Steph Swainston - Dangerous Offspring

Frost had been talking to Gayle on her other side, but she caught a fragment of our conversation and smiled. ‘No one can better Lightning on the ebb and flow of featherback dynasties. He remembers them all.’

Lightning raised a finger shrewdly and drunkenly. ‘I knowed…I mean…I knew them all.’

‘We realise. Why don’t you have some of this?’ I said, offering him a slice of fudge cake which would be well-nigh impossible to talk through.

Lightning refused it for the chance to show Eleonora his knowledge. ‘Our court was in power from five forty-nine until six eighty-seven. My mother held the throne at the time of the Games. The Avernwaters followed, from six eighty-seven to the year one thousand; they held out a long time but their town is now only a Tanager muster. The Piculets rose in power, from the year one thousand until ten eighty-one. Then the Pardalotes were very successful, ten eighty-one to thirteen twenty-six, when Insects killed the last. The Piculets returned from thirteen twenty-six to thirteen ninety-eight. I liked them, but I didn’t think much of the Fulvetta dynasty (thirteen ninety-eight to fifteen sixteen), very debauched in the fifteenth century. The exhilarating times of new Awia had long gone. They used to tell me, “Be decadent while you still can. The Insects will destroy us too.” Well, the last one, Lanare Fulvetta, poisoned her family and was imprisoned for patricide. Then rose the Scoters (fifteen sixteen to fifteen thirty-six) until a flu epidemic put an end to them and tens of thousands more. They were followed by an interregnum and I was champing at the bit then, let me tell you. The Falconets were merchant arrivistes-with sporadic insanity-who filled the vacuum from fifteen thirty-eight to sixteen forty-one. I had to sit through that; they were all quite mad. There was a schism in the family and poor Petronia Falconet went to Hacilith, but his son did well as the first Aver-Falconet. Then the Tanagers appeared, a famous warrior family-’ He smiled at Eleonora ‘-and succeeded to the throne. They restored some of the wonderful original vigour from sixteen fifteen until eighteen twelve…’

‘Financial problems,’ put in Eleonora graciously.

‘Financial problems,’ Lightning concurred. ‘The Rachiswaters rose to power (eighteen twelve to twenty fifteen). They founded Carniss but an Insect swarm ended them, and back came the Tanagers…twenty fifteen until who knows when?’

Eleonora said, ‘That’s the way you see mortals, isn’t it? Just offshoots of family lines, just the latest kings or servants or soldiers.’

Lightning prodded a finger at the table top. ‘That is a very involved question. So in simplest yes and no terms, let me just say, perhaps.’

‘I expect you think there’s no point in getting to know them personally.’

The smile spread over his face again. ‘You, Eleonora, are an excellent personification of the Tanagers.’

‘We may have been good warriors but we weren’t so successful in peaceful times. My forebears didn’t care as much about money as yours must have done.’

Lightning said, ‘Nevertheless, I think you’ll last. Pass the wine, please.’

‘You’ve drunk enough.’

‘I…have drunk enough claret in my life to fill Micawater lake. ‘S true. I worked it out. A whole damn lake of calret. Claret.’

‘Only Awia has such royal splendour,’ Eleonora continued. ‘I feel sorry for the other countries.’

I felt sorry for Lightning’s daughter. He seemed to want her to begin his dynasty once more, so this time he could watch over it properly, but evidently he couldn’t even look after her. I said, ‘If I find Cyan, I’ll explain all this to her. Besides, I’ve been at the front for a long time; I’d welcome a change of scene.’

‘You all have your priorities wrong!’ Frost wailed.

Lightning said to her, ‘I wouldn’t let Jant go if I didn’t think he could do it. Cyan knows and likes him. She listens to him.’

‘I know the underworld, too,’ I said.

‘Oh, god…Good luck.’

‘What do you want me to do if I find her?’

Lightning propped his head on his hand. ‘Hmm. Send her to the palace. No, on second thoughts, bring her here. I can keep an eye on her. Otherwise she might run away again. Harrier may be growing too long in the tooth to keep up with her.’

‘She can watch us drawing up the troops,’ Eleonora suggested.

‘Yes. It might do the uncouth young lady good to see the fyrd in action. She needs a firm hand. She calls herself Cyan Peregrine, as she should, because she will inherit the manor when she’s twenty-one. I am glad she accepts it, but everything else she does these days seems designed to cause me pain. If…If the worst has happened and you need constables, or horses, ask Aver-Falconet. Cyan was supposed to be meeting him anyway…Harrier had to make all kinds of excuses.’

Frost shook her head and clasped her hands around her coffee cup. ‘I don’t like it. I’m busy with my speciality as San wants us to be. I don’t branch out. I don’t have pastimes; I work all the time. But, Lightning, when you’re not playing geopolitics you’re playing family history!’

He asked her, ‘Will you be able to work without Jant?’

She bristled. ‘Yes, of course! I coped for hundreds of years before he flew in!’

‘Use my couriers,’ I said.

‘Typical. Everything to be done at the pace of a nag rather than the pace of an eagle.’

Lightning said, ‘Give him six days, Frost. You never give anybody enough time off. Including yourself, I suspect.’

‘How else would I have built the dam?’ she asked, then turned to Eleonora. ‘Your Highness, be my witness that I object to this ridiculous errand.’

Eleonora shrugged. ‘As you wish, but we’re at the front so I can’t intervene in an argument between Eszai.’

Frost could see she was outnumbered and I felt a twist of guilt because the advance is supposed to be our priority. However, I can manage both and she’s probably just annoyed that I’m more busy than her. She said, ‘Jant, when you return, report straight to me. I’ll have a stack of letters for you by then.’

I picked my jacket off the back of the chair, leant over the table and gathered some cheese rolls.

Lightning said, ‘Wait a minute.’ He struggled to his feet and threw an arm around my shoulders. He was taller than my one metre eighty-five and nearly twice as broad as I am. He accompanied me to the door with a confidential air, saying, ‘Jant, you must know that…Um…I have my own doubts. Um…Oh, god knows I have always tried to show you the right way but you are far too easily tempted…’

‘What?’

‘Cyan is a very attractive girl.’

‘Good,’ I said.

He rubbed the tips of his fingers over the scar on his right hand. ‘I’m not sure if…if she pretty how knows she is. Knows how pretty she is. It might have an effect on certain men…On certain men who have volunteered to find her.’

‘What!’ I said indignantly. ‘I promise I won’t touch her!’

‘You never know what you are going to do, Jant, so don’t bother promising. I wish for once you would plan ahead rather than living in the instant and rushing into things. I remember how you were when you first joined the Circle, eagerly looking for ways to destroy yourself. You still pride yourself on being dangerous.’

It took him some time to say this and I waited patiently. ‘Lightning, you have old-fashioned ideas.’

‘With time you’ll learn they’re the safest. If you…If you take advantage of Cyan I’ll have your guts for bowstring. I will do you more damage than that battle did…I’ll break every one of your weird-looking fingers.’

‘God. You really know how to get through to a Rhydanne. There’s no need to worry, trust me; I told Cyan to think of me as her brother.’