Thillan walked them to the gate and said his goodbyes, hugging each of them and kissing Kamille like it was the last time they would see each other. “Try not to be strangers, girls. With Asher gone on his trip, I’ll be a little lonely down here.”
Kamille kissed him once more. “I’ll be back to see you before you know it… Alright, we have to go while it’s still morning. I love you.”
“I love you too,” Thillan said, walking backwards onto the town road. He waved at them as the gates began to close.
Once they were shut, Ayela took a deep breath and gazed across the open plains. It was a sea of rolling hills covered in green grass and with tall forests over the distant horizon. Then, they turned around and faced the massive mesa with the walled city of Bavylune at its peak. The city was so high in altitude that the waters pouring from the sewers eventually dissipated into a mist before they came close to hitting the ground.
They could see airships of all kinds far above them flying in and out over its tall walls. She’d heard stories of the infamous imperial capital; a sprawling metropolis, the symbol of wealth and culture of the empire. Its infrastructure was organized in circles of wealth, with the poorest dwelling in the outer circles, and only the most influential and powerful of Enthedrill’s citizens living closer to the center.
In the middle of the city was a tower taller than any ever built, named the Emperor’s Tower. It was a massive construct where the Emperor himself lived, but also where the highest military officials conducted their business, as well as where the hall of congress was located. At its base were the imperial interrogators; vicious military officials that employed unorthodox tactics to enact the Emperor’s will. They were the torturers, dogmatic traditionalists and loyal patriots that often kidnapped citizens when they were hunting for persons of interest, like divine logicians.
Rumors spread throughout the empire that a glowing construct of alien origin hovered above the tower. They called it a grammatoginon – relics made of pure energy left behind after an aethril ‘judgement’ of a town. Those judgments were different than the attacks the Kult made when they summoned an aethril: they were random attacks by wayward aethrils for no readily apparent reason. The grammatoginon were often in the shape of a strange symbol, were white in color, and had the glow of whatever aethril left them. From what she heard, though, the one above the tower was in the shape of an upside-down cross – or a sword. No one could truly tell which one it resembled the most. What confused her, though, was its color…
This tale has been unlawfully obtained from Royal Road. If you discover it on Amazon, kindly report it.
…Red didn’t belong to any of the aethrils her religion professed.
She sighed, admiring the natural beauty of the mesa as it stretched on for meters and meters to either side. It blocked the horizon behind it, and they were still far from the bottom. “We have half-a-day’s journey to the base, then we scale the cliffside. There are plenty of cliffs, edges, and caverns on the way that are too small for anyone up top to notice,” Asher explained as they began their trek. “We need to watch for the Kuslav Hawks near the top. The larger caverns are their homes, and they will seize any opportunity for a snack like us.”
“We have everything we need, correct?” Kamille asked.
“That we do,” Ayela confirmed.
“We should be fine. The important thing to remember is to stop if we’re tired. We can take as many breaks as we need to. We have pistols at our hips and extendable rifles packed away in our bags for any threats we run into. If we catch the attention of a hawk, though… It’ll be better for you girls to hide deeper into its cavern. I’ll hold it off for as long as I’m able.”
“Asher-”
“Don’t fight me on this one, Kamille. These are the dangers of traveling in and out of Bavylune by climbing. If this is our only option, it’s our only option. And divine logic isn’t even on the table. We can’t risk any possibility of the empire finding us, or any possibility of entering Bavylune for anything other than residence will be thrown away. If we are careful and mindful, we’ll make it without any complication. It’s not often people go missing by hawks, nor is it common for anyone worrisome to camp in the lower caves.”
They were silent on their journey, thinking and overthinking about everything they faced trying to break into this city. Deep in her heart, Ayela wished there was another way to accomplish their mission, but she knew there wasn’t. No other city had national connections like Bavylune. No other city had funding poured into its news networks, nor did any other have the kind of influential power it did. The house of the empire served as a symbol of authority; if the source was Bavylune, one could believe it to be true.
And that was what they were hoping for.
The trust in their networks was what they were counting on to reach as many as they could. She reminded herself of that hope, and tucked it away in the deepest parts of her heart. As they opened up small talk, light banter, and shared stories on their journey to the Capital, she kept the memories of Kacyn, Rhaja, Gean, the congregant masters, the officers in the congregation, and the townsfolk in the back of her mind.
Their lives served as spark that would see her mission through to the end…
