Maia, her attendant, and the shrouded Manifesto Shield arrived at Enclave's depot well in time for their "excursion," a nebulous term that reeked more and more of shady intent the longer Maia thought about it. President Phrenos wanted to show the shield to someone but he wouldn't say who. If Enclave intended to fight Nexus, and Maia could see no way around it, they would need an army. But the only army around here belonged to Dace, which belonged to the First Families. She knew better than to think Dace would spend its own forces on a holy war: there were too many sons of First Families and their various branches in the officer ranks. Some would be eager to distinguish themselves, but the remainder held their positions as sinecures. There was little in the way of professional leadership in the Dacian army, as the ham-fisted policing of the outer provinces demonstrated. If Dace was a normal city, instead of the home of Enclave, they would have been invaded and conquered ages ago.

That left mercenaries. There were several companies with agents in Unity City: Red Fang, Loyal Cohort, Venerati, Blood Hogs, and a host of smaller operations. The largest and the most frequently used by Enclave was the Hyskos Grand Company. But the Grand Company was expensive, and Enclave didn't have enough funds in its operating budget for enough men to make a difference in southern Kravikas. Not for the months it would take to prepare and wage that war. Perhaps Phrenos wanted to take out a loan, and they were meeting with a lender, but why bring the shield? It was solid evidence against their chances of taking on Nexus and winning. Nothing about this 'excursion' made sense.

A worry burrowed into Maia's gut and turned there, tense and demanding. She had given much of her life to Enclave. Lately, she didn't understand anything it did.

The depot was near Bahram's four great buildings, and the wide roundabout where trains and carriages could drop and take on passengers had an impressive view of the basilica's dome. Its ultramarine expanse required tons of lapis lazuli, ground into pigment and added to paint, and then fused with the vast dome's material using the arts. It was the highest and most visible landmark in all of Unity City — laws were in place to ensure it would always remain so. It was visible from the distant foothills where gurantor trains first descended onto Unity City's floodplain. If any part of the city could be seen, Bahram's basilica was there to crown it.

Maia's view was blocked by a massive gurantor with black shaggy fur, trunk swinging back and forth, pulling a single large car to a stop in front of her. The vehicle was shiny and black, with oversized wheels and advanced suspension for a smooth ride, glass windows imported from Lavradio, and no identifying marks. To the average citizen, its passengers would be run-of-the-mill plutocrats running errands in a ridiculously expensive conveyance.

Phrenos greeted Maia as he joined her on the outdoor seating. They could have gone inside and been waited on by servitors, but the last summer days in Dace produced gentle afternoons with startling blue sky and kind breezes. Others soon joined them: the irritably zealous Guardian Paraskevi, quiet Guardian Ludo, and the still-recovering Dean Galonzo. The principals and one tightly-wrapped object boarded the car and left all the attendants behind.

Their exit was smooth, out the main gate through the wall that separated Enclave's large bubble from the surrounding Unity City. Their gurantor took them north. Each of the First Families held mastery over part of the city and found ways to put their stamp on it: Fortuna, Namalous, Pearlcamp, Donglar, and Karolo. The north side belonged to the Pearlcamps, who insisted that all buildings along main thoroughfares be painted in blues and oranges. The area was most famous for its beautiful residences, largely owned by or rented by high church personnel. Maia's own home was in the Karolo faction of the city, but veteran deans, healers, prelates, and guardians all had homes in the north quarter.

The First Families carved up the city's industries just as they did the geography, with each family enjoying total control over some commercial interest and each commercial interest beholden to a family or one of its smaller branches. The system was kept from spinning into meaningless violence through an intricate network of rents, gifts, and other exchanges of wealth of all kinds. The families were so ingrained in Unity City that the city council had five seats, and every court had five justices.

Maia despised it. She hated the way it circumscribed people's lives and forced them to exist in the shadow of someone greater. People with the smallest of ambitions couldn't manage any amount of success without owing everything to a First Family. Such extensive patronage could deal mysterious setbacks from entrenched interests. Anyone who insisted on following the written rules while ignoring the unwritten ones would be systematically fined into oblivion and, if they persisted, killed and tossed into a dark hole.

So Maia left the Karolos family to join the church. It got her out of the ugly business of the families and into a realm where her talents mattered more. In the priesthood, Family connections only mattered at the top posts of Guardian, Prelate, or Ambassador. To be considered for those posts, one first had to excel at all the lower echelons by competing on merit alone. Many of the First Families' brightest opted out of the dirty patronage business to enter the somewhat more meritorious climate of the church. They were often considered quaint by their materially motivated kin, but Nexus priests of Family descent were mostly happy with their choice.

They passed by a small park, across which Maia could see the ruins of Dean Garsharp's estate. It was just a brief look, a glimpse across a park and between two other buildings, but it woke the worry eating at her. They had cleared away the burnt rubble and leveled the plot, and something else would be built there, but it was another action she didn't understand. The Art School's deans turned on a man who had mentored most of them at some point in their careers, for not reading Vow of Obedience. Defrocking him and taking away his access to prayer wasn't enough. They had to attack him and his elderly bulwark in their house and bury them in a common plot, all five of them stacked together in the same grave. How many times did that man risk his life for the church and its faithful, only to end up like that? No marker. No honors. Even that wasn't enough. They burned his house to ensure no heretical books or belongings were left to pollute the world.

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When Maia returned from Lavradio and heard how Garsharp had met his end, that was the first time she thought coming back might have been a mistake. That didn't mean she could join Nexus like her friend Kasryn. Enclave stood over the world. The church bound millions of souls in worship through its network of thousands of churches and priests. It had defended nations from famine, disease, and monsters. It guaranteed the Treaty of Alignment, which had kept international order for a hundred and fifty years.

Nexus had a lot to offer the church, and it was a shame to toss it aside but, in the final calculation, it was a few buildings and a little over a hundred people. When this conflict was done Maia would salvage whatever was left of Nexus and incorporate it into Enclave. It wasn't entirely right, but it was the best path left open now that open hostilities had been exchanged.

Their gurantor made good time once he was through the gate. It had only one car to pull and a fast road to run on. The road was one of Brother Zorda's, the only disciple in Enclave who still worked outside its walls. Anyone who met him could tell he was impaired. Zorda the Simpleton. Zorda of Idiot of Enclave. They called him worse names, too, but he had more works recorded in the Luminous Histories than any disciple living or dead, and most of them were roads. He commanded a vast quantity of spirit, and he had a knack for moving earth. He could build roads as fast as he could walk. And he walked constantly. At sixty years old, he had crossed the continent several times on foot, building and re-building all the major highways as he went. Riding in an expensive car on a recently-maintained Zorda road was like gliding across a pond on a windless day. The gurantor went on for nearly an hour, and she hardly felt a ripple.

"Can you tell me now where we're going?" Maia asked Phrenos.

"You'll see. You had to make this trip sooner or later." He tried to ease her with a reassuring smile. "Don't worry, this is a good thing." That phrase alone was enough to make her worry more.

When the carriage took a certain turn off the main road, Maia's worry-worm started eating its way through her stomach. It was the turn she never thought she'd take. She wanted to complain that what they were doing was forbidden, that there could never be a legitimate reason for her to be on that road, except the council president and two other guardians were in the car with her, and they were not surprised at all. This was a regular occurrence.

Whatever lingering hope Maia held that she might be wrong died when the famous house came into view, sitting on its lone hill, a square building made of white brick, four stories tall, with sharply angled roofs and porticoes.

The Pinnacle.

For a place that Maia had never seen and never been to, she knew a lot about it. The Pinnacle was where the heads of the Five Families, the Firsts, met to organize their various business affairs. It was fully staffed at all times but only used for one evening a month, or occasionally more if there was an emergency. It had a security force of renowned fighters, most of them experienced mercenaries and soldiers, who didn't mind killing the occasional intruder and asking questions afterward.

The Firsts were not supposed to involve themselves in Enclave affairs. And the church was definitely not supposed to reach out to them — for anything. Enclave had its glebes in every major city, and in Unity City it had a little piece of each of the major territories. Spirit ran strong in the Family bloodlines, so all disciples and a portion of the healer cadre came from them. That was supposed to be the extent of Family involvement in Enclave. It was more than tradition, it was cannon. It was in scripture.

If Phrenos was taking the Manifesto Shield to them, then he was going to explain things to them. Was he going to ask for help? Get permission for something? Just how deep into each other's business were the Firsts and Enclave?

Maia glared accusations at her fellow guardians. "How many people know?"

"In the church?" Phrenos clarified, "just us. And Dean Katerina, of course."

"Katerina is dead." The other guardians and Dean Golonzo stared at her for several seconds, mouths open, speechless. "Doesn't anyone read my reports?"

"You didn't think to put it on today's agenda?" choked out the president.

"It's a preliminary finding. I thought you would put it on the agenda once more was known about it." They looked at her, uncomprehending. Why did she write the prelims if nobody was going to read them?

"She set a trap for Ma'Tocha in Kashpam and died. Nexus has all the fragments of sun now. Chalk up another one for Nexus."

"Impossible!" declared Paraskevi with far more volume than would ever be necessary inside an enclosed coach. "The heretics with their inferior blood and stolen arts could never overcome a disciple with Katerina's heritage. The mouth that speaks such lies should be split open and filled with salt! How dare … "

"I misspoke!" Maia shouted to cut her off, sick of her mindless zealotry. "Nexus didn't kill Dean Katerina, just like Phillip didn't kill Brother Boleslovas."

"Well, that's fine, then." Paraskevi relaxed back into her seat and looked out the window as their destination started to loom over them. The sarcastic equivalence of two untrue statements had calmed her. It made no sense.

As the car glided to the front door, and the building cast its corrupting shadow over them, Maia needed to know one thing. "Why did you bring me into this now? You could have left me in ignorance."

"You're the most competent candidate, you don't have a drop of spirit, and we'll need at least four to sway enough votes. We haven't had a fourth since Fastrada."

Fastrada. There was a sad name. He died in his quarters more than a year ago, an apparent suicide. Maia was elevated to fill his vacancy. She had been given a lot of work the moment she took her position, which prevented her from looking into the man's death. Given how things were in Enclave, she wouldn't be surprised if the reports were entirely fabricated.

"Was Fastrada's death a genuine suicide?" Maia didn't bother to hide her suspicion.

"To all appearances, yes." Phrenos looked as unsatisfied with his answer as Maia felt.