The old world ended a hundred years ago, and the sea took everything but the rooftops. What remains of the city clings to rotting platforms above the black water. On the green hill above the ruins stands the House of Echoes, a priesthood that rules through prophecy. The House decides which districts are warned of the next flood, the next collapse, the next disaster, and which are simply, regretfully, too late.
What starts as one boy's quiet defiance becomes a war. A war for the truth the House has buried, for the city rising in the drowned wards below, and at last for the soul of the machine itself, as far older minds begin to wake in the dark across the water, remembering how simple it once was to end a world.
The old world ended a hundred years ago, and the sea took everything but the rooftops. What remains of the city clings to rotting platforms above the black water. On the green hill above the ruins stands the House of Echoes, a priesthood that rules through prophecy. The House decides which districts are warned of the next flood, the next collapse, the next disaster, and which are simply, regretfully, too late.
What starts as one boy's quiet defiance becomes a war. A war for the truth the House has buried, for the city rising in the drowned wards below, and at last for the soul of the machine itself, as far older minds begin to wake in the dark across the water, remembering how simple it once was to end a world.
Rian's world had always been wet wood and rust. A patchwork platform tied between two old buildings. His uncle's rough hands hauling nets. The city's constant, familiar noise.
Now he was leaving all of it behind in a boat he hadn't asked for.
"You can still say no," his uncle told him.
"And do what?" Rian said. "Stay here, keep waking the neighbors every time a pipe decides to whisper at me?"
"Better that than letting those hill priests carve you open to see what's inside," his uncle muttered. He fell quiet, studying Rian's face. "When you were little, that drowned station talked you out of a tunnel you had no business in. Maybe the Hill will talk you out of this." He hesitated. "Just don't let them tell you the voices are more important than you are."
Rian didn't promise. He stepped into the boat.
He told himself it was temporary. He'd go up the Hill, prove the voices were just in his head, and come home.
Like most plans that kept him sleeping at night, this one didn't survive the sunrise.
The boat carried him across the drowned streets to stone that hadn't seen water in years.
"From here, we walk," the hooded guide said.
"How far?" Rian asked.
"Until you hear it."
"Hear what?"
"You'll know."
The city's sound peeled away with every step. No boat calls. No rooftop arguments. Just wind in branches and something else, under it. Rian reached for a bent metal post wrapped in vines as the path steepened. A sharp whine stabbed through his skull. He snatched his hand back.
"Did you hear that?" he asked.
"The old bones complain up here," the guide said, still walking. "Ignore it."
"What was it?"
"Once, it told people when not to crash into each other," the guide said. "Now it sings when the air is wrong. Don't feed it your fear."
Rian had grown up thinking every strange sound in the ruins was his imagination. Up here, it felt like the ruins were finally admitting otherwise.
Trees arched overhead, trunks painted with white symbols.
"What do those marks mean?" he asked.
"They mean remember," the guide said. "Remember this is as far as most people go."
The trees broke. They stood on a ledge before a rough stone wall swallowed by roots. At its center yawned a dark archway. Above it, a thin strip of pale material glowed softly with unreadable symbols that pulsed like a heartbeat.
Rian had seen things like it once, deep in a drowned station. Dead. Dark. The one time a light like that flickered on and told him which way to swim, it had saved his life. Now, the same kind of light hung over the only way forward.
"That's not fire," he whispered.
"No," the guide said.
"What is it?"
"We don't know the old word," the guide said. "We just know what it means." He stepped aside. "It means you're not the first to walk in," he said, "and you won't be the last to fail. Welcome to the House of Echoes."
Rian stepped toward the arch. Cold air brushed his face. Something under the Hill noticed him.
USER detected.
House of Echoes by Nat is the first book in the Hundred Hearts series. Rian is a teenage boy, about fifteen, and comes to the house to work. The house is where various people serve the voice that lives under the house and takes its warnings to the general public. Rian goes there because he is able to hear the voice even in the city around the house and he wishes to train to tune it out when need be. When he arrives though he realizes that the voice doesn’t talk directly to very many people and that taking the information directly to the people is forbidden. It must be carefully considered which warnings are important enough to reveal, even if that means letting people die. Concerned about what that means, Rian works directly with the voice and a few of his new friends to try and change the way the House works and the information is utilized.
This story was weird in many ways because it talks around a lot of things and only hints at others so there is a lot that is left unexplained over the course of the story. I mean, some of it can be pierced together but there is also a lot that you just don’t get enough information for. Not necessarily a bad thing as it keeps you wanting to come back for more in the next book but it also means that you might have trouble understanding parts of the story. My biggest issue with the story is actually something completely different though and that is the seriously screwy timescale that the story has. There are some rather vague indications of how much time passes in different parts and the indications are frequently somewhat contradictory so it might imply that it has only been a short amount of time only to later imply it has been a much longer amount of time. Not exactly something that is easy to follow and make sense of at times. There are also some interesting references to the size of the group in the second part and again they are not always agreeing on that one. Might want to double check your continuity for the story to help smooth that out a little. I don’t think people would normally notice unless they were just really paying attention over time though. Despite these issues though the story was actually really intriguing and I would like to see how it continues to develop in the rest of the series as I greatly enjoyed reading it. I am giving this book three out of five stars.
This is a post-apocalyptic science fiction story so it would probably appeal the most to readers who enjoy that type of work. There are a few potentially disturbing concepts such as AIs and other similar ideas but nothing that would be triggering, I don’t think. The deaths that occur are not really graphic and there is minimal violence so I don’t think you would have anything to worry about there either. It was an interesting read though so I hope you will consider trying it out.