Blood of the Mantis

‘So…’ Some of the fight had now gone out of him. ‘This is absurd. What do I know of such a business? There is no option, then?’

‘You have been commanded personally, sir,’ the sergeant replied smugly, and Totho knew that he was enjoying being able to snub this half-blood of superior rank. ‘And, if you note, you are requested to take your work along with you.’

The idea, however, did not seem to appeal. For a long time, whole minutes, Drephos stared down at the summons. His mind was elsewhere, charting webs of logistics, of numbers and calculations. Totho saw his lips twitch over and over, baring his teeth at whatever task was being forced on him. Kaszaat and Big Greyv looked as blank as he. Whatever had arrived from Capitas had come without a hint of warning.

Drephos bared his teeth to emit a long hiss. ‘Totho, find me a deputy from the engineering corps to take over here.’

‘Sir?’ Totho stammered out. Is it about me? Am I named in that note?

‘You’re coming with me. I’m taking the whole team, the projects, the lot. We shall also take the big freight automotives. I shall continue to work even on the way there. My work is much too valuable to disrupt.’

‘But where are we going, sir?’ Totho asked him.

‘Inform the others, too,’ Drephos said. ‘We are sent to Szar.’

Kaszaat’s face remained a mask. Totho could only guess at the turmoil beneath.

Twenty-Four

Lake Limnia at night, and the great expanse of moonlit water was chopped into a million pieces by the drizzle, blotched by swathes of reed, pockmarked by the shadows of Skater rafts and boats. It should have been nobody’s idea of a pleasant sight.

Tisamon stood by the shores of Lake Limnia and stared across the rain-dappled waters. Every so often the clouds grew ragged enough that a despairing slice of moon could claw itself free of them, and then its clean, pure light appeared in the lake itself as only a pockmarked, ruined reflection, a face given over to disease and ruin.

If I was a seer, what omens would I make from this?

Around him the Skater-kinden padded on their stilting errands and left him be. Of course there might be other travellers about tonight. Any moment a patrol of Wasps could troop down between the leaning shacks, with arrest or execution on their minds. In truth, he had hoped for that, but for once the Empire was maddeningly absent and his claw remained unbloodied.

He was alone with his thoughts, and he was finding that uncomfortable, because it meant they strayed from the business in hand: the mysterious box and the forthcoming auction. When his mind was let free, to coast like a kite in the gusting wind, it asked the same question, What is she doing now? It had been a long time since Tisamon had been plagued with such imaginings: seeing pearlescent armour, a long, straight sword held perfectly poised, the curving talons of her thumbs, the elemental grace of her fighting stance. Is even this place, even the great distance I have placed between us, not enough? He had hoped that she would recede in his mind, along with the miles that separated them, but he might as well have brought Felise Mienn with him.

She is so swift, so deadly! How close she came to killing me, when first we met. There had been no other, not for a long time, to challenge him so. There had only ever been one other who had set his blood racing in the clash of blades.

Atryssa, forgive me.

The spectre of Tynisa’s dead mother walked before him then, with accusing eyes. Mantids paired for life, it was well known, and many were those who then lived out long years as widow or widower. For life always, and he had bound himself to Atryssa, given her a child even, and now… this, her.

He tried to banish the Dragonfly duellist from his mind, but he could no more do so than he could defeat her, blade to blade. She danced and dodged, and was before him still. He felt like weeping, and then he felt like killing.

‘Hoi, Mantis,’ came a voice, and he whirled about, his claw raised to strike. Nivit had hailed him from a safe distance, though, the bald, angular little man regarding him cautiously.

‘Is it time?’ Tisamon demanded.

‘They sent me to fetch you,’ the Skater told him, his expression carefully neutral. ‘Anyone else looking out over the lake like that, I’d say there’s a girl in it, but you, I reckon you’re just thinking about cutting throats, am I right?’

‘Nothing other,’ Tisamon agreed shortly, and stalked past the other man towards the looming hulk of the grounded Buoyant Maiden.