Adrian Tchaikovsky - Heirs of the Blade

‘Oh it calms down,’ the Solarnese agreed. He was a pleasant, prosperous-looking man whom Praeda wouldn’t have trusted an inch. ‘Even Wasp-kinden can’t maintain that level of arbitrary hostility for long. They’ll get a basic administration in place, a governor and the like set above the Ministers here, and then things will find their own rut and stay there.’

The Fly spat. ‘The Empire, stay here? What in the pits for?’

‘Don’t worry, little man. They won’t cut into your sort of trade,’ the Spider jibed.

‘That’s what you think.’ The Fly bared yellow teeth. ‘Scouts are already heading off into the desert, have been almost since the first soldiers arrived. What are they after, eh? Or is it to invite the Scorpions back?’

‘That wasn’t the Empire, they say,’ the Solarnese opined, but rather uncertainly.

‘It was the Empire,’ Amnon declared. They glanced at him thoughtfully, and read a great deal of certainty on his face.

‘You’re local. You fought them?’ the Spider asked. ‘On the bridge, was it?’

‘On the bridge,’ Amnon agreed heavily, and the weight of memories bled into his words, lending them conviction that could not be denied.

‘I was there too,’ Praeda put in. ‘There were Wasp-kinden directing the artillery, flying in with grenades. In the city, too – Rekef, they said.’ She did not mean to, but she gave that word a hushed and fearful emphasis. From the reactions of the others it was entirely appropriate.

‘They’re after Solarno, for sure,’ said the smuggler-merchant savagely. ‘Flanking us, that’s what they’re doing.’

‘There’s the whole of the Nem between Khanaphes and the Exalsee,’ said the Spider woman dismissively. ‘What sort of flanking manoeuvre sees half your army dead of thirst before it arrives? The Spiderlands is next on their menu, you take my word. They know that, if they want to push their ambitions anywhere south of Toek, they’ll have to make a sustained assault on the Houses, and they’re looking for a way in. Probably air armada over the Forest Aleth.’

The Fly-kinden shook his head. ‘You’re not listening. First thing when they got here, they’re looking west. Not Solarno but the desert. They’ve had surveyors and artificers and wildsmen out there for days now. This isn’t just a staging post. Solarno and the Nem are it. ’ The others stared at him, and he glowered right back.

‘You think they’re going to rob your tombs before you can get to them?’ the Spider said somewhat disdainfully.

‘Know what?’ The Fly snorted. ‘I don’t know what in Waste’s name they’re after, but they’re after it with all their bastard hearts. And while it won’t be my business they’re muscling in on, they won’t want someone like me anywhere close by, I can tell you. Maybe it’s time I went and followed up some leads down Tsovashni way.’

‘And at last!’ The Spider woman stood up, as their missing fourth had finally arrived. ‘Someone who can give us the real story. Grab a chair, Emon.’

Praeda looked over, seeing a short, dark man, his greying hair cut almost to the skull: a Bee-kinden with an artificer’s toolstrip slung over a dark tabarded breastplate. Only when she saw the symbol on his chest did she start. A grey gauntlet embroidered on grey cloth, yet some trick of the weave made it catch the light differently, making it clear and distinct and ominous.

‘Iron Glove?’ she exclaimed. ‘I’d have thought you’d want to be well away from the city. Surely the Empire are shooting you people on sight.’

‘And hello to you too.’ The Bee, Emon, sat down and snagged a mostly empty jar of wine, draining the dregs of it. ‘Who are these?’

‘Travellers who want us to think they’re locals. Or the other way round,’ the Spider woman said wryly. ‘Does it matter?’

‘Perhaps not.’ The Bee then squinted and appeared to change his mind. ‘Or perhaps, yes. You’re…’ his eyes widened, staring at Amnon, and there was a tense moment in which revelations and violence hovered very close together. ‘Never mind,’ the Bee concluded. ‘None of my business.’

‘They fought on the bridge, they reckon,’ the Fly explained, watching the Iron Glove man carefully.

‘Oh, to be sure. I, on the other hand, fought on the river.’

‘The Fourth Iteration? ’ Praeda pressed, for it was the name the Glove had given to their ingenious ship that had taken such a toll of the attacking Scorpions, until the Imperial artillery had finally silenced it.

Emon nodded. ‘A lovely craft it was, too, but in the end it was swim or fly, when sailing couldn’t keep us afloat any more. Not that many of us made it to shore.’

The Solarnese merchant had called for more wine, and the Bee accepted a jug gratefully. ‘So I can see why you’d think I was tempting fate by sitting here, but it’s not so. We’re just arrived, and here because we’re invited.’

That brought all the others leaning closer, waiting for the catch. A trap? was the plain thought on their faces, as if the Empress herself would go to such lengths to punish a cartel of weapons traders.

‘Himself’s shadow is here,’ Emon murmured darkly. ‘He’s not exactly talked it over with the crew, but word is that the Glove is about to shake hands with the Empire, after all this time. Over in Chasme, we’ve made some remarkable advances, they tell me,’ meaning the squatting little artificer town on the Exalsee that the Glove virtually owned these days. ‘A poor sailor-engineer like myself wouldn’t know where to start second-guessing Himself and his adopted son, but the Empire’s the biggest market in the world. Makes sense that we’d want to set things straight and makes sense that the Wasps would want to let us. Nothing but the best for the army, after all, and we surely do make the best.’

Himself’s shadow? Praeda wondered. ‘But what if the Empire won’t talk…?’

‘It’s like I said,’ Emon explained, ‘the Empire asked first. I reckon we probably sent them a catalogue, like merchants do sometimes, when they have special goods for sale. I reckon the Imperial artificers just about must have had a fit when they saw what we’ve cooked up.’ He gave a crooked smile. ‘I reckon the world’s about to change in all manner of directions, I do.’

To Angved’s surprise, Varsec had proved surprisingly good company. The Engineer was used to always having to compete with other officers, and all too used to failing at it, too. He and the aviator were still prisoners, and yet still being treated in a curiously tentative manner by their captors, who were all from the Engineering Corps themselves. Angved had meanwhile got a look at the machinery that had travelled the dusty road south to Khanaphes ahead of them, and he now felt cause to be hopeful.

Of course, they might have decided they don’t need me to make it work, but why bring me along at all, in that case? And if they needed Angved, having decided to roll the dice and gamble on his discovery, then the same seemed to be true of Varsec, who was housed in the same cell and given the same uncertain treatment.

Of course the Khanaphir expedition didn’t have a direct bearing on Varsec’s particular work, but he and Angved had already got past their initial caginess regarding their plans, and it was clear to both that the one could help the other. Aboard the airship – the Empress’s own airship! – they had taken every piece of paper they had been given and begun scrawling schematics and plans, diagrams of force and tension. ..

There had come a moment, far into the morning hours of a night that had slipped past almost unnoticed, when the two men had suddenly stared at one another, the plans spread out between them. Their shared gaze had spoken eloquently of a small part of the world changed for ever, the toothed wheels of progress moving on a notch.