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The delirious winning streak continued. Even two months in, Edge of Steel was undefeated. They headlined the arena and bashed all comers: warriors and elementalists, devourers and drakes, humans and charr and whatever—no team could defeat them, and Lion’s Arch hailed them.

Then Queen Jennah herself hailed them—or at least Logan.

The message came on a scroll of fine parchment, sealed with wax that was imprinted with the royal signet. Logan’s eyes lingered on that emblem, the same sewn into the scarf on his shoulder. Then he broke the seal and unrolled the scroll and read:

From Her Royal Majesty, Jennah,

Queen of Kryta,

Regent of Ascalon

To Logan Thackeray,

Gladiator of the Arena in Lion’s Arch

Greetings:

Your presence is required. Report to the royal palace in Divinity’s Reach, Kryta. We will receive you at our convenience.

“She’s calling me,” Logan gasped, eyes darting again across the scroll. “She’s summoning me.” It was still morning. He had time to don his best clothes and go through the asura gate to Divinity’s Reach and see his queen—all before the night’s match. He looked again at the letter in his hand. “She’s calling me.”

An hour later, Logan was stepping through an asura gate, leaving behind the hurly-burly streets of Lion’s Arch and stepping into the white splendor of Divinity’s Reach. Sultry winds gave way to cool stillness, the loud menagerie of species to the sedate capital of a single, ancient people.

Humanity.

Divinity’s Reach was the last bastion of human glory. White limestone walls, great statues, shrines to gods—Divinity’s Reach was the world as it had once been, as it would be again.

It was laid out like a great wheel, with the high outer walls as its rim and six inner walls radiating like spokes from the hub at its center.

Logan stood in that hub—a broad, beautiful parkland with green lawns stretching to white pavements, beyond which rose great shining buildings. The buildings were grand, with columned porticoes and hanging galleries and friezes carved in their tympana. The carvings showed scenes of glory from Kryta’s past, scenes of beauty from Ascalon before the fall.

This was the heart of the greatest human city on Tyria.

That building was the Chamber of Ministers.

Those white-walled barracks housed the Seraph.

Beyond them lay one of six elevated high roads, each dedicated to a god that the rest of the world had forgotten.

Logan turned to his right, seeing at last the glorious palace of the queen. It was a magnificent structure of spiraling columns and recessed arches, rounded roofs and overhanging stone gazebos and spires reaching to the sky. Before the royal palace sat an amazing domed garden. The dome consisted of a wrought-iron framework covered in a skin of glass. Circular limestone walls rose to a lattice of iron, holding up vast panels of glass. The sun beamed through them onto suspended orreries and solar clocks. Mature oaks and elms and beeches towered among winding paths and trim green lawns.

Logan strode toward the palace gate.

A Seraph emerged from a guardhouse, his armor gleaming mirror-bright but his brows glowering cave-dark. “Who approaches?” he barked while Logan was still half a block away.

“I am Logan Thackeray.”

The storm clouds around the guard’s face suddenly parted. “Logan Thackeray? The Logan Thackeray?”

Stepping up, Logan nodded. “Yes.”

“You look a lot smaller up close.”

“You’ve seen me in the arena?”

“Are you kidding? I was there when you killed that destroyer harpy. I’ve seen you a couple times since then. You’re terrific!”

“Thanks.”

The guard suddenly straightened. “Erm, what is your business here today?”

“I’m here to see Queen Jennah,” Logan replied simply.

“No one sees the queen except by special appointment.”

“How’s this?” Logan lifted the scroll and unrolled it. “A summons from the queen herself.”

The guard squinted at it, reading. Then he stepped back, set a horn to his lips, and blew three times. “One of her attendants will come gather you and take you to her.”

Beyond the guard, a Seraph strode from the arched doorway of