The Kalis Experiments

by R A Fisher

  Syrina realized it had been getting lighter outside only after she stepped into the shanty and was engulfed by darkness. At first, she thought it was empty, but her eyes adjusted, and she saw a battered table hunched beneath a lone pane-less window at the far end of the structure. It looked like it had been hammered together from the same gray driftwood as the shack. Behind it sat the silhouette of a man.

  When the figure stood, emeralds glittered across his scalp, but the rest of his features were still swallowed in shadows. Syrina wondered what the Corsair did in there so early in the morning, sitting in the dark.

  The owl man, now owl-less, peered around in the dim light for a chair and didn’t see one. Instead, he dragged an empty crate from the clutter up to the table and tipped it on its side. He plopped down onto it with a tired grunt.

  “Hello,” the man behind the desk said. “My name is Velnapasi. I hear you’ve caused quite a commotion in your search for certain things you believe you can find. Such a commotion that I’ve waited here all night for you despite a strong desire for a hot meal and my bed. I would suggest you explain to me what you seek and why you think I of all people can assist you. Strange things happen to strange people asking strange questions on the Lip.” He smiled, the expression barely visible in the weak light.

  “Please forgive me for the intrusion,” the little man whined, sounding scared enough to satisfy the pirate. “I’m Gerid. My employer sent me here with only the intention of—”

  “I am no fool to be conned,” Velnapasi whispered, his veneer of pleasantness dropping with his voice. “Tell me who you are and why you’re here, or I’ll toss you to the sea and be done with it.”

  The little man stared at Velnapasi a long time, green eyes glittering under sallow lids.

  “You’re selling smuggled Ristroan goods through an importer named Stysha N’nareth,” Gerid said.

  “A dangerous accusation. Unfortunately, I don’t know what you’re talking about, and I already grow weary of listening.”

  “Come on,” Gerid sneered, fear gone from his face. “I know what I know. You know what I know. You tell me not to screw around. Then why you going to screw around with me? You got nothing else to do, sitting around here in the dark?”

  The green gems in his skull glittered in the growing light, but Velnapasi didn’t speak.

  Gerid continued. “Your sales, they’re interfering with my boss’s business. He wants them to stop for one month. In return, you get quadruple whatever profits you would make from N’nareth.”

  “I don’t think—”

  “To prove his intentions are honest, my boss will get you half your payment within the next two days, as long as you say yes. That’s double up front what you’d make this whole month off N’nareth if you can’t do the math, but I bet you can. No tin shows? You can call off the deal. If it does show—and it will—then at the end of the month, you get the other half. That is, of course, as long as you hold up your end of the bargain.”

  Velnapasi leaned forward, his elbows on the desk. “Who do you work for?”

  The little man shrugged. “My boss thinks you’re getting paid enough that you don’t need to know. I’m sure there are a million things you could tell N’nareth that won’t raise too many eyebrows. It’s a dangerous business you’re in. Problems come up.”

  The pirate nodded and chewed on his tongue.

  Finally, he grinned. “Fine. If I get the tin, I’ll stockpile for a month.”

  Gerid stood and bowed. “Leave your numbers under the right side of that rotten fishing net you’ve got hanging outside before tonight. Oh, and the boss says to tell you, please feel free to round up, but if you take the money and rescind, things won’t go well for you.”

  Velnapasi coughed a laugh. “I’m sure that’s true. Fine. You’ve got your boss a deal. But tell him if he tries to screw me, things won’t go well for him either.”

  Gerid smiled, revealing brown teeth. “I’m sure.” He bowed again. “Keep an eye out for your first payment.”

  Then he stepped out the door and vanished into the Lip.

  9

  Modern Wonders

  Getting Velnapasi his money was easy, and if his figures were a little high, they weren’t as high as Syrina had expected them to be. Ormo could afford it, so she threw in a little extra to show him the boss was sincere.

  Three days later, Rina received a messenger hawk in the nests of The Grace’s Hospice. It was from N’nareth. The buyer had agreed to meet.

  Two days after that, she had an appointment with a man named Gaston N’talisan.

  N’talisan was a professor at the University of Fom. He was from Tyrsh but had been in Fom for the past five years. N’nareth told her that he could tell Rina the rest himself.

  The importer’s directions led her north, away from the University, toward Wise Cathedral, the seat of the Grace near the center of the city. Rina could see the colossal church perched on its hill as the rickshaw drew closer, the chapel’s white and red walls rendered a featureless gray silhouette by the drizzle.

  She’d called for a rickshaw this time. It wasn’t as comfortable as a steam car, but it could go a more direct route. The concierge had advised her that the streets under Wise Hill were even more narrow and winding than they were in the rest of Fom, and neither cars nor carriages could navigate most of them.

  Sure enough, before she reached Wise Hill the rickshaw turned into a claustrophobic maze of three- and four-story limestone buildings roofed with green copper domes. Soon after, even the rickshaw became too wide for the streets, and after suffering through a blizzard of apologies from the runner, Rina was forced to walk the last half-span. The streets were cobbled and well-kept here, but they were clogged with people, and it was slow going.

  She got lost twice and arrived over an hour late. Her destination proved to be a squat unmarked door of heavy wood wedged at the end of a dead-end alley guarded by a plain granite archway, and devoid of other doors and other people. She slammed the knocker once, and a moment later, the door cracked open. Rina stepped into a round room with a high domed ceiling coated with green copper. The centerpiece was a vast C-shaped table covered with black velvet cloth and cluttered with gauges, gears, pumps, and switches. The only light came from a ring of high, narrow windows along the base of the dome. Opposite the entrance was another door, this one square, copper, and so low even Rina would need to bend over to get through it. Books of all sizes were piled in haphazard stacks about the floor. Three people were sorting and assembling parts or looking over books, but it was clear they were the assistants.

  Gaston stood at the far end of the table. He was young—younger than Syrina had imagined a university professor—with a short-trimmed black beard and sharp dark eyes. He was fiddling with some sort of brass gadget while peering at it through a glass and ceramic eyepiece. He had a bearing about him that said he was in control of whatever was going on here, and he looked up and smiled at Rina as she closed the door behind her.

  “Rina Saalesh, I presume. I’m glad you made it.” His voice was soft, friendly.

  She held out her hand so he could take it in a gentle shake. His voice was soft, friendly.

  “My sincere apologies if my tardiness is keeping you from your work,” she said. “I seem to have gotten lost somewhere between here and the Grace’s Walk.”

  He laughed. “You’re not the first to get lost in Fom, and all my work is here, so you’ve kept me from nothing.”

  Rina’s face grew serious. “Now then, I don’t wish to be abrupt, but I see you have much to do, as do I.”

  “Yes, yes. I’m aware that this is a one-time deal for you, and I understand you want to make sure your inventory won’t come back to haunt you later. It’s quite reasonable, given the circumstances. Please allow me to explain what’s happening here and why we need items that would take too long to explain to the Church were we to acquire them through proper channels.”

  “I couldn’t care less about the Church if you
don’t mind me saying. Nor am I much more concerned with the Merchants’ Syndicate.”

  “Yes, well, I hope you don’t take this the wrong way, but that’s good to hear. There’s always the concern around Fom that the High Merchants will someday find a way to make us as dependent on naphtha as the rest of the civilized world. Although truth be told, it seems unlikely that they would ever be able to. Not that many people think that they would. Be able to, I mean. I suppose more of the concern is that they would try, and who knows what kind of damage they would do if they—oh, I’m sorry. I tend to ramble.” He looked uncomfortable.

  Rina chuckled, easing the tension. “You won’t find me so easily offended, so pay it no mind. Anyway, did you not have a similar arrangement with one of my countrymen up until not long ago?”

  “Yes. His equipment was not so rare as yours, though he did manufacture a custom piece for me, now and then. And he never asked to meet me. Fortunately for you, he’s not the only supplier who’s met with recent difficulties.”

  Rina cleared her throat. “Yes, well, I know Xereks Lees as an honest businessman. I hope whatever problems he’s suffering through will resolve themselves in due course.”

  N’talisan was quiet for a time, but then he smiled and looked up at her from his gadget, finished with whatever he was doing to it.

  “It’s no matter,” he said. “My work continues, regardless. Please join me. Allow me to show you.”

  Rina followed Gaston through the tiny door in the back of the room. The chamber beyond it was narrow but high enough to stand up straight in and dropped into a spiral stairway cut into the rock floor, worn smooth with time.

  “I am an archaeologist, technically.” His voice sounded dead over the dull slap of their footfalls in the tight stairwell. “But for the past five, almost six years, I’ve been studying the Tidal Works, and a few years ago the University of Fom was kind enough to give me a grant to come here on a more official basis. You know, the Works have been around for thousands of years. People know how to maintain it, add to it as the city above grows and changes, but generations ago they forgot how it works in the first place. That’s how I got involved. I was fascinated by the idea. How it could be that the people just a thousand years out of the Age of Ashes could know so much more than we do now, after so many millennia of construction and study?”

  “I see,” Rina said, doing her best to feign interest.

  “I found something both disturbing and remarkable,” N’talisan continued, unaware or unconcerned with the lack of attention from his audience.

  They reached the bottom of the stairs and entered a narrow passage lined on either side by rows of ceramic, brass, and copper piping, sprinkled with valves, levers and pressure meters that stretched on in either direction until the way became shrouded in steam and lost in the dim yellow light of the globes. N’talisan turned to the right.

  “How is it possible that people can keep it working but not know how it works?” Rina asked.

  “Exactly.”

  They came to an intersection and turned right again, down an identical passage.

  “The Tidal Works is made of layers and layers of machinery, cables, and batteries that all draw their power from the tidal waters as they flow through the porous stone that Fom is built on. With, of course, a little help from the span upon span of piping that leads from here to the harbor and the southern cliffs.”

  “Well, yes.” Rina frowned. “That’s why it’s called the Tidal Works. Everyone knows that.”

  “Yes, but this machinery isn’t capable of turning the energy of the tides into energy the people of Fom can use to heat their water or power their globes. It stores it, transfers it to the surface, but only a few turbines on the lowest levels convert it to power.”

  “Then what’s doing the rest?”

  “You’ll see.”

  They came to another T-intersection. The wall in front of them was another mass of piping and wires, and the ever-present pressure gauges. The floor down this corridor was a rusty metal mesh, patched here and there with warped graying wood. The air hummed with energy and the sound of rushing water. It was hot, and everything was slick with condensation. Through the mesh of the floor, Rina could see another passage beneath them and another beneath that, until any others were lost in the steam. Echoed shouts from distant workers, clanging, and hissing clamored all around them, but the section they were in was empty of anyone but themselves. The thick, moist air was saturated with the scent of wet stone and metal and saltwater.

  Gaston led her down another stairway—this one straight instead of spiral—then down another, where the passage bent right again.

  “So this is the Tidal Works?” Rina gestured to the rows of pipes and valves expanding around them.

  Gaston grinned. “To make a long answer short, yes. Conduits extend under most of Fom, but the main battery is just over a span to a side, maybe seven hundred hands high. It’s not one solid machine, despite what the name implies. It’s been built through these caverns and tunnels just as the surrounding passages have been, and added to over the ages.” He gestured to the wall of brass pipes, gears, levers, valves, and gauges in front of them. “On the other side of all this are some of the caverns with the storage tanks. The Lower Works turns the seawater to steam and filters it into the condensers. The Middle Works collects it as fresh water and pumps it into the reservoirs on this level, where it can be tapped by the city. Some of the tanks are cold. Others are kept heated by the Works’s energy. Every building above has access to both.

  “All the pipes to the west—here—” he pointed, “are funneling the tidal waters back and forth to the aquifers. The pipes running up and down, like these here, are pressure releases to pump out the excess steam. They can explode—and have—if they aren’t maintained and periodically replaced, which is one reason I need so many spare parts. Besides research, I’ve become something of a caretaker of this section. The Grace has appointed me chief engineer in charge of maintaining the Central Tidal Works, and now I oversee the heart of it.”

  “You must be proud.” Rina smirked and lifted her dress from the grimy floor.

  “No, it just gets in the way of my real work. Ah, here.”

  They reached another passage, this one again on their right, so low it only came up to Rina’s shoulders. It was dark. Only a few of the glow globes that lit the rest of the passages were strung here, as if an afterthought, and if it was hot elsewhere, it was an inferno here. It ran on for a thousand hands before stopping at a gleaming convex black wall. It wasn’t smooth but covered with fine swirling indentations and ridges, like a fingerprint. Or a Kalis’s tattoos.

  There was a little more space in the chamber at the end of the tunnel, and Gaston and Rina could stand up straight, shoulder to shoulder.

  “It took me over two years just to rebuild the Tidal Works enough to open this passage all the way through to the center. There was an access tunnel, but it ended four hundred hands back.” He was bubbling with excitement. “It was another year before that just to sort out all the paperwork so that the Church would let me do it. Other maintenance passages run close to it, too, further down on the lower levels that flood during high tide, but none came all the way here.

  “It’s a cylinder, roughly—though of the few surfaces I’ve accessed so far, none seem to be flat, so it must be irregular in shape—extending all the way to the bottom of the Works, maybe a thousand hands high and two hundred or so in diameter, though again, that seems to vary depending on where it’s measured. The Works around it makes it impossible to be more precise. Nor do we know how far down it actually goes. The map of its shape that we’ve come up with so far is based on guesses. We’ve seen only maybe five percent of it firsthand. Less if it extends deep underground, which in my opinion it does.”

  Rina looked at the black wall. There was a vibration coming from it that made her teeth hurt. It wasn’t independent of the mass of machinery around it but connected by huge bundles of wires that
stuck out of it in random clumps. More gauges, pipes, and valves were fitted to black rubbery tubes that seemed to ooze from it as if the thing were made from some long solidified, viscous fluid.

  “What’s this?” Rina asked.

  “That’s the question, isn’t it?” N’talisan was grinning with excitement.

  She looked again. Not metal or wood or stone or ceramics, or even the nonmetal of Maresg, but something else.

  “It’s an Artifact.” She didn’t bother trying to keep the awe from her voice. “A real, working one.”

  “Yes!” Gaston said. “This, this is the heart of the Tidal Works. And what’s more, I’m sure the Ancestors didn’t put it here to do something as mundane as power a city. I think that purpose was found for it centuries after the Age of Ashes.”

  “What is it supposed to do, then?”

  “That’s what I’m trying to find out. I’ve been trying to build something that will measure the energy it puts out and takes in, test what’s happening within. It’s slow and fragile work. Every precaution is taken, so we don’t disrupt… whatever it’s doing.”

  “And Ristroan technology is better for that?”

  “Now you see. They’re more advanced than we are in N’narad, what with such pointless restrictions laid down by the Church. Maybe even more so than in Skalkaad, at least with regards to things besides naphtha engines. I couldn’t have gotten half as far in my understanding of this thing if it weren’t for some of the equipment smuggled from Ristro, or at least copied from Corsair designs by Xereks Lees. Since I don’t know what we’re looking for, though, I don’t know what sort of tests to do. I need to study everything, checking and rechecking results. Right now, we’re looking at the Tidal Works surrounding the Artifact in the hope that whoever first started expanding its function as a power source knew what it was supposed to be doing. But so far, we can’t even determine how the newer Works is attached to it.” He pointed at a clump of wire and tubing. “It’s just… attached somehow, and the connections never seem to wear out. In fact, none of the Tidal Works seems to wear out near it. All this,” he gestured around their tiny chamber, “is thousands of years old. It has to be since nobody has been this close to the Heart—that’s what I’ve started calling it—for that long, but none of it has needed to be replaced or repaired. Ever, as far as we can tell.”