More mumbles roamed the room, but few dissenters were rash enough to speak out further. But there is always one whose mouth runs too freely.

“And perhaps we should petition the Protectorate for their brutality! Not two days ago I saw a man beheaded in front of my very eyes!”

Oh, Guy, thought Reih. You have just signed your own death warrant. She could see it, but Guy was wrong. To accuse the Protectorate would mean death, even if they could not kill a Councillor in the street like a wild wizard, they could still kill. The Protectorate were growing bold. She looked at the creature dressed in all its finery, but for all that still a thug by any other name. Such proud, noble features he had. When would all the others realise the threat they posed? Harsh words were allowed — such accusations were too far. It wasn’t written but they all knew it, even Guy. She could see the unconscious slump of his shoulder as he realised what he just done.

Reih sighed and rubbed her eyes. She knew there was some duplicity here — she would protect the law with all her might, but Tirielle a murderer? The charge smacked of politics more than crime. The boundaries were clearly demarked still, yet she felt the lines become involute. The Kuh’taenium seemed stretched and blurred in her eyes. The lines were fading. Her link with the law was tainted, and there was nothing she could do about it. It was bred into her bones, a link formed at birth, and now it felt diseased. As Imperator of the Conclave, she and the Kuh’taenium were symbiotic. They shared thoughts, saw each others dreams, gave each other strength. Some would think it unnatural that a building should have a soul, but not Reih. She accepted without question.

She needed the Kuh’taenium’s power more than ever now. Some kind of revolution was coming. She hoped it was all in her mind, but if it was in her mind, it was in the Kuh’taenium’s, too.

She could feel a headache coming on. Knowing there was nothing more she could achieve among the Conclave, she called it to a close, cutting off the Protocrat before he could reply to Guy’s foolish accusation. She needed to rest. The Kuh’taenium was sickened by the betrayal it had been forced to witness, and she felt its sadness in her bones.

As the sun came up, the members filed out through various exits (some above ground, some below — the shell itself sat half submerged in the earth).

His work done, albeit not swiftly, the Protocrat left last. Tirielle was disbarred and the arguments in her favour had held no sway. The Kuh’taenium had decided — Tirielle was on her own, and no rights afforded to a member of the Conclave would be granted upon her capture. Not that such considerations had hampered the Protectorates efforts to capture her until now, but it was the appearance of the thing that mattered.

The Protocrat stretched, spine cracking loudly, and made his way to his superior, who waited under the shade of one of the trees that lined the twelve approaches to the Conclave’s heart.

Reih passed slowly through the outer cells of the Kuh’taenium, ascending gradually to her living rooms at the apex of the giant sphere. The journey took some time as she wound her way higher, looking out through the sheltered windows onto the grounds and the city beyond.

There, under the canopy of growth that fluttered lightly on the day’s breeze, the Protocrat spoke animatedly with someone. Another Protocrat, his face hidden. The two were concealed on the curving paths that ran through the gardens, unseen from below. She stood back from the light watching the two in discussion until she could see who would walk away.

The man left, and Reih let out her breath. His size alone gave him away, but the Kuh’taenium confirmed her suspicions, its sight and senses greater than any mortal. She saw through its myriad eyes. There was no doubt.

Tun, the head of the Protectorate’s Search Division.

So it had all been set up. They had just been waiting for license to hunt Tirielle like an animal. Stripped of the benefits granted to the Conclave, Reih had no doubt that should Tirielle be captured, she would be tortured and killed.

But what could she do? What was she really, but a glorified politician?

What was one human, against the might of their rulers?

She sat on her bed, thoughts whirling dangerously, until the Kuh’taenium began speaking. They talked long, until Dow rose. Finally, she fell into her bed and slept a shallow sleep that did little to refresh her.

She woke to a new day half fled. As Carious slid below the horizon, she began to write.

‘Dear Gurt…’

Further south, unaware of the machinations of the Interpellate within the Kuh’taenium, a caravan travelled, wavering in the blistering heat. Nine outriders shimmered more than most. A man could be forgiven for thinking the sight was simply a product of the heat haze, but it was not — it was the sun reflected brightly on armour that would shimmer no matter the weather. The nine warriors, on steeds black as night, were as glorious as the sun. They were the paladins of the Order of Sard, the suns’ warriors, Tirielle A’m Dralorn’s honour guard and enemy of the Protectorate. Already they had found blood on their long journey. Before it was over they would find more.

The suns baked the earth. The horses’ hooves raised no dust. Within the caravan, Tirielle A’m Dralorn watched the land roll on before her as she was gently rocked by the road. Sweat beaded her upper lip, and moistened her temples, but her dress was light, and here, within the wagon, she was sheltered from the painful brightness of the twin suns. She flicked her tongue over her lip, tasting the salty sweat and feeling her broken tooth. Lately, she found, when she was in thought she worried at the shard of tooth with her tongue.

It was three weeks since she had been forced to flee the sanctuary of her friend Roth’s home, and the memory of the coolness of the caverns and the friendship she had found there sustained her on the endless plains. She had been travelling ever since the first battle on Lianthre in a thousand years. The battle had been fierce, and together with their rahken allies she had survived. She did not know how the Protectorate had discovered her sanctuary with the rahkens, the massive beasts that had until now existed unharmed and untamed in enclaves across the continent. She only wished her fate had not drawn the Rahken Nation into the battle. She wondered how her allies fared, now that their treaty with the continent’s rulers was broken. There would be no pretence of friendship between Roth's kin and the Protectorate now.

It was some unknown magic that had found her, but they had travelled unhindered since. She was beginning to think the magic her enemies had used then could be used no longer, for surely they would have found her on the road. She was far from inconspicuous from prying eyes.

For now, she was safe under the protection of the Sard and Roth.

She had survived the first battle in what would surely become a war to end an age. Now, her companions were guarding her from harm on her path to Beheth. The Order of the Sard’s powers granted her invisibility from the Protectorate’s scrying eyes.

Her flight had been long, and the path treacherous. And yet, the end was far from sight. Her friend and former assassin, Roth, a massive rahken warrior, had exacted her vengeance on her father’s killer, and for that she had been sentenced to death long before she knew her fate. Her father’s murderer had been Protectorate. She had made a powerful enemy. She had discovered since, thanks to the paladins of the Sard, that she was destined to meet another two enemies of the Protectorate. She was the first of three mortals destined to change the world, and in some ways she felt comforted to know that she was not alone, blown upon fate’s fickle winds.