by Mur Lafferty
“Kate we can’t go back to heaven through there. We already determined that.”
“But still. If the mortals are going there for this energy stuff, it might be something we can use. They still need us in heaven. If they didn’t, there would be no need to keep us in exile here. That big beast would devour everything and then come after our new Earth. It’s not doing that yet. So there’s still hope.”
Daniel nodded slowly. “Why do you think Meridian is the answer to whatever the question is?”
Kate shrugged. “Divine inspiration? But I think when we get there, we need to do some recon. I’ll find out about the belief structures in the city. And you,” she grinned broadly at him, “you’re the trickster. You get to go to the underbelly and talk to the mad scientists.”
“Lathe.”
They turned and found the second oldest child, James, looking at them and frowning. “The tinkers call the underside of the city Lathe. It’s supposed to be very exciting, but Mama won’t let me go.”
“Have you been to Meridian often, James?” Kate asked.
He shook his head. “Just two or three times. Daddy bought me a toy wooden horse that actually moved on chaos energy, but it didn’t last long. After Daddy died, Momma said none of us were ever coming back here.”
Daniel glanced at Kate then back at the boy. “Well, we’re here now. Do you want to go with me down to Lathe? Even though you’ve never been, you still know more about it than I do.”
The boy’s eyes grew wide. “You mean it?”
Kate touched Daniel’s arm. “Are you serious? You want to take a kid to the underbelly of a city with mad scientists?”
“I need someone who is more familiar with it than me. Call it divine inspiration. He’ll be fine. We’re gods, remember?”
“Yeah. Gods who can’t even leave this world. We don’t know our limitations, Daniel.”
He thought of what he had done to bring Kate back, and felt, for the first time a very long time, confident. “We’ll be fine. I promise.”
Kate held her hand out to him and opened her palm. A gray hummingbird with a bright red chest sat there, looking around with its beady eyes. “Here. Take Huginn with you. Send her to me if you need me.”
Daniel took the tiny, fragile bird and put it on his shoulder. It didn’t even register as weight to him. “Huginn? And Muninn is the other?”
Kate grinned. “They’ve been hanging around for a bit. One’s thought, the other’s memory.”
Daniel craned his neck around. “Which one do I have?”
“Thought. She’ll take care of you.”
“As much as a hummingbird can.”
“Have you asked his mother yet?”
Daniel groaned. He knew he’d forgotten something.
******
Alicia was too concerned with docking the zeppelin to be concerned about her son going off with one of the gods who created the world she lived in. Kate watched her nod curtly at Daniel as she maneuvered the zeppelin closer to the floating city.
At this point Daniel could feel the proximity to the Wasteland, could feel the power coming up from below him. He hadn’t noticed it gone since the subtle change from Wasteland to Imari. But now he could tell it was closer. The sheer power, the potential, of the area was almost palpable.
The city itself up close was a paradox. Buildings rose hundreds of stories into the air, tethered together by zip lines and flexible steel rods. As the buildings floated and swayed in the wind, the rods kept them from crashing into each other, the flexibility allowing the rods to do their jobs without snapping. Looking down caused Daniel to swoon a bit as the impossibility of the floating buildings with no street assaulted his senses. A fine mist surrounded the bottom of the buildings as if the city were floating on a cloud, and he couldn’t see the ground beyond.
“They say the earth refuses to hold any structure, so it just throws it into the air,” said James, who had come to stand beside Daniel.
“So are there buildings in Lathe?” he asked, squinting through the fog.
“Yes, but they’re tethered lower to the ground. I think maybe three feet at most. Also, I think there are caves in the cliff. Some of the tinkers create in there."
“That doesn’t make any sense. Wouldn’t their experiments cause cave-ins?”
“Sarah says it’s worse when the improbability storms come. You want to keep the chaos energy safe during those times.”
“Improbability plus chaos is worse than a cave-in?” Daniel asked.
“You can build something to get yourself out of a cave-in,” James said simply.
Daniel nodded, conceding the fact.
The zeppelin port was tall and thin, clearly just a place to park your balloon. Daniel could see another port for more nimble airships about half a mile away, also on the edge of the city. Alicia had a berth rented on deck 45. She edged the zeppelin in, instructing Sarah to control the helium to drop altitude, and then she released a lever that shot out grappling hooks from the starboard side to anchor the ship.
“Clean anchor, crew,” Alicia said, and she paused for a moment, looking down, as if she just remembered her crew was gone and she traveled with only her family and two gods who really didn’t know what was going on.
Kate helped Sarah slide a rope bridge along one of the anchors, a series of planks captured inside a net, making it look like a long hammock with a stabilizing floor. “I don’t know what makes me more nauseated, looking up at all the ships and berths, or looking down.”
Sarah smiled shyly. “The zip lines are pretty safe, but if you’re really afraid, you can take the lift to a gondola level. From there you can get a ride to the Sidewalk and from there you can get anywhere.”
“I thought there weren’t any roads in Meridian?” Kate asked.
“Sidewalk is the central location. It’s at the center of the city and it connects to every building, at least by zip line. Not every building gets a gondola, but it’s not really an issue. The only weather this area gets is improbability storms, and you don’t want to be out in that in a gondola or a zip line when that happens.”
Kate narrowed her eyes as she looked into the spider web of the city. “Where are the places of worship?”
CHAPTER EIGHT
Daniel wondered if David Copperfield preferred stuff like making the Statue of Liberty disappear over doing things like making a child’s eyes grow wide with surprise when he pulled a quarter from their ear. Daniel could shape-change and heal, but the look on James’s face when he modified his appearance to look like a boy of twelve, thin and wiry, made all that power worth it.
Alicia watched with trepidation and Kate with genuine amusement as they ran across the bridge haphazardly and clattered down the stairs. They passed people in pseudo-Victorian garb - corsets and waistcoats and watch fobs and hats, boots and coveralls, but the material was different, and the leather had a tough, alligator-look to it. Dinosaur skin, Daniel realized, as he and James pushed past fancy people and grease-covered people alike on the stairs as they headed toward zip lines and gondolas. Most of the floors in the tower were dedicated to zeppelin berths, but a few floors were zip line exits, and several at the top serviced people who had the money for gondolas. Six elevators, ornately decorated in curlicues of brass and iron, stopped at every floor, but it seemed most people were content to take the stairs.
“Where are we going?” Daniel asked, surprised to hear his voice so high.
“There’s a zip line to the ground on the bottom floor,” James said, bowing a quick apology to a gentleman whose hat he had dislodged when he pushed past him. “No one monitors it for safety, they don’t like talking about it, but they know they need it. You can also slide down the cables holding down the city, but it’s a lot more dangerous. There’s nothing to stop you when you get there.”
The ground floor was dirty with cobwebs clogging the corners, trash piling up, and even broken vials that looked as if they had previously held some shiny blue liquid.
James led Daniel to a doorway that opened up to a patio. It was disconcerting to see the mist swirling around them. It felt like the end of the world. A cable extended from the wall above the doorway, a zip line handle attached to it. The people moving on the zip lines through the city were attached by safety harness to the handle. The zip line to the ground had no harness, but Daniel did notice it had a breaking mechanism that slowed the wheels that ran along the cable.
James went to grab the handle, but Daniel stopped him. “Let me go first, then I can be there if you get into trouble. We don’t know what’s down there, not really.” A small stool was under the zip line, presumably for the shorter travelers, and Daniel grabbed the handle and flipped the switch to release the brake.
A god could easily forget his divinity when riding a zip line through an impenetrable fog into an area he knows only as the home of mad, destitute tinkers. The mist swirled around him and the wind pulled at his shirt, and he gasped as he emerged from the mist to see clearly the city below.
He had pictured a shanty town, a group of shacks or tents, maybe a hobo village. He didn’t expect a group of two-and three-story buildings, in the strangest shapes possible, forming a shadow of Meridian almost as large as the city itself. Some buildings seemed to be formed from superheated metals and glass that had since cooled and hardened into flowing designs, sharp points, towers and terraces. And the colors! Meridian had been glorious in its shiny brass and silver buildings, but Lathe held buildings of green glass, red metals, and even a small, square shack that looked to be made of solid gold. Each building was also tethered to the ground, but much closer.
The zip line went from gray to bright red then, signaling Daniel to engage the brake. He squeezed the handles and swayed on the line as his downward momentum fought with him. He stepped lightly to the ground—a relatively flat stone outside the city— and let go, surprised to see the handle whizz back up the cable to return to the top. James slid down a moment later, and they stared around them.
“Is it like you thought?” Daniel asked.
James just shook his head.
“All right. Stay close, we need to explore,” Daniel said, and took off at a trot.
“What are we looking for, Lord?”
“First, call me Daniel. Secondly, I’m not really sure. Like we said, this world is pretty new to us, and we need to learn more. Kate thinks this city is important. So I guess we’re just looking to see what we can find. See what’s going on with the mad scientists down here.”
“Why?”
Daniel pursed his lips. “Kate and I are trying to accomplish something. And we need the help of people around here. We have your mom, and you, I hope…” The boy nodded fervently. “But we are going to need a lot more people before the day is done. Or, you know, maybe we’ll get a week. I don’t even know how time passes here.”
The buildings on the outskirts of town were small, single-story buildings that looked to either be houses or warehouses. Most were shabby and the kind of buildings Daniel assumed would have made up the entire city. Perhaps these were the homes of the true destitute, the ones who couldn't afford to live above and couldn’t afford to leave. They hovered one to three feet off the ground, some with stairs that reached almost to the ground, some just looking to require a big step.
Daniel stumbled and looked down. The ground was covered in rocks from pebbles to boulders, making the terrain dangerous to travel across. How come no one had ever cleared a thoroughfare through here? He kicked a rock out of his way and jumped when it rolled back to where it had been.
“The land decides how it wants to be,” James said.
“I guess so,” Daniel said. They were getting further into the city - with more treacherous going - when they started to see people.
The first was a woman in a large billowy white cape, close-cropped red hair and goggles obscuring her eyes. She stared at them from behind a floating building that looked to be made of glass and metal plates, and then when they saw her, she scrabbled onto the stoop and rushed inside.
James looked as if he wanted to follow her, but Daniel put his hand on his arm and pointed.
Dead ahead was a black building that looked as if it had been created by a child - there was no rhyme or reason to its construction - blown glass streaked with black formed towers and sideways rooms from a simple one-story building, and flashes of light came from within.
“There. That’s where we’re going,” Daniel said.
Deeper into the city, foot traffic was more common. Distracted people, many of them looking distressed, climbed over the rocks as if born to it, heading from one building to the next. Signs over some of the doors showed the buildings to be businesses. “Professor TickTock’s Timepieces.” “Eric’s Weaponry.” And a handful of people worked on ladders to repair the foundation of “Splodey Al’s Explosives,” which had somehow developed a large black hole in the corner. A white building in the shape of a huge bottle was apparently the local doctor’s clinic - “Dr. Ophelia’s Ministrations” - while a squat warehouse made of wood just proclaimed “GROCERIE.”
Some people stood on a side street and called out their wares - clearly a more organic marketplace. Watches, potions, toys, clothing, fruits and vegetables (that looked oddly shaped and consisted of colors that didn’t really want to be grabbed by Daniel’s eye), and even small empty boxes containing, supposedly, ‘ideas’ were hawked. James wanted to look for something to buy Kelly, but Daniel dragged him forward to the black building.
The only problem was, they couldn’t find a door. A man in a black coat with tails, a top hat, and dirty coveralls stopped them and said, in very precise English, “Go on, boys, you know you can’t get into the House of Mysteries. Don’t bother honest people now.”
“The House of Mysteries?” Daniel said.
The man stopped. “You are new to Lathe?”
“Our parents had business here,” James said, surprising Daniel.
The man nodded, satisfied. “You shouldn’t be wandering the streets. This is not a safe city. But yes. When Lathe was established, the House of Mysteries already stood here, and no one has been able to get inside since. People believe the oldest tinker still works inside, but no one knows anything about him or her.” He winked at them. “Tell your parents to visit my store, Professor Burns’s Idea Emporium, for much higher quality ideas than they can buy on the street.” He handed James a black card with white stamping on it and left them.
“So, what now?” James asked.
Daniel grinned. “Now is when you remember that you’re traveling with a god.”
******
Alicia sent Sarah off with the twins and Kelly and told them to stay out of trouble as she took Kate to the Temple. While the Sidewalk was the center of the city, the Temple was apparently the heart, the largest building in the city in terms of width, built like a pagoda with different metallic shades for each level. The bottom was a greenish brass, the one above that a shiny silver, then a reddish copper, then a white gold, a steel almost black, a soft gray tin, a bright orangey brass and at the top, the smallest floor had a roof of pure, shiny gold.
Kate modified her appearance a bit and then they were on the lift to get to the gondola.
“The gondola will take us to yo- Kate’s temple as it’s the most popular. From there we can get to almost any other temple.”
“So all the temples are in one building. That’s convenient. Who else is worshiped there?”
Alicia screwed up her face. “Let’s see. The bottom temple worships Daniel, trickster god of the one-eyed, the forgotten, and hell. Then there’s the temple to Cotton, the Moon, then Persi, the goddess of dinosaurs, Kate’s level is the one with the white gold roof; then there’s Prosper, god of the Harvest; Ishmael, god of the sea; Gamma, the warrior messenger goddess; and Barris, god of the sun is on top. All of the temples are accessible except for the top two.”
Kate leapt nimbly onto to gondola as Alicia paid two coins to an attendant in a green rob
e. “Why can’t you visit the top two?”
Alicia shrugged and looked out over the city. “I don’t know. I just know entrance is forbidden.”
Kate nodded and relaxed into the seat, letting the swaying of the gondola soothe her tight nerves. She hadn’t seen any boys missing eyes yet, which was good. She wondered if news of Dauphine’s demise had reached Meridian yet, then wondered how much time had passed since leaving. It could be possible that much more time had passed. She watched citizens of Meridian soar along the zip lines or lazily traverse the city in their gondolas, and hoped she wouldn’t have to teach the same lesson to this beautiful city. Regardless of the time that had passed in the real world, she had taken down a whole city only yesterday, and didn’t feel up to doing another one just yet.
She closed her eyes and didn’t open them until they reached the temples. For the first time she paid attention to those on the gondola with her. Several young women wore coveralls, and she realized with a start these were young acolytes to the faith based on her. She wanted to follow them, but she knew where she had to go. A burly man with several scars on his face and hands was going to pray to Persi, and a dreamy woman Kate was pretty sure was stoned was headed to the moon goddess level. Only Kate and Alicia were headed upward to Ishmael’s level.
The stairwell stopped at the sixth level and the door at the top opened to a wide room with a pool inset into the floor. The walls were covered in blue, sparkly paint that reminded Kate absurdly of her junior prom. A young priest stood naked in the pool and opened his arms, welcoming them.
“Let me guess. Ishmael is also the god of sex?” Kate whispered to Alicia, who nodded, her dark cheeks flushing slightly.
“Welcome, pilgrims,” the man said. He strode toward them. “Feel free to remove your clothing and join me. The next service begins in an hour, but I’m sure we can pass the time in a reverent and holy way.”
Kate grinned at him. “No thank you, Father. I’m just here on my way somewhere.”
“There is nowhere to go from here except for down, or into the holy pool of the god,” he said, and he stepped out of the water. He was thin, well-built and hairless, his erection incredibly large for his slight frame.
