Blood of the Mantis

‘Magicians have always been able to talk at a distance,’ said Tisamon, in a tone suggesting that everyone would know this, and therefore she should have learnt it as a child, ‘and also know something of the future.’

Perhaps, if I had been brought up a Mantis, I would indeed have known that.

Tisamon’s attitude to magic confused her. He accepted it unconditionally, whilst she still found the whole idea strange and unlikely, despite any proofs that had been shown to her. Moreover, he was distinctly wary of it. Even Achaeos inspired his respect, and there seemed to be a fear in him beyond that, deeply incised in him by his heritage and his blood.

And now we’re in a town crammed full of magicians – or so I’m supposed to believe.

The two Spider-kinden were not hard to find, or shy of attention. They had taken over a guesthouse in its entirety, and had their servants deck the place out in silks of bright colours, reds and golds and azure blues. The whole front of the building had been thrown open to the fickle sun that morning, and Tisamon and Tynisa were thus able to watch the two of them holding court, one reclining at either end.

‘They are good at hating each other,’ Skrit remarked enthusiastically. ‘Always hating, so they keep eyes on each other at all times.’

‘Very wise,’ Tisamon granted. Earlier he had named the two as ‘Manipuli’, using a word which to Tynisa meant an intelligencer or spymaster, but apparently also meant a magician of a particularly Spiderish kind.

‘We should have a watch set on these two,’ Tynisa suggested. ‘Still, I’m sure they’ll be able to vanish away when the time comes.’

‘You want to see big man who pay the boss? Living just over there now. Moved his house yesterday.’ Skrit was reaching for Tisamon’s sleeve, but he held it out of her reach, irritated.

‘That would be this Founder Bellowern,’ he noted.

‘What was wrong with his old house?’ Tynisa asked.

‘House was fine, he just not liked it where it was, had it moved,’ Skrit explained, in a jumble of words. There was nothing for it but to follow her until she had led them to a two-storey wooden construction that was nothing like the rest of the local architecture: square-based, but widening as it rose, so that the roof was the broadest part of it, dotted with round glass-paned windows, and edged in metal besides.

Tisamon stared at it blankly, and it took Tynisa a while to recognize it. ‘An airship gondola,’ she said. ‘Like ours, but a whole lot bigger.’

‘Had it out on the water,’ Skrit explained. ‘Now he wants it inland. Put up his big float and just move it over, then float comes down and pulled down into the roof. Lot of work, that, no one knows why.’

They digested this curiously, but neither could make any sense of it.

‘Who’s next on the list?’ Tynisa asked.

‘Not found yet. All hiding. You have all there are,’ said Skrit, sounding oddly proud of it.

‘Well, they’ll all know whatever there is to be known about the auction,’ Tynisa said. ‘We need to speak to one of them: who’s our best wager?’

Tisamon looked back over his shoulder towards the big guesthouse but she knew that matters would go very badly for all concerned if he tried cutting the information out of those Spiders, whether they were magicians or not.

‘This one,’ she decided. ‘Bellowern.’

‘Why?’

‘He was the man who hired Nivit, and that shows initiative and open-mindedness. He won’t be a magician, because he’s Beetle-kinden. He’s imperial but not army, not actually a Wasp.’ She shrugged. ‘And also I want to know what made him move his house.’

Tynisa had not seen a gondola quite so grand since the Sky Without. Founder Bellowern’s temporary home was now virtually the most sumptuous building in Jerez, larger in all dimensions than the genuine houses around it. It was also apparently impregnable. There was a hatch, but it was ten feet off the ground and looked firmly closed. The windows were too small for even a Fly to get through. Conceivably there must be hatches on the deck above, but she would have to wait until dark before climbing up there.

She realized she did not even know whether Tisamon possessed the Art to climb a sheer surface like this. It was always a social awkwardness, asking questions about another’s Art, but she already knew that he could not take to the air as some Mantids did. His Art seemed concentrated in the spines on his arms and in the honed skill gifted to the Mantis-kinden in the simple business of killing people.