The twelve golden war-chariots of the Celestial Arch-Kingdom of Eloria stood lined abreast across the southern weir bridge, blocking the barge locks with gleaming bronze shields.
Each chariot was drawn by four white desert coursers with braided silk manes.
At their center stood Ambassador Lord Cheryl, draped in cloth-of-gold robes lined with white ermine fur, a towering gold-trimmed crown of sun-rays perched upon his powdered wig.
Behind the chariots, three hundred Elorian heavy lancers held eight-foot bronze pikes leveled toward the Haven-Hold lock-keepers.
Giles Croft walked down the stone retaining wall of Lock Number One, with Lady Penelope Haze and Captain Kenneth Drake.
Giles wore his ordinary grey wool frock coat, a wooden ruler tucked into his breast pocket and a pigskin folder of water-system surveys under his arm.
Kenneth’s hand was resting lightly on the handle of his broadsword. But his fifty town guards kept their muskets shouldered in disciplined silence.
“Who commands this den of thieves?” Lord Cheryl demanded, his voice ringing with high-born haughtiness across the churning weir waters.
