What was left of his bluster vanished altogether as the bodyguard troop began to pile out of the first carriage. Dios knew all about the carbines which the revolutionaries used. Then Slvasta himself came striding down the platform, the self-proclaimed prime minister of the new People’s Interim Congress. Fright began to leak out of the station manager’s mind. If Slvasta was here, Dios was going to suffer as Varlan had. Fear gave way to outright astonishment as he saw Captain Philious walking beside Slvasta.

Hundreds of local people were absorbing the station manager’s involuntary gifting as Slvasta came up to him. ‘Did the express from Varlan stop here?’

‘Uh, no, not really, sir. Sirs! It switched to the Erond line. My signalman was forced to open the points for them. He had to; she held a gun to his head.’

‘So nobody got off?’

‘No, sir. I don’t think so. It barely stopped.’

‘Okay. Now, where is the county regiment headquarters?’

*

The Dios county regimental headquarters was a huge four-storey stone building stretching for over two hundred metres along Fothermore Street at the centre of the city. Behind the façade were several acres of grounds dominated by the broad parade ground, then various stables, barracks, officers’ quarters, a shooting range, stores, even a small regimental museum, and of course the armoury, all laid out in a neat grid and surrounded by a three-metre-high wall. Eighteen hundred years ago, Captain Kanthori had decreed that all regiments should fortify their compounds in case their county ever came under siege from Fallers. People would have a refuge until help arrived.

The Dios regiment had loyally maintained its fortifications for all those centuries. Slvasta was very aware of that as he led his troop along Fothermore Street. There were no pedestrians left on the road; people had been clearing out of the way from the moment he left the train station. News of his arrival had flashed across the city; now ex-sight played over him from behind a thousand locked doors.

Up ahead, there was a final outbreak of loud knocks and thuds as the big iron-bound shutters were slammed across the windows of the regimental headquarters. The huge solid gates in the archway entrance at the middle of the façade had been shut several minutes earlier.

As he drew closer, he saw the rifle barrels emerge from narrow slits in the stone, making the building bristle. He looked at Captain Philious beside him. ‘Talk to the brigadier.’

‘Perhaps.’

Slvasta turned to him in astonishment. ‘What?’

‘I don’t believe we’ve had the discussion of what happens after.’

Andricea stepped forward, drawing a wickedly sharp dagger. ‘You little shit.’

‘No.’ Slvasta held his hand up. Andricea scowled, but sheathed the dagger again.

‘What do you want?’ Slvasta asked.

‘What are your plans for my family?’

‘Normalization.’

‘Excuse me?’

‘You start life again level with the rest of us. Work hard, earn a living.’

Captain Philious looked at him in contemptuous amusement. ‘Great Giu, you really believe that, don’t you? Just how naive are you?’

Bethaneve stepped up. ‘All right, here’s the deal. Amnesty for everyone involved in the revolution, no matter what their crime. Your family are released from our custody, and you keep one third of all your estates and shares, crud like that. You devolve true power to a democratically elected parliament with a written bill of rights guaranteeing civil liberties for all citizens.’

‘Are you crazy?’ Slvasta demanded. ‘You’d let him keep his money? That gives him power.’

‘Take away their constitutional position, and they’re just another bunch of useless hedonistic aristos. We’ve destroyed Trevene’s organization, my people made sure of that. Nobody’s going to follow him if he mounts a counter-revolution. In fact, let him try. It’ll use up his money even more quickly.’

‘No!’

‘Half of my estates,’ Captain Philious said.

‘Done.’

‘I said no,’ Slvasta snapped. He glared at the Captain. ‘Talk to the brigadier or your whole family will be executed.’

Captain Philious regarded him coolly. ‘One ’path from me and everyone on this street dies from those guns, myself included. Actually, no ’path from me will probably have the same result pretty soon; the regiment is getting a bit nervous, in case you hadn’t perceived. The three of you are all that’s left of the revolution’s leadership. It dies with you. The countryside will rise up under my relatives and march on Varlan. I expect the bloodshed will last for years.’

‘The Fallers!’ Slvasta yelled in an agony of anger. ‘They have the quantumbusters. They will kill us all!’

‘Then you have three choices. Keep me alive with a decent estate to maintain my lifestyle while you elect your genuinely democratic parliament, and the Dios regiment marching on Nigel’s nest. Death in the next couple of minutes. Or the Fallers victorious.’

‘That is not a choice.’

‘You swore an oath, Captain Slvasta, an oath to defend Bienvenido – all of Bienvenido – against the Fallers. The same Fallers who manipulated you and your friends into overthrowing my government, leaving this world in political chaos, all so they could snatch the greatest weapon of all. Your revolution was a fraud from start to finish. Now is your chance to put things right.’

Slvasta wanted to throw himself at the Captain, tear him apart. His rage sent blood pounding in his head under tremendous pressure, threatening to burst his temple open. All he saw was the undead corpse of Coulan, sprawled on Balcome’s station platform, the Faller’s terrible, calm confidence as he spoke of their impending liberation. Then the Faller-Ingmar sneered victoriously up at him from the pit, reaching right out of the nightmare that never ended.

‘We will burn you from our world,’ he told the filthy memory loud and clear. ‘I swear it. No matter what the cost.’

‘Is that your answer?’ The Captain’s voice was so calm it was mockery.

‘Slvasta.’ Bethaneve was holding his arm, her face and mind alight with concern. ‘We will have eliminated the Captaincy. Maybe not how we thought, but there will be change now. People will have a voice; they will have justice.’

‘Yes,’ he whispered.

‘What?’ Captain Philious asked.

‘Yes!’ Bethaneve said, incensed. ‘We will march on Nigel’s nest. Together.’

‘For a moment there, you had me worried.’

‘And you will remain in our custody until this is over and we are back in Varlan, where the agreement will be signed.’

‘Naturally.’ Captain Philious turned to the daunting wall of the regimental headquarters, with dozens of rifles following his smallest move. ‘Brigadier Doyle,’ he ’pathed, ‘could you step out here for a moment, please?’

*

Two hundred regiment troops came with them, led by Brigadier Doyle herself. The Dios station manager hurriedly organized two trains, one to carry the horses in long open trucks. Terrestrial horses only, Slvasta insisted. Within an hour, both trains were steaming fast for Erond.

*

They came to the first bridge twenty minutes after leaving Erond – an old stone spandrel arch over a modest, but fast-flowing river. There was a three-metre gap in the middle where explosives had blasted the stones apart. Most had fallen into the water, while others were embedded in the muddy banks.

When the regiment came galloping down the road, there were dozens of people milling round trying to decide what to do. The road on either side was clogged with horses and carts. Slvasta rode his horse to the start of the bridge, forcing people out of the way. He stared at the gap for a long minute. Behind him the regiment came to a halt, ex-sight straining forward to find out what the problem was, their horses whinnying, stomping about anxiously.

‘They’ll have blown every bridge on the way to Adeone,’ Javier said, reining in his horse beside Slvasta. ‘You know that, don’t you?’