Amado Chimera meets his blood-red eyes. “Explain, please, Moon-Eater.”
“Amado will get what Amado wants,” Shade says silkily. “A city without a god.”
The small king presses his lips together, skin around his eyes tightening. “This small king wants what is best for the crater city,” he says very tightly.
“Of course, Amado,” soothes the Moon-Eater. He’s so mean.
“Iriset Sunderer will kill the Moon-Eater?” asks the artist Sipipia.
Iriset shakes her head. “It’s transformation. Unraveling. A technique well known at home. But more intimate this time, because it isn’t death. Not for the Moon-Eater.”
“Not for a sunderer,” Shade puts in.
“Whatissundering?” demands the Intrinsic Foundation commander-philosopher, her green glare bright.
Iriset sighs, wishing she could just work and let others explain. “It’s a technique for creating a new force, a very powerful force. When I—when Iriset unravels the Moon-Eater, Shade will live in a new form. Shade willbethis metadesign.”
“Shade already is a metadesign,” the Moon-Eater grumbles.
“But—” Sipipia looks like she might cry.
Shade sinks down, sitting in the air several paces above the diagnostic design. “Ah, sweet Sipipia.”
Helica Silkhair interrupts, her hand flat for attention. She is drawn with tension, though, clearly affected by the shocking conversation. “This theory is sound, except it would only account for settling the metadesign. All the power in the world the Moon-Eater might be, that will not hold the destructive power of this design inert.” Helica is on her feet now, too, a little line between her brows. “This funnel-anchor pulls the threads straight, in a very reliable-looking balance, but it’s not the natural order of design forces. Forces flow and snap, not settle. An array like this must be maintained.”
“It should be cyclical,” the astronomer cardinal mutters, frowning but also thoughtful. Iriset wonders if he’s glad for a problem to chew upon that is not the sundering of their red god. “Like the phases ofthe moon—something that is ever-changing but steady and predictable. Some design declension built in.”
The sharp commander-philosopher of the College of Intrinsic Foundation laughs once. “So the cardinal is a designer after all.”
He glares at her, but Helica holds her hand up. “This designer wishes to know how Iriset Sunderer thinks to maintain the tension of this massive design.”
Iriset nods at the cardinal. “The moon.”
“Themoon?” The cardinal nearly leaps to his feet. “The moon spends half its time on the other side of the world.”
“Not if we catch it,” Iriset says.
Everyone argues, exclaims, denies, but for Lyric, River, and the Moon-Eater floating above them all like that very moon of Aharté. Even Eliri shakes her head, gray eyes huge as she questions Iriset. Iriset shrugs at Eliri and plops down into her chair to wait. Since she finished her wine, she reaches for Shade’s and drinks it. She hears,harness the moon, impossible, change the face of design, level buildings, more earthquakes or worse—but predictable at least. Iriset doesn’t want to be here for their arguing. She doesn’t want to re-create the Holy Design. She doesn’t care if the crater city crumbles! She doesn’t. The only reason she’s explaining this is because the Moon-Eater wants her to and—it is her fault. (She’s lying to herself, she does want to do it, but not for faith or philosophy or to go home. Iriset wants to do it because she sees how shecan. And once she can do something, doesn’t she have to?)
Suddenly Lyric stands. His expression is calm, though Iriset can see the tension in his shoulders, the tight bend of his knuckles. He waits, and it isn’t long before everyone quiets, looking at him expectantly.
“It is not impossible, what Iriset claims,” Lyric says. “To catch the moon itself. Lyric knows, because that is the case in Lyric’s home.”
Absolute silence is the only answer. Iriset realizes her mouth is hanging open. Again.
“Iriset should be allowed to implement this solution,” Lyric continues. “Because it is for the greatest good of the crater city. How else will the array be calmed? How else will the wild forces of the crater be balanced?”
“Do they truly need to be?” the artist asks.
“They must be,” Lyric says.
“Because Lyric Aharté and Iriset Sunderer came here,” says the small king of Sharp-Shin, who has not spoken since arriving.
Lyric bows his head. “Yes. And that cannot be undone.”
“How dare these destroyers discuss this calmly, when it is because of the anomaly star, because of Lyric Aharté and Iriset Sunderer that so many have already died, so many more might?” demands Berrik.
“What has been done has been done,” Lyric says. “The only way forward is to act now.”
