Heroes, the World Has Changed

I was in the middle of approving a water-treatment budget when the first hero hit my outer gate. The impact rattled my office windows. A second thud followed, then a third, spaced like someone was knocking with a battering ram and a poor understanding of manners. Across the desk, my finance minister froze with his pen halfway over a column of numbers. "Should I call the guard?" he asked. "I heard them," I said. "That wasn't what I meant." I signed the budget. "Then yes." My office sat in the oldest tower of Blackstone Keep, which had been a fortress when the mountain below it was still molten. Now the lower slopes held the city of Bellwether, its glass transit lines and crowded apartment blocks shining under the gray morning sky. The keep's old stones had been reinforced with fiber concrete and warded against everything from artillery to unauthorized drone footage. Apparently, not against a determined hero with a battering ram. I stood, folded my wings beneath my coat, and stepped to the window. A small machine hovered outside the gate, its lens pointed at me. Three people stood behind it: two young men and a woman in a pale blue combat jacket. They wore polished armor over street clothes, each with the same silver sunburst pinned at the shoulder. The woman raised a loudspeaker. "Demon Queen," she called. "By authority of the Crown and the Continental Accord, you are under arrest for crimes against humanity. Surrender peacefully, and the people of Bellwether will be spared." The drone swung toward the city. Its red recording light blinked. "Subtle," my finance minister said. "Modern," I replied. I had been called a demon lord before the first human king learned to write his own name. "Demon queen" was a newer title, popularized by a succession of monarchs who found it useful to blame their border failures on me. The title had outlived the monarchs. I had not bothered to correct it. My secretary, Nessa Vale, came through the office door with a tablet in her hand. She was human, thirty-four, and the only person in the keep who could tell me I was being unreasonable without first checking whether I had a weapon within reach. "The broadcast is already live," she said. "They're streaming to Crownline. The warrant's real." "Real warrants can still be foolish." "They're calling themselves the Dawn Company. Their leader is Elias Rook. The woman is Mara Venn. The third is Tolan Price." Nessa glanced at the window. "They've got a publicist." I looked at the drone. "Of course they do." The gate shook again. A pale gold shimmer crawled over the ironwork, testing the wards. The spellwork was clean, young, and expensive. It might have frightened a lesser creature. I had watched the first suns rise over this world. I had also watched the last four generations of heroes come through that gate. Some had wanted glory. Some had wanted money. One had wanted to prove that a prophecy was wrong. They had all arrived with weapons and left with explanations other people wrote for them. I pulled on my coat. Nessa followed me toward the stairs. "You could simply refuse them." "I could." "And?" "And then they'll turn my refusal into evidence." "That's not a reason to meet them." "It is if I want to know who is paying for the broadcast." The gate opened before we reached it. My guards had released the locks, though nobody had ordered them to. They knew I preferred to speak before I had to fight. The heroes stood on the wet stone path. The woman, Mara, held a sword in one hand and a small black device in the other. The man beside her wore a dark red cape with a sponsor's logo stitched into the hem. The third had a shield strapped to his back and a camera headset tucked behind his ear. Elias Rook took one step toward me. "You're coming with us." "No." He blinked. The drone hovered close enough to show the reflection of my face in its lens. "I'm afraid the warrant doesn't give you a choice," he said. "You're mistaken. It gives you a reason to try." Mara lowered her sword by a few inches. "We didn't come here to fight." "Then you have an unusual way of introducing yourselves." "The Crown has authorized a tribunal," she said. "If you surrender, you'll get a hearing." "Where?" "Crownspire." "That isn't a hearing. It's a stage." Elias's jaw tightened. "You've been at war with the human kingdoms for a thousand years." "I have been alive for a thousand years. The war is younger." The hero with the shield shifted his feet. I watched his grip tighten. "Your defenses are hurting the city," he said. "The wards around the keep are disrupting the transit network." "Those wards have stood for six centuries." "They're interfering with the new grid," Mara said. "The disruption started six days ago." I looked at the device in her hand. The screen showed a map of Bellwether marked with red circles. I recognized the pattern. Someone had placed new relay towers around the city, each one close enough to my old wards to make them react. "Who installed them?" I asked. "The Crown's public works office," she said. "And who signed the contract?" Her eyes flicked to Elias, then back to me. "Crownline Energy," I said. "A private contractor with royal investors." "You know about the grid?" Elias asked. "I know that your new towers are pushing a resonance field into the mountain. If I lower my wards without testing them, Bellwether's foundations will take the strain." "You're saying the Crown's project caused the outages?" Mara asked. "I'm saying I would like to see the engineering plans before I let you dismantle the only thing keeping the city from sliding down the mountain." The drone moved closer. Its red light blinked on. Elias smiled at the lens. "The Demon Queen is making excuses." I took one step forward. The air between us warmed. The smile left his face. "Your warrant gives you authority to arrest me," I said. "It does not give you the right to endanger the people in that city. You have until tomorrow morning to bring me the project plans and explain why Crownline is broadcasting an execution before a trial." "You don't get to set conditions," Elias said. "I have just done so." Mara held my gaze. Her sword was still lowered. "What happens if we refuse?" she asked. "I'll make sure you understand what the old rules cost." I turned back toward the keep before Elias could answer. Behind me, I heard the drone continue to record. I also heard the gate close.