Luna came forward tentatively, slipping hir slight form between Taigan and Maralah. “The symbol?” Luna asked. “Is it a trefoil with a tail?”
“Yes,” Lilia said.
Luna traced the symbol over the center of the diagram, where the Worldbreaker would operate. “I would put her here. You may not want her to work the device, but that thing inside of her, you will want that here. Both of you need to be there, for it to work. There’s nothing in the book about a missing piece, but if there is one, it would sit there.”
Lilia sketched out a drawing of the orrery she had seen in Tira’s Temple. “This is the device, I think,” she said. “Tira’s Temple… showed it to me. Have you seen anything like this in the book? Anything about an orrery?”
Anavha leaned over the drawing. Frowned.
“Nothing about an orrery,” Luna said, rubbing at hir forehead. “I didn’t see any device like this in any of the drawings, but… the instructions for closing the ways, they are mathematical equations that could easily be applied to the heavens. Oh, yes, I can see this now.”
“That looks like the game of spheres,” Anavha said, in Dorinah, though he certainly hadn’t been able to follow any of their other conversation.
“You’ve seen this before?” Lilia asked, in Dorinah.
“Something like it, yes. All different colors of orbs, though. It’s a game, a tavern game here. You have to match all of the orbs so they are correct pairs. Knowing the correct pairs is difficult because it isn’t by size or shape, but distance. There’s math involved, a lot of strategy.”
“I want to know more about this game,” Lilia said. “Can you set it up here?”
“It’s better to go to one,” Anavha said. “Then maybe you can see if it’s really like what you saw.”
Lilia translated for the others.
Maralah dug into the bag of tubers. Taigan tried to pull it back. She snarled at him.
“The Key is more difficult,” Luna continued. “For a long time, I assumed it was the Kai.”
“Tira’s Temple said it wasn’t,” Lilia offered.
“Right,” Luna said. “Instead, it’s someone who can channel all that power into operating the orrery. Yes, all the jistas at every temple are channeling power, but the one here, in the fifth, has to take in all that power and feed it back to the temple to power that… machine. That must be what it looks like, an orrery. It’s… a lot of power. Enough to destroy pretty much anyone. These are organic machines, with the people acting as parts. It makes sense that the Key is a person, an organic part.”
“Maralah, do you think–” Lilia began, and stopped. Her gaze settled on Taigan instead, who was gnawing on a tuber while making faces at Maralah. He noticed her looking, and grimaced.
“Oh no,” Taigan said. “Don’t even say it.”
“There’s only one person here who wouldn’t have died back there,” Lilia said. “You admitted it yourself. Who else could get torn apart by the power of every satellite and not die?”
“You need an omajista! I will be the useful omajista. Blow someone else up.”
“Our omajista is Anavha,” she said. “You’re the Key, Taigan.”
“I so look forward to more pain and discomfort,” he said.
“You wanted to help,” Lilia said. “Isn’t that why you came back? This is how you can help.”
“Killing, helping, as long as they’re the same,” he said.
“I’ll talk to Anavha,” Lilia said; at his name, he perked up, but she didn’t want to share her theory with him, not yet, so she continued in Dhai. “I think others should learn too, though, in case something goes wrong. Luna? You seem to know more about what these can do than anyone.”
“Me?” Luna said. “I… suppose I could, but… I don’t want to stand up there.”
“Maybe you won’t have to,” Lilia said. “I just don’t like the idea of any of us being singular. We only have once chance at this.”
“There’s still the matter of getting into Oma’s Temple,” Roh said. “We can’t just open a gate in there. The jistas will sense us and be on us immediately. Anavha and I barely got out when he opened a gate. It’s like they have some kind of alarm that senses when power is used.”
Anavha, frustrated at being excluded, asked for a translation. Roh provided one.
“I have several contacts there,” Lilia said. “One in particular is very high up. Is Caisa here?”
“Who?” Roh asked.
“Never mind,” Lilia said. “I still need to see who made it from Meyna’s camp.”
“There’s also Saronia. Do you remember her?” Roh asked.
Lilia grimaced. She did. “That bully?”
“She does the laundry,” Roh said. “Carts it in and out of the temple, across the bridge, from the plateau. We could come in through the cart.”
Maralah shook her head. “It’s too many people. A bare minimum of seven must go down, and you will want others, as you said, in case something happens to any single person. I would not attempt this with fewer than twenty. You can’t get them all in through the fucking laundry.”
“We could have Anavha open a gate at the base of the plateau,” Lilia said, wiping away the diagram of Tira’s Temple and drawing a map of the plateau and the spur of rock that held Oma’s Temple. “Maralah, you could set the plateau on fire, at night to draw their attention. That’s a good distraction. The darkness will help confuse them.”
Roh pointed at the temple. “We need to get to the Assembly Chamber,” he said. “That’s where the temple told me to bring the Key and the Worldbreaker. The ceiling of that chamber is glass.”
“Right,” Lilia said.
“Para is ascendant,” Roh said. “When you’ve drawn their attention to the plateau, a lot of other jistas will be pulling on their stars to put that fire out. Kadaan and I can get Anavha in on a wave of air, break in through the glass and make sure the area is secure. When it’s clear, Anavha can open a gate and get in the rest of you. That will be much faster.”
“Why can’t Anavha just open a gate inside the Assembly Chamber?” Maralah said, rubbing her head. “This is overly complicated.”
“We have no idea who will be in that chamber,” Lilia said. “Kirana might have dozens of jistas in there. If Anavha opens a gate directly in that chamber, they will immediately sense his power and send everyone running up there before Roh and Kadaan can secure it, and we’ll be through. Even with Roh and Kadaan coming in first, I still think we will need a bigger distraction than burning the plateau if we really want to make sure the Assembly Chamber is empty. If we can get those guards and jistas below, we can cut them off from their stars.”
“I can cut them off,” Taigan said. “A Song of Unmaking. After that little lark on the beach, I can say for a fact that I can cut off fifty-nine jistas at a time, at least. I’m very good at distractions.”
“And how do you propose to get in?” Lilia said. “We are all very… obvious.”
“I propose that I walk right in and offer that Empress something she would like very much indeed. That will get her and her jistas and guards out of that Assembly Chamber, and anyone else.”
“What could you possibly offer that they’d want badly enough to swarm you for?” Roh said.
“I would give her Lilia Sona, the upstart kitchen girl leading the rebels.”
“No,” Lilia said. “They would cut you off from Oma the moment you walked in. And murder me, certainly.”
“They would try. I’ve discovered that your people and hers are bad at the Song of Unmaking, at least when it comes to unmaking me.”
“It’s a very big risk,” Lilia said. She chewed her thumbnail. “Maybe we won’t do it at all. Maybe we should just risk–”
“Oh, how touching,” Taigan said. “I would be fine. I’m always fine.”
Roh said, “Taigan, do you really think you could get into the temple with Lilia, cut everyone off from their stars, and get yourself upstairs to the Assembly Chamber after?�
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“I’d tell her Lilia knows how to work the machine,” Taigan said, “that she is the Worldbreaker, and she needs to take us upstairs. You’d have the room secured by then, surely.”
“What if I didn’t know how?” Lilia asked.
“Especially if you didn’t,” Taigan said. He leaned toward her. “You know what that angry murderer is doing right now, with the moments that Para is in the sky ticking away? She is throwing jistas into those machines, all four of them, and frantically trying to murder that fifth temple. Her moments are numbered. She knows it. If you and I come in the front of the temple, she will meet us, and I will get us to the Assembly Chamber. I relish the challenge.”
“You’re very confident,” Lilia said.
“I’m always confident,” Taigan said.
Maralah said something to him in Saiduan. He snapped back at her. The air tensed for a moment, and Lilia waved her hands at them. “Let’s not!” Lilia said. “We need to mobilize very, very quickly. Are we all aligned with this plan? If we do this, it must happen tonight.”
“It still needs some refining,” Kadaan said, from beside Roh. “Too much relies on… I’m sorry, Taigan, but we all know how you are. And we know very little about how many people are in this temple. She could have that chamber warded, and if so, there’s no way we could enter, by wink or anything else.”
“I agree this is mad,” Maralah said, “but Lilia is right. We lose our window when Para winks out. But it’s a good reminder that we need two of everyone. There’s too much that could go wrong. You best go find out about this game of spheres, and make sure two of you know it! I’m going to get us a few more jistas. We still need a tirajista.”
“I think I have one,” Lilia said. If Salifa had lived. If any of the jistas from her camp had lived.
“And another in reserve,” Taigan said. “This isn’t your first turn with an impossible attack, bird. And we know how those turn out.”
Heat rose in her face, but she said nothing, and Taigan did not continue.
“All right,” Maralah said. “I need to go make sure these can eat. Kadaan, let’s see if we can get ourselves some of those sheep.”
The room cleared. Taigan lingered, munching on his tuber. Lilia stared at her messy drawings in the soot. Her dirty fingers.
“You have failed at how many assaults now, bird?” he said brightly.
“Go soak your head, Taigan.”
“Let’s count them,” he said, and held out a finger. “There was the harbor, of course. Where you lost the wall and burned yourself out, despite my admonitions.” He held out a second finger. “There was Kuallina. Ah, Kuallina! What a delightfully absurd mess that was, on all levels, when you lost your little Gian and–”
“Shut up, Taigan.”
He held out a third finger. “And of course, you lost your little regiment of rebels in the woods. To a dead man, no less! That is still something extraordinary, let me say. This plan is overly complicated and you know it. You’re relying on too much good luck, and we all know your history of luck.”
Lilia pounded the table with her fist. “Enough!”
“Oh my,” Taigan said, pressing a hand to his chest. “Did I strike a nerve? Was it the dead man? Or Gian?”
“I know what I’m doing this time.”
“You know what you’re doing even less this time. You know why you keep failing?”
“You aren’t very successful yourself.”
“It’s because you are so driven by your own desires. Finding your mother, first.” He rolled his eyes. “A fool’s chase that was. She never wanted you to find her, and for good reason. And when she was dead, what was it then? It was getting revenge on the Tai Mora, certainly, but we both know it’s Kirana you really want. To hurt her as you have been hurt. To destroy her as you’ve been destroyed.”
Lilia seethed. “Why are you here, if I’m such a self-destructive failure?”
He shrugged. “What else do I have to do?”
“You could go annoy someone else. Destroy someone else’s life.”
“Me? I did not destroy your life.” He rose and popped the last of the tuber into his mouth. Wiped his hands on his tunic. “Never forget, bird,” he said, “you chose to come with me. You chose to sit at the table with Kirana and your little girlfriend, oh yes, I heard about that. You chose to keep antagonizing the Tai Mora forces, instead of retreating a year ago. No one made those choices for you.”
He sauntered back out the door, leaving her in the charred kitchen, alone, with the smell of burnt hair and bits of crumbling sod falling from the ceiling. She dropped her head to her chest, and her eyes filled with tears. She was so tired.
“Hey, what you doing? You still in there?” Zezili called from the door.
Lilia wiped at her face. “I just need a few minutes.”
“The sky isn’t waiting on any of us,” Zezili said.
“Get out!” Lilia yelled.
Zezili grinned. “Look at you! All right, all right. But I can’t go far so hurry the fuck up.” She went back outside.
From the kitchen window, Lilia watched Zezili alight on top of the fence that held in three or four dogs, easy as breathing. Saradyn shuffled past the fence, yelling something at Zezili. He raised his head and peered inside. When he spotted Lilia he made a sign at her, something obscene or profane, and yelled, “Impostor!” in Dorinah.
Lilia grimaced and moved away from the window. She hated Zezili in that moment. Hated her easy confidence and health, her seeming detachment from everything around them. She had died once, hadn’t she? She had nothing to fear from death. But Lilia feared everything. Because Taigan was right. She had done nothing but fail from the very beginning. Failed her mother. Failed at the harbor. Failed Ahkio and Yisaoh, failed Meyna. Failed the refugees from Dorinah.
This time, she always vowed, every time, this time it will be different.
But she knew, knew it in her bones, that as long as she kept making the same choices, nothing would change at all.
34
Ahkio had waited years to see his sister again.
Beside him, as they waited for their audience with the Empress of the Tai Mora, Caisa was wringing her hands, her eyes questioning his decision for the thousandth time, but she was loyal, so loyal, and he didn’t feel he deserved it.
He did not deserve it.
But here he was.
He hadn’t told Liaro what he hoped to do. Liaro only wanted to live. Liaro didn’t understand Ahkio’s sister.
An omajista led Ahkio upstairs. “What about Caisa?” he asked.
“She’ll wait,” the omajista said. “We’ve confirmed your prisoner is who you said she is. You can join her upstairs and wait with the Empress, but this one stays with us, for now.”
Some of the color drained from Caisa’s face.
“I really insist–” Ahkio said.
“Move,” the omajista said, and pushed him. Ahkio gazed back at Caisa. His stomach churned. Caisa began to weep.
Had he made a mistake?
The omajista sat him down in the Assembly Chamber to wait. Everything in the chamber was different. Piles of books and papers, and jistas, so many jistas, and Dhai slaves and running feet. He had not seen the temple so bustling in his entire lifetime. Kirana had done this. She had always been a better leader. Yisaoh sat at the other end of the table, her steely gaze fixed on him, hands bound, two Tai Mora guards beside her, and a sinajista, though by all accounts Yisaoh was ungifted. She simply inspired caution in people. He knew that better than anyone.
“Fucking traitor,” she muttered.
Kirana entered the Assembly Chamber from the stairs, which he had not expected. He stood. She came up the steps and regarded him, and he didn’t know what to think of her. This woman, this warmonger, this mass murderer, was not the sister he knew, though she shared her face.
Her gaze did not seek his, though. She crossed the room to Yisaoh. As Kirana moved, he tried to see something in her that he remembered.
He sought some shadow of his sister there, in her face, her walk. But this Kirana’s walk was bolder. Her eyes flat and black: no mirth, no kindness. She had the gaze of a predator.
Kirana took hold of Yisaoh’s chin. Yisaoh spat at her. Kirana laughed and stroked Yisaoh’s cheek. Released her. “She is a good likeness,” Kirana said, rounding on him. “How do I know this isn’t some lookalike? We all thought you dead, Ahkio. I caught them fishing your fucking body parts out of the sewer dregs.”
Ahkio shivered. “I have no memory of that.”
“I bet,” she said. “Sina is risen, and Para and Tira now too, so I suppose miracles are possible. But so is treachery.”
“I’ve brought you who you wanted.”
“I admit I wasn’t certain you would come,” Kirana said, “after all this time.” She gestured at the soldiers beside Yisaoh, and they advanced and took hold of Yisaoh and dragged her back down the stairs. Yisaoh tried to bite Kirana as she passed, but Kirana paid her no mind. “You promised me Yisaoh at Kuallina, and never delivered her.”
“You tyrant!” Yisaoh yelled. “And you, Ahkio, you Sina-cursed traitor! Sina will burn you for this. Oma will crush your bones!” She continued shouting as they took her down the hall.
“I have no memory of that either,” Ahkio said, turning back to Kirana. “But I’ve heard that, yes.”
“If you are truly the same Ahkio, I wonder why it is you brought her here now, finally. Did it take you this long to consider my proposition?”
“I’ve been changed,” he said. “I have heard people say it. I’m not the same man. Maybe that is true. Maybe I’m some construct. But I’ve been shaped by what’s happened since then. I want peace, Kirana. And the sister I knew would keep her word when it came to peace. I don’t know how much of that Kirana is within you, but it’s my dearest hope that this war is over. We can work together to build something better. We don’t need to be enemies any longer.”
The Broken Heavens Page 34
