A bell's hoarse, iron tongue rings midnight and Mazer focusses his full attention on the moon-sharpened tower. Commander of a Tiger Force strike team, Mazer has fought every type of battle available to a Scrovengi special forces soldier, always answering the call with loyal zeal. This is the plan: infiltrate the Emperor's Tower using gliders, capture the Boy Emperor and use him to negotiate the surrender of the Jade Empire.

The hundreds of metres between his team and the destination balcony are a wilderness of potential dangers; Mazer measures their progress by the city's magic lights below and is amazed as they extinguish when he passes overhead, then switch on again in a wave as his magic-dampening amulet passes beyond range. How powerful is this thing, that it can reach out across so many hundreds of metres to touch all those individual lights?

The team hasn't been shot out of the sky by mage fire, which is a good sign by any standard, so the dampener is also working against the magical defences. With a practised air, all forty gliders land gently on the upper floors of the tower. Iskra leads her fighters to the stairway and there's the soft, delicate sound of a slit throat in the dark beyond the balcony.

Mazer heads up a narrow staircase and twenty-six other dark-clad Tiger Force commandos follow in perfect order like soft, black, concentric waves. Voices scuttle from a room ahead and, though this isn't the target area, Mazer can't allow these reinforcements to hit them from behind. He puts his palm on the door handle, signals to the others what he wants and flings the door open.

The room is flooded with light, illuminating a circular table strewn with cards and occupied by eight human guards of the Jade Empire: anxiety freezes into something horrible and solemn on their faces. Knives fly through the air, wrecking the guards like a cavalry charge without moving a single card on the table. There is no noise and no survivors, their lives disappearing like the thoughtless and abundant stars. Mazer looks down at the humans: a few lie face down like fallen nests, another has fallen on his back, a knife through his face, arms flung wide as if asking why; so many lives will disappear like those thoughtless and abundant stars, victims of terrible sorcery or simply good old-fashioned manpower.

They're near the top when fighting breaks out on the floor below, but Mazer knows Iskra will hold until her dying breath. Ahead, several figures dressed in red robes of Dragon School sorcerers appear and, considering the powerful reputation of the Boy Emperor's royal guard, Mazer hopes the amulet around his neck dampens their magic. As he rushes them Mazer is amazed to not be struck down, and the mages are surprised too as the massive Scrovengi slashes and scissors his way through them.

When they're all dead, Mazer is about to turn back to his fighters when a door ahead opens and a tiny figure with black hair steps out. The Boy Emperor rubs his eyes, confused and looking like a normal six-year-old. It's impossible to tell he's a conduit for the memories of countless generations of his people, holder of The Mandate of Heaven – the Jiangese believe their ancestors, culture and loved ones live on in the soul of this boy, that he governs in perfect harmony of the past with the present; not reincarnation of one individual but of an entire people within an individual, each generation adding to the whole, representing the love and toil of a whole nation, a living constitution.

Perhaps Mazer imagines it, but for a moment he does see something profound in the boy's stare. His face is loaded with memories, buried and mighty. He looks like he's about to say something but doesn't, a flame blazing silently from his eyes.

A large, dark figure emerges from nowhere and Mazer can tell it's a Scrovengi behind the mask from the distinctive horns jutting out of his head. Some kind of barbed wire is wrapped around the top of the mask, surrounding the horns, and nine blades dance protectively in the air around the figure, either independently or controlled by his will.

The newcomer lifts his hand and, seemingly in slow motion, pulls the trigger of a small crossbow; trying to intercept the crossbow bolt, Mazer leaps forward but can't stop it crunching into the Boy Emperor's forehead, sending him crashing onto his back in the room he recently left. Enraged, Mazer readies to charge the stranger who calmly lifts a hand of peace and calls out.

"SAIMR!"

The acronym SAIMR echoes in Mazer's head ("cy-mar...cy-mar...cy-mar") because the first time he'd heard it had been a few days before, when he'd been given the powerful magic-dampening amulet by someone with a top clearance level claiming to be an agent of this organisation.

"Murdering bastard!" Mazer yells.

Dressed all in black, the masked stranger ignores Mazer's anger and approaches. "My name is Eremenko. I'm with SAIMR. You're my extraction team?"

"Our mission is...was to bring back the Boy Emperor alive, to force the Jade Empire's surrender."

Despite the mask, Mazer senses Eremenko's amusement. "Your real mission was always to secure my extraction. As you know, SAIMR is a dark organisation and we couldn't have our activities bandied about before you got here."

"My people don't 'bandy' anything about," Mazer defends. "And they're here risking their lives for you...apparently."

Eremenko performs an exaggerated, ornate bow. "My thanks." During this time, Mazer notes that Eremenko's floating blades haven't fallen from the air as he nears Mazer's magic-dampening amulet, so their power is clearly more than just magic—a techno-mage.

Both men ready their weapons at a sound from the room where the Boy Emperor lies dead.

*

A wild, inchoate conviction drives Lu forward, crawling slowly and gently on her hands and knees, stomach pressed to the ground like a snake. She reaches the Boy Emperor, imagining life in his eyes, though the bolt is lodged in his forehead. Some sights bypass the eyes and fall on the heart directly, and Lu feels this for the first time since she saw her father's ship destroyed by...whatever that thing was.

As a military orphan, she'd been taken in by the Boy Emperor, fed and sheltered in the palace like so many others in recent times. Then, tonight, the little sovereign had entered the hall housing the orphans and she'd felt his sleepless compassion as he wandered among them, was surprised when he wordlessly picked her out. She held his little six-year-old hand, almost half the size of hers, as he led her up the stairs, both trusting each other absolutely. There was no need for guards.

Strangely, instead of using a magical light, the Boy Emperor had lit a candle by himself and, with a gesture, invited Lu to sit down in a dark corner of the room. It was then that she saw the look of dread in his eyes, and the hope too, the piteous shine. He was an inextricable labyrinth of feelings. Then the commotion came and the boy walked out, and was flung back with violence.

Looking down, Lu realises she's crawled into a pool of the Boy Emperor's blood. The head turns ever so slightly and his placid gaze falls on her, a small hand reaching out for the last time and falling on hers. The look is so gentle and kind that, recently orphaned as she is, Lu sees her parents in those eyes, and their parents, and their parents going back for generations, each one with a pure and manifest love for their children. She finds that she's crying and the clenched fist of the past is open to her; there's a rush of emotion, a transfer of some feeling between Lu and the Boy Emperor, and then he's gone.

Lu makes a little noise as she realises the child sovereign is dead, then looks up to find two huge figures standing over her.

*

A human girl. It pains Mazer to see the Boy Emperor lying dead, so he focusses on the girl. He looks over to check Eremenko isn't firing another crossbow bolt or one of the many other weapons contained in the pockets and hiding places of his techno-mage armour suit. Though his face isn't visible, Eremenko is clearly suspicious about something, looking first at the girl, then the Boy Emperor, then back at the girl, who shivers under that glacial stare. Mazer places himself between the girl and Eremenko.

One of Mazer's soldiers appears, a look of concern printed on his face. "Sir, they've pushed back our vanguard and put out a general alarm—"

"Dammit!"

"Indeed, sir. But Iskra is holding them off before they can reach the gliders."

Mazer nods. "Then we need to move quickly."

"The girl—" Eremenko begins.

"Can come with us," Mazer insists, then indicates Eremenko. "We'll need your skills at the front."

In the swish of a black cloak, Eremenko disappears down the stairs. A short time after he heads that way, screams echo up the stairs and then are cut off. Following the same path with the girl and his soldiers, Mazer spots the undamaged gliders on the balcony as Iskra rounds the corner, cutting down a pursuing enemy as she goes.

An enemy mage fires a ball of flame at Iskra, who instinctively hits the deck and, still on the floor, throws a shard of ice through her pursuer's chest. She flicks a sardonic glance at Mazer and says, "Nice of you to show up, sir," with a smile.

Mazer hits an enemy in the mouth with the hilt of his sword, then turns to Iskra expectantly. "My timing isn't coincidental," he says, subtly scanning her for a reaction, then, after five seconds, running out of patience. "Coincidental? Get it? Cause I punched him in the teeth."

"Well done, sir, you truly are my lord and saviour," Iskra says, cutting down two enemies at once.

"I know you're not being sarcastic," Mazer replies. "You'd never hurt my ego that way."

More screams from a corridor, then Eremenko appears, blood trailing in torrents from two blades chained to his wrists. As he strides purposefully, his nine floating blades fly forward and take out the remaining enemies. "Get your men to the gliders," he tells Mazer, then turns back to face a group of approaching guards.

Without ordering any of his people to help the SAIMR agent, Mazer fastens the young Jiangese girl to his glider and, in his best Jiangese, instructs her to wait. He speaks her language pretty well; always the consummate soldier. A decision ripens in his mind, and he approaches Iskra before she can ready her glider, spinning her around so they're close, whispering.

"Listen, you and the rest of our mages will have to protect the team while they're in the air if I don't make it back," he quickly says, indicating the sounds of fighting from Eremenko's position.

"I'll come with you."

"No," Mazer insists. "I can't have you associated with me."

Iskra tries to follow him but Mazer pushes her back. "No! Lead the team!" he tells her.

Returning to Eremenko, Mazer hits the deck to avoid the SAIMR agent's spinning chain blades, which are being cast around the room, cutting Jiangese guards to bits. Mazer estimates their killing zone at about twenty metres either side of Eremenko, and his nine floating blades slash through enemies independently, slamming down on those who are pressed to the ground for cover.

Mazer leaps over a spinning chain, rolls to his feet and cuts down two guards. Others try to press him as they crowd their way through the entrance but Mazer stops attacking with his sword and slams into the mass of bodies like a rugby scrum; a pile of at least fifteen guards push at Mazer or at the backs of their fellows, trying to force the Tiger Force commander back but gradually he gains the momentum, slowly edging the crowd out of the entrance, picking up pace as he puts more on the backfoot, and tumbling most of them down a flight of stairs just beyond the entrance. He takes the heads off two who don't plummet down the stairs, picks up a third and, crushing his skull in a taloned hand, throws the body down on the few trying to recover from their fall.

Heading back to Eremenko, Mazer sees him finish off the latest wave of attackers. "Let's go before the next wave arrives," Eremenko says.

Mazer stops Eremenko with a hand across his chest. "First we need to talk about the girl."

A masked face turns towards Mazer. "The Mandate of Heaven was transferred to her. She dies."

Having suspected some form of transfer, Mazer is not surprised, but he is disappointed that the SAIMR agent shares his suspicions. "The Mandate of Heaven is important to them. We would be foolish to destroy that link, that bargaining chip."

Eremenko is emphatic. "You don't understand the plan. You don't understand the context. There are bigger things at stake here than you could ever understand."

He'd felt too much, seen too much. Mazer is a loyal Scrovengi to the bone, raised in the military way, but since SAIMR ordered the killing of the Boy Emperor, he's known they aren't fighting under the honour and tradition he's served his entire life. He feels his faith, a sharp white-hot instrument, turning in his hands. Maybe there's more. Maybe what they're asking him to kill, in himself and in others, is the very thing he should be fighting to protect.

"We're taking the girl back and the politicians can decide what do to with her," Mazer insists, certain the Scrovengi leadership would never condone SAIMR's actions.

A laugh echoes from behind Eremenko's mask. "SAIMR is the Scrovengi leadership now."

They stare each other down while Mazer measures the truth of this statement, then—Mazer smashes Eremenko's head back with a surprise uppercut and throws the SAIMR agents across the room. With supernatural grace, Eremenko turns the momentum into a roll and, whilst regaining his feet, throws a chain blade at Mazer's head. Barely avoiding this first attack, Mazer senses danger as the blade is pulled back his way and dodges it again, punching over his shoulder through a large piece of flying rubble, which breaks into smaller pieces; before any of these can fall to the ground, and in the same movement as the punch, Mazer grasps a fist-sized clump of rock and throws it at Eremenko, who evades and is only just struck on the shoulder.

The rock bounces off but, before Eremenko can move, Mazer charges through a hail of floating blades, deflecting them aside and taking partial hits to the arms and upper body. He smashes into Eremenko with thunderous force and they roll across the floor, striking at each other, each blocking the other's attacks seamlessly. Quick as birds of prey, the nine floating blades turn and shoot straight for Mazer who, whilst rolling, positions Eremenko between himself and the blades, kicking their master back in their direction.

A blade buries itself in the wall where Mazer's head was a second before, and he deflects two more as Eremenko charges forward, striking the ground with one of his chain blades to send sparks into his opponent's eyes; as he does this, Eremenko let's fly with his other chain blade from fifteen feet, throwing it in an elliptical attack, and it comes at Mazer from the left like the turning of a clock.

Blinded by the sparks and fending off more floating blades, Mazer tries to evade at the last minute and manages to dart back, pressing himself against the wall, but Eremenko has thrown perfectly, ensuring no space between his thrown chain blade and the wall. It smashes into Mazer's side with crunching force, dropping him to his knees. The floating blades close in.

Sensing the chance of victory slipping, Mazer gambles and leaps forward, unable to block the floating blades; one passes within an inch of his throat but his speed and decisiveness evades them all. With powerful strikes, he forces Eremenko back but the SAIMR agent is always slipping out of the way and sending in attacks that almost catch the commando off guard.

Still, Mazer is winning ground and, at the sound of incoming guards, he ducks an attack from Eremenko and, sensing the floating blades aiming at his back, kicks his opponent through a set of doors, down a flight of stairs and right into the approaching enemies. Mazer dives to the side as the floating blades shoot straight through where he just was and head down to re-join their master. Screams and sounds of carnage echo from below.

Quickly, Mazer slams the wall above the door with a powerful taloned hand and rubble piles down, blocking the entrance. He turns and charges back to the balcony, where his people are all strapped to their gliders.

"Launch!" he yells at them. "I won't be able to join you, for now, but I'll explain when I see you again. Now, go!" Mazer spots Iskra in the crowd and it opens a vein of memory. He senses her confusion, but she follows the order like a Scrovengi soldier should, launching off into the darkness and disappearing from his life.

Mazer and the girl are the last to go, and they head off in the opposite direction because Mazer knows Scrovengi invasion forces will be here soon. The girl will have to be taken somewhere safer, if she's to preserve the culture of her people. Looking back at the tower, he sees a dark form looking after them, the large eyes of its mask glinting like a bird of prey, then it disappears and a winged shadow moves through the clouds.

*

Anya, Indigo, Sig and Squad are onboard Gaia, speeding towards The Arnlands, a mainly human nation consisting of four disparate countries united by common cultural bonds, but also divided by vast differences. Indigo is in his lab with Kindred, while the others lounge around on chairs in the main room.

Anya and Sig are engaged in a heated discussion, the Dwarf tapping a magazine to emphasise his point. "Look! I'm telling you, 68% of women have fucked a horse! This is irrefutable proof! I'm seeing it! I'm believing it! I know I've said strange things in the past and they've turned out not to be true, but these are cast-iron facts: 68% of women have fucked a horse—no, wait, 68% of women want a stable relationship." There's a mischievous glint in his eyes. "My mistake."

Anya and Squad hit him in the head with rolled-up balls of paper. Smiling, Sig defends himself. "...It's the world's fault for tolerating my sense of humour."

"They don't tolerate it!" Squad points out.

"Well, it's still the world's fault."

Sig returns to organising a hoard of weapons he recently dropped all over the floor. The pile is taller than he is.

Anya turns to Squad, holding a magi-graph page. "You know those encrypted books they found among Lord Scipio's things? Our people have cracked a part of it. We know more about why we're heading to The Arnlands now."

Enthused, Squad reads over Anya's shoulder. "What is it?"

"It's the address of a Doctor Markowitz, in Hellac Arn. As you know, the Arnlands are a nation comprised of four different countries: Hellac Arn, the largest and dominant, Domil Arn, Crangus Arn, and Victus Arn. Doctor Markowitz is a Hellac Arn nationalist, so he wants not only to keep the Arnlands together but to maintain Hellac supremacy, in the face of increasing nationalism in the three other nations. The book doesn't tell us how Lord Scipio knows Markowitz, only that he's a contact, so we should be prepared for anything."

Sig looks up from cleaning his pile of weapons. "I say we kick in the front door and ask questions later."

Shaking her head, Anya replies. "There are some problems that violence can't solve."

Sig defensively throws himself atop the pile of weapons, covering them as if he doesn't want them to hear. "How dare you talk that way in front of the hoard! Of course, all problems can be solved with violence!" He pats and soothes the hoard like it's a baby. "There, there. Don't listen to her. Don't let the nasty lady upset you."

"Sometimes I worry about you," Anya says, shaking her head with a smile.

"You don't need to worry about me," Sig assures her. "I'm a professional."

"Yes, but a professional what?"

Squad sombrely reads a report from the Scrovengi-Jade Empire war. "We should be in the far east, investigating the origins of this war," he says.

"You had to leave Blitz, because Scrovengi agents were looking for you after the incident at their embassy," Anya counters. "The far east is the last place you should be going, at least until things cool down with the Scrovengi."

Sig shakes his head. "It was terrible, breaking into their embassy like that. If they catch us, I don't know what they'll say...I don't speak Scrovengi."

"Very funny, dickhead," Squad smiles.

"Thanks," Sig beams. "You see, I have different forms of comedy. You can't put me in a box."

"You're the perfect size," Squad replies.

"That's racist!" the Dwarf replies, then thinks it over. "...Although I am notoriously flexible, so you probably could put me in a box. Different boxes, different outcomes."

Anya puts her head in her hands and Sig asks her, with a smile. "I'm not interrupting anything, am I?"

"Evolution."

*

Snow flies across the whirling, whistling mountaintop, making it impossible for the small group of soldiers to see more than twenty metres in front of them. The highest mountain in Jiang is imposing, covered in snow at any time of year and said to be inhabited by many kinds of beast, mystical and traditional.

Through an interstice in the snow, the messenger spots the temple, its windows barred like eyes refusing to see. He rushes ahead of his escort, jumping with each step to escape the snow.

He knocks frantically on the door and waits for what feels like forever, until a small slot opens and a voice asks. "Who's there?"

The messenger hears his own voice blasting against the force of the storm. "I bear a message for Sima Chan. I'm told she can be found here."

There's a slight pause, then the heavy door creaks open, as the messenger and his escort slip in, shaking snow from their cloaks and armour. The door closes with a mighty thud and is locked by the same monk who opened it. "Come this way," he says, leading them through the ornate building, decorated with statues of ancient gods and beautiful, unknowable carvings.

They come to a lonely shrine, where a Jiangese woman in simple robes kneels in meditation. This can't be the great military mind, the messenger thinks to himself, but his mission is clear. The escort monk moves away and the messenger takes off his helmet, fiddling with it uncertainly as he contemplates interrupting.

"Speak, friend," Sima Chan, says, though she doesn't face the messenger or change position in any way.

"The Scrovengi have invaded our country," the messenger replies, hesitating over the next sentence as though the words could physically hurt him. "The Boy Emperor is dead, killed by their assassins. The Mandate of Heaven has been removed."

At these words, the woman rises and slowly turns, suddenly becoming more impressive, as if an aura has descended on her or been dragged up from some hidden depth. "I will re-enlist at once. What is the distribution of our forces?"

Bleakly, the messenger replies. "Our armies in the north are scattered or retreating at pace. The war is lost."

An enigmatic smile lightens the woman's face. "The invasion is over, but the resistance is only beginning."

***

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