Perhaps that note in his voice is responding to the note in mine—perhaps he knows I’m not telling him everything. I glance at him, my smile reassuring. “The guardian stones, yes. And if the Divine One cannot help you return to the sky … if anyone in our history ever knew how this might be done, it will be in the records at the temple.”
I must get him to the temple—I am not lying, not about the records, and not about his safety. But I dare not tell him all that I’m thinking: that if he is divine, then he could be the Lightbringer returned to us.
In my vision, the lost stanza seemed to say that all I had to do was show the Lightbringer that ancient copy of the Song of the Destroyer. That, somehow, looking at the scroll would unlock his understanding of who he was.
He will look upon this page and know himself… .
Perhaps this boy is more than a messenger. Perhaps he is the message.
If he is the Lightbringer, then I am the one destined to be at his side.
I’m not fated to walk this earth alone after all.
He might not yet know it, if his destiny is to end the suffering of my people and begin the cycle anew, but I know mine—to keep him safe, and help him discover his divinity. For if his fate is to end the world, I must bring him to my temple … and I cannot let him leave.
TEN
NORTH
Nimh’s temple sits nestled in a fork of the river. The water splits there to flow around the rocky jut of land rising up over the surrounding terrain. Like a tiered cake dominating a feast, the temple overlooks the jumble of buildings and boats spread below it.
Though I saw it all from a distance, the moment of being in the city itself creeps up on me. There’s no one place where it begins, no wall around its border, no edge of the island like there is at home. But though it’s nothing like home, this is still a city, and the best place to search for the tech and the knowledge I need. Last night when I crashed, I didn’t even know there were humans alive down here. Now there’s an entire city. So I keep reminding myself that things are looking up.
We made our way across the plain, where the roads of the civilization that used to be here—my ancestors and Nimh’s—are still raised up a little above the rest of the land. I caught glimpses of a grid now and then.
My head still sort of wants to explode, but I think I can make sense of the story her people tell. Generations ago—so long ago that even my people have lost the records of it—we left this place, and in the time since, they’ve turned us into gods who fled to the sky.
We repaid them by forgetting they were down here at all.
Kind of a raw deal.
But seeing the ruined city has reminded me of one thing: this is the world my people came from. Once upon a time, we had the technology to lift whole cities up into the sky. Surely somewhere here, perhaps hidden away in the darkest corner of Nimh’s archives, is a record of how we did it. Maybe it’s written like a technical manual—it wouldn’t make any sense to someone who doesn’t know what engines are, but I might understand it.
If this world once knew how to raise up a city … then they must still have, somewhere, the knowledge of how to raise one lost prince.
I have to meet this god of theirs.
I can’t help but glance across at Nimh while she’s too focused on our path to notice. I’m like a grounded fledgling here, utterly out of my element. I suppose she’d be just as out of place in my world. I wonder … If I can find a way back to my city, could I bring a representative from this place? Open up communications between our two peoples? It’s the kind of thing a prince should think about, after all.
Nimh and I make our way past a few boats as the water begins to deepen around us. The rivers become more defined, paths hacked through the old roads to allow the shallow craft to pass. I’ve never seen a full-size boat before, but we used to float petals in the palace fountains and race them, and in a strange way, I see that echoed now.
At first it’s just one or two of the long, thin vessels, maneuvered through murky waters by ragged owners using long poles. Then there are flat-bottomed barges made of bundled reeds. Then the foot traffic on the beaten earth paths around us is increasing, and then we’re on the outskirts of the city.
We venture into what’s unmistakably a market, though so early in the morning it’s still waking up. Laid out on the barges, many of which carry small buildings as well as their wares, are baskets of grubby roots, bundles of shiny green lettuce-like leaves, and small silvery things with a smell that nearly bowls me over. When I break our silence to ask Nimh what they are, she shoots me a slightly concerned sidelong look, as if she’s wondering if my crash landing rattled my brains.
“Fish,” she says, as she holds back a smile, not realizing that the word doesn’t mean anything to me.
As I consider pressing the issue, she eases deftly to one side to avoid a pair of men who threaten to brush against her arm. The crowd isn’t too thick yet, but she won’t be able to avoid being jostled forever.
I’d love to know why she doesn’t want to be touched, but I already approached the subject, and she sidestepped. Perhaps she just has really strong preferences. I know a man who only eats even numbers of bites at his meals, a woman who only wears blue. They manage just fine. Maybe Nimh’s in that camp. Maybe she just needs more time to learn to trust someone. That’s fine. Until I can get an audience with this mechanic god of theirs, I’ve got all the time in the world.
I watch her profile as we make our way along the path. She’s so serene now, and so sure. And then I nearly stumble over the cat as he weaves between my feet, his tail raised like a flag.
Okay, cat. I have time to win you over too.
As we make our way through the city, the whole place grows busier, denser, boats scaffolded higher in precarious arrangements that remind me of the slums on the smaller islands—held together, as my bloodmother would say, with spit and good luck. Then the ground changes underfoot, and I can see paving stones beneath the accumulated dirt. Our surroundings seem subtly more permanent. Up ahead, I can see stone buildings looming above the heads of the crowd.
If I’d ever dreamed of life here on the surface, I would have envisioned huts and dirt. A ragtag handful of people barely scraping by. But there’s a vibrance to the chaos of this floating, moving city that defies anything I could have imagined. This place is so big, so real, that I don’t know how to process it.
I’m here—and yet none of this makes any sense. How did we not know about thousands of people? Did we just decide so long ago that everything left Below had died, that for centuries no one ever bothered to look?
I can’t explain any of it, any more than I can explain what Nimh calls her “magic.” My list of questions gets longer every hour I’m down here, and I’m ready for answers.
Nimh straightens a little beside me, and when I follow her gaze, I see what’s unmistakably a security patrol—they look the same no matter where you’re from, walking purposefully, keeping to their formation and letting those around them make way, forcing them right to the edge of the water. A woman balancing a stack of baskets perches with one foot on a boat to make room for them, and they don’t spare her a glance as she wobbles.
I step up next to Nimh, looking for a cue as to whether the patrol’s presence is a welcome development, or whether we should melt to the edges of the path as well. I’ve spent my fair share of time dodging my family’s own security over the years, so I’m ready.