Elantris - Brandon Sanderson [37]
“We are in Elantris, sule. We can’t just go to the lamplighter’s store every time we run out of oil.”
“I know, but surely there’s enough. Elantris must have had stores of oil before the Reod.”
“Ah, sule,” Galladon said with a shake of his head. “You still don’t understand, do you? This is Elantris, city of the gods. What need have gods of such mundane things as lamps and oil? Look at the wall beside you.”
Raoden turned. There was a metal plate hanging on the wall beside him. Though it was tarnished with time, Raoden could still make out the shape etched into its surface—Aon Ashe, the character he had drawn just a few moments ago.
“Those plates used to glow more brightly and steadily than any lamp, sule,” Galladon explained. “The Elantrians could shut them off with a bare brush of their fingers. Elantris didn’t need oil—it had a far more reliable source of light. For the same reason, you won’t find coal—or even furnaces—in Elantris, nor are there many wells, for water flowed from pipes like rivers trapped within the walls. Without AonDor, this city is barely fit to be inhabited.”
Raoden rubbed his finger against the plate, feeling the lines of Aon Ashe. Something catastrophic must have happened—an event lost in just ten brief years’ time. Something so terrible it caused the land to shatter and gods to stumble. However, without an understanding of how AonDor had worked, he couldn’t even begin to imagine what had caused it to fail. He turned from the plate and considered the two squat bookcases. It was unlikely that any of the books contained direct explanations of AonDor. However, if they had been written by Elantrians, then maybe they would have references to the magic. References that could lead the careful reader to an understanding of how AonDor worked. Maybe.
His thoughts were interrupted by a pain from his stomach. It wasn’t like hunger he had experienced on the outside. His stomach didn’t rumble. Yet, the pain was there—somehow even more demanding. He had gone three days now without food, and the hunger was beginning to grow insistent. He was only just beginning to see why it, and the other pains, were enough to reduce men to the beasts that had attacked him on his first day.
“Come,” he said to Galladon. “There is something we need to do.”
The square was much as it had been the day before: grime, moaning unfortunates, tall unforgiving gates. The sun was almost three-quarters finished with its trek through the sky. It was time for new inductees to be cast into Elantris.
Raoden studied the square, watching from atop a building beside Galladon. As he looked, he realized that something was different. There was a small crowd gathered on top of the wall.
“Who’s that?” Raoden asked with interest, pointing to a tall figure standing high on the wall above Elantris’s gates. The man’s arms were outstretched, and his bloodred cloak was flapping in the wind. His words were hardly audible from such a distance, but it was obvious that he was yelling.
Galladon grunted in surprise. “A Derethi gyorn. I didn’t know there was one here in Arelon.”
“A gyorn? As in high priest?” Raoden squinted, trying to make out the details of the figure far above them.
“I’m surprised one would come this far east,” Galladon said. “They hated Arelon even before the Reod.”
“Because of the Elantrians?”
Galladon nodded. “Though not so much because of Elantrian worship, no matter what they claim. The Derethi have a particular loathing for your country because their armies never figured a way to get through those mountains to attack you.”
“What do you suppose he’s doing up there?” Raoden asked.
“Preaching. What else would a priest do? He’s probably decided to denounce Elantris as some sort of judgment from his god. I’m surprised it took them so long.”
“People have been whispering it for years,” Raoden said, “but no one had the courage to actually teach such things. They’re secretly afraid that the Elantrians are just testing them—that they will