Skender kept an eye out for such details as he went. If he ever made it back to the Keep, his father would want to know all about the cultures of the forest and the various homes they had made there. Every beam was unique in shape and size, and great care had been taken in making the joints and stays that kept the greater structure whole, and yet flexible too, to allow for different rates of growth. Wooden limbs entwined around each other, adding sinuous strength and liquid beauty; floors and walls merged seamlessly into trunks and branches, giving Skender cause to wonder how much was fashioned and how much grown that way. Occasional tingles of the Change suggested that there was more to the city than met the eye. Some trees fairly throbbed with potential, like the one in the clearing where they had stopped to rest the previous night. He could feel powerful currents running beneath his feet, through branches and along entangled roots, spreading naturally into the city all around him.
The foresters had made it like that, he reasoned. They had come to the forest bringing Change-workers and other artisans, and from dumb static trees they had fashioned a city that could change both with its environment and with the people inhabiting it. It could expand in size, or contract, if needed. It possessed all the flexibility that a stone city didn't have, and had the added advantage of growing itself. Stonemasons would be in very short supply in a city like this.
But what about ironmongers, Skender wondered. How would the foresters cook, or fashion their tools? They might be able to pluck food from the branches around them or tend stepped farms on the ridge's broad flanks, but he doubted that growing swords or arrowheads would ever be practical.
They walked all morning, ascending steadily by switching back and forth across the steep cliff face. The cloud grew ever more dense and cool on his skin, making him feel clammy all over. Skender's arm muscles burned from carrying the wing, and his knees protested with every step upwards he took. His head swam with hunger and the need for food.
Finally, Delfine called a rest break. On a circular platform surrounded by five muscular tree trunks, the party stretched out on flat brown cushions and rubbed aching muscles. Attendants appeared as if from nowhere, bringing food and water in sufficient quantity to feed twenty people. The foresters broke warm bread and dipped it in pastes and honeys of different hues, sampling from each bowl in sequence. Skender ate and drank without restraint, not worrying about the strange tastes greeting his greedy tastebuds. Only when the gaping void in his stomach was filled did he become slightly more discriminating.
The pastes satisfied him less than the array of meats available in delicate white wooden bowls. He discovered at least three different sorts of flesh, marinated and cooked to the point of dissolving in his mouth, barely needing to be chewed.
When he asked Chu what she thought they were, she shrugged as she took a swig of purple fruit juice. “How would I know?”
“That one,” said the woman called Navi, indicating a morsel Skender had just raised to his lips, “is frog.”
“Frog?” he echoed, feeling instantly less hungry.
“Ghost frog, specifically. They live on fungus at the bottom of the city. The one you just ate is roast crabbler flesh. Do you know what a crabbler is?”
He nodded, blanching. Crabblers were a species of giant spider that lived in the Divide walls.
“The third—”
“I don't want to know,” he said, putting the morsel of meat back on the plate and holding up both hands. “Really I don't.”
The first inkling that Navi might be teasing him came when Chu laughed. “Nice one,” she said. “Crabbler meat is black and bitter. What are we eating, really?”
Navi maintained a blank expression for a second, then broke into a wide smile. Skender felt himself flush deep red as she explained: “Game hen, possum, and fig bat.”
The last sounded only marginally more acceptable than frog to Skender's suddenly restless stomach. Then a worse thought occurred to him.
“Have you really tasted crabbler?” he asked Chu.
She shrugged. “You've seen where I live. If you're hungry enough, you'll eat anything.”
Skender sincerely doubted that he would ever be that hungry.
“Where do you come from?” asked Delfine, perhaps realising only then that Chu and Skender shared different origins.
“Laure,” Chu replied. “It's literally a hole in the ground. The Divide cut it in half a thousand years ago. Things went downhill from there.”
Delfine looked from Chu to Skender, then to Marmion, Banner, and Eitzen eating in silence to one side. “Such an odd mixture of people. I understand how recent events might have affected someone from Laure, but what difference do they make to the Haunted City? To the Nine Stars?”
Marmion avoided the question. “How has the flood affected you? May I ask that?”
She nodded, her face very serious. “You've come upstream, along the great fissure we call the Pass. For all you know, the flood follows its length right to its source. I tell you now that it does not. The flood joins the Pass in a valley not far from here. A community called Chiappin once thrived on the flanks of that valley, home to one thousand people, young and old. Chiappin is now gone, swept away by the terrible waters. Everyone who lived there is dead.”
“And the trees, too,” said Warden Banner, nodding. “If the flood was strong enough to threaten Laure, far downstream, here the effects must have been truly devastating.”
Delfine's eyes shone. “Yes, they were. Where trees two centuries old once stood now lies nothing but dead earth and stone. The naked mountainside is scarred and hideous. I can't bear to look at it.”
She pushed her plate away.
Skender reined in an automatic complaint at the description of exposed stone as “hideous.” Had it undoubtedly not been ghoulish to ask just then, he would have been curious to know more about the backbone of the mountain.
“Let's keep moving,” said Delfine, standing smoothly. “We're only an hour from the summit. There we'll talk properly and consider what's to be done with you.”
Skender resigned himself to more walking as the party gathered itself together and headed off. The promise of rest faded in the face of fear of the foresters deciding that Chu wasn't welcome or that Marmion's quest could not be tolerated. Their rest might be all too brief and conducted in a cell, followed by an enforced march back the way they had come.
He wondered if Sal and Shilly and the others were faring any better. That he was, at least, a captive of members of his own species was small comfort, but one to cling to during their long march.
As the day wore on, the fog thinned slightly, allowing Skender to see further through. It became clear that Milang spread as far across the ridge's face as it did upwards, woven through the trees as inseparably as the mist. From a great distance, the telltale signs of its presence—unnaturally straight lines and sharp angles; gleams of glazed ceramic or glass; moving shapes that couldn't possibly belong to birds or ordinary tree creatures—would be effectively invisible, even without the fog to hide them. He wondered if that was deliberate, and then wondered what the foresters had to fear from the forest around them.
Without the fog, the arboreal city's existence would have been decidedly uncertain. Everywhere he went, he saw sheets of charmed cloth artfully arrayed to catch the moisture in the air. Stately pyramids condensed mist in their cool hearts, channelling steady drips into containers or channels designed to collect every skerrick. In some places, the trickle of water was so loud it reminded him of rain.
Their upward climb couldn't last forever. The summit Delfine spoke of wasn't the top of the mountain range itself, but the uppermost and westernmost point of the ridge the city clung to, hidden deep in the permanent cloud cover. The trees continued to grow over it, but the ground fell away beneath them. Skender noticed a change in ambience long before he worked out what had happened. The sound of creatures in the undergrowth faded as the trunks surrounding them grew steadily narrower.
The summit c
onsisted of a broad structure built around the trees' uppermost reaches, like a crown resting on spiky hair, not touching the head beneath. A vast wooden citadel with a tall belltower in one corner, surrounded by an immense skirt-like shelf that formed an approach on all sides, it would be the only building visible from outside the forest, although who could possibly see it through the fog and at such a great altitude, Skender couldn't imagine. Inside the outer walls, a row of broad wooden steps led up to a boxy central building with a single square entrance and no apparent windows. Guards in ochre uniforms lined either side of the stairwell; six more stood at the entrance. Dark eyes watched them closely as they approached.
Here we go, thought Skender, remembering the Magister of Laure and her cabal of sinister bloodworkers. Why can't the locals ever be friendly?
The guards at the entrance to the central building bowed as Lidia Delfine approached and opened the doors for her. She led the party inside through a series of skinny trunks that formed cloisters around the building's heart. Skender looked up as they entered, startled by the lack of a roof. The cloud-swathed sky seemed brighter to his eyes simply because of the frame around it.
The walls were not painted or carved, but covered in a series of elegant mosaics. Artisans had fashioned many different shades of wood into slivers and placed them in patterns evoking images of wind and fog. The sunlight, even filtered through the clouds and fog, cast them into bright relief.
A sudden softness beneath his feet made him look down. The floor wasn't wood, as he had expected. It was grass—real grass, growing in real dirt, high above the bases of the trees holding the citadel aloft.
“Daughter.”
A deep woman's voice echoed from the cloisters and the chamber's delicate mosaics. In the centre of the chamber stood a woman of middle years wearing a long, many-folded robe in green and brown. Short-cropped silver hair matched the sky above so perfectly that for a moment Skender mistakenly assumed it to be a cap of some kind. Her features were broad and lined with care. Her arms opened to embrace Lidia Delfine as she approached.
“Mother.” Delfine returned the brief clasp of the older woman then knelt respectfully at her feet. “Forgive me. My quest was not successful.”
“That I am given to understand.” The woman nodded, not unkindly, and looked up at Marmion and the others, waiting uncertainly on the edge of the grassed area. Grief cut deep lines in the corners of her eyes. “Success comes in many guises, however. Sometimes we know it not, though it stands openly before us.”
Lidia Delfine glanced over her shoulder. “You believe these people are meant to be here?”
“I don't know, yet, what they are meant to be.” The woman gestured that her daughter should stand. “You, Sky Warden,” she said to Marmion. “My youngest child is dead. Can you tell me what killed him?”
Marmion stepped forward and executed a deep bow. “I fear that I cannot.” His expression recounted the horror of their brief encounter with the wraith more eloquently than words. Skender would never forget the viciousness of that unprovoked attack. “I am an emissary of the Alcaide Braham of the Strand. Our mission has brought us here for very different reasons.”
“Really? My people have been hunted every night for the past two weeks. Moai vanish from places they have rested for hundreds of years. And now you arrive on our doorstep, asking for help. All things are connected in the forest, whether you see the roots or not.”
Marmion bowed again. “Perhaps that is the case.”
“Tell on. Why are you here?”
Skender couldn't hide his restlessness as Marmion commenced another explanation of the Sky Warden's quest. This time, though, the warden didn't stop with just the flood and the man'kin migration. He touched on the odd readings of the seers, but still kept the runaway Homunculus and the twins to himself.
“You didn't mention this prophecy before,” Lidia Delfine accused him, coming around her mother to confront him directly. Heuve scowled to one side, as though all his worst suspicions had been confirmed. “What else are you hiding?”
Marmion opened his arms, a picture of wounded innocence. “I didn't lie to you. Before, you were a potential obstacle. Now, your mother believes our problems to be connected. You are quite correct in pointing out that we are in your territory now. We cannot proceed on our own. By the same token you need us just as much. The flood affects us all. We must work together to strike at its source.”
Delfine fumed on, but her mother seemed mollified. “Your name, warden?”
“Eisak Marmion. May we have yours?”
“Caroi Delfine, Guardian of the Forest. Is this one your guide?” She raised a hand to point at Chu.
“No. She is one of our party, a citizen of Laure.”
The Guardian's expression turned sour. “An Outcast, then.”
Marmion didn't argue the point. “We came here in innocence, knowing nothing of your laws.”
“She should know.”
Skender felt Chu fairly vibrating with the need to defend herself. The wing lay at her feet and her hands hung clenched tightly at her sides. She, like him, was looking filthy and worn after their dunking in mud, dousing in freezing water, and long trek up a mountainside. The bags under her eyes were as dark as her pupils.
“She didn't know,” she said through gritted teeth. “She was raised by a mother who didn't once tell her about the place her ancestors came from. She came here hoping to find out what sort of people they might have been. And she, she's got to say, is not very impressed so far.”
Heuve showed his teeth in warning. Lidia Delfine looked pained and, in that moment, much younger than she ever had before. “Mother—Guardian…I didn't desire to bring her here, but we were attacked by the Panic and there seemed no alternative. I am aware that by doing so I too have broken the law. That seemed better than leaving her to die.”
“I see.” Her mother's expression became less stony. “It's clear I need to hear the full story before leaping to any conclusions. You and you—” one long, elegant finger stabbed at Marmion and Chu “—stay here. The others may rest.”
“Hey—” Skender began to protest, but was cut off when the finger pointed at him.
“Not you, young mage. There is someone else who needs to make your acquaintance.” The Guardian's lips tightened. To a silver-clad aide within the cloisters, she said, “Tell the observer to attend at his earliest convenience in a subchamber of your choice.” The aide bowed and moved off. “Heuve?” Lidia Delfine's bodyguard looked surprised to be addressed directly. He bowed and moved forward. “What is that mark on my daughter's arm?”
The big man remained bowed before her, every muscle frozen. “Forgive me, Guardian. I take full responsibility.”
“No.” Lidia Delfine stepped in front of him, hiding the cut with one hand as though ashamed of it. “It's not his fault. The Panic attacked when my guard was down. Heuve did his best to protect me. I—”
She fell silent. Her mother had raised her hand with a swish of fabric and indicated that she should move aside.
“I thank you, Heuve, for bringing my daughter back to me alive. I would not lose two of my children in one week.”
Heuve dared raise his eyes and saw the Guardian smiling at him with tears in her eyes. He flushed from hairline to beard, and backed away.
Skender felt a hand tug at the sleeve of his robe. Aides had stepped from the shadows to take him away. He went reluctantly, looking over his shoulder at Chu. She stood defiantly on her own. As he slipped into the thicket of pillars, her gaze met his, and she shrugged.
“Who do you think you're going to meet?” asked Eitzen as the aides guided them back down the stairs, the rows of blank-faced guards as stony as man'kin.
Skender shrugged.
“Call us if you need help,” said Warden Banner, touching his arm. Her warm round face and curly hair combined in a picture of maternal concern, and his thoughts turned automatically to his parents, so far away. What were they doing? Were they worried about h
im? Would he ever see his father again, high in the cavelike warrens of the Keep?
At the base of the stairs, the aide guided him in a different direction from the others.
“Don't you worry about that,” he told Banner. “If anything happens, you'll hear me hollering up and down the mountain.”
Banner smiled and waved, and then he was on his own.
“Imagining the future is no great feat.
Seers do it every day. Imagining a future
without us in it is the greater challenge.”
THE BOOK OF TOWERS, EXEGESIS 19:8
Shilly and Tom trailed Ramal closely enough to make it clear they were keeping up, but not so close as to breathe down her neck. The female soldier radiated a low-level hostility that discouraged any attempt at familiarity or conversation. Rosevear walked beside Kemp, still slung between two solid guards whose creaking leather uniforms made a counterpoint to the steady slapping of their sandals. Ramal led them along a confusing route through the Panic city, grunting with annoyance when the humans failed to keep up. Shilly doubted she could have retraced their steps. She wasn't seriously considering making a break for it, but if she had been, that alone would have made her think twice.
Tom didn't appear at all worried that they were captives of strange creatures in a city far from home. He seemed perfectly happy, craning his head to glimpse the sweeping curves of the structures around them. Every time they turned a corner, something new came into view. Surprises constantly loomed at them out of the mist. Panic children suspended upside-down by ropes above a net strung between two buildings, tossing a ball backwards and forwards in some kind of game; a low-pitched elegy sung by a deep-voiced male with a throaty flute accompaniment; a curling, tenuous sculpture of mist formed by three gold-clad Panic females waving large fans back and forth; rows and rows of thin wooden planks suspended from parallel cables that rocked faintly in the night air, purpose unknown. It was enough to make Shilly feel dizzy.
“Is Sal going to be all right?” she asked Tom, unable to stop worrying about the others, as well as herself.
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