Engines & Demons - The Undestined

Chapter 19i

Like the grassland of the great-bailey, the plants that carpeted the ground around the bases of the hives were gleaming with new growth. They had uncurled their orange shoots to the soil, to attract the scouting vesk that had spent the weeks of rain safe within the heights of their wooden pyramids. The long segmented insects tapped their way up the inviting curved bridges, to the deep flowers nestling among the thick coronets of green leaves. The flowers varied in colour, from vivid yellow through fresh blood red and summer sky blue, to brilliant white, and their scent was heady in the warming air.

The rest of the gardens had been similarly transformed, and Maddock, when the old Grower Micreech had showed him around the place as promised, had been mightily impressed. He was used to the crops that grew on the terraces of the farm of Dredar, but the sheer number of plants growing in the Gardens was staggering. Many were truly exotic, not least the ones that grew beneath the glass domes at the very height of the Garden's slopes. All had strange shaped and coloured leaves, and the flowers and fruits they bore were brighter and stranger still. Their scent had filled the humid air beneath the domes, and when Micreech had sliced him a segment of tocs stamen to try, the sweetness it had left on his tongue made rachnid spike taste as bitter as a surberry.

The vesk hives were another wonder, and Maddock would have liked to return to them and kneel on their walkways to study their questing occupants. The fine hairs on the insects' backs became infused with pollen as they explored the flowers, so that they trooped in line through the beds' winding paths, like a multi-coloured militia. But on that hot day of second summer, it was a different army that Maddock was eager to see.

The anticipation was turning inside him at the thought of seeing his brothers again, but it was not such a simple personal pleasure that was causing a similar expectancy to pervade the grounds of the fortress.

The end of the rains marked the beginning of preparations for the High-tourney. Flagpoles had been raised alongside the lines of ascension markers that bordered all the roads leading to Klinberg, and now the standards of the six Chapters snapped and billowed against the backdrop of new green grass. Huge banners also hung from the dull stone and metal walls of the fortress' six corona-towers. On the south-east tower, hung the personal banner of Lord Morath. The trunk of the cherossa tree in its centre was gripped by a rearing madriel, marking him as a Pride-commander, and behind was the intricately woven silhouette of the fortress, which denoted his position of Grand-commander. Though he was dead, the banner would remain so until a new Grand-commander had been confirmed.

The banners of the other Commanders, hanging on the five remaining towers, also had the madriel of their Pride-alpha incorporated into their design. The curling karabok horn of Dolphus was gripped in the strong claws of Lakalla Sawak, steed of Sir Zembulla. The sword beneath Vikas' demon skull had the taut form of Sacsensia lying along its blade, and the red crak of Katchewan grappled with the pale form of Falsch. The colourful vesk of Asquith lay curled back to back with the gracefully rearing Peksul, and Hakansa, his dark striped head and black horns thrown back in a growl, clambered among the three moons of Bannoc.

Over the streets of the surrounding towns and villages, and on the walls and watchtowers of the nearby farms and ranches, similar banners had been hung. Before Maddock had left Dredar the previous evening, his father and some other farmers had been struggling with a huge hanging displaying Pride-commander Galder's burgundy arms. It was to hang on the tavern's front wall, above the main square. Maddock knew that his parents, like many, had Commander Kralaford's banner hanging secretly on their kitchen wall above the fire, but it would be Commander Galder who would receive their public support. The people of Dredar were not stupid.

Maddock wheeled his empty cart swiftly through the Enclosures, to the refectory block where Master Dramut was waiting for him.

"A fast turnaround, lad," he said when he saw Maddock approaching. "We should enter you in the dung races."