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  Even in his weakened state, he had managed somehow to pull down one of the heavy furs from the high shelf where they were stored. Those furs had traveled with them to and fro and had remained entirely unused as relics from another time and place. Folks of the tropics had no use for such trappings. The center of the fur retained the shape of a body curled into it. Mia tried not to worry. Perhaps the warm furs were responsible for his current spry state. She couldn’t lose hope.

  “They remind me of your mother,” he used to say when she asked why they burdened themselves with such unnecessary items.

  “Tell me more about her,” Mia would say.

  “She was very beautiful” was all Father would answer to that request.

  When she was ten, Father had presented her with a leather bag lined in fur. It was much heavier than the gauzy cloth packs people in Hackberry carried.

  “It was your mother’s,” he said. “I thought you might like it.”

  It was an aged brown, with scratches and scars here and there marking its adventures. Soft sable-colored fur lined the opening, and the letter J was intricately embroidered on the front in soft silk threads of green and blue, matching her eyes. Mia would look at her bag and imagine how it might have gotten a particular mark on its side. Did Mother scale a mountain to look from its peak or traverse an ocean to stand on a foreign shore? Mia had no idea whether she ever had done those things. She must have been a great adventurer, however, to come by these fur items so foreign to the tropics. Mia carried the bag with her always, even though the few hammockers about her always joked at its heft.

  “Mia,” Father called from the hearth, interrupting her musings, “I’ve been thinking very long and hard about what my next words will be. I don’t say them lightly.”

  Mia turned back to him. Father had set the table with the morning meal and was taking a seat. She sat across from him, her heart pounding in her chest.

  “All right,” she said, encouraging him to continue.

  “I need you to carry a message to the Order of Vis Firmitas in Willowslip.”

  Mia recoiled at mention of the Order.

  “I know what I’ve said these cycles past, but the clerics there may be able to render assistance in this matter. They have means not available to the hammock folk here in the backwaters. They’re an ancient organization that has retained the ways of old.” A viscous cough punctuated his statement.

  “But you’ve always mistrusted their ways,” she replied.

  “True as that may be, they may have some remedy for the spores, and I have something they may need.”

  What might he possibly have that Vis Firmitas would want? Despite her reservations, Mia grimly agreed to make the journey and carefully packed her most sacred belongings into her lapin bag, including a small notebook where she kept her thoughts, along with a lock of blond hair from her mother pressed into it. Her mother’s locket was Mia’s constant talisman, and she placed it into the bag as well. She also packed her collection of the rarer root blocks, shunts, and conduits kept on hand for repair work. A simple tropics gauze wrap contained her clothing and camping gear.

  When Father handed her the missive, it was sealed with his sap mark.

  “Don’t break the seal,” he instructed. “We’ll be lost if the letter doesn’t arrive intact.”

  Mia thought his request odd, but she obeyed. She was scared for Father and for her own future.

  Giving him one last hug and a kiss on the cheek, she leaned close and said, “You’ll look after Hamish, won’t you?”

  3 Willowslip

  Lumin Cycle 9499

  Melia Kannon struggled to put one foot in front of the other. Her feet had ceased to ache many kilometers back. Now she felt only the shock waves that the blocks of numbness connected to her ankles threw up her calves and into her hips. Willowslip stood off in the distance, a speck on the horizon of blowing green stalks, with mountain ranges to either side of the plain. The sight was majestic from a distance, but she had serious misgivings regarding what they would find when they reached the city. It had taken them many months to get this far, and the vastness of Lumin, which had felt to Melia so small before now, appeared as an endless expanse of land and water. From the cold Northlands, with their remote villages and estates, through the mountain pass and its towns carved from the rocks of the surrounding cliffs, they had nearly traversed the open plains. Along the way, they met only chaos, desperation, and frequently despair. Melia regretted not taking a weapon when they had left the SainClair estate.

  “I don’t think I’ll see Senegast again in my lifetime,” she said, as she and Gerard walked among the tall grasses swaying in unison, like waves rolling across the ocean. She missed her family, her children, her hearthtree, and she worried for them all.

  “I suppose that would indeed be a tall order,” replied Gerard.

  “I fear all the island towns are already cut off from the main continent,” she said after a long pause. “Boats for short travel were always for the common folk, who were unable to afford a trip by baccillum. Now, whether one is poor or rich, common or storied, our tools of travel are the same.”

  “Mine could use a hot soak,” said Gerard, his normally pale skin red and cracking from the merciless wind and lack of shade. He grimaced as he looked down at his travel-weary clothes, dirt caking the fine garments. “It appears my feet aren’t the only thing that could use a soak,” he added.

  Melia smiled at her companion, her white teeth flashing against the brown skin of her face. She didn’t burn like Gerard, but her skin wasn’t windproof and chapped just the same. She would be glad to get out from the open pass and back to the shade of the trees.

  “Perhaps islands like Senegast are better off isolated from the mainland,” she said, frowning at a jagged tear in her sleeve, courtesy of a band of distraught citizens. She’d been obliged to hide her status as a former delegate after that incident. “At least for now,” she added, deepening her frown.

  Gerard nodded as he looked off to the mountain toward their right. If his mother’s letter was accurate, they were headed for its base.

  “I understand why Mother did what she did,” he said finally, “but why not prepare people first? Give them time to develop larger boats and alternate means of land travel.” His words were fractured. The fatigue was getting to them both.

  Melia shook her head. She pressed her arm against her side, feeling the reassuring warmth of the book against her ribs. “I don’t think it would have mattered. We—myself included—were all too attached to our comforts and conveniences. Perhaps Aris understood that a swift wrenching of the bandage was in order.”

  “I just hope Willowslip is better off than the Northlands,” Gerard said, and then his left knee buckled under him.

  Melia stepped quickly to his side and supported his elbow as he struggled back to his feet. She shivered against the wind and thought of the Northlands. Somehow she doubted Willowslip would be any better.

  Melia and Gerard finally wound their way down the road into town toward nightfall a few days later. The entry gate was a shambles, but at least it was open. No one paid the two newcomers any mind as they moved along the mossy roads. Melia wasn’t surprised. She and Gerard looked wretched; the long journey south hadn’t been kind. Gerard favored his left knee with every step, and Melia worried for his health. They needed quarters for the night. It had been weeks, maybe months, since she’d last slept on a mattress. She prayed at least one of the local hospitality hearths was housing folk. They moved through the disordered streets, passing fighters, beggars, vendors, shifty-eyed grifters leaning against the ruins of shops, and everything in between.

  “Network connection!” yelled a man with a pushcart as they passed. “Get yer adapter conduit here. Guaranteed to restore yer connection.” That trick apparently had worn thin, as the man had no takers.

  Some of the shops were boarded up and abandoned. Melia saw signs of rioting come and gone. The early chaos had subsided into hopelessness.
Busted shades and bent and torn branches decorated the buildings. Some of the trees were even scorched on the outside. Nothing without a direct hearthroot had power, so all the plank structures had been abandoned and gutted for any useful materials.

  Melia and Gerard stayed silent as they traversed the clamor of people and small animals before turning west at a large intersection. The road they had turned from kept north, eventually leading to the Lord’s Keep. “Keep” was an inadequate name. It was by any definition a castle and a stronghold at that. Even from their position south, Melia could see the guards standing at every corner tower, keeping careful watch. It was disconcerting, to be sure, but nothing they had time to deal with now.

  “Hoy,” Gerard said, his voice raspy. “I think I see a hospitality hearth up ahead.”

  “Let’s hope they have a hearth strong enough to heat a good bit of water. I have a mighty need for a bath and a cup of tea.” She took Gerard’s arm to steady him, and they continued through the ruckus toward the sign that read, hearth share inn.

  Neither of them noticed the shadow growing long behind them, always twenty paces back.

  4 The Voyage

  Lumin Cycle 10152

  Mia Jayne stared in awe at the large ship before her. It was a sight to behold, with its fantastic metal hull eaten away with age and the ravages of the tropics, a relic from a long-forgotten past. A grove of elder trees grew from the center of the deck. She always traveled by canoe through the channels out among the hammocks, but this ship wouldn’t fit through such thin strips of water. It was meant for majestic trips across the straits.

  It was Mia’s first trip to Willowslip, as Father always had kept them clear of major towns when they’d traveled. “When you’ve seen how humanity acts during war times, you realize the thin veil of civilization we wear is but a mask we don to be able to continue to live with ourselves,” he’d said once, after imbibing a strongly fermented gourd.

  When Mia asked what he meant, his demeanor grew surly. “Such matters are in the past and should stay there!”

  She never pressed the subject after that. Now, as she stood waiting to embark upon the ship, a small shiver trilled through her. She should have pressed harder for information, paid greater attention to the ramblings of her elders.

  “Fare?” said a sailor. His bony face and sunken eyes wore a bored expression as he blocked the embarkation ramp with his body.

  “Gourds,” she replied, and held up a basket of the squash fruit she’d lugged with her from Hackberry.

  “They fresh?” he asked suspiciously. He stared at Mia, as if just noticing something odd about her face. Brushing off his stare, she selected one of the gourds from the basket and rapped it solidly against the rail of the ship’s gangway. The gourd pulsed with a soft glow in her hand.

  “Freshly picked. They should have at least five uses in them.”

  He nodded and took the basket from her hands then offered it to a deck hand who’d slunk up by his side. “That’ll do,” he said, and waved her onto the boat. “Find a place ter set. We’ll be off shortly.”

  Mia boarded and surveyed her surroundings. The deck was built around a large grove of elder trees that occupied a significant portion of the center of the ship. They were a particularly hardy and well-tended bunch. She walked over to the rail that surrounded the dense throng of trees and peeked over it toward the roots below. Their trunks descended into the darkness of the hold, but the smell of moist earth wafted up from the recesses. She reached out a hand to touch one of the branches of the closest elder tree.

  “I would refrain,” a deep voice said from behind her. She flinched back in surprise and turned her head to locate the source. A tall, lean man stood behind her. He had black hair and dark eyes, not unlike Father’s, but his deep skin, although naturally brown and swarthy, appeared ashy and faded. His complexion would be even darker than Father’s if he didn’t clearly spend nearly every waking moment indoors.

  “Why is that?” Mia replied, studying his clothing. He obviously wasn’t one of the hammock folk. His heavy garments were devoid of color, as if each piece had been washed one too many times with lye or had been left in the sun to drab.

  “The shipmasters are very particular about maintaining their elders. If you were caught molesting one of the trees, you’d be put off the ship.”

  Mia raised an eyebrow. “Molesting?” She spoke the word as if it were a foreign object discovered in her mouth, shrugged, and dropped her hand back to the banister. “I was merely curious.”

  He approached the rail to stand beside her and looked at her from the corners of his eyes. “I am called Cedar Kannon,” he said casually.

  “Mia Jayne,” she finally grumbled after some brief deliberation.

  “Nice to meet you,” he said, and flashed a bright smile at her.

  She rolled her eyes in return, but she felt her chest tighten slightly. Something about him disarmed her.

  “Quite a pleasant day to set sail,” he said, undaunted.

  Mia looked up at the bright blue-green sky with its puffy clouds spattered cheerfully about. “Indeed,” she muttered, although she didn’t feel particularly at ease with the day.

  “What takes you to Willowslip?” When Mia didn’t reply, he continued. “I was on an errand and am returning to my duties in town. Serving with the Order of Vis Firmitas is important work.”

  Her ears pricked at his admission. She might be able to learn something of use from this gangly fool. The fact that he was a cleric increased her mistrust, but she had no idea what to expect. The gangly fool that you know is better than the beast you don’t, she thought.

  “I have business with the Order myself,” Mia said, still looking up at the sky through the branches of the trees.

  “What business is that? Perhaps I can assist.”

  He was rather getting ahead of himself. They’d only just exchanged names.

  “It’s a matter of discretion. However, if you wish to be of assistance, I certainly could use direction to reach Dominus Nikola.”

  Cedar coughed conspicuously, trying to hide his surprise. Mia kept her face impassive despite his almost comical reaction to her request.

  “You wish to see the head cleric?” he asked with incredulity. “Seeking an audience with him isn’t an easy task.”

  “Be that as it may, I believe he’ll want to speak with me.”

  As he snorted in repressed laughter, Mia’s eyes narrowed. Granted, my close circle is on the rural side, but are all city folk so disastrously mannered?

  “It’s no concern of yours,” she replied testily. “The offer of assistance was yours. I’m prepared to proceed with or without it.”

  Cedar collected himself and nodded. “Oh, I’ll be delighted to take you to Dominus Nikola. In fact I’d trade my right eye for a front-row seat.”

  “That won’t be necessary,” she said, and leaned against the rail. “It seems I have something the Order needs.”

  Cedar shrugged and said no more.

  After a quiet moment, Mia rummaged through her bag and pulled out a fist-size spiny yellow fruit. She pried off some of the spines then munched on the creamy white flesh underneath. It tasted of mild sweet lemons, and she murmured her approval. “Want some?” she asked, and pulled a second fruit from her bag.

  Cedar eyed the spiny fruit as if it would leap out of her hand and attack him. “What is that thing?”

  “In Hackberry we call them rollies,” Mia said. “They need the moisture and warmth of the tropics.”

  “Don’t you want to save it?” he asked, taking the proffered fruit with hesitation. “It might be a while before you get back here.”

  “Oh, I doubt that,” Mia said. “My business in Willowslip will be quick, and I have no desire to whiffle about.”

  5 Entry

  Lumin Cycle 9499

  Melia Kannon caught her breath as she and Gerard approached the cavernous mountain way flanked by imposing hardwoods. The sprawling roots of the elders hugged the rock
crevasses that formed the entry to the stronghold within. She stopped and looked upward. The jagged walls of rock slipped into obscurity as they rose steeply into the air, framed by the trees. Green mixed with brown and gray, and curling tendrils of vines caressed the large hole in the mountain toward which they trudged, inviting them to explore. How had Minister SainClair found this place? It was massive yet completely innocuous. Melia continued her trek, taking double steps to catch up with Gerard. He was doing much better after a good night’s sleep at the hospitality hearth, but their months of foot travel had taken a toll on both of them.

  “What will we find inside, I wonder,” Gerard said, more to himself than her.

  “Aris said we’d find the future of Lumin,” Melia replied, adding, “although personally I think we’ve carried it with us.” She patted her side where the book was nestled, never out of her reach since that day in the Core, a day that had left her with recurring dreams that had her screaming in the night for the ministers, pleading with them to come with her. She quivered at the memory of the blood, the haunted eyes of Minister Draca, and the crazed expression of Rosewater as he flung himself toward her.

  “I hope so. Right now it feels like Lumin has no future.” He scowled and rubbed his neck.

  “An uncertain future, perhaps, but one nonetheless,” Melia said, trying to stay positive.

  “Look at that door.” Gerard squinted into the darkness of the twenty-foot hole in front of them. “It’s huge.”

  Melia slipped a gourd out of the sack slung over her shoulders and knocked it against her palm. The chemical light swirled to life, emanating from the translucent skin of the round knobbed plant. It was too weak to cast light on the distant door, but she held it aloft as they approached, trying to get a better view. The sunlight filtering through the tree branches and down the dark cavern path illuminated the barest outline of the mammoth door. The shadows in the cavern swirled as Gerard and Melia stepped closer, and she grew tenser with each passing moment.