The Rekef men leapt to their feet, daggers and swords clearing scabbards, and at least two small crossbows being dragged from packs or from under the table, already cocked. Daven himself had his hand out immediately, palm open towards the doorway. By that time there were four armoured Beetles crowding into the room with snap-bows trained, and more of them behind. They wore the bar-visored helms and engraved breastplates of the new merchant companies.
One of the crossbows let loose, its bolt just slanting off the lead intruder’s breastplate. A snapbow bolt then took the Rekef man responsible through the eye, sending him backwards over his chair. A second Collegium shot killed another of the Rekef men down the table, by a reflexive, accidental release. By that time there were at least eight of the weapons directed at them from the open doorway.
‘I am Chief Officer Padstock of the Maker’s Own Company, and you are all under arrest,’ came the clipped tones of the woman that led them. ‘Drop your weapons and surrender to the authority of Collegium.’
Her eyes sought out Daven’s, facing down his open palm without fear. He could kill her, he knew, but that would get him and all his men slaughtered in instant retaliation. For a moment the temptation to do so was almost overwhelming, which he realized was due to the prospect of getting this pack of venomous infiltrators butchered along with him.
Taking a deep breath he lowered his hand and stepped back, feeling at most ambivalent about the whole situation.
It had taken a moment for Stenwold to gather his courage, before he could step back down into the coiled interior of Wys’s submersible. For a moment he had wavered on the brink, sensing the great lightless abyss beneath him, limitless and monster-haunted, as alien and unconquerable to him as the land had seemed to Rosander.
‘You don’t have to go,’ Paladrya had told him, resting her hand on his arm. ‘I know your people have their own fight.’
‘I will see this out,’ he announced, more for his own sake than for hers, and in he had gone.
When Wys had come back from passing word to Rosander, she had brought some new passengers. Word of the new-found heir had been passed to the Pelagist network while she was hunting down the Nauarch of the Thousand Spines. From there it had reached Hermatyre’s exiles.
By the time Stenwold struggled through the hatch, the battle lines had clearly been drawn. Aradocles stood firm, a slight young challenger, while across the main chamber from him waited the tall figure of Heiracles. The elder Kerebroi had brought two servants or guards with him, and they had knives, as all sea-kinden seemed to have knives. At the same time, the stance of Paladrya, Phylles and the big engineer Lej made it clear that they would be weighing in on the heir’s side should the newcomers try anything disagreeable.
Despite everything that separated Stenwold from these sea people, he found he could read Heiracles quite clearly by now. It was plain the man had never expected Aradocles to be still living. It was also plain that he had coveted the throne for himself, and had planned to appropriate the heir’s name and cause to that end. Seeing Aradocles there brought a sudden end to all that, unless some swift treachery could be accomplished. Stenwold observed all that behind the man’s eyes, the last flowering of ambition that had clung on even after the hunt of the heir had set off, and watched Heiracles make a coldly rational decision and let it all go. Chancellor of Hermatyre was better than king of nothing, his expression said, although Stenwold resolved to warn the young prince to surround himself with trusted and capable bodyguards, should he at last reclaim his kingdom.
Then Heiracles knelt and bowed his head – less to a man than to the inevitable. ‘Welcome back, Your Eminence, my Edmir,’ he declared.
With a studied disregard for the knives, Aradocles went to assist Heiracles to his feet. In that moment, the way the youth moved reminded Stenwold very much of Salma. The heir nodded. ‘Use that title only once I have earned it,’ he reproached the older man. ‘I’m not in Hermatyre yet. Tell me, how do we stand there?’
‘The word has gone out to our… your supporters,’ Heiracles informed him. ‘Those of the Pelagists who have taken sides are gathering. A host is ready to march on Hermatyre.’
‘And their numbers?’ Aradocles queried.
‘Still mustering as yet. I hear from Wys that the Thousand Spines
…’ He glanced at Stenwold for more.
‘I hope that they shall not be a problem,’ was all Stenwold would commit to. Or have I misjudged Rosander and his priorities? he considered.
‘Then the numbers should be close to even and, once word reaches Hermatyre that you are with us, we expect the colony’s defenders to undergo a change of heart. Claeon can command obedience, but no love.’
The submersible had begun to descend. Stenwold watched the water outside darken and darken, until there was nothing but black. He could not suppress a shudder.
‘I do not want to come to the throne wading waist-deep in the blood of my own subjects,’ Aradocles said, frowning.
‘If they cling to your false uncle, what can they expect?’ Heiracles asked dismissively.
‘And how are they to know that I am truly with you, that my name is not merely an empty boast? Claeon will tell them that I am slain, that it is merely a trick to unseat the colony’s true ruler.’
It was clear from the way that Heiracles paused before answering that he was well aware of this. ‘I am assured that the people of Hermatyre are eager for your return, Edmir.’
Aradocles shook his head. ‘Not enough, Heiracles. I will not have my people slaying one another, each believing that they fight for the true ruler. If I were to show myself to them…’
‘There’d be enough there who’d gut you, because they’re Claeon’s parasites,’ Wys put in immediately. ‘And with you dead, boy, where’s that leave everyone? All it’d take is one lancer, or one of those new Stations weapons that can lob a spear ten yards. Getting close enough to see who you are is getting close enough to kill you.’
The heir to Hermatyre frowned, looking down at his hands, and, with a shock of familiarity, Stenwold recognized a mannerism of his own, doubtless transmitted to the youth via Salma.
A lengthy journey through darkness took them to where the loyalists were gathering. During the long hours, Stenwold sat alongside Paladrya and tried not to think about the Spider-kinden fleet and the progress it must be making down the coast, or about the Wasp armies massing to take advantage of Collegium’s downfall.
At last there was light: the limn-lamps of a small colony transforming the deep sea in shades of pale blue and gold. Stenwold joined the others in looking out across a crawling seabed. There were crabs and lobsters and similar beasts there, jostling for leg-room, harnessed and saddled, and the swift darting of squid-borne cavalry passed overhead. Spiral shells bobbed and danced around one another, hanging in the water like airships, and some trailed living tentacles while others were propelled by mechanical siphons. Around it all there were the sea-people, a military mob of them, without order and without distinction, and belonging to all kinden.
They docked, and for Stenwold there was the usual awkwardness of them dragging him, cauled again, over to the encrusted mound that was the colony. It had been a long enough absence that the pressure, the cold and the claustrophobia were not the least dulled by his past familiarity. Still, he had been given his chance to avoid this reacquaintance up at the Collegium docks, and he had only himself to blame for being a prisoner of the sea once again.
They held a council of war, whereupon a handful of Krakind nobles and Pelagist leaders got to see Aradocles, so that they could vouch to their followers that this was the true heir after all. Some attempt at a plan was made, but Stenwold soon gained the uneasy feeling that these sea-kinden were simply not used to war. Their idea of such a fight, even with the numbers they had amassed, was to hurl their people at the enemy, as swiftly and fiercely as possible, and hope to let sheer individual skill and inspiration carry the day. Of all the sea-kinden he had met, Stenwold wondered if the only one who might understand how to conduct a war was Rosander.