt nausea hit him in a wave, and he rushed to his room, Prudence and Baalgali’s disturbed stares following him. He slammed the door shut and sat with his head in his hands. He began to cry. He felt like one of the books that he’d let slip between his legs as he rowed away from the Roïtian Peninsula. Wet, useless, and falling apart. He was a scientist. An amateur, perhaps. He didn’t have the credentials, or the funding. But he knew it was what he was. What he was going to be. As a man of science, why was he being ruled by something that felt like the opposite of that? What about the touch had scared him so much? Bang, bang, bang! Alrik felt each impact of the knocker downstairs through his whole body, like the metal was striking his chest. There was someone at the door. Alrik wiped his tears, threw the door open, and strode through the room with as much speed and determination as he could muster. He didn’t get his gun, so if Samjal were to shoot him, he wouldn’t be able to defend himself. He could hide, or he could attempt to reason with him. That was it. He heard a scuttling, then, in the downstairs room. Ghii had kept its promise. “Alrik, are you well?” asked Prudence, concern visible on her face and audible in her voice. Alrik shook his head and hopped down the stairs two at a time, nodding at the statue of Myute on the way. I’ll accept any help I can get, he thought, then stepped into the empty pub and opened the front door. Samjal Mantic’s blank face blossomed into a grin in the murky dusk light. He looked a little different, with a longer beard and maybe a few more scars, but he was the same man. Alrik tried to harden his stare. “Can I help you?” Mantic grinned and laughed, moving to nudge Alrik out of the way and step into the room, but Alrik blocked him.

Mantic raised his eyebrows and didn’t try again. “Can you help me? Alin Goodrin. Alrik Ifani-Smith. You didn’t think someone with more than half a brain could tell those two names belong to the same person?” Alrik shrugged. He was trying to act nonchalant, but every muscle in his body was screaming with anxious tension. “Names can be similar sometimes. It happens. I – I ask again. Can I help you in any way, sir? I’m afraid this store isn’t operational just yet. Should be in a week or two.” Mantic sighed and drew a knife from his belt. It was a nasty, jagged, rusty thing. He didn’t take great care of his weapons. Alrik pursed his lips and backed off, but made sure to keep himself between Samjal and the stairs. “Cut the shit. I saved your life in that shit-arse town, and now you owe me. Today’s Vattedi. Know that?” “Yes. I’m not stupid,” said Alrik, and then regretted his tone. Samjal took a few steps forward, holding the knife out before him as he did, and then closed the door. It was now so dark that Alrik could barely see. “Good. Because some friends and I are putting on a celebration. We could do with your help. Some of these friends have seen you scoping out the king’s menagerie near the crack of dawn. How many times now? Seven? Nine? And you haven’t been caught once. Sounds like you could be useful if you’re the quiet kind. The sneaky kind.” Alrik’s gut tightened. “What kind of celebration?” “None of your business yet. You owe me a favour; you repay that favour. We part ways. I never have to see your face or listen to your nasally fucking Cinuravese accent ever again.” He spread his arms in a motion that might have been comforting if not for the knife. “It’s just to help a friend out, boy. I think we bonded back in Jageurshire, don’t you?” Alrik could only really see the shape of the man, slowly creeping forward. “I’m not going to help you,” said Alrik, and then shouted, “I’m not going to help you!”

“By Mond you are annoying, boy! Will you do what I ask if I lop your tongue off? Then at least I won’t have to listen to you whine.” “You don’t want to do that,” said Alrik, forcing every muscle in his mouth and throat not to tremble. The knife slowed. “Why not? I’m a holy man,” he said, fingering his Mondine necklace. “I read the Moon Signs; I do my prayers. You refuse me and I’m going to gut you like a pig. It’s a simple equation.” “You’re a hypocrite,” Alrik spat. “You’re a bloody fucking hypocrite. You shouldn’t hurt me because you can’t. I have friends, too. In here.” Alrik squeezed his eyes shut, tensed his arms, and took a deep breath. Then he heard voices. “Should we kill him?” came a voice, strange and whispery, from behind one of the stacks of stools. There was a scuttling, like Alrik’s friends were wearing wooden shoes, and then more voices. Lower, higher. Six, seven, eight. Ghii was really playing it up. Samjal was backing away towards the door. “I’m going to fucking fire that informant,” he muttered, opening the door and shaking his head. He stashed his knife. “I’m going to gut you, Alrik Ifani-Smith. And if you or any of your friends tell anyone that I’m involved, I’m going to do it more slowly. Sleep well,” he said, and slammed the door. Alrik held himself tense for a few more moments and then collapsed against a pile of stools, breathing heavily. Dried tears that he didn’t crying were sticky on his face. “Thank you, Ghii,” he said. There was a scuttling, and then a wordless, happy-sounding chord. Alrik smiled, shuddered, and fell unconscious.

He didn’t being carried up the stairs by Baalgali and Prudence, but he must have been, because he awoke in the armchair, still exhausted, several hours later. His whole body hurt, and his mind was shaken. “What happened to you?” said Prudence, handing him some bean curd soup. “A man I met on my travels here. Thought I owed him a debt, and got antsy with me. Don’t worry. I scared him off.” “You... scared him off?” asked Prudence, raising her eyebrows. Alrik smiled, pained, and tapped his forehead. “I did. I promise it won’t happen again.” “Better not. Scared me, Al.” Alrik raised a spoonful of soup to his lips, and the windows exploded inward.

Chapter 26

The wooden walls buckled like paper in a breeze and some of them splintered and snapped, sending huge cracks into the walls and floors. Alrik’s bowl of soup was flung from his arms and shattered, and he hit the ground with a resounding crack somewhere in his jaw. He curled up into a ball, reaching out feebly for his friends, until the rumbling stopped. He opened his eyes, and through the pain and the dust he could see Prudence, soot-blackened and terrified, emerging from the fireplace, coughing out smoke. Baalgali was clinging white-knuckled to his armchair. For the next few seconds after the explosion, there was an eerie silence. Then came the screaming and shouting. It started somewhere far away, but then grew in intensity. People with weaker homes than the Beericle cried out, maybe trapped in rubble and choking on fumes. Smoke began to billow through the empty window frames as fires started around the city. Alrik didn’t dare look outside, but he was the first to speak. “What in the name of Mond was that?” “Since when do you call upon the name of Mond?” coughed Baalgali, stumbling towards the window and closing the latch in an absent-minded attempt to stop the smoke coming in. The floor creaked in new places as he stepped on it. “Since it looks like he’s chosen my fucking street for divine punishment,” spat Alrik. He turned to Prudence, who was dusting herself off, her eyes wide and bloodshot and only semi-seeing. “You alright, Prudence?” he asked. “That’s a stupid question,” she barked, then nodded. “I’m not hurt. Sorry.” “I’m sure no one’s offended,” said Baalgali, coughing again. “We need to go downstairs. There’s smoke everywhere. I don’t trust the floor, either. Downstairs still the smoke clears.” “Downstairs and in plain view of the street?” barked Prudence. “There won’t be

any windows down there either. People will be going mad with shock and fear out there. There could be robbers or looters.” “Robbers and looters or asphyxiation,” said Alrik. “Alright. Alright,” said Baalgali. “Do we have any weapons?” he said. Prudence glanced at him, and then at Alrik, and nodded. “Got a dirk and an old pistol near my mattress.” Baalgali nodded, then turned to Alrik. “You?” Alrik had a weapon. That shiny black pistol that the late Pauly had given him on the equally ill-fated Mulliver. He had it in a drawer in the study. He didn’t want to use it. “Do you or don’t you, kyznah?” shouted Baalgali. “I do. It got wet a while back so it could be faulty, but I’ll get it.” “Good. Myute be with you,” said Prudence, stepping past Alrik and onto the first of the stairs as he went and fetched his pistol. He opened the pan and peered inside – a single lead ball stuffed in with dry shot. He pulled some stuffing out, which had gone soggy and mouldy weeks ago, hoped that what was left was enough, despite not wanting to fire it at all, and ran down the stairs. The sky through the pub’s tattered windows was like a vision of hell. Whatever had blown up was now billowing smoke in a great dark plume, like black mould on the body of a dead god. Through the plume, the rest of the night sky was a flashing orange-red. Carriages with heavy water tanks carried by gracile juksha rung their bells and shouted at the top of their lungs for people to move out of their way. The screaming, thank whatever gods might exist, had mostly stopped. It was replaced by an anxious discomfort as people were sent in a thousand directions. A group of young women in burnt fancy dress ed by. One of them was crying. Baalgali was the first to shake himself away from the image and make a practical move. “Shouldn’t we go out and help?” he asked. “And risk getting robbed or hurt? No thank you. People take advantage of people

after disasters in places like this. I’ve seen it happen,” barked Prudence. “One of Alrik’s ‘friends’ already knows where we live, and he was a piece of work. We stay inside and stay safe.” Alrik cringed. “What the fuck is wrong with this city that we’d get stabbed trying to help after a bomb’s gone off?” said Baalgali, exasperated. “There’s a lot wrong with this city, Baalgali. Especially when things break down. That’s why we’re going to keep the door closed.” “Couldn’t someone just get into the windows if they wanted to?” asked Alrik. “And get impaled on several inches of razor-sharp glass? Maybe if they were using the window to kill themselves, sure,” said Prudence. Alrik shrugged, and after selection by Prudence and himself, he and Baalgali took a chair, either side, and dragged it across the floor, wedging it under the door handle. Alrik could see, after sneaking back upstairs and looking out of his study’s window, that every single building on the street had been damaged. Some had partially caved in. There were still spot fires relatively close by, but nothing in their block had created a significant blaze. Then he saw people, ground his teeth, and ran back down the stairs. Prudence was dusting a stool with her hand, her eyes glassy. Baalgali was staring at the windows like a hawk. “There’s a group heading this way. Rough-looking folk. Seems to be giving people trouble,” said Alrik. “Are they armed?” asked Prudence, her voice tight with anxiety. “Think I saw a rapier. More than that, though, I could see them moving purposefully, jerkily. The way men do before they commit violence.” “Something you’re familiar with?” asked Prudence, snapping into awareness and taking her pistol from her bag. It was an old brown thing, covered and nicks and

scars. I wonder if that thing has seen war, Alrik thought. “Alright, so our first plan is to hide and remain very quiet. If we’re unlucky enough for these people to be looters, they might ignore this place altogether. If that doesn’t work, then we... well... make a lot of noise. Make ourselves seem like a bigger enemy than we are. Throw stools and stomp our feet and fire our guns. Do that last one sparingly,” said Prudence. “You seem well-versed in this,” said Alrik, double-checking the wadding and powder in his gun. “I grew up in a dangerous neighbourhood,” said Prudence. Baalgali motioned to Alrik and they crouch-walked over to a place in the shadow of a haphazard stack of chairs. Prudence squatted to the side, closer to the stairs, blank-faced again. All the different flavours and changes that came with fear. Someone kicked the door off its hinges. Alrik saw Prudence stifle a shriek, and every muscle in his body tensed so he felt like a quivering statue. Already his grip on his pistol was growing sweaty. “Alf, come with me,” said the silhouette in the empty door frame, his voice roughened by smoke. Alf followed his associate inside, and they both squinted in the dark. Three more loitered outside the door, keeping watch. The one who wasn’t Alf was the one with the rapier. Five. Five is too many. Gods, thought Alrik. “What is this place, anyway, Cawl?” asked Alf. He was armed with an ageing knife. Evidently Cawl, the rapier carrier, was in charge. “Some boozer with a loft upstairs that a whore and a couple of her friends live in. Sam said some half-Skandrian, or someone pretending to be half-Skandrian, apparently tried to spruce it up. Could have some good shit in here. Sam also said there were ten other fuckers in here, but I don’t see ‘em. Reckon he was

toxxed.” Sam. Sam Mantic? thought Alrik. His blood ran icy. These people knew Samjal Mantic, and he’d told them about Alrik? “He really did it, didn’t he?” said Alf, taking a few more steps away from the doorframe, looking. The men were cautious, practised, but didn’t act with any of the tension that would suggest they considered themselves in danger. “He did. The man’s sharp as a dirk, but he’s a fanatic. I’d say you’d have to be an idiot to try what he did, but he succeeded, so maybe I’m wrong. Dunno if he survived the blast, though. Knowing him, probably.” Alrik stifled a sob of fear. Samjal Mantic set off the explosion. To what end, he couldn’t fathom. Alf was stalking parallel to Baalgali and Alrik, light on his feet. He reached the main counter and sneezed from the dust, leaning down and inspecting boxes. “Decent stuff, here, Cawl. Ink cartridges, tox wiring. Some old stuff from the boozer, some newer from some kind of typist business.” “Yeah, that’s great. Just grab it. I don’t have a good feeling,” said Cawl. He was staring into the darkness above Prudence’s head. Alrik could see her trembling. Cawl leant down, scraped some of the dust from the floor, and threw it into the air. It came down slowly. Prudence sneezed. “Hah!” shouted Cawl, drawing his rapier. Baalgali leapt to his feet, wielding the dagger like it was bigger and more intimidating than it was. Cawl scoffed. “Little boy with a toy knife! I’ve wet my tros in fear.” “Fuck off,” said Baalgali, still holding the knife outward. “You have no claim over this place or any of its contents.” At that moment, Alrik thought he looked regal.

Alf looked up from packing the contents of Alrik’s boxes into a sack, and blanched. The three others, too, looked for Cawl for directions. He waved them off. “Keep packing.” “I’ll kill you,” said Baalgali, waving the knife. Cawl barely moved. In his mind, he’d already won whatever battle Baalgali could start. He was a head taller, clearly better trained, and his weapon was far longer. “I don’t think you will,” said Cawl, and lunged. Baalgali swung his body to the side and the rapier’s needle tip nicked his clothing and got caught. Then Prudence stood, aimed her pistol, and –Click. Nothing. “Oh, Mond, look at that,” mocked Cawl. “The whore’s shitty gun isn’t working. I’m inclined to chortle. Maybe even guffaw.” He lunged again, and the rapier struck Baalgali’s chest. The tip sunk into flesh and then hit bone. Cawl, hunger on his face, adjusted his grip on his sword and began to lean into it so he could skewer Baalgali all the way through. Alrik rose from behind the stools, raised his pistol, and pulled the trigger. There was a deafening thunderclap, and a sulphurous cloud. A lead ball no bigger than a fingernail breached Cawl’s left, making a neat red hole, and splattered the contents of his skull out of a much messier hole at the back of his head and onto Alf. “I can and will fucking kill every single one of you!” shouted Alrik, holding up the pistol. He hadn’t reloaded it yet, but he was hoping the looters would be too shocked to notice. “Do you hear me?” he screamed. His voice was raw. His head was throbbing. His gun felt like a tumorous growth in his hand. “Get the fuck out of here! I will fucking kill you! I will fucking kill you!” Alf dropped his sack and ran. The rest of the looters went with him. Cawl’s lifeless hand dropped the rapier, and Baalgali collapsed into a sitting position, holding the blade in his chest.

Prudence skittered over to him and studied his wound. “It hit a rib, Baal. It hit a rib; you’ll be fine. You’ll be fine.” Alrik felt the energy drain out of him and sank to the floor, dead-eyed. Baalgali groaned, but then laughed. “Do people with weapons just love my torso? Maybe you could do a study on it, Alrik.”

Chapter 27

Lumi had been sober ever since she’d closed the wound by accident trying to save her friends, but her feelings reminded her of being toxxed, just a little. Hopeful and yet hopeless. In two places at once, like the pit of lava that had nearly claimed Girrin’s life, and yet hadn’t. Both entirely there and entirely elsewhere. Technologically, the Lefaneie were a thousand and forty-two years behind. They carried bows and arrows instead of guns; they didn’t have typewriters or paltwire or modern medicine. But, Lumi had to remind herself, they held magical knowledge that had been lost to the rest of the world, and magic was a technology and a science as much as astronomy or mathematics. Any group of magicworkers who could level a city-state and blow open a hole in the Quodrine that didn’t shut for a millennium had impressive power. Impressive power that could potentially be extremely dangerous to them and everyone else. That was hard to forget. “Follow,” said Jojeron Olifiela, motioning to another white stone doorway, this one smaller and less twisted than many they’d ed through. The enormous domed building that Lumi had likened to a palace was one of the local government houses Jeluli had once had. The actual palace of Jeluli was as big as a city, Olifiela said. It was gone, “Near everything’s twisted, melted, or broken into pieces now,” mourned Olifiela, in a pidgin of Nuarec and Lefan. The hallway narrowed and Lumi became aware of one of the tall woman’s muscular arms as they brushed up close. Now they were in the sick room, the smell of vomit, burning and blood hit Lumi’s nostrils. Olifiela’s expression didn’t change. “Io. Smells like a battlefield in here,” she said, evenly.

It looked like one too. By the door, a Lefan woman squatted, sweat rivering down her temple. Lumi guessed ‘nurse’ from the fact that she was unarmed, unarmoured, and that her front was covered in dried blood. Mostly dried. To her side were a few patients that were well enough to sit up. One, like Ford, had developed a stone eye, though his appeared shinier and more metallic. There were Lefan with burns, broken bones, transmuted body parts, deep cuts. Lumi noticed that they all looked young. Her age or younger. One boy with a hand that was like a lump of dry bone looked fourteen at the most. “Kesse, Pilia,” said Olifiela, nodding to the nurse. The nurse nodded back but didn’t maintain eye . “What happened to these people? These eie?” Lumi asked, as she stepped over someone, sleeping or unconscious or dead, covered by a sheet with only her head poking out. As they progressed into the room, it became harder to look at the wounded. First, there were those missing whole limbs. Their wounds were dressed and handled with care, but the sites of the cuts were bizarre and twisted. Like parts had been lost in the jump back through the wound. “This is all from coming out of the wound and for staying there long,” said Olifiela, coughing. “Two of my toes missing. Other lacks feeling and rings like a bell when struck. Light effects.” “It’s really a wonder that your people survived any amount of direct exposure to the Quodrine at all, let alone for a thousand years,” said Lumi, looking at a man with a stone head and torso, dead, and then looking away. “I’ve only reached into magic. The radiation you people must have endured is incredible.” “Time is more... suggestion than a rule in the Quodrine, but correct. Many of my people are sickly. Sixty-eight. Thirty-seven dead, and likely to be more, but –" Olifiela said, stopping, “I had thought. One thousand and forty-two years gone. For you, almost thirty-five generations. For us, no time. Has medicine not progressed? Could we not a surgeon, sell them something valuable, and have them cure us?” Lumi’s stomach turned. There was no cure for magical radiation sickness. It was in her best interests to be honest, but to oppose Olifiela in an open way could be catastrophic to the plan she was trying to formulate.

“Medicine has most certainly progressed, Jojeron,” said Lumi. “We have tonics that can calm fevers and creams and potions that can heal infections and their symptoms. We’ve developed vaccines – I can explain what those are later. But to my knowledge, there is no known way to cure radiation poisoning. It’s too deep. It gets into the cells, the little bricks we’re built from.” Olifiela nodded and looked away. It was clear that she was in over her head. One of the last of her people, a thousand years displaced and struggling with arcane illness. How could she not be? “Io, my people were always fixated on using magic, but not on what would happen with exposure to it. Too much innovation and too few precautions. That explains a good deal of what happened.” Olifiela sagged as she spoke, tired and put out. Then she donned her authoritative stance once more. “Do you see your friend?” Lumi looked through the room again. It wasn’t easy. At the far end of the room, Lumi watched, transfixed, as a man’s head slowly turned into ice and began to crack and melt while a nurse looked on in shock. She shook her head. “Yuon!” she called, then muted her voice as some of the other sick and wounded groaned and complained. “Yuon!” “Someone here speaks Nuarec?” came a voice behind her. Lumi turned and saw Yuon’s puff of curly golden hair and nut-brown face poking out of a blanket. There was a bandage over his stone eye. Lumi picked her way over the bodies and wrapped her arms around Yuon. He embraced her in turn, and he felt strong. A weight of sadness and worry in Lumi’s gut disappeared. She cupped Yuon’s face in her hands. “An eyepatch! What a cavalier look!” Again, some of the wounded grumbled, and she lowered her voice. “What happened to you? How long have you been here? Can you walk?” “Can you ask enough questions to fill a good-sized novel? Probably,” said Yuon, and with Lumi’s help he pulled himself up and took a few wobbly steps. “Tada,” he said, and bowed. His expression flickered into confusion when he looked at her clothes.

“You’re wearing what they’re wearing. How are you communicating with them? Why are you with them?” “And you say I’m excessive with my questions,” replied Lumi coolly. “You first.” Yuon frowned. “They pulled me from the ice when the thing happened. I suppose they thought I was one of theirs that got caught up in whatever happened. I was still in immense pain from my eye, so my memory isn’t the clearest. They brought me here, where they brought others that were injured. As far as triage went, all I really needed was some water and some rest, but gods, I saw some awful things. The far end of the room here is awful, but it’s nothing compared to what it was like just after. Some of the things I saw – whatever happened to these people wasn’t good. Really not good” “I’m sorry,” said Lumi, her voice small. Yuon nodded, staring off into space before looking back at her. “Your turn, then. Why and how are you working for these people? I’ve heard scraps of their language, and it’s strange, but I think I’ve read something like it. It’s like an old dialect of what they speak in the Lefan Archipelago. It’s bizarre.” Lumi stifled a laugh. “It’s something like that. How well can you walk? I’ll explain everything, I promise. I just want to get everyone together.” “Everyone?” “Everyone. You, me, Girrin, Aurin, Ford. Malbry.” “Malbry,” said Yuon, mock grimacing. “I don’t know if I need that much male vigour in my life again so soon.” “You’re just going to have to make do. Also,” added Lumi, beginning to turn away from Yuon, “Someone else. She’s the leader of this situation, as far as I can tell. For the past while, she and I have been exchanging language notes so we can communicate.” Yuon shrugged. “I’m not about to complain.”

Once they had all gathered , with smiles and hugs and confused looks, Olifiela directed them to a quiet room ten minutes’ walk from the main dome of the government house. On the way, they ed through a part of the age that seemed, confusingly, new. Where the rest of the building was made of mortared stone that in some places had been twisted by magic, this section was rough and looked like it’d been hastily cobbled together. “The building we were last in was unattached to this one,” said Olifiela, curtly. “I had a few of our mages extend a tunnel to keep out the cold.” Lumi quickly translated Olifiela’s pidgin to her friends. “Quite some magic,” said Aurin, who had one of his arms firmly around Lumi’s shoulders. He was being protective again, in a move that surprised Lumi in no way whatsoever. In front of them, Olifiela led the group, with her two most trustworthy Lefan guards, and was trailed the closest by Yuon. It was as if losing one eye had made the other somehow even more curious, and as he peered around, Lumi could almost see the questions he wanted to ask steaming off his head. Behind Yuon was Ford, silent and droopy like a flower that hadn’t been seeing enough sun. Despite all that he’d been through, he was still alive. He looked disappointed. Behind him, dealing with the shortest legs, was Girrin, avoiding both Lumi and Malbry, who were orbiting her at a distance. “What the hell is going on?” whispered Aurin, still wearing a good-natured look, into his sister’s ear. She smiled uncomfortably. Olifiela had given her friends hot baths and clean clothes, but their clothes were plain and she was clearly in a uniform. “We can get to the room and then I’ll explain everything,” she said. “That’s what you’ve been saying for the last hour. Surely it doesn’t require as much ceremony as this.” “It’s not ceremony,” snapped Lumi. “You’re just going to want to be sitting down for it.” “These are statues of Lefan gods,” said Yuon, as he entered the room, a small

sort of study with shelves full of books and scrolls and. On the west side of the room there was a green mark which upon closer inspection was not a stain, but a vein of emerald that had magically transmogrified itself into the wall and one of the chairs. The group avoided it. “You’re right,” said Lumi, clearing her throat. She waited until everyone had been seated. “They have statues of Lefan gods and speak Lefan because they are Lefan. The original Lefan. From before the Shock.” “Juksha shit,” said Malbry. “Pure juksha shit. You’ve brought us here – Yuon’s eye turned to stone – and after we’re caught by some group you tell us they’re what, time travellers? Either tox has melted your brain or you’re just playing us for fools.” Lumi let his statement hang in the air for a moment. No one else spoke. “They’re not time travellers,” she said. “They entered the Quodrine, somehow, before the Sudden Shock. I don’t really know how. And there they stayed in a kind of suspended state. Some buildings slipped through with them, like the one we’re in now. This is a small temple.” “Nearly a thousand and fifty years,” said Aurin, looking at Lumi with that look that meant he was trying to determine how truthful she was being. “How are they not all dead? Nothing can live that long. And how are they not all hideously deformed? Yuon’s eye turned to stone after only a few days.” “I’d appreciate it if you all wouldn’t use my condition as leverage for your own arguments,” said Yuon. He sounded tired, but a little excited. “But plenty of these people, the Lefan if that’s what they really are, are deformed. I spent some time in their nursery and there were people there so horribly transmuted I’d almost believe they’d been in magic for centuries.” “Almost,” said Girrin. She was giving Lumi a similar look to Aurin. Validating. Truth-seeking. “I guess we have to figure out why Lumi would be lying to us. As insane and impossible as this sounds, how would Lumi benefit from not telling us the truth? We’re alone down here, among them. We don’t speak the language, and I don’t know about all of you, but I don’t think I’m strong enough to make the journey north yet.” “She’s in league with them, obviously,” said Malbry, brow furrowed and gesticulating. “She has their uniform on and has been talking to that one.

Probably in bed with her, too. Her mind’s been taken over.” Girrin shot him a look. That one was, of course, Olifiela. “Magic can’t control minds,” said Lumi quietly. “I knew some Old Lefan from a poetry book. Jojeron Olifiela and I established a... rapport. To communicate. She knows some Nuarec words, and now I know some in her dialect of Lefan.” “So, she’s understood us this whole time?” said Malbry, through gritted teeth. Lumi shook her head. “Only scattered words. She’s not a threat to us. I told her that we were a group and she had us taken to a room where we could talk quietly, away from soldiers and crowds.” “What does it matter, if none of the others can understand our language?” said Malbry, again. He was deflating, just a little, but was still visibly angry. “It’s just privacy,” said Lumi, quietly, not entirely sure herself. There was silence for a few moments. The steam left Malbry, and he sat, staring forward. Girrin fell asleep in her chair, curled up like a small animal. Lumi wanted to hold her, but with a jolt of surprise, considered the fact that Olifiela might dislike that. For some reason, that mattered to her. “So, what now?” said Aurin, at length. “We travel to the bottom of the world. We nearly die. Yuon’s eye turns into –” “Please don’t,” interjected Yuon. “Sorry. We survive an ordeal, basically, but what now?” Lumi curled her mouth up. Of course she’d thought about it. Ever since she’d realised that, even with many of them being incapacitated or dead, they had an army, a military force, she might be able to get them to help achieve Cinura’s independence. She cleared her throat. “I’m going to try to get them to help us. With. You know,” she said quietly, trying to avoid Olifiela’s look. The imposing woman was standing in the corner, organising the temple’s scrolls. “That’s not going to work,” said Aurin, flatly. “They have no reason to. Their

few hundred misplaced people against what, the entirety of the Canalian force with guns?” “Not the entire Canalian force,” said Lumi. “Just the ones who are there when we arrive. We scare them away, fortify the city from attack, and declare independence. The Lefan can be the big stick we wave for the big players to take us seriously.” Aurin blew a burst of air from his mouth. “I don’t see it.” “And I don’t see what’s gotten into you, ne?” yelled Ford, standing up. His cheeks were red, and his eyes were furious. “You know what the Lefan have done? They killed my ancestors. Swept them into their empire before Canalas was anything more than some little houses around a lake. This is exactly what we’re against, Lumi. This is exactly what you are against. We came here, to the bottom of the eckfet world, to make independence. Independence for Cinura, maybe independence for the Falarics one day, too. And you side with an empire? Really? It’s hard to mourn for people a thousand years ago. That’s not what I mean. But siding with an empire to fight an empire? It’s idiocy. It’s flawed.” Lumi frowned. “Less than five hundred people hardly constitute an empire, Ford. It’s been a millennium.” “They could make a new one. That’s probably what she’s already planning, ne?” shouted Ford, pointing at Olifiela. The Jojeron stared coldly back. “These people blew up their city. Their women and children and animals. What’s going to stop them from blowing up Cinura, too? What about the Falarics? What if they’re in the blast zone too?” “Ford, calm down,” snapped Girrin, her voice stern. Lumi, swimming with unease as she was, was impressed by the strength of her tone. “No one has been sold out. All Lume has done is help us communicate better with the Lefan, who, might I add, saved us from freezing to death and turning to stone from harsh magic.” Ford looked at her, his face still bright red, and then shook his head, sitting down. “Privileged pale girl. You don’t know a damned eckfet thing.” “That’s enough,” growled Malbry. Girrin stood, and after placing a hand on Malbry’s shoulder in thanks, walked over to Lumi and wrapped her arms around

her. Lumi melted back into her and nearly burst into tears. The feeling of holding her again was like diving into a hot spring after Ollossian cold. “Hey, Lume,” whispered Girrin. “Hey, Gir. Are you doing okay?” “Well, I’m not freezing to death or standing in a limbo that may or may not be a pit of boiling lava, so I’d say I’m doing better.” They both laughed, and Lumi took the opportunity to snuggle into Girrin further. She nearly forgot everyone else in the room. “You’re going to get them to help us, aren’t you?” asked Girrin. “You can talk to them. At least get them to help us get home. I miss my bed. I miss my parents. I don’t know if I have it in me for a revolution anymore,” she said, quietly. “Without a revolution, I feel like we’ve come all the way here for nothing,” Lumi whispered back. “Gods, Lumi,” replied Girrin, shaking her head. “Can’t you just be relieved we’ve survived this long?” The meeting petered out. Olifiela’s two main guards led the rest of the group away. Lumi was alone with Olifiela, travelling in the opposite direction. Before she turned a corner, Lumi’s eyes locked with Girrin’s, and saw worry. “What’s this way?” asked Lumi, then added, “Jojeron.” “My chambers. We should talk,” she said. Her tone worried Lumi. At the same time, she felt a flush rising in her cheeks. “I never said that everyone in my party would be cooperative,” said Lumi, keeping her voice even. “The loud boy, Ford, is Falarese. He dislikes empires. His home has a history of Lefan occupation.” “Much of the Eine has that,” said Olifiela, turning a corner and taking a key from her pocket to open a door. “You see my skin? My ancestors come from Kaadiya, in Usun, in the Second Empire. The Lefan Empires didn’t cover the world, they were the world.”

She opened the door, and Lumi was met with the smell of incense and a hearth fire and the sight of a clean room. The incense was sharp, like eucalyptus or acacia, and the room held a red-sheeted bed, perfectly made, a desk covered in ink pots and messy papers, and shelves upon shelves of scrolls and beautiful, ornately patterned books. “This is your room,” Lumi breathed, touching one of the walls. It was thick grey stone. Near the bed was a deep-set double-glazed window through which the cold, white world outside could be seen. It was getting darker. “It is now,” said Olifiela, taking off her coat. “It used to belong to... the Nuarec word is something. Priest? Something. We have a problem with those gaining too much wealth. Had. Maybe not enough problem for them all to burn, but...” she trailed off. “Please, make yourself comfortable,” she said, and motioned to the bed. Lumi sat and fiddled with her thumbs. If what she thought might happen did happen, it could help her. It could help her, her friends, and her city. But gods, she was nervous. “Now,” said Olifiela, and upon looking up Lumi realised that she was in nothing but a sort of dark shift. Lumi caught her breath. Olifiela was beautiful. Despite a few of her ts hardening in the vortex of the Quodrine, she had the body of an athlete, powerful and dimpled, tall and poised, her skin pocked with scars and little marks. Lumi looked at her breasts without meaning to and then looked away, blushing. Olifiela smirked. “We can’t stay here,” she said. “Stay here?” asked Lumi, her voice small. “Stay here. Jeluli. What’s left of it. We’ll starve or die of the cold once the buildings collapse for good. We need to place ourselves somewhere we can establish ourselves. Farm, maybe. Trade with the rest of whatever world is out there now.” “Yes,” said Lumi, carefully. “That sounds reasonable.” “And I understand that you come from a troubled city in southern Tokarey,” continued Olifiela, shifting her posture, laying on the bed so that one of her breasts fell from her shift. Lumi swallowed the saliva that was building in her mouth.

“We could make an alliance. A deal,” she said. Lumi looked at her. She was being manipulated. Lumi nodded. She could manipulate back. “Yes. Our city, Cinura, was wrongfully taken from us,” said Lumi. “Once, two hundred years ago, just after it was formed, and then again, ninety years ago.” “Would your city not seek independence rather than a new rule?” Lumi nodded, her face hard. Then she spoke, choosing her words carefully. “Cinura is your best chance at establishing yourselves on the mainland. We’re defensible, and far enough from Canalas City that we’d have time to prepare if they were to launch an attack. But you need to let us maintain our independence. We’re not going to fight just to fit under a new yoke.” “What is Canalas?” asked Olifiela, lounging and avoiding the main content of Lumi’s statement. One of her slender hands touched Lumi’s knee. “Canalas. The biggest empire in the Eine, or at least they were. They rule Dubcloch, the biggest country in Tokarey and maybe Einea. A thousand states were conquered to make that country, and they’ve held onto them. They’re powerful. Frighteningly.” “Have they been known by any other names that I might recognise?” “Oh, well... possibly. Meir. The Meirese, they might have been called. A long time ago.” Olifiela’s eyes widened and something like a shocked grin spread across her face. The realisation struck Lumi a little late. “Oh, gods,” she said. “That’s how Jeluli was lost, wasn’t it? A war with Meir?” Olifiela nodded, still grinning, and shook her head. Then her face hardened. “I can’t give your independence. We’ll need a strong foundation to stand against our enemies, and being tied in the government of a foreign city will only weaken us.”

“Then I cannot help you,” said Lumi, between her teeth. “I cannot direct you. If you try to take the city by force, Canalas and Cinura will fight you. There are less than half a thousand of you. Without Cinura’s help, you will all die.” “And what of you?” asked Olifiela. “Without my help, you will die here.” “Then so be it,” said Lumi, keeping her eyes locked on Olifiela’s. “I came here expecting to die.” Suddenly, Olifiela took off her shift. Lumi’s nostrils flared, and she exhaled, and Olifiela motioned to the buttons of Lumi’s uniform. “Perhaps you’ve convinced me,” she said. “But perhaps I could have some encouragement. I haven’t had a beautiful girl in a thousand years. Apparently.” Lumi thought of Girrin, and her heart ached, but when she ed her with Malbry, it went hard. The warmth of the woman, her lips and tongue and body, was reassuring, but in a hollow, echoey way. She closed her eyes and tried to let herself enjoy it.

Chapter 28

“I f you listen closely , you can hear the lithophones starting. Soon you won’t be able to hear anything else, so appreciate that you can for now,” said Baalgali, splayed on Alrik’s bed. A bandage bound him tightly around the midsection. He seemed to be on the mend. He’d joked that his sword and bullet wounds were lovers. Cawl’s rapier was on the nightstand. “What are lithophones?” said Alrik, absentmindedly, sitting on a chair next to Baalgali. The Canalian chest-beating was starting in earnest now. From the barracks spread throughout the city’s outer edges, soldiers were marching out in formation. Alrik couldn’t see them yet, but he could hear them. Drums, a pounding bassy beat that echoed erratically amongst the buildings, and then something else more rhythmically complex. A thousand little buzzing hits of a dozen different pitches and rhythms. Together, they ed with the drums to give the effect of a hive of metal bees. “Lithophones. Stone mallet instruments. Sort of like a glockenspiel? If you’ve ever seen one of those. You hit a tuned rock with a hammer, and it makes a pitch. You get a thousand soldiers to do it, and it becomes a disorienting wall of noise. They use stones for the symbolism. Power and solidity, and all that.” “Strapping that to your back seems like a good way to develop a hunch,” said Alrik under his breath. Baalgali laughed, and Alrik grinned at the sound. The rock beaters came. Turning the corner from the main street, the procession was noisy now. Hearing it approach had been like hearing a lion in the brush, and having it in sight was like having its hot breath on Alrik’s face. There were the colours again. Many shops and houses had the white-grey-bluegold Dubcloch flag hung up above their doors or their windows, but the colours had never looked as strong or as foreboding as they did now. The foot soldiers donned grey and blue, half carrying muskets and the other half carrying lithophones. Among them were officers and other military men in gold and silver.

Alrik frowned. “Bloody loud,” he said. “I told you,” said Baalgali. He had to raise his voice to be heard. “What are they trying to prove with this?” shouted Alrik over the din. “‘We have a great big army and great big cocks that we’re going to waggle around.’” Baalgali laughed out loud and slowly sat up with a groan. “I’m not sure about their cocks, Alrik. I think you might have made that one up.” Alrik blushed. “It’s symbolism, Baal. I wasn’t actually talking about their penises.” “You sure?” asked Baalgali with mock innocence. “You never struck me as one for phallic metaphor.” “Shut up,” said Alrik, as the sound of the drums and stones became unbearable. Baalgali quietened. Then something far, far louder came from the procession. For a moment Alrik thought that there had been an earthquake. An earthquake nine days after an explosion – the bad fortune seemed cruel. Thankfully, and not so thankfully, he was wrong. Because the sound came again. It was two sounds in one, or at least that’s how his pounding ears interpreted it. A sort of high-pitched keening scream, and a deep, rumbling roar, like something made with a voice the size of a mansion. He heard windows shattering downstairs and Prudence screaming. They’d just replaced those. “What the fuck is that?” shouted Alrik. His head swam, but he had time to look out the study window, still thankfully intact. Amongst the procession was a device. It looked like a large wooden boat, but one that had been converted into a huge resonant chamber and made to be carried on wheels. On each side, like little children riding along on a cart, six or eight men drew a bow the size of a large oar across a string as thick as a man’s arm. “It’s some kind of stringed instrument,” said Alrik, agitated. He sat on the end of the bed. The bow was drawn across the immense string again, and he covered his ears. He began to cry.

Baalgali reached out and wrapped his arm around Alrik’s shoulder. This was the first time they’d touched since the Vattedi explosion, except when Alrik helped change his bandages. “Why are they torturing us? We didn’t do it,” said Alrik, through his tears. He wasn’t upset that there was a military parade. He just wanted the sound to stop. What could he do without the ability to focus? Without the ability to think? “Shh. Shh. It’s alright,” said Baalgali, pulling Alrik’s head gently into his chest and keeping it there until the procession ed.

Prudence was sitting imively in her armchair, wearing a grey dress, a newspaper on the armrest. Alrik had to avoid some nails still sticking from the floor from their recent fixing attempts as he approached. His fingers still ached from holding the hammer. “Hey, Prue,” he said. She stared dead ahead for a few seconds and then spoke. “Oh, yes. Hi, Alrik. The story’s on the second page.” “Thanks,” said Alrik, taking the newspaper, heart beating hard in his chest, and sitting down on Baalgali’s couch. It smelled a little of sweat, but it was a familiar kind of smell. With anxiety building in his heart, Alrik opened the second page. BLUE CITY RUNS RED: Order collapses in Cinura following copycat Elderate explosion. Alrik’s stomach fell to his feet, and he covered his mouth. His parents. His home. All the animals there. All the people. Prudence started to ask him if he was okay, but he waved her off and skim-read. An explosion like the Vattedi Fair attack a week later. All but one of the Elderate killed in the explosion, and riots and gang activity killing much of the police force. A group calling themselves the Nos Blau Eritiami claiming responsibility for the attacks had cordoned off part of the city to keep out the police. Canalas City would send a detachment within a month to quell the uprising. Alrik felt cold and numb. Then, he felt angry, and went looking for the only person he could find that might understand or that he could blame. He stormed into the study without a word, reached into the red satchel, and removed On the Learning and Performance of Magic. Lumi, he scrawled in the back. What the hell is going on? He wrote the words and then smacked the book a few times. He exhaled. Some rage left him, and he felt silly. Lumi was in Ollossos. They hadn’t spoken in weeks. She was possibly dead and at the very least far too busy to write back. That’s why he was surprised when she wrote back almost immediately. Alrik? Hello again. What do you mean?

Alrik focused on his breathing. Anxiety. Rage. Fear. His emotions were so strong that they felt like blood poisoning. Do you know what’s happening in Cinura? he wrote. Some more of the rage seeped out of him, and the empty feeling left behind ed the numbness and anxiety. He waited for another thirty seconds before a new message scrawled itself onto the page. Alrik, I’ve been hundreds of Kilometres away from Cinura for Months. How should I know what’s going on there? What are you not telling Me? Alrik’s anger towards Lumi dissipated, except for a low, back-of-the-throat burn. I wondered if it was something your People did, or your People planned, wrote Alrik. How can I know that if you don’t tell me what happened?! wrote Lumi. The words scrawled themselves quickly and messily. She was frustrated. Alrik swallowed saliva and scrawled down a dot point summary of the newspaper article. Lumi’s pen was quiet for a full minute. That’s horrible, she wrote at length. Yes. I’m sick with Worry. My Parents are still there, and I’m stuck here in Canalas City. How do You think I feel? I’m in the Eine’s frozen Armpit. Alrik sighed aloud and wrote slowly and carefully. I’m sorry for blaming You. I understand, replied Lumi, slower and more delicately. Those People, the Nos Blau Eritiami, are not my People. My People were always aiming for a diplomatic Solution. With some Gun-waggling, maybe, but bloodless. I suppose it’s too late for that now. There was a pause, like Lumi was searching for the right words. I’m going to come back to Cinura soon, with the Gun I intend to waggle.

Perhaps this can’t be bloodless anymore, but we can limit the Bloodshed as much as we can. My Parents are there, wrote Alrik. I don’t know what to do. Lumi’s next message came quickly, like it was the only logical conclusion. Come back, she wrote. I’m wanted for acts of Terror. That’s why I ran away in the first place. Alrik’s writing became messy again as he got exasperated. If the Elderate is gone and the Police are trapped, who’s going to be there to arrest you? If you’re worried about your Parents, go to them. Nothing is stopping You now. You have a Month until that Canalian Detachment arrives, after all. Alrik’s heart was in his mouth. The plan that he’d been forming turned from a pipe dream to a possibility in one aching moment. Could he leave his new friends and what he’d made in Canalas City? The answer, he found, was yes. One month. Maybe a little more, maybe a little less. One month to get back to Cinura and protect his parents. I suppose I’ll be meeting you, then, replied Alrik. Then he closed the book and rubbed his temples. He reached into the satchel the doctor had given him, cracked and flaking, took out a fleck of biwid, and began to practice.

“Y ou’re going back to Cinura? You know, if you want to commit suicide, I can think of cleaner and easier ways,” said Prudence. She was knitting something yellow. “I’m not committing suicide,” said Alrik. His voice was shaking in his effort to keep it steady. “I’m going to keep my parents safe.” “Are you going to keep your parents safe? Or are you just going to put yourself and maybe them into more danger? You’re a wanted man,” said Baalgali. “That doesn’t mean anything when the government’s collapsed,” said Alrik, straightening. “What about the Canalian military, then? There’ll be a detachment within the month. You saw how many men and guns they have,” said Prudence. Her voice was hard, almost condescending, and it irritated Alrik. “I’m one man. I can move faster than them, and I can slip by unnoticed. Rather...” he trailed off. “I can slip by unnoticed soon after I leave. I have a plan. It’ll give me an advantage in getting to Cinura. I could get my parents out, maybe, with the headway this would give.” Alrik told them his plan, as clearly as possible. Both Baalgali and Prudence balked at him. Alrik looked at Baalgali. In the eyes, for five seconds, until the eye gave him the shakes, and he had to look down. “I could do with your help, if you’d be willing to lend it.” That night, Alrik lay awake, partly because his bed was miniscule, and when shared with Baalgali he had to perch on it like a ledge. Partly because his mind was ablaze with activity. First, he would string out an idea, like the ligaments of a hunted animal, and follow it through. The first dozen, the first two dozen ideas, ended with him dead or captured. He had some time. He could take a week. But he could also go tomorrow. He disliked that freedom. It made him feel like no matter what, he’d either be underprepared or too late.

He looked over at Baalgali, who was fast asleep with a hand over his bandaged wound. He wouldn’t be able to come. Only one could go. Even if Baalgali was the weight of a feather, he’d be too injured to travel. Alrik’s feelings had been sitting in his gut more easily, as of late. Most dreams he had were hauntings from the rapier-wielding man he’d murdered, and his subconscious had less time to focus on the tumult in his heart.

Chapter 29

Isuppose I’ll be meeting you then. Lumi, wrapped up in a bedsheet, closed the book. Her sheet was soft, silk or something like it, and dark red. She was truly warm and comfortable for the first time in months. Olifiela was asleep, her wiry body coiled like a snake ready to strike. She stirred often. Lumi doubted she ever slept deeply. Alrik, she thought. Have I condemned him? She didn’t think so, but the possibility was there. The boy’s smart. He’s survived this far, through what? Pirates, policemen, and murderers? He should be fine. Should be. She breathed deeply and pored over their messages. His writing was haphazard. He was stressed, maybe injured. Her stomach twisted. Keep yourself safe, she wrote, finally, and then hearing Olifiela stir, opened to an earlier page about the most practical uses of fenworking. Why didn’t she want Olifiela to know what the book could do? She wasn’t sure. She quietened her breathing, and then became genuinely engrossed in what she read, to the point that she jumped when Olifiela touched her shoulder. “Kesse, Lumi,” she said. Her touch was soft. Lumi felt the shape of it in pleasant bruises on her hips. Olifiela sat up, uncaring as her breasts fell past the sheet and into the warm air. That same nauseating mixture of desire, fear, and anxiety washed over Lumi anew. “Hello, Jojeron,” said Lumi, quietly. She kept her sheet tight around her. “Please call me Olifiela. Oli, if you’re lazy. I think if we’re in bed together we can avoid political niceties.” Lumi awkwardly nodded and smiled. Olifiela smiled back, looked at On the Learning and Performance of Magic, and

took it from Lumi’s hands. “Hey!” shouted Lumi. “That’s mine!” “I can see that,” said Olifiela, peering down at the book. Through everything else she was feeling, Lumi saw Oli’s eyes strain and wondered why she didn’t use eyeglasses. Then she felt silly. “Then why did you take it?” whined Lumi. She felt weak, and worst of all, she wasn’t sure if it was a necessary feeling or not. Did she have to get walked all over by the Lefan general to set her people free? Or was Olifiela just going to drag her across hot coals for fun until she was done with her? Her thighs ached, too. It hurt, but it was a good ache. That was a problem, too. Her feelings were mixed fear, apprehension, and genuine attraction. “I took it because I saw it poking a knife hole into the Quodrine,” Olifiela said, turning the book over, and then handing it back to Lumi. Lumi relaxed slightly. “It is a strange book. I don’t know exactly how it does what it does.” “What does it do?” asked Olifiela. She looked powerful, Lumi thought. Statuelike, like she could have ordered an army from her bed. “I think there are two copies,” relented Lumi, after a minute. “And writing in one marks both, even over distance. Through the book, I have made a friend. Another of my people, a man named Alrik.” There was a spark in Olifiela’s eye. “Fascinating. I wonder what it’s made of. May I have the book again?” she asked. So, she’s asking now, thought Lumi, but handed the book over. Olifiela flicked through the pages and then, suddenly, stood. Still naked, she took the book and held it up at her chest level. She took Lumi’s pen, squatted, and made a small mark on the floor in the book’s shadow. Then she dropped the book. “I suspected as much,” she said. The book had landed off the mark, about a

hand’s length to the side. Lumi’s brow furrowed in confusion. “The book... flew?” She felt stupid as soon as she said it. Olifiela shook her head. “It tried to return home. It fell northwards,” she said, visibly fascinated, and picked up the book again. “This seems like normal paper, so it was pressed from wood, yes? Then, somewhere north of here – though, really, the whole world is north of here – there is a tree, or a forest from which wood was taken. This tree or forest must contain immense magical power. Do you know of such a forest or tree? It might be a legend, or hearsay.” Lumi shook her head and looked at the book. “But... why? A doctor gave it to me. He was teaching me magic in secret, so I assumed he’d given it to me simply to help me learn. He wrote it himself.” “Dr. Ibo Melalhir,” said Olifiela, still standing in the middle of the room naked. “Yes. Why go to the trouble of instructing me with a book made of such a material? Imagine how expensive it must be,” she said, looking upon the book with fresh eyes. “Is this Alrik a sorcerer or magicworker of any kind?” asked Olifiela. “No,” said Lumi. “Then perhaps Melalhir was trying to get rid of these books. You were learning magic in secret, so I assume magic was restricted. You and Alrik were both leaving the country, likely never to return, so why not leave the dangerous book with you?” Lumi frowned. “Dr. Melalhir wouldn’t do that to me,” she said. “Just pawn off a book with me assuming I was to die.” Her voice sounded small again. “Perhaps. Perhaps not,” said Olifiela, coughing and handing back the book. “You should get ready, soon. I’m going to assemble my people in five hours and let them know what we’re doing-.” Then, there was a knock at the door, loud and hard. Lumi went back to sit on the bed, eyeing her clothes, now folded, at the other side of the room. Olifiela slipped on her shift and a gown and opened the door.

“Hello, I’d like to – I’d like to talk to Lumi,” came an anxious voice that cracked in the middle. It was Girrin. Lumi’s heart caught in her throat. “I’m sorry, Jojeron,” said a guard in Lefan. “She did not take no for an answer.” Lumi moved out of sight and threw on her clothes. In doing so, she bashed her foot against an end table and bit her lip to stop from crying out. “That’s no matter,” replied Olifiela. “She’ll be out in a moment.” She closed the door and turned back to Lumi, who was tying up her boots. “Your friend is outside,” said Olifiela. Her voice betrayed nothing, but her eyes were curious and searching. “I know,” said Lumi. Girrin looked clean, but frazzled. Her eyes lingered on the door as Lumi closed it behind her. Lumi smiled at her, and she smiled back, but it was forced. Lumi swallowed a teaspoonful of saliva before she attempted to talk. “I –” “You –” replied Girrin, and then they both laughed. There was pain in the laugh, but love, too. Like watching someone you love leave for a better place. “I’m sorry, Girrin. I –” began Lumi. “I’m not angry,” said Girrin, forcefully. Her voice was still sad, but she sounded genuine. She said again, “I’m not angry that you slept with her. I haven’t been comfortable sleeping with you for some time, and you’re a human. I’m not angry with you. I just...” she trailed off. “Come walk with me for a minute. I came to you because something happened, and I need help.” “What happened?” said Lumi, her voice soft. She realised, with an influx of blood to her heart, that Girrin was holding out her hand. She took it. “Ford ran away. I need you to get the general, captain, whatever she is, to get some men to help find him.” “Ran away? Where to? We’re in a wasteland.” “That’s what I’m worried about, Lume,” said Girrin, squeezing her hand. “He

doesn’t want to be here. To him, we’ve gone all this way claiming to be antiimperial and then ed with the remnants of an empire. He can’t justify that, and he’s cracked.” Lumi thought about that for a moment. “Do you agree with him?” she asked. “No,” said Girrin, but it was a knee jerk reaction. She swallowed. “No, I don’t think so. But that’s what I was saying before. I don’t care who you sleep with if they’re... if they’re good, you know? I want you to be safe. But that general? I question her intentions. Lovers, friends, whatever we are, I worry about you getting into bed with someone who has the capacity for violence.” Lumi’s eyes drifted to the floor, and her heart panged. They stopped walking, conscious of wandering too far from Olifiela’s room. It felt like being tied to a post. “I understand,” she said, pushing back tears. “I don’t know if I want to pursue a sexual relationship with her or not. I mean, she’s not bad per se –” “I don’t need to hear about that,” said Girrin. Lumi winced and nodded. “– But I want you, Aurin, Malbry and Yuon all back home safe, and I want Cinura safe, too. These Lefaneie are our best hope of achieving that now. We’d never survive the trip back to our ship on our own. The Duchess is probably a garden for fishes now.” “So, is you getting into bed with the general just you trying to ingratiate yourself with a group of killers to protect your people?” said Girrin. “You don’t even know if she’s killed anyone,” began Lumi. “Do you? That woman could have the blood of a thousand men, women, and children on her hands. She disappeared during one of the bloodiest wars ever. And you’re going to sleep with her for security? You don’t owe her that.” “It’s not like that,” said Lumi. “Isn’t it?” Girrin prodded. Lumi snapped. “It’s not, alright? Will you shut up, now? I’ll go get Olifiela to get some men and find Ford. I’ll come too. You do whatever you want.”

“You’re only being a bitch because you know I’m right,” said Girrin, softly, and let go of Lumi’s hand.

“I forgot how much I didn’t miss being so cold I forgot what warmth was,” said Yuon. He’d insisted on coming with Lumi, Girrin, Malbry and the three Lefan trackers. Lumi had been told that Aurin was somewhere ‘making repairs,’ though what that entailed was unclear. “Well, it’ll be a memory soon,” said Lumi. “You what Alrik said. Cinura’s gone to hell and Canalas is coming soon.” There was quiet for a moment. “You’ve gotten a real attitude ever since your eye turned into a pebble, haven’t you, Yuon?” said Malbry. “I wish I’d had it when you’d played guitar those weeks back so I could have told you to stop,” he replied. Girrin laughed. It was nervous. It was perhaps ten-thirty in the morning, but the sky was dark as if it were dusk or dawn. “Where would he have gone?” called out Lumi. She was lagging to evaluate what the trackers were doing more wholly. “He could have jumped into a crevasse, for all we know,” said Malbry, mildly. “He was manic. Didn’t want to be involved with this. I don’t really blame him, you know. Do you know what Canalas did to the Falaric Islands? What the Lefan did?” “Do you?” replied Lumi. “It’s been a thousand fucking years.” “A little,” said Malbry, put out. “But it was terrible. I know that much.” They trudged for another half hour. The cold, Lumi’s constant companion for so much time, was like an estranged friend who’d come over for lunch and now refused to leave. In the distance, Lumi saw some buildings and thought to see if Ford had run off to hide in another ruin, when Lumi heard a cry. “Ford! Ford?” shouted Girrin, her shrill voice echoing around the ice. There was silence, or something close, for a few moments. Then the cry came again. Male. It wasn’t saying any words yet, but upon closer listening, Lumi heard:

“Eckfet!” “Ford!” shouted Lumi and tried to run towards the sound. She tried, but the ice distorted it and warped it. Ford’s pained swearing seemed to be coming from multiple directions at once, and Lumi stamped her foot on the ice with a crack in frustration as she came to a stop. “Ford!” she shouted again. “Come out! We want to help you!” “Lumi?” came Ford’s voice. Lumi started off again, the trackers jogging to keep up, with her friends trailing behind her. “Is that you, Lumi? You were my capitan, Lumi. I trusted you with my life. And you’ve put me in bloody hands again.” “I’m sorry,” cried Lumi, stumbling forward. “I just want my people to be safe. That includes you, Ford. Cinura and the Falarics are brothers and sisters. I never meant for you to feel like this.” “You should have thought!” cried Ford, and Lumi realised that she was practically on top of him. There he was, huddled in a little wind-worn dip in the ice and snow, his ankle twisted. He looked small, cold, and angry. “I came with you to Ollossos because I thought I’d either help destroy the work of tyrants, or I’d die,” he said, through chattering teeth. The rest of the party was still some distance away. “I never want to see my city, my island, how it was. Now, you ask me to side with tyrants. So, you know what I will do? I will take the second option. I will die here. I will die here and escape the empty shell my islands have become and the immoral woman you have become.” Lumi swallowed her shock. “I can’t let you die here, lombrar,” she, through tears that froze on her face. Ford spat on the ground, his spit freezing just as quickly. “Don’t use my language if you don’t care about my country. You’re a fool, Lumi. I thought that you were clever. A very clever girl. But you’re a fool.” “You don’t know how this will go, Ford,” pleaded Lumi. “This isn’t going to be a Lefan conquest. It doesn’t have to be. Our rebellion will start ripples. Maybe

one of those will lead to the Falarics going free, too. Shrug off the weight of Canalas. You can’t do anything if you die here from exposure and a broken ankle.” Ford was silent for a moment, save for his shivering. “Please come back,” said Yuon, appearing beside Lumi, looking down at Ford and towering over them both. “As someone who shares half of your blood, please take heed of my words. These people saved me. These Lefaneie saved me.” He paused. “Do you know what it looked like in the crevasse, Ford? Blue. Bright blue. The light from above caught inside it like I was on the inside of a great split jewel. I thought I was going to die seeing that, but I didn’t, and that’s left me alive to do the things I want to do, the things I believe in. Lumi isn’t as worldly as she thinks she is,” said Yuon, and Lumi had to stop herself from protesting. “But she’s right,” continued Yuon. “This Lefan ‘army’ is less than half a thousand men. Enough to spark unrest, help wrench Cinura from Canalian rule? Perhaps. Enough to subjugate and destroy like a real empire would? No. The Lefan Empire died a thousand years ago. This is just a remnant. And the best way to help your home, my father’s home, is to ally with them.” Lumi stayed quiet, humbled. Ford was crying, shivering harder, until he motioned with his arms, ‘up.’ Malbry and one of the Lefan trackers took him around the shoulders and helped him, bones creaking, onto his working leg. “I still think you’re a bit foolish, lombsia,” he said to Lumi, giving her a wry smile. “But I lost control of my sorrow and acted foolish.” Lumi smiled at him and touched his shoulder. “I suppose we’ll have to settle on both being a little foolish, then,” she said to him. One of the Lefan trackers stepped to her, in a sudden move that almost made her jump, and whispered to her in Lefaneie. “We must hurry. The assembly is happening shortly.” “Yes, thank you,” said Lumi. “Come on, everyone. Io, aloss! Fast as we can ing for Ford’s ankle, we’re to meet in the central dome of the Government House. Jojeron Olifiela is to give a speech concerning affairs.” The unoccupied trackers and Yuon nodded, while Malbry and the other Lefan were too focused on carrying Ford to do much more than grunt. Girrin sighed, and Ford remained imive and silent.

The Government House, the first building that Lumi and her party had seen or been in since the Quodrine’s wound had closed, looked less impressive from the outside. Olifiela had told her that at least twenty partly complete buildings had been regurgitated by the closing wound, but the Government House was among the most defensible –‘defensible’ from the Meirese, in a war lost a thousand years prior – and had been the closest when the wound had spat them out. “Watch your step,” said Lumi, taking Girrin’s hand and helping her up the incline of a layer of the spiral. The spiral was still there – that much ice and rock wouldn’t move instantaneously – but it had softened, somehow, like the energy seeping from the wound had been keeping it rigid and steep. The edges were easy enough to climb carrying a crippled Ford, and the flat spaces in between the indents were large enough for buildings to cling on. Lumi’s legs burned, though. She’d been too sedentary for this past week and a half, and she had a long journey and possible fight ahead of her. “Kesse, om lur Lumi Elemar, nieraun tü Jojeron Olifiela,” said Lumi, to the two pike-wielding guards at the main entrance to the House, a tall wooden door. Where did they get their wood from in a place like this? Lumi thought, as the guards nodded and allowed them through, the two Lefaneie and Malbry first carrying Ford. Lumi came in last, and the wave of heat felt like an embrace. Less comforting, perhaps, was the raucous sound of hundreds of voices coming from up the hall, and the increasing smell of many bodies in a relatively enclosed space. Lumi squeezed to the front of the congregation and into the House’s main dome atrium. There, every single Lefaneie soldier that wasn’t dead or too sick to move was assembled. They were all varied, some looking Huzunite while others looked Inivanese and Canalian and Kandrii and a thousand other things in between. I suppose that’s what happens when you conquer most of the known world, Lumi thought. Then, not that the actual countries they come from still exist. In the centre of the room, on a podium with a lectern that had developed a streak of scarlet gemstone in its centre, stood Olifiela. She wore a robe, white as the snow outside, and had her hair delicately arranged in curls and ties, in a way that ultimately made her look more like a regal bird than a military general.

“Malbry, Gir, Ford, Yuon,” said Lumi over the din. Olifiela had not spoken yet and appeared to be looking at notes. Lumi motioned to her friends. “Come here. She’ll be speaking in Lefaneie, so I’ll do my best to translate for you.” She tapped one of the Lefan soldiers carrying Ford by the shoulder and tried to ask for a chair for him. She didn’t know the word for chair, so she said, ‘sit table?’ The Lefan man laughed, nodded, and in a few moments had fetched a chair for Ford, his ankle freshly dressed and wrapped. He still looked displeased. “So, when’s this woman going to start –” “Good day, people of the Lefaneie,” boomed Olifiela, cutting Ford off with her magically enhanced voice. Lumi translated loudly enough for her friends to hear. That sentence was simple. “And our new friends,” the general added, waving an arm towards Lumi’s group. The words caught in Lumi’s mouth for a moment. It was hard to translate in such a loud, crowded place. She smiled, waved as if she was some stuffy queen in a parade, and then spoke to her group when most of the Lefan eyes had left her. Some of them were so young. She wasn’t sure if the word Olifiela had used was friend, accomplice, or ally, but she chose friend. “I’m sure in the recent weeks since our emergence from the wound, you have all been informed of what has happened. That our city is gone, along with everyone in it, blasted away by our allies. The world has turned a millennium and near half a century more while we have remained in stasis. We have blinked, and in that blink the world has become something entirely unlike what we knew.” This was more complex, so Lumi had to concentrate and substitute as she translated. Olifiela sounded sad, Lumi thought. Mourning. One would be, thought Lumi. To wake up and know everyone you ever knew beyond a select group of people were long dead. “However,” continued Olifiela. “There is yet hope. As we walked out of the wound, there were others that walked towards it. Our allies came seeking to gain an advantage in an battle of their own. I have spoken to their leader,” she said, and Lumi frowned, translating as ‘I have spoken to one of them,’ “And together we have broken down the barrier of language, at least a little. They are not savages, and they come from a fertile land to the north. I, as your Jojeron,

have confided with my councillors, and we have agreed that we will help these people, these Cinures, in their battle, in exchange for sharing their land and helping us establish a base on the mainland.” There was an uproar. As soon as Olifiela said ‘help these people,’ the Lefaneie began to shout. Those who were holding spears banged them against the ground. Through the hubbub, Lumi caught something in the corner of her eye – Aurin, hands out, concentrating. Of course, she thought. If the Lefaneie might take the proposal hard at first, having a non-Lefan sonoranteer is a good decision. Lumi paused, looking at Olifiela. She thinks of everything, she thought. She didn’t know if she liked that or not. “So, what’s she said that’s got them so rowdy?” asked Malbry, snapping his fingers in Lumi’s face. She scowled at him and then repeated in a shortened form. Ford donned a deeper frown. “Fertile land,” he repeated simply. “Give her a –” ‘chance,’ is what Lumi would have said, if Olifiela’s voice hadn’t exploded fivefold as loud as before. “Quiet! Quiet yourselves. Do not be fools. We are few, now, and we are misplaced. The Third Lefan Empire is gone, and now that I know what became of it, I do not want to repeat its misgivings.” Her voice lowered to its original volume, and the crowd quietened again. “This is a new world. We need a foothold. The Cinure’s enemies are powerful, but they are unaware of us. Technologically, they have advanced more than us, but their magic is weaker. They do not know it as we do. I took every single one of you from a battle that levelled the jewel of our civilisation. Know now that I choose for your wellbeing again.” The crowd’s noise bubbled, but didn’t spill into shouts. Olifiela had regained control. She took a long, deep breath, roar-like in its amplification. This must have been a sign, because Aurin promptly quietened her. “The weapons that our enemies, and they are our enemies, are carrying, are called muskets. Guns. Firearms. I’m sure some of you saw travellers from the east with fireworks, in our own time. A gun is a firework in a tube, with all the beauty stripped away, built to kill. When the gun is fired, an explosion occurs, and a metal ball leaves the tube at terrific speed. These weapons are loud and

emit much smoke and a flash of fire like a lightning strike.” “She’s just describing what guns are like,” said Lumi, quietly. Malbry nodded. He looked wistful. “Going to be a hell of a shock when they hear one go off,” he said. “However,” continued Olifiela. “It takes minutes for a musketeer to ready his musket after an explosion. We, with our spears and bows, can overpower them in this refractory period. Another weakness is their loudness. Our archers can send an arrow through the air almost silently, while a musketeer can be heard for leagues after a single shot.” The crowd was murmuring, now. Lumi couldn’t tell if it was in excitement, agitation, or both. Olifiela spent the next few moments looking out into the crowd, as if she were scanning every single face, reading their worries and protests and fears. Then she spoke again. “Our best scouts have seen some of our ships in decent repair, out on the ice. Further exploration will lead to even more being found, wherein they will be mended to the best of our ability. My best mages and craftspeople – and you know who you are – will be at the helm of the restoration process. We number four-hundred and sixty-three. We need only two good ships to get that number to the mainland. I give us a month,” she said. Another ripple of unease spread through the crowd, but she raised her hands to silence it. “Does Cinura have a month before Canalas sends a detachment down to deal with the problem?” asked Ford, after Lumi had translated. Her stomach was twisted. Reassembling ancient, magically warped warships wasn’t going to be easy, even with five hundred brilliant mages. Did they have the time? Did they really? “Maybe,” she said. “Just.”

Chapter 30

Alrik and Baalgali were sleeping in the same bed, curled up like two small animals in a too-small den. Baalgali hadn’t kissed him since that day in the glen tower, but this was something. Maybe it was something good; maybe another kiss would make it too hard for Alrik to leave. He’d decided to wait, that he needed more time, but now that more time had ed, he only felt more anxious. He could wait another three weeks, couldn’t he? Arrive at the same time as Lumi. You can’t guarantee that your parents will remain safe for that long, he told himself, avoiding the obvious secondary thought that he couldn’t guarantee they weren’t already in danger or worse. And you can’t guarantee this plan won’t fall through. If it does, you’re on foot or juksha. And you’ll be down and out. You must leave. Tomorrow. Alrik had known that his plan would drive a wedge between him and Baalgali, but he hadn’t realised the kind of pain that it was going to cause. Baalgali stirred, and Alrik looked at him. The wound in his chest – the sword wound, not the bullet hole – had healed enough that he didn’t need a bandage, but a plaster, visible with his shirt riding up as it was, covered it. He’d been lucky to get the medical attention; after the explosion at the rear of Parliament House, the city had been in pandemonium. Theirs was not the only house or shop looted. Alrik could still picture the widening of Baalgali’s eyes as he saw a dead body, just a misshapen lump, lying in the street the day after the event. Half of Parliament House was a blackened, smoking husk, charcoal and burnt paper, but the damage had spread far beyond that initial event. All the newspapers wrote was that, by the grace of Mond, King Ebon and the Prime Minister had survived, and that famous athlete and royal darling Camishan Fthese had tragically died in the incident. The true body count was unknown. “Alrik,” hissed a whispered voice from the doorway. Alrik turned his head, half

expecting to see Ghii. Instead, Prudence stood in the crack of the door in her shift. Alrik rose, slipping away from Baalgali as best he could without waking him, and treaded out of the study, easing the door closed behind him. He moved to avoid some nails sticking from the floor. Prudence waited for him on the couch, curled up in apparent comfort but carrying with her the feeling of an impending interview. He sat on the couch next to her so she couldn’t look at him dead on. “You’re going soon. When?” Her voice was firm to the point of approaching cruelty, but not reaching it. Alrik had to remind himself that she wasn’t a threat, as she regarded him with strong, moonlit features. “I am. Tomorrow, I think.” “You think? Stop hedging, Al.” “I know. Tomorrow.” She nodded and then looked away. Alrik breathed in that moment her eyes left his. “I’m worried about you. You’re queer, sure. A strange man. But not a malicious kind of strange, I don’t think. I’ve grown to like you. And Baalgali...” She let that hang in the air. Alrik nodded, jaw tight. “Baalgali likes you, too. Differently than I do. Now, I don’t mean to tell you this now, when you’re so close to going, but if he’s been a little cold, a little distant, I wouldn’t chalk that up to his feelings. I’d tell you that it’s where he’s from. Two men in bed together? In Skander-Sareen? It’s not upheld by the Zhayry, so it’s not protected by legislation, so it’s not encouraged in society. It might be hard for him.” Alrik sat back and nodded. He’d thought Baalgali was just uninterested; that he’d grown tired of girls and chose Alrik for some variety. He nodded again. The pit in his stomach grew worse. “Are you telling Alrik about my dark secrets?” came a voice from the next room, gravelly with sleep. Baalgali stumbled in from the study, rubbing his eyes. He waved to Prudence, hesitated, and then sat, right next to Alrik, on the single

couch seat. Alrik blinked. “Not a secret that I’m fond of you. Not a secret that you seem a little fond of me, either,” said Baalgali. “That’s one part that makes it worse that you’re going. And like this. Say you get there, your plan goes to shit, and you’re shot full of holes? Or, slightly better scenario, your plan goes to shit, and you escape, but then you’re wanted by the biggest, most heavily armed city on the continent.” “It’s an all-or-nothing plan,” said Alrik, as if that was an explanation. “Are you an all-or-nothing person, Al?” asked Prudence. Alrik’s mouth curled up at the side and he slowly let his head sink onto Baalgali’s shoulder. “I don’t much know what kind of person I am, but people I care about, and people I want to try to help, are in danger. And this is my best way of getting to them before it gets worse.” The night sky started to show the first smoky signs of dawn, and Baalgali brewed them coffee, a Skandrian blend he had bought from a market and said was the only good coffee in the city. It tasted like cloves and cinnamon, with perhaps even a hint of pepper, but it felt good in Alrik’s body. Prudence sat, stately as a custodian, sipping her drink, lost in thought. “One thing I hope you’ve thought of, Alrik. What if this gets traced back to us? You and Baalgali have been seen together. You and I don’t spend much time together in public, but that’s down more to the fact that I don’t go out much in the daytime. Is the typewriter that you hired linked to this address?” Alrik’s blood went cold for a moment, but then he shook his head. “No. I took the typewriter from the Typists by hand.” “And your address on the papers we had made?” “Somewhere in Nunless Province,” Alrik said, sweating in relief. “Those can’t be traced back to you, either.” Baalgali cleared his throat, and Alrik turned to him. The young man’s brow was furrowed. “Could be traced back to me, though. What you’re wearing today when you go, you got that through me. We’ve been seen together in Park Meir and surrounds. I’m not officially living here, so they can’t trace my address, but...” he trailed off. Then he started to smile.

“What?” asked Prudence. That morning was loaded with melancholy and anxious anticipation. His smile seemed out of place. “Odsil Province,” said Baalgali. “I’ll go to Odsil Province. It’s hundreds of miles away, good to hide in, but still in Dubcloch. They have a branch of the University of Dubcloch there, and if they don’t have my exact course, I should be able to do something similar.” Alrik looked at him. Was he honestly happy about this? He seemed it. “You’re willing to do that for me?” he asked. Baalgali laughed. It was a little rueful, but mostly amused. “It’s not just for you. It’s better than Cinura, sure, but this city is too damn cold, and I’m happy for an excuse to run off into a desert again.”

Alrik awoke and immediately closed his eyes. His internal clock of dayrests and nightwakes was ruined. He was still in the armchair, and his body ached. He forced his eyes back open. Baalgali had moved to the long couch, and was sleeping soundly, a trail of dried saliva down the side of his mouth. Prudence was in her corner, stooped over a newspaper. Alrik stood and took inventory of his things, laid out on the floor against the wall – Baal and Prue had helped him with them last night. The sword of the man Alrik had killed and had stabbed Baalgali, covered in cloth. He’d given Baalgali the gun – Alrik had said it was to protect him as he went north, but truly, he just couldn’t fire it again. There was a good sturdy leather pack, a parting gift from Baalgali, which he opened to examine its contents. Dried food, a flask of water, sailor’s ropes, and a tin of sardines. An ancient tin knife. What few mezzevos Alrik had left to his name, On the Learning and Performance of Magic, and all six untouched toxaument vials; enough to get prison time for if he was caught. Alrik almost laughed at the thought. Next to the pack and the sword was the uniform, pale green and wrinkled, that Baalgali had procured for him. Alrik looked over to the young man lying on the couch and silently thanked him. He willed the tears to stop as he pulled the uniform on and they wet its front. It was like a robe, almost, but it cinched at the chest, waist and sleeves, presumably for ease of movement. “Hey, Al,” came a soft voice from the other end of the room. Prudence, with her newspaper. Alrik approached, and Prudence motioned him down, so he knelt before it. She tapped a word on the page – ‘synecdoche,’ from an article about changes in Kandriian sea trade policy. “Sin-neck-dosh?” she asked, trying to sound it out phonetically. If Nuarec had been a more sensible language, she would have been right. Alrik smiled and shook his head. “Sin-neck-dock-key.” Prudence crumpled her brow and shook her head. “It means when a part of something is used to represent all of it. If a Dubclochian and a Kandriian fenced, for instance, you might say that ‘Dubcloch won’ or ‘Kandrii won’ rather than referring to the individuals involved.”

Prudence looked at the word again, nodded, and then leaned forward and wrapped Alrik in her arms. Alrik froze, and then he relaxed. Prudence’s arms were warm and slender, but strong. A lock of her wavy hair tickled his ear. He twitched, and she laughed. They pulled back and looked at each other. “You might be the strongest man I know, Alrik. Your plan is foolhardy, but, by Myute, I think it might work.” She placed her hand on his shoulder. “Write to me. Small words, at first. Maybe big ones later.” Alrik smiled. The tears had started up again. “You don’t think we’ll ever see each other again?” Prudence looked into the distance, retracting her hand, and shrugged. “Dubcloch is changing. The world is changing. Maybe the forces you anger today won’t exist five years from now. I wouldn’t put it out of the question.” “You talk about revolution like it’d be a nice change of pace,” said Baalgali, from behind. He was standing, silhouetted by the sunrise, hands clasped behind his back. He looked nervous. Alrik hugged Prudence, instigating it himself this time, and she made a small, happy sound. Then he stood and turned to Baalgali. Something crackled, and Alrik looked down and saw that Baalgali was holding a note – a small, torn piece of paper. Baalgali extended the note, and Alrik took it, opening it. What he saw, he couldn’t parse for a moment – patterns, almost like the flow of fruits and flowers on a vine rendered in ink, covered the page. The left corner had a few crossed-out mistakes. Alrik blinked. This was Kandriian script – written from right to left, and top to bottom. These were words. “Thank –” began Alrik. Baalgali waved him off. “I know you can’t read it. Even if you could read a little, my handwriting isn’t the best. Translating it won’t work either – Nuarec doesn’t have a lot of the little subtleties of language Kandriian does. But it’s a poem, and it’s one I really like, so, I do plan to read it out to you... next time I see you.” Alrik paused. “Next time?” Baalgali nodded. “Next time. This is a promise as much as it is a piece of paper or a poem. It’s called The Night Will Fall and the Wind Will Cool, by a poet called Divavshesh Khe-Tan. Don’t you dare look for a translation before I see

you again.” He smiled. His eyes looked moist, but no tears fell. Alrik pocketed the note and then, taking a step forward, flung his arms around Baalgali. His third embrace of the day, and he wasn’t frightened. He wasn’t overwhelmed. He wished he could have held on longer. Baalgali kissed him on the head, and then Alrik craned his neck up and kissed him on the lips. Baalgali blushed and smiled. It wasn’t a long kiss, but it sent Alrik’s mind a-flutter. Alrik pulled away. “Goodbye, Prudence. I’ll write. And I’ll see you again, I swear. Perhaps you should pray for it. That might help.” She smiled. “Perhaps I will.” Alrik turned to Baalgali. His voiced cracked. “Goodbye, Baal. I won’t translate your poem. I’ll have to make a trip to see you in Odsil. It’ll be an adventure – though I, er, don’t know how I do in the hot.” Baalgali smiled again. It was hard to stand close to him now – like any more intimacy with him would make it impossible not to stay. Alrik gathered his things and walked down the stairs, the thump in his chest and the creaking of the boards the only sounds before his too-new, dear friends waved and shouted their goodbyes to him for what might be the last time.

It was a cool morning for summer, and Alrik’s breath fogged from his mouth like he was breathing smoke. His head was clear, though. By the gods he didn’t believe in, he needed it to be. He shrugged his shoulders to adjust the pack. The rapier was tied to his back with a cord from one of Prudence’s old dressing gowns. “One foot in front of the other. Think while you walk,” he whispered to himself. The cobblestones seemed particularly uneven today. He was only thirty paces from the Beericle. He could still turn around. No. As usual this early in the morning, the only people in Park Meir were labourers, those stumbling home after nights out in the city’s busier areas, and Crown Guards–four at the entrance of the Great Mondine Basilica, and over on the other side of the crystal-clear Lake Meir, ten before the Citadel. There had not been that many there before. Alrik tried to look purposeful; like he was on his way to work, like he was pretending to be. He caught a look inside the Basilica, its great dark wood doors open, and saw a few of the destitute and homeless sleeping among the pews. He was almost certain the doors were opened at night for that reason. Above them, he caught with his quick glance, an impression of a great vaulted dome ceiling, covered delicate filigreed murals of a starry sky, alive with purples, greens, and reds, and bright, burning stars. He nodded to a sleeping halzphy bird on the lake, its neck tucked into the white down of its back, and breathed in the smells of bird and thirn droppings, rotten freshwater plants, and coffee from a stall nearby. He walked faster. The fewer people awake and around when he did it, the better. The citadel grew larger in his vision, and he smelt sweat on his armpits and tasted it on his upper lip. A guard looked at him out of the corner of his eye but said nothing as Alrik strode past, playing at purposefulness, to the Arterial Canal, and the place where the Citadel wall had crumbled. He doubted he would have been let that way without his uniform. He twitched as the rubble of the glen crunched loudly underfoot, but he kept his

pace as he wandered into the space. Frost had collected on the needles of the pines, and where there had been puddles, there were now dangerously slick sheets. Alrik stepped carefully, following his mental plan of the area as much as his eyes, to the little far corner where he had seen a gap in the stones. He squatted down so that his eyes were level with the crack in the stone, and just as he had ed, it was enough for him to fit his hand through – just. Fingers splayed, he slid his hand into the space, and worked his arm. There was a small crunch, like a leaf underfoot, and a scrape like shovelling ice. Then nothing. The stone had not moved more than a millimetre, and there was still the one below it to contend with. Alrik had to do the less pleasant thing – one of many today. He reached into the outer pocket of his red satchel and took a vial of green-grey liquid. Pulling his hand from the stone gap, now dirtied, he did what Baalgali had shown him he should – he unscrewed the vial’s cap, where a teat ended with a tiny, sharp needle, and jabbed the thing into one of the veins of his arm. Alrik fell on his arse, gasping in pain. His pupils at once dilated so wide that he was blinded, and his throat contracted so he felt he was breathing through a reed. He feared for a moment that he might be allergic to the tincture, that he might suffocate or shit himself or be unable to move, but after twenty seconds and deep, slow breaths, it stopped. His heartbeat was like a war lithophone, but he could breathe, and his vision was mostly clear. Mostly, because at certain angles he could see what his altered consciousness was reaching at, what the toxaument had gifted him with: magic. Nausea and euphoria bubbled up his head and chest like a gas. Motion seemed both easier and harder to follow. When he moved his own hands, pushing himself back onto his knees, they left trails in his vision like fireworks. When he looked up, however, he felt that he could track each movement of each needle of the pine trees, each turn of an insect’s wings – he could predict them. Time and space and movement were, here, reaching through the Quodrine, simultaneously more meaningful and easier to ignore. He looked back at the stone. It looked like a landscape to him now –millions and millions of cells, of components, made up the stone. He could touch them, now, at a distance. He could wrap his hand – the hand in his mind – around them,

wider and stronger than his physical hands ever could be. He felt the stone, fully encomed in his mind, and yanked it. The stone moved maybe three inches and was stuck again, and Alrik groaned as if struck. Too much too fast, he thought to himself, feeling an echo of pain in his body like he had tried to lift the stone himself. Far too much, far too fast. Slowly, painfully slowly, he was able to work the stone from its place, where the young and old walls met. It scraped free, and thank Myute and Mond, the one above it fell after it, its mortar not enough to hold it where it was. Alrik, shaking, fell onto his hands and knees and crawled through the hole and stood, blinking, in the side court of the Citadel of Coelhartzphin. “Fucking hell,” he muttered. His head still spun, and he collected a wad of saliva in his mouth and spat at the ground, trying to clear his body. To get to the menagerie, he had to traverse a courtyard built against the wall of what he had known as the glen, a spot of manicured lawn, worked iron fence and painfully artificial flower arrangements where visitors to the zoo or the other facilities at the outskirts of the Citadel might rest their legs. Thankfully, nobody was around yet. Alrik left the resting place and cringed as he walked onto a great wide lawn and across a terrifically smooth concrete road, likely the main drag into the castle itself. He glanced to the left and saw a wrought-iron gate with nasty teeth, and a higher wall which rose to one of the immense, round towers of the castle. He snapped his eyes forward again, stepping into the cover of some trees shielding the zoological gardens from uninterested ers-by, and breathed in relief at the cover. The Crown Zoological Gardens, which Alrik had seen so many times from afar, were more breathtaking and even crueller than he could have imagined up close. The light from the morning sun was still too bright, and the iron words ‘Zoological Gardens’ left colourful trails when he looked at them, but he could walk steadily enough. Even if he could not, he had to.

Beyond the muffling cover of the trees, the zoo was a loud place. At its entrance were great cages filled with blue-winged frogbirds, some awake and others flitting and chittering like their red cousins that Alrik knew. In a too-small enclosure was a family of tiny sand-yellow foxes with enormous ears, and beyond that a group of wallabies dozing and chewing on a fenced-in section of lawn. Most of the noise came from birds–a bird the size of a chicken but with iridescent feathers and a great green tail protested, surrounded by more birds in colours so bright and shiny they looked painted. Alrik tore his eyes from the sights and walked on. There were no humans around. That was good. He stumbled a little as the tox made him misjudge his footing. The further into the zoo he went, the larger the animals got, and the sturdier their cages. To his left, a ruddy-furred hopper as tall as he was. To his right, a thirn even taller, with a wicked, curved claw on each of its feet. It twisted its feathered head, turned an eye on him, and made a sound like a deep drum playing far away. Alrik quickened his step. Sarensa was in the far south-east corner of the gardens – he had memorised it as such. He ed another thirn, somehow bigger than the last with claws each the length of Alrik’s chest, and a rhinoceros, and an elephant, and a prone shape the size of a carriage that might have been a wolf-crocodile. Alrik’s heart was beating out of his chest – excitement, fear, curiosity, and the magical drug in his blood drove him wild, and in his haste, he bumped into someone. Alrik looked up, apologising profusely, and met the eyes of the man standing before him. They were not alone together – two serious-looking men in fine clothes with bejewelled and gilded muskets stood behind him. The man was ageing, with a grey and white beard and little hair on his head, and winter robes the colour of blood. On his head he wore a circlet of some kind. Alrik blinked and bowed. “Your majesty, I am so sorry,” he said, dropping to his knees. King Ebon of Canalas City and the Dubclochian Empire looked down at him, the man’s eyes boring into his head. “That’s enough. You may stand. May I ask what it is you were in such a rush to do? Be honest with me, boy, and you won’t be punished.” Alrik’s vision swam, and his heart felt as if it was going to burst. This was too

much. This was far too much. “I-I need to feed the falar, your majesty,” he stammered. He could kill the king right now, he thought. He could unsheathe Cawl’s sword and slash the man’s throat. No, you couldn’t, he told himself. Even if your fingers weren’t too shaky, you couldn’t kill someone again. Not even someone whose death might bring some good. “The falar?” said the king. Alrik stood now, eye to eye with the king. The king’s eyes were a pale, watery green. His guards looked at each other in a way Alrik didn’t understand. Did they suspect him? “Yes, your majesty.” “But the falar has been fed already. Surely Head Keeper Afthas has informed you.” “Ah, yes, sir. He has. This is a new – a new suggestion. I offered it to Afthas, and he accepted it. The falar was looking a little thin, so I suggested rationing some funding towards the frogbird feed – Mond knows they’re not what our visitors come here for anyway – to make the falar look healthier. Plump – plump the chicken, so to speak.” Alrik smiled a deeply fake smile. His hands were clasped behind his back, white-knuckled, to hide their shaking. The king nodded, but looked perturbed. Distrustful. “Yes, well, I trust Afthas will liaise with the Master of Coffers to make the difference. On your way, zoo man.” Alrik nodded his thanks, gave a ‘your majesty,’ and ducked away. He felt the gaze of one of the guards upon him, but didn’t turn around. Fuck. Fuck, fuck, fuck. Alrik could still hear the footsteps of the king and his guards when he arrived at Sarensa’s cage. It really was far too small. She regarded him dubiously, her saillike left wing close enough for him to touch in the cramped space. “Hello,” whispered Alrik. Would she listen? Would she be able to comprehend what he was doing? This wouldn’t work if she outright refused to fly with him on her. He blinked hard and his vision swam. A little toxaument left. Good. The lock to Sarensa’s cage had been hard to see from his vantage point up in the

glen tower, but on one sunny morning with Baalgali, he’d managed to get a good look at it, and Baalgali had sketched it down. Then, Alrik had visited a locksmith, matched the sketch to a big, bulky thing called a Mannell Heavy Duty. Alrik had bought it with a tip of twenty percent, rushed home, and pulled the thing apart with a screwdriver. He now intimately knew every part, every millimetre of metal that made up the lock’s mechanism. Now, with the toxaument in his blood and the lock in his hand, he could put that knowledge to use. Click. The lock fell open, and Alrik felt a surge of pleasure. His hunch about cuts to the zoo’s budget had been correct. The gate to the enclosure didn’t come open at once, and Alrik hesitated with it. The moment it was open, he’d be outed. He had to set everything up beforehand. He shrugged the pack from his shoulders and squatted with it before him, retrieving a length of rope and the tin of sardines. He pulled the pack tight once more, and grabbing the pull-tab on the tin of sardines and opening the container in a motion that splashed his fingers with foul juice, swung open the door of the cage. Sarensa didn’t move. Alrik held one hand out with the tin of sardines, the other around the length of rope. The great beast turned one eye to him, and the pupil tightened. Then the great head snapped forward with great speed, and Alrik stumbled back, one of the sardines falling out onto the ground. This seemed to embolden Sarensa, for she took two steps each as long as a road was wide and leapt from the cage and directly above Alrik, so that her pale belly blocked the sun. He heard shouting in the distance, and the whoosh as the creature’s great head swept down and ate the dropped sardine. Alrik stumbled away, dropping the tin, shouldering the pack, and considered his next tack. The falar was incredibly tall – at her full height, walking on her wings and her back legs, she was nearly two storeys. But when she leant down to grab at the sardines, Alrik took his opportunity. He threw the rope around Sarensa’s midsection, her deep breathing chest, until the other end came back around, and fumbling, he grabbed it. He hastily tied the

rope together in a knot that he’d learned back on the Mulliver and groaning, hoisted himself onto the beast. She turned her head and made a low grumble that sounded as much like confusion as annoyance. A gunshot rang out, and Alrik’s blood froze – but it was a warning shot. Would they shoot one of the king’s prized animals? Alrik was banking heavily on no. “Protect the king!” came a voice as Alrik pulled himself solidly, for the first time, onto Sarensa’s heaving side. The gunshot had made her nervous, and she stumbled, legs unsure after so long cramped up. “Shoot the boy!” came a man. The king. The king had just ordered Alrik shot. He gritted his teeth, finally sitting upright, leaning against the natural curve of the creature’s back. He breathed in. What now? He’d ridden a juksha before, but not for many years. How did you get them to start? He dug his heels into Sarensa’s sides, and she whipped her head around, trying to shake him off, but didn’t take a step. Then, two more musket shots fired, one ball whizzing past Alrik’s head as he ducked, and Alrik felt Sarensa’s muscles tense in a way they hadn’t before. Alrik took a deep breath. The falar’s ascension was dramatic, clumsy, and graceful all at once. Using all her legs and wings, the creature sprung into the ear, so high as to clear the tallest cages, and with a great beat of her wings that knocked down two nearby guards, gained a grip on the air. Then she dropped, with a whump, to the ground. Alrik screamed. A guard raised a musket at him, so close, and then Sarensa launched again, gripped onto the air and held. Alrik’s stomach left him somewhere after the first leap and the first beat of the great wings, and he breathed in deep, vomited off her side, and then whooped. It had worked. He had escaped. The citadel grew smaller, the king and the guards becoming toy soldiers and then motes of dust, the citadel shrinking from a scale model to a toy itself, and then that was all swallowed up by the great map of Canalas City, the grey, yellow, red, and coffee brown surrounded by fields of yellow and green. He feared falling, but for the moment, he was ecstatic. He was far too high for any bullets to hit him now. For the first time since he’d been marked as a criminal, he was, in a way, truly safe.

PART FOUR - DECEIT

Interlude III - Dorus

Asevered piece of the Dorus is now flying several hundred metres in the air over a road south of Canalas City. Even the Dorus, with thousands of years of conscious experience to compare this to, recognises this as unusual. Branches get caught in strong winds and leaves and seeds fly on the slightest breeze, but this is different. This has intent. Cinura. The human is taking the Dorus down to the place of shouting and flames. No, this isn’t good. This is the first thing the Dorus has viewed as objectively un-good in thirty years, since its pieces were stolen in the first place by the human with the three-letter name. And what of the other pieces? The one at the bottom of the world is still being written on with that irritating ink, but is warm, protected, safe. There is an intent there, though, too. Men and women who should be dead building wooden ships that should have rotted to nothing. Cinura. Why Cinura? And then there’s the third piece, the outlier. The three-letter man had some severed pieces, loose pages, tucked around his high-up room. The Dorus can’t sense any movement from him anymore. If the Dorus can feel, it feels a sick pleasure. But, mixed with that, is a worry, and an anger. One of those loose pages has moved. And now there is ink on it, too. Deep in the heart of the city of Cinura, a missing piece of the Dorus is in danger once more. The Dorus decides. Its first decision in over three hundred years since a gardener attempted to prune it and it decided to break all his arms and legs. It begins to chase its missing pieces. Placing runners like grass, the Dorus grows. It is a slow process, compared to how fast humans move. It might take months. Maybe a year. The Dorus is patient. The Dorus’s runners leech life from the surrounding land to give it strength,

leaving a dark, dead swathe in its wake. A kangaroo’s heart stops, and it falls down dead as the root es underneath. Acacias wither and die. If the Dorus can think, and if it can sing, its mind may look like this: ‘Other plants may grow and die, but not I, not I, not I.’ A Deifurese man, strongly built with bronze skin and auburn hair, leans down and yanks at a little sapling that’s curiously sprouted on the outskirts of his farm. The Dorus sets his skin and clothes ablaze, and his screams echo through the countryside. If the Dorus feels, it feels angry, angry, angry, angry. Angry, angry, angry, angry.

Chapter 31

The ship was called an elikimalus, and Lumi was about ready to stop looking at it and get out of the cold. “She’s beautiful,” she said, teeth chattering. By her side was Olifiela, tired-eyed but beaming. The elikimalus, a sleek Lefan longship painted in peeling red with a shattered mast, was nearly seaworthy, two weeks after being picked from the rubble – a good five kilometres inland – and pieced together. The Jojeron said that the boat was named Lizadigo. “She?” asked Olifiela. This time, it was in Nuarec, but next time it might be in Lefaneie. She and Lumi’s shared pidgin had grown increasingly complex over the last few weeks. It served them well enough. “Io, she,” said Lumi. She was shivering and wished that Olifiela would hold her. Rather, she wished that someone would hold her. “It’s what we call boats. Most do, in the modern world.” Olifiela looked back at the ship, wistful. “The modern world. I’m not sure what makes it a ‘she,’” she said, squinting, and then motioned for Lumi to move. Lumi nodded, jumping up and down and shaking herself to try to warm up. It was winter now. So much time has ed, she thought as she followed her general. So much time to go wrong. Two heating anfenieüle towers had been erected to fight the cold near the Government House dome where the bulk of the Lefaneie still stayed, but it was not enough to sustain everyone. Many people, including Girrin and Malbry, had spread out to other settlements closer to the coast and the boats for the reconstruction project, and the land there was always pitch dark and freezing cold. Most nights, Lumi slept with the Jojeron in her rooms back by the Government

House. Some nights, she slept with the woman, and some nights, she enjoyed it. Olifiela was a hard woman, not well-versed in most pre or post-sex niceties, but she was caring in other ways. Sometimes she would make Lumi tea or soup and massage her aching back with fragrant oils. It was pleasant, but it felt shallow. Like the two of them were jumping in a puddle and pretending they were commanding an ocean. The two of them walked in silence. Walking was something Lumi had grown accustomed to in her journey south, and it remained her constant companion even after so much had changed. There were no juksha or carts or carriages, so everyone walked. Even the Jojeron. “I’d like to stop at one of the settlements, Oli,” said Lumi, after a time. The nickname was still tentative. “I have friends that I haven’t seen in some weeks. I wish to check on them.” Lumi thought she saw the Jojeron’s mouth tighten for a moment, but she nodded. “Io. As you will. I will accompany you. The kepetoti, ‘pillbugs’ could be out between here and your friends, for all we know.” Her voice was strained, odd, but Lumi was used to it. That’s how she got whenever Lumi mentioned her friends. It was like she was trying to push Lumi away from them through tone and nothing else. “I’ll be fine walking by myself, thank you,” said Lumi, smiling meekly. “I know the path, even in this light. If I get lost, I’ll take a tox lozenge and light my way. I’ll be safe.” Olifiela bristled. “You must not do that,” she said, her voice low and loud. “You are my ambassador. My key – our key, the key for all our people – to the new world. I cannot have you running off and freezing or getting killed. You will remain in my sight, and I will accompany you to see your friends. I will wait with you, and when your time with them has elapsed, I will accompany you back to our chambers.” Lumi took a deep breath and looked down at the ice. Cracked, but thick. Just a few feet below her was ice that hadn’t melted in a hundred thousand years. How much had changed in that time? “No. I’m going alone.”

“Do you not care about our collective fate, Lumi? Mine and yours and ours?” “I know you’re relying on me to be your ambassador in the new world, Jojeron. You want me around because I closed the wound, let you out, and you want to keep an eye on me. But I’d politely ask you to have faith. I have survived this long, and likely want to survive even more than you want me to survive.” “The risk is far too great,” said Olifiela, mostly in Lefaneie. Flustered. “If I judged the risk as too great, I would not take it. I’m not your subordinate, Oli. I’m your ally.” “We saved your lives. Does that not indebt you to us in some regard? Are you not grateful?” Lumi nodded. “It does. And I am grateful. We’ll take you to the only damned city that you’d be able to get a piece of, because it’s burning down as we speak. If you leave us here, you’ll all die. We will too, but so will you.” Lumi’s upper lip quivered. She maintained eye with Olifiela, who stood frozen in place as if the ice had taken her. Then Lumi pivoted and strode away. She was chilled to the bone by the time she reached Xemipu, the tiny settlement that about forty or fifty Lefaneie and Girrin and Malbry called home. Apparently, xemipu meant ‘red rose,’ though Lumi struggled to see its namesake in the frigid, wind blasted town. Before Jeluli had fallen, it had been ten kilometres from the city proper. Now it was less than four. Lumi walked up the gravelly slush that was the main street and saw the cluster of little buildings where Girrin lived. She’d helped her move there, on a bright day that had been marred by the silent understanding that Girrin was moving away so she wouldn’t have to see Lumi with Olifiela anymore. Lumi understood that, as much as it hurt not to see her. Sleeping with Olifiela was a calculated choice, and not entirely unpleasant. She understood Girrin, but also understood, believed, that what she was doing was for their safety. It was right.

Her legs tired as she reached the house, knocking three times. Its door was a magically transmuted half-iron-half-wood slab, emanating heat. It opened, and there was Malbry. Lumi smiled and threw her arms around him, nestling into him like a chick to a mother hen. He took two wobbly steps back and then returned the embrace. It lasted maybe five seconds, and Lumi pulled away. “Hey, arsehole. You treating Girrin well?” “I’d have appreciated a ‘how are you?’ or even an ‘I’ve missed you.’” “You can pretend that’s what I said if you want,” said Lumi, smiling. “Really, though. Thank you for looking after her. That’s all I really care about.” Malbry searched her expression and nodded. “I know.” He looked away and cleared his throat. “She’s out collecting ice, as is, with a few of the other men. Should be back soon.” Lumi could swear she heard jealousy his voice, but it could have just been concern. “You know how thin she is. How she’s not built for winter in bloody Ollossos. But you know she doesn’t take no for an answer.” “Gods, do I,” said Lumi, easing her sore body into a chair by the hearth. This one was still wood, mostly. She stared into the fire for maybe two minutes until the lights danced behind her eyes and muddled her mind further. “I had an argument with Olifiela. A bad one, I think.” Malbry looked at her side-on, brushing frost out of a fur cloak that had been left on a rack by the door. “A romantic argument?” he asked. “Or...” “Or,” said Lumi. “Or maybe a romantic one. I don’t know. I understand her position, and I understand that she has years of experience being a leader, but in the past weeks she’s begun to close a vice over me. Control where and when I can’t go, what I can and can’t do. I’m not one of her soldiers, and I actively resent being treated in such a way. I’ve been pushing back.” “Not one of her soldiers,” said Malbry, yanking a knot out of the fur with his brush. “Just one of her paramours. Maybe she’s so used to others bending to her will that it extends to the people she sleeps with, and not just the ones she fights with. People find it difficult to change when what they’re doing feels good. And ordering people around feels good. It’s a rush.” Lumi looked down at her mud-encrusted boots and sighed. They looked almost

pretty in the warm glow of the fire, but she’d have to track back to Olifiela in them before the night was done. “You have experience ordering people around?” she asked. “I thought you just liked being a prick,” said Lumi. The words weren’t said as an insult. Malbry shrugged. “I used to run the family business.” Lumi frowned, brushing some slush from her shoe. “You used to? What are you, twenty-three at most? How old were you when you worked, five?” The muscles in Malbry’s face tightened, and he yanked particularly hard on a tuft of fur. “My dad wasn’t exactly up to it anymore, so I took the helm. Kept it going. It fell through. That’s it.” Lumi raised her eyebrows and laughed. “Dad couldn’t handle it?” Malbry turned to her, then, and stood to his full height. He pointed his finger like a pistol. “Don’t you fucking dare, Lumi. Don’t you dare joke about things you don’t know about. My father was strong. My grandfather and great grandfather too. My whole family has been. Is. The reason...” he trailed off. Lumi could see his shoulders droop like a puppet with cut strings. She felt a wave of guilt. “My father was a big man. Broad. Strong,” said Malbry. Lumi could see the resemblance in him. “He works every day of his life until he turns the corner to the age of about thirty-five. Then he just turns off. Goes out, like a tox heater that’s run out of juice. He loses control of his muscles and forgets how to speak. I watched my father, the man I respected the most, regress into someone who couldn’t even say my name.” Malbry scowled. “I’m sorry,” began Lumi. “Yeah, fuck off with that,” said Malbry, his voice still shaking. “That’s why I know how to order people around. My grandfather was too old to work, and my father was too far gone to clean up his own shit, so I took the mantle of the family business. My mother couldn’t handle it – there’s a person who couldn’t handle it – and she left. Two years ago, my father ed away, and the year last, my grandfather did. The business went under. I’ve been living in the Tall Quarter ever since. Well, before...” he trailed off. “Before this.”

“You lived in the Tall Quarter?” asked Lumi. “I never saw you. I lived there too. With Aurin.” “Couldn’t have anyone knowing,” said Malbry, and then he went quiet in a way that told Lumi he wasn’t going to talk again. The pair of them sat in a silence that eventually mellowed into companionable for some time. Then there was a knock on the door. “Come in,” called Malbry. “I’m wearing clothes.” “A shame,” came a male, Lefan-accented voice from behind the door. It was opened by a stocky man in snow-caked Lefaneie gear, beaming from ear to ear. Malbry laughed and shook his head. “I’m afraid I only have eyes for women, Salemi.” Salemi nodded and held the door open. A few of the Lefaneie, mostly Olifiela’s elite, had begun to learn Nuarec. Two more Lefaneie strode through. A tall man and a broad-shouldered woman, and then, so covered in snow that she might have been made of it if not for her red hair, was Girrin. “Girrin!” Lumi shouted before her better judgement stilled her tongue. Girrin’s head snapped to her out of fear and surprise, eyes wide, and then her expression softened. “Hey. Nice of you to pop in.” Lumi smiled, and Girrin smiled back, and started to take off her outer coat. She rubbed her tired eyes. For a moment there was unsureness. Lumi was standing up, but Girrin hadn’t moved. Lumi didn’t want to be the first one to make a move. Perhaps Girrin didn’t either. Lumi stepped forward and Girrin had already run-stumbled into her, falling into her open arms. She was fatter than she had been, and stronger. It warmed Lumi’s heart. “Got a little more muscle on you,” said Lumi, and Girrin smiled up at her. The three Lefaneie men seemed to sense the tension and left the pair alone. “Is that good?” asked Girrin. She sounded tentative. Almost scared. Lumi’s heart panged. “Yes, of course. It means you’ll better face whatever’s out there. Whatever’s... up there.”

“Yeah,” said Girrin, touching Lumi’s arm and then looking at the floor and moving closer to the fire. There, she took off everything except her shift. Malbry, Salemi and the other men were unfazed. I suppose there’s not much room for modesty here, thought Lumi. She herself had been feeling more and more like a pampered cat by the day. All the walking wasn’t enough. The level of comfort in Olifiela’s home was seductive and dangerous. Lumi sat again. She was sedentary now, as she had been for a while. A trickle of sourness entered her mind. Under cover of a meagre towel, Girrin changed into more homely clothes, and Lumi averted her eyes. The sour trickle eventually gave in to a sort of comforting mist as Salemi and Malbry started cooking. Some starchy tubers, just like back home, but there was meat there, too. Pork and fragrant, peppery spices that for all Lumi knew might have died out in the time since the fall of Jeluli. The food, discovered frozen by a salvage team in a spatout section of Jeluli, was 1,000 years old, and as fresh as if it had been preserved days ago. Some of the Jojeron’s counsellors had debated its safety, and there was the distinct possibility that it was irradiated, but what more was there to do? The Lefaneie army couldn’t sail to Cinura on empty stomachs. Cutlery. Crockery. Chairs. What else had reappeared as the wound closed? Salemi handed Lumi a steaming wooden bowl of stew and she thanked him quietly in Lefaneie, tapping the side of the bowl in the respectful custom. He smiled at that, and Lumi smiled back. Though she was ravenous, before taking a spoon of soup, she took in a deep breath, stood, and moved to the seat next to Girrin. She saw Malbry follow her with his eyes, expression blank. “Hey, Gir,” Lumi said. Girrin was too busy eating to reply, but smiled. It seemed genuine. I thought you were supposed to know a person more as you spent more time with them, she thought. I feel as if I know Girrin less than I did when we met. Lumi tried a spoonful of their dinner. It was so hot that it hurt, but when the heat mellowed, she exhaled in satisfaction. She spent the next two minutes shovelling the stew into her mouth. Gods, I look like someone who grew up poor; she thought. It wasn’t enough to stop her.

“Hardly a royal eater, are you?” jabbed Girrin. She wiped her mouth with her arm. She was already done, her food somewhere between her throat and her hollow legs. “Even with your connections.” “Royal? I’m not royal in the slightest. The Lefaneie aren’t royal, they’re military. Their empress died with everyone else with the Shock. And I, erm...” she began, and then she trailed off. “But you what?” asked Girrin, shuffling her chair closer. One of its transmuted metal leg tips screeched on the ground. Being closer to Girrin was almost intoxicating. Lumi fought down her feelings. “I’m possibly not on the best with the Jojeron now. We were walking back from seeing one of the ships being assembled and I told her I would come see you and Malbry, and...” Lumi gathered the words. Girrin’s brow was furrowed. “And she decided that she was to come too, and to wait outside and walk me home upon my leaving. So,” said Lumi, “I told her, in Lefan and in different words, to fuck off. We’re associates, I am not her subordinate. So now she’s mad at me. I’m worried that’ll come back to bite me in the arse.” “I see,” said Girrin. Her hand moved to Lumi’s knee and Lumi felt the electric shock again. She focused on controlling her breathing. Gods, how did Girrin still affect her so much? It was almost easy to ignore her when they were apart, but when they were together, the feeling was palpable. Should she ask her to stop? “Maybe what I did was stupid,” said Lumi. “We need her, all the Lefan, on our side when we’re up north. We need them badly.” “They need us, too, Lume,” said Girrin. “They don’t know the world now. The houses they used to live in, their palaces and coliseums and whatnot, are ruins. I’m proud of you for standing up for yourself.” Girrin leaned forward, and Lumi realised with a start what she was attempting. Lumi leant forward too, and felt Girrin’s hand on her cheek for the first time in – gods, how long? Then, when their lips were an infinitesimal distance apart, so close Lumi could feel the warmth of Girrin’s skin, the door swung open. Girrin jumped back and toppled off her chair. Malbry was there to stop her from hitting the hard floor, but what was left of her stew splashed across the small room.

Lumi’s eyes locked on the woman standing in the doorway. “Why are you here, Jojeron?” she asked. Maybe Olifiela was trying to enforce her power, and maybe there was a better reason. Her chest was heaving, and her eyes were wide. Maybe something was wrong. “The Lizadigo,” Olifiela said, panting, pulling herself into the room by the doorframe. She kept the door open and saw the mess she’d caused but didn’t apologise for it. “Something is attacking it. I don’t know why, I don’t know exactly what, but a scout told me. He said I needed to come, and I thought to bring you, too.” Malbry frowned, looking up from cleaning to Olifiela and then to Lumi. “What’s she saying?” he said, not fully understanding the half-Lefan pidgin they were speaking. “Sounds worried.” “Something’s attacking one of the ships. She can’t say exactly what.” “The bugs? Surely a troupe of Lefan could get those.” “No, not woodlice,” said Lumi. She turned to Olifiela again, placing a hand on Girrin’s shoulder in some mix of pointed defiance at the general and genuine care for her friend. “What did it look like?” Olifiela shook her head. “Large. Terrifically large. Almost human, but not. Wrong. It moved far too quickly, like it wasn’t so much walking as slipping through the air. This is all I managed to gather from the scout. He was flustered.” Lumi’s blood went cold. Could it be the same creature? The one that had nearly sent Lumi to her death on the anchor chain? The one who had spoken to her in the night? She had to go. She grimaced. “I have to go, Girrin. I’ll see you soon. I promise.” She took Girrin’s head in her hands and kissed her on the lips, in open view of everyone, including the general. Girrin blushed, and Lumi grinned, half in fear. “Stay safe.” Back into the snow, back into the discomfort. Olifiela reached into a satchel and produced a great big swathe of white fabric that tumbled onto the snow. At the edges of the sheet, Lumi saw small metal rings, secured to the fabric with elaborate knots. Tied onto those rings were ropes, long and white, and these ropes were what Olifiela was currently tying on to herself. “Come here. I need to tie you to me,” she said. She seemed jittery.

Lumi’s stomach churned. What was she doing? Tying herself to Lumi just to do something stupid and drug-addled with them both? Nevertheless, she stepped forward. Olifiela, hands shaking, positioned Lumi so that her back was to Olifiela’s bosom, and then began to tie the two of them together. Little nooks and loops that Lumi hadn’t even noticed were in the Lefaneie uniform facilitated the process. “I haven’t shown you these yet because they’re unsafe, and I’d prefer for you to be safe,” said Olifiela, pulling a few knots tighter. “But this is desperate. I need you... to come with me. And we need to get there quickly.” “And how will –” this help? Lumi was about to say, before she felt the magic surge out of Olifiela and the sheet billowed with wind, lifting the pair of them into open space with a jolt. Lumi’s words, and her stomach, felt left on the ground. The pair climbed, Olifiela’s flying device whipping with the wind as they rose higher. Higher meant colder, and the wind stung Lumi’s cheeks like she was dragging them across jagged ice. Ollossos lay below them like a great grey oil painting, with all its dips and discolorations and shinings, Lumi thought, made by a painter that wasn’t having the happiest of days. With some pulling on strings, Olifiela steered them south, towards the Lizadigo. It was a bizarre feeling, being suspended in the air in this way, at the mercy of a woman she had recently argued with, freezing her arse off. It was bizarre also in that it was so exhilarating. Flight through magic. How extraordinary. Even more bizarre was the sight that awaited them at the Lefan ship. The ship itself, at this point half ship and half wooden skeleton, was being assailed by the creature that had haunted her dreams for months. From their vantage point it seemed both smaller and larger than it had from the ground – it was easily as tall as the slanting ship, though both seemed toy-sized from their height. “I’ve – I’ve seen that thing before,” Lumi said through cracked and frozen lips. The words carried themselves through to Olifiela through her body more than the thin air.

Olifiela called back. “Are you sure? You’ve seen a soioiei?” “A soioiei? ‘Wind person?’” Olifiela grunted. “Let me land.” Landing was more frightening to Lumi, but seemed to relieve Olifiela. The focus needed to alter air pressure and create wind was taxing. Lumi was impressed that Olifiela still had the strength to pull the ropes and guide them down. She has so much experience, Lumi thought, and suddenly felt small again. The creature prodding at the ship nearby didn’t help that feeling. The pair alighted on a nearby hill, next to a detachment of Lefaneie who were peering at the beast, though none had dared to follow it down. Lumi had to stop herself from asking if one of them had a telescope. Olifiela untied Lumi with violently shaking hands, nodded to her, and moved to the group. ‘What exactly is the creature doing?’ and ‘where exactly did it come from?’ were answered with ‘we don’t know’ and ‘it seemed to appear from nowhere.’ Then it moved again. In a shorter time than a human blink, the enormous creature travelled two hundred yards. It sounded less angry now, and more pained. More stressed. “Roz-Amenofriak,” swore one of the soldiers. “What are we to do, Jojeron?” he turned to Olifiela, who was spitting into the snow, ridding herself of whatever toxaument she’d taken. She wiped her mouth. “For now, we just observe,” she snapped in Lefaneie. Then she turned to Lumi. “A soioiei is a word we use for something caught in the Einic Layers,” she said in pidgin. “Anything can be caught – some chairs, buildings, ships, we’ve found, have been caught half in this world, half in another. Normally, it just irradiates them. With people, though...” she trailed off. “In the last days before Jeluli fell, happened, the city’s cleverest people experimented with slipping between the layers. Some could get caught, and would have to be retrieved. They would look

something like this. Magic realms aren’t designed for flesh, so people become warped. Too large, too small. Smeared. This one’s bigger than any spectre I ever saw –though I didn’t see many.” “Does it – do they – still think?” asked Lumi. “Is it still a person, I mean?” “I don’t know,” said Olifiela, wiping her nose on her sleeve. “It looks like it’s in pain,” said Lumi, her voice soft. “Or like it’s lost something.” Olifiela said nothing. The spectre moved quickly again and was at once at the skeletal half-built end of the ship. The Lefan group to Olifiela’s left tensed and cried out as the creature lifted one great fist and brought it down on the elikimalus. “No!” cried out the Jojeron. One of the soldiers ran forward, spear in hand, but Olifiela grabbed him by the collar and yanked him backwards. “Do you see what the spectre does to the ship, tolso? Think of what it could do to your body. Don’t be a gods-damned fool.” So, the group, including Lumi, stood and watched as the creature destroyed half of the ship. Then, when the skeletal half of the ship was smashed, it stopped and circled around, looking at what it had done. “Why did it do that? Come out all the way here just to destroy the ship.” “It didn’t,” said Olifiela. “Half of it is still there.” The creature peered down at the pieces, and made another low, grumbling call. Here, closer, the sound was less like a great beast, and more like the voice of a man, garbled like he was screaming underwater. The pieces of the broken ship began to move. They shuffled and banged together at first, as if in a sharp, localised wind, and then began to move individually. The spectre was fenworking. Lumi gaped. First, twisted man separated the debris into five piles, all roughly even size, with the care of a bird making its nest. Nobody was shouting anymore. The five piles shimmered with magic and then began to take shape into characters. The script, distorted in its fragmented assembly, was harsh and angular. What was going on inside the thing’s fragmented mind?

“That’s Old Script,” said Olifiela. Lumi looked at her quizzically. “It’s what Lefan was first written in, maybe a thousand – two thousand years – ago. The early Lefaneie adapted it from a script they learnt of in the land east of our archipelago.” “Well, what does it say?” asked Lumi. Olifiela breathed deeply. “I don’t know. I can’t read it. It’s ancient. How this creature could know about it I simply don’t –” There was another blink, and then the creature was gone. The air where it had been shimmered with heat and expended magic. The five ancient symbols sat starkly against the permafrost, half in the shadow of the half-built ship. Olifiela regarded them and exhaled. “Right. Toriele, I need writing materials and someone with a steady hand. I want those symbols to be copied exactly, and then for them to be salvaged. Make them into firewood, if that’s all they can be. We mustn’t waste anything.” Toriele, the quietest member of the Lefan group they’d landed beside, nodded, and started off. Olifiela ordered the rest to clean up, recoup, and search for a translator, and then turned to Lumi as they dispersed. “We’re going to have to learn to live with each other,” she said, curtly. She paused. “You were right. You are not my subject.” “I know,” said Lumi. “But you need me,” continued Olifiela. Lumi nodded, tight-lipped. And you need me too, wriggled into the air between them unsaid. “This may have delayed us, unfortunately, but I have some important things in mind for the meantime,” said Olifiela, her tone brightening. “What can you tell me about guns?”

Chapter 32

Alrik saw the Amber Cliffs through bleary eyes and began to weep. He’d been up in the air on Sarensa’s back for over a day, maybe thirty hours, and every one of his muscles ached. His lips were chapped, and his body was bruised from where it had rubbed against the beast’s body with the thump, thump, thump of her wings beating up and down. But, gods, he’d arrived at the Amber Cliffs. He closed his eyes to the thrum and did some murky calculations in his frazzled head. “That must be nearly nine hundred kilometres in just over a day,” he said in disbelief. “It’d have taken me the whole month to do it on juksha-back.” Though, travelling by solo juksha or carriage would have been easier. Too much of his day-long journey had relied on the integrity of Alrik’s knots, especially when pulling on either side of the creature’s torso to steer her, and as Alrik was far from an expert at tying good knots, there were scares. Performing the balancing act of urinating off the side of Sarensa had been such an ordeal, Alrik had almost given up and let himself piss his pants. Instead, he had rationed his water, and tried to meditate the way he’d seen Prudence doing, to distract from his discomfort. He wasn’t sure if it helped, but the effort of trying distracted him enough so that he nearly fell to his death when, in view of the Amber Cliffs, Sarensa dove. Alrik hadn’t felt more than the occasional up or down drift from Sarensa for the last thirty hours, so this dive made him feel as if the soul was being squeezed from his body. He grasped a tuft of Sarensa’s downy filaments, instantly guilty for it, but they came off in his hand. The enormous flying creature was still diving, and all Alrik was attached to her by was his shoddy criss-cross of blankets and rope knots. Then she levelled out, and Alrik crashed into her backfirst with a thump that knocked the air out of his lungs. In seconds – he had no idea how many – they’d gone from far up in the sky to being just above the tree level. The jagged tips of a million towering evergreens whipped past them, and Alrik could feel that at least two of his knots had come undone. A blanket, one of the only things stopping Alrik from freezing to death at altitude, came loose and fell away into the forest.

Shit, shit, shit, thought Alrik, cursing his sore spine and his lack of experience. What skills had he learned from reading books? Nothing useful, he thought. At least Sarensa had levelled out. Whatever had led her to dive had ed, and she stayed mostly even now, occasionally flapping harder to overcome a particularly tall pine. Alrik took this opportunity to turn around. This move was unpleasant, pinned to the creature’s back and half-untied as he was, but after his vision switched and his stomach lurched, he succeeded, clutching onto the creature’s back, and holding his satchel close. His muscles ached even more than they had, and he wondered how long he’d be able to maintain this position. All this time, all this distance. He thought of his father trying to teach him to tie knots when he was a child. Alrik had been distracted by a millipede in a crack in the concrete beneath them. His heart ached. Then, his head ached as Sarensa spread her wings, stopping midair so suddenly that Alrik’s head snapped against her shoulders and he was knocked unconscious. He awoke curled up on the forest floor, head pounding. Leaf litter itched the exposed skin of his neck and ankles, and the pommel of the rapier jabbed his ribs. He opened his eyes and saw the sun more than halfway from west to east. The days were shorter now, but even the dim light aggravated his head pain. Alrik picked his head up, and for a moment his vision swam. It only settled as he pulled himself fully upright and focused on breathing. One breath after the other. Where was he? Where were his things? Where was Sarensa? Where was he in relation to Cinura? He stood, shaking himself, eyes closed. Should he call out for Sarensa? Probably not. There weren’t many big predators in Roïtian forests, but there were some. Some of them might even be people. “So, this is...” he wondered to himself, taking his first steps since waking. Leaf litter from pines and bushes crunched under his feet. It was a nice feeling, different to the cobble of Canalas and the concrete of Cinura. He paused. A large stretch of evergreen woodland north of Cinura, close to the Amber Cliffs. “This is Heckett Weald,” he said, and then nodded as if agreeing with himself. It would maybe be a week on foot to Cinura from here, if he made good time.

Maybe two if he didn’t. Maybe never if he couldn’t find his things or something else stopped him. Alrik’s only scouting experience had been self-taught, as his parents didn’t share his ion for nature and his schoolmates hadn’t either. His first thought, after concluding that he lacked nearly all his belongings, was to look for a vantage point from which to survey his surroundings. A bolder person than Alrik might have opted to climb one of the pines, but Alrik was not so bold, and still in some pain, so he instead went in search of a hill. At times like this, Alrik wished dearly that he could fly. To escape his horizontal life and experience the world in up and down more than a few inches from the ground, like creatures of the water and the sky. Could magic remedy that, somehow? He doubted it. Ultimately, he climbed the gentle incline to his west and found a hump of grass and dirt from which he could peer down into the valley. There was a glimmer, a distance below and towards the east. Some sort of pond or river. There was a shape near that water, too, leaning its long neck down and scooping some water up in its gullet. It was nearly as tall as some of the younger trees and covered in shimmering yellow and white down. Sarensa. Orienting himself with a rapier mark in the ground beneath him, pointing to Sarensa and the water, Alrik stepped away from the hump. He stepped back from the marked earth and placed another mark at a distance. As he continued forward, he did this a few more times, meticulous in his alignment. As large as Sarensa was, it’d be incredibly easy to get lost in this forest where all the trees looked the same. “And what, pray tell, are you going to do once you find Sarensa? You’re out of sardines. It’s doubtful she could even take off with all these trees about,” he muttered to himself. He mentally rebutted that. He approached the pool quietly, sheathing his rapier after a half-hearted attempt to clean the dirt off. He didn’t care much for the instrument, mostly because he never intended to hurt someone with it again. Every time he closed his eyes, he saw what had remained of Cawl’s head. Every time he tried to justify his killing

by telling himself that he’d been protecting a friend, the guilt overtook him. It weighed him down like a quilt filled with stones. When Alrik reached the lake, Sarensa was gone. He walked toward the edge of the pool, a shining mountain spring perhaps twenty feet across. It was filled with clear water and looked shallow until Alrik came to its edge and saw that it was far deeper than he had expected. Where had Sarensa gone, and how had she left so quickly? Why? There was a rustle to Alrik’s left, and he turned his head. A chirp, then more in reply. Then, chittering, a group of downy-thirns appeared from the undergrowth in the middle distance. Perhaps a metre long and covered in thick, fuzzy feathers, they held their remarkably long yellow-tipped tails above their heads as signals. Alrik’s heart filled with excitement – he’d never managed to see one in the wild – and he reached for his red satchel. It was gone, of course. His heart sank, and his eyes travelled downwards, and on the way, they saw a shadow in the pool. Alrik had either not noticed it at first, or his mind had interpreted it as a meaningless shadow. But from this new angle, he could see that there was nothing adequate to cast it. It was a long shape, like a great log, only curved in the easy way that only a resting creature could be, and segmented into a huge shovel-shaped head, short legs, and a long, flat tail. It was distorted through the water, but Alrik could see that it was immense. It could have been three or four times his height in length from head to tail, and its head was bigger than his torso. Alrik backed away from the pool. It was a wonagan. A cruel god’s idea of a salamander. As little Cinuravese as he had learnt, Alrik had still picked up what wonagan meant – ‘dangerous mouth.’ Okay, he thought, putting at least three more metres between him and the pool. I’m not going to have a drink there any time soon. He was shaken. Part of it was fear, of course, but part was excitement. If only he’d had his notebook. He bit his lip and shook his head. No wonder Sarensa had left. She had good selfpreservation instincts. Alrik leant against the rough bark of a tree and felt around in his pockets. The poem Baalgali had given him. The hilt of his rapier sticking into his side and

deep in a crevice, a piece of dried meat that he must have taken from his satchel at some point. It’s not much, but it’s worth a try, he thought, taking the meat and standing up, holding it up in the air. He made sure to give the pool a wide berth. “Sarensa!” he called, his voice muffled by the trees. He held the pathetic piece of meat like a great prize. “Sarensa, I have meat for you. Good meat. Er, great meat,” he said. He couldn’t even convince himself. He looked up the hill and the stream that fed into the pool below, but all he could see were trees. No rustles or birdcalls. Even the downy-thirns were gone. He turned back, and then off to the side; he saw something glinting. Not the pool, for it was duller and smaller and a much different shape, but something reflective. Wet stone, maybe? No, he thought. Metal. Gunmetal. He took a deep breath and turned back to the pool. Right on the edge of it stood a man in a Canalian military uniform. He was staring right at Alrik. Alrik stared back and coughed, then waved. The man didn’t wave back. “Hello,” shouted Alrik, attempting casualness but failing. The soldier was eyeing him, and Alrik had noticed he hadn’t looked back at the gun in the trees. His gun, if it was a gun. “State your full name and citizenship status, young man,” said the soldier. His accent was almost Canalian, but with a twinge like a Cinure. Curious. “Are you from Adrest?” called Alrik. He just had to distract him long enough to figure out what to do. In a physical fight, the man would crush him, armed or not. He had to use his head. “I am from the true capital of Roït, aye,” said the soldier, the defiance in his voice carrying clearly. “And you’re avoiding answering me. I won’t repeat myself.” Alrik breathed deeply. If he moved from his position, the soldier might try to cross the pond. If he got close enough, would the wonagan eat him? It would remove the soldier as a problem in Alrik’s journey south, but the idea of more blood on his hands made Alrik sick. “My name is Alin Smith. I’m a labourer

from Cinura. I’m just on my way back home from, er, logging,” said Alrik. He’d taken one step towards the Roïtian soldier. The man had not moved from his position. If Alrik threw a stone into the water near the soldier, would the wonagan leap out and ensnare him? Would it not be bothered at all? Alrik ground his teeth. “You do realise that Cinura is in complete lockdown following the riots, don’t you?” asked the guard. He, too, had taken a step to the side, in the same direction that Alrik had. He was trying to close the distance. “I’ve been away from home for a long time,” said Alrik, deflecting. The soldier’s upper lip curled. “You’re testing my patience. I’ve been posted out here for a long time, child. Long before your people decided to start throwing shit back in the King’s face. You either come with me quietly and I detain and process you at the nearest outpost or I shoot you and let the thirns have you.” He took three decisive steps forward, less than two body’s lengths from Alrik now, and stood firm. Alrik held out his hands to make him stop, gritting his teeth. The man was less than a foot from the water’s edge. It was impossible to see if the wonagan had moved or not. “I would strongly recommend you don’t do that,” yelped Alrik. He looked from the soldier to the water and back again. Maybe could run for the gun? The soldier followed Alrik’s eyeline from himself to the water, and his face turned a sickly pale colour. ‘What’s that?’ the soldier asked. The intimidation in his voice was gone, replaced by fear. “It’s called a wonagan. It’s bigger than a robust juksha and it has a cartwheelsized head full of sharp teeth.” It was strange how quickly the dynamic had changed. Almost funny. “I’ve, er, grown up here, and I have an idea,” said Alrik. Scared as he was, a part of him recognised the soldier’s authority, and felt awkward talking to him. He slowly kneeled and pulled a rock from the earth, porous and full of dirt. “I’m going to be honest with you, I’m not sure if this is going to work,” said Alrik. “But my idea is, I throw this rock to the far side of the pool, and the wonagan moves to look at what made the noise. Figures its prey moving about. Then we run.” The soldier was sweating a little, standing on the tips of his toes. He wasn’t a

small man, and Alrik thought he looked a little silly. He was scared out of his mind. “What’s your name?” asked Alrik. “My name is really Alrik Ifani-Smith.” The man looked at him. Was Alrik manipulating him? Maybe. It’d be harder to shoot someone in the back if you knew each other by name. At least that’s what Alrik hoped. “My name’s Yusuth Warsh.” Alrik looked into the man’s eyes for a moment, felt the usual burning pain that eye caused, and then looked away. Nodded. “Alright,” he said, and threw the stone. It was a long shot. It landed half a metre from the shore and bounced. Alrik winced. “Good one, Alrik,” said Yusuth, adjusting his flamingo stance. He was glaring at Alrik now, though Alrik couldn’t be sure if it were in frustration or something more sinister. “Why did you say my name like it’s some sort of curse?” muttered Alrik, digging out another, larger stone, and throwing it. It landed right at the edge of the pool. Alrik and Yusuth, both poised to run, paused. Alrik had imagined the wonagan bursting from the pool after its supposed prey, spraying them both with icy water as they ran. In that time, Alrik thought to get enough distance from Yusuth that he could avoid being shot. Instead, the wonagan rose slowly and quietly, appearing as no more than several greyish-black humps floating above a dark shadow. Alrik looked at Yusuth, and Yusuth looked into the distance, presumably at his gun. And they ran. The wonagan burbled, and with a splash and the sludgy sound of moving mud, it crawled from the pool. Alrik anticipated this and ran for higher ground. Yusuth didn’t, and he stumbled down further into the valley where the creature ran after him, remarkably fast on its short legs. Alrik groaned, and before he could stop himself, began jumping up and down and shouting. “Oi, slimy,” he yelled. Fear made his stomach twist into knots, but he kept jumping. If the wonagan was anything like the salamanders he’d observed near Cinura, it’d respond more to low-pitched sounds, like the

thumping of Alrik’s feet on the earth, than Yusuth’s shouting. You’re putting your life in danger to save a Canalian soldier, Alrik, do you realise that? He asked himself. Do you really realise? And it worked. The wonagan turned. Now it was scurrying towards him, if a creature as big as a flattened, slimy bear could scurry, far faster than its size should allow. Alrik scrambled up the hill, no longer bothering to stomp his feet. Yusuth, further down, had reached his gun. Yusuth began to shout, and for a moment the wonagan stopped, as if unsure of which target to pursue. Then it made its way back down the hill and slid down into the water. It had given up. This prey wasn’t worth it. Alrik squatted in place, panting. Yusuth had developed the good sense to walk softly. He was clutching his gun and a pack that had been tucked behind it. Alrik watched as, after surveying the gun, Yusuth raised it to his eye and pointed it at Alrik. Alrik’s face fell. He locked eyes with Yusuth as well as he could over the distance, squashing his discomfort. The man looking down the length of the barrel was frazzled, covered in mud. His chest was covered in flecks of blood – either he’d injured himself running away, or the wonagan had managed to get a tooth or claw in. Alrik tried to make his face stony, but he was trembling. He kept his eyes on Yusuth’s. He didn’t raise his hands. Slowly, then at once, Yusuth lowered his rifle and ran. Alrik listened to him run off into the fast-approaching evening. For a few minutes Alrik squatted where he was, the tip of his wrapped rapier scraping in the dirt. He stared blankly into the tree line. Too much had happened in too little time, and his mind couldn’t process it all. So, he stood, expression remaining hard, and continued up the hill he’d seen the pond from the first place. He felt a little like he was toxxed; like the colour of everything was a little wrong, like his body moved slower than his mind. It was evening when Alrik found Sarensa. It had taken him nearly three hours to find her, though in the end she was less than fifty metres from the wonagan’s lake. Alrik was so dazed, his head so fuzzy, he had spent most of his time stumbling in circles.

Sarensa looked at Alrik warily. She was laying down in a small clearing, the little slitted nostrils atop her long beak puffing steam in the cold air. Alrik approached her slowly, making himself look small. An animal behaviour that she could understand. Sarensa gurgled low in her throat-pouch, regarding Alrik with suspicion, and then something about her countenance changed. Whether she recognised Alrik, or simply decided he could approach, she pulled herself from her defensive position to an open one, fluffing the thin layer of fuzz over her body and settling down onto the forest floor so her head rested on the pine needles and detritus. “Hello, beautiful girl,” said Alrik, crouching by her side. Her bright red eyes, which he could now see were rimmed with white gold around their pupils, turned to look up at him. He placed a hand on her side, waiting and watching, and her breathing held steady. He smiled, standing up on the tips of his toes and reaching for his satchel, which was held on by two thin ropes. Had it come loose, it might have been lost forever. Alrik ought to have starved. For once, though, Alrik lacked the energy to dwell on the negatives of what could have been, and instead retrieved some dried dates and meat from the pack. He sat and leant against Sarensa’s side. His belly finally full, he was lulled to sleep by Sarensa’s warmth and the rhythm of her breathing. As he drifted, Sarensa drew a wing in to cover him, like a hen protecting her chick from the cold.

Chapter 33

Aurin fired the musket into the air, the blank shot’s smoke puffing towards the mast of the Lizadigo, and the gathered group of Lefaneie cringed. Olifiela looked on, visibly irritated. Lumi sat at a distance, observing their reactions. Pain. Discomfort. Fear. These were to be expected, but they weren’t to be ignored. The ships were completed, and a team of magicworkers was urging their ship onwards, squalling it with arcane winds. The second ship, the Nieoxo, was a short distance behind, riding in their wake. They were leaving Ollossos. Both ships were at their utmost capacity, and Lumi felt as if she’d been canned. Over four and a half hundred Lefaneie soldiers and six outsiders crammed into two ships with a capacity of less than two hundred each. It was their third day of sailing, and Lumi had taken to wedging herself in between luggage, out of the way and out of sight, for some privacy. Placed at intervals above and below decks were small makeshift anfenieüle heating towers, so the biting cold Lumi had known for so long travelling to and within Ollossos was gone. It was almost comfortable. That, however, only made Lumi more anxious. The thought of feeling cold again, truly cold like she had before, haunted her like the spectre had. Bang! The musket fired again. Soldiers tensed their jaws and fists but took it perhaps just a little better than they had before. Of course, they had heard loud sounds before. War was loud; Olifiela told Lumi that the Meirese Army descending on Jeluli had been like a snarling mass of beasts, but the crack of a musket was still a shocking, aggressive reminder of how far behind the Lefan were. There should have been three ships. Like a child rejected by its mother in the snow, the third ship, named Eliatia, had been abandoned. A month had not given the Lefaneie, even with a full force of magicworkers, enough time to assemble all three ships. They needed to conserve toxauments in preparation for whatever was going to happen when they reached Cinura, and since the closing of the

wound, the latent magical energy in the area had greatly decreased – Lumi’s original plan of collecting material was no more. So, they were packed in tight, like the canned beans Lumi had bought from the grocer in Blucvisdoc what seemed like an age ago. It had only been a few months. “Lumi, I need a hand with something,” came a voice. Aurin. The crowd of Lefan soldiers familiarising themselves with gunfire had dispersed, but the deck was still crowded. Aurin was standing alone at the side of the ship, leaning on the railing, looking at Lumi. No, that wasn’t right – he wasn’t alone. Salemi, the smart-mouthed Nuarec speaking Lefan that had lived in Xemipu with Malbry and Girrin, was there too. Odd. “What is it?” asked Lumi, yelling a little to be heard over the din of the deck’s traffic. Salemi gave her a toothy smile, his arms crossed. Something about the little movements his body made gave Lumi pause. Was he toxxed? Magic was restricted to the heating and sail squalling crews by order of the Jojeron. “A leak. Belowdecks,” said Aurin. “Quickly and quietly, if you will.” Lumi furrowed her brow in confusion, but followed without further question. She looked down to keep her footing on the uneven deck. Leaks weren’t unexpected; it was remarkable that the ship, even reconstructed with the aid of magic as it was, floated at all. Access to magic just meant that the Lefaneie could fenwork wood together instead of having to lift and position it by hand. Lumi ducked under a worn red cloth reading ‘watch your head’ in Lefaneie, waiting for a short dark-skinned soldier to shuffle past at the bottom of the steps. Even aside from the ship’s patchwork nature, it was an odd, archaic thing. The elikimalus style was more than a thousand years out of date, but it sailed well. It was mostly wood, as it ought to be to float, but marbled in between some of the wooden grains were other materials like stone and crystal and something green and plant-like. Some marbling looked suspiciously like hair or flesh, but Lumi didn’t entertain that thought any more than she had to. Aurin beckoned her aft, through crowds of milling, chatting and working Lefaneie, to the lower decks’ furthermost left corner. Aurin continued onward, but Salemi stood guard, arms crossed by a tied-down crate of food. He winked at Lumi, and she smiled back warily before, with a start, she felt an eerie, unnatural silence as she ed through a field of deadening.

He was using magic. The little alcove Aurin had led her to was silent to anyone outside it. Then she was in the little alcove, and her group was there. Girrin, Yuon, Malbry, Ford. All looking salt-dried and tired. All with serious faces. Girrin was resting on Malbry, broad-chested and cross-armed, with Yuon sitting apart. “Sit down, Lume,” said Aurin. His voice was kind, but it had an edge to it. Lumi cringed slightly, nodded, and sat. Aurin looked behind him, around the corner to Salemi, and gave him a thumbs up. He turned back, and then all eyes were on Lumi. They expected her to speak first. “What the hell is going on, Rin?” Lumi asked. “Why the lies and the shusher outside?” “The magicworker and the misdirection weren’t for your sake, Lume, but for the sake of everyone else on this ship,” said Aurin, glancing behind him. His voice was tight, but there was something else layered on top of it; a warmth, a delicateness, like one a mother might apply when telling a child their dog was dead. Lumi’s heart sank. “This can’t fall on the ears of the Lefaneie, Lume. We brought you here to talk about you and the general.” Lumi leant against a crate, pursing her lips. “None of the Lefaneie except Salemi?” she questioned, motioning to the doorway to their little alcove. “Salemi and a few others,” said Aurin, nodding, frustrated. “But that’s beside the point. We –” “We’re already planning to overthrow one government, Rin,” said Lumi. “Now you’re looking to start a rebellion within the rebels. That’s stupid. That’ll only make us and them weaker in the long run.” “Let me explain,” said Aurin, taking a deep breath. “I know that this group needs stability. We all do, here, and the rest elsewhere,” he said, motioning to those assembled. Girrin nodded. “He’s right,” she said in a small voice. “We’ve talked about it when we can. It hasn’t been easy.”

Lumi frowned. “Which is why we’ve only managed to tell you this now, Lume,” said Aurin. He was leaning now, too; he looked exhausted. “Look,” he said. “You know the main plan. The first detachments from Canalas reach Cinura, and we meet them there. We talk it out, with the Lefaneie at our backs. We state our independence, with the muscle of our new army backing us up.” “But if they almost inevitably don’t let that stand...” said Malbry. “But,” said Aurin, nodding. “If they don’t take to it, we drive them out. It won’t be a battle. We don’t want it to be one. We use noise and smoke and magic, and we scare them off. Once they’re gone, we establish a perimeter around the city, and take our independence by force. The cirque makes Cinura easy to defend; they’d have to come up through Wry Neck. Kenneman – a man I used to work for – said that there are cannons somewhere in the military stronghold in the central business district. Maybe we could use those.” Finally, Yuon spoke up. His stone eye seemed to have been shined, and he moved with nervous energy. What was he thinking about? “Wait, cannons? Proper cannons, with munitions?” “So I’ve heard.” “But what does this have to do with Olifiela and I?” asked Lumi. Their plans, and how to escalate from one to the other if needed, were constantly sieving through her mind, too. They were probably doing so in every mind on both ships. What was Aurin getting at? “It has to do with how you choose to play your... part, with her,” said Aurin. His posture had straightened once again, and he was visibly uncomfortable. “I know you’ve argued. You’re headstrong. You’re my sister. But we’re worried that when it comes to it, she won’t listen to you at an important time if you don’t try to get back in her good books. We’re not asking you to grovel, but if we’re eventually to split from the Lefaneie, it can’t be now, and it especially can’t be when we’re standing before the Canalian army in Cinura.” Lumi’s heart sank now properly. Anger mixed with disappointment and sadness somewhere around her navel, and then down her legs.

“So, you’re asking me to whore myself out for your sake?” she asked him, voice rising in pitch. “Even you?” she asked, pointing to Girrin. Girrin looked back at her and shook her head. “You mean continue exactly what you’ve already happily been doing?” she said flatly. Lumi flushed. “We’re asking you to get back in the good graces of the leader of the army you’ve brought to our side, so that the fate of our city, our home, can be assured. I’m not telling you that you must do that with her anymore. We’re grateful, Lumi. I’m grateful, but you can put it in the worst words you want. You can’t manipulate me with that anymore,” said Aurin. “I’m smarter than that. And so are you.” Lumi felt herself sink somehow lower, as Aurin directed Girrin and Malbry to leave the deadened bubble first, and to have a minute or so before Malbry left, too. Then it was just Aurin and Lumi in the room. The sounds of the ship came rushing back in as Salemi popped the bubble. Seabirds. Oars. Swearing. Aurin wrapped his arms around Lumi, and she closed her eyes in his warm embrace. It made her feel a little more like a human being. “I’m sorry for manipulating you,” said Lumi, weeping quietly. “I don’t think I do it on purpose.” “I don’t think you do, either,” he said, rocking her gently from side to side. “But I do think if you carry a thoughtful attitude over to Girrin, you might get some results. I suppose I always thought I’d see you married off, one day, but if your love is... unconventional...” he trailed off. “I stand not to judge.” Lumi smiled at him, wiping her eyes. “I don’t think anything’s going to get Girrin to come back to me now, brother. Not as a friend, or anything else. I’ve been cruel. I’ve been manipulative. And she has Malbry.” “We’re not in the Eine’s frozen arsehole anymore, Lume,” said Aurin, with a grin. “Properly, now. She doesn’t need someone running hot as him to keep her warm every night. Just give it a try.” He gave her another short, tight hug. “Now, there’s a leak that I actually do need to look at, and I’m late to see to it,” he said, dashing out of the alcove, and

leaving her alone.

Three and a half days later, they made landfall. Lumi pulled the journey-worn coat she’d bought in Blucvisdoc around her shoulders and stood closer to Olifiela. Olifiela stayed imive, resting her hand on the wooden rail that surrounded the Falar’s Wing, one of the two oblong platforms for magicworkers to stand and squall the ship forward. They were empty now, save for the two of them and some of the higher ranking Lefaneie on board; among them, Salemi. The ship dropped anchor parallel to the rocky shore and a rookery of penguins scattered. Ten Lefaneie, squalled up a little by their fellows to soften their landing, jumped from the ship and fastened it to a rudimentary docking post dug into the shore. Beyond the post was Henrik’s shack, and beyond that was the black maw of Wry Neck. All was covered in a thick layer of snow. It snowed south of the cirque in summer. Winter was starting in earnest now, and Lumi dreaded getting off the heated deck of the ship. She glanced at Olifiela, who had her arms crossed. Her expression was unreadable. They hadn’t slept together since Lumi had tried to come back into the general’s life, and Lumi thought they never would. That was fine by her. “It’s not much to look at from this angle,” Lumi said at length. Olifiela looked back at her. “Every single one of my Lefaneie has to squeeze through that? With everything we have?” Lumi nodded. “I’m afraid so. There are other routes to the east, past the Amber Cliffs, but they’re populated. A few little hardy towns loyal to Canalas. We’d be better to establish the Lefan presence within Cinura itself before trying to encroach on other areas. Cinura is sort of its own entity. Trying to be, at least.” “Lucky for that. If you weren’t, we wouldn’t be here,” said Olifiela. She looked at Lumi and smiled, and Lumi smiled back. Maybe she didn’t see her as an equal yet, but Lumi felt a little closer to one in her eyes now. A sonorally-enhanced shout came from the shore below, announcing that the ship was properly secured, and Olifiela started as if woken from a trance. Lumi took a deep breath in, loud enough for the general to hear her, and she looked at her questioningly.

“What are you scared of? This is your home.” Lumi looked back, unnerved by how well the woman had been able to see her emotions. More calls went out as a team of magicworkers began to fenwork together a set of scaffold-like stairs for walking off the ship. “I worry that Cinura’s changed an awful lot since I’ve left,” said Lumi, looking off to the snow-covered mountains that marked the southernmost part of her home.

Chapter 34

Why didn’t I shoot him? “Pick up your feet, Warsh. You’re lagging behind.” It was the General. Yusuth squeezed his eyes shut and opened them again. He took his place back in the line, feet crunching on pine needles and humus that hadn’t yet been cleared from the shaded forest path. The air was filled with the sounds of boots on earth and clinking muskets. “Still reeling from the wogga-wotsit?” larked Finan, a tall, pear-shaped soldier ahead of him with bad saluting technique and hair like egg yolk. Yusuth grimaced. “Wonagan,” he called out. “And I’m not reeling, but I won’t drink there again.” Yusuth swallowed, feeling how dry his mouth was, and took a sip from the near-empty flask at his belt. The path stretched on for many miles, winding through the thick forest of Heckett Weald. He knew where it led, of course – General Mikan couldn’t let any of them forget. Cinura. Troubled, frustrating little Cinura. Ahead of the procession by a few bends in the road were two juksha-drawn carriages filled with wooden tower shields, guns, ammunition, food and water. At a fork in the road three miles south, they were to meet with a larger detachment from Canalas City. The general had repeated many times that this was not to be a battle; Cinura wasn’t well-armed enough to be a threat, and the police forces in the city, hemmed in, were still at work. The words calmed the men, but Yusuth could see something else in Mikan’s posture, in the way he interacted with his men, that suggested differently. Yusuth’s father, a soft-spoken policeman from a little green town outside of Adrest, had been the top prosecutor in his constabulary. He’d told little Yusuth about all the things you could see in a man’s face, in his muscles and his bones, that gave him away. General Mikan was afraid. That made Yusuth’s stomach quiver. The boy he’d come across in Heckett

Weald, the one he didn’t shoot and still didn’t know why – that boy had known things. The way he’d controlled that beast troubled him. The people in Cinura had knowledge about these lands that the Crown might not. He had the sinking feeling that he and his men were walking, chests puffed, and guns unloaded, into something far more dangerous than they had anticipated. “I really need to take a crap,” said a man to Yusuth’s left named Dlannick. Dlannick, who had a mighty tendency to complain. Yusuth steadied his musket with his left hand and nudged him, shaking his head. Dlannick grunted and breathed in to speak – no doubt to tell Yusuth to fuck off and stop treating his squad mates like they were his subordinates, like chicks needing to be huddled in by a chicken. Yusuth couldn’t help it, really; it wasn’t his fault that he felt he should micromanage when his superiors were so often caught up in bigger things. The words died in Dlannick’s mouth the moment they rounded a twist in the road and saw what was there. Yusuth heard a ripple of cries from the formation, which promptly broke into a gawking gaggle. General Mikan started to shout for them to get back in order, but even his voice cut out. Cursing at the chain of infractions, Yusuth pushed forward into the mess to see what was before them. A carriage flying Crown colours, obliterated on the road in a field of broken wood and dust and debris. Four dead or dying juksha in a pool of blood, still tied to the wreckage. Who had done this, and how? There had been whispers of the Cinuravese being involved in the attack on Canalas itself – but this was different. This didn’t match up with the way those terrorists had acted before. “How did they get here before we did?” asked Finan, using his height to look over the group at the wreckage. General Mikan was beside the congregation, choosing two of their fastest men to run to the nearest paltwire station two miles back and alert Canalas City and Adrest. “Something about this isn’t right,” said Yusuth, peering at the wreckage. I need to have a closer look, he thought, and, without knowing it, became the first of the group to leave the safety of numbers and walk towards the wreck.

The two messengers ran off, and General Mikan’s attention turned back to his men. He ordered them into formation in a terse voice, but Yusuth hardly heard. At any other time, he’d be kicking himself for not being the first to follow an order. Now, there was just too much else to think about. The general’s voice carried loudly over to him. “Get away from that, Warsh. Don’t be a fool. This is clearly the work of explosives, and there’s likely unexploded gunpowder all over that wreck.” “I understand, sir,” said Yusuth, crouching down, awfully close to the carriage. “However, sir, I don’t think any of the gunpowder in this carriage went up. If you’ll look, sir, you can see that the wheels separated from their axles, but they’re mostly undamaged, and the bottom of the carriage is battered, but not broken. I don’t think this carriage exploded, sir, I think it was dropped.” He looked back to his superior, who was shaking his head. The general made a curt hand movement, and Yusuth nodded, slipping back into formation. It was shakier than it had been only minutes ago. Men glanced around furtively. Yusuth heard whispers among the straight backs and quivering guns that it really did look like it had been dropped, and but what could have dropped it? His mind burned with the same questions. If it was the result of fenworking, the Crown had seriously underestimated the power the Cinuravese possessed. But if the Cinuravese had such power, why hadn’t they driven Crown forces out of their city decades ago? General Mikan called for the party to ease until the two messengers returned – if they ever did. Each man sat heavily, processing the grisly sight in different ways, leaning their guns on their sides or splaying them across their laps. Not one gun was left untouched. Such was the way of the Crown. I ignored that tenet and got bit in the torso by the void’s answer to a toad, thought Yusuth, ing Skolt, a man who tied his boot laces too loosely, and nodding to him. It didn’t hurt to be polite. Really, he was running a regimen of politeness that he’d acted out and perfected time and time again. His mind was spinning, far above them in the air, as if he’d taken far too much tox and had drifted away from himself. Magic spilled from the cracked air like heat. Yusuth gasped, the cool forest air around him becoming like the tropics in the summer. The party rippled like a

puddle someone had dropped a stone into, and Yusuth heard screaming. A man was burning. General Mikan, unharmed, corralled the men, the burning one carried on Finan’s strong shoulders. Yusuth stood, reached for his rifle, but it spontaneously fired, and the lead ball careened off into the sky. He yelped, dropped his gun, and retreated towards a point further back down the track, away from the crushed cart. “What... magic... sir?” asked Yusuth, between gasps, saluting with a burnt hand. The further the squadron travelled from the cart, the less stifling the magic was, until it became a sort of inner-ear buzz that was easier to ignore. The burned man – a loose jacket-buttoner named Makeli – was attended to by their two most medically trained men, one of them a nearworker. They stripped his shirt off, and the nearworker, Temmus, placed a hand on his chest. “His skin is burnt, but not anywhere else. Just the outer layer. It’ll slough off, he’ll be sore, and bald for a time, but he’ll heal. What was that, sir?” he said, looking up at the general. He spoke with a lisp and was one of the few men in Yusuth’s squadron that he didn’t have any outstanding negative opinions on. The general stared back at the smashed cart. There was a shadow there, one that in the fading light Yusuth had taken for a distant tree or something like it. But it was new. It had moved there. Like a child’s drawing of a giant, twisted and wrong. Yusuth blinked, and it was gone. Then it was there again. Flickering in and out of existence like a sputtering flame. “Magical disturbance. Something... slipping through the cracks in the Einic Layers. This is magicworker shit.” The general swallowed and then raised his voice to address the whole group. “We stay here, and we wait. I don’t... I don’t know what caused this.” His voice faltered. “But we represent the Crown, and we will uphold its justice. So we carry on.”

Chapter 35

If Alrik ignored the fire and smoke and rubble, Cinura didn’t look any different from when he had left. The main road into the city was deserted and made smoggy as the pre-dawn mist mixed with smoke from what was left of the Can’las houses. The ground crunched underfoot and Alrik wrinkled his nose at the smells of burning wood and plaster as he came to the age into the city proper, an opening that looked more and more like a gaping mouth as he came. Sarensa looked at him from the tree line, even her shape small in the distance. She had accompanied him for the past week, but didn’t like the smoke, and had refused to come any further. Alrik was glad. He wasn’t sure how he was going to let her go otherwise. Alrik stepped onto Cinuravese ground and was immediately held at gunpoint by a sunwaak. He held up his hands, digging his teeth into his lower lip in frustration and confusion. “Çinuráves, tok pì toï?” asked the orange-dressed man. Alrik looked at the sunwaak, took him in; he was a Cinuravese man, through and through, with Inivanese eyes, a T’fonkese nose and a ruddy shade to his skin that could have been Kandriian. And he was speaking fluent Cinuravese creole. Alrik gathered his thoughts – a difficult task with a gun barrel taking up most of his vision. “Tì no... no speak Çinuráves,” he stammered – and it was true. When Alrik was growing up, road signs and directions had been in Nuarec. School was taught in Nuarec. Creole was reserved for curse words and the elderly. The sunwaak, or the man in sunwaak robes, kept his gun up. Was this part of the new regime? Mandatory Cinuravese? They hadn’t given much warning to the unlearned. “Anrij pì enne?” demanded the gunman, and Alrik shook his head.

“I don’t know what you mean!” he shouted, making the gunman start and back away a few inches. “I am Cinuravese. I was born here. Listen to my accent. Scan my belongings if you want. This is my home. I was born here.” The gunman hesitated and lowered his gun. His scowl softened a little. “What brought you back here? Not a dhiggi good time for travelling.” Alrik swallowed down fear and nodded. “I’m here to take care of my family,” he said, looking the man in the eyes. “What’s your name?” “Elam. Stay out of trouble. Talk to Master Kenneman in the tent parliament by the Anmon if you need an authority,” said the man gruffly, giving Alrik a nod, and turning back towards the city entrance. Alrik took a deep breath, shook his shoulders, and began the final stretch of his journey home. The arcane streetlights in what was left of Murkurkil and the other wealthy districts still worked. That was notable because everything else was decimated. It looked like every house had been demolished piece by piece, each nail, each adornment, each brick and paving stone removed and smashed. The only things left whole were hearths, refrigerators, wardrobes, furniture and other refuse. Alrik began to wonder what happened to the people who had lived there and then decided he’d rather not know. As Alrik walked down the well-worn path into the curves of the cirque’s bowl, he was struck by a surprising observation; people still roamed the streets, albeit not many in the early, dark morning. Worn farmers assembled their Levaan mirrors to gather the sun when it came, and bakers and other cooks began their morning preparations. Down here, out of the smoke, the air smelled of bread and crisp morning winter. The jacaranda trees, not yet stripped of their purple flowers by the cold, were covered in frost. There were more people than bakers and farmers out on the streets this morning; there were wanderers, too. People like Alrik. He nodded and smiled at one, who nodded back and clasped his hands together. A traditional greeting? Alrik didn’t know. Master Kenneman, whoever he was, had done more than lock up the police force, as extreme an action as that was – he’d done something to its people. Alrik pondered in the knife-sharp air, stepping from cobble to cobble and

then on dirt as he left the lavish foothills for good, and came to his house. His street. His flat didn’t look any different. For some reason he’d expected it to. It stood, as it always had, in a little corner of a Coelhar street, wedged between two other buildings. It had aged, maybe; the paint on the doorframe was a little more faded, splintering. It was lit from within, and as Alrik came closer, he could feel heat from the hearth spilling up under the door. He knocked. An uncertain moment ed, and Alrik’s worry took that moment to fester. What if they didn’t live here anymore? What if the new system that Cinura had been shoved into made them scared to answer their doors? What if they were dead? He swallowed dry, and hated the rebels, deep and fiery, for the length of a breath. Then he did his best to let the hate go, to evaporate into the air like only more mist. Everything had been a certain way, and while that way was negative in many ways, it was comfortable. It was safe. The door opened. The man who darkened it was older than Alrik knew him to be. His dark beard was speckled with white and grey, and the line between his eyebrows looked deep enough to need a bridge to cross. He looked different, but he was still the same man; Arvid Ifani. Alrik’s father. Staring at his son in shock. “Hello,” said Alrik. His next words left his body in a whoosh as his father took him and compressed him into a powerful hug, emptying his chest of air. Alrik returned the hug to the best of his ability. His father looked down at him, still incredulous, and shook his head. “I have so many questions, essi. And so many... feelings. Things that I’m not the best at saying. But whatever they are, they should be said inside,” he said, motioning to Alrik to walk in. Alrik took his shoes off and put them by the door and then smiled at how he’d done it without thinking. He sat at one of the once rough-hewn old wooden chairs by the hearth, looking around their house as his father mixed leaves and sugar in a mug for him. It wasn’t tea, in that it didn’t come from a true tea plant, but it was a pleasant tisane that Alrik had enjoyed since childhood. He watched his father, both silent, and noticed to some surprise that he had started to cry. “Where’s uma, ufa?” he asked. It was the elephant question that had followed them both into the tiny house and somehow managed to squeeze inside. His father nodded but didn’t

look up. Alrik’s heart sank. “She’s sick,” said Alrik’s father at length. Alrik could see his father’s mind working as he stirred the herbs, working out how to phrase what he had to say. “I don’t know how it happened, exactly. She might have been set off by the smoke, once Kenneman started burning down the Can’las houses. Maybe the explosion of the Elderate building before. It’s come with the onset of winter. Either way,” he said, dipping a ladle into a small pot over the hearth, pouring the steaming water into the mug, then handing it to Alrik. “She’s poorly. She struggles to sleep most nights for the coughing, and I’ve had to take to sleeping with wool in my ears as to be rested for work. This all... this city... it’s changing,” he said, finally. He hadn’t made a drink or any food for himself, but instead chose to sit as he was on another chair by the hearth, his hands empty. Alrik didn’t ask if he could see her. Both he and his father knew that after however long in a crowded city far away, he might be carrying a sickness that’d make her worse. Knowing he was looking after her by not seeing her didn’t make that hurt any less. Alrik drank his tisane. He’d finished gazing around the room with fresh eyes several minutes earlier – there wasn’t much to gaze at – and had taken to staring at the old calefactor, still standing where it was. He wandered for a moment if it still worked or not, but then realised that it wasn’t the same old calefactor. It was new and looked polished. Alrik’s mind shifted. He turned to his father. “You said you’re still going to work. The market still runs?” His father nodded, brightening slightly. “Oh, yes. Better than it ever has. No more sunwaaks with guns and spears pressing down on the crowds. People can sell religious items now, too. You know your mother and I don’t practise, but it’s... encouraging to see. I’ve seen some people in dulhi hats and green Mondine robes, free to walk on the streets.” Alrik nodded, and his mouth curled down at the sides. “Do you think that was worth burning down half the city for?” he said, and his tone surprised him. He’d gained either confidence or arrogance in his jaunt east and back, and he wasn’t sure which one it was. His father grimaced. “As to that, I don’t know, essi. It’s a nasty, dirty business. It makes me wonder what it felt like for the people not involved with the Nos Blau ninety years ago, just trying to live through the days in the fighting. But it’s not going to be like that,” he said. His voice played with ruefulness and acceptance.

“Why not?” asked Alrik. His drink had gone cold with perhaps a fifth left, forgotten. “There’s a new Nos Blau. The police are trapped in by the rebels. They won’t win, but it’ll be a fight.” Alrik’s father shook his head slowly. In the silence, Alrik heard his mother cough, the first he’d heard of her since arriving, and his heart ached. He swallowed down the feeling. “Because the only thing that the Canalian Crown has done in the last hundred years is grow more powerful,” said Alrik’s father. “They have more men, better weapons, and now they have those terrible Hetterfolk. This is a significant effort on the part of the rebel group; I’m not disagreeing with that, but it’ll be crushed as soon as the soldiers arrive from the City and from the Hetterfields. The Blue Prohibition will be reinstated, and the rebels will be rounded up and hanged or shot. A flash in the pan.” His father motioned for Alrik’s mug and he gave it to him. Rather than going to clean it, he ladled some still warm water from the pot over the hearth and poured it into the drink, then brought it to his own lips. Alrik’s head swam with thoughts of what to do and worries of his mother. Concern for what was going to happen, and what already had. If this uprising was going to be so easily crushed, what were this Kenneman, and the people working with him, doing? Alrik’s father placed his mug down, and it shook as the steps of an approaching army began to rattle the windowsills and cutlery.

Chapter 36

Lumi marched back into the city of her birth with an army at her back; a far cry from how she’d expected to return. When she was a young girl, reading what books she could get her hands on and hearing whispers of the armies of the Crown, or of Eawar, she’d pictured them differently. For one, they were more colourful. In children’s books, soldiers wore bright colours – surely a terrible tactical decision. They also rode on great robust juksha in battle finery and hefted spears and broad-bladed swords. There were some broad-bladed swords here, but no juksha, and no bright colours. The smoothness of the march-in of the Lefaneie army relied heavily on whether the Canalian army had yet arrived. It was impossible to transport the cargo from the Lizadigo and Nieoxo through Wry Neck, so they’d both had to sail around the southern headlands with skeleton crews and attempt to dock in the nearby town of Tine. It would be half a day until what was on those ships could reach Cinura – assuming two millennia-old Lefan elikimalus warships pulling into the bay didn’t cause too much trouble. So the Lefaneie, and their small five-parts-Cinuravese-to-one-part-Falarese contingent, trod into Cinura with only what they could carry on their backs and in their arms. The smell of sweat mixed with the sharp early morning air and the sound of arrows rustling in their quivers. Lumi carried the strange spear Ford had found in the hands of the statue in Ollossos, and out of the group of over three hundred, only Malbry and Aurin carried firearms. They were grateful to leave the blistering cold of wintry Joyrey, remarking amongst themselves at the dilapidated old Mondinist church. More than three centuries old, and it was younger than they were. How did that make them feel? Did they feel that they’d been given a second chance at life, an extension of their years a thousand times over? Or did they feel scared and displaced? Lumi had known Olifiela intimately and still struggled to fathom the flashes of thought and memory she sometimes saw behind her eyes. A harsh smell caught in Lumi’s nose, and she grimaced. Something was burning, and it wasn’t a hearth or bonfire. With the smells of burning wood were others

Lumi couldn’t place. Frowns and coughs ed through the Lefan contingent. They kept on at a pace that Lumi had to trot to keep up with. Presently, she took her telescope, now rusted and creaking as it was pulled open, from her red satchel and brought it to her eye. What she saw gave her an expression that Girrin noticed even amidst all the hubbub and noise. “What is it?” she asked, traversing the sloshy gravel underfoot that was gradually becoming the packed dirt of the lower suburbs. Lumi took another look at what she’d seen to make sure she was right, and closed her telescope, turning to Girrin with a worried expression. “The smoke is from the Can’las houses. They’re all burned down, from what I can see. Every single one.” Girrin’s already-pale face paled further, and her eyes pulled away from Lumi’s. She swallowed and then nodded. “Your book friend was right, then,” she said, her voice shaking. “There’s a faction here apart from the one we’ve brought with us. And they’ve done... something to the Canalas houses and the people that were in them.” Lumi nodded slowly, and then the realisation struck her like a mallet on a gong. “Oh, Girrin, I’m –” “Don’t,” said Girrin, her voice flat. Her posture was upright, her eyes straining straight ahead. She was making herself act strong. Lumi nodded at her and then looked ahead herself. They walked in silence as the minutes and footfalls ed, and they were in the district of Anmon. Here, the smoke was thinner, and there were people bustling about, wide-eyed at the encroaching group. Tan, grey and black fabric shapes came into view, clustered around the Anmon Cascade itself, tents. Refugees? Or some sort of base for the Nos Blau Eritiami? At the perimeter of the campground stood eight guards, all in sunwaak attire and Crown muskets; Lumi decided that they were either turncoats or rebels who’d taken police equipment. They took hold of their muskets as the Lefan approached them, but none of them made any threatening moves. Lumi felt a bubble of fear rise from her gut to her throat. Olifiela wasn’t fluent enough in Nuarec to speak for them, and no one else would. The contingent stopped, and Lumi swallowed the fear and stepped forward. “My name is Lumi Hellemar, and

I speak for the group formed by Irinus Mawegu, and this contingent of the Lefaneie of Jeluli. I believe both of our parties want the best for this city, and would wish to meet with your leadership, whoever that may be, as soon as possible. The Lefan soldiers will lay down their arms and wait outside your encampment while we meet. You have my word.” Lumi’s voice was shaky and weak, but with the help of one of the Lefaneie in the crowd, she felt it become amplified once, and then twice. By the time her speech was done, she was sure a quarter of the city could hear her. She buzzed with magic and nervousness and power and then stood and waited as the electric buzz died down with the sound. One of the not-sunwaaks, a tall cedar-coloured man with a greying black beard and a medal of some kind at his chest, waved them forward. Lumi advanced, Olifiela in her shadow. Lumi breathed deeply, conscious of the movement of the air through her nose, into the anxiety-tight barrel of her chest, and then out again. The decorated gunman led the pair of them through the outer layer of not-sunwaaks. Olifiela was as tall as or taller than most all of them, but Lumi only came up to chests or shoulders. She gritted her teeth and forced it from her mind. She had no space for insecurity now. Past the cascade, echoing with the sound of the water tumbling into its depths, there was one tent, only slightly larger than the others, which stood marked with a ‘K’ by the main tent flap. The gunman led them into the tent, following close behind. Lumi felt the hairs on the back of her neck turn up as she felt his gaze on her. So much time spent steeling herself from things lately. She was flesh, not steel; when would she crack? The inside of the tent was almost as cold as the outside and lit by candles rather than arcane lights. Aside from two guards sitting, rather than standing, with their muskets by their sides, the tent was almost empty of people. It was empty of most other things too: the only things Lumi could see were a few cabinets, desks, wooden boxes filled with papers, a pile of preserved foodstuffs, clear glass bulbs of water, and two maps hung up on the walls – one of them southern Tokarey and the Falaric Isles: the other, northern Tokarey, Kandrii, and the Lefan Archipelago. The maps were intricate with notes and colour and looked to be by far the most expensive things in the room.

“Mister Kenneman, sir. The announcers are here. Unarmed, sir,” said the man accompanying them. His accent was Cinuravese; when Kenneman spoke, his voice was Canalian, through and through. “Very pleased to meet you! Please get these gentlewomen chairs, Mister Kalkin,” Kenneman said, grinning from ear to ear as he motioned for their accompanying soldier to assist. He seemed a pleasant man, perhaps in his late thirties or early forties, with thinning orange hair and freckled skin so pale his blood showed through it and made him appear red. He wore something with the cut of a sunwaak’s uniform, but it dyed a deep midnight blue. Lumi must have stared. He looked down at his clothes, and grinned, somehow, even wider. “You like the uniform? Full disclosure, it is no more than a dyed sunset walker outfit, but it really does strike an image, doesn’t it? I’d love to make every one of us one of these, but in this weather, uim be damned, nothing dries.” Lumi took a seat and nodded, trying to keep the discomfort off her face. This man had the countenance of an entertainer at a rich child’s birthday celebration, not of a leader of a bloody coup. Was it a farce? If it was, it was a good one. He extended a freckled hand. Lumi took it and shook. “Lumi Hellemar,” he said, her name sounding frivolous in his voice. “I’ve heard about you – and not only in that, er, stunt with the sonorance. Not that that wasn’t an impressive display,” he said, his voice becoming strained. “But it was... booming. We aren’t in the most secure of positions now, as I’m sure you understand.” Lumi kept her face still and didn’t respond. If the first thing she said in their encounter was an apology, that would step him up and step her down. Instead, she said, “Have you considered what we offered in our address?” Her voice sounded too thin and wobbly in the cold room. Olifiela looked at her and to Kenneman and back, but he never turned his eyes towards the Lefan woman. With a movement like a predator moving into a crouch to pounce, Kenneman’s bearing changed. He sat forward; his blue-green eyes locked onto Lumi’s. She held them. “That’s an interesting question, Miss Hellemar. Interesting, at least, once we scrape off the first few layers of juksha shit from this whole debacle and determine what it is you’re really offering. I know about your small army outside, and I’m interested. But this bizarre tale you’ve concocted to go along with it isn’t helping. You come to me, with days before the Crown arrives, with a Huzunite at your side, expecting me to believe

you’ve somehow resurrected a group of thousand-year-dead soldiers who have agreed to fight for you and for Cinura?” Lumi saw Olifiela roll her jaw out of the corner of her eye and willed the woman not to punch their meeting partner in the head. She took a breath that was deep but quiet and still, so Kenneman couldn’t see she was steadying herself, or that she needed to. “We are offering no more and no less than what our original statement entailed,” said Lumi, making sure to use ‘our’ and ‘we’ – it wouldn’t hurt to remind the man of the army assembled outside. “In travelling to Ollossos to recover magical resources, my party made a discovery. Thirty kilometres or so south of the tip of the Tongue of Amenofriak, we found a leftover of the Sudden Shock, we think. A sort of bleeding wound in the Einic Layers that had transmuted everything around it and twisted the land. Logically, if the closer to the hole we picked our material, the stronger they’d be, we came closer. Things became... illogical. Transposition of space, confusion of time. The thick ice split below us, and, to assist a companion that had nearly fallen down a crevasse, I performed magic. A simple spell, for heat and light. Then, the wound closed, and spat everything it had been holding back into the world. The material was no longer potent enough to collect.” Olifiela nodded as if she’d understood every word and finally decided to speak. “We, the Lefan, called it the rojojaie – the old wound, the king wound. We weren’t awake when we were beyond the rojojaie, but some of us lived. Though, I understand, it has been some time.” Olifiela seemed earnest, almost meek. I suppose she was a politician, once, Lumi thought. She knew how to play different roles depending on who she was dealing with. The fact that she managed it, so displaced in time and even by language, Lumi found impressive. She looked at the Lefan general, thinking, and then looked back to Kenneman. “Well,” he said, his tone more ambiguous. “Your accent doesn’t sound like any Huzunite accents I know. From where do you hail? And, oh dear, I don’t seem to have extended the proper greeting to you!” he shook his head and extended a hand. “My name is Olifiela Esla, and my title is that of jojeron – something like ‘general’ or ‘war leader,’ in your language. And I hail from Jeluli,” she added, smiling sweetly. “As I clearly stated.”

Lumi couldn’t fully hide her smile. Kenneman’s expression was changing, but she couldn’t be sure what to; either he was coming around, or he was about to boot them from the city. “Quite right,” he said at length, hitting his palms on the desk. His eyes were vacant, looking past them. He nodded to himself. Absorbing the information or planning something else entirely. He closed his eyes and reopened them, focused once again. “So, how many men do you have?” he asked. His voice was sharper, more direct, more commanding. It was as if he’d turned from a sardonic desk operator to a commander in the space of a few breaths. How many people constituted this man? “Men and women,” said Olifiela, taking his eyes in hers just as easily as she had when he had been calmer. She pronounced women like ‘woe men,’ but the man seemed to have at least the decency to not correct her on the spot. “Four hundred and fifty-two,” said Olifiela, head held high. She said the numbers in Nuarec with such confidence Lumi knew she must have memorised them. This unsettled her. The number was eleven shorter than it had been at their meeting in the Lefaneie dome. Lumi glanced at Kenneman. He and Olifiela began to discuss numbers, arms, rations, recompense. When Olifiela didn’t know a word or the phrasing she wanted, Lumi would interject. Kenneman was abrasive but seemed fair; he agreed to Olifiela’s of the Lefaneie establishing a base in the city after the conflict was ed almost immediately. “Four and a half hundred good soldiers,” said Kenneman. “I wouldn’t complain if all they were armed with were decently thick sticks. But what do you have? Swords? Bows? Moons. They’ll think you’re performers in a play. Indecorousness of the weaponry aside, I assume you can use it all.” Olifiela nodded and motioned to Lumi to speak. “Every child raised in Jeluli that wasn’t groomed for political or royal seating trained with the bow and arrow each week until it became instinctual,” said Lumi. “Arrows don’t have the stopping power that lead balls do, but they’re much quieter, and the Canalian soldiers won’t be expecting them.” Kenneman nodded curtly, narrowing his eyes. “And is shooting arrows at the Crown soldiers what you are trying to achieve? Is this the route that you want to take?”

Lumi shook her head, but Olifiela remained imive. Lumi glanced at her, willing her to nod. She didn’t. “We will do what is necessary to free this beautiful city,” the beautiful, ancient woman said, grinning wide and showing a mouthful of white teeth. They were exchanging pleasantries and preparing to leave the tent when something crossed Lumi’s mind. Kenneman’s men were numerous, but she didn’t recognise most of them. Surely the people in her old group would have been the first to the Nos Blau Eritiami – the ones less squeamish towards violence, at least. “Before we leave, may I ask,” she said to the man, and Kenneman perked up. “What happened to the group operating before the Nos Blau? The rebels. Led by Irinus.” Kenneman’s expression was dead for a moment, like a lizard’s. Then he smiled and explained. Lumi nodded. She felt a headache coming on.

Chapter 37

Lumi’s voice wasn’t how Alrik had imagined it. First, there had been the march of something that sounded like an army, but with no gunfire or thumping juksha steps. Then, after perhaps an hour, Lumi’s message came. The way it blasted forth from further down in the cirque, Alrik thought she was near the Cascade – though with its echoes, it might have come from anywhere. Alrik took the sword of the man he had killed and once again tied it to the belt around his waist. He took his red satchel, battered and sun-flaked, with a flask of water from the kitchen and some rough bread. He didn’t plan to be gone long, but he’d learned to be prepared. He knocked on the door to his parents’ room, quietly. His father had gone to check on his mother half an hour before, just after Lumi’s speech, and hadn’t returned. Alrik suspected he’d fallen asleep. “I’m going walkabout in the city. I’m curious as to the state of things. I promise I’ll be back soon,” Alrik said, again working to keep his voice low. He nodded to himself and walked out of the house. Part of him felt foolish, like he was breaking a rule. All this distance he’d come, the risks he’d taken, to see his parents safe again, and after a few hours with them he was gone. What am I to do now, though? he thought. He’d come to protect his parents, in whatever way he could, but there was nothing that he could do yet except fret – something he couldn’t help doing. The threat of the Crown loomed in the east, but they were still coming; Lumi’s army was sure to be an unwelcome surprise for them. He’d pestered his father to see if they needed any food or supplies, but they hadn’t. Alrik stood just outside the door of his cramped family home and laughed. He’d ridden most of the way here, badly tied to a huge falar, been attacked by a soldier and a wonagan, walked the rest of the way, and now he was useless.

He shook his head and started walking, his worn shoes kicking up dust on the dirt road. He wasn’t completely useless. He’d done a brave, stupid thing, and come to his parents faster than he could have any other way. He had a relationship of sorts with one of the big players in the city – Lumi, and that army that she had somehow come to lead. That had to count for something. Not that he was any sort of negotiator – he’d managed to stop that Adrest soldier, Yusuth, from shooting him, but that seemed like luck. He closed his eyes and visualised the people he’d met, and what they’d done that related to the conflict in Cinura: Samjal Mantic, the terrorist; Jeang and the crew of Gannet’s ship, transporting some strange cargo in a bizarre mutiny. Their ship had been going to Canalas City. Alrik stopped walking. He was barely a canal’s width from his house. The Mulliver had been docked in Tine, the closest port to Cinura that stayed unfrozen most of the year. The newspapers had said that the same group that attacked Canalas had claimed responsibility for the destruction of the Elderate building in Cinura – the Nos Blau Eritiami. Alrik had thought this an empty claim to increase their notoriety. But if a ship carrying strange cargo and crewed by strange men sailed between two cities, and parts of both of those cities had been blown up and claimed by the same group – what was to say that it wasn’t true? And that the strange cargo had been whatever bombs they’d used? This only works if the Mulliver ever made it into port, though. He thought. Still, his heart raced. Alrik picked up his speed towards Anmon, mind whirring like an arcane windblower. If both attacks truly were supplied with explosives from the Mulliver, then whoever had orchestrated them had to have resources in both Cinura and Canalas City, and probably other places besides. There had been men from far and wide on that ship: far Huzun, Inivan, Skander-Sareen. Alrik had thought those aboard the ship were simply well-travelled. But now he wondered – did they know what they were doing? How far did this plan spread?

Stumbling at a sudden incline, Alrik began to hear a great rustling and mumbling of voices. Whatever words he heard, though, he couldn’t understand. It reminded him of the marching parade in Canalas, and how much it had shaken him. He wasn’t sure that, if what was brewing led to battle, he would be able to do anything but cover his ears and shake. The susurrus of this crowd was different, though, and not just in their language. Where Crown soldiers and guards thudded with their guns and heavy packs, these people seemed to be travelling light. Among the sounds of their talking, breathing and shuffling were subtler sounds; the knocking of thin wood and the shink of velvet. Alrik saw the army then, past an abandoned store painted cyan and rough to the touch. He balked at the crowd, but beyond that, he was curious. It was like seeing Ghii or Sarensa for the first time. People were a kind of nature unto themselves, he thought. Perhaps something he knew would be of merit. He approached the army with caution, conscious of his gangly, awkward silhouette. If for some reason they wanted him dead, he’d be filled with arrows in a few seconds. He shook his head. Some thoughts were best left ignored. No guard stopped Alrik as he approached the army’s perimeter, but a few of them stood. All dressed in dirty sky blue, under the dappled light through the purple trees, they looked like ghosts. Some of them played instruments and sung in quiet harmonies, like they didn’t entirely want to be heard, while others played games with their hands, tapping each other’s fingers in odd rhythms. Curious, fearless eyes in faces swarthy and tan followed Alrik as he came. He cleared his throat, wishing upon the green moon that he had a sonoranteer at hand. “I’d like to speak to Lumi Hellemar,” he announced. His voice carried well enough to those nearby, but got lost in the crowds and trees. One man, however, heard him, bowed at Alrik, and disappeared. Alrik nodded gratefully. The day-moth that alighted on Alrik’s shaking hand ten minutes later was beautiful. Lemon-yellow fibres surrounded its head and thorax like a thick fur coat, and upon its wings was a pattern like honey baked onto cracked ceramics. It didn’t observe Alrik, really; he was just a surface on which it rested. And he was grateful.

Every moment that he wasn’t writing or observing or planning, dread flooded in him like molten sick. His mother was ill, and badly. He’d left Baalgali and Prudence, never to see them again. Sarensa wasn’t built for the woods he’d left her in. He’d taken a man’s life in a violent, cowardly way. That, most of all, couldn’t sit with him. The memory, the cause and the effect, pushed up against the rest of his mind like a tumour. A cold mountain wind came down and the day-moth took flight, erratic around Alrik’s head, and he followed it with his eyes until it was gone. When his eyes came back down, a woman was standing before him. ‘Standing above him’ might have been more appropriate to say; she was tall, with a nose as wide as it was long, thick and short-cropped hair, and an air of menace that mostly came through her eyes. Her skin was dark in a way that Alrik read as southern Huzunite. He blinked, and then he looked to her side. There was a Cinuravese girl, short and tired and thin, looking at him like he was the strangest thing she’d ever seen. Across her shoulder was a red satchel, dirty and worn. Alrik swallowed. “Hello, Alrik,” said the girl – Lumi – extending a hand. Alrik shook it. Her hand was cold, and her fingers were short. He furrowed his brow and tried to maintain eye . “Hello Lumi,” he said. “How, er... how was your trip?” His heart sank as the words left his mouth. Lumi looked at him in utter confusion, a curly lock of hair blowing into one of her eyes, and then she wheezed, bursting into laughter. Alrik ed her, laughing until tears welled at the corners of his eyes. He felt exposed and ridiculous, but also refreshed. It was surreal, as if he were meeting a friend that he already knew for the first time. The Huzunite-looking woman looked on at the two of them, confused, until Lumi, wiping her eye with a grimy hand, addressed her. “Olifiela, this is Alrik. The book boy.” Realisation ed over the woman’s face, and she smiled widely with white teeth. She bowed her head, maintaining the smile. “The book boy,” she said in heavily accented Nuarec. Alrik nodded at her, and she furrowed her brow. Lumi clicked her fingers and nodded her head as she ed something, and then motioned to the woman, addressing Alrik now. “This is Jojeron Olifiela. You are to refer to her by her title.”

Alrik nodded and bowed deeply towards the general. The general looked at him, her smile still present, but lacking teeth. “Interesting that you should refer to me by my title and not Lumi by hers,” she said. Her accent was thick, but the words were confidently spoken. Alrik looked to Lumi, whose face was unreadable. She shrugged. “I’m her advisor, I suppose, but I don’t really have a title. Regardless, might we retire? You can come with us if you want, Alrik. The guard barracks in this district have been cleared, so Kenneman has extended us hospitality there. The rest of the Lefaneie – they might wander the city. They’re a little disoriented and need to adjust. Kenneman’s seeing to it that they’ll have food. The Jojeron and I want to plan, and it’ll be interesting to see your perspective.” Alrik nodded, pleased at how easily the words seemed to come to Lumi. The general stood before them like a statue, ambiguously floating between being a benign and intimidating presence. With a call from Lumi, a moustached man in a sunwaak’s outfit and musket emerged from the bustle, nodded to the trio, and began to lead them. The sounds of foreign chatter and strange and beautiful music faded into echoes as they walked. A few of the ancient soldiers followed them, pottering around with dazed expressions, and by the time they arrived at the barracks they numbered about fifteen. As much as Alrik had felt out of place in the Mulliver and in the apartment in Canalas City, and all the places in between, he had a stranger feeling entering the barracks. There was a mat by the door, coloured by dirt, and pairs of boots beside. The building was blue, though perhaps tinged a little grey. There were many places within the city Alrik called his own that had never been his places. Even this place had been torn away from its previous inhabitants. When Alrik walked in, trailing behind Lumi’s compact form and the tall and stern Lefan general, the first thing he noticed was that the grandfather clock against the far wall was cracked, and its pendulum didn’t swing. An arcane light shone from a fixture in the ceiling, over rows and rows of messy beds. “The sunwaaks certainly left in a hurry once Kenneman’s people arrived,” said Alrik, probing into the quiet with his words. Lumi responded in a way that Alrik read as enthusiasm, and he felt better for it.

Conversation was difficult, but it was rewarding when he got it right. “He talked to us about that,” she said. Alrik thought her words sounded guarded. The Lefaneie were straightening the beds, pushing on the bed frames and feeling the bedsheets with quiet interest. “Kenneman, I mean,” said Lumi. “I was part of a group, back before my party travelled to Ollossos. We weren’t much; maybe thirty people, all meeting in a church in Joyrey and planning how we might change things. While I was in Ollossos, Kenneman spoke to that group. He told them that he had people who could help them. And he did. Somehow, Kenneman produced a hundred men and women willing to fight for us. They struck at night and managed to beat all the sunwaaks back or away from the city. They destroyed the Elderate,” she said, and at the end her voice faltered. She’d written to Alrik before about her desire to free Cinura from the Canalian yoke, but, clearly even to him, this wasn’t how she’d wished it had gone. “That’s generous of him,” said Alrik lamely. Lumi shrugged. “He’s a Dubclochian man. From the west, near the border of Deirfur. Says the Deirfurese government’s sent him to help keep Dubclochian expansion in check. At this point, it’s in our best interests to take him at his word. The Crown will be at the Northern any day now.” By that time, they had entered a well-lit room of lacquered wood chairs and desks, with medals and weapons lining the walls. An office. On the far side of the room, which was larger even than the sleeping quarters they’d walked through, was a plush couch, to which Alrik was immediately drawn. “Was this man’s original idea to hold this city against our enemy with only a hundred and thirty soldiers?” said the general. Her voice startled Alrik, strong and delicate as it was. Lumi looked at the wall for a moment. There was a plaque there, with a name, and a realistic painting: Alberre Philao, First General of Adrest. He was a stern man with eyes like an ancient tortoise, deep in their sockets, and a thin mouth. Alrik wondered where he was, and if he was still alive. “The ideal plan wasn’t and still isn’t for violence to come at all,” said Lumi, quietly. The fact that violence had already come was a clear ‘but.’ “The numbers we have here, now, with the Lefaneie, will just help us with that further. If the

Crown men think that we could fight... they’re much less likely to fight us. We can talk it out. Ninety years ago, Cinura never had anything to bargain or to threaten with. This time, we have an army. That’s the difference.” She stayed where she stood, looking at the plaques and paintings on the wall, while the general Olifiela went to the far end of the room and took a seat at the big, austere dark wood desk there. As she sat, she stumbled; the chair was on wheels. She frowned, and then carefully began to spin. She was ancient, far more so than any person had any right to be. Every one of the Lefaneie were. It disturbed Alrik; he didn’t know how Cinura or even the world would react to this. Extinct species didn’t come back to life, and if they somehow did, their reintroduction could have drastic consequences on the ecosystems they returned to. “If these Canalians are anything like the Meirese I ran from, violence is all they’ll understand,” Olifiela said, slowing her spin and looking over the items on the desk: a dried-out inkwell and a pen, a packet of cigarettes, and a dusty glass that could have held water or beer or anything. “There’s no reason that they’re like the Meirese, though,” said Alrik, and immediately regretted it. Lumi turned to him as if he’d raised and fired a pistol, and Olifiela turned her cold eyes on him. He breathed in sharply. “Well, I mean,” he began. “A thousand years. Forty generations. Their name has changed. Their king has changed dozens of times. They have steam engines and muskets and typewriters. There’s little more connecting them to whoever you fought a millennium ago than there is connecting the Cinuravese and the Lefaneie.” Olifiela blinked slowly, like a house cat. Then she nodded. “You speak well, book boy. It’s naïve of me to expect little to have changed in such a long time. Such a long stretch of time to the rest of the world, perhaps,” she said, and trailed off. For a moment, she almost looked unsure. Then her eyes snapped back to him. “Do they still worship Mond and the Sinners?” she asked. Alrik thought, and then nodded. “They do. No doubt some things have changed, but they still worship the same god. I can’t say what that means about how they may or may not have changed. Nearly a hundred years ago, some people who called themselves the Nos Blau – no Eritiami – tried to take this city from Canalas. They rallied under religion and faith. So, to help prevent it from happening again, they banned public religious practice. Even private religious

practice that they could spot. At least that’s what my parents have told me. I’ve never known a person who held a religion. Or at least I hadn’t until recently.” He ed Prudence and Baalgali, then. “A state without any sort of faith is a bizarre state,” said Olifiela. Lumi was staring at the wall again, sitting on the corner of the desk. Alrik had gravitated to the couch, where he sat up straight. “I have faith in something, I think,” said Lumi. Her eyes were still far away, but focused on the distance, as if searching. “If my access to magic has shown me anything, it’s that many things influence us that we cannot perceive. I don’t know if I believe in Mond or the Kandriian Zhayry or the Lefaneie gods. But I am sure there’s something out there.” “Perhaps you’ll find Amenofriak, and start worshipping our gods,” said Olifiela, leaning back in her chair, sarcastic. “You can start a revival in this modern age.” “I’d like to do a bit more looking first,” said Lumi, and she smiled. Alrik smiled too and leaned against his hand. The moment was quiet and calm. Friendly, even, with a girl he only knew from words and a woman who should have been a thousand years dead. Within days, soldiers of the Crown would march into the city and demand to see order restored. Knowing that gave the scene a surreal quality. More surreal still was that it gave Alrik hope – there was reason to believe this situation be different. The sight of more than four hundred Lefaneie soldiers amongst Kenneman and his men could be both intimidating and confusing enough to make things change. It was a strange time. Alrik, exhausted, fell asleep on the couch, only to awaken a few hours later to the sound of the bulk of the Lefaneie army finding their bunk beds, chatting and singing amongst themselves. An anxious-looking Lumi gave him instructions on how he might avoid them on his way out. He thanked her, and she smiled at him again. The last he saw of her was her looking over Olifiela’s shoulder as she pored over a map of the city covered in lines and notes. Alrik arrived at his silent house, checked in on his parents and saw them sleeping, and went to his room for the first time in Mond knew how long. His mother had neatened it. He stripped off everything but his underclothes, feeling the chill, until fell into his bed and pulled the blankets around him. He almost

exclaimed from the comfort. After laying silently for what felt like an age, Alrik lit the candle by his bedside with an acrid smelling match, and thumbed through his worn semi-stolen books until sleep took him.

Chapter 38

Alrik had tiptoed from the police complex, a frightened look on his face, but managed to leave with little issue. His appearance was still startling to Lumi; to see someone’s handwriting, one imagined a voice in the words that could never approach what a person could be like in the flesh. Alrik was as real as the wind or the concrete in the lower districts or the bark of the jacaranda trees. The contrast between the nebulous word-Alrik and the real thing was disturbing. He picked his nose, for one thing. None of the bunks in the complex were big enough for both Lumi and Olifiela to sleep on together, so Olifiela opted to take the bottom bunk, while Lumi took the top. It was a cold night, and she huddled in her blankets until she was warm, but sleep was evasive. The thought that the Crown could arrive at any time and roll over the city like a storm stuck like a needle. If they attacked at night – a strategically advantageous move – they could reinstate their power in the city before any kind of treaty or concession could be arranged. Lumi lay wide-eyed for a time and then got out of bed. Her Lefan coat was dirty and stained, but it was the warmest thing she had, so she pulled it on. She opened the door with a creak to the sound of whispering Lefaneie who were clearly struggling to sleep themselves. She stepped into the cold, which gave form and whiteness to her breath, and closed the door behind her. She ed Alrik saying he had gone on night walks. He knew all the paths that weren’t watched by the sunwaaks, all the little alcoves and alleys and urban oases where the most interesting insects and small animals could be found. There were no sunwaaks anymore, and Lumi found herself wandering in a wide circle through streets of worn cyan brick complexes and flickering arcane streetlights. The jacarandas were starting to lose their flowers, looking awkward and halfdressed. Lumi leant on one, feeling the springy grass of its island under her

boots, and then she heard a cry. She turned her head. A sound came again, but it was more strangled. It was a human. A girl. Lumi’s mind moved to the most logical places. A girl was lost. Being attacked. Being raped. Her stomach turned and she called out. “Hello! Hello, are you well? I’m here. Call out to me!” The words echoed and then were lost in the winding streets and cracked concrete. There was silence enough for Lumi to take three long breaths, and then a cry came again, more deliberate this time. Lumi began to run. Another cry came, and it was close now. Coming from one of those little alcoves Alrik had talked about, this one containing a tree. A tree, and a girl struggling. Lumi’s feet pounded against the concrete, and her mouth tasted of acid. She was at the foot of the tree, and in front of the girl. The girl was dirty and soaked in tears, tangled in the branches three men’s heights from the ground. Her arms had bled where sticks had prodded her. She looked down, saw Lumi, and she lost all muscle tone, collapsing further. “Leave me alone, Lumi,” said the girl. She looked pathetic, dangling like a misplaced doily, soggy. Lumi shook her head and took a few steps forward. “Gir, what are you doing? You’ll hurt yourself. You already have. Can you get down from there? Can I help you?” Girrin barked a laugh. “I’d like to get down,” she said. “I only climbed up here so that I could throw myself off. Every bloody building is locked. I couldn’t find a roof. So, I found a tree. And now I’m fucking tangled in it.” Lumi stepped closer, and Girrin didn’t protest. “Why do you want to do that?” asked Lumi, her voice shaking. The knowledge of what Girrin had attempted swelled within her like bile. It wasn’t to say that she herself had never considered it, when times were their toughest at home, and in the deathly cold of Ollossos, but she’d never come this close. “My parents. My little sister. Little Mavin,” said Girrin, and she spat, pulling herself up into something like sitting, ed by a web of sharp and wobbling branches. “Dead. Burned by Kenneman’s men in the first assault. They burned in our house. Our Can’las house” She spat again, and there was blood in her saliva. Lumi’s heart sank. “I’m sorry,” she said, feeling lame and ineffectual.

Girrin laughed again, wiping the mucus and tears off her face and righting herself even more. “No, you’re not. You’ve sided with that monster. You’ve given him the Lefan army. How many more children are they going to burn? You have no heart, Lumi Hellemar. You do what’s convenient when it suits you, the consequences be damned. The people be damned. You claim to have done this, all of this – Ollossos, everything – for the people here. Yet now you’re in bed with the man who’s gotten a lot of them killed. And don’t even get me started on who you’re actually in bed with.” Lumi stood and let her talk. Every moment that she spoke was a moment she wasn’t trying to throw herself onto the concrete. Lumi’s first impulses were to rebut, with things like What else was I supposed to do? He has control of the city and Your family was part of the gentry you knew we were setting out to dismantle. She held her tongue, and simply stood, hands behind her back and watching, heart aching as if a juksha had its foot upon her chest. “Gods, for once we’re together and you’re not talking,” said Girrin. “You talk so much. You make speeches. You talk your way into and out of things. But you don’t talk to me anymore. You found that woman and forgot about me. You forgot about everyone.” Lumi swallowed, and Girrin looked at her. A moment ed, crickets chirping in the distance, away from the buildings. Then, Girrin went loose again as if she had no muscles to speak of. “Get me down.” A breath. “Please.” Taking the little box from her satchel, Lumi took a lozenge and let it sit on her tongue until the tox came. She chewed the tablet, tasting grass and citrus and something nastier to speed up the reaction. Then she felt her perception shift. It was basic fenworking that anyone in Olifiela’s army could have done after a lick of toxaument and a thought, but Lumi was focused, sweating, on performing it as delicately as she could. She placed a distant grip upon one of the tree branches and snapped it with a jerk. She felt the wood give way, not in her body, but in her mind. She did this until a jagged path was cleared from where Girrin lay dead-eyed to the ground below. She took a deep breath. Escaping into the magic made it easier to ignore everything that had and was going to transpire, but focusing was still difficult. She lacked training in a bad way. “I’m going to pull on you for a moment. It’ll feel strange, so don’t worry,” she

said to Girrin. The girl blinked but didn’t respond otherwise. Lumi took another deep breath, and then, forcing her connection to the Quodrine into two halves, to split her mind in two. Both parts pressed down on the tree branches below Girrin, so that they couldn’t reach up and stab her. She began to carry Girrin down from the tree. Despite her state, Girrin let out a small gasp. When her mind could no longer hold the strain, Lumi’s body began to feel the weight, and for once she was glad rather than worried by her friend’s waifishness. Lumi carried Girrin down off the tree until she could re- her thoughts again, and the tree branches came back up with a crack that broke several of them. Lumi, now holding Girrin suspended in the air and sweating with the effort, walked beneath her, arms raised, and released her hold. The false sunwaak standing guard outside Kenneman’s camp let Lumi in without a word, even as she cradled the bleeding woman in her arms. Cinuravese faces nodded at her in the gloom, and she nodded back when the streetlights or campfires dotting the area illuminated her. She found the Anmon Cascade itself quiet except for its incessant dull roar. Lumi dissolved a pill of powdered Ictonish acacia blossom and fleeced magnolia under her tongue. Girrin lay shivering on the moss until Lumi let go some of the power the toxaument gave her and released heat into the air. Girrin’s shivering stopped, and she took a deep breath. She glanced to the side, at the black hole and flowing ribbon of glassy water that was all that was visible of the cascade. “You can’t heat the whole stream, Lume,” said Girrin. Lumi kneeled, staining her knees green, and smiled. “I know.” She cupped her hands together and took a handful of water from the stream and lifted it, imparting it with heat until it almost scalded her hands. Then, she let it drip onto a gash on one of Girrin’s arms, where it steamed and washed away some of the blood. Girrin watched with lazy interest. When all the cuts and scrapes on Girrin’s front were cleaned, Lumi took her by the small of her back and helped her sit up. Their faces were only an inch or so apart. Girrin leaned forward and placed her forehead against Lumi’s. “I know you’re not heartless, Lume,” she said, her voice tired and fragile. The words reverberated through Lumi’s head. “I know why you sided with that man. That

doesn’t help now, though. It doesn’t replace anything.” Lumi almost nodded, but didn’t, so she could stay where she was against Girrin. Instead, she grasped Girrin’s hand, squeezed it, and went back to cleaning her wounds. They disengaged shortly after, Girrin staring off into the distance where the Crown soldiers would soon come from, her eyes empty as if she were blind. Lumi dressed her wounds with fresh torn-up menstrual rags and healing toxauments chewed up and spat out; Lumi wasn’t a nearworker. She asked for a blanket from a guard and was given one. Her word carried some weight since the deal with Olifiela, her and Kenneman. She cocooned Girrin in it, seating them both by a blazing fire, leaning into each other wordlessly somewhere between sleep and waking, until dawn came. Lumi awoke to the sound of shouting. It wasn’t long past dawn, and the cirque was still wreathed in mist. The fire had gone out, and she was freezing. Girrin was gone, too; only she wasn’t. She was scaling a pole in the centre of the encampment that had been erected overnight, a sort of makeshift lookout that could have been a crow’s nest if it had been on a ship. Lumi glanced back at the embers of the fire, and with a few false starts, managed to get them hot again with what toxaument was left in her body. By then, Girrin was at the top of the tower in its little nest, standing straight up and looking north. North towards the only age into the city big enough for an army. She took a telescope from a coat pocket – she must have taken it or been gifted it from one of Kenneman’s men – and looked out. Something in her posture changed. She stayed like that, looking for a few moments. Then she cupped her hands around her mouth and shouted down. Her words were inaudible for half a moment before they reached the threshold of a sonoranteer down below and became almost deafening. “I can see them!” Girrin was shouting, anxious and excited both. “The Crown soldiers, I can see them coming up towards the northern age!” Lumi felt far colder than she had a moment before, her blood gone to ice. The message of the soldiers’ arrival had sent a buzz through the camp, and Cinuravese and Lefaneie armsmen and organisers went to and fro, discussing, arming themselves, all in hushed but in bright tones. Out of the hubbub came Olifiela, motioning for Lumi to follow her into Kenneman’s tent past one of the dead fires. Lumi held out a hand, ‘wait,’ and turned to watch Girrin make her way down the misplaced crow’s nest. Only when her friend was safely on the ground did she follow Olifiela into the tent.

The tent was crowded. There was Olifiela, a thick Lefan jacket pulled over her nightclothes, hair messy and eyes wild, and about five other high-rankers, Lefan and Cinuravese alike. They all crowded around a map of the city, marked from the top and the north where the Canalians would come in, and how they’d likely organise once they ed the Can’las Houses and entered the city proper. It’d likely take them an hour and a half to get all their men and animals to the city from the . Down in the bowl, the Lefaneie and Cinures had an hour and a half to consolidate their plans. “We funnel them into a residential area in the north of the city – Murkurkil or Arama. We surround them, make their numbers more burdensome than helpful. Get Lefaneie on the rooves and slowly reveal them as the Crown assembles. We mustn’t make any agreements until the full weight of our forces are revealed,” said Mister Kalkin, the grey-haired medallioned man who was one of Kenneman’s chief advisors. Lumi took up a place beside Olifiela and quietly translated words she might not understand. Then she cleared her throat and spoke up. “The plan is mostly good,” she said, “but it couldn’t be Murkurkil. Too many wide roads and big estates there. Plus, the fact that the Can’las houses have been burnt down means cover will be hard to come by. I’d recommend directing the Crown into either Arama, or if we can stretch them far enough, the Tall Quarter to the east. The roads are narrow, and the buildings are built high; it’s a good place to surround someone and shout at them.” Kalkin looked at her unsurely, digested, and then nodded. The Lefan gathered there, once everything had been translated and provided sufficient context, agreed as well; they would make the Crown deal with them on their own , and it’d happen in the quiet northern district of Arama.

Chapter 39

Two orange figures made murky in the mist let the congregation into the city. Bolstered by the second caravan, which had finally come two days late, the Crown men were fifteen hundred strong. Yusuth was just a figure among hundreds now, marching, carrying his musket; a man doing a job for the mez. He hadn’t expected them to just let his men in. Whispers of what happened at the front of the formation rippled back to him as they marched; there had been no attempt at a show of force or even negotiation. They’d just turned to the side. Yusuth ed one, a ruffian in a stolen policeman’s robe with a blank face. Yusuth stared at him, but the man looked straight ahead as if he wasn’t there. Man and juksha kicked the loose dirt into clouds of dust, which mixed with the mist to fill the air with the almost-too-calming scent of petrichor – but there was sickly burnt tinge to it, too. The reports were true; every house, every gazebo, every restaurant in the Crown Quarter had been burnt to the ground. Yusuth’s stomach turned, wondering if anyone had been inside when it had happened. This was a directed attack. Inevitably, further east in the city they’d see the smashed ruins of the House of the Elderate, just like the Canalian Parliament’s west wing. Bile snaked at the back of his throat. These people were willing to go far. “Halt!” cried general Philan, a fresh-faced man of perhaps thirty-five taking over from the infirm Mikan for all three assembled squadrons. He spoke strongly, but looked nervous; he was easily the youngest general Yusuth had ever seen. All fifteen hundred men stopped within a moment. The whispers ebbed back to him, and he heard why they’d stopped – several great chunks of house had been laid on the road leading to the city’s heart as if stacked there by a giant, or, more likely, a group of magicworkers. The similarity to what Yusuth had seen become of the cart filled him with anxiety. With the path to the east only leading to a winding, circuitous route out of the city, the little army was forced to turn west, onto a wide, open road. Loose dirt

became packed dirt and then gravel. Small blue houses, seemingly abandoned, began to appear. Every step that Yusuth took felt weighed down not only by his supplies, his dagger, and his musket, but by fear. They were being herded, and every man there less green than Middagh knew that. It was a common tactic, but it was a tactic, which was more than they’d expected from the Cinures; what was their plan? Would they lead them to a narrow street and pelt them with rocks and whatever weapons they could find? Would they attempt a full-on assault, using a specific chokepoint to their advantage? Or, if it weren’t to come to violence, was this simply a way of making them feel controlled, less intimidating when it came down to their surrender or negotiation attempts? They travelled like this for half an hour, and by the time they had arrived deeper in the city, the buildings grew tall, and the streets narrow, and in the distance, arcane and flaming lights were aglow in houses. The army began to turn the corner long before Yusuth did, and he felt the change in the formation, more as a gasp or commotion than any legible whisper. As he turned, he saw a congregation. Fifty men and women stood in the centre of the road, in a relaxed formation. Their features were impossible to pick out, but they looked mostly Cinuravese, with some anomalies. At the front stood a woman, tall and dark in odd blue clothing. To her right was a Cinuravese girl, and to her right was a man, tall and pale, who, after only a moment, slipped into the crowd. Canalian? His stomach turned. A high-pitched whine swept the crowd as a sonoranteer fumbled their start, and then a woman’s voice came out across the road. Yusuth, far up on the road’s incline, could see everything. “My name is Lumi Hellemar, and I represent Cinura. We are here to negotiate, so bring your leaders. No one will be armed.”

The sheer size of the Crown’s battalion was overwhelming. Estimates had numbered them at a thousand and a half. Lumi knew that this was little compared to what actual armies stood at, but combined with the strict way that they marched, the thump of the wide feet of their juksha, and their upheld guns, they were menacing regardless. She wondered for a moment if they might stop, but they didn’t; they were about fifty metres away, at this point. She could taste the dust in the air, smell sweat and juksha. She nodded to her sonoranteer, a wiry woman she hadn’t caught the name of. As she did so, she heard whispers to her side between Kenneman and Olifiela, the former then disappearing into the crowd behind them. Lumi furrowed her brow, and in her distraction amplified her sharp breath, sending a screech across congregation. She balled her fists and made her statement. It echoed throughout the street’s high buildings until it became muffled in the mass of warm, shuffling Canalian bodies across from them. There was relative silence. The Crown soldiers had stopped, all in even neat rows like pieces in a board game. For a moment, Lumi wondered if they might just ignore what she’d said, push through them and retake the city by force. That was an unacceptable outcome with the ancient Lefaneie hiding in the houses and alleyways all around them, armed with old-fashioned weapons and deadly toxauments. At the back of her mind, too, she wondered about Kenneman; where, by the moons, had he gone? Thankfully, their request did not go unanswered. A single man riding a gracile juksha, both in finery the grey, blue, white and gold of the Dubclochian flag, parted the crowd around him like reeds in the wind. He was a tall man, with a straight back, broad shoulders, and a pale, broad face like a piece of slate, smooth and young. He trotted towards Lumi’s group, and she could feel Olifiela shuffle uncomfortably, but she didn’t turn to see what was wrong. The leader, whoever he was, stopped two metres in front of them, but didn’t dismount. He and his juksha loomed over them like one creature. Beyond, the army stood like statues. Lumi once again felt the hand of the clock fall on her. She cleared her throat. “State your name and your intentions,” she said. Her sonoranteer glanced at her, but she waved her off.

The Canalian general looked down on her, literally and otherwise, and raised his voice with an expression like he shouldn’t have had to exert the effort. “General Philan of Adrest, the capital of Roït,” the man said, rolling the ‘r’ in ‘Roït’ as if in a conscious effort not to sound Cinuravese. “My intentions are to clean up the mess that’s been made here with as little fuss as possible.” Lumi kept her eyes on him as he spoke. Was he nervous? She wasn’t sure. Something about the cant of his shoulders, though, suggested worry. “And how do you propose to do that?” asked Lumi. She was getting better at projecting her voice now, she thought, magic or no magic. The general’s juksha stirred, and he pulled at its reins to settle it. “I propose that you let us take you into our custody to receive your proper treatment, as well as everyone else involved in the topical events. I propose that you let us , to go down into the city to wherever you’ve put good Canalian working men, and let them out and help them out of whatever Mond-damned conditions you’ve left them in. I propose that we take the money it’ll cost to rebuild the Crown Quarter from you once we’ve dealt with all the ridiculous nonsense that you’ve left on our doorstep!” By the time he reached the end of his rant, the corners of his mouth were white with spittle and his slate face was painted red. Lumi felt the situation slipping away from her. Despite the attacks on Cinura and even Canalas City itself, the Crown had not come with any intention of negotiation or bargaining. Yet, she had to try. She opened her mouth to speak, but someone spoke to her side before she could. “Didn’t you have difficulties coming here, General Philan?” said Olifiela. Philan turned to her as if he had only just noticed her. His expression changed, every line morphing into a slightly different shape that Lumi couldn’t quite understand. Olifiela smiled warmly. “Yes, that’s correct,” she said, audibly working the Lefan accent from her voice. “Something went wrong on the way here. Pieces have moved and they’ve moved other pieces and terrible things have come crawling out.” Lumi couldn’t stop herself from looking at Olifiela in confusion, but when she’d turned back to the general, the red of his face was now pale white, a mask of fear. “I notice that you don’t have any Hetterfolk with you either, even though reports

said you should,” said Olifiela, taking a step towards the man and his juksha. “Did something stop them from coming, or did they just choose not to? It’s strange.” The general was petrified, and Lumi’s heart was racing. The tension travelled from the man all the way up his army, hands grasping tighter on muskets. Where are the Lefaneie? she asked herself. She even glanced up among the houses, a conspicuous move, but she could see no one. Her blood was cold. Something or someone had stopped the gradual revelation. The thousand and a half soldiers in front of them would see only the fifty of them lumped together as no threat. No leverage in negotiation. Oh, no. Oh, no, no, no. “I do not have to take this from you,” said the general at last. Olifiela backed away and then looked up into one of the buildings herself. With a sickeningly decisive muffled scrape, the general drew a sabre from his belt. “Step aside, or lay down your arms and let yourselves be arrested. I didn’t come all the way here to –” he was cut off, as someone, somewhere, laid a thick layer of deadening over him. Lumi tried to shout, but the words only echoed around her body with nowhere to go. At the same time, a mist was coming upon them; a thick, white, unnatural mist that swallowed up Lumi, Olifiela, their fifty Cinures, and every single soldier exclaiming silently in fear further up the road. Lumi’s mind ran so fast her head hurt, and she stumbled to the side, reaching for Olifiela or anyone else who might know what was happening or who had done this. Then, the arrows began to fly.

Chapter 40

About one fifth of the city had walked out of their homes and travelled to the northern age on that day in a sort of little exodus to see whatever was to happen when the Crown soldiers and the Nos Blau Eritiami came to bear. The other four-fifths of the city were sensible and stayed in their homes. Alrik was on the street with the travelling fifth for some time until he slipped away from them and onto one of the many paths he’d memorised over the years. It was a strange kind of calm to slip into old habits after travelling so far away and so far back. The main difference was the sword he held at his hip – if a Canalian soldier threatened him, he could wave it. Only wave it. He didn’t have to worry about the army walking down into the city, or his mother sick in her bed. He could take each step knowing what the ground felt like here, what could grow there, and what might live there if he cared to lift a rock or a cobblestone. If it weren’t for the people and animals that might appear in his path, he could have done it blindfolded. As he had many times before, Alrik travelled to the richer part of the city through its poorest links, its alleys. Where rainwater and human waste had run through the gutters, life had bloomed, with little rivulets and small trees growing where sewerage grates had become blocked and formed puddles. One of them that Alrik ed had once held a shining black frog that had made a sound like a fussing infant. The pool was empty now, but the weeds around it had grown little blue flowers. From Anmon to Ayek to Arama, the buildings grew taller and finer, the wood and stone more polished, the roads smoother, the arcane streetlights steadier in their light. The roads became steeper too, in the way of streets that are more often ridden upon than walked upon. There was walking now, though; Alrik had left the adventurous Cinuravese behind him, and before he was fully aware of it, he found himself uncomfortably close to the place he’d only been planning on seeing from afar. He was in an alleyway, the mouth of which opened onto another steep street, and

through it he could see the first line of Cinuravese rebels. His eyes widened as he saw that one of them was Lumi – she was talking to someone in front of her he couldn’t see atop a decorated juksha, just the front of a head wrapped in Dubclochian colours from where Alrik stood. They talked for a few moments in words he couldn’t hear over the wind through the alleyway. He didn’t dare step out, but watched, and tried to listen. He saw the tall, darkskinned Lefan general step towards the juksha, her posture confident. A minute ed, and then the alleyway filled with mist. For a moment, Alrik’s brain attempted to rationalise the fog. The cirque trapped great clouds coming off the mountains, leading to rain and flood – perhaps, somehow, a cloud had descended amongst the houses. Perhaps the normal morning mist had thickened. However, upon hearing the commotion coming from outside the alleyway – which he could now no longer discern from the alleyway itself – he realised that it was deeply unnatural. His stomach dropped to his foot and as he stumbled back. He felt for the wall, him and it moist from the mist, and clung to it, cringing at how it wet his shirt. Outside the alley, he heard sounds – cries that might have been pain, echoes of surprise and shock and the clanging of armour and weaponry. Then, nothing. Alrik opened his mouth, felt his throat vibrate as the word ‘what?’ was formed, but it stopped there. The air was deadened. Alrik, and everyone else in range, was now deaf and blind. He stayed close to the wall, relying on his sense of touch to guide him when not much else could. Things had clearly gone badly during the confrontation; there was no other reason that the Lefaneie would have done this. Unless the Crown somehow had enough magic s with them to have done this, in which case things had gone very wrong. Alrik tried to feel what was happening. One day, when he was younger and a little less afraid of sunwaaks, he’d travelled into some of the caverns the Anmon flowed into. There, in the darkness, there were olms – little, pale things, like boneless fingers frilled with gills and tiny, vestigial legs. They’d had no eyes and no nose. Yet, when he stepped too close, they’d slithered away into the dark water. He drew on that now. The magic was suppressing the vibrations of sound in the

air, but there was simply too much mass in the ground to stop it there. Alrik closed his eyes – not that they’d been helping anyway – and felt. There was a rumbling out on the road from hundreds of human feet, and between them, the deeper thumps from the pads of juksha. The vibrations were hard to determine, especially through Alrik’s shoes, but they seemed to be growing weaker, more spread out. They were scattering. He felt a thumping close by and felt the air move as someone, or a group of people, ed by, and he hugged even closer to the wall. There was a ripple in the air, as if it were water hit with a stone, and with a savage rush, sound came back. Alrik clutched at his ears and opened his eyes to see that the mist had cleared a little, but his head was reeling with pain. Cries of men and women, the sounds of things flying – arrows, Alrik was almost sure – and war instruments, after silence, were deafening. Then the sounds cut out again. Alrik scampered away from the site of the clash as fast as he could, navigating by the mist-slick wall with the fingers of one hand. Sounds became muffled and then painfully loud and quiet from moment to moment. The mist eddied at a gust of wind funnelled through the alleyway, showing a figure, only briefly, standing, wet, terrified. She was short and everycoloured, in the Cinuravese way. “Lumi!” cried Alrik, but the dying deadening spell cut off the second syllable of the word. Before the mist overtook her once more, Lumi turned to look at him, and began to run. “Alrik!” she cried, and her voice was clearer. The spell was nearly gone. “I’ll make a flame, try to burn away some fog. Come closer.” Alrik did. The flame that Lumi formed was a hovering light, perhaps an arm’s length above Lumi’s head, and at first did more to obscure their surroundings by filling the fog with blinding light. Then, some fog thinned and Alrik could see Lumi’s face again, up closer than he’d known he was. She looked lost and terrified. “What’s happening?” he asked her. She shook her head. “We need to get into one of these buildings. They should be full of Lefaneie who’ll listen to me. Gods above,” she said, breathing in.

Alrik nodded dumbly, turning pale as the realisation crept into him of what ‘we’ meant. “I don’t want to fight anyone,” he said. “I didn’t come here to fight anyone. I came here to see what happened in the negotiations. I –” “Alrik,” said Lumi, stepping even closer so he could see the bags under her eyes, the tiny hairs on her cheeks. “I didn’t want to fight either. I don’t know why it’s happening or who started it or what I’m going to have to do to make it stop, but it’s happening. You have a sword. I have a spear, and I have my magic. Gods hope that we don’t have to defend ourselves, but if we do, I hope that you’d have the nerve to me if it meant protecting this city; my family, your family, every child and animal within the cirque.” Alrik stepped back and then stopped. He felt odd; anger and fear mixing uncomfortably in his gut. He nodded. Lumi held the flame above them as she searched for a street-level door to one of the many apartments around them. One of them, with a recently painted white door that stood out odd among the blue, presented itself, but was padlocked. Lumi placed a hand around the lock and, with a few moments of tension in her fingers and wrist, heated the lock until it popped, and the door swung open. The foyer must have been well-maintained before an ancient guerrilla force had been through it. A flight of stairs that had been white and shiny was covered in footprints made by shoes that had been tailored more than a millennium ago, and probably not washed since. Modern amenities, like an arcane clock and lamp, had been cast aside to allow easier age. There were no Lefaneie on the bottom floor. Lumi didn’t seem surprised and immediately set off up the stairs. “Whoever lives or lived here really seems to wish they were in Canalas Town,” said Alrik, following her. Lumi raised a finger to her lips to shush him, but smiled and nodded. Alrik didn’t ask why they had to be quiet when they were walking to Lumi’s own people. He only followed. Lumi came to the door, wriggled its handle, and saw it wasn’t locked. She looked at Alrik and nodded again. He found his hand hovering to the hilt of the dead man’s rapier. Lumi opened the door quietly, and Alrik stayed close behind. Then Lumi shouted a sharp order in Lefaneie. “Lefaneie lakan ła. Niexeron ło lün pü uniepe lile. Lata ane!” “Lata! Niexeron, lata!” came voices. There were at least ten, maybe closer to

twenty, all crowded around the windows of the trashed upper floor apartment. A little of the mist had drifted in from the street below, and their forms were obscured, before Lumi cracked the knuckle in her thumb, breathed in, and pushed the air outside with a burst of wind. Alrik tried not to worry about how much toxaument she was taking. The air was slightly obscured, still, and Alrik realised it was the haze of magic. Each of the Lefaneie here, even clutching their longbows and polishing their swords, were toxxing. “You,” said Lumi to one of the soldiers closest to her, a woman with eyes that could have been Inivanese and a great stringed beam of a bow in her hands. “You speak any Nuarec?” The woman nodded. “Some, niexeron.” Lumi nodded, glancing out the window. The fog was nearly gone, maybe waist height off the ground, and the street was deserted now – they shouldn’t stay for long. Random shouts punctuated outside, but not any gunfire – yet. “Who ordered this attack against the Canalians, xurere? The Meirexe?” asked Lumi. The archer cocked her head. “Jojeron e üm niexeron Kenneman üm you, niexeron,” said the woman. “This was idea, eh, plan, no?” Lumi shook her head, frustrated. Alrik stood apart from both, looking out over the street. Something seemed to move, but Alrik decided it was a tendril of dying mist. “I didn’t order for this pointless violence, xurere. I was there in the negotiations,” said Lumi. “Neither Kenneman nor Olifiela ordered this to happen. You were intended as an intimidation force unless the Canalians instigated an attack first. They were meant to see you. You weren’t meant to hide; they were meant to see you!” The archer frowned, parsing the words into her own tongue in a few moments, and then nodded. “A bad thing has happened. We should collect ourselves, gather in a place, niexeron.”

Lumi nodded, seeming more satisfied, but just as anxious. Alrik was looking over the street again. The mist had fallen even further, and with a lurch he realised that some of the shapes it had hidden were bodies. Nearly all of them were Crown, stuck with arrows or crushed underfoot in the confusion and chaos. Some of them were Cinuravese, and even some of those had met their fate at the point of an arrow. Alrik tried to contain his vomit. Most of them weren’t moving, but a few were. His eyes wandered from them, trying to process the sight, to a group of slightly darker shadows hugging the wall of a nearby alley. Then, the momentary flash of something shiny, metallic. “Down! Get down!” shouted Alrik, and in a moment the flowery wallpaper behind them was blown apart by a volley of musket fire. Luckily, everyone in the room had known enough Nuarec to stop in time, but a bow that had been leaning near the door, unstrung, was shattered. When the spray of debris had finished falling, Lumi urged them up again, stopped to pick something small from the floor and rushed down the stairs. “We need to see their movements. Xuxeri, nock your bows, and Alrik,” she said, turning to him, and touching his shoulder gently. “Draw your sword if you must. Your life is important.” Then she turned away, addressing them all again. “Move as quickly as you can without moving loudly. We’re going to Lagtower.”

Lumi rolled the crushed musket ball around in her fingers. It was cold and rugged where it had collided with the wall, but it was something. It might help her. She pocketed it, stepping out of the shade of a building and savouring the mild sun that came down on her now that the mist was gone. At the same time, she felt her heartbeat quicken. They were in a battle now – or was it a battle, really? Her feet struck the concrete too loudly. “This is a mistake. This is just a tragic fucking mistake, and we can mend it. We’ll find the turncoats, punish them, and we can return things to... to...” she trailed off. Alrik, closer than she’d thought, was looking at her in interest, confusion, or both. “What?” she snapped. His eyes widened, and he fell back into the rear of their group without a word. Lumi took a breath, glancing left, right and upwards at an intersection before waving her group on. They broke into a jog. The district of Laggen wasn’t far – north of the Anmon and east of the central business district. There wasn’t much reason that the Crown soldiers would seek it out unless they also had designs on its vantage point. Lumi pursed her lips, even as she ran, as Lagtower grew larger in her vision. Perhaps they should sneak in. So they did. On approaching the mossy mound of earth the tower sat upon, and after checking the perimeter twice and then thrice, Lumi walked to the door and tried the doorknob. It was unlocked. She frowned. She pushed the door, and the thick wood slid forward in its stone frame and opened silently. She went in front, taking the steps two at a time, focusing on keeping herself contained. Even within the confines of the stairway, she felt as if she were to balloon outwards, burst in fear and anger and confusion and excitement, run away or jump off something tall. So, she put the utmost care into every quick step, making sure they fell without so much as a thump. Behind her she could hear the footsteps of her group, less cautious but hopefully not too cacophonous. Finally, she was at the door, and the person behind her (who had been the quietest of the bunch) nearly ran into her. It was Alrik. She nodded at him and then stepped away to allow some more space. She tried the older, rustier handle to the tower’s room, and that turned, too. She pointed to Alrik’s sword – where had he gotten that wicked thing? – and he

grimaced but nodded. She whispered to the archer, a woman named Ełaem, to tell the others to keep their blades ready. It wasn’t unreasonable that some Crown soldiers might have seen Lagtower in the distance and gone in. Then, Lumi counted down on her fingers and aloud in Lefaneie, her breaths heating her fingers in the close air, and then kicked the door open. No one was there. The room was in ruins, and it stank. Where the doctor had placed his books and specimens up on shelves, the specimens were either gone or on the floor to rot, their embalming fluid inundating the books until they too began to decompose. The windows were flung wide open and had been for a long while, judging from the way the desk and chair were sun-bleached, and a recent rain had sent little weeds and tiny mushroom stalks growing from the Doctor’s chair. He was nowhere to be seen. “No one has been here in a long time,” said Alrik, leaning against the wall, nose wrinkled at the stench. “Something’s happened to the doctor. He was acting... strange. Very strange when I left.” “Wouldn’t surprise me,” replied Lumi, rubbing her eyes. Alrik then turned away to look at the books scattered all over the floor and scooped them up as best he could, trying to avoid the stagnant liquid. Lumi looked at him in curiosity, then steeled herself, and stepped toward the window. Her posse of Lefaneie, led by Ełaem, followed in, crowding around the window. Ełaem’s bow was unstrung now and tied around her back. Lumi had to blink a few times before she could see the city clearly. Facing south, she could see more than she’d anticipated; in the older parts of the city, further from Can’las town, the buildings were shorter and squatter, without the rain gutters the Canalians built into their houses. She could see movement from all sorts of folk, and she squinted to discern them. Crown men, marching in a formation to the southeast, towards the central business district. A smaller force than the one that had been herded into Ayrance, but still numbering several hundred. Even where she was, far out of musket range, her chest constricted with fear. Aurin, Girrin and Ford were in Anmon, and now there was a battalion between them and her. “They’re going to the police station. They’re going to try to free the sunwaaks.”

Chapter 41

Amagically amplified call surged up from the streets below them, and the formation of the marching Crown men shivered as if they’d been struck. It wasn’t their call, then. Alrik looked to Lumi, whose face was scrunched up in concentration as she listened. The call came again. Alrik had no clue what it said, but Lumi’s face lit up. “It’s Lefaneie,” she said. “It might be Olifiela. She’s saying, ‘To the west, gather, crack in the mountain.’” The call came out again, and Alrik himself finally leaned out of the window, appreciating the sun for just a moment before the wind chilled him. Then he made the connection. “There’s an old dry rivulet carved in the side of the cirque in the west of Laggen. I’ve been there a few times.” “Sound is close,” agreed Ełaem. Alrik pointed west, away from where the Crown soldiers were marching. They couldn’t see it from that angle, but he knew the way. Lumi looked at him, as if trying to read him, categorise him, and pin him down like a butterfly in a case, and nodded. “Alright,” she said. “The old dry riverbed. On the way down, Ełaem and I will lead in case any Crown has moved nearby. Once we’re secure, Alrik will take the lead. Understood?” She looked at Alrik, and he paled, but nodded. He was reluctant to leave the tower, even as Lumi confirmed that it was safe. He touched down on the springy, mossy ground, took a breath to steady himself, and then closed his eyes, putting his faith in those around him as best he could. In his mind’s eye, he walked every street that branched out from where he stood, every dead end and every nook. “There are several ways to get to the dry rivulet, but the most direct one doesn’t give us much leeway if we bump into any Crown soldiers. Most routes that I can think of have long, straight stretches of road or alley that would be bad to be caught in. There are two other ways I can think of, but I’m not sure if you’ll like them,” he said. He mentally patted himself on the back for mostly containing his babbling. “Why not?” asked Lumi, voice brusque.

Alrik scratched his shoulder. “Well, we’d have to go on the rooves.” The blue clay house at the end of Suluru Avenue was still abandoned, and its stairs could still hold Alrik’s weight. He made a note to not peer too closely, not distract himself at all the fascinating things that were growing in the half-ruined house’s wet corners. He called Lumi and her Lefan posse on. “This is how we’ll get to the roof,” he said, half projecting and half containing his voice. “If everything’s as it was when I last saw it, we shouldn’t need to do any long jumps.” Lumi eyed him as she followed him onto the roof of the house, looking anxiously over the urban area. “Why’s this house the only one on the street in this state? If this was pre-Kenneman, pre-everything, what made them leave and no one else claim or demolish the house?” she asked him, as he pulled himself up to the next roof, another one of old clay, rough and warm on the hands. He extended an arm to help her up as he spoke, the Lefaneie climbing up easily on their own. “Blue Prohibition. Not just a minor infraction either – whoever lived here was running a sort of church or temple out of the house. Sunwaaks found out, they kicked the door down, demanded everyone submit. They didn’t. They murdered three of them there. No one wanted to buy it after that, I don’t think. I see some interesting salamanders in there now, though, so that’s a positive.” Lumi, for some reason, laughed, and then shook her head. Her smile carried on to Alrik, and he grinned back, without really knowing why she’d laughed. “Gods, Alrik. Salamanders, really?” Alrik shrugged. Evidently what he’d said sounded different to how he’d intended it, but Lumi didn’t seem offended. She shook her head again and urged him on. They moved from this roof, a sturdy building, and from a distance saw that it was now hung with Mondinist double moon lanterns and a little statue of a mantis priest by the door. Alrik saw Lumi smile out of the corner of his eye. As Cinuravese buildings are wont to do, they became more ornate and less blue the closer they got to the edge of the cirque, before stopping at a sheer wall of rock and scraggly bushes. It was difficult to see from where they were, but yes, Alrik had been right; the winding line of a tiny river’s course had been cut into the mountain, orange and red with oxidisation and dust.

Their feet went from stepping on clay to brick and then ornate roofing shingle. The Lefaneie were diligent and remarkably sure-footed, and Alrik knew the way, but three houses from the little canyon, Lumi stumbled and sent a tile plummeting to the concrete below. Alrik lunged forward to steady her and held her as he righted both once again. The noise the tile made when it shattered on the ground sounded more violent than musket fire. Alrik led the group behind a trio of tall chimneys that adorned the roof of this abode, where they hid, as best they could, for the next few minutes. Beyond them, on the ground below, there was not a sound. So they kept going. When they reached the rivulet crack, looking down from the roof of an extravagant two-storey villa, nothing could be seen save for gardens that had since grown out of control and the effects of negligence on expensive building materials. Alrik, personally, found it much more interesting that way. Lumi peered down off the roof and, twisting her mouth to the side, she cupped her hands and yelled. Alrik almost went to stop her, but the words that came out weren’t Nuarec. If any Crown were to have come here, they would have when Olifiela first sent the call out. If she’s speaking in Lefaneie, they’ll know as little as I do. Still, the words hung in the air, echoing around the villa’s courtyard for an uncomfortably long time. And then they were swallowed by it. All echoes ceased to exist, as a deadening spell came from somewhere, and then people began to emerge from all around the garden. They wore Lefan clothes Alrik recognised, and the general, Olifiela, was standing among them. It was as if they’d materialised from the bushes, trees, and eaves, but Alrik could see where they’d come from – little nooks and crannies, like the ones he might search out, using light and dark and the contrasts between as their camouflage. He was impressed and frightened. “Come down here,” said general Olifiela, in Nuarec, and then Alrik felt himself plucked from the roof, as if he were a toy in a child’s hand, and gently taken to the ground. He shook himself as soon as his feet touched the brick of the courtyard. The burnt metal smell of magic stung his nose. He looked around them, and for a moment, had hope; a hundred, maybe two hundred Lefaneie were here, all gathered, much like they had been in Anmon the day they’d arrived, albeit more tense. The initial force they’d thought to frighten the Crown

with was here. They’d still be able to scare them off like they’d planned. Lumi ran up to Olifiela and grabbed her by the bottom of her collar and yanked her down to her height. Olifiela’s eyes widened in surprise, and Alrik instinctively backed away. “What the fuck, in the name of every last god that’s ever been entertained in the mind of a person in this stricken world, is going on?” she screamed. Olifiela stood stunned for a moment, before pushing Lumi off, where she stood still, almost nose-to-nose, scowling. “I can’t understand you when it’s all Nuarec and when you scream,” replied Olifiela, quiet but defensive. “Bollocks,” said Lumi, though her tone had softened. Her expression shifted from pure rage to a less aggressive but no less powerful mixture of confusion and sadness. The two of them stared at each other for the space of three long breaths, and then Lumi spoke up again. Her voice carried. “Did you call for the attack on the Canalian soldiers in the street in Ayrance?” Olifiela met her eyes and shook her head. “No.” “Did you call for the mist to be formed? Did you call for the arrows to be loosed?” Alrik felt himself slinking into one of the many corners the Lefaneie had up until now been standing in, but kept watching. Olifiela shook her head once more. “I did not call for this. I did not call for anything but the plan we established over the past weeks and finalised the morning that the soldiers came. Someone has dug beneath us.” Alrik thought she looked sincere, and it seemed Lumi thought the same. “Undermined, I think the word is,” said Lumi, absent-mindedly. She reached behind her and ran a hand over the spear there, an ancient-looking thing. While she stood vacant, somebody emerged from the crowd. He was dressed in Lefan clothes but didn’t carry himself with the same trained balance that they did. His movements were those of a modern man – Alrik could see it, like the differences between animals adapted for different environments. “Hey, Lume,” he said, and Lumi snapped out of her daze.

“Aurin!” she cried, ran up to him and hugged him. A brother, or a lover, or a friend. Alrik smiled and slowly extracted himself from his hidey-hole. Aurin, Lumi, the general, and a Lefan high ranker called Salemi then gathered into a small circle. Alrik crept up to it without much of a thought, and when Olifiela gave a questioning look to Lumi, she nodded him on. Alrik absorbed himself into the group as they spoke. “The Crown soldiers, at least the largest detachment that we could see from Lagtower, are travelling to the central business district to free the captured police there,” Lumi was saying. “That makes sense,” said Aurin. His voice carried a certain gravitas, a pleasant rumbling. He was pleasant to observe in general, even in his messy state. “And so, we have a choice with what to do with our people. Should we send everyone to the CBD to address the Crown? Should we all return to the Anmon, gather, fortify, and protect the resources we have there? Or should we split our army in two and attempt to do both at once?” said Lumi. Salemi’s lips thinned into a line. “The first plan was to scare off the Meirese with numbers, no?” he asked in Nuarec. Alrik took a moment to realise who he was talking about – Salemi’s terminology was several centuries out of date. “Numbers which we don’t have now that we’ve been scattered,” rebutted Lumi. Alrik’s eyes flicked to her. She didn’t fit in there, with her size and her age, but he ired her tenacity in making up for it. The next one to speak was Olifiela, and her practice in projection and presence was clear. “That mist was my plan,” she began, and Lumi shot a look at her, but then she continued. “But it was only my plan to use it if, even after our Lefan group had been shown, the soldiers refused to come to . We came here and brought enough magical material for four ‘events’ like that. One of them was untimely. The other three can be far more strategic. We should send a large group, maybe two thirds of our force, to the central business district, wherein we can ambush the soldiers there, perform an ‘event’ – hopefully frighten them away. Salemi?” “Io, jojeron?” said the soldier, standing up straight. “I want you to lead that force. Take some of the most magically adept and the least frightened, you know. Leave a good few of them to me. I’ll take Lumi, her

brother, and the book boy, as well as a few of ours, to get back to our resources. Fast and quiet.” Salemi frowned, but nodded and saluted. He began to gather up soldiers, shouting in Lefaneie. “So, you’re coming, book boy?” said Olifiela. Alrik almost jumped. He hesitated, then nodded. “I don’t want to go on the front lines,” he said, and then internally berated himself for his cowardice. He continued. “But I would like to help.” “Good neie,” she said, giving him a shallow but kind bow. The next few minutes were alive with activity as the Lefaneie and the two other Cinures in the square buzzed around Alrik like flies hesitant to land on a boring corpse. Swords were polished, bows were tested for flexibility, waterskins were refilled from the fountain in the middle of the square; boots were emptied of stones they’d collected, uniforms were buttoned up with buttons four times older than the paving stones the people stood upon, and, quietly, some of the injured that had ed on were covered in loose curtains from within the mansion and tucked away. Ełaem and the general – or, rather, the jojeron – took the lead in their procession of fifty men and women. Their formation was not strict, but ever-moving, always glancing as they ducked and adjusted themselves around each other – Lumi had said that this was a tactic of theirs. Having many eyes looking in many places was one of the best ways to avoid missing any detail. Alrik felt blind by comparison. He saw Aurin’s broad back, in his Lefan clothes, and Lumi next to him with her spear, and then the Lefaneie moving all around them. No one had asked for his help this time; his hand lay on the hilt of his rapier, but what would that do? Would it even pierce a Canalian gambeson? He didn’t know if he’d be able to strike someone in the first place. On some level it was easy – hold the sword, move the arm – but the emotional and physical ramifications of what it could do were terrifying. “I hear something,” said Olifiela, and Alrik had to speed up to catch their group sinking into a shadow at the side of a building. Alrik looked around, terrified, for the glints of eyes or musket barrels.

“I t’s not worth it. They’re separate from the bigger force, probably just going to gather their supplies. Leave them.” Yusuth pushed down the barrel of Finan’s musket. I’m seeing things, he thought. There’s no way that boy, Alrik, would be here again. All Cinures must just look the same. He hoped that he was making the right decision in not firing – whoever they were, though that was vague. Whoever they were, they’d made a huge cloud of mist, a magical act that would have taken immense resources and time to master out of nowhere. They’d put an arrow in Dlannick’s neck. An arrow. Yusuth was terrified. He was in a group of twenty-five now, with enough ammunition, food and water to last them three or more days, but their guns were misfiring or not firing at all; the moisture from the mist had worked into the tiny parts of their weapons and some had to be taken apart to get working again, if their owners had the time to do so. The larger force of rebels was going to the central business district to challenge the Crown soldiers there. A bold move. Yusuth’s group, and the other ten or so doing a similar job, orbited the area at intervals, with orders to rush in and provide if a call came. For now, they had to sit in the dirty streets – and they were filthy this far into the cirque, for one reason or another – wait, and hope to Mond that whoever these people were wouldn’t find a way to kill them all with creeping, sickly magic. Yusuth sat there for an hour, and his mind began to wander. As if it had all become too difficult to remain within his body, he felt as if he was floating above himself, looking down, and became aware of the absurdity of his situation: they had walked into the city, a thousand and a half men strong, and had been scattered to the winds. The might of the Crown, still the holder of the largest continuous country in the world, Dubcloch, defeated by some magicworkers in a frozen southern town. Never mind that Dubcloch was half inhospitable desert. Never mind that Canalas City was sinking into the ground. Things were moving, shifting, echoing and mutating into new forms that the world had either never seen or not seen in many, many generations. And perhaps the Crown, Yusuth thought, was too bulky

and old to keep up. He broke ranks. “Warsh!” shouted Finan, his red face looking at him in confusion and shock. “Warsh, what are you doing?” The answer was ‘deserting,’ but Yusuth didn’t say it. I’m an idiot, he thought, but he kept running. They’ll find me and hang me because I won’t be worth a firing squad, he thought, but kept running. In enough time, Finan’s cries could no longer be heard, and he had travelled ever so slightly north and west – towards the exit. Towards freedom. He caught his breath, and the sound of it made him clutch his ears in pain. The impact of his hands on his head sent tremors through his whole body and he cried out – and that was truly horrific. It sounded like a thousand men, a thousand men with mouths like waterfalls and chests like mountains, shouting in his ears. He dropped to his knees. It was happening again. Another magical attack.

Chapter 42

They had trekked quietly through the city for what might have been an hour or twice as long – their pace, the constant looking over the shoulder, made every second tick by as if it were a minute. Olifiela cocked her head as a sound came from a few blocks over, amplified Lefaneie. The jojeron nodded to herself. “You may want to block your ears. The attack on the Meir – on the Canalians, is starting.” A whisper of concern spread through some of the younger-looking Lefaneie around them, and Alrik looked to Lumi. “It’ll be alright,” said Lumi, smiling warmly. Aurin, a man he now knew for certain was her brother, looked at him and smiled as well. Then, with Alrik’s next step, his ears met with the loudest sound they’d ever experienced. He stumbled, and his knees on the concrete pounded like drums. It was too much. He blacked out. He awoke in the gutter with a throbbing headache and bones that felt bruised. His back had been soaked through with water from a patch of moss, and his head rested against the brick of a building behind him. He tried to push himself to a sitting position, but his arms buckled before he could get upright. He could hear things – his hands against the pavement, the distant sounds of running, crackling fires, but they were quieter now. The magic was gone. Lumi and the rest must have lost him in the chaos. The sun, too, was going – it had been around two hours since he’d fallen unconscious, and it was nearly evening. He tried to push up from the ground again and groaned with effort. That felt painfully loud, but that was only because it was echoing around in his already pained head. He blacked out again, for just a moment longer, and was awoken once more by other sounds, sharp and tinny, like stones tapping against each other. Then someone jumping to the ground from a height.

Alrik’s eyes snapped open. A tall man stood over him, and in the distance a bulky creature – not a juksha, but a kind of large goat – stood idly. Alrik’s eyes turned back to the man, and for a moment he was unable to parse where he knew him from. He looked a little different – he had some new scars, but he still had the broad shoulders and wide face of a Hetterman. “Hello, Alin,” said Captain Dsjevme. The man he’d escaped with Samjal back in Jageurshire. Alrik felt himself seize up in fear and relax only a moment later in resignation. He could barely move. Something wobbled slightly at the left of the Captain’s belt – a wicked-looking hammer the length of a man’s arm. “Hello, Captain Dsjevme. I’m sorry about your scars,” croaked Alrik, trying to look up to the man’s face, but the edges of his vision were discoloured and blurred. Had it been only the horrific noise that had made him this way? He felt ghastly. If he’d had the energy, he would have checked for bruises or worse wounds. Also, if a furious Hetterman hadn’t been standing over him. Dsjevme laughed dryly and shook his head. He leaned against the wall –Alrik’s sword was gone, he realised, now one of the various things strapped to the side of the Captain’s mount. “It wasn’t easy to get here, you know. I received a paltwire call while I was east a few days ago, telling of how things might have been worse than we’d anticipated in Cinura. I was on my mountbock, I didn’t have any other duties for the day, so I took some of my most trusted men and went south. You know what happened when we came to the city, finally, a few hours ago?” Alrik shook his head, the motion sending pain arcing through his neck. “Bizarre and terrible things. As we approached, we became aware of a line of trees stretching from the west, most not much taller than a child. Around them were patches of grey plant life among the green. They were drawing life from the earth to continue forward in their line, growing rapidly even as I watched. One of my people, perhaps too brash, stepped forward to hack down some of the plants that were blocking our way to the . The man burst into flames. His skin bubbled and blackened, and he dropped to the ground, stinking of burnt flesh and smoke.” Alrik’s brow furrowed in shock and confusion, and he tried to get to a sitting position once more. Surprisingly, the man let him, leaning against a wall beside

Alrik, but with enough distance between them, Alrik thought, to prevent Alrik from planning a surprise attack if he got the strength. Alrik instead sunk into the moss and tried to think straight. “Why are you telling me this?” he asked. “What does it have to do with me?” Dsjevme sighed, walked casually over to the pack at this mountbock’s side, and pulled out Alrik’s book – On the Learning and Performance of Magic. “I don’t know how you got this, Alrik,” he said, leaning into the name, “Or even how it came to be. The paper of this book is made from wood of the Dorus. However, you came to be carrying it, the Dorus has followed you. Give it enough time, and it’ll find its way here. So, I’ll save you the trouble and throw it away myself once I’m done here.” He paused, breathing heavily against the wall. Alrik’s mind was clearer now, if only a little, and he started to notice the man’s little movements; years of practise, and perhaps years of paranoia, kept his head moving like it was on a string, always glancing for movement, never to be snuck up on. Alrik felt the softness of the moss on his back. This wouldn’t be such a terrible place to die. A little insect, blue from this angle but with an iridescent shell that might be green or purple in other lights, landed on his chest, and he watched it. “I’m honestly sorry about your friend. And your face. Again,” said Alrik. “I didn’t know what that book was made of. I knew it had magic, but the Dorus? I didn’t. I didn’t know.” He saw the Captain nod. Gods, that makes sense, recognised Alrik, head spinning. That makes sense. No wonder the doctor was acting strange. “I don’t want to kill you, really, Alrik. But if there’s one thing my people stand by, it’s that peace should be maintained. We’re not warring tribes anymore, and we shouldn’t act like them. So, it’s my duty to push down things like this. You’ve seen a lot of things in your short life – how many moon cycles have you seen, twenty-five? But I’m afraid I can’t let that journey continue.” The big man sounded truly sad. Alrik felt his tenuous grip on reality, on life, slipping further. The fighting was furious, and it was elsewhere. There was no logical reason there’d be anyone coming to save him. Alright, he thought. Do it quickly. He didn’t feel brave enough to say it, though.

The captain reached for the warhammer at his belt and then his head whipped to the side, as a scuffle came from close by – very close, perhaps only two houses away. His mountbock bristled, its hooves tapping against the concrete. Alrik kept his eyes closed, took a deep breath, and then concluded. It wasn’t a conclusion he liked, but it was a conclusion he’d come to, anyway. “I’m so sorry!” he shouted, and then cringed as Dsjevme turned to him, seething. The warhammer was nearly out of its strap now, and it couldn’t be more than a second before he’d have it free and Alrik would be done for. He didn’t know why he cared to live, but he did, and so he cried out again. “I’m sorry! Lumi! Lumi!” The hammer came down and cracked concrete where Alrik’s head had been before he’d jerked it out of the way. Alrik’s head spun, figuratively and then literally, as he rolled downhill, crying out Lumi’s name once more. Captain Dsjevme cursed something awful in Hetterspeak and made to follow Alrik, but stopped as a person came stumbling out from between two sea-green buildings. She was tall, with dark skin and short, curly hair. She wore a blue and white Lefaneie uniform that was splattered red and brown by blood and muck. She looked drunk or heavily toxxed. She came closer, and the Captain’s attention fell from Alrik and followed her, reaching for his pistol and loading it. Then he raised the gun, shaking his head. Olifiela looked at him, and blinked, and in the air between them came an incredible rush of wind, coming in from the big man’s side and slamming him against the wall of a nearby house so hard that the sandstone cracked. He was unconscious instantly. Unconscious or dead. Alrik looked into Olifiela’s eyes, wondering if his own carried the remorse, relief and dread that he felt, and then watched as she stumbled away without a word.

At Olifiela’s command , Lumi had hit the floor, scraping her stomach and elbows, and there had been the thunder of gunfire and the whizzing of lead shot overhead. For a few moments, smoke had enveloped the place where the explosions had come from, and Olifiela’s people, including Lumi, used this time to their advantage. “Loose!” barked Olifiela in Lefaneie, and each archer in the group jumped to their feet and let fly an arrow, all coming together in a mass toward the encamped soldiers. Olifiela and Lumi applied a slight pressure, a forward force in space just in front of the group, pushing all arrows ing through it to an even more blistering speed. The speed threshold was an odd thing to maintain, the arrows ing through it feeling like needles through gel in the shifting space of Lumi’s mind. Then, there was the sickening fork-through-ham-leg sound of flesh being struck by arrows, then cries of pain. Lumi hit the ground again, elbows bleeding onto the concrete, and awkwardly rolled over her spear to take refuge in the shade of a building. The sonorance ‘event,’ maybe ‘curse,’ had scattered the Crown men, but they were gathering again. Even now, Lumi could hear marching – and the Lefaneie didn’t march. More Crown. Lumi squinted through the dust and the smoke, took Olifiela’s arm and shook it. “We need to leave,” she said, her voice between a dehydrated shout and a whisper. Olifiela looked at her blearily – she must have been casting the brunt of the last few major magic works. Her words didn’t seem to at first, and Olifiela’s skin had a greenish tinge. “You don’t look well, Oli,” said Lumi. Olifiela took a step back, and shook her head. She shook her head again, harder, and then ran away. Her people turned to Lumi, concerned. Ełaem, a chunk shot from her shoulder and haphazardly bandaged, stepped up to her. “We should go.” Lumi stared at her for a long moment, fuming. Then she nodded. As they approached the cascade, the sounds of gunfire, shouting and burning

grew quieter, and were replaced by the sounds of wind. It didn’t carry the burnt metal scent of magic, so Lumi thought Cinura must soon be having one of its storms. Beyond the perimeter the Crown soldiers had set up and kept around the police station, Lumi saw no one. The wind picked up and shifted from a low whistle to a howl. Scraggly bushes and little wide-leaved trees in the yards of the lower districts whipped around. Lumi picked up her feet and let them slap against the dirt floor. Girrin. Aurin. Yuon. She had to find them. The rain started just as she turned the final corner to face the cascade. What had that morning been a campsite was now a ruin. The tents had been dismantled and set ablaze, and among them were shapes – some campfires, some bodies. A few of those had been burnt, too. None of them were moving. Lumi swallowed vomit and pulled her hood over her head. She should search through the camp, see if anything was left. A group of soldiers must have moved from the main force and attacked the Cascade when they were first scattered. How they knew to do so, Lumi didn’t know. She should have searched through the camp for belongings, carefully and quietly, as not to alert any possible hiding Crown men, but instead she shouted. “Girrin!” The archers bristled, especially Ełaem, and slunk to more hidden nearby places. Lumi was weeping and was glad that it couldn’t be seen through the tox redness in her eyes and the rain. If a Crown man were to rise from behind a corpse now and brain her, she wouldn’t look too pathetic. “Girrin!” Lumi cried again. The wind sounded like an ethereal dog, now, a natural sound but with an unnatural-sounding quality and sustain. Her voice was as swallowed and muffled, as if she’d been surrounded with another deadening spell. The wind and increasing rain were the only sounds for a few moments. Then, a call came, echoing in sonoranteered Lefaneie. “Kese, xeron!” it was Salemi, looking battered and walking with a limp, but managing a pained grin. He was followed by maybe twenty Lefan soldiers, all looking worse for wear, and on his arm, he held one in particular; battered, almost foaming at the mouth. Tall and noble in any other moment. The group established a perimeter without a word, Salemi nodding to Ełaem as some sort of acknowledgement of each other’s status. Olifiela looked at Lumi and managed a queasy smile. She took two steps towards her and then collapsed into her arms. Lumi held her there, hearing her jagged breathing, and stroking

her head. “It didn’t work. The sonorance at the police station. It didn’t work,” Olifiela warbled in pidgin. Some of the water hitting Lumi’s neck was warmer than the rest. Lumi realised Olifiela was weeping. “What do you mean?” said Lumi dumbly. “Where are the rest of the Lefaneie?” “Scattered,” said Olifiela. “Some were killed. We’d started to develop methods – make their weapons wet and they can’t shoot us. But we didn’t have enough water. And we’re running out of toxauments.” Lumi looked back up the slope of the city, blinking through the rain. The fires that had started throughout the city were struggling in the downpour. Lumi’s clothes were soaked down to the sealskin layer, which thankfully held some heat. “I have an idea of what we could do. If we have enough toxauments for one more big push.” Olifiela looked up at her and listened as intently as such an exhausted person could. Lumi spoke her plan and had taken in a breath to speak again before there was a thump in the near distance and she spun around to face it. Yuon stood on unsteady legs at the base of a weathered jacaranda tree, pale and panting. Lumi ran towards him before she was conscious of it. She collided with him, her head at his chest height. He held her back, if gingerly, and coughed. “I’m not going to be the one you worried about the most,” he said, and then pointed to his right. There stood Malbry and Girrin, the latter being helped down another tree by the former. Lumi froze still for a second. Seeing Girrin, apparently safe, after all of this, was almost too much to bear. Girrin was the one to walk to her and hold her first. Lumi tried to pick her up, but a pain in her back prevented it. “I’m glad you’re safe, Lumi,” said Girrin. Her voice was raggedy. “How did you three stay safe?” Lumi said, turning to her brother, who put his arm around her shoulders and kissed the top of her head. The relief she felt left her almost ecstatic. “The skinny one over there,” said Malbry.

Yuon waved. He looked tired, and he had an odd metallic smell about him. “I deadened us,” he elaborated. “So, we wouldn’t end up dead.” No one laughed. Girrin placed her head on Lumi’s shoulder and spoke quietly. “Up in the trees,” said Girrin. “For hours, up in the trees, looking down at what the Crown men did here. I wanted to scream, and maybe I could have without being heard, but I didn’t. I could have run down and tried to help, but I didn’t.” “You stayed alive. You weren’t equipped to fight them. You did what you could.” As they spoke, Aurin disengaged and went to talk to Salemi and the other Lefan soldiers. Olifiela peeled off from them and walked to Girrin, Lumi, and Yuon. She turned to Lumi. “So, do you want to be part of this?” she asked. Lumi frowned. Girrin turned to her, her expression questioning. Lumi shook her head. “We have a plan to drive the last of the Crown out of the city, and it has to be done here, at the cascade. They’re coming, following us, so we’ll meet them. I don’t think I’m well-trained or disciplined enough to do it yet, so I’ll be with you three and Aurin when it happens. Probably somewhere safe... somewhere off the ground. Maybe the trees again.” Girrin furrowed her brow. Olifiela looked grave and nodded. She looked at Lumi with barely veiled disapproval. “No room for weak links in the chain.” Lumi clung to her brother like a lifeline as they huddled in the tree. The Lefan stragglers, numbering about fifty, had made a formation that started as a semicircle around the Cascade, facing the central business district, and then more spaced magicworkers in two parallel lines leading up the main road. Aurin hadn’t asked any more questions about what was going to happen, but Lumi thought he was holding on to her tighter than usual. The jacaranda tree stood as a near-silent witness to what was unfolding before them; though the rain had stopped for now, the wind still whistled and agitated the leaves around them. “I have a stick poking directly into the flesh of my arse,” said Aurin, suddenly, and Lumi stifled a laugh. Her gaze was fixed on the horizon, where the houses looked like dark water under the grey clouds. “You probably should have worn pants then,” she said quietly, and Aurin exhaled out of his nose, carefully readjusted, and grunted. Then the soldiers

came. They were a sorry-looking group. There were perhaps ten juksha between them in a group easily numbering two hundred and fifty or more, with ripped clothes and guns that didn’t shine like they had that morning; their ranks were now bolstered by even rougher-looking men. Lumi couldn’t see their faces from this distance, but they looked angry, and tired, and hungry. The sunwaaks, now stripped of their namesake outfits. It took a painful two minutes for the scrappy group to march close enough to have a decent shot at firing. The Lefaneie there hadn’t taken the time to check if the Canalians would attempt an amicable agreement, and thankfully so – because as the magicworkers by the water began to perform in tandem, the Crown soldiers were already kneeling and firing. The street where they stood was filled with smoke, and lead shot whizzed away, but they weren’t close enough. They were just too scared to advance; understandably. Lumi folded herself more into Aurin’s arms and willed none of the bullets to come near. They weren’t large, and they were far enough from the Crown’s obvious enemies to not be big targets, but an errant bullet might come, and Lumi lacked the strength to bend it away with fenworking or wind. She almost wanted to close her eyes, but she couldn’t. For whatever reason, that was more frightening. So, she focused on the Lefaneie magicworkers. There had been some in the Guide to Magic about synchronised spellcasting – unlike when you performed something by yourself, when you were in a group it had to be a performance – you needed to communicate where you were pushing, where you were pulling, what you were exciting or dulling or loudening or quietening. There were pages and pages of hand signals and postures that communicated these things so that a large group of magicworkers could pool their power together to create something stronger. The standard motions had changed in the millennium since the Lefaneie had learned them, but Lumi got the gist; water was drawn from the cascade through fenworking, each magicworker directly by the opening, drawing it out in gentle, calm movements, all synchronised. The water began to ripple and then move, stretched like a piece of transparent toffee, bubbling up like a worm. The magicworkers seemed unaware of the musket balls coming towards them; one of

them had been hit in the shoulder and ignored it. Then, like a cap had been pulled off and overwhelming pressure released, the water shot upward and forward, up the incline. Like a waterfall the volume of a lake falling up instead of down, gallons and gallons of water blasted into the city from its centre with an intensity like the sneeze of an angry god.

Chapter 43

Alrik’s worst nightmare came up the hill at him first in a trickle that pooled around his legs and then as a fast current. He broke his daze, and struggled onto shaky legs and whimpered aloud at the sound and sight of the flood, backing into the wall of the building behind him. He turned around, stumbling to maintain his balance, found a door, and kicked it open. No one was inside. However, as he’d hoped, to the side of the single main room was a set of mud-brick stairs that led out onto the roof. The water was up to his ankles in the house now, making discarded mugs float like tiny boats, and he sloshed through it to the staircase, splashing dirty water on the walls. Up on the roof, all Alrik could see was devastation. From some point deep in the city’s centre, a terrible flood, like an upward tsunami, had sprung forth. Some poorer houses had had their foundations crumbled away and had slid into the mucky water. Trees had been uprooted, and the water was thick with dirt, clay, plant matter – and bodies. Some of the bodies weren’t moving, while others struggled – how long had it been since this had started? And they varied – there were cats, fish, birds, humans, big and small, pigs, the great heavy shapes of juksha. They all bobbed perversely upward, along with the debris that hadn’t once held breath, as the water rose higher. There was a single wooden chair on the little balcony where Alrik sat, curled up, and held himself around the legs, sobbing. Any one of those bodies could be his mother. Any one of those bodies could be Alrik’s childhood friend, Kalmir. Any one of those bodies could be Lumi. Any one of those bodies could be Dsjevme; for some reason this hurt Alrik more than he thought it would. The sky was grey and the sunlight through it made the water look like toxaument waste. It was lapping at the upper steps of the house Alrik was hiding out on, now. Five steps from the top, then four, then three. A rat, a hardy straggler, climbed to the top of the steps and shook the water from its fur. Then the water receded. Slowly, at first, as if it were being polite, then quickly. Just as it did so, there happened to be a break in the clouds – not a rapid clearing of the sky, but a little split in the greyness where the sun could peek through.

From where Alrik was, all it did was highlight the sickening rime of dirt, fertiliser, sewerage and corpses the devastating reverse flood had left behind. The water was a sickly brown, but further down the incline, it shone, reflecting the pink and yellow rays of the beginning sunset, punctuated by the island branches of jacaranda trees. Alrik sat forward, engrossed. In the great distance, there was a figure climbing the sheer, scrubbed face of the south-west side of the bowl. As Alrik watched, the stranger reached the top, and then turned around to look. His face was impossible to see, but Alrik was sure they were looking at each other. The man was in Crown clothes, and he was running away. Deserting. The man raised his arm in a wave. Alrik waved back.

Aurin tried to joke with her, but Lumi was numb. When the first of the lower buildings had collapsed into the waves, she’d reasoned that everyone that close to the epicentre of the fighting must have fled. Then the bodies started to rise from the water, far more than there had been Crown soldiers, and her stomach sunk into her shoes. A regret and a kind of nihilism pressed her as she watched the water rise, destroy, and then fall. Aurin’s warmth was the only comfort she knew, and it was alien. Even so, she leant into it. Someone loved her, so she couldn’t be as evil as she felt. Hopefully. The water receded, and with it came the debris. Pigs, glassy eyed with their legs out at ridiculous angles, floated by. Cats. Hoppers. People. The people were the worst. Lumi tried not to look, but she couldn’t stop herself; there was an old woman among them, dead as the rest. She floated in the muck almost serenely in a floral dress and comfortable slippers. She was one of the first to descend, and with her came a dozen more. A hundred more. In ten minutes, the Anmon Cascade was blocked with bodies, plugged like the drainage hole in a fancy Canalian bath, and the centre of the city now held a tiny, putrid lake. The next few minutes ed in a silent crawl. Lumi could see Olifiela talking to the magicworkers who, with her, had performed this terrible thing at Lumi’s request, but she couldn’t hear them. All she could hear was the pounding of blood in her ears. The message went up the chain into the devastated slick of the surrounding city where the furthermost Lefan had perched to keep pushing the water forward. Then, the silence was broken by a battle cry, blood curdling and loud in Lefaneie. They had won. Every single Crown man was dead or indisposed. They were victorious. At some point, Aurin helped Lumi down the tree, though she only knew as much because she felt the dirty water up to her shins. The day was starting to darken. They’d have to find shelter soon. Shelter from the... shelter from no one. Cinura was free for now. They’d ended the lives of a thousand and a half men and god knows who else. And now people would think before they tried to take the city again. What was left of it. She collapsed against Aurin, who held her up like she was a scarecrow. Her head was flooded with the hot, reactive liquids of guilt and relief. “Think our place in the Tall Quarter might be a bit wet?” said Aurin, and it was

the first thing that she’d properly heard in some time. She laughed, and then she kept laughing. She bent over double, and every single scrape and scar and bruise she’d accumulated over the last nine or so hours made itself known to her at once, and she began to sob. Aurin helped pick her up, and she blearily replied. “You’d hope a place like that might be a bit too tall,” she said, and then laughed so hard that she wheezed. Aurin ed her, and the two of them walked towards the cheering group. There was a general level of fear, even now – there could well be Crown stragglers about – but every face Lumi saw was Lefan or Cinuravese. Malbry, a patched gash in his shoulder, held a sleeping Girrin in his arms. The crowd moved and shaped itself, and someone different came out of it. He wore boiled leather and silks and held a gun in his arms – a long, wicked thing with a curved stock and a curious device like a spyglass screwed to its top. Lumi’s eyes found his from nearly fifty metres away. He was around his forties and might have been Cinuravese – but he could well also have been Skandrian. No one seemed to have noticed him. He frowned, as if slightly annoyed. Then he raised his weapon. “You know, Lume,” started Aurin, stepping in front of Lumi, smiling in the way he always did before he was going to make a joke. Before she could say anything. “You should really –” there was an explosion, a gunshot, and a hexagonal hole the size of a baby’s fist appeared in Aurin’s neck. His brow furrowed in confusion, a hand going to his throat, and as he tried to speak, blood gurgled out of the wound. He paled and collapsed to the floor. Lumi let out a wordless, anguished scream, dropping to her knees as she watched a pool of slick, brilliant red blood surround her brother’s head in a twisted mockery of a holy idol. She held his hand as he looked up at her. His face was confused and pale – and loving, maybe. She loved him. He loved her, he’d looked after her, and he was fading, and it was all her. “Nearworker! Nearworker!” Lumi shouted, looking up, repeating the term in Lefaneie – and then she saw his murderer running away. With no thoughts, she leapt over her brother and ran after the killer, summoning the last of any toxaument left in her and grabbing him, despite the distance, by the hair with an enraged surge of fenworking and slamming his face into the concrete. The man

dropped his gun and stumbled, trying to get back up, but Lumi grabbed his head with invisible hands and, again and again, brought it down. She stalked up to him, and by the time she’d reached him, he was curled into a ball, and his face was a bloody mess. She stood over him, and in the dying light of the day she found his features hard to discern – the features he had left, at least. Skandrian? Cinuravese? From somewhere in distant Huzun? He was breathing heavily, but still alive, staring up at her. For a moment she hesitated – question him, find out, so she could seek out whoever had planned this, if it had been planned, and tear them to pieces? Or just kill him? Then, the man pulled a tiny music box from his pocket and pressed a switch. Two tones, halfway dissonant and halfway consonant, played from it, over and over. Lumi shook herself, growled, and reached for the spear on her back, raising her foot to stomp on him. The man closed his eyes, and Lumi’s foot hit the concrete and jarred. The man disappeared, replaced with the smell of burning metal, leaving only his gun behind. Lumi took a step back, and then screamed until she coughed blood, curling into a ball where the man had been and wishing, wishing, wishing that she’d been just a little faster. Just a little more perceptive. After half an hour, she was helped up by Olifiela. Girrin was there too, and Yuon and Malbry and even Ford, but not Aurin. Not in any way that mattered. Lumi finally made herself look over to where he had been – if there was any miracle of nearworking that had saved him – but all she saw was a body, something as lifeless as a table or a chair, covered in a white cloth. Dead, like half of the city she’d thought she was working to save.

Epilogue:

Alrik picked the drooping orchid and placed it in his bucket. It was an overcast day, as most Cinuravese winter days were, and the chill had him wrapped in a coat he’d been given by the Lefaneie. Presumably, whoever had owned it had died in the conflict, or the flood; a thousand years, give or take a few, after they were meant to. Thirty days, one moon turn, one month. Much of the city was still in advanced disrepair; the poorer houses surrounding the Anmon Cascade had been most badly damaged. Several hundred people – the body count was still growing – had their lives taken that day, about two hundred of them Lefan soldiers. Every Lefaneie still alive could now comfortably fit on a single ship, Olifiela had said. Focusing on these facts was impossible. Alrik’s mind simply didn’t allow them to sustain themselves; he’d break down into tears, spend days at a time sleeping, or go on frantic runs through the city in the earliest hours of the coldest mornings. So, he kept himself occupied by picking up some of the surviving flowers and putting them in his bucket, so he might take them to his little fertilised pot and nurse them back to health. He was lucky, he knew; his mother’s health was improving, even as the winter cold took hold, and both of his parents were unharmed, but he had to keep walking. He had to do something to feel as if he was contributing to what his city had become. Water was scarcer, now – the Anmon still had human and animal remains polluting it, literal tons of mass that had started to rot. Drinking water had to be rationed from the runoff from snow caps, assisted by Lefaneie fenworkers. Alrik was a little dehydrated, honestly; he’d taken some of his rations for his plants. The place was finally self-governed, at least; a provisional government had been established, made up of Nos Blau Eritiami and other respected of the community. They’d built a perimeter from the city, taking cannons from the armoury, and manning them day and night at the Northern . No one was in or out, and for now, no messages were, either. Yet, Alrik had held a letter in his pocket for the better part of the last week, that

he wished dearly to send by palt to Canalas City. Prudence, Baalgali – how did they fare? They must know he wasn’t among the dead. He set down his bucket and walked again, in the kind of mania he reached when the plants no longer satisfied him. He trotted north, bandy legs stronger and thicker than they had been, but still his, still wiry. He was still him. He took the usual route to the Northern age and then made a turn into a place that was tighter and darker. A set of stairs so rough-hewn they might have been naturally formed led up to a little cliff shrouded in bushes and conifers. From this vantage point, he could see much of the city. He’d spent some of his time here reading, exploring the library’s selection now that the censorship laws had been dropped. This time, though, he was here for another reason. “Hello, girl,” he said. Sarensa stalked out of the shadows on her great long legs and made a low gurgle, something like ‘hello.’ She leant her great spear head to him, and he stroked the fuzz there. She could hunt on her own – some hunters and fishers around the city had been confused at the sight of larger hoppers and even stiltwalkers that had been attacked by a huge predator – but falars appreciated limited company, so Alrik tried to say hello as often as he could. She was a temptation, too, though; a bit of rope, a little bait, and he could fly away. Anywhere he wanted – almost. “They probably wouldn’t like me coming back to Canalas City,” he muttered to her, taking a brush from his red satchel and beginning to brush down her fuzz. He felt so close, there and then, to climbing on to her, ropes be damned, and urging her off. Getting her off the cliff, and going anywhere – maybe somewhere tropical, like Monarech, or somewhere pleasant and mild like Reata. But he stopped himself. His mother ailed less, but she needed his help. The plants, and whatever animals had survived, needed his help. He’d travel again someday – maybe sooner rather than later – but not now. He would stay to care for what he loved.

Lumi had watched as five attendants had lifted her brother’s body and lowered him into a shallow grave at the edge of a cliff, overlooking the city he had been born, lived, and died in. His casket had been mud-brick and closed. The officiator had given no speech, only there to legitimise the event. Every waking moment that Lumi experienced was pain, and even many of those in her sleep were, too. The man, simply labelled The Gunman in her head, haunted her. His weapon sat on the unused dining table in her temporary housing. She hadn’t touched it, but she also hadn’t destroyed it. Lumi felt the pain as a physical presence in her mind, a resident that took up too much space for any kind of usual feeling or thought to gain a hold. So, she spent time examining it, like she thought Yuon might – to her reckoning, two-thirds of it was the pain of losing her brother. That pain was like a physical ache, like a truly life-threatening injury that had somehow failed to kill her. The last third, she surmised, was the lack of knowing. Who had the man been? How had he magicked himself away and left no trace? What was the music box? What was the gun? Did he answer to anyone? Was he still alive? Her mind had immediately gone to Kenneman, but that didn’t help. His disappearance before the events of that fateful day had been unusual, especially combined with the miscommunication that had started the bloodshed in the first place. But why would Kenneman send someone to kill her brother? Or kill her. He had stepped in front of her at the last moment, after all – unwittingly saving her life and ending his own. Lumi shed so many tears in the month that followed the tragedy that her water rations didn’t make up for what she was losing, and Girrin, who was smaller and needed less, offered some of hers. It wasn’t spoken between them, but Lumi wondered if the closeness between them now would have existed if they hadn’t both lost loved ones in the fighting. Then, one day, a letter came under Lumi’s door. Lumi furrowed her brow, wondering if it was some sort of public message – no letters should have come in from the outside during the embargo. Yet, it was addressed solely to her, and was handwritten. She opened it, her confusion deepening.

You know it was him, and I do too. We will speak soon. Joyrey’s Men. Her heart leapt and beat faster than it had in weeks, and she searched the letter, flipping it up and down for any clues, any identification, but she could find none. She placed it on the table, next to the gun that had killed her brother, and paced. She didn’t know what they were referring to, or who. It could be a terrible, cruel joke, or something she was reading into wrong. And yet, it gave her hope. She’d stay in Cinura for now, try to help, and then she’d leave to look for him. Look for Aurin’s killer, and anyone else who might know about him, and find them.

Kenneman scaled the last hill out of Cinuravese territory onto a grassland, with Tommund, Mawari, and Jeang at his back. He would have preferred to ride, but only a mountbock could have made those slopes, and they’d needed to move quickly. The foreign character actress and her squat sidekick would be looking for him, unfortunately. “By Omolu, it’s cold,” said Mawari, rubbing his scarred shoulders. Tommund, a southerner, smirked. Jeang was quietly fascinated by the contraption attached to the stump of his missing leg – loud hydraulics pumped with each step, but he could run at a decent pace now with relative ease. Over his back he had one of the Zhan ‘42 model weapons Kenneman had had made in Skander-Sareen. One of only five in the world. Another of the five, along with the man who’d used it, were gone now. Gone, or in the hands of that fucking revolutionary girl. Kenneman scowled, shading his eyes from the overcast sunlight and looking to a distant part of the plain. “There. There it is,” he said,” pointing. A line of trees grew here, surrounded by a swathe of dead and dying grass. It made a yellow line on the landscape, stretching far to the west, working its way around rocky ground and puddles. “That’s it? That’s the Dorus?” asked Jeang, sceptical, mechanical leg sighing. “That’s it,” confirmed Kenneman, breathing in deeply. “An arm, at least. A feeler it’s sent out. First time it’s done this as long as anyone can .” As they approached, they saw that the ultimate tree in the line was visibly growing at perhaps a finger’s breadth a second. Without a word, Kenneman became the head of their group, reaching into a pack at his side and slowing. The tree shook against the direction of the wind, ruffling its leaves in warning. The shaking extended to the trees behind it, and even a tiny sapling before it which was only just poking above the ground. Kenneman took the object from his pack and held it out. It was a piece of unmarked paper, no bigger or more beautiful than any other – only it buzzed, it burned, with magic. “I come with an offering,” said Kenneman. “And a proposition for more. I would

like to make a deal with you.”

About the Author

My name is Hope C. Dixon, and I'm a (as of publishing this) 23-year-old author from Perth, Western Australia. I've had a ion for wildlife, for flora and fauna, and for creation, since I was very young, writing about far-off worlds since about the age of nine. People, too, have always intrigued me. I'm autistic, only diagnosed as an adult, and so I've taken an almost scholarly approach to understanding how other people work, too. I don't view humans the exact same way I do animals, but I feel like beauty can often shine through them in similar ways. I'm queer - specifically transgender and bisexual - and this also influences my worldview and my characterisation. I've never written a story that centres queerness before, but I consider it an interesting aspect to prod at and challenge through literature. Some of my favourite authors are Ursula K Le Guin, Daniel Abraham, K. A. Applegate, and Brandon Sanderson. Read more at Hope C. Dixon’s site.