Fourteen: Upside Down

Lilith flared her wings like two pale blades and shot up to the Udis ruins hanging over Morris.

She drifted a slow circle in the dim air, then spotted an open window and dove headfirst.

The Little White Dragon tucked her wings; those white bone fins are great in open sky, but in tight rooms they snag like thorns.

For someone built for agility, getting jammed in a doorway when danger hits feels like a trap sprung.

Lilith lifted the Astrolabe and tipped its marble point with a small shake.

“Starlight.”

A pale-blue orb blossomed at the staff’s tip, a cold lantern pouring light over the hushed gloom.

“This place looks wrecked,” she muttered, words floating like breath in frost.

The room didn’t feel like it had slept for millennia; even under thick dust, its former shape lay clear like a sketch under ash.

Crouching, the Little White Dragon padded to a wooden cabinet. She tapped its face with the Astrolabe, and a thin breeze brushed the dust away like a hand wiping slate.

She pushed open the cloudy glass door and found a few useless cups nested inside, empty as shells.

With a sigh, Lilith shut the door. Looked like a pantry, so this was either a kitchen or a dining room.

She prowled the room, then found a door leading to a long corridor, a dark vein running through the house.

She circled again and found a pot flipped upside down, a cold stove above it gone mute, shattered bowls lying on the floor like broken moons.

Water stains ringed the tiles, traces of an overhead washer that once dripped like slow rain. A few canned goods hid in the cabinets like stubborn stones.

Shame. The house wore only dust, not ruin, but food doesn’t keep against time’s teeth.

When Lilith pried open a can, it offered nothing but a lump of unspeakable rot, a swamp of smell and color.

After confirming there was nothing else, the Little White Dragon went to the doorway and leapt, clawing up the frame like a cat on a tree.

Her short legs kicked and she huffed, crawling over the frame with stubborn breath like steam.

She dropped from the frame into a long corridor. Head bent, she studied the floor, its arc like a bridge backed by chandeliers that rose taller than her.

She tapped one with the Astrolabe, and the hanging lights answered, blooming with glow like night flowers.

So the arcane fixtures still worked; the outage had cut the magic flow. Get close, and the house remembered how to breathe.

The thought made her grateful she hadn’t hovered near that stove; one twitch and she might’ve lit it, and her head would’ve cooked like a chestnut.

Going full fire-head gets you smacked more often than not.

She kept walking. Two steps in, she tripped on a raised ornament, nearly planting her backside on the floor like a dropped peach.

Cursing, she stood. A few paces later, she headbutted another chandelier. The dark-purple frame stamped a hot-red mark across her face like a seal.

Pain bloomed. Lilith whimpered, voice thin as a kettle’s whistle.

“It hurts,” she hissed, and kicked the brute under the light.

The kick landed true on her tender pinky toe and the copper ridge, and the shock sent her rolling on the floor like a snagged fish.

“Mmph.” She hammered the chandelier’s frame with a small fist, then cradled her flushed hand and slunk past the bully lamp like a wary fox.

Stumbling through the corridor, the Little White Dragon burned half her effort to clamber over the opposite door and spilled headfirst into another room.

She was mad, heat rising like sparks. If she could draw enough Star Energy in this house, she wouldn’t be eating all this grief.

“Hmph. Careful, or I’ll start the Void Command Seat resonance and blast every obstacle here into the sky,” Lilith shot a glare down the corridor, anger coiled like a spring.

But she hadn’t forgotten why she’d come. She was here for the sword. The span above Hero Street was wide as a sea, and her task was heavy.

She couldn’t waste time.

She lifted her gaze and swept the room. Maybe a study? Yet with a table and two sofas, it felt more like a parlor.

Cabinets lined the sides, likely holding files. Lilith decided to fish for clues.

The Little White Dragon drew the Shattered Ark from her back, a broken star of steel, and tied a rope to its hilt.

She spun the rope and cast; the Broken Sword bit into the wall with a thunk, lodged like a nailed banner.

Lilith grabbed the rope and climbed to the cabinet, thighs pinching the line as she pulled the doors open like peeling bark.

As expected, the cabinet was crammed with files, a hive of paper.

She considered, then chose to burn a little Star Energy. If she ran dry, she’d dive into a sewer pipe later and top off like a thirsty eel.

She waved the Astrolabe. The files lifted from the cabinet and drifted free like leaves in a slow current.

She slid along the rope to the ceiling, a pale moth on a line, and wrenched the Shattered Ark back out of the wall.

The Little White Dragon stacked the files neatly before her, paper hills in a moonlit field, then sat and started flipping one page at a time.

“Victor Clinic, December income report? Even Necromancer Cultists need doctors. Learned something today.”

“Juo Brewery had a dew-distilling mishap. Wine prices rising long-term, the public wailing like wind? These Necromancer Cultists really love to drink. Pure drunks.”

“Education Department announced a new notice. Adults who failed assessment can take it again. Impact under observation.”

“What a mess,” Lilith grumbled, pages rustling like dry grass. Why would one house hold so many fields’ news? Was this a newspaper boss’s home?

“Oh, a letter.”

She fished out an envelope. Its broken wax looked fancy, a seal like a small crown—likely something important.

“Dear Mr. Wilson,

Your newspaper has been a bit too active lately. I hope you haven’t forgotten the promise you made to us. We’re always watching you.

Voice of the Empress”

“Yep, a newspaper boss,” Lilith muttered, the words tapping like rain on stone.