He dreams of a darkened room. He has dreamed of this room many times. Though he has never been there in the waking world, he thinks of it constantly, imagines it constantly. And in his dreams, he goes there. He knows logically that the room is likely nothing how he imagines it, but that does not change how the room appears in his dreamworld.

  There is always a four-poster bed, with crimson curtains and sheets. The wood of the impressive frame is shaped from Qi’shathian ebony. Each post bears a likeness of one of the Four Guardians of Aurelia: Lion, Owl, Scorpion, Phoenix. They are strangely carved, their faces contorted in howls and screeches of pain, rather than triumph. They loom gargoyle-like over the room, as though defying anyone to approach the sanctity of the bed.

  The imperial bed.

  There is always one window, south-facing, but admitting only pale light, light bleached of colour and warmth, as though with a presentiment of frost. This is perhaps because Lucan knows that Northern Aurelia is a great deal colder. The winters, they say, cause towns and cities to become snowed in, the roads unusable, and even the Engines slowed down, great piles of glittering snow having to be cleared from the tracks and lines.

  The only other prominent feature of the room is a floor-length gold-rimmed mirror. He knows—in the strange way one knows things in dreams—that it is a mirror of Sumyrian workmanship. Yet, the mirror has never showed him any prophetic glimpses. Always, he inspects himself before it. He admires the golden cape adorning his shoulders, the sceptre in his hand, the heavy crown upon his brow bearing four bright jewels: a ruby to represent the Phoenix; a jacinth to represent the Lion; an Emerald to represent the Owl; and a sapphire to represent the Scorpion. These are the symbols of his new office: Emperor of Aurelia. But more than this, they are a secret and delicious heresy. For in the waking world, one Emperor bears the sceptre and robe, and the other bears the crown. But in his dream, there is no other. There is only Lucan and the whole continent under his immortal heel.

  As he stares into the mirror, he sees—for the first time—something that should not be there. He starts, stumbled backward. Yet his eyes remain glued to the canvas of light and trickery.

  There is no room reflected, anymore. Nor is he reflected. A ind of fog has flooded the mirror’s world, obscuring all in clouds and shadow.

  He squints. The crown feels suddenly very heavy on his head, weighing him down. A feels the blood throbbing through the veins at his temples. He feels the pulse of his own life, like some kind of Engine. But even the greatest of them have an expiry, he thinks. It is not merely power I must acquire, but life!

  One shadow looms larger, deeper, than the rest. It is man-shaped, striding through the fog of the mirror-world. Towards him. Lucan trembles. He feels suddenly he should grab the bedsheets and throw them over the mirror, obscure the dreadful vision from sight. Yet he cannot look away. Something is coming and he must look, he must see. Whatever the secret, whatever the price…

  The shadow draws nearer, nearer. A towering man, filling up the whole mirror. A black impression like a bruise on reality.

  And then suddenly there is light. Lucan screams as the face comes into sudden, dreadful focus. The features are his, and yet not his. They are his features ravaged by war. They are his features warped by age and something deeper: madness. Lucan is cold, calculating, driven, ambitious. But not mad. No, his mind, in fact, is the one faculty on which he knows he can rely. The flesh is weak, but the mind… the mind can endure.

  But now he sees himself reflected, all sanity gone, all mind discarded, and only a burning obsession behind the eyes, eyes that could set cities aflame. He does not understand what he is seeing, does not want to understand. With a terrible effort of will, he tears his eyes away from the mirror.

  As if that act of cowardice were some occult permission, the phantom in the mirror suddenly reaches out, reaching through the glass, into reality. His hand grips Lucan’s throat with awful strength.

  “Governor!” the phantom says, grinning. “Governor!”

  The scream of terror that leaves Lucan’s throat is so loud that the dream dissolves in its shockwaves.

  ***

  Lucan started awake. He stared up into Dreyne’s scarred visage. His head pounded with both physical pain from where he had been struck and the exertion the dream had put him through. His heart thundered in his chest. His hands were trembling. He gulped at air and took a moment to steady himself.

  Where am I?

  He was in cell four. Qala Jin’s cell… But Qala Jin was not there, anymore. The rack lay empty. And Dreyne…

  Memory returned as the dream became hazier and hazier, fading back into the horrid fog from whence it came. He shook himself.

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  “Master!” Dreyne said, relief in his voice.

  Lucan cursed.

  “What are you doing here?” he spat.

  Dreyne flinched like a kicked dog.

  “I… I… I was worried…”

  “Do not worry about me!” Lucan roared, clambering shakily to his feet. His limbs did not seem overly willing to comply. The blow to the head had been harder than he realised. The filthy pirate could well have killed him. “Worry about our enemies escaping. Raise the alarm! Rally all your men. Now! Dreyne! Now!”

  The assassin did not need to be told twice. Realising his error in lingering, he fled to the cell door.

  “Dreyne!” Lucan called.

  The assassin turned.

  “No survivors.”

  Dreyne nodded and vanished like a shadow. Lucan could have smiled at that, if he did not feel like his skull was about to split open. No wonder his dreams were full of phantoms: he had surrounded himself with them.

  He staggered out of the cell and into the corridor. There, he was gripped by genuine shock.

  Xarl lay unconscious on the floor. What kind of strength does it take to knock out Xarl? Not only was Xarl huge, but his theront nature made him tougher than any man. Lucan grit his teeth. Qala had powerful allies, it seemed.

  Above Xarl’s unconscious form, wedged between the narrow walls of the corridor, was a glittering spear. Lucan frowned. The workmanship was exquisite. Sumyrian, in fact. He paced towards the spear. He kicked Xarl and the theront grunted, rolling over onto his side. Lucan kicked him again and he started awake.

  “Get up, Xarl,” Lucan said.

  Sheepishly, the theront got to his feet. His ugly, half-frog face bore a look of utter shame. One leg, Lucan noticed, was ruptured and bent at an odd angle. But the wound was healing before Lucan’s eyes, bone realigning, flesh reknitting. The Governor averted his gaze, disgusted. One benefit of Xarl’s bestial nature was his potent capacity to restore wounds, but the sight was a nauseating one.

  “My lord, I am sorry. The small one… he was so quick…” The theront cast his bulbous eyes around mournfully for his sword. “They… they took Darkbite.”

  “Let that be a lesson to you,” Lucan snarled.

  Xarl howled.

  Lucan ignored him. He took hold of the central handle of the spear. He stroked it. There was a noise like a sword on a whetstone, a kind of soft shriek, and the two ends of the spear suddenly withdrew, compartmentalising themselves until they fit, impossibly, within the lightweight haft he held in his palm. The cylinder was no bigger than a scroll-case, yet could be unfolded into a full, perfectly balanced weapon. And sharp, too, to pierce stone so easily… Lucan went to slide the cylinder into an inner pocket of his robe—and realised his robe had been taken. That cost me one hundred Demons! he seethed. And they just took it! From the very back of a government official! His fist clenched tightly about the cylinder, and he felt minded to go after Dreyne, to use it with lethal force on his enemies, to revel in the jarring impact of steel… But it would not be seemly. For now, his reputation was still in tact, though certainly holes had been rent in the hull, and now water could leak in if he did not plug them quickly…

  Still, having lost the robe, there was no sense in throwing away the impressive spear-weapon. He was not much of a fighter, but were he caught unawares again, it would be wise to be armed. And this weapon had a nasty surprise in its tail.

  Xarl was kneeling.

  “Forgive me, my lord!” he wailed. “I let them escape!” He cracked a fist against his huge, domed head. Once, twice. The noise made the dungeons reverberate.

  “Stop that, you oaf!” Lucan snapped. He had no time for self pity. “If you want to do something useful, then check the other cells, and ensure we are not missing any other prisoners.”

  “Yes, my lord.” Xarl shambled off, the keys at his belt rattling.

  Lucan sighed. Things had been going so well, despite the natural disaster that’d befallen Wylhome, but now he had an escaped prisoner of inestimable value, and there was the potential he could be exposed.

  The Shadow Market becomes more important than ever.

  It was perhaps time to put into place his contingency plan. In the event Dreyne returned empty handed, he needed to ready a ship so that, if things went south, he could depart in haste. Oryon’s imminent visit only put additional impetus on that contingency being in place.

  So long as you have Benjamyn Hart, and he believes you will deliver his daughter, then you may yet triumph.

  A dark wailing broke his concentration.

  Lucan turned. He had never heard Xarl cry out in panic before. A dread filled Lucan’s heart, more palpable, more awful, than even that which he’d experienced in the dream. He seemed to see the imperial dream crumbling before his eyes. The phantom wearing his own ravaged face had perforated the sanctity of his imaginal space, had worked some infection into the core, and now all was turning to bile. I cannot lose it, not when I have come so far, done so much, made so many sacrifices…

  “What is it?” he choked.

  The theront stood white-faced at the end of the hallway.

  “All prisoners present, my lord… But my sword…” The theront broke down, slumping against the wall. He was actually weeping. Horrid, blubbery tears.

  Lucan could have struck the theront, but he was too relieved. For a brief second, he’d thought Hart or one of the others had escaped.

  I still have my trump card, he thought. There is still the Shadow Market to come!