‘How do you know, Cryl-Nish?’

‘He said as much to Tiaan in Tirthrax, after the Aachim came through the gate. The Histories tell me the rest.’ Poor Tiaan, Nish thought. I was wrong about her at Tirthrax. It raised the uncomfortable thought that he may have been wrong about her other actions as well.

‘Is that all?’ said Troist.

‘Tirior and Luxor seem reasonable people, surr. If something were to happen to Vithis I believe they would be prepared to bargain with us, as would some of the other clans. It seems that they suffer Vithis for the moment, but clan rivalries run deep. He was openly hostile to Clan Elienor, who are not of the Eleven Clans.’

‘Do you disagree with any of this, Ranii?’

‘No, surr,’ after a long hesitation.

Troist looked across at Yara, who made a gesture with one hand. Nish could not interpret it, but the look on her face suggested that she was as disgusted as Ranii.

‘Do you have your commission, Cryl-Nish?’ said Troist.

‘My commission, surr?’

‘As marshal! Surely you did not expect to keep it, after this fiasco?’

‘Er, no,’ said Nish. ‘Vithis cast it on the floor at the beginning of our meeting.’

‘Vithis threw your papers on the floor!’ Troist exclaimed. ‘You did not mention this, Ranii.’

‘It … slipped my mind, surr,’ she said hastily. ‘I have the documents here.’

Troist took the papers and tore them in half. ‘It is clear the embassy was doomed before it began and Vithis had no intention of negotiating.’ Troist paced back and forth, as he was wont to do when thinking. ‘You may go about your business, Ranii. I’ll speak to you in the morning.’

When she was gone he said to Nish, ‘I won’t pretend I’m happy, Cryl-Nish. Though it seems the mission had little chance, a skilled diplomat might just have extracted an offer we could have lived with. I am mindful that you are not a diplomat. Even so, you should have put up with his taunts. You have made things worse and I see no hope of an agreement now.’

‘The man is a tyrant, surr. Not striking back would be seen as a sign of weakness.’

‘I didn’t ask for a lesson in politics, Cryl-Nish. Our situation is more desperate than you know. With the aid of the Aachim we would probably have won the war. If they stay neutral we will probably lose. But if they ally with the lyrinx …’

‘Yes?’ said Nish, when Troist had been pacing for some time.

‘It will all be over in a fortnight! Leave us.’

The army continued to grow over the next few days as stragglers, and sometimes large bands, came in from all directions. They now numbered more than four and a half thousand, and their fleet of clankers, ninety-six. A powerful force, though matched by the lyrinx shadowing them in the west. Tension hung in the air, thick as glue. Troist paced more than ever. Fights broke out among the soldiers: brutal, ugly affairs that only ended when one was battered into unconsciousness. The other was whipped bloody, but it made no difference. Within hours, there would be another affray.

The whole camp knew of Nish’s fall from grace, and that any chance of an alliance with the Aachim had vanished. He ate alone. Nish had begun to have stomach cramps, so knotted was he inside. He had let Troist down, and everyone else. Why hadn’t he kept his mouth shut?

He went back to his old work, assisting with the development of tactics to use against the Aachim constructs, but Nish was conscious how little he knew of them. He did not even know what weapons they carried inside. But at least he had seen constructs in operation, and that was more than the other officers could say.

He realised that someone was talking to him. ‘I beg your pardon?’ he said.

‘If they attack, h-how can we c-c-combat them?’ The speaker was Lieutenant Prandie, one of the most junior officers, even younger than Nish.

‘Pits!’ said Nish. The idea had just popped into his head. ‘Constructs float hip-high above the ground and I don’t think they can go any higher. If we were fighting a pitched battle we could dig a series of pits across their path, cover them, and when the constructs fell in, they would not be able to get out.’

‘Neither would our clankers, should the battle move that way.’

‘But we would know they were there.’

‘A useful idea,’ said Troist, who had been standing up the back unnoticed, ‘but it’s not going to win the battle.’

The weather continued unrelentingly hot and dry. The green shoots soon withered and they had to move camp constantly, but still the horses lost condition. Troist was forever worrying about their supplies. The flour was full of red weevils, the casks of salt meat had a putrid tang, and they had not had fresh vegetables in a fortnight. Troist had recovered the fallen army’s war chest but money could not buy what was not available.

A bout of dysentery passed through the camp, leaving half the soldiers groaning in their hammocks with vomiting and bloody diarrhoea. Troist, a man who seemed to have constant trouble with his bowels, was among them. Nish was unaffected, perhaps because he had been ostracised by the rest of the camp. Everyone lived in fear of an attack that they would not be able to defend against.

It did not come, and as the days passed, he began to understand how the soldiers felt. Maybe battle, bloody though it would be, would be better than this waiting day after day, never knowing what the enemy was doing or even where they were.

In the second week after the failed embassy, clouds began to build up in the afternoon. Instead of being hot and dry it was hot and sticky. Storms threatened but never came. There were more fights than ever, but Troist now turned a blind eye to them. Nish understood that too – it was the only way they could let off steam. Sometimes he felt like punching his fellow officers for no other reason than the way they spoke, or walked, or ate.

This day it looked as if the storm was finally coming. At sunset, towering clouds hung in the south-west, and they were an ominous purply-green. Lightning flashed. Nish was bent over the chart table when he heard pounding hooves and one of the scouts skidded to a stop outside the command tent next door. He ran inside, then came out again. ‘Where’s General Troist?’

Nish hurried across. ‘What is it? Is there news?’

The scout made a rude gesture. ‘Not for your ears!’

Troist appeared from the direction of the latrines, hastily fastening his trousers. They went into the command tent. Nish tried to follow but the guards barred his way. Frustrated, he returned to his work, but shortly afterwards was called to the command tent, now empty apart from Troist. The flaps were closed and it was sweltering inside.

‘It’s war!’ said Troist. ‘The lyrinx are moving. They must have been waiting for the weather to change.’

Lightning flickered in the west. This was it.

‘I have another job for you,’ the general continued.

‘I’m surprised you still trust me, surr.’

‘It’s not a diplomatic mission,’ Troist said coolly.

‘What is it?’

‘My wife and daughters are still here. I should have sent them away long ago but … I could not bear to be parted from them. You are to take them east to safety.’

‘Won’t that be rather dangerous?’ Lest Troist think he was a coward, Nish added hastily, ‘For them, I meant.’

‘Not as dangerous as staying here. Will you do it?’

‘Of course, surr. I would be honoured. Where are we going?’

‘Yara will tell you, once you are gone. I’m not taking any risks.’

‘Risks, surr?’

‘Spies, traitors,’ Troist said impatiently. ‘The families of high officers are always targets in times like this.’

‘When do we go, surr?’

‘You’ve got fifteen minutes, or until the storm hits. Easier to keep it quiet that way.’

‘Am I going alone, surr?’

‘Mounce will accompany you. He won’t like it, but that’s the lot of a soldier. I can’t spare anyone else, nor even him. Get ready!’