The outer edge defenses of High District were built on a stone-built scale that revealed the deep, institutionalized terror of the men who governed Rookvale.
Len and Bram walked westward along the upper terrace. Then, the street ran parallel to the Great Palisade. A barrier of upright iron spikes five meters tall, set into a foundation of mortared granite two paces thick. The tops of the iron spikes were not mere defensive points. They were forged into barbed trident heads. They were wrapped in spiraling coils of braided copper wire that gleamed with a dull, green rust crust under the street lanterns.
Every thirty paces, a heavy wooden reflector box was mounted to the wall on an iron swiveling bracket. Inside each box, a high-pressure copper-flame burner threw a brilliant, packed beam of emerald light down the narrow lanes and dead-end alleys that dropped toward the middle wards. The beams overlapped with clean, steady care, washing the granite curbs and flat stone slabs in high-intensity radiance, eliminating every pocket of shadow wider than a human hand-span. The gears were wound twice daily by convict laborers who turned iron winches in the wall turrets. That kept the copper reflectors sweeping on steady, clockwork arcs.
