Chapter 25
And sadder
The rest of the meeting goes about as well as can be expected.
Weirdly, time travel strikes most of those gathered as less ridiculous of an idea than capturing the moon. If Iriset hadn’t lived her entire life in the literal shadow of such a thing, she would probably agree.
For the most part, Iriset watches Lyric, keeping herself quiet.
It’s to her benefit if they all figure out the details without her.
She’ll command less blame. Lyric holds his inner design so calm, Iriset is almost jealous.
But she knows he feels Aharté’s will here.
Forcing Iriset’s hand to argue on behalf of Holy Design.
Though Helica Silkhair and the striking green-eyed commander-philosopher of Intrinsic Foundation whose name Iriset can’t help but learn is Raijin remain skeptical, they seem unable to come up with an alternate plan.
Though Raijin insists alongside the artist Sipipia that they should seek out alternative energy than the unraveling of the Moon-Eater.
But Shade himself pooh-poohs them, silly and vocal, and finally gets them to shut up by letting his eyes turn pure red and his fangs grow until he can barely talk through the layers of them.
He hisses and says, rough and lisping, which makes it worse: “This is the will of the Moon-Eater, the red god of this crater city. If a designer or artist or anyone disagrees, there are so very many ways to silence dissent.”
The quiet after that is enough to hear the cardinal shifting in his seat and the click of Eliri’s crystal claws. Finally, Amado Chimera says, “The Moon-Eater’s will be done.”
“Thank you, Amado,” Shade says, teeth suddenly normal again—for him, at least. “Now, Iriset will be focused on sundering, to learn what needs to be done to this god and get the power exactly right. When necessary, Iriset will overlook the plans coming together. Iriset Sunderer is the point of this spear, yes?”
Helica Silkhair lifts her chin, but without arguing begins to suggest a list of tasks to complete and a prioritized order.
They’ll need to bring in more city architects and begin construction of these steeples immediately.
The plans must be worked in detail so they know what to dismantle and where, and possibly some parts of the city need to be evacuated eventually.
Experiments will be run, on several scales.
“And please,” Amado Chimera asks, “will the Moon-Eater convince Lodestone and Rising Smoke to participate?”
“Unless the small kings wish to have the precincts leveled, the small kings will,” Shade agrees smoothly.
“More precise data is needed to predict the declining progress of the tremors,” the cardinal says, “to mitigate damage as preparations are made, and to convince the people this is for good.”
Mirea sir Unrich says, “The models so far suggest the quakes will grow stronger and closer until they are nearly consistent sometime six months from now.”
Lyric, who remains standing, says, “There will be a total solar eclipse eight days before the summer solstice. Is that in six months?”
“How…?” the cardinal murmurs, but then nods. “Yes, that is correct about the eclipse, and yes, it’s in nearly seven months.”
Iriset straightens up suddenly, realizing why Lyric wants to focus on the eclipse.
It isn’t because of catching the moon—they know where the moon will be anytime.
It isn’t only because of its position during their time.
No—it’s because in their stories and histories, the mirané people were made by Aharté during a solar eclipse.
That sneaky son of a bitch. No way is that part happening. She narrows her eyes at him, aware that her left eyelids don’t narrow quite as well yet and hating it. He isn’t looking at her, but fuck the miran, Lyric, she thinks. Full offense.
The Moon-Eater slaps his hands onto the table, and the entire intricate diagram map of the metadesign array wavers thanks to his disruption of the nearest force-pagoda.
The Chimera city planner whimpers, but nothing actually breaks.
The Moon-Eater grins. “Well, this old fairy is happy to have a death date to look forward to! As it is, there is so very much to do. Sundering to teach, sex to have, blood to drink, children to corrupt. Best get to it!”
He flits up and away, and Iriset scrambles after him, barely remembering her bag.
“Moon-Eater, may I have a word?” Lyric calls in mirané.
Shade stops, turning sinuously to look at Lyric, and the whole group of people frankly staring at the three of them. “Come this way,” Shade says, sliding Iriset a glance.
The Moon-Eater leads them out through the hidden doorway. As Lyric passes, Shade waggles his fingers at those remaining before the door rains back down and solidifies.
“Up, up.” The Moon-Eater shoos them up stone steps and outside to a path along a line of tall, willowy poplar trees with leaves shaped like tiny hands.
Iriset distances herself from Lyric as he immediately asks, “Do you know where Rabbit went?”
There’s no reaction from Shade except a simple, emotionless answer. “South. To seek a quieter place than this Moon-Eater’s wild city. I told ahz, ‘Look to the sea, if you need comfort that is not mine to give.’”
“Ahz?” Iriset says. It’s the opposite of an, toward woman instead of toward man.
The Moon-Eater huffs, then brushes his hand down the little hand-leaves of the nearest tree. “If Never had been here when Rabbit was born, az might have chosen it for all the same reasons Never did. And if Rabbit were a little more like me, az could change ahz shape.”
“Why did Never choose it?” she murmurs softly.
“Why do you want to know about Little Rabbit?” Shade counters to Lyric.
“I want to find ahz,” Lyric says simply.
It means he’s leaving. The realization is like a warm cloud turning to ice and falling falling falling through her blood. “And Never?” Iriset presses, to distract herself. She shouldn’t care.
The Moon-Eater leans closer to her, feeling like nothing at all. No body heat, no spark of ecstatic. “The first people we met, the first people who spoke to us, they said it for the wind and it for the sky and it for the fall of leaves in autumn.”
Iriset says, “That’s lovely. Why didn’t you do the same?”
Suddenly there’s weight to the Moon-Eater again, a pressure of four forces like any human standing beside her. “The first people we met were all he in their words, and I thought that was how humans were.”
“And that’s what you wanted to be.”
“Humans are happier than the wind and sky and fall of leaves.”
“And sadder,” Iriset feels like she is required to say.
Shade laughs. “And sadder!” he agrees, like it’s an amazing thing.
Then the Moon-Eater waves, rather casually, and darts away between two poplars.
Iriset stands there, beside Lyric, for Silence knows how long. She can’t think of what to say, but can’t follow the Moon-Eater. She wants to stare at Lyric again, look at his eye. Their eye. Demand answers, cuss him out for this Holy Design, for leaving, for getting exploded.
“I’ve always wanted to,” Lyric murmurs.
“Wanted to what?”
“Go to the sea.”
“I didn’t, not until she told me about it,” Iriset says. Why shouldn’t they talk about Singix? She’d loved the woman, and Lyric thought he had.
“If I make it that far, I’ll write about it for you.”
“That’s quads’ travel,” Iriset says, hearing the complaint in her tone. “Are you really…?”
Lyric says, “Come sit with me,” and then just walks away.
Puffing breath between her lips in aggravation, Iriset obeys.
Ah, red god, Lyric is so annoying when he’s like this.
Calm. Certain. Beautiful. Not accusing her of apostasy despite the evidence in his own face he’ll never escape again.
There were nights she crawled into his lap and he read poetry or murmured to her about the city and balance, about what he thought of the soft flesh between her hip and her groin, the strength in the arch of her foot and the small of her back.
He was like this then, those times, calm, certain, beautiful, hers.
Those were the nights she forgot that everything between them was a lie.
Still is.
He finds a garden where the walkways are sand, not gravel, soft and warm and glittery pink.
They twist like tiny tributaries around chunks of quartzite and broken geodes in half-circles and thick spears.
The quartz is clear, amethyst, smoky, and one geode is so large Iriset could nest inside its cup.
Lyric takes her to a bench between two giant skulls—they look like real bones, but there’s never been a horse as tall as a house to have a skull this size.
(Has there?!) The other could be a mammoth skull, though, except instead of ivory tusks they’re smooth curving pink quartz, which does not grow in this shape without architectural intervention.
The not-horse skull has a series of amethyst horns growing up its long nasal bone, and both its eye sockets are so covered internally with crystal they could be two littler geodes themselves.
Iriset should make a mask like that. For when the opal eye needs a break. A half-mask to recharge the forces in her invention. She’ll come back here when she has the lattice cap for her opal eye, to study the interplay of bone, fossil, crystal, whatever.
When Lyric sits, she chances a look at him, caught again by the heterochromatic change in his face. She can’t see any freckles. “I don’t know who you are without those freckles,” she says.
“Are you sure that’s the biggest change?” He rubs his hand over his shorn hair.
Iriset flops onto the bench, back bent, arms loose. Lyric touches her jaw, then gently turns her face toward him. His fingers are cold. It’s winter, after all.
“Can I see what you’ve done to yourself?” Lyric asks gently.