‘Dealing with the
Vekken?’ rumbled Scadran. ‘They are not at all trusted, here.’ He glanced
sidelong to see Hofi nodding agreement.
‘Nor should they be.
They’re an ambitious and grasping lot, always looking for a chance to extend
their borders,’ Thalric declared. He smiled at that, but kept the next thought
unspoken.
Just like the Empire in miniature, I suppose.
Still, with empires size was everything and, in the fullness of time, Vek was
small enough to fit easily within the Empire’s jaws.
‘We’re going to offer to
split the Lowlands with them,’ he explained, and let that drop into the room
and silence them.
‘Sir . . . ?’ Graf began
slowly, after a long moment.
‘We can’t trust them,’
Arianna interupted. ‘And they won’t trust us either, I’m sure.’
‘You’re right. It’s all
nonsense of course, and they’ll know it for that, but they won’t believe that
they can’t beat us if they need to. Someone here please tell me Collegium and
Vek’s recent history.’
‘Vek was at Collegium’s
gates in living memory, sir. Thirty years back, or so,’ said Graf.
‘Nobody here’s
forgotten,’ Hofi added.
‘So what happened?’
Thalric prompted.
‘They wanted inside the
walls quick,’ Hofi said. ‘But they got held off so long at the gates that a
Sarnesh army came to attack them, and they had to retreat.’
‘Right,’ Thalric agreed,
‘because Sarn and Collegium are close allies, these days. So our offer to Vek
will be simply this: an army will be on the move towards Sarn, through
Helleron, soon enough. With that keeping the Sarnesh on their toes, Vek can
take Collegium at last, which they have been wanting to do for a very long
time.’
‘They’ll sack the entire
city,’ said Arianna. ‘Everyone here knows they haven’t forgotten their defeat.
When they were forced to withdraw from the walls they burned the crops in the
fields and razed a dozen of the tributary villages. They’re a vindictive lot in
that city.’
Thalric nodded. ‘Nobody
much likes them, that’s plain.’ Privately he was not overjoyed with the plan,
but his own wishes were entirely secondary. ‘The Empire’s path into the
Lowlands is fraught with difficulty as it is,’ he reminded them. ‘The Ants and
the Mantis-kinden will fight, and there will be a great many miles that will
have to be bought with blood. However, the real danger is here. If these
scholars and pedagogues all end up pointing in the same direction, they could
conceivably forge the enemies of the Empire into a single blade. If that
happens, not only will the conquest of the Lowlands become much more difficult,
but if it fails the Empire will have that blade at its own throat, because they
will not stop at simply defending their own lands. So, Collegium must fall and,
if Vek is our agent in that, then what outrage the Lowlands can muster will
fall on them, and away from us. That is why I sail for Vek tomorrow.’
‘What about us, Major?’
Scadran asked.
‘Right now, go and
prepare your fall-back positions. Find places to lie low when the fighting
starts. I will have specific tasks to assign all of you, and we will meet again
tomorrow before I leave for Vek. After the Vekken arrive here, you will all be
on hand to disrupt the city’s defence in any way that seems profitable. For
tonight, though, you are dismissed.’
The Amphiophos had not
seen such a rabble thronging its antechambers in living memory, Tynisa thought.
The Assembly’s guards were having fits about the situation. With things as they
were, though, it could be no other way. There could be a hidden knife here
stalking the halls of power as easily as on the streets of the city.
So it was that Stenwold,
Master Gownsman of the College, artificer, Assembler, was waiting for his
audience in the company of a Mantis-kinden Weaponsmaster, his halfbreed
duellist daughter, and a hulking Ant renegade with a loaded nailbow. Tynisa
could only guess how the sight of them evoked horror and dismay amongst
Sten-wold’s opponents within the Assembly. They must think he had come here in
a bid to take over the city.
‘Now we are here, I am
leaving Stenwold in your care,’ Tisamon said to her, appearing abruptly at his
daughter’s shoulder. ‘You and the Ant must watch over him as best you can.’
‘Where are you going?’
Tynisa asked.
‘Hunting,’ the Mantis
said. ‘I have played Stenwold’s game long enough, all this polite spying of
his. Now the Wasps have made their move, and I will play my own game. They are
still in this city and I will hunt them down.’ Here in the antechamber of the
Amphiophos he looked wholly out of place, a savage shadow of the past.
They both turned as Stenwold
approached, wearing his best Master’s robes. He had obviously caught Tisamon’s
last words, for his broad face carried an unhappy expression.
‘Tisamon . . . ?’
‘Yes?’ The Mantis gave
him a challenging look. ‘You disagree, Sten?’
‘No, but . . .’ Stenwold’s
face twisted. ‘If possible, could you take a prisoner, at least. It would help,
it really would help, to discover what they were up to.’
‘A prisoner?’ Tisamon
considered. ‘If it is possible, I shall do.’ And as Stenwold seemed to relax he
added, ‘But as for
her
, she dies.’
‘Tisamon—’
‘No, Sten. She betrayed
you.’
‘Yes, but—’
‘And in betraying you
she betrayed us all, including me. And she knew it, Sten. As soon as she saw
me, she knew the risk she ran – and she ran it willingly. They had their chance,
and they failed, and now there is a price that must be paid. All kinden
understand this, Sten. Except for yours.’
Stenwold grimaced, and
Tisamon continued, ‘If you have one real reason to prove me wrong, let me hear
it.’
He waited, giving the
Beetle plenty of time to reply, and then shook his head. ‘I’m sorry, Sten, but
some things just have to be.’
He then looked to
Tynisa, who nodded, taking on the duty he had offered her. Then Tisamon turned
on his heel and left the antechamber of the Amphiophos.
‘I’m sorry too, Uncle
Sten,’ Tynisa said.
Stenwold tried to smile,
felt it slipping on his face. ‘I’m a foolish old man, Tynisa. I’m too old for
this game, really I am.’
‘It’s not exactly the
time for that thought, Master Maker,’ said Balkus. He had his nailbow plainly
displayed over one shoulder, so that the three Beetle-kinden guards in there
with them were giving him nervous looks.
‘You need to think now
about what you have to do,’ Tynisa agreed. ‘And, for what it’s worth, I think
Tisamon is right. Maybe it’s just my blood talking, but if he wasn’t setting
off now I think I would go do it myself.’
‘Who am I to judge?’
said Stenwold sadly. ‘The world, I think, has more need of those like Tisamon
and yourself than it does of me.’
‘Master Maker?’
They turned to see a
middle-aged Beetle-kinden, robed as Stenwold was, step out into the
antechamber.
‘The Magnates and
Masters of Collegium are assembled and waiting,’ the man announced. ‘You have
your day, Master Maker. You had best make the most of it.’
Stenwold nodded. ‘You
and Balkus must wait here,’ he explained. ‘They will not let you in there,
armed as you are, and I would rather have you armed out here and watching, than
unarmed in there and blind to what goes on outside.’
Tynisa nodded, and
Stenwold clasped hands with both of them, and then followed the usher in.
He stopped just within
the doorway, so that the usher had to return to lead him over to the podium.
Lineo Thadspar was already there, one of the oldest Assemblers and the
Assembly’s current Speaker. He was a white-haired and dignified old man who had
always treated Stenwold with at least a distant courtesy. Now he nodded as the
other man approached him.
‘Master Maker, in the
past, I think, you have believed that we did not take you seriously,’ he said,
with dry humour. ‘Let this accusation, at least, not be levelled at us any
longer.’
There was a murmur of
amusement across the tiered seats that ringed the chamber of the Amphiophos.
Stenwold simply stared, because the stone of those seats was now barely visible.
They were all there, so far as he could tell. For the first time since the
Vekken siege thirty years before, every single Assembler had answered the call.
He saw plenty of faces
he knew, although rather few had any reason to like him. There was such a host
of them, four hundred and forty-nine men and women. Of these, more were men
than women, and more were his senior than his junior. The entire staff
governing the Great College was here, and the prosperous mass of the elected
Magnates of the town, the merchants, landowners, factory-owners and the
independently wealthy whom the public regarded as the most trustworthy of those
who sought office. Thanks to his recent activities, every one of them knew who
Stenwold was, and what his grievance. They were not all Beetles, either, for
the College staff was varied. There was a scattering of Ant-kinden of differing
hues, and amongst them Stenwold caught the eye of Kymon of Kes, the Master of
Ceremonies at the Prowess Forum, whom surely he could at least count as an
ally. All of the other kinden of the Lowlands were represented too, even a
single Moth named Doctor Nicrephos, who was probably older than Thadspar
himself.
But Stenwold’s eye was
inevitably drawn to a pair present who were not Assemblers at all. One was a
Beetle-kinden, but his Collegium-style robes were edged in the Empire’s black
and gold. The other man was a Wasp-kinden, plain and simple, no doubt a
bodyguard or minder.
Thadspar cleared his
throat and with a rattling of its mechanism the Assembly’s brass automaton
ground across the floor towards him, whereupon he plucked two glasses of wine
from its tray.
‘Master Maker, I don’t
mind telling you that you have been making altogether a great deal of noise,’
the old man said. ‘You have been somewhat underhand in procuring this Assembly,
and there are those amongst our number who felt that you should indeed be
punished rather than rewarded with the, doubtless, great gift of our
attention.’ He handed a glass to Stenwold. ‘However, wiser heads have prevailed,
to the extent that we will at least hear the full details of whatever it is
that you wish to tell us, before we begin deliberating.’
And
the attack on Tark would have nothing to do with this change of heart, of
course
, Stenwold reflected. He accepted the glass and took Thadspar’s
place at the podium when it was now offered him.
‘The Assembly of
Collegium,’ Thadspar started, his usual dogmatic lecturing style slowly
reasserting itself over his brief humour, ‘is known, I hope, for its
carefulness in making decisions, by its refusal to be coerced, threatened or
tricked into unwise measures. You shall now have your say, Master Maker, and I
for one am most interested to hear your words. However, once you have spoken,
it is only just that those accused should also speak.’ He gestured to the
Beetle in Wasp-liveried robes. ‘This gentleman, you may recall, is an
ambassador from the Wasp Empire who came to our city during the Games. Master
Bellowern, I suspect Master Maker’s accusations will not be entirely new to you.’
‘Some rumours, Master
Thadspar, are impossible to avoid, no matter how much one would prefer to,’
replied Bellowern, granting a smile for the benefit of the Assembly.
‘Master Bellowern will
therefore make his defence when you have spoken. You must agree that this is
only fair, Master Maker.’
Stenwold nodded tiredly
and gazed out across the great mass of faces. Bellowern apart, he knew that
there was no great love for him in this audience. He was, in their eyes, merely
a troublemaker, and he knew exactly how set in their ways these old men and
women could be. Even if he showed them that the Empire was worth making trouble
over he would still be little more than an annoyance. And, of course, some of
the more venal would have been bribed by the Empire, while others would
sympathize with the imperial philosophy of strength and conquest and the Wasps’
success in keeping public order. Others still would enjoy lucrative business
across the imperial borders with the Consortium, the Empire’s merchant cartel.
And of course most of them would simply not care.
He gathered his strength
together because, of all peoples, his kinden understood how to endure. Physical
or mental burdens they could bear, and they had been slaves a thousand years
before the revolution had set them free and given them mastery of their own
fate.
We are Beetle-kinden, who are tough and hardy, and go
anywhere and live amongst all peoples and, wherever we pass, we make and build
and better the world.
If his audience was
hostile, greedy and uncaring, then he had his words ready and he would speak
his heart and reveal the findings of his twenty years of intelligencing and
campaigning. He would give them everything he knew, not twisted as propaganda
but honest and true, and he would then hope for their illumination. There
seemed precious little to put his faith in amongst those frowning faces, but
the
potential
of the Assembly of Collegium was vast.
And so he spoke. He told
them everything.
It was a wretched place
down by the river that Hofi had chosen to meet at, and Arianna liked it not at
all. Swathed in a cloak, her hand beneath it wrapped about her dagger hilt, she
was aware that she drew curious looks from those others on the street that
evening. It was not simply spies that concerned her, for the thought of robbers
and other such lowlifes was much on her mind. Collegium was well policed, but
where the river ran, before it met the sea, was a much decayed part of the
city. Collegium’s goods came in by sea, now, and more by rail, and the warehouses,
homes and factories that had been fed by the river trade a generation back had
fallen into poverty and disrepair. A quite different neighbourhood had since
risen up.