The Will of the Many (Hierarchy, #1)

by James Islington

“How long has your Septimus been like that?” Vek. Still inclined to curse in my ancestral tongue, even if I can only risk it in my head. I paste on a puzzled expression and cast a glance back. “What do you mean?” “He’s been working here too long.” Hospius’s intense brown eyes search mine until I turn forward again, focusing on the steps. “You don’t have to worry. I won’t say anything.”

AH! Already found out

These lead to the deepest level, where the long-term prisoners are kept. Sentences of more than two years: murderers and purported Anguis collaborators, for the most part.

Only six feet wide and not much deeper, each unlit alcove contains only two things. A prisoner. And the Sapper to which they are strapped.

I want to watch him more closely—something still feels not quite right about him, his presence here, this entire night—but my desire to avoid notice is stronger.

“Nateo. Can you hear me? My name is Sextus Hospius. Nonagere.” He says it all carefully, enunciating, but it takes me a second to place the last word. It’s Vetusian. Don’t react.

Only a few nearby trees roar their violent, brilliant death throes.

Years ago, in those terrible months after Suus, I would have given a limb to have made contact with these people.

“Me.” The bow doesn’t move an inch. “Nice to finally meet you, Diago.” There’s a mental dissonance when the name I haven’t heard for three years registers.

Even through my physical pain the reminder’s a dagger, made keener by accusation.

I stumble at the sight of the latter, heart wrenching. The peaks of waves glitter. Sparkle. I can smell the salt. A series of massive white stone monoliths jutting from the blue, perhaps a mile from the shore, mars the view. But otherwise, it’s all light and clean colours and open horizons down there. I haven’t seen the sea in almost two years.

“They say that young men know they will die, but only old men believe it. For some reason, I don’t think that’s true of you, Vis. I hope it’s not.”

There’s a heartbeat where I see my father’s bloodied form as I fall, my sister’s ghostly hair in the water. The old rage stirs.

“There comes a point in every man’s life where he can rail against the unfairness of the world until he loses, or he can do his best in it. Remain a victim, or become a survivor.”

“Nervousness means there’s a fear to be faced ahead, Diago. The man who is never nervous, never does anything hard. The man who is never nervous, never grows.”

Veridius thinks and then nods, again in that approving way that makes me feel as though I’ve done exactly the right thing.

This is stupid. Social suicide. “From what I can tell, the only difference between you and him is that his father is more successful than yours.” I should stop.

Then all’s quiet. In the distance, I hear waves crashing against the shore somewhere far below. I close my eyes, but Suus is there. It takes me a long time to sleep.

I was never meant to wield Will, and I still learned them when I was at Suus.

“Besides, the bad blood between him and your father isn’t exactly a secret.” I shift in my chair. “Ah.” Callidus might be right. Veridius couldn’t simply refuse me entry, or even be the one to expel me—my reputation after the naumachia has seen to that. But no one could protest if another, higher-ranked student pressed a case. I’m a little unsettled I didn’t see it myself.

I’m stuck here during dinner for two whole months: the punishment seemed like a reprieve at the time, but more and more I’m wondering whether Veridius might actually have preferred this outcome. Isolating me, rather than expelling me and drawing attention as a result.

It also doesn’t hurt, I’ll admit, that even in her work clothes she’s undeniably pretty. I have to be wary of that, too, though.

Hehehe

The king and queen of Suus, of course, were warning me of girls more interested in my position than me, but the principle remains the same.

“Congratulations. You’ll be reporting to Praeceptor Dultatis in the morning.”

Vek. Eidhin is shirtless, which I think is strange given the evident chill in the air.

Hehehe

I fall into a comfortable routine of pre-dawn sparring and spending the two earlier meals of the day with Callidus, whose company I increasingly value.

Which is why, halfway through my second month, I finally break.

A fair system only works if there’s an unbiased means of assessing merit. When there is no pride or selfishness involved.” He gives a soft snort, shaking his head. “Which means that fair systems cannot exist where people are involved.”

In trying to become God, they created Him. I think that’s the translation, anyway.

“Obiteum is lost. Do not open the gate. Synchronous is death.

A dark smear on the top of the wall glints even in the dim light, but there’s no time to clean it.

Wonder if Religion simply got the idea for this place from the ruins, or whether the connection is something more sinister.

Elsewhere, crypts are sometimes reclaimed as families get absorbed by others, their name withering and dying—but not here at the Necropolis. Here, burial is an eternal monument.

“I don’t think you do.” Lanistia doesn’t look at me. “Ulciscor was making preparations last night, after he found out you were still in Six. If you hadn’t made it to those ruins, you might not have been going back.”

It’s Sedotia. The woman who crashed the Transvect and shot Ulciscor. The woman who was helping Melior at the naumachia. The woman from the Anguis.

Relucia seems genuinely pleased to be here with Ulciscor, but is plainly also an exceptional liar.

But the sense of loss emanating from the others at the moment… it’s too potent. Too familiar to ignore.

The other part of me remembers my father’s lessons about honour. About how it exists to provide a guideline for how to live, not how to die.

He addresses many of those tales in my direction, I think understanding the awkwardness of being a newcomer, and doing his best to include me. And perhaps feeling that by sharing the memory, he is also sharing a small part of his son, too. I decide I like him.

“How do you do it?” I frown at her. “I understand pretending, but this… you’re married to him.” “Habit.” Relucia’s answer is brusque, but then she softens. “He’s not the worst of them, you know. Not by a long way.”

“How long have you been married?” “Four years.” He eyes me. “And she is lovely, but be wary, too. She’s a Sextus through merit. She’s sharper than she lets on.”

Time slips. Begins to blur as the night screams around me, over me, through me.

There’s a moment of displacement as my stomach sucks up into my chest; the darkness, the yawning depths at my feet, and I’m back at Suus. Falling, helpless and scared, my father’s bloodied, pleading gaze on me as I vanish from his sight.

Some of the tangled growth around me is cleared, cut away to provide an easier path. I am not the only recent visitor.

That same old form of Vetusian I saw in the other ruins. LUCEUM. OBITEUM. RES. REMEMBER, BUT DO NOT MOURN.

“What is this place?” I mutter the words absently, glaring at the massive symbol ahead. “It is a test.” “VEK!”

AHHHH

It’s not thick enough to hide that where his eyes should be, there are only gaping, red holes. The stranger doesn’t react to my fear. Just watches me. Motionless. Mute.

A bracer, studded with several dozen small stones. Each one with a unique symbol etched into it.

I pick a stone with two perpendicular crosses and give it a short, sharp twist. Sure enough, a soft grating echoes from the left-most corner section. Right where it should in the Labyrinth.

“You’re fine,” I whisper to it. Abandoned and alone, injured, struggling. Maybe I see more of myself here than I care to admit.

“But he didn’t have any friends, really, either. It’s just… it’s the sort of thing that makes a difference.” He screws up his face and shakes his head in embarrassment, then hurries off.