The parade grounds of the Public Palace had been transformed overnight. Huge tiers of seats stood along the sides of the grounds, sheltered from the early winter rain by multiple stories of private boxes above. The fresh wood, still smelling of mountain pine, was wrapped with brilliant blue and gold bunting. The stands were crowded with gentry in their finery, nobles who came too late for a private box, and commoners who won a lottery for free tickets to the worst two rows of seats. These were still among the best in the city, as only those crammed into the parade grounds would be able to hear the speeches by the Kaiser, the General, and the vanquished Queen. A crowd of groundlings, most of them here since before first light, stood between the seats and the paved plaza, shuffling impatiently.
At the head of the courtyard a small podium of gilded wood had been erected for General Calloway’s speech. High above the ground, a balcony for royal proclamations issued from the keep, a wooden roof and side baffles recently constructed to protect the Kaiser’s delicate constitution from the midwinter rains. Below, the ruddy Bloodrock jutted from the keep wall. Against a rock large enough that dragons were once chained to it, the dangling human-sized manacles looked like jeweler’s chain.
Cheers had been audible, rising through the city as the triumphal procession approaches, for multiple hours, but now they were sounding from very close indeed. A drumbeat throbbed the ground from the back of the procession. A captain of the Palatine Guard blew three short blasts on his whistle. At the signal, the vendors of wine, sweetmeats, and toasted grains scrambled out of the plaza, while guardsmen eased the crowd another step back.
As a brass band called out, the entry gate was briefly filled with two enormous Dastrux banners, the poles mounted on ox-carts. Behind them came nearly 2000 horn and fife players; these parted and took up positions on either side of the gate, playing the rest of the parade through.
Oskaks said, “I think I can see Annais from here!” The band augmented its numbers with local musicians, and Annais signed up with her flute.
Next came the unit judged to have sacrificed the most, bearing their regimental colors (azure, a bend enarched argent, three chalices or in base). A huge cheer went up from the crowd. The uninjured came first, then the walking wounded, then those borne on carts; last came a pole with a scroll pinned to it bearing the names of the dead.
Someone in the stands said, “They held the pass at Danstorë alone for 12 hours before relief arrived.”
Next came a block of knights, gleaming in their arms, 2200 in number, serving as an honor guard. The cheer for them was hearty, but slightly lesser.
Next came the prisoners, all dragonborn, mainly saurians. They were naked and chained in file, their nobles wearing wooden yokes. The crowd jeered them as enemies, and for the strangeness of their reptilian bodies.
“No wonder they’re so cold of feeling, with nary a nipple to suck at.”
“Have the males had their pizzles trimmed, or do they come out of the womb like that?”
“Slimy lizards never saw the inside of a womb in the first place, and that’s a fact.”
Yet the person of Queen Ukynth, placed as she was at random to deny a station of honor, was clear. Those about her marched more steadily, prepared to meet their fate in dignity. And Ukynth herself walked with majesty yet, her head held high, her shoulders slung back and relaxed, her tail unflagging. The jeers faltered at the sight of her: she had an air of dressing herself in the sky, as though all the peoples of the world were hiding shyly beneath her skirt; or of a nurse, baring her body willingly for the succor of the helpless, all the world her charges.
No one said it, but everyone thought: This is royalty. This is the blood of dragons.
“They actually got her,” Gerald wondered.
“She walks… I wonder if they should have caught her,” saidOskaks.
“That’s the question,” Gerald replied under his breath.
The rest of the prisoners passed beyond into a staging area with the rest of the procession, but Ukynth was pulled from the line and chained, under guard, at the base of the Bloodstone.
Next came the wagons of treasure from the war, piled high with gold and silver coins, inlaid chests lined with velvet and propped open to show their cargoes of precious stones, crystal casks of fine wine, pots of incense-sticks, carts of weapons and armor and finery, bales of silk and samine, stacks of ivory, cones of spices, sacks of sugar, cages of exotic birds…
Yet the carts were not so many, nor piled so high, as one might have hoped, as the old heads who remembered glorious wars of the past had anticipated.
The crowd chattered: “I heard the dragonmen put all their treasures and children in one temple and burned the lot together to keep them out of our hands.”
“I heard the Hellstalkers burned the city in their carelessness, and not a thought for the rest of us.”
“I heard that High Mage Tyre pulled the whole city down to the Acid Hells for all eternity.”
“None of the rest of us heard that, and if you know what’s good you’ll realize you didn’t hear that either.”
Next came the victorious legions, and cheers gave way to shocked silence. The band pressed on, but it sounded tinny and unspririted without the cheers beneath it. The wounded were not present, and the triumphant general, as was usual, had dismissed the most war-weary units on the march home. Very few men were left, scant thousands of an army that numbered 50,000 or more. And their faces were hollow, their eyes dark.
“What… happened out there?”
“So few made it home?”
“So many went home instead.”
“Not all under orders; there’s deserters been attacking travelers on the road. All hushed up, but my brother’s a Roadwarden and he told me.”
Gerald prays and mutters “Welcome home.”
Next the crowd fell into a more formal silence and the band switched to a hymnal march. Great statues of the virtues were wheeled by on carts pulled by men, then a house-sized model of Fortune’s wheel, and then a huge canvas painted as the night sky with representations of the planetary gods.
Then the band struck a rising fanfare, and General Calloway’s honor guard entered. They numbered 1,000, knights and heavy infantry together in the General’s colors. Not entirely her colors; blue stitching had been added to her red and purple. And at the back center, the General herself, mounted on a red horse, bore a shield with her crest and again not her crest; the shield was still party per pale gules and purpure, but the alerion argent has been replaced with in a canton argent, a phoenix azure. Flanking standard-bearers carried the same symbol.
This was too much. The crowd began to speak quickly and under its breath.
“Oughtn’t be allowed.”
“Give it three minutes and it won’t be, I’ll wager.”
“It’s a shame. I liked her.”
“What happened out there?”
Gerald laughed and prayed, “Mother of all endings, this is your glorious knight of ruin: please stay your hand.”
More Palatine guardsmen filed into the parade grounds. The crowd drew back a pace from the plaza. But the commotion was overborne by the last element in the parade, a deafening drum corps that beat out the ending of the song the band was playing.
The honor guard parted. Calloway marched to the front, where, as there had been no sign otherwise, the Kaiser’s personal groom helped her dismount. She climbed the golden scaffold, and all eyes turned to the Kaiser’s balcony. Aida cheered her.
Kaiser Anselm II stepped into the light. He must have taken some exercise this morning, for he was not so pale as rumor held, but his long black hair was slick, and his left arm clutched his cane rigidly. All was forgotten. The crowd jumped to its feet and cheered their Kaiser.
The Kaiser closed his eyes and soaked in their adulation, drawing more than emotional strength from it, for long minutes. Just when sharp eyes might notice the cane begin to quiver in his grip, he raised his right hand and dropped it for the people to sit. He himself ascended to an ornate wooden throne and lowered himself into it with only a small sign of infirmity.
It appeared the order of the day was to be ignore, don’t engage, don’t rise to the bait. He spoke the customary words.
“Imperatrix Calloway, serving as Dux Bellorum in the Khavandri-Shethya War, I stand ready to receive thy victorious sword.”
Calloway swallowed and took a deep breath, but her voice was steady.
“Nay, your Imperial Majesty, I may not deliver it so.”
Unheard of. There are two responses to the ritual phrase. One is to assent and return the ceremonial sword of office; the other is to deny that the general has triumphed. The latter, which Calloway spoke, is used by a general to formally resign and request a replacement, but no general would be granted a triumphal procession if it could be claimed they had failed. Especially not in this economy, and certainly not a popular political actor like Calloway. Was Calloway about to call out the whole war as a useless disgrace?
Before Anselm finished rising in a white-lipped rage, Calloway plunged on.
“Many of my cohorts fell behind during the march, and the balance of my wounded are camped in Dastrux Garth. My column was harassed by deserters all the long march home. Your Imperial Majesty entrusted the legions to my care, and my duties to them have not yet ended. I have not seen the men safely home.”
Anselm raised his hand, but his order was drowned out by a chorus of relieved cheers and cynical boos. His eyes flickered from side to side, taking in Calloway’s honor guard and the outnumbered Palatine. He licked his lips with a bloodless tongue.
“Very well, Imperatrix. I relieve thee of thy duties as Dux Bellorum. Return to thy legion and gather thy wayward forces, that they may receive their discharge pay and disband.”
Confused applause. Calloway bowed, doffed her helmet, and she and her guard withdrew.
The band struck up for a brief intermission. The vendors came out and sold second rounds. Ten minutes went by.
Aida asked why the crowd reacted to Calloway’s new blazon. Gerald and Oskraks explained that bearing a phoenix in blue, the color of the Empire, could be read as acknowledging that the Empire is dying (scandalous) and taking responsibility for revitalizing it (treasonous).
Kaiser Anselm emerged from the keep’s gate with a long, silver winged spear. Traditionally he should be stripped to the waist, but he wore a dark blue woolen tunic either against the drizzle or to conceal his disease-ravaged body.
“Queen of Khavandri-Shethya,” he intoned, “Wilt thou submit to our suzerainty?”
She laughed, a deep rumbling chuckle.
“No, little giantling, I will not.”
Anselm squared his shoulders. Proceedings were coming back under control. “Then, by ancient custom, I grant thee the right of death-speech. Hast thou aught to say?”
“Yes. The stars have told me the future. Some that any fool can read, some that only you, kinglet, have anticipated, and some that thy lore has forgotten. Harken:
Fortune with force her foes will harrow.
The beasts and birds, bloodied with strife,
On meat of men make their supper.
The descendants of Dastrux by deed condemned,
Once strong, now sour, their seed shall end.
Brothers’ blood will besmirch the sword,
Ravens rip at the ruined dead.
The day turns dark with dour skies,
The grains and grasses fail, and gluts the worm.
Red sun rises o’er ruined land.
Still I speak, the stars have told me.
Though corruption long covered, cracks the earth.
Tunnels of terror ope, in times ancient dug.
The lowest labor into life’s profusion.
The pure earth pains, plagued by ill.
Now tumble the tombs, their twisted gates
On wicked wings let fly winds of ruin.
Now rise the revenant, return the dead,
And give Hells no host to hoary souls.
I spoke, and I stop; I see so and no more.
Go die then, Dastrux, in despair,
In the court of Koth’ I catch thee yet!”
She closed her eyes and began to chant. A guard called out, “Majesty?” but Anselm was frozen to the spot. Ten gunshots rang out, and the queen went limp, hanging from the manacles, her precious royal blood draining into the gutter. There would be no revitalization of the House of Dastrux today.
At the same moment, a spray of blood and bone shards erupted from the back of Anselm’s head. The crowd screamed, and Gerald and Aida swore. For a long moment, all eyes turned to the guardsmen with arquebuses drawn. Then, unfallen, Anselm turned with murder on his face. Pointing up, he intoned, as if in a trance, “Movement in the bell tower.” Two guards arrived to support him, but he shook them off. A white-robed physicker waved a rod over the wound, her snake familiar partially unwinding itself. Anselm allowed himself to be led into shelter.
The crowd was hemmed in by guards, and each was searched before being let go. Half a dozen pickpockets were caught, but there were no clues to the assassination attempt.
The whole city retired each to their local pub to gossip over the events of the day…
