Chapter 17 #2
“The riots around the wall only scattered about an hour ago,” Bibi continues, her voice low.
“Many in San-Er do not care about these new changes. Their coins are kept under their mattresses. Their apartments are rentals. But there are also many who do. Many who lost their life savings overnight. Crescents are offering cash rewards to offset the fury. Trying to convince the financial district that this is for their own good. It’s only working for some of them. ”
Bibi steps off the main thoroughfare and onto a narrow street, leading the way toward the Palace of Union.
She chooses this route on purpose. There are several closer entrances to the palace, but it is along this street alley that Calla sights her first glimpse of what damage she missed, what chaos must have taken place as the Crescent Societies played their hand.
One half of the building on the corner is…
gone. Its walls are charred, its debris blocking pedestrian access.
The building’s very innards are exposed, the lining between its four floors, the armchairs, the tables, the rugs that have been blighted in each apartment.
Slowly, Calla pulls the rag off her head, getting a better look without her vision obscured.
A spark from one of the electric wires jolts and flies into the air, fizzling quickly from the trickling rain.
Upon first glance, it is only overwhelming damage.
Then Calla spots a hand. A foot, underneath a fallen television console.
“I’m afraid we have greatly underestimated how many heretics are hiding in the twin cities,” Bibi says.
“This is absurd,” Anton exclaims. “Even qi does not do this.”
“It does.” Bibi puts her hand over her forehead. She’s not blocking her eyes from the rain, but from flecks of ash, floating loose in the alley air. “I witnessed this myself.”
“God of fire,” Calla mutters under her breath.
Anton, hearing this, gives Calla an apprehensive look, but he doesn’t tell her she’s being ridiculous. He’s shaken too, despite the conviction they put behind their statement for the news, decrying each and every one of these heretics to be charlatans.
“I wasn’t warning you about the heretics in my note,” Bibi says.
“I was warning you about the Crescent Societies. They want to block qi from the capital. There are sigils to do so. It’ll mean no more jumping, but also no more of these attacks.
San-Er can’t tolerate any more. We’re going to reach utter collapse if the Crescents piss off another heretic who’s made their living bootlicking the palace. ”
Calla’s gaze snaps up. She almost finds it hard to believe. Will the Crescent Societies block their own greatest weapon—the qi that helped them take the city, the sigils that grew their members into mighty weapons?
While she’s inspecting their surroundings, she doesn’t notice Bibi’s pause, but Anton does. He prompts, “What is it?”
“What?” Bibi returns.
“What’s the face? You’re wincing like you got caught shitting in the bed.”
Calla turns slowly.
“That’s disgusting,” Bibi replies. Slowly, she unfolds her arms, letting her jacket hang loose. “Look, I handed over our father’s letters as my entry into the twin cities. Chief among them were the blueprints that our mother initially drew for the Dovetail—”
“That’s not true,” Anton interrupts. “It’s palace propaganda.”
Bibi blinks. “No, it’s not.”
“Our parents were not secret insurgents.”
“Yes, they were. Why do you think King Kasa orchestrated that attack?”
Calla wishes she had thought to wander off a minute ago. Then she wouldn’t have to bear witness to this uncomfortable family squabble.
“I don’t know, Bibi, because he killed people whenever he liked? Why would Father want to incite a coup—”
“I can’t claim to know why, because he didn’t write a journal explaining his every consideration for his children to read in the event of his death,” Bibi says, her voice edging into mocking.
“But he was communicating with the Dovetail for some time, and it got him killed. When I was recruited, the first thing the elders did was show me his letters. They hoped I could follow in his footsteps. I was a Makusa, and I had big shoes to fill.”
“That’s—”
“Why would the Dovetail follow a noble?” Calla asks.
With the way both Anton and Bibi jolt, they might have forgotten she was standing there quietly. The scorched building groans, its beds of cinders lifting with each gust of wind spinning into the alley.
Bibi scrubs her eyes. “If Anton would let me finish,” she mutters, “I was going to say that I brought in blueprints, but they weren’t the most valuable intelligence among Father’s letters.
He was offering the Dovetail an inventory of sigils too.
In exchange for their loyalty, he provided a lost language. Of course they would follow him.”
Something still seems peculiar. The Dovetail are rural dwellers; they are different from the Crescents of the capital.
Calla cannot claim to be particularly familiar with the Dovetail, but she is familiar with the provinces.
She has read the reports detailing how many temples remain standing, how many shrines burn steady.
Just these last few days, she has witnessed Bibi praying beneath her breath, her rural accent changing the shape of her lips in a manner utterly foreign to San-Er.
Out there, at the mercy of the natural world, the Dovetail consider the old gods to reign supreme.
The kingdom in its current state, with its councilmembers and provinces and taxes, is an abomination.
It removes the natural order between the heavens and earth.
So why would the Dovetail take sigils from some noble?
Why would they care to wield qi and risk distancing themselves from their precious gods?
“You’re trying to say that you’re responsible for the Crescents having access to new sigils,” Calla says.
Bibi nods. Anton studies his sister closely. He folds his arms.
“Are you, though?” he asks. Hard to tell whether he’s only playing the contrarian or if he really is this stubborn. “Were the letters Father’s, or were they planted with the Dovetail preceding the attack at the manor?”
“Anton,” Bibi says, annoyed. “King Kasa never went public with the claim that Father was a rebel launching a coup against the royals. Why would he plant evidence?”
“You don’t know—”
When Calla swivels abruptly, Anton reacts in an instant, pulling a knife.
A part of her is pleased that he is attuned to her reaction before anything else, before he, too, registers not an enemy she’s sighted, but the smell.
Something sharp and bitter, heightening across San-Er. Spreading an intangible toxin.
The light behind Anton’s eyes snaps out.
When Calla tries to reach for her qi, her access is blocked, leaving her powerless.
It lasts only a second.
Calla gasps, fighting to fill her lungs when the smell disappears in a snap. Her qi is within reach again. She detects her reserves restoring from the inside out, an acute sloshing returning to her bones, her muscles, her veins.
Where her reaction is fought internally, Anton lurches and throws both arms against the brick wall behind him. He behaves no differently to Calla’s cat, overwhelmed enough with the situation to warrant lashing out. There’s a vivid flash. Anton, proving to himself that he can control his qi again.
“For heavens’ sake, Anton,” Calla hisses. “Get out of your sister.”
Wearing Bibi, his eyes flicker around the alley warily.
He has brought the yellow backlight with him, hueing his black irises despite the change in body.
Before Calla has the time to study the switch—or dare pulling from his qi—Anton complies with her instruction, and another flash takes him back to his own slumped body.
He’s sheepish when he lifts onto his elbow, picking himself off the concrete ground.
Bibi blinks, making sense of her lapse in time.
“Did you just invade me?” she demands.
“What the fuck was that?” he asks in return.
No one answers, because the answer is obvious, and Anton himself knows too. The Crescents are uncovering a lost language.
Bibi scowls. Without further remark, she turns, marching in the direction of the palace. Calla gestures for Anton to hurry and follow, and Anton frowns, waving his hand for Calla to go first. She stays put.
Anton relents, brushing by. Calla inhales. The wound at the back of her head has almost healed over entirely.
She picks up the pace behind Anton and Bibi, trekking through an emptied San.
Perhaps as a result of the riots, the industrial alleys have emptied—the factories dead silent, as they would be at three in the morning while the neighboring casino’s lights are bright.
The coliseum appears within view, but Bibi does not proceed toward it.
She keeps walking directly ahead, and Calla knows they must be heading for the hidden door: the one she used during the takeover to avoid being seen.
Only when they turn the corner, there’s a group of Crescents already waiting.
Bibi halts first. She holds out her hand, indicating Calla and Anton should let her handle this.
“Woya,” she greets. “What’s going on?”