In the Shadow of Lightning

33

The Cinders said nothing as they escorted Demir out the front of the Hyacinth. He recognized none of them – they were not the same ones he’d told off at the riot earlier.

Abductions and executions weren’t nearly as common as they once were, but they did still happen, and Demir kept his senses keen as they loaded him into a plain carriage and trundled him off across the Assembly District. None of the eight Cinders surrounding his carriage were glassdancers, which was either an oversight on the part of the Inner Assembly, or meant that they really just wanted to talk to him. But why send the Cinders instead of a messenger? What was so damned urgent that it couldn’t wait until morning?

He wanted to grab the closest Cinder and give him a shake. She invited me up to her room for a glass of wine, you assholes. That wouldn’t end well, of course. The summons of the Inner Assembly was more important than getting laid, and the fact that he was, even subconsciously, comparing the two meant that maybe there was more of his old, arrogant self left in him than he thought.

Demir was just beginning to wonder if perhaps he should have woken Montego when their short journey ended abruptly, the door opening, and Demir emerging to find himself in the shadow of the Maerhorn; the squat, central fortress of the Assembly District. The thick, unadorned walls of the Maerhorn stood out among the gorgeous amphitheaters and marble statues like a boil on a courtesan’s face. The Cinders quickly surrounded Demir, hurrying him across the covered bridge that connected the second floor of the Maerhorn to the street. Demir allowed himself to be swept along, still trying to ascertain the meaning of this whole affair. A piece of skyglass helped calm his nerves, and none of the Cinders so much as blinked when he slid it into a piercing.

They crossed a massive, foreboding threshold with ancient murder holes and several rows of portcullises, then took an immediate right across a narrow killing room, up some precarious steps, and down one wall where they crossed another bridge to enter the Maerhorn’s inner keep. There was no one here but Cinders, lining the walls and halls, backs straight and eyes front. Demir wondered if they’d even need a glassdancer to execute him, or if they had one waiting somewhere. He couldn’t sense one.

The whole group stopped so abruptly that he almost ran into the Cinder in front of him. The woman out front turned on her heel, knocked once on a nondescript wooden door, and then pushed it open and gestured for him to enter. Demir eyeballed his escort one last time, throwing out his sorcerous senses in a broad net, before stepping inside.

It was a large, long hall, brightly lit by dozens of gas lanterns that hung down from the ceiling in ornate chandeliers. The cold stone walls were covered in thick tapestries, the floors with battered crimson rugs, and a spread of five wingback chairs faced the door in a semicircle. All five chairs were occupied.

Father Vorcien, elderly, cracked, and frog-like, his chins coated in glassrot scales, sat in the center chair. To his right was Aelia Dorlani, younger than Father Vorcien by two years but trying to hide her age behind gallons of makeup. On that far right side was Gregori Kirkovik, the bearlike northern patriarch. To Father Vorcien’s left was Supi Magna, glowering at Demir as he entered, and on the far left sat Sammi Stavri. The Inner Assembly; the five most powerful people in Ossa and, perhaps, the world.

Demir fell into a soldier’s at-ease stance and pretended to ignore Supi Magna’s glare. Why had they summoned him? Was it about the riots? Or were they going to question him about the Ivory Forest Glassworks? Was this, he thought with the lurch of his stomach, about the phoenix channel?

“This is quite the prestigious gathering,” he said.

“Look at him,” Supi Magna snapped. “Sun-darkened like a provincial farmer, hands callused. Hardly the Ossan elite material we’re looking for.”

“We’re not asking him to a ball,” Gregori rumbled in his thick provincial accent. “Come off it. I don’t give a shit about your precious glassworks and side projects. This is important.”

“As important as a guild-family patriarch threatening the Cinders in front of a mob?” Supi demanded.

“More so,” Gregori grunted. “The Cinders need to be put in their place on occasion just like everyone else.”

Demir was taken aback by the exchange but tried to keep it off his face. The Inner Assembly was clearly not of one mind regarding … whatever it was they wanted him for. “Care to fill me in?” he asked.

“And no respect! Look how flippant he is. Look how–”

“Supi,” Aelia said. “Shut up.”

Demir glanced at Aelia, meeting her eyes, wondering if she knew that he knew that she’d ordered his mother killed. Based on her cool, vaguely distracted gaze, she did not. He then let his eyes settle on Sammi Stavri. She was the youngest of the group, though she was in her mid-sixties, and she sat dejected and despondent in her wingback chair, head lolling like she was either drunk or senile. Last he heard, she was neither. Something was going on here that he did not understand.

Before he could push them further, Father Vorcien finally roused himself and cleared his throat. “It’s good to see you again, Demir.”

“And you, Father Vee.”

Father Vorcien snorted. “I apologize for the Cinders, and the hour.” Father Vorcien’s eyes wandered momentarily before returning to Demir. On a man who could bluff a gargoyle, that was the greatest tell that he was distressed. “Just a few hours ago, word arrived from the Copper Hills that the Foreign Legion was soundly defeated by a Grent army led by Devia Kerite.”

Demir rocked back on his heels, his stomach doing a backflip. No wonder the whole group wasn’t lambasting him about the riot. This was far more serious. The Foreign Legion, defeated? That didn’t seem possible. “I thought Kerite and her Drakes were in Purnia butchering natives on behalf of the Nasuud.”

“She was wintering in the Glass Isles,” Aelia spoke up. “We negotiated for the use of her mercenaries against the Grent, but the Grent snatched her out from under us. She didn’t even give us the courtesy of a counteroffer!”

“And we’ve been screaming at each other ever since,” Gregori rumbled. “Who is to blame for that?” He shot a glance to Sammi Stavri.

“Gregori!” Aelia snapped.

“What?” Gregori frowned at Aelia. “We’re talking to Demir Grappo. Even if his mind broke at Holikan he is still Adriana’s son! You think he doesn’t know we bicker? You think he’d fall for our united public front? Bah!”

“Your sensitivity touches me deeply, Gregori,” Demir said. He kept his expression bland, his voice bemused, but inside his thoughts were churning over themselves. There was something deeply comforting about seeing the weakness within this most powerful of cabals, but he did wonder if they had frayed so badly that they were showing it even to him. Of course, an army led by Devia Kerite sitting on their doorstep would fray the nerves of any ruler. Demir had an inkling what this was about now, but … could he really be right?

Gregori grinned at him. “My little brother sends his regards, and I understand my grandniece loves your hotel.”

“Tirana fits right in.”

“I’m glad. She’s very pretty, you know.”

All four other members of the Inner Assembly rolled their eyes, and Father Vorcien sighed heavily before saying, “Now is not the time to marry off your distant relatives, Gregori. Demir, that is not all that happened. On the heels of this news of our defeat, we learned that the entire senior staff of the Foreign Legion has been assassinated; killed at the very moment they were trying to regroup.”

Demir’s throat went dry at this news. He didn’t quite believe it. He definitely knew why they wanted him now, and it was more terrifying than the prospect of the Cinders executing him. “What happened?”

“They were ambushed and murdered by a large team of Grent glassdancers.”

“Shit,” Demir replied.

“Shit is right.” Sammi Stavri suddenly seemed to come alive, her head whipping around so that she could stare bleary-eyed at Demir. “He hasn’t told you the half of it! Two of my little brothers. Two cousins. Two Vorcien cousins, a Magna, and three Dorlani. Of the greatest guild-families, only the Kirkovik came out unscathed.” She shot a look at Gregori, as if blaming him for the fact that her brother hadn’t kept any of Gregori’s family on staff.

That, Demir realized, explained Sammi’s current state. Losing two siblings was a personal and professional blow to a family as powerful as the Stavri. Two cousins just added insult to injury. “My condolences,” Demir said softly. Sammi seemed to shrink into herself, as if physically repulsed by the sympathy of one as young and powerless as Demir. He turned his attention back to Father Vorcien, noting that Supi Magna had ceased glaring and was gazing unhappily into the darkness outside a nearby window. “Why summon me?” Demir asked, though the answer was now obvious.

“Because the Grent just wiped out all the best officers in the capital,” Father Vorcien replied simply. “Everyone else is either stationed in the provinces or gone for the winter holiday. We’ve spent the last two hours digging around for anyone in the city with experience commanding more than a single battalion of soldiers. There are three of you, and frankly the other two have never won a battle.”

“We need the Lightning Prince,” Gregori interjected.

Demir puffed out his cheeks and then slowly exhaled. What a name for a man who’d never suffered a loss and still managed to come out of his only campaign looking bad. He glanced around until he saw a stack of wooden chairs in the far corner of the hall. He walked over, took one off the stack, then dragged it back toward the Inner Assembly. The legs screeched across the stone floor, thumped over rugs, then he deposited it exactly where he’d been standing and sank down into it.

“You all must be really glassdamned desperate,” he said.

“The safety of the capital is at stake,” Aelia replied.

He almost – almost – called her out then and there. How sweet it would have been to see the look on her face when he accused her grandson of killing his mother. But that would have accomplished nothing, and she was right: the capital was in real danger. “And you think I can stop Kerite? Don’t we have a defensive cordon for that? What’s the point of all those massive forts outside the city if not to stop exactly this?”

“Do you know anything about Devia Kerite?” Aelia asked.

“As much as there is to be known,” Demir admitted. “I based my tactics in the Holikan campaign on her own lightning war across Purnia. But she’s never published her letters or memoirs, or so much as given an interview to a newspaper. She’s never disclosed her inner mind to the public in any way – the only career general in modern history to stay so closed off.” He considered what he did know about Kerite and took a guess as to what they would say next. “You don’t think our defensive fortifications will stop her.”

“After what she and the Grent did to the Foreign Legion, I don’t think they’ll even slow her down,” Father Vorcien grated. “Our star forts are outdated and in disrepair, not to mention severely understaffed. They’re not ready for a regular siege, much less an attack by such a skilled commander.”

The news, unfortunately, did not surprise Demir in the slightest. Just another example of Ossan arrogance. “It’s too bad no one rich and powerful within the Assembly could have directed funds to their upkeep.”

He could see Supi Magna’s jaw tightening, but none of them responded to his disrespect. He laughed inwardly, a joyless echo in his own mind. Speaking of arrogance, was he even listening to himself? This was how the old Demir had spoken to the Assembly. Had he really not changed?

Gregori spoke up. “The Grent have every advantage at this moment. Kerite can roll over our fortresses and stab straight to the heart of Ossa, or she can simply rage around the countryside unopposed, destroying our industry, flooding Ossa with refugees, and cutting us off from reinforcement or resupply. She has already cut our line of communication with Harbortown, and her fleet has it under blockade.” Harbortown was officially a district of Ossa, though it was some ten miles to the northwest on the coast, connected by canal, so that Ossa didn’t need to always go through Grent to reach the ocean.

“We don’t need to stop her,” Supi Magna said, his tone dripping exasperation, “we just need to slow her down. We’ve summoned the provincial brigades. If we can buy a month, or even just a few weeks, we’ll have enough soldiers to overwhelm her. Surely the Lightning Prince can slow down a single mercenary general?”

“Sarcasm doesn’t suit your stately cheekbones, Supi,” Demir said. The quip was half-hearted, his thoughts now turning to this impossible task. And it was impossible. Slow down Devia Kerite, the greatest strategic mind of any modern military? If he had all the powers of his younger self he could have bought them a single week at best.

“Hah!” Gregori slapped his knee. “I missed you, Demir. Everyone else takes us all too seriously.”

“You mean everyone else has respect,” Sammi said.

It was clear now which members of the Inner Assembly actually wanted Demir there. Curious that Aelia had voted for Demir, considering what she’d done. Demir kept all his doubts inward. They might be so tired and frayed that they showed him their weaknesses, but he’d be damned if he showed them his. This was not, he realized, a choice. It was either accept command of whatever remnants of the Foreign Legion still remained and do his best, or flee the damned country before Kerite could raze Ossa.

“What would I have to work with?” Demir asked, ignoring Sammi.

Father Vorcien resumed the briefing. “The Foreign Legion was badly battered. We won’t know just how badly until the morning, but we estimate eight thousand remaining troops. We have a few battalions of cavalry that just arrived tonight, and we can bring up sixty thousand National Guardsmen.”

“The National Guardsmen are only slightly above useless in a real battle,” Demir said.

“Agreed.”

“And Kerite?”

“Ten thousand mercenaries and twenty thousand Grent troops, fresh off their victory with minimal casualties. News has already leaked of both the assassination and the loss, so there will be panic in the streets of Ossa tomorrow. We need you to keep Kerite from sacking Harbortown, or from destroying our forts. If she does either of those things, we won’t be able to control the populace.”

Demir’s fingers itched to pull out his witglass, to churn through the thousands of possibilities in mere minutes, analyzing hypothetical battles like a human thinking machine. He put his hand in his pocket, brushing his fingers across the godglass within. He could feel when he touched the witglass, and shied away from it. “You are sending me to fail,” he said.

“Others would fail worse,” Father Vorcien stated quietly.

It did not sound like a ringing endorsement, but it did mean something coming from Father Vorcien. The old toad had always seemed bemused by Demir, and though he’d never been a proper mentor, during Demir’s political career he’d always thought of himself as Father Vorcien’s one-day successor on the Inner Assembly. It was a long-shattered dream now, but knowing that he had Father Vorcien’s backing to defend the capital made this … well, not exactly possible, but perhaps palatable.

Demir found himself chewing on all this and realized that the knowledge that he was guaranteed to fail made this whole thing a little less terrifying. Leading troops, giving commands; it was all quite scary. But if he cracked like he had at Holikan, what was the consequence? The capital would burn anyway. It was a cynical thought, but comforting in some twisted way.

A smart man would have flipped them all a rude gesture and then gone home to pack up the entire hotel, fleeing the city by morning. Demir wished he were that smart. “If I agree, I want assurances that the Assembly isn’t plotting behind my back while I’m gone. Dispel any call for censure for what happened with the forgeglass riot earlier today, and publicly call me a hero for dispersing the mob peacefully. Make it a front-page story in all the newspapers tomorrow.”

Supi snorted loudly. “Is that all?” he asked sarcastically.

“It’s a simple request, all things considered,” Demir shot back. “If I don’t at least try to slow down Kerite, tens of thousands of Ossan citizens will die. I got a glimpse of the street fighting in Grent, and if I can minimize that happening in Ossa, then I will have succeeded.”

“The property damage–” Aelia began.

“Means nothing to me,” Demir cut her off gently. “I will do this to save people, not any of your mills or tenements or glassworks. Take that into account when giving me command: I will not accept the meddling of the Assembly. I won’t divert resources to save some precious guild-family holding or move a battalion through a neighborhood flying a silic sigil to make one of you look good. Accept that, or be damned.”

Gregori and Aelia both frowned, perhaps regretting their votes. Sammi appeared not to be listening. Father Vorcien didn’t so much as blink. “Done and done.”

“You know my methods,” Demir continued. “I want everything.”

“That’s vague,” Aelia drawled.

“I analyze information,” Demir said. “To do so I need every single scrap. Every spy report, every copied ledger, every single piece we have on both their forces and ours. I want to know the last time the Grent infantry were issued new boots all the way up to Kerite’s favorite breakfast. Not just official reports, mind you, but information gathered by your own personal spymasters.”

“That information,” Supi Magna said sharply, “is not available.”

“Gah!” Father Vorcien retorted. “It is a small price to pay for a chance at victory.”

“But our spy reports are guild-family property,” Aelia protested.

Father Vorcien thumped his fist on the armrest of his chair. “We will give him everything we have – all of us – and if I suspect anyone has held back I will conduct an audit myself.” The other four, even Gregori, grumbled in response, but none seemed willing to stand up to him further.

“Good,” Demir said. “I’ll take command immediately. I’ll need a direct line of communication to those new cavalry battalions that just arrived. I’ll deliver the rest of my demands to this room within the hour. Supi, may I speak with you for a moment?”

The Magna patriarch glanced at his colleagues in surprise, then uncoiled his thin body from his chair and followed Demir into the far corner of the hall. His shoulders were stiff, his chin raised as Demir turned toward him.

“I trust you have some news of your investigation into the incident at the Ivory Forest Glassworks?” Demir asked quietly.

The question seemed to take Supi off guard. “Investigation? It’s been just two days and one of those was spent dealing with that damned riot. Half the glassworks burned down. There are still prisoners unaccounted for, fled into the forest! I want…” Supi glanced back toward his colleagues and lowered his voice. “I want a full shackleglass inquiry and I will call you to answer.”

Demir knew he couldn’t stand up to questions under shackleglass – but the good news was Supi had just handed him a perfect screen for Thessa’s disappearance in the form of those escaped prisoners. He also knew about the blackmail material Filur Magna had kept. He didn’t have it, but knowing about it still gave him a card to play. He took a half step closer to Supi and thrust his finger up under the taller man’s chin.

“Look here,” he snapped quietly, “I know exactly what you were doing at the Ivory Forest Glassworks – the fearglass, the skimming. I asked questions the moment your granddaughter lost those shares to me. When I confronted Filur, he attacked me and I was forced to defend myself. It was his pissing guards who set the fire. By accident, for sure, but it wasn’t me who spread the flames. If you’d like me to repeat all of that under shackleglass, I am more than willing.”

There was a glint of something in Supi’s eyes – fear, perhaps – and he stiffened noticeably. If the other members of the Inner Assembly found out how baldly he had corrupted a government contract, they would take all the government contracts away from the Magna. Demir went on before Supi could answer, knowing that he had to press the advantage to secure this half bluff. “However, if you’d like to keep Filur’s secret ledgers a secret, I’m willing to let bygones be bygones. I want nothing to do with fearglass, so I’ll sell you back Ulina’s shares.”

“You’re very generous,” Supi grated.

“At two hundred percent,” Demir finished.

Supi’s eyes bugged, his fists clenching and unclenching. Finally, he nodded. “And not a word will be said of the subject?”

“Not a word,” Demir promised. “Friends?” He let a small smile play out across his face, but immediately wondered if he’d pushed it too far. Supi ignored his outstretched hand and stormed back to the other guild-family heads. Demir watched him do so, then headed for the door. “You’ll have more communication from me within the hour,” he promised.

In the hallway, the Cinders had faded away as if they were ghosts. He was grateful for that moment alone and ran a hand across his face, trying to come to terms with his own mortality as he contemplated leading troops into battle once more. It couldn’t end the same as last time. He wouldn’t allow it. He needed to gather all his mental strength and hold it close until after this thing was finished. If he didn’t, both soldiers and civilians would die by the thousands.

“I’m going to go stress-shit my brains out,” he said to the empty hall. “Then I’m going to take command of the Foreign Legion and pit myself against the world’s greatest strategist. This’ll be fun.”