Stephen Deas - The adamantine palace

'Heirs are important.' For a moment Meteroa's face went as blank as a mask. Then he smiled politely. 'Ask Hyram.'

Jehal laughed. 'Heirs are dangerous. Ask Aliphera. Oh, wait, you can't. She's dead.' He sniffed the air again. 'Whoever arranged the incense burners should be whipped; they're not doing their job at all. Did you put the scent vines around the east window of the bridal bedchamber as I asked?'

Meteroa nodded. He pushed Jehal back towards the feasting hall. The dancing had stopped. Princess Lystra was standing in the middle of the floor. Everyone was looking at him, but he didn't have time to see any more before a gang of knights launched themselves at him. The next thing he knew, he was whisked off his feet and being carried high in the air. People were shouting and cheering. When he strained his neck to look, he could just about see Princess Lystra being escorted away by two queens, her mother on one side, Zafir on the other.

He closed his eyes. They weren't even out of the feasting hall before groping hands started to tear his clothes away. Over the ribald jokes of his riders he could hear Queen Fyon laughing. He shuddered. The women were always the worst.

They carried him high over their heads, parading him in front of everyone they could find, until they reached the Sun Tower in the centre of the palace. They almost dropped him there, trying to carry him up the narrow spiral stairs, but apparently they were quite prepared to risk that rather than let him walk. By the time they got him to the top he was dizzy, but he wasn't given any time to think about that. Someone was already pressing a goblet into his hands. One of Silvallan's nieces. What was her name?

'Maiden's Regret!' shouted a voice to a chorus of laughter. 'The Maiden!'

He drank it down as he was obliged to do, and prayed silently that the riders around him weren't as drunk as they seemed. Mentally, one part of him listed all the dragon-kings and -queens who'd been poisoned on their wedding nights. Another part slowly started counting, ticking off the seconds before the Maiden's Regret took hold of him. It would be longer than most, he'd made sure of that.

They finished stripping him and put him into his wedding shift, a pointless wrapping of cloth designed to fall apart at the lightest touch. By now the room was spinning, but he still had a few minutes before the potion took him completely.

One by one, the riders, the princes, the princesses came to him with ritual offerings of advice for the night to come, and then left.

'Maiden's Regret loosens the tongue!' shouted a voice. True, he thought. That's what the alchemists were using in my eyrie, with their truth-smoke. On my Scales and on my soldiers. He grinned. What a waste. All those men and women left half-mad with lust.

'It loosens everything.' More laughter.

Meteroa must have been beside himself. I must write to Hyram, thanking him on behalf of Cliff top's whores. He started to laugh.

'Are you murdering your father?' Jehal blinked. The question seeped into his consciousness like honey dripping off a spoon. Jaslyn. That's who the voice was. Princess Jaslyn. Because hadn't Lord Meteroa said she was coming? And he didn't remember seeing her before.

Why not? urged a voice inside him. Why not tell her the truth and be done with it. Everyone wants to know. Make her go away.

He opened his mouth, but a hand shut it for him. 'Get out of here, you little witch. How dare you! Shoo! Shoo!' The hand let go of him. 'I'm so sorry, nephew. Treat your bride kindly but not too kindly. I'll wager she likes a little roughness that one. Most of us do.'

Jehal looked up and smiled. Queen Fyon, but she was going now, turning away. Hadn't he been about to say something? Whatever it was, it was gone.

It seemed that he blinked, and his knights were gone too. That's right. Maiden's Regret fools with your sense of time. You haven't got long before it takes you now. Not long at all.

There was a door. That's what he was supposed to do. Go through the door. And before he'd even finished thinking it, it was done, and up another spiral of stairs, and the stupid wedding shift was already falling off, and then he was naked and standing in a room with eight sides, with windows in all the walls, every one open, with a floor strewn with pillows and blankets and mattresses stuffed with everything from down to straw, and Lystra was standing in front of him. She was far gone with the Maiden, swaying slightly from side to side, and her eyes were black and immense.

A little droplet of fire seemed to fall inside him and gently explode. Princess Lystra opened her mouth and reached for him. He swayed towards her.

Not yet not yet not yet!

He had seconds before he lost any idea of what he was doing. With all that was left of his will he started counting windows. Second on the left from the door. Faces east. That one…

He pushed Princess Lystra towards that window. 'Stars,' he murmured. 'Look up at the stars.' He stood behind her, wrapping his arms around her, and peered through the air to another tower and another window. The window was still dark. Queen Shezira wouldn't have had time to get back to her rooms yet. A pity, because he'd wanted her to see him take her daughter. A sort of prelude to everything else he was going to take, and she wasn't even there.

But then the Maiden came, and Lystra was grinding herself against him, and there could be no more waiting.

Scorched Earth

It took the rest of that day and most of the next to reach their destination, picking their tortuous way along the floor of a valley, among hundreds of rivulets that bubbled and splashed among a sea of strewn rocks and streaks of sand and gravel. On either side of them forested slopes rose sharply towards rocky peaks. It rained relentlessly. Every now and then one or other of the riders missed his footing and slipped. By the end of the first day all of them were limping.

Which serves them right for trying to hike in heavy armour, Sollos thought.

In the evening Curly Beard and the other Outsiders sat sullenly silent, huddled under the thickest of the trees, seeking what shelter they could get from the rain. When they looked at the dragon-knights, their eyes glittered with a mixture of greed and hate. The knights glowered back. Sollos and Kemir took it in turns to snooze, but no one else got much sleep. Strangely, the alchemist seemed the most anxious of them all.

As soon as dawn broke, Curly Beard jumped to his feet and declared it was time to move on. With great reluctance, Rider Semian handed over the promised gold. Curly Beard disappeared back down the river with three of his friends and the sack of coins, leaving two of the Outsiders to guide the knights onwards.

'If we went after them, we could still catch them,' muttered Kemir.

It took barely an hour for the other two Outsiders to abandon them. The first slipped away in the woods when one of the knights fell and broke his hand. The other one, when he saw that he was the last, simply ran, trusting the sureness of his feet on the rocks, knowing the knights could never catch him. Rider Semian declared the man a traitor and ordered him shot, but by the time Sollos had his bow strung, the Outsider was too far away. He sent a couple of arrows after the man to keep Semian happy and then pretended to listen while the knight told him how poor a shot he was.

Slowly, Sollos realised that the knights didn't know what to do. He watched them dither and wondered what profit there might be from leaving them to their fate. Six riders and one alchemist, alone in the mountains…

He looked up. Sure enough, high above, he saw a speck in the sky. The knights had someone to watch over them.

'You! Sell-sword!'

Sollos looked around. He assumed it must be one of the knights, but it was the alchemist, pointing a finger at him.