His progress into the
room was measured in servants who opened the doors for him, swept the floor
before his feet, removed his outer robe and the weight of the crown. Others
were serving him wine and sweetmeats even as he sat down, food and drink
foretasted by yet more invisible underlings.
His advisers sat on
either side of him in a shallow crescent of lower seats. The idea was that the
Emperor should look straight ahead, and only hear the words of wisdom that
tinkled in his ears, without being in any way swayed by the identity of the
speaker. Ideologically brilliant, of course, though practically useless, since
he had an ear keen enough to identify any of the speakers from a single uttered
word. Instead, all they gained for themselves were stiff necks as everyone craned
around to look at whoever spoke.
I
could change this.
He was, after all, the Emperor. He could have them
sitting around a table like off-duty soldiers on a gambling spree, or kneeling
before him like supplicants, or hanging on wires from the ceiling if he so
wanted. Not a day went by without some petty detail of the imperial bureaucracy
throwing thorns beneath his feet, yet he always found a reason not to thrust
his hand into the works of the machine: it would be bad for morale; it had
worked thus far; it was for a good reason, or why would they do it like that?
And in his worst dreams
he heard the true reason for his own reticence, for at each change he
implemented, each branch he hacked from the tradition-tree, they would all
doubtless murmur,
He’s not the man his father was.
He had sired a legion of
short-lived bastards and no true-blood sons, and perhaps that was why: the
burden of the imperial inheritance that he did not want to pass to any child of
his. Still,
that
problematic situation was looming
closer each year. The imperial succession was a matter he had forbidden his
advisers to speak on, but he felt the weight of it on him nonetheless.
The assembled advisers
shuffled in their seats, waiting for his gesture to begin, and he gave it,
listening without interest as the first few inconsequential-seeming matters
were brought before him. A famine in the East-Empire, so perhaps some
artificers should be sent to teach the ignorant savages something approaching
modern agriculture. A lazy gesture signalled his assent. A proposal for games
to celebrate the first victory over the Lowlands, whenever it happened. He
ruled against that, judging it too soon. Another proposal, this from the
sad-faced Woodlouse-kinden Gjegevey, who had a sufficient balance of wisdom and
acumen to have served Alvdan’s father for the last nine years of his reign and
yet survived the purges that had accompanied the coronation.
‘It might be possible to
proceed more gently in our invasion plans,’ the soft-voiced old man said. He
was a freakish specimen, as all his people were: a whole head taller than any
reasonable man, and with his grey skin marked by pale bands up over his brow
and down his back. His eyes were lost in a nest of wrinkles. ‘These Lowlanders
have much knowledge of, mmn, mechanics, philosophy, mm, logistics . . . that we
might benefit from. A, hrm, gentle hand . . .’
Alvdan sat back and let
the debate run, hearing the military argue about the risk inherent in relying
on a slow conquest, while the Rekef insisted that foreigners could not be
trusted and the Consortium pressed for a swift assault that would see their
Lowland trading rivals crushed. All self-interest, of course, but not
necessarily bad for the Empire. He held up a hand and they fell silent.
‘We have faith in our generals,’
was all he said, and that was that.
Before speaking, the
next speaker paused long enough that Alvdan had a chance to steel himself for
the words to come.
‘Your Imperial Majesty.’
General Maxin, whose frown could set the entire Rekef trembling, began
carefully. ‘There remains the matter of your sister.’
‘Does there?’ Alvdan
stared straight ahead with a tight-lipped smile that he knew must chill them
all.
‘There are those who
would—’
‘We know, General. Our
dear sister has a faction, a party, but she has it whether she wishes it or
not. They would put her on this seat of mine because they think she would love
them for it. So she must be put to death like all the others. Are you going to
counsel us now about the place of mercy in imperial doctrine, or lack of it?’
He heard nothing, but in
the corner of his eye caught a motion that was Maxin shaking his head.
‘Do you remember General
Scarad?’ the Emperor continued. ‘I believe he was the last man to counsel us
about mercy. An unwise trait in a ruler of men, he claimed.’
‘Yes, Your Imperial
Majesty.’
‘Remind us of our
response, General.’
‘You agreed with him,
praised him for his philosophy and then had him put to death, Your Majesty,’
replied General Maxin levelly.
‘We praise you for your
memory, General, so pray continue.’
‘An alternative
disposition of your sister has been suggested to me, Your Imperial Majesty,’
Maxin said, picking his way carefully. ‘She cannot be married, obviously, and
she is not fit for office, so perhaps she should find some peace of mind in
some secular body. Some philosophical order, Majesty, with no political
aspirations.’
Alvdan closed his eyes,
trying to picture his sister in the robes of the Mercy’s Daughters or some such
pack of hags. ‘Your suggestion is noted, General, and we will consider it,’ was
all he would say, but it appealed to his sense of humour. Yes, a nice peaceful
life of contemplation. How better to drive his little sister out of her mind?
When he was done, and
his advisers had no more advice to give, the servants repeated their rigmarole,
but this time in reverse. Once he had stood up, his advisers began to sidle out
of the room, leaving only General Maxin, who seemed to be taking an
unaccountably long time to adjust his swordbelt.
‘General, we sense by
your subtlety that you wish to speak to us.’
‘Some small diversion,
Your Imperial Majesty, if you wish it.’
‘The Rekef are becoming
entertainers now, are they, General?’
‘There is a man,
Majesty, who has fallen into the hands of my agents. He is a most remarkable
and unusual man and I thought that Your Majesty might welcome the chance to
meet this individual. He is a slave, of course, and worse than just a slave,
not fit to serve any useful purpose. In private he is full of strange words,
though. Your Imperial Majesty’s education might never have another chance such
as this.’
Alvdan at last looked at
Maxin directly, seeing a slight smile on the stocky old soldier’s face. Maxin
had not advised his father, the late Emperor, but he had been wielding a knife
on the night after Alvdan’s coronation, making sure that the next morning would
be free from sibling dissent or disunity. He was not one for jokes.
‘Well, General, we are
intrigued. Take us to this man.’
The flight had been like
something out of a fever dream, nightmarish, and unheard-of.
Thalric had come to Asta
expecting to be punished. He had anticipated encountering the grim face of
Colonel Latvoc or even the pinched features of General Reiner, his superiors
within the Rekef, because he had failed the Empire. There had been a mission to
seize the rail automotive that the city of Helleron had called the
Pride
, which was then to have provided the spearhead of an
invasion to sack Collegium and have any dreams of Lowlands unity die stillborn.
Instead, motley renegades under the command of Stenwold Maker had destroyed the
Pride
and even managed somehow to cast suspicion of
that destruction on the Wasp-kinden who had so stalwartly tried to save it.
A small setback for the
Empire, which must take by force, now, what might have been won by stealth. A
great setback indeed for Captain Thalric of the Imperial Army, otherwise Major
Thalric of the Rekef Outlander.
And yet there had been
no court martial for him to face in the staging town of Asta. It seemed that
the race for the Lowlands was now on, and even a flawed blade like Thalric
could be put to good use. There had been sealed orders already awaiting him:
Board the
Cloudfarer
. Further
instructions to follow.
And the
Cloudfarer
itself: it was a piece of madness, and no Wasp
artificer had made her. Some maverick Auxillian technologist had come up with
that design and inflicted it upon him.
It had no hull, or at
least very little of one. Instead there was a reinforced wooden base, and a
scaffold of struts that composed a kind of empty cage. There was a clockwork
engine aft, which two men wound by pedalling furiously, and somewhat stubby
wings that bore twin propellers. Thalric had boarded along with a
pilot-engineer and Lieutenant te Berro, Fly-kinden agent of the Rekef, who was
to brief him. Then the
Cloudfarer
had lifted off, a
fragile lattice of wood shuddering up and up through the air under the
impelling force of her propellers. Up and up, rising in as tight a spiral as
her pilot could drag her into, until they were sailing across the clouds
indeed, and higher. Then the pilot let go the struts to either side, and the
Cloudfarer
’s vast grey wings fell open left and right,
above and below, and caught the wind. The vessel that had seemed some
apprentice’s mistake was abruptly speeding over the world beneath it, soaring
on swift winds westwards until they were casting across the Lowlands as high,
it almost seemed, as the stars themselves sailed.
And it was so
cold
. Thalric was muffled in four cloaks and layers of
woollens beneath, yet the chill air cut through it all, an invisible blade that
lanced through the open structure of the
Cloudfarer
and put a rime of white frost on him, and painted his breath into white plumes
before the wind whipped it away.
They would reach
Collegium faster than any messenger, eating up any lead that Stenwold had
built, so that despite Thalric’s detour to Asta it was anyone’s guess who would
arrive first. They were so high, up in the very icy roof of the sky, that no
flying scout would spy them. Even telescopes might not pick out their silvery
wings against the distant vault of the heavens.
And as he suffered
through this ordeal, from the cold and the wind, he hunched forward to catch te
Berro’s fleeting words, for these were his instructions, his mission, and he
would need to remember them.
‘You’re a lucky man,’
the Fly said, shouting over the gale. ‘Rekef can’t spare an operative of your
experience simply for a disciplinary trial. Lowlands work to be done all over
the place. You get a second chance. Don’t waste it.’ They had worked together
before, Thalric and te Berro, and a measure of respect had grown between them.
‘We’ll put you down near
Collegium,’ te Berro continued. ‘Make your own way in. Meet with your agents
there. There can be no unity allowed for the Lowlands. There are two plans. The
first is swifter than the second, but you are to enact both of them if
possible. Even if the first succeeds, the second will also help the war
effort.’
And te Berro had
explained to him then just what those plans were, and whilst the first was a
commonplace enough piece of work, the second was a sharp one and the scale of
it shook him a little.
‘It shall be done,’ he
assured the Fly, as the
Cloudfarer
continued its swift,
invisible passage over the Lowlands so far beneath them.
*
He walked into Collegium
without mishap, entering at the slow time near noon when the city seemed to
sleep a little. Collegium had white walls but the gates had stood open for
twenty years, had only been closed even then because the Ants of Vek had
harboured ambitions to annexe the Beetle city for themselves. There was a guard
sitting by the gate, an old Beetle-kinden who was dozing a little himself.
Collegium was not interested in keeping people out. If it had been, then he
might not have needed to destroy it.
Thalric had been granted
a short enough time in the city when he was here last. Two days only and then
he had been bundled onto a fixed-wing flier to go and catch Stenwold Maker on
the airship
Sky Without
. At that thought he tried to
discern where the airfield lay from here and see whether the great dirigible
was moored there today, but the walls were too high, the buildings looming
above him, for much of Collegium was three-storey, and the poorer districts
were four or five. He knew that the Empire had much to learn here. The poor of
Collegium cursed their lot and complained and envied, but they had never
witnessed how the poor of Helleron lived, or the imperial poor, or the slaves
of countless other cities.
If
we destroy Collegium, will we ever regain what is lost in the fires?
Because it was not only a matter of writing down some secret taken from one of
the countless books in the College library. This was a way of life, and it was
a good thing to have and, like all good things, the Empire should have it.
Imperial citizens should benefit from the knowledge of the men and women who
had built this place.
But the second plan that
te Berro had given him would kill all that, and he had his orders.
The kernel of discontent
that had been within him for a while now gave him a familiar kick, but he
mastered it. If the Empire wanted things in such a way, the Empire would have
it. He was loyal to the Empire.
He stopped so suddenly
in the street that a pair of men manhandling a trunk barged into him and swore
at him before they passed on.
What
a heretical idea.
Better keep that one hidden deep in one’s own
thoughts. To even think that loyalty to the Empire, to the better future of the
Empire, was not the same as loyalty to the Emperor’s edicts or to the Rekef’s
plans, well, that sort of thinking would get a man on the interrogation table
in a hurry. He had avoided a well-deserved reprimand for failing at Helleron
and he wasn’t about to start playing host to that kind of thought now, that was
just asking for trouble.