Final Throne / Season 1, Episode 7
Iron Shatters Dawn
The scream of iron against stone tore through the dawn, a jagged wound in the air that made even the hardiest men flinch. I stood atop the inner rampart of the Theodosian Wall, my boots grinding into the grit of shattered mortar, the cold of the morning seeping through my cloak like a blade. Below, the outer wall—already a ruin after weeks of bombardment—shuddered as another cannonball from Mehmed’s monstrous Basilica struck. Dust and splintered rock sprayed upward, a gray haze that stung my eyes and coated my tongue with the taste of ash. My hands, gloved in worn leather, tightened on the hilt of a sword I hadn’t drawn since yesterday’s skirmish. Not yet. Not until they came over the rubble. “Basilisk again, Majesty,” muttered Theodoros, my captain of the guard, his voice rough as the gravel underfoot. He crouched beside me, his helm dented from a glancing blow last week, his beard flecked with the same dust that clung to us all. “Third strike this hour. They’re aiming for the breach at the fifth tower. If they hit it square—” “They won’t need to,” I cut him off, my gaze fixed on the Ottoman lines beyond the ditch. Through the thinning mist, I could see their banners snapping in the wind, crimson and gold, a sea of them...