The Divine Cities Trilogy: City of Stairs, City of Blades, and City of Miracles, With an Excerpt From Foundryside

by Robert Jackson Bennett

  Mulaghesh sighs. “I was wondering when it’d come to that. I didn’t find much the first time, you know.”

  “There’s more. There has to be more. Hidden in nasty places.”

  “You’re asking me to turn over a bunch of very classified stones, Sigrud.”

  “Shara must have found it, or something about it. If you find that, it can help me understand what her war was about. I would not ask if I did not think you could do it.”

  “I’ll try. I promise nothing. But I’ll try.” She looks into his face, exploring its scars, its bruises, its wrinkles. “Be safe, Sigrud.”

  “I promise nothing,” he says. “But I’ll try.”

  He slips out the door. When he reaches the wall, he readies himself to jump it, but looks back. He thought she’d still be there, watching him, but she isn’t. Instead, Turyin Mulaghesh has sunk to the ground and now sits, one hand still absently resting on the handle of the sliding door, her eyes staring into space, as if she’s just heard the news about the death of a very dear friend.

  He watches her for a moment longer. Then he leaps over the fence and slinks into the night.

  You and I have confirmed that Olvos’s Frost of Bolshoni—the miracle that allows us to converse through panes of glass—was originally intended to operate within frozen lakes. It was not intended to work in glass, nor was it intended to work in mirrored surfaces, as we have both seen that it can do, with the right guidance.

  In addition, Pangyui’s recent work on Jukov suggests that the miracle called Sadom’s Breath was originally created to turn tree sap into wine, and was operable only during certain phases of the moon so that Jukov’s followers could turn a pine tree into a fount of wine for their wild rites. However, during the latter stages of the Divine Empire we have records of shepherds using Sadom’s Breath to turn tree sap not into wine but into water, and it could be used at any time of the month. They used this miracle to survive in the wilderness, leading their flocks across ranges that were previously impassable. But there are no records of Jukov or Olvos directly altering any one of these miracles.

  There are more instances. The conclusion I draw is not, as you suggested, that miracles fade as their existence goes on, causing fluctuations in their function. Rather, I believe that miracles changed and mutated just as any organism might: the Divine Empire was a teeming ecosystem of miracles and Divine entities, all with varying levels of agency and purpose, all shifting and altering as the years went by. Though many have gone, those changes still shaped this land.

  The Divine was not absolute, as we might prefer to think. And though it is gone, these mutations echo on. We must prepare for what happens if one miracle should change and shift enough that, improbably, it could adapt, and survive.

  —LETTER FROM FORMER PRIME MINISTER ASHARA KOMAYD TO MINISTER OF FOREIGN AFFAIRS VINYA KOMAYD, 1714

  After the soft rains comes the fog, swelling up from the countless rivers and tributaries winding through Ghaladesh. It fills the yards and county lanes of the eastern portion of the city. Sigrud can tell that this is the astronomically wealthy portion of Ghaladesh, the neighborhoods inhabited by the scions of industry: the actual houses become more and more elusive, hidden far back from the road behind walls and hedges and fences and gates, the barest hint of lit windows in the distant hills. Whereas Mulaghesh lives downtown, close to where all the action is, the people here are so powerful that they force the action to come to them, and can refuse entry to those they disdain.

  Sigrud wipes moisture from his brow as he steers the puttering little auto along the lanes. He tries to tell himself it’s just the warmth and the damp. He tries to tell himself he’s not sweating because he just stole an auto, along with a pistol and ammunition, and is now about to bring both of these stolen goods right under the nose of Ministry officers.

  Sigrud stops the auto at the top of the hill and surveys his surroundings. He glances at a nearby mailbox and confirms he’s close to Shara’s estate.

  He pulls over. Turns out the lights. Then he slips out of the auto.

  Sigrud received sparse training on wilderness tactics when he trained for the Ministry, but he’s had a lot, lot more in the past ten years, having spent so much time in the forests north of Bulikov. Those wintry, piney places are about as different from the steamy hills of Ghaladesh as one can imagine—but trees and grasses are still trees and grasses.

  He pulls a gray-green cap down low over his head, steps into the brush, takes out his spyglass, and stays low.

  For the next three hours he surveys the area. The Komayd estate isn’t the biggest one, but it’s pretty damned big, situated on a seven- or eight-acre lot, with high wooden walls and the main house clinging to a stream that runs across the grounds. His eyes widen when he actually sees the house. He thought it would be big—he recalls Shara acidly saying, Auntie’s sitting on quite the nest egg, I’m told her neighbor’s a steel baron—but not this big. The house is more of a mansion, with dark stone walls on the lower floor and a dark plaster second floor—a common style in Saypur.

  Despite its size, the estate is well guarded. Sigrud doesn’t get close, but he manages to count one car at the front gate, one guard on foot at the side gate, and a third guard in a blind set up just behind the estate in the woods. There’s also a roving car that makes runs up and down the country lanes, taking up vantage points to check the area.

  It’ll be hard to get in. The walls are watched from all angles. The grounds themselves, though, seem relatively deserted, at least from what he can see.

  So how to get in?

  He stands on one small hill below a towering teak tree and eyes the stream that runs across the Komayd grounds. It looks deep, maybe six or seven feet.

  “Hm,” he says.

  He creeps to the south of the estate, listening closely. Brightly colored birds and even the odd monkey stare down at him. The trees are nothing short of tremendous. He’s heard before that Saypur boasts the most impressive foliage in all the world, due to its wet climate, and he can’t disagree. The trees are tall, thick, and, he hopes, concealing.

  He cocks his head, listening, and then he hears it: the quiet trickle of water.

  He finds the stream and sees that it is deep, or at least deep enough. He wonders how far the stream will take him, how far he’ll have to go. One mile? More? And I’ll have to avoid detection throughout….

  He looks up at the sky. Evening will be here soon. He takes off his gray-green coat, then pulls out his pistol. He contemplates bringing it, but he’s had bad luck with wet ammunition before: supposedly some Saypuri-made rounds can fire underwater, but Sigrud’s always found their performance to be spotty. Maybe they’ve made advances since he was in the service, but if so he hasn’t heard of them.

  Tsking, he hides the pistol in his coat, then shoves the bundle underneath some ferns. Better to come back to it later, when I know it will work. He checks to make sure his knife is still strapped to his thigh and the waterproof electric torch is strapped to his belt. Then he takes a deep breath, dives in, and begins to swim upriver.

  * * *

  —

  It’s full dark by the time Sigrud emerges onto the Komayd grounds, just beyond the southern wall. He moved upriver agonizingly slowly, swimming and sometimes creeping through the waters. He’s fairly confident he passed under the walls undetected, swimming through the deep shadows of the stream. Now he’s more worried about who could be on the grounds.

  Dripping wet, he crawls up to one towering garden hedge and peers at the giant home beyond. He crouches there for a full twenty minutes, watching carefully. The windows of the home are dark and empty. There’s no one he can see. There must not be enough ready personnel to waste time inside the home of a dead politician.

  He takes stock of the house. The stream runs across the east grounds of the estate, and a big teak tree stands just beside one of the second-f
loor windows. He considers shimmying up it and jumping in—but if there’s no one guarding the interior grounds, why not just go in through the back door?

  Sigrud slowly stalks up to the Komayd mansion, listening for the errant snap of branches or rustling of leaves. Then he dashes across the back patio, hunches by the back glass doors, and listens.

  Nothing. Silence.

  He pulls out his lockpicks and goes to work. It’s a weak lock, and in seconds he’s inside, gently closing the doors behind him.

  Sigrud turns to get his bearings. Then he stares, perplexed.

  The entrance hall is huge and grandiose enough to be startling—but what’s even more startling is that it’s completely and utterly empty. Not a stick of furniture in sight and nothing on the walls, except for the drapes on the far windows and a small round mirror hanging from one of the columns.

  Did they move out all her belongings?

  Listening for any footfalls, he creeps toward the main hallway. The floor is pink marble and the walls are wood, painted a soft green with crimson crown molding and bright gold gas sconces. The room must have played host to countless paintings, some of enormous size—he can see where the hooks once hung—but they’re gone too.

  I am going to feel very stupid indeed, he thinks, if I risked my neck to break into an empty house. He sucks his teeth. But if it is empty…then why guard it at all?

  He silently stalks down the main hallway and looks in the first few rooms, parlor rooms and game rooms and libraries and such—or at least that’s what he assumes they are, because they’re all empty as well.

  It’s confusing on two levels for him: not only is it odd to find the house empty, with no signs of furniture being here recently, but it’s odd to imagine Shara living here. She always had a deep dislike of large, wide spaces. She never said it, but he suspected it was her training: in a big room, lots of people can see you from far away, where you might not be able to see them.

  Odder still—where are her books? Shara loved books more than nearly anything else in the world. As someone who occasionally had to move her belongings, Sigrud—and especially his lower back—can attest to that.

  Then he gets an idea. He walks back where he came from, headed toward the dining area. Not in any of the big, wide rooms…But perhaps she lived in—

  He freezes as he crosses the entrance hall.

  He sinks low and looks over his shoulder. Waits. Watches. But there’s nothing.

  He could have sworn he saw movement before the columns by the door. Maybe even a face. But the only things in the room besides him are the sconces, drapes, and the mirror, which is still hanging from one of the entry columns.

  He peers at the mirror. Perhaps I glimpsed myself moving in the reflection, he thinks.

  That’s possible, he supposes. Though the angles are not at all the right ones for him to have seen himself in the mirror….

  “Hm,” says Sigrud softly.

  He tries to focus on the task at hand. But as impossible as it might be, part of him insists he glimpsed someone in the mirror for one second, someone who was not him: a Saypuri woman, with hard, dark features and amber-gold eyes.

  He walks forward and looks closely at the little mirror. All it shows is the empty entrance hall and his own scarred face. Frowning, he retreats to the dining area.

  This area is quite empty, but not totally empty: there’s a small table in this room, along with four small chairs. He can see a bit of food stuck to the side of the table, perhaps a smudge of jam. It must have been used within the past few months, possibly.

  He goes to the servants’ stairwells and creeps down.

  This portion of the house, below the mansion, is shorn of all grandiose displays of wealth and power. It’s white wood, scuffed stairs, and creaky wooden doors. He knows it’s intended to house the servants, so its spaces will be much smaller, much more cramped, and much more hidden.

  In other words, he thinks, much more to Shara’s liking.

  He comes to the bottom step and pulls out his waterproof torch. He flicks it on, keeping its light trained on the floor. He opens the door to the servants’ quarters and shines the light in.

  Inside is a long hallway, but unlike all the others, this one is not empty: it’s lined with bookshelves, tall and towering, each piled high with thick, ancient tomes. He walks down the hallway, shining his light about, and sees that each of the servants’ rooms—small, with a single door—is also filled with bookcases, not to mention countless overstuffed chairs and small side tables, each covered in old tea doilies.

  He walks over to one table and picks up the doily sitting there. It’s old, limp, stained, something that really should have been washed and changed, but the person who lived here clearly never had the time.

  He holds it to his face, and smells it. The powerful scents of tea fill his nose, sirlang and pochot and jasmine.

  Tears well up in his eyes. “Hello, Shara,” he whispers.

  * * *

  —

  Just a little under five hundred miles north, across the South Seas in the dark basement of a small but well-guarded house in Ahanashtan, Captain First Class Kavitha Mishra drums her fingers and grimaces.

  Hm, she thinks. This is bad.

  She looks at the mirrors before her. There are sixty-one in total, all of varying sizes and widths, all hanging from the moldering brick walls here in the basement. It’s quite dark in the basement, with one tiny candle burning; yet despite this lack of light, sixty of the mirrors are reflecting things that they really should not be reflecting.

  Most of the mirrors show nothing but darkness. Others show meeting rooms, doorways, hallways, bedrooms, garages, and one reflects the eye of a telescope, which appears to be pointed at an apartment balcony across a city street. The mirror sits so close to the telescope that she can look right through it and see the magnified windows beyond.

  None of this should be possible, of course. There is no conceivable, logical explanation as to why, for example, one mirror appears to be reflecting a forest lane, when there is no forest lane anywhere close to the mirror’s face. What it should be reflecting is Kavitha Mishra, sitting before a small burning candle at the desk, frowning and wondering what to do. But it doesn’t.

  She knows how these particular mirrors work. It’s a miracle, of course, one she herself has performed dozens of times.

  But she’s never had this happen before.

  Did he see me? she thinks. Did I turn it off fast enough? Does he know?

  Mishra sighs softly and sits back. It took the better part of three years for her to get the mirrors situated in the right places throughout the Continent and Saypur: by, say, placing a small, tiny mirror in the desk drawer in a meeting room in Parliament, for example, or hanging a small mirror on the trunk of a tree outside a military barracks, or slipping a narrow mirror behind a painting on the wall of a major financial trading firm. Mishra doesn’t have a lot of close allies alongside her in the Ministry, but she had enough for this. And knowing what everyone of importance is doing or thinking at any given moment can make a handful of people far more effective than an entire army.

  Though they had to be very careful with where they put the mirrors, since, after all, it’s a two-way connection: just as she can see and hear the things happening on the distant mirrors, the people on the other end could see and hear her in the basement. As such, many of the mirrors act solely as listening devices, hidden away in dark places near important action.

  She remembers what the controller said when he first tasked her with this duty: Vinya Komayd used this miracle all the time, when she was in the Ministry. They all did, they were all hypocrites, preaching fear of the Divine while also using it. But this particular one, the Frost of Bolshoni, allowed her to gain control of all of the Ministry, and much of the Saypuri government, peering out of windowpanes and mirrors far away, watching and
listening…And her niece, of course, almost certainly did the same….

  The thought troubled her deeply at the time. Though she knows the controller is now far more powerful than Vinya or Shara Komayd ever were.

  Mishra waits a moment longer. Then she grimaces. No more fretting about it. I’ve got to tell him.

  She stands and walks into one of the three broom closets at the far end of the basement. Usually she or whichever other contractor is on duty will use these rooms as a fallback: if one mirror displays a lot of activity—a loud meeting, a fight, people enthusiastically making love—they’ll take the mirror off the wall and sit with it in one of the dark, soundproof closets, so the noises it’s making won’t filter through to any of the other sixty mirrors. But she won’t be using it for such, not today.

  She opens the door, steps inside. Total darkness embraces her.

  Then she takes a breath, and says one word.

  “Nokov.”

  There’s a pause, and then from somewhere in the closet there’s the sound of a soft shuffling, like something creeping through nearby weeds.

  A high, cold voice wafts through the darkness: “Mishra.”

  He chooses not to physically manifest before her. This is increasingly normal now: she senses that, as he grows in power, he also becomes more and more abstract, and harder to comprehend. But understanding it doesn’t make it any less uncanny.

  She clears her throat and tries to focus. She definitely tries to ignore the low groans coming from somewhere out in the darkness, like trees weighed down with ice. “I have a report for you, sir.”

  “Ah.” The voice is right beside her now. “Excellent. Thank you.”

  “I’ve observed an…unwelcome visitor to the Komayd household in Ghaladesh. His appearance matches the man you encountered here in Ahanashtan, at the slaughterhouse.”

  A long pause.

  “Does it.”

  “Yes. Tall. Dreyling. He appears to have infiltrated without the awareness of the Ministry officers stationed there. He was, ah, wet—which makes me think he approached through the stream running by the house.”