He tried to locate the Dragonfly, saw the man again spearing towards him. Edric shot a blast of his sting, but his adversary flitted out of the way. The bulk of the heliopter was still clawing for height, and he dropped beneath it to give himself space to think and manoeuvre.
But the Dragonfly was veering off suddenly, and Edric looked about to see what he was avoiding.
It was a Tarkesh orthopter with red flames blazing from its cockpit. The heliopter shuddered in the air as it tried to correct its course, but the orthopter, even as its wing cables were snapping, shifted its aim lazily and struck against the bigger machine’s side, staving it in. A second later and one or the other had exploded, and then they both had, and Edric was hurled head over heels through the air and across the city.
Feeling a wave of hot air roll over him, Salma caught himself in the air, still seeking out his target. There he was, blown almost up against the wall by the force of the two dying machines. He was right at the gatehouse, amongst the wrecked artillery. Even as the colonel got to his feet on the stones of the wall, Salma was stooping down on him.
Barely in time, Edric saw him coming and dragged his sword from its scabbard. It was a Hornet piece, big and heavy-edged, and he slashed furiously at Salma as the Dragonfly fell on him, but Salma was a natural in the air, pitching aside to let the great blade pass him. His own lunge scored across the colonel’s side and then he had knocked the man down, and the two of them went tumbling end over end towards the broken edge of the wall. Edric was now on top and with one hand to his side he straightened up, raising his sword to split Salma’s skull. At the same time, Salma stabbed upwards, his blade punching through his opponent’s light armour and up to the hilt beneath the man’s ribs. The Wasp colonel’s sword fell from his hand, spinning through the air until it struck the ground far below. A moment later, Salma sent the man’s body heading in the same direction.
Ten
‘What it is,’ Destrachis shouted above the wind, ‘is that the money goes to Collegium. That’s the way it works.’
Felise clung on grimly, trying to catch his words as the rushing air swept them past her.
‘If you do well for yourself in Helleron . . .’ he continued, quite happy, apparently, to carry on this conversation at the top of his lungs, ‘if you own a string of factories, make a mint, then you retire to Collegium. That’s where the respectables live, and having money like that buys you a lot of respectable, you see?’
She nodded, still trying to understand. Their automotive jolted at that point, some join or flaw in the rails, and she nearly lost her grip. If she fell now, though her wings would catch her safely, she would never catch up with this machine again. Nobody could fly as fast as the engine was propelling them.
‘And so,’ Destrachis went on, ‘there’s a market for luxuries. The Collegium rich like to flaunt it, same as everywhere. Spiderland goods come in up the coast, but for anything from the north, there’s a real battle to be the first with it. And that’s’ – he waved an arm perilously around, having hooked onto the automotive’s side with the other – ‘where this comes in.’
The machine they were riding was mostly open cage-work. The middle section was for the cargo, five or six heavily padded crates lashed together on a low-sided hold. At the front was the engine, which had originally sounded like thunder rolling across the hills to the west of Helleron, but the sound of it was now mostly merged with the wind. Parts of it glowed red-hot, while other parts were constantly being tightened by the three-man crew of artificers. It ran on firepowder and seemed, even to Felise who knew nothing about such matters, like a dangerous beast waiting for its moment to attack.
At the back of the machine was the meagre space the thing set aside for its crew. Two men were forward now, keeping the engine in tune. One was watching some dials and gauges that were wholly occult to her. Behind him, Destrachis and Felise clung on tight.
They were close-mouthed, tough-looking men, those three. Black Guild artificers, contraband runners, Beetle-kinden, all of them, and loosely allied to the fiefdom that Felise had served so well by eliminating the Last-Chancers. They were, above all, supreme opportunists, as this venture showed.
‘You see, this was going to be the big business,’ Destrachis further explained. ‘The Iron Road from Helleron to Collegium by a direct and unbroken rail, instead of having to go the square way round Sarn. Only they got the rail finished and then some fool blew up the engine. Thing called the Pride, most expensive automotive ever made, and they blew it up. You’d think someone else would step in, but no, the fellow who owned the Pride has the contract, and he’s blasted if he’s going to let anyone else get the first ride, so he’s having a new engine built, and meanwhile all these miles of shiny rails are just sitting here, doing nobody any good! So you see, these lads decided to jump at the chance. They tell me it’s easy enough to make an automotive run on rails, and once it’s running on the rails it goes a lot faster than if it wasn’t.’ He was grinning wildly, his hair streaming and, in the face of that, she had to smile back. ‘So these lads cornered the market!’ he finished, and she nodded to show she understood.
‘I love machines!’ he told her. ‘They fascinate me!’
‘But you can’t, really,’ she called back, and she knew that, downwind as she was, her words would not reach him. He read the remark in her face, though, and his grin merely widened.
‘I don’t understand them, but I love them. All the little parts and pieces!’
Despite the lack of available space, the artificers had taken them aboard willingly. They were engaged in a high-risk venture, for there could be brigands or even militia in their way, but Felise Mienn was the woman who had killed a dozen Last-Chancers single-handed. When she had asked Destrachis why they were taking him too, he had told her it was for the same reason.
‘You’re a fighter?’ She had sounded sceptical. He was a man for the underhand knife, perhaps, but no warrior.
‘I’m a doctor,’ he had said, with some dignity. ‘Or at least that was my training. I’ve been a lot of things since. Anyway, it’s a risky trip we’re on now. Injuries are likely from the journey or the machine itself. They’ll be glad to have me patching them up.’
The nameless little automotive scorched across the miles, the fastest thing in the Lowlands, according to its crew. Even the Pride itself would not be able to do this journey so swiftly, they boasted, since the power of its ingenious engine would be hindered by the weight of its carriages.
Felise was amazed that she could even catch her breath, amazed that the constantly churning engine did not fly apart or the crewmen get caught in its works or burned at any minute. The rush of the engine, the sweep of the countryside as it was hustled past them, the occasional brief image of some small village or herder’s croft, it all seemed to sing in her heart.
Would this be such a bad life? Perhaps she could find these men again, when she was done, after—
After what? For surely there would be no after. The one task that had sustained her this far would take the world with it once it was done. As though peering from a brightly lit room into the clouded night skies, she could see no after.
But this thought, with so much else, was soon blown past her by the incessant wind, and Destrachis was still grinning at her, so she smiled back at him and allowed herself to enjoy.
Destrachis woke with the tip of a blade at his throat. For a second he twitched uncontrollably, instincts yelling at him to do something, anything. He suppressed them, lying calmly for a moment to gather himself. Then he opened his eyes. There was a little moonlight slanting across them, and his eyes – and hers, he knew – would pick out enough from it to see their way.
‘I’m awake,’ he said quietly. They were in a Wayhouse located not far from Collegium. She had paid the surprised Way Brothers for a private room, and let Destrachis take a place on the floor, but now she had apparently had second thoughts.
Felise Mienn studied him down the length of her sword
, and he thought she was trembling slightly in the faded moonlight.
‘How do I know I can trust you?’ she demanded.
He allowed himself a slight smile. He knew from experience that, on his slightly lined face, it seemed an expression of infinite reassurance. ‘Felise—’
‘You are too convenient,’ she said. ‘I think . . . I think you may be working for him. For Thalric – or for his masters. You are here only to stop me. Or else to warn him.’
She was trembling, he saw, but for all that the sword was still. Its tip was close enough to dimple the skin of his neck, but it drew no blood.
‘Felise, please listen to me.’ It was long practice that allowed him to lie there, as calm as a cloudless sky, and speak in such reasoned and measured tones.
‘Why would you leave your work in Helleron?’ she asked.
‘I am a mercenary at best, I have no roots—’
‘And why come along with me, just like that?’
‘You have money, do you not?’
‘And why—?’
‘But most of all,’ he said, risking much to cut across her increasingly urgent questioning, ‘we have had this conversation before.’
Dead silence from her. He stared into that face, beautiful as it was, and, in that instant, he saw nothing whatsoever alive behind her eyes. He granted her a long moment, and then continued.
‘Three days ago, camping beside the automotive, we had this exact conversation. Remember, it scared the squits out of those smugglers we were with? You accused me of being a Wasp agent. You had me pinned like this, almost exactly the same. It was the middle of the night, just like now. And then we talked, and I explained to you that, no, I wasn’t a Wasp agent, and that if you wanted me to leave you, then I’d do it, but I’d rather not. I’m simply a travelling companion who is, for the moment, heading in the same direction as yourself. And I’m not overly fond of the Empire, either. And I have watched you fight, and I find you admirable.’
‘Admirable,’ she echoed. He was not entirely sure she had understood his words.
‘Capable of being admired,’ he explained lazily. ‘I have lived in a great many places, both inside and outside the Lowlands, Felise, and I have never met anyone quite like you.’
She was trembling again, and he knew that this was the point where the loose string in her head that was keeping her in check might snap, or not. He fought down his own anxiety and made himself wait.
‘I . . .’ There was the look of a lost child on her face, and the ‘I’ she spoke of was someone else, someone surfacing from long ago to take brief possession of a body long vacated. ‘Where am I? What is this place?’
‘Just a Wayhouse on the road. We’ll go to Collegium tomorrow.’
‘What’s . . . Collegium?’ She seemed dazed.
He wondered what would happen if he led her deliberately astray now, invented some other purpose for her. How long would the deception last, and could it be that simple? But, no, here came her familiar expression once more, ice spreading across her face and making her cold and hard again.
Abruptly her sword was back in its scabbard. ‘He is there,’ she reminded herself.
‘Or has been there,’ he corrected, allowing himself to sit up, gingerly touching his throat but finding not a mark on it.
‘He is there,’ she repeated. ‘And I will fall on him, and all his allies, and leave not one alive.’
The worrying thing, for Destrachis, was how this thought seemed not to fire her up but to calm her down.
Lieutenant Graf perused the dispatch, keeping his expression carefully blank. Amidst the scars, his one eye flicked back and forth over the few words it contained, looking for a way out.
‘Major?’ he began at last, and Thalric saw that, like so many in his position, he was a man who had forgotten, until this moment, what really frightened him.
‘Never underestimate the cowardice of a subject race,’ Thalric said, and Graf studied him cautiously.
‘I had not thought . . .’ Graf twisted in his chair. It was something Thalric had observed before, when underlings had sudden sight of the spectre of authority at his shoulder. Graf was a man who could, perhaps, have bested him, certainly a man who had no reason to believe he could not. Thalric was his superior, though. Most of all, Thalric was higher within the ranks of the Rekef. And, although it was Thalric’s plan as much as Graf’s, it was, here and now, the subordinate’s role to bear the blame.
‘We neither of us predicted it, because we are Wasps. This development is merely a result of the weakness of our enemies,’ said Thalric, growing tired, letting the other man off the hook. ‘Perhaps we should have foreseen, but the plan seemed sound enough to me when you first outlined it.’
Graf visibly relaxed into his seat as Thalric took the paper from him. It was advance word from a man he kept fee’d in the Amphiophos, where the Assembly met. This man was just a servant, but he saw everything that went on there.
‘Well, the endgame can be salvaged, even though we might look like fools for all the rest.’ It had seemed reasonable, for Stenwold was already no friend of the Assembly. He had dangerous ideas and he left his post too often to undertake private ventures. He associated with dangerous and unsavoury types, yet now he wanted to speak to the Assembly, and they wanted to make him wait, to consider the error of his ways. Graf and Thalric had wanted to drive a wedge between Stenwold and his peers, so that the wait might become an eternity, so that his voice might never be heard.
‘So what happens?’ Thalric asked disgustedly. ‘He is constantly seen, agitating, rousing up the students of the College, going to dubious places to speak the very words that have so riled their precious Assembly in the past. And would you not think that this disgraceful behaviour would sour matters further, that they would cast him from their ranks and have done with it? If this were a place with any decent rule of law the man would have been crucified as a troublemaker before now.’ He crumpled the piece of paper and threw it across the room.
‘Yet now they want to speak to him,’ he spat. ‘All his rabble-rousing has them quaking in their sandals. They’re desperate, now, to have him where they can see him, and if that means they must allow him his hearing then so be it. They’re too feeble or too frightened to take the beetle by the horns and have the wretch arrested.’
‘But at least they won’t be well disposed to him, when they meet,’ Graf suggested.
Thalric turned a hard gaze on him, ‘They won’t meet, Lieutenant. We’re going to see to that. Our final move is to happen now. Get word to Arianna straight away. Tonight would be best, and let’s hope that word of the Assembly’s decision won’t even have reached him. Then gather your men. I assume they’ve been briefed on who lives and who dies?’
‘Death for the Mantis and his daughter,’ confirmed Graf, ‘but Stenwold lives, if possible.’
‘And dies if not,’ Thalric completed. ‘And when he disappears or dies we’ll put the word around that the Assembly had him dealt with after all, and then see how badly his precious students take it.’
Arianna left Stenwold dozing on his back again, lulled asleep by her latest embrace. The house was quiet, and she washed and dressed swiftly, and left even as dawn was creeping up the skirts of the eastern sky.
The stalls of the markets were in place already, the earliest business of the day commencing. Arianna wandered through them casually until she was sure she was not being watched or followed.
Her feet then found the path into the richer district of the mercantile quarter, close to the white walls of the College itself. The shopfronts here were just being unshuttered, for the rich could afford to rise later and with more leisure. Most of those out on the street already would be servants, waiting for one place or the other to open its doors for business. She passed on.
On the next street she paused at the barber’s shop. The Fly-kinden who was giving the floor inside a final opening sweep was Hofi, of course, but he did not look at her, nor she at him. Her attent
ion instead wandered over the placards he kept in his window. Anyone who wished could pay him a few coins to tell the world whatever they wanted announced. There were some goods reported for sale, goods similarly required. Rather more were personal valedictions, anonymous accolades for lovers, sly insults, even challenges. Her eyes skipped over them until she found her latest brief: a poem penned in a blocky hand, idolizing some woman named Marlia, but she recognized the key words in the first line and followed the stanzas down until she knew her new instructions.
So soon! Her heart lurched. She had been keeping the pot boiling so deftly. She could not think what had happened for Thalric to hasten the pace so violently. And tonight?
It just could not be done.
But of course it could be done. It would be easy enough. It would, in fact, pose no problems. Her instant reaction, though, was to kick away from it.
She had now been staring too long, and Hofi inside would note it. She turned and walked on, but stopped two shops down, peering through an iron grille at the jewellery behind it, yet seeing none of the gold or glitter. When she had been standing over Stenwold, her claws had been out ready to kill him, or at least she had told herself she was ready. Now her readiness would be put to the test, for now she had direct orders.
Direct orders and no luxury of choice. Of course she must do what she was told. She was Spider-kinden, so betrayal and double-dealing were in her blood. Stenwold Maker would not be the first to find her loyalty buckle beneath him just as he trusted his weight to it, nor the last either, no doubt. It was a game she once had played badly in Everis, but everyone was an expert out that way. In Collegium, amongst the plain and simple Beetle-kinden, she was superb at what she did.
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