by Martha Carr
“I’m not drooling.”
“If you say so.” He grinned and nodded for her to follow him into the throng of magicals going about their business in the lower marketplace of Hangivol. “And don’t get too attached to having that around. It’s only temporary. This is the kinda tech that doesn’t make it across the Border, so as soon as we go Earthside again, you’re back to being illiterate.”
“Fine. But I’m keeping it on ‘til we go back.”
Chapter Forty-Two
In the first five minutes of their trek through the crowded streets of the lower marketplace, Cheyenne figured out how to turn down the background noise with the activator so her enhanced drow hearing didn’t give her an enhanced drow headache.
Durg’s niece was right; an activator does all the heavy lifting. No spells and no studying. No wonder magicals don’t wanna leave the city.
Now it was a lot easier to follow Persh’al without being distracted by every unknown sound. He led her through a second series of alleys and passages until they came to another market courtyard, more or less. This one sold food, clothing, potions, and one scrappy yellow magical had a stack of cages full of squawking birds—striped chickens with two heads and lionlike tails instead of tailfeathers.
“Okay, what are those?” Cheyenne asked, staring at the yellow-skinned magical hawking caged birds.
“Hmm?” Persh’al followed her gaze and wrinkled his nose. “O’gúleesh chickens, basically. They taste like shit in comparison, honestly.”
“No, I meant the guy selling them.”
“Oh.” Persh’al chuckled and pulled her away when the magical caught sight of her staring and gave her a cold sneer in response. “That’s a gremlin, kid. A tamer one than the raider, for sure. They’re pretty harmless for the most part, until you cross their arbitrary line in the sand and flip their switch into total nutjob. I stay away from them if I can. Ticking timebomb of rage, those guys.”
“Uh-huh.” Cheyenne sneered back at the gremlin, whose attention was quickly diverted by a new potential customer.
Persh’al leaned toward her and lowered his voice. “I’d cut it out with the staring from now on, yeah? Maybe you’ve noticed an odd reaction or two in Peridosh when magicals see a drow down there schmoozing with the rest of us. Same holds true in Hangivol but magnified.”
“I thought this was drow city.” Cheyenne glanced into an open storefront and thought immediately of Gúrdu the raug Oracle. The setup inside was exactly the same, low tables and heaps of cushions scattered around the floor, hookahs on every table, flickering lanterns in every color, suspended magically below the low ceiling. But this room was full, littered with magicals sprawling across the cushions and taking huge pulls from the hoses, staring at each other with vapid eyes and dull, washed-out smiles.
“It is drow city. Hey, I said, quit staring.” Persh’al grabbed her upper arm and pulled her forward. “You keep standing in front of the wrong places like that, and someone’s gonna draw you in. L’zar will rip my head off if I let you stop for a magical ride in a nectar barn.”
She shot him a questioning frown, and he released her arm before nodding in the direction they were headed.
“Think Earthside opium den, kid. That shit’ll drug you up until you’re nothing but drow-headed goo. Got it?”
Cheyenne raised an eyebrow and skirted around a group of old troll women huddled around an outdoor stove controlled by magical tech to maintain the perfect heat, their scarlet braids a washed-out pink and their violet skin nearly gray. “As long as you get it that you’re not letting me do anything.”
“Fine, Cheyenne. I’m not gonna argue semantics with you, because the outcome’s the same. All I can do is strongly advise against something, yeah? And it’s my ass on the line if you decide to do the complete opposite.”
Fighting back a laugh, she nodded slowly and forced herself not to stare at the pair of huge orange eyes peering out of the pitch-black alleyway beside them. “I trust you, troll, so advise away.”
He snorted. “Yeah, okay.”
The streets grew narrower and darker the closer they got to the center of the city. Her activator-enhanced vision picked up less technology now, most of which was a quick scroll of code when she glanced at a doorway or a holographic sign flitting in bright colors across metal walls.
“All right, time to move on up, huh?” Persh’al cast brief glances at the few dozen magicals milling down the side street before he stepped into another alley. At the end of that was a broad staircase, the steps made of metal grates. The entire thing lit up in her vision with quickly scrolling symbols rearranging themselves from O’gúleesh to English in a blur of color. “Shit. Should’ve bought two of those things.”
He waved her forward to climb the first few steps, then tapped the metal rail with the back of his hand. “You’re gonna have to get us up this one, kid.”
“I’m pretty sure you just have to keep walking up.”
“Ha. You’d think so, wouldn’t you? Not that simple. Since you’re all synced up with that fancy piece of machinery on your hand, be a useful incognito drow and find the switch.”
Cheyenne stared at him, ignoring the blue and green updates flashing at the edges of her vision. “You lost me.”
Persh’al scanned the metal railing. “You’re looking for Uppertech. District 5, I’m pretty sure, or whatever district we’re not in right now. Things don’t look the same since the last time I was here.”
“Yeah, I imagine a couple hundred years will do that.” Cheyenne looked down at the metal rail of the staircase leading up toward what looked like another walking level cut into the metal buildings between the alleys. A dozen words scrolled across the railing’s surface—Halter’s Deck, Ritfarrin, Qi’woc. Then she found the words Uppertech District 5: Open and pointed at it. “One more step above you.”
Grinning, Persh’al stepped up the stairs and gripped the rail where she pointed. “This one?”
The words flickered before disappearing beneath his hand. “I guess. Your hand’s right on the words.”
“Perfect.” He gripped the metal rung beneath the rail and gave it a sharp twist. The staircase clicked and squeaked, shuddering beneath them as more grated stairs unfolded from the top at a ninety-degree angle and built a brand-new walkway above them. The new stairs hit the roof of a tall building on their left with a clang, and that was it. “Gotta know where you’re going in this place. One wrong twist and you end up in Desire’s Pit covered in tiny…you know what? We don’t have to go there.”
Cheyenne cocked her head and followed him up the stairs. I’m down with the activator. Not so sure I’m into a city with a place called Desire’s Pit.
The newly unfolded staircase on their right was as sturdy as the first when they reached the landing and turned left to head toward the opposite rooftop. She peered over the rail at the fifty-foot drop and took a deep breath. “These stairs don’t move on their own, do they?”
“Come on, kid. This is Ambar’ogúl, not Hogwarts.”
Cheyenne gave a surprised laugh. “Sounds like those books are a huge hit with Earthside O’gúleesh.”
“Oh, yeah? I only read the first one. Couldn’t get over the massively inaccurate description of trolls, but whatever.”
They reached the end of the staircase and stepped onto the roof. On the other side, another metal wall rose at least another thirty feet in front of them, and the shape of a doorway in the blank steel wall swam in Cheyenne’s vision, with scrolling code and more commands than she could follow before they reached it.
“You see the door with that thing?” Persh’al gestured toward the wall.
“I see something.” When he pointed at the lit rectangle of metal, she nodded.
“You know what? Maybe you should be my guide.” He placed his hand on the glowing section of metal. It pulsed with green light and the wall disappeared, opening another doorway through the thick sheet of steel.
“Whoa.” Cheyenne peered into the new
est tunnel, blazing with more scrolling code on every wall.
“Yeah, whoa is right. Glad you’re enjoying yourself.”
Fast-paced warbling music wafted toward them through the tunnel, and after a short walk, dazzling white light spilled into the darkness between the metal walls. Then they were out, and Cheyenne squinted against the brightness and the ramped-up code and identifying labels scrolling across every surface. “Jeeze.”
Persh’al chuckled. “Yeah, it takes some getting used to. Feel free to take that thing off if it’s too much.”
“Not too much.” Cheyenne focused on the flashing words in the upper right-hand corner: Darken Analysis. There’s a prompt for everything. She waved her hand toward the flashing command, which responded instantly. The layers of code filtered away from her vision and left only two things behind: an option to turn super-scan back on and a smaller, more focused strand of data hovering over the shiny steel building on her right where she’d been staring. “Can this thing read my mind?”
“Kinda. More like it reads your magic, but these days, one could argue they’re the same thing. Lose control of one, and the other’s not far behind, am I right?” Persh’al laughed so hard he snorted, nudging her with the back of his hand again before gesturing around. “This is Uppertech, kid. Formerly known as Uppershim, with serious upgrades.”
“No kidding.” Cheyenne gazed around the courtyard, taking in the bright, polished steel flashing a blinding silver where Ambar’ogúl’s sun glinted off the shiny surfaces. “This is different.”
“The upper echelon.” The troll spread his arms to encompass the entire area. “Five districts. As I’m sure you’ve noticed, this one’s for entertainment of the culinary variety. Mostly. Don’t ask me about the others because that’s not where we need to be right now.”
She grinned at him. “District 5, ‘cause you’re still hungry.”
“Caught me red-handed, kid. Keep up.” He marched away from the tunnel, pumping his arms at his sides and looking even more ridiculous with the bulging pack swinging behind him every time he turned to take in a new sight. “Smell that? Ah, That’s real O’gúleesh cooking for you. Clean, delicate, better than a Michelin-star restaurant. You’ll see.”
Eleanor would have a thing or two to say about that.
Chapter Forty-Three
The courtyard of Uppertech’s District 5 was filled with as many magicals as down below, though these citizens were obviously wealthier. Their oddly styled hair and flowing, shimmering garments made the garb of the O’gúleesh on the lower level look like rags in comparison. A tall, lithe fae draped in silk and bathed in a daisy-yellow aura drifted past them, her feet barely touching the ground, if at all. An ogre woman with silver-painted lips and kohl around her eyes moved with a haughty, condescending grace most of her species didn’t have. Two tall goblins, one of them with a monocle that clicked, turned, and flashed blue light wherever he looked, strolled slowly across the metal floor, muttering to each other. The other had thick chains of gold and silver draped around his neck and down both the front and back of his shirt. They jingled with each step, and Persh’al leaned toward Cheyenne when she stared after the goblins.
“Looks like your personal style made an appearance in high-society fashion on this side.” He nodded at the silver chains wrapped around her wrists, and she shot him an unamused look. “Or not.”
They walked past a steel fountain in the center of the square, which emitted a thin stream of violet mist that hovered over the basin in an illuminated cloud. The scent of cherry blossoms, damp earth, and an underlying taint of raw meat was overwhelming. Cheyenne wrinkled her nose and had to turn away. “What’s with the community perfume?”
“I said loud and smelly, didn’t I? It’s supposed to cleanse the palate from the lower levels. They’ve bumped it up a notch since last time I was here.”
“It’s not an improvement.”
“I’m with you there.” Persh’al pointed at a glistening marquee above a narrow doorway. The building was the same bright metal as everything else, with tall, thin windows reaching floor to ceiling on either side of the door. Each window reflected a different holographic scene in motion: fancy parties, laughing magicals, and the thin plastic cards of O’gúleesh currency exchanging hands. “That’s our first stop, kid. I think better on a full stomach, and short of the bathhouse, a bar is the best place to listen in on what everyone’s too buzzed to keep to themselves.”
“There’s a bathhouse?”
Persh’al glanced at the purple cloud of mist over the fountain and grimaced. “Not remotely on the sightseeing list.”
Cheyenne looked at the thin metal sign with a thick etching of O’gúleesh symbols. Her activator flashed the translation right beneath it: Wildhaven.
They headed toward the entrance, and a burst of tinkling laughter rose from the front of another store. A group of magicals had gathered in a circle, watching a video hovering in the air between them.
“Can you imagine?” A troll with oiled crimson hair gestured toward the image. Gem-encrusted rings glinted on every one of his fingers. “Having to drag an entire shipment like that. On foot.”
“There’s misfortune, and then there’s sheer laziness.” The orc woman’s high nasal voice grated on Cheyenne’s nerves. “Honestly, I don’t see why they are still let into the city.”
A tall figure dressed in a flowing gray shirt and trousers emerged from the storefront. Cheyenne froze mere feet from the front door of Wildhaven when she saw the purple-gray skin and bone-white hair of her heritage. Another drow.
“The same might be said for any of you,” he muttered as he passed the tittering circle of magicals. The smiles disappeared from their faces and they stared after him, looking nervous. The drow forgot them immediately and crossed the plaza on his own business. His golden eyes flickered toward Cheyenne and looked her briefly up and down before he disappeared between two brightly polished steel buildings.
“Cheyenne.” Persh’al paused with his hand on the iron handle of the bar’s front door. “We’re trying to blend in, remember?”
“Yeah.” She looked one more time at the alley where the drow had disappeared, then followed the troll through the open door. “If this is supposed to be drow city, how come that’s the only one I’ve seen?”
The door closed softly behind them, inaudible beneath the lilting music coming from all directions inside the bar.
Persh’al cleared his throat and brushed off the front of his shirt before gazing around the brightly lit room. “They’ve migrated to the inner sanctum, for lack of a better term. In and up.” He shot her a quick glance and shrugged. “Compared to where the Crown’s been putting up all the drow she wants to keep at her side, Uppertech might as well be another farming village.”
“I don’t see how that’s possible.” Cheyenne blinked, scanning the glass and metal surfaces glinting around them. Everywhere she looked, information scrawled across her vision. Like we stepped into a machine that happens to serve booze.
“Yeah, well, maybe one day you’ll see it. Who knows, right?” Stepping out of the small vestibule inside the door, Persh’al nodded for her to follow.
Wildhaven was filled with a low buzz of polite conversation and delicate laughter. Glasses and silverware clinked, voices mingled at a poised volume, and the music drifted softly over all of it. Cheyenne couldn’t pinpoint where it was coming from and gave up trying. Sounds like Rachmaninoff underwater.
A shiny silver orb the size of a softball bobbed toward them from the other side of the broad dining room. It stopped in front of the newest guests and blinked with pink light. “Welcome to Wildhaven. Please sit wherever you like. May I take your luggage?”
Cheyenne fought back a laugh. That floating metal hostess sounds like Betty White.
“No, thanks.” Persh’al nodded curtly, shooting the hovering orb a thin smile. “The luggage stays with us.”
When the orb didn’t budge, the troll nudged Cheyenne in the ribs and
cocked his head, still staring at the blinking pink light.
So it’s all politeness and etiquette coming from a robot. This is weird.
She lifted her chin and stared at the blinking light as if it were an eye. “I prefer to keep my belongings on my person, thank you.”
With a final blink, the silver orb darted away from them and left the restaurant’s newest patrons to find seats.
The dining room was studded with round tables surrounded by curving booths draped in white fabric. The backs of the booths rose five feet higher than the tables, forming individual pockets of privacy. “Looks like we won’t be hearing much drunken gossip from those tables.”
“Nah.” Persh’al waved her off. “We’ll sit. Gorge ourselves on the kind of meal I haven’t had in a few centuries, and then we’ll start listening in. This is just the front room, kid. The back room is where all the action happens.”
He slid off his pack beside an empty circular booth and shoved it toward the center before sliding in after it. Cheyenne did the same, slipping quickly onto the smooth seat of a woven material that felt like fur, and frowned. “By action, you mean what?”
“Relax. We won’t be fighting anybody. To tell you the truth, I’d get my ass kicked in two seconds without an activator. Of course, I’ve had way more practice fighting with bare magic than any of these yuppies, but nobody here would be caught dead without their tech. So no, we play it safe, we listen, do some schmoozing, see what we can dig up. Don’t make any waves, and don’t get caught with your pants down. And try to have fun while you’re at it, huh? You look like L’zar when he gets woken up from a nap.”
She sat back in the booth and shook her head. “No, I don’t.”
Persh’al shrugged and scanned the clear surface of the metal table, projecting an illusion of glass.
“I did notice one thing that might be important.”
