He looked up at her. “That depends on how long you’re keeping me.”
“At least until you’re well enough to travel. And food will be provided whenever you wish.” She glanced at the empty plates. “Is there anything else you want now?”
“Do you have books in Altanic?” Moon asked on impulse. It was partly strategic; he had to keep her thinking of him as a person and not a dangerous if wounded animal. But if he was going to be stuck here for a while with no idea what had happened to the others, a distraction would help him keep his sanity.
Her brows moved in a way that made him think she was trying to conceal unflattering surprise. “I’m sure some can be found.” She hesitated. “Anything else?”
“Why is there a pool of water in the middle of the room?”
“To cool the air,” she said, and walked out.
Moon took the opportunity to lick the plates, then tried to stand. He had to haul himself up on the window sill and once upright, he swayed, shaky and sick. He didn’t think they had drugged him. There just weren’t that many drugs that affected Raksura that weren’t Fell poison, and this didn’t feel like it. It was more likely that his battered body had reached its limit for the moment. He barely made it back to the couch in the other room, climbed into it and burrowed down into the blankets, sliding back into sleep.
Jade and Rorra crossed a bridge beside an elevated canal, heading toward a clump of domed stone structures like small mountains. Below them, more ordinary paths, paved with flat river stones, wound through a garden and a grove of trees, linking more modest buildings of white limestone. There were groundlings and their draughtbeasts and carts everywhere. It wasn’t as noisy as the section of the city near the trade portal or any of the markets, but it was still enough to get on what was left of Jade’s abraded nerves.
Jade was in her Arbora form, wearing a set of Kalam’s clothes, an open Janderan jacket, pants, and sandals on her feet. It was uncomfortable and just felt odd, especially the sandals, but it would keep anyone from suspecting she was a Raksura.
“Is that it?” Jade jerked her chin toward the biggest structure. “I need to stop so I can try to catch the scent.”
“All right, I’ll pretend to be tired.” Rorra leaned on the parapet looking into the canal. A small boat was sailing by, and Rorra flicked her blunt claws in the water.
“Are you sure you’re pretending?” Jade leaned on the rail beside her. There were canal boats and wagons driven by the Kishan moss that offered transport around the city, but they were enclosed and made it nearly impossible to scent anything.
Rorra’s expression was wry. “A little. Kedmar isn’t nearly this large. Kalam was surprised, too.”
Jade knew how much gratitude she owed to both of them, for leaving Callumkal to the care of Golden Islanders and Raksura, for coming here to help search for Moon. Considering the reception Kalam had gotten in isl-Maharat, Kalam and Rorra had decided not to appeal to any officials of Kish, not until they had help. Their plan was to search for Moon on their own until Niran and Diar arrived with reinforcements from Kedmar.
Their knowledge of Kishan cities was invaluable, and they also gave Jade someone to talk to, since Stone was barely speaking to her.
Jade hadn’t wanted to bring Rorra and Kalam at first, and it had added to the coldness between her and Stone when he insisted on it. As soon as she had seen the city, she had known she was wrong, and her effort to conquer that irritation had made things even worse.
This place made the port city they had stopped at on the way to the sel-Selatra look like an outpost. Even with Stone, Jade wouldn’t have had any idea how to find Moon. Rorra and Kalam had never visited here before but they seemed to know exactly how everything worked. Rorra had found a caravanserai and Kalam had paid for it with the little tokens the Kish used for barter. His supply came from Kedmar, originally brought along on the expedition by Callumkal, and he was able to buy food and anything else they needed. The only problem was that Rorra had to keep her fire weapons carefully hidden, since they weren’t permitted inside the city.
When they had first arrived, Rorra had explained that there was a place called the trade portal where all the boats had to go before they could navigate freely within the perimeter of the city walls. While they waited at the caravanserai, she had gone there to get word of any survivors from the forerunner docks.
“We should search the cadashah, depending on what Rorra discovers in the trade portal,” Kalam had said while they waited for her to return. It was a Kish word Jade didn’t know, and he had explained, “That’s a place with physicians where anyone can go at any time, for treatment or medicine or to stay, if they’re very ill and it takes time to cure them. If the people who found Moon didn’t realize he was a Raksura, they may have taken him to one. The cadashah don’t ask for payment, or anything, so it would make sense to take an injured, unknown traveler there for help. If it’s the same way here that it is in Kedmar, the problem will be that everyone who doesn’t have a private physician uses cadashah, so they’re all over the city.”
But when Rorra returned, it was with rumors of survivors found in the burning ruin and taken to conclave leaders. “They’ll want to question them,” she had said. “Obviously. Giant things don’t just fall out of the sky every day.”
So they had divided up the sections of the city that had public buildings for the conclave’s use, and were checking the cadashah near them as well. Apparently the conclave had dwellings on top of structures used as libraries and meeting places, which made it easier for Jade and Stone to get close enough to try to pick up Moon’s scent. Kalam was out with Stone today; he and Rorra switched between their two Raksuran companions in an effort to keep anyone from noticing and marking their movements. They met at the caravanserai every night and crossed off sections on Rorra’s maps.
Now Jade tasted the air deeply, sorting out Rorra’s scent, and the blended scents of all these busy groundlings. It helped that this city was almost as clean as a colony tree, with relatively few scents of rot or sewage. But no scent of Raksura, either. “Nothing. I’ll try again once we’re closer.” Rorra was also asking questions of the people who took care of the buildings, telling them she was searching for word of a missing Jandera flying boat that she feared had been destroyed in the strange ruin’s collapse.
Rorra pushed away from the parapet and they started down the curving walkway toward the domed building. “How long are you and Stone going to be angry at each other?”
Jade suppressed a jolt of irritation, feeling her spines press against her coat. It was followed immediately by a jolt of guilt; Rorra helped search for Moon with the dedication of a favored warrior and it couldn’t be easy for her to walk all over this city, no matter what she said. “I didn’t think it was obvious.” It had to be obvious. She and Stone could barely look at each other.
Rorra glanced at her. “It probably wouldn’t be, if I hadn’t been living in your laps for so long.”
Jade shook her head. “I’m angry at him because he’s angry at me. When we find Moon—” She cut herself off, forcing the bubble of fear down. “—we’ll talk.” No, we won’t. Because I’ve come as close to killing my consort as if I snapped his neck myself, and Stone hates me for it, and I hate him for not stopping me. Even if—when they found Moon alive, that wouldn’t change. “It’ll be all right.”
“I hope so,” Rorra’s voice was uncharacteristically soft. As they drew near the smaller walkway that curved off toward the first building, she straightened her shoulders. “All right, remember, you’re my friend the mineral hunter from the port of Ked-kalabesh.”
When Moon woke next it was night, and the bronze lamps above had lit the room with a warm light that came from the Kishan moss. He struggled out of bed and went to the other room to look out the windows at the city. It blossomed with light from the open terraces, windows, from hanging lamps along the bridges and walkways. Snatches of voices were carried on the wind, with threads of music and drums.
He tasted the air. Again, no hint of other Raksura nearby, though that didn’t necessarily prove anything. They got away, he told himself. That’s why they aren’t here. Even if they had been trapped in the docks somewhere, they would have escaped when the structure had started to come apart.
At least he felt more awake than he had earlier, his head clear. He was weak, but the deep ache of abused muscle under the burns was less, and his newly growing skin itched. He tried to shift again, just in case Ceilinel had decided to trust him, but he could still feel a barrier keeping him in his groundling form.
Someone had been here, taken the dishes away, and left more water and tea, and more of the little cakes, and he hadn’t even woken. There were new garments lying on the bench, another skirt-pants and a knee-length shirt of dark material with a soft brocade across the shoulders. A second low table had been carried in, and it held several Kishan-style books. Wincing, Moon sank into an awkward crouch on the floor to examine them. All were in Altanic, though one had Altanic text on one side of the page and Kedaic on the other. It was a history of Kish, and he set it aside to read first. While he was down there, he crawled over to the other table and ate the rest of the cakes.
He shoved to his feet and took the fresh clothes. Across the room was a door to a smaller space, the scents coming from it suggesting it was a bathing room. It was, with the basins for washing and elimination similar to the ones on Callumkal’s flying boat, just larger and of richer materials. He used both, careful of all his burned patches and the bandages, then dressed again and continued to explore.
There was a door over the next arch, carved wood heavily reinforced with chased metal, but it was standing open. He slipped through into a curved hallway with one wall open to the chamber below. Everything was richly polished stone, sometimes carved but more often just showing off the natural colors of the different minerals. He followed the waist-high stone balustrade, tasting the air, looking for the source of the strong draft.
On the other side of the dome he found a gallery in the outside wall with floor to ceiling stone latticed windows, open to another view of the city. The breeze flowing along it was strong, and it had a better view of the aqueduct and a four-level building supported on multiple bridges, with open walls and walkways. It was brightly lit, and from the stalls he could glimpse and the groundlings moving around inside, it might be a market.
Moon carefully tore off a piece of bandage, then went to the gallery’s far corner and found a place where he could knot it around the support for a stone drainage pipe just outside the lattice. The effort left him a little weak and he went back to lean against the wide doorway, the warm wind ruffling his hair. It would be better to put something on the opposite side of the building too, in case the wind changed. He refused to think about the fact that there was no one left, no one looking for him.
He pushed away from the wall and followed the hall around to a curved, serpentine stair that reminded him a little of the colony tree. Downstairs he wandered the lower floor and found two hallways blocked by locked metal gates. One had a draft that carried the faint scents of oil and spices, and he could hear distant voices occasionally. It probably led to the kitchens and the area where the groundlings who took care of the house lived. The other hall was quiet and he suspected it might lead to the stairwell down to the lower parts of the structure. It was confirmation that he was a prisoner, though a pampered one.
When he wandered back into the main stairwell hall, the little blue groundling walked out of a wide doorway, saw him, and let out a squawk of alarm. Before it could panic further, Moon said, “Where’s Ceilinel?”
It took a breath, steadied itself, and said, “This way.”
It led him back through the doorway, through a couple of ante-chambers, and out into another large domed room. Pillars of a gleaming jewel green surrounded a seating area with curved stone benches with thick cushions. A carved stream of water wound its way across the floor, decorated with bronze and gold insets of water plants, insects, and frogs. Ceilinel sat on one bench, facing two other groundlings. One was of a similar species to Ceilinel, with gray skin and a headcrest, but larger, more heavily built, and its hair was light-colored. The other was slim, smaller, its head of an oddly triangular shape, the rest of it mostly concealed by the silky drapes wrapped around its body.
Moon’s unwilling guide went to Ceilinel and said, “He’s awake again.”
Ceilinel glanced up and spotted Moon. “That’s all right, Vata.”
Vata retreated hastily out another doorway.
The other groundlings faced away from Moon, and hadn’t looked around. The big gray one said, “Surely you realize how dangerous it is keeping that creature here.”
Ceilinel’s brows lifted and spread. “I’m not sure why you seem so certain of that, Gathin. The Raksura are a relatively unknown species, but the Jandera seem to find them peaceful enough.”
Gathin made a noise Moon could only interpret as skeptical. The other strange groundling said, “The Jandera who seemed to find them so are all missing or dead.” Its voice was low and deeper than Moon had been expecting.
Ceilinel regarded it. “That’s inaccurate, according to the messages we’ve received from the coast.”
“But none of them are here to speak for themselves,” Gathin said.
Since there was apparently no objection to his presence, Moon went in, his bare feet silent on the cool tiles. He stopped at the first bend of the carved stream, tempted to put his toes in the shallow water.
The slender groundling said, “The only difference between these creatures and Fell is that we know less about them.” It leaned over. “You are putting yourself and your retainers in danger by allowing one of those things, no matter how injured, to remain in this house. You should release it from the conclave’s custody so it can be contained.”
Moon let out a silent hiss of derision. Ceilinel clearly wanted him to hear this, though he already understood just how precarious his situation was. He waited for Ceilinel to indicate that the creature was in the room, but she said, “I don’t feel that I or anyone else is in danger. Should we not take this opportunity to find out more?”
Gathin said, “We don’t have the leisure for that kind of inquiry.”
Moon couldn’t tell what Ceilinel’s game was, but he didn’t want to participate. He said, “Why not?”
Gathin twisted to look at him, surprised. It said, “Who is this?” The other turned more slowly. Its eyes were huge blue circles above a small nose and a thin-lipped mouth. Something about it reminded Moon of that brief glimpse of the carved face in the foundation builder city.
Ceilinel said calmly, “This is Moon of Opal Night, consort to Jade, sister queen of the Indigo Cloud court.” She added to Moon, “This is Gathin, she is the speaker of the Imperial Boundaries, and Utreya-cal Doyen, who has taken on the duty as speaker for Hia Iserae.”
Gathin stared. Her expression seemed to be conveying both horror and chagrin. It was always chancy reading the expressions of unknown species, but Moon thought this was a pretty safe guess. Doyen blinked slowly, the lids coming from the side of its eyes. Ceilinel said, “Moon, please sit down. You aren’t recovered yet.”
Moon stepped over the stream and went to the bench between Ceilinel and Gathin. His legs quivered at the last instant and the movement pulled at all his new and half-healed skin. He winced and settled on the cushion, trying to breathe slowly. Ceilinel took in Gathin’s expression with some impatience, then asked Moon, “Were the books to your liking?”
He wasn’t sure if she was testing him or showing off the extent of his civilized skills for Gathin and Doyen. Moon said, “The Natural History of the Kish Imperial Origin looks interesting.”
Gathin had managed to recover a little from the shock. She said, “You are the Raksura found in the ruin.” Doyen didn’t react in any way that Moon could see, but there was something about its gaze that he wanted to interpret as predatory, even though its slim hands and delicate finge
rs were as unthreatening as possible.
“Are there any other Raksura here?” Moon asked.
“I hope not,” Gathin said, sounding aghast at the idea.
It had the unmistakable sound of the truth. Moon hadn’t really kept a hope that Ceilinel was lying and the others were locked up here somewhere, but it didn’t hurt to be sure.
Doyen asked Ceilinel, “Will he cooperate with the conclave?”
“Let’s ask him.” Ceilinel turned to Moon. “A claim has been made by a group of Hians that Callumkal attacked their ship in a dispute over a valuable foundation builder artifact. They say this dispute was what made the ruin fall from the sky and that it caused the deaths.”
Moon didn’t understand. “The deaths? You mean the Hians who were in the ruin?”
“No. The ruin fell into the border area between Kish-Majora and Kish-Jandera, near the city of Kedmar. Though it fell in an empty plain, many Janderi and Janderan in nearby towns were struck ill, and at least fifty-three were reportedly killed outright. There were probably more. They are still attempting to ascertain the extent of the damage.”
Moon was frozen for a moment, too stricken to react. Two thoughts hit him simultaneously: did it get as far as the Reaches? and they meant to bring it down right on top of Kedmar. He managed to say, “Callumkal can tell you that’s a lie. So can Kalam and Rorra and the Jandera who were with him.”
“The Hians claim Callumkal is dead, killed by Raksura. A flying craft will be arriving tomorrow from Kedmar-Jandera and the speaker for Kedmar has asked the conclave to wait for its arrival before formally hearing the Hians. I’m hopeful Callumkal, or some other representative, is on the craft.” Ceilinel leaned forward, suddenly intent. “Whoever the craft brings, you will be asked to tell your story to the speakers in the conclave. Will you be able to do this?”
“Yes,” Moon said, because there was no choice. He was the worst possible person for this. Did the Hians making this accusation know who had accidentally brought the artifact out of the foundation builder city? And would anybody believe it was an accident?