Queen of Candesce

“Today the old debts will be settled! Two hundred years and more the truth has waited in Buridan tower—the truth of what Sacrus is and what they have done! Nearly too late, but not too late, because you, here today, will be the ones to settle those debts and at the same time, prevent Sacrus from ever committing such atrocities again!

“Let me describe my home. Let me describe Buridan tower!” Out of the corner of her eye she saw the army commanders ru

“That’s right,” she nodded. “You’re fighting for far more than you may know. This isn’t just a matter of historical grudges, nor is it a skirmish over Sacrus’s kidnapping and torture of your women and children. This is about your future. Do you want all of Spyre to become like Buridan, an empty tomb, a capricious playground for the winds? Because that is what Sacrus has pla

The officers had stopped at the head of the crowd. She could see that the commander was about to order her to be taken off her perch, so Venera hurried on to her main point. “You have not been told the truth about this war! Before we leave this place you need to know why Sacrus has moved against us all. It is because they believe they have outgrown Spyre the way a wasp outgrows its cocoon. Centuries ago they attacked and destroyed Buridan to gain a treasure from us. They failed to capture it, but never gave up their ambition. Ever since Buridan’s fall they have bided their time, awaiting the chance to get their hands on something Buridan has guarded for the sake of Spyre, since the very begi

“Since the creation of Spyre, my family has guarded one of the most powerful relics in the world! It was for the sake of this trust that we kept to Buridan tower for generations, not venturing out because we feared Sacrus would learn that the tower is not the empty shell they believed—afraid they would learn that it can be entered. The thing we guarded is so dangerous that my brothers and sisters, my parents, grandparents, and their grandparents, all sacrificed their lives to prevent even a hint of its existence from escaping our walls.

“Time came when we could no longer sustain ourselves,” she said more softly, “and I had to venture forth.” Dimly, Venera wondered at this grand fib she was making up on the spot; it was a rousing story, and if it proved rousing enough, then nobody would believe Guinevera if he survived to accuse her of being an imposter.

“As soon as I came forth,” she said, “Sacrus knew that Buridan had survived, and they knew why we had stayed hidden. They knew that I carried with me the last key to Candesce!”

She stopped, letting the echoes reverberate. Crossing her arms, she gazed out at the army, waiting. Two seconds, five, ten, and then they were muttering, talking, turning to one another with frowns and nods. Some who prided themselves on knowing old legends told the men standing next to them about the keys; word began to spread through the ranks. In the front row, the officers were looking at one another in consternation.

Venera raised a hand for silence. “That is what this war is about,” she said. “Sacrus has known of the existence of this key for centuries. They tried to take it once, and Buridan and its allies resisted. Now they are after it again. If they get it, they will no longer need Spyre. To them it is like the hated chrysalis that has confined them for generations. They will shed it, and they don’t care if it unravels in pieces as they fly toward the light. At best, Spyre will prove a good capital for the world-spa

The soldiers were starting to argue and shout. Belatedly the officers had realized that they weren’t in control any more; several darted at the locomotive, but Venera crouched and glared at them, as if she was ready to pounce. They backed away.

She stood up onto her tip-toes as she flung one fist high over her head. “We have to stop them! The key must be protected, for without it, Spyre itself is doomed. You fight for more than your lives—more than your homes. You are all that stands between Sacrus and the slow strangulation of the very world!

“Will you stop them?” They shouted yes. “Will you?” They screamed it.

Venera had never seen anyone give a speech like this, but she’d heard Chaison work a crowd and had read about such moments in books. It all took her back to those romantic stories she’d devoured as a little girl in her pink bedroom. Outrageous theatricality, but none of these men had ever seen its like either; few had probably ever been in a theater. For most, this roundhouse was the farthest they had ever been from home, and the looming locomotive was something they had only ever glimpsed in the far distance. They stood among peers, who before today had been dots seen through telescopes, and they were learning that however strange and foreign they were, all were united in their loyalty to Spyre itself. Of course the moment made them mad.

Fist still raised, Venera smiled down at the commander who shook his head in defeat.

Bryce and Jacoby Sarto clambered along the side of the locomotive to join her. “What’s the news?” she asked over the roar of the army at her feet.

Bryce blinked at the scene. “Uh… they’re on their way.”

Sarto nodded. “I semaphored the Sacrus army commander. Told him you realize your situation is hopeless, that you’re going to lead your army into a trap.”

She gri

“It—is—tüüüüüme!”

20

The sound of bullets hitting Liris’s walls reminded Garth Diamandis of those occasional big drops that fall from trees after a rain. Silence, then a pat followed in this case by the distant sound of a shot. From the gunslit where he was watching he could see the army of the Council Alliance assembling next to the rust-streaked roundhouse. In the early morning light it seemed like a dark carpet moving, in ominous silence, in the direction of Liris. Little puffs of smoke arose from the Sacrus line, but the firing was undisciplined.

“Come away from there,” said Venera’s friend Eilen. They stood in a musty closet crammed with door lintels, broken drawers, cracked table legs: useless junk, but impossible for a tiny nation like Liris to throw away. Lantern light from the corridor shone through Eilen’s hair. She could have been attractive, a habitual part of his mind noted. At one time, he could have helped her with that.

“I have a good view of the Sacrus camp,” he said. “And it’s too dangerous to be on the roof right now.”

“You’ll get a bullet in the eye,” she said. He grunted and turned back to the view, and after a moment he heard her leave.