Dragonfly Falling Read Online Free PDF Page B

hesitation at the time.
After all, the man had been trying to kill him.
    And yes, the Wasp had
been another human being with all a man’s hopes and aspirations, and now
snuffed out by eighteen inches of steel. But also, there had been enough
Dragonfly dead during the Twelve-Year War to make the numbers now massed
outside Tark pale into insignificance. Amongst them, his own father and three
cousins, including his favourite, Felipe Daless. Not just kinden but kin : blood that called out for a levelling of the scales;
three principalities of the Dragonfly Commonweal that groaned under the boot of
the Empire.
    He hardened his heart.
There would be more blood spilled before the end of this, and some of it could
easily be his own.
    Skrill had stopped
ahead, waiting for them. Totho blundered up to her.
    ‘And how did they find
us?’ he demanded.
    ‘Scouts, Beetle-boy.
What do you think they were doing?’
    ‘They followed you .’
    ‘You take them words
back, or we’re lookin’ to have a disagreement right here,’ she said hotly.
‘Nobody asked you to link with us.’
    Totho swallowed whatever
words he had been going to utter and, after a moment’s thought, said, ‘Well
it’s just as well I did, or you’d have been spitted right back there. What do
you think of that?’
    ‘Will the pair of you be
quiet?’ Salma grumbled without much hope.
    ‘I was playing with
him,’ Skrill said. ‘I was—’ Suddenly she fell silent, turning away from Totho
with her hand plucking an arrow from her quiver.
    ‘Put the bow down! Put the swords down! Put
the crossbow down! ’ barked a voice from somewhere
within the grass. There was an uncertain pause, and then a bolt spat out of a
nearby thicket, ploughing the earth at Totho’s feet. Even as they watched men
began emerging in a crescent formation in front of them, swathed in cloaks of
woven grass and reeds, but all with crossbows levelled. For a moment Salma
thought it was the Wasps that had them, but they were Ants – Tarkesh Ants –
with their pale faces smeared with dirt and green dye. Beneath the cloaks they
wore armour of boiled leather and darkened metal.
    ‘Weapons down! ’ shouted their leader. ‘Or I shoot the lad with the
crossbow. This is your last chance.’
    Totho dropped the bow
quickly enough, and his sword as well. Salma did the same, trying to gauge his
chances of taking to the air. He counted ten Ants in all, and they would be in
each other’s minds. The least wrong move and they all would see it. Salma did not rate his chances of dodging so many bolts.
    Skrill gave a hiss of
annoyance and placed her bow on the ground, replacing the arrow in her quiver.
    ‘What in blazes have we
here?’ the Ant officer asked, aloud for their benefit. ‘A bag of halfbreeds, it
would seem.’
    Salma could only guess
at the silent thoughts going meanwhile between him and his men.
    ‘We’re not with that
army out there,’ he said hastily. ‘In fact, we’re from Collegium.’
    ‘I can’t see a crew like
yours fitting in anywhere outside a freakshow,’ the Ant officer replied
levelly. ‘But what you are right now, lad, is prisoners. You come along with
me, and anyone who does any tricks gets a bolt up the arse, and no mistake.
There’re folk in the city just waiting to speak to folk like you.’
    ‘We’re not your
enemies,’ Salma tried again. He tried a smile, but the officer was having none
of it.
    ‘You might be all sorts,
lad, but I think you’re spies looking to get inside the city. Looks like you
got your wish too, doesn’t it, although not in the way you might prefer.’
     

Three
    The Prowess Forum had
never seen the like. This was no formal event, no meeting of teams from the
duelling league, and yet the backsides of the onlookers were packed all the way
up the stone steps that rose in tiers at every wall. The aficionados of the
duel were crammed in shoulder to shoulder, from College masters through the
ranks of students and professional bladesmen to