- TMK -

Here, among the bay clouds, Tasiana reveled in her achievement. For she stood on a hulk of metal, wood, and canvas that tamed the sky. The Maddox was hers, the newest man-o’-war in Saironia’s already vast arsenal. Commissioning this ship was her first act as Empress. From the steel outrigger tanks holding excess cirrus to the fifty-ton turrets at the vessel’s blade-shaped bow, all of it was a manifestation of her will.

           

And every one of the nearly thousand crewmen aboard this city in the sky knew it.

           

She inhaled the moist air while the Maddox’s colossal engines spewed an endless torrent of steam and smoke out of blackmetal chimneys. Planks rumbled as the bow veered to the left, aligning the starboard with the crescent harbor of Taulrenius. Each arm of the city extended into the tepid sea for so many miles, the origin of the man-made peninsulas vanished into the horizon. Granite fortresses tapered off the arms of Taulrenius, keeping watch over a bay that also tricked the eyes with its enormity. Thousands of ships made foam streaks across the waters. Huge shipping galleons toted goods from the trade cities while sloops trudged in from the fishing grounds along the southern coast. In the sky however, even more ships buzzed over the bay. They darted over one another in a frenzy of teal cirrus, smoke, and steam. Each one racing for one of the dozens of spires along each arm of the city. These spires, cylindrical towers of brick pocked with docking bays, absorbed and hemorrhaged an endless stream of airships. Midway down these colossal towers, a mass of cables radiated outward in a wire corona, connecting the spire to Taulrenius’ gondola system.

           

The city itself was endless as the bay–a ceaseless grid of brick and plaster. Rarely, this urban expanse was broken by autumn splotches as metropolitan parks gave rise to artificial forests. Meanwhile, wealthier areas of the city sported colorful painted lady houses, adding a dash of charm to this angled jungle. But for the millions of souls who called Taulrenius home, brick, plaster, and brass were what they knew.

           

That and the endless haze.

           

People believed Taulrenius was like no other city in the world for many reasons. In truth, its exceptionality trickled down to one aspect–its size. For the more Taulrenius grew, the more steam rose to the sky.

           

Steam became the endless dew. Dew turned to mist. Mist to clouds. Finally, the volume of vapor produced by millions of steam carriages, airships, boats, and gondolas fell back down onto the city as rain. Taulrenius unintentionally achieved what no other city had before or since.

           

Through the sheer volume of people residing within its walls, Taulrenius created its own weather. True, the weather was poisoned by the billowing black from millions of chimneys.

           

But it was weather, nonetheless.

           

Taulrenius’ sooty rain was a marvel. It was a symbol of Taulrenius’ unimaginable industry. Thousands of factories, forges, and shipyards waiting to birth a tide machines no other nation could hope to best. All the city needed was a single overriding will.

           

Tasiana’s will.

           

While her mother and grandmother had squandered their inheritance from Taul Rend, who raised this city from the depths of the sea, she would not. The Maddox was only the beginning. She would blanket the continent under warship’s shadows, under the shadow of the crimson star.

           

But before that dream had a chance of materializing, the first domino had to fall. Said domino came in the form of the Salamander approaching her along the Maddox’s deck. Aarturian stood beside him, the Salamander a head taller and several hundred pounds heavier than the Homunculus. The Salamander prince’s slit pupils narrowed on Tasiana while the nostrils on his monitor-lizard head flared. Scaly, four-fingered hands swung with the Salamander’s heavy gait. Like most of his kind, the lizard wore loose fitting robes over his bent spine. Robes that covered nearly all of the onyx spots that dotted his otherwise sandy scales.

           

Tasiana greeted him with a civil grin. She pulled away the ivory-fur hood she used to keep warm. As she did, her emerald-streaked walnut hair fell over her shoulders. She returned the Salamander’s stare, her eyes showing lime green while her rich, caramel skin drank the sun.

           

She waved away the dozen or so soldiers set to guard her and walked to meet her guest along the ship’s railing.

           

“Majesty, this is–”

           

“AftoLysanderOs Arkonais,” Tasiana interrupted Aarturian. “A pleasure. If a bit tardy.”

           

The Salamander bowed his head curtly before addressing her, “Tasiana Rendsire Lorylyn.”

           

“Empress,” Aarturian corrected him.

           

The Salamander flaunted his crocodile glare at Aarturian. “Not to me.”

           

Aarturian’s eye flashed with color as Tasiana raised her voice, “None of that now, Aarturian. One cannot fault a guest for speaking the truth. I do so grow weary of titles anyhow. In this instance, Tasiana will do just fine.”

           

“As will Lysander,” the Salamander answered, his forked tongue slipping hissing intonations to each word. “As it appears AftóLysänderÓs is too much for your Saironian tongue.” 

           

“Appears so.” Tasiana was unmoved by lizard’s impertinence. The Kingdom of Halicarnassus was the oldest surviving nation in the world. It had the longest reigning family, the oldest traditions, and the most archaic way of life since the advent of cirrus and steam. Above all, the Kingdom, especially its nobles, was famous for its hubris. Such hubris led to Nassian disdain of all that was foreign, including Tasiana. Disrespect was their way, no, their life.

           

Regardless, Lysander had a purpose.

           

Respect was not among the prerequisites to fulfill said purpose. That was a quality reserved for the Aarturians of the world. If conceit brought Nassians like Lysander into the fold, conceit was a quality she could overlook.

           

Lysander leaned on the oak railing. “I suppose I should ask why you’ve summoned me from my city.”

           

“Vandeirus is hardly your city. Even if it were, I’m not sure it is a title you would like to claim,” Tasiana said as Aarturian placed his body between the two of them. “Slums, crime, overcrowding, and so much sewage it flows into the streets. Were Vandeirus yours, I’d daresay that would make you the laughingstock of the Kingdom. I wouldn’t even want to know what King Arkonais would think.”

           

“He would think nothing. Menader is a feeble wretch who only cares about siring more princes to claim nonexistent lands.”

           

“What does that make you?”

           

Lysander’s slit eyes narrowed as the brown veins along his iris bulged. “The pinnacle of three millennia of eugenics. The product of a thousand pedigrees and countless ancestors who weeded out the taint in their blood. I am that which you’re pathetic Empire tried to mimic and failed. You are nothing but a shadow of my shadow.”

           

“Mimic? Certainly not. Emulate? Of course,” came Tasiana’s cool reply. “Eugenics has been the foundation of Saironia ever since its inception. True, we were a millennium behind the Nassians when they first selected their choice bloodlines. Yet we improved upon it tenfold.”

           

“Ha!” Lysander let out a rasped cackle, his tongue slapping against recurve teeth. “Improved? What is this improvement you speak of? You breed only to weed out sickness and witlessness. You allow people a choice in their work and a say in their matches. The only thing about blood and breeding you respect is in your own pedigree.”

           

“Which is why the Empire is rising while the Kingdom falls,” Tasiana countered. “Your eugenic castes only go so far. With every pedigree cycle, more forlorn are born. Whether by accident or the slow trickery of inheritance, your forlorn have gone from a few Salamanders at the Kingdom’s genesis, to throngs beyond measure. Nearly half of your populace is considered unfit to breed by the metrics of your castes. What number of that throng can actually prove they are worthy to bear the name of breed and clan? So many Nassians lack the first and fourth monikers of their name, they practically define the Kingdom. What you call the envy of the world, I call a rotten, empty skin of a regency.”

           

“Rise? Don’t make me laugh. Let me remind you, Empress of your own mother’s disaster when she last sought to show your Empire’s ‘rise’. How many soldiers died invading the steppe? How many Arrcosi did they kill before they stumbled home? Your ‘rise’ was what Nassian poets weaved into comedies for years. I still laugh at the thought of it.” Lysander spat. “And what of the forlorn? They are the dregs of our society. You look at them with pity. All I can see when picturing the undesirables of Vandeirus, Kaltax, or Halicarnassus, are rats without end. Tell me, since when do kings bother with the plight of vermin?”

           

Tasiana kept her cool even as the embarrassment of her mother’s retreat stung at her pride, and the pride of all her people. Still, she knew what had to be done to avenge that defeat. So, before Aarturian could interject, Tasiana silenced him with a swift hand.

           

“Because vermin will pave your path to becoming King.”

           

“Do tell, Empress. Show me how the refuse you choose to recycle into the breeding pool will overturn more than three millennia of tradition.”

           

“I would’ve thought you already took notice.”

           

“Come again?”

           

“Look at where you stand, Salamander,” Tasiana said, gesturing to the deck of the Maddox. “All rulers like to play tit for tat games about who is superior. You and I are no exception. In the end, however, all things boil down to simple numbers. For instance, the Maddox has a complement of eight hundred fifty souls. Some of those are marines, some are aeronauts, cooks, officers, and others. Regardless, that is eight hundred fifty more souls aboard this ship than you have.”

           

“I hardly see–” Lysander’s serrated jaws snapped shut as Tasia cut him off.

           

“You know the amount of provisions it takes to keep this ship afloat? For a single day, I must supply this ship with fifteen hundred pounds of grain, seven hundred pounds of beans, nine hundred gallons of water, and eight tons of coal. Now tell me, what is your best guess at the number of farms and mines it takes to stockpile that much material? Don’t bother answering. I know you haven’t the slightest clue. Now that in itself begs the question of the timber and metal it costs to build the ship. Once again, the answer is more than you could possibly imagine. However, my point is not to expose your mathematical or logistical inadequacies. It is to show what lies below us.”

           

Tasiana leaned over the rail, her eyes locked on massive drydocks dug at the edge of the bay. There, the skeletons of two more man-o’-wars took shape among cranes and squeaking metal. Huge oaken beams carved from a dozen ancient trees lay along a stained keel like the ribcage of a gargantuan wale. Workers hammered nails and lay planking as metalworkers forged armor plating that would eventually grace the ship’s sides.

           

Tasiana beamed upon her gestating fleet, savoring the panicked hiss that escaped Lysander’s snout as his gaze followed hers.

           

“Two more man-o’-wars will be ready by years end. And two more after that. Whatever I will shall be made. Be that seven ships or ten thousand rifles, the industry of the Empire is at my command. Industry I am willing to share.”

           

“Enough.” Lysander’s slit pupils narrowed. “What do you want of me?”

           

“Direct. How unexpected,” Aarturian muttered from the side.

           

“I want you to use the only thing you can. Your forlorn,” Tasiana continued. “You spoke of my mother’s defeat in Arrcus thinking it would insult me. While your attempt at mockery failed, your instincts did not. The shame and scar of my mother’s defeat, of her humiliation along the steppe scars my Empire to this very day. What you can do, Prince, is help me mend that wound.”

           

“And why would I want to do that? More importantly, how?”

           

“North, Harralheim?”

           

“Are you mad?” Lysander’s heavy saurian feet slammed into the wood as he rocked backwards. “What use is that ice bound hell to any of us?”

           

“To you as an individual? Nothing. To your forlorn, however? Harralheim represents the promised land your eugenicists denied them since the day they first drew breath,” Tasiana replied emphatically. “A frozen hell it may be, but it will be theirs. In the southern reaches, your forlorn will work what arable land exists on the continent. To the north, they will hunt the greathorn and mammoth herds. In time, the colonies will grow.”

           

“If they survive their first winter,” Lysander’s skepticism dripped off every word. “We Salamanders are creatures of the desert. We are born to thrive under the sun. Every wave of forlorn I coax north will die with the blizzards. Until Vandeirus is but a city of ghosts.”

           

“Funny, I would’ve supposed a city of ghosts would be your ultimate goal. Considering your previously voiced sentiments of the forlorn,” Aarturian interjected.

           

Lysander whirled towards Aarturian; his clawed hand extended menacingly. “Why y–”

           

“Ah!” Aarturian’s hands glowed with a myriad of color as they had in the garden. “Don’t forget where you are, Prince. Nor what I could do to you were my sovereign to give the order.”

           

“Tasiana,” Lysander addressed her in his entitled tone. “Muzzle your hound.”

           

“Truth be told, I have been muzzling him for some time. However, your self-serving rhetoric, while wholly expected from an ambitious, yet overindulged royal, has stretched my patience.”

           

“And if I were to walk away right now?”

           

“There are many princes in the Kingdom as pigheaded as you. I merely have to take my pick. Not that you would live to see your successor. I suppose I would say you fell from the Maddox or pirates brought down your ship. In any case, I doubt Menander would care. Not until you’ve taken the Kingdom for yourself. Which I am very happy to help you do. Now, if you’re willing to listen, you may leave this ship not only with a means to your advancement, but your life as well.”

           

Lysander’s amber, veiny eyes scanned the ship. Beside him Aarturian grinned without humor. Behind him, Imperial guards waited, watching their every move.

           

Reluctantly, the Salamander choked out his reply. “Continue.”

           

“As I said before, if you coax your forlorn to the north, I will ensure their survival. Five hundred alchemists will go with your colonists. There, they will erect greenhouses, mine the volcanic heat beneath the ground, and ensure your forlorn survive the winter. With the first successful winter, more forlorn will come. In three years’ time, hundreds will have become thousands. They will start affecting the hunting patterns and take a chunk out of the fur and slave trade. Then and only then will the Skald tribes come down to drive your forlorn off the continent. When that happens, you will do absolutely nothing.”

           

Lysander was visibly confused. “I’m sorry?”

           

“You and the nobility of the Kingdom will not do anything to save them. Instead, you will show the millions of forlorn across the Kingdom just how little their lives matter to Menander and his house. Harralheim will become your rallying cry. And with my Saironian arms, that army of forlorn will make you King of Halicarnassus.”

           

“And you? What will you do? What do you gain out of any of this?”

           

“That, my dear prince, is simple. I will protect the forlorn abandoned in the north. I will drive back the Skald and claim the colonies you founded. Albeit, under the crimson star in place of your hegemony. In short, I will take Harralheim for my own.”

           

“Outlandish. That is the only word I have for this scheme. There is much you’re not telling me. There is no scenario, no plot in my mind where I can comprehend why you need me to facilitate your conquest. Not when you could just as easily invade the north on a whim.”

           

“Does it matter?”

           

The trio grew silent as a new breeze enveloped them in the sea’s scent of brine and ammonia. Tasiana sighed, clasping her hands together as she leaned over the railing. She should have been nervous. Such back-alley diplomacy was where she had seen her mother flounder, even crumble. However, contrary to what Nassian elites like Lysander believed, her mother’s weakness was where Tasiana drew strength. Because watching her mother’s failures imparted lessons of which princelings like Lysander could only dream.

           

Lysander’s forked tongue flicked between his scaled lips. Then, the Salamander spoke, “I sow the seeds of your invasion. In return, you build me an army rivaling that of AftóMenanderUs? King of the Odran, the Savannah, Nassians, Marchborn, and Agrippa?”

           

“Surpassing. Not rivaling,” Tasiana corrected him. “Rifles, cannon, powder, grain, cirrus, airships. Whatever you lack, I shall provide. In whatever category Menander’s forces surpass your own, I will tilt the scale to yours.”

           

“So, not only will I trick my people to a false utopia, but I shall also be made a regicide. When it is all over, when the fires of the Kingdom’s civil war have been extinguished by Saironian waters, I will reign over not but ashes.”

           

To that, Tasiana grinned. “Tell me, Prince. Is it better to rule ashes or not to rule at all?”