And theres your king, added Rachael.
His Majesty King Julius, eighth monarch of the Throne Restored and King of the Jackelians, sat on a cushioned red seat in an open coach and four, staring sadly back at the curious crowds.
Molly gestured at Crown Prince Alpheus sitting to the kings side, hardly any older than either of the poorhouse girls. He doesnt look happy.
Why should he be, when his fathers got the watermans sickness? His pappy wont see out another two years as monarch, then the boys for the knife.
Molly nodded. The Kings robes had been subtly tailored to accentuate the fact that both of his arms had been surgically removed, and in time the young prince would no doubt be dragged bawling to the bone-cutters table by his Special Guard jailers.
It had been ever thus, since Isambard Kirkhill strode across the land in a sea of blood and pistol smoke to assert parliaments
right of supremacy at the head of the new pattern army. No monarch shall ever raise his arms against his people again.
Five hundred years since the civil war and the House of Guardians were still adhering to the strictures of Isambard Kirkhill, old sabre-side as his enemies had nicknamed him. There was the weekly march to Parliament Square from the palace the latter little more than an empty marble jail now. The symbolic unchaining of the kings iron face-gag, then the king would bend down on one knee and assert the House of Guardians right to rule for the people. These days his only witnesses were a few uninterested spectators, a handful of curious foreign visitors and the long line of silent statues of Guardian Electors past.
Look, said Molly, pointing behind the carriage. Captain Flare.
Rachael pushed at the costermongers and fish-stall hawkers in front of her to get a better look.
It is him. Molly, will you look at those muscles? He could crush a regiment of Cassarabian sand riders between them thighs.
Molly knew that Rachael favoured the lewder penny dread-fuls, adventures that featured the action between the silks of dune-swept harems as much as the ring of sabre steel across a battlefield. But it was true. The commander of the Special Guard was impossibly handsome. None of the penny dread-fuls cover illustrations had ever done him justice. Captain Flares cloak drifted behind him like a thing alive, a dancing shadow, his piercing blue eyes sweeping the crowd, making them feel he was staring straight at each of them alone. A flash of light glinted off the captains restraining neck torc, blinding Molly for a second.
Hooray the Guard! An almost hysterical scream from one of the crowd, and as if it were a trigger, the entire multitude took up the shout, cheering and stamping along the broadways. Someone in the crowd started singing Lion of Jackals and soon half the avenue had joined in the bawdy patriotic lyrics.
Molly stood next to Rachael, cheering, a swell of pride rising in her chest. Hooray the Guard indeed. Between the Royal Aerostatical Navy ruling the sky and the powerful and heroic Special Guard on the ground, demolishing any enemy that dared to threaten Jackals, the kingdom was the most powerful force on the continent.
Other nations would have used that power to build an empire, bully their neighbours into subservience. But not Jackals. Their people suffered no rule of mad kings, power-hungry caliphs or rapacious senators. The quiet, peaceful Jackelians had pulled the teeth of their own would-be overlords and had prospered for centuries trading, building, and quietly, doggedly innovating. If a Jackelian had a town garden to potter around in, or a village field to snatch a quick afternoon game of four-poles in, their empire was complete.
Other nations had dictator kings, political assassinations, and the heart-tugging wail of starving children and barren fields lying fallow while peasant armies slaughtered each other at the whim of local warlords. Jackals let its over-ambitious fools argue and wag fingers at each other across the House of Guardians.
Other nations had dark gods and wild-eyed prophets that demanded obedience, child mutilation, slavery, and poverty for the people while wealth flowed to an all-powerful priest class. Jackals had its deity-free Circlist philosophy, gentle meditations and a wide network of oratories. A Circlist parson might drop round and request a quick brew of caffeel, but never call for the beating heart of a familys firstborn to be ripped out of its chest.
Every few decades a foreign power would mistake the Jackelians quiet taste for the rule of law for the absence of ambition. Would mistake a content and isolationist bent for a weak and decadent society. Would come to the conclusion that a nation of shopkeepers might better be put to serving what they had built, made and grown to warriors and bullies. Many enemies had made the assumption that prefers not to fight equates to cant fight and wont fight. All had been punished severely for it. Slow to rouse, once they were, their foes dis covered Jackals was no nation full of bumbling storekeepers, greedy mill owners and stupid farm boys. They found a pit of lions, a people with a hard, unruly thuggish streak and no tolerance for bullies either foreign or raised on Jackals own acres. Of course, being the only nation on Earth to possess a supply of celgas had never harmed the kingdoms standing. Jackals unique aerial navy was truly the envy of the world, a floating wall of death standing ready to guarantee her ancient freedoms.