Adrian Tchaikovsky - Dragonfly Falling

‘I’m not a deserter,’ she protested. ‘I’m not an Auxillian.’ She fell silent, knowing that whatever she said could only make her position worse. The same understanding was in his eyes, too.

‘I’m sorry,’ he said, with a shrug. ‘A man’s got to make a living, and it’s not easy sometimes.’

He had taken her into his tent, come nightfall, with the fire left to burn itself out by the opening, and she had assumed he would take advantage of her. Instead he just made sure she was tied too tight to escape, and then lay down at whatever distance from her the tent would allow. She realized that in some perverse feeling of concern he had brought her inside to keep her warm.

‘Please,’ she addressed his back. ‘I promise you more money than the Wasps will pay. Just take me to Sarn. Sarn can’t be too far out of your way.’

‘Don’t make me gag you,’ was his only reply.

Gaved woke with the dawn, as he always did. It was good to be travelling alone and in the wilds. It had been fun going along with Phin for a time, but in the end other people tended to crowd him.

And yet here I am, so self-sufficient I’m doing the Empire’s work still . The cursed Spider, Scylis, had seen right through his vaunted independence, and he could do without some mercenary telling him things he already knew.

He remembered his last sight of Phin, sprawled dead with a nailbow shot straight through her. She had deserved better than that, but then so did most people who died.

The girl was awake and staring at him and obviously about to start pleading for her life again. That would only depress him. ‘I’m going out to water the place,’ he told her, ‘but I’ll be watching, and if you make a move it won’t be a stone this time, but a sting, you understand?’

She nodded, and he went outside into the growing sunlight, smiling to greet it, as he always did. Then the smile slipped and he growled, ‘Who in the wastes are all of you?’

Che watched the Wasp re-enter, with an odd expression on his face. He had a small knife in one hand, and she opened her mouth to scream, but he said, just above a whisper, ‘Now I’m going to cut you free. No sudden moves, all right?’

The knife sawed through the bonds at her ankles, and then at her wrists, and a moment later he backed out of the tent again, and she saw a flash of reflected sunlight as he cast the knife point-first into the ground.

She crawled cautiously out after him and saw that they were not alone, that there were at least a dozen other people crouching or standing around the tent. They had swords and bows and crossbows, and they came from all kinden, and they distinctly had the look of the bandit about them.

‘Well,’ Gaved said. ‘I suppose she’s yours now.’

‘Don’t move, Wasp. We’ve not done with you,’ said one of the bandits — and a moment later Che was running forward, throwing herself into his arms with a cry of joy, because under the grime and the tarnished cuirass and the rough clothing was none other than Prince Salme Dien, who she thought she would never see again.

‘Salma! How can you be here? How can it be you?’

‘I had some help in finding you,’ he replied, embracing her gently, and glanced back towards one of his own people who was muffled in a cloak. Then the hood was pushed back to reveal that the face beneath was bright and rainbow-hued.

‘You found her?’

‘And then she found me,’ Salma confirmed. He looked at Gaved the Wasp. ‘Did this man hurt you?’

Gaved visibly tensed, knowing that her answer would seal his fate.

‘No,’ she said. ‘Nothing like that at all.’

‘Then pack up your tent, Master Wasp. You’re coming with us.’ He turned again to his followers. ‘Phalmes?’

A tough-looking Mynan stepped forwards. ‘Yes, chief?’

‘We’re heading back for camp, and then I want a messenger sent to Collegium.’

Che then thought about the plans that Totho had given her, the plans still concealed inside her tunic.

The war was far from over.