Adrian Tchaikovsky - Empire in Black and Gold

Bello had given that some thought. ‘It will be the Spider,’ he said.

Tisamon went very still, and Bello saw with a start that his bladed gauntlet was on his hand. ‘Spider-kinden?’ he asked softly.

‘A woman,’ the boy stammered. ‘She. .’ She had said not to say it. ‘She put me. .’

‘She pointed you in my direction, did she?’ Tisamon was very still. ‘If it was some jest of hers, she shall not be laughing hereafter. Not if she is champion for the Firecallers.’

‘Master, what-?’

‘Oh we hate them, and it is an old blood hate,’ Tisamon whispered. He was like another man in that moment, a man with the weight of centuries dragging at him. ‘We kill them, when we can. Though they laugh at us and call us savages, yet they do not think of us without a chill. I shall be glad, tonight, if it is a Spider-kinden they have chosen.’

His face was a stranger’s face, a face not to be met with on a dark street.

Bello could not concentrate at work. He flew only two errands, let the others pick up the slack. There was no shortage of volunteers. Everyone had a family trying to make ends meet. The broad, squat Beetle did not care who got paid, so long as the job was done. What he did mind was his boys distracting one another and chattering too much while they waited. Bello felt the weight of his hand at least twice when telling his fellows that he would be watching a real challenge fight tonight, that he was specially invited. It beat being on talking terms with Holden. It made him a celebrity.

He did not think about the Firecallers, about what they would do with him if they caught him. They would not move before the fight, Tisamon had told him. It was bad etiquette.

And if he loses?

He did not think about it.

The Golden Square had once lived up to its name, but not within living memory. It had been a theatre, hosting bawdy comedies for the artisan classes. Now it was a makeshift arena. The management let it out to any local gangs who had a score, and didn’t charge. The bookmakers’ takings more than covered costs and it kept the place independent of the fiefs, more or less. It had been on House of Maynard turf until recently, but the tide had carried the Firecallers’ borders past it. Some half-dozen of the Maynard men turned up, led by a grim-looking Ant-kinden woman with a shaved head. It was no secret that if the challenge match went against them, so would a great deal else.

They dressed drably, keeping under sleeves the white-patterned bracers that told of their allegiance. In contrast, the score and a half of Firecallers were rowdy and boisterous and wore their red silk scarves with fierce pride. Maynard himself had not shown, but the leader of the Firecallers, a broad-shouldered halfbreed, was holding court at one end of the sand.

Bello’s nerve nearly failed him three times before he managed to approach the place. There were all manner of toughs knocking shoulders outside it, from fief soldiers to the local labour, or tradesmen here for a flutter. In the end he waited for his moment and just darted in, pitching over their heads and dropping into the doorway with, for once, the poise of an acrobat.

‘Very adept,’ said a familiar voice from behind the door. He looked round, but it was a moment before he found Tisamon standing there. ‘You’re a good flyer. Perhaps you should try the Guild. You’re of an age to train.’

Bello blinked at him. It was strange to face this travelled, seasoned man and know something, as second nature, that he had no idea of. ‘The Guildhouse here’s a closed shop, Master. Unless you’re sponsored, you don’t get in. Nobody’s going to sponsor me.’

‘The Messengers keep other houses in other cities,’ Tisamon said, but then looked away as the bald Ant-kinden woman came over.

‘With you standing by the door, Mantis, it looks like you’re going to run,’ she said. Tisamon stared at her coldly but she faced up to him without a blink. ‘What? We’re all bug-food if you take your leave, man. Anyway, they’re asking for you. We’re about to settle this.’

Tisamon nodded. ‘Clavia, you keep an eye on this boy here. Don’t keep him with you, but I want him unharmed when this is done.’

The Ant-kinden, Clavia, frowned, but Tisamon waved her objections away. ‘Call it a condition of my employment.’

‘Rack you, Mantis-man,’ she spat out, but she was nodding. ‘Whatever you want. I swear, if you foul the works here, I’ll kill you myself.’

She stalked off to her fellows, who had a good view of the sand. Bello wanted to go with them but then saw why not. So I am not caught, if this goes badly. He glanced up at Tisamon. Does he fear he’ll lose, or that the Firecallers won’t accept his win?

The fighter was making his way after Clavia, and Bello was about to find a place, when someone said, ‘Oi,’ softly behind him. With a sudden stab of fear he turned, but then grinned to see a familiar face.

‘Master Holden!’

‘You’re up late, boy.’ Holden’s smile was barely there. ‘I see you got involved in all of this. I tried to warn you about it. It’s hard to make an honest living in this town, but you should at least give it a try.’

‘I’ve not joined a fief yet, Master,’ Bello said. ‘I just. .’

Holden shook his head. ‘We all have to pay the rent,’ he said sadly.

‘Even you?’ Somehow Bello had never thought of old Joyless Bidewell making the extra climb to Holden’s rooms above. ‘But you’re doing well? You said so.’

‘That’s a close neighbour to doing badly. They live on the same street.’ Holden tousled Bello’s hair. ‘Now you’ve got this far, now you see all these men, these criminals, making more money in a night than you see yourself in a month, you’ll see things in a different way. You’ll be a fief-soldier soon enough, working from the ground up. It’s a shame, but you’re not the first.’

‘Master Holden. .’ He wanted to say that he wanted to be a freelancer, a duellist, like Tisamon or Holden himself. It was not a job for a Fly-kinden, though, not even for the biggest and hardiest Fly-kinden there ever was.

‘Go find yourself a seat,’ the Beetle said to him, and passed on through the crowd.

Bello looked around, and saw that there were at least a dozen Fly-kinden already in the rafters, finding niches where they could enjoy a unique viewpoint. Some were wearing Firecaller scarves but he found just then he wanted to watch the fight more than he feared them. He let his wings take him up to a beam and sat there, his legs dangling. He felt the eyes of Clavia on him as he flew.

The sand, where the fighters would square off, was nothing grand, just a strip about twenty feet long, no more than five feet wide. In the fiefs they liked their fights close and bloody. At one end the Firecaller leadership sat enthroned. At the other end were Clavia and her few minions. Along each side, close enough that a missed stroke could clip them, were the gamblers, the drinkers and the fight enthusiasts who had come to make a night of it.

Tisamon stepped down before the Maynard men. He cut an odd, stark figure in his green arming jacket and gold brooch, his folding-blade gauntlet on his hand and his arm spines jutting. The crowd quieted. It was poor form to shout at the fighters.

A Beetle-kinden man stepped down before the Firecallers, and it was a moment before Bello cried out in protest, voice high above the mumble of the crowd. They looked, they all looked up to see him: a skinny little Fly-kinden child with his mouth open and his face pasty. He had eyes only for one, though: Holden, with a Firecaller scarf about his neck. Holden, looking up at him briefly, face resigned.

We all have to pay the rent. It’s a shame, but you’re not the first. Bello felt numb. The crowd had already forgotten him, laughed him off. Only Holden spared him another glance. He was dressed in armour of hard leather: cuirass, pauldrons, kilt, bracers and greaves. The crowd went quiet again as he took his swords from their scabbards in a long-practised motion, holding them almost crossed before him.