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oblong, triangular, rectangular, octagonal, and square), nine libraries (public and private), four indoor gardens and arboreta, twelve major indoor baths, sixty-five towers, twenty-seven minor domes and three major ones, and was, in the famous words the Empress Undauntra I, “the most bleeding indefensible structure it has ever been my duty to occupy.”
    In those days, no one familiar with the Imperial Palace spoke of going there. One went to the Dragon Wing, if it was a matter of war, or the lorich Wing, if it was a matter of law, or the Central Palace, if it was an Imperial matter, and so on.
    It was to the Dragon Wing that our friends found themselves traveling. Khaavren knew some of this, from having been told of it, but he had no comprehension of it until, walking around the immense complex of buildings, looking for the Street of the Dragon, he realized he was seeing one massive structure.
    “It’s amazing!” he cried to his companions.
    Pel smiled complacently, but Tazendra touched his arm and said in a low voice, “Come! Not so loud. Everyone will think that you come from the duchies.”
    A puzzled look crossed Khaavren’s countenance. “But I do come from the duchies.”
    This time, the look of puzzlement crossed Tazendra’s features, while Aerich smiled.
    In due course they came to the Street of the Dragon. They walked along it until they came to the gate into the Dragon Courtyard. Eight guards were stationed on the walls of this gate, dressed in the black with silver trim of their House. Each carried a pike and had a sword at his side.
    As the companions came near, one of the Guards said, “Who approaches the Gate of the Dragon, and by what right?”
    “The Cavalier Pel, Guardsman of the company of G’aereth, with potential recruits, to see the Captain.”
    “Enter,” suggested the guard.
    They passed beneath the arched gateway, which had not been closed. Khaavren found himself, to his own annoyance, nervous. For the first time, he began to wonder if he could make his mark in an organization filled with such men and women as these. But he resolutely put these thoughts aside.
    They were challenged once more before being admitted into the wing itself. They were in a hall wide enough for a party twice their size to walk abreast. The walls were of marble, and unadorned save for occasional oil
paintings of great battles, none of which, we are forced to admit, Khaavren recognized.
    The apartments of the captains of the Imperial Guard were located in the west sub-wing of the Dragon Wing of the Palace, which was reached through a wide hallway that jutted off from the main entrance at a sharp angle, passing beneath a plain arch and sweeping in a gentle curve away from the central area of the Palace. In it, each of the captains had apartments arranged in this way: a large foyer or waiting room, a private audience room for the captain, and audience rooms for up to six lieutenants. Behind the captain’s audience room was a stairway, leading up to the captain’s living quarters. Each captain also had a small stairway which communicated to the audience quarters of the Brigadier-General of the Imperial Guard, to whose person and household the entire third floor of this sub-wing was devoted. The fourth and top floor was a vast meeting hall, where the Brigadier could address as many as three thousand Guards at once.
    There were quarters in the Palace for six captains, although there were, at present, only two. Each captain could command as many as six lieutenants, although Pel’s captain, My Lord Count of Gant-Aerethia (or G’aereth, as he was then known) had only troops enough for one, and had therefore chosen to have none. We should note in passing that this decision of Captain G’aereth’s had the effect, not entirely accidental, of leaving his troops with the belief that anyone who could show himself worthy would be promoted to fill the spot.
    Khaavren and his companions entered the foyer of this captain,