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Red-and-white checkered awnings lined both sides of Main Street, providing shade to the countless tables, which were full of unnaturally large produce of every conceivable variety from every climate known to grow edible plants: carrots, cucumbers, tomatoes, potatoes, mangos, pineapple, coffee, cocoa. The Dikaió Culture citizens grew the crops that fed the city in their fields atop the glass towers downtown—each skyscraper roof grew an abundance of seasonal produce to fill the market each week. Some of the stalls displayed animal products like milk, cheese, and honey. Animals were precious, so meat was reserved for special occasions and could not be found at the market. It would not be safe to keep the animals atop the skyscrapers where the crops were grown, so the livestock were kept in the prairie lands just outside the city, but not outside the protection of the city’s light.

On Saturdays, the Farmer’s Market was usually full of the bustling noises of the city’s citizens shopping for the week, but that day the crowds were silently staring at a seventeen-year-old girl with stormy gray eyes, olive skin, and wild, curly brown hair flowing behind her as she ran down the center lane carrying her groceries home.

A woman’s voice broke the silence: “How did she do that?”

The question was familiar enough that it did not interrupt Mallory’s concentration. She moved with wicked speed, pushing a one-wheeled wooden cart full of produce and using two long poles in the back to steer. Her chin jutted out with determination, as she deftly maneuvered the cart around the stunned crowd, including a magistrate in his pristine blue uniform and cap, who blew his whistle and called for her to stop. His calls were largely irrelevant, as everyone knew that he would never chase her down or bring her before the Administrator given her family’s status. Besides, the cart was so heavy at this point that it was almost impossible to stop, and the slight slope of Main Street meant that Mallory was picking up speed. Two companions, roughly her age, were running after her. Her friends were transporting their groceries in the usual fashion, in their families’ grocery boxes. The boxes, white with silver stripes, flew via six spinning propellers. Loaded with their families’ allotted groceries, the boxes were struggling to keep up with the three teenagers.

The boy, Caleb, was tall with short-cropped sandy, blond hair. His eyes were every bit as bright and piercing as the girl with the cart’s were gray and stormy. The sky reflected in them seemed to laugh as he ran. The other girl, who went by Alex instead of Alexandria, had emerald-green eyes, and she was breathing heavily. Her straight, black hair bobbed harshly as she stumbled along. She wore a simple dark blue uniform, nearly identical to the magistrate’s except for the insignia and holstered weapon. She was slightly shorter than the girl with the cart, but her demeaner demanded attention, which was saying something given the spectacle racing down the street.

“Mallory,” Alex huffed, “would you please just let us help you? All we have to do is say the word.”

“Whatever for, my dear?” Mallory laughed merrily as she turned a corner on the left, nearly spilling all the contents of her cart. “I think this new invention is working quite well, and it’s so much faster than your silly old Dikaió boxes anyway. What do you think, Caleb?”

Caleb nodded, “Oh yes! It’s one of your best ideas yet, Mal.”

Mallory smiled genuinely this time; the flush in her cheeks from running, growing more crimson.

 

Alex teasingly threw her shoulder into Caleb as they rounded the corner behind Mallory, and he would have fallen into a table full of honey jars if the owner had not yelled, “Cloth, protect!” The tablecloth reached up and caught the boy just before he destroyed months of the bees’ labor.

“Thanks!” Caleb smiled awkwardly. The stall owner glared at him but nodded an acknowledgment all the same. Then Caleb raced away to catch up with his friends.

The road Mallory had turned onto led to Silver Street. It was lined by some of the oldest buildings in the city, constructed by the founding families. Unlike the ten-to-twelve story buildings that were made of steel and glass along Main Street and some of the newer parts of the city, the houses on Silver Street were made of cobblestone, thick wooden beams, and stucco. Every home was immaculately kept up with beautiful yards of manicured grass and flower gardens. The wealthiest families of the Dikaió guilds lived in these houses. The wealthy homes of Silver Street were just downhill from Mallory’s own house in the Governor’s District where the leaders of the city lived.

The hill was not steep, but she was hoping the cart’s momentum would keep her from having to strain too hard to push it the final few yards home. Nearing the crest, she did not quite make it to the top before her momentum ran out, and the cart began to push her back down the hill. She braced her feet, but the small stones in the road kept her feet from fully contacting the pavement, as they rolled out from under the treads of her shoes. Not being able to gain any friction to stop her descent, she slid backwards past Alex, who paused and watched sadly as her friend lost ground. About midway down the hill Mallory bumped into something solid in the middle of the road and stopped sliding backwards.

She looked over her shoulder to find herself wedged between the heavy cart and Caleb, who had finally caught up to his two friends. He was grinning and breathing heavily.

“Troubles?” He asked.

Mallory tried to move around him or push back up the hill, but the weight of the cart kept her pinned against him. “Okay, move!” She ordered.

Caleb laughed, “If I move, you’re going to end up all the way at the bottom of the hill and then what?”

Mallory bit her lip. She hated it when he was right, and she hated feeling powerless. “There has to be a way to get this thing up the hill.”

“I can help,” Alex yelled from the top of the hill, “I just need to say the word.”

“I hope you fall in a lake!” Mallory yelled back at her.

Alex winced then yelled back, “If you had magic, you’d be in trouble for that you know.”

Caleb laughed at the exchange as he always did, “And you’d be all wet, Alex!” Then he looked down at Mallory who was still struggling to push off of him, “But on the other hand, if you had magic, we wouldn’t be in this position in the first place, would we?”

His breath tickled her ear, and Mallory’s temperature, which was already elevated from running across the city with her cart, increased uncomfortably. Only last year, Caleb had been as awkward and spindly as she and Alex were, but overnight his tall frame had broadened. Now he looked more like her dad than her childhood friend, and Mallory was not sure how she felt about it. However, his increase in size and muscle was the only thing keeping her from embarrassingly sprawling at the bottom of the hill, so there were certainly perks to be considered—which gave her an idea.  

“Here, hold these,” she said, handing Caleb the poles she had been using to steer the cart. He took them and rather effortlessly supported the weight of the cart. Mallory ducked down under the pole, and she popped back up on the other side free of the weight of the cart. She giggled and smiled demurely at Caleb, “Would you mind?”

“Oh, I don’t think so!” Caleb motioned to set the cart down, which would have almost certainly sent carrots, cabbages, and potatoes tumbling down the hill behind him.

“C’mon,” Mallory said, “we’re so close to the top. It wouldn’t be much for you.”

Alex had walked back down to the pair. “We could just use magic. Cart, up the hill,” she ordered. The cart sat motionless in Caleb’s hands.

Mallory’s smile faded. “It’s not that kind of cart, Alex. Now, Caleb, what do you say?”

Caleb looked from Mallory to the cart and back again, frowning. Then his face brightened. “What would be the difference between me doing the work for you and Alex using magic to help you? She could call a couple of sprites to lift the handles and push.”

Mallory eyebrows leaned in toward her brow, and the corners of her mouth sucked in slightly. He had her, and she knew it, and even worse, the smirking expression on her face showed that Alex knew it too. The three stood there in a standoff between the immaculate buildings on either side of Silver Street. The downwash of air between the buildings had created a gale of wind, and Mallory’s curly hair whipped wildly around while she thought about how she was going to get that cart up the hill. Just then Alex and Caleb’s grocery boxes finally turned the corner and caught up with them. Mallory watched as the boxes fought the wind to climb the hill. They both leaned to one side, and began to zig zag, sluicing through the wind in a parallel two-step dance through the air until they reached the group. Mallory cocked her head to the side and bit her lip.

“Oh no!” Caleb muttered. “She’s thinking.”

Alex’s eyes widened, “Mallory?”

Mallory smiled broadly, “Excuse me,” she said, ducking below Caleb’s hand holding the cart handle. She pressed herself back between Caleb and the cart. Caleb blushed slightly in the awkwardness of it all, but he could not help but laugh. Mallory took hold of the handles. “Okay, you can let go now. I’ve got this.” Caleb let go, and Mallory began to push the cart, not directly up the hill, but imitating the grocery boxes, zigging and zagging from one side of the street to the other. The incline was much easier to manage as she was only climbing the hill a few feet at a time at an angle rather than trying to assault it head on. Caleb and Alex were waiting for her at the top of the hill when she finally made it, slightly winded but beaming with accomplishment. Both were silent at her victory, but that was how these sorts of things usually went, and so without a word they continued on toward Mallory’s house.

The Matriarch’s house was a picturesque shingle-style cottage with open-air verandas on the second floor that wrapped nearly all the way around, punctuated by four triangular walls inlaid with picture windows, one on each side of the home, and four turrets on each corner. Gray-and-brown cut cobblestones were intricately stacked about midway up the house, and brightly-painted periwinkle wooden siding ran from midway up to the deep-black shingles covering the roof. The door to the house was painted an inviting royal red, and matching roses were immaculately displayed throughout the landscaping, drawing the eye from every perspective. Two centuries-old oaks stood on the corners of the grounds; their branches hospitably bidding every passerby to come and be welcome in their shade. The house faced the public square, opposite the Governor’s house—which was every bit as uninviting in its white colonial formality as the Matriarch’s house was calm and cozy.

Mallory and her friends headed past the stone steps leading toward the red front door, past the waving oak, and turned in down a side path that led to the back door.  Mallory stopped short and looked for a place to set her cart down. Right now, the cart was supported by a wheel and her two legs, but if she just dropped the handles then the only thing supporting it would be the wheel, and all the fruits and vegetables from the Farmer’s Market would tumble out. “I think on the next iteration of this cart, I’ll add a couple of legs for support under the handles. Would you two mind holding the handles while I unload the cart?”

Caleb reached down and took a handle, but Alex stepped back firmly. “No!”

“C’mon, Alex. It’ll just take a minute,” Mallory assured.

“No. I’ve put up with your experiment long enough, Mallory Knenne. You’ve had your fun with your ‘girl-powered’ grocery box.’” Alex made quotation marks with her fingers for emphasis. “Emptying this thing by hand is going to take a lot longer than a minute, and you know it. Let me unload the box, so we can do something fun with the rest of our day.”

“She’s right,” Caleb nodded and put his free hand on Mallory’s shoulder. “What d’ya say, Mal? Want to have some fun with your friends today?”

Mallory thought this had been fun, but after the fight up the hill with the cart, she didn’t have the energy to argue: “Fine! Go ahead!”

 

Alex smiled and bounded up the stoop to the backdoor. She leaned inside and called with confident authority, “Pantry sprites, collect, sort, and store the groceries.” Four silver wheels, each about two feet tall with neon white lights flashing near their centers, burst out of the door and rushed toward Alex and Caleb’s grocery boxes, still hovering near them. “No, no! Pantry sprites, wrong boxes!” Alex yelled. The wheels stopped and sat, quivering in place, waiting for the right words. “Pantry sprites, collect groceries from this wooden cart.” Flustered, Alex pointed toward Mallory’s cart. Three of the silver wheels shot nylon cords from their centers, which spread into a net. The fourth wheel rolled into the cart, began quickly levering itself under the produce, and pitching it over the side into the net. Within a minute all the produce had been unloaded into the woven net, and the wheels scurried back into the house to unload their bounty.

Mallory dropped her handle, “I’m going to go find some wood to make legs for this cart. Who’s with me?”

Caleb dropped his handle, tipping the cart on its side, “Another time, Mal. You agreed to have some fun with your friends.”

“Caleb, you’ve always said helping me with my projects is fun.”

“Have I?” Caleb scratched the back of his head, grinning awkwardly.

Alex stomped her foot. “Knock it off, you two! I already know what we’re going to do for the rest of our day. I have a new book.”

Mallory’s jaw dropped. “Why didn’t you start with that when we met this morning?”

 

Alex shrugged. “It was market day. You would have wanted to go look right away, and my mother would have lost her mind if I didn’t get the edamame this week. That stuff disappears faster than Caleb when cleaning duty is being assigned at school.”

“Well, let’s go look at it now!”

Caleb ignored the jab at his aversion to cleaning, “I’m in. I’ll go drop off my groceries and meet you both at Book Club.”

In short order, the three teens were standing outside Alex’s grandparents’ house, static excitement charging the air around them. The Tudor house was dark even in the full light of the sun. Large pines stood at every corner. Moss covered, natural stone cladding rose up the first story of the house and the chimney above the roof. The half-story just below the roof was lined with dark brown, cedar-shake siding. The trim of the windows and doors were all hunter green, nearly the same color as the pines and the moss.  The current Administrator, her grandfather, occupied the main house with her grandmother, and she and her parents lived in the Chief Magistrate’s coach house in the rear.

As the apprentice to the Administrator, Alex’s father led the magistrates in maintaining justice throughout the city. Soon though, they would be moving into the main house. Her father would take the master’s position as soon as Alex turned eighteen, and Alex would become the Chief Magistrate administrating justice to the city like her ancestors before her. She had been trained as an expert marksman, knew martial arts, and all the laws and the words with which to enforce them with the Dikaió. One day the main house would be hers.

Alex checked the door; it was locked. Her grandparents and parents must all still be at the market, but the house knew Alex, and she unlocked the main door with a word: “Open.” Mallory and Caleb followed her into a dark foyer. Normally, they would have made themselves at home, being frequent guests at the Administrator’s home, but this was a clandestine visit. Alex lit no lights as the they crept to the back stairs that led to the attic. The attic door was sealed with old magic; there were no words that could open it, so no one in Alex’s family had been in the room for generations, but while hunting for invention supplies in the old buildings on the estate, Mallory had found the secret. Alex pulled a golden key on a chain from under her shirt and inserted it in a small hole below a brass knob. The lock clicked as she turned it, and then she twisted the knob. The three teens burst into a dusty room full of bookshelves.

Books were a rarity in the city. Everyday life’s Dikaió magic was passed by word of mouth, and books were not only unnecessary, but had come to be seen as dangerous. Before the three teens were born, in their parents’ youth, two young boys had turned up a book full of old magic. They had fiddled with a particular section of words and ended up creating a sprite that projected an intense arc of fire extruding from silver funnels on top of a spinning turret. Nearly as soon as they had used the Dikaió to birth the fire sprite, they had lost control of it and the boys were the sprite’s first victims. Then it had started several houses on fire, and no one could turn it off or stop its advance down the street. The charred remains of the houses still stood on Manuel Ave. Caleb’s grandfather, who had just become the acting governor that year, had confronted the sprite as it rolled mercilessly down the street. No one was sure if he could control the old magic, but when he yelled, “Dikaió fire cease!” the sprite went dark. It was quickly dismantled and destroyed. The City Council had issued the decree at that point that the ability to read would be reserved for the ruling Dikaió class, and it was only to be used in emergencies. All other magic for everyday life would be memorized; nothing was written down, and all other books were confiscated and destroyed by the Governor’s Office.

Mallory had found the first unconfiscated book in her grandmother’s study when she was ten-years old, playing hide and seek with Alex and Caleb. The book was behind a door under the oak shelves. All three had learned the basics of reading by that point, given their class, but none had actually seen a book that was not conjured in the light of the Dikaió. It was large, about the size of a small painting in a frame, and heavy. It was titled Basics of Woodworking and had informed many of Mallory’s earliest inventions, granting her a semblance of magic—some even called it old magic—that allowed her to do everyday things without using the Dikaió. Ever since, the three friends had been collecting books and squirreling them away in a secret room in Alex’s grandfather’s attic, which they called the “Book Club.” Caleb had even smuggled out the book that had created the fire sprite from a shelf in the basement of city hall, but not even Mallory dared to touch that one on its perch at the top of the highest attic shelf. Mallory often wondered if this room contained all that was left of the old magic. If it did, and anyone found out about Book Club, it would surely be destroyed. They were the sacred protectors.

Alex closed the door and turned the ancient lock. The girls sat down in two armchairs that had bits of fluff protruding from their worn blue-and-red plaid fabric coverings. Caleb plopped lengthwise on an old couch that they’d covered with a sheet, so that a desert dust storm would not form every time the young man decided to get comfortable. Mallory started the process of lighting the oil lamp. Alex had wanted to outfit the Book Club with some Dikaió lamps, but Mallory insisted that the lighting should fit the atmosphere of having physical books, and by using one of their book finds as a guide, she had managed to convert two Dikaió lamps into old-magic lamps that used a flaming fabric wick hanging in a pool of paraffin to provide light by fire. The fire was easy enough to produce with a bit of magnesium they had taken from the Smith Guild, which could be sparked by striking it on metal. The paraffin had been a trick to find, but the book said that one of paraffin’s uses was as an ingredient in pesticide, and it turned out that the Dikaió Culture Co-op still used it for that purpose in the rooftop gardens atop the skyscrapers and had readily parted with a gallon, completely unaware of its flammable nature.

As Mallory lit the lamps, a warm glow spread across the room. Shadows paired with the light in a chaotic but oddly soothing dance, recalling some primitive feeling of safety around the firelight. Awash in the amber light, Mallory leaned back in her chair, crossed her legs, and folded her hands in her lap. “I call this meeting of the Book Club to order. Alexandria Nelson, future Dikaió Administrator, you have summoned us here with news of an unread volume. Is this so?”

Alex sat up straight and smoothed the wrinkles from her navy-blue pants, always happy to take a more formal tone. “That is correct, future Madame Matriarch.” She pulled a large, leatherbound book from behind her chair. “It’s a peculiar volume with no title.”

Caleb sat up and reached across, pulling the book from her hands.

“Hey,” Alex yelled. “Give it back!”

He smiled, holding the book away. “As the future Dikaió Governor, it is my duty to inspect this volume to ensure the safety of the city,” he replied smugly.

Mallory laughed, “C’mon, Caleb. Put it on the coffee table where we can all see.” Caleb shrugged and laid the book on the table.

Alex carefully opened the cover, “As I was saying, there’s no title, but it has a very curious table of contents.”

Mallory eyes widened as she quickly scanned the words. “What does it mean?”

“It means we shouldn’t be messing with it,” Caleb slammed the cover shut and picked it up again. He pushed off the couch with the book and started walking to the tallest bookshelf. “I’m putting it up top with the fire-sprite book.”

“Caleb, wait!” Alex cried standing from her chair and moving after him. “C’mon, give it back!” Mallory followed after her, both girls trying to take the book back, but this time he held it above their heads.

“No!” Caleb’s voice was low and threatening, and the girls stepped back. “I’m not joking around about this. These are the sorts of things that could really hurt people in this city, and even though I’m not the Governor yet, I am training to be. It’s my christened duty to protect you and everyone else here. You invited me to be part of the Book Club because the three of us will one day be in charge of the city, and knowing when to take the knowledge from these old books and when to leave them alone is part of our legacy. You know as well as I do that this is one of those ‘leave-it-alone moments.’”

“Well, there’s no harm in me looking at it,” Mallory whispered. “I can’t use magic anyway.”

“I’m sorry, Mal. We still don’t know what a Dikaió Chorus is capable of. What if you start trying out some of the phrases in this book, and it turns out you can use the dangerous kind of magic after all?”

Alex pleaded, “And what if there’s something in there that could help Mallory use the good and helpful magic like the rest of us?”

 

“It’s not worth the risk to everyone else, Alex. We have to agree not to mess with this book.”

Alex nearly spat, “I’m not agreeing to anything of the sort.”

“You’ll agree, or I’ll tell my father about Book Club,” Caleb retorted.

Mallory stepped back. “Caleb, no! You can’t!”

“I can, and I will. I walk past those burned-out houses on Manuel every day on the way to my duties in the city, and every time I do, I wonder if we’re going to end up like those two boys that created the fire sprite. People were in those houses, Mal. Do you want that on your conscience, Alex?”

“Of course not. But how do you know there’s a fire sprite in that book?” Alex pointed.

“I don’t, but I don’t know there isn’t one in here either, or something worse, and I’m not willing to risk it. Now promise me you’ll leave it alone!”

“Fine!” Alex sank back into her chair.

Mallory also sat down and nodded slightly.

Caleb placed the large volume on top of the fire-sprite shelf. They sat for a time in awkward silence: the two girls brooding, and Caleb not willing to face their ire but drawing a blank on how to lighten the mood or change the subject. The joy of the Book Club was lost, at least for today. Finally, Mallory leaned over and blew out the lamps. The three friends did not say another word to each other as they slipped down the stairs and out of the house, heading for their respective homes.

When Mallory got home, her parents were still not home from the market either. They had moved into the Matriarch’s home two years ago on her mother’s thirty-fifth birthday, when she inherited the role of Matriarch. There had been a constant stream of Dikaió christenings that her mother had to attend after that, and Mallory was required to attend all of them as the Matriarch in training. Her mother drilled her daily on the magic words that the Matriarch was required to use in her various duties. Her mother gave her the same pitying look every time Mallory tried to use magic and nothing happened. It was maddening.

Mallory collapsed on a plush chaise in the living room. She did not want to think about her loss right now. There was a new variable at play, and she had not had time to process what it meant. She looked out the large bay window toward the Governor’s house just past the large oak. She tilted her head and bit the corner of her lip. Mallory had never seen Caleb so upset about a book before, not even the fire-sprite book. He was the one who had brought it to the Book Club and placed it like a trophy on top of the tallest shelf. If he were so worried about them messing with hurtful magic, why would he make that book accessible to them? And was what Alex said possible? Could there be something in the new volume that would make her Dikaió useful, that would give her the same abilities with magic that everyone else in the city enjoyed?  It seemed impossible, but she couldn’t shake the small ember of feeling that the new book had fanned up inside her, a feeling she had not felt since she was a little girl: hope.