“I cannot work miracles,” Lizanne stated flatly. “And there may well be Blood Cadre in their ranks.”
The Electress’s smile broadened further. “Best kill them first, then.”
“Even wid her, it’s too much of a risk,” Varkash persisted, his objection soon echoed by Captain Jarkiv and a few others.
“This is what you fuckers signed up for!” Atalina’s voice cut through the rising babble like an axe blade. She rounded on them, teeth bared and shoulders hunched as if about to charge. “What did you think? It’d be a gentle stroll all the way to Corvus? We paid in blood to escape Scorazin, now it’s time to pay again, but this time we escape the biggest prison of all. Defeat the Household Division and people will flock to us. An ocean of people that’ll sweep all the way to the Imperial Sanctum.”
She stood, glowering at each of them in turn, daring any to raise an objection. They all looked away as her gaze fell on them, except Varkash, who stood returning her glare in equal measure. “If I’d had more of my Fools left after Scorazin . . .” he began.
“You didn’t,” the Electress cut in. “Take your people and go if you’re determined on it. But know that once we bring down this empire the books they’ll write in the aftermath will make full note of Varestian cowardice. Is that really the name you want to carry back to the peninsular? Varkash the shiny-nosed coward, Shame of the Seas? If so, good luck finding another crew.”
Varkash straightened, fists bunching and the slabs of muscle on his bare arms tensing. Lizanne entertained some hope he might launch himself at the Electress, the ensuing chaos facilitating a swift exit from the tent whereupon she would find Tinkerer and make good their escape. Sadly, the threat of a coward’s name evidently outweighed the pirate’s fury. After a long moment of simmering rage he crossed his arms and gave a short nod.
“So then, General,” the Electress said, turning back to Arberus. “What’s your plan?”
? ? ?
“Remember, where their ranks are thickest. The Tinkerer’s new toys lack accuracy.” Arberus held out a revolver, a long-barrelled model presumably scavenged from an unfortunate cavalryman’s corpse at Scorazin.
“This will do, thank you,” Lizanne said, patting the short-barrelled constabulary pistol in the holster under her arm. “Besides, I doubt any amount of arms will make much difference this night.”
“If there was another way . . .”
“Oh, spare me . . . General.”
She turned her back on him and gestured for Hyran to follow her to the edge of the copse where they had secluded themselves to await nightfall. Like her he wore all-black clothes of loose cotton and was armed with a pistol. His hands played over the weapon, twitching a little as he clicked the cylinder. “Stop fiddling,” she told him. “And don’t fire that unless we’re discovered. Until then product is your principal weapon.”
He forced a smile, face pale in the gloom, and consigned the pistol to its holster. “Just wish we had more of it.”
Seeing his wan, tense features, she suppressed the urge to leave him behind. Tonight she would have need of all allies, regardless of ability. “Before this night’s out,” she said, forcing a brisk reassurance into her tone, “I suspect there’ll be product aplenty for both of us.”
She lowered herself into a crouch and moved into the sparse bushes beyond the reach of the trees, motioning for him to follow. “Now?” he whispered.
“I see little point in delay,” she muttered back. “Do you?”
She paused to survey the ground ahead, finding it frustratingly free of cover all the way to the Corvantine picket line. Luckily, it was a lone-moon night so at least the shadows were deep. She cast a glance back at the copse where Arberus waited with the Brotherhood and the hundred or so other mounted troops in the army. A few hundred yards to the rear of them waited the entirety of the Electress’s host, no doubt still tired from the rapid forced march along the darkened Corvus Road. Lizanne considered it a minor miracle no Corvantine scout had discovered their approach. She harboured a faint hope such good fortune might result from an over-confidence on the part of whoever had command of the Imperial expedition. They most likely can’t believe a rag-bag collection of convicts and peasants would attempt something so foolish, she decided, fighting down another flare of rage at Arberus. Not without good reason.
“Green?” Hyran suggested, eyeing the intervening distance with palpable unease. “We could cover the ground in only a few seconds.”
“Raising dust and drawing the pickets’ gaze in the process,” Lizanne replied. She lowered herself into a prone position and motioned for him to follow suit. “It’ll have to be the laborious approach, I’m afraid. Stay two feet behind me. Move as I move and stop when I stop.”
She started forward, covering the first hundred yards in a steady crawl. As the glow of the Household Division’s camp-fires began to grow she lowered herself to her belly and inched her way through the grass in slow, careful increments. She could see the picket line now, tall men in black uniforms patrolling back and forth. The Emperor’s Ravens, she concluded. They were also known as the Black Hearts thanks to the numerous atrocities ascribed to them in the Wars of Revolution. She could make out the face of the closest sentry, finding the stern-eyed, weathered visage of a veteran. Clearly there were no easily scared conscripts to be found in this camp.
She came to a halt and watched the veteran make a slow progress across her path, rifle unslung and held low as his eyes scanned the grass. His gaze swept over the patch of shadows where she lay then moved on, paused and moved back again. Lizanne stifled a curse as the man’s features tensed, well-honed soldier’s instincts no doubt warning of something out of place. He began to move closer, his thumb easing back the safety lever on his rifle with a soft click.
Lizanne heard Hyran give a sharp intake of breath and saw the veteran’s eyes widen in alarm. She depressed the third button on the Spider, injecting a half-second burst of Black and reached out to clamp the soldier in place just as he opened his mouth to call out a warning. She rose to her haunches, looking left and right to check on the position of the other pickets. Fortunately, both had just completed their regular turns and were moving in opposite directions.