original palace, now the home of the Imperial Chancery—its pearly white stone an eerie pink in the dusk. To the left, Glorina Park led the eye through trees, shrubs and pathways to the mountain-shadowed frontage of the Imperial Exchequer. To the right, the crenellated wall of the Emperor’s Division garrison ran parallel to the highway.
Traffic was light at this time of the evening. Most of those who worked in the District had already gone home. The duke had chosen the hour of his attack for precisely that reason. But even so…
“Too many,” said Ahasz. “There are too many people. I would not have a massacre.”
“They’ll run soon enough when the fighting starts, your grace,” Urnagi replied.
Deaths were inevitable. Any tactic intended to minimise fatalities would only jeopardise the attack on the Imperial Palace. But still, so many people, even this late in the day.
Two troop-wagons and an artillery carriage had taken position at the entrance to the District. They waited patiently for those vehicles departing to clear the gap between the two outcrops. Once the last of the civilian traffic had passed out of the District, the troop-wagons moved to block the highway. They settled heavily on their keels, and troops boiled from hatches at the rear.
“Caster,” Ahasz ordered.
The regimental-major tapped a box fastened to the cupola’s inner surface. Ahasz selected a circuit, flicked a switch, and spoke into the grilled speaker/microphone. “Tayisa.”
The colonel responded quickly: “Your grace?”
“The railway?”
An underground spur of the railway served the District, with stations near the Exchequer and Imperial Palace. It was the chief mode of transport to the District for proletarians.
“All going to plan, your grace. We control the necessary signal-points, and the troop trains will be rerouted.”
It was the easiest way to get troops into the District. Basilisks and artillery carriages, of course, could not be transported via the railway.
The duke’s convoy reached the “Knot”, a complex junction of under- and over-passes with mesh road-beds, bridges spun of silver, insubstantial against the backdrop of blockish palaces and precise gardens. The Knot split the highway into four: Palace Road, Exchequer Road, Chancery Road, and Park Road. The convoy kept to the lanes which led to the Palace.
Palace Road swooped down from the Knot to run along the top of a wide and low hillock bisecting the southern half of the District. It traversed the Imperial Palace’s frontage, ending in a great roundabout, the centre of which featured a monument to the Pacification Campaigns. It was telling, Ahasz felt, that the monument honoured not those killed in the Campaigns, but the victories won. Beyond the roundabout, the Ruins occupied the most southerly end of the valley. Little more than a collection of time-battered walls, mosaics and pillars, the Ruins were believed to have been the palace of an ancient king of the region, but after ten thousand years little could be known for certain.
Ahasz turned to gaze at the Imperial Palace. Carved from the very substance of Mount Yama, it presented a cliff-face of carved balconies, turrets, colonnades and archways. Shadows pooled in the nooks, crannies and lattices, rendering the various carvings in stark relief. Night crept across the District but had yet to reach the Palace. Nevertheless, spotlights sprang into life, illuminating the statues to either side of the Palace entrance—Emperor Edkar I to the left, Poer I to the right; each fully one hundred feet high and also cut from the rock, their blank gazes watching beneficently over the District. Between them, six archways led into the Palace’s great entrance hall, with its forty-foot-high ceiling, its thirty-nine pillars. Each pillar held a twenty-foot-high statue of a Shutan emperor or empress in a niche. Everywhere in and about the Palace, a visitor was under the gaze of the Imperial Throne.
The duke looked
Traffic was light at this time of the evening. Most of those who worked in the District had already gone home. The duke had chosen the hour of his attack for precisely that reason. But even so…
“Too many,” said Ahasz. “There are too many people. I would not have a massacre.”
“They’ll run soon enough when the fighting starts, your grace,” Urnagi replied.
Deaths were inevitable. Any tactic intended to minimise fatalities would only jeopardise the attack on the Imperial Palace. But still, so many people, even this late in the day.
Two troop-wagons and an artillery carriage had taken position at the entrance to the District. They waited patiently for those vehicles departing to clear the gap between the two outcrops. Once the last of the civilian traffic had passed out of the District, the troop-wagons moved to block the highway. They settled heavily on their keels, and troops boiled from hatches at the rear.
“Caster,” Ahasz ordered.
The regimental-major tapped a box fastened to the cupola’s inner surface. Ahasz selected a circuit, flicked a switch, and spoke into the grilled speaker/microphone. “Tayisa.”
The colonel responded quickly: “Your grace?”
“The railway?”
An underground spur of the railway served the District, with stations near the Exchequer and Imperial Palace. It was the chief mode of transport to the District for proletarians.
“All going to plan, your grace. We control the necessary signal-points, and the troop trains will be rerouted.”
It was the easiest way to get troops into the District. Basilisks and artillery carriages, of course, could not be transported via the railway.
The duke’s convoy reached the “Knot”, a complex junction of under- and over-passes with mesh road-beds, bridges spun of silver, insubstantial against the backdrop of blockish palaces and precise gardens. The Knot split the highway into four: Palace Road, Exchequer Road, Chancery Road, and Park Road. The convoy kept to the lanes which led to the Palace.
Palace Road swooped down from the Knot to run along the top of a wide and low hillock bisecting the southern half of the District. It traversed the Imperial Palace’s frontage, ending in a great roundabout, the centre of which featured a monument to the Pacification Campaigns. It was telling, Ahasz felt, that the monument honoured not those killed in the Campaigns, but the victories won. Beyond the roundabout, the Ruins occupied the most southerly end of the valley. Little more than a collection of time-battered walls, mosaics and pillars, the Ruins were believed to have been the palace of an ancient king of the region, but after ten thousand years little could be known for certain.
Ahasz turned to gaze at the Imperial Palace. Carved from the very substance of Mount Yama, it presented a cliff-face of carved balconies, turrets, colonnades and archways. Shadows pooled in the nooks, crannies and lattices, rendering the various carvings in stark relief. Night crept across the District but had yet to reach the Palace. Nevertheless, spotlights sprang into life, illuminating the statues to either side of the Palace entrance—Emperor Edkar I to the left, Poer I to the right; each fully one hundred feet high and also cut from the rock, their blank gazes watching beneficently over the District. Between them, six archways led into the Palace’s great entrance hall, with its forty-foot-high ceiling, its thirty-nine pillars. Each pillar held a twenty-foot-high statue of a Shutan emperor or empress in a niche. Everywhere in and about the Palace, a visitor was under the gaze of the Imperial Throne.
The duke looked
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