Blood of the Mantis (6 page)

For accommodation he had been given the best rooms in the guest wing of the Amphiophos, and he had not let them suffer beneath their somewhat overblown Beetle style, but had lavished them with draped silks and cushions – or rather his servants had. What matter that he would be staying there only a few days?

When Stenwold entered, Teornis was lounging on a couch, with two brightly clad Fly-kinden servants dancing attendance on him.
Servants or slaves?
Stenwold wondered. Slavery was outlawed in Collegium but was the cornerstone of Spiderlands society, and nobody was inclined to pose that question for fear of the reply. It helped, all the same, that there was not a manacle to be seen, and Teornis’ staff were dressed as richly as Collegium’s merchant magnates.

‘Master Maker,’ the Spider greeted him in a pleasant, reassuring voice. Like the best of his kind he was the consummate socialite, all things to all audiences. ‘Thank you for accepting my invitation. Pray join me.’

Stenwold cautiously moved to the couch facing him, accepting a goblet of wine from one servant, a honeyed locust from the other. Behind Teornis, a sultry Spider maiden reclined on her side amidst the cushions and watched Stenwold curiously, but the Beetle found himself thinking,
I have a sultry Spider maiden of my own
, and he smiled at that.

‘War Master Maker, I should have said,’ Teornis added.

Stenwold swallowed the locust and held up a hand. ‘Please not that title, Lord-Martial. I have no stomach for it.’

‘Then I shall call you Stenwold, and you must call me Teornis.’

‘You are too kind.’

‘I am just kind enough,’ said the Spider. ‘You are now a hero to your people. I shall flatter you outrageously until you agree to my every demand.’ His smile was the whitest Stenwold had ever seen. ‘I always thought myself fond of titles, but even I find mine has begun to weigh on me. There seem to be ever more matters martial to deal with these days.’

Stenwold nodded. ‘Someone in a hurry addressed me just “War Maker” today.’

‘A hazard of a practical surname.’

‘It could be worse.’ Stenwold found himself smiling again. ‘When I was a student here, there was a fellow called Hiram Master who entered into the Assembly. Nobody had thought about it, but suddenly he was Master Master. He resigned a tenday later.’

Teornis laughed politely. ‘Stenwold, are you currently in the right frame of mind to discuss Spiderland politics?’

‘
Is
there ever a right frame of mind, for my people?’

‘Nonetheless, there are matters we must discuss. I have been called back home. My mother and my sisters and my aunts have decided that my military skills, such as they are, are now required at Seldis. The Wasps are liable to take the annihilation of their Fourth Army rather badly. We will, of course, say that we have no control over those reckless Mantis savages and never have had. We have even sent messages of condolence, though I would not want to be one of those messengers.’

‘You think the Wasp Empire will attack the Spider-lands.’

‘The Empire will have to do something about Seldis, at any rate. Whether they will simply keep troops on hand to deploy against us, or whether they will actually seek to take the city, I cannot say, but they will do
something
.’ Teornis drained his wine and let a Fly servant refill it. ‘It is a strange thing, how the borders of our lands are intentionally blurred. On our maps, Merro and Egel are ours, and all the land to the edge of the Felyal. Some overly ambitious cartographers even place Tark and Kes within our borders. We like owning things, we Spiders. And yet, at the same time, living in Seldis gives one a strange perspective on life. For the Spiderlands proper it is a backwater, a place for the disgraced and the clumsy, but, playing our games there, and looking with amusement at our northern neighbours who cannot – forgive me for saying it – ever match us in our dances . . . Well, we find that the borders are blurred both ways. That, strangely, we are Lowlanders even as you are. Lowlanders and Spiders both. This is why the Aldanrael, and several other families under our banner, have acted as they have. You must allow that our disposition and actions will be important, in the months to come. We are no mere onlookers.’

‘You have proved that very ably, Teornis.’

‘Our army at Seldis grows, ready to repulse a Wasp invasion should matters become so dire, and we are seeking assistance from the cities south of us: Siennis and Everis-on-the-Isle. There is a complication, though, and this is where you can dabble in Spider politics, if you wish.’

‘I wish anything but,’ Stenwold told him, ‘but continue, please. What is your complication?’

‘It is that we have another point of contact with the Empire. Over the last few years the Wasps have expanded along the eastern edge of the Dryclaw, until they have reached our own sphere of influence. If they were to put pressure on us there, then there would indeed be a complication. Military attention would be divided but, more importantly, so would political attention. Those with interests in that area might call for peace, even collusion. Self-interest, you understand, is a significant force in our culture.’

‘In all cultures,’ Stenwold agreed. ‘Where are we on the maps exactly, Teornis? The eastern edge of the Dryclaw is not well known to us, and the Scorpion-kinden discourage exploration.’
As do your own people
, but that was a thought best kept silent.

‘The desert is a triangle of sorts, broad at the northern edge, but narrow towards the Range of the Tail, as those unimaginative Scorpion fellows call it. South from there lies a large lake, and land that is my people’s and yet not my people’s, and a city named Solarno.’

Stenwold nodded. ‘I’ve heard it mentioned.’

‘The Aldanrael has no interests or agents in Solarno, Stenwold, but I have heard that the Wasps have been seen there, speaking much of peace and trade and sizing up the local militia. Solarno is a renegade city, founded by those who had failed in the Spiderlands. Exiles and outcasts mainly, and officially we have no traffic with them. Unofficially, however, it is a thriving market, a stopping point for eastern-bound travellers, an oubliette for those who have slipped in the dance. The Spiderlands maintain Solarno’s pretence of independence simply because it is useful, you understand?’

‘And now the Wasps are there.’

‘And the rulers of Solarno, I’ll wager, are not taking them seriously. They will instead play their games and try to use the Wasps against their local enemies. Solarno is the Spiderlands in miniature, if you will, for they are only one city but divided against themselves. If the Wasps catch them unawares, Solarno will turn from our plaything into the Wasps’ own gateway into our lands. At that point any chance of aid such as we have recently rendered to Collegium will cease, because we will have our own worries to keep us busy.’

‘You want me to send some of my people to this Solarno?’ Stenwold asked him.

‘Spider-kinden agents would only be caught up in the dance,’ Teornis confirmed, ‘and worse, they would have their own agendas. At this juncture I trust your agents more than my own. Someone polite and diplomatic is called for, Master Maker, not swift to take offence nor quick to be deceived. Most certainly – mother preserve us! – not that Mantis. But I trust your choice in this.’

Long journeys are soonest started
was a Fly-kinden maxim. It seemed to Stenwold that his plans, for once, fell into place all too easily. A few days after his words with Teornis, and everyone seemed to be leaving except him.

There was only one Spider-kinden ship in Collegium’s harbour now, but it was Teornis’s personal vessel, the craft on which he had weathered out the sea battle, rather than on the great flagship that had been so prominent. Spiders always preferred guile and speed to strength. The sailors, too, were Spider-kinden mostly. Stenwold had never thought of them as a maritime breed but, then, the waters around Collegium were new to bloodshed. Eastwards were to be found the longships of Felyal and the Kessen navy, giving the Spiderlands plenty of reason to man their fighting ships and protect their trade routes. Stenwold watched as the great grey sails of spun silk were hoisted slowly, billowing in the wind, strong as iron and yet light as air.

It had been easy enough, in the end, to choose who he would send off to Teornis’ newly threatened land.

‘I’m grateful to you for doing this,’ he said. ‘I know you’re no agent, to be sent hither and thither as I choose.’

‘You know, I’m really rather looking forward to this,’ Nero told him. ‘I have been in every Lowlands city east of Collegium, and three or four in the Empire, too, but there’s always somewhere new. Solarno is somewhere I always meant to pay a visit.’ He grinned broadly. ‘The world just goes on and on, doesn’t it?’

‘Just be careful,’ Stenwold warned him.

It was true, though, that Nero was the best-travelled of any of them, and he had done his time in the Spiderlands too, been flavour of the month in Siennis one season, his daubs hung on everyone’s walls. Stenwold glanced back in time to see Che hugging Achaeos tight. She, too, was attired for travelling: an artificer’s leather coat and hard-wearing canvas breeches, and a big pack slung over her shoulder. She had insisted that she could not sit at home while Achaeos was off working for Collegium. Looking at her now, Stenwold still saw her as so very vulnerable, in a way that Salma and Tynisa were not. Was that just his wish to protect his own kin, or something truly powerless within her?
Still
, he forced himself to think.
Look at what she has come through. Look at what she has accomplished.
To deny her this chance and send some other simply because they were not blood-kin would be hypocrisy on his part.

‘You look after her well,’ he told Nero sternly.

‘Sten, you couldn’t have chosen a better unless you called up another Fly-kinden,’ Nero assured him, knowing that Sperra – Stenwold’s other Fly agent – had adamantly refused to go anywhere near the Spiderlands. ‘Look at it this way,’ the Fly continued. ‘Me and a Beetle-kinden, it’s perfect – you could go anywhere, two people like that. You could go into the Empire, even. I’d worry instead about the Moth-boy and his crew. They’ll stand out just about anywhere they go.’

‘True enough.’ Stenwold sighed. ‘You know your route? You’re sure enough of it?’

Nero nodded. ‘Ship to Seldis, overland south on the trade route to Siennis, Mavralis, and then by ship across the Sea of Exiles apparently, to Solarno. Fires your blood, doesn’t it, hearing all those names?’

‘Travel in the Spiderlands . . .’

‘Isn’t new to me, remember? And we’ll have letters of introduction from your man the Lord-Martial there.’

‘Nero, he’s not
my
man,’ Stenwold corrected. ‘He’s nobody’s but his family’s and his own. Don’t relax, and don’t rely on him either. Cut loose from him as soon as possible and make your own decisions.’

‘Right,’ Nero confirmed, and grinned again. ‘I love the Spider-kinden. Never a dull moment.’

One of the sailors called them, just then. They were ready to cast off, and the wind and tide were with them.

‘Che,’ Stenwold called out.

‘I know. Be careful. Look after Nero.’

‘That isn’t quite –’

She came over and hugged him briefly. ‘We’ll be all right, Uncle Sten.’

‘Just do whatever you can,’ he said, ‘but don’t take risks.’

His wings a blur, Nero was already touching down on deck. Che reached out to Achaeos, brushing fingers, and then she dashed after the Fly, thumping up the gangplank to turn briefly at the rail and wave down at them.

For Achaeos the route was harder still: across the whole of the Lowlands, all the way to the borders of the Empire, and then further still. No ship, no rail could take him there, nor even a road untramped by imperial boots. This was where Jons Allanbridge entered the story.

Jons Allanbridge was an adventurer, a fortune-hunter but, despite this, a good son of Collegium. He had fought in the air when the Vekken attacked, piloting his airship over their fleet to drop boxfuls of grenades – until the wind swept him too low and a catapult put a man’s weight of metal scrap through the balloon.

Now, in return for a purse of gold and repairs to his craft, he would provide transportation for Achaeos and his companions. His airship, the
Buoyant Maiden
, would feel cramped with six aboard but she was a fleet little thing and Allanbridge had been flying her unnoticed over borders for years. Even a months-long jaunt like this was all part of the life of a merchant adventurer.

Like most Beetles, Allanbridge was squat and broad, a decade younger than Stenwold, with the hair already receding from his dark brow. He wore artificer’s canvas, and a woollen robe over that, a long scarf bundled about his neck.

‘These all of your lads, are they, Maker?’ he asked. He was not one for titles, and Stenwold was grateful for that.

‘All present,’ Stenwold agreed. About them the wind was up, tugging at the flags of the airfield, striking up a constant clatter of lines against the metal of scaffolds and flying machines. Stenwold turned to Tisamon and clasped hands with him, wrist to wrist.

‘Sten, I must ask . . .’ the Mantis began awkwardly.

Stenwold, who had noticed what company his friend had kept in the city, volunteered, ‘This is about the Dragonfly, Felise?’

‘You must watch her,’ the Mantis warned.

‘I’m surprised you didn’t suggest taking her with you,’ Stenwold remarked, thinking of Felise’s skills and the advantages of having a capable Dragonfly’s sharp eyes and nimble wings.

‘No.’ Tisamon’s expression became opaque. ‘She is not ready yet. She would not . . . I do not think she would always remember our objectives.’ But then there was something more in his face, a sudden tug at its composure.

‘Tisamon, what is it?’

‘Nothing.’ Too quick an answer.

‘Tisamon . . . ?’

The Mantis checked him with a look, eyes filled with an emotion outside Stenwold’s experience. ‘I will go and she must stay. Do not ask me to take her – not yet. I will return to her. Remind her . . . I cannot . . . She . . .’ The Mantis’s breath caught. Uncomfortable truths were crawling just beneath the surface of his face.