The grease-slicked stones of Baker’s Row steamed in the bitter morning air, carrying the sharp, stomach-turning stench of burnt tallow and scorched horsehair. Across the debris-choked intersection, the Iron Duchy’s vanguard had dissolved into a swearing, slipping mass of metal-clad infantry trying desperately to crawl backward out of the killing zone. Drovic hauled his massive smithing hammer over his shoulder, his chest heaving as he spat a glob of grey phlegm onto the soot-stained cobblestones."They're pulling back through the side alleys!" Drovic shouted, wiping a thick forearm across his sweat-streaked forehead. "They’ve had enough of the grease!""Don't celebrate yet, you old fool," Lysenne snapped, her voice cutting through the ragged cheers of the surviving East District irregulars. She stood tall atop the battered grain cart, her grip tight on the splintered ash-wood pole of the royal standard. Her eyes weren't fixed on the retreating infantr

"Aerovan, get back down to the cellar before your legs snap like dry kindling," Lysenne barked, dropping off the grain cart and marching straight toward the forge entrance. Her boots crunched over shattered slate and frozen mud as she closed the distance, her soot-stained gauntlet reaching out to shove the old blacksmith back toward the dark, yawning threshold of the basement stairs. "We don't need a corpse bleeding out on the flagstones right now. We need you coherent.""I am coherent," Aerovan rasped, swatting her hand away with a feeble, trembling swipe that lacked any real force. His breath came in ragged, whistling gasps, each inhalation sounding like dry leaves being dragged across a rough concrete floor. "More coherent than that iron-headed idiot Drovic, anyway. He’s out there trying to stack paving stones with three broken fingers and a concussion.""Which is precisely why you need to lie down," Lysenne countered, her voice dropping from a royal command i

The iron-shod heel of a royal boot struck the cracked flagstones of the forge yard with a sharp, echoing snap that cut cleanly through the low, miserable murmur of the surviving commoners."Sit down, Master Miller. Your whining won’t grind the corn any faster, and it certainly won’t stop the Iron Duchy from bringing up their battering rams while you waste our breath," Queen Lysenne declared, her voice ringing with an uncompromising authority that brooked no argument. She stood on an overturned crate near the center of the ruined courtyard, her patched velvet tunic scorched black at the hem and her face smeared with soot, looking less like a monarch and more like a battle-hardened commander who had dragged herself out of a burning tomb.Master Miller, a corpulent grain merchant whose silk doublet was now stiff with dried mud and vomit, flushed a deep, mottled purple as he half-rose from a charred crate. "Call it whining if you dare, Your Majesty, but the people in the west wards are st

"The Iron Duchy didn't just smash our gates, Master Miller," Drovic growled, stepping further into the pale, soot-stained light of the ruined courtyard. He winced as his left arm brushed his ribs, the makeshift bandages tightening over his mutilated hand. "They parked their entire heavy vanguard right across the central avenue. The royal granaries aren't sitting in a quiet pasture anymore. They're sitting in a heavily fortified No-Man's-Land bristling with steam-piston patrols and snipers who haven't missed a target since the first shell fell."Master Miller's face mottled from purple to a sickly, mottled grey. He looked desperately around the courtyard at the grim, soot-blackened faces of the surviving smiths and Gold-Crest soldiers who had gathered around the anvil ring. "Then what do you suggest we do, one-hand? Just sit here and watch our children chew on their own boots until everyone drops dead of hunger? A starving garrison is a defeated garrison! You don't need a sieg

Drovic let out a harsh, barking laugh that quickly devolved into a rattling, wet cough. He wiped his mouth with the back of his good sleeve, smearing a fresh streak of dark crimson across the coarse wool."Under it," Drovic wheezed, his eyes narrowing as he glared down at the rusted iron grate. "You've got a fine imagination, Your Majesty. Assuming the rats haven't chewed through the masonry centuries ago, those drainage pipes empty straight into the lower cellars of the commercial district. Right beneath the Iron Duchy’s forward picket line.""Which means they aren't patrolling it," Lysenne snapped back, giving him no room to retreat into his pessimism. She kicked the edge of the grate with her steel-capped boot, the rusted hinges groaning in protest against the damp stone. "They're watching the sky, they're watching the barricades, and they're watching the main avenues. They aren't expecting anyone to crawl through three miles of municipal filth in the middle o