Seal of the Worm

Forty-Five

Straessa awoke each time the rhythm of pace of the rail automotive changed, which in practice meant at least once an hour. Now they were slowing, and the irritable thought crawled through her mind: What now? Ambush, sabotage or mechanical failure? Outside the window the sky was grey with dawn.

Then there was someone shouting at the far end of the carriage, coming closer, and it occurred to her that she was nominally at least partly in charge around here, and so she should know what was going on.

By the time she had sat up, the shouted words had forced their way to a lobe of her brain that was sufficiently awake to understand them.

‘Awake! Get up! Get your kit! Clear out!’ A Sarnesh soldier was pushing his way down the aisle. ‘Ready to fight, Beetles! Come up! Out and muster ready to march.’

‘Wait, wait – we’re here?’ Straessa protested, snagging at his arm. He stared at her, curbing his annoyance on seeing that she was an officer of some sort.

‘Well, the Wasps won’t exactly let us ride the line all the way to their terminus,’ he told her, ‘so we’re now as close as we’ll get. On foot for most of us from here on in. Collegium gets the left flank, between the Mantids and the non-Sarnesh Ants. We’re centre and right. Get your people out and ready to march, then stand ready for further orders.’

Straessa applied her mind to that, trying to think like a Sarnesh tactician. Probably they were counting on the non-Ants to give way before a determined Imperial push, resulting in the sort of slow revolution you usually got in a clash of infantry speeding up, allowing the Sarnesh to execute some sort of flanking manoeuvre or similar. Nice to know they rate us so highly.

By that time most of the Collegiates sharing her carriage were in motion, starting to pile out even as the vehicle slowed to a gradual stop. Straessa fought her way free of them and headed off after the Sarnesh messenger into the further carriages, encouraging the rest of her contingent to get moving. She cast a guilty look about the baggage car but there was no sign of the Tidenfree crew at all.

She was still kicking her soldiers awake when she heard a distant boom, feeling the ground shake as, no doubt, the more powerful enemy engines felt out the range. She didn’t waste any time in contemplation, though, but just began shoving Company soldiers out of the doors all the faster.

Outside, when she finally got there herself, was a study in qualified chaos. The other officers and sub-officers were forming the Collegiates into maniples, but lots of people had got out of place or gone in search of new friends over the long journey. Straessa waded in, looking for her own unit, telling anyone she saw who looked lost just to find a maniple that was short of someone. In their midst, Balkus was organizing the little Princep Salma detachment to support them: stretcher-bearers, surgeons, ammunition runners.

Right, so where’s the rest of them? The Netheryen Mantids had an easier time of it simply because they had no battle order to speak of, just a great loose-knit mass of them armed with bows and spears, blades and the hooked arms of their beasts. They stood very still, though, far more so than the bustling Collegiates. Straessa recalled that this was the first time they had come to a war on their own terms, without just providing a mailed fist for the Moth-kinden. The thought lent them both a professional quality and also a vulnerability. The Mantis-kinden were doing something new, which in itself was new.

On the Collegiates’ other side she saw the Vekken and the Tseni, and somehow they were standing side by side and not killing each other. Sarnesh soldiers were there, too, talking to the Vek contingent and getting them to space out rather than form the traditional solid Ant block which would offer nothing but bait for artillery at this distance.

She clutched at her rapier hilt to steady herself, secure in the knowledge that she could whip the blade out as swift as thinking, and she had the skills to put it to good use. The thought was very clear in her mind, a source of strength and reassurance for the brief moment before she looked at all the soldiers around her, with their snapbows in hand. Her own was slung over her shoulder, and that was the weapon she needed to feel confident about. There was precious little room in this latter age for the sword. Those days of duels and champions and blade-skill were diminishing. Only the Mantids still pined for them. The rest of the world had moved on.

‘Chief.’ Gorenn dropped down beside her. ‘We’re over there.’

‘Thanks.’ Straessa looked the Dragonfly over. ‘I suppose we’ve arrived, then. Doesn’t seem real, does it?’

Gorenn gave her a grin that could have meant anything. ‘Heart of the Empire, Officer Antspider.’ She followed Straessa as the halfbreed went from maniple to maniple ensuring everyone had their kit and was ready to march when the word came.

‘You’ve got enough arrows?’

‘We’re positioned next to the Mantids. I know where to go to beg more. Straessa . . .’

Gorenn’s tone was different, and the Antspider turned back to find her staring out towards Capitas, the greatest city in the world. Straessa’s own words echoed in her head: I suppose we’ve arrived, then, and she shivered, thinking just how far they’d come.

‘Wasn’t that long ago I was just a student cheating at the Prowess Forum and playing artist’s model and sword tutor for spare coin,’ she said. ‘I’m half expecting someone to tap me on the shoulder any moment and tell me I’m late with an essay.’

Then there was a Sarnesh at her elbow. ‘Officer, Milus wants all the detachment commanders assembled so he can give out the battle order.’ And the man was already on his way, heading for the Vekken.

‘Keep discipline for me here,’ Straessa told Gorenn. ‘Looks like I get to find out how this is all going to work. Though why he can’t just tell me through any Ant who’s passing by, I don’t know.’

‘Don’t take any shoving from the Sharnesh,’ the Dragonfly cautioned her.

‘Sure as death, I won’t.’

‘Good.’ Gorenn nodded, and then her wings flashed from her shoulders and she was off.

Straessa adjusted the hang of her snapbow, and then loped off towards the Sarnesh, looking for Milus and his officers. In the end she found the tactician at the head of the rail automotive, accompanied by a Mantis woman and representatives of the other Ant cities.

‘Good of you to join us, Officer,’ Milus said flatly.

Straessa made no rejoinder. Now was not the time to put the man’s nose out of joint. ‘What’s the order, Tactician?’

There was the crash of another impact, a plume of dust flying not too far short of the Sarnesh lines; the ground shook underfoot.

Milus outlined his battle plan with swift efficiency, his voice loud enough to carry as far as it needed to, and not a jot louder. He explained that the right wing of the assault would be the automotives; that current indications suggested that the Lowlanders should have air superiority by a small but comfortable margin, so that the wall could be bombarded without loss of life once the Farsphex were downed. He went over the ground defences that the Wasps had set up and noted the specialist auto-motives the Sarnesh had brought to level the earthworks and stake fences. He explained that there would be Sarnesh officers along with every detachment, so that Milus’s commands could be relayed – and obeyed – immediately. He noted the heavy weight of artillery lined up on the city wall ahead of them without emotion, and detailed each of his subordinates to be sure of which amongst their soldiers had the Art to fly or climb. ‘Volunteers, if you can. Give the order, if not.’ He seemed to look straight at Straessa as he said it.

The first Sarnesh Stormreader streaked overhead, followed by a handful more. Another greatshotter shell landed with a gout of flame, close enough to the Tseni to knock a score of them over in the impact.

‘To your soldiers,’ Milus instructed them. ‘March on my signal.’

General Tynan stood atop the walls of Capitas and watched the Lowlanders approaching out of the pre-dawn.

The Second Army and most of the Third were spread out before the walls, making best use of what entrenchments and fortifications they had been able to put up. Beneath his feet the wall quivered every time the greatshotters spoke, and soon enough the rest of the artillery would join them. The Lowlanders were coming in an open formation, though: the Ants spread out in a loose cloud that would firm up into a solid fighting line as soon as they hit the enemy, and the Collegiates in the small maniples they had used when he had come against their own city.

‘Their left’s the Beetles,’ Major Oski noted. ‘A screen of Mantis-kinden beyond them. Their right’s mostly automotives.’

One of the wall leadshotters boomed, a ranging shot falling short of the enemy – but not too far short.

Out in the city behind them, another sort of battle was taking place. Ernain’s supporters – the Bellowern clan of Beetle-kinden and all those others who had committed treason to secure a new tomorrow – were spreading the word even now, adjusting the hierarchies, making room for the new order. They were relying on Tynan to win victory for them today, so that their tomorrow could come.

‘I reckon they’ve got superior numbers,’ Oski remarked. ‘We’ve got more engines but that Engineer, Varsec, he said they’d have more to put in the air, and just as good. Which means that having more engines – or even walls – isn’t going to win it for us.’

‘They’re slowing,’ Tynan noted.

‘Well, they’re thinking that some over-keen fellow down the wall just told them what the best range of our wall artillery was,’ Oski pointed out.

‘They’re still taking strikes from our greatshotters.’

‘General, we have precisely two greatshotters, and they’re big and immobile enough that their orthopters won’t be able to miss ’em if they want to come and drop a bit of ordnance.’ He nodded down behind him to the two huge engines, barrels even now being winched lower to deal with the advance of the enemy. ‘I wouldn’t want to be on the crew there, is all I’ll say.’

A Farsphex roared overhead, close enough for Tynan to feel the breeze of its wings. Others were lifting off from airfields across the city, along with a rabble of Spearflights and even some of the lumbering old box-shaped heliopters the Empire had effectively abandoned. The enemy orthopters, their Stormreaders, were already waiting in the sky, and now they began stooping for the attack.

‘It’s been an interesting campaign, General,’ Oski remarked, although his voice shook a little as he said it. ‘I’d say the usual about honour to serve and all that, but I reckon you’ve not quite forgiven me for me being one of Ernain’s people.’

‘Ask me again tomorrow,’ Tynan replied softly, watching the flying machines scatter across the sky, seeking out their chosen opponents, spinning and darting and gyring over the city, or else out across the extent of the Lowlander army.

‘Right,’ Oski said, ‘time to start some serious artillery business.’ He clapped his small hands together briskly.

‘I thought you said they were out of range.’

‘That’s on the assumption that our over-eager artillerist wasn’t specifically shooting short, to my orders, sir. If they aren’t going to wait for the aviators to have it out before they come trooping in, I don‘t see why we shouldn’t get a few low blows in at the same time.’

As the Imperial artillery opened up, much of it was still out of range – clearly Milus was no fool. The wall’s extra elevation and the unexpected reach of some of the pieces still landed a fair few missiles amongst the front ranks of the Lowlanders, though – exploding into whirling storms of shrapnel or spraying sticky fire over anyone luckless enough to be nearby.

At Straessa’s shoulder, her Sarnesh liaison issued flat, emotionless directions, and she passed the orders on, drawing the leading edge of her maniples back and trusting to the rest to make space, just as they’d practised.

Those orders would have originated from Tactician Milus, of course, and she was bitterly aware that he was well out of the range of the enemy engines. He was sitting in the automotive carriage he used for his headquarters, out of sight in case the enemy had sent out assassins or snipers, and yet with thousands of other pairs of eyes through which he would watch the fight unfold.

The Mantids to her left had spread out further, and she saw their far edge begin to creep round like a long, curved horn towards the enemy, inching around their flank. There were not enough Mantids that they could cause serious damage to so large an Imperial force, but their reputation preceded them. They had taken their toll on the Empire’s armies more than once, and the Imperial commander would already be trying to redeploy in case they tried one of their traditional damn-the-odds charges. Straessa reckoned those charges weren’t part of the plan for today, not given the new calm sense of purpose the Mantids seemed to display. They had diminished themselves, almost, from the killers of legend to something more like mere soldiers. But soldiers often lived, whereas killers of legend always met a tragic fate.

‘How’s the air battle going?’ she asked.

Castre Gorenn gave her an odd look. ‘Lots of machines going in all directions. You’re asking me?’

‘Someone?’ Straessa called hopefully. ‘Anyone?’

‘They’re doing their best to hold things up,’ one of her soldiers told her. ‘But we’re already trying to get some bombs on their wall, so they can’t just keep giving us the runaround – they’ll have to make a stand. I think we’re winning.’

‘Keep an eye on them.’

‘Antspider!’ someone yelled, and already the Sarnesh who stood behind her was rattling off instructions. ‘Airborne incoming. All snapbows up.’

‘Snapbows to the sky!’ Straessa shouted, ‘and get those pikes up!’ She heard the instruction passed outwards by the officer of each maniple.

Ahead of her the sky was black with Wasps. The bulk of an Imperial army was always its Light Airborne, and here there were thousands of them, a vast cloud of flying men and – and, yes, their insects too, the creatures held on a fraying mental leash by someone with the Art to speak to them. The Empire clearly didn’t intend to wait for its orthopters to be whittled away.

The Airborne boiled forwards, coming in high enough that they would be clear of enemy shot until they chose to close the range. They were like a stormcloud. Coming from the east, they blotted the morning from the sky.

‘Gorenn, give me range.’ With only one eye, Straessa knew enough to defer to the Dragonfly’s keener sight.

‘Wait . . .’ Castre Gorenn had an arrow to the string as she peered upwards. ‘Wait, now . . .’ Then her arrow was gone, the string abruptly no longer taut beside her ear even as the Wasps started to descend. And she whooped, ‘Now!’ as loud as she could.

‘Loose!’ Straessa endorsed her, but her maniple already had – and the rest were taking that as their signal. To the left, the Mantis archers had already let fly their shafts, and many of them were already taking to the skies to meet the Wasps in their own element.

The return shot came sleeting down at the same time. A bolt struck Straessa’s helm like a hammer blow and, all around her, Company soldiers were dropping, picked out from the Collegiate host more by chance than by any decision by the enemy.

‘Stretchers!’ Straessa shouted. She did not have to order a second shot, for everyone still able to was putting bolts into the Wasps as fast as they could.

Captain Bergild brought her Farsphex back towards the walls, taking as narrow a line as possible, feeling the net of her pilots spread out around her, dancing only to her tune. Of course, the Sarnesh had their own link, and she could see it in every move they made through the sky, all of their Stormreaders moving like game pieces to a single mind’s masterplan.

The Imperial Spearflights and clumsy heliopters were mostly gone already, only the best of them surviving the first savage moments of the battle. She reckoned that the Imperial craft were outnumbered three to two, and the Ant pilots were pushing furiously to get at the walls and the greatshotters.

And yet we’re holding them. Or almost. And whilst ‘almost’ wouldn’t serve in the long run, it would give time for more Imperial reinforcements to come to Capitas’s aid, whilst the Lowlanders were all here already, as far as she could work out, with no reserves to call on at all.

There were more of the Ants, but they were less experienced pilots, without the true feel for the air that an aviator needed. Worse, their mindlink kept them in contact with their forces on the ground. Whoever was giving the orders was not doing so with a pilot’s eye. Bergild and her people could improvise, lead them, fool them. She was pulling out all of her tricks for this battle, because what else had she been saving them for?

Another of her pilots was abruptly gone, canopy torn open. A further handful were trying to get a bombing line on the centre of the Sarnesh detachment, to change the enemy priorities a little, perhaps. Their Fly-kinden bombardiers were already looking for targets, but the enemy numbers weren’t allowing them enough time to themselves.

Then one of the greatshotters was silenced, a Stormreader dropping down to hover virtually overhead for a second as it unloaded its bombs. A Collegiate, not a Sarnesh, came her instant speculation. The Beetles were more experienced pilots and they flew as individuals, dodging through the airborne melee with no regard for anybody else’s plans.

Prioritize any craft making for the other ’shotter, she instructed, but the response was instant: Captain, they all are.

Hornets are in the air, came the warning, and she ordered, Get clear of the wall, quickly.

They had fewer insects than they’d used to clear the skies over Collegium, and there had been no vile-smelling paste to mark out Imperial machines as ‘friends’ – not that it had helped much before – and so Bergild could only try and call her pilots back and get them out of reach as a cloud of angry hornets spiralled up from the cages they had been penned in. They would not last long, she knew – and they were a desperate measure because of the danger they would pose to the city itself and the men on the wall, but at the moment that last greatshotter represented the only reliable superiority the Empire currently held.

Another try at bombing their centre, she decided, selecting half a dozen pilots for the job. Get their attention again. And you, she detailed another handful, get yourselves over their automotives and start to break them up. The rest of you, split up and hunt down the Collegiate . . .

Her commands fell away into a great yawning chasm of uncertainty.

Her hands were still gripping the stick, but something was abruptly gone from her, and she could feel a kindred void in all her fellows.

The machine confining her lurched in the air and, amidst the rising panic from her pilots she could only think, What am I doing here. What is all this for?

I have no idea how any of this metal works.

Something had reached up and obliterated any understanding that she might have had of her work, her lifelong trade.

Her Farsphex lurched to one side as she twitched and fought with controls that no longer made any sense to her. The densely peopled ground wheeled about her madly. She could not even get out of the cockpit. She could not release the hatches. Her last few moments gave her a view of a spinning sky that was raining flying machines, each one spiralling out of control, tumbling earthwards as though gravity had finally come to its senses.

Bergild screamed.

Straessa saw the walls shake and at first she thought it was an illusion, a heat-shimmer brought on by the sunrise. Then the Sarnesh messenger at her back made a peculiar, almost plaintive noise, and she realized it was real.

Her people were ceasing to shoot, at first just a few but then more, then all, until only Gorenn in their midst was still sending her arrows up at the Wasps . . . the Wasps who were no longer shooting downwards but milling around in the air, pulling back towards the Imperial lines.

‘What’s going on?’ Straessa murmured, but too quietly for anyone to hear, because she had no expectation that anyone had an answer. She stared down at the snapbow in her hands – an unfamiliar weight of metal that did . . . something. It was a weapon, that much she knew, but one she had no idea how to use.

Out beyond the Sarnesh contingent, all the automotives had ground to a halt, save one that was ploughing about in a determined circle. The only other machines in motion were the orthopters and, as she watched, she saw them fall from the sky, each in its own graceful, doomed arc, and that seemed only natural because she could not see how such things could possibly have got airborne in the first place.

Then the walls of Capitas shuddered again, rippling like a curtain, and her hands grasped her telescope, and then were unable to do anything with it.

‘They’re cracking.’ Gorenn sounded deathly afraid, far beyond the very understandable fear that Straessa was fighting down. ‘The walls . . .’

‘The ground . . .’ said someone else.

The Imperial forces out there were moving. Those who could fly were getting within the city’s boundaries in the air. The rest were abandoning their positions, fleeing while they could. Straessa saw the ground heave and twist, and heard herself ask, ‘Is that because of us? Are we doing that?’ She would have believed just about anything, right then.

‘No,’ came the hollow, shaky voice of the Sarnesh. ‘That’s not us.’

‘There’s something coming up from the earth,’ Gorenn declared flatly.

‘People,’ someone else with sharp eyes suggested.

‘Not people,’ the Dragonfly corrected, staring out at those human-shaped forms boiling out of the riven ground that had consumed the Empire’s earthworks, already butchering those Imperial soldiers too slow to get out of their way. Around them, the ground seethed with the segmented forms of centipedes of all sizes.

‘What are they? What do they want, if they’re not ours?’ Straessa demanded plaintively. None of them could not know that – between them, by their repeated contact – Che and Seda had bored a path of least resistance between Capitas and the Worm.