Free Babylon Steel by Gaie Sebold Page A

Ikinchli. We have people with tusks, people with fur, we have Barraklé and Edleskasin and even Monishish or Dra-ay from the Perindi Empire. Hells, there are at least thirty known races within the Perindi Empire alone, and half of them seem to end up here.
    No-one knows who the original builders of the city were, or what they looked like. If there were builders. The city feels so alive, sometimes I think it just set itself here, and waited for people to start arriving, to fill its lungs with breath and its veins with blood.
    I headed to the Hall of Mirrors. It looked spectacular, as always. Its dome is a fine framework of black-painted iron, lacing together panes of multicoloured glass; by day it’s pretty enough, but at night, with all the light spilling out, it looks like a giant coloured lantern. (If you’re of a cynical turn, of course, it’s more reminiscent of one of those deep-ocean fish I’ve heard of, that uses pretty lights to lure its prey).
    The smell of expensive perfumes, the subdued notes of a small orchestra, and the discreet murmur of a great deal of money changing hands greeted me as I went in, and looked up, like I always do. I had a drunken conversation with a friend once who suggested the panes of glass are in a mystic pattern which hypnotises people into spending money. We had just been on a bit of a spree, admittedly, but I think he was wrong. Although the first thing I saw when I dropped my gaze was Bannerman’s, and his window display got me, like it always does, dammit.
    I told myself I wasn’t here to shop, but I did go over for one quick look. Okay, there wasn’t anything there I actually needed, but it was all so shiny. And I was pretty sure the centrepiece was a Gillalune. Elegant, gorgeous, just the thing for day or evening wear... but I really, really didn’t need another sword, and I couldn’t afford a Gillalune anyway. I was still there, trying not to drool too obviously, when I heard my name being called.
    “Hey, Chief,” I said. “How’s it going?”
    He strolled over, saw what I was looking at, and whistled. “Splashing out?”
    “That wouldn’t be a splash, that would be a flood.”
    We both looked at the window for a bit longer, and Bitternut sighed. “Beautiful.”
    “You think it’s a Gillalune?”
    “Looks like it, doesn’t it?” he said. “Look at that wave-pattern on the blade. Bet it sings like a bird.”
    “Yep. You got time for spice tea? I need to talk to you about something.”
    He gave a quick glance around. “Looks quiet enough, so long as we stay on the square, but I can’t stop long.”
    We settled ourselves at the only café where we could both fit our legs under the table.
    “So how are you?” I said.
    “Crazed. Carnival opened last night.”
    “Ah.”
    Carnival’s a portal. There are seven permanent or near-permanent portals. Four are fixed ones that always open onto the same planes. Portal Bealach is the biggest, our main trade route. It links to a spot on the border between the Perindi Empire and the Flame Republic (lot of work for the Diplomatic section). Portal Eventide links to the Fey lands; Throat Portal links to a plane that seems to be mostly ice, darkness, and brutally ferocious beasts, but also contains several powerful if not very appealing countries (more diplomacy); and Portal Spirita, which is an anomaly – it’s a permanent portal, but the plane on the other side changes. Very little comes through Spirita, and what does is strange. Stranger, that is, than what comes through the others. Lunatic travellers, self-proclaimed saviours, victims of obscure curses and scholars of lost tongues.
    The other portals seem to open up almost at random, but they all have a feel, or a mood, if you like. There’s Crowns, through which we get generals without their armies, weapons-makers, runaway heirs to distant thrones, royal retinues, escaped slaves (that’s where Flower came through), wandering bureaucrats, occasional legions that