Adrian Tchaikovsky - Dragonfly Falling

Thalric raised an eyebrow. ‘Is it like that, then? Well then, do you want me to tell you about her? The truth? You must be still wondering whether the subtle Spider has spun a straight line?’

‘Thalric,’ Stenwold said warningly, and found his hand at his sword-hilt, and the Wasp’s gaze followed it.

‘I did not take you for a killer of unarmed prisoners.’

‘You’re Wasp-kinden,’ Stenwold pointed out. ‘Therefore you’re never unarmed. What do you want , Thalric?’

Thalric stood up from the table, a little of his casual ease sloughing off him. ‘I have been alone before, and hunted, but never so much of both at once. There was always the Empire. Now I find that the Empire I knew is a hollow egg. The insides are rotting with factions and I, who have disdained them, have become a casualty of politics. You believe, Stenwold, in something beyond yourself?’

‘I believe that it is the duty of the strong to help the weak, and of men and women to live in peace and to build together,’ the Beetle said, without even thinking. That was the doctrine so much of Collegiate thought was based on.

‘I believe in the Empire, but it did not bear the weight of my belief,’ Thalric said.

‘So you’re more imperial than the Empire now, is that it?’ Stenwold shook his head. ‘I can’t see you as such a thorough turncoat.’

‘I had my chance to die for my beliefs, Master Maker,’ Thalric said with surprising emotion, ‘but when they came for me, at the last, I fought them. I made my decision then. I can no longer claim now to be a loyal son of the Empire, having failed to follow its last command. I have to live , Maker, and you know as well as I the fate that awaits an agent cut loose by either side. He falls, Maker. He falls and is gone. So employ me, make use of me, while you still have me.’

‘Sit down again,’ Stenwold said, and then, ‘Let’s talk.’

Thalric returned to the table, glancing up at Arianna’s hostile gaze. ‘She would still see me dead, I observe.’

‘Perhaps she has more sense than I do,’ Stenwold said. ‘What do you know of the forces currently marching on Sarn?’

Thalric raised his eyebrows. ‘From what I recall, the Seventh had the honour set aside for it — General Malkan’s Winged Furies. Malkan is the Empire’s youngest general, and very ambitious.’

‘What is the Empire’s attitude to taking prisoners after a field battle, Thalric?’

The question was obviously not one the Wasp had expected. ‘It depends on the battle. A battle against Ants would see few prisoners taken. If the fighting was bitter then the soldiers may leave none alive to be taken, whether they have surrendered or not.’

Stenwold found himself gripping the table, imagining Che surrendering with hands out in supplication, yet the swords still coming down.

‘So the Sarnesh have lost a battle,’ Thalric mused. ‘Who did you have with them, Master Maker?’ When Stenwold did not reply, he said, ‘Not your niece?’

There was no mockery in his tone, so Stenwold nodded.

‘I am sorry,’ said Thalric, and when the Beetle glared at him he continued, ‘She impressed me as a woman of intelligence and resource.’ He seemed to brace himself before adding, ‘Do you want me to go and find her for you?’

‘You?’ Stenwold demanded, puzzled.

‘With appropriate help,’ Thalric said, and it was clear that he was wrestling the idea into shape even as he spoke. ‘I might be able to achieve it, for I am at least of the right kinden, and among the thousands in Malkan’s army, I could appear just one more foot soldier, one more of the light airborne.’

‘I must think,’ Stenwold said, standing.

‘At least consider the offer.’

‘I must think,’ the Beetle repeated, and left the room. Arianna sent Thalric a last poisonous glance before she followed.

No more bad news, please. No more messengers. Stenwold was still haunted by the stricken look on Sperra’s face, when he had told her of Scuto’s death. Home, now. No more war business. No more shaking hands. Home, was the plan. No more of the heavy marble halls of the Amphiophos. Home and try to find a path to save Che. Any path that does not involve me placing trust in Thalric. It might be that there was no such alternative. And how to keep him mine, once he is loose? If the Empire would accept him back then he would betray me without a thought.

He stomped wearily down the steps of the Amphiophos, hearing a ragged cheer as some late celebrants recognized him.

‘This won’t go away, will it?’ he said gloomily.

‘My kinden scheme all their lives for such recognition,’ Arianna said.

His sharp glance left her instantly contrite. ‘I’m sorry, I know that’s not what you want to hear.’

‘It’s what I am, though, isn’t it,’ said Stenwold. ‘I’m as much of a web-spinner as Teornis. The difference is that the people who get caught in my webs are my own. My own friends, my kin.’

The frightened expression appearing on her face had his hand to his sword instantly, turning and drawing. He froze, then, hearing two or three people cry out in shock at the bared steel.

‘So they’re still calling you War Master,’ said that oh-so-familiar voice, that twenty-years-familiar voice, and Stenwold sheathed his sword numbly, noting that neither father nor daughter had so much as flinched at the threat of it.

He put out his hand, noticing it tremble slightly, and clasped arm to arm with Tisamon, feeling the man’s spines flex. ‘You’ve no idea how good it is to see you,’ he said. I’ve missed having a mad killer by my side. The thought made him laugh out loud, and he went to embrace Tynisa like a true father. But she took a step back, and then he noticed the sword and circle brooch she bore — saw in her haggard features the cost of that honour.

‘Tynisa. ’

‘I live,’ she told him flatly.

‘The Mantis-kinden?’

‘I live,’ she said again.

Stenwold felt Arianna flinch at the thought. A nation of Tisamons, how could that ever work?

‘And Collegium is still standing,’ Tisamon observed. ‘You Beetles will always surprise me.’

‘I am told,’ Stenwold said, ‘that you are not entirely free of guilt in that.’

That dragged a smile from Tynisa. ‘We didn’t know if Teornis would get here. We didn’t know if he would even try.’

‘I am surprised,’ Tisamon admitted. ‘And at what cost is the city saved?’

Stenwold nodded. ‘At least we are here to pay it. The Spider Aristos has saved Collegium, as much as anyone has, and we cannot deny him that.’

‘The world,’ Tisamon declared, ‘has turned upside down.’ His gaze sought out Arianna, recognizing her for the first time beyond the College student’s robe. The claw was on his arm, as simple as that.

Stenwold put a hand on his shoulder as though he had not seen it, facing the man’s hostility head-on. ‘She has stood by me,’ he said. ‘She has saved my life and fought for my city, and she could have betrayed or killed me at any time. She is’ — Mine, she is mine — ‘loyal,’ he finished, at last. ‘And she did warn us of the Vekken, and we put that time to good use.’

‘Trust comes slowly,’ Tisamon agreed as Arianna regarded him cautiously.

‘I see you didn’t trust them enough to sail here with them,’ Stenwold observed.

‘As to that. ’ Tisamon looked sidelong at Tynisa, ‘we had other engagements.’

‘A little job to do,’ Tynisa confirmed. ‘We’ll know, soon enough, if it has worked.’

Haldred was a Wasp of good family, a captain in the imperial army and a man whose preferred career path would have placed him securely in the imperial city of Capitas all his life. For a rising star in General Maxin’s retinue, however, there came some tasks that could not be avoided. A great deal hung on this, he had been told, and success in achieving it would be remembered. His name would be commented on to the Emperor himself.