by L. W. Jacobs
She would find a way. Odril needed to pay for what he’d done.
Finally, a recess was called, and Ella stood as the arbitrarium began to empty, watching for where the Arbiter went. She found him striding up the walkway toward his offices and had to run to catch up with him. “Arbiter Sablo!”
He turned, eyes at first cold, then warming on sight of her. “Hello. Miss—Aygla, was it?”
Her brows rose involuntarily. “I’m surprised you remember.”
He smiled, revealing a set of perfectly white teeth. “Couldn’t forget a face like yours. What can I do for you?”
Ella steeled herself—she hated asking for help. “I— Do you remember my predicament regarding the thief?”
“Indeed I do. It isn’t too often that our women are preyed upon up here. I was sorry to hear it. Have you found the guilty party?”
“I have.” To say the least. “Unfortunately, he refuses to settle out of courts, so I’m going to need to file a hearing.”
“Ah. And you came to intercede on your behalf?” His tone was distinctly cooler.
“Oh, no. I have little doubt he’ll be found guilty. I came to—offer you a trade.” She’d been rehearsing how to say this all morning, but it still came out stiff. “I find myself in need of some money, and would offer you a trade in calculism, until such time as my suit has cleared.”
“Calculism? Aren’t you a scholar?”
“I am. And not a professionally licensed calculor, sir, but studied informally for my house, sufficient that my work only needs a cursory inspection before approval.”
The Arbiter nodded, still striding up the walkway, and Ella held her breath. An Achuri street tough had been willing to help her—would the highest Councilate officer do the same?
“A lot of people come to me for help,” he said finally, “and many of them asking for money. But not many offer something in return. How much do you need?”
She cleared her throat. “Just enough for rooms, sir. I can manage the rest.”
His expression softened at this, and he glanced at her. “Ascending God, girl, have you got nowhere to sleep?”
“I don’t. I was—staying with a friend, but she couldn’t keep me anymore. The robbery left me totally destitute.”
“Take rooms in the Tower, then,” he said, tone decisive. “Bill it to my account, and anything else you need. I’ll let the bursar know.”
“The Tower!” She’d been imagining something simple, likely in Riverbottom. “But I—”
“I’ll have nothing else. The city isn’t safe for an unaccompanied woman, and I am partially to blame for that. But I will take you up on your calculism offer. My offices, first thing tomorrow.” He turned to her, nearly to his door now. “Sound fair, Miss Aygla?”
“More than fair, sir. I thank you.”
He gave a half-chuckle. “Don’t thank me till you see how complex the finances of a Councilate servant unable to own stock but still in possession of multiple enterprises in Worldsmouth can be.” He took her hand and gave it a perfunctory brush. “Now, if you’ll excuse me.”
“Certainly.”
Ella began the long walk down a little dazed. As nice as Sablo had been at the tavern, she’d still somehow expected him to say no. Expected to be sent back out onto the street and have to use her resonance to steal money, to hole up somewhere like the slum she’d lived in after escaping her parents’ house.
Instead, she was staying here. Ella shook her head, still feeling underdressed and under-cultured for the grandeur of the place. If it weren’t for the petty talk of politics and manners she remembered from her mother’s parlors, she would have felt daunted. But no, this was still the inbred, myopic system of money and governance she’d learned to hate years ago.
The pepper-haired woman in the Tower offices raised her eyebrows at the request to rent a room on the Arbiter’s accounts, but sent a message upward by use of a small cylinder in a tube with a crank, and received a reply just a few minutes later authorizing Ella. The downside was she wouldn’t let Ella register under a different name. She would have to trust that Odril wouldn’t try anything here, with so many lighthairs and lawkeepers around.
Her room was a third of the way up the Tower, a simple studio—one bed and a table, with a curtained area for the privy. Simple save for the far wall, where a single pane of cast blue glass stretched from wall to wall and floor to ceiling. Ella walked to it with a gasp. Outside, the lamps of Newgen were just being lit, reflecting on the water, sun going down in a blaze behind the forested hills to the west, all cast in a deep, azure blue.
She had never seen anything like it. Ella stood a long moment, transfixed by the sheer scale of the place, fear of heights held in check by the ledge of rooms below, tower spiraling out beneath. Then she locked the door, dragged the bed flush against the window, and curled up, looking out the window. She was a mess inside—lonely, unsure of what to do next, indebted to too many people, and at the same time grateful for a safe place to stay, excited by what she’d discovered, and liberated by her new power.
Odril couldn’t touch her now. Or at least, it would take a lot more to touch her. She now timeslipped deeper than he could, and all the brawlers in the world wouldn’t matter if they couldn’t catch her. He could set some kind of trap, but as long as she was careful, stayed in the Tower or public places, she should be fine.
The resonance didn’t help her with her oath to ruin him, though—not if she wanted to help Tunla and the other women in the process. There was still a part of her, an angry core element, that wanted to attack him, to hurt him like she’d been hurt—but if he survived, she would be at fault, and if he died, his contracts would transfer over to someone even worse.
So, she had to ruin him legally. The corruption in his ledgers was a solid basis for legal dissolution of his assets, especially if she could get some of the ledgers as proof—she was hoping Tunla could help with that. But the arbitrarium today had been daunting—Councilate legalese and the complex restrictions in which the barristers had argued was entirely different from the scholarly language she knew so well.
And she couldn’t count on the Arbiter’s help. As kind as he’d been in accepting her trade, she remembered his frosty tone when he’d thought she was asking for help with the arbitration.
Amazing, that a Councilate Arbiter might actually be concerned with justice.
The thought made her pause. It was the sort of thing LeTwi would say—would have said—but it wasn’t LeTwi now, not his voice, just her. He was gone, as surely as if he’d been a friend who’d gone away, and she felt the loss, the absence, even if he hadn’t really been a friend. She wasn’t sure what he’d been. But she was sure now that he’d been linked to her resonance, like Tunla had said.
It was just her now. And little as she liked it, much as some other core part of her wanted to run, like she’d ran three years before, she knew she needed to stay and fight.
Ella stood. Winning meant a lot of knowledge she didn’t have—knowledge of Councilate laws, knowledge of the courts, knowledge of barrister strategy in attack and defense. But these were things one could study.
And studying was something she knew how to do.
A few minutes found her back in the Arbiter’s offices at the top of the Tower, the same slick-haired young man glancing up at her. “Can I help you?”
“You can,” she said. “I’m here to file a lawsuit.”
17
We have to push them to the extreme, past the extreme, past every extreme—cold, exhaustion, hunger, violence, isolation—to bring on the transformation. Without it, they are only so much meat.
—Riglen Sablos, founder of the Titans, Yiel 11
Ella’s first day in the Tower passed without incident. Sablo was out for the day, but she found a stack of his personal business ledgers waiting for her in the rear office. They were every bit as complicated as he’d warned, and she spent most of the day sorting them out, leaving late that afternoon weary but satisfie
d she’d done something to repay the debt she owed him.
She met Tunla that night—or tried to. She’d written an address and time on the note she left when she escaped Odril’s office, assuming Tunla would be able to come, but the Achuri woman didn’t show. Ella waited an hour or more, watching shopfronts slowly close along Sandglass Square, sun catching in the giant hourglass the Councilate had erected there. The bells rang every half hour, like they did in every conquered city, as if trying to drown out local systems of time.
Achuri children played in the cobbled open space, and she entertained herself trying to understand their words, a mix of Achuri and Yersh, but worry kept distracting her. Why hadn’t Tunla come? Had she not seen the note—had Odril seen it instead and was planning an ambush? Did he have the women locked up—was he refusing them food, as Tunla said he sometimes did? She would feel awful if they were being punished for her.
Finally, Ella stood. It was stupid to go back to his office, stupid to think he wouldn’t have some plan in place to get her back. Had maybe locked them up hoping Ella would come back. But she was reasonably sure she could timeslip out of anything she saw coming. Tunla was her only friend here, unless she could count the street tough, and she was worried about her.
So, Ella struck resonance a few streets away from his office, late-evening traffic slowing to a halt around her, air gelling. It felt like she could resonate for days, like overcoming her voice had also widened her store of uai, but there was no reason to push it. She ran the rest of the way to the office, though running in slip this deep was more like swimming.
It looked normal from the end of the street—no Arlo or other obvious guards outside, no broken windows or signs of struggle. Ella moved closer, nervous despite knowing only another timeslip would notice her at this speed.
Nothing looked amiss. It was after working hours, so the main office room was dark, but peering in the narrow bedroom windows, she could spot lamps and candles. Ella circled to the far side, to the room she knew to be Tunla’s, crouched, and opened the window. She was there and unhurt, frozen in the act of massaging her foot.
Ella let out a deep breath, then against her better judgment released the slip. Time slurred forward, and Tunla’s head snapped up at the sound of the window opening. “Ella! What are you doing here?”
“Our meeting,” Ella hissed, looking around. “You didn’t come.”
Tunla looked away. “Odril’s got us locked up in here until you come back.”
“Till I come back? I’m not coming back.” The guilt she’d been fearing hit—they were locked up because of her.
Anger came fast on its heels. This was just more reason to get them out.
“How did you get out, anyway?” Tunla asked. “I saw your yura run out.”
Ella grinned. “I pleased my ancestor.”
“You what? Ella, that’s great! I— Normally, we have a song. I would sing it for you, but”—she glanced around—“maybe better not to draw attention just now.”
“Sing it for me when you get out.”
Tunla took a step closer. “But how did you do it?”
Ella shook her head. “It’s funny; I’ve been thinking about that all day. I didn’t please him, Tunla. It’s more like I…fought him. He was always an intellectual and always taking the other side of debates from me. And I guess somewhere in there, I realized I disagreed with his basic position and he was holding me back.”
“So?”
“So, when Arlo threw me back in my room, I took another eleven balls”—Tunla goggled—“and LeTwi came back, but it was like he was drunk. And I noticed, the more I fought with him, the drunker he got—and the more control I had over my resonance.”
“So, you…fought him.” Tunla said slowly. She winced, likely at something from her own voice.
“I guess so. I’ve been thinking of it almost like he had something to teach me, but he couldn’t say it. And once I finally figured it out, then he was gone.”
At this, the Achuri woman nodded. “We have an expression in Achuri, that our hindrances are our greatest teachers.”
“Although he wasn’t happy about leaving. He wanted to stay, wanted me to believe him. Actually, I’m not really sure it was a he—it started sounding so strange toward the end.” Ella shook her head. There was so much more to learn.
Tunla was still squinting at her. “So, the secret is overloading on yura?”
“That and arguing, at least for me. Have you heard any other versions? Know anyone who’s done it?”
Tunla shook her head. “My aunt has done it, but she’s gone now, with Wenla in the villages. There are others in the city, but”—she shrugged—“I can’t find them like this.”
Ella set her jaw. “Well, I’m getting you out of here. I filed a lawsuit against Odril today.”
Tunla whistled low. “Be careful, Ella. He has men looking for you.”
She chuckled. “What he doesn’t know is if they find me, they’re in for a surprise. Tunla, I can slip so much deeper, for so much longer, than before. It’s—”
“It’s part of pleasing your ancestors,” Tunla cut in. “The gift they give puts yura’s effects to shame. That is why we used to look down on its use, though now the youth take it like honeycakes. Though to think that yura is able to help with ancestors…” She shook her head. “If we’d known this, we could have really fought the Councilate.”
This was something Ella had been thinking about, like a heavy weight on her chest. “Whoever learns this first will have a huge advantage—in mining, in manufacturing, in fighting…”
Tunla nodded solemnly. “And are you thinking of telling everyone? Of publishing it?”
Ella winced. “I don’t know. Yes, I—it’s been my hope for years to find something like this. To learn something new and important about culture and resonance. But I know what people could do with this, and I don’t want the Councilate to just seize it, to suddenly have all their soldiers turn into Titans.” She gave a start. “Though I may have already let it out. The street tough who gave me the yura, Tai, I mentioned it to him.”
“Is he working for the Councilate?”
“I don’t know. When I first met him, he was watching some kids on the street, but last time, he was wearing a Coldferth uniform and delivering something to Odril.” It was hard to believe it of him—he’d had such an honest face. But faces could lie.
“Maybe he is, then. Many of our boys are in it now.”
Ella nodded, disappointed. “Well, hopefully, he just thinks I’m a crazy lighthair lady and doesn’t actually try it.”
“Speaking of crazy lighthair ladies, you really shouldn’t be here.”
Ella glanced around. “I know. I’m going. But—Tunla, I need your help. I need evidence for the suit I’m filing against Odril.”
“What kind of evidence?”
“Ledgers. Receipts. The paper trail to show he’s been embezzling, and that he’s helping the Houses launder money.”
She nodded slowly. “I can do that. But—I’ll have to make copies of them first. It’ll take me a few days.”
Ella heard a noise and spun to the left, but it was just a street urchin pushing a cart of blankets through the alley. “Let me know what you need. I won’t have much of a suit without them.”
Tunla nodded. “Well, don’t be stupid about it. Life is not so bad down here.”
Ella remembered the other women looking at her, unwilling to escape. She hated how trapped they were—not only by Odril but by the system that had beaten them into consenting to it. “Well, I’m going to make it better.” She glanced around again, starting to feel unnerved. “I’ll come back every night and check on you. Leave me a note in the window if you can’t make it. I’m—sorry that I caused all this.”
Tunla waved at her. “This way, I don’t have to do his laundry. And I think it did us all some good, seeing you walk out of here like that. Even if we didn’t follow.”
Ella nodded. “Take care, friend.”
&
nbsp; Tunla returned the gesture, too far to clasp hands. “Atumbarye. It means ancestors keep you.”
“Atumbarye, then.” Ella struck her resonance and vanished into the night.
Sablo was in his offices the next morning when she arrived, deep in conversation with two men in House Coldferth colors. He nodded to her and went on talking, Ella curious but unable to make out details from across the wide room. When they were done, he gave her a smile. “Sorry about that. More rebel activity in the mines.”
Her thoughts went immediately to Tai, to what she’d told him. Had they tried yura overdosing? Was the secret out? “I’m sorry to hear it. Did you check over the books from yesterday?”
“Had my auditor do it,” he said, buttoning up the silk robe he wore in the arbitrarium. “Said it looked quite professional. Another stack for you here.”
“Great. I’ll get to work on them right away.”
He nodded. “I’ll be done around lunchtime, if you want to take lunch. I know a great place.”
That was unexpected.
“Sure. I’ll—be here.” She laughed, gesturing at the hefty stack of ledgers.
He left with a smile, and she got to work, mind turning over her conversation with Tunla as the numbers tumbled into place. There were so many things she didn’t know about yuraloading—that was what she’d started to call it, in her mind—things she could find out if she met more people who had done it. Tai, at least, would be a start—she was supposed to meet him tomorrow at noon. Maybe he knew others. It was frustrating to think that Tunla knew more like him in the city but couldn’t do anything locked up.
Weighing heavier on her mind was what to do with the knowledge. Assuming her experience wasn’t just a fluke, yuraloading had the power to do so much. Beyond almost guaranteeing her admittance into the Thousand Spires—or a position as Councilate Advisor, for that matter—it would be worth hundreds of thousands of moons if she sold it to one House or another.
