Eleven

The ring of twisted copper wire dangled above her, suspended from a thornbush branch. The walls of Myna were behind them now, and they had made good time heading north-west before nightfall had caught them. They rode, which Che found easier than she had expected – easier even than the two Wasps seemed to, who had at least a little more experience than she did.

They had found a suitable hollow and had tethered their mounts, with Varmen using his sting to start a campfire, after a few explosive false starts. The man’s pack-beetle had its leash still tied to the pommel of his horse’s saddle, presumably so that they could get moving that much faster if need be. It was a ridiculously small creature, around the size of a Fly-kinden, and almost obscured under the heavy load of luggage that Varmen apparently felt compelled to travel with.

Varmen was not overly talkative, nor aloof either, for he responded readily when questioned. He and Thalric exchanged anecdotes intermittently, a well-travelled round of Imperial localities, favourite drinking dens, family names and public figures. Che hovered at the edges of their laconic conversations, feeling excluded by their shared race and past. Even she, though, could detect the huge gaps in their exchanges, the vast areas of personal history unvisited. Neither of them was keen to pin down any specifics of the respective military careers that each had abandoned.

The road that he was now guiding them along had provided the Empire’s invasion route, all those years ago.

Now that they were camped, Thalric was taking first watch, while Che had taken to her bedroll and let sleep overcome her. She had left her herbs simmering over the fire as instructed, although the two Wasps wrinkled their noses at the smell of them.

Above her head, a small spider had already begun to build its trap within the ring of twisted wire.

Just the other side of sleep, the fierce sun of Khanaphes blazed down, fragments of day and night, times past and present, faces she had known. Her newfound heritage was clawing at her, seizing control of her head and forcing her eyes open to see . . .

The sun over Khanaphes was a bronze nail-head driven into a cloudless sky.

Ethmet, the First Minister, stood on the steps of the Scriptora and watched his world teetering on the brink of destruction. It was an unexpectedly peaceful sight, for the second sun above him was descending with gentle grace: a black and gold orb blazing back the light of the true sun, suspended impossibly over his city like nothing he had ever witnessed. He could hear a faint insect-like drone, but he could not tell whether it came from this floating giant or from the dozen smaller machines that buzzed in wide circles, keeping a vigilant perimeter.

The city of Khanaphes, which had stood changeless for countless centuries, was now becoming unrecognizable to the old Beetle-kinden minister. It seemed that he had been serving the unseen, unheard Masters for ever, just one link in the chain of First Ministers stretching back into the golden dawn of time. He had thought, in time, to pass on the mantle of responsibility to one of his like-minded colleagues, had thought to become another name carved on the lists adorning one wall of the Scriptora’s hall of records. A legacy of honour, surely, but also a curiously anonymous one, in no way marked out from his predecessors or his successors. But that was not to be, for history had chosen him to be significant after all, and the thought made him weak.

Khanaphes could have recovered from last year’s unpleasantness, he knew. For the Scorpions to come from the deep desert and conquer half the city, aided by agents of the Wasp Empire, that was a terrible thing. The Scorpions had gone, though – the power of the Masters had put the rabble back in their place, the river Jamail overflowing its banks to wash Khanaphes clean of them. Ethmet should have rejoiced at this clear sign of favour, unprecedented in a thousand years, but even then he had fretted. He did not want to carry the burden of importance. Let me pass on and be gone, and let my name survive only in stone.

But then the Wasp-kinden had come, in force. They had come with ambassadors who had explained to him that it was rogue elements fleeing the justice of their Empress who had been behind the Scorpion attack. Ethmet had recognized the lie, though even the men they had sent to him believed their words to be true. Nonetheless he thanked them on behalf of the city, and had assured them that the Dominion of Khanaphes bore them no ill-will.

It was not quite as easy as that, they then explained. The Wasp Empire felt dishonoured by the incident, cut to the bone by shame and guilt at the way its renegades had injured a neighbouring power. They had come to put matters right, to ensure that Khanaphes was properly defended whilst rebuilding its strength.

Ethmet had assured them that the Khanaphir trusted to the Masters, and therefore such kindness really was not necessary. By that time, messengers from upriver had been flocking to the city with further news.

You should not put yourself to any trouble, he had assured the Wasps, and they had told him that there would be no further trouble, and that was what the soldiers were here for – the soldiers who had been marching south from the Imperial border, come to defend Khanaphes from . . . From just about everything, it seemed, including any aberrant belief amongst the city’s leaders that it might not require defending.

So far there had been little trouble: Ethmet had ordered it so. The Khanaphir guardsmen and militia had stood by as the Empire entered their city, not raising sword or spear against the intruders. For tendays now there had been Wasp soldiers on every street, in every marketplace, on the city walls, watching the rebuilding. Ethmet had wrestled with his conscience, for there had once been a rod of iron to his spine, which countenanced no deviation from The Way Things Were Done – as set down a millennium ago by the Masters themselves. Surely, having witnessed what must have represented the Masters’ intervention on behalf of their favoured city, that rod should be even more inflexible now? Surely he should be exhorting his people to rise up and slay the Wasps, to defy their new-minted Empire?

And yet, when he reached out for that rod of iron, he found that it had rusted through. Something within his proud heart had shattered quietly when the Scorpion-kinden had sundered the walls of his city, and captured every street and building as far as to the western bank of the river. Now his former strength of purpose was gone, and he hid a terrible fear inside him: that if the Khanaphir fought against this new invader, the Masters might do nothing to save them. Ethmet did not think on the flood that had driven away the Scorpions, but only upon all those losses they had suffered before the flood had come. What more might be lost? Would the hand of the Masters serve only to sweep the Wasps from a barren ruin? It was blasphemous, such thinking, yet he could not rid himself of it. He could not give the order to go to war.

He had meanwhile called on the Masters, night after night, praying for guidance. There are foreigners profaning your city, great ones, he had told them. Shall we do nothing?

And an echo had come back, Nothing, only nothing – so that he could not know if he had been answered or not. He had eaten the drug called Fir to open his mind to them, and reached for their guidance, but still that empty Nothing had returned to him. He felt as though the Masters themselves were waiting, and likewise holding their breath.

And worming in his gut was the knowledge that it had not been his prayers that had inspired the Masters to drive away the Scorpion-kinden of the Many of Nem. For all that he had entreated them, as their pre-eminent servant, they might as well have been no more than the statues they had left behind.

As yet the hand of these new conquerors had been felt only lightly. Some foreigners within the city had been exiled, others arrested and taken away. Traffic in and out now had to pass Wasp checkpoints. Ships were searched at the docks. There was a curfew, though enforced erratically. A few deaths, a few more beatings: the Wasp soldiers were being kept in check. A few who had killed or raped in a manner that, by some invisible yardstick, was unacceptable had been executed publicly on crossed spears thrust up through their living bodies. So far, the Wasps were being very considerate conquerors, but Ethmet had an unpleasant feeling that this must surely change.

And then, only this morning, the Imperial colonel serving as chief ambassador had come to him with news which was plainly scarcely less new to the colonel himself.

The Empress is coming to Khanaphes.

In fact, the Empress had been on her way for several days, but the news had been carried only a half-day ahead of her, in case some enemy of the Empire might choose to take it as a challenge. The news the colonel had brought him was that the Empress would be arriving in Khanaphes by noon.

And now Ethmet looked up at this descending airship – the world of the now descending to destroy thousands of years of carefully husbanded history – and he felt like weeping.

There had been a Rekef mission to Khanaphes which had gone painfully awry, that much Seda knew. The few survivors who made it back to the Empire had not been Rekef people but Engineers, and so, instead of the secret service keeping its errors secret, matters became widely known in a variety of circles.

Seda knew that nobody had expected her to take much interest in this business. It had been meat and drink for General Brugan’s enemies, ammunition for their broadsides at him, when her advisers met. She was their grand figurehead, the beautiful, whimsical Empress, and they knew she left the minutiae of government to them. She made a great show of acceding to their requests, validating their decisions, making herself the unchanged catalyst by which every other thing happened, but she left them to get on with their areas of expertise, which they appreciated.

But when Khanaphes had been mentioned, as a ranging shot aimed at General Brugan’s high standing in her eyes, she had announced, ‘We will go there.’

There had been silence amongst her advisers then, and they glanced at each other uncertainly. Her brother, the late Emperor, had kept to their ridiculous tribal custom of leader and advisers all sitting in a line, not facing one another. That did not suit her, though, so she had changed it effortlessly, without anyone being able to muster an argument against her decision. Now the Empress would meet with her advisers outside on a sun-warmed balcony, sitting or even reclining on comfortable couches in the Spider style, while plied with food and drink by the palace servants.

‘There is nothing there,’ had ventured Colonel Thanred, an old soldier who was the nominal governor of Capitas. ‘Just a backward Beetle city full of simpletons.’

‘The Rekef clearly believed there was something there worth seeing,’ a Consortium magnate had suggested snidely.

‘Lowlander agents were present in the city, so it was our duty to ensure they did not secure a base from which to strike at us.’ General Brugan had retained his composure magnificently, for which Seda indulged him with a small smile of approval that did not go unnoticed by his peers. He lies so well, she had thought, almost proudly.

‘We have quelled the rebel governors and generals, have we not?’ she had asked them, affecting a slightly bemused smile. ‘Our Empire is whole once more, thanks to your efforts. Our wounds are healed.’ She included them all in the smile, even those who had patently done nothing but stand on the sidelines and wait to see how matters would turn out. She had then locked eyes with the old Woodlouse-kinden, Gjegevey, adviser to her brother and their father before him, a man whose counsel was more valuable to her than any dozen Wasp-kinden dignitaries.

‘You word it perfectly, of course,’ a second Consortium man had observed, fat, old and ugly, but a man endowed with a rare sense of art and poetry. While her duller brother had demanded blood-fights in the arena, this man had been quick to arrange more refined entertainment for her, and thus won himself a place amongst her favourites – for now. ‘Empress, you should know that some of the Consortium have been considering a move eastwards. There are cities across the Jahalian Rift that our factors claim show great promise . . .’

‘But if we do head east, who would know of it?’ she had asked him pleasantly, and he was shrewd enough to remain silent and wait for her to elaborate. She was positively beaming now, letting them bask in her radiant expression. ‘We must not forget that we are no longer a solitary power surrounded by small cities who barely feel our approach before we snap them up. We now stand amongst those who think themselves our equals; even if we still stand head and shoulders above them, we must not forget that we are watched. We must remind them what it means to be an Empire.’

She had gauged their expressions in turn, reading worry, anticipation, a certain dormant bloodlust coming to the fore again.

‘We shall break no treaties,’ she had declared, ‘and so the Lowlander city-states will merely fret and protest. Yet we can extend our protective hand to a neighbour in need, a neighbour who is just within their sight. A city of Beetles, sorely oppressed by Scorpion barbarians, shall come to see the wisdom of sheltering beneath the black and gold flag. And their kin in Collegium will wring their hands and tell each other how terrible it is. And do nothing.’ Her smile, as it toured the balcony, had been sharp as a razor. ‘Or not, perhaps. Maybe it is just a fancy of mine, this thought of Khanaphes. What think you, my advisers?’

She had them immediately, of course. It was a perfect plan, bold and cautious in equal measures. It would remind the world of the Empire’s power but, more than that, it would remind the Empire’s own soldiers and citizens.

Two days later saw completion of the debriefing of those Engineers who had survived the Rekef fiasco. It had been assumed that they would be punished for their failures, but something very strange had happened during their interrogation, for their leader had produced a remarkable report. Suddenly a colonel in the Engineering Corps, the highest-ranking Imperial artificer there was, was also trying to promote the possibility of an Imperial expedition to Khanaphes, not realizing that his Empress had already pre-empted him. The idea had gathered momentum fast, until . . .

Until here I am, Seda thought. The army had gone in first, of course, and her airship had departed Capitas only after the expedition leaders had confirmed their control of the city. Such control had come about swiftly, for there had been no resistance from the Khanaphir, and she had her own good reasons to be glad about that.

Her reasons presented to her advisers for this expedition had been lies – just as much lies as Brugan’s dissembling about why he had sent men here originally. The Engineers’ quest here was a useful sideline, one that she did not understand but was prepared to indulge.

She had come to Khanaphes for her own private reasons. She had come here seeking power.

‘It’s a woman!’

For a moment Praeda held the telescope steady, expecting the honour guard and dignitary that had disembarked from the airship to be merely some vanguard for an even greater potentate, but it was plain that this slight-framed girl who had stepped down the ramp from the gondola was the whole and purpose of what was going on. She seemed a mere slip of a Wasp-kinden female, for all that she was dressed with an elegance any Spider might envy. She was clearly precious to the Empire, though, for as well as a dozen Sentinels in the heaviest armour, and a further dozen of the Imperial Light Airborne, Praeda’s glass identified the four warriors closest to the woman as Mantis-kinden, decked out in black and gold as though they had surrendered a thousand years of heritage in exchange for Empire coin.

‘What is so remarkable about that?’ rumbled her companion.

Praeda Rakespear gave him a quizzical look, but then nodded. ‘I suppose you’ve no reason to know of the shameful way in which the Empire treats its womenfolk.’

‘She must be the Empress,’ Amnon declared. He was squinting at the far spectacle from the rooftop they had commandeered, hidden in the shadow of a row of statuary.

Praeda laughed harshly. ‘Oh, of course,’ she said sarcastically. ‘First place she’d stop, here, on her journey to the moon.’

‘Why not? The Dominion of Khanaphes has influence yet,’ Amnon said, obviously chastened but being stubborn. In his mind, no doubt, his home city did still have some shred of the power that it once had wielded, a thousand years ago and more.

From force of long habit, Praeda opened her mouth to make some scathing comment, and stopped herself when she remembered that Amnon sometimes took her vitriol to heart. Her glass was still trained on the mysterious Wasp woman, waiting for some clue as to her identity. The old First Minister was bowing to her, but then the Khanaphir bowed a great deal, even their leaders.

The Wasp woman reached out and laid a hand on the First Minister’s forehead, and Praeda’s reaction was, She’s going to kill him! because she knew that female Wasps could also use that stinging Art of theirs. The gesture was not a physical attack, but it seemed an attack nonetheless. Praeda watched the old Beetle man drop to his knees, swiftly enough for her to fear that he might not easily get up again. After a moment of uncertainty, the other Ministers present began following suit. The woman watched them with a proud air.

A proprietorial air.

‘Fire and forge,’ Praeda murmured, finding her view through the telescope suddenly quivering. ‘Amnon, I’m a fool, and I should listen to you, because you see things more clearly than I sometimes. I think you’re right. I think it’s her.’

Amnon grunted, happy at the validation, and reached for the glass. He took it clumsily, but soon had it to his eye, twisting its sections to bring the view into focus. He would never make an artificer, but he had taken surprisingly swiftly to many of Collegium’s innovations. His reverence towards the Masters of Khanaphes, pounded into him as a child, had been extended into a kindred awe of machines which Praeda, an artificer herself, found endearing and not a little gratifying.

‘If only I had a snapbow,’ Praeda breathed.

‘I had not thought you had such unfond memories of my home that you would wish to complete its ruin,’ Amnon stated mildly.

‘Well, of course not,’ she admitted. ‘Still, she is very bold to expose herself to any public-spirited assassin who might come along. But you’re right. I am no killer and your people would suffer.’

‘I am glad you see matters so, for I have brought just such a thing with us,’ Amnon continued, unperturbed.

‘A snapbow?’ she demanded.

‘I thought it might be useful.’

‘Maybe it will be, at that,’ she allowed, retrieving the glass from him. ‘So, what’s the woman doing now . . .?’

Seda stood perfectly still, watching a score or so of old men and women, the pick of the Ministers of Khanaphes, bow their heads to her.

Of course, my brother never set foot out of Capitas, she reflected. Where our father and grandfather flew with the armies, he buried himself in the Imperial palace for fear of encountering the hatred of his subjects. How different a man might he have been, had he been welcomed like this in Szar or Myna or Vesserett. And was that so unlikely? If any city wished to avoid the Imperial scourge, how better to do so than with such a complete display of supplication as this? The Khanaphir government’s public obeisance to her was a gesture to melt the heart of the harshest tyrant, and surely she was not the fear-ridden monster her brother had been.

Surely, surely? She knew what they said about her: her servants, her advisers, her generals. Those near to her had heard the rumours by now, for all that she had done her best to keep the knowledge contained: the Empress has strange tastes. Missing slaves caused no great comment, but there would inevitably be some palace steward who had done the relevant arithmetic to work out just how many were vanishing, and other servants of her private chambers who had to deal with the detritus . . .

But that is for a reason, she assured herself. It is not like my brother’s pointless cruelties. I need . . . And she did need, and she could feel that need within her even now, which would have to be slaked sooner rather than later.

Behind her, Gjegevey the Woodlouse was picking his way down the airship ramp, leaning heavily on his staff. He paused to see the Ministers in such submission.

‘Ah, remarkable,’ he murmured, and she knew from the faint unsteadiness in his voice that he, too, suspected it was more than diplomacy that had brought them to their knees.

‘Rise,’ Seda commanded. ‘The Empire thanks you for your reception, and it knows that you will have prepared suitable chambers for us.’

There were Khanaphir servants scurrying away even as she spoke, and she had no doubt that the city’s bounty would be laid bare for her by the time she reached the Imperial embassy, or wherever it was they chose to receive her. She tried to focus on the political and material matters in hand, while keeping at the back of her mind her very personal reasons for demanding to come here.

Still, some instinct she could not name had prompted her to touch the First Minister’s brow like that, and she would swear that, as she did so, she had heard a distant voice echo from out of the very earth itself, and it said: Kneel.

Kneel.

And Che awoke to see the first pale skies of dawn, her heart hammering in her chest as though she had been running, clutching at the very ground itself to remind herself of where she was.