King Aer Roggarth III.

Arrows careened off the interlocking shields of our defensive wall, rebel bows all but ineffectual against the mail and steel plate with which the Ward Guard were outfitted.

The rebel line swayed with mixed enthusiasm, taunting my soldiers from across the square and trying to bait them out of line. I was tempted to order the charge, but reminded myself there were worse things than peasant hunters and tool-waving malcontents lurking in the shadows beyond the palace gate. Our position was safe enough for the time being; the rabble was wary of the silver-inlaid halberds facing them over our kite shields, securing the palace while my carpenters worked furiously to repair the damaged gates.

"How long, Chief?" I called.

"Soon, sire," Chief Mattors answered, desperation in his voice.

His team's hammers rose and fell at a frantic pace, rejoining boards those things had shattered with comparative ease.

My eyes were drawn and held by two carcasses, still smoldering on the flagstones nearby. Six guards fell in that initial assault before Lieutenant Valik slew them and regrouped his men to push the rebels outside the yawning gate.

As I watched, another guardsman went down when an arrow found the narrow gap over the shield in front of him and below the visor of his burgonet.

"Make them strong, Mattors!" I ordered, "but get it done—the fripperies may be added later."

"As you say, majesty!"

"Wandeers incoming, sire!" Lieutenant Valik of the Ward Guard called, directing my attention to the colorful unit advancing from the right flank. He dashed off to prepare the line for the radiance unit's advance.

"It's about damned time," I cursed. Most of the royal guard were already chasing demons about the Ward, so it had taken some time to assemble the next watch. "Form ranks and offer quarter, Captain," I called to Julaen Raliggi, the Captain of Wandeers.

"Yes Majesty!" He returned with an abbreviated bow and flourish of his wide-brimmed hat. "Behind the shield wall, men! Form up!"

With practiced precision two score wandeers took up positions behind the Ward Guard. The royal guard, in gleaming breastplates, tricolor tabards, and armed with shining rapiers and wands hanging from blue baldrics, were the dragon of Dollif. Though sometimes disparaged by other units as overly pretty, the royal guard's bite was by no means dainty. Some wore gleaming open-faced helms like the Ward Guard, while others preferred the wide-brimmed hats adorned by plumes of colorful feathers like their captain.

"Three ranks, first on guard!" Raliggi ordered, drawing his sword so it gleamed in the glow of the amber streetlights. His men, arranged in standing rows three deep, took a step and staggered their positions, tabards swirling. The first rank took a knee so each rank behind them could clearly see the foe.

I sensed unease in the darkness beyond the gate. Though they could see little of what was happening behind the Ward Guards' tall shields, they surely counted veterans among their number who had seen wandeers in action.

"Halberdiers, withdraw to flanks!" Lieutenant Valik commanded, near the gate. The Ward Guard raised their pole axes and moved smartly to the sides. There was a murmur of voices outside as the rebels tried to make sense of what was happening. Some voices raised in alarm. Others in bravado, considering a charge on the gate.

"Present wands!" Captain Raliggi shouted, raising his sword.

As one, the wandeers drew and brandished their wands.

The devices, each attuned to its wielder, had been in use in Dollif for a century, and in that time the royal guard and its victories had become famous through Terrok. Their design had changed over time, from the original straight wand to a right angled version with an upright grip that improved aim and comfort—like a hand crossbow without the bow.

At the tip of each was an illumantium crystal focus, pulsing softly with daytide radiance. Above the butt of every ash wand, a wandeer's thumb poised over a triglyph, ready to unleash arcane hell.

"Offer the quarter, Valik!" I called, reminding the lieutenant of his duty. As wielders of such awesome power, it was Dollifite tradition to offer any foe facing a squadron of wandeers a final chance to surrender.

"Royal quarter offered," Valik called into the darkness. "Drop arms and submit to the king's justice ... this constitutes your final warning!"

There was a distant rumbling of uneasy shouts and calls beyond. I clearly made out the words "We'll be executed!" and "Down with the king!" among the others. I sighed, disappointed but not surprised.

Still, I waited a ten count before giving the signal that would seal our enemies' doom.

"Forward, fools! Before they loose!" A booming voice called in the distance, and there was a general cry from many throats as a mass of people suddenly rushed toward the gate. I had a sense of shadowy movements larger than men in the darkness behind the surge.

My lips tightened and I nodded to Raliggi, who relayed the gesture to Valik.

"Shields down!" Valik called, and as one the Ward Guard turned their kite shields sideways and knelt.

"Second rank, loose!" Raliggi cried immediately, lowering his rapier toward the foe.

The wandeers standing in the second row, bodies turned sideways so the wands of the third row could aim, touched thumbs to trigger glyphs, and their wands flared with blinding blue light.

Thirteen bolts of pure energy blasted forward, cutting through the night with loud cracks of displaced air. Thirteen victims fell, lifeless and crackling with arcane energy as the unerring bolts found their targets.

My jaw tightened, and I told myself that rebels were no longer my subjects.

The wandeers who had loosed the bolts sagged to one knee, making room for the rank behind them. There was no pain in using a thumb wand, but when the triglyph converted its wielders' energy to magic, the physical toll was instantaneous.

Most of a wandeer's training was in fencing, agility and endurance. Wand use itself was uncomplicated and deadly once a wandeer was bound to his or her wand. The Roggarth monarchy guarded the secrets of illumantium with a zeal only outshone by love for our people, but I trembled at the thought that one day armies of wandeers might face off across battlefields, littering the world with dead because of our legacy. If, for example, a rabble uprising was lucky enough to sack the palace, even long enough to discover our secrets... Thoughts like these kept me awake at night.

"Third rank, loose!" Raliggi commanded, using the traditional commands for archery units the wandeers had replaced. Another dozen rebels dropped dead in their tracks. The third row took a knee, and immediately the first rank stood, followed by the recovered second.

"First rank, loose!" Raliggi ordered, and again the blinding flash seared itself on the vision, the miniature thunderclaps wore on our ears, and a dozen unlucky men and women fell dead as the wandeers assumed their initial positions.

"Shields up!" Valik shouted, and his Ward Guard stood, interlocking their shields in time to meet the remaining rebels. The assault was underwhelming, broken as it was by the wandeers, and the guardsmen had no trouble holding their positions, lashing out with swords wherever an opening presented itself.

Valik looked back at me, clearly wondering whether to order his halberdiers back into position. I nodded. Whether out of pity or a desire to save my wandeers in reserve, I was sure the Ward Guard could mop up the remaining rabble without much more difficulty. At Valik's command, the halberdiers moved into ranks behind the shields and began spearing opponents.

Forty dead in three counts. With a division of wandeers, the royal guard could take apart any force on the continent, if only so much illumantium could be found.

"Captain Raliggi, take some of your men to the gatehouse to pick off archers," I ordered. "Leave the rest in reserve."

"Yes majesty," he said, and called off two sergeants and their squads to the gates. The remaining wandeers, recovered from the first volley, stood facing the melee and waiting patiently. Raliggi moved behind his men, organizing several to watch the walls in each direction, should any get past the sentries there.

"I commend you, your majesty," a gravely voice I recognized said, behind me. "Your wandeers do you proud."

"Thank you Sir Perinor," I said to The Hand's commander. I had not realized he was in the palace. "Once my guard is assembled, they make the work seem easy. I judge, by your presence, that your men have taken care of the force seen moving toward the cathedral grounds?"

"Oh yes," the graying knight said with a somber smile. "My men are, even now, combing the grounds for any sign of further resistance."

"Your men?" I asked, indicating the forty or fifty men filing out of the palace behind him. "Who are these with you, then?"

"A small force looking for direction," Perinor said. "May I present the Second Horn of Sendarmo, led by Aldus Leocci." The tall youth stepped forward, and bowed formally, his face grim.

"Ah, young Aldus," I said in greeting. With Perinor's reminder, I recognized the gold horns of House Leocci on their black surcoats and shields immediately. "You have certainly grown into a fine young man. If you are half the marshal your uncle is, you are most welcome. Please deploy your men above the gate. I hope to have the last of the demons eradicated by first light, but your archers would be useful there."

Aldus Leocci raised an eyebrow, but gestured his archers forward. They seemed slow to carry out my order, as if unused to following the boy.

"Perinor," I said, ignoring the odd lack of discipline and turning back to the priest. "Please offer what insight you can about the nature of this sudden menace."

"I believe this little matter will be concluded even sooner than you think, sire," Perinor said, his lips rising in a curl of satisfaction. An odd expression, but he continued. "Tell me, is it true that the Wandeers have never been defeated in an even conflict?"

His expression troubled me, but I saw no irony in the question. "The wandeers have only ever been defeated by vastly superior numbers or treachery." Before us the street quieted as the last of the rebel charge broke and fled. We hadn't lost a single man. "Why do you ask?"

"It may be my own paranoia speaking," Perinor laughed, "but it seems to me that any force seeking to overcome the royal guard would be foolish to meet them on fair terms."

"Yes, true," I said, studying Perinor with a frown. Perhaps he too saw the strange desperation in the rebel attack on my palace. Foolish indeed, even with demonic aid. During hard times, riots erupted in the poor areas of Connorton, Connor Square, or the harbor wards because an untrained mob directed at the palace was unlikely to have any effect. Yet here they were, at least fifty dead by my count already, and still determined to show themselves at the gate.

Why?

"This 'army' of monsters and malcontents is hardly well led," I continued. "They have all but thrown themselves onto our pikes. Even the two demons leading the charge were..." As my eyes moved across the bailey to find the charred remains, they alighted on a sight vastly more horrific. My voice died away as the blood drained from my face.

"No!" I cried.

"I suspect misdirection, sire," Perinor leered, somewhere behind me.

Only Captain Raliggi, in the process of ordering his men about the bailey saw the danger. "Down!" he bellowed, diving into the wandeer before him and pulling him to the ground.

"Loose!" Aldus Leocci commanded at the same time. His two dozen archers arrayed in loose formation behind my wandeers let fly, cutting them down almost to the man.

Time crawled to a standstill about me as they fell, shock clear on their faces, many with arrows in their backs. Others pierced through the arms or legs. Standhope, Overlane, Gent, Beckfarrow; I knew them all. Each loss was a fortune in training and trust that could not be replaced. One arrow, gone astray, felled a halberdier instead, his mail pierced at the knee.

Raliggi rolled to his feet and blasted two archers—a heroic display of stamina to loose two bolts in succession—and received three arrows in the chest for his heroism. 

I drew my own wand, decorated by gold braids and a porcelain grip, but no less deadly than a wandeer's. It was outright desperation to imagine I could have a personal effect on the night's outcome. As monarch, it was not my duty to take part in combat directly, but rage rose in me and I was helpless to do ought else.

Before I could aim, my arm was caught in a vice-like hold and the spell went wild. Perinor deprived me of the weapon with titanic strength. I gaped at him, stunned. 

"I mentioned this 'little matter' would be wrapped up sooner than you thought, sire" he said in amused tones. "Naturally, I was speaking of your monarchy."