The Song of a Poisoned Star

24

The nightmares came from above. They were perfectly silent, so Bilen didn't notice at first; but someone shouted and pointed, and she looked up and saw them, clinging to the sides of their towers like great spiders.

No two were the same. One had four legs, another a dozen, one was wrapped around a spire like a snake. They had spines, and hair, and feathers and scales. Some had heads covered with eyes, some eyes all over their bodies, some no eyes that could be seen at all. The only thing uniform about them was their colour.

They were all made of the stuff of the city: so they were grey from a distance, but splashed and whirled with subtle colours. Their torsos, their limbs, and their wings where covered in dots and flecks and whorls. Their eyes, though, were pitch black orbs in grey skin, impossible to guess where they were looking.

'Don't attack, and don't run!' Bilen shouted.

A group of mercenaries either couldn't or wouldn't listen; two sprinted as hard as they could back to the shore. They were dead before they made a dozen steps: one was shot by grey bristles launched from above; the second fell, writing in pain when some corrosive material was hurled across his torso and face. His organs splashed onto the soft grey ground.

At that, one of the clerical guard fired a pistol. The shot bounced from a wall, but the consequence of that was more death: a thing like an ape plunged from above to smash three men into bloody ruin.

'Stop!' Bilen screamed again, and then the same in High Kalian.

Heads turned to look at her, both human and inhuman.

'If you run, they'll kill you. If you attack, they'll kill you,' she said, as loudly and as calmly as she could. 'The only way out of here is to talk.'

A thing shaped like a mantis but much taller than a man skittered down into the plaza, and stood there, moving only its huge mandibles, silent except for the clatter of claw on claw. Bilen approached it, quietknives ready.

Not that it will be much use, she thought. But if this was where I die, I'm not going quietly.

'Hello, First Ones,' she said in High Kalian. 'We bring you a warning.'

The huge mantis shifted its position. It tapped its forelimbs against the ground, glancing up at the creatures hanging above.

'There is a danger,' continued Bilen.

It stared at them.

'What's it doing?' Errani asked. 'Can it understand you?'

'It should be able to,' Bilen replied. 'High Kalian is their language. I think the problem might be that it can't speak.'

The mantis squatted, its six legs splayed; and with a wet plop, it disgorged a slimy grey capsule.

'Ugh,' Decaux said, 'fine time to take a shit.'

But the thing was an egg or a cocoon, and it writhed and squirmed and a fat six legged grub, the size of a big dog, burst out, covered in muccus. This sank into the grey material of the city road, and the newly-hatched grub rolled on the ground to dry itself. Then with a shiver it righted itself and scurried towards the humans.

Bilen backed away, towards the bishop and Decaux. The grub sprouted a short, thick trunk that it waved in front of it, sniffing as it went. It scampered up to her but then shivered and backed away; it tried the Bishop and the clerical guard with the same reaction. Then it ran up to Decaux. This time it became excited, scuttling sideways around him.

As with everything in the city, the grub was almost silent; the only sound it made was the soft wet noise of its breathing.

Decaux aimed a kick at it, which it dodged. The mantis stood, and stalked towards Decaux and the grub; the grub run away, and sheltered under the mantis, quivering. The mantis pointed one if its huge forelimbs at Decaux. Its claws beckoned the brightsword.