Empire in Black and Gold

imperial garrison in Myna was large, and all within easy reach of the palace. As soon as someone realized just what was going on then they wouldn’t be able to move for armed Wasps. She cast a glance at Tisamon, seeing how they were working together like a pair of hands now, just like before. She could hardly believe it. Before tonight is out I shall shock you, father. You cannot ignore me forever.

Totho was working feverishly on the fifth door now, and meanwhile they were accumulating more ragged, determined looking Mynan men and women, weighing Wasp swords and daggers in their hands and waiting for further orders.

These had been a warrior people, Tynisa recalled, before the conquest. Not so belligerent as Ant-kinden or the Wasps themselves, but fighting to defend their own was ingrained in them. Just as well, because they’re going to need it.

They had reached the end of this row of cells but the corridor continued, and Chyses was already hurrying down it. They all heard his shout of ‘You’re here!’ and then he was running back towards them.

‘I’ve found her!’ he declared. ‘Come on, man, hurry!’

A woman’s voice from down the corridor called, ‘Chyses, watch out!’ and almost as the words echoed the first bolt of energy crackled past. Totho dropped to one knee and worked the crossbow’s lever furiously, emptying the weapon as another sting-bolt exploded against the wall beside him, scorching his cheek. One of the Wasp soldiers ahead of them went down before Totho’s barrage, but the way ahead was dark and he was not a good shot by nature. A second soldier had ducked behind his companion, and was now crouched flat against a wall. Tynisa dragged Totho into the shelter of one of the cells as he fumbled for another magazine.

‘You’re not a soldier,’ she reminded him, but then there was the hiss of another bolt of energy zipping past the doorway, and she heard Chyses curse.

She tensed, because she knew, in spite of herself, that Tisamon was about to rush the man, and that she would go too, to back him up. Even with that thought there came a cry from where the soldier was, and the sound of a scuffle, metal ringing on metal. Tisamon dashed past their doorway and Tynisa followed suit but it was over before either of them got there. The soldier lay face down with an arrow in his back and several jagged wounds elsewhere, and Achaeos was standing over him, trembling. He held a dagger in his hand, his arm steeped in blood to the elbow. His offhand palm was wet with his own and he had a split lip, and from that Tynisa could reconstruct the past moments. Achaeos had crept up in the dark for a shot, but it had not been as sure as he hoped, and the wounded man had charged him. She wondered whether this was the first time he had killed a man close to.

‘Good work,’ Tisamon nodded, and the Moth nodded back wordlessly. Something twisted in Tynisa then, because that simple commendation from him was more than she had ever received.

‘Kymene!’ Chyses exclaimed, and Tynisa realized that behind the bars of the one open-fronted cell, in the shadows, stood a woman who was watching them keenly. As she stepped into the light, Tynisa was struck by the instant calming effect she seemed to exert on the Mynans there, each and every one of them.

‘The door, if you please,’ she said, as though all of this were her own plan and she had been expecting them. Totho hurried up with the keys and then, when none of these would fit, starting scratching away with his autoclef. Tisamon returned down the corridor to take up his post by the guard room, and Tynisa knew it would not be long before they heard the sounds of further fighting there.

‘Who are these people?’ Kymene asked Chyses.

‘Foreigners,’ he explained. ‘They’re here after two of their own.’

‘Then we owe them a debt for their aid,’ she said, and just then Totho opened the gate in the bars with a cry of triumph. As Kymene stepped out like a queen entering her kingdom, Tynisa decided that the woman could be no more than a year or two her senior.

She heard awed whispers from some of the freed prisoners. ‘The Maid,’ and ‘The Maid of Myna,’ they murmured.

‘Whom do you seek?’ Kymene asked her.

‘A Dragonfly man and a Beetle-kinden girl.’

‘A brown-skinned girl with dyed pale hair?’

‘You’ve seen her!’ Totho exclaimed instantly. ‘Where-?’

‘I don’t know which cell is hers, but when they lead her back to it, they always take her that way,’ Kymene explained. ‘Chyses, you must stay and guide them.’

There was no argument from Chyses now as he bowed the head to his leader. Kymene laid a hand on his shoulder in thanks.

‘Show me how you intend to leave this place,’ she said, and he had the map out ready in an instant. She studied it for a moment, marked the route. ‘I will take these,’ she indicated the freed prisoners, ‘and I will meet you on the outside. Be quick.’

If it had not been for the injured shoulder troubling him, if it had not been for the spectre of his confrontation with Ulther looming large, Thalric reassured himself, he would not have slipped as he did.

He was on his way to the harem, making the best speed he could without actually running. Ahead of him he saw some servants scattering at his approach, but he was used to that by now. Only a moment later, but far later than it should have, did the realization strike him. Servants with swords drawn? And these people had been dirty and ragged, not wearing the plain dark tunics that Ulther dressed his menials in. He swung round instantly, but they had already closed in and a hand grasped his collar. There was a sudden point of pain at his throat.

He was about to fight, to summon his energies for a final retributive sting, but the angle of the blade changed slightly, putting the razor edge against his flesh, and he felt a little blood welling up there, and he remained still.

They came up to him then, a half-dozen grimy Mynan locals holding Wasp swords and daggers like the very piece at his throat. Some soldier’s diligence in keeping his kit in good order was now about to make an end to him.

He craned around, and his captor pushed him back against the wall, the blade cutting a little with the movement.

He found himself staring right into the face of Kymene and his heart went cold with it. She was unmistakable, the Maid of Myna. Caged, she had seemed too great for that space to contain. Here she was free like an impatient beast that had never lost the ways of the wild. She put him in mind of a great green hunting beetle, as large as a horse, that had once been brought to a gladiatorial match. Even pitted against mounted soldiers with spears, the monster had made a bloody accounting of itself, raising its great mandibles to the crowd and cowing them to silence.

‘I know you,’ she said softly. ‘You’re — don’t tell me — Thalric. Captain Thalric, is it not? The political.’

‘Your memory does you credit,’ he said hoarsely.

‘I’m sure you remember me,’ she said with a wicked smile. ‘It seems you’ve been in the wars, Captain Thalric. Or did you have an accident cleaning your crossbow?’

‘It’s been a busy night,’ he confirmed. Her eyes held his, and he felt as though they were unravelling his mind, his entire past, piece by piece.

‘It’s liable to get busier before dawn,’ she promised. ‘Where are you bound, Captain, all bandaged up like that? The infirmary’s the other way, they tell me.’

He tried a smile and found it came quite easily despite her, or even because of her. ‘I’m going to kill Governor Ulther,’ he said, and he knew she could see, in his eyes, that it was no less than the truth.

He had surprised her, though, and he treasured that moment, even though the blade wavered against his skin. She might be the Maid of Myna, but she did not know everything.

‘The Bloat? You’re going to kill the Bloat?’ she asked, and it was a moment before that name made a connection.

‘If you’ll let me,’ he said mildly, and watched his words ripple through her supporters, now a dozen in number. They were all staring at him, blankly or wonderingly.

‘Captain Thalric, hero of the revolution, is it?’ Kymene said slowly. ‘Perhaps one good deed to balance out all the bad ones?’

He gave her a thin, bleak smile.

‘Or is it just Wasp politics, like your little sideshow earlier?’ she prompted.

‘We take our politics seriously.’