Heirs of the Blade_ Shadows of the Apt_ Book Seven - Adiran Tchaikovsky [146]
Thalric shrugged. ‘It would make sense. This is the man the Lowlanders approached, when they wanted Commonweal aid against us.’
Varmen grunted. ‘Nice to have been told that before.’
‘I didn’t ask you to come.’
‘That’ll teach me to do the decent thing,’ grumbled Varmen. Deftly, he drew open the beetle’s pack and took out his breastplate. ‘You up to doing a few buckles? It’s a lot quicker with someone helping.’
They’re going to shoot us any moment, Thalric suspected, but then reckoned that might be true whatever they did. With that in mind, he turned his back on the Dragonfly archers and helped Varmen on with his armour, finding a certain calming quality in the ritual of latching and tightening wherever the ex-Sentinel directed. Soon enough, Varmen had breast and back armour, pauldrons on his shoulders, tassets hanging from his belt, the gauntlets on and helm at the ready.
‘That’ll do,’ he decided. ‘Besides, they’re coming this way.’
Thalric glanced up to see that the soldiers’ leader had returned, and now the whole pack were approaching cautiously. He took his stand alongside Varmen, hoping that his copper-weave shirt would turn away a few arrows, if need be. For the first time in a long while, he found himself wishing for some black and gold livery to match the other Wasp’s armour.
The Commonwealers stopped short of the Wasps, and Thalric could practically see the ghosts of the Twelve-year War in their eyes. At last, though, their leader said, ‘My prince wishes to speak with you,’ uttered as though the words were bitter gall.
So it was that two Wasps, armoured and armed, came to visit the court of Felipe Shah.
Thalric had seen enough during the war for Felipe’s garden serving as an audience chamber not to surprise him. There were a half-dozen Dragonflies scattered irregularly about it, kneeling in attendance, but it was clear who was the prince and who merely the hangers-on. Felipe Shah had dressed himself formally in robes that were stiff and elaborately embroidered, and edged with plates of gold. Their colours shimmered and changed with his slightest movement and at every shadow or change of the light.
The soldiers and their belligerent leader were obviously intending to stay as close as possible to the Wasps, to forestall any treachery, but the prince shook his head.
‘Coren, no,’ he said simply, and the archers backed away until they were loitering at the very furthest limit of the castle, a grey area where the open-sided design of the walls muddied who was inside and who was without. The man called Coren retreated to some nook behind his master’s back.
For a long time, Prince Felipe Shah just stared at the two Wasps – long enough for Thalric to become uncomfortable. He had plenty of history among the Commonwealers, but none of it on a social footing. He had no idea what to expect, or whether this scrutiny was simply considered good form for a Dragonfly-kinden.
At last the man spoke. ‘What do you seek here?’ His quiet voice sounded weary.
Every kind of grand response marched through Thalric’s mind, but all he finally said was, ‘Help.’
‘The Empire seeks help?’ It was said without rancour, indeed almost matter-of-factly.
‘I seek help. We are neither of us good sons of the Empire – not any more – and we seek help for her, not for ourselves.’
‘Why here?’
‘Because here is where she was going, when . . . when it happened.’ It appeared that candour must be the order of the day, but Felipe’s reaction proved encouraging, a little of his reserve dropping away.
‘Do you know what she is?’
‘Cheerwell Maker, the niece of a previous guest of yours – or so I’m told,’ Thalric replied promptly. ‘Your Highness, I don’t know what’s wrong with her, but . . .’ The words would not come, perhaps because of Varmen’s solid Apt presence beside him. Felipe Shah did not assist him either, merely waited. Thalric gritted his teeth, feeling acutely embarrassed to even contemplate coming out with the words.