The boat glided along a path between the trees. The nose dropped and began tearing divots in the dirt, sending shocks through the hull. Branches scattered over Saul and Olivia, broken by the passage of the boat’s massive wings. Apparently the wings were made tough, because the tree branches yielded or snapped, rather than stopping the boat.

  Broken limbs and gray feathers filled the air.

  Cringing against the helm of the boat, Saul raised his eyes for a moment. A six-foot cocoon flew past overhead, another piece of debris among the dirt and branches. He swore inside his head. There could not be a worse place to crash land on Hidria with an earth born exile along.

  The boat skidded, and rocked, and then came to a stop.

  Olivia lifted her head from the shelter of her arms. She was close enough to Saul he could smell the sweat on her skin and dust in her hair. He sat back on the seat by the helm of the boat and released his grip on the sword at last.

  Olivia let out a short bark of laughter. “Is that it? Are we on the ground?”

  “Yeah.” Saul brushed twigs off his shirt. His fingers came away dirty, passing through the tear in his jacket from his fight with the two gern back at the mansion on Earth. He hoped no one else had come by to investigate his place after Olivia. Though in the end, it might not matter. If he got the hilt from Luther he might decide not to go back.

  Olivia stood up and looked toward the rear of the boat. She started down the aisle between the seats. Saul massaged the ache left in his neck from his awkward sleep and then began to pick his way over the debris-covered deck after her, past the prone body of the unconscious guardian he had fought on the way down.

  He found his backpack on top of her coat beneath a cluster of branches. He shifted the branches while Olivia pulled out the pack and the coat. She also retrieved her cattle prod from nearby. Then Saul heard a groan from behind him. He turned, a curse already on his mind, as he expected to see the guardian coming around.

  The guardian lay still, chest rising and falling with breath. From beneath a pile of branches the groan turned into a scream that came from the back of a man’s throat. Not a scream of terror, but a scream of frustration and rage.

  Saul rushed to the pile of branches, Olivia close behind him. Together they tore away the branches, until the source of the scream became obvious. A cocoon torn from the ground had landed in the boat. A man with a bald center of his head lay on the floor, looking up at Saul and Olivia with one eye covered by one of his hands. The remains of a cocoon lay around him, but otherwise he was naked. He didn’t look like he had lived a particularly strict life, but given the circumstances Saul didn’t know if that made sense.

  The man shuddered and then sat up, hand still covering one eye. “What’s going on?” he said in an American accent. “Is this heaven?”

  Saul took a deep breath. “Not yet, man.” He glanced and Olivia, whose eye were locked on the bald man’s face. She was blushing. Saul figured that was on account of the man’s lack of pants. “Welcome to Hidria.” He turned to Olivia. “Don’t just stand there, we’ve got to go before the authorities get here.”

  Olivia’s eyes moved to Saul slowly. “What’s going on? Who is this guy?”

  “I’ll explain once we’re clear.” Saul met Olivia’s eyes. “Trust me, this is a long story.”

  “I trust you,” she said. But her tone wavered. She stood frozen.

  The naked bald man picked himself up from the deck. He looked at his hands. “I can see.” He sounded surprised. “I got my eye back. Wow.”

  Saul marched past the man and put his hand on Olivia’s shoulder. “We need to go.”

  She nodded and let him lead her to the side of the boat. Saul felt Nat’s presence and glanced up. The little insect child descended to him from the trees and landed on his shoulder.

  “Saul, I saw the guardians. They’re forming a perimeter in the air around the park but I don’t see anyone on the ground yet.”

  “We should hurry and get out of here before they land.”

  “This is a park?” Olivia said numbly. She looked out from the boat’s side at the clearing in which they had landed.

  Saul followed her gaze. Human shapes moved among the trees. The remains of cocoons littered the roots that poked up from the ground, along with disturbed dirt and feathers from the wings of the boat. He shook his head.

  “Saul, who are all these people?”

  Looks like I have to tell her now. Saul took a deep breath.

  “They’re exiles from Earth.” He wrapped an arm gently around her shoulders as if he were her boyfriend and they were on a walk. He gave her a gentle nudge. “Climb down. I’ll explain as we go.”

  Olivia crouched, her trench coat in her arms, then climbed down from the boat behind a broken but twitching wing. Saul sheathed his sword and then slipped on his backpack. He followed her down to the grass of the park clearing. Groans and cries and laughter echoed through the park from the people that had just torn their way out of the cocoons at the roots of each tree.

  Saul hated charnel parks.

  Olivia turned in a slow semi-circle, staring wide-eyed at the people of all kinds who filled the glade. Saul looked around, in search of a gate. He spotted one about sixty or seventy feet down the path from the wing boats’ bow. He guided Olivia with him, and they started walking toward the gate.

  “They’re people?” she said, as they passed a cluster of naked men and women. “Why are they here?”

  “It’s the trees,” said Saul. “They attract souls and birth them in new bodies.”

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  “New bodies?” Olivia nodded, but her face looked pale. Her cattle prod hung loosely in her grip.

  “Everyone in this garden died somewhere on Earth. They’re the lucky ones. They got pulled in by the trees.”

  “The trees.” Her fingers tightened on the handle of the cattle prod.

  “They’re not ordinary trees. They’re art-children designed to attract souls.”

  The two of them approached the gate in the steel fence. They looked up at the sign over one corner of the bars. “Starlight Grotto,” Olivia’s eyes moved down to the numbers under the sign. “Forty pieces a head.”

  Saul grimaced. The enslavement of reborn exiles was an unfortunate reality in the cities of Hidria. Even so, he had no good way of telling Olivia that the sign referred to the sales price of each exile the place sold. Likely enough she would figure it out on her own.

  He checked to see if the gate was locked. It was, but the lock was old, rusty, and corroded from years of rain. It did not resist as he pried the metal apart with his fingers. The strain made his hand ache, but he didn’t stop. Something gave inside the lock with a clink of metal. He dropped the broken lock to the ground at his feet. The gate swung open.

  Men and women along the buildings beyond the gate turned to look at Saul and Olivia as they walked onto the black pavement of the street outside the charnel park. A vivid wave of scents hit Saul. The scent of trees and newly birthed flesh was replaced with that of aromatic food and coffee from a place across the street, the stench of garbage in the gutters, and something completely unrelated to smell. The overwhelming presence of thousands of nearby makers startled Saul with its heavy weight.

  He had been gone from Hidria for over five years. His sense of other makers might be sharper than normal, having mostly been exposed to exiles over that time. He hated, hated how small it made him feel. But he knew he was just like the countless city-dwellers, a man of Hidria.

  Saul led Olivia toward the smell of coffee, wanting to get off the street as much for comfort as for mortal safety. Evidently the authorities had not had time to cordon off the gate, but they would definitely spot Saul and Olivia if they kept out on the street too long. Winged boats glided over the park behind them.

  Olivia shook her head. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

  The words came out under her breath but Saul knew they were ones he was meant to hear by the bitter, accusing sound.

  “I didn’t know how to tell you. Here, let’s go in here.” Saul motioned to the door to the cafe that stood before them. “We probably look similar enough to pass as normals, in spite of everything.”

  “Normals,” Olivia murmured.

  What is normal, Saul thought. Compared to a street in a Hidrian city Earth lacked a bit of magic in the form of art-children. Olivia hesitated before the doorway. The presence and stares of other makers threatened to bury Saul’s spirit sense. “Come on. Please.”

  She shook her head. “Why should I follow you anywhere?”

  Saul grimaced and turned away from Olivia. “Because it’s the only way you’ll get home in one piece.”

  He controlled his expression and returned his gaze to her face.

  She looked up at him with a defiant glare. “Is that what you think?”

  “I don’t know what I can say to that, except yes.” Saul took her hand under the coat draped over her arm, but she pulled it away from him.

  “Don’t touch me.” She turned from him and walked to the door of the cafe. She let herself inside.

  Saul looked over his shoulder, but saw no one following them though half the people on the street seemed to be watching. He sighed, but then followed Olivia.

  She stood before the counter of the coffee bar, looking around the room. The hardwood floor gleamed with sunlight and the small yellow lamp set behind the bar. Saul followed

  Olivia past a few tables to the place where the bartender waited to take orders. The place wasn’t quite empty of other customers, but it was close. Saul saw a teenage couple sitting by the back wall, sipping at their drinks. The two of them stopped talking when Saul caught up with Olivia and turned to watch.

  Evidently Saul’s presence was enough for them to take notice even in this city full of makers. He felt a bit of pride at that because presence meant power, and his skill at making had always surpassed his raw ability. Of course, drawing attention wasn’t good at the moment. Olivia glanced at him but said nothing.

  “You two want anything?” asked the girl behind the bar.

  Saul shrugged. “A table and some water.” He didn’t have any maker money easy at hand, but there were a few strings of pieces in his pack. He didn’t want the bartender or the teenagers to see what else was in the pack, though. Bad enough his sword stuck out and Olivia still held that damned cattle prod.

  The bartender smiled at Saul, but the corners of her mouth twitched with nerves. “Pick a table. I’ll get your water.”

  He smiled at her and then walked over to a table in the corner by the front window. To his relief, Olivia followed him. She set her coat on the back of her chair, propped her cattle prod against the window, and then sat down across from him. He sank into the other chair and glanced out the window on the street. No sign of any guardian or city police following them yet. The presence of the masses of other makers on the street seemed lighter in here. Bless the small mercies.

  He turned to Olivia. “I’m sorry I didn’t tell you. But I didn’t think you’d understand if I did.”

  “I’m not stupid.” She hung her head. Her hair swung forward on either side, hiding her scars completely, as well as much of her face. “You thought you could play me.”

  “I didn’t mean to lie.” Saul sighed. Technically I didn’t lie, he thought. “Look, this world is the next in sequence from Earth. People from your world are usually reborn here. They don’t have the powers of makers, and a lot of Hidrians think that means they’re subhuman. I wish my people hadn’t decided to make yours into slaves, but I can’t stop them from where I am now.”

  “So they sell people.” She sounded numb.

  “Yeah.” And there’s no excuse. “Hidrians don’t like the earth born.”

  “Where do people on Hidria come from, if people from Earth are reborn here?”

  “We’re born here in our first life. When we die we move along the sequence.”

  “We’re the same? Then, why do you hate us?” There were tears in her eyes and a sob in her voice.

  “It’s not hatred.” Saul bit back the next instinctive words, the old words he had learned as a child. Words that said earth born exiles were not fully human. “Someone has to take care of the people who are reborn here.”

  “Take care? You’re buying and selling.”

  “I know. That’s not what I meant.”

  “Is there anything else you aren’t telling me?”

  Saul took a deep breath. “Yes. Just one thing.”

  Her eyes met his. She nodded to him. “What is it?”

  “I’m not looking for the hilt to bring it back to Earth. That wouldn’t help the Gern situation anyway. I want it for myself.”

  Her eyes narrowed. “What? Why?”

  “The part of Apahar that’s inside that hilt is an aleph sliver. It’s not just a weapon. Aleph slivers are also called world seeds.”

  “That doesn’t explain why you want the hilt.”

  Nat wriggled down into Saul’s collar. Little coward, Saul thought. He nodded to Olivia. “Only a handful of makers ever get their hands on an actual aleph sliver. Those that do usually have to go through challenges, creative, spiritual, and physical challenges. They fight their whole lives for the chance to use one of those slivers and become a worldmaker.” He put his hands together. “I was one of the ones who didn’t make it.”

  Olivia folded her arms. “Is that why you were on Earth? You wanted the one in the hilt.”

  “I would have taken it, but I knew it would set off the gern if I didn’t do it the right way.”

  She nodded. “So you wanted to rule your own world? How grandiose are you?”

  Saul sighed. “Not as grandiose as I used to be.” He looked down at his folded hands, then glanced out the window. The street still looked clear. “I know you don’t want to trust me, but I’m still on your side.”

  “Yeah, right.”

  “Olivia.”

  “Don’t talk to me. Just go.”

  “They’ll catch you if you stay here.”

  “So what. Won’t I just end up their slave eventually?”

  “You’ll definitely end up a slave if you stay here much longer.”

  Olivia stood, and picked up her coat. She slipped her arms into the sleeves. Her jaw was set.

  Saul picked up his backpack and looked at her. “Are you coming with me?”

  “I suppose I am.”

  They walked past the approaching bartender toward the door. A hiss cut the air. Outside the cafe, people started screaming.