Rowan recounted Ivan’s visit in mindspeak, but chose not to replay the memory. Lily didn’t know why he avoided it, but she noticed that since he’d been back he hadn’t shared any memories with her.
I’m going to inspect what Ivan gave to Lily, Rowan said. He stood up and went into his room. I don’t think there are any Workers in my bed, so I’ll pretend to be taking a nap and look at it under the covers. The rest of you should go about your own business as if we’re not sharing mindspeak.
Lily took her tea out onto the veranda to watch the sun set. Juliet joined her, while Caleb, Tristan, Breakfast, and Una went into the men’s sitting room to play at being relaxed by lounging in the leather chairs and pretending to read. Lily could feel the tension in them mounting as they sat too still and neglected to turn the pages of their books. She had to remind them all to breathe. It was a few minutes before Rowan contacted the coven again.
It’s a map, he said. The coven could feel how perplexed he was. He shared what he was looking at with the rest of them. I think it’s a way out of the city.
In double vision, Lily saw both the sanguine stain of the sunset over the rim of her teacup and the micro-thin sheet pulled tight between Rowan’s fingers. It took her a moment to realize that she was seeing a cross section of the city that focused mainly on what was belowground. There was one building aboveground that was used as a landmark, and what seemed to be a series of dug-out spaces below. Breakfast was the first to recognize the structure that was the point of entry aboveground.
That’s Hearing Hall, he said. It ruined my joke.
The caverns beneath it look like the Stacks in Salem, Juliet said. Where they grow the bio-assets.
Lily felt a spark of recognition from Rowan. You’re right, Juliet, he said. These tall, narrow rooms are the perfect size and shape for skinlooms and this main cavern is perfect for womb combs. But it’s huge. Much larger than what we had at Salem.
Um . . . what’s a skinloom and what’s a womb comb? Because they both sound utterly nauseating, Una interjected.
Skinlooms are huge frames to grow sheets of wearhyde, Tristan replied. Womb combs are vats that house ice lattices, which we use to grow both cultured meat and tame Woven.
I’m having a hard time picturing it, Breakfast said.
I’ll show you, Tristan said, and shared a memory of the Salem Stacks.
. . . I watch my feet go down steps carved right into the bedrock. So many steps. They don’t just go down, they also go out. It’s strange to think that by the time you actually reach the main cavern, you’re out of the city and what’s above you is the Woven Woods. I wonder what they’re doing up there.
Rowan has already been down here for hours. No idea how he handles the smell. Blood, blood, and more blood. No amount of cleaning can get the scent of it out of the rock. Maybe it’s because he’s an Outlander. He’s been covered in blood since the day he was born.
I reach the bottom of the steps and pass the rooms that house the skinlooms. I see a new apprentice mechanic—Gavin is his name, I think—pull out one of the tall, thin frames of the looms from the wall. It glides silently on its casters as Gavin stirs his brush in a bucket of culture, preparing to paint it on the frame. In two days it will be ready for harvest—a perfect sheet of wearhyde. They are what gave the Stacks their name, but I always thought that name was wrong. The skinlooms aren’t stacked on top of one another; they stand upright, like books on a shelf. I don’t know what you’d call that, though.
I enter the main room—a cathedral that soars up and up, the walls and ceiling lit by sconces that glow with magelight. The sconces seem to float like little bubbles of light against the rough-hewn rock. Below the ancient stone and eerie magelight are the stainless steel vats that hold ice lattices. The womb combs. Some of them are enormous, and they’re the reason the cavern is so high. My teacher told me they were made to grow the greater drakes—huge and terrifying as the mythical dragon. They only grow greater drakes in New York now, and even then only rarely. It’s been a long time since the Age of Strife when the Thirteen Cities warred with one another. Mechanics used to ride those things into battle. That must have been a sight to see. I’ve always wanted to fly.
I peer around a few of the smaller womb combs up front and spot Rowan three rows down. I go to him. He’s pulled out one of the lattices so he can inspect the crop of tame Woven embryos that are growing inside the hexagonal cells. It looks like a sheet of honeycomb that he’s holding up to the light. A dark speck of life is nestled in the center of each cell. I have no idea how he can do that barehanded. It’s like he doesn’t even mind the freezing cold of it. Inside the cell, cupped right around the embryo, heat is maintained by the crucibles who tend them. The rest is kept several degrees below zero. Less infection that way, but torture to touch, or at least I think so. Rowan sees me and gives me that lazy smile of his.
“Good morning,” he says.
“Afternoon,” I correct, and then catch myself when I see his smile turn into a grin. “I know I was supposed to be here at nine,” I begin, already explaining myself. Why do I always feel like I have to explain myself to him?
“Don’t worry about it. Come and help,” he says. He’s understanding and forgiving as usual. I don’t know what’s more annoying. That he’s genuinely better at everything or that he’s so damn accepting of the fact that everyone else is so flawed . . .
Sorry, Tristan said, abruptly ending the memory. I didn’t mean to
go on like that. Sorry, Ro.
It’s okay, Rowan replied.
Lily could feel their friendship repairing. The frayed edges of where their personalities met up were weaving themselves back together as if neither of them could remember why they were fighting.
The sun had set and the lights from the city below were winking on, terrestrial echoes of the stars above. Such a pretty prison, she thought. Lily put down her teacup and went inside.
The cavern in the map definitely looks like the Stacks, only much larger, Lily said, trying to get back on subject. But why would Ivan give this to us? Rowan—you said you thought it was a map out of the city.
Yes. Rowan directed their attention to the far end of the cavern. There was a steady rise in the gradient and a small opening at the end. That could be a tunnel to the surface.
Maybe, Caleb said. But that brings up another question. Why would Ivan want to help us get out of Bower City?
Lily took a guess. Ivan thinks Grace is trying to trap Toshi. If I claim Toshi like she’s planned, he’ll get caught and go to jail. I think it’s because she wants to replace him with Rowan as Ivan’s second. Toshi is strong, but Rowan is still stronger.
He’s definitely trying to protect Toshi from something, Rowan said.
Maybe it’s me. Maybe it’s you.
It was clear that between the two of those options, Rowan felt that she was the greater threat.
I’m not out to ruin anyone else’s life, Lily said, stung. She thought of Toshi’s parents—his father’s swollen fingers and the sound of his mother’s voice, sickly and weak in the next room. She let her coven view the memory with her. Toshi has family here, and they need him. I’ve decided that claiming him isn’t an option anymore, even if he is willing. She started looking through her things for something suitable to wear. There’s only one way to find out why Ivan really gave us the map. We follow it, and maybe get out of here tonight.
She let her coven go back and forth, arguing. There were a dozen reasons to wait and a dozen reasons to act immediately. None of those reasons mattered to Lily anymore. She just wanted out of Bower City.
Lily was dressed in a dark silk tunic, pants, and flat black shoes, and sitting patiently at the end of her bed with the lights off by the time they realized that she was going with or without them. She even had a bag of salt in one pocket and a small jar of the miracle soap in the other, just in case they actually made it out of the city and found themselves on the road back to Salem.
Okay. But we’
re going in three small groups, not as one big herd, Rowan insisted.
Lily stood and went into the bathroom. She lit all the candles she could find there and began gathering their energy slowly so as not to disturb the Hive. She didn’t know if fueling her mechanics would be considered an act of aggression, and she wasn’t about to take any chances alerting them. Their best bet at avoiding the Hive was to act as calmly as they could. A witch wind whistled through the window and Lily slowed her harvest until the wind lowered to a soft moan.
Caleb took command as he’d done on the trail. Una and Tristan with Lily first, he said. I’ll go with Juliet second. Breakfast, you and Rowan last.
I’m going with Lily, Rowan insisted.
No you’re not, Caleb ordered. You go with Breakfast or you don’t go at all.
Lily could feel Rowan struggling with this and resisted the urge to support him. Let’s go, she said, ending the conversation. She changed the energy she’d gathered from the candle flames into force and flooded her coven’s willstones with power. She felt them all stretch and sigh as they soaked in her strength.
They waited for the sounds of the villa to die down, and then left their apartments in the groups and in the sequence that Caleb had designated. As Lily flowed through the darkness, Una and Tristan on either side sweeping her along with them, she connected her coven each to each, unifying them even though they were physically parted. Caleb’s caution, Tristan’s thrill, Una’s prowl and pounce, were all joined into one. Rowan’s unease at being away from Lily was like a twanging note in the song, out of tune with the rest.
The coven made their way through the foyer, through the side door, and down the long passageway connecting the villa to Hearing Hall. There were no locks on the doors and each group of the coven breezed through, so fast and silent with Lily’s strength in them that they neared invisibility. Lily knew the Workers were there, but she doubted even their multifaceted eyes could see her preternaturally swift coven under the cover of night.
The map was in Lily’s mind’s eye as she glanced around Hearing Hall. The oculus let in a beam of bright moonlight onto the marble floor, but the light was lost in the silver-black shadows among the pillars. The air was heavy, and the empty space was anxious for them to make a sound for it to amplify. The weight of silence was a ringing pressure inside Lily’s ears. She saw something move among the pillars, just off the edge of her vision. She snapped her head around to find it, but there was nothing there.
The other two groups joined hers shortly.
Look for the way down, Rowan said in mindspeak as he and Breakfast caught up to the rest of them.
The doors, Tristan replied, already moving to them. One goes to the villa, but what about the other two?
Caleb sped down one passageway, his connection to Lily getting thin as the crystals in the marble distorted his willstone’s vibration. He came back shaking his head.
It leads to another government building. It looked like offices, he said.
Tristan tried the third door, and it opened into emptiness. There are no stairs. How do they get down with no stairs?
You’d need wings, Breakfast said, joking.
Rowan leaned through the open door and let his magelight brighten, trying to judge the distance down. His light never reached the ground. Yes. You would, he said in all seriousness. Then he launched himself over the edge.
Lily felt her heart fly into her throat. She pushed her way through the others and knelt at the precipice to watch Rowan’s magelight descend into darkness. By the time he reached the bottom it was only a faint glimmer. Rowan’s feet, then knees, and then hands met the ground as he dispersed the energy up through his body in stages, ending with the thwacking sound of his palms slapping down. Lily’s skeleton jolted and her teeth clacked together along with Rowan’s.
I’m all right, he said. He stayed in a crouch for moment, checking his surroundings before straightening up. Two of you will have to make the jump carrying Juliet and Lily, but everyone else should be able to make it.
Lily was still shaking when she felt Tristan pick her up in his arms and jump. She clutched at his neck and held her breath as she dropped down into the smothering belly of the earth. Even as she fell, Lily could feel the deadening hum of quartz in the soil around her. It was like entering a tomb.
Her whole body rattled with the impact of their landing. Tristan did his best to shield Lily from it, but even fora witch-fueled mechanic it had been a long drop. Lily felt Rowan’s hands catching her and running over her lightly to scan for any damage.
I’m not injured, she told him privately in mindspeak. He removed his hands, but ignored the group order and stayed nearby as the coven began to move through the gloom.
They fanned out and let their magelight increase by degrees, but the space seemed to go on forever.
“It’s three, maybe four times the size of the Salem Stacks,” Juliet said. The sound of her voice made Lily jump, but then she realized there was no reason to continue in mindspeak. There were no Workers down here. Nothing living at all, except her coven.
“But the same layout,” Tristan added. “Look. Here are the rooms for the skin looms.”
They passed by a series of tall, skinny passageways. Breakfast pulled one of the looms out of the wall. It was three times his height, but it rolled out easily enough on casters that were set into tracks on the floor.
“Empty,” Breakfast said. “Guess they don’t have much use for wearhyde here.”
“Why would they?” Una said. “They can get fine Italian leather if they want. They can afford it, too.”
Lily nodded and started to move toward the hulking shapes occupying the main cavern. As she approached the first of many rows of womb combs, she could tell it was old. She put her hand on one of the stainless steel sides and imagined it full of ice lattices, each little cell housing a Woven embryo.
So many Woven, Lily thought. She brightened her magelight as much as she could without blinding herself, but she couldn’t find an end to the procession.
“I’ve never seen so many,” Rowan said, echoing Lily’s thought. “Not even in New York.”
“Is the New York Stack large?” Una asked.
“The largest of the Thirteen Cities,” he answered. “Growing tame Woven is their main industry. Most of the city is underground on what you know of as Long Island. But this is even bigger.”
“We should try to find the back wall. That’s where those stairs are on Ivan’s map,” Caleb said.
They started to work their way down the rows of womb combs, every step bringing them deeper into the disorienting vastness of the space. Support pillars sprouted out of the floor and started to divide up the main area into smaller sections, confounding their sense of direction. Soon it was difficult to tell which of the sections led left, right, or straight on to the back.
“We’ll split into our groups again,” Caleb said. “Everyone stay in contact through Lily.”
Her coven reached for her mind. Lily built a web of rapport that spun out as her coven dispersed in search of the back wall. The rows skewed on a diagonal as the size and shape of the womb combs changed.
Different Woven, Rowan thought. He was whispering to himself in his head, but Lily was in such close contact with him, and he was keeping so close to her physically, that she overheard.
Greater drakes, most likely, based on the size, he continued. Lily got an image of a dragon creature with iridescent skin, giant talons, and stunning wings. It was so large several people could easily ride it.
By the tanks for the greater drakes is where they made the mascots. The image that flitted through his mind looked like an enormous dragonfly-serpent hybrid, clinging to the mast of a tall ship. It seemed to scan the sky, looking for danger, and its double-decker wings filled the sails with wind while it wrapped its long, scaly tail protectively around the rigging of the ship. Lily assumed that had to be a mascot.
Back there, the medium-size womb combs must have been where
they made the guardians and other mammalian mixes. Lily got a glimpse of one of the guardians that they chained to the bottom of the greentowers.
So what are these smaller vats for? They aren’t really womb combs. There are more of these than any other, but I can’t think what would grow in them. Fast germinating Woven—the kind that hatches from an egg, mostly likely. Rowan pictured something that looked like wild Woven to Lily. They were mostly insect, but also part reptile or mammal, and none of them were the same. Who would want to grow so many, and why?
The vats stood like sentinels, lined up in perfect formation in the long-forgotten dark.
“It’s an army,” Lily whispered. A chill ran down her spine as she said it, and she knew she was right.
Rowan turned to her, discarding the notion out of hand. “No, this type of Woven serves no purpose. They’re made from the leftover genetic material of the useful Woven, like the guardians, drakes, mascots, and cleaners—cleaners are mostly insectoid,” he explained, seeing her confused look. “After you make a few batches of useful Woven you just throw whatever remains into one of these vats and see if anything good comes out of the mix. You have to destroy ninety-nine out of a hundred because all that most of them can do is eat and fight and . . .” He trailed off, a stricken look on his face.
“Pretty accurate description of the wild Woven around the Thirteen Cities, isn’t it?” Lily said.
“No, because wild Woven reproduce like crazy.” Rowan shook his head, unable to accept what was staring him in the face. “We make sure they’re sterile—all of the Woven that we make in the womb combs are sterile. They can’t reproduce.”
“So how did the wild Woven start reproducing?” Lily asked gently.
“It was almost two hundred years ago. An accident—”
“Really?” Lily took a deep breath. “What if it wasn’t?”
His eyes looked inward, and Lily could feel the skin on the back of his neck begin to crawl. “There are so many vats,” he said, starting to think the unthinkable.
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