The words sparked a few uncomfortable memories of that student decrying ‘Makerist’ policies in the Forum. How earnest that young man had been, how passionate! Did Stenwold not recall another youth, not so very much older, debating in tavernas and on street corners, haranguing a hostile crowd to try and open their eyes to ideas they did not want to tolerate. Only, in Stenwold’s time, that idea had been the Empire’s hostility. And I won. I opened their eyes, after near on twenty years. The boy’s not the same. After all, I know the Empire, and he doesn’t.
‘Jodry,’ he said, a little subdued, ‘I’m right, aren’t I?’
The other man’s first reaction was a shrug, as if to say that it was too late to change things now, but he plainly sensed that would not be well received, so put in hastily, ‘Oh, without a doubt. Come on, Sten, they were at the gates not so long ago, and if it wasn’t for your Mantis friend doing away with their Emperor, and all the chaos that caused, they’d have had us, too. And since they pulled themselves together, it’s been swords drawn all along the border, little skirmishes and raids, and a war looking for an excuse to happen. Of course you’re right, Sten.’
And Stenwold looked on his — what? Not quite old friend, so political ally, then — and realized that at last he could no longer read Jodry with utter certainty. He shook his head, giving up and conceding the point. ‘You bring me down to business, then.’
‘I thought I ought to add some structure to the debate, that being my job,’ Jodry agreed gravely. ‘So, speaking of skirmishes and borders, do I take it I can’t dissuade you from this little jaunt?’
‘The Mynan border situation is looking serious,’ Stenwold said. ‘It needs attention. The Three-city Alliance needs to know that we’re holding to our treaty, and they know me. And the Empire knows me, too. Maybe just turning up will get everyone to back off.’
Jodry looked at him doubtfully. ‘So this isn’t… it, then? Only, I’ve seen some of the reports, the sort of numbers massing at the border there.’
‘I wouldn’t think so,’ Stenwold assured him, with as much confidence as he could muster. ‘You, I and the Empire know that the peace can’t last, but we’ve time for a few more rolls of the dice yet.’
Five
Winter had brought fouler weather than normal, and every hand had been working day and night, slave and free, mending fences and clearing ditches ready for the growing season. Now the spring seemed to have come early, an unwanted stagnant heat that surely belonged to the depths of summer beating down oppressively on all and sundry, sapping strength and shortening tempers.
Still, the dry earth was beginning to submit to the plough. All those irrigation dykes they had so carefully re-dug were distributing the water neatly, only needing a little aid from the pumping well in order to reach every field. This was a dry land, south of Sonn, but his family had worked it for generations. They knew how to wrestle with it, to conquer and command it.
There was an hour and some left before the heat of noon drove everyone into the shade, and he pitched in as though he was nothing but a servant himself, and a young one at that. He might be old, and need a broad-brimmed hat to keep the sun from his bald head, but he took some pride in knowing there was scarcely a stronger man on the farm. Now he straightened up, ignoring the twinge in his back. Something had caught his attention, and he scanned the flat landscape, trying to work out what it was: some discontinuity, something that did not belong.
The ploughing automotive was chugging its slow way back and forth in the next field, slaves following it on foot to strew the seeds, and boys following them with slings and sticks to keep off thieving beetles and roaches that might try to plunder the furrow before it was turned back. All was as it should be, surely, and yet…
A man running. A simple sight, but he ordered his land well, and there was no need for anyone to run. For a moment he wondered if one of the slaves was making a break for it, and he reached inward for his wings and his sting, quite willing to go after the man personally — but, no, the man was running towards him.
It was his overseer, Mylus. The Ant-kinden had served him as an Auxillian for ten years, and performed well enough that he had bought the man’s service from the army in order to bring him here. He had a rare gift for organization and a firm, even hand with the slaves.
If Mylus was running, something was wrong.
‘Lyren!’ he called out, hoping his son was within earshot. Sure enough there was a patter of feet and the boy — boy? He’s past thirty. Must stop thinking of him as the ‘boy’ — was at his elbow.
‘Father?’
‘Get Aetha and the children into the house, son.’ Mylus was skidding to a stop before him now, saluting out of unbreakable habit, but the old man’s eyes were focused past him, watching the great plume of dust raised by an automotive. Not one of mine, that’s for sure. The machine was paying precious little heed to the neat order of his farm, stilting over field and ditch on its six curved legs, gashing the ground and scattering the workers.
‘But, Father-’
‘ Go,’ the old man snapped, and almost everyone in earshot was at attention automatically, Lyren included.
‘At ease,’ he added, when his son had taken off for the house, calling out for his wife. Mylus remained impassive, but the old man knew him well enough and could read worry in the mere way that the Ant stood. ‘What will be, will be. Let us hope it’s only me they’re here for.’ The vengeance of the Imperial throne had been known to encompass entire families before. ‘If that’s so, and the worst happens to me, you’ll have to manage the farm. Lyren will return to service soon enough, and you know the place better than he does, anyway.’
‘Yes, sir.’ To Mylus, everything was still an order.
The automotive was a model that the old man had seen a few other times, a good all-terrain scouting model, swift but exposed. Even as it neared, one of the occupants had kicked off into the air. They must have already picked him out at a distance, for the flier headed right for him, dropping down a few yards away to study him.
‘General Tynan?’ the newcomer enquired.
The old man nodded guardedly. Instinct was calling on him to fight, but he could not fight the whole Empire. He had known that the throne would send for him sooner or later. He was a loose end that must be tied up one way or another. After all, he was the general who had failed to take Collegium.
It had been hard, giving the order. Another tenday, at most, and the Second Army, his glorious Gears, would have been inside the walls. two more tendays, perhaps four, and he would have had the streets secure, or most of them. The city would have been his, for the glory of the Empire.
Except the Empire that he had left behind him had run into difficulties of its own. The Emperor had been murdered, then his sister — A woman? Unthinkable! — had taken power, and what seemed like half the Imperial governors had decided that they could do a better job than her. He had received orders to return home as swiftly as possible, to support the pacification of the traitor-governors. He had known a no-win position when he saw one.
Conquer the Beetle city and he was betraying the throne. Abandon the siege and he was betraying the military campaign that was the Empire’s lifeblood. But even if he could have taken Collegium in a day, he would have needed the bulk of his army to hold it, at least at the start; and of course the rest of the front had been falling apart even then, had he but known. In marching the Second back home, he had made the correct choice, but history books were cruel arbiters of right and wrong.