The Air War (Shadows of the Apt 8)

by Tchaikovsky, Adrian

  Amnon swung himself grimly into her place, behind the weapon, something magical and terrible by his peoples’ standards, but simple by the lights of Praeda’s instruction. His dead mistress had done her best to equip him for the world he now found himself in, and she had known he would be going to war.

  He swung the weapon round to seek out enemy artillery, finding a leadshotter whose three-man crew was already tilting it to drop a shot towards the back of the automotive column. With sure hands he aimed, and absorbed the thunderous kick of the compact little killer with the great strength of his arms and shoulders. He saw one of the Wasp engineers simply explode as the ball passed through him to punch the artillery piece in the rear, spinning its barrel round to catch at least one of the other crewmen as it did so.

  He fumbled with reloading, shoving another fist-sized ball down the barrel and wadding it tight, before prising out the spent firepowder cartridge and replacing it with a new one. Then he spared a glance for the battle with the Sentinels.

  It was practically over, and his heart lurched just to see it. There were only three Sentinels there, those great plated mechanical woodlice with their high single-eyed prows, but the wreckage of most of the Collegiate force was strewn around them. As he watched, he saw a Sarnesh machine plough in, smoke gouting as its weapons loosed, and one of the Sentinels rocked under the impact, but no more. A moment later the larger leadshotter within a Sentinel’s body spoke out, its eye flashing fire. The side of the Sarnesh machine was staved in, its headlong charge turned into a mad circling as one set of its tracks locked. Then another Sentinel rammed it, aiming for the crumpled side, and tipped the doomed machine over, smashing the Sarnesh automotive onto its side. Amnon saw the third machine lining up carefully to send a leadshot round into the stricken machine’s unarmoured undercarriage.

  His driver began shouting that something was ahead, and he swung the loaded smallshotter around, hoping to see the great enemy artillery that was their target.

  There were three more Sentinels in the way and, even as he watched, smoke exploded from one open eye, and an automotive on his left flank was abruptly flung in the air, fuel tank rupturing in a brief ball of fire.

  The first bomb had landed close enough for the resounding roar of it to sing through every glass component of Banjacs’s machine.

  The artificers ceased work a moment as the impact shook the chamber, but Banjacs’s own shouting whipped them back to it. The inventor might as well not even have noticed that the city was under attack.

  ‘If you have somewhere to go or people you would be with,’ Stenwold addressed the two students with him, ‘then go. Nothing’s keeping you here.’

  Eujen Leadswell’s idealistic indignation had retreated into an iron core deep within him. ‘No, Master Maker, I’ll stay.’ And it was plain that the Wasp would stay there with him. Stenwold could not decide whether he would rather have Averic just get out of his sight, or whether remaining where an eye could be kept on him was the best thing.

  ‘Banjacs!’ he shouted, as another, more distant explosion ruptured somewhere out beyond the walls. ‘How long?’

  The old man had been up a stepladder, refitting a rack of metal tubes that looked like miniature organ pipes, after two abortive attempts had so far failed to coax any life out of his machine at all. At Stenwold’s words, he jumped down, looking about him wildly.

  ‘Get off the machine, you fools!’ he shouted at the artificers, as though they had not been scurrying there to his explicit instructions a moment before. He gave them scant time to scramble clear before fitting the last components back into place and taking a large step back.

  Still nothing happened, and Stenwold was about to curse the man furiously, when Eujen pointed upwards. The great glass tubes that formed the lightning engine’s main body were now glowing with a pale light, a mere reflection of the enormous storm imprisoned down in Banjacs’s cellar.

  ‘It’s ready! At last, it’s ready!’ the inventor whooped, a young man again for just a moment. ‘My machine is at your service, Maker.’ As he rounded on Stenwold, there was enough passion in those eyes to spark tears, but also a sanity as though the completion of his long-awaited project had given something back to him that he had been missing for many years.

  ‘Messenger!’ Stenwold called instantly, and a Fly-kinden who had been watching all this activity with utter vacant bafflement was instantly before him, glad to find himself of some use.

  ‘Go to the Great Ear and tell them to sound,’ the War Master ordered. ‘Now! Let’s get our pilots out of the air.’

  The Fly-kinden was off in a moment, wings taking him straight up and through the gaping skylight that would serve as the aperture of Banjacs’s great weapon.

  ‘Let us only be in time,’ Stenwold added, so quietly that perhaps only the two students overheard him.

  There was a shout from the doors, and a moment later they were kicked in. The body of a Company soldier fell through them and, the next second, a band of men came forcing their way in, snapbows and swords in hand, with a burn-scarred Beetle leading the charge.

  Forty

  There was fighting further down the line. Straessa could see that the troops to her far left were engaged in melee already, and that did not bode well at all. Her own maniple and its neighbours seemed to have fallen into an uneasy stand-off, the Imperial troops still reforming but refusing either to commit to the fray or just to go away. Straessa’s people were still shooting bolts at them, letting the Wasps know that they were still within range, but Gerethwy was reporting little harm done.

  ‘Well now,’ he said at Straessa’s shoulder, studying them again through his glass. ‘I think we’re about to get the hammer, frankly.’

  ‘Tell me.’

  ‘You can see how they’ve a mass of Airborne there – and their infantry has formed into smaller detachments, a bit like ours really only rather more of them.’ He sounded overly at ease, as if at pains to seem casual. Given his usual effortless calm, she read volumes of emotion into that. ‘They have a whole load of Spider-kinden skirmishers too, some sort of Ants and some Scorpions, but they’re getting them all in better order this time. I think . . .’ he coughed away a little dust, or that was the impression he tried hard to give, ‘I think they’re ready for us now.’

  ‘I don’t reckon we could do all that shifting and changing,’ Straessa remarked philosophically. It was dawning on everyone that everything up until now – the Wasp dead, the repulsed charges – had barely bloodied the Second Army: no more than a testing of the waters. Now the Imperial general had determined a suitable response to what was no doubt a slightly novel variation on some textbook tactical problem.

  ‘In fact,’ even Gerethwy’s careful voice had a quaver in it now, ‘I’d say that in three . . . two . . . ah, yes.’ And abruptly the milling crowd of Light Airborne redoubled in size, soldiers kicking themselves into the sky with their Art in a great unordered mass, whilst below them the ground forces began their advance, the loose screen of skirmishers rushing ahead of the slower blocks of Imperial infantry and shielding them from the snapbow shot that was sleeting down on them.

  ‘Pick your marks. Fire at will,’ Straessa ordered, because the oncoming Spiders and their allies were so spread that volley fire would be like punching at mist. The Empire had given up a fair extent of ground when its soldiers fell back, but the skirmish line was coming on fast, rushing to close with the Collegiates and silence their snapbows as swiftly as possible. Around Straessa, the pikemen stirred and braced themselves, watching that oncoming tide.

  ‘Rear ranks, shoot at the Airborne.’ And any moment there’ll be an order, and everything will change. Advance, probably, given the record so far. The Spider-kinden were nearer now and, to the right, a closer-knit band of copper-skinned Ants were loosing their own short-barrelled weapons as they approached, more to spoil their enemies’ aim than a serious attempt at killing. Any moment now.

  She heard the whistles one after each other. Retr
eat! Stand and fire!

  ‘Oh, bollocks,’ she said softly, looking about her to see how the other maniples had taken it. As she might have expected, some were already pulling back, either into clear space or pressing against the troops behind them, Others were standing firm, often with both neighbours abruptly stripped from them, and Straessa saw her own leftmost neighbour stand, the wide eyes of its sub-officer show white as the man looked wildly around him. To her right the block was already pulling back.

  ‘Sub, getting real close,’ Gerethwy said. Around her, her soldiers were shooting and reloading, shooting and reloading, smooth as a drill because they trusted her ability to make decisions.

  And if she stood and fought, she would be supporting her fellows. The pride of Collegium did not enter into it. There were other maniples now depending on her, as they had been relying on their fellows who were already falling back.

  And if she retreated, then some of her people might live.

  Piss on you, Marteus. Why aren’t you here to make the call?

  She put her whistle to her lips and blew the signal: Retreat! Retreat! She could only hope her neighbours took the hint.

  Moving backwards in square formation was not something that could be done at speed, but they were setting new records right then, their order fraying slightly with every step. She saw, to her lasting horror, that the maniple that had been on her left was not pulling back along with them, but standing firm, shooting and reloading.

  Her people were saving their shot for the Airborne already coursing overhead, and the leading edge of the skirmishers would reach them soon anyway. All around her the Collegiate army was losing its cohesion. She saw the first few soldiers simply start to run, drawing the Airborne after them.

  ‘Hold firm and keep together!’ she yelled, but she was still watching that other maniple, its commander either too stupid or too much of a hero to pull back. She saw the skirmishers break over it for a moment like foam on the sea, and then it was overwhelmed, surrounded, the soldiers fighting with shortsword and pike and the weapons of their Art, and fewer and fewer, the opposing numbers and skill at arms eating into their formation and gutting it.

  ‘Steady!’ Gerethwy almost snapped. He had the Foundry snapbow levelled again at the onrushing skirmishers, awkwardly feeding the tape himself whilst another soldier steadied the barrel, even as they fell back with increasingly swift and ragged steps. And: ‘Now.’

  The mechanized weapon hammered out its ugly tune, and this time he just let the mouth swing wildly, ripping across the swiftly approaching skirmishers, cutting down a dozen nimble Spider-kinden, before raking into the band of Ants beyond them. Straessa looked about her, noticing that they were amongst more Collegiates now – the rear maniples that had been held in reserve, unsure of what was happening but now hastily readying themselves for battle.

  ‘Hold now!’ she ordered her soldiers. ‘Hold and—’ and then the skirmishers were just a dozen feet from them and something slapped across her scalp hard enough to send her reeling, and her left ear was ringing with shock. Staggering, she looked about to see that Gerethwy was down, his breastplate and coat dabbled with blood. Shot? The truth came to her in the next instant, even as she was hauling her sword from its scabbard. Jagged pieces of the Foundry snapbow lay all about him, the barrel twisted where it had met the mechanism. Jammed, and then some.

  ‘Stretcher!’ she yelled, her voice shrill above the sounds of battle. The Woodlouse-kinden was curled about his hand, or what the exploding weapon had left of it. We’re going to stand and fight and die now, because we can’t pull back fast enough to get clear. But maybe you can get out, Gerethwy. Maybe I can accomplish that much.

  Then the first of the Spider-kinden were upon them, leading with rapiers and short spears, and by old habit she found her swiftly drawn sword falling into a perfect duellist’s line, fending aside an oncoming blade and then, even as the attacker tried to pull back, playing her old Prowess Forum trick of flexing her game shoulder forwards for those few critical inches of extra reach, only this time it put the point of her weapon through her surprised opponent’s eye.

  This experience seemed real in a way that the snapbows had not, but she had no chance to reflect on it just then. Her instincts clamoured at her, Survive! Just survive! And the only chance for that was her sword, the slender barrier between her and death.

  The Esca Magni skipped through the air, zigzagging desperately as Taki felt the little impacts that were the outliers of a stream of piercer bolts trying to close in on her. There were at least two Farsphex behind her now, each taking a turn in following her twists and gyres while the other tried to come at her from below or above. The aerial battlefield wheeled before her, sometimes populated, sometimes not. When it was busy, she saw mostly the enemy, and the friends she did see were engaged in the same fierce flight as she was.

  What the blazes is Maker playing at? But it was looking as though she would never find out. Chance and skill and mechanical superiority were eroding around her, moment to moment. The Wasps only needed to get lucky the once.

  Abruptly another Stormreader shot across her nose, engaged in furious evasive flight – one of the Mynans from the colours. Something snapped in Taki then, the Exalsee warrior-pilot in her suddenly shouldering aside the cautious air-tactician she had become.

  Curse the lot of them, she swore, and wrenched the Esca sideways after the Farsphex that was on the Mynan’s tail.

  She knew she had no time and that she was laying herself open, that the orthopter in her sights would have been warned – was already taking evasive action and drawing her into a line that would see her cut up by her pursuers’ shot. Stupid. Hopeless. And she dragged all the power she could out of the Esca’s springs and leapt forwards, her twinned rotaries blazing bolts, and the cockpit of the Farsphex exploded in broken glass and wood fragments, and the vessel dived purposefully for the earth with the pilot’s dead weight against the controls.

  There’s one for Corog. Then she was flinging herself madly through the air, higher and higher, because the pursuing Wasps were on her, and fighting mad now, their comrade dying in their very minds. Oh, I went and poked your nest, did I? Well, see how you like it!

  She darted higher, the city spread out like a model beneath her, smouldering where the bombs had struck. She had a brief impression of the battle about her: dozens of circling Farsphex, but so few of Collegium’s own. Had the Empire devastated the Collegiate numbers so thoroughly while she was not paying attention?

  She tried to dive back down, and for a handful of seconds was engaged in a mad spiralling battle for control with one of the chasing Farsphex. Levelling out for a moment, she saw a couple of Stormreaders, not fighting but dropping – plunging recklessly down into the streets, heedless of the enemy or the bombs or . . .

  What’s that noise?

  It had been sounding for some time, she realized. It was familiar, though she had not heard it from quite this perspective, competing with the rush and clatter of an aerial fight while she was over the city itself. It was the Great Ear.

  For a moment she could not think why anyone would be sounding the Ear now, when the enemy had so very plainly already arrived. Then she remembered.

  Oh, no, no, no! Because that was the signal, the get-out-of-the-pissing-air signal, which meant Maker or whoever was ready to make something terrible happen.

  Still cursing to herself, she rammed her Esca towards the ground, because if she was to die, let it be in the air, yes – but let it also be a pilot’s death. Whatever Maker had in mind, whatever the artificers of the College had cooked up, she did not want to know. Most particularly she did not want to find out in person.

  A staccato rattle of impacts into her undercarriage made her pull the stick back by instinct, heading up again – the second Farsphex had second-guessed her and was trying to drive her into the aim of the first, but most crucially he was driving her away from the ground. How long had the Ear been sounding? How long did she have left?
She tried to slip sideways, to lose them just long enough to cut down below the rooftops, but she had gone too high and they were wise to her piloting now, and they would not let her go, would not let her down.

  A panicking glance showed her no hope of reprieve. The bulk of the Collegiate machines were down – or downed – and those still in the air were sharing her plight: unable to get out of the fighting without leaving it the hard way.

  Frightened as she had not felt for a long time, she threw the Esca across the sky, never quite getting free of her pursuers, never quite able to push through the scythe of their shot to land – even to crash. And all around her there were more of the enemy, and they all knew exactly where she was.

  Straessa lunged again, spearing a lean Spider – old enough to be her father – in the shoulder, her point piercing between the plates of his chitin mail. Around her, the bulk of her soldiers had resorted to their swords, with a few opportunists behind her still taking potshots with their bows, almost directly into the face of the enemy. The other maniples around them were also locked into the fighting, or else had fled, running back towards the camp and what scant salvation could be found there. Every so often – so incongruous she would have laughed – she heard someone sound the whistle for retreat, but the input of tacticians into this battle had come and gone. It was not even a matter of selling their lives dearly. The flesh wanted to live, and could not be made to understand that this was no longer an option. So they fought, and shed the blood of their enemies just to buy mere minutes more for themselves.

  Overhead, the Light Airborne were a constant curse, shooting or diving about the battlefield, but they seemed most concerned about chasing after the runners: whole fistfuls of the black and gold stooping on the backs of fleeing Collegiate soldiers with sword and sting.