Jigano's smile widened at Melinoe's acceptance, and he bowed his head in gratitude. "Then I'll send some of those books with you when you leave," he decided. "The disease - or curse," he allowed with a wry tilt of his chin, "is clearly magical in nature, or at least unnatural, which should help narrow down what historical afflictions to the crops and plants to focus on and which can be ruled out."
Her enthusiasm was infectious, and he chuckled, a gleam of approval in his blue eyes as Isuma purred along to his delight at finding a fellow scholarly rebel. "Reconstructed blueprints of some of the larger public buildings, yes, but no city plans that I've found yet - which doesn't mean they aren't here!" He cautioned. "The books stored here are vast and we've barely made a dent in beginning to catalogue them. But we haven't found anything in the Atheneum itself that predates the Barrier rising, and the Settlement here was constructed before that happened." His shoulders rose in a careful shrug as he sipped his tea, but that wicked grin still danced at the corners of his mouth. "Plenty of buildings have been repurposed as homes or shops since then, and many more have been left in ruins, so any map more than a year or two old would already be out of date. Zariah, though..."
He hummed thoughtfully, smile fading as he considered the rude young woman with the dead eyes. "No records, no. She is a... Northhavener," he said, arching a brow wryly at Mel. "Since we're not supposed to use the words 'Outlander' and 'Natural' anymore, even if they're useful ones, according to the royal fit she threw. But she arrived with the rest of that group last autumn, not even a full year past. In truth, she's largely kept to herself; I've seen very little of her around town, or helping anyone not from Northhaven since I arrived. But a few weeks ago she suddenly declared herself Queen, got a dozen or so bullies to back her up, and has been swanning around making decrees and throwing people in her new jail since then, if they don't knuckle under." He sighed, glancing down at his reflection in his teacup for a moment before returning his gaze to Melinoe. "It's not that everything she's proposed is wrong... I'm not against letting the mages choose a new name for themselves, if they don't like 'Abandoned,' but by and large the people who have lived here all their lives never had a government and mostly comported themselves just fine. There are thieves and bandits, yes, but when they become a problem people band together and take them out, just as they do to handle problems like the flinthopper fires, or building the Sparkbird perch in Deepfrost, or planning the Fiat Lux celebration."
Her enthusiasm was infectious, and he chuckled, a gleam of approval in his blue eyes as Isuma purred along to his delight at finding a fellow scholarly rebel. "Reconstructed blueprints of some of the larger public buildings, yes, but no city plans that I've found yet - which doesn't mean they aren't here!" He cautioned. "The books stored here are vast and we've barely made a dent in beginning to catalogue them. But we haven't found anything in the Atheneum itself that predates the Barrier rising, and the Settlement here was constructed before that happened." His shoulders rose in a careful shrug as he sipped his tea, but that wicked grin still danced at the corners of his mouth. "Plenty of buildings have been repurposed as homes or shops since then, and many more have been left in ruins, so any map more than a year or two old would already be out of date. Zariah, though..."
He hummed thoughtfully, smile fading as he considered the rude young woman with the dead eyes. "No records, no. She is a... Northhavener," he said, arching a brow wryly at Mel. "Since we're not supposed to use the words 'Outlander' and 'Natural' anymore, even if they're useful ones, according to the royal fit she threw. But she arrived with the rest of that group last autumn, not even a full year past. In truth, she's largely kept to herself; I've seen very little of her around town, or helping anyone not from Northhaven since I arrived. But a few weeks ago she suddenly declared herself Queen, got a dozen or so bullies to back her up, and has been swanning around making decrees and throwing people in her new jail since then, if they don't knuckle under." He sighed, glancing down at his reflection in his teacup for a moment before returning his gaze to Melinoe. "It's not that everything she's proposed is wrong... I'm not against letting the mages choose a new name for themselves, if they don't like 'Abandoned,' but by and large the people who have lived here all their lives never had a government and mostly comported themselves just fine. There are thieves and bandits, yes, but when they become a problem people band together and take them out, just as they do to handle problems like the flinthopper fires, or building the Sparkbird perch in Deepfrost, or planning the Fiat Lux celebration."
