Description

` The emperor 's tears will unlock the gate,' Eugene of Tielen has won the five Tears of Artamon, the rubies which entitle him to be crowned emperor of the five nations of the historic split empire of Rossiya. But on the eve of his coronation, once the rubies are added together for the very first time within the imperial crown, a strange phenomenon happens: a beacon of light shoots up in to the night-sky in the five gems. Could it be a great portent - or an evil omen? Eugene has banished his defeated foe, Gavril Nagarian, into a living death in the dismal Ironsea System.