The Scarab Path

There was a flurry of movement nearby, and he instinctively jabbed an arm out towards it, reaching for his sword with the other.

'It's me, it's me!' Trallo shrilled, coming to rest beside him, surveying him critically. 'They did a real job on you, didn't they?'

Thalric groaned, pulling himself fully to his feet, light-headed and breathing through waves of pain.

'I hope you can walk,' Trallo added reproachfully. 'There's no way I'm carrying you.'

'I can walk.' And I can think up some explanation for Marger and the others, as well. He was still ransacking his memory for the name of the armoured halfbreed.

Twenty

She awoke, and was in a strange place.

She was still in Khanaphes, because the city signed every brick that composed it, but this was nowhere she recognized. The ceiling was too low, the windows too small: it was certainly not the splendour of the Place of Honoured Foreigners.

Nor was it the coloured cloth of the Marsh Alcaia, and that was something to be grateful for, at least. She gathered up the pieces of her last recollections and tried to put them in order. The Fir dream came back to her with shocking suddenness: the mantis of the Darakyon, reaching out with bloody claws towards her. She sat up with a start.

'Achaeos?' she whispered the name, out of force of habit, but his ghost was not there, not even a tremor in the air to hint of it. She was in some kind of dormitory, lying on a narrow cot that was one of five. It looked like a room allotted for servants.

They were going to kill me, she recalled. The woman they called Mother had urged, Take her blood. Was that why she was now here? Were they going to farm her blood, syphon it off in cups and quarts? Che realized she was not tied to the bed, but she was willing to bet that the door was locked, and the single window was too small to let a Fly in.

Trallo? Perhaps the Fly had escaped. Perhaps there would be a rescue, after all. By who, though? She could not imagine Manny and Berjek charging in with sword and pike, but at least they could always go and seek aid from the Khanaphir. It would be a diplomatic embarrassment, of course, and if the truth of her deeds should become known they might be thrown out of the city — or worse. That might still be better than being bled to death by Fir-eaters over the course of a month.

She recalled Trallo shouting something. Had he been shouting for help? And hadn't help arrived? She had an image of a bright figure with its hands on fire. The Fir-eaters had been screaming …

There was water and soap laid out for her at the foot of the bed, and the sight of it brought a surge of relief out of all proportion, since the Fir-eaters had not looked as though they cared much for washing. There was even a towel folded over the bed-end, Collegium style. Someone's trying to make me feel welcome. After washing, she drank a great deal of water from a pitcher, trying to rid her mouth of the bitter taste of the vices she had dabbled in. Perhaps this is some kind of Khanaphir hospital?

They had laid out a robe for her too, and she eyed it suspiciously. She was still wearing what she considered as her working clothes, hardwearing and practical even though they were filthy and malodorous.

Realizing her sword was gone, she cursed quietly. Her new situation seemed subtly balanced between comfort and threat. Am I a prisoner here, or a guest?

She decided not to change clothes. Instead, she tried the door, and found it opened out into a corridor. Immediately she was surrounded. There were three of them, men in dark leathers and helms, shortswords at their belts. One closed the door neatly behind her, another was off and away at a run. She swung round, reaching again for the absent sword. 'What is this?'

'If you'll come with us,' one of them said, the tone of his voice strictly neutral.

'You're — wait a moment, you're Iron Glove. What's going on?' she demanded.

'Just come with us, Bella,' the man repeated. The two of them were standing on one side of her, blocking the narrow corridor. She backed off the way that the third man had gone running, and they followed smoothly.

'I'm the Collegiate ambassador,' she told them, trying for authority. 'I insist you tell me where I am and what is going on.'

They gave no reply to her bravado, which was perhaps all it deserved. She was retreating and retreating, seeing only closed doors on all sides, or doorways and stairwells where other Iron Glove men stood and watched, barring any escape.

'Is Corcoran here?' she asked desperately. 'I know him. He's a friend.' An acquaintance, barely. 'Please would you go find him. He's in charge here, isn't he?'

'Not any more,' one of the men said flatly, and her heart sank. What have I got myself into? Some schism amongst them? And how would that involve me?

She realized that she had unthinkingly backed into a larger room, and turned, groping for her bearings. It was a dining hall, still low-ceilinged but wide, and windowed on one side beyond a row of pillars. This was a little more like the Khanaphes she knew.

The long table that dominated the room was set with fruit and some sort of fish, simple local fare. The sight of it made Che realize how hungry she was, but there were only two chairs set there, and until the other one was claimed she was not going to sit down. The two Iron Glove men had now retreated to the doorway she had entered by.

'Someone,' she insisted, 'had better tell me what is going on.'

Even as she spoke, that someone entered the room from the far door. She saw a broad-shouldered man in intricate dark mail, pulling off his gauntlets even as he approached. He went to stand by one of the chairs, which was drawn out for him by one of his men. Cautiously, Che approached the other.

He laid the gauntlets on the table, undid the chinstrap of his helm and took it off. Che stared into the solid, closed face of a stranger, a halfbreed, strong-jawed and heavy-browed, touched by that faint discontinuity that so many of mixed blood were tainted with …

As she studied him, something shifted inside her, as though the ground beneath her feet had turned suddenly treacherous.

'Hello, Che,' he said, and she was rushing around the table to get to him, throwing her arms around the fluted breastplate, feeling his own arms hesitantly encircle her, almost too gently to feel, as though he was desperate not to break her.

She stood back a pace, looking him up and down. That face, which a moment ago had been as full of mystery as a stranger's, had that familiar half-bewildered expression that brought back long-ago days in the Great College.

'I can't believe it,' she said. 'I can't believe it's you. Look at you!' The sight of him unleashed a whirl of memories. 'I thought they must have killed you,' she continued. 'I was sure they must have found you out. I never heard anything more …' A cold thought came to her. 'You're not …?'

'With the Empire? I am not,' he said firmly. He was trying to smile at her, but a lifetime of hiding his hurts and joys was making it hard for him. 'And the man who found out what I had done was no normal Imperial officer.' He made an awkward gesture at the table. 'Eat, please. Will you eat with me?'

'Of course.' She sat herself down hurriedly, hands moving rapidly to the food under urgent directions from her stomach. She glanced back towards the two men who had shepherded her into the room. 'How did you go from the Empire to these Iron Glove people anyway? Are you turned merchant now?'

As he sat opposite her, a smile broke through at last. It made his face look unfamiliar: a hard thing born from the years since they had left Collegium, not something of the boy she had known at all. 'Che, I am the Iron Glove,' he replied.

She frowned at him, bolted a mouthful of fish and said, 'I don't understand.'

'A year ago I fled the Empire with my … business partner. We came to settle in Chasme, and started work.