Chapter One
The castle flew slowly overhead and faded into a cloud bank. A tingle-touch of engines brushed across Arren’s face as he gazed at it. He checked his notebook, flipping pages to see if it was one he’d seen before, but he couldn’t tell. It had been backlit by bright sky, its color obscured, and the angle was wrong to see the shape of the towers.
“Arren, you out there?” his dad called from the back of the shop, voice dampened from hundreds of bolts of fabric. “Mrs. Fractalpearl wants you to fix her hair dryer.”
“Sure, I’ll be right there.” Arren closed his notebook and slipped it into a pocket. Rather, he tried, but the pocket resisted. A mostly-dead battery, a pair of pliers, and a tangle of rubber bands all opposed his efforts. He tucked the notebook under his arm and went inside. The castle was gone anyway.
Through the service door, Arren entered a dim, cavernous space full of soft, muffling textiles. The scents were subtle but distinct: musky wool, acrid red dyes, raw wood pallets. He wove his way around towering piles of shipments for the automated trucks to take to other towns, crates of new fabrics, waiting to be divided for use by local tailors, and huge spools of yarn, destined for the knitting machines.
Knitting machines would be interesting at least. There was nothing like that here. No machines except Arren’s own, no manufacture but his small, impromptu repair service, offered in exchange for continued housing upstairs. He’d been getting a lot of business lately.
“It was working great, then poof, this morning — nothing.” Arren entered the shop in the front where Mrs. Fractalpearl was demonstrating the lifelessness of her hair dryer by flipping the actuator back and forth. Not an especially effective demonstration, since it wasn’t plugged in.
Where the warehouse had been density and darkness, the shop was all light and display. Colorful fabrics hung from racks, glass tables held rainbow-hued mounds of yarn skeins. Dad was rearranging a display of thread on a wall. He swapped one bobbin of blue thread with a slightly darker shade, then stepped back to examine the result.
Arren was tired of thread, yarn, and fabric. He loved trains. Liked electric generators. Even appreciated garbage processors. But his parents shipped and sold textiles, and right now they were the only ones willing to give him a place to live and work. He should be in Unity, at the university with his friends, but he’d messed that up. He had no right to complain.
“Let me take that,” Arren said as he accepted the hair dryer. He pretended to look it over. Mrs. Fractalpearl had thick, greying hair which hung past her hips; Arren was certain the actuator had overheated. “I will have it fixed for you tomorrow morning.” It would take only five minutes, but mom insisted that if he told people that, they wouldn’t value his service.
Arren wrote up a receipt and gave her a claim tag. Behind the counter was a pile of other gadgets awaiting repair: a blender, a voting terminal, and a flashlight. Arren rolled his eyes at the latter — people couldn’t even change their own bulbs? But if they were willing to pay, he should be grateful. “Here you go.”
“Thanks, you’re a sweetie. I’ve been telling all my friends how the visioner you repaired works better now than it ever did.”
That wasn’t possible — he’d just reattached a wire. Maybe she’d moved it to a location with better reception. “Glad to hear it.” Arren set his notebook and the hair dryer in the bin, and took the whole thing out to the warehouse and up the stairs to his room. He nudged the door open, then sighed as it swung wide.
His room was about four by four meters. Beside the door was the icon of Surya, currently dressed in his aspect of Sunmaker, a small fiery globe cupped in his palms, a look of concentration on his face. Surya smiled at Arren as he stepped into the small bare patch where the door had swung. Arren nodded back, noted his virtue rating remained unchanged: 893, and searched for a place to work.
He climbed over a big, broken grain-drying fan, squeezed between a shelf and dresser, and finally dropped the bin on his bed. He needed more room, but mom refused to allow him to use any of the warehouse space below. He realized that warehouse space was limited and valuable in Oreana — or any of the Unity towns — but lately so many people wanted repairs, he was going to have to find some way to get more space. Maybe if he could fold his bed up?
Arren sat cross-legged on his mattress and began to take the flashlight apart. It was unsettling, if rewarding, this increased demand. For most of his life he’d tinkered with devices, particularly old, discarded things. But lately lots of mechanisms seemed to be breaking, all at once, and he had no idea why. It was all normal wear and decay, but the timing was odd. As if something had been maintaining them before, and now had stopped.
He replaced the flashlight bulb, rewired the blender motor, and was disassembling the voting terminal when he heard footsteps on the stairs, accompanied by agitated whispers. Arren’s hands had been so full he’d failed to close the door, but usually that didn’t matter. No one else came up here. Now it sounded like both his parents at once. He set the terminal aside and extracted himself from the bed, careful to not let the soldering iron tip over.
They were still whispering on the landing by the time Arren climbed and squeezed his way to the doorway. “Oh Arren, just look at you.” His mother tried to smooth his hair and pat his pockets flat. The hair might have complied — he couldn’t tell — but the pockets remained as bulgy as ever.
“What?”
“Do you think he’s in trouble, Lindy?” his father said.
His mother tugged Arren’s shirt straight. Arren glanced at the icon he stood beside: 894, his virtue rating was up one. He couldn’t be in trouble. “What’s this about?”
“The Exarch is here; he wants to see you.”
Nathan Freed, Exarch of Surya, representative of the god and chairman of the Suryan Polico was one of the most powerful men in the world. Arren had seen him from afar at ceremonies at the temple complex, just like everyone else in Oreana. He’d never heard of anyone talking to the man.
“Huh,” Arren said. “Maybe he needs something repaired?”
“Don’t be stupid,” his mother snapped. “The exarch would send someone. Besides, why would the temple complex need repairs? They have Surya for that.”
Arren shrugged. “Let’s go see.”
His mother’s constant smoothing, tugging, and patting nearly tripped him on the way down, but eventually they all made their way out to the shop, where the Exarch of Surya, Master Nathan Freed waited dressed in white and gold robes, escorted by two suryan brothers in saffron, none of them looking at any of the fabrics.
His mother began to stammer, but Master Freed ignored her. He looked straight at Arren and said, “You are Arren Powers?”
“Yes.”
“Very good. I have heard rumor of your skill. Assuming I have heard correctly, I would like you to work for me.”
Now it was Arren’s turn to stammer, but his mother had regained her composure. “I am Lindy Powers, Arren’s mother and current employer. He would be delighted to offer you his services, of course. You will provide housing as well?”
Master Freed nodded. “Of course. I can’t let him stay in the monastery, but we have sufficient rooms.” He addressed Arren, “We have a large unused storage space where you can set up any required tools. Will that be acceptable?”
Arren couldn’t suppress the smile. Just what he’d been hoping for. “I’ll be over this afternoon — just a few more things to repair.”
Master Freed nodded solemnly. “Very well. I will send transports to pick up your supplies.” With that the exarch and his escorts swept out of the shop.
Both of Arren’s parents babbled excited congratulations, but despite the promise of a large workshop, Arren felt more unsettled than elated. What could the god’s own dwelling need repaired?
