For all of five seconds, Rath remained immobilized by shock.

The shouts and curses from the Shields on the roof continued, growing in volume, agitation, and in one case unrestrained outrage, and their runaway reactions were rushing headlong towards panic. The same could be made out all around, from distant rooftops and the faraway spires of ruined buildings, to the middle ground of the surrounding streets and promenades, and to the inside of the building below them and the ones nearby. The entire city had witnessed the incomprehensible, impossible, and unbelievable departure of The Factory from Refuge.

Rath surged into motion. He swung around. Where her subordinates seemed seized by emotion and uncertainty and had been knocked off the foundation of their discipline and training into undirected motion, Vice-Exarch Llylm simply stood frozen, her mouth agape and her eyes wide and staring at the point in the sky where The Factory had vanished.

Rath grabbed her by the arms — his Custodian soul screaming at the outrage of thus assaulting the dignity of an Elder — and gave her a little shake.

Her eyes focused on him.

“Get your people to The Wall,” he told her, forcing his voice to come out clear and steady. “Right now.”

Immediately, the retired Shield officer responded to the order. “Aye, Magister! It will be done!”

Rath released her and she jumped to action, barking orders. Most of the Shields bolted for the roof hatch at once, but one corporal required the Vice-Exarch’s open-handed cuff to the top of his head to shed his distress.

Rath desired Wfythurgthyr, took flight and dove down into the courtyard. The people in the building had flooded into the open area to see what was happening and the place was in turmoil, with nearly every head turned towards the sky and nearly every arm gesturing or pointing. The four Blades of Rath’s escort and Ylyryl and her two Amazons had formed a line with arms interlinked against the press and were fighting to keep the crowd from surging into the invisible head of the Bridge.

Unable to land because of the jam, Rath hovered above and used the booming voice of the Talent whose name he still did not know. “Get out of the way! Push them through! Right now! Get these people moving to The Wall!”

The biggest men, sergeants Khyrm and Zhym, in the center of the line, obeyed at once and when they released their linked arms, the dam broke and people surged towards the curb of the fountain. Within an eye blink, at least two score vanished, not just the few who stumbled onto the head of the Bridge but also many near them outward for several meters, their close proximity chaining the magic. The rest of the crowd recoiled instantly and the tumult of curses, shouts, and weeping redoubled.

Rath used his voice Talent again, and his words thundered across the courtyard, drowning out every other sound. “Get to The Wall NOW! Snatch up everything and everyone! GO!”

Sergeant Ylyryl, Corporal Wihn, and Shieldmaiden Sylia immediately began grabbing Shields from the crowd and shoving them into a line along the edges of the lane that Rath had marked with bricks, creating a funnel with their bodies. Gyre, grim but determined, was already forcing his way through the crowd leading a line of stretchers borne by Shields and civilians.

Rath hovered, watching the people below, making his presence a demonstration, a bulwark, a point of focus. People were moving now. Officers and sergeants and Elders were shouting orders, shoving when necessary, and civilians and Shields began to move in small groups, then clumps, and finally a wide continuous flow, ten across and hurrying onto the head of the bridge. A hundred left. Two hundred.

Rath grimaced. The escape of The Factory had convinced all that their world had come to an end.

And then the courtyard was nearly empty, with most of the civilians gone and only able-bodied Shields and the Blades that had come with Rath remaining. A trickle of people from other parts of the house — harried, frightened, burdened, carried — wandered into the courtyard and were directed by Ylyryl and the other Shield officers onward to the head of the bridge.

He saw a little girl, dirty, barefoot, chasing a little dog, muddy, barking, that refused to be caught around in circles and loops. A female Shield, gray-haired, limping with a bandage on her lower leg, caught the scrambling dog in one arm and then caught the girl in her free hand and carried both towards the fountain and disappeared.

A white-haired old man shaking his head adamantly while he sat in the mud of a corner of the courtyard. Several civilians, men, women, youths, and children, surrounded the Elder, arguing, imploring, and commanding. Agitated and angry, the old man shook his head, gesturing and slapping the ground with his hand. Finally, the surrounding families rushed in, bodily grabbed and hoisted the Elder, resisted his weak struggles, and then ran towards the head of the Bridge.

Rath stayed where he was, above the mud and the heartbreak, trying to wrap his head around the impossible.

The Factory had left the world of Refuge and gone up into the realm of the stars.

The rampaging questions careened through his head.

Had there been Monitors on the Factory?

What would become of them beyond the sky?

Would The Wall try to leave?

Could it leave with The Tower still resting upon it?

What was to become of the world of Refuge and all the people on it?

He shook his head to clear it. More questions that could not be answered fed on themselves and threatened to overwhelm the calm that he was struggling to maintain. Seeking action and purpose, he descended to the ground, landing near his Blades. His task had to be to evacuate everyone possible, as many as he could. With The Factory gone, the only hope that remained was The Wall. That was something he could do. That was something that was within the power of his Talents. Beyond that … he could not worry about beyond that.

The four Blades, Khyrm, Zhym, Eyrhem and Dhal, circled Rath, waiting for orders. None of them were distracted or showed uncertainty.

“With me,” Rath said. That was the only order that came to mind at that moment.

He marched across the hopelessly muddy courtyard to Ylyryl. “Send Sylia to The Wall with a message for Fhaeyr and Aron. Tell them that The Factory has left Refuge. The Wall may be next. I need someone to go to The Gash and get eyes on The Tower. I want to know if it moves at all.”

With a grim expression, Ylyryl nodded at Sylia, who, jaw clenched, marched, not ran, to the Bridge and vanished.

Rath looked around at the faces of the group now surrounding him: the expressions of Blade Sergeants Khyrm and Zhym were locked down and unreadable; Blades Eyr and Dhal simply waited; the remaining Amazons Sergeant Ylyryl and Corporal Wihn also showed no signs of question or confusion.

Because all of them expected Rath to tell them what to do.

He looked around.

The courtyard was empty now except for the detritus left behind: scraps of this and that, a lost shoe, a broken chair. Even the poles that had held up the temporary awnings had been taken.

He knew that there had to be thousands of other people all across the Cantonment in the same condition as those that had evacuated here. Many of them would need to be carried or led. To get them to The Wall as fast as possible, he needed to bring the Bridges to them, rather than try to have them all come here to this restricted funnel.

He did not need bodyguards. “They’re going to need all the help that they can get back at The Wall. All of you get on the Bridge.”

None of them moved. None of them protested. They just looked at him and waited.

“That’s an order,” Rath said.

The four Blades saluted, but remained. Ylyryl gave a little negative twitch of her head. Corporal Wihn remained impassive.

“Then with me. We’re going out to the street and set up another Bridge.”

In the building, as Rath, with the others close behind, was following a corridor that he thought would take them out into the street, Vice-Exarch Llylm met him from a side corridor with a score or more of Shields and Amazons following her.

“The building is empty,” she reported simply.

“I’m moving the Bridge to the open street. Send your people ahead to start clearing out all the buildings and temporary camps nearby. Everyone has to go. No exceptions except for people helping with the evacuation.”

“It will be done, Magister.”

Since it became instantly clear that she was waiting for Rath to proceed, he went on down the corridor and into a grand entrance way and out through a set of double doors that stood blocked open. Beyond was a short portico and then the wide, stone-paved street, which, here at least, was clear of rubble.

Without further orders, half the Shields with Vice-Exarch Llylm fanned out and started running into every still standing nearby building.

Rath strode across the street and the retired Shield officer followed close on his heels. He thrust out his arm twice to indicate lines. “I need a row of stones or bricks here and here and a row across the other end. This will be the entrance. We’ll do it this way every time until we see a better way. Two squads should be posted here with a sergeant. They should organize and assist. No running. No shoving. No shouting. No panic. But everyone goes.”

Vice-Exarch Llylm turned to her people. “Get to it.”

More of the Shields rushed to gather stones and bricks.

Rath looked to the north. Perhaps half a kilometer up the street, a large building had fallen onto the pavement, and its bricks, stones, and timbers now formed a ten foot high dam of fractured rubble all the way across the street. He could pass over that easily with Wfythurgthyr, but everyone else was earthbound.

To the south, the street was not blocked, though there were plenty of mounds of debris and numerous damaged buildings.

Rath started south, and Vice-Exarch Llylm paced him, one step to the right and one step back. Ylyryl, Wihn, Eyr, and Dhal ran ahead right away, forming a curved skirmish line. Khyrm and Zhym stayed close on his and Vice-Exarch Llylm’s heels.

People began to come out of the still intact houses to look and then rush back inside when the still running Shield messengers ran up to them, spoke a few words, and then moved on. One of these neighbors, a white-haired Elder, made right for them. The Elder was wearing an obviously older style but still fitting Shield uniform and approached Vice-Exarch Llylm.

“Llylm, what’s the word? Have you been in contact with the Cantonment Command?”

“Magister Wrathghur is in command,” she told the Elder calmly.

The Elder’s eyes widened and he faced Rath. “Magister … master of magic … the old Talents resurface? Wrathghur … Rath of Lineage Wolf!”

The old man surprised Rath completely by dropping to his left knee, with his right hand in a fist and his right forearm resting on his right knee. He bowed his head. “I am Ehlren of Lineage Wolf! I stand ready to serve, Magister!”

Rath, again, was stunned into immovability for a few seconds. When The Factory had left, it had taken away the old world that Rath had known, and now it was undeniably clear that that single catastrophic event had also robbed him of his own place in the world that came after.

Rath suppressed his instant impulse to help the Elder to his feet; the man was a Shield doing his duty.

“Take command of this street, Elder Ehlren. Gather everyone and organize them. Muster all able-bodied Shields. Set guards and patrols as you see fit. Have all civilians take everything of value and fall back to the Bridge just back along the way that I have created with Aehlkhndhosthyr. There is a detachment of Shields there to manage the head of the Bridge. We will withdraw to The Wall.”

The Elder rocketed to his feet and gave the Shield salute. “It will be done, Magister!”

The Elder spun around and jogged away, calling names and ranks.

Rath had pulled his orders from books and theatricals, but they had seemed to fit. Command meant decisions and he would do his best to get them right.