Jordan and Tamsin rose within a column of water, past strata of worn stone in all the colors of the rainbow. Light filtered down from somewhere far above, illuminating the glistening membrane of the bubble in which they travelled. Never in all his imaginative journeys had Jordan pictured such a place as this. Every now and then they passed giant slots in the walls of the shaft, in which he glimpsed galleries full of verdigrised machines. Then the thrumming of giant engines would make the membrane of their bubble shake and dance; ring-shaped standing waves would form in the meniscus and interfere, making little landscapes of jewellike diamonds in its resilient surface.
Tamsin had conquered her fear—in fact, she was now bolder than Jordan. She kept trying to climb the curving wall of the bubble to see some new wonder. She would slide back and bump him with elbow or knee.
Whenever they passed one of those titanic chambers, Jordan’s heart seemed to skip a beat. He sensed the forces gathered here, and felt awe. But he stared into the green depths and said to himself, this is our creation, and repeating it, felt the awe deepen and merge with a new emotion he couldn’t name.
It was like the first time his mother had let him hold the hand of a younger boy to lead him along the path from the village to Castor’s manor. He was entrusted with a responsibility, and felt humbly determined to carry it through.
The Winds were omnipotent. They were also lost and, he now believed, afraid. The assault of the Heaven hooks on the Boros manor now seemed to him an act of desperation on their part. They would never be so mindlessly destructive in the normal course of things.
He and Tamsin rose upon the palm of Mediation, until the light above became a wavering disk and the shaft opened out to all sides. They were in a lake or lagoon, still rising. Before he could say anything, they slid sideways, and the bubble collapsed just as they were about to reach the surface.
For a second all he felt was freezing cold. Jordan kicked out into a confusion of bubbles and white froth, and was on the edge of panic when he felt a surface below his feet. He let himself settle for a moment, then kicked up from it and drew a deep breath of air.
Tamsin was swimming vigorously for the nearby shore. Awkwardly he pushed himself to follow her. Coughing and shivering, he stumbled up a beach of white pebbles to collapse next to her. She was already on her feet, hands on her hips as she stared around them.
They were on the shore of a pond that nestled among golden dunes. There was a little grass next to the pond, but no trees or sign of human habitation. The dunes hid whatever else might be nearby.
“So,” said Tamsin. She was frowning. “Where are we, then?”
“I don’t know. Ka?”
“I am here,” said the little Wind, from somewhere in the vicinity of Jordan’s collar.
The slight breeze was cuttingly cold. He stood up, shuddering.
“Command some heat,” said Tamsin.
“In a minute.” He looked around, found the tallest dune, and headed in that direction.
They said nothing as they climbed the sliding side of the thing. It took longer than he expected, and by the time they reached the top they were both covered with sand that stuck to their wet clothes and skin like plaster.
“Damned desals,” muttered Tamsin. “They could at least have gotten us to shore.”
It was even colder up here in the breeze, but you could see forever. Jordan shielded his eyes from the watery sun and turned slowly.
“Oh.” He pointed. “We go that way.”
“How do you know—” She stopped when she saw where he was pointing.
At least twenty thin spires of smoke rose above an indistinct patch on the western horizon.
*
“They’ve taken the middle tower!” The bearer of the bad news was black with soot and bleeding from a wound in his shoulder. The gangs by the steam cannon stopped working and fell into a confused battle of talk. Armiger shrugged.
“Let them have it. Makes a bigger target.”
This comment was relayed down the line, eliciting an uncertain cheer from the gunners. “So shall we turn the beasts on the tower, then?” asked one.
They were set up in the center of the palace parade grounds, east of the queen’s walled garden. From here the cannon could be aimed anywhere except at the houses northwest of the keep. From here Armiger could see and judge most of the action, but not what was taking place there. What he could see was smoke and chaos at six points along the walls; fires in the tent town and boiling mobs of refugees trying to get into the great hall or over the walls into the garden. The mobs were getting in the way of Matthias’ mobile squads, who were supposed to be crisscrossing the grounds quickly to tend to potential breaches. They were bogged down amid screaming women and children, unable to reach the troubles spots along the southern walls.
The only really important news came from the semaphores. Armiger let his glance touch on each of the flag teams in turn, filling in a mental picture of how Lavin’s forces were arrayed around the palace.
“He’s up to something.” This was no determined assault—just a lot of smoke and bluster. Armiger had no idea what Parliament’s general might be planning, and that worried him far more than the loss of the gate tower.
“Forget the tower, load the charges like I showed you!” He waved his sword in a tight circle over his head. All down the line, the gunners began lighting the sacks he’d had prepared last night. Then as the great wheels of the cannon began to turn, they fed the smoking bundles into the hoppers.
“What good will this do?” whined one of Matthias’ lieutenants. The man was a tenth-generation noble, completely ineffectual. He was positioned here, away from the walls, so he could do as little harm as possible. “All those things do is make a stink. That’s not going to stop Lavin.”
“You’d be surprised,” said Armiger. The sacks were filled with a combination of pitch, oil, wood, offal, and metal shavings, designed to produce a good imitation of industrial smog. The Winds would pay little attention to wood smoke, however large the conflagration, since it mostly just released carbon that trees had previously fixed from the atmosphere anyway. This stuff, though, would loose ozone, sulphur dioxide, maybe a little cyanide into the atmosphere. With an extra whiff of hot metals for good measure, it should whip the Winds into a fury.
He watched with satisfaction as the first of the smoking bags lofted over the walls. The environmental insult would be coming from Lavin’s camp. Lavin would know what he was doing; the fatal results of the battle where Armiger had first used sulphur were widely known now.
“We should be sweeping those walls clean!” The lieutenant pointed.
Armiger shook his head. “Just wait. And be ready to run for cover.” He would have preferred to have used this tactic as soon as the assault started, but he had wanted to make sure that Lavin’s camp no longer contained enough men to extinguish these fume-bombs. The attackers were engaged at the walls now; in the chaos, this smoke should be overlooked.
“What do you mean, run for cover?”
“I mean you might want to dig a hole and bury yourself in it now, because they may decide to take away all the buildings when they get here.”
“They…?” The lieutenant’s face went pale.
Armiger watched him with amusement. “This is no time for half measures.”
The gunners were well into the rhythm of it now. Time to turn his attention elsewhere. Armiger strolled away from them, leaving the lieutenant stuttering.
He had to trust that he was still invisible to the Winds. With luck they would concentrate their fury on Parliament’s encampment. He certainly hoped he could get everyone inside and under cover before the forces of the Ventus Terraforming System arrived.
It was the biggest risk he had taken since coming to this world. He was deliberately inviting the scrutiny of the Winds. Nothing else about this siege could threaten his existence or his plans. From a strategic point of view, risking a meeting with the Winds now was idiotic.
Armiger didn’t care. There were people he felt for in the palace. He would surely survive this assault, but he doubted he could save them—at best, he could probably escape with Megan, but Galas was the queen bee, the attackers would swarm her the instant they glimpsed her. No, it was better to annihilate Lavin’s forces using the Winds, and hope that they left the ordinary stone and wood of the palace alone.
He read the situation from the semaphores again, and made his decision. The chaos of battle was reaching its peak. Under its cover, he would be able to spirit Megan and Galas away from this place. If all went according to schedule, the Winds would arrive after his escape and pin down Lavin’s forces, giving Armiger and his people time to complete their escape.
He ran for the keep. Missiles rained down into the nearby tents of the refugees. Armiger tried not to think about their fate, or that of the men on the battlements who were fighting and dying to ensure his escape.
*
“There is a way,” said Enneas. He began pulling down rocks with his good hand. “See there? That crack?”
They had all the lanterns here now, and everybody who could be was crammed up against the rock fall. Lavin focussed on breathing deeply to still his claustrophobia. He was afraid he would have an attack of his old vertigo here, and that was the worse thing that could possibly happen.
The little chink Enneas had found looked impossibly small to get through. The old robber picked up one of the lanterns and stuck his arm in it, then twisted to peer after it. “Yes!” he shouted excitedly. “I can see right through.”
“We can’t get through that,” grumbled somebody.
“You can’t,” agreed the thief. He sized up the men pressed up against him. “I can; I’m little. He can, so can he…” He appraised Lavin. “And so can you, sir. But we’ll have to remove our armor.”
Lavin’s throat was dry. Worm into that little crack? With a thousand tonnes of stone poised to collapse on him?
He glanced at the faces of his men. They were determined. Enneas seemed positively jubilant; this kind of challenge appeared to be what he lived for.
“All right,” said Lavin. “You first, thief. Show us how to shove a mouse through a keyhole.”
Enneas began unlacing his armor. “This is going to hurt,” he muttered. “Doing it one-handed will be hard. I’ll need some help.”
In the end it took two men on either side and one underneath to slide Enneas into the chink. He left his lantern behind, held his broken arm tight to his side and pulled himself into pitch darkness on his scabbed back with no complaints.
“Damn,” whispered the man next to Lavin. “I would never have believed it.”
Lavin grinned. “Pass him his lantern.”
“Come on!” Enneas waved from the other side. “It’s clear from here on in.”
When it was his turn, Lavin too went without complaint. The thief was a braver man than he, it seemed. Life never tired of teaching new lessons.
They were able to get the four smallest men inside along with Lavin and Enneas. This was not the force Lavin needed for his first plan, which had been to sneak in, grab the queen, and sneak out again. There were enough men to try his second plan, which was to steal into the queen’s chambers, take her and dangle her from a window until the defenders surrendered. For that plan, he needed only enough men to hold a doorway for some critical minutes.
They were all dressed in the colors of the royalists, which should help; it still depended on how many soldiers were now in the tower. If Hesty had done his work, they were spread out on the walls, ready to fall back when Lavin’s forces made onto the grounds.
Hesty had been instructed to wait two hours before exploiting any breach. Lavin didn’t want the defenders rabbiting up the palace steps too soon.
The others passed them their armor and weapons, and when they were ready Lavin gestured with his chin, and they moved forward into broader and quieter precincts.
Enneas seemed happy now, despite having opened the wounds on his back. He hummed as he looked around himself alertly. “Nearly there,” he said after some time. “Look for a side passage.”
They found it, right where Enneas had said it would be. The space was little more than a crawlway, but the thief slipped into it without difficulty, and the others followed. This passage had been dug through the sandy soil under the palace, and soil crumbled and fell in Lavin’s eyes and mouth with each pull he made to follow Enneas. Blinking and coughing, he finally sat up next to the thief to discover they were at the bottom of an eight-foot deep pit. The ceiling above the pit was of fitted stone, arching toward some pillar out of sight.
“Old cistern,” said Enneas. “We’re at the farthest extent of the catacombs. It’s a maze, so follow close and don’t take any turnoffs on your own.” He looked at them expectantly. “Well? Somebody give me a boost.”
When they were up and ready to set off after Enneas, Lavin nodded to one of his men. He had given him a sack of copper pennies earlier, and now that man took up the rear, and dropped a penny every few meters. Lavin didn’t want to have to rely on Enneas to find his way out of here.
They came to a stone staircase leading up. “That’s it,” said Enneas. “Those stairs take you to the lower servants’ way, and there’s a door there that exits right into the front hall of the palace.”
“I’ve seen it,” said Lavin. “Thanks. You stay here and wait for us.”
“Gladly,” said the thief.
Lavin walked up the steps, took a turn, opened a door and despite his confidence was somehow still surprised to find himself standing in the empty entrance hall below Galas’ audience chamber.
*
Calandria rolled over. Her head was pounding, and her shoulders and right arm were very sore. She looked up, saw smoke, raised her head and heard shouting and the roar of muskets.
She lay on the parapet of one of the walls stretching from the gate to the main tower. Rocks and flinders of stone lay all around her. Several bloody bodies dotted the walkway nearer the gate.
Where was her gun? Levering herself up, she spotted the microwave gun lying a few meters away. It appeared unharmed. She was superficially battered, her helmet dented, face and shoulders bruised, but otherwise unharmed.
She crab-walked over to the gun, then crouched under the crenels away from the sweep of the steam cannon below. They had stopped their deadly barrage in any case; it looked like the assault on the tower had failed.
For a while she stayed there. She didn’t want to think about where she was or what she had done to get here. The things she would have to do next might be worse.
She knew what Armiger looked like from Jordan’s descriptions. He might be anywhere within the acres of palace grounds. She was betting he would be in the tower, with the queen.
It seemed insane to move, but her use of the microwave gun might bring the Winds down on the palace anyway. Using it, she could clear a path through any number of defenders. She couldn’t bring herself to turn it on human opponents again, however. She would find another way in.
Something was burning in the courtyard near the main doors. The smoke was rich and grey, and it made a smothering pall that hid the spot where her wall met the outside wall of the keep. Steps led down at that point, but she wouldn’t use them; no doubt the main doors were securely barricaded by now.
There was a row of narrow windows seven meters above the point where the wall met the keep. Later there might be soldiers at those windows firing down into the courtyard; for now they were open and unmanned.
Calandria took off her boots and tied them over her shoulder. Then she started to climb the chipped and cracked face of the keep.
*
“I can’t believe our luck,” said Lavin. They were at the doors to the audience chamber. There was no one about.
One of his men shrugged. “Your plan worked perfectly, sir.” His tone suggested no other outcome had been possible.
The sounds of the siege penetrated, as did the smell of smoke. In all his plans, Lavin had assumed the tower would be a hive of running men and hawk-eyed commandants. His strategy in this battle had been to draw the queen’s force out to minimize the numbers here, but he had never dreamed it would work so well.
He revised his plans. They might be able to smuggle the queen out of here after all.
A scout eased the door open a crack and peered through. “I see no one… wait, there’s one man.”
“What’s he doing?”
“Walking. Must have just gone up the stairs ahead of us and paused here for a second or something.”
“Let me see.” Lavin motioned him aside. They had agreed on how to deal with simple soldiers: they would walk right by them. Lavin might be recognizable to some officers and the generals, but to few others. And they were all dressed in the queen’s livery.
So this man should present no problem…
Lavin cursed under his breath when he saw who it was. General Armiger walked slowly, his head down as if musing, hands clasped behind his back. He wore scrolled black armor, with a commander’s flag jutting over his shoulder. He would notice any commotion, and Lavin had no doubt he knew where all his troops were supposed to be. They would have to kill him now, and as quietly as possible.
“Your invincible queen has tried to kill herself.”
For an instant Lavin felt the words had been spoken to him; his heart almost stopped. Then he spotted the woman who had spoken. She stepped from the shadows of the doorway to the antechamber where Lavin had dined with Galas.
General Armiger took her in his arms, and she rested her cheek against his breastplate. “It is my fault,” he said.
“What?” She drew back a little, looking up at him.
“I told her the truth. I took away her hope.”
“She’s only human, after all.” The woman sighed. “Does that disappoint you?”
Lavin blinked. It couldn’t be true. She would have held faith to the very end, in the face of any opposition. He knew her. Nothing could shake her confidence in her own ideals. Had he thought she could fall prey to despair, Lavin would have done anything he had to in his negotiations to ensure this assault did not happen. He would have made concessions.
If Galas despaired, then they had both lost, for that would mean the woman he had come to rescue no longer existed.
He forced himself to focus on the present situation. “We will walk in casually. Kasham, step behind him as we pass. Bahner, do likewise with the woman. A blade in the heart, then drag them behind the throne.”
The men nodded. Lavin stood straight and swung the door open.
Armiger was walking quickly towards the far door. The woman stood where they had embraced, looking after him.
Lavin raised a hand, and his men halted in silence. Armiger reached the door to the antechamber, and passed through it without looking back.
Lavin caught Bahmer’s eye and shook his head. Bahmer shrugged. Then they entered the room.
The woman turned, noted them with indifference, and walked to one of the tall windows on the right. She stared out as they passed by. Lavin led his men left to the antechamber, and they were through, as simply as that.
He stepped boldly into the corridor beyond the antechamber. A stone staircase led up to the left, and two broad wood-paneled corridors radiated right and ahead. There was a deep carpet on the floor, and portrait paintings on the walls. These must be Her apartments.
A man in servant’s livery ran up. Lavin forced himself to stand perfectly still, although his heart was hammering. “Are you looking for the general, sir?” asked the servant.
“The queen, actually.” He felt his men shifting uneasily behind him. They were close to breaking strain, he knew—any slight provocation now and they would unsheath their swords. He prayed they would remain as cool as he pretended to be.
“The queen is… indisposed,” said the servant. “General Armiger is with her.”
“Where?”
“Her closet, at the end of this corridor, but sir, General Armiger said they were not to be disturbed. He ordered even the duennas to leave.”
Lavin sniffed. “This is critical to ending the siege,” he said, and walked on.
They passed two more servants and five of the queen’s maids, one of whom Lavin recognized. None looked at them. Then they were at the queen’s door.