Zotikas: Episode 1: Clash of Heirs by Rob Storey, Tom Bruno Read Free Book Online Page A

dumped refuse until they had literally piled it
to the top.
    The middle of the Karst Borough was interrupted by a
gash of even deeper darkness. The enormous chasm, unimaginatively called the
Abyss, separated the east side of the sunless city from the west. The only
connection was a half-mile section of fallen tower serving as a bridge, though
by going out of the way, one could skirt the ends of the gap.
    Above, Kieler felt the oppressive weight of the Plate
sealing the city like the lid of an enormous coffin. Spiking through the Plate
at regular intervals, except for where the expanse of the Abyss dropped into
nothingness, were dozens of immense, black columns. These pillars reached from
the bedrock far below to the highest levels of the city above. It was these
timeless structures, built by a civilization long gone, that formed the
cornerstones upon which the great trade houses of the current era had fashioned
their Rei-lit metropolis.
    But the people below, subsisting on the shadowy plain
beneath the Plate, were Kieler’s friends, outcasts, just like him. Rejected by
the major houses, they fled here, or if they could make it, to some remote
outland location beyond the reach of the Omeron. At least they weren’t criminals
bound for Feleanna’s arena.
    This city is reversed , he thought. The random specks of light and life
below are like stars, and the unseen, shallow, metal Plate above like a
reflection-less sea .
    Curiously, as he looked up at the bottom of the Plate,
in one area he saw faint but definite points of light, different from the weak
aura of lichen. It was like a cluster of a half dozen stars. Odd, but not
Kieler’s concern as he mustered himself to leave the dim underworld.
    Dropping his gaze from the wispy light, Kieler
wondered if he would ever see this shadow-city again, his home for most of his
life.
    After the raid on the Cortatti compound, he had
napped, packed, and finally donned his disguise to climb to this point. Behind
him, away from the slope of rubbish leading down to Karst, stood a heavy stone
arch, marking the beginning of the main path out of the nethercity.
    Years ago, Kieler had made this trip in reverse with
his father. In self-imposed exile, his father had led him through the Dragon’s
Gate, down the crumbling, pillared path and under the Arch of Darkness to dwell
in the city of night. Most, like his father, never saw the light of Rei again.
    Kieler remembered the fear of that moment, standing in
this same spot, a child of eight, clinging to his father’s side. His fear now
was just as real, but this time it was a result of his own choice to leave.
    Growing up here had been a depressing adventure.
Kieler couldn’t just sit by and watch his father work obsessively on his processes
and engines. So he explored. He knew this place. He knew more of this labyrinth
of tunnels, passages, crawlspaces, sewers, nooks, hideouts and boroughs than
almost anyone alive. This had been his perpetually gloomy playground.
    More than once he had become lost deep down below
Avertori, to the point of thinking he would never find his way back.
    Yet he always had. And he had made a life for himself
here. After his father was killed, Movus gave Kieler opportunity and direction
through the Coin, despite the infrequency of his actual presence. Kieler had
striven for advancement and risen quickly in the ranks.
    Now he was leaving his life underground and taking on
a new life above, a life not his own, and the life, he thought wryly, of a
supposed dead man.
    He was point man for a revolution. Most people, below
and above, had little hope or purpose in their lives. He had both, and it made
the prize worth the risks.
    He took a last look at the faint sparks of light
below, lights that represented people he knew, and cared about. That he was
fighting for them, and the respect of Movus, made him proud.
    Given it was a pit—it was still home.
    Kieler turned and stepped through the Arch.
    Before him lay a low-ceilinged