The Mantis Variant - Book One - 31. Chapter 31 - Epilogue 1 - Plotting

Later that night, when the two men were upstairs and the three young women were still seated by candlelight, Ilya commented, "What if we just did it ourselves."

The two others looked at her with expectant expressions.

"What do you mean?" Dozi asked.

"Burn it to the ground," Ilya replied.

Lahari nodded. "I'm in."

Dozi frowned at them. "The Lovegoods?" she said in disbelief. "You know they're all Messiahs, right? How on earth do you think it would be possible to do that without getting caught and killed yourselves?"

Ilya looked at Lahari.

Dozi shook her head. "And what about the innocent people who might die in the fire?" she continued. "People like Agrell before she escaped, or children that were born into the cult. What if there are others who have tried to get away but were caught and are still there?"

"I wish Agrell were alive," Ilya said, and she choked down the lump that started to rise in her throat. She looked at Lahari. "If we are going to do this, we need someone with intimate knowledge about the cult."

"I know someone," Lahari replied.

*

It was determined by the inhabitants of the underground that their home was destroyed. The magma did not rise as high as the newly appointed Principal Messiah hoped, and there was only a single heartbreaking fatality to the molten stone. However, it flowed into many of the deep chambers, and much of the impressive original excavations by the old Oselian military were filled by the magma. The liquid slowly cooled and solidified into igneous rock, and again became part of the peninsula's bedrock upon which Teshon City sat, but most of the underground no longer existed★