For this reason, the commonplace expression “the all-seeing eye” is both a reminder of the first prince-warden of the order as well as a threatening figure of speech.

In the great Bedrock cities, the scions of the Manors walk secure in the knowledge that all those who support the imperial palace are protected by a skein of watchful enforcers.

In the market and industrial towns, known variously as Rings or Crosses, mayors, manufacturers, guild-folk, and merchants scramble to place their younger children in the Imperial Order of Wardens, hoping to nurture a friendly ear within its complex web.

In the Halts that provide havens along the roads, appointed intendants sit with nervous smiles at their desks, never sure who among their entourage may be a spy recording their every transaction.

Even prosperous Moat villages must welcome young justiciars for three-year terms of office, not knowing who is there to gain administrative experience and who is an agent seeking to uncover conspirators, malcontents, and fugitives.

Only in the lowly Hedge or Ditch hamlets do folk rarely concern themselves with wardens, as wardens rarely have reason to go there. Wardens are the guardians of the imperial roads, the lifeblood of the empire that connects all the outlying provinces with the heartland. It is the couriers who walk the unprotected hillside paths and lowland lanes and who are therefore, in the countryside beyond the reach of the roads, the sole fragile defense against the Pall and its deadly Spore.

From The Official’s Handbook of the Empire as compiled by Luviara, theurgist, working at the behest of the Inner Chamber of the Heart Temple

8 THE SPORE

In the dawn twilight, Elen and Kem shouldered their packs and set out from the Spires. The promontory lay eerily quiet. There was no rumbling wind, only the whisper of an exhausted breeze. When they reached the statues, Elen halted. Kem gave her a puzzled look but said nothing, remembering her warning from the night before.

She examined the statue that held the head of a dragon. It was difficult to truly know a face woven out of shadows, but she was certain the haunt had shared these features: a long, well-made face with deep-set eyes that the sculptor had lined with a hint of humor. The eyes of the beast cradled in the statue’s arms had the same expression, maybe even the same eyes: ready to laugh, and yet made wary by a spark of surprise. The surprise of getting one’s head cut off? I should have known that was coming, the beast’s wry gaze seemed to say.