For those of you it may interest, a reference to Star Wars, and a reference to Five Nights at Freddy's is in here somewhere. ;D

I've been looking forward to this moment, because I've been building towards it for the better part of two years. I am, perhaps, overly excited for this reveal. 8D

Also, STAR OF DELTORA IS ON ITS WAY THE GLITTER SO PRETTY I CAN'T EVEN I'M DEAD

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Chapter 11: Your One True Name

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Star began to stir at the sound of her name being called from far away, and to a terrible, sharp throbbing in her leg. The pain brought her to her senses faster than she would have liked, and she couldn't help crying out. The more awake she became, the more she felt the pain, and the more her whole body ached.

It seemed pitch black, and she couldn't see a thing in any direction; but she knew the voice calling to her at once. It was Zan, wide awake at her side, rousing her as gently as he could.

"Are you alright?" he asked when she cried out, sounding truly worried.

"I think my leg is broken," she gasped. "Where is Forley?"

"Coming around. Here, let me take a look at that."

Star felt rather than saw him shifting toward her legs. He touched each in turn, feeling for the injured one. He only had to barely touch her left leg to send lightning bolts through her, and she yelped again. Her father's people would have been disappointed in her for showing what they thought of as weakness. Here in Habaharan, she was glad that the Zebak were practical enough not to care. She was clearly hurt badly, and she wasn't trained in the ways of Central Control. Of course she should cry out in pain. There was no point in pretending that she was alright.

"Oh, this is a problem," muttered Zan. "How are we to get out of this hole now?"

Somewhere on her other side, she heard Forley groaning as he woke up. He had probably been brought to his own senses by all the noise she was making. Star also found that her eyes were growing used to their surroundings, though it was still impossible to see much. As she thought of this, a blaze of light dazzled her eyes, and she blinking back the spots that blinded her. Zan had lit a torch, and was holding it high to brighten the space.

It was a very small space, illuminated completely by that one torch. There was a heap of rubble all around them from the wall that had given way, and a layer of dust beneath them, and spider webs in every corner. Then there were the three of them, battered and sore, and in one case broken, from their fall. Lying still on her back, there was nothing else she could really see. At her feet, Zan was peering into each corner he could see, and also at her broken leg. He shook his head sadly at her.

"This looks bad," he commented. "I don't know if we have anything to splint that, either. And where has Vivi gone to? She was the only one of us who didn't fall. She could have helped us!"

Star looked up as far as she could, and saw a faint light from the enlarged hole above them. It was hardly even a light—only less dimness than everything else, high overhead. And, as Zan had pointed out, Vivi was nowhere to be seen or heard.

Frightened by everything that had happened, Star gripped the sigil and desperately pleaded for healing. Take this pain away, at least, she begged I can barely see straight like this!

To her great relief, the sigil did part of what it asked. The stinging sensation of mending bone never came, but the pain began to lessen. She quickly found herself well enough to sit up, though Zan looked surprised at her sudden recovery.

So, there is still only so much I can do on my own, she thought sadly, doing her best not to look at her twisted leg. She glanced at it only once and then looked away, shivering at the awful sight.

Forley began to pull himself up, shaking his head at the sudden torch light. Bits of crumbled mortar showered from his hair and shoulders as he did so. He rubbed his sore head and looked up, toward the less dimness. Then he sighed, leaning back on his hands and shaking his head again.

"Well, I'll be," he said sadly. "Ten feet it is, then. It seems I owe you money, Zan."

"How can you think of stupid bets at a time like this?" Zan thundered back. "There's no way out! No ladder, no rope, no door—we're completely trapped down here! Not to mention Star's hurt herself."

"It's not like I wanted this to happen," she snapped, beyond annoyed that Zan had pointed out her leg so quickly. Forley had noticed it now, and looked perfectly horrified.

Relieved of most of the pain for now, Star tried to think of a solution. It was just another puzzle, which surely had an answer. All they had to do was think of it. She suddenly had a feeling that Vivi was a large part of that answer, though, and she wondered furiously where the child had gone.

"Vivi's got to come back soon," she said resolutely. "Perhaps she's looking for something we can use to climb out."

"How can you be so sure?" Zan grumbled. "She's given us up for dead, for all we know."

"I don't think so. We've already come this far together, after all. Abandoning us now would be too impractical for her. Besides, if she gave up now, she would die of curiosity."

"I agree," Forley said slowly, digging in his pocket. "We started on poor terms; but she's been more than helpful since we met her, and she is friendly with me. As there seem to be no other options, I propose we wait for her to come back. In the meantime, Zan, here's that arin I owe you."

He tossed the gold coin over Star's head, and Zan caught it in his free hand. For the second it was in the air, it twinkled in the light. As Star watched its brief flight, something about it seemed to call to her mind's eye. There was something strangely familiar about it. Something she was supposed to recognize for some reason.

To Zan, it was just a regular coin, and a token for being right about something. He shoved the arin into his own pocket and leaned back against the wall, sticking the torch into the rubble to hold it up. Then he crossed his arms and settled himself to sulk while he waited.

Forley was doing the same, pushing more rubble out of the way to make himself some room. He gasped in surprise, and his companions turned to see him lifting something out of the rubble, into his lap.

"It's a chest!" he exclaimed. "A chest with a lock! Let's have a better look at this."

He moved closer to bring the chest into the light. It was a small treasure box of sturdy wood, bound in rusting iron, and sealed shut with another four-letter combination. Forley pulled at the lid, the hinges, and the rusted metal, testing for weakness. Finally he sat back on his heels, placing the unopened chest on the floor in front on him, and sighed in frustration.

"This must be the tenth lock," he decided. "And we still don't know the answer to its riddle. Star, we must think hard about this. All the other riddles were easy, once we had thought about them. And surely one of us has heard this one before. Perhaps when we were very, very small, and too young to remember."

"I don't think so, Forley. I've written them all down in other books back home. Shaaran helped me catalogue them, and she never mentioned this one. They never told us stories about other secrets being hidden down here, either. It seems more and more unlikely to me that they even knew about this."

Forley stared hard at the little wooden chest, puzzling over it in exasperation. After a minute he looked away, sliding his eyes toward Star's twisted leg.

"Just how bad is that?" he asked. "Aren't you in pain?"

"A little, but the sigil is helping with that," she answered, doing her best not to look again. "It won't mend the bone, but at least it doesn't hurt so much. Even if Vivi does find something we can climb, I don't know if I can manage it like this. We might have to send her for something to bind my leg, first."

The two of them shared a moment of annoyed, worried silence over this. Star glanced at Zan, who had remained staunchly silent the whole time. He had taken the arin out of his pocket, and was fiddling with it to occupy himself.

"Can I see that?" she asked, holding her hand out.

Zan obviously didn't understand the request, but he placed the coin in her hand. She held it up to the light and turned it over in her hands. It was like any other arin in the city. It was round and smooth, and heavy because it was pure, solid gold. On one side was engraved a soiled, serpentine dragon, the emblem of the Dragon Lord who had reigned when the coin had been printed. On the other side was the symbol of the empire, a grach with its wings spread wide.

It was an ordinary object here. In Rin, it might have been kept in the house of books, with other mementos of great adventures, and things to be studied and admired. Most of her father's people had never seen so much gold in one place before; and the idea that thousands of such coins existed somewhere, just to buy and sell things with, would have baffled them. But to her, here and now in this empty hole, it was supposed to mean something much more. Something far more precious than what it was.

Suddenly, that thought gave her an idea.

"Zan, arin means gold, doesn't it?"

"Yes, I suppose it does," he answered. "All our coins are named after the metals they are made of. Arin for gold, yune for silver, dazi for copper, and riva for iron."

"Is there anything else arin can mean?"

"Of course not. It's just a word in a different language. Arin is the only other word they have for gold—the metal, anything made of it, even the color. Why?"

"I had a thought… Forley, hand me the chest."

She handed the coin back to Zan, and Forley placed the chest in her lap.

"It occurred to me," she said, working on the combination, "that my father's people came from a place called the Valley of Gold. And if arin means the same thing…"

As she slid the last letter into place, the lock clicked loudly in the stillness. All three of them jumped in surprise at the sound, unable to believe that Star's vague idea had worked.

"Your true and secret name," she recalled from the list. "So, the answer was arin all along!"

"How is that possible?" Zan asked before she could open the chest. "You are the people of Rin, not the people of Arin…"

Even as he spoke, his violet eyes grew enormous with understanding. Hearing the two words so closely together for the first time, Star and Forley were equally amazed.

"Oh my goodness…"

Forley scratched his head in wonder, marveling at the chest with renewed excitement. "Well, strike me down. They might just mean the same thing, as well."

"I believe they must," Star agreed, as reason came together in her mind. "When the Zebak came to conquer our homeland, they would have called it Haran Arin, the Place of Gold; we know enough of their language to guess that much. Perhaps to mock their new slaves, they called this place Haran Arin, as well. Then, over time, because Haran Arin is a lot to say over and over again, the name was shortened. So Haran Arin became… Rin. And so it has been to this day."

There was a strong sense of truth in her words, and she knew at once that they hadn't come from her own mind. They felt almost like a personal memory, somehow woven together over hundreds of years, from thousands of forgotten words and countless people. It was a grand feeling, and it made her smile faintly.

"You seem so sure of that," Zan commented. "How can you know all this?"

Star turned her smile on him, and let it grow. "I just do," she answered simply, reaching under her dress to take out the sigil. She held the medallion up in the light for her friends to see, reminding them that she had unexpected ways of knowing things.

Zan held his arin up beside the sigil, and the three of them noticed for the first time just how alike the two objects were. Round and smooth, heavy with pure metal, and standing for so much more than just gold. If only for the images stamped on the coin, the two could have been perfect twins.

Zan made an odd face, somewhere between amazement and sadness. "Your home, history, and name weren't the only things they took from you, it seems."

Star nodded, sharing his feeling of sorrow. "In a way, the people sleeping above us are just as much a part of Rin's history now as we are. If my people are like the Earth sigil, then yours are like this arin. We understand each other's stories better than we've been told to think."

The two exchanged a glance, perfectly understanding each other for a long moment. In spite of all their differences, they really were alike in all the ways that truly mattered. Everything they had just learned, everything they had just discovered about themselves, made the whole adventure and all its trouble worth it.

When the moment had stretched on too long, Forley broke the silence by clapping his hands together and rubbing them impatiently.

"That is one great mystery unraveled, and that is excellent. But please, Star, open the chest! Let us see what we've come all this way to find! The curiosity will kill me if we wait much longer."

Finally, Star carefully lifted the lid. To their disappointment, the first thing they found inside was a faded letter. Star took it out of the chest, planning to read it, but there was more beneath it. On the bottom of the box were two polished stones, set in silvery metalwork, nestled in what seemed to be web-like pools of fine chain. While Star was puzzled by all they had found in the chest, Zan suddenly looked delighted.

"Why, these are magicites," he said, reaching inside and taking out one of the stones. Along with the stone and its setting came its web of chain. He immediately set about slipping the chains around his wrist and fingers, so that the stone fit snuggly into his palm. He flexed his fingers, testing the fit, and grinned to see that it suited him.

"I've always wanted one of my own," he continued, once he was happy with it. "Let's see, here. This one is a ruby, one of the fire stones. The other one looks like moonstone, which is an air stone. Forley put the other one on. With all your babbling of being element air, you will like that one better, I think."

Forley seemed unsure, but he reached for the other magicite and began to fumble with it, trying to make sense of the chains. "Magicites, huh? Those magic stones that some guards use, are they not? I've never really understood them, I'm afraid."

"Oh, it's quite simple. You take aim and fire. I've done some training with them in the past, and there really isn't much to it. How did Zak describe it? I think he said something like, it blows up whatever your brain thinks of. That sounds stupid, but I suppose it isn't wrong. Here, I'll show you."

He aimed his stone across the small space, spreading his fingers wide, and focused his gaze on a pile of rubble. Without warning, a bolt of flame shot out of nowhere and hit the pile with alarming force. The whole place suddenly grew intensely hot, and plumes of smoke filled the air. They all had to shield their faces from the blast, and found themselves chocking on smoke.

"I'm sorry," Zan coughed, waving the smoke from his eyes. "I'm not great at this yet."

Forley was brushing at his stinging eyes, but he was also chuckling to himself. "Well, you could have killed us easily, so that's a start. Perhaps this air stone can summon a gale, to clear away the smoke?"

"Regrettably, no, not yet. That takes a great deal of practice; air stones are always the trickiest to control. Although… Air stone are good for healing. This might be a solution for Star's broken leg. A first try will be far from perfect, but she might be able to get out of this hole with less trouble. Put the thing on and try it."

While Forley went on trying to make sense of the chains, Star tried to read the letter. She quickly found that it was no use. The writing was so faded and the air so thick with smoke, it was impossible to see properly. She carefully folded it, being careful not to tear it, and tucked it into her own pocket.

From somewhere above them, they suddenly heard coughing, and a voice exclaiming in surprise.

"Hey! What are you guys doing down there? You're not dead, are you?"

"Vivi!" Forley called back, impossibly relieved. "Where have you been? We need your help!"

"Yeah, no kidding," the girl's voice came again. "Don't worry, I found some rope in the house. I tied it down to something that won't fall apart, too. Here it comes!"

With that, a length of rope plummeted down from above, nearly smacking Star in the face. It was a sturdy rope, too, and would be easy enough to climb. In fact, she had to smile in thanks for the time Alanis had taught her to do it, so that she might scale her grandparent's house to climb in the attic window and visit her cousin in secret whenever she wished. She had come home with suspicious burns on her hands the first few times she had tried it, and remembered having a time explaining them to her parents; but she had figured it out quickly and gone on to do it many times.

Only, she had never had to do it with a broken leg.

"Wait a moment," she called to Vivi. "There's one thing we have to do first."

"Fine, but hurry up. I think you woke up the people next door with all this noise."

Sensing now that they were running out of time, Forley finally finished strapping the moonstone to his hand, and then looked cluelessly at Star's leg.

"What do I do with it?" he asked Zan.

"Just grip her ankle and tell it to heal itself," Zan shrugged, as if it were obvious. "I've seen it done plenty of times."

Forley took a deep breath and cautiously slid his fingers around Star's ankle. He focused his whole attention on it, waiting desperately for a response. For a long moment, nothing seemed to happen. Then, at last, the stone began to glow, brighter and brighter in the smoky dimness. As the glow grew stronger, Star felt the sensation she had been bracing herself for. A prickling like needles filled her whole leg, as the broken bone was rapidly knit back together. In less than a minute, it was whole again.

"Well?" Forley asked. "How does it feel? Can you stand now?"

"It certainly isn't perfect," she answered, letting him and Zan help her up. She placed a little weight on her weak leg and found, though it still felt flimsy and sore, that she could stand on it. "However, it will do for the task at hand."

"You go first, then," Zan told her firmly. "Should you fall, we can catch you before you break your other leg."

"Thanks," she said dryly, rolling her eyes. Then she took the rope and began pulling herself up as quickly as she could. It was harder than she remembered, being careful of her leg at all times; but she reminded herself that climbing ten feet in this way was no great feat. It wasn't the side of a house, and it certainly wasn't the side of a mountain. She reached the top in little time, and pulled herself into the cellar without help.

Vivi was standing nearby, peering out the cellar door for danger, and offered no help at all. Her attention was on the smoke rising out of the hole, filling the cellar, and slowly drifting outside.

"I don't know what you guys were up to while I was gone, but you sure made a mess," she said to Star. "If someone sees this smoke, they'll come here and find us."

"It wasn't my idea," Star replied. "In any case, we did find the tenth lock, and we figured out the puzzle to open it."

Vivi whipped her head around and grinned. "Oh, great! Did you find the tool you came looking for?"

"I think so… I mean, we must have," Star answered slowly. She had been so concerned with the puzzles and their answers, she had forgotten the rhyme that had led her to Rin in the first place. "We found a pair of magicites, and a letter we haven't read yet. Zan has some skill with them, and Forley wasn't terrible with his first try, either. There isn't much I can do with them now, but they certainly are useful."

"Agreed," came Zan's voice, as he pulled himself out of the hole and stood up. "Magicites are available for purchase, but for an outrageous price that only the highest ranking guards can afford. Otherwise, Central Control issues them to guards of their own choosing. We are extremely lucky to have come across these. And in in such an unlikely place, too. I wonder what they were doing here, all this time?"

"That may be explained in the letter," Star suggested, patting her dress pocket. "But we should wait until we're home to sit and read it. Now that we've found what we came for, we need to get out of here."

"And quickly, too," came Forley's voice, as he, too, climbed out and stood up. "If Vivi is concerned about being seen, I'm willing to be concerned, also. We should certainly be going back the way we came."

The four of them filed out of the cellar and into the sunlight, trying to make themselves as small as possible. As far as they could tell, the dirt road was still deserted. Glancing at the window of the nearest cottage, however, they could see people stirring behind the drawn curtains.

"We should take our chances and make a run for it," Zan suggested. "If we hurry, they might not notice us."

"You don't have to ask me twice," Vivi chirped proudly. "I'm great at running from people. Watch this!" With that, the girl dashed off ahead of them, remarkably fast for such a young child. Without another choice, the others all ran after her.

"You there!" barked a voice behind them. "Halt, in the name of the Dragon Lord! Halt, I say!"

They stopped and whirled around, horrified to see a small gang of gray-clad guards storming after them from around a bend in the road.

"Run!" Vivi shrieked, turning and sprinting away even faster than before. Agreeing completely, the rest of them broke into a sprint as well. Behind them, the guards were shouting in fury and matching their pace. In fact, it seemed to Star that they were gaining on them.

They would have no time to lift the cover of the manhole and slip away. The guards would see them trying to escape, and catch them before they got very far. Then they would realize that the compound had a weakness, and surely they would report it. The refuge of the sewers would be discovered, at last, and be destroyed. The sewer people were sure to fight back; but how could they stand at all against the will of the Dragon Lord? They would be doomed.

Star felt her heart plummet into her stomach at the thought. Escape was impossible now. The only choice she could see was to surrender, and at least spare the sewer people a terrible fate. Yet she kept on running as fast as she could, trying to ignore the shooting pains in her bad leg. Every impact on that leg was weakening it, and she feared that it would break again if she didn't stop soon.

It seemed completely hopeless now.

The guards were closing in just as the manhole came into view. Roused by the noise outside, several people had appeared in the doors of the nearby cottages to see what was happening. And so there was quite an audience there to see when Forley skidded to a halt and spun around to face the guards, aiming the moonstone into their faces.

The blast that came next ripped through the whole area with the force of a hurricane. It sent Forley flying back, off his feet and into his companions. The four of them fell in a heap in the middle of the road, shouting in shock, watching as the sudden gale plowed through everything in its path. The guards were blown away and into the wall of a house; the house itself quaked, its windows cracking and its roof buckling, and the people inside could be heard shrieking in confused terror. Elsewhere, anything that wasn't secure was being ripped up and carried away in the fierce wind.

All at once, Star found that she and her friends were surrounded by an awestruck gathering of slaves, and a sea of hands was helping them up. The people were amazed by what they had seen, and clearly pleased.

"By the stars," exclaimed one man, "I've never seen such a thing in all my life! Where have you come from?"

"From nowhere," Vivi informed him shortly, as she skittered to the manhole and made no move to lift it. "Now go on back inside. We'll be going now."

The nameless man raised his eyebrow and considered her for a second. "Through the manhole?" he asked. "Now that is a clever thing. You've come from the city, then."

The small crowd was murmuring in excitement at this. Since it had already been guessed, Zan and Forley shrugged and bent to lift the cover.

"Don't tell anyone," Forley begged them. "If they ever found out—"

"No, no, of course not," the man insisted right away. "Your secret is perfectly safe with us. You young people are in a hurry, but I must ask before you go. Might we escape this wretched place this way? So many have tried in other ways. None have succeeded."

Star, Zan, and Forley all turned to Vivi, who had already jumped into the tunnel. Seeing that the decision was somehow hers, she gazed around the eager faces of the crowd and shrugged.

"Sure, be my guest," she said as she began to climb downward. "Everyone's welcome down there. Take it from me, Vivi. I'm a famous thief, you know."

Her companions all nodded in apology for her attitude, and began to climb down after her.

"Just don't attempt it in full daylight," Zan told them as he climbed into the darkness. "She's been here before, but she came under cover of night. Go only a few at a time; it will make your escape less noticeable if you go in smaller numbers. And don't send your women and children all at once; if all the same people disappear at the same time, that will also look suspicious."

One woman in the crowd scoffed and planted her fists on her hips. "What do you propose we do, then?" she demanded.

Zan dug in his pocket and pulled out his arin, and tossed it to the man who had spoken to them first.

"Flip this coin for it," he suggested. "That's fair, I suppose."

Forley climbed down after him, and held his hand up to Star to help her down.

"Don't worry, I won't let you fall," he told her as she eased down into the tunnel. Her leg ached at the idea of the descent, and having to retrace the whole way through the sewers. She tried not to think of it by reminding herself that her friends would help her, and by thinking of the slaves they had just met.

We've given them a new hope, she thought. Just look at their faces. Perhaps some of them had given up and resigned themselves to this life, like June had. Now that they know there is a chance, something they can do to change their lives, everything is different.

That, too, made the whole adventure worth it. Even her broken leg.

As she painfully climbed down the tunnel, the first man and a young boy appeared at the hole above her and began shifting the metal plate back into its place. The boy peered down after her, looking like he would have rather jumped into the tunnel and followed them at once.

"Remember us when you get back," he begged her. "Remember us."

"I will," she answered as the dark closed in around them once again. "I will remember you. I promise."

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Afterthoughts…

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As you can probably tell, I've had a lot of time to plan this plot twist.

I've also had a lot of time to plan on the next thing, which involves Alanis and Leah explaining their own personal reasons to be in Habaharan. Following Star on an adventure like they always said they would is kind of obvious… But there is a lot of hope for redemption going on here, actually. Their own fathers always went on quests to try and prove themselves somehow, and the apple really doesn't fall too far from the tree.

(Also, Leah might end up eloping with a foreigner, like her grandmother before her, but nothing is set in stone yet. In any case, you won't see that plot bunny hopping along as it happens.)

As I believe Forley put it, onto the next!