The Sea Watch (90 page)

‘You’re on your way to her ladyship,’ said a Spider woman, who was presumably master of the vessel that had taken him on. She was a lean, sun-weathered woman with a scarred chin, and she grinned at him. ‘Collegiate navy, I like that. You speak nice to Herself, and you’ll come away with an intact hide, you hear?’

Stenwold thanked her courteously, and they put him in a boat that was somewhat bigger than the last one, so that four Spider marines could row him over to a nearby ship of the armada. It was a large, strongly made vessel, but by no means the grandest or the largest, and he was glad that his recollections about Spider-kinden shipping had proved accurate. Things might have become difficult otherwise.

So it was that, by passing through a succession of firm hands, Stenwold found himself before the admiral of the armada.

She was a woman of perhaps his own years, with the usual caveat that Spiders aged gracefully, and hid their age more gracefully still. Her hair was silver, but intentionally so, and there were perhaps a few lines on her face that no amount of craft could hide. In the privacy of her cabin, she was dressed in a simple white gown, without decoration or ornament. She wore it like a queen, and Stenwold had no doubt of her authority from the moment he saw her. She was a woman for whom the world turned, such was her invulnerable self-assurance. Beside that, the fact that she kept the marines at hand became a mere detail. There was no suggestion in her behaviour that they might be
necessary
.

More than this, though, he recognized a resemblance in her face, and he felt his heart sink slightly.

‘Good afternoon, Sieur Beetle,’ she addressed him, and a Fly-kinden servant that Stenwold had not even noticed was already at his elbow, pouring him some wine into one of the tall, narrow goblets that the Spider-kinden preferred.

‘They tell me that you are the Collegiate ambassador,’ the woman continued, taking up her goblet as soon as it was filled.

Stenwold lifted his own, letting the two silvered vessels clink together. ‘That may as well be true, for I have come to speak for my city.’

‘I had hoped someone would,’ she acknowledged. ‘I am the Lady-Martial Mycella of the Aldanrael. Whom do I have the pleasure of addressing?’

‘My name is Stenwold Maker.’

‘Good.’ She nodded politely. ‘A serious envoy, then, for serious times. My son writes approvingly of your acumen, Sieur Maker.’

No more, he does.
Something obviously showed in Sten-wold’s face, because abruptly she was very still.

‘Your son is Teornis,’ he said heavily.

‘One of them.’ She saved him further confession, already reading it from his face. ‘Then he is dead.’ At Stenwold’s nod, she asked simply, ‘And did you slay him?’

‘I did.’ For she would have seen it in him, deny it as he might.

Had there not been a heartbeat’s pause then, when she remained utterly without expression, he would never have known. That was all she let him see of her loss.

‘You have not improved your bargaining position,’ was all she said, and when he made to tell her that he had not meant to, not wanted to, she waved him away, killing the words with a slight gesture. ‘Tell me that Collegium sues for peace,’ she instructed.

‘It does not. It stands ready to defend itself at all costs,’ he told her formally.

‘Then there seems little point in your coming here and putting yourself in my power, Sieur Maker. Under the circumstances, one might imagine that matters will go poorly for you.’

‘I bring a warning, my lady,’ Stenwold replied gravely. ‘I would ask you to take your ships back to their home ports.’

‘No doubt, but I am not in the vein to grant petitions at this moment, unless they include a prayer for leniency, coupled with a surrender.’

‘May we go above?’ he said suddenly.

She frowned suspiciously. ‘You wish to signal to your compatriots? I think that would be unwise. I have no wish to announce to Collegium which is my flagship.’

‘A fair point,’ he conceded. His heart was beating very fast now, as though he was waiting for a bomb to go off. ‘In that case, could I recommend that you have the ships’ boats standing ready to be launched, as many as you can.’

Lady-Martial Mycella stared at him, trying to pry some meaning from his face. He felt her Art plucking at the edges of his mind.
Tell me, tell me.

A rap at the door frame announced the arrival of a Spider-kinden man dressed in armour of chitin and boiled leather.

Mycella frowned at him. ‘Speak.’

‘My lady, it is the
Glorious Phaedris
,’ the man got out. ‘He is in . . . difficulty.’

‘What sort of difficulty?’ Mycella snapped, and when the man gaped at her, she set her mouth in a hard line and marched past him. ‘Hold the Beetle until I return,’ she shot over her shoulder, as she left.

Stenwold drained the goblet, trying to calm himself, wondering just how advanced the
Glorious Phaedris
’s difficulties would be by the time Mycella reached the deck.

Scant minutes later she sent for him, and the baffled marines hauled him up into the sunlight.

It was easy enough to spot the
Glorious Phaedris
. He – as the Spiders would say – was a colossal vessel, fore and aft decks bristling with leadshotters, whose three masts would have hoisted a spread of canvas to put any other ship in the armada to shame. His hull was painted in a pattern of red and gold that glittered in the bright sunlight, making it seem as though fire scorched his flanks.

That fire was now being doused. The great ship tilted at an alarming angle, stern proud of the water, and very clearly sinking. His nearest companions in the fleet were hurriedly readying their boats, getting them into the water as swiftly as possible, to take on the ailing giant’s crew.

Mycella stood at the rail, observing this scene with every appearance of detachment. ‘Clever,’ she remarked, as though they were watching some piece of theatre.

‘It had to be the largest ship in the fleet,’ Stenwold confirmed. ‘It was a reasonable calculation that I’d not be aboard it, when I was brought before you.’ When she rounded on him, he added, still sounding eminently reasonable though his heart thundered, ‘After that, of course, all bets are off. It could be this one next, as easily as any other.’

‘Sabotage,’ she stated flatly. ‘Some spy of yours is amongst us. Well, scuttling a single of my ships shall not save your city, Sieur Maker.’

‘Shall we wait to see which vessel is next?’ he asked her. ‘I predicted that you might need convincing. We won’t wait long now, so I advise you to have all boats ready.’

He had explained everything to Aradocles in great detail. It would have been easy for the new Edmir to forget any debt owed to the land, but whether it was through his service to Salma, or his own good character, Stenwold had never doubted the boy for a moment.

‘My lady,’ said one of Mycella’s crew hoarsely. ‘The
Costevan
.’ His shaking finger picked out a long-hulled armourclad, an Ant-crewed vessel clad all in metal. What sails could not have shifted had been brought here by engines, showing that the Spiderlands had more at their disposal than mere galleons. Being so armoured, it was sinking far swifter than the
Glorious Phaedris
, rolling uncontrollably to port as its crew clambered about it, struggling for higher ground. Stenwold grimaced, knowing that the rescue boats would come far too late for most of the armoured soldiers. Then he saw the water ripple at the edge of the sinking boat, and a twisting grey tentacle squirmed its way up the canted deck and whipped about the ankle of one of the floundering Ant-kinden, pulling taut in an instant and yanking the man into the sea. Stenwold felt his stomach lurch with horrible memory.

Arkeuthys.

‘I beg you,’ he said, ‘mobilize your fleet. Take your ships away from my city. Unless you go, they shall all be destroyed before you even touch land. It is set in motion now, and I cannot stop it.’

They had seen Arkeuthys’s contribution to the sinking. What they had not seen was the Gastroi – the tireless, hardworking Gastroi – swimming up to the underside of the hulls, using their Art to cut through wood or metal as easily as they could grind their way into stone. The results of that labour were already plain to see, though: two ships sinking, indeed one very nearly sunk, and every other ship’s captain thinking,
And who’s next?

He saw Mycella consider coldly what would happen if she now ordered full sail against Collegium, saw her evaluate the sea wall defences, the time it would take for beach landings where the coast allowed it, both east and west of the city. There were not so many suitable anchorages, only a few rocky coves and the one broad beach that the Vekken had used when they had tried to take the city by land and sea. How long, to disembark all her soldiers, all the machinery of war, the supplies and the ammunition, while all the time her ships were being taken, one by one? How many would be left of her army, to menace the walls of Collegium? Even as she considered it, the cry went out that yet another ship was failing. The sea-kinden were gaining confidence.

‘Up sail, all ships. Send the order through the fleet,’ Mycella said, her tone clipped. ‘Have all boats ready, as well.’ She rounded on Stenwold. ‘And as for you, no doubt this . . .
thing
will plague me all the way to Seldis, unless I put you back in the water.’

Stenwold nodded. In truth he suspected the ships would soon enough outpace the sea-kinden, whether he was alive or dead.

‘Put him in one of the boats,’ Mycella instructed. ‘Have him rowed into harbour under a peace flag. Let the legend of Stenwold Maker acquire one more chapter.’ As her sailors scrambled to obey her, she said, ‘My son was right to admire you, Sieur Maker. I do not know how you have accomplished this, what underwater engines your people have constructed, but it is duly noted. Today is yours.’ Only when he was already in the boat, and the sailors were beginning to lower it hand over hand into the water, did she call back to him.

‘There will come a tomorrow, Sieur Maker, when we shall speak again. Remember that.’ And the sheer depth of her pain and anger, shorn for a moment of all her veils, chilled him to the bone.

Characters

Aagen
– Wasp-kinden ambassador to Collegium
Accius
– Vekken Ant-kinden ambassador to Collegium

Achaeos
– Moth-kinden lover of Cheerwell Maker, died in the war

Akkestrae
– Mantis-kinden in Collegium

Albinus
– Ant-kinden intelligencer in Kanateris

Aldanrael
– a Spider-kinden Aristoi family

Amnon
– Khanaphir Beetle-kinden expatriate

Ancient League
– the Moths and Mantids of Dorax, Etheryon and Nethyon, allies of Collegium in the war

Aradocles
– Krakind heir to Hermatyre

Arianna
– Spider-kinden lover of Stenwold Maker

Arkeuthys
– giant octopus

Arvi
– Fly-kinden secretary to Jodry Drillen

Balkus
– renegade Sarnesh Ant-kinden

Berjek Gripshod
– Beetle-kinden academic

Bloodfly
– notorious Fly-kinden pirate from a generation ago

Caractes
– Polypoi hermit

Cardless
– Beetle-kinden servant to Stenwold Maker

Cheerwell Maker (‘Che’)
– Beetle-kinden, niece of Stenwold Maker

Chenni
– Smallclaw Onychoi, Rosander’s artificer

Claeon
– Krakind Kerebroi, Edmir of Hermatyre

Cynthaen
– Mantis-kinden fisherwoman

Danaen
– Mantis-kinden raider

Daven
– Wasp-kinden Rekef agent

Despard
– Fly-kinden artificer of the
Tidenfree
crew

Diamedes
– Krakind Kerebroi, agent of Hieracles

Ebris of the Ganbrodiel
– Spider-kinden pirate

Elder Padstock
– Beetle-kinden, Chief Officer of the Maker’s Own Company

Elleria of the Aldanrael
– Teornis’s cousin

Elytrya
– Krakind Kerebroi Littoralist agent

Epiphona
– Greatclaw Onychoi, Nauarch of the Three Red Fish Train

Fel
– Swiftclaw Onychoi, of Wys’s crew

Fernaea (‘Fern’)
– Fly-kinden seer, of the
Tidenfree
crew