Alchemist, arcanist, artificer, and aeromancer, Alaeron thought. Well, why not? He finished connecting the pieces of his arcane engine. "Hold on, ah, my lord?"

  "I am an emperor now," the noble said. "You may call me Your Soaring Highness."

  "Yes. Of course. Hold tight." Alaeron made sure the golden chain was secure, the engine connected to the platform, and then slipped the disc into his mouth, maintaining a grip on the chain with one hand.

  His previous experience had prepared him, but it didn't make things any easier. His consciousness expanded, his body and mind strained for tools he didn't possess...but he tried to focus on something simple. Rise.

  The engine hummed, the gearwheel turned, the golden chain tightened ...and the ten-foot-wide balcony rose smoothly into the air, dragged along after the engine, which now floated at the end of the taut chain like a kite on a string. That level of levitation barely required any effort at all—like lifting a teacup with your hand, perhaps. Of course, even holding up a teacup would get exhausting given enough time, but Alaeron didn't plan to do this for that long.

  The noble pounded his fists on the arms of his throne and cheered as they rose up, five feet, ten feet, fifteen, twenty. The debased Shory followers on the ground hooted and waved their spears in the air.

  "Higher!" the noble screamed. "Higher!"

  Instead, Alaeron went lower. The noble shrieked in outrage as the balcony settled back to the ground. As the enraged Shory emperor stood up from his throne, Alaeron gave the golden chain a practiced tug and tore it loose from the gearwheel, shutting down the whole engine. He spat the disc out of his mouth. It was speckled with blood, and his nose was trickling a bit too, but his ears and eyes seemed fine. Marvelous. Using the arcane engine at this level would kill him relatively slowly.

  "Take me back up!" the noble screamed

  "Rescue my assistants," Alaeron said.

  "I could kill you," the noble said.

  "My death won't give you wings," Alaeron replied. His voice was mild. He was too tired to scream and shout and make speeches. So he just shrugged.

  Until the noble lifted his arm, and Alaeron realized the lunatic might kill him anyway, and then he spoke very quickly: "Why content yourself with just a throne room when the whole city could fly? Save my assistants, and with their help, I will make great things happen!"

  The noble lowered his hand. "All right. Yes, a flying chair is fine, a flying city is better." He turned to his followers. "Gather our forces. We strike the Domes at dusk."

  "I'm going with you," Alaeron said. If possible, he would get Skiver and Jaya and flee this lunatic.

  The noble smiled. "Yes. Because I am going, and where I go, you go, Aeromancer."

  ∗ ∗ ∗

  The domes glittered black and silver under the moon, which seemed bigger and brighter here than it ever had in Andoran, or even Numeria. And the stars! Arrayed in such profusion, each one lighting up unknown worlds. Alaeron felt a stab of sadness. If only he had the resources to use the arcane engine to its fullest capacity, he could see all those worlds. Perhaps if he traveled to Absalom and underwent the test of the Starstone, and succeeded and became a god, he could join Desna as the god of the stars, and leave the cares of this world behind.

  Perhaps.

  But for now, he had to concentrate on not dying.

  The army of the Shory Empire was a ragtag bunch, perhaps a hundred soldiers armed with weapons that ranged from spears tipped with bits of broken metal to ancient ceremonial swords encrusted with gold and gems. They had crept through hidden tunnels, emerging quite close to the Domes of the Polymatum, and now they massed behind their leader ...which meant, unfortunately, massing behind Alaeron, too. He would have much preferred to be at the rear.

  "The daemons have deceived us!" the noble shouted, loud enough to make Alaeron wince. "We have given them souls and slaves, and they promised us the skies, but what have they given us? Empty wind, empty words. But the gods are good. They have brought us aeromancers, yes, three of them, but two are trapped below. We will free them. We will slay!"

  Alaeron couldn't tell whether the noble's people even understood him, but they seemed eager enough to fight—to live in the tunnels in the Pit of Endless Night, they must have been accustomed to fighting.

  "Now!" the noble shouted, and raced toward the domes, gripping Alaeron by one wrist and dragging him along like a child's doll. The debased Shory descendants followed, eerily silent. Alaeron had never been in a charge before, but he'd expected more whooping—then again, battle cries would rather give away their tenuous element of surprise.

  They reached a narrow hole at the base of one dome, no wider than two men going abreast, and Alaeron prayed there wouldn't be guards posted there. He knew little of military strategy, but even he'd heard enough songs and poems to know that a small force could hold a narrow pass for a long time against massed attackers. The fact that the noble leapt into the pit without hesitation suggested that, in addition to his total ignorance of Aeromantic Infandibulum, he also had a profound lack of knowledge about military matters. What exactly did Shory nobles know, then? Little of value, it seemed, which might explain why Kho had fallen. Alaeron was Andoren: he knew all about the evils of decadent, useless aristocracy.

  No denying the fellow was brave, though. Wielding only a ridiculous ornamental sword, he slew the two sleepy rats guarding the tunnel, not even letting go of Alaeron in the process. The alchemist nearly tripped on one of the corpses, though fortunately he kept his feet—otherwise the press of bodies following would have trampled him. Yes, the rear would definitely have been Alaeron's preference, had his wishes been taken into account. Better the trampler than the trampled.

  The noble spoke a word and a flurry of floating lights swirled into life, like a swarm of orange fireflies, casting enough light to see by. These tunnels were of soft earth rather than the bedrock of those in the Pit, and the passages had been made for smaller creatures, so Alaeron had to duck his head frequently to dodge away from roots and protruding rocks. There were numerous side-tunnels and branchings, but the noble never hesitated over which direction to choose. He'd been here before, clearly, doubtless to make his arrangements with the daemons. Alaeron wished he'd asked a few more questions about what to expect—

  They burst into a huge torchlit chamber, a little piece of Abaddon under the earth. The noble let go of Alaeron and ran, shrieking, toward a group of enormous creatures in the center of the cavern. The alchemist moved aside, pressing his back against the stone wall to the left of the tunnel, making way for the massed Shory warriors, who followed their master.

  Alaeron had never seen a leukodaemon. Numeria was not so terribly far from the Worldwound, and monstrous creatures sometimes strayed over the border, so he'd seen the corpses of terrible creatures, all tentacles and teeth and tongues. But these leukodaemons ...there were four moving about the cavern, each twice the height of a man or more, a sickly greenish aura clinging to them, and all surrounded by clouds of stinking flies. The mist of vermin and poison made it hard to make out their exact shapes, but they were spindly-limbed, and where their heads should have been, they had only the bleached bone skulls of horses—except one, which seemed to bear the skull of one of the monstrous lizards said to hunt deeper in the Mwangi Expanse. Were the skulls somehow their heads, or did they merely wear skulls as helmets or decorations, or—

  "Help us!" someone shouted, and Alaeron shook himself out of his numb shock. The Shory noble laid about him with his sword, slashing at the daemons, to no apparent effect. One of the leukodaemons swung its ponderous head toward him, and the noble suddenly vanished. At first, Alaeron thought he'd been killed, but then he realized the madman had simply wreathed himself in darkness again, along with many of his followers. Shory descendants were fighting with armored rats and wererats, kicking over piles of jewels and statues and all manner of relics and treasures. Kormak had said the leukodaemons poisoned the relics here, to spread strange plagues throughout the world—this must be where that poisoning happened.

  Alaeron shuddered. If they did bring Vadim treasures, they would kill him, and perhaps many other people in Almas. This expedition was doomed to failure, but worrying about Vadim's wrath was a problem for another day. He looked around for the source of the cry for help, but everything was chaos and smoke and flies and the clash of metal. The leukodaemons were loosing arrows, fired from enormous bows made of animal bones, killing debased Shory and their own rat-people indiscriminately.

  Alaeron climbed up on a heap of boulders and looked around the cavern. There—on the other side of the battle, of course—were stacks of cages made of metal and wood, holding all manner of creatures: apes, pigs, goats, hyenafolk, jungle cats ...and humans. "Help us!" someone within shouted, and Alaeron began to work his way around the edge of the cavern, sticking close to the wall, trying to avoid the fighting. One of the leukodaemon arrows struck the wall beside him, and where it impacted, writhing worms and greenish slime showered down. After that he ran, making straight for the cage. A dozen humans were inside, Jaya and Skiver among them, the rest presumably kidnapped villagers and sacrificial victims. Two or three were on the cage floor, moaning, glistening with sweat, obviously ill. Skiver grinned and reached through the bars of the cage to clasp Alaeron's hand. "Glad you could make it. Care to let us out?"

  Alaeron looked at the cage door. There was no lock, and when he rattled it, the door seemed welded shut. He pulled, but it didn't give. Alaeron sighed. "Just a moment."

  The feral mutagen. He'd considered taking it before the battle, but it made him savage—made him want to fight—and he didn't want to give up his wits in these circumstances. But now he had little choice. He had no bombs to blow apart the door, and didn't have time to let acid eat the bars. He needed strength. Alaeron tossed back the mutagen, grunted as it hit his system, then shuddered as claws tore from his hands, muscles bulged throughout his body, and teeth lengthened in his mouth. Skiver drew back in alarm, and Alaeron gripped the cage door and strained. He snarled and growled as he pulled, muscles burning and straining, until the door popped free, its hinges squealing under his onslaught. Alaeron hurled the cage door at a pair of giant rats, then waded into the nearest node of the battle, opening rats with his claws, snarling at a wererat in a spiked helmet. He was about to charge a leukodaemon when Jaya screamed in his ear: "Alaeron, let's go!"

  The battle frenzy began to fade as he asserted his conscious mind over the bestial fury, and he shook himself, snarled in agreement, and followed her toward the tunnels. Some of the escapees were carrying their wounded, and with his feral senses, Alaeron could smell the stink of disease on them. He hoped the Uomoto healers were up to the task of saving them.

  The way out of the tunnels was easier: they just kept moving up. They met no resistance, and when they reached fresh air, some of the rescued Uomoto began to weep. "Hurry home," Jaya said, kissing a gray-haired man—perhaps her uncle?—on the cheek. A few of the villagers spoke to Alaeron in their own language, presumably thanking him, and he tried to be gracious even as the fangs crowding his mouth began to recede.

  "Let's go while we can," Skiver said. "I don't know who's going to survive that fight down there, but I don't want to hang about to congratulate either side on their victory."

  "Yes," Alaeron said. "Let's—"

  "Let's fly!" the noble crowed, leaping up from the hole at the base of the Domes, shadows trailing from his shoulders like a cloak. The villagers shrieked and ran from him—as well they might, since he'd stolen most of them from their homes. Jaya and Skiver stepped back, but didn't run, and Alaeron just raised his hands. "Yes, of course." He glanced at his companions. "I told him how you're my assistants. That I had to save you before we could make his city fly again."

  "Of course," Skiver said. "We're what you'd call essential."

  "Did your people win?" Alaeron said, inclining his head toward the pit.

  The noble frowned. "What? They're fighting leukodaemons. Deacons of disease. Handpicked—handmade?—followers of the Horseman of Pestilence. No, my people will all be slaughtered. It's sad, so sad, but that is the price of the sky!"

  Alaeron closed his eyes. Saving his friends had meant consigning those poor mad people to death. They'd chosen to follow the noble, true, but Alaeron had been the one to pit them against foes they couldn't possibly defeat. And their new emperor obviously cared nothing for the value of their lives.

  "Come, come," the noble said. "We go fast, must be fast, much to do, so much work, oh yes."

  Alaeron looked behind him. The freed Uomoto were all gone, back home, into the dark. That was something, at least.

  The noble hurried swiftly along, and Alaeron and the others went after him, moving as quickly as they could across the broken ground. The noble skipped like a child on his way to a party. "Hurry hurry, fast fast, while the daemons are still busy, yes, before they come looking for me—"

  The earth rumbled, and they all stopped and looked back at the domes. Something was moving at the base of one dome, wriggling out of the earth, and a cloud of buzzing black flies rose up before it.

  "Too late for that," Skiver said. He drew a knife, then looked at it, and snorted. "I might as well try to fight a bear with a spoon."

  "Boring, so boring," the noble said, as a leukodaemon slithered up out of the hole and stood. "I want to fly, not play with daemons!"

  As if in response to his words, the daemon spread terrible black wings, its horse-skull head or helmet swinging back and forth, scanning the night. The creature beat its wings and lifted a few feet off the ground, trying to get a better vantage.

  "Stupid daemon!" the noble shouted. "Why should it get to fly! Not fair not fair not fair!"

  That man was their only hope to fight off this demon. The man who'd just called the demon's attention by shouting at it. Alaeron didn't like those odds. "Jaya," he said. "Do you still have that sling?"

  She handed the sling over wordlessly, her eyes fixed on the daemon and its bow. The daemon drifted back to the earth, then started loping toward them.

  Alaeron had a few bottles on his person that contained substances so unique that he was loath to ever use them, because then he wouldn't have them any more. One bottle was made of magically treated glass, and contained a substance that Zernebeth had found deep in the Silver Mount, oozing from a shattered bank of machinery. She had insisted that the pink slime was alive, and that it responded to organic matter violently and unpleasantly. She hypothesized that the slime was a scavenger that destroyed organic waste for the denizens of the Mount, though she admitted it might be a weapon, instead. She'd only recovered a small quantity, and an even smaller quantity had found its way into Alaeron's possession. He hadn't studied it thoroughly, being distracted by his relics ...but perhaps it was time to use it anyway.

  Alaeron carefully removed the bottle—the slime inside sensed his warmth and surged toward his hand, making the bottle shift. The thing inside ate through most materials. It had taken Zernebeth ages to develop skymetal-infused glass that could resist its corrosive qualities.

  The glass would still shatter with a hard enough impact, though.

  Alaeron put the bottle in the sling, whirled it around and around, and slung the pink slime at the onrushing leukodaemon. The glass shattered, but the monster didn't slow. Jaya loosed arrows, and Skiver threw knives, and the Shory noble hurled insults—too annoyed to think of actually fighting, it seemed—but nothing had any effect.

  Alaeron dropped the sling and grabbed the two flasks he had nearest to hand—just alchemical fire, not even magical, but fire was good at burning out disease, so maybe ...He hurled the flasks just as the leukodaemon leapt into the air again, vast wings stretching out over them, blotting out the moon.

  The flasks of fire struck and burned merrily in the creature's wings, limning it in flame. The horse's skull on top seemed to be smiling. The daemon beat its wings, the flame barely an inconvenience, flies buzzing around it like an aura of foulness. The daemon drew its bow.

  And then dropped it. The bow fell from suddenly spasming claws, and the daemon tumbled after it, falling to the earth where it crouched, shuddering.

  Its skull fell off, bouncing all the way to Alaeron's feet. The bone itself was smoking, and had far more holes than eyes and nostrils could account for. There were smears of pink slime around the new openings.

  The daemon writhed, clawing at the place where its neck should have been. The slime had certainly hurt it, or at any rate distracted it, but Alaeron had no illusions that such a creature would die easily. "Run!" he shouted, and immediately led by example.

  Skiver and Jaya caught up with him, and the noble ran alongside, as easily as if taking an evening stroll. "Nice, nice, very nice," he cackled. "You will be my Minister of Artillery, too, perhaps, Aeromancer. We will raise the city high, and cast the daemons down, yes, we will!" The noble gestured behind him, and darkness streamed from his fingers like smoke from a fire, a cloud of impenetrable night billowing out to cover their escape. The noble might have done something like that earlier, Alaeron thought sourly. He was unlikely to get his hands on something as exotic as that pink slime again.

  Not that it mattered, really. Alaeron was by no means certain he would even survive the night. But at least he hadn't been captured and caged by a leukodaemon. One should celebrate whatever victories one could, he supposed.

  ∗ ∗ ∗

  "Our destiny is upon us!" the noble shouted from his throne. "We'll shake the daemons from the domes, the shadows from their hill, the marids from the Cistern Major, the flying apes from their towers, yes! The Shory will rise again! And we will rain devastation down upon the upstart empires, yes, the ones who've risen from the ruins we left behind, they will burn. You will make bombs for me, Aeromancer, and we will turn all their cities into ashes."

  Alaeron paused in his assembly of the arcane engine. He'd planned to give the Shory possession of the device, to tell him the rest of the city was beyond saving, and hope the madman might be satisfied with a mere flying platform ...but even that was too great a weapon to give him. The engine could lift huge weights, Alaeron was sure. What if the noble added on to his platform? Enslaved others to build for him? Lashed the engine to some great temple or castle? What if someday he did manage, if not a flying city, at least a lethal airship, a flying citadel? A madman who owned the skies ...Alaeron had led innocents to their deaths today. Could he unleash the Shory noble on the world as well?