Part 26 (1/2)

'It's all because their Spider mistresses let them get away with murder,' Thalric remarked.

She looked over at him, her expression undecided. 'So you told him it was all for my own good, did you?'

'Wasn't it?' he asked.

Slowly she returned to her seat. 'What right do you have-' but he was smirking at her in that patronizing way he had always done, from the beginning, and she demanded, 'What?'

'I had forgotten,' he said, 'how you Collegiates aways talk of rights rights of humanity. This is nothing to do with having a right right, according to some obscure philosophy. Che, I look after my comrades, past or present. It's an Imperial virtue, believe it or not, although one that's seldom practised these days.'

'And I can't look after myself, is that it?'

He looked at her, fighting for a moment to hold in the response, and the laugh that went with it. 'No,' he let out, finally. 'Oh, Che, even when we first met it was after you had gone to great lengths to put yourself straight into the hands of the man most likely to betray you to me. When we were in Myna together you managed so well with the resistance that they were about to execute you as a collaborator. Che, from what should I believe that you will keep yourself safe?'

'You ...!' As she stood, her indignation was strangling any chance of getting coherent words out. 'How-! Why you-!' He still had a faint smile, which maddened her even more, and she slapped the little table, flipping it over entirely and scattering chess pieces to the four quarters of the room. 'Bah-!' she got out. Thalric was not looking suitably chastened, instead was plainly fighting not to laugh out loud.

Oh, that does it. She went for him, then, catching him completely by surprise. She was not entirely sure what she intended, save perhaps to strangle the smile from his face, but she knocked him backwards off the couch and landed on him hard enough that she heard the breath whoosh out of him. Shocked at her own success, she dithered, sitting back on his stomach. His recovery was impeded more by his laughter than her weight.

'Hammer and tongs!' she exclaimed. 'What?'

'You don't change,' he choked out at last. 'You must have been a riot in the debating circles. Do you attack everyone you don't have an answer for?'

The humour of it got through to her at last. The anger burning but a moment ago, now seemed to have died a death, not even an ember left. She met Thalric's eyes, feeling his body twist beneath her, testing himself against her weight, and there was a moment when something pa.s.sed between them. Che felt suddenly uncomfortable and scrabbled backwards, ending up perched on the couch he had just vacated. Thalric picked himself up and dusted himself down, then plucked a chess piece from the floor, where it had been digging into his back.

'I've escaped another mauling from Corolly, then,' he said vaguely. She knew, from his abruptly subdued tone, that he had felt that fleeting something too.

'Thalric ...' she began, but did not know where to go next.

'They suggested I should seduce you,' he told her, the words ambus.h.i.+ng both of them without warning.

She stared at him, agog. 'What ...?'

'Good Rekef practice.' Instead of looking at her, he was busy picking up game pieces.

'Why are you telling me this?'

'I'm trying out honesty,' he said. 'I'm just telling you what they suggested.'

'I should go,' she said. He was still hunting chessmen, though, and she did not want to go until he had at least turned to face her. 'Thalric,' she said, more urgently, and he looked at her at last. The expression he had been hiding from her left some traces still, on his face. He looked a little uncertain, a little shaken. She tried a smile on him, saw the corner of his mouth twitch in return.

Something crashed downstairs and they heard the servants scream.

Che was out of the room in an instant, reaching for her sword. She saw the Beetle, Corolly, surge out onto the landing, dragging at the string of a crossbow. There were soldiers in dark armour rus.h.i.+ng up the stairs already, who reached him before he could c.o.c.k the weapon. One of them smashed Corolly across the face with the b.u.t.t of a snapbow, knocking him to the ground. Another put a foot on the Beetle's chest, levelling a long-barrelled weapon at his face. The rest were surging towards Che.

She brandished her sword, and only then did she recognize them.

'Totho?' she faltered. The lead figure was wholly concealed in armour, black metal plates cast into elegant flutes and ridges. She was not even sure that she had identified him correctly until he spoke.

'Che.' She could barely recognize the hollow voice from within the helm. 'You're coming with us.'

'You!' Thalric spat the word out from behind her, and she felt a sudden plummeting in her stomach at what was about to happen.

Totho raised some kind of weapon, levelling it directly over her shoulder, but Thalric was quicker. The flash and flare of his sting warmed her cheek before it struck Totho across the breastplate and pauldron. He reeled back with the impact, the short weapon in his hands snapping a bolt into the ceiling. The seething fire from the Wasp's Art merely boiled off his armour, leaving it patterned with pale lines but unbroken.

'Everybody stop!' Che cried out at the top of her voice. 'What is going on?'

Totho grabbed her just reached out, took hold of her tunic and hauled her towards him effortlessly. As her back was pulled hard up against the grooves of his breastplate, she could feel where it was still warm from Thalric's shot.

Thalric stood in the doorway of his chamber, hand again spitting golden fire. A man beside Totho went down, a fist-sized hole charred through his leather armour. The weapon in Totho's hand snapped again, striking stone-dust from the lintel and forcing Thalric to duck back. Che was struggling to escape from Totho, but he held her close with a grip she could not break. 'What are you doing?' she demanded over and over until he roared in her ear, 'Just shut up for once, Che. You're coming with me!' The vehemence shocked her into silence, mouth left open in mid-complaint. The Iron Glove contingent, some dozen men in all, began retreating back down the stairs. She heard Thalric call her name as he ran out onto the balcony, and his hand blazed again. Then a snapbow bolt tore across his arm and another skimmed his ribs, and he fell back.

'Where in the wastes are the rest of them?' someone was asking, and she recognized Corcoran's voice. 'Setting an ambush?'

Totho paused, and Che could almost feel the workings of his mind, transmitted through the armour that was digging into her back. If the rest of the Imperials were elsewhere, then Totho could accomplish more than simply dragging Che away.

Deliberately she began fighting him again, and she heard his curse echo from inside his helm. Corolly had appeared at the balcony rail again, crossbow loaded now. A snapbow bolt made him duck back. Totho came to his decision.

'Let's go. We have what we came for.'

Under the gaze of the aghast servants, the Iron Glove men retreated from the Imperial emba.s.sy. They left a dead man on the balcony, irrevocable proof of how they had broken the peace of Khanaphes.

What can he mean to do? Che asked herself helplessly. Che asked herself helplessly. They will hunt him down for this. The Ministers will set Amnon and the Mantids and everything they have on him They will hunt him down for this. The Ministers will set Amnon and the Mantids and everything they have on him. She envisaged being manhandled to the docks, a swift flight through the Estuarine Gate before the alarm was raised. Totho was not taking her towards the river, though. As she was marched briskly on, she understood where: the Iron Glove factora. He must be mad. What will he do, holed up in there? He must be mad. What will he do, holed up in there? 'Totho, tell me what's going on,' she pleaded, but he said nothing, just hustled her on through the streets of Khanaphes, under the increasingly concerned attention of the locals. 'Totho, tell me what's going on,' she pleaded, but he said nothing, just hustled her on through the streets of Khanaphes, under the increasingly concerned attention of the locals.

She stumbled, as a memory revived within her like a cold knife in her, leaving her suddenly sick with the thought. It is just like before It is just like before. She pictured a mountainside outside h.e.l.leron, and a sudden abduction by a familiar face. It had been her lost Achaeos that had stood before her then, rather than Thalric of the Empire, but the face of her kidnapper had still been Totho's.

But it was not truly him, not then. That first time, it had been the Spider-kinden shape-changer, Scyla. And now we are come full circle, and this time he really has done it And now we are come full circle, and this time he really has done it.

Twenty-Six.

She had expected Totho to at least sit down and talk to her, after they bustled her into the Iron Glove factora. He seemed to have no time for her, though. She had a.s.sumed at first that this was some mad impulse of his, and that he could not know what a nest of hornets he would be stirring. Now she saw that he had planned everything.

They had moved her from room to room within the factora, ahead of a wave of fortification. Allotted such primitive facilities, the Iron Glove were not content to let them lie: the solid stone framework of the factora building was being re-edified even as she watched. She caught brief moments of the process as they moved her deeper inside. They were fixing metal grills over the windows, with apertures large enough to admit a snapbow's barrel. They had replaced the main door with something iron-bound and reinforced. Iron Glove people were running everywhere, now, strapping on breastplates and buckling on helms, checking the workings of crossbows and snapbows.

He's making ready for a siege. She could understand the logic. The Khanaphir could not stand by and allow these foreign merchants the run of their city. But they are not merchants But they are not merchants. The staff of the factora had transformed their headquarters into a fort, and themselves into soldiers. She had no doubt that they practised regularly with all the different weapons that they sold.

At last she caught a brief glimpse of Totho again, helmet pushed back, his face appearing almost transformed. It was a look she remembered from when she had found him engaged in some artificing project or other, where everything was coming together just at the last moment.

She called out his name, even as two Iron Glove men began manhandling her up some stairs. She saw his head turn, then he strode over, leaving half a dozen metal-clad men waiting on him. He still wore his own elegantly fas.h.i.+oned mail, that made the serviceable equipment of the others look like something that should be hanging in a museum.

'Later,' was all he said, from the foot of the stairs, and then turned to go.

'Totho, tell me what's going on!' she cried, struggling furiously with the men that held her. 'This is me me, Totho!'

'Yes, it is.' He turned sharply back to her, and he was actually grinning. It was an expression of desperation and elation all muddled together. 'Oh, I'll tell you all right what's going on, but not now. Soon enough I'll tell everybody everybody what's going on.' Then he was off once more, marching back to his troops, and Che continued being hauled backwards up the stairs. what's going on.' Then he was off once more, marching back to his troops, and Che continued being hauled backwards up the stairs.

'Curse you!' she shouted after him. 'You can't do do this!' She was about to add that he had no right, but Thalric's words came back to her, about what her 'rights' were worth. this!' She was about to add that he had no right, but Thalric's words came back to her, about what her 'rights' were worth.

'Bring her in here now.' She recognized the voice as Corcoran's, though his helm left him as anonymous as all the rest.