Axis sat his horse, staring beyond Maximilian and Ishbel to the mountain. It was burning as fiercely as if it had been made of wood.
“What a wonderful beacon for Armat.”
Axis glanced to his left to where Georgdi sat his horse. He’d arrived at the head of his twenty thousand only half an hour before, just as the first wisps of smoke had started to appear about Serpent’s Nest. He looked tired, but otherwise well, and his eyes gleamed mischievously. He said he’d seen the smoke from Armat’s campfires the previous night and had marched through the night himself to ensure he got here in time.
There had been barely enough time to get Georgdi’s men into position, and to tell him what news there was, before Maximilian and Ishbel had started on their way down the road.
Axis glanced about him to make sure that everyone else was in position. Maximilian had asked that Axis, Inardle, StarDrifter, Georgdi, Egalion, and Ezekiel all be positioned at the front of the ranks.
“What’s he going to do?” said Georgdi as Maximilian and Ishbel drew close.
“I have no idea at all,” Axis said, his eyes fixed on Maximilian’s and Ishbel’s conjoined hands.
Maximilian saw Georgdi sitting just behind Axis, and gave him a nod. Words could come later. He and Ishbel came to a halt some ten paces before Axis, who was at the head of the group of commanders. Behind the commanders ranged Maximilian’s army: Escatorians, Isembaardians, Icarii, and Lealfast, all standing in ordered rank and slightly distanced each from the other.
“Ishbel,” Maximilian murmured, and she nodded, stepping away from him to one side.
“Axis,” Maximilian said, walking closer to him. “Your sword, if you will.”
Axis unsheathed it and handed it to Maximilian hilt first. Maximilian nodded his thanks, walked back ten paces to where he had originally halted, looked briefly at the burning mountain, then used the sword to draw three intersecting circles, large enough that he could stand in their center without touching any of the circles. He dug them deep into the ground, so that each circle became almost a mini-trench half a finger deep.
Then he walked back up the road three or four paces, and drew a straight, deep line back down to the intersecting circles.
“Your sword,” he said, handing it back to Axis, who took and sheathed it wordlessly.
Maximilian walked toward Ishbel.
“My lady,” he said softly.
Ishbel took a deep breath.
“First,” she said, “a gift from the past that we may together weld a future.”
Axis frowned at her phraseology, and hoped it was merely metaphorical.
Ishbel went down on one knee on the dusty road as she spoke, holding out her cupped hands.
Axis gasped, as did everyone else who could see.
As Ishbel bowed her head before Maximilian, the Goblet of the Frogs had appeared within her cupped hands.
“I had a vision of presenting you this goblet, my lord,” Ishbel murmured, only for Maximilian’s ears, “that night we first lay together.”
He took the goblet from her, running his fingers over her hands as he did so, then held it up so that it caught the flickering light of the flames.
It flashed emerald and amber, and the frogs about its sides capered and leaped.
“It is an object of great magic,” Maximilian said, then turned back to the waiting commanders.
He went to StarDrifter first. “Talon,” he said, “may I have a feather from your wing?”
StarDrifter’s eyes widened a little, but he gave a nod. “You may have a feather from my wing, my lord,” he said.
Maxel reached out one hand and ran his fingers gently over the curve of one of StarDrifter’s folded wings. When he withdrew it, he held a white and gold feather between two of his fingers.
Maximilian dropped it into the goblet, resting his hand over the mouth of the goblet for a moment, head bowed.
Then he moved to Ezekiel, sitting his horse just to one side of StarDrifter. “General,” Maximilian said, “I see you wear a chain-mail tunic made of the finest rings of steel. May I have one of those rings?”
Ezekiel bowed his head. “Of course, my lord,” and Maximilian reached out and ran his fingers over the skirt of the tunic as it lay over Ezekiel’s thigh, and, as he withdrew the hand, a steel ring glinted between two of his fingers.
Maximilian dropped that into the goblet as well, resting his hand atop it a moment as he concentrated, then moved on.
From Egalion, Maximilian took a thread of his emerald tunic, and from Georgdi, a hair from his horse’s mane. Each of these went, in turn, into the Goblet of the Frogs.
Then Maximilian came to where Inardle sat her horse, to Axis’ right.
“I want nothing from you, Inardle,” Maximilian said, “save your passion.”
And with that he ran his fingers lightly down the wrist of Inardle’s left hand where it rested on her leg, and then over the back of her hand and down her fingers.
She drew in a sharp breath, and frost rose where Maximilian had run his fingers.
Maximilian sent Axis an amused glance, then scooped up the frost on the tip of a finger and flicked it into the goblet.
“Thank you, my lady,” Maximilian murmured to the now somewhat flushed Inardle once he had pressed his hand over the mouth of the goblet.
Then he turned to Axis. “From you, StarMan,” he said, “I require something a little different. A snatch of Song, if you please. Something that relates specifically to the Star Dance.”
Axis frowned, then a fragment of music filled the air. Maxel raised a hand, sweeping it through the air between them, clenching the music in his fist, and depositing it into the goblet.
“What was that song, Axis?” he asked.
“The Song of the Star Gate,” Axis said. “We would sing it to teach Icarii children the wonders of the Star Gate and of the Star Dance which filtered through the gate.”
“Thank you,” Maximilian said, then turned away before a clearly perplexed Axis could ask anything of him.
He walked back to the three intertwined circles and stood in their center, placing the goblet carefully in front of his feet. He raised his head and looked for a long moment at the burning mountain rearing high above them, then turned his head and addressed the assembled mass behind him. His voice was low, but very clear, and it carried to every last soldier or birdman and woman.
“What happens next,” Maximilian said, “may appear to be catastrophic, but it will not harm you. Nothing that happens will harm you. Be still, and assured. Ishbel,” he said, now looking to where she stood to one side and in front of him, “the crown of Elcho Falling, if you please.”
She took a deep breath, then crossed her hands over her chest, bowing her head and closing her eyes.
When she lifted her head, and lifted her hands outward, they held a great writhing mass of darkness.
The crown of Elcho Falling, the three entwined bands of gold almost utterly hidden.
Maximilian reached out his hands, hesitated, then gripped the crown.
Instantly, cracks fissured up the mountain from its base, allowing great gouts of smoke and flame to spurt into the air.
“Stars!” Axis muttered, wishing that Maximilian had asked him to position the army even further back. He looked at those around him. Most people were staring at the mountain, their faces reflecting varying degrees of concern or fear.
Axis looked back to Maximilian.
Maximilian now held the crown before him, just in front of his face. He took a deep breath, then blew, and all the darkness about the crown was carried away, dissipating into the air as it went.
Now Maximilian held the crown in all its glorious simplicity. He raised it above his head…then let it drop.
The movement was so unexpected that Axis jumped. He expected the crown to hit Maximilian’s head and bounce off into the dust, but instead it fell onto the top of Maximilian’s head…then appeared to expand so that it slid down over his head, then expanded more to slide over his shoulders, then down his body, his legs, and expanded just enough that it fell into the three circles of intertwined trenches at his feet, filling them completely.
Now Maximilian stood in the center of three entwined circles of gold. He reached down for the goblet, lifted it up to chest height, and tipped it over the straight line that connected to the gold circles.
Emerald water poured forth, then fizzled into the dirt trench.
For a moment, nothing, then something in the distance made Axis look up, and he gave a cry of fear, echoing the cries about him.
Behind the burning mountain, the Infinity Sea had risen in a towering wave, higher even than the mountain, and was crashing down toward them with a roar that became deafening as it neared.
Behind him, Axis heard men and horses panic.
Before him, he saw Maximilian put an arm about Ishbel as she stepped into the circle.