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K ANTHE SULKED HIS way up the steps of the Blood’d Tower of Kragyn, named after the Klashean god of war. It was the second-highest spire in Kysalimri, second only to the royal residence. The Blood’d Tower housed the empire’s map rooms, war libraries, and all manner of chambers devoted to tactics, strategies, and weaponry.

All dedicated to the god Kragyn.

A sculpture of the warmongering deity, chiseled out of granite, rose high out of the Bay of the Blessed. It was one of the thirty-three Stone Gods that graced the harbor into Kysalimri. Kragyn’s statue depicted him with four muscular arms, bearing aloft a shield in one, a sword in another, and an ax and spiked mace in the others.

The monument to this fierce god had not been a welcoming sight when Kanthe and the others had returned from Hálendii two days ago. They had arrived sullen in defeat, certain their sojourn had only worsened their circumstances.

With Eligor risen, what hope do we have?

Tykhan’s warning had cast a dark cloud over their return to the shores of the Southern Klashe. They had come here to regroup. They had little choice. With Mikaen’s return to the city, bearing his poisoned queen, Azantiia had become too dangerous, especially with Wryth having spotted them in the depths of the Shrivenkeep.

By the time they had set sail, the king’s legions were already rousting the city, turning over every rock, searching for them. To make matters worse, rumors flew more swiftly than the fastest skrycrow. The reported presence of the traitorous Prince Kanthe in the city bolstered a growing belief that the Southern Klashe had poisoned Queen Myella, risking also her unborn child.

In this way, too, their failed mission had only exacerbated the situation.

How can we hope to ever discover the key to controlling the turubya ?

A complaint rose behind him. “If you climb any slower, we’ll soon be treading backward.”

Kanthe grunted back at Rami, “You try dragging this heavy cape up these stairs.”

“Ah, but you strike such a handsome figure in it. Most regal, indeed.”

“Not that it did any good.”

Kanthe tugged the garment higher over his shoulders. He had been abruptly summoned to the strategy room by Empress Aalia, the Illuminated Rose of the Southern Klashe. Prior to that, he had been attending a midday meal with emissaries from Qaar Saur, whom the empire was trying to woo into supplying more draft-iron for the Klashean forces. Such alchymical metal—light but strong—was essential to expanding their fleet of wyndships. Unfortunately, the negotiations had not gone well. The Qaar envoy had not been impressed to break bread with the king consort of the realm, instead of the empress herself.

Even when I came all primped, coiffed, and oiled.

He scowled at the exuberance of his royal attire. He wore a traditional imri cap and a splay-sleeved robe that reached his knees—which was all tolerable and matched what Rami wore. But from Kanthe’s shoulders, a heavy cape hung. Its gold-and-silver embroidery formed the Haeshan family crest of a mountain hawk in flight, where its eyes were thumb-sized diamonds and its claws were solid gold, all of which weighed as much as a suit of armor.

Rami smiled, finding only amusement in Kanthe’s exasperation. “There’s a Klashean saying. The heavier the cloak, the thinner the man. ”

“Which means what?”

“That only the insecure seek to deck themselves so resplendently, to hide what they lack.”

Kanthe sighed. “Our Qaaren guests must have believed as much.”

“If so, they would be sorely mistaken. I’ve shared many a steam bath with you. And there is nothing thin about you. Especially what hangs between your legs.”

Kanthe tripped a step, taken aback at such blunt talk. Even after a year spent on these shores, he still found such rawness discomfiting.

The Klashean culture had a notoriously rigid structure, divided into a dizzying array of castes, but the main division was between the ruling imri, which meant godly in their tongue, and the baseborn , those who had to remain covered from crown to toe when outside their homes. The Klasheans even had an adage for this strict caste system: Each to his own place, each to his own honor.

Still, despite this rigidity, Klashean relationships remained weirdly fluid, both inside and out of wedlock. It was why Kanthe could wear a kingly cloak, sit on a throne next to an empress, yet never hold her heart or share her bed. All knew that honor belonged to another. Still, no one expressed any disdain or ridicule regarding this situation.

At least, not to my face.

Kanthe remembered Frell’s earlier explanation for all this. The alchymist had theorized that this fluidity might have something to do with the Klasheans’ rigid caste system.

When one screw tightens, another must loosen, Frell had offered.

Which certainly proved true.

Especially with Rami.

The prince shuffled both men and women through his bed, sometimes at the same time. Upon first arriving here, Kanthe had been offered the same accommodation by Rami, who expressed an interest in him that his sister never did. Kanthe had rebuffed him at the time, unable to be that loose. But Rami had taken it in stride, showing no offense, accepting it with his usual cavalier blitheness.

Still—like now—all of this sometimes caught Kanthe off guard. He knew Rami’s statement was not a veiled attempt to lure him into bed, but simply a statement of fact.

Kanthe returned it with the same blunt honesty. “I may not be thin, but you, Prince Rami, are blessed by the gods.”

Rami drew alongside him and clapped him on the shoulder with good-natured appreciation. “It’s why I share my bed so freely—to pass that blessing on to as many as possible.”

“All must admire your generosity of spirit.”

Rami cast him a sidelong look. “And some don’t know what they’re missing.”

Kanthe didn’t trip a step this time, knowing Rami was only trying to get a rise out of him. He didn’t fall for it. “I suppose some must suffer such a loss. For me, I’ve got my eye on another.”

“Ah, I imagine you do.” Rami cast him another amused look. “But are you man enough to shake those bells to ringing?”

Kanthe blushed, picturing Cassta, wondering what effort it would take to do just that. He suspected he might not survive such a challenge.

Rami’s voice turned more serious. “My brother, you should truly speak to her. Pining from a corner will get you nowhere.”

Before he could answer, the top of the steps appeared. Kanthe rushed the last of the way, leaving the question unanswered. He had no time to ponder dalliances, especially after the disaster in Azantiia.

He climbed into a curved antechamber at the top of the tower. The only level above this housed a battery of nests, where bridle-singers trained and dispatched hundreds of skrycrows each day. Overhead, muffled cries and squawks echoed down.

Kanthe turned his back on the closed doors into the strategy room and crossed to a window that had been cranked open. He stopped to cool his heated brow after the long climb in the heavy cloak. The breeze carried the salt of the sea—and the sharp bite of crow shite.

Still, he lingered there, knowing Aalia had summoned him to discuss what to do next. He girded himself for that hard talk, recognizing there was little they could do.

Past the window, the breadth of Kysalimri—the Eternal City of the Southern Klashe—still stole his breath. Even after a year, his mind struggled with its vast expanse. The city could be a country in and of itself.

Off in the distance, the blue waters of the Bay of the Blessed glinted under the bright sun. Closer at hand, the imperial citadel rose like a marble mountain from the banks of Hresh Me, a central freshwater lake. The palace’s walled grounds occupied a landhold as vast as most cities, rising in a hundred spires, so expansive that it took a multivolume series of atlases to map its countless rooms and passages.

But even this fortress paled in scope to Kysalimri itself. The Eternal City spread from the sea in a concentric series of blazing white tiers, climbing in stacks of walls, each more ancient than the last. Thousands upon thousands of white towers pointed at the sky, all crafted of the same white marble, set ablaze by the sunlight. The stone had been mined from the neighboring mountains of the Hyrg Scarp, an enterprise that had worn those peaks down to nubs.

Kanthe finally had to turn away, too daunted by the immensity, by the responsibility it represented. Last winter, a fierce battle had been waged, resulting in great destruction, with thousands of lives lost. The city was still rebuilding those damaged sections.

But if we fail to stop moonfall, none of this will matter.

Tykhan’s defeated words still haunted him.

With Eligor risen to full power, doom is inevitable.

Kanthe took a shuddering breath, then shoved down his despair. He refused to accept that judgement. He intended to fight to the very end. He had no choice.

None of us do.

One person certainly agreed with this assessment. A sharp voice cut through the sealed doors into the strategy room. It rang with fury, with frustration, and with the weight of an empire behind it.

Rami stood before the doors and looked back at Kanthe. “It seems our Illuminated Rose is baring her thorns.”