While we walk, I fill Agni in on what we've developed of the plan so far. She gives a startled squawk when I tell her we're planning to take the fortress by storm, but as I go on she gets more thoughtful, brow creasing. When I'm done, we pass the last few minutes in silence as she ponders.

  The chamber we come to shows signs of having been used as a meeting room before. There's a table-like slab of rock with a few dead buglights on it and scratches on the walls that might have been maps or diagrams. Racnaea is already there, but there's no sign of Sprocket.

  "You're late, I suppose," she says to Margie.

  "These two had something they needed to work out," Margie says. "And nobody else is here either."

  "They are also a little bit completely late," Racnaea says.

  A few minutes later three men arrive. The leader is older, his hair a wild frizz of pure white, one eye a milky gray. The other is still sharp, though, and he focuses immediately on Agni, going tense at the sight of her uniform. The pair behind him look like bruisers, tall and heavy-set, with long clubs made from pick-handles in their makeshift belts.

  "What the fuck's this?" he says, turning to Margie. "You decide you like the taste of boot-leather now, you fat twat?"

  "Shut up and wait, Arborough," Margie says. "I don't want to have to explain it twice when Jena gets here."

  "She's here," says a woman's voice from another tunnel. Jena swaggers in, whip-thin and wiry. "But for once I agree with the old fucker. What's going on, Mags?"

  "Right." Margie gets up and gestures to me. "Kal, this is Arborough and Jena. They run the other two shifts." She looks sidelong at the pair. "If you can call them shifts. Assholes, this is Kal, the newest arrival."

  I stand up. "Welcome."

  The pair of them look at me skeptically.

  "What's he good for?" Arborough says.

  "I'd do him." Jena picks something out of her teeth. "Might not be proud of it after, though."

  "Kal has a plan to get us all out of here," Margie says.

  "Him and everyone else who comes through the gate," Arborough says. But he's looking at Agni.

  "I have more than a plan. I have friends," I say. "This is Agni. She's with us. And I have some allies on the outside, desert nomads."

  "And Racnaea's on board," Margie says.

  Racnaea, goggled again, has been looking across the table with a scowl. At this she starts and puts on a grimace instead.

  "That true?" Jena says. "You think it can work?"

  "It work," Racnaea allows. "But only if we are a little bit completely committed."

  Arborough snorts and shakes his head.

  I lay it out. The lift, the ventilation shafts, the armory, the walls. I give it everything I've got, all the little confidence tricks and easy smiles. I can feel Jena coming around, her excitement building every time Arborough voices an objection and I have an answer. The old man, though, is still scowling by the time I'm finished.

  "Fuck," Jena says. ". We could do it. Take the walls and string the commandant up by his fucking ears."

  "Yeah?" Arborough says. "Then what?"

  "Then … whatever we fucking want, right?" Jena says. "We'd be ."

  "Out into the desert."

  You could be reading stolen content. Head to Royal Road for the genuine story.

  "There are emergency supplies in the storehouse," Agni says. "Food and water for months, in case the cargo ships don't make it through."

  "Great," Arborough says. "So we won't starve before the Navy comes and blasts us to bits."

  "We'll fight them too, if we have to," Jena says. "You heard the guard. There are guns and things on the walls."

  "You don't know what you're fucking talking about," Arborough says. "You're a . I served ten years on one of Earth-as-in-Heaven's battleships. could blow this whole place apart from out past the horizon. You can't fight the City, the ."

  "," I cut in, loud enough that everyone stops to look at me. Under the combined gazes, I hesitate, but only a little.

  They're just marks, I tell myself. Just another couple of marks.

  "That's how the Princeps rules," I go on, before anyone can object. "You think he's unbeatable, inevitable, so you don't fight back. And because nobody fights back, it becomes . But only because people believe it."

  "I've seen what happens to people who try to fight," Arborough snarls. "They end up in the Wailing Dark, or used by fleshcrafters for spare parts. Don't tell me the Navy ain't real."

  "Oh, it's real. There are ships and guns and dungeons." I give a confident smile, ignoring my churning stomach. "But who crews the ships? Who fires the guns?"

  "The Princeps' sailors --"

  "The Princeps' . People picked up from the tithe. You think they want to be there?" I point upward, toward the guards. "Hell, you think any of want to be there?"

  "They're still going to pull the triggers," Arborough says. "Or else they end up down here with us."

  "And who throws them in the pit? . Don't you get it? Everybody obeys because they're scared of what everybody who obeys might do! The whole thing is a house of fucking cards. If enough people figure out that there's another option, it all comes tumbling down. All it needs is somewhere to get started. And that's here."

  "Why here?" Jena asks, sounding genuinely curious.

  "Because this is the back end of nowhere." I'm improvising now, sprinting along as fast as I can while the bridge burns behind me, driven by the wild fizz in my blood. "It'll take time for the City to even find out what we've done, and more time for them to do anything about it. We can spread the word -- my nomad friends will help. You think the desert clans want to tithe their young people to the Princeps? We can send ambassadors to the mountain towns, all the way to the Divide. You think they're happy with the City taking half their rockwater? Hell, even the fucking cannibals would probably be on our side. Can't ask for a more glorious fight than this!"

  "That's a lot of maybes," Arborough grumbles. "What if nobody answers?"

  "You want to spend the rest of your life down here, old man?" Margie says. To my surprise, she's looking fired up too. Even Racnaea is sitting up straighter in her seat. "Not interested in seeing the suns again?"

  "Of course I want to get out!" Arborough snaps. "But these are my people we're talking about. I have a responsibility to them, and that means not getting them killed doing something stupid."

  "You mean you're comfortable being boss, and this might shake things up," Jena sneers. "I've seen you getting cozy with the guards. Getting a few little favors, are we?"

  "At least I haven't fucked half the mine --"

  "If it's your people you're worried about, why don't we put it to them?" I say. "We can go right now. I'll lay out the plan."

  "Kal --" Margie hisses, .

  I wave her down. Yes, going public with the plan would be a disaster, but the suggestion calls Arborough's bluff. Because Jena's right -- he look comfortable with the way things are. But even the two bruisers behind him are looking thoughtful, and I'm sure the rest of his shift would be more likely to see things my way. He must know that, too.

  "Shit." Arborough runs a hand through his white fuzz of hair. "You really mean it, don't you?"

  "I do," I say.

  "And you?" He looks to Agni. "You haven't said much. You're really committed to this?"

  "I'm here, aren't I?" She looks uncomfortable. "I have one condition."

  "Condition?" I look at her. This is the first I've heard of it.

  "It's about what you said. How the guards don't even want to be here." She takes a deep breath. "I want your promise that any guards who don't fight won't be hurt."

  "What the ?" Jena says.

  "Do you know what they've done to us?" Arborough says. "For ?"

  "That's my condition," Agni says. "Your promise, or else I'm out."

  "She's right," I say, before a general argument can start. "The whole point is that nobody has a choice in any of this. The blame goes to the system, the Princeps."

  "You can be fucking sure not going to pull any punches with ," Jena says.

  "Anybody who fights, do what you have to do. But some of them will be asleep in their beds. Just give them a chance to surrender, that's all."

  "What about the commandant?" Jena says. " sure as shit wants to be here."

  "Hang him up by his ears," Agni says immediately. "I don't give a damn."

  There's another pause.

  "It's not unreasonable," Arborough concedes.

  "Then you're in?" Jena says.

  He runs his hand through his hair again. "I'll put it to my people."

  Rekka would be proud of me, especially since I cribbed half that stuff from one of her coffeehouse speeches. It had gotten polite applause from the City's children of privilege; I can see by the looks on the faces around me that it's gone a lot farther here.

  So. I guess we're doing this.

  We're all going to die, aren't we?