The Sea Watch

Fourteen

‘I have had word from Everis,’ Stenwold informed his co-conspirators. They were all in his study again: Arianna, Jodry, Danaen, Laszlo and Tomasso. Cardless had just poured the wine and absented himself.

‘Not encouraging word, I take it,’ Tomasso put in.

‘Well, I know at least that the Migrating Home was able to dock, unload and leave unmolested, which I suspect is part of how this Spider “good form” business works. However, my eyes in Everis say that a fleet is being assembled: warships, supply ships, troop carriers. A fleet in its infancy, as yet, but there are a lot of new sails along the Silk Road coast, and Everis is where they’re all bound.’

‘An armada, they’ll be calling it,’ Tomasso supplied.

Stenwold nodded. ‘That they do. There’s precedent, then, for this?’

‘Oh, it’s a rare honour,’ the bearded Fly replied. ‘A whole load of Spiders have to be facing in the same direction at the same time to get an armada together, and none of them putting knives in the backs of the others, either. You’ve fired up the Aldanrael, Stenwold, and sounds like they’re putting most of what they’ve got into this one. Normally it takes a rebellious satrapy to kick up this kind of response. Of course, we know what hasn’t helped.’

‘The Arista on the Blade,’ Stenwold agreed.

‘Someone’s favourite daughter, no doubt,’ Tomasso concluded glumly.

‘She deserved her death,’ Danaen said contemptuously. ‘She deserved a worse death. An arrow was too clean. Do not tell me now that we should have spared her.’

‘Laszlo has explained to me the circumstances,’ Stenwold said, ‘and you did what you had to. Still… she was a fool to try and face you down. If she had been wiser, she would have lived, I’m sure.’

Danaen’s expression was not so sure of that, but Stenwold did his best to overlook it. Save me from over-zealous allies. ‘Well, if it comes to that,’ he said, ‘we’ll have to see how Collegium artifice matches up to Spiderlands cunning. The Vekken did not find it so easy to take us, either by land or sea.’

‘The Vekken, however, did a lot of damage – and so did the Empire after them,’ Jodry said miserably. ‘We cannot go on fighting wars. We cannot afford the cost in lives or goods. Stenwold, have you thought about finding allies in some other Spider house?’

‘Which?’ Stenwold asked him.

‘Well, I have no idea, but the Aldanrael must have enemies.’

‘Spider politics, Jodry. As you say, we have no idea. They change their faces daily in that part of the world. Each morning they get up and learn a new list of who their friends are, and who their enemies. Arianna, am I right?’

‘You would not lack for people willing to profit from you,’ she conceded, ‘but you would never know their hearts. Anyone you dealt with could easily be an agent of the Aldanrael. Do not enter those waters. You have neither compass nor chart.’

‘As an example of this, I received a message from the enemy, last night,’ Stenwold announced. ‘It was left on my pillow.’ He showed them the small slip of parchment. ‘It says no more than this: “You have heard your spies. Perhaps you would now wish to listen to us. State your time and place, if you would not have the ships sail.” I suspect I shall hear no more from my agent in Everis. He has done what the Spiders wished and told me of the threat to Collegium that they are assembling.’

‘But Teornis wants to talk,’ Jodry prompted.

‘Supposedly.’ Stenwold took a deep breath.

‘You cannot talk with Spiders,’ Danaen spat scathingly. ‘Every word is a lie. Every promise is made to be broken. The only peace to be had with Spiders is after you’ve killed them.’

Jodry coughed. ‘Yes, well, for my part I say we have to meet with him. He won’t want a fight, so we can surely find some way through this mess that doesn’t see a hundred ships blockading our harbour and landing soldiers all the way down the coast. The Spiderlands is vast, Stenwold. We have no idea what they might send. They have plenty of artificers amongst their subjects, too. Don’t think it will just be sailing ships and swords.’

Danaen was scowling at Jodry, and looking daggers at Arianna as well. The two Flies sat back, waiting to be of some use. Stenwold put a hand to his forehead. ‘I will meet with him,’ he stated.

The Mantis made a hissing sound. ‘If you so much as hear them speak, they will corrupt you, – or kill you. There is no dealing with them, save with a blade.’

‘That is not our way,’ Stenwold snapped, with enough authority to beat her down. ‘This situation is slipping out of control. Spider-kinden who have lived in Collegium all their lives are fearing to show their faces in the streets. Honory Bellowern, of all the cursed people, sent me a message of support from the Empire, in our time of need, and if this cannot be resolved – if Spider sails reach our harbour – then no doubt the Eighth Army will march into Myna so as to bring that support so much the closer. We have to act, therefore. I will meet with Teornis.’

‘Stenwold Maker, listen to me,’ the Mantis declared fiercely. ‘I will kill Teornis of the Aldanrael.’

Stenwold stared at her. ‘I don’t…’

‘I will take a score of my people and I will go to where he is, and kill him and his servants and guards and all who lodge with him,’ Danaen stated flatly. ‘That is the only way to negotiate with Spiders.’

‘And what will that accomplish?’ Stenwold demanded. ‘We’re not at war with just Teornis, we’re at war with his whole cursed family. All that would achieve is ensure that we would never again be able to negotiate any kind of peace.’

Danaen folded her arms sullenly. ‘Where will you meet him then? How will you deal with him? He will twist your mind with his Art. He will have his agents hiding, ready to poison you or slay you.’

‘Some neutral party, perhaps, to mediate…?’ Jodry started.

‘Who?’ the Mantis snapped at him. ‘Who, indeed, that they have not bought? Who, that you can fully trust? You can trust only my kind, to be rid of all the influence of his kinden, and we say kill.’

‘And who could we trust with the knowledge of what would be said at such a meeting. No third parties, Jodry. If we do talk to Teornis then we must talk fully and frankly.’

‘Well, then,’ the Speaker for the Assembly looked grim, ‘the Mantis is right, Sten. How could you be sure it wasn’t a trap?’

‘Arianna says he won’t just have me killed out of hand, since it’s not their way,’ Stenwold told him.

‘With respect, Master Maker,’ Tomasso put in, ‘their way is to win.’ He had sat in silence for a long time while the others talked, with Laszlo fidgeting at his side. Now his voice drew their attention. ‘Spiders play Spider games with each other, and the top Aristoi will tell you how they keep to their little rules. But, Master Maker, those rules are only for those at the very top, only for the people that move the pieces around.’

Stenwold thought of Teornis’s earlier note, welcoming him to the Dance. Or was that just to lull me into a false sense of security? Do I really believe that a Spider Aristos would consider me an equal?

‘And besides,’ Laszlo put in, ‘doesn’t mean they don’t off each other sometimes.’

Stenwold opened his mouth, then closed it again, the words gone. After a pause he said, ‘There must be a way. I want to believe that Teornis just wants a way to back out gracefully, without making himself look a fool before his family. But I see what you say.’ He sighed. ‘There must be a way,’ he said again.

‘Perhaps it will come to us,’ Jodry said thoughtfully. ‘Some place, some mediator, some guarantee of safety. Let me think about it. I’m sure something will spring to mind.’

‘Well, if not, then the armada,’ Stenwold agreed. ‘While you’re racking your brains, spare a thought for our sea defences too.’

After his informant had left the parlour, Helmess Broiler settled down on his couch thoughtfully. ‘Who would have thought…?’ he kept repeating to himself. Elytrya draped herself across the back of the couch and traced her fingertips across his scalp, waiting patiently for him to unpack his thoughts to her.

‘This whole Spiderlands business has taken me quite by surprise,’ he told her eventually. ‘In this life you learn to be wary of apparent good fortune, especially where a Spider is involved. However, perhaps life has finally decided to give back to me some of what Stenwold Maker has taken away.’

‘Perhaps killing that man Failwright was a mistake,’ Elytrya suggested.

‘Apparently not, for they’re blaming the Aldanrael for it, and that makes me a very happy man.’ Helmess poured her some wine. It was a good Spiderlands vintage, and he reckoned that it would be in short supply soon. ‘You had better keep yourself indoors for the moment,’ he added. ‘After all, I know you’re no Spider-kinden, but the general populace of Collegium are unlikely to be as enlightened in that particular respect as I am.’

‘So there will be war,’ she observed. ‘You people always seem to be having wars.’

‘Only because Maker insists on dragging us into them,’ Helmess retorted. ‘Well, let him try to drag himself out of this one. He’ll find it won’t be so easy.’ He paused, thinking. ‘Although he has a clever mouth on him, does Maker, and I can’t deny it. I don’t think we can allow him and Teornis to hammer out an accord. That wouldn’t suit us at all, now, would it?’

‘You want your Spider fleet to come sailing into the harbour here, do you?’ she said, gently mocking.

‘Why not? Would a few dozen wooden ships pose any difficulties for your warriors?’

She snorted. ‘Rosander’s Greatclaw-kinden would sink every last one of them before they had any idea what was going on.’

‘Well, then, you may even become the heroes of the hour, until everyone realizes that you’re not stopping with just the Spiders.’ Helmess laughed. ‘We must try to arrange for Maker to be standing front and centre when that happens. Have him hold out his hand in friendship. I want to see Rosander pincer it off at the wrist.’ Abruptly his mood darkened. ‘Or maybe not. Maker’s too clever by half, and he could talk a Fly out of the sky. I think maybe the Spiders should do him in.’

‘That would make sense,’ she agreed. ‘Why should Failwright be the only martyr?’

He laughed at that. ‘Oh, yes, a martyr. I’ll pay for the statue myself, once he’s dead.’

Elytrya studied his expression. ‘And you have a plan.’

‘I may have.’ Helmess nodded. ‘I think I need to set up a meeting, as a concerned and patriotic Assembler of Collegium. Our little informer must needs earn his keep. Go and fetch him back in again, would you?’

She straightened up and glided over to the door, while Helmess’s eyes followed her every move. I am doing well out of this deal, he considered. She was no true Spider-kinden but she was as beautiful as they, and with a liquid, sly grace that he actually preferred. And as duplicitous as any Spider, no doubt, but that just adds to the thrill.

She brought in the neatly dressed young Beetle man, and Helmess addressed him from the couch. ‘Master Cardless.’

Stenwold’s servant gave Helmess a polite little bow. He had proved to be quite the find: a well-educated man who had been dismissed from a good position in Helleron after certain irregularities had turned up in his master’s finances. Bitter and ambitious, he had arrived in Collegium prudently after the war, just when old Maker had been looking for a new servant. Helmess had leant on a few acquaintances to provide Cardless with glowing references, whereupon Maker had taken him on without a thought. Moreover, Helmess was sure that Cardless was an exemplary servant, with not a financial irregularity to be seen. After all, he was now drawing two salaries without even having to put a hand into another man’s pocket.

‘I have a job for you, Cardless,’ Helmess informed him. ‘Something a little more than your usual watch-and-report.’

The servant’s stance altered in a way that indicated, though with impeccable politeness, that special duties carried an additional charge.

Helmess smiled sourly. At least he is predictable in his villainies. ‘Oh, you’ll get yours, don’t worry, but I want you to bring me that Mantis woman you mentioned to me.’

‘Danaen, Master Broiler?’ Cardless wrinkled his nose. ‘That savage?’

‘None other,’ Helmess confirmed. ‘Tell her I’m a concerned citizen that wants to talk about the evil Spiders, and who better than their traditional enemies to set me straight, eh?’

‘Very good, Master Broiler,’ Cardless agreed. His answering smile was superior enough that Helmess decided to take him down a peg.

‘And now you’re asking yourself whether I’ve ever wondered if you’ll sell me back to Stenwold Maker,’ he guessed, seeing the truth of the accusation instantly written across the other man’s face.

‘Master Broiler, I would never-’

‘Save it. I know you,’ Helmess cut him off. ‘Understand this: Stenwold Maker is an honest man, and he’d have no time for a traitor in his own house, confessed or not. The best you’d get out of him then is a kick out the door and a bad reference. You keep doing what I tell you, Cardless, and you’ll profit from it, so don’t get any clever ideas. Now go find me that Mantis-kinden. I’ll see her tomorrow, if you can arrange it.’

After Cardless had gone, Helmess stretched out luxuriously, feeling very pleased with himself.

‘Tomorrow,’ Elytrya asked him, ‘and not tonight?’

‘I prefer to do dark deeds in daylight,’ Helmess murmured. ‘People aren’t expecting them then. Besides, I thought you and I could explore a different branch of villainy tonight, no?’

‘I must say, our Master Maker is rather getting into the spirit of things,’ was Teornis’s remark, when Arianna had finished recounting her news. The Spider lord’s townhouse had changed since she had last seen it. The calibre of his staff was subtly different now: fewer fancily dressed Fly-kinden menials and more obviously armed men. She had spotted at least a half-dozen Kessen Ant-kinden – mercenaries she presumed – standing alert with repeating crossbows in hand, and there were some newcomers as well: arrogant, strutting Dragonfly-kinden wearing armour of chitin and wooden plates. Those on the roof had extravagantly recurved longbows, and those indoors carried single-edged swords. They were an import from some satrapy of the Spiderlands where the Aldanrael held sway.

‘Of course,’ Teornis went on, ‘he’s still a Beetle, plodding and cautious and devoid of style.’ He was sitting at a desk, leafing through papers, and in that looked to Arianna like any Beetle merchant or academic. When he glanced up to meet her gaze, however, she noticed the quirk at the corner of his mouth, and realized he was doing so deliberately for his own amusement. Or for mine. Very few outsiders understood that a great deal of what comprised a Spider-kinden was a sense of humour, especially when times were hard. The ability to step on to the scaffold and offer one last jest to the crowd was the mark of a true Aristos.

‘He will agree to meet if terms can be proposed that will satisfy his people.’

‘Meaning the mad Mantis,’ Teornis sighed, and the smile slipped. ‘Whatever terms we baffle Maker into offering, I’ll see her dead. Let them be ignorant savages in their own forests all they want, but when they kill one of my blood, then blood shall follow. They think that they have a sole monopoly on grievance and revenge? Well, I look forward to giving that creature Danaen a real reason to hate my kind. I’ll strip her skin off, an inch at a time, and make her eat the flesh of her followers.’ The words were matter-of-factly spoken, his eyes fixed on her face to gauge her reaction.

‘She’s nothing to me,’ Arianna told him. ‘I’m sure she’d kill me in an instant if she thought Stenwold wouldn’t know about it. It wouldn’t matter how loyal I was, or to whom, because to her I’m just another Spider.’

‘It’s Maker’s error to employ such volatile servants,’ Teornis agreed. ‘Well, now, I shall find some convenient place that even the Mantis cannot object to. Let me confront Maker face to face, and we shall see what he will not do to avoid another war. My agents are already abroad in the city, stirring up fear, turning the people’s anger away from our kinden onto their reckless leaders. Soon he’ll accept any terms I offer him just to avoid a riot.’

‘I don’t think so,’ Arianna said, before she thought about it. There was a moment of silence in which Teornis’s expression revealed nothing of his own thoughts. And so at last I act like something more than a mere servant, she considered. You promised me adoption into the family, Teornis. Don’t forget that.

He nodded shortly. ‘You’re right, of course. I do our Master Maker wrong. He’s better than that, and he won’t bend so easily. He listens to that fat fool Drillen, though, and Drillen is just a… what are those flying machines? He’s just a great bloated airship buoyed up by the opinion of the hoi polloi. Once they turn on him, he’ll soon force Maker’s hand.’

Arianna nodded cautiously. ‘That seems likely.’ And so Jodry Drillen’s life is saved, because his cowardice is more useful to us alive than his death is as a warning. She found herself surprisingly relieved, having not realized how she had grown so used to the portly Assembler.

‘I will need a little acting out of you, at some point, if things come to it,’ Teornis informed her. ‘Maker has other traits than his plodding to recommend him as an opponent. For a start, he is sentimental. It is a noble quality, perhaps, but a true manipulus should know when to abandon sentiment. If my enemy put a knife to the throat of my sister, or my mother, then I would demonstrate my love of family in the vengeance I took thereafter, not in bending the knee then and there. Maker is not like this, as we have seen.’

Arianna had a sense of what was coming, and shifted uncomfortably.

‘Who does Maker hate most in all the world?’ Teornis asked abruptly.

‘I’d have said it was the Empire, until just a tenday ago. Now maybe it’s you,’ said Arianna, testing how frank she could be with him.

‘Oh, no, no, no. The Empire, always the Empire,’ reprimanded Teornis. ‘The reason he’s so agitated by this current tangle is that it distracts the attention of the city from the Empire. He wants us as allies, in the end. So he’ll scheme for that, tell us all his tedious rote about common enemies, over and over again. He hates the Empire far more than us, and with good reason. They’re unpleasant fellows, at the best of times, and their manners are even worse than the Beetle-kinden. But… But he put himself in their hands, of his own free will, for your sake.’

‘That was then.’

‘Oh, my dear, no. He did it then, and he will do it again now, if need be. For you, my dear one, only for you. If Stenwold Maker proves himself devoid of reason, and will not nod his head like a good loser, then it’s time to threaten what he holds dearest: you yourself, – you and only you. Play along, if it comes to that. I know you can.’

And how far will such playing have to go? Will I have to keep acting even while you cut my throat? But he did not seem to think he was asking anything unusual, just one more deception.

‘Of course,’ she replied.

‘Of course,’ he echoed. ‘But it may not come to that. On the other hand, it may go considerably further.’ Teornis shook his head, looking genuinely regretful. ‘There is one other little duty you may have to shoulder, if things proceed to their worst. I’d rather not impose it on you, and I swear I’ll do what I can to find any other way, but I shall be honest with you in this. You may have to kill him.’

She said nothing, and kept her expression as still as she could.

‘Inelegant, I know,’ he said, apparently in the belief that he was mirroring her thoughts.

I told Stenwold it would not come to that, she reflected. To simply eliminate an opponent is graceless, for the Aristoi, until they have ripped everything else from him. But, of course, how better to demonstrate that a man has nothing left, than to have his death come by the hand of the one closest to him? Oh, yes, that would be elegance indeed.

‘I would rather not have you break cover in such a gauche manner,’ Teornis drawled. ‘However, certain circumstances may require it, so I give you fair warning. Stenwold Maker is not the only one who might need to fear violence at our negotiations.’

‘Stenwold wouldn’t-’

‘Oh, surely he himself wouldn’t,’ Teornis agreed, ‘but I want your blade at his throat if anyone in his party would.’ Seeing her expression he smiled again. ‘I understand how you must feel about this, my dear, but you perhaps have been living amongst their kind for too long. You have forgotten your true self. When your shell of Beetle-ness has been cast aside, you shall emerge as the pure Spider, I assure you, and such thoughts will no longer trouble you.’

Helmess returned home later than he had planned, delayed by unwelcome business. Honory Bellowern had summoned him peremptorily to another meeting at Helmess’s other townhouse. This time the Imperial Beetle’s manner had been shorn of the sly, his usual cunning almost submerged by the great tide of good fortune that had swept him up.

‘Well now, are you ready to receive the benefits of a friend of the Empire? They may be yours sooner than you think,’ Honory had declared, the moment they were alone together.

‘You mean this business with the Spiderlands,’ had been Helmess’s reply, sounding as disdainful as he could manage. In truth he suspected that the rift between Stenwold and the Aldanrael was far more of a boon to his own plans than to anything the Empire might be seeking, but he kept that well and truly to himself.

‘We require another favour, Master Broiler,’ Bellowern had told him, predictably enough. ‘We’d like you to fan the flames, if you would. Rattle some swords towards the Spiderlands. Go shake Stenwold Maker’s hand and call him a true patriot.’

Helmess’s sour smile had not needed much feigning. ‘I’ve started on the path.’

‘Your initiative has been noted,’ had come Bellowern’s patronizing response. ‘I’ve not had orders back, of course, but I anticipate that, once the sails are in sight of the harbour, there will be an army ready to march to repatriate Myna and the other so-called Alliance cities back into the Empire. The bleeding hearts of Collegium will be too busy fighting for their much-vaunted freedom to object. After that, Helleron, then the Lowlands, frankly. By year’s end we’ll be investing Sarn with a couple of full armies, and you and I will be dining in the Amphiophos, under the black and gold. How’s that sound to you?’

Helmess’s smile had been broad and genuine, though the thought behind it had been, Oh you have no idea just how many players there are in this game, Master Bellowern. The black and gold might receive a little surprise, if it comes down the coast again. ‘Just let me know what you wish me to do,’ he had invited, before setting off home to meet his next unwitting tool.

Danaen strode into Helmess’s parlour displaying all the confidence in the world, but these Mantis-kinden were not as inscrutable as they thought they were. If she had been a Spider or a Moth, then Helmess would have had no window onto her soul. In her expression, though, he registered naked curiosity. She would not be well educated about Collegiate politics, but no doubt she had heard that Helmess and Stenwold were not best of friends.

He had sent Elytrya away, during this interview, since it would not do to be seen with anything resembling a Spider-kinden at his side.

Danaen folded her arms, looking contemptuous, and Helmess thought, Five centuries ago, and your kind might have been justified in that expression. Nowadays you’re just a joke in bad taste, but perhaps I will get the chance to laugh at you, after all.

‘I asked to see you because I know you have the ear of Master Stenwold Maker, and he so seldom listens to me,’ Helmess began mildly. The Mantis woman just stared back at him impudently, but he assumed the demeanour of a concerned, perhaps slightly ineffectual Beetle statesman, as he knew she must view him, and continued. ‘We were all extremely surprised when he told us about the Spider situation,’ he continued. ‘After all, it was his people who brought Teornis and the Aldanrael family into the war with the Vekken, and with the Empire too.’ He watched her carefully, from behind his avuncular exterior. There was no suggestion that she had heard the rumours – in fact the extremely accurate rumours – that he had been collaborating with Imperial agents. But, of course, Mantis-kinden wouldn’t deign to listen to Beetle gossip, and how I shall now exploit that. ‘A lot of us are worried about how Master Maker will handle this.’

Her scowl of derision deepened: no doubt she took him for the peace-making kind. Helmess let her believe so for a moment, then said, ‘Many of us in the Assembly fear that after all this, after the blood that has already been shed, Maker will simply roll over and get back into bed with the Spiders as though nothing has ever happened.’

She raised an eyebrow. ‘That makes no sense. Why would he even tell you, then? Would any of you fat Beetles even have known, had he not opened your eyes?’

‘Well, perhaps not.’ Helmess picked his words with care. ‘But, then, Master Maker has achieved his current rank amongst us by taking us into wars. That has been the subject of our many disagreements, and I am less certain about his means of taking us out of them. He has become known as a… compromising man. You know of the Vekken siege a few years back, yes?’

He received a curt nod.

‘Well, you must know that Maker is even cosying up to the Vekken these days.’

And she did know – he saw it in her eyes – and he had planted his seed of doubt. She said nothing, but her posture was now different, less stand-offish, more receptive.

‘So, he’s got us into another fight. Well, if what he says about the Spiders is true, then perhaps that’s fair enough. What I’m worried about, what many of us are worried about, is that now he’s made himself the centre of attention all over again, he’ll just make some deal with Teornis and then hush the whole thing up.’ Helmess steepled his plump fingers. ‘And what will that solve? Really, I mean, what? Will it stop them taking advantage of us? I really rather doubt it. I’m not too proud to admit that the Spiders are a clever lot. I’d not want to talk terms with one of them. You never know what you might be agreeing to.’

She nodded, just a little, and he thought, Prejudice is such a wonderful thing.

‘Your people, of course, you know the Spiders. When I heard that you and yours were involved, well, that offered a spark of hope, I can tell you. I was hoping that Maker would just put your talents to their best use: a strong, solid strike against the Spider-kinden, to show them we’re not to be toyed with. Nothing seems to have happened, though, since Maker made his big announcement. Some of us are getting worried that he’s going to go soft on us again.’

She cocked her head to one side, watching him narrowly. ‘What are you saying?’

‘Would you kill the Spider lord, if you had the chance?’

‘Of course.’ She did not pause for a moment.

‘But I’d guess Maker doesn’t want that, or he’d have given you the order already. After all, Teornis is right here in the city.’ And how that must gall her. She must almost be able to smell him from twenty streets away. Yes, look, there go her hands to her weapon hilts, just at the thought…

‘He’s… thinking,’ was all Danaen’s voice said, though her body language betrayed a great deal more.

‘Oh, well, thinking is always a wise precaution.’ Helmess made a great show of holding his hands up in despair. ‘Tell me, please, are my fears justified? Is he going to meet with them?’

‘He might. That’s what he’s thinking about,’ said the Mantis. She had come here wearing a full suit of distrust, but he was easing her out of it piece by piece. ‘But he has found no meeting place he can be sure of.’ Her expression shifted to a sneer. ‘If not for that, no doubt he’d be meeting with them already.’

‘Then perhaps that’s what he should do,’ Helmess said frankly. Danaen was frowning, caught off guard, but he pressed on. ‘If he and the Spider meet somewhere secluded, somewhere private, then who knows what might happen?’

She merely stared at him, and he saw he would have to elaborate.

‘Some isolated spot free from interference,’ he went on. ‘Where the Spider’s agents and creatures would not be able to intervene, let us say. If, at that meeting, the city’s interests were not being upheld – if they were being sold to the Spiderlands through craven negotiating, perhaps – then a bold sword stroke could accomplish a great deal.’

She did not seem to realize that he was trying to lead her into iniquity, or perhaps he was only giving voice to thoughts that had been running through her head already. He had no doubt that she saw no betrayal in all this, for to her, as to so many of the old-style Felyal Mantids, hatred of the Spider-kinden was a great and noble cause, and anything that furthered it could not be considered bad. He watched her closely, trying to interpret her thoughts from her expression. In the end she said, ‘Perhaps, but it will not happen. There is no such place.’

And my work is almost done. ‘And if I have already thought of such a place?’

He now had her utter, focused attention, and it was a frightening thing. Her victims must feel as he felt then, he realized. Her unsheathed concentration had razor edges.

‘Where?’ she asked, and he told her – and was treated to a genuine Mantis smile.

Stenwold mulled the proposal over slowly, trying to see it from all angles. He had with him only his most able people, now. He had not summoned Elder Padstock, because he did not want to sully her loyalty by revealing the inner workings of diplomacy. He had not called Jodry Drillen, because he knew the man was already under pressure from the Assembly. Stenwold still respected his opinion, but now, when Jodry spoke, Stenwold could hear the voices of a great many other Assemblers behind him.

Arianna and Tomasso, he had therefore boiled his council down to. Arianna and Tomasso and Stenwold himself, gathered here in Stenwold’s study to hear Danaen out.

‘A ship?’ Stenwold pondered. ‘Your advice is a ship?’

‘My advice is: let me kill these Spiders. Do not meet with them,’ Danaen replied firmly. ‘If you must, meet them somewhere away from this clutter of stone. Meet them where they can arrange no ambushes, no surprises. Have a ship, a big flat trader-ship, towed out to the open sea. We come to it by sea and so do they. We send some over, perhaps your little Fly-kinden, to search for hidden knives. When we are sure there are none, then we row you there by boat – you and just so many others. Meet the Spider there, talk if you must. Or let me kill him.’

Stenwold glanced at Arianna. ‘Your thoughts?’

She took her time answering, which reassured him. It was always good to have another well-thought-out viewpoint.

‘I think it might serve,’ she said at last. ‘I’d guess that Teornis would accept it. Given what you’re fighting over, he would find it appropriate, I think.’

Stenwold’s gaze turned to Tomasso.

The Fly-kinden was already nodding. ‘It’s cursed hard to sneak up on someone on the open sea in broad daylight,’ he remarked. ‘You’d see a sail miles off, and even an engined vessel without the high profile of a mast would be spotted in time to take action. The Tidenfree will be your transport, Master Maker, since you know yourself there’s precious little that can outpace or outmanoeuvre her. If the Spider lord does try to bring in more force, we’ll spot them and get you out before they arrive.’

‘Then we’ll do it,’ Stenwold declared, and he found himself immensely relieved that he would at last get to wrestle with Teornis directly. I have known the man long enough, and yet I cannot see why he has jeopardized so much for so little. I must first understand. Then perhaps I can solve this business without another pointless conflict.

‘I shall provide your escort,’ Danaen declared.

Stenwold frowned, thinking of short Mantis tempers and mocking Spider words. ‘Perhaps just you and a couple of your people. I’ll recruit a few of Padstock’s company, as well. Myself and eight others, say, that should be manageable, and Teornis to bring along the same, and have the same chance to check over the ship as we have. I can’t think of anything fairer than that.’

Danaen looked disgruntled, but made no complaint. In an ideal world, Stenwold would have preferred to go without any Mantis at his back – and that was a strange thought to have, given his history – but if there was a trap, if negotiations broke down beyond recovery, then he knew that he could rely on nobody as much as on Danaen’s people. They would be prepared to die, not for him but for their age-old hatred of the Spider-kinden.

‘A messenger,’ he decided. ‘I’ll pass our proposal to the Aldanrael, and let us hope they accept it.’

‘I cannot think that they will not,’ Arianna predicted, but any subtleties in her tone passed him by.