“Will they have any artillery?” Laurence asked, paying no attention to the attempt at persuasion.

“Cannon? No, of course not; they do not even have muskets,” Sun Kai said, “but what does that matter? There may be one hundred of them or more, and I have heard rumors that some among them have even studied Shaolin Quan, in secret, though it is against the law.”

“And some of them may be, however distantly, kin to the Emperor,” Hammond added. “If we were to kill one, it could easily be used as a pretext for taking offense, and casting us out of the country; you must see we ought to leave at once.”

“Sir, you will give us some privacy,” Laurence said to Sun Kai, flatly, and the envoy did not argue, but silently bowed his head and moved some distance away.

“Mr. Hammond,” Laurence said, turning to him, “you yourself warned me to beware of attempts to separate me from Temeraire, now only consider: if he should return here, to find us gone, with no explanation and all our baggage gone also, how should he ever find us again? Perhaps he might even be convinced that we had been given a treaty and left him deliberately behind, as Yongxing once desired me to do.”

“And how will the case be improved if he returns and finds you dead, and all of us with you?” Hammond said impatiently. “Sun Kai has before now given us cause to trust him.”

“I give less weight to a small piece of inconsequential advice than you do, sir, and more to a long and deliberate lie of omission; he has unquestionably spied on us from the very beginning of our acquaintance,” Laurence said. “No; we are not going with him. It will not be more than a few hours before Temeraire returns, and I am confident in our holding out that long.”

“Unless they have found some means of distracting him, and keeping him longer at his visit,” Hammond said. “If the Chinese government meant to separate us from him, they could have done so by force at any time during his absence. I am sure Sun Kai can arrange to have a message sent to him at his mother’s residence once we have gone to safety.”

“Then let him go and send the message now, if he likes,” Laurence said. “You are welcome to go with him.”

“No, sir,” Hammond said, flushing, and turned on his heel to speak with Sun Kai. The former envoy shook his head and left, and Hammond went to take a cutlass from the ready heap.

They worked for another quarter of an hour, hauling in three of the queer-shaped boulders from outside to make the barricade for the riflemen, and dragging over the enormous dragon-couch to block off most of the entryway. The sun had gone by now, but the usual lanterns did not make their appearance around the island, nor any signs of human life at all.

“Sir!” Digby hissed suddenly, pointing out into the grounds. “Two points to starboard, outside the doors of the house.”

“Away from the entry,” Laurence said; he could not see anything in the twilight, but Digby’s young eyes were better than his. “Willoughby, douse that light.”

The soft click-click of the guns being cocked, the echo of his own breath in his ears, the constant untroubled hum of the flies and mosquitoes outside; these were at first the only noise, until use filtered them out and he could hear the light running footsteps outside: a great many men, he thought. Abruptly there was a crash of wood, several yells. “They’ve broken into the house, sir,” Hackley whispered hoarsely from the barricades.

“Quiet, there,” Laurence said, and they kept a silent vigil while the sound of breaking furniture and shattering glass came from the house. The flare of torches outside cast shadows into the pavilion, weaving and leaping in strange angles as a search commenced. Laurence heard men calling to each other outside, the sound coming down from the eaves of the roof. He glanced back; Riggs nodded, and the three riflemen raised their guns.

The first man appeared in the entrance and saw the wooden slab of the dragon-couch blocking it. “My shot,” Riggs said clearly, and fired: the Chinaman fell dead with his mouth open to shout.

But the report of the gun brought more cries from outside, and men came bursting in with swords and torches in their hands; a full volley fired off, killing another three, then one more shot from the last rifle, and Riggs called, “Prime and reload!”

The quick slaughter of their fellows had checked the advance of the larger body of men, and clustered them in the opening left in the doorway. Yelling “Temeraire!” and “England!” the aviators launched themselves from the shadows, and engaged the attackers close at hand.

The torchlight was painful to Laurence’s eyes after the long wait in the dark, and the smoke of the burning wood mingled with that from the musketry. There was no room for any real swordplay; they were engaged hilt-to-hilt, except when one of the Chinese swords broke—they smelled of rust—and a few men fell over. Otherwise they were all simply heaving back against the pressure of dozens of bodies, trying to come through the narrow opening.

Digby, being too slim to be of much use in the human wall, was stabbing at the attackers between their legs, their arms, through any space left open. “My pistols,” Laurence shouted at him; no chance to pull them free himself: he was holding his cutlass with two hands, one upon the hilt and another laid upon the flat of the blade, keeping off three men. They were packed so close together they could not move either way to strike at him, but could only raise and lower their swords in a straight line, trying to break his blade through sheer weight.

Digby pulled one of the pistols out of its holster, and fired, taking the man directly before Laurence between the eyes. The other two involuntarily pulled back, and Laurence managed to stab one in the belly, then seized the other by the sword-arm and threw him to the ground; Digby put a sword into his back, and he lay still.

“Present arms!” Riggs yelled, from behind, and Laurence bellowed, “Clear the door!” He swung a cut at the head of the man engaged with Granby, making him flinch back, and they scrambled back together, the polished stone floor already slick under their bootheels. Someone pushed the dripping jug into his hand; he swallowed a couple of times and passed it on, wiping his mouth and his forehead against his sleeve. The rifles all fired at once, and another couple of shots after; then they were back into the fray.

The attackers had already learned to fear the rifles, and they had left a little clear space before the door, many milling about a few paces off under the torches; they nearly filled the courtyard before the pavilion: Sun Kai’s estimate had not been exaggerated. Laurence shot a man six paces away, then flipped the pistol in his hand; as they came rushing back on, he clubbed another in the side of the head, and then he was again pushing back against the weight of the swords, until Riggs shouted again.

“Well done, gentlemen,” Laurence said, breathing deeply. The Chinese had retreated at the shout and were not immediately at the door; Riggs had experience enough to hold the volley until they advanced again. “For the moment, the advantage is ours. Mr. Granby, we will divide into two parties. Stay back this next wave, and we shall alternate. Therrows, Willoughby, Digby, with me; Martin, Blythe, and Hammond, with Granby.”

“I can go with both, sir,” Digby said. “I’m not tired at all, truly; it’s less work for me, since I can’t help to hold them.”

“Very well, but be sure to take water between, and stay back on occasion,” Laurence said. “There are a damned lot of them, as I dare say you have all seen,” he said candidly. “But our position is a good one, and I have no doubt we can hold them as long as ever need be, so long as we pace ourselves properly.”

“And see Keynes at once to be tied up if you take a cut or a blow—we cannot afford to lose anyone to slow bleeding,” Granby added to this, while Laurence nodded. “Only sing out, and someone will come to take your place in line.”