Tarfel was staring down at the trundling engine, calculating its path. ‘How long will the city last if the second plains bridge is sundered?’

Matil did not answer, but the seneschal was at her elbow. ‘We have water from the wells and aqueducts, but our food stores are … minimal. We have not … prepared.’

‘Nobody could have foreseen this!’ Ghiz snapped, elbowing into their conversation. Tarfel’s mouth twitched, but he said nothing. ‘Exalted, we must sally! That engine will cut us from the plains!’

The engine halted, a thin ribbon of smoke already rising into the wind above. It rocked on its giant wheels, shuffling, then settled. A moment later, the first black arrow screeched into the sky, fizzing off over the gorge. It climbed and stalled, dropping soundless into the chasm.

Chel watched it drop from view, his eyes darting straight back to the engine. It was only a hundred strides from the bridge’s end. ‘Lord Ghiz is right. I don’t know how long it will take them to reload their engine and find their range, but that time is shrinking.’

Ghiz stared at him, eyes narrow, angered by his impertinence but unwilling to snap at support. He smoothed his moustache with tense fingers. ‘Exalted?’

Matil’s jaw was clenched, the muscles bulging beneath her ears. ‘Sally. Sally now.’ Ghiz was away, rattling in his gleaming armour, a flurry of lieutenants in his wake, frantic signals rung out by horns from the ramparts. In the courtyard below them, horses whinnied and stamped as their riders mustered, and the second gate groaned open.

‘Ghiz!’ Matil called down from the rampart, as another black arrow hissed overhead. ‘Destroy that thing! Burn it to the ground!’

He saluted as he mounted, then spurred his mount away at the head of the column, through the archway and toward the outer gate.

‘He’s going out himself?’ Chel found himself surprised.

‘Lord Ghiz likes to lead by example,’ Mira the seneschal replied, her expression neutral.

Matil summoned the wall’s commander, issuing unrepeated orders with firm intensity. The engine had shifted again, dragged onwards and around by the team behind its great iron shield, while its operators scuttled around its hidden rear, preparing another great volley. The smoke over it was thickening.

The outer gate opened, and the engine’s activity froze.

Chel heard the hoofbeats clearly, the slow clap of iron shoes on bridge stone, thickening and merging as the column rode out. At first they were at a walk, a jingling procession of heavy lancers, mounts, and men gleaming in the morning sun. Some carried flaming torches, despite the day’s bright warmth. Ghiz rode at their head, a long pennant bearing the Serican Butterfly and his family crest behind him. At a signal, the column broke into a trot as one, the beat of their hooves an amplified staccato.