When we were first drafting the early parts of this book, we had our characters coming around to the idea of revolution much sooner — as soon as they found out about Branek’s plans, in fact. But it didn’t take long for us to decide that was too early . . . and that, in fact, the idea should be something Koszar sprang on the rest of them as a surprise, not through a nice, sane conversation. (After all, he’s the lifelong revolutionary: where that plot is concerned, the rest of ’em are trying to keep up.) That bit wasn’t really interesting enough to be worth posting, but we were just a touch sad to lose this: a follow-on snippet in Chapter Nine, where Alsius — who is, despite everything, still a cuff accustomed to the status quo — renders his opinion on the advisability of such things.

* * *

And on the other hand, she had Alsius.

::–hope she can talk some into you, because Lumen knows you’ve never listened to me. But an uprising is the last thing we should be considering just now. We need to focus on finding the man who holds Ninat, and rescuing Mirscellis from the realm of mind, and on destroying these Primordial-cursed medallions. Tell him, Renata.::

Vargo stood on the other side of the stage, dressed down for the upcoming trial in a loose coat and high boots, face hidden by his shimmering prismatium mask. She couldn’t see his eyes past the glitter, but she suspected they were cast to the heavens. Alsius’s tirade rattled on like a carpet runner worn from too much treading.

::–to mention the harm it will cause to merchants with businesses there. You remember how it was after the Dreamweaver Riots. This will be so much worse.::

Ren wondered if Alsius had forgotten she wouldn’t be able to respond, or whether he was taking advantage of that fact to deliver all his arguments without interruption. Vargo could still intervene, of course, but she read from his silence that he’d already tried and failed. Alsius might be like a father to him . . . but in the end, they were still the products of opposite banks. For all his good intentions, Alsius saw any disruption of the status quo as a threat, because he didn’t truly understand the threat others lived under every day.

Not to say that Ren didn’t have any qualms herself. When she’d climbed the Point to the amphitheatre a little while ago, she’d paused at the top to catch her breath and look out over the Old Island. It was hard to imagine the place barricaded off, half the people there turned revolutionary, the other half cowering inside their houses and hoping the trouble would pass them by. Nothing about that would be painless, or without cost.

But how much had the people of Nadežra paid over the last two hundred years?

None of those were thoughts Alta Renata ought to be having, but she found them hard to push from her mind.