August Virilio smiled sleepily, but Principe Guinevera leapt to his feet, knocking his chair over. “Who?” he raged. “Name them, fair lady, and we will see justice done!”

“I did not come here to open old wounds,” said Venera. “Although I recognize that my position here is perilous, I had no choice but to leave the tower. Everyone else there is dead—save myself and my manservant. Some bird-borne illness took the last five of our people a month ago. I consigned their bodies to the winds of Virga, as we have been doing for centuries now. Before that we were dwindling, despite careful and sometimes repugnant breeding restrictions and constant austerity… We lived on birds and airfish we caught with nets, and supplemented our diets with vegetables we grew in the abandoned bedrooms of our ancestors. Had I died in that place, then our enemies would truly have won. I chose a last throw of the die and came here.”

“But the war of which you speak… it was centuries ago,” said Lady Anseratte. “Why did you suppose that you would still be targeted after so long?”

Venera shrugged. “We had telescopes. We could see that our enemies’ nations were thriving. And we could also clearly see that sentries armed with machine-guns ringed the tower. I was raised to believe that if we entered the elevator and tried to reach Lesser Spyre, those machine gunners would destroy us before we rose more than a hundred meters.”

“Oh, no!” Guinevera looked acutely distressed. “The sentries were there for your protection, madam! They were to keep interlopers out, not to box you in!”

“Well.” Venera looked down. “Father thought so, but he also said that we were so reduced that we could not risk a single soul to find out. And isolation… becomes a habit.” She looked pointedly at the ambassadors of Oxorn and Garrat.

Sarto guffawed loudly. “Oh, come on! What about the dozens of attempts that have been made to contact the tower? Semaphore, loudspeakers, smoke signals, for God’s sake. They’ve all been tried and nobody ever responded.”

“I am not aware that anyone has tried to contact us during my lifetime,” said Venera. This was true, as she’d learned in the past days. Sarto would have to concede the point. “And I can’t speak to my ancestors’ motives for staying silent.”

“That’s as may be,” Sarto continued. “Look, I’ll play it straight. Sacrus was involved in the original atrocity.” He held up a hand when Guinevera protested loudly. “But gentlemen and ladies, that was centuries ago. We are prepared to admit our crime and make reparations to the council when this woman is exposed for the fraud that she is.”

“And if she’s not?” asked Guinevera angrily.

“Then to the Nation of Buridan directly,” said Sarto. “I just wanted to clear the air. We can’t name our co-conspirators because, after all this time, the records have been lost. But having admitted our part in the affair, and having proposed that we pay reparations, I can now continue to oppose this woman’s claim without any appearance of conflict.”

Venera frowned. Her second gambit had failed.

If Sacrus had wanted to keep their involvement a secret, she might have had leverage over Sarto. Maybe even enough to swing his vote. As it was he’d adroitly sidestepped the trap.

Lady Anseratte looked up and down the table. “Is the other conspirator’s nation similarly honorable? Will they admit their part?” There was a long and uncomfortable silence.

“Well, then,” said Pamela Anseratte. “Let us examine the details of your inheritances.”

From here the interview deteriorated into minutiae as the council members pulled out individual documents and points of law and debated them endlessly. Venera was tired, and every time she blinked to clear her vision, she worried that a new migraine might be reaching to crush her. Pamela Anseratte conducted the meeting as if she had boundless energy, but Venera—and everyone else—wilted under the onslaught of detail.

Sarto used sarcasm, wit, guile, and bureaucracy to try to torpedo her claim, but after several hours it became clear that he wasn’t making headway. Venera perked up a bit. I could win this, she realized—simultaneously realizing just how certain she’d been that she wouldn’t.

Finally Lady Anseratte said, “Any further points?” and nobody answered. “Well,” she said brightly, “we might as well proceed to a vote.”

“Hang on,” said Sarto. He stood heavily. “I’ve got something to say.” Everyone waited.

“This woman is a fraud. We all know it. It’s inconceivable that this family could have sustained themselves and their retainers for centuries within a single tower, cut off from the outside world—”

“Not inconceivable,” said the ambassador of Oxorn from behind her griffin mask. “Quite possible.”

Sarto glared at her. “What did they do for clothes? For even the tiniest item of utility, such as forks or pens? Do you really believe they have an entire industrial base squirreled away in that tower?” He shook his head.

“It’s equally inconceivable that someone raised in such total isolation should, upon being dropped into society and all its machinations, conduct herself like a veteran! Did she rehearse social banter with her dolls? Did she learn to dance with her rocking horse? It’s preposterous on the face of it.

“And we all know why her claim has any chance of success. It’s because she’s bought off everyone who might oppose it. Buridan has tremendous assets—estates, ships, buildings, and industries here and on Greater Spyre that have been administered by other nations in absentia, for generations. She’s promised to give those nations the assets they’ve tended! For the rest, she’s proposing to beggar Buridan by paying all its debts here and now. When she’s done Buridan will have nothing to its name but a herd of gangly equines.”

“And this house,” said Venera primly. “I don’t propose to give that up.” There was some stifled laughter around the table.

“It’s a transparent fraud!” Sarto turned to glare at the other council members. “Forget about the formal details of her claim—in fact, let it be read that there’s nothing to criticize about it. That doesn’t matter. We all know the truth. She is insulting the name of a great nation of Spyre! Do you actually propose to let her get away with it?”

He was winning them over. Venera had one last hand to play, and it was her weakest. She stood up.

“Then who am I?” She strode up to the table and leaned across it to look Sarto in the eye. “If I’m a fraud I must have come from somewhere. Was I manufactured by one of the other nations, then? If so, which one? Spyre is secretive, but not so much so that we don’t all keep tabs on one another’s genealogies. Nobody’s missing from the rosters, are they?

“And yet!” She turned to address the rest of the council. “Gaze upon me and tell me to my face that you don’t believe I am noble born.” She sneered at Sarto. “It’s evident in my every gesture, in how I speak, how I address the servants. Jacoby Sarto says that he knows I am a fraud. Yet you know I am a peer!

“So then where did I come from?” She turned to Sarto again. “If Jacoby Sarto believes I did not come from Buridan Tower, then he must have some idea of where I did. What do you know, Sir Sarto, that you’re not telling the rest of us? Do you have some proof that you’re not sharing? A name, perhaps?”

He opened his mouth—and hesitated.

They locked eyes and she saw him realize what she was willing to do. The Key to Candesce was almost visible in the air between them; it was the real subject of tonight’s deliberations.

“Sacrus has many secrets, as we’ve seen tonight,” she said quietly. “Is there some further secret you have, Sir Sarto, that you wish to share with the Council? A name, perhaps? One that might be recognized by the others present? A name that could be tied to recent events, to rumors and legends that have percolated through the principalities in recent weeks?” She saw puzzled frowns on several faces—and Sarto’s eyes widened as he heard her tread the edge of the one revelation Sacrus did not want made public.