> "Scrub-a-dub my little crew, the skies are wide and blue,

>

> Daddy sails the clouds so high, with treasures bright and true!

>

> Away he goes on winds so strong to lands of gold and cheer,

>

> But he’ll be back before too long with wealth to share, my dear!" —Garanese bathtime song

A HOT BATH

On Family estate, The Gate, the Yunei Empire 09.06.03.11.12

There was, of course, a Proper way to draw a bath, and Deng-Nah’s servants had followed it perfectly. The water was painfully hot when he first sank into it, so that he had to do so slowly and with held breath…but it was just on the right side of painful, and the feeling of being cooked relaxed into a deep pleasure.

Deng-Nah, of course, had followed the Proper way to prepare for his bath. He had already soaped and cleansed vigorously from a bucket of lukewarm water, lathered and rinsed and combed his hair, and scrubbed himself from toes to nose. He was clean already. The point of the bath at this point was to relax and settle him, and hopefully allow decent sleep.

Di-Ha smiled at him as she settled in opposite, her own hair falling in loose wet cascades over her shoulders. He’d rarely seen her with her hair down or her face bare of makeup, nor with her skin flushed red and shining from the heat. She looked radiant.

“There,” she said. “I think I can hear your muscles sighing with relief.”

Deng-Nah nodded and settled down against the edge of the bath with a groan. “I…hah. I don’t think I knew how tense I’d become,” he acknowledged.

“Turn around and come here,” she instructed. Deng-Nah opened an eye to arch an eyebrow at her, then obeyed her command. She put her hands to his shoulders and guiding him into position, leaning him back so that his head rested against her breast. She gave him a little smile, then bent down to kiss his forehead. “Close your eyes,” she whispered.

He did so. Moments later, her fingers went cleverly to work on his shoulders, down his arms all the way to his hands, then back to his chest and from there up his neck to his scalp. Everywhere they went they explored and pushed slowly gently but firmly, probing, finding, stretching, smoothing and releasing. As she massaged him, she hummed a sweet song.

It worked beautifully. Soon he was hardly conscious, just drifting in steamy relaxing bliss with an untroubled mind. A timeless interval passed unheeded until he finally noticed that the water had cooled to merely warm, and Di-Ha seemed to have fallen asleep herself, her arms still splayed down his chest but her own head nodded down and to one side. She was even snoring slightly.

He opened his eyes and considered her. Considered how incredibly beautiful she was. What a woman.

How could he even consider leaving? His father really had been foolish, to heed the words of a witch…

Di-Ha stirred, opened her eyes, and caught him watching her. To his surprise, she blushed.

“Don’t stare at me,” she whispered.

Deng-Nah sighed, and remembered a scrap of poetry he’d written some time ago. “If I could see just one thing / and then nothing more / I would give you my last sight,” he said, aloud.

Her blush deepened. “Did you compose that here and now?” she asked.

“If only I was that clever.”

She tidied up his hair, redundantly. “You are clever.”

“Am I?” Deng-Nah sighed and closed his eyes again. “I don’t feel clever or stupid. I feel like I am…floating on a river’s current. As though that is all I have done, all my life. I married very well—” he opened his eyes to smile at her, and was pleased when she smiled back “—but…what have I done? What have I achieved? Will my story be to inherit and pass forward my family but do nothing with it? What is a man who does nothing more than preserve his inheritance without growing it?”

She sighed and stroked his forehead. “Your mind has been so full of strange thoughts lately. Not just the dreams, but these questions you ask, these things you take an interest in. You are so…restless…all of a sudden.”

“I know.” He yawned. “I cannot decide if it is because I am tired and irritable from lack of good sleep, or because I have woken up somehow, and come to see that I was not doing anything.”

“…Nah-nah,” she favored him with a rare diminutive. “About…about what your father told you…about that prophecy…”

Deng-Nah’s eyes flew open and he blinked up at her. “You heard?”

She had the good grace to give him a small embarrassed shrug. “I was coming to surprise you and I…Sho-Gong had been ordered away. What your father said—”

“Was the rambling of an old man who made the mistake of heeding a witch, Di-Di. Nothing more.”

“Is it?” She caressed his brow. “Or is that what you are trying to tell yourself?”

Deng-Nah sat up and turned to face her, taking her hands in his. “How could I leave the perfect woman?” he asked.

She smiled, but also shook her head. “…No. Don’t try to comfort me that way.”

“It’s the truth. I see nothing that would cause me to leave. For all that I’m restless…I wouldn’t do that to you, or to our child.” He gently laid a hand on her round belly.

“Not even to save us?” She laid her hand upon his. “I know you, Nah-nah. It is Proper for a woman to study her husband and become an expert in him. Perhaps I know you better than you know yourself. I think…well, let me ask you plainly. Suppose you were faced with a choice,either to protect our lives by sacrificing our standing, or the reverse…which would you choose?”

“I—” Deng-Nah, halted, surprised by the very Proper answer that rose in him, and the way it felt exactly like vomit. He couldn’t speak such a polite lie, not to her. “…Di-Di…you know why I leave matters at court to you,” he said slowly. “If it is proper for a woman to study her husband, is it not also proper for a man to study his wife? And I cannot think that any scandal or decrease in standing would hold you back for long. You can overcome anything, so long as you are alive. If that choice is before me, I would have you live and rebuild. But… is there a threat? I have imagined one, but perhaps it is just the disquiet of my mind inventing ghosts and demons.”

She gave him a sober look. “Did I not speak of it when I returned home? A conqueror of the mind is sweeping the barbarian earthmotes, and the Empress herself fears he may be taking aim at the Divine Empire.”

He didn’t reply. After a second, she extracted her hands from his and rose to sit on the bath’s edge. She gathered her hair into a rope and squeezed the water from it. “There are powers in this world beyond what is Proper at court, Nah,” she told him. “At court, it is proper that the foreigners are harmless barbarians, too stupid and squalid to be of interest to the empire. But it is polite fiction.”

“What is the truth, then?” Deng-Nah asked.

“The truth, though it could ruin our family for me to be heard saying it, is that the City of Emperors is not the greatest city in the world. That honor belongs to a place called Awd-an-hi-yee, a city on the Great Crescent earthmote*.* As many people live there as in Shenggung, and its people have a history just as old and armies just as great as our own. Their ships fly the skies and trade, yielding great wealth and power, and the Four and the Eight walk more often among them than among us. Even the Golden River, it is said, takes foreign men for her husbands more often than she takes a Yunei man.”

Her sober look was now deadly grim. “Our armies have spears and bows, and are well practiced with them. Their armies have airships and cannons and disciplined lines of men with reliable guns that can accurately strike a man dead from three hundred paces. The truth, my love, is that the Empire has been overtaken and left behind, and we shall remain behind so long as the Gate is closed. His Majesty the Emperor believes this.”

Deng-Nah saw the problem immediately. The Emperor was an enlightened being, having transcended beyond such mundane matters as decrees and policies. Such worldly duties fell to the Council of First Lords, in the Emperor’s name. It would be treason to suggest that such worthy paragons of Propriety would ever even contemplate regicide…

But if anyone could ever do such a terrible thing, it was them. And many an emperor had died unexpectedly over the long years, from sudden illness, shortly after stepping in and issuing personal decrees. The Emperor, in short, was not just ascended above mundane policy, but forced beyond it by the very powers who had ascended him.

“But the Council of First Lords would not sanction opening the Gate and beginning a dialog,” he said.

“The First Lords, may their wisdom be rewarded with a thousand years of health, believe that doing so would be to allow in the very floodwaters we seek to remain dry from.”

“Surely the Council of First Lords are wise enough to see that inaction can itself be the action that costs everything?” Deng-Nah asked, carefully.

“The First Lords earned their positions in this life on the virtues they showed in past lives,” Di-Ha replied. They were speaking in code and innuendo now, in the paranoid manner that became habitual when one must always be on guard for spies. What was not said was as important as what was, and Deng-Nah knew her well enough for her meaning to seem plain: none of them has earned or worked for a damn thing, and they don’t understand how precarious the empire’s position actually is.

“…So you believe we are soon to be invaded.”

“Indeed. By a sorceror who conquers silently and without spilling a drop of blood. And his influence has spread from Awd-an-hi-yee like creeping knotweed. This circle, these ‘wan-ists,’ they are his hands and agents. And they have their eyes on our empire, my love. They have their eyes on everything.”

Deng-Nah frowned. “How do you know this?”

“You have not been as attentive a student of your wife as you claim, Nah-Nah. I know many things, much of which is deeply Improper to know. And I know that the prophecies of witches tend to come true.”

“None of this gives me any reason to leave, though,” Deng-Nah pointed out. “Quite the reverse, it gives me cause to stay! I cannot imagine abandoning you and our child in good times, let alone a time of grave peril—”

“The village that sits below a mountain peak imagines the mountain is unchanging, until icy weather loosens a boulder and it comes down upon them.” Di-Ha gave him a profoundly sad look. “I do not want you to leave, and I know you do not want to. Which means you would only do so for a very good reason. We do not know what it is, yet. But…I believe we will, soon.”

“How can you say that?” Deng-Nah asked. “What about our child? What about my family’s name? You should not be saying anything to encourage me.”

“I am not,” she replied, evenly. “I am simply stating what I know and believe to be true. I believe these dreams of yours, this restlessness that has come on you…I believe they are the signs of prophecy about to come true. I wish it were otherwise, but I…”

She trailed off and looked aside. Slowly, her hand came up to rest on her pregnancy. “…Did you ever ask yourself why I chose to marry you out of all suitors?” she asked. “I am cousin to the Empress. This family was an…acceptable match, but the On clan gained more from it than I did, politically.”

Nah blinked at her, then rose to sit next to her. “I did wonder, ” he admitted.

“It’s because when you were among the many suitors who courted me, you were the only one who was actually there in that room with me. All the others…their minds were on the future, on the political advantage of the match, or on their worries and fears about seeming properly perfect. You, though…you were nervous and worried about those things as well, of course, but you spoke to me as me, not as the Empress’ cousin. It may seem like a small thing, but since that day, I have known you as a very…a very genuine soul, my love. You are the breath of clean air that releases me when I return from the stuffy staleness of court.”

She sighed. “But I also know that means if something comes along, whatever it may be, that calls you away…you will heed it. So the very thing I love best about you might also be the thing that takes you from me.”

“Di-Di—”

“No, Nah. Don’t promise not to go. I know you well enough to believe that you must, when the time comes. And I trust you enough to believe it will be for a good reason. So…” she sighed heavily, then looked him in the eye. “I cannot give you my blessing to leave, but…but I will promise you that you are right. I will weather it, and our child will not be ruined by it. You don’t have to worry about us.”

“What kind of man would I be if I didn’t?” he replied, bringing his hand up to caress her cheek.

She smiled, and rested her head on his shoulder. “And there it is. The only reason I can think of why you would go, is to protect us from something.”

Deng-Nah could say nothing to that. She had skewered him, right in his heart, and so hard that It hurt…but it also made him feel profoundly loved, and that in turn made him feel a keener love for her than he’d known before. He held her close, and they sank back into the water to enjoy the warmth and comfort of each other, just for a little time longer.

----------------------------------------

He woke…sometime later. They had gone to sleep curled up together under a futon in his chambers, but Di-Ha was now withdrawn a little, curled up a little in a nest of supportive cushions. She was entirely sound asleep and peaceful.

Deng-Nah…was not. He had slept, yes, but this time the dream had been particularly vivid. The green-eyed woman had smiled at him and nodded approvingly. Then she had faded into the background, and there had been the golden-haired man who was somehow also a woman. Only this time, instead of the unfamiliar environs he usually occupied, this time he had been in a familiar setting, right here in the On family estate. In Deng-Nah’s dream, the figure had simply walked past the night guards, used a rope and grapple to scale the wall, and the dream had ended just as he stalked past the bedrooms.

In the distance, a tuned floorboard squeaked. Far, far too heavily.

A wave of drowsiness and the nigh-irresistible urge to ignore it and go back to sleep washed over him, but it crashed into the warning of his dreams and left him stark awake and suspicious. He sat up, noticing that his hand had already reached for and grasped his sword without thought.

He let go of it long enough to don his night-time robes, tied the sash, then stalked out of the room as quietly as he knew how to be.

Unlike any intruder would, he knew which floorboards were tuned, and where the thick joists beneath them were that would keep his step from resonating and thudding. The estate’s buildings were made so that no-one could move about them silently…but Deng-Nah had made a game of doing exactly that as a child. Now, his boyhood play meant his bare feet made hardly a sound at all.

Nobody was about. There was a water clock in the garden, a bronze bowl with markings up the inside fed by a carefully tuned trickle of water and emptied twice a day, at dawn and nightfall. It was about a third full. The guard changes happened at quarter-night, half-night and three-quarters.

Hmm.

Another board sang up ahead, and again there was that sudden leaden heaviness in his limbs and the desire to say it was nothing and go back to sleep, but now Deng-Nah’s suspicion was really up. He set his thumb to the sword’s handguard, ready to push and whip the blade out at an instant’s notice, and ghosted down the veranda toward…yes, toward the hall of heirlooms.

Every major family had such a vault, a place for storing keepsakes and mementoes of its members. On special occasions and holidays, they were the focus for properly honoring the ancestors. But, they were also a trove of riches and well-protected.

Except tonight, the guard watching it was asleep. Deng-Nah frowned at him. That was Mo-Shu, a good and dilligent man. It was unthinkable that he would take a nap while on the job. And indeed, when Deng-Nah gave the slumped figure a nudge, he got no response at all. A loyal, alert, attentive and hitherto unimpeachable guard completely failed to stir from a slumber he would never have chosen to take.

Fine.

The time for sneaking and subtlety was past, he decided. With a grunt and a war cry, he yanked the door aside and sprang through, his sword glittering in the dark. A gaunt figure in nondescript grey clothes, head-and-shoulders taller than Deng-Nah, straightened in alarm then fell back as Deng-Nah assaulted him. The sword rang nastily off some hard steel hidden under the thief’s clothes and bounced back with its edge chipped. They issued a high grunt of exertion and backed away, uttering a word Deng-Nah didn’t know but understood the intent of.

As they did so, they passed through a shaft of light from the vents in the roof, and the reflected light of distant earthmotes shone in hair the color of gold, and cast shadows on a sharp-angled, foreign face that had haunted his dreams for weeks.

The wave of drowsiness came again, but Deng-Nah backed away, raising his sword into a guard posture at the door. He gave the slumbering Mo-Shu a kick, but the guard simply toppled over sideways and began to snore.

The yellow-haired man gave Deng-Nah an astonished and troubled look, and struck again with this peculiar mind-magic, harder than ever. This time was too much: Things grew soft, and melty and warm, and Deng-Nah realized he was only dreaming again, and really he was still fast asleep in his own bed…

…

…No!

A flash of green eyes in the dark behind his eyelids brought him back to wakefulness just as the stranger was lowering him gently to the ground. The foreigner stared at him astounded for a second, and then Deng-Nah’s fist slammed into his jaw with a satisfying crack!

The man went down instantly. Tall he might be, but he was light and frail too, and Deng-Nah’s punch had been sweet perfection.

Almost instantly, Mo-Shu snorted, grunted, then uttered a cry of dismay and surged to his feet. his dismay turned instantly to shame and sorrow as he saw Deng-Nah, and he grovelled low to press his forehead to the ground.

“Lord Deng-Nah!”

Deng-Nah gestured for him to stand. “Get up, get up.”

Mo-Shu rose, but kept his body bowed low. “My lord! I have failed my duty to you and your family! I request—”

“Request denied. You were dutifully on guard and this…thief, or wizard, or whatever he is, put a spell on you. You are pardoned of all wrong-doing, Mo-Shu. Feel no shame and stand straight.”

The other man sagged, then gathered his composure and straightened up. “Yes, Lord.”

The sound of shouting heralded the arrival of more guards, all wearing a shame-faced look. Deng-Nah guessed he would soon be denying several more requests to perform some act of self-flaggelation, but for now the men gawped at the unconscious foreigner sprawled in the middle of the heirloom hall.

Of course, most of them had never seen a foreigner, before.

The man stirred with a groggy groan and spat out a mouthful of blood.

“Shackle him,” Deng-Nah ordered. “I will interrogate him myself, in the fire garden.”

As they hoisted the limp form and dragged it away, Deng-Nah stooped and picked up the heirloom the thief had been stealing. It took it a second to place it, as the only thing he’d ever found noteworthy about it was its nondescriptness. The Box of Deng-Hao On, the clan’s patriarch who’d first elevated the On family to its present station after his journeys with the esteemed Yun-Fah Le. Which made it the oldest keepsake in the family archive and thus the most treasured…but as an item itself it was dull. A plain, unadorned wooden box without any visible catch or keyhole, that no-one had ever persuaded to open.

Why this out of all the treasures arrayed around the room? Nearly all of them were richer and grander…

He made to put the box back on the shelf, then on impulse took it with him instead as he returned to his quarters, dressed briskly while Di-Ha sat up and quizzed him, then strode out to the Fire Garden to confront the man from his dreams.

----------------------------------------

Mouse woke to a bucket of water being splashed in his face. His jaw hurt like fuck, and that was about all he could muster the focus to think about for a few seconds, until a robed figure standing next to him placed a hand to his head and the familiar faint blue glow of healing magic drove all the stunned fuzz out of his mind. Even the taste of blood receded.

As he came to his senses, he tried to move and found his wrists and ankles were firmly bound to a wooden stool, leaving him in an awkward posture from which not even the world’s most limber acrobat could have effected a quick escape. Several Yunei men stood around him with their hands on their swords, which were still sheathed but with the definite promise of imminent and very swift death should it be necessary.

…Well shit.

There was a beat where nothing much seemed to be happening. The armed guards were waiting for someone. In his mind, he felt the tickle of Jerl’s attention and concern.

Problem?

Captured.

What? How?

Dunno. One of the Yunei broke through my power and…

Shall I pull back?

Mouse looked up as the man who’d punched him in the mouth came striding out from a nearby complex of rooms, dressed rather more finely now in a robe of rich blue silk. He was turning the Word Vault over in his hand, frowning at it.

…Not yet. Might still be able to talk my way out of this.

He felt Jerl’s skepticism and worry, but also assent.

Mouse nodded, took a deep breath, and looked up into his captor’s face. Time to see if Mind could compensate for not knowing a lick of Yunese…

----------------------------------------

Deng-Nah considered the man from his dreams for a minute before speaking. The figure seemed calm. Tense, certainly, but not obviously scared. Odd, considering he must know that the inevitable sentence for this trespass would be death. Cold eyes as blue as the clear sky watched him carefully.

“Lord, the foreigner surely does not speak anything of our enlightened tongue,” Sho-Gong pointed out. “Your time is too precious to waste on a thief and barbarian.”

Everyone stiffened then looked as one at the prisoner, who shrugged slightly.

It was…not a voice, or anything so easily defined. It was just that the knowledge, somehow definitely external, arrived in Deng-Nah’s head that the prisoner was amused, and did understand them.

A conqueror of the mind. The icy chill of that thought ran down Deng-Nah’s back, and he was about to command Sho-Gong to kill this stranger immediately when—

;;

Deng-Nah hesitated, torn between paranoia and…what? The certainty that the prisoner was truthful? how could he possibly be certain of that? If Di-Ha’s news of conqueror of the mind was true, then such a conqueror would know exactly how to manipulate him, surely?

He met the prisoner’s eye, and the thought—his own, or so it seemed—struck him that a conqueror of the mind wouldn’t even bother with manipulation. What reason would they have to bother? For that matter, what reason would they have to sneak and skulk in the dark like a common thief? A conqueror of the mind, it seemed to him, could just walk in and claim what he wanted.

To his surprise, the prisoner expressed at learning he knew something of the battle beyond the wall and across the sea of clouds.

“Why did you come here?” Deng-Nah asked, aloud.

;;

Deng-Nah frowned at the box in his hand. “This?”

;;

“This?” Deng-Nah repeated. He waved the box. “It’s a lump of wood.”

The prisoner smiled at him and…and um…

What…what had they been doing?

Deng-Nah scowled and concentrated. They were in the Fire Garden. Himself and several of his guards. They were there for a reason. An important reason, that had somehow entirely slipped from his mind, and continued to slip away as he groped for it, like trying to chase down and pick up a cat.

Until, suddenly, it leapt into his arms. He gave the prisoner a shocked look as he remembered, just as abruptly as he had forgotten. Several of his men growled and fidgeted with their swords, but the thief just gave him a level look with perhaps the faintest hint of a shrug.

That had been a demonstration.

The prisoner sighed, and the images and impressions started flowing faster now. It was communication without words, there was no need for them to speak the same language. All Deng-Nah had to do was pay attention, and the knowledge flowed.

He saw Auldenheigh, its spires and trams and airship docks and thriving, wealthy people. He saw the airship guilds, each with dozens or hundreds of ships and thousands of men. He saw the freedom of the skies, the wonders of different earthmotes, from the cave-city of Long Drop to the great Face of Mehoom.

He saw Nils Civorage, the man to whom shades bowed, who stole minds and who had set his sights on enslaving all the world. He saw what Civorage had done, to Auldenheigh and to many other places. He saw the Circles and the shambling, empty-headed husks of people who tended them.

He saw the Crowns and Heralds, blessing this mission. He saw what manner of thing was in this tiny, dusty box that had sat forgotten on a shelf for generations and now rested in his hand.

He saw…everything. He saw the faces from his dreams and now he could put names to all of them. But in doing so the mystery only deepened, because the woman with the green eyes was only a little girl…

“Lord?” Sho-Gong was touching his shoulder carefully. “Lord, are you well?”

Deng-Nah smacked a suddenly dry mouth and jerked his head to try and shake his thoughts back into some kind of order. “Ah….yes. Yes. I am…fine.”

“Lord, this barbarian is some form of witch. For your safety, let me kill him.”

Deng-Nah looked his captive…*Mouse…*in the eye. Part of him felt that Sho-Gong’s counsel was wise. A man with this power was truly dangerous. But again the thought rose in him that if Mouse truly came as a foe, then he would not bother with explaining himself or with communication. He would simply dominate, and the harm would already be done.

Was that the foreigner’s will at work? Was that a suggestion he had planted? It…did not feel so, somehow. And it occurred to Deng-Nah that he seemed to be at least a little resilient to the prisoner’s powers. How else had he achieved this capture?

Why that should be, though, remained an unanswered question. Of more immediate concern was the question of what to do, here and now.

Thoughts turned over in his mind. The new facts he had just learned and the new visions he had seen collided with his recent dreams, and an idea formed like dew on a bloom in the early morning.

“…No. Let him go.”

“My lord, I—” Sho-Gong began, clearly dumbfounded.

“I have spoken, Sho-Gong.”

Even so, there was a moment of hesitation among the guards, before Sho-Gong finally remembered what was Proper and bowed low. “Yes, I obey.”

In moments, the prisoner’s hands and feet were unbound. Mouse stood to his full and truly intimidating height, massaging his wrists where the bonds had been tight enough to pinch. He met Deng-Nah’s eye, then looked down at the box, then back up.

The understanding filled Deng-Nah like a cup that it would be futile and stupid to withhold it. He knew the power that…that Jerl wielded. Knew that if Mouse failed here, he would simply un-do the failure and try again, until they succeeded.

He handed over the box. Sho-Gong and the guards remained at rigid attention, but could not disguise the disbelief in their eyes. They did not understand; Mouse had not shown them.

Mouse smiled and nodded. After a second he frowned, then bowed low.

“The esteemed lord is generous beyond the limits of my humble gratitude,” he said, in heavily accented but perfectly proper manner. And then…he was gone. There was that moment of forgetfulness again, and when focus and attention returned, there was no sign that the prisoner had ever been there, aside from the seat he’d been bound to, and the faint impressions of his feet in the gravel.

Deng-Nah exhaled, and felt Sho-Gong’s stare.

“Speak, Sho-Gong.”

“My Lord…that man stole from you. He broke into your house and robbed your family’s treasures! He is a foreign barbarian who has trespassed on the sacred clay of the Yunei!”

“Yes, he did. He also showed me the end of all freedom encroaching at our very gate,” Deng-Nah sighed. “We have just encountered a thing much larger than our own concerns, and I do not think there is any Proper way to handle it.”

“I…do not understand, Lord.”

“No. I suspect neither do I, not fully.” Deng-Nah turned to his men. “You will not speak of this, unless the Emperor himself commands you. And he may, soon enough.”

The men glanced nervously at each other, then bowed and scurried off at Deng-Nah’s gestured command, taking the chair with them. Deng-Nah took a deep breath, and turned back to his chambers.

He found Di-Ha sitting and awake. She gave him a pale, worried look in the dim light.

“What has happened?” she asked.

“You were right,” Deng-Nah told her, and slid the door behind him. He sat with her, and told her what he had seen.

Their conversation lasted through the rest of the night.

----------------------------------------

> “I ‘eard ‘ow ‘er Grace the right Duchess still ‘as ‘er agents in th’ city, still workin’ behind t’scenes. She means t’come back, one day. I wish I could join ‘em. This city ain’t free no more. I’d fight ‘fer the ol’ Duchess, if’n I could. But they’s got ‘ter be careful as mice, don’t they? Ain’t safe ‘ter stand up ‘ter these Oneists, ain’t safe at all…” —Words spoken by Geree Bowdler to his friends at the Pin Polisher Public House, the night before he converted to Oneism and joined the Circle.

TREEFOOT SAFEHOUSE

Cheapside, Auldenheigh, Enerlend, Garanhir Earthmote 09.06.03.11.12

The Blackdrake Network’s new base of operations was above a threadmaker’s shop on Tapener’s Row. Pickler’s Lane was supposedly still intact and undiscovered, but that was in large part because Lord Drevin, via his distant coded instructions, was keeping the place as a fallback location. The safehouse at Broadwalk was burned and gone, having been evacuated just minutes before the Oneists and their pet Constabulary task force had swept in on the place. Sergeant Bothroyd had taken a serious risk in passing on the warning, so for the time being he was in quarantine, behaving himself and generally being a good and obedient copper. An old man just doing his job as he waited out the last few years until he could retire and enjoy his pension.

Adrey hoped the sergeant would get to enjoy it. He’d earned the right.

For her part, it felt good to be back. That short break on the Oasis had been restful, healing, very necessary and it had been wonderful to see Ellie and to see Lisze’s first steps on the road to recovery, and to meet little Saoirse…but it had also reinforced that she was meant to be here, fighting this fight.

Even if the board was somewhat changed since she’d seen it last.

There was a map of Cheapside rolled out on the table. Originally it had been weighed down at the corners with whatever was to hand: a pistol, a cup (empty and dry, but still smelling faintly of beer), a bag of magestones and a small book. Now, though, it was so full of pins that the weights were long redundant.

Most of them were an unhappy red.

“Goodness…” Adrey frowned as the scale of the Oneists’ gains in the city became apparent. “We really made them angry, didn’t we?”

“Oh, it ain’t that,” Skinner replied. “They’re desperate. We gave ‘em a solid kick in the balls that night, an’ th’ whole city saw they’re not so untouchable as they want t’seem. So, they’ve bit back hard.”

“To try and mend the illusion.”

“Aye.”

“And a frightened dog bites sooner and harder.”

“Pretty much.” Skinner leaned forward to pluck a pin out of the board and toss it into the little bowl he kept to on side. “Curfew’s tighter, checkpoints all ‘ave a Circle creeper or two mannin’ ‘em. Sometimes, they even board trams an’ check documents, or jus’ stop folks in th’ crowd. Anyone pipes up ‘ta complain, they get a thumpin’, then off to Ol’ Brackish.”

“All by order of the so-called Duke, I’m sure…”

“Mhm. After our little party, ‘is Grace issued many a proclamation an’ decree.” Skinner snorted. “Poor bugger. Like as not ‘e’s jus’ like ‘yer friend Lizzy an’ all the others, except sometimes they ‘and ‘im the ducal seal so’s the papers are genuine an’ official.”

“No doubt,” Adrey agreed, bleakly. Her Grace’s Prison Brackishmarsh was, or rather had been, Auldenheigh’s main destination for recidivist criminals who simply couldn’t be part of society in any capacity. From all she’d ever heard of the place, it was a grim warren of black-painted iron bars and whitewashed brick walls, where dignity was deemed to be a civilized privilege that the inmates had thrown away. It sounded ghastly.

The Oneists, of course, had promptly taken the place over when they dominated the Duke. Now, it was effectively just a waiting-place to hold troublemakers prior to their Encirclement. Though, everything the resistance had found suggested several of the Oneists’ more enthusiastic non-Encircled enforcers were former inmates.

Encircling dulled the mind and wits, after all. The Oneists couldn’t afford to all be brainless puppets, Civorage needed some sharp minds…and where better to find them than in prison after a good spell of meditating sullenly on how the previous regime had wronged them?

They were nasty pieces of work to a man. Brutal, sadistic, often pathologically murderous. But the very volatility and ruthlessness that Civorage prized in them and that made them so dangerous to the general public also made them unprofessional and sloppy by the Blackdrake’s standards.

It really was quite an asymmetrical game they were playing, Adrey thought. The Oneists had the numbers, the Blackdrake Network had the skill and discipline. Which was more telling?

Only time would answer that question.

“’Ow good is ‘yer new safehouse?” Skinner asked.

“It’s a boarding house for young ladies. Gentleman callers not allowed. I can probably roost there a good long while, but it’s no use for harboring agents or stockpiling materiel.”

“Hmm…”

“It’s still a line of communication.”

“True. If’n you don’t mind bein’ a pigeon.”

This content has been misappropriated from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

“Fine by me. After that incident at the Hunting Hounds it’s probably best if I stick to low-visibility duty for now.”

“Ah, ‘yer wasted on th’ timid stuff. But here an’ now, we do need t’build the web again...Alright. What’s your cover at Hatpin?”

“Adelia Rubb. Her husband is Charlie Rubb, an airshipman away on the Felicity’s Flight for the next two years. Adelia’s come in to the city looking for work. I’m thinking she’ll find a position as a governess.”

Skinner nodded as he made note of this. “Solid. I like it.”

“So that’s the plan for now? Rebuild the network?”

“That’s it ‘fer now. Let the Oneists thrash about a bit, stay out their way, fix what they break…but I got a target in mind ‘fer the next rescue. You’ll want in on that.” He flashed a rare smile.

“Why, who’s the target?”

“Who else?” Skinner’s smile broadened into an honest grin. “We robbed ‘em of some nobodies before. No offense ‘ta miss Lisze intended, beggin’ ‘yer pardon. But who’s th’ one person in all Auldenheigh we could break free an’ it’d really, really hurt ‘em?”

Adrey paused, then joined him in grinning. “The Duke.”

“Aye. Be quite a turnabout if he got free, made a big public statement an’ declared support for ‘Er Grace Ellaenie, wouldn’t it?”

“It’d be a coup,” Adrey agreed. “It won’t be easy.”

“No. S’why we need th’ network repaired first. But that’s the goal. ‘Course, you’ll take what I just said ‘ta ‘yer grave rather’n let the Oneists learn it, right?”

“Skinner, I promise you this. They’d never take me alive no matter what I knew.”

“Good.” He pulled his watch from his pocket, then nodded. “Arright. Time’s gettin’ on. You’d best sleep so’s you can go back ‘ta Hatpin in th’ mornin’ an’ tell ‘yer landlady you found work.”

Adrey nodded and considered the map one last time. They had a lot of work to do if they intended to pull off this particular coup. A lot of work. But what price Auldenheigh’s freedom? What price Civorage’s defeat?

No price was too high. She watched as Skinner stuck a new pin in the map to mark her safehouse—appropriately, he found an actual hatpin—then turned and headed through into the back room where a divider and curtain created a little privacy around a cot in the corner. Once upon a time, it would have been the unthinkable limit of slumming it.

Now, it was a safe, warm, dry and comfortable place to sleep. Anything beyond that was pampering.

She smiled at the change in herself, lay down, gathered some blankets around her, and fell asleep on the thought that she was back, and ready to open the next chapter of her home’s liberation.

----------------------------------------

> “Rumor has it, one’a the Keeghan clan’s come up wi’ something he claims’ll change the world just as much as his grandpa’s lift gas. Something about sending messages flying through the air on little lightning bolts? Fuck if I understood it, but they’re the family who made wood and rope take to the sky, so if anyone can send a letter without pen and paper, it’d be them…” —Overheard in the Ship’s Wheel Inn, Crae Laugharne.

LOADING UP AND GETTING READY TO SAIL

The docks, Out-Town, the Gate 09.06.03.11.12

Business as usual, that was the key. No rush, no fuss, no forced nonchalance. The trick to getting away clean now was for everything to be normal. Jerl had made appointments to meet with a couple more buyers, and he honored those appointments even though his scalp and spine were itching with the thought of the Word Vault now secure in the safe in his cabin. Part of him was seriously expecting a squad of Yunei soldiers to come marching out of the Gate to confront them at any minute.

Time suggested no such threat, and Mouse had said he was fairly sure that Deng-Nah On wouldn’t suddenly be changing his mind like that, but still every minute ashore felt perilous now.

Fortunately, the meetings with the buyers were straightforward and productive. Both were happy to buy the last of Jerl’s furs and whisky at prices that left him with a profit to show, and the ship’s stocks were fully replenished.

Jerl was just finishing up with the harbormaster when he became aware of a small man—well, all Yunei were small, but this one was especially tiny, maybe a full foot shorter than Jerl himself—standing and waiting patiently. The man was dressed for travel, with an overcoat over his warm robes, sturdy wooden clogs, a modest pack and bedroll upon his back, and a sword at his belt.

For all that the gear seemed rugged, it also had that well-made, expensive look. And the sword’s scabbard was beautifully lacquered and decorated with script. His hair was worn in a high, neat topknot bound with ribbons, and his beard was short, neat and expertly barbered.

Jerl had never seen him before…but he guessed he could put a name to this face.

He turned and called over his shoulder up the ramp to call for Mouse, but Mouse was already coming down it. He smiled at the newcomer, then bowed politely and said something in the Yunei language.

The man gave a mildly surprised grunt, then returned the bow and replied in kind, just two short sylabbles: “So mu.”

Mouse smiled at Jerl. “I figured he’d be coming. I saw it in his mind.”

The man turned to Jerl, and bowed. “Joihichi, ban Jer-al How-ten.”

Mouse’s mind tickled Jerl, delivering the correct reply. Jerl returned the bow, a little stiffly. “joy-ee-hee-che-mai, hei Deng-Nah On.”

There was a mutually uncertain pause. Obviously, further communication was going to be a problem, but…oh, to the Shades with it. Jerl stepped aside and gestured with an open palm, inviting Deng-Nah On to climb the ramp. That at least didn’t require him to know the lingo.

The nobleman nodded gratefully, and took the invitation.

“He’s coming with us, then,” Jerl commented to Mouse as they watched him climb up to the deck.

“There’s something weird going on with him,” Mouse replied. “I saw it in his thoughts. He’s been…dreaming of us, somehow. For weeks, now.”

“You’ll have to teach him Garanese pretty quick,” Jerl pointed out.

“He’ll learn,” Mouse predicted.

Jerl watched the little man pause on the deck and look about, clearly out of his depth and trying not to show it. “Why is he here?”

Mouse shrugged. “Why are any of us here?”

Jerl could only concede that point with a pause, a frown, and a shrug of his own.

“We’d best get moving before someone comes asking after him,” Mouse pointed out.

“…Right. Sinikka!”

The elf’s head popped up from below decks. “Skipper!”

“We all aboard?”

“All aboard, fueled and ready!”

“Then tell Derghan to prime and light ‘em, we’re going!”

“Aye aye!”

Mouse had already bounded up the ramp. Jerl followed, drew the ramp up behind him, and wandered on up to the wheelhouse while the familiar rhythm of shouting, activity and grumbling engines erupted around him. Deng-Nah On followed him, and sat on his pack in an out-of-the-way corner while Jerl got the ship in motion.

“Jerl? There, ah, is one small matter we need to resolve…” Amir had sidled up with his tools and almenac in hand. “Where exactly are we going next?”

“Haptar Getesh,” Jerl decided.

“…Right. Ah, Gebby? Lubber’s reckoning for Prathardesh Earthmote. I’ll have a leading course for you shortly.”

Gebby nodded and gave the wave to the ground crew. “Yes, navigator,” he replied as the bolt came loose and the queen lifted. Deng-Nah On clutched and grabbed at the doorframe to steady himself. With a spin of the wheel and a crank of the telegraph, the Queen turned, lifted her nose a few degrees, and headed out into open sky.

----------------------------------------

Deng-Nah sat in his corner for a few more minutes until things seemed to settle down. There were still—and elves, too! Elves with strange black and red skin and eyes the color of fire, and one whose skin was as white as mulberrry paper and whose eyes were as iridescent as opals—who darted here and there tying off ropes and moving things around. Somebody had already lit a large iron box stove and was measuring out rice and beans and smoked meat.

The deck seemed steady enough, so he rose to his feet and moved to the rearmost rail to look back upon his home. The rail was high, tall enough for these tall, gangly folk. From Deng-Nah’s perspective he felt only a little fear of some random rock or sway pitching him overboard. He held on for reassurance, but his eyes were drawn to the Gate, to the Wall, to beyond the wall and…there. To the patch of green and gilding and water gleaming in the sunlight that was his estate. To the life, and wife, and child, father and wealth he’d never be able to go back to now.

He still felt sick with uncertainty, and hardly able to believe he’d done this thing. This thing he’d been swearing for weeks he couldn’t possibly do, would never even think of doing…and when it came to it, when the right person had come along and given him the right knowledge, it had become obvious that he couldn’t not do it, no matter what it cost.

Still…he couldn’t look back without sorrow and fear.

Please…let this have been a worthy sacrifice.

Mouse came up beside him, leaned on the rail, and gave him a reassuring smile. It helped, a little.

But only a little. The ship plunged into a cloud, and cool wetness fogged the deck…and stole away Deng-Nah On’s last view of home.

He couldn’t help himself: he stood at the rail and wept.

----------------------------------------

> “Try as I might, I found no signs of civilization anywhere on the Unbroken Earthmote, save one place. The nomadic Ithfey clans migrate constantly to avoid Eclipse, and no human settlement could last long in the weeks and months of darkness down there…but there is a tower, on a remote outcrop of stone. I heard of it by rumor, and went to find it, and glimpsed it from afar, but never managed to come there. I imagine few ever shall…” —Prince Ruber of Valai, My Travels

A TOWER IN THE BITTER COLD

The Unbroken Earthmote, Talvi’s Sphere. 09.06.03.11.16

The tower had stood on this particular spot, Civorage knew, since the very first days of creation. Even then it had been a sort of reply or tribute to the Glacier Keep, far away on the very opposite side of the Unbroken Mote, but after the Forsaking it had become something more like a criticism or parody.

It was also the birthplace of Oneism, though it had taken Nils some time to realize it.

The edifice was hardly welcoming in appearance. Like its mistress, the tower was all shades of white and icy blue. It thrust up from a mountain peak like a jagged core of partially knapped flint, though the twisted, sharp shapes were not part of the architecture. Centuries of accumulated ice had given fangs to Iaka’s Tower.

There was nowhere good to land or tether at the tower itself, though. So, as he had done years before, Nils rapelled down off the Make Your Own Fortune until his boots crunched into the permafrost. Unlike that first trip down to this layer of the worlds, this time he didn’t participate in hammering in the stakes or securing the ship. Instead, he shrugged his fur-lined coat about his shoulders and started up a narrow, winding stair cut in the cliffside.

It ought to be perilous. Seven years ago, it had been. Seven years ago, the steps had been buried under ice and compacted snow and he’d had to wear spikes on his shoes and climb with the aid of axes. Seven years had changed matters greatly, however, and now the stair was even-flat, well-maintained and dry. There was even a rope to hold. his ascent was sure-footed and safe.

Still, Civorage wasn’t a young man any longer. His knees in particular disliked the climb and complained throughout.

There was a brazier burning at the top of the steps, and two of Iaka’s Circle standing guard. They were anonymous under the thick layers of fur, wool, face mask and goggles, but it wouldn’t have mattered anyway. Civorage could tell from the merest glance at their minds that these two knew only the blissful, unwanting happiness of the Encircled.

They opened the outer doors for him, then closed them again behind. Ahead of him was another pair of doors, then a third. By the time he’d passed through a third, the air was warm enough to have him prickling with sweat under his cold weather gear.

Three more Encircled and a Nornfey came up at once to help him shed the too-hot clothes and attend to his comfort. They were gone as quickly as they came, and Civorage strode on through into the tower’s heart.

It was a dazzling place. White stone edged with black stone, lit by perpetual blue flames. Iaka was, technically, no longer a Herald…but she had once been a Herald, and her command of magic was unrivaled among mortals. Indeed, it was by her sorcery that she had lingered long past the ordinary mortal span of years.

Even if it meant she would never rise from her throne ever again.

Power thrummed through the air in warm waves as Nils stepped into her chamber. It was a wide cylindrical space, perhaps half a furlong across, and the path from the entrance to the foot of the throne dais threaded between silver rings embedded in the floor, upon which groups of Encircled and Nornfey danced and chanted a low, soft plainsong. To Civorage’s senses, the walls rang not only with the echoes of their voices, but also with the echoes of their thoughtless contentment.

This was Iaka’s creed and purpose: a world without suffering or hardship in even the least degree. To the Circle here, the labor of maintaining themselves, their lady and the tower was just as much a joy as was dance and song. If the price of that was shedding all ambition, all preference, all aversion and all self, then that just proved how evil those things truly were. Personhood, Iaka taught, was the great anchor that kept the spirit from soaring free.

And Civorage had to admit…there were times when he envied the Encircled. He, alone of all people in the world except for Mouse, could truly know their bliss. Sensing it now, here in this place, left him with a feeling of tiring weight as though his body and his concerns were literally hanging from his limbs like bags of lead shot.

But all the cares, aches and exhaustion fell away when Iaka looked down from her throne and blessed him with that Infinitely warm, unconditionally caring smile.

It was the sort of smile a mother ought to give.

“Hello, Nils.” The dignity of years was in her voice, along with the soft reassurance that his cares and troubles were all okay. Somehow, her black hair and eyes with the light of blue fire burning within them managed to transport him to a childhood he’d never had.

He almost sighed. Instead, he ventured his own small, childish imitation of her smile and bowed. “My Lady Iaka.”

She straightened in her seat. The throne she sat in was thousands of years old, worked perfectly smooth and comfortable by the erosion of long occupancy. Nils had no idea what sort of magic powered it or from what source, but he could feel it in the air, through his feet, prickling his skin. As she looked in his eyes, verbal communication became redundant. She understood.

Redundant though it might be, she still spoke. “Defeat after defeat. This curse weighs heavily on you, my love.”

“Is there truly no way to lift it?”

“A powerful Beldame and Crownspouse gave her life to place it on you, love, and you dealt the killing blow that carried out her sacrifice. It is very possibly the most powerful act of witchcraft ever performed in this world.”

“Even more powerful than them?” Nils asked, indicating a nearby Nornfey.

Iaka favored her creation with a proud smile, but nodded. “Even more. I did not sacrifice myself in their creation.” The nornfey in question gazed back at her with rapturous adoration. Her smile widened a little, then she looked back to Nils. “I have meditated long on how to lift Thaighn Saoirse’s hex from you, beloved. If we cannot succeed in the quest to find more Words and empower you beyond its scope, then the only other option is a sacrifice equal in scale to the one she made.”

“Giving my own life to lift the curse on me seems…redundant,” Nils ventured. Iaka’s laugh chimed through the plainsong and echoed off the walls.

“That it would!” she agreed. “Oh, darling, don’t speak of such things. We cannot match Saoirse’s sacrifice with a single life, excepting your own or mine. Neither of which will do at all.”

She stood, and paced a slow circle around her throne, though she remained carefully inside the lines and ritual markings etched into the dais. As she moved through the magical field, it flickered and flamed on her limbs and hair like the ghostly discharges known as “Dragon’s Fire” that sometimes gathered on airships in stormy weather. Its light washed her pale skin in shades of azure and cerulean, and scarce-seen echoes of her form seemed to precede and trail her movements by a few inches. “I had hoped by claiming more Words you would gather the strength to overcome her. But it seems the curse itself thwarts you in that respect. Which means, we must fall back on the other plan, and meet her sacrifice with one of her own.”

“What are you proposing?” Nils asked. “Surely we have nothing to sacrifice that will match her life?”

“Oh indeed not. No single life will do…but quantity will suffice where quality is lacking.”

“But…they would suffer.” Nils frowned. Iaka’s whole crusade was against the existence of suffering itself. How could she propose—?

“That, my love, depends on the manner of their sacrifice. And besides…in this imperfect world the Crowns made, we may at times be forced to choose a little suffering now to prevent greater suffering from coming to pass.” She paused behind her throne, resting her hands lightly on its back. “What price the eventual cessation of all misery, forever?”

Nils looked at the Encircled again, and felt their minds. Their lives were so easy now, and they were so contented. They had nothing to worry about, no stress, no concerns, no longing or fears. They were utterly at peace, able to accept every moment of their lives, be it work or leisure, with equal joy. Iaka was right. If the end result was to bring such a gift to all the world, then how could any sacrifice be too much?

It was his burden to bring about that vision, the vision Iaka had first sent to him on the day her subtle influence had led him to the Word. He should have seen it at the time, really. All the Unbroken Earthmote to choose from and he just happened to mine the one spot where the Word was buried? And the visions that had come to him afterwards, of the world re-made…

It had taken him a couple of years to finally find and meet her, to fully understand her vision and the place she was offering him in it. But between his powers of Mind and her long-studied skill and the knowledge of a Herald that she still possessed, their conversation had been deeper than mere speech could ever fathom.

He was her champion. Her chosen. The eldest son she favored with responsibilities that could be entrusted to none other. It was a burden, but one he alone had the courage and grit to bear, and that made him glad of it, even if it was still wearisome at times.

Still…what she was proposing did trouble him somewhere in his heart. Some lingering, short-sighted animal instinct fretted at the idea.

“How…how many?” He asked.

She told him. It was…a great many. A very great many. The worry in his heart grew a little more urgent.

She sensed his thoughts, and beckoned him to step up onto the dais and join her. “Don’t worry about it for now, my darling. You’ve worked long and hard and suffered many setbacks. You deserve a rest…”

Nils had never been able to resist this gift. In moments, without even really being aware of having moved, he had stepped into the magic field with her, and felt it wash away all age, all pain, all doubt and conflict. He was in her embrace, her hands cradling the back of his head to draw it into her bosom as she crooned soft, warm understanding ,and Nils relaxed with a heartfelt sigh as he felt her blessing, the Circle’s blessing, take hold. She took away all his worries, all his burdens, all his tension and left behind nothing at all. His last thought, for the moment at least, was gratitude and love that he could be as the Encircled were, for a little while.

All thought and doubt fled from him, and for a time he was happy.

----------------------------------------

> Q: Why is the Yunei Emperor’s palace like raising your hand at an auction? A: They’re both for biddin’ (forbidden)! —Janko’s Junior Joke Journal, a commercial flop.

THE IMPERIAL COURT

The City of Emperors, Yunei Empire, Yonguitang Earthmote 09.06.03.11.18

Di-Ha took Luyo’s hand and held it tight as she alighted from her palanquin. The baby was not far from due now, perhaps two weeks or so, and the weight in her belly pulled every step and movement. To maintain Proper grace and dignity suitable for the Emperor’s court in this condition was…challenging.

But she was up to the challenge. She must be, for her own sake and her child’s and the On Clan’s. Under most circumstances, the Council of Lords might have graciously delayed their summons until the birth was long past and she and the child had both recovered.

But for a nobleman of Deng-Nah’s station to brazenly leave the empire on a heathen airship…

The scandal was too great. It was all anyone would talk about, and so Di-Ha must act now, speak now, show herself now, or else the terrible sandstorm of gossip would erode all credibility beyond any hope of repair.

Besides. Her condition in itself was a statement to the court. She needed to be seen in her gravid condition, to wield her vulnerability like a weapon. It was the only avenue and argument which might yield fruit.

By that design she might preserve some sympathy for Deng-Nah, too. No Proper man, no matter how misguided, would abandon his wife unless it were truly, unspeakably urgent…

Stranger things had happened, and stranger happenings had been survived. Woe to those living in such times!

So, she rode a careful edge as fine as a sword’s blade. She needed to appear dignified and serene, but also give just enough of a hint that it was difficult. The aim was to appear to be gamely struggling for propriety, and succeeding. So, she gripped Luyo’s hand and leaned on her just a little more, she kept her gait careful, her steps short and shuffling. Her bow to the court as she entered was as shallow and as pained as she could possibly get away with.

The buzz of conversation among the courtiers had ceased as she entered. Now, silence rang from stone walls and pillars. Today was a fine sunny day, and so the Emperor and the Lords held court in the outdoor plaza where the breeze could stir the leaves and add a gentle texture to the quiet.

Di-Ha’s wooden clogs clacked loudly on the beautiful marble flooring as she approached the waiting-place where she would be announced. Though, with so many people already staring at her, the announcement seemed almost ridiculously redundant.

Still. There was a Proper Way to do everything. And standing before the Emperor himself was no time to forget that.

The chime of a bell and a loud call and chant in poetic language heralded the Royal arrival. The Emperor and Empress emerged from the palace depths, progressing at such a serene and stately pace that their robes betrayed no sign that their legs moved at all. They seemed to glide over the floor like game pieces, or like swans on a still lake. Behind them, with no less solemnity, came the five Lords who would hear her, and make their pronouncement.

The court, of course, had all knelt and pressed their foreheads to the floor as soon as the Imperial presence was declared. Even Di-Ha, heavy as she was, could not forego that obeisance, though provision was made for these things. A servant rushed a pillow to her, and she was permitted to kneel on it and bow her head, rather than kowtow fully.

With that done, the court were commanded to rise. Di-Ha met the Empress’ eye as Her Majesty sat beside her husband. Her cousin was in no position to offer any overt signal or acknowledgement, but the eye contact said much. She still had one ally here, at least. And if she had the Empress on her side, then she had the Emperor too, most likely.

Still. As everyone knew but all were forbidden from acknowledging aloud, the royal couple were not the power here. The mundane power belonged to the five men who settled themselves in their own seats, a step down and in front of the royals. Their power was one of efficiency and action; the Emperor and empress wielded the deeper powers of influence and symbol.

The balance was a careful balance, requiring the most Proper of attention.

The Lords were a daunting assortment, Di-Ha thought. Lord Fao in particular had the grim look of a man whose mind was already made up, and Lord Sho’s grey, blind eyes gave away absolutely nothing. Lord Le was the one most likely to be kindly disposed to the On Clan: his family’s own ascension to its present rank had been in part thanks to Deng-Nah’s ancestor, Deng-Hao. Lord Hu was likely to be soft, too: he was a cousin, on Di-Ha’s father’s side of the family. Though on the other hand, that might inspire him to harshness, to separate his branch of the family from any suggestion of shame.

The last figure to settle, in the middle seat directly in front of the Imperial couple, was Lord Bei, the first of the Council. His face may as well have been carved in stone, though the look in his eyes as he considered Di-Ha was not hostile. He snapped his fan open and swooped it through a ritual gesture of command to indicate that the Council was ready to hear the business before them.

The court’s officer followed the theatre of it to perfection. He advanced two high paces forward, stamping his feet so hard the sound of his clogs crack-cracked around the plaza.

“Before the court! The Esteemed Lady of Fourth Rank, Di-Ha On, born of the Sung Clan!”

Again, the pillow was brought forward. Again, Di-Ha knelt and bowed her head. Again, Lord Bei swooped his fan.

It was Di-Ha’s turn to speak. “His Enlightened Majesty’s loyal and humble servant answers the summons,” she said. She pitched her voice to be quiet and modest, but still clear. A tricky balancing act that she had practiced since she was a girl. On this occasion, her training served her well: she was clearly heard by all, without seeming harsh or proud.

Lord Bei waved his fan the third and last time, returning it to a position flat in front of his chest. The court officer bowed, then turned to Di-Ha.

“Esteemed Lady Di-Ha On! The court has heard your husband has disobeyed the Imperial command against travel beyond the Empire’s borders. It is Law and Proper that he and his family be punished! The Council will now decide what measure of punishment seems suitable. You may speak in your defence.”

“I thank the Lords for their forebearance and attention,” Di-Ha replied, properly.

Lord Bei finally spoke, now that the necessary ritual was out of the way. “Such a thing has not happened in many generations, Lady Di-Ha. Your husband was cousin, by marriage, to the beloved Empress. For one such as him to defect and debase himself in this manner is unforgivable. The penalty should he ever dare return must be extreme. The punishment due to you is in question. What the Lords seek to understand is your judgement in choosing this man for your husband, and whether you are complicit in his crime.”

“I understand, My Lord,” Di-Ha replied.

“And what say you?” Lord Bei asked.

“I say, My Lord, that I knew of my husband’s decision to depart, I discussed it with him prior to his going, and he went with my blessing and encouragement.”

Astonishment crashed around the plaza as though she had dropped a boulder into a deep pool. Di-Ha could scarcely have said a more shocking thing. But that, of course, was the plan. Gasps, mutters and whispers lingered for many seconds until Lord Bei gestured with his fan again and the gong was rung for silence.

Lord Bei glared around the plaza in the ensuing silence, then returned his attention to Di-Ha.

“You enter a plea of complete guilt and culpability, then,” he said.

“I do not, my lord, for this was no thoughtless and casual flouting of the law for personal gain. My husband left to defend the empire against a grave and disturbing threat. He knows he can never return. He believes in his bones that this sacrifice is a necessary one, and he made it out of loyalty and love to His Majesty the Enlightened Emperor, and duty to our sacred empire.”

To her private delight, Lord Bei seemed speechless. Lord Fao, however, was not.

“And now you compound crime with crime,” he said darkly. “The Empire has stood for thousands of years. We are unassailable! To suggest otherwise is—”

Di-Ha added a third crime to her tally, and interrupted him. “—Truthful.” she snapped the word with a whip-crack force and suddenness that left Lord Fao astonished and blinking. “And I will say it now, at risk to myself and even to my unborn child, out of love for His Majesty.”

She looked directly at the Emperor, another breach of the usual protocol. She and Deng-Nah had discussed her strategy far longer than the question of his going, and this daring maneuver was her own idea. It might backfire terribly, it might doom her. He had almost refused to go, knowing how extreme her brinkmanship would be. But that in itself was an arrow for her bow. “I suggest that to ignore a threat when it erects strongholds in front of our very gate is the height of Improper willfulness. His Majesty’s humble and loyal servant asks the Most Enlightened One if it is not so.”

She bowed low, painfully low, in utmost deference to the ultimate authority on what was and was not Proper. When she straightened again, she saw that the Empress had raised her own fan to cover her face, and the Emperor was leaning slightly toward her, listening.

After a moment, the Emperor nodded gravely, and looked down from his dais again. “…A house whose master ignores a gathering threat before its doors is, indeed, an Improperly tended house,” he declared. There were more whispers, but they faded the second Lord Bei’s hand tightened on his fan in readiness to gesture.

Lord Fao, however, was not so easily defeated. “Is it not also Proper, Most Enlightened One, that there are channels of action and inquiry that a man should take before he resorts to flouting the law and decree of his betters?”

Blind Lord Sho stirred, pursing his lips thoughtfully and tilting his head back a little so that his cloudy eyes gazed up toward the sky. “I believe that Lord Fao must accept that the Esteemed Deng-Nah On has acted out of loyalty before he can make such an argument,” he suggested. “And if so, is not a misguided mis-step made with noble intention more Proper than an act of open disloyalty?”

“If it is so, then even the Esteemed Lady’s interruption of Lord Fao is forgivable,” Lord Hu replied. “Are we to tolerate all rudeness and Impropriety if the one who commits it claims a higher purpose?”

“The question cuts at the heart of the Proper Way and its purpose,” Lord Sho mused. “Do we serve the Proper Way as an end itself? Or do we follow it as the means to approach a higher and nobler end?” He turned his head toward the Emperor. “His Majesty’s humble and loyal servant requests education from the Most Enlightened One.”

The Emperor nodded gravely and bowed his head in contemplation.

Di-Ha held her breath. She had sent a letter to the Empress the very morning Deng-Nah’s departure, indeed before he had even left the family estate. In it, she had laid out a philosophical argument. It was now likely that her life hung on how well-received that letter had been, and whether her cousin had taken the implicit message.

At length, the Emperor opened his eyes and spoke.

“The Law serves a higher purpose, one which transcends us and all we do. So too does that which is Proper. The Proper Way is not our highest goal, but our highest teacher and guide. And is it not most Proper to acknowledge, at the end of things, that rank and station are fundamentally a relationship bound in the giving of wisdom, and the sharing of love? Do We not have a duty to care for all Our peoples? And do the people not in turn provide all We may require? Are we not privileged to receive the peoples’ fidelity in such a position of sublime ease? And are we not in turn thankful for all their sacrifice through the deepest, most sacred bonds of love?”

Di-Ha watched Lord Fao intently throughout this discourse. Was she imagining it, or was some indignation and frustration at play behind the blank mask of his expression? How peculiar.

Before there could be any further comment or word, however, a new voice…cut in. Not via speech, but via the feeling of speech, arriving in the mind without the crude medium of ears and voice.

“The Most Enlightened One speaks wisely and truly.”

There was a heavy sort of sound from somewhere above, and a new breeze rushed through the plaza to stir the trees into rattling life. It was the displaced air of a huge body in flight, an endless ribbon of burnished golden scales that swooped low over the plaza that rushed past and past and past before looping back around on itself. It was led by a barbeled, horned head as huge as a draught horse, with eyes as bright and red as molten gold.

Di-Ha fought to control herself. She had not ever expected this!

As one, the court kneeled, hardly daring to look up. But the River of Heaven was impossible to turn one’s gaze away from, her form was just too inspiring. The mere sight of her looping and coiling back and forth above the palace rooftops drew the eye upwards and relaxed expressions of carefully managed serenity into gapes of open, unmasked awe.

Finally, her foreclaws and massive jawed head dipped downward and into the plaza, and she spoke in a voice that was felt in the head rather than heard with the ears, somehow both a tectonic rumble and a warm alto at once.

“Please, my beloved kin…stand, and be not afraid. I come as Herald of a great and magnificent destiny, which presently shall be laid before you.”

She reached down, and touched her clawtip to the inlaid marble floor before the throne. There was a great rushing inwards, a wind that whipped up hair and robe, fan and parasol, and forced all the courtiers to brace against it as the endless length of her seemed to pour in, and in, and in, until there was a moment of brilliant golden light far too bright to look upon…

And then she was standing there, with a long staff in her hand. Breathtakingly tall, perfect in her face, her clothes, her poise and presentation, both of the Yunei and yet not quite, in a way that was most Proper indeed…

There was a long moment of incredulous silence. Nobody knew what to say or how to react to this most prestigious interruption. It was broken when the Emperor rose from his throne to greet her, bowing low. Here was one of the few beings in all creation toward whom it was Proper for him to show obeisance, and he did not forget it.

“You honor us, o River of Heaven,” he stated, and bowed again. “What hospitality may such as I offer, meagre and unworthy though it must inevitably be?”

The choice of words was exquisitely poetic. But Dragon’s reply was poetry itself.

“The wise man will offer us / the rivers and lakes / yet still he calls them meagre.” She recited, politely returning his bow. Several nearby courtiers sighed appreciatively.

The Emperor, of course, was Emperor by right. He did not fail to reply in kind. “If all my poetry could / flow like the River / I too would fly without wings.”

Masterful. Truly masterful. Di-Ha noted a few nearby courtiers discreetly wiping away tears. For her part, Dragon smiled warmly. “Prose truly befitting such a Proper people,” she declared. “We are well-pleased to visit, and apologize for such a sudden intrusion on your affairs. I pray you sit, and allow me to announce my Crowns.”

Not even the Transcendent Emperor could maintain perfect serenity in the face of such an announcement. It was brief, but Di-Ha saw his expression flicker and his eyes widen, just for a moment, before he bowed again and returned to his seat.

“Your servant awaits your pleasure.”

Dragon nodded, then turned her attention from him to the Lords, and the courtiers. She favored Di-Ha with an especially long look, and a smile.

“My Lords, esteemed nobility, ladies and gentlemen. The matter before this court today has come to the attention of the Crowns themselves, for it concerns events across all their creation, and the working of terrible misdeeds and crimes beyond the scope of this empire’s law and custom. They come now, all four, to share their thought and will with you.”

There was a little nervous fidgeting, brief touching-up of clothes, makeup and hair, straightening of posture, swallowing of nerves. Once it had settled down, Dragon nodded again, and tapped her staff on the ground, twice. Small bells set in its head chimed as she did so.

“I announce the Faceless Lady, Mage of Mists and Shadow, Knower of Secrets and Walker Unseen, My Lady Haust,” she declared.

There was no arrival, as such. It was as though the Crown of Mists had been standing there all along, still, silent and unnoticed. Even now, she was a…quiet presence, somehow. If a whisper could be made solid, it wouldn’t have been so thistledown-light as her, and yet she was still definitely present, and abruptly present at that, right in the middle of the plaza behind her herald. The surprise was so incredible that it took several seconds for anyone to remember their Proper manners.

The Emperor and Empress were first. As one, they rose from their seats, knelt, and pressed their foreheads to the floor in deference.

No-one could remain upright while the Most Enlightened One bowed so low. In seconds, the whole court was following suit, and Di-Ha was glad indeed for the pillow that had been left at her feet.

Cool hands touched her arm before she could complete the obeisance, and she looked up into Haust’s veiled face. The Crown smiled and shook her head, and then…was just a wispy shape made of vapors and breeze, which faded away. She had already moved across the plaza and was bidding the royal couple to stand.

“It is the desire of us Crowns to move beyond such gestures,” she explained as she helped them rise. “It is good and Proper to show respect and love, but it is even more so to live the things these gestures signify.”

The Emperor blinked at her, recognizing the thought he himself had only recently expressed in her words.

Haust smiled at him, then turned to address the watching crowd.

“Too long it has been since I appeared in these halls. Yet long have I walked among your people, in guises usually not recognized,” she admitted with a disarming smirk, causing genuine smiles to break out among the many courtiers. “Though no people are perfect, there is much here that captivates us. You are uniquely suited for the mission we come to offer.”

Before any could ask for clarification, Dragon rapped her staff a second time.

“The Prince of Joy and Song, Master of Wine and Arts, Keeper of Laughter and Bringer of Jollity, My Lord Sayf!” she declared.

Sayf’s arrival was rather more modest than Lady Haust’s, though his garb was far more lavish. He simply entered through the great archway at the plaza’s leadward entrance, with his thumbs tucked jovially into the rich silk sashes around his midriff.

Philosophers had long written about Prince Sayf, and the appearance of perhaps too much indulgence he usually wore, but today he appeared before the Court as he Properly should be: strong and well-fed, but fit and trim. Pampered but without the loss of a steel-hard edge within him. Ancient stories had it he was a warrior of great renown in a previous life; Di-Ha could easily believe it. He seemed completely at ease.

Despite Haust’s words, it just didn’t feel right to welcome the Crowns without some gesture of deference. This time, the Emperor ventured a deep bow. Sayf laughed and embraced him, placing his hands on the Enlightened One’s arms and drawing him up…then returned the bow with a merry twinkle in his eye.”

“There! That will do for us.”

“I…thank you,” the Emperor cleared his throat and glanced at Lady Haust. “My Lady of Mists spoke of…a mission?”

“Oh yes!” Sayf boomed. “A mission which concerns the very survival of freedom and love in this new creation of ours, which we had always hoped to share in the task of tending. Now, that beautiful future is in dire jeopardy, and there are no other people who stand united and apart from the threat.”

The chimes on Dragon’s staff rang a third time, and all turned in expectation of the third arrival.

“The Queen of Snows and the Hearth, Mother of Culture and Wisdom, She who Transforms: My Lady Talvi.”

This arrival was accompanied by a marked drop in temperature, to the point where Di-Ha’s breath steamed. It wasn’t a biting coldness, though. Indeed, it was actually quite refreshing, like the moment one stepped into a cool and sheltered room after too long under the hot sun. Talvi herself was the very picture of dignified age, her white hair and lined face being testaments to a long and successful life rather than the withering of years. She accepted the court’s (rather shallower) bows without comment or correction, beyond an inclining of her head, and paused at Di-Ha’s side a moment.

“…Your child is very close, my dear.”

Di-Ha had no idea how to properly respond to this. “Ah…yes, My Lady. That is so.”

Talvi smiled faintly, then reached out. “May I?”

Di-Ha could only nod. Talvi’s touch was light and surprisingly warm as she rested a hand on the baby’s bump and shut her eyes a moment. A small smile crossed her face as she…listened? “…A son,” she declared. “And my blessing: you will have an easy birth.”

“Th-thank you, My Lady.”

Queen Talvi smiled, and proceeded on to stand beside her fellow Crowns without further comment.

Last of all, and announced only by the rap and chime of Dragon’s staff, was The Great Emperor of the Hunt, Lord of Fathers, the Protector of the Wild. The Horned King. He Whose Sublime Name Must Never Be Spoken.

Unlike the others, he did not simply appear. He could be felt approaching up the grand staircase, and each increasingly alarming, earth-shaking step conveyed the sheer, dangerous presence of power incarnate. He entered through the grand arch, and the court’s collective gasp raced off to become a storm of whispers.

All paled before him, in all possible manners of being.

He was a giant, his head barely scraping under the arch. He was so immensely broad and stocky and carried such a vast weight of muscle, his physique would have been repulsive, were there any flaw or imperfection of form to be found. As it was, his size wasn’t as the performing man’s soft-seeming bulk at a traveling show, nor the disproportionate framing of a hard laborer at the bottom of society. His was athletic grace, sheer power, and flawless shape, united and taken as far as a man could go.

And then taken further. Far further. He was beyond in every graspable sense of the word, beautiful and terrible to gaze upon, and the effect only grew more the longer one looked, as if one‘s perception could only slowly grasp the truth of him in small, incremental steps. Nothing about him relented in any way. Even his face was so utterly, brutally handsome it managed to terrify and captivate at the same time.

Here was a being not to be trifled with. Happy and friendly though his countenance was, he could destroy everyone and everything with but a loose thought, remake them all with another. They all existed as free and independent minds because he wished it to be so. A wish he could change at a whim.

Perhaps that was the point: to give everyone some visceral understanding of him, for their own sake. It worked too, judging by way everyone strained to remain in place and not back away from his presence. For even his incomprehensible weight served to convey knowledge of his unfathomable power; each step of his mighty bare feet pushed the very land around like a boat in water. Lanterns swayed, chimes tinkled, and all forgot Proper etiquette and reached their hands out to steady themselves. He strolled into the court as casually and free as the King of all that he was, and his every step sunk deep into the exquisite marble, leaving perfect impressions as if he were treading on soft wax. From each footprint sprung forth intricate, breathtaking inlays of vines, of flowers, of leaves and of birds. The effect matched beautifully with what was already there, and elevated the whole well beyond the original artisans’ already illustrious efforts.

As was his habit, he chose to appear as a peerless hunter-warrior in minimal but entirely Proper attire for a man of such utterly immense strength and godly form: he stood mighty and all but bare-skinned from head to feet that he might move unencumbered, yet modesty was provided for by a pair of fighting trunks about his loins and the long skirts of a warrior’s waist-robes, draped down to above his knees in rich green fabric—dress equally fit to don the layers of armor, run after prey, or contest hand-to-hand in a duel of honor. His hair was wild and untamed but glossy and clean, as befit any Proper man.

He carried no weapon, for to do so would be an insult to court…and he needed none anyway. Legend spoke of him running so fast across the plain, the very air snapped with the violence of his passing. Of throwing a punch and disintegrating whole mountain ranges, or raising them up with a kick to the ground. Of leaping from the bottommost reaches of the spheres up to and across the very highest.

At his heels trotted his Hounds, Heralds themselves who rarely deigned to present as the nigh-transcendent beings they were. One was dark of fur and red-eyed, one blue-eyed and white as snow. Dawn and Dusk, who sat at the archway and waited patiently with their tongues lolling.

There was no question of failing to bow to *him…*but the court had learned its lesson from the other three. The Crowns, it seemed, favored genuine but moderate gestures of respect. Di-Ha suspected this one fact would shortly lead to a pronounced shift in etiquette across the whole empire.

The Horned King chuckled at the array of shallow genuflection, but it was the sound of delight for all its subterranean bassiness. “Well have you learned, and so quickly! Thank you. What matters is truth. An outward show is incomparably insulting without the inward disposition, is it not? And how easy it is to forgive a small mistake in etiquette, when one knows the intention!”

He favored the Emperor in particular with a smile. “We are most pleased that you voiced this truth before our arrival. Well have you exemplified your people, Transcendent Emperor of the Yunei. And well have you governed, my good Lords. It is gratifying and Proper to see your people so richly benefitting from wise, temperate leadership.”

“The Lord of Fathers speaks kindly,” the Emperor replied. “We…do our best. And I must hasten to add, I have learned wisdom even now in letters from a courtier now present. I would be remiss to take the full credit for insight.”

This was a compliment for Di-Ha’s ears only, and one that nearly caused her to betray herself from blushing. Thank goodness for the thick white makeup, or everyone would have seen her face go red.

The Horned King in turn raised an eyebrow and smiled, genuinely, and the well-wishing love washing off of him was almost an assault upon the mind. “Really, now? My, we have chosen the moment well, eh Talvi?”

“You always did have a flair for good timing,” the Ice Mother replied, archly.

The King only smiled bigger, and there was a certain…edge…to the playful intent now radiating off him—

It was quickly restrained. He shook his great shaggy head, “All this time and you still know exactly what to say…anyway. Come. All of you, sit with me. We must take counsel on deep matters, such as has never before happened in this world.” The King sat right there on the hard stone ground, which promptly flowed and rippled away from him like water from a great stone splashed in its midst. A burst of stonework beauty flowed out from him, as the Lord of All condescended to the level of his creatures in genuine, humble friendship.

The court, heeding his request, sat about him like students around an old master. To Di-Ha’s amazed gratification, as she herself stooped to lower herself to the ground, she became aware of a warm, hard-bodied presence at her side. Prince Sayf, somehow, had come to help her from all the way across the plaza.

“No no, my dear! Here—”

And somehow, an ornate lounge chair appeared behind her. She couldn’t help but glance at the Emperor, who gave her the slightest of amused smiles, and she took her seat.

She had never sat in anything so perfectly, deliciously comfortable.

“There.” Sayf actually gave her a wink, and then returned to his previous spot. Another thought crossed his mind, and then with a dramatic snap of his fingers, caused cushions to appear for everyone else—the Emperor an Empress were given slightly better of course, but on the whole…

There was a message here. It seemed the way of the Crowns was to layer lessons within lessons.

In moments, the court looked nothing like a formal inquiry into a noble family’s alleged misbehaviour. Now it resembled a dojo, with the masters sat in the middle, and the court gathered around to listen

“Right. Settled, everyone? Good. Forgive me, I too must relax a bit…”

Di-Ha became conscious of a…shimmer, at the outermost edge of the plaza, extending in a bubble around them. The King sighed deeply, and—

A feeling as if being stretched into rice noodles and compressed into the hardest of lumps washed across them. It was uncomfortable, and disorientating, but thankfully it passed quickly.

“And now you see me a bit more as I am. My true embodied being is configured for an existence far above the present world, and indescribably greater in its innate nature, but I can bridge the gap when needed, as it were.”

And so it was. There was a strange sense that she and all her fellow courtiers had become, in comparison, far less in their being, and he had unraveled far more… yet nothing identifably different was there. And yet nothing was the same. It was perplexing, but the Crowns were keen to get on with things.

And then she understood. All the Crowns appeared more in their being, immensely so, and it was that which drove home the truth; they were about to converse with gods who were in turn revealing some of themselves, each according to their natures, and in a manner that could be understood.

With Lady Haust, that meant an ethereal quality so gossamer, she might have been the shadow of pure spirit. The Queen was stunningly, incomprehensibly beautiful, both youthful and aged at once without any contradiction. Lord Sayf became the hardest of warriors with the smile and countenance of the sweetest of courtiers—the very embodiment of a warrior-poet.

And the Great King filled out somehow to embody radiant, absolute, uncompromising, maximum power. All forms of power that a man could posses were his, so much so it was almost soul-wrenching to behold the beautiful, magnificent, terrible handsomeness of his being.

His gentle sense of humor did wonders to make his presence bearable.

“Don’t be shy! Look all you wish, I am as I am to teach and our physical beings are part of that lesson. In a less formal or consequential setting, I might be tempted to more playful things…”

He gave a mischievous grin that conveyed everything about what he meant.

“But that, I think, must be for another day. And be not afraid. Know that so long as you do not cross the bubble, no harm will befall you here, I promise with the full weight of my name.”

Quiet nods of understanding undulated around the plaza. “To business,” intoned Queen Talvi, when the moment was right. “First, to address the matter of the Esteemed Lord of the Fourth Degree, Deng-Nah On. It is our belief that he has acted Properly in this case, by the principle of serving a higher good.”

“A good we have forseen,” added Lady Haust, “though not pre-ordained.”

“Yours is not our destiny to control, but to tend, and to nurture. In any garden, unexpected delights—”

“—And weeds—” Sayf interjected.

“—and weeds may emerge. And so we come to tell you of a particularly…dangerous…weed. And to put before you our thoughts and our beliefs. What you do with that knowledge is yours to decide.”

So they spoke. And the Yunei listened. And Di-Ha found herself growing both in the sense of vindication for what Deng-Nah had gone away to do…but also growing worry for him.

They spoke at length. Magicked refreshments into being, spoke more. Evening was approaching as they finished, though none of them felt tired…

“I think that is enough,” the King grumbled at last. “Too much time in my presence can have strong effects on the unprepared. As it stands now, the moment you all leave this space, you will feel profoundly exhausted. I would recommend you take much rest. And so, before that…do you understand what now befalls your people? What your great mission must be, for the sake of all?”

There were solemn nods from everyone. All order and hierarchy had been forgotten, for the moment. Di-Ha could see it in everyone’s eyes, even if the Lords somehow found the insanity to turn around and forbid action after this—and surely they wouldn’t, for they were nodding too—the Yunei Empire as it had been would never again be the same. They had been Called.

And there was only one answer they could give.