Page 24

The gates of the palace are closed against us, soldiers building barricades within the grounds, raising magical defenses, using the powers they would normally use for gardening to build defensive walls. It looks different to its usual grandeur, but the purple and gold of the imperial symbols still fly over it. The emperor is here. This is where he has chosen to make his stand.

“How do we do this?”

Rowan asks.

I shake my head. I have no training in siege warfare or the finer points of storming a palace. All I know are the things I want to achieve here: I want to bring an end to the emperor's reign, and I want to make sure that Alaric is safe.

“If this takes too long, Alaric will die,”

I say. “I know all of you want to take the palace, and you will have the beasts by your sides if you want them, but this place is not my priority. He is.”

I did all of this to try to find a way of ending this where Alaric would survive. I want the empire to change, I want the emperor to fall, but not at the expense of Alaric’s life. Never that.

To my surprise, Rowan nods. “People matter. I know how much he matters to you. So I'll help you get him back. We will go in with a small group while the rest storm the gates."

There is no time for a plan more complicated than that. I just have to hope it will be enough. A small group of the gladiators gathers around me, the few who survived the colosseum floor, plus a couple more. It seems like pitifully few, but hopefully we will not have to take on the might of the emperor's soldiers.

Everyone else charges at the gates. It is a sight to behold, and I watch some of it through the eyes of a watching crow. It is like a wave battering against the walls, only this wave is formed from people who have magic, because this is Aetheria. In just seconds the air is filled with bursts of magic, with fire and lightning mixing, with people moving in strange ways that have nothing to do with gravity, the gates are covered in frost, then flame, then lightning.

And the beasts pour over all of it. The emperor's remaining soldiers move to engage the onrushing hoard. Many will have been slain last night, many more have been killed in the colosseum, I suspect that many have simply fled, realizing the way things are going. Or perhaps they are trying to keep order elsewhere in the city. Yet there are still enough here to try to protect the palace, enough that this will not be an easy fight.

I know that we will only have a brief window to save Alaric, so I rush around the side of the palace with Rowan and the others. Of course the walls prevent entry but Rowan stands in front of them and I can see him straining as he seeks to use his power to the maximum effect. Normally his control over earth and stone is limited, but I have seen him keep stones off him, seen him raise up the earth to grab people's feet. Now he works on the granular level, eroding the mortar between the stones, letting it crumble little by little so that it is not long before he can push the stones over, leaving a hole in the wall big enough for all of us to get through.

We are in the imperial gardens, moving quickly and quietly now. The strange beasts that the emperor keeps in his menagerie ignore us. One of the purple and gold butterflies bigger than my head flits past, apparently unconcerned by the violence taking place on the other side of the palace. I can hear the shouts and the screams from that side. I can see the violence from above through the eyes of one of the birds watching. The soldiers are putting up as much resistance as they can, so that the space before the palace is starting to fill with bodies.

We are meeting no resistance. It seems that the soldiers have put all their efforts into stopping the breach of the walls. Even so our small group moves quietly, trying to keep low and out of sight. One of our number has a minor talent for manipulating plants, so they have them provide us with cover as we move, the leaves flowing ahead of us to close gaps between rows of hedges.

The emperor’s grand receiving room on the fringes of his garden is not far ahead. It is shielded behind the usual magic that keeps out anyone trying to enter from the gardens. I'm not sure how we're meant to get through it, but some of the others look confident.

We need to get through it, because that is where the emperor is. He is standing there with Lord Darius, Selene Ravenscroft, and a couple of guards. We approach, and now all of the gladiators with me spread out around the shield, using whatever magic they possess against it. Rowan shifts the earth beneath it. Cesca runs lightning into it through her sword. Someone makes water cascade down it. The gladiators with me pour everything they have into breaking that shield.

Still, I don't think it will be enough. Then I see Selene Ravenscroft make a gesture, and it seems that cracks appear in the shield, cracks that widen and then split apart, shattering the magic into thousands of fragments which dissipate in the air. I had not thought that she would go this far to help us. She helped me with my dampener, but I thought that was simply out of her sense of justice. To do this… she is actively betraying Emperor Tiberius.

“Traitor!”

the emperor roars, but he does not have time to do more than that as we charge forward.

Lord Darius leaps to his defense, now it seems he's concentrating his power much more than he was in the colosseum. One of our number screams, his flesh blackening as fire burns it from the inside. The full might of the master of the games is incredible to behold, especially when he combines it with a series of attacks with two swords that move with lightning speed. I engage him, swinging my net, while Rowan comes in from the far side.

Even outnumbered as he is, even though he is long past his fighting prime, Lord Darius moves with a speed and power that means he keeps up with us, at least for now. I know however that sheer numbers will eventually bring him down.

The emperor seems to know the same thing. He is backing towards the door as if looking for a place to escape to. I disengage from Lord Darius, starting towards him, half expecting him to simply run.

But he doesn't. It seems that the emperor was not looking for a way to escape but simply enough space to concentrate. Around me I feel time slowing to a crawl, my net seeming to creep across the space between us. Then time stops for me, and I am paralyzed in the middle of my attack.

So is everyone else in the room, except Lord Darius. We are frozen like statues by the emperor's power, but it is more than just us. Through the eyes of a bird, I see that out in front of the palace, the citizens the beasts and the gladiators have come to a halt, standing frozen in place by the emperor's power.

Somehow, he has managed to be selective about it. Those who stand against his forces are frozen in time, cut off between one second and the next, while his soldiers are free to keep moving. Free to kill their helpless opponents. I see the soldiers sauntering among them, thrusting blades through hearts or cutting throats. They are taking their time, as if knowing that there is no threat now. This is not a battle but a series of executions.

“Did you think it would be so easy here?" The emperor demands. I can see the concentration on his face. “Here right above the stones that give the city its power? There's a reason my ancestors built their palace here.”

There is a note of strain in his expression. It's obvious that this is on the limits of what he can do. How long can he maintain something like this? How long does he need to maintain it when he is free to kill all of us?

"You thought you could beat me in my own palace?" he demands. "You thought that a mere animal like you could ever stand against me? Well, you're going to pay for that. But not before someone else pays first.”

He steps out of the room for a moment, dragging a figure back with him. He has to drag him not because of any resistance, but because he is as frozen as anyone else, his feet locked in position, so that the emperor must push him in front of me, the way he might adjust the positioning of a statue until it was in the perfect spot.

He manhandles Alaric’s frozen form into place before me, and he smiles as he draws a golden dagger.