And then, five days later, while the Assembly was still collating news of Wasp military movements, the Buoyant Maiden was sighted drifting towards Collegium.
They were all there to greet it, even Sperra, who had found herself able to fly a little the day before, just a dozen yards before exhausting herself. Jons Allanbridge’s airship touched down with unusual solemnity aboard, though, and the faces of its passengers were dour.
Tynisa was first out, and it was to Che she went.
‘I’m sorry,’ she said, trembling, almost falling into her foster-sister’s arms. ‘Che, I’m so very sorry.’
Twenty-Six
Night brought no peace to the shores of Lake Limnia. The slap and ripple of the water was underscored by the chirr and buzz of a thousand insects that raised a racket enough to drown out anything that had happened further out on the water.
Every so often the water would take one of their chorus, either by the flier’s own clumsiness or through the predatory skills of some lake-dweller. There would be a deep plunk punctuating the nocturnal serenade, a few errant ripples not caused by wind or weather, then no more.
Then something more substantial struck the water near its edge, raising a great sheet of spray that battered against the reeds. For a second there was nothing but the waves washing back and forth, and then something was crawling out of the shallows, dragging itself through the mud, tearing at the lakeside vegetation for purchase. The insect choir was joined by the gasping and choking sound of a man fighting for life.
And then stillness, save for his ragged breath. His wings had failed him at the end, but close enough to shore that the water had not claimed him. He had stretched himself out there with his feet still in the lake, every muscle strained, his wounds burning with a slow fire.
Lieutenant Brodan lay on the lakeshore and felt out the extent of his injuries. The Mantis had scored a long gash across his right arm and side, raking him with pain, but it had only sliced shallowly over his ribs and not cut into anything vital. He lay still and tried to breathe, wondering if life was even worth it now that he had failed the Rekef. Better to die, surely, than face whatever repercussions his superiors would dredge up for him.
His men were dead, every one of them. Only a superior prudence garnered from experience had kept him alive, and that would prove a double-edged sword when the accounts came to be tallied.
There was a rustle nearby and he craned his neck to see the shabby, shrouded form of Sykore picking his way towards him. He tried to stretch an arm out towards her, to burn her for her betrayal, but she hissed at him disdainfully, planting the end of her walking stick on his chest, causing an agony so severe that he nearly passed out.
‘Foolish,’ she said. ‘Foolish Wasp. Fool of a Rekef. Can you accomplish nothing by yourself?’
He glared at her, furious but impotent. The haggard creature sighed and removed her stick from him, baring her pointed teeth in annoyance. ‘We must have the box. You only want it for your silly games, but my master needs it. He shall have it. I shall save you and your reputation, Lieutenant Brodan, since it falls to me.’ Sykore hissed. ‘I shall risk more this night than I would like to but, just as you, I must account to my superiors, and their punishments for failure throw the devices of your Rekef into shadow.’
‘What are you going to do?’ Brodan got out.
‘You would not understand,’ Sykore told him. ‘Nor would you believe.’ Inwardly, she steeled herself. Spying on the Spider-kinden girl was easy enough, thus seeing the world through the link of blood that she had forged. How much could she borrow, though? How far could she take it? Could she hold the Spider long enough to have her bring the box?
She thought not. The link had become fragile and, besides, the Moth seer would surely detect it if she borrowed so heavily.
She needs must expose herself, her own body, to danger. None of her kind relished that, for by nature they were lurkers in the shadows. She was loathe to risk so many decades of precious life in such an attempt, but the tools available to her were now few. She had only her own hands with which to take the box.
‘Await me near here,’ she told Brodan. ‘I shall come to you with the box, if I can.’
He stared at her sullenly, mistrustfully. She scowled at his ingratitude.
‘I shall save you, Lieutenant,’ she told him flatly, ‘both from your own stupidity and the wrath of your lords. Think simply of that.’ And with that she was hobbling off into the night.
The Buoyant Maiden had received a few new scars from Wasp sting-shot, most notably a smashed steering vane that had made even their return to Jerez problematic, and so Allanbridge had taken her away for emergency repairs. The next morning would see them sailing for Collegium, leaving this sodden town behind them at last.
They would not be sorry to leave it.
‘For me,’ Gaved informed them, ‘this is as far as I go. I won’t be on the airship with you tomorrow.’ Sef was cradled in one arm, wrapped in an ill-fitting robe that Nivit had somehow been able to procure.
Nivit regarded his old partner doubtfully. ‘No way you can keep her here,’ he pointed out.
‘Not here,’ Gaved agreed. ‘We’ll find somewhere, though. Somewhere… somewhere beside some lake that has no cities in it.’
Nivit chuckled scratchily. ‘Never thought I’d see you become smitten.’
Gaved shrugged. ‘I’m just sick of the life, Nivit. I need a break from it.’
‘You’ll be back at it, wherever you go. You’re a hunter born.’
Sadly, Gaved agreed that it was probably true.
Nivit’s offices were getting crowded now. Thalric was asleep, or feigning it, recovering from the stress he had put on his wound, having commandeered Nivit’s own bed. Tisamon sat in one corner, perhaps meditating, perhaps just keeping an eye on the two Wasps. A frown on her face, Tynisa was bandaging her hand, which was bleeding yet again. Achaeos watched her until she met his gaze, then he gave up on looking at anything else within the shack but the object he held in his hand.
Shadow Box. Box of Shadows. Soul of the Darakyon.
He had not expected it to be so beautiful, so very elegant, its surface intricate and twisted, wrought of unknown wood, layer on later of carvings, so that within the outermost cage of briars there were deeper and deeper details to be discerned, creatures and trees and mere suggestions of form. Form and movement.
He blinked, he whose eyes knew no darkness. Yet here it was, this mythical concept he had heard so much about but never seen, for there was no box within the carvings, no core to it at all but merely a darkness at the box’s heart. His seer’s senses were blinded by it, a caged piece of night that was likewise to magic as staring directly at the sun was to the eye, so great and potent that it could not be properly viewed.
What am I to do with this, now I have it? What would the Wasps have done with it, ignorant as they were of the magical arts?
What indeed? Was there merely some demented collector in the Wasp Empire, some man of great political power and no true knowledge, who had somehow set his heart on this thing that held the death of an age within it? Or perhaps…
Perhaps someone in the Empire truly understood what it was. A Wasp magician? Surely that was impossible.
In the shadows of magic, however, there was so little that was impossible.
The Wasps intended to use the box. He was sure of it, irrationally, without being able to give a reason. This was no mere collector’s toy. They wanted it. But how did one use it? What did one do with the Shadow Box? Holding it within his hands now, he realized that it had never been made with any purpose. It had never been made at all. No craftsman’s hands had added that wealth of shifting detail. It had formed from the very death of the Darakyon, shaped itself out of hate and pain and failure.