One of her bolts struck the enemy engine, and she saw the smoke start to billow. The Wasp began to lose height as quickly as he could, and then she saw the pilot kick the cockpit open and throw himself over one side, wings unfurling to catch him. She broke off immediately, and just then the Esca took three solid strikes from behind, two piercing the canvas of the craft’s wings, and a third slamming into the fuselage two feet behind her. Taki dived low, almost clipping the tumbling ship she had just dispatched, but a quick glance back showed that her pursuer was still with her, its ballistas ratcheting out bolts with mechanical precision. She hauled the Esca up into the sky, as steeply as she dared, knowing that she was thereby making a target of herself. Another bolt nipped past her, causing her to flinch.
Taki released her first chute, cutting it free entirely and sending the Esca wide. The Wasp was too close behind her, and the silk of the chute was in his wings before he could avoid it, snarling them, stopping them, and turning him from a flying machine into just another weight to plummet into Solarno.
She looked desperately around for Scobraan and spotted the Mayfly as just a small shape against the grey wall of the Starnest’s airbag. She sent the Esca scudding across to help him. Airships were notoriously difficult to bring down and, unless the Wasps were notably bad at their craft, it would take a thousand little bolts to pierce that bag enough to make the ship lose even a foot of height. The material would simply contract about each tiny puncture, every needle-wound nearly sealed almost in the moment of its making.
Scobraan’s Mayfly hurled itself straight at a Wasp orthopter, breaking the nerve of the pilot, who let his machine drop away rather than clash head-to-head with the big, armoured fixed-wing. Scobraan brought his craft as close as he dared to the Starnest’s fabric, until it seemed to Taki that he was skimming across it, that he should be leaving ripples in his wake.
Flame gouted from the Mayfly’s aft, indicating the firethrowers that Scobraan was so proud of, for what punctures could not do to damage an airbag fire would invariably accomplish, shrivelling the material to nothing. Taki felt her heart leap for joy at the sight.
But the Starnest remained untouched, no more than a long soot-mark to tell of Scobraan’s passage. Some new material, she reflected numbly, some stuff that would not burn. It seemed the Wasp artificers had outmanoeuvred them.
Then there was a Wasp pursuing Scobraan, darting around the Starnest’s bulk to fall in line behind him. Taki saw the Mayfly break off quickly, trusting to its armour to shrug off the shot of the nimbler craft, but then the Wasp opened up with its paired rotaries – pillaged Solarnese weaponry – and the Mayfly jerked in the air, losing height.
Taki was already diving to intervene, sending the Esca in as fast as her wings could beat, but the Wasp kept his line perfect, sending bolt after bolt punching into the Mayfly’s frame as Scobraan tried to throw him off. Then abruptly Scobraan was not trying any more, and the Mayfly Prolonged was simply dipping, nose-heavy, towards the ground.
Axrad, Taki realized. The Wasp fliers were all painted alike but she recognized the way he moved in the air, his unique style and skill.
She slung the Esca towards him. It was time to conclude their business.
Twenty-Five
It was well before dawn but General Malkan had his slaves dress him in his full armour. This was a state occasion, he decided. He would be the representative of the Empire speaking with a foreign power, even a captured and humbled one, so it would do to look the part. He had unpacked his suit of partial plate mail, enamelled black and edged with gold, to go over the lightweight hauberk of fine chain made to his personal specifications by the Beetle smiths of Sonn. He had his best sword, with the gilded pommel, buckled to his belt, and held his helm beneath his arm. After all, there was no shame in appearing gracious in victory.
‘Have the man brought in,’ he instructed, once the last buckle had been tightened. The armour was well made enough that its weight barely slowed him, distributed evenly across his shoulders as though it was nothing more than a scout’s light brigandine. His slaves retreated from his tent without needing any order, and two soldiers then marched in with the captive.
Malkan studied him: a Commonwealer, which confirmed the rumours and gave cause for thought. He was a young man, with his kind’s slender build and a steady gaze despite the broad bruise spreading across half of his face. His hands were bound behind him, but he stood straight and tall like a visiting officer come to inspect the troops. Malkan decided that in other circumstances he might have liked this man. As it was, he did not have that luxury.
‘So you’re the one they call the… what is it? The “Wasted Prince”?’
‘I can’t vouch for what your people call me,’ Salma replied. He had found a curious calm within him, now his run of fortune was finally at an end. Had he not been here before, in the custody of the Wasps? Of course he had, and worse, too. He had even died outside the walls of Tark, had he not? Then all this was just borrowed time. It was all credit he had accrued with the world, and if the world now called on him to pay his debts, how could he complain? ‘You are General Malkan, I take it.’
The Wasp general made the smallest nod but Salma, looking him in the eyes, saw the faintest disquiet there, a tiny worm gnawing at the man’s contentment.
‘You have a name?’ Malkan asked him.
‘Prince Minor Salme Dien, enforcedly at your service,’ Salma informed him, managing a moderately accomplished bow.
‘You really are a prince, then.’ Malkan had witnessed the last convulsions of the Twelve-Year War, for as the youngest general of the Empire, most of that glorious, costly campaign had preceded him. He recognized the Commonwealer title, though. ‘Renegade, are you, then? Exiled?’
The suspicion already in Salma’s mind began to solidify. ‘Not at all, General. Still a proud son of the Commonweal, I’m afraid.’
Malkan regarded him without expression. ‘A little out of your way, aren’t you?’
‘We go where the Monarch commands.’
‘I don’t believe your Monarch has ever heard of the city of Sarn. I don’t believe it’s even marked on the Commonwealer maps.’
Salma was staring straight into the man’s eyes, and he saw that small flicker again. He’s here in person talking to me, and he’s got up as gaudy as a Spider whore, but he’s not telling me how wonderful his Empire is and how defeated I am. Somehow I’ve thrown him off his course. He took a deep breath and smiled casually, as though he and the Wasp were merely standing in Collegium debating philosophy. ‘Mercers are always allowed a little initiative, General, in how we go about fulfilling our orders.’