Empire in Black and Gold sota-1 Read online

  Tynisa waited for her own opponent’s next attack. Already she had gained a little measure of him. He was quick but unimaginative, his strikes were textbook. The next time he lunged for her, she passed under his blade. His offhand darted in, as she knew it would, but she was already past it, suddenly faster. As she passed him, she tried to bring the razor-sharp edge of her rapier across his throat, but he was pushing forward. The curved guard jagged off his chin and his feet tangled with hers. They were both off balance in a moment.

  She felt the balcony rail at her back, and then a moment later it was snapping under their combined weight, pitching them both into the hallway below. But she had a free hand and he did not. She hauled at him as they went over, trying to thrust him ahead of her.

  As his comrade vanished, the first assassin swore and hurled Che away from him. She hit the passage floor hard, but kept hold of her knife, desperately turning to menace him with it. He paused, catching his breath for a heartbeat, as swords scraped and rattled below them.

  ‘You!’ bellowed Stenwold, from the doorway of his room. The assassin turned swiftly, and froze.

  The reason was that Stenwold held a weapon levelled. It was a crossbow without the arms, a great, heavy four-barrelled thing with a quartet of broad metal bolts jutting aggressively out at the world, resembling javelins more than anything else. Che knew it as a piercer, and that there was a prodigious firepowder charge just waiting for the touch of a lever to explode.

  The assassin remained poised, and Stenwold studied him levelly, despite the blood soaking his own arm. ‘Sword on the ground, and perhaps-’

  Che noticed the man about to spring, hoping to catch Stenwold in mid-sentence, and she stabbed down with the knife hard enough to pin his foot to the floor. At that moment Stenwold pulled the trigger. It was as if the sound swallowed up every inch of the house, as a double charge of firepowder erupted in the confined space of the piercer. The assassin was punched off his feet, flung all the way down the landing and pinned to the far wall by three of the bolts. The fourth, without any human obstacle to travel through, rammed itself so far into the bare wall itself that its tip must have been visible from outside.

  The quiet that then descended, laced with the acrid smell of the spent powder, was absolute.

  ‘Where’s. . Tynisa?’ Stenwold asked heavily. Che pointed mutely downwards.

  They got to the broken rail and looked down to see her standing with the second assassin splayed like a doll on the ground before her. As she stood, head bowed, looking at the first man she had ever killed, the blood-shiny rapier was still in her hand.

  Che heard her uncle suck in his breath. ‘Hammer and tongs,’ he murmured. ‘It’s her.’ Che caught a glint in his eye, some token of recognition that had nothing to do with Tynisa. The surroundings must be different, as must the dead man below, but this very tableau, this moment of stillness and contemplation, had caught him off guard. For just a second he was twenty years younger and elsewhere, seeing and wondering about some event long past.

  And then Tynisa looked up at him, pale and staring. He hurried down the stairs and took her in his arms. The first death, he thought. There came to him the image of an orthopter’s cabin in Myna with that Wasp soldier falling back. The first death by our hands is always hard. She would survive it, though, he knew. It’s in her blood.

  A moment later Tynisa pushed away from him and went over to Che, taking her foster-sister’s hand.

  ‘You’re not hurt?’ she said. ‘I thought he had you.’

  Che blinked at her. ‘Uncle Sten killed him.’ She had not expected such sympathy.

  ‘I need you to do something for me,’ said Stenwold to them both. He was now sitting on a nearby couch, the dead man at his feet. ‘One of you go and get Doctor Nicrephos for me, quick as you can.’

  ‘Doctor Nicrephos?’ Che asked in surprise. ‘But you want a proper doctor, surely?’

  ‘He’s an old charlatan, that one,’ Stenwold agreed. ‘But he knows his poisons, though. These killers. . weren’t using clean blades.’

  Tynisa was out of the door in an instant, leaving Che gaping at him, feeling suddenly cold.

  ‘But you. . You can’t. .’

  Stenwold managed a smile. ‘Oh, I’m an old Beetle, remember, Cheerwell. My insides are made of leather. Take more than some street-corner thug’s blade-spit to floor me. Still, maybe you should reload the piercer. Spare bolts and powder are in my room.’

  She fairly flew back up the stairs, leaving him for a moment with his thoughts. He peeled the cloth from the face of the assassin there, recognizing the stamp of a halfbreed’s features: a blend of Spider, Beetle and Ant-kinden. The other one had been pure renegade Ant, so Cheerwell had done well to even stave the man off. ‘Local talent, these two,’ he said to himself. Not Wasps, and nobody the Wasp Empire would either own or be connected to. The game had clearly changed.

  Che came back down the stairs, stuffing heavy bolts into the piercer’s muzzles. ‘Will Salma and Totho be in danger too?’ she asked.

  ‘Tonight? I don’t think so — but tomorrow is anyone’s guess. Cheerwell, I’m changing my plans.’

  ‘Changing them how?’

  ‘I have four seats reserved on the Sky Without for tomorrow. You’re going to be on it too. All of the Majestic will.’

  ‘But you said-’

  ‘Plans change. Now I need to stay here long enough to close my books, so I’ll join you when I can.’ Seeing her about to protest further he held up a hand. ‘And I don’t mean that as some kind of euphemism for “I’ll never see you again”, Cheerwell. I never was a death-or-glory boy. I’ll catch up with you all in Helleron, but for now, as I said, I want to keep you safe. It’s a mad thought, but I think you’ll be safer with my people in Helleron than here alone with me.’

  Tynisa was back now, pulling in her wake a stooped, grey-skinned figure. Che stood back as the old Moth-kinden entered. She recognized him from the College but he taught the sort of disreputable classes that sensible young Beetles did not choose to attend. He was the very picture of a storybook wizard, with his long hair gone a dirty grey, and his slanted eyes blank-white, without iris or pupil.

  ‘Master Nicrephos,’ Stenwold began. ‘I have need of your services.’

  The Moth laughed between his teeth. ‘A believer at last, are you?’ he replied in almost a whisper. ‘No? Well, no matter. This morning I was your debtor. Tomorrow I shall not be, hmm?’

  ‘Just come and shake your bones or whatever,’ Stenwold grunted. ‘And then consider all debts paid.’

  Stenwold had gone out somewhere before Che was even up, leaving her with a clutching feeling of anxiety. The events of the previous night came back with a jolt at the sight of the ruined banister.

  The world has gone mad.

  She had watched while Nicrephos had ostentatiously tended to Stenwold’s wound, and had ground her teeth in frustration at it. This was no doctoring. Nicrephos had muttered charms over the wound, burned a few acrid herbs and tied a little bag of something about the Beetle’s arm. Stenwold had just sat there patiently, his dark features gone grey with pain or poison, leaving the quack to go about his mummery — even thanked him when he had finished.

  After the Moth had gone, Che had rounded on her uncle. ‘What was that all about? You can’t tell me you believe in that nonsense, like some. . credulous savage?’

  Stenwold shrugged. ‘I can’t pretend it makes any sense to me, but I’ve seen Doctor Nicrephos bring back from death’s doorstep a man that all the real doctors in this town had given up on.’

  ‘But he barely even touched the wound!’

  Stenwold shrugged — then winced. ‘It’s easy, once the lamps are lit, to scoff at shadows,’ was all he said, and then he had retired to bed.

  And this morning he was gone already to bustle about the town, but at least he had scribbled Tynisa and Che terse instructions.

  The back room of the Taverna Merraia, third hour after dawn. Be packed. And that was all
it said.

  The girls walked there together, and close together, for there were a lot of foreigners about on the streets during the Games. Some were simply merchants and artisans but others had a darker look. More was bought and sold during the tenday of the games, of all commodities, than in the entire month beforehand. As was their way, Beetles never let such a gathering go to waste. In the simple walk from Stenwold’s villa to the taverna they encountered a band of renegade Vekken mercenaries, all swagger and glower. They saw a Tarkesh slavemaster in conference with two Spider buyers, because whilst one could not own a slave within Collegium’s walls, one could sell them on paper — a neat distinction. There were men who looked like brigands here to tout their loot, Spiderland nobles and their cadres of followers, Mantis-kinden killers-for-hire with their bleak stares. . It was a relief to simply reach the taverna without some new assailant dashing at them from the crowds, and both of them had hands close to sword hilts. Tynisa might have her customary rapier, but this time Che wore a proper shortsword, Helleron made. When the killers next came hunting her, she would provide them with a real fight.

  The Taverna Merraia was done up in a half-hearted Fly-kinden style, with low-set doorways they had to stoop through, and an interior walled with packed earth and carved wooden columns on three of its sides, while open shutters extended almost the whole of the fourth. The moment they entered, the miniature owner bustled out to them. ‘Ladies, ladies, pray let us not expose you to all these rude gapers. Come, I have a private room for you, yes?’ He raised a bushy eyebrow, and Che nodded slowly. It seemed that Uncle Stenwold had indeed been busy.

  The back room was the real Fly-kinden thing, rather than the basic tat displayed out front for the tourists. The table stood barely more than six inches off the ground, and there were cushions instead of chairs. Most importantly, should they need it, there was an escape hatch in the ceiling that would take them out to a street running behind the taverna. Flies were known for such fallbacks.

  ‘He must have sent word to the others too,’ Che guessed.

  Tynisa merely nodded. She had been oddly quiet today, hardly a word from her since they got up at dawn. Che examined her companion’s face, but the deftly applied make-up hid any clue as to whether the girl had slept well or not.

  ‘So? Last night?’ she said finally.

  Tynisa looked at her, captured her stare. ‘Have you. . you haven’t ever. . killed anyone, have you?’ the Spider-kinden asked quietly.

  Che shrugged, trying to look casual. ‘I could have killed that one that cut Uncle Sten. I got him. . a couple of times.’

  Tynisa continued to hold her eyes until eventually Che admitted, ‘But no. I haven’t. I just fought, like we do at Prowess Forum. Till then I don’t think I really realized it could be. . for real.’

  ‘I killed him.’ Tynisa looked down at her hands. ‘He was good, but I killed him.’ With great care she drew the rapier from its slim scabbard, and Che could remember being very jealous when Stenwold had bought it for her. It was a beautiful Spider-forged piece of work. They were not great smiths by and large, but certain skilled crafts held their interest, and sword-crafting was one of them. This one was done as a copy of the Mantis style, the back-curving guard that protected the hand was formed into sharp, curving leaves and the blade was ground to a slightly uneven taper that nonetheless left both edges keen. True Mantis-work was rare and expensive as weapons came, and Stenwold had not been able to find the genuine article for sale. They might be tree-living savages in so many ways, without comprehension of all the great things the revolution had brought to the Lowlands world, but when the Mantis produced a sword, or a bow, or anything else they turned their craft to, they made it with the skill of ages.

  ‘You had to kill him,’ Che said solemnly, her eyes still on the blade. ‘He would have killed you otherwise. Don’t feel bad.’

  ‘I felt. .’ Tynisa pursed her lips together. ‘I felt so alive.’

  ‘Alive?’

  ‘In that moment, when I was past his guard, it was. . Help me, Che, but it was wonderful. I forgot everything else. At that moment I didn’t care about you, or Sten. I just knew that I had won, and it was good. It was so good.’

  Che remembered the girl’s sudden concern after the fight, Tynisa trying to make up for the remorse she should have been feeling. ‘I don’t know, I-’ she started, and just then, blessedly, Totho and Salma were being ushered into the room by the taverna’s owner. Totho was bundled into a shapeless long coat, a canvas bag slung over one shoulder, so it was Salma who must have drawn any looks all the way across Collegium. He was known for dressing well, but understated, always fashionable, never gauche. Now he was hidden somewhere within a hugely elaborate, high-collared robe and the garment was — as the saying went — almost splendid enough to be offered its own department at College. Blue and green and red, iridescent like mother of pearl, its curling hems were lined with plates of gold.

  ‘What exactly are you got up as?’ Tynisa demanded, recovering her customary cool. ‘Or did Sten’s note actually say you should look like a mad foreigner?’

  ‘It’s not my fault that nobody in this forsaken backward little town ever dresses properly,’ said Salma. ‘What was I supposed to do with my robe? Leave it behind?’

  ‘Don’t you have any. . bags?’

  Salma opened the robe to reveal an inner garment of simply cut turquoise cloth lined with numerous pockets. There was even a sword scabbard sewn into it containing a short-bladed weapon of odd design.

  ‘You do realize that someone tried to kill us last night?’ Tynisa told him, although there was no reason he should know. ‘I suppose at least it won’t be me now drawing the arrow-shot.’

  ‘Tried to kill you?’ Totho asked, shocked.

  ‘Tried to kill Uncle Sten,’ corrected Che, ‘only we got in the way. The killers, they’re. . dead, both of them.’ She remembered how the city guard had finally been called, and Stenwold had sent them on their way with the bodies and no questions asked, a clink of coin. Everyone, even Stenwold, seemed to be pretending that nothing had happened, and she suspected this was the way of it for those with secrets that too many questions could compromise.

  Stenwold came in just then, without ceremony. ‘Good,’ he said, on seeing them all present. He settled himself on the floor across the table from them, making sure he had the door on his right hand and not to his back. ‘Time for some truths,’ he began. ‘Although if you’re half the people I take you for, there’ll be no surprises. Che and Tynisa know the histories I’ve been teaching by heart now, and Salma’s Commonweal has first-hand experience of the Wasp Empire’s ways. And Totho. .’

  The artificer swallowed. ‘I listen, sir.’

  ‘So what is it you want to do?’ Che asked Stenwold. ‘About the Wasps, I mean.’

  He nodded. ‘The Lowlands has not changed — its political balance anyway — has not for perhaps five hundred years. It’s incredible to think it, but if you discount the usual jostling rivalry between the Ant city-states it’s much the same as it has been ever since the revolution. Perhaps conditions are better, in some places, but there has been a balance struck that has lasted, and that has had little to do with outside pressures and everything to do with our self-made isolation.’ Try as he might he could not keep the College Master out of his voice. ‘The world beyond our boundaries has contrived to assist us. The Spiderlands beyond Everis have always seen us as a resource, an amusement and an oubliette. The Barrier Ridge cuts us off from the north so well that most Low-landers know little or nothing about Salma’s home except the name “the Commonweal”. Luckily for us, they have never been of a mind to impose their civilization on us. Salma’s people are more inward-looking than we. A fair assessment, Salma?’

  ‘Both harsh and fair,’ his pupil agreed.

  ‘And to the east. . Well, most of it’s desert, and what’s not is a patchwork of little cities and hill tribes, and none of them rich or sophisticated, or that’s what the textbooks say. Wel
l, in the last two generations all that has changed, and keeps changing, and it will change faster than anyone wants.’

  He sighed. ‘Looking at you, the lot of you. . it takes me back. When I was not so much older than you are, I and some like-minds headed east, to see if the disturbing news from that quarter was true. It was indeed, for a new power has arisen. The Wasp-kinden, who are described in our oldest records as barbarians primarily interested in cutting each other’s heads off, are an empire now. Their borders have since been pushed to not so very far east of Helleron and Tark. There is a city called Myna. .’ The memories swelled in him, and he closed his eyes. ‘We witnessed the fall of Myna, and realized a little of the Wasp dream. One world, one empire: that sums it up neatly.’

  ‘But this must have been. . what, twenty years ago?’ Tynisa objected. ‘So where are they? Why aren’t they all over Helleron? Why aren’t they at Collegium’s gates with an army?’

  ‘As to Helleron, they are familiar with the Wasps. Indeed, the merchants of Helleron have been doing well out of importing the spoils of their war, and they sell them the latest in Beetle-made arms in return. They want to see the Wasps as just another city-state that is constantly fighting, never really changing. There was a time, during the Empire’s war with Salma’s people, when enough of Helleron suddenly woke up to what was brewing on their doorstep. But the Wasps came in with their treaties and their promises, and signed lots of comforting pieces of paper about the Empire going no further than Myna and, so long as the trade revenue keeps coming in, the Helleren magnates overlook just what it is they’re trading in. And perhaps those that don’t overlook it don’t get to live very long. And as for what their army is up to. . Salma, you’re best placed to answer that one.’