City on Fire (Metropolitan 2) Read Online Free PDF

follows. The wood paneling here is beautifully, intricately carved with patterns of fruit and flowers. They pass through two sets of the bronze-strapped airlock doors, which open automatically at their approach and close behind them.
    “We’re in Crane Wing now,” Sorya says. “Some of the junior Keremaths lived here, with their dependents and loyalists. All chucked out now, or sent to the Shield.” Her hand dips into one of the greatcoat pockets, comes out with a key on a silver chain. She puts it in a door, pushes the door open.
    “Your suite,” she says. “Have a pleasant sleep shift.”
    “Thank you,” Aiah says. Sorya drops the key in her hand, tips her cap mockingly, as if in imitation of a uniformed doorman, and strides away.
    Aiah stands for a moment looking into the dark room, then reaches in to find a light switch. Her fingers touch cool metal. She turns the knob and the lights come on.
    The room glows, all polished woods and gleaming metal and soft, sumptuous fabric. Aiah steps in and her feet sink into deep carpet. The room is three times the size of the apartment in Jaspeer she shared with Gil. Wonderment tingles in her nerves. This place is hers ? Hers alone?
    She puts her bag down and closes the door behind her: it moves in silence on brass hinges, with a push of the finger. Aiah explores the suite in wonder— the gleaming kitchen, the luxurious lounge, the bar with its shining crystal decanters. There is food in the refrigerator, stores in the cabinets, fruit trees blossoming on the terrace. Her fingertips brush over the smooth, polished surface of wood tables, and she wonders if she will ever get used to so much wood around her. There had been a revolution, a complete readjustment of power; but it had not touched this room.
    There are plasm connections everywhere, as available as electric power outlets. Aiah checks the communications array, the headset with its priceless ivory earpieces and gleaming silver keys, and finds it doesn’t work.
    Not everything, she reflects, can be perfect. She opens the door into the bedroom— and smothers a scream with her fist.
    She slams the door and staggers away on a wave of nausea. The room swims around her, and she sinks into a chair. Soft leather receives her.
    The suite’s previous occupant had died in bed, and he had not died well.
    Clearly magecraft had killed him. The sheets and mattress were crusted in dried blood, and there were sprays of red on the walls, floor, even the ceiling. The body had been removed, but the mess had not.
    Sorya , Aiah thinks. Sorya chose this room for her.
    All truces are temporary. The words echo in her mind.
    Aiah jumps up from the chair, walks to the door, puts her hand on its bronze handle. And then wonders where she’s going to go.
    Beneath a lovely carving of grapes, outside in the hall, Aiah finally catches a few hours’ rest, sleeping on the carpet with her jacket for a pillow.
     

CHAPTER TWO
     
    “Hello, little bird.”
    Aiah looks up and sees Charduq the Hermit gazing down at her. He has been there all her life, on his pillar at the Barkazi Savings Institute, with rain and Shieldlight falling alike on his head, and the wind blowing his long beard up in his eyes.
    “Hello, old crow,” says Aiah.
    Charduq smooths his beard with a gnarled hand. “A little bird should have more respect for the older birds of this world,” Charduq says.
    Aiah is only eleven years old, but she knows better than to let some mangy holy man get the better of her. “If the old crow wants more respect,” she says, “he should fly down off his perch and get some for himself.”
    The hermit giggles. “The little bird’s claws are sharp,” he observes. “And she has got herself some new feathers. What is that uniform?”
    “For my new school.” Aiah’s new skirt, vest, and blouse are all too large, to allow room for growth, and the long sleeves of the blouse are rolled up to her elbows. She is not proud of her appearance, swathed