Adrian Tchaikovsky - Blood of the Mantis

Arianna made a vague sound and pressed closer in against him, so he put a protective arm about her as he stared bleakly out of the unshuttered carriage window.

Collegium had not changed so much, but it had definitely changed. There were companies of militia drilling in what had been the Stockhowell Market: awkward-looking Beetle men and women, and various other kinden as well, some in heavy chainmail and others in breastplates worn over heavy buff jackets. He saw halberd heads weave and dip, and crossbows shouldered in mock threat.

He kept looking until he saw a company equipped with the slender, silvery snapbows, industriously going through the motions of loading them. He had operated one himself, of course, and he knew how effortless it was. The weapon seemed to have severed all connection between the hand that pulled the trigger and the man that fell dead twenty or fifty yards away.

But it is a Beetle weapon , he realized. Totho had wrought it well. The Wasps were still half-savage, without the iron discipline of the Ants or the broader understanding of his own people. The Wasp-kinden were well suited to skirmish and raid, to vicious assaults and angry reprisals. His own people were civilized and cool-headed and, because of that, they would take to this new weapon as nobody else. In time , he thought, we could conquer the world with our reason and our good intentions. Let us hope that our future shall not suffer from the Wasps teaching us how to make war.

The train shuddered to a slow stop, at which Parops reopened his eyes.

‘Returning to your men, Commander?’ Stenwold asked him.

‘I have spoken to them. They will march,’ Parops agreed. ‘We will go because, if Sarn falls, the entire Lowlands will tumble with it. It will be the first time, I think, that the Ants of our two cities have fought side by side.’

‘Long may it last,’ said Stenwold, though he knew that it would not.

He took Sperra straight to the College infirmary, where the most skilled of Collegium’s doctors would do what they could for her. She clutched at his sleeve briefly and he felt ill at having failed her.

The next morning he received visitors almost as soon as he was dressed. His drawing room was busy with a dozen functionaries, including two faces he knew: Lineo Thadspar, still Speaker for the Assembly of Collegium, and Teornis of the Aldanrael, who had returned to Collegium on the same train.

He studied their faces, the lined old Beetle and the smooth, agelessly handsome Spider-kinden, and he noted their expressions.

‘I take it the news is not good.’

‘No worse than expected,’ said Thadspar wryly. ‘We knew it would come to this.’

‘The Wasps are marching,’ Stenwold predicted.

‘They are, indeed. You have a source in Helleron, you will be surprised to discover, who has been sending missives by Fly-kinden messengers. He signs himself Wood-builder.’

Stenwold nodded. That would be the Helleron councillor Greenwise Artector, of course, who would be in a position to see a great deal of what went on in that occupied city. He did not speak the name, though, for his old habits as an intelligencer suggested it might be unwise. ‘What does this Woodbuilder have to say now?’

‘That a new army is marching from Helleron – the Sixth, known as the Hive. It marches to reinforce General Malkan’s Seventh, and from there on to Sarn.’

‘As you say, nothing unexpected.’

‘And he says also that he has given information to the Lord of the Wastes, so that that gentleman may impede the Wasps as best he may. I must confess I can make nothing of that message.’

‘I think we can, Master Thadspar,’ said Teornis. ‘Stenwold, you have a protege, do you not, who is making a name for himself in Sarn and out in the wilderness.’

Stenwold nodded slowly. ‘Salma, yes.’

‘Apparently this Lord of the Wastes has been attacking Wasp supply convoys,’ Thadspar explained. ‘Presumably aided by your Woodbuilder’s intelligence. All very complex.’

‘It boils down to the same thing, though,’ said Stenwold. ‘Sarn must be defended, and the attack will come sooner rather than later. Do we have men we can send to Sarn’s aid, just as Sarn has aided us?’

‘I’m sure we do, although I have not had much involvement with the merchant companies…’ Thadspar started.

‘Perhaps you should not commit your soldiers so hastily,’ interrupted Teornis. ‘I fear you are not the only man with news, Master Thadspar.’

The two Beetles stared at him, waiting.

‘I am afraid there is another Wasp army, numbering I know not what, presently marching south from Asta to Tark. Word has come from the Dryclaw to my people, and was waiting here for me when I arrived. From Tark, I imagine that force will move on westwards down the coast, through Merro and Egel, through Kes and the Felyal, and then to here. The Wasps want Collegium, as you already know.’

‘And your people, what will they do?’ Stenwold asked him.

Teornis smiled. ‘Why, Master Maker, I have no idea. We are an independent, free-spirited lot. We might do anything.’ The smile hardened. ‘There are webs, though, of my own spinning, and we shall see what has been caught in them, by and by.’

The Esca Volenti ’s clockwork motor started with a whir of cogs, and a handful of the mechanics began nervously to wheel the orthopter out past the Wasps, onto the field. Beyond it, Lieutenant Axrad’s own vessel was lazily powering up its wings with a deep grumble of its mineral-oil engine. The Wasp pilot threw Taki a salute before dropping into his cockpit and closing the hatch.

Back in the hangar, Che had already returned to the Cleaver , familiarizing herself with the controls. She heard Nero climb in behind her.

‘We’re going as soon as Taki’s taken off,’ she told him.

‘Right you are.’ He stood behind her, holding on to the back of her seat. ‘Roomy, this, but you can’t see a thing,’ he decided, and she heard the hatch rattle again as he opened it for a better view.

Out on the field, the Esca ’s two wings began working their way up to a blur, and then the flying machine’s legs left the ground and slowly folded in, taking off on the vertical. Axrad’s heavier machine prowled stubbornly along the airstrip before slowly lifting into the air with great beats of its own four-wing arrangement. Then they were both aloft, spiralling about one another, gaining height: for a moment the sole point of concentration for everyone watching below.

Even when the Cleaver ’s engines started up, there was a moment before anyone could distinguish the new sound from the two fliers receding above. Then the barrel-bodied fixed-wing was already moving, dragged forwards by its propellers and advancing slowly on the open hangar mouth. It was an unlovely thing in motion but it was solidly built, shouldering aside a smaller vessel that obstructed it in its hunt for the sky. Che felt it lurch and kick as she wrestled with the controls. It was taking all her strength just to keep the craft on a straight line.

I hope it’s livelier than this when it gets into the air.

‘Che!’ Nero called down to her. ‘Trouble!’

The Wasps had noticed them, at last, or perhaps they had simply begun loosing their stings on the bystanding mechanics. Che saw several of the Solarnese go down. A moment later the Cleaver ’s hull thrummed under scorching impacts.

This is a wooden flier , Che reflected, with an engine that burns combustible fuel. She needed to get into the air immediately, where the swift passage of the Cleaver would hopefully put out any burning on the exterior.