Djal nudged him. “Don’t antagonize her, she could take you.”
“That’s never stopped him before! He’s been this way since the moment he was born,” Eminyela said, shaking her head. “It’s too late for your warnings, he’s built a career on it.”
Djal addressed Ev. “In Laalvuri, you’d say Sanno is a pamphleteer. But it’s not the same. Sanno is a writer. He works for a paper called The Citizen where he and a few others write about what’s happening in the city. They try to report only what they’ve verified as true.”
“A losing battle, lately,” Sanno said. “I’m sorry if my joke was in poor taste. I don’t call him The Leader. The home…”
Smoke, this was a lot to keep track of. Ev didn’t feel antagonized by Sanno’s joke, but he’d paused expectantly and she had no idea what to do.
“Is the heart,” Mala finished, laying a hand on Ev’s shoulder. “She knows it better than any of us, so much so that she’s never had to say the words. Mind telling us what you’re doing here? Planning to publish an account of this drink we’re all sharing?”
Her question was addressed to Sanno, and he answered it. “I’m meeting one of my mother’s dearest childhood friends.”
Ev couldn’t tell if he meant it, or if any of them believed it, but there was a beat of silence and then Ifeleh forged ahead, leading them to a table.
“There’ve been more collapses since I wrote,” Eminyela said when they’d settled into a booth in the back corner. Her son sat by her, and around the circular table were Ifeleh, Djal, Mala, Thiyo, and Ev. “Here’s the pattern I’ve noticed. It’s not that collapses are uncommon.” She moved their glasses to make space on the table for a map and tapped it. It had six amorphous circles on it, one for each level of the city. They were dotted with marks of different colors. “This is every incident of damage from 740, when Usmam Umarsad died, to 753. This map doesn’t reflect well on us, but it’s important. The colors represent years. As you see, 740 and 741 were quite violent, with dozens of incidents per year, and then the factions brokered a peace. Things quieted until there were four incidents in 751. Five the next year, then four again. Perhaps not enough to get upset about, and all of them clustered in mid-level neighborhoods with drinking establishments, or residential areas that house a lot of young men without families. Some fighting is to be expected. My colleagues think I’m a paranoid madwoman.”
She rolled up the first map and replaced it with a second one. The six circles were a multi-colored forest of marks. “This map covers from 754 to the present.”
“What happened in 754?” Ev asked.
“Ten years ago, in 754, three huge collapses destroyed a large swathe of farmland in The Orchard and The Basket, and our ability to feed our citizens was severely hindered. I’ve long suspected that those collapses were a deliberate act of violence—someone must have planted explosives—but it’s never been proven, and many people believe they were just bad luck. Or incompetence on the part of the Office of Infrastructure. Whatever you believe, their impact was real. Scarcity begot more violence, which begot more scarcity. Violence led to collapses. The Office used to do mostly preventative maintenance, but we switched our focus to repairs. So yes, after the collapses of 754, things got a lot worse. That’s acknowledged by everyone. What’s not acknowledged is the different nature of the violence.”
“It’s spread out everywhere,” Ifeleh said. “But it doesn’t look random. Every level has concentric rings of incidents.”
“Exactly,” Eminyela said. “If I were trying to do the greatest possible damage to the structure of this city, this is how I would organize it. And you’ll notice that I’ve added marks in black ink. Those are the sites of collapses that weren’t connected to a violent incident. Ichinek says the world just moves like that sometimes, and our office is there to clean up the mess when it happens. But there have been eight allegedly ‘unprovoked’ collapses this year, and that’s the highest on record. I can’t believe any of this is an accident, not after making this map. But Ichinek won’t listen to me. He shuts me down every time I bring it up. I tried to send out workers to repair the most heavily damaged sites, technically contradicting his authority, and when he found out, he got furious and fired me. I think he’s involved.”
“Ichinek?” Ev asked.
“Buriyewon Ichinek, First Structural Engineer,” Eminyela clarified. “My superior.”
“She’s the Second Structural Engineer,” her son said with pride. “And she’s not a corrupt hack.”
“Was the Second Structural Engineer. Now I’m just Emi Ulachiru with some stolen maps—and a very loyal childhood friend who learned to skirt the law in her tenure as a…” Eminyela trailed off and smiled at Ifeleh.
“Smuggler,” Ifeleh said. Ev had never seen her look so soft toward anyone. “No need to dress it up with fancy words.”
“I can’t figure out Ichinek’s motives,” Eminyela said. “Why wouldn’t he want the damage repaired? He lives here. The city’s stability should be important to him. I understand the Firestarters want destruction to precede their revolution, but as far as I can tell, he’s not one of them.”
“Is he greedy?” Ev asked. “I know of someone who might be paying him.”
“That’s horrifying, to think he’d betray us for so little,” Eminyela said.
“That smoking pile of ash,” Sanno said through gritted teeth. Ev liked him even if they’d gotten off to a strange start. He wasn’t afraid of anything, and there was a spark of rage in him that reminded her of Alizhan.
“The person I’m thinking of is very persuasive,” Ev said. “She probably promised him a position of power and influence, in addition to the money.”
“Tell us about her,” Eminyela said.
Ev nudged Thiyo, and through Djal, Thiyo relayed all the information he’d discovered in Iriyat’s journal, the grand experiment she’d planned in Adappyr and its potential consequences for this city and others.
“We found her… agent in Hoi,” Ev said. “He’d taken notes on books in the National Archives. She wanted information about how the islanders predict waves. We destroyed it, so at least she doesn’t have that.”
“If she is planning a quake here, then why would she arrange to visit now?” Eminyela asked. “It’s already dangerous enough that people are leaving in droves.”
The streets of Ndija had been packed with refugees. But Ev fixated on the other thing. “She’s what?”
Sanno drew a folded piece of paper from a pocket and handed it across the table. It was from a pamphlet—or not a pamphlet, but his paper The Citizen. Ev had to force herself not to flinch away from the drawing of Iriyat above the text. The Adpri didn’t subscribe to the Laalvuri belief that images of people were a sin against God’s Balance. They didn’t believe in much except earth and fire, the Adpri. Still, Ev didn’t think she’d react to a drawing of anyone else like that. The heart-shaped symmetry of Iriyat’s flawless face might as well have been a tangle of medusa tentacles for the shock it had sent through her.
Would she bring Alizhan? The text was light on details, little more than an announcement that Iriyat ha-Varensi was coming to the city’s aid. Ev showed it to Thiyo, whose eyes widened. He’d never met Iriyat. Having met both her mother and her daughter, the drawing was recognizable.
“Iriyat ha-Varensi will arrive next triad to oversee the efforts of the men she sent here. The mercenaries, that is. The Lampgreen Company,” Eminyela explained to Ifeleh, since Ev hadn’t been able to unclamp her hand from the page.
“What have they been doing?” Ifeleh asked.
Thiyo gently pried the page from Ev’s hand and passed it to Mala. He touched her hand, and Ev knew he’d been asking the same question as her. There was a chance Alizhan might be in Adappyr soon. Ev felt an unfamiliar lightness in her chest. They could look for her.
“Oh, it’s all very heroic. Digging up collapsed sections. Saving trapped people. But they’re a miserable lot to have hanging around the city, get
ting drunk in all the bars and beating up anyone they think is ‘Unbalanced.’ The city guards had their hands full and now things are out of control. There’s been a skirmish every few triads for weeks. It’s always hard to say who instigated them, but…”
“A riot is good cover for people who want to systematically destroy walls and columns,” Ev said, paying attention at last. “And almost anything could start one. A thrown rock. A fistfight.” She tried not to look at Ifeleh. It hadn’t been Laalvuri mercenaries who’d attacked her and Thiyo. They’d been Firestarters—or so she thought.
“I don’t think you’ll find any men in Lampgreen colors when you go looking,” Eminyela said. “Or they might be Lampgreen men, but they won’t be dressed like it. I’m sure they’ll all have True Sons tattoos.”
“Some of the territorial violence has been committed by people claiming to be Knifehearts,” Sanno said. “I suspect that’s not the case. We may never know how much of it is ideologically motivated.”
Eminyela pointed to a spot on her map. “Two triads ago, there was a riot in Dripwater on the Left Bank, and there were two small collapses in the aftermath—I think you should start there. I can’t say how damaged the neighborhood is, or whether it’s still structurally sound, and I’m not sure what you’ll find.” There was a note of worry in her voice for the first time. “Whether there will be people fighting or… demolishing things more directly.”
“This is why you asked me to come,” Ifeleh said. “We’ll take care of it. The less you know, the better.”
“No,” Ev said suddenly. “Don’t go looking for the perpetrators. It’s too late for that. You’re a smuggler. Let’s smuggle people out before the collapse. The old, the sick, the young… anyone who’s not willing or able to stay and work.”
“Through the caves?” Ifeleh asked. “We won’t be able to get many people through at once, but we can try.”
“The surface is livable for a time, if you have a tent,” Sanno said. “Some people could go out that way. But it will be hard to convince people to go.”
“Maybe not if their neighborhood just suffered a riot and two small collapses,” Ev said. “Why don’t we go to Dripwater and ask?”
“I can’t go with you,” Eminyela said. Ev wasn’t sure if she meant she wouldn’t be helpful or she couldn’t be seen with them. Maybe both. “But Sanno will. It’s the rest shift now, so the majority of residents will be at home. I doubt anyone’s getting any sleep after what’s happened there recently.”
“Speaking of the rest shift, you should go now,” Sanno said.
Eminyela nodded. Ifeleh got up when she did, and the two of them hugged. Ifeleh murmured “Emi,” then walked her to the door. What would it feel like to come home to a city that either hated or venerated you? At least Ifeleh still had one person who treated her like a friend.
The mood in Dripwater was bleaker and more fearful than anywhere else Ev had been in the city. The streets were a chaos of rubble, splintered wood and cracked stone everywhere, and Thiyo made a comically dismayed expression when they discovered that the neighborhood lived up to its name. Ev laughed at him, then felt her heart pinch. He shouldn’t be here. He could barely throw a punch. She didn’t want him in another fight.
The streets weren’t as silent as Eminyela predicted. Residents were out, working in small groups to clear debris and shore up damaged walls. After Ifeleh made it plain that they were there to help, they were handed shovels and directed down Ulomi Tida—tida meant “street,” and as far as Ev could tell, “Ulomi” was the name of a family that had once lived there—to the site of a collapse. Like most others in Adappyr, the street was lined on both sides with columns. It ran from the Sun Hall out to a staircase set into the rock wall of the city, and the damage had happened to the residence closest to the stairs. All the homes in this section of the city were built side-by-side and back-to-back, sharing as many walls as possible. A hole in one family’s home was an unplanned window into their neighbor’s.
“Some of these people have lived here for generations,” Sanno said as they surveyed the fallen front wall of the house. “They make arrangements so that one branch of the family lives in one house and others live behind or next to it. Sometimes they even build doors between the houses. All the plots are the same—a living room and kitchen just inside the door, and two bedrooms and a bathroom set into the back.”
Whether or not the owners of the two damaged houses were family, they were taking care of each other. Both families were out in the street with piles of construction materials—stone, metal, mortar, and a small amount of wood—having a lively discussion about how best to proceed. Ifeleh chatted with them, trying to gauge their mood and gather information. Ev listened, waiting for her aunt to warn them of future collapses and suggest that some citizens might want to evacuate. When Ifeleh did, the residents only sighed in resignation. They didn’t want to leave.
The fronts of both houses had fallen, but the ceiling was intact. It made Ev a little ill to think of how much city was on top of them. If there had been a hole that let them peer up into Underfoot, she’d have felt even sicker.
“Normally, the Office of Infrastructure sends out teams to fix any problems like this—preferably before anything so severe happens,” Sanno said. “But there’ve been so many collapses of late that they’re stretched thin. They’re relying on volunteers, or sometimes mercenaries.”
In no time, they were shoveling debris into wheelbarrows and carrying stones to rebuild the wall. It was hard work, but it felt good to be doing something. Ev was much happier constructing something than punching in someone’s face, no matter how much they deserved it.
She ended up inside the house with Sanno, carrying a heavy stone. The living space had been tidy before the damage and subsequent construction, but now every surface was thick with dust. Further inside the house, they discovered another broken wall, one that let them see through the back of this family’s home, into another family’s. Through that hole, they could hear loud construction and discussion, some of it in Laalvuri. The noise emanated from the next street, which Sanno informed her was called Nyangulo Tida. She felt sorry for these people whose homes had been ruined, who were sacrificing their rest time to fix it. How many more families like this were in the city? What became of those who lacked the means to fix their homes?
The work was so engaging that Ev stopped noticing the occasional drip from the ceiling, or the little falls of dust. She was disgusting all over, so what was one more handful of filth?
She did notice when the world rumbled. It sounded just like the storm in Hoi, before the rain came pouring down, but there was no rain this far underground. She stilled, meeting Sanno’s gaze. The thunder came again, this time accompanied by a tremor underneath their feet. The pots stacked in the kitchen clinked against each other.
She tackled Sanno to the floor. It wasn’t a conscious choice. Her mind put together some combination of sensation and sound just before the next tremor brought all their work and the ceiling crashing down on them.
The quake shook the street and enveloped them in a cloud of dust. On the ground, covering his neck, Thiyo braced for some worse impact. He could hear chunks of ceiling raining down around him. A few chips pinged off his back.
It only took minutes, but it felt eternal. When it passed, he staggered upright and watched the rest of his companions do the same. But Ev had been inside the house, and the house wasn’t there anymore. The walls around it had collapsed, obstructing the space from view. Even the ceiling of the street slanted lower. From inside the house, there must be a hole looking up into the next level, one Thiyo couldn’t see.
Ev was inside the house. He yelled her name and grabbed for Djal’s arm, thinking find Ev as hard as he could. Djal nodded and wrenched his arm out of Thiyo’s tight grip. They all gathered around, shouting and shoveling. Soon his arms ached, and the crooked fingers of his right hand were painfully stiff. An hour elapsed before they’d cleared a passage into the hou
se. Too much time. She would have suffocated. Mah Yee, what if she was dead? What would Thiyo do? The thought alone nearly buried him, the possibility weighing on him with every shovelful of rubble removed.
The house was a disaster of overturned furniture and broken crockery. There were no bodies inside. Where there had once been two damaged house back-to-back, now there was a rubble-filled passage from his street to the next street over.
A discussion rose up around Thiyo, in serious but not panicked or mournful tones, as the residents of the street explained something to the Vines crew. He had no idea what they were saying, only that it didn’t sound like sorry for your loss. That didn’t slow his pulse, but it kept him from screaming.
As this discussion ended, Djal came to him. He put a hand on Thiyo’s shoulder and looked him in the eyes. He spoke slowly and clearly, but Thiyo could still only catch pieces. “Ev” was one of the pieces. Djal gestured at the two ruined interiors, now connected, and pointed through them. Someone must have been digging from the other side. They’d gotten to Ev first.
Where is she? Thiyo demanded.
It wasn’t necessary to think so aggressively at Djal, who’d been nothing but patient since they’d met, and who seemed to care a lot about Ev, but Thiyo couldn’t quiet his feelings. Djal’s solemn expression didn’t reassure him. He said something far too long for Thiyo to catch, but it only took one word to understand.
“Iriyat.”
24
We Will Rebuild
Iriyat. How was Thiyo supposed to solve that? Djal had conveyed, through a series of drawings, gestures, and very slowly pronounced words, that Iriyat was in the city, and that anyone who’d been rescued by her men had been taken to meet her. Djal had even made an illustration of the city’s central public space, filled with a crowd of stick figures surrounding a stage, and on that stage were two stick figures he named “Iriyat” and “Ev.”
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