“Damn,” Bel cursed. Her mind wandered to Flann and Jan. Had the old men been pulled into the fighting? She hoped not. “It sounds like I really need to speed things up down here,” she said, angry with herself. “And right now I’m stuck going to dinner with a dinosaur.”
Stion craned his neck around as he continued walking down the incredibly wide hallways of his palace. The thick slab of polished stone that served as the building’s floor shuddered with the force of his steps, even in the low gravity of the Underworld. “I’m a what? That word didn’t translate.”
Bel’s snakes recoiled and she feared that the massive magistrate thought she was insulting him. “What’s a dinosaur?” she repeated weakly. She really wanted Stion liking her, especially if the surprise dinner guest was going to be trouble. “I don’t know, actually,” she said with what she hoped was an innocent smile. “What are–”
“We prefer to be called ‘walking serpents’,” he growled, “although some people have called us dragonets.” He flicked his tail a few times. “Is dinosaur and Old World term? You’ll have to tell me more about it.”
Bel withered at the thought of explaining her second-hand knowledge of James’ world. She had a vague memory of James saying that Dinosaurs were Greek, but she didn’t know what those were either. Embarrassed, she meekly replied, “okay, but it isn’t that important.”
Cress elbowed her in the ribs. “This is a serious situation, Bel,” she whispered, “we need be on our best behavior.”
Bel’s snake flicked their tongues in irritation. “Let me finish talking, and then I’ll pay attention, I promise,” she pleaded.
“Look, Bel,” Beth said seriously, clearly tired of only hearing one side of a conversation, “do whatever you need to do down there, shake people’s hands, lick their faces, whatever weird shit is the custom down there, but you need to figure out Lempo’s plans fast. Things are going up in smoke up here, and we don’t know where all of his inquisitors have gone. Some of them could be surrounding us, or going to other islands to gather strength there, or they could even be going after you.”
As Beth spoke, a spider woman pulled a massive door upwards with a set of webs anchored to the ceiling. The door neatly lifted into a space in the ceiling above it, creating a seamless corridor that lead to a room with a long, stone dining table laden with food – mostly sizzling meat. As the aroma wafted out, it pulled Orseis forward like a fish on a line. Stion watched her pass with amusement before waving his ornamental club, urging Bel and Cress – and the engineer, Martinus – forward.
Bel stepped into the room and scanned along the table, taking in the Stion-sized throne on one side and long bench with human-compatible plates and utensils set at evenly spaced intervals. Everything was incredibly luxurious – the stone was a deep red with natural speckling of a darker vein, the utensils were a shining silver, and the plates were carved from a deep green stone and had detailed designs inlaid along their edges. She was so distracted by the setting that it took Bel a few moments to look to the far side of the table where setting had been made for the other dinner guest. She looked up, met the person’s eyes, and then her heart plummeted a thousand feet into an abyss.
She blinked, desperately hoping that she had been mistaken, while her mind spun so quickly that it shattered her thoughts into a million pieces.
“Oh,” Bel breathed.
“Oh,” she repeated weakly as ice spread through her veins and wrapped around her intestines. Her feet scuffed forward and stopped as her body refused to take another step. “I just found one,” she whispered to her siblings. “An inquisitor. He’s who I’m meeting for dinner.”
She recognized the man: he was dressed in the deep blue robes of Technis’ inquisitors, with golden filigree that traced the hems of his clothes and marked his high rank. More than recognizing his clothes though, she knew him. The sight of his face filled her mind with unbidden sensations: the skin being flayed from her back, James’ screams as he was whipped when Bel didn’t cooperate, the days of constant bloodletting. The memories rattles around in her head, setting her snakes to hissing as they picked up on her agitation.
“Ah,” the inquisitor said. He smiled like a submerged crocodile and slowly took a sip from a crystal glass. “If it isn’t Lempo’s beloved daughter. Are you talking with Bethany and that red-haired boy through your little earring? Do send them my regards.”
“It’s Clark,” Bel whispered. “The same one we knew in Technis’ prison.”
She swallowed with difficulty, her throat suddenly dry. “He says to send his regards.”
Clark grinned at her and leaned back in his seat while Cress examined Bel with concern. Stion stalked forward to his throne and crouched over the padded rests sculpted for his large body, unconcerned with the animosity between his guests. Orseis finally tore herself away from the food and retreated back to Bel.
“I’m gonna disconnect,” Bel said. “I’ve got to pay attention.”
“You know him?” Orseis asked, her tentacles nervously passing her divine spear from sucker to sucker. “Is he a problem?”
“He is a human,” Cress said darkly. “They’re always trouble.”
“Ladies, don’t judge me so quickly,” Clark responded. He used the same underworld tongue as Cress, shocking Bel. “Bel and I spent many of her formative years together.”
Bel found a seething anger boiling up from her chest and melting the terror in her veins. She uncurled her spine, squared her back, and stared straight into Clark’s eyes. “Where did you pick up that language, Clark? Was there a helpless child wandering around? Did you rip it straight from their vocal chords?”
She turned to Stion and pointed angrily at the inquisitor. “Magistrate, you should know that this man is a killer and a monster.”
Stion laughed, a loud, deep rumble like a rolling thunderstorm. His reaction only incensed Bel further and she hissed along with her snakes. “He may be,” Stion replied, “but so are you, little gorgon!”
He chuckled. “Do not think that we don’t know of your little escapade with the giants. Every survivor is a killer in this world, unless you stay safe behind the walls of a city like ours.”
He gestured to the bench along the table. “Now sit,” he commanded. He gestured between Clark and Bel’s group. “This is exactly how things should be – he hates you, you hate him, and each of you cannot act without the other acting in opposition.” Stion closed his eyes in contentment. “Trapped in a perfect balance.”
His eyelids opened slowly and his eyes darted from one of them to the other. “But perhaps you could convince me that events should tip one way or the other, hm?”
Bel gaped at the powerful walking serpent. “What?”
Clark laughed and banged his staff against the floor several times before speaking in Mycenaean so Bel could understand him. “He’s asking for bribes and favors, you naive thing,” he mocked. He clicked his tongue loudly. “If only you had learned more about politics, perhaps things would have gone better in the Golden Plains. Then maybe you would have gotten here without so many difficulties.”
Bel grit her teeth, staring daggers at the hateful man. He glowed a deep, insulting red in Kjar’s sight, as if she didn’t need more confirmation that he was evil.
“Magistrate, there is no gain to keeping such a creature around,” Clark said, his tone light and jovial. “Let us dispose of it – we would be doing you a favor, really. They aren’t even citizens of your fine city.”
Cress slammed her fists into the table. Bel winced as her knuckles met the hard stone, but Cress was unflinching in her outrage. “What gives you the right! As if a human like yourself could be a citizen!”
Stion thumped the table a few times with his ceremonial mace, demanding quiet. Then he bent his neck down and tore a huge hunk of meat from one of the steaming carcasses laid out across the table. Bel recognized the act as a demonstration of control and her eye twitched in frustration. She looked away, fearing she would be tempted to say something that would injure her position, and noticed that Orseis had camouflaged herself to blend in with the mottled stone of the table. The cuttle-girl was slowly making her way over the surface, her tentacles snaking out to sample everything she passed.
What an opportunist, Bel thought proudly. Seeing her companion boldly striking filled her heart with resolve.
Stion either didn’t notice Orseis’ antics or didn’t care, addressing the room and leaving Orseis to her harvest. “While it is true that Clark is not a citizen, he is the guest of one.”
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Clark smiled. “The great Technis travelled through here in his youth, before he gained the power of a god. He spent many years in the city, adding his knowledge to the archives.” The inquisitor leaned towards Stion. “Surely you can see that Technis has learned much since then – perhaps a small sampling of his new knowledge would be proper recompense for releasing these troublemakers into my custody?”
“Knowledge that you’ve tortured out of people,” Bel hissed. “My brother would be happy to share any of his Old World knowledge with you, Stion, and could give you better guidance than this thief.”
Stion flicked his tail as he picked a bit of flesh from between his teeth with a metal spike as long as Bel’s arm. “There’s no need for name-calling. I dislike both of you for all the trouble you are causing anyway, so there’s no point in trying to further lower my opinions of you.”
He turned his head towards Clark. “It’s been many years since Durak, Technis, and Gweniffer set out on their journey. Simply hearing the tale may be worth all of this trouble, although I fear that you wouldn’t give me a true account.”
“Technis has nothing to hide,” Clark boasted.
“Oh yeah?” Bel challenged. “Then why did Durak ascend while he’s sitting around enslaving people? And who’s Gweniffer?”
Stion leaned closer and Bel could smell the bloody meat on his hot breath. “That is an interesting point,” he rumbled. “Clark, why has Technis not yet ascended?”
Clark lifted his hands and made a “T” shape on his chest. “He wishes to remain in the mortal realm and guide the humans to further glory. If he ascended, then he would be forced by the pantheon to watch us from afar.”
Bel snorted. “You mean he’s planning on breaking the pantheon’s rules and he doesn’t want to give them the chance to interfere.” Dutcha was doing the same thing, of course, but Bel couldn’t blame her mother spirit for wanting to be free. It wasn’t as if she was enslaving people either.
Clark scowled at Bel and she knew that her guess was correct.
“So,” Stion grumbled, “you won’t be revealing Technis’ plans.” He turned his long neck, shifting his gaze from Clark and back to Bel. “And what does Lempo, great goddess of change and upheaval, want?”
“Uh…” Bel faltered. “She wants me to gather help down here and then go back to Satrap.”
Stion brought his face closer to Bel and she resisted the urge to take a few steps back. “To do what, exactly?”
“Stop him?” she squeaked. “If I don’t, she threatened to drop a mountain on Satrap and wipe it all out.”
Bel was thankful for Clark’s bark of laughter because it caused Stion to shift his attention back to the inquisitor.
“An empty threat,” Clark proclaimed. “Lempo may be able to play with probabilities and people, but she cannot conjure a mountain from nothing.”
Bel wondered if that applied to Dutcha as well. But maybe he doesn’t know about the spirit. I’m certainly not going to be the one to tell him.
“So you do not know what Lempo plans,” Stion hummed. He opened his mouth and bit down onto the cooked skull of some large, beaked creature. Its skull shattered under the force of his bite, and for an awkward minute there was no talking that could be heard over the loud crunching of bone. At last, Stion threw back his head and swallowed.
“It matters little to me or the city either way,” he declared. “If your country and Technis are annihilated it would have no impact on us down here, except, I suppose, that there would be fewer humans making it through from the surface.”
He chuckled. “The thought of it is pleasing, actually.” He turned his head to Bel. “And you say that all I need to do is to keep you here? And Lempo will wipe the humans from the surface of Olympos?”
“But that’s… bad?” Bel squeaked, suddenly realizing that her ideas of morality weren’t matching up with those of the magistrate.
He waved his small hands in an approximation of a shrug. “Technis is a citizen, I suppose, but I can have him removed from our census so that he won’t die as one. No one would object to a mountain falling upon a former citizen.”
“The mountain thing is nonsense,” Clark snarled, “she is overestimating Lempo’s abilities. Technis tricked her easily enough, after all.”
“More like Technis was tricked and doesn’t know it yet,” Bel growled. “My mom has more plans than you’ve got stolen hairs on your head.”
Stion stood waving his mace to cut off Clark’s response. “So what if Lempo cannot deliver? Then nothing happens.” He casually flipped his mace through the air. “And things remain in balance down here. Just how I like it.”
Clark stood and slammed the butt of his staff into the floor. “Magistrate, I protest! If you release the girl to me now, then Technis will grant you favor beyond your–”
Stion turned and stepped towards the door, which rose at his approach. “Not interested,” he called over his shoulder. He gestured to some unseen servants as he passed the doorway. “Keep the two groups separated for now.”
Several robed strangers with a variety of features – a spider woman, two thin, willowy creatures with yellow scales, and a burly man with a furry body and the head of a cat – streamed into the dining room. Bel belatedly realized that she hadn’t eaten anything and reflexively reached out to grab a loaf of bread and a hunk of some unknown meat before she could be dragged away.
Martinus, the curious engineer, stepped forward to block the three servants making their way to Bel and her companions. “I’ll show them out, if that’s okay with you. I wanted to ask the gorgon some more questions about the Old World.”
The servants hesitated for a moment. They looked back, but Stion was long gone, his thundering footsteps already fading into the distance. They shrugged and all converged on Clark instead, who sat sullenly in his seat while staring death and murder at Bel.
Martinus patted Bel on the arm. “Come, take a walk with me.”
Bel glanced at Cress, but her friend had an uncertain expression. Martinus prodded her forward until she started moving to the exit, and Cress and Orseis were forced to follow.
“I hope you two got enough to eat,” Orseis said, happily patting her stomach as she trailed along behind Bel and Martinus.
Cress looked at the shorter girl and laughed. “If not, you seem to have taken enough for all of us.” Her gaze travelled up and down Orseis’ spear, which she had turned into a skewer for a wide assortment of meats.
Orseis hugged the weapon closely. “These are for me, lady. You should have thought of yourself when you had the chance.”
Cress laughed, clearly more amused by the girl’s antics than offended.
“Shouldn’t you start doing things for your new patron?” Bel asked. “Do you really need to keep eating so much?”
Orseis triumphantly lifted her spear. “I took this food deceptively. My new patron is pleased, I’m sure.”
Bel laughed. “It’s nice that we’ve got translators,” she giggled. “We can finally have a proper conversation.”
“Ah, yes,” Martinus shouted, “the translators!” He looked up at Bel and reached his hand forward. The fingers of his glove sprung out like snakes from a burrow and grappled the small metal ball that had been translating for her. He freed the sphere with a twist before the fingers on his glove retracted, taking it away from Bel. The engineer glanced at the miraculous orb with contempt before shoving the translator into a pouch at his side. He then quickly repeated the attack on Orseis and Cress’ spheres.
Once he was done he clapped his gloves together with satisfaction.
Bel stared dumfounded. “Why would you do that?” she moaned. “I have so many questions for Cress.”
Martinus grinned, showing off a full set of metal teeth. “Because they’re all spies, of course!”
“Spies?” Orseis fretted, holding her meat-laden spear close. “Spies for Stion? Does he know how much food I took?”
Martinus guffawed. “He eats more meat than you in a single bite, child, I wouldn’t worry about that.”
Orseis’ mouth twisted. “Okay, but I also took this nice knife,” she said, brandishing a shining blade the length of Bel’s hand that she had somehow concealed with her tentacles. “Is he going to come after this?”
“You really are working on your deception,” Bel gasped.
Martinus squinted at the knife, clearly unable to grasp why she had taken it. He pulled on his long beard before he opened his mouth to explain things. “They’re political spies, for all sorts of factions. None of them will care much for some tableware.”
He shook his head. “Magistrate Stion really doesn’t care much about you, you know, and would rather be rid of you than have to keep track of you and that other guy.”
“Why did he save us then?” Orseis asked quickly. “Bel almost got killed where the airship was hitched, but the undersecretary saved her.”
“Yes, well, it’s the factions, like I said,” Martinus replied. “Kjar’s followers were adamant that an avatar of their goddess couldn’t be killed within city territory, and the other justice-aligned groups lined up behind them. They’re big supporters of any free city, so Stion can’t very well ignore their requests.”
“But why demand that we stay?” Bel asked, bewildered. “Why not banish us? He’s some kind of dictator, right? Can’t he do whatever he wants?”
The old engineer gestured around himself with wide open arms. “The Free City of Walls has a rotating dictatorship. He was elected into the rotation, but if he messes up then someone else may be able to take some of his slots.”
Cress fluttered her wings with agitation and spoke her own language, her irritation plain. Martinus scratched his head as he looked between them. “This’d be easier if you all shared a common tongue, you know.”
Bel shrugged. “We aren’t always lucky.”
“Right, well, to summarize, politics here are complicated. Stion doesn’t want Lempo angry at the city or the citizens angry at him. He didn’t want you dying in the Free City’s territory, and he doesn’t want to waste resources helping you either. Luckily for you, not all of the factions are so ambivalent.” He pointed to Cress. “Now I’m going to explain the same thing to her,” he said testily.
“Wait,” Bel cried out, reaching out to grab his shoulder. She recoiled when she realized that his shirt was smeared with grease and dust. “Uh, what about Technis?” she asked as she mournfully tried to shake the gunk from her hand. She grabbed a nearby leaf from a large, potted tree and got to scrubbing.
“What about Technis?” he replied, confused.
Martinus had just lead them outside, and she once again marvelled at the enormity of the devices that powered the city. “I get that you’re really powerful, but aren’t you worried that Technis would do something bad to the city?”
Martinus laughed. “Ah, that’s not a concern. It seems pretty obviuos that he’s planning to leave, right?”
Bel’s eyes widened. “Leave? What do you mean?”
“Leave to the Old World. Why else would he be messing around with so many portals?” The engineer grinned, his earlier irritation instantly forgotten. “Oh, that reminds me! I forgot to mention that I was talking with your brother – great fellow, crazy ideas, can’t wait to talk more – while you were at dinner. He gave me enough details on Technis to figure out the rest.”
He nodded exuberantly, bits of dust and lint shaking free of his beard. “Yup, Technis always was a clever one. Must have spent a few lifetimes to get the portals right – and squished quite a few people too I should think – but he’d think it worth it once he got them working.”
Bel’s pace slowed. “So Technis is planning to leave Olympos and invade the Old World?”
Martinus nodded. “Exciting, isn’t? The war will be spectacular! Just imagine – Old World technology against our abilities and Technis’ grafts!” He rubbed his hands together and the friction on his gloves released a thick and cloying scent of oil and burnt metal. “Of course,” he added sadly, “Technis has already been studying Old World technology and tactics, and he’ll catch them by surprise too. It may not be that fair a fight.”