The little bolt had punched a jagged hole in his cuirass. Carefully – oh so carefully – he unbuckled it, whimpering as that jogged the bolt. He then slid a hand under it, blindly feeling.
His copperweave had fared no better, but the bolt was jutting proud of it, however much it might feel that it was buried in his guts. The delicate mesh had parted like string before the snapbow missile. They had always told him those weapons were good, but he had never expected to be on the receiving end of one so soon.
The bolt had cut into him, but shallowly. His third layer of armour had stopped it going further: Spiderlands silk. The early tests by the inventor had confirmed its efficacy. Like an arrow or crossbow bolt, the snapbow's missile spun, which made it accurate, but also meant that it snarled hopelessly in silk. Thalric had three layers of folded silk pressed beneath the copperweave and, after penetrating two layers of metal, this mere cloth had slowed the bolt to nothing.
It hurt him as badly as it had being stabbed, that one time outside Vek. He could not have felt much worse if the bolt had simply run him through. He wasn't going to die, though, and in a little while he would be ready to stand up and walk around. And then he would want some answers.
Out on the field, the battle ground towards its predetermined ending. The double line of snapbows that Pravoc fielded ripped into the heavy Tyrshaani infantry, butchering them in their uncomprehending hundreds. Predictably, as the scales tipped, the Fly-kinden rose up in a great cloud and simply vanished away, fleeing for either the city or the wilderness, depending on their faith in the victors. A few were bold enough to put a final arrow of farewell into some Tyrshaani officer or other that they had reserved particular contempt for. Meanwhile the orthopters had started preliminary bombing runs against the Tyrshaan gatehouse, on the assumption that the city would require a little extra persuasion to open up.
*
Colonel Pravoc's entry into the governor's palace in Tyrshaan went unopposed. By that time the controlling elements of the Wasp garrison had been almost completely obliterated, and to the Tyrshaani themselves it meant nothing which slavemasters held their leash. The surviving Bee-kinden soldiers surrendered in good order, laying down their weapons and sitting down outside the walls of their own city, while tearing off the blue sashes that had never been more than empty symbols – Vargen's illusion of autonomy. Wasps being what they were, there were a few incidents of revenge killing, just as there was some looting once the Imperial forces got inside. It was all within the tolerated bounds of military discipline, and Pravoc's orders were for the city to be left intact and simply returned to the Imperial fold.
In the governor's own war room he found Vargen, already doubled in stiff rigour over the table, scattered markers and tiles oddly mirroring the fate of Vargen's own crushed army. The man's face was purple and twisted, his tongue protruding and his eyes wide.
There was a pair of Fly-kinden waiting there for Pravoc, one in the drab of a servant, the other dressed in Imperial black and gold, and not a blue sash in sight. Pravoc raised his eyebrows at them, seeking explanations.
'When it became clear that his cause was lost,' said the better-dressed of the Flies, 'Governor Vargen took poison. Tragic.'
Pravoc, seeing the outraged and horrified expression on the dead man's face, wondered if Vargen had known that was what he was doing, when he had taken the wine. He noted the Fly's careful use of the word 'governor' rather than 'general'.
'Who are you?' he demanded.
'My name is te Pelli. I am a factor of the Consortium out of Shalk,' the Fly replied, his face displaying nothing more than polite deference. 'I wanted to be the first to assure you that we of Shalk were only yoked to Vargen's schemes through threat of force.'
Pravoc sniffed. He had no illusions about how little a threat would have been necessary, nonetheless it suited him well enough if the Fly-kinden were happy to do his job for him. The faster he could report an unequivocal victory, the higher he would rise in the eyes of his masters.
Thalric found him there later, after the ex-governor's body had been removed, along with the poisoned wine.
'What happened to you?' Pravoc asked, and then added, 'Regent,' a moment later. 'Get caught up in the fighting? Unwise.'
'It came looking for me.' Thalric studied the man's narrow face and found it devoid of anything meaningful. 'Some assassins tried to kill me.' As he said it, he found the words sounding petty in his own ears. Had he still been Major Thalric of the Rekef it would have been a reasonable thing to say. It would have been the preface to organizing a plan of action, a counterplot, a piece of espionage. Thalric the Regent was not free to pursue such courses, and so it came out sounding like a whine for attention, a demand that something be done.
Pravoc's change of expression, however slight, conveyed the same opinion. 'Makes sense. Vargen was against the Empress and you're her man here. Makes sense that he might try to remove you.' He left a measured pause. 'But you came through all right, I see, Regent.'
With his ribs pulsing in pain, his arm bound up, Thalric felt unexpectedly lost for options. The Rekef man he once was would have accepted none of it. With the threat of the entire secret service behind him, he would have ensured that colonels, even generals, would gabble out anything they knew, rather than offer cool insolence. The Regent, though… he felt, as Regent, that he should have more respect from this brusque soldier, and at the same time the thought made him sick of himself. Respect for what? Earned how?
'I survived,' he said, turning to go. As he reached the doorway he stopped. 'I was surprised there were none of your men at hand, Colonel. When the attack occurred the camp all around me seemed quite deserted.' He turned, but surprised no admission of guilt, no new expression at all, on Pravoc's face.
'I was fighting a battle,' Pravoc said firmly. 'If you'd asked me for bodyguards, I'd have found them. Complain to the Empress if you want.'
Thalric's smile in response was thin. He appreciated this man's confidence in his own abilities, in his refusal to bow to such an empty thing as the Regent of the Empire, but also he did not trust Pravoc at all. For a Rekef man, trust came hard and often never.
'The Empress shall know that you have done your work here adequately,' Thalric declared blandly. 'What else is relevant?'
He made sure that his gait revealed nothing of the stabbing pains in his side, where the snapbow bolt had been within three layers of silk of killing him. Someone out there knew now that he had fought off three men and was still alive to complain of it.
Let them worry, he thought. Ten Thalric had decided against returning home with the army. Even an Imperial army with a mechanized baggage train moved at a snail's pace. Besides, he was expected to return with it, and at this juncture he did not feel like doing anything that was too obviously expected. The fewer opportunities he gave his hidden enemies, the better.
So he commandeered an automotive. What was the point of being Regent of the Empire unless you could do that? He knew it to be an empty honour, but that was not general knowledge. His two-man crew of driver and engineer/artillerist were more than happy to break away from the plodding convoy and make best speed along the dusty roads leading north to Sonn. What Colonel Pravoc thought of it, Thalric did not attempt to find out.
Sonn was one of the earliest conquests of Alvdan the First, one of the linchpins of the Empire. It had been conquered by force but the Beetle-kinden residents had soon seen the benefits of Imperial rule, and the place was now the heart of the Consortium of the Honest, the mercantile arm of the Imperial administration. The Beetle-kinden traders, slavers, shippers and bankers had soon made themselves an indispensable part of the Empire, and their kinden had proven the very best of second-class citizens.