Hell's Gate

"We won't be the only sightseers wanting to gawk at the city, after all," he'd said. "Most members of the Conclave will want to explore at least a little. I rather doubt that many of the Conclave's delegates have ever had the opportunity."

"Thus proving that even an inter-universal crisis can have some benefit," Andrin had smiled, and her father had laughed aloud.

"Fair enough. And don't worry, I'll be gawking right alongside you, 'Drin. Unlike you, I may have been here before, but you're not the only Calirath intrigued by ancient ruins and monuments."

Now her father appeared beside her at the rail as she saw high spires rising from the temples of two dozen or more faiths. Gilded domes caught the sunlight with mirror brilliance, scattering diamond points of light into the sky. And then, ahead of them, a faerie arch rose like a golden thread. It joined a second delicate arch, then another and another, as span after span marched across the wide Ylani Strait, and Andrin's breath caught at the sight of that eldritch bridge, spa

"How?" she breathed softly. "Who could build such a bridge?"

"I wish we Ternathians could take the credit, but we can't," her father said with smile. "That honor goes to His Crowned Eminence, the Seneschal of Othmaliz. It's been finished for seven months, I believe."

Andrin glanced from the bridge to her father.

"But how, Papa? Surely a bridge that long ought to collapse under its own weight! Or as soon as a heavy wind hits it!"

"Well," Zindel's eyes twinkled, "some say he made a pact with the devils of the Arpathian Hells?all eleven of them. Hells, that is," he amended. "I don't think anyone could possibly count the number of devils Arpathians fear. Not even the Arpathians. I gave up trying several years ago, since they seem to invent new ones each time the moon changes phase or the wind shifts. Others say the Seneschal pledged his immortal soul to obtain the plans and that he'll have to spend the rest of his life building temples, trying to earn it back." He chuckled. "It's less colorful, perhaps, but the simple truth is that he put out a call to the greatest engineering geniuses on Sharona and promised a dukedom and half the lifetime earnings from the bridge traffic to the engineer who could design and build it."

"It's … astonishing," she said, inadequately.

So it was, and the closer they came, the more astonishing it grew. The pilings were massive towers of concrete and stone. The spans were made of steel, but not the solid steel she'd expected. Instead, they were made of steel cables, which gave the bridge its gossamer appearance, like a bridge made of thread. She frowned, trying to reason it out, as the wind whipped past in crosswise gusts.

Then she understood.

"It really is sheer genius!" she cried aloud in pure delight. "Using cables, not rigid beams, means the entire structure can flex just enough to keep from cracking!"

Her father gri

"Bravo, 'Drin! That's precisely why it worked. And don't forget, this part of the world is subject to relatively frequent earthquakes. I'm sure that was another factor in the final design." He laughed. "If you ever grow bored enough to entertain thoughts of an ordinary career, you might consider engineering."

Lady Merissa, who'd finally recovered from her seasickness, gasped behind Andrin's shoulder.

"Your Majesty! What a ghastly suggestion! Her Highness is a Calirath! Not a . . . a tradesman!"

The guardian of Andrin's reputation was glaring at her father, her expression scandalized, but the Emperor turned to meet that outraged stare calmly.

"My dear Lady Merissa, I didn't mean to shock you. But as a Calirath, if Andrin wants to build bridges between her comportment lessons, her sessions with the dancing master, and her studies with Shamir Taje?among other distinguished tutors?" he said, his eyes twinkling, "then by all means, she may build as many bridges as Ternathia has need of, with my blessing. We Caliraths have taken up any number of interesting occupations, just for the challenges involved. Besides," he added smugly, "engineering isn't a trade. It's a profession."

The distinction, alas, was lost upon Lady Merissa, and Andrin had to clap both hands over her lips to keep from laughing out loud at her protocolist's apoplectic look. Lady Merissa, clearly horrified by the Emperor's answer, turned a savagely repressive glare on Andrin … whose father did have the temerity to laugh.

"Lady Merissa," he said with a chuckle, "you're a hopeless aristocrat."

Lady Merissa was clearly torn between squawking in indignation and the deference due the most powerful single human being on Sharona. While she tried to make up her mind which to do, the human being in question turned back to his contemplation of the Ylani Strait Bridge, and gave Andrin a solemn wink. Zindel chan Calirath thought the whole notion of Andrin shocking the bluebloods by taking up engineering was wickedly fu

She was a vibrant, intelligent young woman whose natural enthusiasms were all too frequently curbed by the political realities of her birth rank. For other girls, the choice to study engineering might have surprised people, including the engineers who taught their discipline to new generations, but at least it would have been possible. For Andrin, that door was almost certainly closed, and her father deeply regretted that. He looked back down at her and brushed hair back from her brow.

"You do understand, Andrin, don't you?" he asked softly.

Her eyes were as gray as the wind-chopped water of the Ibral Sea. No guile lived in those forthright eyes, but there was a depth of reserve, a sense that they looked steadily at a thing, measured it carefully against a host of complex factors, and sought to understand it within its many shifting contexts. They were eyes too old for a girl of seventeen, yet strangely vulnerable and young.

"Yes, Papa," she said equally softly, and the smile that touched her lips was sad. "I understand. I have to be too many other things to think about indulging a passing fancy."

Or even a serious one, he added silently.

"I wish it weren't so," he said aloud. "But we can change neither the world, nor our place in it. And that's enough said on the subject. Look," he pointed to the left-hand bank, "isn't that the most beautiful Temple of Shalana you've ever seen?"

Andrin looked, then let out a long "Ohhhh!" of appreciation. A tall needle-shaped tower rose from the top of a soaring dome. The needle was gold?genuine gold filigree?and the dome was a patchwork of gold and blue in a swirling, striped pattern that boiled intricately down its curved surface. The gold portion, like the needle tower, really was genuine gold, applied as a thin foil in layer upon successive layer by thousands upon thousands of pilgrims, and the blue swirls were brilliant lapis, a mosaic of thousands upon thousands of tiles cut from the semi-precious blue stone that was sacred to Shalana. The strips of lapis were, in turn, inlaid with other stones?blue stones that caught the sunlight with a fiery dazzle of light. Faceted sapphires by the thousands encrusted the dome in a breathtaking display of the wealth controlled by Shalana's ruling order of priestesses, and the Grand Temple's walls were white marble, inlaid with still more lapis in an intricate geometric pattern of sunbursts and stylized waves. The Order of Shalana was reputed to be the most powerful religious order in the world, with temples?and banks?in nearly every country in Sharona, and Andrin could believe it as she gazed at that gloriously beautiful structure.

"I've never seen anything so lovely in my life!" Andrin breathed softly. "It's more beautiful than any of the temples in Ternathia. Anywhere in Ternathia."