King Kalen Darigon stood in his bedroom, beneath the western face of the clockwork tower. His thin window offered a vista of Vultheras, its districts and its walls; the Wendergerd Bridge, alight with the glow of burning tanks; and the crescent shore of the Brass Sea, ablaze with fire and obscured by smoke and the storm.
The king had donned his royal attire; a gray and gold dress suit complete with the cloak of a white bear draped over his shoulders. He squeezed an envelope between his gloved hands and furrowed at his own reflection, made visible by the glare of a detonating shell. A column of fresh smoke billowed far below, among the residences of his city.
Sink or swim? Kalen wondered. Is now the time? Do I make my choice?
The envelope’s seal of ruby-colored wax broke by the pull of the king’s thumb. He unfolded its flap and slid the contents carefully into his hand. As the floor trembled, and the window flashed in war’s terrible glare, Kalen opened Mary’s final letter.
I know you will be the one to open this letter, Mary began in elegant pen. I know that you will only open it when your moment is at hand. Our time is short, then; it’s shorter than you believe.
I was not born, my king. I was first imagined, designed, and then made. I was built to satisfy a task for my master. For that reason, I was told many secrets, but he was cunning and limited his confessions by vagueness and half-truths. I have learned that the clock hands draw close, and that we are mere seconds from the last midnight of our world. I have thrown my wrench through the clock gear; I harmed his plan, to buy us just one second of time.
I know you are troubled. I know you are afraid. You’ve come to a moment where you are alone. There is no one at your side. You might be tempted to expire prematurely, or spend your efforts fighting at a heroic stand. Do not exhaust yourself. The small hand of time will move forward on your final night, and you will know it by its passing. You will know where you must stand to make false the hand of midnight; preserve our world a moment longer, until he arrives.
He is what my master fears most.
Take my mask and remember these words….
“From this darkness,” Kalen whispered. “I will deliver the next world.”
The letter juddered and crinkled in the king’s grasp. Tear drops stained its yellowed pages.
“My king, you say? Not, my love?” Kalen wondered aloud; dropped the letter to the floor. “If it were him, instead of me… would you have said your true feelings?”
The king squeezed the last of his tears from his eyes. “You were a good woman, Mary,” he said. “And a terrible companion.”
Urgent knocks rapped his door and Kalen turned. “Enter!” he yelled.
The door swung open and a royal knight crossed the threshold, dressed in a similar gray and gold dress suit. The knight’s sword, drawn in his hand; his eyes, sharp with awareness; conveyed the immediate danger.
“Your highness,” the guard began. “The palace is under attack. We’re to take you to the war room immediately.”
“Attack?” Kalen asked and his foul mood soured still. “So soon?”
“Bastilhasians, your highness,” the guard clarified. “It’s a mutiny from within.”
The king’s eyes widened and he turned to face his bed. On the silk fabric of his blanket laid the scabbard of his iconic sword, the blade of the silver-headed Dragon sheathed inside. Beside it was Mary’s white-horned mask. “Is this the moment?” he muttered.
“Your highness, we must move quickly,” the guard said. “The sooner your safety is secured, the better.”
The king held his loaded scabbard in both hands. “You’re married, aren’t you, Edward?” Kalen asked, recalled the guard’s name.
The guard, Edward, blinked. “Yes, sir. I am.”
“If your wife loved another man,” the king asked. “Would you stay loyal to her?”
“I don’t understand,” Edward answered.
“My kingdom, like a tragic marriage, collapses around my ears,” Kalen said. “I fear I won’t have the strength to see my final moments through.”
The guard’s eyes glistened and he appeared to understand. “I would stay loyal to the end, your highness.”
“Even if your loyalty was futile, and wasted?” Kalen asked.
“That is my wife,” Edward answered. “That is my country.”
The king nodded. “Well spoken,” he said, and attached the scabbard to his belt. He lifted the mask and tucked it in the back of his waistband. “Let’s be away from this place. I dare say, I hope to never see it again.”
Edward, the guardian knight, led king Kalen out of the bedroom. A half-dozen royal knights awaited outside, and together they led the king further down the many steps of the clocktower. Its elevator had been damaged and its lights flickered by the disturbance of battle. When they entered the palace proper, their ears met the din of clashing swords. Bodies littered the halls, propped up against furniture, or laid out on carpets soaked in blood. They were injured in all manner of ways, from the cuts of blades, to bullet wounds, and burns from magic.
And, each of them wore Bastilhasian colors. King Kalen could not tell which of the fallen had died loyal, or if the loyal still remained.
The fastest path to the war room was through an open courtyard. That visibility posed a problem, but the corridors of the palace were easily blocked. On a field they had room to move, and by shortening the path they mitigated the danger of ambush. Edward communicated this to the king; he agreed to advance through the courtyard doors.
They stepped out into the downpour, over a straight path laid through their courtyard garden. The lovely summer blooms of Vultheras, once bright with vibrant hues, were then dormant. The guards trampled them as they drew a perimeter around the king.
They were halfway through the courtyard when the windows of the first floor shattered.
Bang! sounded the first rifle, and the many thereafter. The knights shielded the king with their bodies. Flesh though they were, they were royal knights of Bastilhas, and their blood ran as steel through their veins.
“First Aid,” one knight said. “Level 3.” A green arcane circle appeared in their hand and as they touched it to a raw bullet wound, their flesh sewed itself closed.
The other knights did the same, and endured the first volley. The doors ahead and behind swung open, and men in Bastilhasian dress charged with their swords drawn. The traitors shouted a battle cry to the words of the national anthem.
“That which we love, that which we protect?” the king repeated, a scowl hard against the features of his face. “What would you curs know about love?!”
“Protect the king!” Edward shouted. “Drive through—!”
His words were cut short by the slice of a sword. It was not a crude mutineer that delivered that mortal blow; no, not just anyone had the strength and speed to send a royal knight crumbling with a single strike. It was another of the royal knights, who had once pledged loyalty to Kalen Darigon himself. He struck Edward down while wearing the colors of Great House Darigon!
The king howled, drew Dragon from its scabbard. The loyal knights collided with the mutineers, and the king traded blows with his traitor. Exceptional though he was, certainly among best warriors in the land, he was no match for king Kalen’s overpowering strength; his presence and his size. In three swift blows, the knight’s sword flew from his hand. It landed, stuck in the distant grass, as the king slipped Dragon’s thin blade through the knight’s ribs. That traitor’s heart was punctured and he died with his final gasp.
Kalen lowered the corpse, kicked it off his sword. Those knights still loyal to his cause fought admirably, but the mutiny was worse than an Edward described. Perhaps he didn’t know, Kalen thought as he turned his sword through the stomach of a mutineer in soldier’s dress. Perhaps he didn’t want to believe. Was I really such a failure? Did they hate me this much?!
Bang! bullets zipped across the field, grazed the king’s cheek and ripped through his cloak. His side became bloodied, but he didn’t slow a step. Not here! he thought, eyes sharp under adrenaline. This is not the time! This is not where I fall!
“Devastator!” the king shouted. “Level 7!”
Kalen handled his sword with both hands, its blade red with blood and magic. He turned and swung in a wide arc toward those that struggled in his path, traitor and loyalist alike. A red wave was released by the pass of his hew, and it sliced through everything. Blood spilled with the rain, and men came apart as straw unravels from an unbound bale.
In shreds, the traitors fell. Only the royal knights had the constitution to withstand the king’s attack; even then, they survived on scarce breaths and trembling words, while they struggled to stop their profuse bleeding.
King Kalen unclipped his cloak and it fell to the ground. He charged through the opening he created, through the open doors, and into the hall beyond the courtyard. It was also filled with corpses, but by then he was certain; those were the loyal ones, dead and scattered as debris.
He encountered no resistance as the clashing of blades faded fast behind him. The report of distant guns told of the battle his knights waged, until they didn’t, and the king was left in silence. It was his brief, disturbing peace.
“Halt!” he heard as he stepped into the reception of the war room.
Kalen heard the clatter of rifles and watched as soldiers aimed from behind make-shift barricades of furniture. There was a moment of confusion, but in truth, no one could mistake the king.
“Your highness!” the voice followed, and a woman jumped the barricade. She stepped over the bodies of the fallen, and the king was sure; the dead that lined the reception floor were traitors.
General Wulff straightened up, made a crisp salute. “We were afraid we’d been cut off,” she said, dropped her hand to rest it on the bloody guard of a not-so-ornamental rapier. “Where is your guard?”
“Fighting,” Kalen said.
Her response came by the eyes, as she glanced between his red-stained uniform and his bloodied blade. She understood.
“Right this way,” Wulff said. “High Command, or what’s left of it, is eager to receive you.”
