The Crown of Gilded Bones (Blood and..

cypress trees. Many buildings were there, among the trees,
all of them spaced apart and large enough to house a
decent-sized family. This was nothing like Masadonia or
Carsodonia, where sprawling manors and estates were
prevalent, and the workers either traveled from the city or
stayed in barely livable huts on the properties.
The livestock took no notice of the wolven that followed
us as we passed the farms. Perhaps they were used to their
presence or sensed they were of no threat to them. Had the
farmers or people in the city heard the wolven in the middle
of the night as they came to the Temple of Saion? That must
have been a sound to wake up to.
But thoughts of the wolven’s howls fell to the wayside
as nervous energy jolted my system. The city suddenly
appeared before us.
There were no gates, no inner walls or buildings heavily
stacked upon one another. The scent of people forced to live
in cramped, narrow spaces didn’t stain the air. That was the
first thing one smelled when entering either Masadonia or
Carsodonia. It always reminded me of misery and
desperation, but Saion’s Cove smelled of fruit from the
nearby orchards, and salt from the sea. The farmlands and
moss-strewn cypresses simply transitioned into the city, and
that was a statement.
There was no separation between those who fed the city
and the tables that food sat on.
Seeing that brought forth a rush of faith and possibility,
and I sat a little straighter. I didn’t know much about
Atlantian politics, and I knew the kingdom wasn’t without
problems. They were quickly becoming overpopulated,
something Casteel hoped to alleviate through negotiations
with Solis officials and by reclaiming the lands east of New
Haven—a large and mostly uninhabited chunk of Solis.
Some may not even notice how significant this one
difference was, but it was huge. And it was proof that if
Atlantia could do it, so could Solis.