Book Three - Chapter Two

Ariya gasped at the massive tower before her. She craned her neck, looking straight up in order to see the top. She had known the Golden Tower was huge, but it hadn’t looked quite so big from other parts of the city. Now that she was right in front of it, it almost seemed to stretch on forever into the sky. It might even have been taller than Gavamir’s walls, yet it was so thin. Sure, it looked big enough from right next to it, but compared to how high it was and from far away, it was a twig. From what Ariya could see, it was a uniform circular shape from bottom to top, although she couldn’t quite see the very top.

Beside Ariya, holding her hand, stood Lusya. She looked up at the tower as well, though she didn’t look impressed. Her eyes were slightly closed. Most people probably wouldn’t have noticed, but Ariya had had a lot of time to get used to reading Lusya’s facial expressions. Her eyes had been that way since just after breakfast. Ariya had no idea why. She could only guess that Lusya had thought of something that had upset her. That seemed to have been happening a lot the past couple months. Ariya could make a couple guesses at what that something was, but she couldn’t be sure which it was. She wasn’t even sure it was any of them. It was unlike Lusya to dwell on things like that.

Ariya wished there was something she could do to help, but, if there was, she couldn’t think of anything. Lusya wouldn’t even talk about it. She always said nothing was wrong. Ariya was sure that wasn’t true, but she also knew Lusya wasn’t just saying it. Lusya didn’t lie, after all. That just made the whole situation even more confusing though.

Well, if nothing else, maybe Ariya could help take Lusya’s mind off whatever it was.

“How big do you think it is?” Ariya asked, pointing to the top of the tower.

Lusya glanced at her. “About three hundred feet.”

“Oh,” Ariya replied. “You read that somewhere, didn’t you?”

“Yes.”

“Cheater.”

Lusya cocked her head and blinked. “I was not aware there were rules.”

“Well there were, and you broke them,” Ariya said putting her free hand on her hip with a huff.

Lusya’s eyes widened a little. “I see. I apologize.”

Ariya grinned. Mission successful. “I forgive you.”

She looked up at the building again. Three hundred feet. Last she had checked, Ariya had been a little under four feet tall. Granted, she hadn’t checked in a while, and she was pretty sure she had gotten taller, but it wasn’t by more than a few inches. So this thing was a little less than a hundred of her tall. It was a height that would have been hard to imagine if it hadn’t been right in front of her. Almost too tall. What was all that height even for? And another thing…

“It’s not golden,” she said.

Despite its name, the whole tower was a pale off-white color. It didn’t look anything like gold.

“It was once covered in a large number of golden decorations,” Lusya explained, “according to writing and artwork from the time. Although, it was referred to as the World-Pinning Tower at the time.”

“That’s a cooler name anyway,” Ariya said.

“I have no strong opinion on the matter.”

“Why was it called that?” Ariya asked. “Did they think it actually held the world together?”

“Considering there were thousands of years of history prior, they would have had to be quite foolish to believe that,” Lusya replied. “By the world, they meant civilization. The tower’s constructors believed themselves the height of civilization, and this tower proof of that.”

Ariya nodded in understanding. “Oh, I get it. That’s kind of snooty.”

“Indeed.”

“It’s still cool though.”

“I see.”

“So, what happened to all the gold thingies?” Ariya asked.

“It is unclear,” Lusya replied. “It has not had them for quite some time. Gold is resistant to corrosion, so it is unlikely they were all lost to decay. The simplest explanation is that they were somehow destroyed or dislodged, and the remnants moved or stolen, but I am no historian.”

Ariya hummed in thought. “I guess it doesn’t really matter. But I wanna know.”

Lusya nodded. “As do I. However, short of engaging in our own research and achieving a breakthrough, there is no way for us to know.”

Ariya gasped, a broad smile forming.

“We are not going to do that,” Lusya said. “We have neither the time nor the resources.”

“Awwww,” Ariya groaned as her smile turned into a frown. She understood, but, for a second, she had been looking forward to exploring crypts and uncovering long lost secrets with Lusya.

A man and a woman walked past, arm-in-arm. The former wore a doublet so clean it almost glowed, with the latter in a puffy blue dress. They gave a questioning look as they glanced at Lusya and Ariya, like they didn’t belong, and continued into the tower. A guard at the entrance started to say something, but then seemed to recognize them and let them through with a smile and a bow.

Unlike that place back in Larsev—and even a lot of other places in Zentril—the city here charged people to go into the tower. The view from the top was pretty popular, apparently, so the city got some nice extra cash out of it, though Ariya wasn’t sure what a city was going to do with money. Some nobles and rich people could get in for free, though, which seemed a little backwards to Ariya.

“So, what time was that?” Ariya asked.

Lusya tilted her head far to the side and blinked twice.

“You said ‘at the time,’” Ariya said.

“The time of the Odessian Empire,” Lusya said. “Just before its decline began. Much of this city was built at that time. It owes its current status to a single emperor.”

“The Odessian Empire was a big deal, huh?”

Lusya nodded. “That is correct.”

Ariya spent another few seconds just admiring the massive structure. The empire must have been pretty powerful to build something like this. She could kind of understand how they might get some big heads about it.

“Would you like to visit the top?” Lusya asked.

Ariya looked up and frowned. “That’s gonna be a lot of stairs, right?”

Lusya would carry her if she got tired, but Ariya didn’t want to force her to do that. Besides, she was a big girl, and big girls could walk on their own.

“I believe there is an elevator,” Lusya said.

Ariya blinked twice. “A what?”

“A vehicle of sorts that will get us to the top.”

Ariya gaped, too stunned to speak for a moment. “You mean a flying machine?”

“No. It is a simple contraption that can be raised or lowered by ropes and a pulley system.”

“That’s so cool!” Ariya exclaimed, bouncing on the balls of her feet. “We have to go up. Come on, come on!”

Lusya nodded. “Very well.”

She led the way to the entrance. The guard gave them a stern look as the approached.

“Stop,” he said in Zeltan, holding up a palm to signal them.

Lusya stopped in front of him and said something back to him in Zeltan. A lot of people were impressed by Lusya’s language skills, but this man remained stone-faced throughout. There were a fair number of relti in the city, so she guessed what he thought was one speaking Zeltan wasn’t that unusual. That made Ariya smile a little. She had decided recently that it was kind of fun having a secret no one else knew. Watching people act in ways that would completely change if they knew one little thing she did had a weird thrill to it. It almost made her feel strong.

The man nodded and replied. Ariya managed to catch the words “girl” and “copper.” There were some numbers in there too, but they zipped by too quickly for her to parse.

There were two major languages in Ketslind, the kingdom Zentril was located in: Zeltan and Fyemish. Ariya had learned enough Fyemish to get by, but, since Lusya had only had time to teach her one, Ariya barely knew any Zeltan. She felt a twinge of jealousy every time Lusya spoke the languages like she’d been doing so her whole life.

She was pretty, strong, smart, and she seemed to speak every language under the sun. Was there anything Lusya wasn’t good at? Well, there was expressing her feelings, Ariya guessed.

Lusya handed the guard a couple coins and they had one last exchange in Zeltan. The man’s expression noticeably lightened once the coins were in his hand. It was a coin flip which language anyone spoke. Here in the city, most people could speak both. They would change to Fyemish for Ariya’s benefit if they were talking to her, and Lusya would ask them to if the conversation involved Ariya, but often, Ariya was stuck listening to gibberish as Lusya talked to somebody. It had been worse out in the country. Out there, most people spoke one or the other. There were maybe a couple people in a village who knew the other well enough to hold a conversation.

The guard tossed the coins into a box beside him and waved Lusya and Ariya in.

“Wow,” Ariya breathed as she entered the tower, turning her head to and fro to bask in her surroundings.

It was surprisingly plain. There was nothing there except a spiral staircase snaking across the walls and what Ariya guessed was this “elevator,” which seemed to be a wooden platform with ropes tied to a series of bars overhead. It was pretty dim too. Windows ran along the walls, allowing the sun’s light in enough to see, but there weren’t enough to properly light the place up, leaving the tower lit as if by dying lamps. Aside from the windows, the walls themselves were pretty barren too. They were the same off-white as everything else, with nothing resembling a decoration to be seen.

Even so, it was no less impressive than the outside. Ariya had never seen a ceiling so high up. It was kind of weird, now that she thought about it. Three hundred feet ahead didn’t feel that far, but looking straight up, she could almost believe she was looking at the sky.

Lusya led the way to the platform. It had fences along the sides for some reason, so they couldn’t get right on. An attendant opened a gate and allowed them to step on, then closed it and moved over to a sort of crank, which seemed to be connected to the rope by something way up at the top of the tower. It looked like a hook of some kind, but it was too far and dim for Ariya to tell for sure. There were several other cranks dotted around, each also manned.

“When you want to come home, let the guard up top know, and he’ll ring the bell,” the first man said in Fyemish.

“Will you hear from down here?” Ariya asked.

“Sure will. There’s a nice ECHO! In here,” the man replied with a grin. There was a faint repetition of “echo” all around as he finished speaking.

Ariya giggled, even as the other men groaned and rolled their eyes.

“Ready to go up?” the man asked.

“We are,” Lusya said. “Hold still, Ariya.”

“Okay!”

The men started turning the cranks, and, slowly, the platform started to raise. There was an odd sensation, like the ground was pushing up into Ariya’s feet. Which, she supposed, it was, as weird as that thought was. It wasn’t fast, by any means, but it was still cool. Almost like flying. It wasn’t as exciting as Lusya jumping while carrying her, but Ariya decided it was okay for there to be both exciting and relaxing flights. She understood why the fences were there now, though. If they hadn’t been, she probably would have worried about falling. It wasn’t much, but the platform swayed slightly as it rose, which the security of the fences kept from being too scary.

Within a minute or so, they were at the top, within a small, round room, like a miniature version of the one below. She could see where the stairs let out into the room. It hadn’t looked like anyone was using them on the way up, and it still didn’t.

A guard waiting there opened two gates: the one on the platform, and another that was built into the floor. Lusya and Ariya stepped off the platform, and the man rang one of two bells hung on the wall next to him. The Ariya watched over her shoulder in awe as the platform started to sink back down under the lip of the floor they’d come onto, until she couldn’t see it anymore.

“Wow,” Ariya said. “Did they build that ‘cause people got sick of walking?”

Lusya shook her head. “It is part of the original design. The staircase is, and has always been, purely aesthetic, as is the case for the building itself.”

They stepped out of the room onto a massive terrace, which seemed to wrap around the room, making up the bulk of the tower’s top. Planters dotted both the ground and railing, filled with a veritable rainbow of flowers that flooded the platform with sweet smells.

Ariya and Lusya approached the railing, and Ariya gasped at the view. She could see the whole city from up here. Even the people, though they looked like insects from this distance. It was surreal, seeing so much of the world stretch out before her, seeing the web of streets and buildings from above. From this view, it almost didn’t even look like a city. Just some weird drawing on the ground. She didn’t think she’d ever been this high up before. The only times she had been at all close, she had been in too much danger to appreciate it.

Wanting to compare with where she had been, Ariya looked straight down into the plaza below and regretted it in an instant. Her head swam as she swayed on her feet, her breakfast threatening to shoot up out her throat. She took a step back and stared at the much closer floor.

“Are you unwell, Ariya?” Lusya asked.

Ariya looked up and shook her head. “I feel fine now.”

Lusya glanced down at the ground below. “You should not look straight down from this height.”

“You just did though!”

Lusya cocked her head and blinked. “I am different, child.”

Ariya sighed. “I know.” She could understand Lusya not wanting to repeat herself, but still. “You don’t have to ‘child’ me.”

Lusya blinked, but didn’t say anything else. For a moment, they both just enjoyed the view. Ariya was careful not to look down again.

“Who builds a building just for looks?” Ariya asked, recalling what they had been talking about before.

Ironically, she had no problems understanding Lusya’s fancy words in Fyemish, since Lusya had taught her the language. Though, by now, Ariya understood most of them in Slarvish too. Lusya tended to switch between the two when talking to Ariya, though she favored Fyemish these days.

“It is hardly uncommon,” Lusya said. “There are the likes of royal palaces, for instance. Almost every royal or noble home is needlessly large and extravagant.”

“Yeah, but people still live there, right?” Ariya said. “This is just for looking, isn’t it?”

Going by the elevator ride, there wasn’t a single real room in the tower. There was the entrance, the little room that served as a separator between the terrace and elevator, and the terrace itself. Plus the stairs, but they were just for looks too. As far as Ariya could tell, the tower looked pretty and let you see a nice view from the top. When Lusya had said purely aesthetic, she had meant it.

“Correct,” Lusya said. “Though this view could have pragmatic applications, the tower was built for beauty and as a show of status. At least, that is what historical records indicate.”

“You know a lot about this stuff, huh?”

Lusya shook her head. “I know a bit about the Odessian Empire, and I made a point of researching them and this area since I planned to pass through here, but I am far from an expert.”

“That’s still cool,” Ariya said. She followed Lusya’s line of sight and realized that, unlike Ariya drinking in the new perspective on the city below, Lusya was just kind of looking straight ahead at the horizon. “You don’t like it, do you?”

“The structure is impressive,” Lusya said. “However, I have no strong feelings on its appearance or this view.”

Ariya frowned. “Oh. Do you want to leave?”

Lusya shook her head. “As I said, I have no preference. If you would like to stay, I have no objections.”

Ariya looked out over the city again and smiled. “I think I would.”

#

Lusya and Ariya ended up spending almost an hour up on the terrace. Ariya drank in the view from every spot she could. She wanted to sear every angle of this view into her memory. When she was done with that, she spent some time smelling and admiring the flowers. There were tons of different kinds, and getting close let you smell all the subtle differences between them. Some of the dressed up guests gave her funny looks, but she just ignored them. After that, though, there wasn’t much to do. She got pretty bored, so she told Lusya they could leave.

They went back to the little room. Lusya told the guard they were ready to leave, and he rang the other of his two bells. The elevator platform rose up, Lusya and Ariya got on, and it lowered back down. This time, the feeling was almost like falling, but not quite. It would have been a little scary if Lusya hadn’t been there.

Finally, they were back on the ground and walked out of the tower. As they exited, a dark-skinned human man in an unusual dress-like garment walked up. The guard at the entrance stepped aside to let him in, though with a less warm welcome than to the couple from before.

“There’s so many types of people here,” Ariya said in Slarvish as they exited the plaza.

Much like keeping Lusya’s secret, speaking about people in a language they couldn’t understand gave Ariya a strange sense of excitement. She also felt a little bad about it, but she wasn’t saying anything nasty, so it was probably fine.

“Indeed,” Lusya said. “It is quite diverse.”

There were humans, relti, and tiransa of all sorts of colors—well, mostly shades of brown and gray, but it felt like a lot—wearing countless varieties of clothes in Zentril, including some Ariya had never seen before. The vast majority of the people looked like they came from Ysuge, but it was still the most non-Ysugians Ariya had ever seen in one place. Gavamir was second, and it wasn’t even close.

Even without that, the split of humans, relti, and tiransa was closer than anywhere else. There were fewer tiransa than there had been in Larsev, but way more relti. Again, humans were still the majority, but, for the first time in this journey, Ariya couldn’t turn anywhere without seeing at least one of all three.

“But why?” Ariya asked. She wasn’t complaining, but it seemed pretty random. Zentril was big and pretty sure, but what drew so many different people here?

“A variety of reasons,” Lusya said. “Some of them are diplomats. Ketslind is rather powerful at the moment. So, if a distant land has any contact with Ysuge, it is worth their time to maintain contact with Ketslind specifically. Zentril is not the capital, but it is the largest city, and many influential people reside here, including the royal family in the early summer.”

“We could have met the king if we’d come earlier?” Ariya exclaimed.

“It is doubtful,” Lusya said. “We would have had to reach Zentril about two months earlier, and the chances we would have been able to meet him even if he was in the city are low.”

“That’s no fair,” Ariya said with a pout. She sighed. Oh, well, no use crying over it now. “What are the other reasons?”

“Some come simply for the city’s historical significance. It’s status as a trade hub also draws many, though that may be in large part because of the former factor.”

Ariya hummed in thought. “You said some emperor guy built this place, right?”

“The city was already here,” Lusya said. “He raised it to its current status by moving the Odessian capital here and renaming it Senkrillis, which eventually became Zentril. Whatever it was named before has been lost to time.”

“Why did he do that?”

“He believed it was at the center of the continent, and having the capital there would be symbolic of the empire’s power,” Lusya said. “‘Senkrillis’ means “central” in Odessian, just as Zentril does in Zentan.”

“But…it’s not the center at all…” Ariya said. She had seen Lusya’s maps. They were in the center region, but the city wasn’t even close to the exact center of Ysuge.

“The emperor did not have the benefit of modern cartography,” Lusya said.

“Oh, okay,” Ariya said. “Is that why there are so many relti and tiransa too?”

Lusya nodded. “They are here for more or less the same reasons.”

“That makes sense.” Ariya blinked as something occurred to her. “Where are we going?”

They had been walking for a while since leaving the plaza. Ariya had assumed they would go to another one of the places the innkeeper had recommended, but Lusya tended to ask about stuff like that first. They could also have been going back to the inn, but it was still early for that, even if it was just to eat lunch.

“The Square of a Hundred Fountains,” Lusya said. “After that, you may select the next location.”

Ariya cocked her head. The innkeeper had mentioned that place, but Lusya hadn’t shown any signs of being interested in it at the time. “Huh? Why there?”

“You seem hot,” Lusya said.

Ariya raised a hand to her forehead and wiped it, a big pool of sweat coming off on her hand. She hadn’t felt hot, but she guessed she had been out in the summer sun all day. With the end of Jauna closing in, it was late summer with less than a month to go before autumn, but the heat wasn’t letting up just yet. And now that she was aware of it, the heat was a massive weight bearing down on her shoulders.

“Okay,” Ariya said. She wasn’t sure if this square would help, but Lusya knew best.

Another couple minutes later, and they walked out into what Ariya assumed was the Square of a Hundred Fountains.

“We have arrived,” Lusya said, confirming Ariya’s suspicions.

The square was huge. You could have fit a dozen of the inn side by side just to make one line across. And, like the name implied, there were tons of fountains placed throughout. Ten, about as large as any she had ever seen, surrounded one the size of a small building at the center of the plaza, with a bunch of tiny ones interspersed between. She didn’t know if it was actually one hundred, but it was a lot. If whoever had named the place had given up on counting and chosen a big number, Ariya couldn’t blame them.

Most of the fountains were made of white stone—or stone painted white, at least—but there were some standouts among them. A few were black, others were more outrageous colors like bright red or even rainbow. One fountain even looked like it was made of glass. It wasn’t totally see through, but it was pretty close.

Lusya led the way into the circle of fountains, and Ariya released a relieved sigh she hadn’t realized had been building. Cool water sprayed on her from all around, light enough not to be oppressive, but heavy enough to drive the heat back and make her body feel a thousand times lighter. Even the bubbling sound of all the running water somehow seemed to soothe her.

Lusya grabbed her water flask from her belt, took a couple sips, and handed it to Ariya, who greedily gulped down several large swigs before handing it back, blushing. She knew better than to be so greedy with the water by now.

“It is fine,” Lusya said. “We can get more water. Zentril has no shortage of it.”

Ariya smiled and nodded. “Yeah.”

“We may stay here until you are sufficiently relieved,” Lusya said. Her eyes were open the normal amount now. Whatever had been bothering her seemed to have passed for now. “Let me know when you wish to move.”

“I will,” Ariya said. “Thank you, Lusya.”