The welcoming committee within the tent was also some way from Imperial standard. General Tynan, nothing more than a bald and ageing Wasp with a fancy rank badge to Pingge’s eyes, stood with proper military decorum in the centre of the tent’s interior, an easel beside him with maps tacked on and annotated. Beside him, though, an elegant Spider-kinden woman reclined on a couch, attended by a couple of Fly-kinden men, while there were two more Spiders, both men and well armoured, right behind her. On the general’s other side were a pair of colonels, a thin one with the badge of the Engineers and a stockier one that she already knew as Cherten of Army Intelligence.
‘Major Aarmon.’ Tynan received Aarmon’s pinpoint salute, even as his eyes flicked over the aviators’ delegation. He nodded slightly, and Pingge saw the Spider woman smile a little in acknowledgement of the newcomers’ bravado. But, of course, the Spiders have women soldiers, more of them than the men, and they’ve been marching with the Second for tendays. This is probably the most receptive audience Aarmon’s likely to get.
‘Your people are winning a lot of credit for the Engineers, I understand,’ Tynan observed, ‘both for your machines and your training. You’ve made quite an impact. On the enemy as well, I’m sure.’ It was not a joke and nobody smiled. ‘I’m aware that you’re not a standard army detachment.’ His eyes made brief reference to the Fly-kinden and Neshaana. ‘If you’ve come here to fight that battle, then take it elsewhere. I don’t care. I have a city to capture, and the composition of your force is of no importance to me, so long as you do your job.’
‘Yes, sir,’ said Aarmon, stiff-backed and outmanoeuvred.
‘What you need to know is that there have been developments back home regarding the engineers and your resources.’
‘Sir?’
Pingge could almost sense the words passing swiftly between Aarmon and Scain and Neshaana, and the other pilots back at the impromptu airfield.
‘Colonel Mittoc?’ Tynan prompted his underling.
‘Hm.’ the skinny engineer nodded rapidly, ‘General Lien has finally decided to trust us with a consignment of your fuel. It arrived yesterday, for my personal supervision. All very secret, not to let the enemy get hold of, and so on.’ His annoyance at being kept in ignorance was plain on his face. ‘However, it’s here now, which means no more long hauls to Capitas for you. As of now you’re operating from wherever the Second camp, and it’s only a hop from here to Collegium, I’m sure. You understand what this means?’
‘Yes, sir. Endgame,’ Aarmon said coolly.
‘Well put, Major.’ Tynan took over. ‘We will be engaging the ground forces of the Collegiates shortly, and then the battle will move to the walls. Your mission now is twofold: you are to continue your attacks on the city, but you must also target their air power wherever possible, as an absolute priority. And when we begin to take down their walls you must screen the army, and especially the artillery, from air attack. I leave the specifics to you, but the elimination of the enemy air power is paramount. At any cost, you understand?’
There was a second’s pause before Aarmon replied, ‘I do, sir.’ Pingge did not have to be a part of the pilots’ communion to understand. This is it then. This is when they throw us into the fire. And she thought of the skill and determination of the Collegiate airmen, and wondered how many people she knew would be dead within a tenday.
Thirty-Two
This time, when Averic returned to his meagre lodgings, after a day’s drilling with the Student Company and still wearing his purple sash, the lock on his door had simply been smashed.
Thieves, he thought first, but in his heart of hearts he knew otherwise. He had been trying to forget the Wasp woman who had come with her brown-dyed face, and told him he was a traitor, and he had been all along. She had marched away with the army, after all, and the episode had taken on a dreamlike quality, for of course he was not a traitor, not to anyone.
Yet he had spent his day drilling with Collegiates who fully intended to kill as many Wasp-kinden as they could, should the fight draw this close and, if he were to subject his position to the philosophical rigour beloved of the academics, he would have to confess that he was surely betraying someone. It was just that, so long as he attached his loyalties to the nearest available target, he could pretend that he was unshakably honourable and honest. These were qualities he had always assumed that he possessed, but now he was forcibly reminded that apparently it had all been an act.
Not the woman waiting for him, this time, of course, but a man: a Beetle with burn-scarring about his face. He sat on Averic’s bed, wearing the hardwearing patchwork canvas of a tramp artificer, cleaning his nails with a knife and grinning at the Wasp youth standing in the doorway.
‘Come on in, why don’t you,’ he suggested.
Averic directed a palm towards him wordlessly, but his lack of resolution must have shown very plainly in his face, for the man’s grin never faltered.
‘Very nice, always the posing. Now get over here and take your orders, boy. Stop pissing about.’
By accent, the stranger could have passed for a Collegiate.
‘You’re Army Intelligence?’ Averic asked, in a small voice.
‘Right in one. Expecting some sly Rekef bastard, I’ll bet. We’re ahead of them on this one, and you should be grateful. Rather deal with us than with them, I’ll bet. Sit down here beside me, youngster.’ He patted the bed with his free hand.
Averic shuddered, unable even to identify the emotions fighting within him, and then he slouched forward and sat down, feeling obscenely like a prostitute before a client. When the man put a heavy arm about his shoulders, he yelped and tried to spring up. The Beetle was strong, though, and the knife was close.
‘I hear you’re deep cover,’ the Beetle gave a smirk that gave onto a world of insinuation. ‘Listen, boy, it’s all going to come down any day now. We all do our part, the city gets its Imperial governor, and it’s commendations all round. This is Intelligence’s big chance, before the Rekef boys try to foul things for us. We all pull together, we Imperials.’
‘You’re no Imperial,’ Averic whispered. It was the accent: it was simply too genuine.
‘Clever lad. I was in the Empire for almost ten years before coming back here. You Wasps, you know how to run things, and how to look after your own. Flap-mouthed gutbags that run this place — would you trust any one of them? Do you really think they know the first thing about how to make a city go? Piss on them. Sick of this place when I left, I was, and twice as sick of it now I’m back. But that’s fine, because it’s going to be my sort of place any day now. And yours, too. I’ve my eyes on a lieutenancy, and I reckon you could scrape sergeant out of this. Could even stay in the College, if there’s still enough of it left, and if we let them teach still.’ Horribly, inappropriately, he hugged Averic to him. ‘Now, boy, our work is all about targets, foci of resistance. The people here will fight — surprised me with that, they have — but we cut off a few heads and they’ll fall apart. No chain of command, see.’
‘What do you want me to do?’ Averic asked dully.
‘Cut throats, boy. Burn them. Stick them with a sword. Dead leaders make poor tacticians, as we say. And, as you’re here on the inside, you’re going to be perfectly placed to catch them off guard. Sure, the Big Men around here, they’re out of your range, but you’re well placed for some College Masters who won’t be suspicious about a student turning up for a little extracurricular, eh?’ The Beetle chuckled throatily. ‘See here, here’s your homework, boy.’ He thrust a tattered scroll at Averic.
Averic stared numbly at the list, a meagre handful of Collegiate names, all they would trust him with, set against the grander tapestry of men and women the Empire wanted dead. Treachery seemed to be welling up inside him. So I was an agent all this time, he found himself thinking sadly. The Empress expected, apparently, and even at this distance her awful might seemed to weigh on him more than the Beetle’s arm. He tried to picture his parents, to review their parting words, parse them for some hint that this had been their plan all along.