For a moment he paused, as if to savour his petty victories. ‘Pretty soon everyone was taking on any locals who wanted in just to protect us from all the others. Then we started talking to each other – sorted out a new hierarchy based on how many swords, how much land, all the basics. Those Dragonflies willing to deal with us, we accepted them as our near-equals, gave them ranks like proper civilized people. The others got to go to the bottom of the pile and, with our new allies, we had strength enough to keep ’em there. For about half a year it was . . . well, you know the North-Empire at all? The hill tribes? It was like that, every village and town for itself. But you know how we are, Aulric: we’re better than that. We sorted it out. And those locals we’ve taken in and taught, they’re proving good students. One of the governor-generals is a reformed brigand chief of theirs. I’ve met him – he’s mad for all things Imperial, splendid fellow.’ A shadow crossed the merchant’s expression. ‘Of course we hear things have calmed down back home, with herself in charge at last.’
Thalric made a quick judgement. ‘I’ve seen no sign of armies pointed your way, Colonel. The Alliance cities are a problem, but . . .’ He glanced briefly at Che. ‘Seems to me the Lowlands are likely to be foremost in people’s minds.’
‘That’s fine, because we’d value good relations with the Empire,’ Aarth explained carefully, and Thalric understood him perfectly well. They wanted trade and the chance to visit home, but not to return to the bosom of the Empress. They were on to a good thing here, as lords of their own little backwoods empire.
After that, he and Aarth discussed matters mercantile, Thalric improvising well enough to keep the man happy. Shortly thereafter, Varmen was back with them.
‘It’s not what I’d call safe, west of here,’ their guide explained, after Thalric had bid Aarth farewell. ‘Still a few places holding out against the governor-general, which is what the local crook calls himself. We’ll have to go carefully, and be ready for a fight.’
When they left Lans Stowe, or Landstower, Varmen’s little pack-beetle had taken on a more sprightly gait entirely, and Varmen had transformed himself. He wore head-to-toe chain-mail, from the coif framing his face like a hood, to the long hauberk falling most of the way to his knees, to . . .
‘I’ve never seen mail trousers before,’ Che declared, staring. ‘I think that’s more armour than I’ve ever seen anyone wear ever, Varmen.’ She had kept her distance from him so far, but the sight of the man so heavily protected evidently struck her as almost comical.
‘This?’ Varmen just grinned. ‘This isn’t armour, mistress. This is just clothes you need to keep the rust off.’
As soon as they were beyond the farmland attached to Landstower, they travelled away from the roads, at Varmen’s suggestion. The terrain was surprisingly hilly, with irregular patches of dense forest, but there were plenty of goat tracks, and Varmen explained to them that the roads themselves dated only back to the occupation, and were little better, just hard-packed earth. ‘You see, the locals never did travel much,’ he explained.
Oh, I know, Thalric recalled. All these lands were places where he had fought, undertaken Rekef missions and cut throats. Imperial policy had been strict concerning the longevity of noble families in all areas under conquest.
Also at Varmen’s suggestion, they travelled on after dusk each day despite the intermittent snow, making several hours’ careful progress along the animal tracks before camping for the night, so as to make better time despite the short winter days, and to make life more difficult for anyone hoping to catch them unawares.
That was why their enemies, instead of ambushing them at their camp, were eventually forced to descend on them raggedly as they progressed.
The three of them had been moving along a lightly wooded track between two hills, when Che called out the warning, her own eyes better in the dark than either of the Wasps’. A moment later, there were forms gliding down around them, half a dozen, and then more. Thalric had his sword out, his offhand extended to sting, and Che had a hand to the hilt of her own blade.
‘All right, what’s this?’ Varmen demanded, with weapon already to hand: a sword longer and heavier than army-issue standard.
‘Give me a lantern!’ someone snarled, and one of the figures produced a rush-light from beneath a cover, lending a faint illumination to their surroundings. The newcomers were mostly Dragonflies, partly armoured in their borrowed black and gold. Standingbetween,andalittlebehindtwoofthem,wasthespeaker: a Wasp-kinden, not Aarth but the slaver at the Wayhouse.
Thalric made a quick count and found eight Commonwealers gathered in a loose half circle around them. Most of them carried spears, but a couple had bows with arrows to the string.
‘Your name’s Varmen, no?’ the slaver asked.
‘I owe you money?’ the big Wasp asked. ‘I don’t know your face.’
‘No need to worry yourself. I don’t want you. You can just take off,’ the slaver told him.
‘Is that so?’ Varmen said, looking round at all the Dragonfly-kinden. ‘Kind of you.’
Thalric was not sure what he had expected from Varmen, but when the big man grabbed his beetle’s halter and just backed off into the trees he found he was not overly disappointed. Che obviously had possessed more faith in their guide, for she shouted after him vainly, even as a curtain of driving snow took him from view, and then rounded furiously on the slaver.
‘What do you want with us?’ she demanded. Her own sword was out now, a short Collegium piece.
‘With you, nothing. Go follow your man there, if you wish,’ the slaver replied.
‘I don’t wish.’ She stood closer to Thalric, despite the odds. Just then, he could have wished for her to take the man’s offer, because he was faster than she was, both on the ground and in the air, and protecting her would get him killed all the sooner. Still, the odds were hardly favourable even without her.
‘What’s this?’ he asked them. ‘Who are you?’
‘Captain Halter, at your service.’
There was an awkward pause, because clearly the man expected his name to mean something, but Thalric could not place it.
‘I don’t know you . . .’
‘No?’ Halter’s face betrayed a twitch of annoyance. ‘But I recall you, Major, or your description at least.’
This use of Thalric’s old rank sent a dangerous jolt through him. This may suddenly become worse than I thought.
‘I wasn’t always the man of means you see before you,’ Halter continued, clearly delighting in having a captive audience. ‘I used to be a very lowly man indeed. But not entirely abandoned: I still got the lists.’
Thalric stared at him. ‘You’re not serious.’
‘I used to spend a lot of time memorizing those lists,’ Halter explained, positively beaming over his own cleverness. ‘We got plenty of fugitives coming through the Principalities. It was one of the few ways I could really attract my superiors’ notice, by turning in a few decent traitors. Names and descriptions, I memorized every one. Used to recite them to myself before I slept, most nights.’
‘I don’t know who you think I am,’ Thalric started. ‘My name’s—’
‘Aulric, you told the merchant,’ Halter finished for him. ‘So he told me, but I remember a man who matches your description nicely – a man who was right near the top of those lists, not so long ago.’
‘Listen, I’m not—’
‘Then you won’t mind stripping off and letting me and my lads look at your scars,’ Halter proposed, leering. ‘You see, Sergeant Aulric, this Thalric I remember had picked up a big old scar running from his navel to just about his knee. The description was very specific.’
‘Those lists . . . they must be years old, though.’
‘Oh, but once you’re on a list, there’s only one way off, as everyone knows. Imagine the reward I’d get for turning in such an inveterate traitor.’
But I’m not a traitor: I was the Regent . . . And of course such a revelation woul
d make matters a great deal worse. Thalric steeled himself, reasoning that this slaver would want him alive. Once again, he wished Che had fled, but to order her away now would surely give Halter the idea of using the woman as a hostage. Right now, the man probably thought Che was a servant or slave or something.
‘So, you’re going to strip, or shall we just fly you off to the Empire and see if they want you?’ Halter demanded.
Thalric was formulating a line concerning the wrath of his notional Consortium masters, when a voice shouted out from behind Halter.
‘Right now, you sneaky bastards! Face a real man!’
Halter whirled around, and half his men with him, to see an apparition come striding into the lamplight, out of the drifting snow, approaching almost within spear-reach before they could react.
The newcomer appeared colossal, but that was mostly the armour. A full-face helm exposed nothing of him save a narrow eyeslit, whilst segmented pauldrons encased his shoulders, and his torso was locked into a massive breastplate and backplate, from which hung curved tassets that descended clattering to mid-thigh. Brutal-looking gauntlets encased his hands. All of this was worn over the full layer of mail that Thalric had last seen the same man wearing, for that voice, despite its hollow echo, was Varmen’s. He had his heavy-bladed sword in one hand, and a broad heater shield strapped to his other arm. The man had transformed himself into a ghost of the Imperial past: here was the heavy armour of the Sentinels, who until not so long ago had been the Empire’s pride and joy and the unyielding fist of its line battles.
The only flaw in all this barrier of solid steel was a small, jagged hole in the breastplate, low-down to the left and barely noticeable.
‘Oh, piss-damn,’ Halter swore, shaken, and Thalric let fly a sting-bolt that killed one of the archers, whilst lunging at the other in a flurry of wings. The bowman twitched backwards, out of reach, but Thalric’s backhand swing smashed his bow before he could bring it to bear. Then Varmen was charging down on Halter, an unthinkable weight of both metal and man in smooth, furious motion. The slaver rapidly let fly with his sting three times, twice caught on the shield and once searing harmlessly off the breastplate. One of the Dragonfly spearmen, undergoing a surfeit of loyalty, tried to get in the way, but Varmen did not even give him the courtesy of a sword stroke, barging him aside as though the man was irrelevant, bellowing ‘Pride of the Sixth!’
At last, Halter tried to fly, wings suddenly sparking from his back. He had left it too late, though, and Varmen’s blade chopped down to catch him neatly between neck and shoulder and slam him to the ground.
The Dragonflies had joined in the fighting, and Thalric had been hard pressed to keep the spearmen at bay in those first few seconds, until Che had lanced one through the ribs. Once Halter was down, however, they scattered instantly into the night. Had there been a free archer left amongst them, Thalric would have expected some long-range reprisal. As it was, he reckoned he and Che were probably safe from at least that particular pack of villains for the rest of the night.
He turned his gaze to the armoured behemoth that Varmen had become, and saw that the man had not yet sheathed his sword, but instead was now staring at him through that dark eyeslit.
‘The lists,’ came the man’s voice, hollow from within the helm.
‘What?’ Thalric asked, with a sinking sensation in his stomach.
‘He said your name was on the lists,’ the other Wasp stated flatly.
Thalric felt himself tense, so as to be ready if the man came for him. Halter’s sting had barely marked that solid armour, but Thalric’s Art was considerably stronger than most, and he would aim for the lighter mail over Varmen’s throat.
‘What’s going on?’ Che wanted to know.
‘Lots of people were on the lists,’ Thalric said defensively, enlightening her not at all.
‘Oh, I remember the cursed lists, and all the names on them were Rekef,’ Varmen spat. ‘It’s true, isn’t it? You watched me doing all that mumming for the Dragonflies, all those hints about how you were a sneak, and all the time you were laughing at me ’cos it was true all along.’ His voice had turned raw and angry.
‘Varmen, listen,’ Che said hurriedly. ‘It’s not what you think—’
‘I remember your lists,’ Varmen snapped. ‘When we were waiting to march on Sarn with the Seventh, two or three times some pack of Rekef executioners would come from down the rail line, with their cursed lists. They’d haul someone out from inspection, hustle them off, and then it was an unmarked grave and no questions asked. Because they were on the lists. And, you know what, I don’t care. Let Rekef kill Rekef, I’m not going to piss any blood for that – but those poor bastards they hauled out, we knew them. We’d known ’em for years, you know? Ate with them, diced with them, trusted them to watch our backs – and they’d been Rekef all along, spying on us, writing down every last thing anyone said that sounded like it might be treason.’
‘So what are you going to do about it?’ Thalric demanded of him.
The faceless helm shifted left and right, seeming something less than human, a mute animal in pain. ‘If I’d known . . . I’d never have agreed to guide you, if I’d known.’
‘Listen,’ Che told him, ‘I’m not Rekef, right? I’m a Lowlander from Collegium. You’re . . .’ She remembered his cry: Pride of the Sixth. ‘Sixth Army? You were at . . .’ She got her recent history straight and blinked. ‘Malkan’s Folly, that must mean.’
‘Malkan’s Stand,’ Varmen corrected, giving the Wasp-kinden name for the battlefield on which Imperial ambitions towards the Sarnesh Ants had been smashed . . . and where the Empire’s heaviest line infantry had met the new dawn of the snapbow. Her eyes were drawn to that single flaw in the man’s mail, a finger-sized hole punched effortlessly through that thick armour plate.
‘I’m no Rekef, and Thalric hasn’t been one for years. That’s probably why he was on this list to begin with.’
Varmen’s carapaced shoulders slumped. ‘I’d never have said yes,’ he muttered, but he sheathed his sword in a single motion, through long habit able to find the scabbard’s mouth without searching, and then he was fumbling at the buckle to his helm, dragging the weighty thing off and then drawing back his coif, showing a tousled, unhappy man underneath.
‘We’re glad you came back, even so,’ Che told him. ‘And that you could get all your armour on so fast.’
‘All?’ he said, with a faint smile. ‘Woman, this isn’t all. This is just what I could, you know, throw on in a hurry. Most of it’s still on the beetle.’ His eyes found Thalric’s and the smile faded.
‘What can I say?’ Thalric shrugged. ‘So I was Rekef. As she says, not for a long time – and the Empire has gone to some lengths to get rid of me since. Putting my name on the lists is the least of it.’
Seeing Varmen’s grim expression linger, Che pressed on. ‘I promise you. Nothing about this journey relates to the Rekef, or even to the Empire.’ She essayed a smile. ‘Let me tell you about my sister.’
Fifteen
A crowd had gathered in one of Khanaphes’s great plazas. Merchants and artisans and farmers clumped together, looking up at the balcony from which, traditionally, the city’s leaders had formerly made pronouncements, passing on the words of the unseen Masters.
Now the balcony bore a less familiar burden, as a handful of Beetle-kinden Ministers was overshadowed by the presence of the Empire. However, the most imposing presence belonged not to the Wasp-kinden officers, nor the Mantis bodyguards, but to the Empress Seda herself. For all that she was such a slight and unassuming figure, something about her instantly drew the eye and held it. No Spider Arista possessed such raw presence as she did, looking out over the anxiously milling people of Khanaphes.
Across the street, from the window of a merchant factora, Praeda and Amnon watched as one of the Ministers stood forth to address the populace.
‘That’s not Ethmet,’ the big man murmured. ‘Why isn’t the First Minister there?’
Praeda shrugged. ‘You tell me,’ she replied, resting a hand on his arm. ‘These are your people. When I was here last I’d have said that very little the Ministers did made many kinds of sense.’
The foremost Minister standing on the balcony – at this distance just an anonymous old man – held out his hands, and the citizens below quietened swiftly. ‘People of Khanaphes, rejoice!’ he declared, with all apparent sincerity. ‘Rejoice for the friendship of a new Empire!’
The people below did not seem minded to spring into instant celebration, but merely stared upwards cautiously. Praeda guessed many of them would have heard how this selfsame Empire had been behind the ruinous Scorpion attack of the previous year, from which the city was so plainly still recovering. To have such a large Imperial force insert itself effortlessly within their walls caused them understandable concern.
‘The Honoured Foreigners of the Wasp Empire have heard of our troubles,’ the Minister pressed on stoically. ‘They are deeply grieved that renegades from within their own borders may have incited the Scorpions of the Nem to attack our walls.’ Nothing in the Minister’s assured delivery acknowledged just how swiftly those walls had been brought down, or the terrible cost of that assault. Khanaphes, city of ten thousand years, did not like to dwell on its own defeats.
Praeda shifted at the window, wishing she could get her telescope out, but knowing that, at this angle, sunlight might flash from the lens and draw Imperial attention. Amnon had talked his way into this place, the merchant that owned it was surely somewhere in the crowd outside, and she was still worried that word might already have reached the government that their errant son, their former First Soldier, had returned.
‘So it is,’ the Minister was saying, ‘that the Honoured Foreigners wish to make amends. Even today they will be taking their soldiers off into the Nem, with all their fearful artifice, there to confront and slay as many of the despoiling Scorpions as they can find. These foreigners, our friends, shall thus take the blood of the Many in recompense for the harm their rebellious subjects have done here. They tell us that, after they are done, we need not fear the return of the Scorpions for five hundred years!’
Heirs of the Blade (Shadows of the Apt 7) Page 19