Dangerous Offspring

by Steph Swainston

  The town blossomed up beneath me. The stone rings opened up; widened; then I lost sight of the outer wall and all beneath me were barracks roofs and the square. I’ve only got seconds.

  I folded my wings in and bent my legs arching my back concave so my feet were almost behind my head. I scrabbled in my boot top for my flick knife. With less drag, we whirled round each other faster–the Insect pulled my shirt and the tight material cut into my waist, restricting me further. I flicked the blade and swept it behind my head, cutting the end of my ponytail free. Then with swift cuts I slashed through my stretched shirt feeling it open up around my sides and tear of its own accord over my stomach. The claw ripped free.

  I snapped one wing closed, raised the other and stalled–slipped sideways away from the Insect.

  It turned over in the air, legs uppermost, mandibles snapping and antennae whipping. A long bronze line of light reflected from the sunset along the length of its body.

  I braked as hard as I could. I spread my feathers wide and flat, fighting against the airflow forcing them up. They hissed and jiggled, bending like bows. I splayed my legs trying to counteract the spin. The distance between me and the Insect increased. It shrank below me. I saw it, still rotating along its length, fall towards a messy impact with the barracks roof.

  I did not have enough distance left to stop. I was braking as hard as I could but the spinning roofs were too large, too near. Well, this is it, I thought. This is how it ends. At least it’ll be over quickly. I had an image of Tern in my mind like a portrait. I spun as I fell, every couple of seconds, trailing my foot in the corner of my vision. The barracks ring flashed away. I levelled with the towers; they shot above me. I glimpsed soldiers on the ground, their mouths round Os. Detail leapt out: the flags, the cracks between hall roof slabs, grit in the drainpipes. I hugged my arms and legs in tight. I closed my eyes and my mind was already dissociating, awaiting the impact.

  Thumpf! I hit something elastic and jolted. I seemed to arc out in a slow trajectory. I almost stopped, then–crack! crack!–I tumbled head over feet straight down and hit the ground heavily, backside, wings, and my head jerked back and hit the stone.

  Oof. I skidded to a halt feeling my skin burning. I opened my eyes and looked around. I was loosely wrapped in voluminous folds of canvas, through which the lamplights shone orange. The stuff around my face blew in and out with my panting. All right, I thought; I’m alive. I’m on the ground and alive. Ooh, my head. I pressed a hand to it with Eszai stoicism but nothing gave way. I rolled around, winded, and scrabbled at the material but I couldn’t find an opening. I stabbed my axe into it, cut a rent and crawled out, onto the cobbles of the central square.

  Acres of orange canvas seemed to curl away from me on both sides. I looked at it and saw the massive letters, backwards and upside down: ‘Riverworks Company Est. 1692’. A glance up to the roof of the hall told me I had snapped the flagpoles holding Frost’s banner. They hung down, trailing it between them.

  I hugged my head, rolled over and moaned. My right arm and shoulder were skinned and bleeding profusely. Sliding on the cobbles had worn a hole in the banner, through my jeans’ denim as if it was tissue, and blood was trickling down my right leg. My shirt was laddered and my axe scabbard reduced to leather shreds.

  I rotated my shoulder, gasping at the pain.

  A jangle of chain mail and the flash of plate armour–Tornado was running towards me out of the hall. The front of his helmet was featureless and forbidding. He hooked the visor back and I saw his shocked face. ‘Jant, are you all right?’

  ‘I think so…I mean, I’m bleeding…Shit, I’m bleeding!’

  ‘You lucky bastard.’ Tornado pointed at the broken banner. I shrugged lopsidedly at him.

  He slipped his shield from his arm and stuck it upright with its spike between the cobbles. It had a printed street map and the horn blast codes pasted on the inside. He hung his axe on top.

  Tornado, I’m so glad it’s you. I would have wasted hours trying to explain my ordeal to someone with more imagination. Now the nightmare faded rapidly when faced with this bloodstained mail-coiffed frontiersman smiling like a maniac behind a blade I would have been unable to lift.

  I said faintly, ‘Who’s dead?…I felt the Circle break. Who did we lose?’

  ‘The Lawyer.’

  ‘Gayle? Damn…’

  ‘Thunder.’

  ‘Thought so.’

  ‘And Hayl.’

  ‘Gayle, Hayl and Thunder…That’s one fuck of a storm…’

  Tornado wiped the edge of the padded hood drawn over his forehead and the thick stubble on his cheeks. ‘Come inside.’

  I took a couple of steps and stumbled, but he supported me. He said, ‘When all this started Hayl rode out to the dam to close the winch tower portcullises. We didn’t want Insects to crawl through. Then they started flying! He shut the gates but he, like, never made it back. Thunder was covering him with bombardment from the trebuchets, but the first Insects came down and swamped his crew. He didn’t stand a chance, either. Gayle’s men tried to stop the artillerists fleeing and she got killed with ‘em. Lightning made everyone else stay inside. Flying Insects–I haven’t, like, seen anything like this before. We need to tell San. We need Rayne too.’

  ‘She’s on her way.’ I sighed. Concussion was greying-out my thinking, and I could do nothing more. Tornado walked me into the hall and we pressed through the crowd of civilians and armoured soldiers. Vowing to pretend it was only a hangover I climbed the stairs to my room, still feline but not in as much that cats walk in straight lines. I dressed my skinned arm and leg myself and collapsed on the bed.

  CHAPTER 12

  The clatter of hooves in the street roused me. I lay with a terrible pain in my arm and a stiff ache in my wings, feeling like death–fast-thawing like a corpse out of the Ilbhinn glacier. I wondered why I was always doing this to myself, until I remembered I came by this pain in the line of duty rather than pleasure.

  The sound of hooves intensified, with the jingling of bells. There must be a whole company outside. I tried to get out of bed and gasped as the ache fired into a streak of agony. I slipped a T-shirt on and looked out of the window. It gave onto the second ring; the road below was full of horses, and lancers riding in full plate, holding their lances point down. Their line, two abreast, wound around the corner. The noise of bells on their bridles might reassure the horses, but it put my nerves on edge.

  High over the barracks roof, a few Insects were twisting up into the air.

  The lancers passed by and the street emptied. On the cobbles a dispersed smear of brown fur and pink bone was all that remained of the Eske fyrd’s grizzly bear mascot. Behind it, a door to the barracks block was open and two soldiers with crossbow bandoliers stood on its step. One leant forward to light a cigarette, then straightened up and blew out smoke.

  A quick movement caught my attention. An Insect ran round the corner and hurtled down the street. The smokers slammed their door shut. The Insect dashed beneath my window, then seemed to lose its footing with all six legs at once. It fell and bowled tail over forelegs with its own momentum, crashed into the wall and lay still, with a red-fledged arrow sticking out of it.

  Lightning will be awake, then.

  The door was ajar and I heard Tornado’s voice counting to ten three times as he ascended the stairs. He reached the top and knocked so powerfully that the door swung wide.

  I called, ‘Yes!’

  He continued knocking.

  ‘It’s bloody open; you can bloody come in if you bloody have to!’

  He entered, still in filthy armour, and a scowl. ‘You’re looking good this morning.’

  ‘The flight is starting again. What time is it?’

  ‘Six a.m. There aren’t as many, yet, but the ones that came down yesterday are still clogging the roads. Wrenn’s clearing the middle road with a company of hastai, and I’m going to relieve him soon. Lightning says where are you? Lourie sent me because Lightn
ing bawled at him to come and fetch you. He said, “Get that lanky Rhydanne git down here now!”’

  ‘Lourie said that?’

  ‘No. Lightning.’

  ‘Ah.’ I tried to comb my hair and gave up, made the mistake of consulting the mirror. Blood and iodine had seeped through the bandage on my shoulder and dried, sticking it to my skin.

  Tornado bent to peer out of the window. ‘I’ve never seen the like of Insects in the air. I bet it pisses featherbacks off to find that Insects can use their wings.’

  I agreed. ‘There we were, happily taking wings as trophies and using them to glaze windows, never thinking they could grow them and use them to fly.’

  ‘I wouldn’t have believed it.’

  ‘They’re heavy, graceless fliers. They seem glad when they touch down.’

  Tornado shrugged. ‘You were pretty impressive.’

  ‘Up until the point I crashed. Look how badly skinned I am.’ I glanced at my scale mail hauberk and gambeson, which I hang upright on crossed poles like a scarecrow. My helm sat angled on top, the rust-stained tail of its white horsehair crest hanging down.

  ‘At least you’re not mad.’

  I paused in lacing my boots and blinked at him. ‘Mad? Why should I be mad?’

  ‘You should see Frost.’

  We descended the stairs into the hall full of soldiers and townspeople, not crushed together like last night but running about in panic, shouting over the distant buzzing. Zascai came and went from the doorway, crowding around Lightning, who stood leaning against the doorjamb, scribbling a note. He had his bow on his shoulder and, standing at his heel, his favourite deerhound, Lymer the-two-hundred-and-tenth, watched the street attentively.

  He folded the paper and handed it to a runner, who raced out of the hall. I pushed to his side but he didn’t notice me.

  Immediately a fyrdsman vied for my attention: ‘Comet, what do I do if–’

  ‘Wait,’ I said.

  ‘But how can they be flying?’

  ‘Just wait!’

  The same was happening to Tornado, who was dealing out orders for an infantry company. Eszai are equal in status and there is no hierarchy among us, meaning there is no final authority in a crisis and, if we have no pre-planned strategy, it causes problems. Lightning tended to dominate and I usually deferred to him, knowing he was the best of us at envisaging the whole battlefield. He could remember where every company was at any given time.

  ‘Snow sent me, Lightning,’ a woman said in pidgin Awian. ‘He said the flamethrowers now are working.’

  ‘At last. Have you any infantry to fend off Insects? No? I’ll send for a squad. You–who are you?’ He was pointing at an approaching longbow man.

  ‘Warden of the first battalion Rachiswater archers.’

  ‘You are? Since when? What happened to Cirl?’

  ‘He’s dead, my lord. We can’t get into the barrack attics to shoot from the windows because people are hiding inside and they’ve locked the door.’

  ‘Can you not reason with them?’

  ‘They won’t reason.’

  ‘Break the door down, but make sure you guard them back to their houses. Ensure the houses are free of Insects and for god’s sake make them stay there. Then take up your position.’

  ‘Yes, my lord.’

  ‘Lightning…’ I spoke up, but he was too harassed to hear.

  A warden crowded into the doorframe. I guessed from his stainless accent that he was one of Eleonora’s cousins appointed to her lancers. He said, ‘I believe we should–’

  Lightning interrupted, ‘I asked you to tell me where Hayl’s husband has gone.’

  The captain said, ‘He is bereaved. He is as furious as he is demented with grief. He has taken a company of lancers to rescue people from the armoured carts and peel towers.’

  ‘Outside town?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘I told him not to!’

  ‘He said it was his revenge on the Insects. He said he will ride them down, unless the flight intensifies. The horses are even more terrified of Insects above them, especially the noise, and they can’t hear our orders. Becard only has one company from the third battalion Eske lancers.’

  ‘I thought you said the first battalion?’

  ‘Third, Lightning.’

  ‘Third. Third. Well, take the first, then. Put your armour on and venture out. Give him support but order him back as soon as you can. Tell him I said so, in the Emperor’s name.’

  The hound’s hackles prickled; it started barking furiously. Lightning peered out around the doorjamb, unslung his bow, drew and loosed. An Insect charging down the street skidded to a halt in front of us, in death throes. Lightning lowered his bow and noticed me. ‘Jant, don’t just stand there!’

  The fyrdsmen crowded around us. Lightning looked from face to frightened face. ‘You will all damn well wait while I speak with Comet…Jant, what’s happening? How can they fly? They never have, before. Never! Have you discovered anything?’

  ‘I think it’s a mating flight.’

  ‘A what flight? It’s chaos. Come and see Frost.’ We turned away from the crowd and his dog padded after us. Lightning continued, ‘We’ve lost seven hundred men and I would say twice that number are too afraid to leave the barracks. I need you to bring me more information. Tornado, please take over and by god tell the second Rachiswater archers to stop dropping stray arrows on the pyre crew.’

  ‘I’m going to report to the Emperor,’ I said.

  ‘Yes, of course.’

  I heard a soldier mutter to his mate, ‘Fody said that Insects are carrying men off and drowning them in the lake. Picking them up and flying away with them!’

  I rounded on him. ‘That’s false! Fyrdsman, don’t spread rumours! Insects are weak fliers, and they can’t lift anything. On the ground, they return to being normal Insects. Bear that in mind, all of you!’

  As we crossed to Frost’s table Lightning continued quietly, ‘It’s not true, is it? They are not normal.’

  ‘No. Their behaviour has completely changed. The ones in the streets are trying to run back to the lake. They all return to the water, and I think they’re laying eggs in it.’

  ‘They’re what?’

  ‘They put their tails in and a sort of froth comes out. Then they range over the whole valley. They drag the people they’ve killed to the lake. They’re dissolving the Wall and pulling all kinds of dead shit out.’ I explained how they were making a splanchnic swamp of the lake and were agglutinating a wall to enclose it. It was as if they had claimed it as their own.

  Lightning looked shocked. ‘Take care how you speak to Frost.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘She hasn’t slept for three days. She is near breaking point. If she worsens I will send her to Whittorn, Eszai or not.’

  ‘No, Lightning. Zascai stress casualties are kept at the front, so we should do the same for Eszai. People recover much faster with their dignity intact.’

  ‘Well, she’s having a bad effect on the Zascai.’

  ‘We need her to work the dam.’

  Frost had arranged four tables into a square, with no opening, and she was hidden by a high wall of folders, books and stacks of paper piled on top. We walked around two sides, seeing that when she had run out of books she had continued building with tool boxes. Only the far side was clear, facing away from the crowd, with her coffee pot and a pile of nuts and raisins on the surface. Frost was sitting, shoulders hunched, and her head on her hand. She swayed very slightly as she spoke to one of her engineers in emphatic, low tones. ‘So Insects are flying again? I need to know.’

  ‘Yes,’ he said.

  ‘Go and man the telescope. Watch the dam. If they start papering over any part of it, come and tell me.’

  ‘Yes, Frost.’

  ‘I want all the barrels of limestone-cutting acid under lock and key. I want fifty draught horses ready to ride to the dam at a second’s notice. I want weather reports four times a day. If a drop
of rain falls I want to know.’

  ‘Yes.’ The engineer glanced at me and rolled his eyes.

  ‘Bring me the spillway capacity calculations. If they block the spillway, it’s goodbye, Lowespass.’

  Lightning cleared his throat. The foreman saw his chance to escape and dashed away.

  Frost had dirt under her fingernails and white salt crusted at the edges of her eyes. Her hair, dry with neglect, was tied back but the ends straggled on her shoulders. She shoved her sleeves up her broad forearms with a gesture like a washerwoman, and said, ‘Tell me the figures.’

  ‘What figures?’

  ‘How many men have died? How many injured? How many people have I killed?’

  ‘It’s not your fault,’ Lightning said.

  ‘Come on, Saker, what else can it be?’ Her voice took on a hard edge. ‘There’s no record of Insects ever flying. Thou knowest that more than anyone, thou hast been around almost as long as they have. My lake is the only thing that’s new. The Insects are reacting to my action. To my dam–to water.’

  ‘Water?’ Lightning said. ‘There has always been a river.’

  ‘Standing water.’

  ‘It could be population pressures,’ I suggested. ‘Maybe they only swarm every two thousand years.’

  ‘They are flying to reproduce,’ Frost stated.

  Lightning rubbed the scar on his palm. ‘Don’t be awkward…If Insects reproduce in the air we would have seen it before. Besides, Rayne dissects them and she says they have no male and female forms.’

  ‘They had no wings, either, before I built the dam.’

  ‘They had very small wings,’ Lightning said.

  ‘Oh, yes. We thought their wings were vestigial, but it turns out they were just immature.’

  I said, ‘Having wings isn’t enough. They’ve also somehow gained the instinct to fly. It isn’t easy, it took me years to learn.’ I pulled my T-shirt neck down so they could see my collar bones which had been broken so many times they were gnarled.