“The Geraia is in session,” the ghoul said. “Elariel is with them, in case her testimony is required. You may speak to her, but do not interrupt the proceedings.”
The Geraia, Gyre had gathered, was something like the ghoul’s version of the Senate, and so he was expecting the chamber of the Senate in Skyreach—a semicircle of chairs, with a central rostrum for a speaker. Instead he found himself walking into something more like an arena, a circular floor ringed by more construct guards. Around it were box seats, each separated from its neighbors by columns, stacked one above the other at least ten levels above the floor.
Gyre guessed that membership in the Geraia must be based on age, because the ghouls in the boxes looked ancient, fur gone gray and patchy. Many were housed in customized constructs, like the one Naumoriel had used, connected to them by tubes and wires. Someone was talking in the liquid gabble of the ghoul language when Gyre entered, but the speech came to a halt as a murmur ran through the room. Gyre felt wide, rheumy eyes on him as he crossed to a small table, where Elariel was sitting hunched over, looking miserable.
A bell rang, low and deep, and someone else was talking up above. Gyre heard Tyraves reply, waiting near the door, but it was all incomprehensible. Elariel looked around, her ears going rigid with shock at the sight of him.
“Gyre?” The word was a hiss. “What are you doing here? I thought…” She lapsed into her own tongue for a moment.
“I figured I’d drop in and see how you were doing,” Gyre said, taking the seat beside her. Overhead, an argument seemed to be in progress.
“You can’t be here,” Elariel said. “This is the Geraia. There hasn’t been a human here since… since ever!”
“It’s a historic occasion, then.” Gyre grinned, fighting down nerves. Elariel’s ears twitched, and she smiled briefly, then shook her head.
“There is no way you’re getting out of here alive,” she said.
“From what Tyraves was saying, neither are you.”
Elariel straightened up. “I was always prepared for that. Even if my master had succeeded.” She looked sidelong at Gyre. “They told me that he died. I don’t suppose…”
“He’s dead,” Gyre said. “I’m sorry.”
“He didn’t expect to return. He would regret only that he couldn’t bring the Leviathan to life.” Her ears drooped, but she kept her shoulders square. “And Kitsrea?”
“Dead,” Gyre said. Best keep it simple for now. “I was the only one who escaped.”
“And you came back here. Why? You must know they’ll kill you this time.”
“I have a plan. Sort of. But I’m going to need your help.”
“I’m not sure there’s much I can do.” Elariel gestured at the guards all around. “Before you got here they were debating if I merited a quick execution or a painful punishment as an example to others.”
“There must be some of them who agree with what Naumoriel was trying to do.” Gyre craned his head in a circle, catching many of the old ghouls looking down at him. “Naumoriel was old enough to remember the war, and some of these look even older.”
“If you mean they want revenge on the Chosen and the Order, of course they do,” Elariel said. Her ears quivered angrily. “But they’re cowards, afraid of the slightest risk. They’ve hidden under this mountain for so long they can’t imagine doing anything else. My master hoped to push them, make it impossible for them to remain concealed, but…”
“What if I offered them a way to strike back, without any risk to Refuge? Do you think they would take it?”
“I think they won’t listen to a human, any more than you would listen to a… a talking loadbird.”
“A talking loadbird would get a lot of attention because it’s a talking loadbird,” Gyre said. “If I try to explain my plan, will you translate for me?”
“You mean here? Now?”
“When else?”
“I don’t have any authority to speak here,” Elariel said, her ears drooping again. “It’s against the rules of the chamber, unless I’m called on to answer a question, and even then—”
“What are they going to do?” Gyre said. “Execute you?”
“I…” Elariel stared at him with her huge, dark eyes, the tips of her ears slowly rising. “I suppose you’re right.” She gave a small, sharp-toothed smile. “Just don’t blame me when they dissolve your living brain in a vat of acid.”
“Can they really do that?”
“Oh yes. Dhaka can be used for some very imaginative tortures.”
“Good to know,” Gyre said. “Okay. Let me get their attention, and then do your best to translate.”
She nodded, and Gyre got to his feet.
Time to find out if this sounds as good as it does in my head. He took a deep breath and shouted as loud as he could manage.
“Members of the Geraia!”
The murmur of conversation running through the hall cut off abruptly. As the echoes died away, an old woman’s tremulous voice said something sharp, and there was a scattering of laughter.
“She asked what the beast was braying about,” Elariel said under her breath. “‘Beast’ in this case specifically in the sense of an animal bred for labor, like a—”
“I get the gist,” Gyre muttered. “Just follow along.” He cleared his throat and said, “I apologize for the interruption. I understand that my presence here is unprecedented. But I believe that my experience has been equally unprecedented, and I have a proposal I would like to put to you.”
It was actually an advantage sometimes, Gyre thought, not to speak the language. People were shouting back at him, but they were easy to ignore. He plowed forward, Elariel repeating his words in her own tongue.
“Naumoriel planned to reactivate the Leviathan and use it to crush the Republic and the Order. You have condemned his plan as dangerous for Refuge, and you are right to do so. If I had not been able to defeat the agents of the Order, they might have caught up with him and found proof of your city’s existence.”
“You’re not helping your case,” Elariel hissed as the shouts from above grew louder.
Gyre swallowed and went on. “But even if he failed, I think that Naumoriel understood the problem. The problem is humanity. Here I stand, after all, in a place where no human has ever stood before.”
A ghoul shouted something back, to more laughter. “He says that can be fixed,” Elariel translated unnecessarily.
“You could kill me, certainly. But you cannot avoid dealing with humanity. There are too many of us and too few of you. Fortunately for both sides, we don’t need to be in conflict!” Gyre spread his hands. “I know, in the past, humans served the Chosen. But the Chosen are dead and gone. All that’s left is a shadow, a dead hand locked around humanity’s throat. A corpse-claw called the Order.
“That’s where Naumoriel went wrong. If he’d succeeded with the Leviathan, he might have crushed Skyreach, maybe even broken the Order. But he could never have destroyed humanity entirely, and he would have succeeded only in teaching the survivors to hate the ghouls even more than they already do. Eventually, they would find their way here, and they would destroy you.”