Adrian Tchaikovsky - Dragonfly Falling

Then he stepped out of the room, following Arianna’s path, for he had unfinished business.

‘Explain to me why these machines are such a threat,’ demanded one of the Tarkesh tacticians, sounding irritable. He might even have been the king, for Totho found it difficult to distinguish Tark’s ruler, to whom he had been briefly introduced, from the other men on his staff. There were about a dozen of them, men and women, and they all had the same Tarkesh features that made them look like siblings. The king wore no special garments or insignia, just the same plate and chain armour as the others, even here in his war-room, and like them looked as though he was short on sleep. Totho supposed that, mentally, he kept saying, ‘I’m the king, I’m the king,’ but for outsiders it was impossible to tell.

‘It’s all to do with flight: Art flight and mechanical flight,’ he said, looking from face to face just to be sure. ‘I’m afraid I don’t fly any more than you, so can I ask my friend here to explain about Art flight?’

One of them nodded, one of the women, and Salma stepped forwards. Totho glanced around to see Parops standing to attention behind them, having persuaded the court to see them at all.

‘Your Majesty,’ Salma said tactfully, bowing to the correct Ant, ‘may I present myself as Prince Minor Salme Dien of the Dragonfly Commonweal, arrived here in common cause with your city-state at the behest of Master Stenwold Maker of the Great College.’

It sounded impressive, but he prompted no awed reaction from the assembled tacticians. Instead they just eyed him suspiciously.

‘The Wasps are not strong fliers,’ Salma continued. ‘With only the wings their Art can summon up, they cannot fly for long distances. They can just about get from their camp across your walls, but they could not simply circle over your city for hours, or even many minutes. Moreover, they could not gain enough height to get out of range of your crossbows without wholly exhausting themselves. You’ve seen that for yourselves, I’m sure.’

There were nods and a few hard smiles around the war table, and Salma thought, They actually think they’re winning!

‘I’m sure the Wasps have some who are better than that, probably scout squads of their best fliers, but not enough to make a difference. They also have their insect cavalry, and their machines. I forget what Totho called them.’

‘Heliopters,’ Totho supplied. ‘The problem is that they don’t fly very high either, and they’re very exposed to your artillery, because they’re big and slow and not as heavily armoured as you might think, because then they couldn’t get off the ground at all.’

‘We have seen such,’ one of the tacticians confirmed.

‘But their airships can fly much higher,’ Totho explained. ‘So high, in fact, that the only thing able to threaten them would be something else capable of flying that high. I don’t even know if your orthopters could do it but the Wasps obviously thought they could, which is why they mounted the night attack that saw most of them destroyed. At a great cost to the Wasps themselves, true, but now they can safely attack your city from the air. They can drop explosives on you, or even just rocks or leadshot. They can deploy their soldiers, as well, over any part of the city that they choose. Even though they can’t fly up high of their own accord they can glide down without much effort. I am afraid that the Wasps have brought a new kind of war to you.’

Though the tacticians did not exchange glances or confer, Totho sensed the flurry of thoughts passing between them. At last one of them spoke.

‘We must destroy them, then, on the ground.’

‘That would seem to be your best chance,’ Totho agreed.

‘An attempt at sallying out with any affordable force would meet with defeat almost immediately,’ another tactician warned. ‘A sally with sufficient force would merely leave the city wide open, and the potential casualties amongst our troops would be unacceptable.’

‘A covert attack would be the only solution,’ a third concluded, fixing Totho and Salma with a fierce stare. This, Totho realized, must be the King of Tark.

‘We will trust your analysis of the situation,’ the man continued. ‘You have information and perspective that we lack in this. We distrust new wars, and we see this distrust has brought us to this point. We must mount a swift strike tonight to destroy the airships. Then we must destroy the Wasps in the field before they can construct or import more of them.’

‘Your Majesty,’ said Salma, ‘I would go with your men, if I may?’ The tacticians studied him, narrow-eyed, and he shrugged. ‘For one, I can fly. I can see better in the darkness than your people. And I am a sworn enemy of the Wasps.’

‘We have favourable reports of your fighting in the recent attack.’ The King nodded. ‘You indeed have talents we lack. Very well. And your comrade?’

‘No-’ Salma started, but, ‘Yes,’ said Totho.

Salma goggled at him, wrong-footed for once, and Totho felt obscurely proud of that. ‘I may not be the fighter that Salma here is,’ he said, ‘but I am an artificer of the College, and destroying the airships is an artificer’s work.’

‘You must stay always with our people,’ the King warned him. ‘They will know each other’s minds, but not yours. You must not stray from them.’

‘I will do what is asked of me,’ Totho confirmed, and realized Salma was still staring at him, shaking his head slightly. ‘I have one other request for Your Majesty, though.’

‘What request is this?’ The King and his staff were all suspicion again.

‘There was a halfbreed scout captured with us, when your soldiers took us in,’ Totho explained. ‘Her name is Skrill. Please let her out of the city when we start on our sally, so that she can head for Collegium and inform Master Maker what’s happening here. He is trying to organize an army against the Wasps, I think, and he may be able to help, so he needs to know exactly what’s going on here.’

There was a long silence between the tacticians then, as they passed their narrow thoughts back and forth, trying for a consensus. Eventually, the King nodded slowly.

‘It shall be so,’ he said.

‘Would you mind explaining to me just exactly what you’re doing?’ Salma demanded, once they were back in their rooms in Parops’s slightly skewed tower.

‘I don’t mind at all,’ said Totho. ‘If you don’t mind answering the same question first.’

‘I am going out to fight,’ Salma said, ‘because I have been trained to fight, and because the Wasps are the enemies of my people, and most of all because I know how to look after myself-’

‘That’s not it at all,’ said Totho. He now felt drained and miserable. The prospect of tonight’s activities oppressed him, and he sensed that he had been robbed of choice from the moment he had set foot in Tark. My last real choice was to leave Che to the Moth. And what a good choice that had been.

‘ What’s not it?’ and even to Totho, who had no great ear for such things, Salma sounded evasive.

‘You don’t care about Tark. No, that’s unfair — but you sold yourself long to the Ants. You can fight, but you’re no good at destroying airships.’

‘The Moths of Tharn can destroy mine-workings. I witnessed that in Helleron.’

‘Because they’ve practised, they’ve learned particular things by rote. That’s not the same,’ Totho said. ‘But here you are charging out to fight thirty thousand Wasp-kinden, and you don’t care about Tark enough to do that. You’re looking for her, the dancing girl.’

Salma was quiet for a long time before finally getting his words in order. ‘You know, Toth, I really do underestimate you sometimes.’