‘So — ’ and enough meandering, old man — ‘this war, Gjegevey, that your ancient Argastos was so feted for. It was the war against the Worm, was it not?’
‘We do not speak of such things,’ Terastos hissed, cutting Bartrer off. Seeing the others’ somewhat tired expressions he entreated them, ‘Yes, so we are a secretive people. So we hold our knowledge close, and treasure it. But there are names that are not spoken. We damn them into obscurity, and in doing so we deny them power. If you are what you seem, you must know this, Beetle girl.’
Che met his gaze, her easy retort fading in her throat. Yes, I do. Somehow I do. But times have changed. ‘The Empress will speak all the forbidden names there are, if it gives her even a thimbleful more power.’
The Moth actually shuddered. ‘So I will speak of Argastos, but I will not speak of the war that he won.’
‘The war against the Worm?’ Bartrer said, obviously enjoying herself. ‘And what was that, Moth-kinden? The great and terrible war, and yet only marginalia are left of it.’
‘I warn you,’ Terastos spat. ‘Speak it again and I will abandon you all.’ Incredibly, he turned his blank eyes on Che, entreating for her intervention.
Bartrer gave him a superior smile but, before she could speak, Maure stepped in.
‘Enough,’ the halfbreed stated. ‘I know some little of that war. The Woodlouse-kinden that trained me taught me just so much. Argastos is one thing, whoever he was — or is — but we do not conjure them by naming them. Even the old insult for them, to call them “Worm”, is too much. You are right, Mistress Bartrer, that a very many enemies joined together to defeat them. For ten generations after, there were nightmares of their return, for everyone knew that they were not so very finally defeated, and, even so, the means used to cast them down were enough to cripple half the powers of the world. Some never recovered their old strength. But we do not speak of them.’
Terastos nodded soberly. ‘Suffice to say, Argastos was a hero, when he brought about their ruin, and after that he became something else.’
‘A corpse, can we hope?’ Thalric put in. ‘Forgive me if I sound somewhat desperate, but the man is thousands of years dead. So what is she after and what are we expecting to find? And just tell me whatever you believe. Don’t patronize me simply because I have the good fortune to be Apt.’
Che squeezed his hand. His answering smile was strained.
‘There is something awake at the heart of the forest, this much we sensed,’ Maure admitted.
‘His memory must run long among the Mantis-kinden, if nothing else,’ Bartrer mused. ‘It’s only after he comes and goes in the histories that you even get mention of the two holds here. Immediately before that they’re calling the entire forest Argaryon — no prizes for guessing after who. So you’re telling me that, throughout all those centuries, your “Servants of the Green” never told you they had a guest?’
Terastos shrugged. ‘Our servants served under certain conditions, and the sanctity of their places was one such. It was suspected that something of Argastos remained, but if so, the Mantids seemed a strong enough guard to keep him where he was. And until this cursed Empress decided to meddle, were we not right?’
How much does he honestly know, then? Che wondered, and she came to the depressing conclusion that Terastos was being particularly frank, for a Moth. The name of Argastos had been unpicked from their histories — the histories Terastos had access to at least — so that the man only knew something had been there, and that it was safely barred away from the world. The details of what had been there, and of what was to be feared, were lost.
She turned her gaze on Helma Bartrer, and decided that there were depths in the woman she could not decipher. The driven academic on the edge of a breakthrough in her research? Or is there something else?
‘There is, hm, one more matter, of course. Once I had enough people searching for the name, ahm, Argastos, it was bound to come to light.’ Gjegevey did not sound very happy about it.
‘The report.’ There was a similar reluctance in Tegrec’s voice.
‘So tell me and stop all this theatre,’ Seda chided them both.
‘During the last war, shortly before the, hm, battle known as Malkan’s Stand, a reconnaissance airship from the Seventh went astray over this forest and was, hrm, brought down in a storm. A single survivor, one Sergeant Corver, made it out of the trees, but his sanity was, hrm, decidedly in question. His report is, ah, lurid, contradictory, lacking in internal logic. He speaks of a terrible place within the forest, of, ahm, dead men returning to life, of being drawn to a, hrm, hall of sorts, of great gates, and passing within them into a place of darkness where he met, hrm. .’ The old Woodlouse blinked several times. ‘He met a Moth-kinden who named himself, hm, Argastos, who gave him a message. Despite the Rekef being most, ahm, insistent in questioning this sergeant, his story did not change.’
Seda’s eyes gleamed. ‘And the message?’
Gjegevey’s face twisted. ‘You understand we did not know this when we named Argastos for you back in Capitas.’
‘Tell me.’
‘The ahm, the message was thus: “Go to your Empress. Go to her and tell her: I am here, and ready for her. When she seeks me, she shall find me waiting.”’ Gjegevey sighed. ‘At the time Corven first made his report, your, hm, brother still lived, Majesty. I do not know what to say.’
‘Say that you were right, to bring this Argastos to my attention. Say that here is a power that has lasted a thousand years and more, and has still retained a modicum of wit. Most of all say that we will find Argastos before the Beetle girl, or else I will have everyone in this expedition on the crossed pikes.’
Part Two
‘Outright Victory or Death’
Eleven
They were all waiting for Eujen when he walked in. He suspected that the lecture hall had never been so full as now, housing his new recruits.
Standing at the lectern, he did not feel the expected authority of a chief officer drop on his shoulders. He was still Eujen Leadswell, a mere student who had conceived the stupid idea of a Student Company, mostly because the girl he was sweet on had gone off and joined the Merchant Companies and then refused to allow him to do the same. Stab me, but is this sort of rubbish what history is actually made of? Idiot people like me making bad decisions for all the wrong reasons?
Oh, and sod Stenwold bloody Maker for taking me seriously, while I’m on the subject.
He had Averic standing beside him, and a stout Beetle girl who had been one of the first to sign up, so had de facto become a sort of officer. They all three wore the purple sashes that Eujen had adopted because he had known a clothier trying to shift an excess of that colour. The lectern bore a big pile of similar sashes, and a single snapbow.
His audience watched him as though expecting him to do tricks for their amusement. These were not his volunteers, who had rallied willingly to his banner out of a desire to protect their home. Before him instead were conscripts: those able-bodied individuals amongst the student population who had been forced to take up arms by Maker’s Draft, and who had been assigned to him rather than to the Merchant Companies, because he was reckoned to be on their level or some such.