Across the Parnassian Sea…
The hour before dawn was a moment of pause in the cheerfully corrupt and deeply superstitious city of Kota Gelangi.
Even the hardest-drinking merchant princes had staggered home, and the politicians and gossip-mongers were yet to rise from their beds. As Tristo Arpin bumped a handcart over the cobbles of Rua Capitolana, lamps winked out and wings fluttered above, swarming in clouds as dense and black as a gathering storm.
The bats provided his livelihood, which was removing the guano that splattered Liberty Square. His sons, who were a great disappointment, called it shit-scraping. Tristo liked to remind them that there were worse ways to earn a living—just ask the poor souls who toiled in the mines.
The three men paused before the steps of the popular assembly. Everyone called it the Red House for its brick façade. Directly across the square sat the limestone offices of the gossip-mongers, whose broadsheets could be relied upon to deliver scandals, sexual indiscretions, and the crimes of the day, preferably violent.
They set to work. For a while, the rhythmic sluice of water and scrape of stiff bristles on stone were the only sounds. In the gray light, Tristo’s broom caught a paper idol blown from one of the shrines—a sinuous form with painted blue scales and a bit of scarlet felt glued to its mouth. For a tongue, he supposed, or flames.
He was a city man and had never seen a Sinn. Prayed he never would. In his grandparents’ time, the draconic monsters had burned large swathes of Kota Gelangi. The creatures never returned to the capital, but they still plagued the mines, and people feared and worshipped them in equal measure.
Tristo picked up the soggy idol and returned it to the nearest shrine. It was just paper, but best to be respectful with such things. As his gaze drifted upward to the copper dome of the Red House, he noticed something dangling from the spire. Something that hadn’t been there yesterday.
Tristo shaded his eyes, squinting at the object. On holidays, the provincial flag of Satu Jos would fly from the dome, a flame rising from a forge encircled by iron ingots. But it was not a holiday, and this was no flag. As he stared, a crow landed on it. Then another.
“Finish here,” he said, thrusting the broom into his eldest son Gil’s hands. “I’ll be back.”
“What is it?” Gil asked, but Tristo was already crossing the square. The night watchman had worked there for two decades and Tristo knew him well. He went around back to a door with a brass plaque that said Mail & Deliveries.
After half a minute of vigorous pounding, it was answered by an elfin, balding man in a blue jacket that was buttoned crookedly. “Arpin,” he said in surprise. “Do you need to use the necessary room?”
“No,” Tristo replied. “But something has caught upon the spire.”
Dimas cupped a hand around his ear. “Did you say caught fire?”
The watchman had been going deaf for years, but his nephew was a delegate’s aide and made sure he kept his job. Tristo repeated himself, speaking slowly so Dimas could read his lips.
“Is it a bat?” Dimas asked, looking worried now. Bats were a protected species in Kota.
“Not a bat,” Tristo said firmly. “Bigger.”
The watchman stood aside. “Arpin, you’ll come with me to check, won’t you?” He winced. “My knees.”
Tristo didn’t want to. Surely it was just an empty flour sack, or perhaps a large paper idol caught by the wind. Yet the shape of the thing bothered him. And the way it didn’t move in the wind, as if it was heavy.
No, he didn’t much care to take a closer look, but Dimas was blinking at him hopefully, so Tristo came inside. The corridor smelled of expensive carpets and polished wood. Dimas led him past smiling portraits of past consuls. They reached a nondescript door and beyond it, a winding staircase that spiraled upward through the heart of the building.
“A long climb,” the watchman warned, lighting a lamp.
Tristo’s legs ached from hours on his feet, but morbid curiosity pulled him forward. They ascended in silence, breath puffing. Through narrow windows, he glimpsed the awakening city, coaches and carts rolling down avenues, smoke rising from kitchen chimneys, shrines coming alive with morning supplicants.
The stairs seemed endless, and they paused several times to rest. At last, they emerged onto a landing with a door leading outside.
“The dome gallery,” the watchman explained, unlocking the door with a key. “Mind your step.”
A narrow railed walkway encircled the copper dome. Kota Gelangi spread out beneath them, stone and terra cotta broken by green parks and a muddy brown ribbon of river. On another day, Tristo would have marveled at the view. But his eyes were drawn upward, to the spire that rose another fifteen cubits above them. And to what hung from it.
For a few seconds, he could not make sense of what he was seeing. Then Dimas was noisily sick, startling the crows. They exploded upward with raucous protests. When Tristo saw what they had perched upon, what they were doing, his stomach twisted, bile rising in his throat.
“Travian’s bones,” he breathed, pressing a fist to his mouth.
“We must inform the authorities,” Dimas said weakly. “The vice consul, the witches . . .”
Tristo nodded, not trusting himself to speak. He stumbled back towards the stairs, Dimas following. By the time they stepped outside, the square was filling with gawkers. As Dimas went to fetch help, a group of smartly dressed gossip-mongers came running over, notepads in hand, shouting over each other.
“Is that what it looks like?”
