They were back inside their room at the hotel, waiting for the merchants to choose what to sell at the market that day. Atan had been the first one awake, and Serit had immediately started asking him questions about wind spirits.

“Can you tell me more about the strati? I know the general idea, but not what they entail,” they were asking at that moment.

Saia held Aili's shard in her palm as Atan answered, trying to figure out how she was supposed to answer her message.

“That's a very broad question. Is there something in particular you were looking for?”

“I was wondering who builds… I don’t know, big structures, buildings, stuff like that. Is there a specific stratus or is it something any spirit could potentially do?”

“Well, the first stratus is newborns, and they're rarely involved in important work. Only things that require a lot of physical prowess but close to no reasoning skills. They're still learning how to be spirits, they have to be kept under control by guards.”

“And there's a list of them,” Serit added, glancing at Saia as if to remark how important that information was.

She ignored them, certain they would explain at the first chance they'd get.

“Yes, and once they manage to get out of the list, they become part of the next stratus: subordinate workers. They can choose which job to do and for whom, they can get paid and have the right to build themselves a house, but they can't have their own activity. That's reserved for the next stratus, traders.”

“So they could do any job?”

“Yes, construction included. But not of their own initiative, they always work for someone else. Traders, usually. The person you met the other day is one of them.”

“Filsun?”

Atan nodded.

“Then there's the guards, who obviously take care of surveillance and land-scouting, judges, who are old enough to administer the law, and the elders, which are divided into lower elders and higher elders.”

“Based on age?”

“Technically yes, but a lot of spirits decide to stay in their current stratus, because rising higher would mean abandoning their job for a completely different one. They can't avoid becoming lower elders though, after three thousand years of age. The higher elders are always twenty-four, they only get replaced when they die. Or better, when somebody kills them, usually because they have divisive opinions and few friends. But what do I know,” Atan shrugged. “I’m just a shilvé guide.”

“And what's the difference between lower and higher elders?”

“They have the task of governing the city, but higher elders also decide ascensions. When they should happen, where the people will go, what…”

Ménon, the merchant's daughter, stuck her head inside the room from the adjacent storage platform.

“Atan? Mom needs your opinion on something.”

He nodded and stood.

“Another quick question before I go?” he asked Serit.

“No, thank you. You told me everything I needed.”

He left for the other room, leaving Saia and Serit alone with two regular guards and the three birdguards. Saia briefly wondered whether it was a bad idea to ask Serit about the shard in front of them, but she was too impatient to wait; if Aili had sent her the message that morning, it meant she needed something. And it wasn't like the guards didn't know what the shard was for, considering they were the ones hiding her own.

“I need your help,” she told Serit.

They were clearly annoyed at that interruption of their thoughtful trance, but still raised their eyebrows with curiosity when Saia showed them the shard.

“This belongs to a friend,” she explained, talking in their ears to prevent the guards from listening. “I want to communicate with her, but I don't know how.”

Serit reached out with a hand as if to take the shard, but Saia closed her fist and retracted it.

“No, it's too important. I'm already trusting you more than you deserve.”

The annoyance in their viss grew a bit, even if they didn't let it show on their face.

“This friend of yours... Are they a god?”

“Yes.”

Serit nodded, thoughtful again.

“Where are they, now? Back at the mountain?”

“Why are you asking all of these questions?” Saia said, speaking louder. “You promised you would 'make it up to me,' right? Just a few hours ago. Or were you lying just to save your ass?”

Her viss was buzzing so strongly that she struggled to hold it back, so she decided not to. She expanded her domain and let her emotions strike Serit, from her loneliness to her nostalgia for home, all the anger she felt toward them and the representatives, the frustration of not being able to take her shard and go home.

Serit's eyes narrowed as if they were looking at something far away, mouth bent in a grimace that seemed caused by pain. Saia was so focused on them she almost didn't notice the three birdguards standing as one. Two stepped forward while one ran toward the room's exit.

Serit raised one hand to stop them.

“It's fine.”

Saia stopped, realizing she couldn't afford to waste much more viss. She stared at Serit, and they nodded.

“I guess I deserved this.”

“You did.” Saia showed them the shard again. “How do I send her a message?”

“As you would when trying to influence someone's emotions, but instead of focusing on the imprint, you need to control the intensity, or data. The problem in this case is to make it understandable even if it's made of multiple words. You already know how to manipulate intensity, right?”

Saia nodded.

“I learned during the matches with the Doves.”

“Then you need to do that, but sending an intensity after the other in quick succession.”

“I was hoping I could send a whole word at once.”

“That would be convenient, right? You would save a lot of viss. Alas, it doesn't work like that.”

Saia decided to try with a single word. She shut off her vision and recalled Aili's code.

“What are you going to tell her?” Serit asked.

“Good try,” she replied, then sent the shortest message she could think of: listening.

Her viss left through the invisible channel that connected the shard to Aili. Saia checked that it wasn't contaminated with her own. She didn't know how she would react if something happened to it, but throwing Serit out of the platform and into the depth of the sky wasn't a far off possibility.

Everything was in order, so she put the shard back into her shoulder. The merchant and her assistants finished their preparations shortly after, so they all left together, leaving only two regular guards and a birdguard back at the room.

Aili's answer arrived almost immediately: Did army attack mountain past. Did giant of fire appear near mountain.

Saia was a bit worried in gauging the amount of viss she must have used to send her so many words. Which meant her message was important, even if she found it difficult to interpret. She seemed to be asking about events in the past of the mountain, except she had never heard of something like that, not even in the sacred texts of the monks' village.

She took Serit's arm, forcing them to slow down.

“Do you know anything of an army attacking mount Ohat? Or a giant made of fire?”

“Giant made of fire in what sense? A person?”

“I don't know.”

Serit smirked.

“So it's your friend asking.”

Saia's grip slightly tightened, which only made them smile wider. They slowly returned serious as they thought about her question.

“I don't know much about it because it's well outside Iriméze's routes, but there's a big perennial fire somewhere on earth. As far as I know it has never moved.” They thought a bit more. “I don't how about armies, sorry. I can do some research once we're back home.”

Saia nodded and let them go, wondering how to communicate that to Aili. She decided for a short: Nothing. Investigating.

“Why are we going to the market too?” she asked Serit.

“I need to ask some questions around. There was a reason why I asked Atan about the strati, you know?”

“Which is?”

“If the elders are buying all of that material, they certainly want to build something, whether it's the chain Urnit talked us about or something else entirely. It's unlikely they're working on that directly, especially since there aren't many of them for such an ambitious project.”

“So you want to find who is building it?”

“Yes. And possibly ask them some details.”

Runì and her daughter left to set up their stand. Serit reassured Atan that they and Saia would just be wandering around the market before leaving the main group.

“We'll start from the second stratus: the workers,” Serit said as they trudged through the crowd, Saia and birdguards in tow. “I bet we can find at least one of them here.”

“How do we recognize them?” Saia asked, looking through dozens of spirits at once.

“They're probably helping out the merchants, moving crates around... There!”

They stopped and pointed at a platform. It was positioned lower than the one they were walking on, empty of stalls and thus of people, exception made for a group of five spirits floating in a circle next to a pile of rolled-up carpets.

“They're not doing anything,” Saia said.

“I think they're waiting for someone to take the cargo. I bet the carpets are for one of our cities.”

“I didn't see many sheep around.”

Serit laughed.

“Some spirits have the elders' permission to spend short amounts of time near the earth to work. Which makes our task even more complicated.”

They told the two birdguards to wait and descended a ladder that was connected to the platform. Saia followed them, keeping a bit of distance in case those spirits were the kind who didn't like humans.

“I was sent here by the representatives of Iriméze,” Serit was saying. “Can I ask you some questions?”

Saia realized she could understand them well because they were speaking in Shilizé, not in the spirits' language. Despite that, the workers seemed to understand at least the gist of their question. They all glanced toward one element of their group.

“Ask,” they only said.

“I’m waiting for a cargo of weapons from Iriméze that's going to arrive soon. Where can I find someone to carry it to my storage platform?”

“You should ask a…” they hesitated, narrowing the golden slits of their eyes as if trying to remember a word.

“The higher stratus?” Serit suggested. “A trader?”

The spirit nodded.

“Yes, a trader. We can't take jobs.”

Serit frowned, showing a disappointment that Saia didn't see in their viss.

“I really hoped to solve this quickly. I know a lower elder, maybe they could accept the crates and send some workers to help? Or do they need to ask a trader first?”

“Elders is different. They can ask workers to do what they want, if they pay.”

Serit inclined their head.

“Really? That might work out, then. But I didn't see many of you around, has something happened? Someone hiring you en-masse, perhaps?”

They chuckled, as if to give the impression the question wasn't entirely serious, then shot a side glance to Saia. She expanded her domain to include the spirits.

“No,” said the one who had been speaking up to that point, after a brief consultation with the others.

They asked the rest of the group too, and everyone seemed to agree with that answer. One of them told something to Serit, and they pretended not to understand until the first spirit translated.

“We're usual number around. No more and not less.”

“They're telling the truth,” Saia said in Serit's ear.

They thanked the workers and left them to their tasks.

“The workers aren't building the chain,” Serit said once they were on a platform far enough from the group of spirits.

“How do you know?”

“The amount of people needed to build a chain capable of connecting the earth to the higher skies would be huge, impossible not to notice. The elders have probably asked some other stratus.”

“The traders?”

“Maybe, even if I find it unlikely. Filsun would know, since he's one of them. Unless he wanted to keep that a secret for some reason.”

They reflected a bit.

“Let's go back to his house and ask.”

Serit climbed back to the higher platform, Saia went after them, and the birdguards followed.

“If it's not the traders, who?” she asked. “The guards?”

Serit thought about it as the crowd of spirits flowed past them.

“It's the most likely option. Guards follow turns anyway, so not seeing many of them around shouldn't attract attention.”

Saia observed the workers they'd left behind: two cargo sprites and two mounts with their shilvé owners had stopped at the platform's level. The workers checked their documents, then fastened the crates on top of the animals.

She couldn't help but imagine what would happen if a crate fell, or a sprite couldn't keep itself solid enough to hold it. It would go down, past Ifse and the flying cities, to the earth below. If there wasn't a god to protect the people living there, someone could be hit and die.

She couldn't reflect on that further, because Serit was moving with resolve through the crowd of the market toward a path of platforms that were significantly lower than the others, and thus less travelled.

She followed them, the birdguards once again close behind her. She hadn't forgotten their reaction when she had invaded Serit's emotions with her own. She hadn't known what had set them off, whether the sudden silence, Serit's pained expression or her intense stare. All the same, it was clear they weren't there to protect the group from the eventual dangers of the trip; they were there to keep her under control.

She searched them again, expanding her domain to look inside their clothes and examine their viss. Apart from the tied-up tridents and the satchels filled with blue feathers, portable lights and special containers to eat food with their beaks, she didn't find anything unusual.

She was still examining them, following Serit toward Filsun's house, when her sphere shined again with new viss. She slowed down to better focus on the sequence of letters she was receiving: Don't worry. Everything good. Miss you.

She was about to answer when a birdguard screeched. She looked around in every direction, expanding her domain a bit to anticipate what was coming their way.

But the guard wasn't warning her of an attack: the platform in which Serit had just entered, a passage with the sides covered by billowing curtains, was rising with unexpected speed toward the top of the city. Before she could even think of what to do, it was out of her range and beyond the shifting veils of the marketplace.