Chapter 5: The Heretic's Map
The silence in the cockpit was heavier than the Miasma. Kaelen's eyes were flat, his voice devoid of the panic from the chase, replaced by a cold, transactional calm that Lyra found far more threatening.
She weighed her options. He was right. She had endangered him, his ship, his livelihood. But this artifact... this was her entire life. It was her father's life.
Slowly, keeping her eyes on his, she unclipped her pack and settled it on her lap. The muffled, cold throb was steady against her legs.
"They'll kill you just for seeing it, Kaelen," she warned, her voice low. "This isn't just stolen goods. This is heresy."
"I've been hauling heresy since before you could climb a rope," he retorted, not moving. "Show me. Now. Or I'll space you and take my chances with the Hounds. At least they might believe I was just a stupid, hijacked pilot. If I show up with you," he jabbed a finger at her, "I'm an accomplice. I'm already a dead man, Lyra. So you're going to give me a reason to live."
She took a breath, her hand closing around the cold metal inside the pack. "You're not wrong."
Lyra pulled her spare cloak away, and the cockpit was instantly flooded with a soft, pulsing violet light. Kaelen's breath hitched.
She lifted the artifact from her bag. It was a sphere of interlocking, dark metal rings, all orbiting a core of what looked like solid, captured twilight. The light came from that core—a swirling, purple-black energy she'd never seen before. As she held it, the rings began to turn slowly, aligning themselves with some unseen force, their movements intricate and impossibly precise. Tiny, pin-prick lights, like stars, ignited and died along the edges of the rings. It wasn't just an object; it was a device. And it was working.
"By the Architect's broken throne," Kaelen whispered, his anger momentarily forgotten, replaced by a scavenger's awe. "That's not just an artifact. That's a... a Keystone."
"That's what the Purifiers called it," Lyra said, her voice barely audible over the hum of the ship. "My father called it the Lodestone. The Lodestone of Aethelgard."
Kaelen's head snapped up, his eyes sharp. "Aethelgard? That's a myth. A children's story about a city in the sky that survived the Fall."
"It's not a myth." Lyra's hands tightened on the sphere. "My father was an Architect historian. A 'heretic,' according to Soris. He spent his life searching for this. He believed the Architects didn't just die out. He believed the most powerful of them left, that they built Aethelgard to escape the Miasma, to escape the decay."
She looked down at the swirling core. "He said the Purifiers aren't just enforcers. They're a cult. They believe the Architects are gods who sacrificed themselves to build our islands, and that any attempt to 'ascend'—to find Aethelgard—is the ultimate sin. They took my father when I was twelve. I've been searching for this, for his work, ever since. I'm not just a scavenger, Kaelen. I'm finishing what he started."
Kaelen stared at the device, his expression unreadable. He reached out a gloved hand, not to take it, but to trace one of the orbiting rings.
"He was right about one thing," Kaelen said softly, his eyes fixed on the pin-prick lights. "This isn't just a key. It's a map. A navigational chart."
He turned back to his console, his movements quick and decisive. He pulled up his own star charts—a complex, 3D rendering of the known floating islands and trade routes.
"Your father's a fool, and you're a bigger one," he said, but the bite was gone. He was thinking, calculating. "This... Aethelgard... even if it's real, it's not just a place. It's a lie that will get us all killed. But the Purifiers believe in it. And they want this."
He pointed to the Lodestone, then to his own charts. "They've locked down The Rim. They'll have alerts at every major port before we're halfway to Bazaar. Your five hundred credits is worthless."
"So what's the new price?" Lyra asked, her stomach twisting.
"The price is, you stop being a scavenger and you start being my partner," he said, turning back to her. "That thing," he motioned to the Lodestone, "is a map to a place that shouldn't exist. Which means it's probably full of things that really shouldn't exist. Architect-tech. Untouched. The biggest score in history."
"You want a cut," she said flatly.
"A cut?" He laughed, a short, harsh sound. "No, kid. I want half. Fifty-fifty. I get us through the blockades, I get us to Bazaar where we can find someone who can read this damn thing, and I keep us alive. In exchange, I get half of whatever treasure is waiting at the end of your fairy tale. And on my ship, you do exactly what I say, when I say it. You're not a passenger anymore. You're crew."
He extended his gloved hand. "That's the deal. Or you can take your magic ball and try to float to the next island on your own."
Lyra looked at his hand, then at the Lodestone pulsing in her lap. It was a beacon. And it was painting a target on her back. She couldn't do this alone.
"Fifty-fifty," she agreed, placing her hand in his. His grip was like a steel trap. "But it's my map. I have final say on where we go."
"We go where the map says," Kaelen corrected, releasing her hand. "But we go how I say."
He turned back to the controls, his good mood evaporating. "Now put that thing away. That light gives me a headache. And it's probably broadcasting our position to every Hound in the sky."
Lyra carefully wrapped the Lodestone and put it back in her pack. But as she did, she saw the pin-prick lights on the rings flicker. They weren't random. They were forming a new pattern.
The Lodestone wasn't just a map. It was plotting a course. And it was a course Kaelen's charts had never seen before.