Read Online Those Above: The Empty Throne Book 1 by Daniel Polansky - Free Book Online Page B
Authors: Daniel Polansky
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much different to that either, gave the whole Rung a strong whiff of mildew and worse. Sixteen years Thistle had lived in the echo of the suck – he figured he ought to have got used to it by now, but he never had.
As far as Thistle was concerned the world was the Roost, and the Roost was the Fifth and the Fifth was the Barrow and the few neighbourhoods surrounding it, east to the pumps, south to the harbour, upslope towards the Points. Beyond that, Thistle’s perceptions of place grew hazy, vague impressions of privilege and soft silks.
Thistle pulled on his trousers, noticed the shaky job he’d done during his most recent repatching, told himself to borrow some thread from his mother and take care of it later that evening, knew he wouldn’t get round to actually doing it. It is a curious fact that the less one has to do the less one does, a vicious cycle that if uninterrupted leads to torpor. He went back into his hutch and pulled up a loose stone from the back corner. From inside the alcove he removed a thin bit of pig-iron, one end sharpened into a point, the other shoved into a piece of cork. The shiv was worn and ill-made, but like anything else that might be used as a weapon it was strictly illegal – humans were forbidden to own any blade larger than a cooking knife, even the Cuckoos had to make do with their knobbed ferules. Thistle told himself he carried it for protection, in case a rival crew caught him alone in a back stairwell or an alley. This wasn’t quite a lie, but it wasn’t quite the truth either. Thistle liked holding the shiv in his hand, liked feeling its weight when he walked. He shoved it into the back of his trousers, pulled his belt tight around it, put on his boots and started out into the afternoon.
Down the crumbling stairs, jumping over the third step on the second landing, crumbling now for half a generation, a trap for the forgetful or foreign. He skirted the door of his own apartment, quickly and quietly as he could. Mother would be down at the water, doing the day’s wash. Inside would be his sisters, Thyme and Shrub and little Ivy, three years come winter and still couldn’t quite walk right. And of course Apple, sharing the back room with the small altar their mother kept to Siraph, coughing his life out against the thin walls. In truth it had been Apple that had led Thistle to taking up his spot on the roof, the ever-constant hack, an intake of breath and two sharp ejections of phlegm. Thistle’s shack was dirty and often damp and always smelly, but it beat listening to your brother dying all night, every night. Secretly Thistle sometimes found himself wishing that Apple would stop mucking around already and just get to it. What was it exactly he had to live for? Thistle wondered. What was the point of prolonging such a miserable existence?
But then that same question could be asked of everyone – at least everyone Thistle had ever met.
Outside the Barrow was busy as ever, lines of porters like ants carrying goods up from the ships, laden double with bolts of raw silk from Chazar or chicory from the Baleferic Isles or Dycian oranges. From the Source at the top of the First Rung a complex and elaborate series of canals ran down through the city and back to the bay. But only the Eternal could use them, and since no seed-pecker ever came down to the Fifth, the waterways were empty of anything but fallen leaves. What goods made their way from the docks were taken to their destinations on the back of one of the city’s endless supply of human chattel. Most of the men on the Fifth that had jobs – a modest majority, if you were being kind – worked in such a fashion, unloading cargo from the huge caravels that floated into the harbour, hauling it upslope, back and forth from morning till nightfall.
Thistle found the boys at their usual spot, in a long-abandoned pumping station a few blocks towards the docks. It was a small stone building beneath one of the main pipes, an
As far as Thistle was concerned the world was the Roost, and the Roost was the Fifth and the Fifth was the Barrow and the few neighbourhoods surrounding it, east to the pumps, south to the harbour, upslope towards the Points. Beyond that, Thistle’s perceptions of place grew hazy, vague impressions of privilege and soft silks.
Thistle pulled on his trousers, noticed the shaky job he’d done during his most recent repatching, told himself to borrow some thread from his mother and take care of it later that evening, knew he wouldn’t get round to actually doing it. It is a curious fact that the less one has to do the less one does, a vicious cycle that if uninterrupted leads to torpor. He went back into his hutch and pulled up a loose stone from the back corner. From inside the alcove he removed a thin bit of pig-iron, one end sharpened into a point, the other shoved into a piece of cork. The shiv was worn and ill-made, but like anything else that might be used as a weapon it was strictly illegal – humans were forbidden to own any blade larger than a cooking knife, even the Cuckoos had to make do with their knobbed ferules. Thistle told himself he carried it for protection, in case a rival crew caught him alone in a back stairwell or an alley. This wasn’t quite a lie, but it wasn’t quite the truth either. Thistle liked holding the shiv in his hand, liked feeling its weight when he walked. He shoved it into the back of his trousers, pulled his belt tight around it, put on his boots and started out into the afternoon.
Down the crumbling stairs, jumping over the third step on the second landing, crumbling now for half a generation, a trap for the forgetful or foreign. He skirted the door of his own apartment, quickly and quietly as he could. Mother would be down at the water, doing the day’s wash. Inside would be his sisters, Thyme and Shrub and little Ivy, three years come winter and still couldn’t quite walk right. And of course Apple, sharing the back room with the small altar their mother kept to Siraph, coughing his life out against the thin walls. In truth it had been Apple that had led Thistle to taking up his spot on the roof, the ever-constant hack, an intake of breath and two sharp ejections of phlegm. Thistle’s shack was dirty and often damp and always smelly, but it beat listening to your brother dying all night, every night. Secretly Thistle sometimes found himself wishing that Apple would stop mucking around already and just get to it. What was it exactly he had to live for? Thistle wondered. What was the point of prolonging such a miserable existence?
But then that same question could be asked of everyone – at least everyone Thistle had ever met.
Outside the Barrow was busy as ever, lines of porters like ants carrying goods up from the ships, laden double with bolts of raw silk from Chazar or chicory from the Baleferic Isles or Dycian oranges. From the Source at the top of the First Rung a complex and elaborate series of canals ran down through the city and back to the bay. But only the Eternal could use them, and since no seed-pecker ever came down to the Fifth, the waterways were empty of anything but fallen leaves. What goods made their way from the docks were taken to their destinations on the back of one of the city’s endless supply of human chattel. Most of the men on the Fifth that had jobs – a modest majority, if you were being kind – worked in such a fashion, unloading cargo from the huge caravels that floated into the harbour, hauling it upslope, back and forth from morning till nightfall.
Thistle found the boys at their usual spot, in a long-abandoned pumping station a few blocks towards the docks. It was a small stone building beneath one of the main pipes, an
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