IF A CITY CAN HAVE A GENDER, Nessantico was female.

    She began life as a jewel in the glittering, slow waters of the River A'Sele. She was an island city in infancy, connected to land by massive stone bridges and connected by the A'Sele to the sea that nourished her with trade goods. The A'Sele bustled with ship-borne commerce from its convergence with the River Clario to the river's wide, protected mouth in the Nostrosei, all of the largesse passing through Nessantico. As the influence of the tribal chieftains who first settled Nessantico began to grow, so did the city, spreading out from the island to the banks on either side.

    By the time the rulers of Nessantico began to call themselves Kraljiki and Kraljica, by the time they extended their rule beyond the city's borders, she had grown into a vital young woman, swathed and armored in great walls that were never breached by any invader, her armies sweeping over the villages, towns, and city-states around her. Irresistibly strong, she was also seductive: the city where the Kralji held their illustrious courts, where the ambassadors of a hundred lands came to beg and bargain and bluster, where ships from foreign lands of the Strettosei and the Rhittosei brought their goods and treasure, where a dozen cultures melded to form a stronger alloy, where the magical gifts of a dozen gods were displayed and sought after.

    Over the decades and the slow centuries—as the country which took its name from her became yet more influential; as the Kralji became de facto rulers not only of Nessantico but of Il Trebbio, then Firenzcia, Magyaria, and more; as the Holdings spread out in all directions even across the Strettosei to the shores of the Westlands; as the Faith of Concénzia subsumed and forcibly converted the majority of the other religions and lesser gods within the Holdings, Nessantico—the city, the woman—allowed herself to relax and enjoy her reputation. Always strong even as the borders of the Holdings ebbed and flowed under the effects of war and commerce, always magnificent even as tastes and styles changed, always seductive and desirable no matter what other exotic lands and places might come into brief fashion, she spread steadily beyond the walls that had once confined her, gathering to herself all that was intellectual, all that was rich, all that was powerful. Her standard of deep blue and rich gold fluttered from the towers, and the lights of the téni glistened like star-jewels in the night.

    There was no city in the known world that could rival her.

    But there were many who envied her.