Class Reptilia

“You should have told us!” Naz whisper-yelled, leaning over to point accusatorily at Ember. “I would have gone with you! I’m a pisces, for god’s sake.”

Ember glanced behind them. Luckily, it was a particularly spirited day, and none of the other students were paying them any mind. “I only had permission for myself,” she said weakly. “Besides, it turned out fine in the end.”

“I would have expected this from Carn, but not you,” Naz added, and the fox nodded in corroboration. “Who knows what that freak wanted with your scale, and all he told you in return was to fight someone.”

Ember held her hands out in front of her, pleading for mercy. Wait until they find out that I intend to challenge that harpy eagle. 

Carn threw an arm over Naz’s shoulders, jostling her. “She means, ‘thank you for telling us.’ We’ll help you contact your father.”

Ember smiled slightly. The decision to tell them about her mission hadn’t been taken lightly, but despite Naz’s scolding, she felt that it had been the right one.

“Hello,” someone said, and Ember realized that they had reached the front of the line, where the faculty member at the window was trying to get their attention. 

“Sorry,” the three said sheepishly. They pushed their school IDs—carved into a thin wooden card—across the counter. The woman checked their names and identification numbers, then rifled through the files under her desk, coming up with three lumpy envelopes, one gold, and two black.

“Congratulations,” she said, handing them over.

They thanked her, holding the envelopes close to their chests. As they turned down the path, glanced at each other, then rushed to break them open—Carn by ripping off the top with his teeth; Ember by tugging it open with her finger, and Naz by making a neat slit with her knife. Inside was their stipend for passing midterms and staying at the university. 

“Finally!” Carn exclaimed, grinning widely enough to reveal the full length of his canines, and Ember echoed the sentiment. Unlike Naz, whose father lived in Mendel and regularly sent her money, she and Carn were flat-broke. As long as they were students, their school supplies, medicine, and food were provided, but any extra was awarded only twice a semester. 

Ember poked around in the envelope. It was her first time seeing such a variety of Mendel’s currency. The money was separated into pouches by type. Within the first was the least valuable unit, dark-brown cacao seeds that smelled earthy. The second held simple, unmarked disks, made from copper, silver, and gold alloys. In the last were the most valuable, a couple of tiny, brightly-colored gems. It was an impressive assortment, especially for Ember, who had received the highest stipend thanks to her high scores.

“Let’s go to town,” Carn suggested, his one eye gleaming. “It’s a Saturday, and we’re done with exams. What better time is there?”

Ember was quick to agree. In three months of living since coming to Mendel, she had yet to see the city proper except for on the night of her arrival. Studying—and lately training—had kept her busy, and she had been afraid that her lack of knowledge about Linnaean culture would once again make her stick out as a foreigner. 

“Good idea,” Naz added. “It’s about time that Ember tried something other than the school-issued food.”

Ember let herself be led from the center of campus to the southern hub. As a transportation site, it was known as one of the busiest spots on campus, which is precisely why Ember had avoided it. Sure enough, it was overflowing with other students itching to spend their stipends. Draft animals bearing riders or carts were arriving and departing the broad trail every couple of minutes. Others mingled among the waiting students, eating from buckets of nutrient-rich oats.

As Ember watched, a rider dismounted a massive, grumpy-looking bovine with droopy horns. It bellowed at him, flicking its tail against his side. The rider pulled back, gesturing in surrender, and quickly took off the animal’s tack. The creature huffed, trundling through the crowd and disappearing into the woods.

Ember pointed incredulously. “Did he just tell off that rider?”

“I guess he’s done working for the day,” Carn laughed. “They come and go as they please, in exchange for snacks and companionship.”

 Sure enough, there wasn’t a whip or spur in sight. “No wonder there’s such a long line,” Ember laughed.

Even with animals taking breaks, the line moved quickly. When an open-topped carriage pulled up, Ember and her friends pushed forward to claim it. As usual, there was no driver, just a massive draft horse with a deep brown coat and feathered feet. They each boosted themselves into the car, and a Linnaean couple climbed in after them, taking up the opposite bench. 

Naz leaned over the front of the carriage, raising her voice. “Take us to Main Street, please!”

The horse neighed, taking off in a brisk walk. The carriage rattled over the hard-packed dirt but held steady, stabilized by its four wide wheels. Other draft animals passed them on the left, some riderless, others pulling carts or carriages. Though Ember recognized a few from her hometown, many were completely foreign, like a tan-colored creature with two humps. 

The horse ignored the side trails, staying on a wide path that skirted campus on the southern side. As they traveled, both Naz and Carn and the Linnaean couple chatted quietly. Ember draped one arm over the side of the carriage and peered out, content just to watch and listen. 

“Where does your father live?” Carn was asking.

“He has a little cabin north of the city, by a lake.”

“He’s a pisces, right?” 

“Yes, he’s a loach, like me.”

“Was your mother Linnaean?” Ember interjected softly, curious about Naz’s past. 

The pisces shook her head. “My mother passed in childbirth, and my father fled here when I was just a baby. Even at that age, I was showing signs of development, and there was no way he could stay in hiding and care for me at the same time.”

“What was it like to grow up here?”

“I was lucky. The other families helped my father find work, and they looked after me until I could go to school. I grew up without hardship or shame, unlike many of our classmates.”

Ember smiled, knowing that it wasn’t entirely true. Though it was common in Mendel, Naz had been raised by a single parent in a new country. She respected Naz’s humility, though, and leaned back against the carriage seats, returning to slightly listening. 

After about ten minutes, the horse turned, taking a northwestern path through the forest. The transition from the university to the city was gradual, with the university buildings being replaced first by dense forest and then by free-standing residences. One-room treehouses sat tucked between high branches, and entrances to tunnels were marked with piles of stones. They were well camouflaged, and for each one that Ember spotted, she was sure that she had missed three more.

The horse continued on, unbothered by the weight of five people and the carriage itself. Rather than thinning, the forest grew thicker. The trees reached impossibly high into the sky, far taller than the tallest buildings on the mainland. Their trunks were wide enough to fit Ember’s dorm room many times over, and their roots often rose high enough above the ground for the carriage to pass underneath. Hollow openings were blocked with doors, some fitted with tiny flaps for animals to pass in and out.

More than once, Ember noticed Linnaeans dressed in flowy, all-green clothing on the path or between the leaves. They wore helmets and thick leather boots, but they navigated the branches with certainty and grace. Some carried spools of metal wire, toothed blades, or armfuls of new limbs. One was attaching supports to a new sapling. “Who are they?” Ember asked.

“Those are tree-shapers,” Carn replied. “They’re expanding the city.”

The concept seemed backward to Ember. “They’re doing construction by… planting more trees?”

“They are one and the same,” Naz explained, “but it’s more complicated than just planting trees. Tree shaping has been a tradition since the first settlers came to Mendel. We monitor the health of the forest, removing excess vegetation and nursing the well-placed saplings. Like us, the trees have appointments with medics: dead growth is removed, pests are treated, and they’re given supplementation based on what they may need.”

Ember paused, failing to make sense of it. Even in the university, some growth had been cleared to make way for buildings. But as they traveled, the trees only grew taller, their crowns blotted out by the light of the midday sun, and their roots stretched like bridges from one bole to the next. Foot-long openings appeared at various heights along the trunk, some fitted with panes of glass. 

As Ember watched the treeline, she had the sense that she was missing some essential component of the scene. Her eyes would alight on something peculiar, but the speed of the carriage would rip it away before she could define it. 

A white arm reached out of one opening, draping a bedsheet over a nearby limb. Ember reeled, shocked, as structures took shape in the wood before her eyes. Each place that tree bowed out was a natural hallow, the inside of which had been converted into a Linnaean dwelling. The wide branches and roots touched in just the right places to create serviceable walkways, and the foot-sized indentations spiraling up the trunks formed staircases.

Tree shaping… so this is what Naz meant. Unlike the university, which was fairly new, the city had existed for over one hundred fifty years. It must have taken generations, but maintaining the trees’ good health had allowed the Linnaeans to manipulate their growth, creating living architecture.

The path widened, and trails branched off in every direction, each one busy with travelers. The structures increased in number until they filled every inch of Ember’s vision, disappearing underground and high into the treetops. Pots hung from the thinner branches, and greens and herbs grew from notches in the bark. Flowering vines were strung up over the path, filling the air with a sweet aroma. 

The doors to larger hallows were marked with the names of shops, and street vendors sold their goods using roots as booths. Linaneans walked along the natural bridges, some holding shopping bags. Oftentimes, companion animals perched on their shoulders or hung around their necks. Every few minutes, a messenger bird would fly a circle around someone’s head, dropping a scroll into their outstretched hands.

The horse brought them to the head of a winding street. The atmosphere buzzed with feverish activity. Ember looked back and forth, trying to see everything at once. The path led under roots and between gargantuan trees, circling outdoor restaurants and markets and finally disappearing in the distance. 

The horse pulled the carriage to one side of the road, and Naz pushed the door open. “Welcome to Main Street,” she said.

Hekate37 Finally, our first look into the City of Mendel.