Dragonfly Falling

She had stood watching with him, now she frowned. ‘I’m no strategist.’

‘If you’d asked me yesterday I would have said well. Now something’s changed, and this message doesn’t make me any happier. I’m going to talk to Daklan.’

‘Is that wise, Major?’

He managed a smile. ‘Lorica, I am a simple man. Nobody ever believes me when I say that, but it’s true. I like my life simple. I am for the Empire, and I should therefore stand shoulder to shoulder with everyone else who is, and face with a drawn sword all those who are not. That is simple. you see, but someone is trying to complicate my life. I’m going to talk to Daklan, to discover precisely what he’s not telling me.’

He found Major Daklan out by the artillery positions, with Lieutenant Haroc nearby as his constant shadow.

‘Major, how goes the war?’

Daklan’s face was so devoid of guile that it was evidence of guilt in itself. ‘Well enough, Major Thalric.’

‘The Vekken seemed slow off the mark this morning, I thought,’ Thalric said. Daklan gave a glance over at Haroc and then nodded.

‘I cannot explain it. I heard some talk of disturbed sleep, no more.’

‘You don’t think they’re losing their stomach for the campaign?’

‘Not at all.’ Daklan shook his head. ‘Tactician Akalia seems satisfied with their progress. Every day they are closer to breaking the wall, or taking it by storm.’

‘She’s a cold woman,’ Thalric observed. ‘I’ve heard some of the casualty figures.’

‘That’s Ants for you,’ said Daklan dismissively. ‘The ships, the artillery, the men — she’s only looking for the victory. Whatever has unsettled her men clearly hasn’t reached her yet. Perhaps the Collegiates have developed some kind of mind-affecting gas that has drifted over here. Ant-kinden are strong of body, but they lack our strength of will. They would be more easily swayed than we.’

Thalric nodded carefully, and then said, as offhandedly as he could make it, ‘I hear there was a messenger from command.’

Perhaps there was a moment’s flicker in Daklan’s eyes. ‘Nothing to worry youself with, Major. Helleron has fallen to our troops, or rather, has capitulated. The Winged Furies now threaten Sarn and so the siege here will not be relieved.’

‘Good,’ Thalric decided. ‘Then all we have to do is wait.’ He turned and walked back towards the camp, knowing coldly that Daklan had been lying, and that his days of cherished simplicity were gone.

They had been shadowing the Vekken army since it first came in sight, and had been given an unexpectedly good view of the first day’s festivities. All that time, he had kept his head low, which was a skill he had acquired over many years of doubtful company, while Felise Mienn had gone about her business as freely as she pleased.

Living off the land, Destrachis considered, was a game for fools and peasants. And, inexplicably, for Dragonfly nobles.

He had watched her. With the cloak blunting the sound and shine of her armour she could freeze to near- invisibility while standing amongst trees or crouched against the scrub. She moved as though she was part of the landscape, and she would always come back with food. He himself was, he suspected, eating better than he had in the fiefs of Helleron.

When she came back this time he had to put the question to her. For all that questioning Felise was a dangerous game, it was time to air some facts

‘You were a Mercer, were you not?’

She looked at him as though she didn’t know who he was, which was always a possibility.

‘What do you know of the Mercers, Spider?’

He smiled. She scared him badly a lot of the time, but he knew he must never show it. ‘I have done my stint in the Commonweal. That was what attracted me to your cause in the first place. I therefore know the skills a Mercer needs in going about her business. There’s a lot of open country in the Commonweal: woods and farmland and marshland and hill country. Lots of villages but lots of space between them, and the roads not so good, and half the Wayhouses lie empty and rotted. Keeping the peace, tracking bandits, carrying the Monarch’s word: it means spending a lot of time in the wild, doesn’t it?’

‘It does that,’ she agreed, then she sat and dumped a bagful of roots beside the fire, together with some grain biscuits she must have taken from a farmhouse. He took out his smallest knife and began to peel, aware that she was looking at him with more curiosity than usual.

‘Destrachis,’ she said at last, and he allowed himself to relax, because when she could actually remember his name she was least likely to threaten him. ‘What was a Spider-kinden doing in the Commonweal?’

‘My question first,’ he pressed, carefully not looking at her.

‘Yes, I was a Mercer, when I was very young. I wanted to. but it changed when. ’

He sensed a shift in her and said hurriedly. ‘I drifted north of Helleron years ago. Ended up in Myal Ren and then travelled a little, plying my trade, stitching and quack-salving.’

‘I saw him today again,’ she said, without warning.

His knife stopped for a second and then went on. Looking down onto the Vekken encampment, he had caught a glimpse of a couple of men in black and yellow armour, but her eyes were better than his and she now swore she had seen Thalric.

Her patience impressed and appalled him. She had been stalking this entire army for almost a tenday now.

‘So when are you going to make your move? Are you going in there after him?’

He had missed the change, but she had snatched her sword out. ‘So many questions,’ she said. ‘Why? What are you hiding, Spider? Who are you working for?’

‘You,’ he said, still peeling although his hands shook slightly. ‘Or, if you won’t have me, for myself. I’m not your enemy, Felise.’

‘No. you’re not.’ The sword was hovering just in the edge of his vision. ‘But I do not know what you are. ’

Why did I ever agree to this? But he was here now and there was no getting away from it. He would rather cut his own thumbs off than risk becoming a target for Felise Mienn.

‘I will have my moment soon,’ she said. ‘Thalric cannot hide amongst the Ants for ever. Or perhaps I will go in and get him. We shall see.’

Thirty-Two

There was one matter only before the imperial advisers today. The tangled news of the Spiderland intervention in the progress of the Fourth Army had been flown to Capitas as fast as a chain of messengers and fixed-wing flying machines could fetch it. It had thrown them all but, while most were still reeling, General Maxin had been able to find his moment. After all, there were few setbacks for the Empire that he could not turn into his personal opportunities. Life was a ladder, and if he clung on when everyone fell back a rung, then he was inevitably closer to the top.

Of course, he must be seen to be deeply concerned. He had even brought an expert to speak before the council, which meant a double victory for him. Not only was he himself shown to be so committed to the Empire’s progress, but his witness was formerly in General Reiner’s camp, until she had seen the way the wind was blowing and come over to Maxin’s side.

She was a Spider-kinden named Odyssa, a Lieutenant-Auxillian in the Rekef, and she had been telling the advisers and the Emperor what she knew about the Spider military potential. The summary was that it varied.

‘The Spider ladies and lords prefer to hire or levy their armed help when needed. There are personal retinues but no real standing army,’ Odyssa explained. ‘The various cities of the Spiderlands all have provincial forces that can be called on and, as there is always plenty of work for mercenaries and fighting men in the Spiderlands, there is always a sizeable pool to draw on.’

‘Perhaps we should simply avoid these Fly-kinden places,’ one of the Wasp advisers said. ‘What glory or profit