As night settled against Eternon on the third day of assaults, the emperor stood with his arms crossed as he listened to reports of the casualties. A three-pronged assault, as anticipated, had just occurred, coordinated with the small naval engagement in the southern harbor. This time the troops advanced evenly, straight at their targets. This time Eternine had placed his men hiding behind the walls, bursting into formation at the last moment to stop the Teljuks before they could pass into the gaps.

Though artillery had widened these gaps, though the Teljuk ships and soldiers used in the attack had outnumbered the Truscans, the third day ended much like the previous two.

As they fought, the Truscans shouted that the Teljuks would not be allowed to even see the inside of their city, blocking the advance even one step into the valley between the wrecked third wall and the crumbling second.

“Yes, use the women volunteers if you need to. They know more about clay and basket weaving than any soldier. And the soldiers need rest anyway,” Eternine ordered a nearby civilian engineer, the man he had put in charge of maintaining the walls during the siege. “Do we have time to put back the stones?”

“Only if they attack late again tomorrow, majesty, or if you want to risk the crews being hit during tomorrow’s bombardment,” the engineer advised.

Nege approached the two men. The elite, purple-cloaked guards recognized the Prophet and let him pass. Choosing to wait by the tower door, the spot near the second gate where Eternine daily watched his men fight and die for him, Nege listened with curiosity to the emperor’s orders.

“No. We won’t have that chance. And the builders won’t either,” Eternine said.

“Mud and clay will work, majesty,” the engineer vowed. “With even a light barrier of sticks we can at least make a defensible obstacle. And it will hold up just as well against cannon fire as our walls.”

“Can you build it overnight?”

“With Infinity’s help—”

“I’m not asking if you could do it using a miracle. I want to know if your crew can repair the walls before sunrise.”

Taking a moment to make a worthwhile, realistic assessment of the damage and the amount of labor and materials he could summon, the engineer squinted as he stared at the pieces of stone that were the city’s walls. “Yes. It should be possible.”

“Then make it happen.” The emperor placed his hand on the shoulder of his engineer, smiling at the short, round man. “I’m counting on you. This city is counting on your work.”

“You needn’t worry then,” the engineer said before turning toward the tower’s exit. He didn’t bother giving a more formal farewell. He was accustomed to Eternine’s courtly methods.

The engineer’s departure seemed an appropriate time for Nege to approach the emperor. So he stepped around the brick and stone-lined doorway and excused himself through the wall of advisers and runners carrying orders. “Excuse me, emperor,” Nege said, tapping his staff into the battlements.

“Ah, come closer my Red witness,” Eternine said when he saw Nege standing nearby. He motioned for his advisers to step away so the Prophet could come through.

“A runner said you wanted to speak with me.”

“That I did.” A legion captain with a thick black beard, standing near Eternine, was determined to get an answer from the emperor and posed a question Nege couldn’t hear. “No, captain. We don’t need any men on the sea walls. And have the ships make plans for quick boarding so they can fight on the walls as well. No man has one job in this siege, I’m sure you know.”

The statement seemed to satisfy the captain and he bowed before making his way back to his regiment.

“I saw you watching the battle,” Eternine said to the Prophet with a smile. Popping his back and stretching, the emperor began unstrapping his heavy breastplate, setting his gold-lined helmet on a parapet. He took a short breath that came across as relief on the surface, but Nege’s empathic senses told him this was a sign of impatience. “What did you think?”

“Murel had more words of appraisal for your tactics,” Nege said.

“Is that your Gold or White?”

You might be reading a pirated copy. Look for the official release to support the author.

“He’s Gold.”

“Yes, the one with the monotone voice.”

Nege laughed, sharing a similar annoyance at Murel’s lack of emotion. But Nege knew this was common in Golds, especially Golds from Prosper.

“And the White. Is she still of the belief you should not interfere?” the emperor asked as he handed his armor off to a waiting attendant.

“It’s not just Sono’s decision. The Sept made it as well,” Nege explained.

“Yes. Your whole planet is rooting against us.” Eternine crossed his arms and stared out at his city. He saw the half-ruined third wall being propped up with clay and sticks. He saw the crumbled towers where his gunners would still take cover to fire into the Teljuk masses. Most of all, he saw the determined faces of his people.

Ignoring the cries of fear from his attendants, Eternine unbuckled his sword and climbed the parapet, standing next to his helmet. The soldiers and civilians, treating wounded walls and men on the ground, turned with sudden excitement and vigor when they heard their emperor shout above them, “With half the numbers facing them, our Truscan soldiers withstood the Teljuks today!”

A cheer mixed with the painful cries of the wounded who still wanted to shout with joy. Hopping down from the walls, ignoring the fright this caused his attendants, the emperor smiled at Nege. “You listen to those people. Then tell me whether or not your Sept thinks we’re worth saving,” the emperor said, not hiding his disdain for the Prophet’s neutrality.

“Asking me to fight for you at this moment is strange, emperor,” Nege said.

“And pointless. I know you’ll never kill. You have a stick with a coat of red.” The emperor sneered at the Red’s weapon and shook his head. “I thought they would send me a blade and your Sept sent me a stick, and a man who won’t even use that.”

Nege gripped his staff till his knuckles turned white. The rage he felt at this blatant insult fell away from him, and only slightly lit up the red streaks in his staff’s tip.

“If kneeling and begging at your feet would convince you to fight alongside me and my city I’d do it in a heartbeat,” the emperor explained. He noticed the animalistic warning the lighted staff gave off, but chose to ignore it, even smiled that he’d struck a nerve with the Prophet. “But I can tell when a man cannot be swayed.”

“So what did you need?” Nege asked.

The emperor re-buckled his sword and rested his hand atop the onyx-tipped pommel. “Your Gold, Murel, said he’d help with wounded. I know Golds can heal, and I would like him to heal my wounded soldiers as well as the civilians he’s currently aiding.”

“That’s…” Nege tried to think of a word for no that didn’t sound so ugly.

“I know. I know it goes against your neutrality. But he’s been doing it with the civilians injured repairing the walls. They’re not exactly bystanders.”

That was only because Nege never informed Murel of how the people had received their injuries when he brought them to the Gold. Nightly and daily the walls were repaired, under a near constant danger from small groups of Teljuk gunners and the cannons attempting to undue the civilians’ work.

“Just think about it for a moment. Talk it over with Murel, that’s all I’m asking,” Eternine said.

Nege sighed and said, “We’d have to extend the same compromise to the Teljuks. Our Gold over there is being just as unhelpful to them as we’re trying to be to you.”

“Fine. Sure. Give the Teljuks all the help in the world. Give them more, if it means you’ll give me the slightest aide.”

Nege hesitated, feeling the overwhelming determination burning behind the emperor’s words. “I’ll see what I can do.”

The cannon’s iron shot exploded into the already half-demolished tower, sending the Prophet into a dive that nearly broke his legs as he tumbled down the spiraling stone steps.

“Nege, get down from there!” Sono shouted into Nege’s mind. “Get back here this instant!”

“Get down!” Eternine shouted from the battlements as a second shot quaked the walls so much the emperor set his hands against the parapet so he wouldn’t fall.

The sun stood high over the eternal city, its heat blocked by a sparse cover of puffy, white clouds. Battle cries and explosions, crushing stone and splitting flesh, mixed with the imperceptible flutter of red and white flags bumping against each other, blended into a chaotic symphony that set Nege’s heart on fire with the undeniable passion of the moment.

“Hold fast!” the emperor commanded, not bothering to brush away the dust of pulverized stone clinging to his sweating face as he stood firmly once more.

“I cannot, Emperor,” Murel said in a loud but cold tone Nege had trouble hearing. “It would be too much.”

“Too much to save lives? I thought that was what you Prophets were supposed to be doing? Third regiment, move against the front gate battlements!”

With the emperor’s orders, a runner sped away and another stepped forward to take his place.

“Emperor, the fourth regiment still hasn’t been used,” a general adorned more richly than the emperor advised Eternine. “We’re losing ground in the northern gap.”

“They fought yesterday, General. Let them back a moment,” Eternine said.

“In a moment more we may lose the northern gates! At least let them through the second wall.”

“The enemy must only see us use the precise amount of soldiers needed to defeat them, General. Keep your men ready the moment I need them and no sooner.”

Nege stood a little over ten meters from the emperor, looking down on the man from the perfect vantage of the ruined tower’s lower window. The open air of the collapsed roof gave him perfect sight of the battle going on just in front of him.

“Nege, we have to move away from here before the Teljuks enter the city!” Sono commanded in Nege’s mind.

“I’ll stay here, thanks,” Nege replied as a musket ball bounced off the wall in a puff of centuries-old dust.

“Oh no. I’m not leaving a Red unattended in a battle. This is the final assault. And from what Murel is predicting, it is most likely going to break through.”