‘So this means…?’ Johynn made a steeple of his hands.

‘No firegrain, Majesty, so the only resource there will be now is wood.’ Brynd stood to attention alongside Apium, but Fyir had been allowed a chair, a rare concession in the Emperor’s presence.

‘So, commander…?’

‘Our heat sources are therefore questionable,’ Brynd continued. ‘But let’s not overlook the fact that half your personal guard has been slaughtered.’

‘No heat, no heat…’ Johynn moaned, as if reciting some destructive mantra.

Brynd glanced across at Apium. The captain merely shrugged.

Jamur Johynn walked over to the window. ‘And how, how am I now going to keep the people of my city – of my Empire – warm?’

Brynd thought, As if you give a shit about anyone who’s not Empire-issued nobility or a landowner.

‘How can I look after them now the moons are in place? Everyone depends on me, Commander Lathraea. Everyone needs me.’

‘Perhaps we’ll manage OK without-’

‘Don’t be ridiculous,’ Johynn snapped. ‘This failure makes it even worse for everyone. They’re going to rebel and have me killed now, aren’t they?’

‘Who?’ Brynd said.

Johynn turned to face him again. ‘Them.’ He tilted his head towards the window, and the city beyond. ‘My people.’

‘But it’s not your fault an ice age is starting. There’ve been hundreds of years of accurate predictions, you were merely the Emperor to face the challenge. There’s always stocks of wood-’

‘But I have to look after them. It means four hundred thousand responsibilities. You wouldn’t have a clue what that’s like.’

‘They know you try to look after them,’ Brynd insisted. ‘Your Imperial lineage has always been popular.’

‘The ones already living here, perhaps. But any other idiot arriving from whatever benighted corner of this Empire they inhabit will be surprised when we can’t let them enter. Then they’ll hardly love me, will they?’

Johynn’s voice started to falter. His fingers were drumming the sill as he stared out of the window again. Every movement suggested an increasing sense of panic.

Johynn said, ‘But I’m their saviour, oh yes. It is my right, before the Dawnir, before the movements of Bohr and Astrid. I’m their saviour.’

‘My Emperor, perhaps this isn’t the best time to ask, but do you know who else was aware of our mission?’

‘What mission?’

‘The one from which we’ve only just returned,’ Brynd said patiently, looking to Apium, who raised his eyebrows, shook his head, and mouthed the word ‘nuts’.

‘Only a few of our Council members – Ghuda, Boll and Mewún. Chancellor Urtica, too. Only those four, no one else. No one else. No, absolutely nobody.’

‘Is it possible that any of them could’ve informed an enemy? Is it possible one of them didn’t want us to succeed?’

Johynn spun around, approached Brynd. ‘Are you saying we’ve a traitor within our own halls now? For the love of Bohr, what next? Are you quite sure, Commander Lathraea, that such accusations have good foundation?’

‘Our force was almost wiped out. You say no one outside the Council knew of our mission, yet we were ambushed. Sire, I’m only trying to find out who might threaten the Empire.’

‘You’re a good man, Commander Lathraea. A good man. You were all good men, you Night Guards.’ He leaned close to Brynd, then whispered, ‘I can trust you, can’t I?’

Brynd straightened up, bowing fractionally. ‘Beyond my life, your Majesty.’

Johynn came closer still, the smell of alcohol on his breath now as intense as a bad perfume. ‘It’s over.’

‘I’m not sure I follow,’ Brynd said.

‘I’ve had increasing suspicions that someone in here is after me. They all are, maybe. They want to take my life, my existence. They want this.’ Johynn indicated the halls, the furnishings. ‘They want it all before the ice comes. I’ve heard them whispering in their chambers, making decisions for me. Doing my job for me.’

‘My lord,’ Brynd said, ‘they’re your Council. That’s what they’re supposed to do. No one is out to get you.’

Brynd considered his own words, because perhaps that wasn’t altogether the case. There was usually something devious going on. This was government, after all.

Jamur Johynn took a step away from Brynd and looked him up and down as if judging his character in one simple gesture. A childlike gesture. Brynd began to feel self-conscious again. Johynn opened his mouth, but the door opened just then.

A welcome break as the Emperor’s daughter walked into the room.

When he had first joined the Night Guard, he remembered seeing her, in her younger days, when she seemed confined in this building like a butterfly in a net. Hers seemed a delicate energy waiting to be restrained. Serious meetings would be interrupted by her childish conversations with her older sister, Rika, the heir to the Imperial seat, and their joyful shrieks filled the corridors with warmth. But those days were soon gone, departed at about the same time their mother was killed. Johynn had tried to replace parental love with treats and indulgences, something the little girl never seemed to desire, but altering her in some remote way.

Eir possessed a certain natural grace, a distinctive quality of manner. With short-cropped black hair, and tall for her age, her attitude to dress was cavalier, wearing items from any number of eras without caring how they matched. Her eyes were intense, her eyebrows two thin lines, and her face lacked the symmetry necessary to appeal to Villjamur convention. She liked to dress a little bit different. Despite her non-traditional looks, a queue of eligible suitors waited to claim her hand, and maybe decisions had already been made for her by her father over who she would be betrothed to. Maybe that was why she was rude to almost every boy she ever spoke to. For all her privileges, Brynd guessed it was no real existence for a woman in Villjamur.

‘I apologize for disturbing you, father, but the Dawnir wishes to speak to the commander.’

The Emperor stared at her as if he did not recognize who she was.

Brynd intervened. ‘We were just discussing what our Dawnir could want-’

‘Some more plots against me, no doubt,’ Johynn muttered.

‘Should we see him now, my Emperor, if you’ve finished with our business?’ Brynd asked.

‘Yes, yes. Why not.’ He waved Brynd away, walked to the window. This time he opened it, allowing the icy air to enter the room, stepped aside, his fists clenched, then suddenly burst past them, out of the room, leaving the three men and his daughter behind with the echo of a slammed door.

‘Hello, commander,’ she said.

There was always a slight informality between her and the Night Guard soldiers, engendered by their close proximity over the years. ‘Lady Eir, I fear your father’s been drinking.’

‘And you think that’s my fault?’ Anger dissolved into disappointment on her face. He knew she had been trying her best to stop her father from drinking excessively, taking away half-empty bottles once he’d fallen asleep, had stared at him reproachfully with those big green eyes every time he refilled a glass. Now she just gazed at the wall as if some comfort could be found there, but there were too many mirrors to encourage her to look for long.

‘Yes, I didn’t mean to be harsh, but your father has islands and cities to help run. There’s enough bad judgement being made in this city without our ruler drinking as well.’

‘I know, I know,’ Eir said. Her tone was confident, though her posture suggested it wasn’t natural, that she had something to prove to herself. ‘Anyway, what happened to you all?’

‘Ambush, and massacre. We’re the remaining survivors from… from where we were sent last.’

Eir said, ‘The firegrain trip? Who were you fighting?’

Brynd couldn’t believe it. ‘Even you know about it. Is nothing sacred in these halls?’

‘I’m sorry,’ Eir said. ‘Fyir, will you be all right?’ She lay a hand on him kindly, a gesture that other men might envy.