Mystery

by Ash Vellum

Six hundred years after the Makers fell, the city of Calder Reach clings to the face of the Spillway, a colossal ancient dam holding back a mountain sea. At its top burns the Undying Flame. At its foot lies the Sump, where the poor die of fevers nobody can explain. The Chantry of the Flame teaches that Measuring was the sin that ended the old world. Counting is forbidden. Curiosity is heresy. Ancient books are burned on sight. Teo Brask hauls the dead to the pyres for a living, and he can't stop counting them. When the bodies on his cart all come from four streets around one blessed well, he starts asking questions. A blind archivist with a cellar full of forbidden pages teaches him how to ask them properly. A devout young healer helps him find answers. But the Archdeacon of the Flame has read the old books too. He knows exactly what Teo is doing, and he has his own reasons for keeping the city in the dark. A story about plague maps and poisoned bread, about measuring the world with a shadow and a stick, about an old wall that is slowly breaking, and about the dangerous idea that knowledge belongs to everyone.