'General Brugan,' Thalric acknowledged. 'I trust you are well?'
'When the Empire is well, I am well,' Brugan confirmed. As the Lord General of the Rekef he was the most powerful man in the Empire, and one that even Thalric had a wary respect for. It was no secret that his support had turned the balance of power in favour of Seda, nor a secret that he had murdered his chief rival over the late Emperor's dead body. He was ruthless and intelligent and ambitious, therefore a model Imperial general.
'The Empress has been missing you,' he said blandly. Brugan was not one to be misled by Seda's public face. He surely must know as well as Thalric the true woman behind it. 'Also, when your official duties permit, I have some news of an old friend. I'd appreciate your views.'
'As you wish, General,' Thalric said. Brugan was one of the few people he was both careful and also happy to oblige. The man was good at his job and good for the Empire.
Thalric passed on towards the top end of the hall, towards the clustering robes. He noticed a nod in his direction from the absurdly tall, hunchbacked figure of Gjegevey, but Thalric ignored the grey-skinned, long-faced creature. The old slave was a favourite of the Empress's now, one of her inner council, and it was people such as he who were the problem. Beyond Gjegevey stood a Grasshopper-kinden, in a robe of pale lemon, whom he did not recognize, but saw as another slave risen above his station. Beyond that…
'You,' he began, before deciding whether he should. 'Moth-kinden.'
The grey-clad shape turned, and Thalric was surprised to see a Wasp face looking out from within the cowl.
'Alas no, although the mistake is understandable.' The man was short and balding, but a Wasp nonetheless.
Thalric stared at him. 'Who are you?'
'You are the RegentThalric,' the man replied. 'I recognize you from the portrait in Her Majesty's chambers. My name is Tegrec. I am the Tharen ambassador, for my crimes.'
It took Thalric a moment to connect name and place. The result was displeasing to him. 'Weren't you a traitor?' he asked, his voice loud enough for a few people to look round.
Tegrec only smiled his implacable smile. 'Weren't you, O Regent?' he asked, so that nobody else heard. Thalric looked on him without love, seeing behind him two other grey-robed figures, real Moth-kinden this time.
'What's brought you – and them – here?' Thalric asked bluntly.
'Times change, O Regent,' Tegrec said mildly. 'I am here for Tharn, and the Moth-kinden thereof. The war is now over between my birthplace and my adopted kinden.'
'Is that so?'
The ambassador's face was all sly knowledge. 'It is true that the Moths managed to drive out the occupying Imperial force, but only at great cost. Current conditions now suggest that a more open relationship with the Empire will be beneficial to us all. The Empress herself has expressed a personal interest.'
'Of course she has.' Thalric's tone was bleak.
'Her Majesty has pronounced herself especially pleased with our gifts.' Tegrec made a grand gesture towards the head of the hall like a magician and, like magic indeed, the doors opened at that exact moment and the Empress made her entrance.
She had an honour guard, he noticed. Thalric felt weak. It had been a concern of hers, before he left, that she ought to have an honour guard, but how could she have trusted one? There were too many throughout the Empire who wanted to see a man on the throne. It seemed the problem had been solved, and he now understood Tegrec's gift. The Moths of Tharn had been clever.
There were only six of them but he doubted she would need more. Tall and slender, wearing armour of delicately crafted mail and leather that had been enamelled in black and gold. Each bore a narrow sword at the hip, a clawed gauntlet on his hand.
'How…?' he began, but was unable to say more.
'How can she be sure of them?' Tegrec asked, standing close enough that Thalric wanted to strike him. 'Why, they are sworn to her protection, dedicated wholly into her service by command of the Skryres of Tharn. I think you know how seriously the Mantis-kinden take their honour.'
They took their place and stood there, still as statues around her throne, their faces hidden in the shadow of their helms. In their midst the Empress Seda looked young and demure, dressed in the minimum of finery. Her own natural beauty was all the adornment she needed. She smiled warmly at Thalric and held out a hand. He made himself walk forward and take it, stepping within the Mantis circle to seat himself beside her. Her touch felt shockingly warm.
It was like sitting next to something venomous: a scorpion with sting raised. He sat there very still, tried to ignore the brooding presence of the Mantis-kinden who had been sold into her service.
'You will be joining me in my quarters later, of course?' she said.
'Of course, Your Imperial Majesty,' he replied, with a broad, despairing smile. The next day he lay recuperating in her chambers, pale and feverish. The day after that, he made himself scarce from any public engagements, retreating to the palace storerooms to seek out Osgan.
Theirs was an unlikely association and it had come about through Thalric's desperation. Had he still been his own man he would have spared the wretched Osgan not a word, would as like as not have despised him.
This was not the first time his eyes had been opened to the sort of man he was. When he had been on the run from the Rekef, he had viewed his life from the outside and the world, he knew, held more pleasant sights. I was a model Imperial citizen, he reminded himself. Filtered through his experience, the thought was a painful one.
'You look like I feel,' Osgan remarked and it was broadly true. Mid-morning and Osgan was still unshaven, eyes redrimmed in a sagging grey face. Once a solidly built Wasp, he was now fast becoming simply heavy. There was already an open bottle on a crate beside him. The Rekef man behind Thalric's eyes looked at him and recognized a liability.
Images from the night before last still recurred to him as he sat down opposite. He and Osgan avoided each other's eyes, both of them men who had seen too much.
Osgan shook a pair of dice out of a leather bag, a handful of small coins from another. 'Might as well make use of the time,' he grunted. He was an appalling gambler, but Thalric made sure he did not lose too much. Only a year ago Osgan had been a rising star in the Consortium of the Honest: supply officer for the Ninth Army, stationed in Capitas, with his hands immersed in the stream of Imperial funds, even holding the favour of the Emperor, but now…
He held his current position among the steward's staff becauseThalric made it so. If not for that he would have been a debt-slave by now, meat for the fighting pits, conscripted into the Auxillians. It had all fallen down for Osgan, on the day the Emperor died.
It had fallen down forThalric: same day, different reasons. Thalric who had been a traitor, just as Tegrec had named him, who had killed a Rekef general, who had been brought to Capitas in chains. Thalric who had been saved from a bad fate for, he was discovering, a worse one. Thalric who found the Empress's court at Capitas that bit stranger each time he was dragged back to it. Thalric, who had grown used, in his career as a traitor, to having people around to talk to.
The Rekef man he had once been could not have cared less. That Rekef man had underlings and superiors and enemies. The traitor he became had stood alongside such as the redoubtable Stenwold Maker, the Mantis butcher Tisamon, the enigmatic Achaeos. They saw more of me than my own people were ever allowed to. It had seemed right, then, but he had not thought he would ever be coming back.
But I grew used to having someone to talk to. Well, now he had Osgan. He could say what he liked to Osgan. Nobody listened to a shaky supply officer who was drunk most of the time. Nobody cared about this man, except Thalric.