Suspicion narrowed those green eyes, firmed those lips, wrinkled that chin. Lapis ignored the wariness and took another bite of the eggs the cook, Melly, fried for them, savoring the smoky flavor. She coated them in a red sauce that did not curl her toes, a bonus in her estimation. She could smell the heat wafting from Rin’s plate, the strength matching his apprehension.
Perhaps he should concentrate on scarfing the sausage patties and the sweet orange berries folded in sour greens.
Not all had risen to enjoy the morning meal, but those who had—Caitria, Mairin, Linz—grinned and waited, as if they expected a confrontation. That was not how she and the street rat did things—though, considering how badly her break in character scratched her wayward brother, perhaps he, too, would do something unusual.
“You suggested that, didn’t you?” Rin asked, his focus on Patch. Her partner just raised his eyebrow and sank his teeth into the fluffy brown bun. “’Cause the La—Lanth ain’t no sweet when pissed.”
She did not appreciate the sentiment, however much it might match her angry concern for the rats. Still, her silent acceptance of his foolish endeavor needled him, which meant he would remember how and why she did so, long after the rest of the trip faded into a barely recognized memory.
“And you haven’t eaten anything,” Caitria said, tapping the corner of his plate with the tip of her fork. Her stern reminder had all the strength of her wide grin backing it. Rin snarled and grumbled and dug in with typical rat intensity.
Scand had no such difficulty, his second helping already in his tummy. Lapis was pretty sure so much digested there, he could not suck in his bulging gut.
“Since you’re here, you’ll be doing apprentice work,” she said as she accepted a refill of her teacup from Brander. The thief sank into his chair next to her, his amusement matching the sudden mirth of her partner’s.
“OK,” Rin and Scand said in chorus.
“That means running errands and doing ‘keeper duties.”
“Lorcan says he has plenty to keep them busy.” Jhor and Sanna entered the room; dark smudges and bloodshot eyes meant he had not slept the night before. He clattered into a seat near them and set his meal down more carefully on the table.
“He does,” Caitria agreed. “He always has something for teens to do. How are the khentauree?”
He sighed and Sanna slipped her hands over his shoulders in comfort. “They’ll be fine. We need to heat the sponoil slowly, but the four are adamant about speeding up the process for Luthier, the pony-sized one. She has a lot of delicate innards that aren’t in other khentauree, enough to remind me of Ghost. I think she’s a special research subject, like he was, and meant to lead the others, like he was.”
“They are blind-afraid,” Sanna said, her soft buzz comforting. “They see only darkness, with their backs to the light.”
“And how would you be, if Ghost lay in stasis, waiting to thaw?” Jhor asked.
“I know you would do all you could to help, so I would not be blind-afraid. I would just pace.”
Lapis tipped her head down to hide her grin. A pacing Sanna would drive the modder nuts, as his disgruntled reaction attested.
“And I looked in on the bird.”
That caught their attention.
“It is a strange bird, not like the ones at Ambercaast,” the khentauree said. “It is patchwork and mishmash with nothing familiar.”
“That’s true,” Jhor agreed. “Its shell may be Dentherion, but its insides aren’t. The Meergevens at the mines didn’t have anything like it, despite bringing in a lot of advanced tech from Siindernorth. Vory and Zain were breaking it apart, and they said they hadn’t seen a bird like it, in Abastion or Dentheria. Neither have I. The empire constructs theirs with the same layout and coding to make them easier to fix, and this one has odd wiring and unusual microplates.” He glanced at Caitria. “Vory fried it when she shot it, and they’re having difficulty retrieving any information from its memory files.”
“We have special weapons meant to disrupt flying tech,” she said. “It interferes with their communication devices and the links between their power sources and their hardware.”
“It works well.” He dug into the food, too fast to taste the wondrous meal. Sanna clucked at him, and he ignored the warning to slow down.
“Too bad my mother isn’t here,” Caitria murmured. “She’s pretty good at pulling info from the most destroyed tech. But she took my sister and the kids to Gredditch, in celebration of Ty’s birthday. My parents started a home for orphans, and my sister runs it now. Ty’s the eldest and he just turned eighteen. It’s a vacation for them, and now that the storm’s hit, they won’t get back for a few days yet.”
“Orphans? Like street rats?” Rin asked.
“Yes, but we provide a home for them. They don’t live in the hallways or by themselves in cubbies. My dad’s training them like he trained Cawry and me, and they’ll be modders when they get old enough.”
“So there’s really a town down here?” Scand asked, skeptical, as his eyes darted to the doorway and back.
“Yep. It started out as a safe place for people left behind when the Taangis Empire withdrew from Theyndora. It grew into a rebel base and, in the last fifty years, transitioned into something like a House in Jilvayna. When my dad took charge, he created a space for modders, and they brought their families, and it expanded from there into a Wolf Collaborate mission center. There are maybe ten thousand people who live in Ragehill, depending on how many are on missions.”
The rats choked, reflecting Lapis’s shock. Ten thousand? Where did they all fit?
“Ragehill farm commune hides the rebel connection,” she continued. “You haven’t seen them yet, but we have fields to the south, in places where Taangis strip-mined. We run cattle and sheep and have a stable of horses and oxen. We raise chickens and ducks and pigs and other farm animals. The nearest towns like Calderton think we’re some rural fanatic religious cult that’s been around for about a century, which is fine. It keeps them away and hides our rebel roots.”
“You seem tech-heavy for a Theyndora rebel outpost,” Jhor said.
“We are. Some of that is due to being a Collaborate mission center, but mostly, Abastion’s the only western country that’s ignored the prohibitions on tech. Normal people have communication devices and electric stoves and water heaters, even if it isn’t up to contemporary Dentherion standards. Farmers have aquatheerdaal-based vehicles for the fields, cities have horseless transportation, medical establishments have modern equipment. Much of it runs on batteries that are recharged by wind and sunlight.”
How much did Abastion influence Faelan? Midir? The Wolf Collaborate? It provided an extant example of people using tech and defying the empire to do so. The country’s puppet kings must not have cracked down as hard as the Jilvayna ones, or the use of the sophisticated items would have gone underground, leaving the average citizen without.
Of course, with the aquatheerdaal shortage and the search for a replacement, Dentheria had other motivations to leave Abastion well enough alone—for now.
Caitria regarded Lapis, her enthusiasm dimming. “When Faelan visited, he was most enchanted with the horses. He said they reminded him of you.”
Another reminder, she should not have hidden for eight years. “When did he come?”
“About two years after the attack. Carnival and Jarosa were shoring up support for the Collaborate and visiting member rebel organizations to make certain they stuck with it. I think being here did him a lot of good.”
Mairin laughed. “He met you, and who can resist your cheerful charm?”
Caitria blushed.
Mairin grinned around the table. “Her dad says she became a mega-fan. Followed Faelan everywhere while he was here, and when he left, so did she.”
The Abastion rebel wobbled her head about and shoved food into her mouth rather than reply to the teasing.
“My brother has that effect on people,” Lapis murmured. While others found cruelty and meanness as ways to attract buddies and underlings, Faelan relied on kindness and compassion—and he always seemed to draw far more friends and supporters than the callous.
“He cares—something many leaders think is a liability,” Patch said. “They talk about helping others, but it’s just a stepping stone of obfuscation to garner trust. Of course, what he wants to do splats against reality, and that’s a painful break to fix.”
“That’s why he needs lots of help,” Caitria said. “And why I volunteered.” She sighed and tapped her utensil on her plate before setting it down. “My father wanted me to stay here and be a modder. He thought Jilvayna was too dangerous for rebels, and while he was right, I knew that’s where I needed to be.” She squinted at Mairin. “Mega-fan?”
“Tell me you didn’t follow him everywhere during that visit.”
Her face wormed around in time with her thoughts, then she returned to her meal. “What else did my dad say?”
“That Jetta and I are lucky you like women, or me and her would have been outta luck.”
Caitria pursed her lips, then shook her head and leaned over for a kiss. “That’s silly. Faelan’s a thinker. That’s what I find appealing. He has plans for a better future and works towards it rather than making nice speeches and hoping someone else acts on his words. And that’s why the Wolf Collaborate is so important.” She jabbed her finger into the tabletop. “It’s toiling here and now for a future everyone can enjoy. There may be disagreements about how to reach it, but that dream is the fire in every rebel who looks to it.”
Alaric said much the same thing when founding the Collaborate and the Pack Council. Lapis remembered his arguments with Jarosa about it.
Melly peeked into the room and hobbled over to the tables. She had tech supports on each leg, and while they helped her stand to cook, she did not walk smoothly with them. Lapis found them intriguing because a couple of the rats could use a similar walking aid. “Caity-dear, the krav’s ready.”
She perked up. “Great! Hurry and finish eating, and we can start the tour!”
Caitria split the contingent into tour groups, mainly because so many slept in. Tia tried to wake Mint as they congregated, and he just rolled over and snored louder. How any of the others rested through the noise, Lapis did not know.
So she, Patch, the rats, Brander, Linz and Tia accompanied Caitria on the first excursion, all bundled in jackets because the Abastion rebel said the corridors got cold.
She expected something like the underground in Jiy or Ambercaast, freezing tunnels lined with doorways connecting larger, sparse rooms. If Ragehill managed ten thousand residents, how many people did they squeeze into small accommodations off the corridors? Or did several share abodes, and because of missions, rarely stayed there at the same time?
Did they have clothing stores, restaurants, knick-knack sellers? Or did the place resemble an enormous rebel House? The commons room, the comms and the communal bathroom being so close together gave her that impression.
Caitria led them into the hallway and away from the hangar. Stubby brown carpet blanketed the floors of the dingy white corridors, which contained several open doorways leading to rooms filled with tech and more tech. Some housed jumbles of metal and wires and odd whatevers that laid on tables, others had blocky tech screens sectioned off from each other by grey panels, while still others contained an array of liquids and burners and blinking cubes. The area reminded Lapis of a Meint medical center, which always seemed bright, smelled like fresh acidic fruit, and had a sense of cleanliness not found elsewhere in Jiy.
“This is the tech vicine,” Caitria said, arms wide to denote the entire area around them. “A vicine is an old Alban city district, and that’s how the first rebel residents divided Ragehill. In the tech vicine, we take care of and do research on tech, as you’ve probably guessed, and maintain the power for the first level and hangar. It’s positioned here because the comms have a better chance of working rather than returning static. The third and fourth levels are notorious for interference.
“The first floor is divided into five vicinir. The other four are the greenhouse, the chancellery, the first quarters, and rebel central.” She laughed. “Whoever came up with the names wasn’t exactly creative about it. The greenhouse grows a few plants, though it’s mainly a storage space for foodstuffs. It’s basically the Night Market, only it takes up a lot more space. The chancellery houses the local government, the first quarters are the first level habitations, and rebel central is pretty self-explanatory.”
“This place runs like a regular town?” Patch asked as they continued past rooms with busy people inside.
“Yes, though the wealth disparity is less because everyone here is a rebel or rebel-adjacent. You don’t get rich running missions. If you sell enough confiscated Dentherion tech to the underground, you can live comfortably, not extravagantly.”
“Where do you sell it?” Brander asked.
“Calderton has an active Revechere syndicate base, and we make trips to the Corals. Our capital has as many syndicates and rings as Jiy, though they don’t have an undermarket. You deal directly with the boss’s representative.”
Lapis found that intimidating. If she had to negotiate with a Minq associate or a Ram syndicate shank, she would hand stuff over to Patch and let him get a better deal.
He squeezed her hand, and she realized her fingers made white imprints on his skin. He chuckled and kissed the side of her head, likely following her thoughts and laughing about her cowardice.
“There is a chancellor, but the officeholder’s main job is to deal with outside interests. The chancellery keeps tabs on the missions and payouts. They also do things like maintain records and public spaces and run the schools. So typical bureaucrat stuff. Anything that requires force or consequential Ragehill decisions is a rebel responsibility.”
“Force? Like bein’ guards?” Rin asked.
“Yes, but we don’t have patrols. There isn’t much crime here. Sure, there’s random theft and we’re not immune to violence, but most of the problems people have are psychological, so they’re sent to doctors, not arrested. The rebel vicine has a jail, though, the long-term lock-up’s not used much. If anyone poses that much of a problem, they’re asked to leave.”
She led them into an enormous room with over-bright lamps hanging from the ceiling and pipes running the length of the walls. Lined up in rows in the center of the cement floor stood four-wheeled, square metal flatbeds with two benches bolted in place. Crates and plastic-wrapped things filled the ceiling-high shelves.
A man wearing a bright yellow hardhat with red smears on the sides waved at them, and to reach him, Caitria wove through workers more intent on staring at the motley group than working. He stood next to four flatbeds hooked together, two with benches, two without. He motioned to the seating, and she cheerfully thanked him.
“Hop on! I think the back’s large enough for you, Tia. If not, we’ll add another krav.”
Tia signed, and Rin grinned. “She’s sayin’ it’s fine,” he told them.
Ah! Lapis smothered a grin. Brander had offered to translate for the terrons, but having the two teens do so would keep them occupied. As her apprentices, she would assign them to Mint and Tia, and their exciting adventure would become a work mission.
She shuffled up the ramp and fit—barely—and the rats chose the bench in front of the terron. Lapis and Patch sat in the third one, while Brander and Linz slouched down in the second. Caitria planted herself next to the driver, who concentrated on a cube with a small screen, sliders, buttons, and a large, grooved knob.
Thin rails rose from the edges and clicked into place at shoulder height, and a pane of glass slid out from under the first flatbed and folded up to protect the bench. The driver pressed a button, and the vehicle lurched into motion, then rolled from the room and entered a corridor large enough that three of the flatbeds could pass one another, with room to spare.
The passage was plain, with a cement floor, whitewashed walls, and a chain of lights illuminating everything below in a bright white. While people walked at the sides behind a waist-tall metal barrier, most drove flatbeds laden with cargo to their destinations. Those going in the same direction as theirs hugged the right-hand barrier, while those going opposite were to the left. The center appeared reserved for faster panels to pass ones so weighed down, they moved at a crawl.
Caitria planted her elbow on the back of the bench and turned about, her cheeks a ruddy blaze. She patted the padded metal with her hand. “These are kravir. That translates to something like quickers. They’re the primary mode of distance transportation in Ragehill, especially if you have heavy loads. Otherwise, people walk or veli where they need to go. Carpet means you can walk there. If you see cement and red lines, the passages are for velir.”
“Velir?” Lapis asked.
“They’re single-person vehicles that have three wheels—one in front, two in back. You sit on a seat above the wheels and hold on to the balance handles. There are two types; you can pedal with your own two feet, or you can use one that moves on its own. You can hook up a chashel to the back, which is kind of a large basket with wheels. You’ll see a lot of parents using them to haul their kids around.”
The krav picked up speed and Lapis snagged her hair and curled it behind her ears. The vehicle moved fast enough to create a breeze. She tried to picture a similar thing rocking down the streets of Jiy, and privately decided she preferred wagons drawn by horses and cows. Having nothing but a glass between her and a potential obstacle disconcerted her.
They passed several cross-corridors, where a central pole pointed a glowing green plate towards the direction that could ‘go’, one at a time. Green lines guided the driver, whether they turned or continued straight, and once a krav exited the intersection, the plate would fold down and the one to its left would flip up and point. When the central pole did not activate, the ones on the corners flipped up orange glowing plates and the pedestrians crossed to the other side.
“The first floor is pretty active with kravir and velir,” Caitria told them. “Think of kravir as wagons you can hire for transportation, like Rik’s. They have a driver, so you don’t have to worry about figuring out how they work. If you need a veli, there are stores that rent them. They usually have one out front, so they’re easy to spot. You just need to fill out a form and put Lorcan as the contact. They’ll know you’re a guest.
“Just so you know, the shop owners and the majority of people here know Lyddisian, but there are a few who only speak Bast. They’re a reserved bunch and prefer to work in the fields rather than associate with most of us. When they sell our excess crops at markets, though, they’re adept at gathering information for rebels to use.”
“Is there a lot of excess?” Linz asked. “I mean, ten thousand is a lot of people to feed.”
“Unlike Jilvayna, Abastion doesn’t limit the use of tech for agriculture. This includes vehicles, but also fertilizers and growing techniques and weather reports. Smaller plots of land can produce more, and if we’re smart about crop rotations, it’ll stay that way.” She grinned. “Believe it or not, I talked with Yedin’s grandda on the subject. We’re quietly looking into helping him with fertilizers. Nothing overt that the crown might take exception to, but how will anyone from court know they’re using better fertilizer?”
The offer struck Lapis as something Midir brokered. His interests spanned a greater swath than becoming king, and as far back as she remembered, even when he pranced and preened and was a bit stuck up, he looked for ways to improve living conditions for the common Jilvaynan. More food would help so many, as lean times for the poorest often happened.
The monotony of the ride bored her, though she enjoyed snuggling with Patch. The corridors provided little to view, other than kravir and random walkers. No business fronts, no décor on the walls. No plants, nothing. She almost asked if the rest of Ragehill looked like this. Almost.
Noise increased, and they passed beneath an arch and entered a humongous square. Arches circled the space, tall enough for three of her to fit, and had detailed grooves with gold glittering in the depths. Gold pilasters spanned between them, and above those sat friezes with depictions of battles, offerings, and daily activities. While the paint flaked from the sculptures, the overall punch of wine reds, brilliant golds, sky blues, grass greens, tree browns, and wheat yellows remained.
The battle friezes depicted warriors dressed in leather armor fighting tusked horse-beasts, birds with over-large beaks and talons, and a creature that looked like an upright bunny with mouse ears, a long snout, and a lizard’s tail. The others contained people in robes or multi-colored cropped tops and wrap-around skirts of knee or ankle length. More important individuals were twice average size, and wore tall, jeweled headdresses, multiple necklaces, and chains that ran from ear piercings to a forehead ring. They rode horses through woods and fields or sat on beaded thrones.
Most women had blinding-white skin and darker clothing, most men had dark sienna skin and lighter clothing, though a couple of people sported a pale tan. Those people dressed light or dark, and Lapis wondered who they represented.
The average people carried baskets and vases, sewed, played instruments, cooked, and danced. Many held upright banners and food-laden trays and paraded behind those of more importance. Pets and wild animals filled the ground and sky.
Larger-than-life portraits hung between the friezes and the ceiling. The once-significant people stood in front of landscapes and thrones, all bedecked in flowing garments, necklaces and bracelets, tiaras and crowns, and perfect makeup. They held feather fans with beaded strings, unrefined branches with various animal symbols burned into the wood, head-sized seashells painted with landscapes and decorated with jewels, and woven rings wrapped in wine-red fabric.
Above the paintings, a dome of red and gold geometric patterns delighted the eye. They ended at a circular gold border ringing the top. Within was a brilliant blue, cloudless sky broken by a dull brown mound. Five trees grew there, the middle larger than the other four. Tiny people walked up a twisting trail in a long procession.
The scene resembled illustrations in scholarly history books depicting ancient Jil religious rites, the ones where they poured communal blood onto mounds in honor of the gods. Lapis knew the ancient peoples of western Theyndora, like the Jils, the Rams, the Albas, all shared a similar tradition.
“This is extraordinary,” Linz breathed, looking around, eyes wide.
“This is why my father doesn’t know exactly what Taangis used this place for,” Caitria said. “The empire built a military complex over this religious center, the same way they obliterated other important sites. Their leaders made a big deal about destroying western Theyndora religions because they found the blood practices barbaric. It seems unfathomable that they would leave sacred spaces that honor rulers and gods intact.”
“There are more rooms like this?” Patch asked, arching back to regard the ceiling, the blue light whisking around his patch.
“Yeah. There’s even one where the communal offering bowl still sits on top of the stone pillar. The pictures on the walls in that room show teens cutting the pads of their fingers and bleeding into the bowl, after which a priest takes it to the mound and pours the blood into the ground at the base of the tall tree. There’s a lot of glittery gold and silver paint there, and you have the sense of the ancient divine just walking into it.”
“Tia says her granna told her about how rich Taangins would buy up the land temples sat on, then make them into homes,” Scand piped up. “They’d show off all the artwork and brag about how they were saving old history for future academics, and they’d invite scholars from Pelthine over to study it. The empire didn’t care, because the purchases still stopped the locals from practicing their religion. Her granna worked in one of those estates in Ramira, before being sent to Ambercaast.”
Caitria blinked. “Huh. So this might not have been a military complex, but a noble’s estate?”
Lapis turned around as they came to a stop and waited for a long line of kravir to proceed in the perpendicular direction. “So nobles preserved religious centers because they got to brag about their academic prowess, in defiance of their empire’s objectives?”
Tia nodded and signed.
“Her granna liked to tell a story about the empire destroying a temple, and that night, a storm passed through and flooded the military encampment, obliterating everything. It spooked the superstitious, and they threatened to quit the army, so the commanders didn’t burn any more of the buildings. The rich swooped in and gobbled up the land, which had the same effect.”
Apparently, Dentheria did not employ a similar superstitious lot . . .
“Lapis?”
She blinked and looked at Patch, then back at the painting directly behind them. A woman stood in front of a throne carved to look like a droopy willow tree, regal in an orange and red crop top and wispy skirt, the sleeves long, bell-shaped, and falling to her knees. Gold bracelets dangled from her wrists, gold and beaded necklaces decorated her chest, and a tiara with sharp points adorned her sleek black hair. She held a sunset-painted shell at waist height, the landscape on the grooved outside rather than the smooth interior. But the loose bun style, wisps in front of her ears, her pose, the soft look on her face . . .
“Did you know your parents visited Ragehill before Faelan was born?”
She shook her head at Caitria’s inquiry.
“Faelan had the same reaction to that painting. He said it resembles the portrait of your mother that hung in the foyer of Nicodem.”
“It does,” she whispered.
“My father told him the person who painted it visited here, to look at the portrait for inspiration because your mother loved it so much. The plaque at the bottom says she’s Kvan Revallene siv Shion Adarske. That translates to Lady Revallene of the Wandering Petals. She’s holding a sunset shell, which normally denotes royalty, but the Wandering Petals were nomadic shamans that traveled to religious centers and performed rites for the Willowcrown, the main Alban god. They gave up any attachment to their previous life and devoted themselves solely to their rituals. The Alba never would have allowed royals to do that, so she might have been a sympathetic benefactor.”
“How old is this temple?” Tears formed, and Patch laid a comforting hand on her back. Rin glanced at her, and she could not identify the emotions other than melancholy that swirled through him.
“We don’t know,” Caitria said. “There’s an old library with old books on the second level, and from what some of them say, this place predates the Taangis empire by at least a thousand years. We know there was some restorative work done, but we don’t know when or by who—though, if rich people bought up the temples, then one of them probably brought in specialists to restore the artwork.”
Lapis nodded and rubbed at the lump in her throat. She needed to talk to Faelan. With the storm raging, any communication was probably nil, but she wanted to try. Because if she did not, she would fret about the unexpected link to her mother for the rest of her stay.
Why had he not mentioned it to her? She would remind him, how much she disliked such surprises. They made her anticipate bad things, and she needed hope, rather than pessimism, to guide her in Abastion.
