Stenwold was suddenly on the ground and rolling, and there was a fierce line of pain down the back of one leg to join all the other nagging wounds suffered that night. He lurched to his feet, tripped down on one knee again, then managed to stand up, feeling his mauled leg trembling beneath his weight. Teornis was driving straight for him, the point of his rapier dancing in the air like a gnat.
Wholly off balance, Stenwold tried to get his blade back between him and his opponent. The rapier swept over his parry to whip across his face, opening a cut above one eyebrow. Teornis’s face was wiped clean of all mockery now, down to the bare bones of his expression: not the cold distance of a killer, but infinite remorse.
‘You had to force me to this,’ the Spider hissed and his rapier bound effortlessly past Stenwold’s own blade, aimed so as to pierce the Beetle between the ribs with merciless precision.
He held off, in the end. Something changed in his face, some expression of bitter regret, and he hauled the sword aside, so that it only scored Stenwold’s flank rather than running him through. Stenwold did not possess the same finesse, however, or perhaps that final reserve of restraint, and his instinctive counter-strike jammed his blade up to the hilt between the plates of Teornis’s hauberk.
The Spider gasped, a hollow whooping of air, and then he fell, and Stenwold dropped to his knees beside him, bleeding from a dozen wounds and utterly exhausted.
Paladrya! something inside him wailed, and his eyes desperately sought for her body.
She lives. She lived, though with both hands to her face to staunch the wound the Dragonfly had given her, whilst Phylles stepped back from her assailant’s body, the stingers slowly retracting into her hands. The Polypoi woman looked around, her face bleak, and stomped over to where Fel lay, kneeling gently to put a hand on the dead man’s arm, as though sea-kinden Art could somehow repel even death. It was clear, though, that there was nothing that would bring Fel back to take his place among Wys’s crew
‘Stenwold…’ came a weak voice from beside him, and he looked down to meet the gaze of Teornis. The white-faced Spider was curled about the fatal blade. ‘Stenwold,’ he spoke again, ‘what have we come to?’
Stenwold looked down at him miserably, unable to condemn the other man, even now.
‘I lifted the siege of Collegium,’ Teornis managed to get out, face twisting with each word. ‘I drove the Vekken back, didn’t I?’
‘You did, at that,’ Stenwold agreed quietly.
‘Remember me for that… and not for this,’ the Spider whispered, and Stenwold felt a tide of loss rise within him. Despite it all, despite every piece of treachery brought down on his city by the Aldanrael, he knew he had lost more than he had gained by the killing of Teornis.
Then Phylles stood up swiftly, and Stenwold looked back over his shoulder to see that they were no longer alone there. The palace had awoken at last, it seemed.
A slender Moth-kinden woman was standing there – or so she seemed to him, with her grey skin and white eyes, her expression one of solemn melancholy. A handful of others had moved in behind her, and Stenwold recognized white-bearded Sfayot at the woman’s shoulder. Sfayot, who was chancellor, of course, so the Moth he was now deferring to must be…
Must not be a Moth. Staring, Stenwold now noticed that the colours cast on her drab skin by the lanterns were not quite the colours of the lanterns themselves.
‘Your Majesty,’ he ventured, judging that the best way to address the Monarch of Princep Salmae.
The Butterfly-kinden, who had been known as Grief-in-Chains once, studied him coldly. ‘Why have you brought death into my halls, Master Stenwold Maker?’ she asked.
‘Your Highness,’ Stenwold repeated, then he was struck by a sudden thought, ‘It is said that your Art can heal even terrible wounds.’ He gestured mutely at Teornis. ‘Please…’
The woman’s expression softened slightly, but only to retreat to another, more private sadness. ‘No more,’ she said. ‘My touch can heal no more and, besides, he is past help.’
It was true: Teornis lay still. Spider reserve had somehow sufficed to compose his features in a philosophical, almost amused expression.
‘Again I ask why you come here to shed yet more blood, War Master,’ the Butterfly demanded, but the voice that answered her was Paladrya’s. The Kerebroi woman had been standing nearby, still mopping at her bloody face, but her eyes were now fixed on one of the Monarch’s small party: a Spider-kinden youth of no more than twenty years, with dark, curling hair.
Stenwold blinked and stared, too, and looked upon the heir of Hermatyre.
Forty-One
Helmess had expected to find a gang of cut-throats waiting for him, but the crew gathered in the back room of the Endeavour taverna looked surprisingly respectable. He saw Beetle-kinden in artificers’ leathers, complete with tools, plan cases and the like, Fly-kinden attired as moderately prosperous tradesmen, factory workers or peddlers, and the sole Wasp-kinden there wore Ant-made chainmail and gave every impression of being a renegade mercenary.
Honory Bellowern strutted before them like a scholar showing off his students.
‘Mark this man,’ he instructed his followers. ‘This is the Empire’s man within the Assembly.’
Helmess was uncomfortably aware that their collective gaze contained a measure of contempt. Nobody liked a traitor, even when the treason was convenient.
‘I can get the lads of our kinden in amongst the artillerists, or working repairs on the fortifications,’ Honory explained. ‘Two of them have been here almost a year, getting known and trusted, and they’ll vouch for the others. Our Fly-kinden will drop in on the Aldanraels. They should be able to lose themselves amongst the rabble there. When two or more Spider families get together, nobody can keep track of all their servants and slaves.’
‘I wonder that you don’t have a Spider or two on the payroll,’ Helmess observed.
‘Ah, well, current policy is not to use Spider agents on Spider business,’ Honory explained. ‘Can’t be entirely sure who’s been bought by who, you see. Besides, most Spider-kinden on the Rekef books want to go anywhere but the Spiderlands, and nowhere near the Aristoi. I’d be suspicious of those that acted otherwise, frankly.’
‘I see the sense in that, I suppose. And your Wasp, where does he fit in?’
Honory laughed. ‘Well, General Brugan does like to think we lesser kinden need mothering.’
The Wasp agent eyed him bleakly, but the truth was clear. He was here purely to make this a true-blooded Imperial venture, while the actual work would be performed by the rest.
‘I’m glad to see you’re back in the game, Master Broiler. You’d kept to your house so much I was getting worried for your health,’ Honory remarked, with perhaps a suggestion of threat.
‘It has been so long, and I’ve steeled myself to take this last step, but I will confess I needed a little while to gather the courage,’ Helmess replied, with an apologetic shrug. In reality, of course, he was only free to act now because Teornis and his bloody-handed retinue were safely out of Collegium. And I can’t mention them to Honory, or to anyone else. There were too many secrets involved, that Teornis had pried open, but were still closed to the Empire.
‘Well, so long as you’re with us now… I understand you’re on the war council.’
‘Much to Jodry Drillen’s bafflement,’ Helmess agreed. ‘You’re right, I think he’ll crack – if only because he’s pointing in the same direction as myself. When he does, he’ll fall. Those same warmongers that cheered Stenwold Maker to the echo will take Drillen apart once he suggests peace talks.’
‘Splendid, splendid,’ Honory said happily. ‘Now, for the next few days, you go draw your lists of those we must remove. Better to be over-diligent. A few extra men dead, who did no wrong, will cause us less difficulty than a few alive who might become a problem. We’ll see you back here shortly – I’ll send word exactly when. My people have marked you, though, so no turning back now.’ He said it in a jovial manner, but Helmess as much as heard the clink of chains behind his words.