“Are we going out into the city?” Gilgamesh said, while they were still in the hallway outside of Stefan's office.
Dellen jumped, then he glanced at the chef to make sure he hadn’t noticed anything. “I kind of thought you didn’t want to be seen. I also thought you’d left.”
“Oh, don’t worry, they can’t see me, hear me, or touch me.” Gilgamesh said.
Dellen hurried them out of the room. “Great, but they can still hear me talking to what looks like empty air.” He gave Gilgamesh an insincere smile. “I hope you’ll understand if I don’t always answer your questions.” He looked to the side, and his brows pinched together. “Why can I see you?”
“You have an affinity for Chronometric Aether.”
Dellen tilted his head at Gilgamesh. “I have an affinity for Electrical Aether.”
“The two are not mutually exclusive,” Gilgamesh said. “I’ve been thinking, and I’m almost certain that’s why your re-integration with the time stream went so poorly.”
Dellen rubbed his fingers together while sensing within. “I can feel Electrical Aether flowing through me. I don’t feel Chronometric Aether.”
“Well,” said Gilgamesh, “Part of the problem is that you probably don’t know what Chronometric Aether feels like.”
“I see, and what is the other part of the problem?” Dellen asked, feeling skeptical, he might not know what Chronometric Aether felt like, but he knew how Electrical Aether made him feel, and it was Electrical Aether that flowed within him.
“There is next to no Chronometric Aether in this hamlet of yours.”
“Hamlet?” Dellen said. “Were you on the same balcony? Copperopolis is a huge city!”
When Gilgamesh replied, Dellen could hear the rolled eyes in his voice. “If there are fifty aetherforged in this entire city, I will be impressed. The unforged are a rarity outside of this city.”
“I thought you didn’t know much about the outside world,” Dellen said.
“I see the bodies before they’re refined.”
Dellen nodded and changed the subject. “I thought you’d gone back to the Refinery.”
“I can’t,” Gilgamesh said.
“Care to elaborate?”
“All of the paths back are closed to me. For now, I’m stuck with you.”
“Are there many of… Your kind floating about the world?”
“Not that I’m aware of.”
Dellen tried to think of how to phrase his next question delicately, “Will you be trying to send me or anyone else to the Refinery?”
“What? No!” Gilgamesh said indignantly, his gears spinning in agitation, “Now stop asking me about this; I cannot tell you any more than you saw. All you’re allowed to know is that in one version of your life, you forged yourself, nearly died, and were sent back; I cannot tell you more than that, so I’ll reiterate, are we going out into the city?”
Dellen did what he could to swallow his curiosity; Gilgamesh had to possess knowledge on subjects that theologians or philosophers could have discussed for generations. “No, it occurred to me that if I’m not the first Northcote to want to become aetherforged, then there might be useful resources here, on the estate.” They stepped into a hallway. “What if everything, or at least some of the things I need, are on the premises?”
Gilgamesh’s gears spun, which Dellen took as an indication of thought, “Do you mean to say that you don’t remember how to forge yourself?”
Dellen’s mind’s eye filled with memories of guiding surging Aether. “I remember bits and pieces.”
“Do you know how to take your first steps?”
“I do not,” he said, feeling glum.
“Where do you want to start?” Gilgamesh said.
Dellen showed some teeth. “The library.”
The Northcote library was a vast room with towering bookshelves. It was located in a room adjacent to his father’s private library, connected by a small door. The smell of old parchment and oiled metal filled the air. Sunlight struggled into the room, blocked by drapes hung over huge windows.
Dellen pulled the drapes open, luxuriating in the warmth on his face. Dappled rays illuminated the room with a golden glow. He paced through the aisles, eyes scanning the spines of books, searching for anything that might be relevant. Looking at the titles in order, he heaved a sigh, ‘The Wondrous World of Winged Creatures: A Comprehensive Guide to Avian Species,’ ‘Culinary Delights: The Art & Science of Gastronomy,’ ‘Battle Strategies of the Aetherforged: A Historical Analysis of Warfare & Tactics.’
He soon realized that the library was not organized in any discernible manner, making his search difficult. Dellen worked his way deeper into the library, carefully examining the spine of each book but finding nothing of relevance.
Dellen came across a promising title, “The Aetherforged’s Guide to Enhancement,” but upon opening the book, he found it to be a collection of anecdotes and tall tales with no practical information on how he might improve himself.
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Days went by, and Dellen found himself surrounded by piles of books, each one as unhelpful as the last. He discovered a tome titled “The Hidden Potential of Aetheric Energy,” only to find it filled with obscure theories and arcane diagrams unrelated to his interests. Another book, “The Clockwork Conundrum,” offered a history of aetherforged technology but lacked any actionable advice for forging.
The following day, Dellen was awoken by Maisy. “Oh my lord, you must read the headlines in the broadsheets; it’s terrible.” She tut-tutted, as she moved around his room, opening drapes and letting in the light.
Dellen sat up in bed, having fallen asleep reading from a stack of sequentially unhelpful books from the family library. “What is it, Maisy?” He said, rubbing at his eyes.
“The crashes,” Maisy said.
Dellen held out his hand for a paper. There was the headline “Logistic Crisis!”
A series of unexplained airship crashes has alarmed the citizens of Copperopolis.
Dellen read on, but there was no further information, just the names and sizes of ships that had crashed. From small carriages to larger vessels for shipping goods around the city.
“Most baffling, Maisy.” He said. He took his breakfast, dressed, and returned to the family library.
The week dragged on, and Dellen began to lose hope. Each time he thought he had found something useful, it turned out to be another dead end. He had scoured almost every inch of the library, and his search seemed to be in vain.
Exhausted and disheartened, Dellen slumped into a chair, surrounded by the mountains of books he had gone through. He’d been better, once, he knew he could do it again, but not there.
“Chin up,” said Gilgamesh, returning from another nap. “The first time we met, you were positively bursting with metal. I’m sure you can do it again within a few centuries.”
Dellen looked at him askance. “Centuries?”
Gilgamesh was silent for a long tick. “Wait, do I have the measurement wrong?” His voice brightened, “Oh, that’s right, you’ll be dead in a few centuries if you don’t figure it out faster. Linear time is confusing.”
Dellen stifled a yawn. “Linear time is simple, if exhausting. I’ve spent days at this for no palpable benefit.”
“Maybe you need to look at the city?” Gilgamesh said. “You were born here, at least I think you were. We definitely know you lived here; otherwise, the time stream couldn’t have brought you, us, here. Why not walk around and see if it shakes any memories loose?”
Dellen brightened. “Not a bad idea; where do you think might be familiar?”
Gilgamesh gave his approximation of a shrug, a tortured shifting of clockwork that would likely eviscerate any finger too close at the time. “Seems safe to say it wasn’t this library. Maybe the grounds of the Northcote Estate and parts of the cog we’re on?”
Minutes later, they were walking through the gardens around house Northcote, lush but overgrown; the vibrant colours of the flowers and soothing sounds of the birds were a welcome change from the dimly lit library.
Dellen stared at the metal plumage of a singing bird perched on a nearby branch. If a bird could forge itself, so could he. Its body whirred and clicked, working in synchrony to create a captivating, otherworldly tune. Though borne from a complex network of machinery, the bird’s song was beautiful. Its melody bridged the gap between the mechanical and the organic.
A few feet further down the path, he startled a nautilus; it burst out of the bushes and flew around a corner. He watched it go, red and white tentacles undulating out of a metallic shell. “How does something like that fly?” He asked aloud.
“Does this feel more familiar?” Gilgamesh said.
“No, I think I need to see the city.”
Together, they walked out the front gate of the Northcote family grounds. Feeling the subtle spin of the cog, Dellen followed an avenue leading to the outer edge, allowing them to take in the view of Copperopolis. The gap between cogs allowed a view down to the chasm below. The sun’s rays danced on the metallic surfaces of the city, casting a warm glow on the machinery.
Around them, citizens, usually almost exclusively unforged. Dellen thought he might have seen one person walk by with a forged hand, but they were lost in the crowd before he could react, and the glint could have been anything else. He continued to watch as citizens went about their daily routines, the rhythmic whirring of machinery and pistons accompanying their every movement. Children played in the streets; their laughter intermingled with merchants’ cries advertising their wares.
The architecture was a blend of form and function, with buildings crafted from copper and brass, displaying both the beauty of artful design and the practicality of sturdy engineering. Gears adorned the facades of homes and shops, interlocking with the mechanisms that made the individual buildings move.
Feeling adventurous and glad to be free of the library, Dellen decided to navigate the moving bridges that connected his cog to its neighbours. As he and Gilgamesh approached the first bridge, they noticed its complex system of gears and levers, working to swing the structure from one cog to another with precise timing.
They waited for the bridge to align with their destination and crossed to the neighbouring cog. Dellen felt the twist in his stomach as his momentum shifted from left to right, with the difference in rotational direction.
Curiosity piqued, Dellen ventured deeper into unknown terrain, lured on by the novelty of his surroundings. “Are you quite certain this is safe?” Gilgamesh said.
“I don’t recall reading any reports of muggings as I scanned the papers,” Dellen said. “What has you worried?”
“Well, I don’t know how to get back to your estate, do you?”
“Ah, yes,” Dellen said. He pointed. “If you use that tower as a landmark, we.”
“No, we can’t use that tower; that’s not on your cog.”
“Of course it is; that’s the Raven Tower,” Dellen said.
“No, my eyes are sharper than yours.”
“You don’t have eyes.”
“I can see farther than you can, and that’s a praying mantis on the tower,” Gilgamesh said, somewhat snippily.
Dellen looked to the skyline, searching for any familiar landmarks. “Well, we’ll just have to step onto a cog heading back towards Aurum Heights.”
“I see, and you know how to do that?”
Dellen gave Gilgamesh an annoyed look. “When we need to, we’ll take a carriage.”
The smell of cooking food and fresh spices led them to a nearby market. Dellen inhaled and bought a wrap of peppery meat with some unfamiliar vegetables. Scanning the area, he saw a departure dock with a short queue for carriages.
Ten minutes later, a carriage touched down. A particularly short woman climbed out, letting Dellen take her seat. The carriage was burnished copper, mostly green with age, the color marred by irregular scratches along the side. “Take me to Aurum Heights, please,” Dellen said to the pilot, flipping him a sovereign he’d claimed from a wallet in his rooms.
The pilot gave him a nod of acceptance, and Dellen felt the airship pushing up beneath them, taking them into the air. He marvelled at the view of the city unfolding before him. The intricate maze of interconnected cogs, each with its distinct architecture, spun in a pre-ordained dance.
Back at the Northcote Estate Dellen said, “Before we venture out again, I’m going to spend a few hours in the map room.”
He led Gilgamesh to a large room with twenty-four moving models of Copperopolis. The models labeled the ninety-seven major cogs of the city, as well as the almost innumerable smaller cogs that orbited them. Wheels within wheels, each of the larger cogs performed a dance where they moved from centre to edge over a twenty-four-hour period.
A smaller cog, like Aurum Heights, moved twice as far as a larger cog in the same period. “It would be helpful if you also studied this,” Dellen said. “Your vision is better than mine; you might be able to help next time we get lost.
Dellen spent hours memorising the movements of Aurum heights relative to the larger pieces of the city, learning to predict where it would move next.
“I think I feel better prepared to visit the rest of the city.” He said to Gilgamesh.