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* * *

—

With Lykos soil in a secure pouch, I depart the desert, spoiling for a fight.

My shuttle bears north over the desert chalk. Behind, Heliopolis trembles in the warped horizon. A great shield wall, a kilometer high and fifteen long, blocks the mouth of two converging mountain ranges. House Votum crafted the wall to shield Heliopolis from the desert storms that come when spring cyclones descend from the Sycorax Sea in the far north to tear south through the Waste of Ladon down onto Heliopolis. Sparks shiver along the wall’s crest as engineers weld guns from broken ships into place.

I lament the waste of firepower. The guns are only there to satisfy the demands of Heliopolis’s inhabitants and the Master Maker Glirastes, not to counter an invasion. Heliopolis is the second-wealthiest city of Mercury, rich with architecture, famous for its chariot races, and the gateway to the coastal mines, but it is strategically insignificant for my aims. To the north is where I will break the enemy.

Heliopolis is a thorn in my boot. A hotbed of loyalist insurrection, plots, and back-alley murders. Behind its wall, the haughty city of limestone slouches south toward the Bay of Sirens and then the Caliban Sea. Refugees and soldiers boil through the dusty streets and stuff the city with a ripe summer stink. But there is another scent there in that desert city. Not gull shit or fish markets or the exhaust of war machines, but something else, something creeping that clings to the root of the brain.

Fear.

Fear in the eyes of my legions as they look up to orbit where Atalantia fine-tunes her invasion plans, or to the shadowed mountains where the Fear Knight and his guerrillas sharpen their impaling stakes, or to the streets filled with Mercurians, any of whom cou

ld be a spy or an assassin.

If the death of the fleet was an amputation, this siege is death by exsanguination. Bit by bit, frontline exposure to the perversions of the Fear Knight’s guerrillas and waiting for the Rain deteriorates their psyches. My loyal Martians patrol deserts and mountains and erect war machines and battleworks, waiting to be shot by snipers or hear the bug scream—that dread keening which signals a spider mine’s activation. Each a better fate than being captured by the Gorgons, the Fear Knight’s veteran impalers of Zero Legion.

Fear robs my men of their dignity, their nobility of purpose, their belief in our cause. Who can believe in the intangible with a garrote around their neck? They wait to die, slowly strangled by Atalantia and Atlas.

Some hold out hope that the Republic will send a fleet. There is a small chance, but if I hunker down and wait for my wife to move the gears of demokracy, there will be nothing left of us when the enemy strikes. We will die like flies, and fear will spread as the shadows of Atalantia’s fleet creep across the steps of the New Forum and their titanium boots tread the shores of my home.

So that makes it all very simple.

I must kill it before it kills us.

* * *

—

Our flight path takes us over the Waste of Ladon, the sunbelt that chokes the center of Mercury’s main continent, Helios. Half buried in its sands lie the remains of the three armies the Waste has swallowed in its time. Soon I will feed it a fourth.

Somewhere in the Waste’s axeblade central mountains, my Howlers herd the Fear Knight toward the tripwire of my trap—the mining city of Eleusis. Sevro should have been leading them. Four commanders on two planets I’ve sent against Atlas. Four have been returned impaled hole to hole. Only Sevro and I can match the brutality of the Fear Knight. But I have too much weight to bear alone. So I have dispatched my best remaining small-group commander, Thraxa, to lead, and my best sword, Alexandar in case it comes to blows.

To the south, past Heliopolis, commandos install missile systems, mines, and anti-infantry microwave cannons in the tropic archipelagos and deep jungles that sprawl into the Caliban Sea. To the northeast along the Petasos Peninsula are the rising elevations and temperate climes of a tiara of heavily populated cities called the Children.

The capital of the planet, and headquarters for my army, remains Tyche. We have made the treasured seaside home of the Votum into a fortress. Even as we pass over crop latifundia far to its east, you can catch the glint of its spires, and the soothing sight of its guardian mountain: the Morning Star.

Due to Orion’s free-fall maneuver, the flagship of my fleet survived Atalantia’s ambush—what the troops are calling the Battle of Caliban, for all the ships that fell through atmosphere into the sea—and now keeps watch over Tyche as her systems undergo repairs with hopes of one day returning her to the stars.

Tyche is crucial not just as a fallback citadel, but for the gravLoop that runs south under the Hesperides Mountains connecting Tyche to Heliopolis. Safe from bombardment, it will be the single artery for reinforcements if the fight reaches Tyche, and it will serve as our escape route to Heliopolis if Tyche falls. The only other path is across the Waste of Ladon, and I’d rather have dinner with the Fear Knight than dare cross that devourer of armies.

I busy myself with reports in the Necromancer’s warroom as the shuttle flies north. Beacons from submerged torchShips blink on the command display as we reach the northern extremity of the Sycorax Sea. Across the warroom’s data display, a Silver aide drones on about shortages of anti-radiation meds in the south. Most are being hoarded in Tyche for the inevitable fallout.

“Soon we’ll have a surplus,” I say.

“Have you discovered a new supply, sir?”

“No.”

His eyes flutter as he understands.

I feel stuffy. My spirit aches to be released from this endless stream of supply logistics and construction delays. I need fresh air.

I find Rhonna outside the entrance to the garage bay. Orion must be inside. My niece issues a crisp salute. Since her part in Orion’s rescue, her popularity with the army has increased, especially with the Blue and Orange sailors and officers. So far, it hasn’t gone to her head. Credit her father, Kieran, for that. “How’s she looking?” I ask.

“Quiet, sir,” Rhonna replies. “Eats alone, when she eats. Spends more time in the shower than the mess. Like she can’t get clean. Avoids the men when she can. Night terrors make her dope up to sleep. Never dozes in quarters. New spot every night. Guard detail can barely keep tabs on her.”