The air was moist and damp, owing to the constant spray from the waterfall.

People I saw tended toward more conservative dress. Conservative fashion often happens when everything must be hand-made. Women and men both wore their hair longer than galactic standard, with most men’s hair brushing their shoulders. Women favored braids to keep control of their long hair.

Vendors shouted at us from their stalls lining the street, hawking everything from trinkets to food to young girls dressed in rags. Children smeared with filth ran alongside the carriage as soon as we were inside the gates. They climbed up on the running boards and I was afraid of one of them falling under the wheels. My concern abruptly shifted to my own safety when the children leaned through the windows and reached for me. Ved beat them back none too gently and they leapt off the carriage like monkeys.

We saw the Watch kill someone mere minutes into the city. He couldn’t have been more than sixteen. They had him backed into a corner and he was waving a knife, clutching what looked like a coin pouch in his other hand. They simply leveled their spears at him and impaled him through the chest. One of them scooped up the pouch, fished something silver out of it, and tossed the remainder to an old woman who was standing nearby. She spat on the warm body and went her way.

Our driver took us up to what they call the Lift – a gilded cage large enough to hold two carriages. Enormous chains stretched as far up and down as I could see, running at a slight angle to accommodate the tiered structure of the city. I could see other lift cages up and down the chain. I leaned out of my window to call to the driver. “You knew these lifts were here?” He turned around and nodded at me, the waxed ends of his gray mustache bobbing. A native of the city, perhaps, or at least someone with knowledge. “Is this lift the only way up and down the city?” He shook his head. I waited, but he wasn’t any more forthcoming than Ved usually was, so I ducked my head back inside to find Ved picking his nose.

Despite the look of it, the Lift pulled us up smoothly and fairly quickly, and we were afforded a beautiful view of the massive waterfall to our right, which divided the city in half east to west. Stretched out below us, I could see the massive river flowing south. I noticed clumps of something in the water, and upon closer inspection I realized they were corpses hung on chain nooses. Some of them were very old; some fresh. The poor people, whoever they had been, were both hanged and drowned at the same time. Our driver informed me these were criminals who had threatened the ruling Houses in some way and been condemned to death for it. After our first half hour in the city I was about ready to steal a boat and ride that river back to the spaceport and my beloved Garden.

Upper Town proved more to my liking.