Tamas raised his head when the door to the balcony opened and he suddenly realized he’d been dozing.
“Sir,” Olem said. “It’s time.”
Tamas stood up, shaking the sleep from his head. He went to the door, holding it open for Lady Winceslav. “My lady.”
The group filed out onto the balcony. Tamas looked out over the Garden and the sight took his breath away. Not a single cobblestone could be seen between the pack of bodies below. People stood shoulder to shoulder, the murmur of voices sounding like the lap of waves on the beach. The crowd filled the King’s Garden to excess and poured out into the five connecting streets. There was no end to the throng for as far as the eye could see.
“Sir,” Olem said.
Tamas forced himself to look away from the crowd. He prided himself on being a man who felt little fear, but the size of such a throng made him feel small. He wondered briefly if he was mad. No one could control that writhing mass. The looks on the faces of his companions assured him that they shared his awe – even dry, annoyed Ondraus was speechless.
Tamas adjusted his hat to block out the noonday sun and ran a hand across his cheek. He realized he hadn’t shaved in two days and the stubble was thick on his jaw. Hardly appropriate for a field marshal in a dress uniform.
The sound below them had sunk to a barely audible whisper. He turned and felt a surge of his heart when he realized that every face was directed at him.
“Never have I seen a crowd so large. An audience so willing,” Tamas murmured. “Is everything ready?” he said to Olem.
“Yes, sir.”
Tamas scanned the rooftops of the surrounding buildings. His powder mages and his best marksmen lined those rooftops, rifles sighted into the crowd. Tamas tried to picture the face of the Privileged who’d ripped apart his mages the night before. Weathered, older, with gray in her hair. Wrinkles in the corner of her eyes, and a robe that smelled of dust. He wondered if she’d show here in a bid to rescue the king. Up at Skyline Palace, visible on the horizon to the east, Taniel and the mercenaries were picking up her trail.
Tamas glanced at his companions on the balcony and wondered what they’d say if they knew they were bait for a Privileged. He could sense that Olem’s third eye was open and examining the crowd.
“Give the signal,” Tamas said.
Olem lifted a pair of red signal flags. He waved them twice.
The gates to Sabletooth opened with a grinding shriek heard for half a mile around. The crowd turned away from Tamas, bodies twisting in giant waves as their attention was fixed to the opposite side of the King’s Garden. Tamas leaned forward, heart ringing like a hammer in his chest.
Mounted soldiers poured through the gates of Sabletooth. They pushed their way through the crowd. Tamas could make out Sabon’s shiny black pate at the head of the column, shouting directions. The crowd was forced back and a cordon opened. A simple prison wagon followed them out.
The crowd roared as with one voice and surged forward. For a moment Tamas feared that Sabon and his men would be pulled down. Would the king even reach the guillotine?
The soldiers pushed the crowd back. They inched across the square, soldiers fighting the mob the entire time. The king’s cart came to rest before the guillotines, right below Tamas’s balcony. Soldiers stretched out behind the wagon, forcing the cordon to remain open like a giant snake through the multitudes. Tamas swallowed a lump. Between the two rows of soldiers was a string of over a thousand people, legs connected by chains. The string led all the way back to Sabletooth. They were nobles and their oldest sons, plus many of their wives. Their rumpled finery meant nothing in the jaws of the mob as spittle and spoiled food flew past Tamas’s soldiers.
“The headman’s going to retire after this one,” Olem said.
The sight both made Tamas’s heart soar and sickened him, all at once. This was the culmination of decades of planning. He trembled in excitement and shook with self-doubt. If there was one action he’d be remembered for in the histories, this would be it.
There was a commotion down Queen Floun Avenue to Tamas’s right. His heart jumped into this throat. “Rifle,” he ordered.
Olem handed Tamas a rifle.
“Spare charge.”
Tamas took the spare powder charge and broke it between his fingers. He touched the black powder to his tongue and felt an instant sizzle there. He shuddered and clutched at the railing as the world warped in his sight. He squeezed his eyes closed, and when he opened them, everything was in sharp focus. He could pick out individual hairs on the heads six floors below, and he could see half a mile down Queen Floun Avenue as if he was standing there himself.
“Dragoons,” he said. “A whole company.”
The dragoons wore the decorated uniforms of the king’s Hielmen and pushed forward upon mighty warhorses. They shoved through the crowd as if it was an empty street, stampeding over women and children without a glance back. Swords were drawn, pistols out as they thundered forward.
Olem lifted the signal flag in one hand without being prompted. He twirled it over his head, then leveled it horizontally down Queen Floun Avenue. Tamas could see black-coated men, mere dots in the crowds, begin to head in that direction. They were big, surly men from the famed Mountainwatch, brought in just to work the crowds. The riflemen on the buildings above Queen Floun Avenue shifted to look down upon the dragoons. Tamas spared a glance at Olem: Sabon had briefed him well. Professional, unblinking, even when the Hielmen threatened the very heart of their plans.
“Don’t fire until my signal,” Tamas said. Olem’s flag jolted out the order.
The dragoons slowed as they reached the King’s Garden. The crowds were too thick even for their hundred-and-forty-stone animals. More bodies disappeared beneath their horses as there was no place to flee. People turned toward the dragoons.
The Hielmen’s horses came to a complete stop. Where else could they go? Climb upon the very heads of the mob? The Hielmen frantically urged their mounts forward as wails went up behind them, friends and families screaming in anger, trying desperately to help their wounded.
The first Hielman was pulled off his mount and disappeared beneath the surface of the crowd. Hands reached for the others, who began swinging their sabers in panic. A pistol shot went off, and the crowd responded as one: with a roar of fury.
One Hielman lasted for several minutes, forcing his mount in a circle, hooves thrashing, sword swinging to hold off the crowds, before he joined his comrades, pulled down and gone. Tamas heard a gasp of disbelief. Lady Winceslav fainted. A head rose above the crowd. It still wore a Hielman’s tall, plumed hat, but it most definitely lacked a body. It trailed blood and tissue as it was passed from hand to hand. Other heads soon joined it.
Tamas forced himself to watch. This was all his doing. For Adro. For the people.
For Erika.
“A bad way to go, sir,” Olem said. He took a drag of his cigarette, watching the crowd with Tamas when even Charlemund had turned away.
“Aye,” Tamas said.
The king and queen were led onto the guillotine platform. There were six guillotines, lined up and ready, operators waiting at attention. Manhouch and his wife stood before the crowd, pelted by rotten food. Tamas blinked as a chunk of bloody meat slapped the queen in the face, leaving red smeared on her alabaster skin and her cream nightgown. She fainted, falling to the floor of the platform. Manhouch didn’t seem to notice.
Tamas glanced back toward the Hielmen’s heads. They were making their way through the crowd, closer to the guillotine.
The king stared up at Tamas, then fumbled in his pocket, removing a soiled piece of paper. He cleared his throat and started to speak, though Tamas doubted anyone but the headsman could hear his words. The noise grew as Manhouch tried to yell his speech, until he finally fell silent, chin falling as he gave up. The headsman pulled on Manhouch’s chains. Frozen, the king did not move until the headsman cuffed him on the back of the neck and dragged him to the guillotine.