?Whoever becomes master of a city accustomed to freedom and does not destroy it, will be destroyed by it?.

  Niccolò Machiavelli. The Prince

  The whisper of azure waters, like the voice of a forgotten spirit, slipped beneath his skin. The boat slid forward, borne by the strength of the Ether. Beneath the surface, the Blue Agave flickered past, a forest of spears guarding their prey. Mikena kept his eyes fixed on Mádyè—the bronze mask glimmered dully in the glow of the magical orb.

  When Mikena was a boy, his brother once dragged him to a frozen lake in the Wolf’s Maw. The ice cracked beneath his feet and he plunged into the black water—cold clamps tightening on his chest. Then Tirin had pulled him out. Now there was no one. The waters of the River were warmer, yet the feeling was the same—he was drowning, only now in another’s magic, in another’s design.

  Suddenly the boat shuddered, and Mádyè’s voice cut through his thoughts.

  “Prepare yourself, General. We are nearly there.”

  The water gave a hollow gasp; the prow veered to the right. Ahead loomed a pier of fresh-hewn timbers, torches burning, the silhouettes of armed men rising on the bank.

  The Rivers of Blue Agave—true wonder. They had reached Sardas.

  The boat thudded against the pier; hands reached to help them ashore.

  In the half-dark, the general recognized them at once: black armor, their faces hidden behind featureless masks. This was the unit that had captured him—a special guard. Unlike the Eridian soldiers Mikena had faced in battle, these men seemed to live in shadow, moving smooth and silent. He could swear he did not even hear them breathe.

  This underground shore lay close to the city; once they stepped from the cave they stood already on the heights. Below, hemmed by mountains and the sea, walled high and sheer, Sardas sprawled. Its lights burned; pale smoke seeped upward.

  Mikena sighed, a cloud of vapor escaped his lips. Spring still lingered cold here. While in Mutaaresh orchards already bloomed, bees and bumblebees fought for nectar, birds sang, and the sun each noon blazed white upon the horizon, here frost still glazed the grass at night.

  “You have taken the slope. Commendable,” he hid his unease behind a smirk.

  They climbed onto a platform. Fresh timber still smelled of resin, tacky underfoot—this observation point had been built only recently.

  Mikena studied the northern slope facing the city: here and there rose plain wooden structures. Shadows of men hid within. They were hard to see. No campfires, no torches, no magical orbs. Only the eye of the full moon gleamed, and the pale line of the Flow of Stardust cut across the heavens.

  Port-Sardas: an impregnable fortress, the last true stronghold before the road to the capital. Nemar and Mezz, further on, were no match to it. The city stood still and timeless, and it seemed nothing could alter its fate. Could such grandeur ever be overcome?

  Yet strangely, few ships crowded the port. Could they not know the enemy was at their gates?

  “Sardas has sent most of its fleet to aid Port-Galan,” said Mádyè, evidently following his astonished gaze.

  Mikena frowned, staring at the sea’s silver glitter. On the horizon faint lights shimmered—one, two, five, seven. Seven masts in all.

  “That is not enough to break Sardas,” he spat in irritation.

  The Eridians must have lured part of the fleet away. Yet seven ships were nothing against the port’s mighty walls. What game were they playing?

  “It is only part of the plan.” Eyes gleamed within the mask’s slits. “Do not trouble yourself. Merely enjoy it. When else will you see so splendid a moon?”

  Mikena leaned against the railing, gazing down into the rocky gorge. Drawing away the ships and striking through the mountains—it was a reckless, audacious strategy. All these posts along the slope seemed newly built. Did the adviser truly believe so much in his own genius that he would take such risks? Terrifying, absurd folly.

  Mádyè rested beside him, elbows propped, watching the night sky.

  “Do you think victory will be yours?” Mikena’s chest still boiled with anger.

  “Soon the darkness will fall and cover the moon. Shadow will lie upon the invincible ancient city—that shadow which heralds its inevitable end.” Whenever the adviser spoke thus, he seemed to change—less human, less near, less alive. “All things end: men, cities, millennia. Nothing lasts forever.”

  “I see none of your strength.”

  “Of course not. Our strength is hidden from the eye.” Mádyè’s head snapped toward him, his ponytail whipping across his back like a serpent. “I will tell you a little. You have earned some reward for your good conduct on the way here.”

  “Viper!” Mikena cursed inwardly.

  “Secret talks are under way. I sent two of your own men as envoys. Perhaps Sardas will yield without battle.”

  The general nearly choked on the air. Outrage flooded him. Energy burned in his body, a hunger to seize the insolent man, to see fear in those calm eyes. He dared use his men. Dared threaten a general. Dared presume against great Sardas as if it were some petty town, not a fortress of legend.

  A sick ache spread in his chest.

  “Cursed intriguer,” he whispered, then louder: “And you think they will surrender just because you ask?!”

  “No, of course I do not. But it would be better if they did.”

  The dim lights on the sea grew larger, brighter. White rectangles of sails glimmered.

  Should he risk all to flee? To kill Mádyè?

  Soldiers ringed them, a cliff’s drop beyond the railing, and at his side a man whose power he could not measure. The trap had sprung shut with such force that darkness swam before his eyes.

  From a narrow path a figure emerged, handed the adviser a scroll, and vanished catlike into the dark.

  The rustle of parchment, a weary sigh from Mádyè—and Mikena’s heart clenched. He needed no words to know.

  A dread hush hung over the city. The wind moaned faintly; surf thundered in the distance. The ships drew nearer, sails snapping louder and louder. One heartbeat, two, three—and the world cracked. Thundered. The desperate peal of bells rang back and forth, echoing off the mountains, racing to the sea. The city blazed with lights, voices rising; soldiers took their posts upon the walls—yet saw no foe, even when they looked straight at them. Eridian troops lay hidden among rocks and sparse brush, creeping on goat paths, shunning the moonlight as though in fear.

  Green eyes glowed through the bronze mask, shining with no reflection of fire. The adviser was calm.

  Cold sticky fear gripped Mikena as he watched.

  “Are you ready to choose, General?” The even voice pulled him back to the moment. “Cross to my side. Lead the second delegation. Persuade Sardas to surrender.”

  He did not hesitate, forcing confidence into his reply.

  “I am loyal to the Sihemic Empire to the end. No god could bring down Port-Sardas, let alone a man.”

  “Then you refuse?”

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  “Yes!”

  “Then the rest lies on your conscience.”

  Mádyè lifted a hand to his troops. A horn rang out. Noise swelled—not only steps and cries. The air itself seemed to sing with tension.

  “I have prepared for this day three months. Come closer.” Unexpectedly, he seized Mikena’s arm, pulling him near. “I promised to protect you.”

  When the fortress found their position, arrows would fly. What protection could an adviser give—one a head shorter than himself?

  Chaos shattered the general’s composure. Seven ships. A few thousand men in makeshift works on a harsh slope. Too little, far too little to crush the city-fortress. Yet why did dread gnaw so deep?

  A faint clicking, a low drone sounded near.

  Beetles—huge scarabs—crawled from beneath the mask, from his sleeves, from under his robes. They swarmed across his shoulders and back, growing in number each instant. Dozens, hundreds, thousands.

  They shone not with gold but with polished bronze—the hue of his mask.

  Mikena tried to pull away, but Mádyè gripped him so hard his arm went numb.

  Never had he witnessed sorcery so dreadful.

  A weight pressed on him. Beetles clambered onto him as well, claws snagging his clothes, covering him as with a carapace, a cuirass.

  “What is this?!” he cried, above the rising drone.

  “The army we awaited. The army that will take Sardas.”

  The hum grew louder. The lights on the sea drew swiftly closer.

  There were too many to count. Not only upon them, but swarming up from the cliffs, from cracks in the rock, from bushes and grass and trees, from the water, from the city walls. Swarms massed, lifting into the sky, blotting out stars and moon, casting a giant shadow over the troubled city. The port grew restless; cries rang out, dogs barked, horses snorted in panic.

  A dull whistle—and the dark sky burst crimson, a blossom of fire from the far side. Sardas had signaled the onset of battle.

  “Look. A wondrous battle it will be.” The fortress walls flared as archers lit their arrows. “Look.”

  The adviser clung to him, perhaps seeking a point of balance, stooped under the weight of his living bronze cloak.

  Trebuchets hurled stones into the air, seeking to crush the swarm. Yet the beetles, swift and elusive, slipped between the missiles.

  “Commence!” a voice rang above. Mikena could not even turn his head, pressed down by the crawling weight. Insects tangled in his unruly hair, tugging at it; spiny legs scraped across his shaved neck and cheek, sending a shudder through him.

  Mádyè’s gaze glazed, as if he were not here. He no longer controlled the strength with which he squeezed Mikena’s arm. His mind had split into thousands upon thousands of fragments. He was every beetle at once, every part of the bronze army. The adviser was the army itself: one man divided into a multitude of soldiers.

  Was this the power of Freedom? The power of the Flow of Stardust, where each grain raced free through the ages, and together, by choice, became the might of a mountain ready to fall.

  The walls flared with fire as arrows were lit. At the roll of war drums, the bright points of flame quivered, then arced toward the mountain pass.

  And darkness fell upon the city.

  Sardas trembled, shuddered, filled with screams.

  Mikena closed his eyes, listening. His sense for magic was poor, his strength modest—but even he could feel.

  The beetles were smaller than darts, stronger than arrows, faster and nimbler than any weapon men knew. The perfect balance. They pierced armor and wood, swept all before them. Where they could not, they shattered, fell, then rose again to resume the slaughter.

  They pursued both the fleeing and the hiding. All whom they deemed enemies.

  Mikena had fought in the thick of battle, had heard the last cries of the slain, the pleas of the wounded for mercy or for death. But this—this was on another level. It was as if the city itself screamed and wept. Sardas could not resist. It could only stare, horrified, accepting the inevitable.

  The flaming arrows reached the observation point, but the second volley was weaker—the bronze scarabs were fulfilling their task. They were perfect soldiers, the best: they did not retreat, knew no mercy, heard no pleas.

  Beyond them, from the mountainside, another storm fell upon the city—arrows unlike those of Sardas. Heavy and ungainly, they scattered chaotically over rooftops and pavements, then exploded in brilliant white flashes, deepening the chaos.

  This side suffered losses as well. Fire-arrows ricocheted from the beetles’ bronze shells but struck those who lacked such armor.

  Ships were entering the harbor, hastily furling sails and training their guns. Yet even so, Port-Sardas was not ready to yield.

  In the distance, new mast-lights flared—the withdrawn fleet was racing back to the city.

  The adviser’s empty eyes blazed anew.

  “So that’s it!” he snarled.

  “The deceiver deceived,” Mikena muttered with a tense, nervous laugh. Sardas must have only feigned the fleet’s departure, waiting for this attack. Seven ships could never stand against the power of an ancient port.

  The ground shuddered, walls trembled, massive stones rained down.

  “Stone giants,” Mikena whispered.

  The city’s mages were awakening the colossi to defend against their foes.

  White dust billowed skyward in a vast cloud, and a deep roar rolled through the valley. The enormous figures tore free from the walls. According to legend, each giant’s awakening was bound to a human life—snuffed out when its guardian fell.

  The walls collapsed upon the innocent, burying entire districts. Soldier or civilian—it mattered not; their blood ran red alike, as though the city itself were bleeding.

  History was being forged before their eyes.

  The fleet of Port-Sardas surged forward at full speed. The first dull shots echoed; the nearest frigates, encircling the seven Eridian ships, opened fire.

  “You will regret this!” the adviser thundered. At last releasing Mikena, he raised his hand—the beetle armor rippled.

  The mountain battalions did not respond, continuing their grim task. At first the general thought their disobedience strange, but the command had been meant for another army.

  A fierce, humming shadow rose from the city like a heavy cloud. It buzzed and shimmered faintly in the moonlight, circling, swelling, changing form—until it became a vast bronze serpent.

  Mikena froze, staring at the mythic creature as a bloody rain poured from its swarm-woven body onto the city below. The beetles had pierced countless targets, then gathered into the monster’s flesh—one living storm.

  “No,” his voice broke, hoarse. He knew what would follow. “No!” he cried louder, lunging at Mádyè, seizing the strings of beads on his mask.

  The string of beads snapped. Amid the swelling chaos came a sudden stillness; the general heard the scattered pearls clatter upon the wood. The mask fell, striking the ground with a dull thud.

  Their eyes met. Mádyè looked at him with faint surprise; Mikena was stunned. The contradiction tore at him. The adviser was strikingly beautiful. How could a man with such a face wield such monstrous, ruinous power?

  He is not human. Neither in nature nor in spirit—he is a creature born of the beetle swarm, the embodiment of the Flow of Stardust. Perhaps the Flow itself.

  The ground trembled beneath them. Something colossal struck the cliff behind; a hail of stones cascaded down.

  The giants were hurling boulders, tearing chunks from the walls and flinging them toward the mountains and the sea, crushing the Eridian ships below.

  Cries and screams rose from every side.

  When the dust settled, all were blanketed in white grit—the living and the dead alike.

  Blood streaked the adviser’s pale face, and his green eyes blazed with a terrible madness—the gaze of ruin, of death itself.

  Mikena stood at the brink.

  “If you think yourself merciful, then stop this!” he shouted. “Mádyè, I beg you!”—for the first time calling him by name, without formality. “Spare at least the civilians!”

  To his shock, the adviser answered, “I try not to harm the innocent, but I cannot always halt a beetle racing toward its prey. They are so fast and strong they pierce flesh, shatter bone, break wood, metal, stone. Sometimes I cannot change their course. It is better that no one stand in their path.”

  “You will destroy everything! You’ll kill everyone!”

  Did the adviser flinch? For an instant he seemed to hesitate, but another crashing stone brought him back to the moment.

  “Yes,” for the first time the general heard true emotion in his voice—and for a heartbeat saw pain and doubt on that face. “I will destroy everything.”

  Humanity fled him as swiftly as it came.

  The great serpent took full form, writhing through the heavens, its bronze scales shifting and alive. A manifestation of the Flow of Stardust itself, it roared with a sound that shook the world, then plunged upon the returning fleet, devouring ship after ship. Frigates cracked like nutshells, vanishing into its gaping maw. Knowing neither friend nor foe, it consumed all that stood in the path of its might.

  Mikena watched through a haze; the battle had numbed his senses. He saw the adviser weakening, his movements growing ragged and slow; he saw the giants batter the mountain fortifications, destroying themselves in the process. Lacking stones, they tore off their own limbs and hurled them at the enemy. He saw—and felt nothing.

  Port-Sardas, steadfast for a thousand years, walled and guarded by stone colossi, was crumbling.

  No one knew how many innocents had died, nor how many more would perish in agony beneath the ruins. This was a battle between god and men, one that would be remembered for centuries.

  The giants collapsed, their strength spent—so too the bronze serpent’s. The swarm fell in dead scarabs, though who could tell if they were ever truly alive? It seemed Mádyè could no longer control them.

  The adviser snarled like a beast, straining to hold the raging monster that had gorged itself on ships and drunk the sea water mixed with blood. The serpent was dissolving again, turning into a formless cloud.

  One by one the giants toppled, and when the tumult at last waned, Mádyè dropped to his knees—and from the sky the beetles rained down in a final, deadly shower, covering the city. The bronze armor shattered too.

  The fall of Sardas was not merely a defeat in war. It was the end of a world—the end of everything Mikena had known and understood. Nothing would ever be as it was before.