something wordless and rushed towards the flames, arms outstretched, shouting her name, but it was too late, already too late.
People were shouting at each other, soldiers breaking formation. The few drivers whose machines had yet to start were leaping clear of their seats. Cries for surgeons arose from those struck by pieces of Praeda’s machine.
Nobody noticed the Wasp woman with the snapbow.
Rigging an automotive to explode — one that relied on a fuel engine — was simpler than Gesa had thought. After all, the thing was almost a bomb already, save that it relied on its explosions to be controlled. Adding all the additional firepowder she could get hold of, and linking the ignition flame to that and to the fuel tank had fallen within the level of artifice that any Army Intelligence agent was trained to. She only regretted that she had not been able to rig more of them, and that the big Khanaphir himself had not been in the machine when it was started.
Now she was stretched out to full length atop one of the big transporters that the army would be leaving behind them, sighting along a Collegiate snapbow at their commanding officers, waiting for a clear shot whilst the tenuous discipline of her enemies disintegrated all around her.
She could feel the sands running out for her. She had decided to fulfil her orders, but that did not mean she could not get out alive as well. She had just killed one of the Collegiate leaders on her list. She would not be able to get them all, but she reckoned that she could make a good enough showing, and then make a stab at escaping too. And wouldn’t Colonel Cherten look sour about that.
She wanted to take down the Mynan woman, but Kymene was now in the midst of her people, offering no clear shot, so she took the next most dangerous.
A squeeze of the trigger, and abruptly Marteus the Ant was falling backwards, clean kill or just a wound she could not say. She had never been intended as a markswoman.
Next target, now: the other Company chief officer, the woman Padstock. Gesa dropped her spent snapbow onto the transporter cab’s roof and took up the other loaded weapon she had left ready. There was a cluster around the downed Marteus, most of them staring about them, but the general panic had obscured the sharp sound of the snapbow.
She sighted up, heart hammering within but all outward calm… then there was a scrabbling immediately behind her, and she twisted reflexively, raising the weapon.
Had it not been a Fly-kinden, she would have been able to kill her attacker right then, but the small man was already within the arc of her barrel, elbowing it aside and sweeping something round towards her. She had a glimpse of the knife’s blade, and got a knee in his stomach just as it came in, so that it only raked her side, instead of gutting her. He was not even wearing Company colours, just some ragged little renegade.
She kicked him hard in the chest, knowing that she had accomplished all she could and that now was her last chance to get clear. The man was shouting loudly and enough people were taking notice.
She took flight, for already the odd snapbow bolt was heading her way, and there would be enemies in the air, too, at any moment. Her wings cast her over the ridges of tents, through an increasingly busy sky, and then dropped her down amongst the canvas, briefly out of sight. She ducked inside a tent-mouth, pausing to hear the hunt getting nearer. Could she hide here, let them rush past her? No, even the Collegiates were not that incompetent. She backed further in, almost to her knees, and cut a slit down the tent’s back to peer out, seeing that the search was organizing itself dangerously fast.
She widened the slit, working swiftly yet patiently until she was holding closed a gap she could push her way through. The first chaotic impetus of the hunt was past her, but those coming after were being more methodical. Timing would be everything.
She took a deep breath, ripped the canvas open and took to the air. Now, only speed would save her.
The snapbow shot hammered into her from above, a colossal slap to her shoulder that shocked her more than it hurt, the bolt tearing its way in and then out of her, hurtling her from the air. Landing with breath knocked from her, and the wound abruptly a ball of complaining fire, she saw the self-same Fly descend on her, holding her own second snapbow. He had simply flown up and waited, guessing at her best chance of escape.
He slung the emptied weapon at her as he landed, and she batted it away as an agonizing flurry of her wings hauled her to her feet like a puppet. Then he was on her with his knife, and she stumbled out of reach, hurling her own at him. Even as he flinched back, her hand was open, palm outwards. One last blow for the Empress.
Someone punched her hard in the back and abruptly she was lying on her side, and it hurt terribly to breathe. The Fly was standing out of reach — as if that could have saved him! — but it seemed that her Art had now deserted her. She had no strength for it any more.
Someone knelt beside her, rolling her over onto her back so that she gasped in pain, blood spattering out of her mouth. She saw the Mynan commander, the woman Kymene, with a snap-bow cradled in one arm.
Just one sting…
But all she could do was cough, and the coughing was all blood, and at last she gave up her tenacious hold on life, with the thought, I have done enough of my duty.
‘What are you all doing, standing around here?’ Kymene’s high voice cut through the babble of voices as she stormed back through the camp, snapbow in one hand and the blood of the enemy spy on her armour. ‘Infantry, muster to the east of the camp as ordered. Automotives — those that have started take your positions, mechanics to check over any yet to start! Move! The enemy is still coming! You think they will have stopped for this?’
She found Amnon kneeling by the still-burning wreck of the automotive. By then the surgeons had got all of Praeda that was left from the twisted metal, but no science of Collegium nor mystery of the Inapt could do anything for her.
‘Come on,’ Kymene urged more softly, a woman well acquainted with loss. ‘This is no time for grief, Amnon. Not when so many are looking to you. Not when there are Wasps to kill.’
He straightened up slowly. ‘Is that it, then? Is that all there is?’
‘Until my people are free, I will kill every Wasp and Spider and any other kinden that stands between me and my home. If you must grieve, let your enemy grieve with you. If you want vengeance then they now bring you all the opportunity you need. If you would lose yourself, then lose yourself in duty.’
Amnon glanced around and saw that the armed host of Collegium was finally on the move, assembling in proper battle order east of the camp, ready to advance. The far north-eastern horizon was already dim with the first dust of the Imperial forces.
With a great roar, he leapt for the next automotive to grumble past, swinging himself up beside its artillerist and the smallshotter mounted there.
The Esca Magni kicked into the air, that first beat of the orthopter’s wings hammering at the ground, throwing the craft straight up, clawing itself away from the yawning pull of the ground. All around Taki, and below her, the rest of Collegium’s air power was launching, their Stormreaders ungainly and impossible for that first moment, before transforming into things native to the sky.
She gave the Esca its head, let it find its path over the city, her eyes fixed on the eastern sky. The bright sunlight seemed alien to her after so many battles in darkness. Glancing left, she saw a flight of Mynan machines painted in their black and red, whilst a long string of Collegiate pilots trailed off on her far side. She spotted Corog’s machine powering ahead, the tip of a great broad arrow that was slowly forming behind him.
Contact! came the flash from one of the locals, and a moment later Taki revised her picture of the sky, for the enemy were far closer than the had anticipated, already diving out of the sun on their first attack run. She cursed herself for falling into useless patterns, for today’s fight would owe precious little to any of their previous engagements.
Her lamps stuttered and glowed as she tried to shove a mass of orders into the minds of her fellows, in a pitiful echoing of the interplay of thought amongst the enemy. On me; attack full forwards; break off; circle back; drawn them with us. Knowing, even as she made the attempt, that they would lose the thread of the message before getting halfway through it. In the end she just sent Follow my lead! three times, as she made her run.
Piercer bolts flashed and danced about her, the closest Farsphex spotting her — probably they even knew her by now, by her smaller, fleeter craft and her flying style. She jinked left, trusting to the skill of her fellows to adjust, opening up with her own rotaries and scoring a handful of glancing strikes before she and her opponent were past one another, just flashing blurs gleaming in the sun. Her enemy would have to deal with her allies, she with his.
She abandoned her line immediately, because the sky before her was being cut into pieces by shot from both